The Necromancer's Grimoire (2 page)

Nadira searched for Corbett in the yard, then the stables where she found him with a groom examining the hoof of one of the chargers. She stepped back shyly when they both looked up, conscious that she had blocked the light from the doorway. She heard him murmur, “Soak it in warm salt water. I will look to it tomorrow.” He met her outside the big doors and steered her by the elbow behind the stable. He stopped her by the mountainous manure piles and smiled his soft smile. “What is troubling you?”

“Many things, my lord Corbett…”

He held up his hand.

She nodded, and corrected herself, “Corbett.”

He prompted her. “Something is troubling you…”

“I have many questions. I wanted to speak to you about what happened in Rome. I wanted to ask about some of the things I saw and heard. I did not want to ask at table, or in the sleeping chambers.” She glanced meaningfully at the servants and workers moving about the yard with wheelbarrows and pitchforks.

“Of course. You are aware, however, that should you be out of sight for more than a few minutes, someone will come looking for you.” He smiled and nodded as Montrose strode around the corner of the stable. “As you can see.”

Montrose greeted him with a nod, “Sir Corbett.”

“Baron. I trust you slept well and have eaten.”

Nadira looked from man to man, aware of the tension that was only diffused by social niceties.

“I did and I have. Thank you.” He turned to her, keeping his face serious, “Nadira, I would prefer you not wander.”

As Nadira did not know how to respond, she remained silent, as did Corbett. Eventually the extended silence said what Nadira would not voice. Montrose narrowed his eyes, understanding perfectly. “I ask you for this favor, out of concern for your safety.”

Nadira nodded. He was not being unreasonable, considering recent past events. Was he to be her bodyguard, or did he mean to set one upon her? She cleared her throat carefully before speaking. “My lord, you cannot be suggesting that you will follow me about?

He frowned. “No. Of course not. I am not unreasonable.”

Corbett smiled again but Montrose's face just darkened to a deeper hue.

The older knight tilted his head and his gray eyes were kind. “Baron, until your confidence in our party is assured, I agree that Nadira should refrain from wandering too far from sight. Let us return to the inn and find a more comfortable place than a stable to talk.”

Nadira allowed Montrose to take her elbow without resisting, though she wanted to jerk it away in protest. The presence of Corbett deterred her from any unseemly rebellion in public. She tried to quell the anger she felt. For months Montrose had discouraged her journeys into the next world, but now he would use her, like all the others had used her, to find his enemy. She grit her teeth. As the three marched back to the inn, Nadira used the silence to calm herself and plan her next move.

Her mind swirled around the possible retorts and punishing remarks she might make to him in private. Nadira stopped. Her escorts stopped with her.

“What is it?” Montrose asked with alarm.

She looked up at him, tall and concerned, and realized both the problem and the solution in one moment. “You do not know.”

“No. That is why I ask.” Exasperation was written in the set of his jaw. He flashed a glance at Corbett, equally reticent to quarrel in front of him.

The gray knight took the hint and with a slight bow said, “I must see the innkeeper. Please excuse me.”

Nadira did not want him to leave, but understood that she needed to address one problem at a time. Montrose returned the bow with a nod, and then pulled Nadira up the wood stairs to the balcony, and then into the sleeping room where he closed the door with a soft click. As soon as the door closed his face melted into such a mask of despair that he effectively smothered Nadira's planned attack.

“Oh God, Nadira, don't torture me like this.”

She sighed and sat down on the rope bed. He sat beside her with a mirroring sigh.

“Time will blunt the edges of this trouble between us,” she began carefully. “You must overcome this fear that I will be lost…”

“Fear?”

“The word tastes bitter, does it not?” She took his hand. “Spit it out then.”

He shook his head. “I am not unreasonable,” he said again, as if the repetition of the word made it true.

“Well, sometimes you are,” she said, and was rewarded with a slight curve of his lips.

“Only when you are near am I at peace. When you are more than a stride away I am in agony. Can you heal this hurt with a silver needle?” He looked down at her, expecting a serious answer. She had one ready.

“Robert.” He winced at her familiar use of his name, but Nadira wanted to bring them together as equals. “Robert. I know something now that I cannot teach you with words. I know what it is that Richard sought. I have it now. His quest is over. Your quest is over. I now understand why he wanted it so badly, and this is what you still cannot know...” She meant to continue with the details, but at the mention of his brother's name his face broke and then was held together with so much effort that Nadira knew he had not heard a word after she had said “Richard”.

“Very well, very well,” she murmured. “We will talk of this later.”
What a field of sharp stones this is.
This is not something I can heal with a silver needle.

Evening brought a varied circle of travelers to the great fireplace in the main hall of the inn. Nadira smiled shyly at the strangers who passed by with their muddy boots and wrinkled cloaks. Benches and chairs were pulled closer to the flames and many hands and feet were stretched toward its warmth. She needed the firelight for her mending. Her busy needle, delivered to her that afternoon by one of the inn's servants, flashed in and out of the brown silk as she listened to the men speak in low voices. Her own men were not idle. They, too, sat near the fire, oiling boots and repairing leather straps and bits of saddlery.

William sat reading to her left, and Alisdair to her right, working on his boot. Two of the inn's guests had been giving her curious looks and one stared rudely at her all evening. It was this man who earlier caused Alisdair to get up from the table where he had been teasing the pretty serving girls and stomp heavily to the bench at her side. He had placed his bulk between her and the stranger and snorted loudly as he pulled off one boot and set it on his knee, examining a crack in the leather.

“All sorts in public houses,” he grumbled.

Nadira nodded. All sorts indeed. Montrose was deep in thought at a table not far from the fire, a mug before him and an attentive barmaid behind him
. He will sleep well tonight
. William took a deep breath and turned a page. Corbett had given him some printed books to read. They were bound in simple calf, small sextodecimals he kept tied in his wide sleeves. Nadira had not asked what they were about. His face told her it was engrossing and perhaps disturbing, as squalls of disquiet passed over his face from time to time.

The four knights were huddled together at another table. Nadira longed to get Corbett aside and alone. How to negotiate such a meeting? She glanced up every few stitches to take in the room and note any changes in position among the travelers. She considered the direct approach. She could get up and ask Corbett for an hour of his time. She would get it, but not alone. She lifted her eyes briefly. Montrose was nodding, his chin nearly to his mug.
Maybe
.

From across the room Corbett's eyes met hers and he nodded, tipping his head toward Montrose. She rose and took her mending to the table, seating herself on the bench beside the baron. Montrose lifted his head briefly to look at her, his eyes bloodshot and his hair lank, then returned his attention to the mug.

Nadira put her hand on his knee under the table, but said nothing. What could be said? It is to be expected that after the troubles, pain and fear of the last few months a time of reflection would release his demons of grief and revenge. He had not given himself the time to grieve. He had told her this himself when they were on the road. There was the pursuit of the
Hermetica
and nothing else. He had been relentless in his duty to his brother's memory. Now that duty was done. He snorted and took the last pull on the mug. The barmaid was at his elbow in a moment. Nadira remained silent. She would achieve what she needed. Montrose would be satisfied that she was safe beside him, and she would have a private talk with Corbett. Even now she doubted his knee could feel her hand through the thick wool of his breeches.

Corbett lowered himself beside her.

“He is insensible.”

“He is miserable. He wants me to travel to locate his enemy. I refuse. I wish he would sleep.”

“Sleep will not help when a man is tortured by his heart. His dreams would pursue him even there.”

“Perhaps.” Nadira sighed. Montrose drained the new cup and wobbled. Nadira moved her hand from his knee to his elbow and steadied him. The barmaid hovered for a moment, but with a wave from Corbett returned to her place by the barrel. Montrose shuddered then leaned forward to lay his head on his arms, moments later a loud snore emanated from deep within his chest.

“Well then. You have your wish, little one.” Corbett murmured.

“It took a great deal of…what was he drinking?”

Corbett laughed softly. “It matters not.”

“No. I suppose not, though I worry, for I do not know how to heal his hurt.” She lifted his hair away from his mouth so he could breathe without inhaling the dark strands.

“All hurts are not meant to be healed.”

“What?” She turned back to the knight. “Of course they are.”

The barmaid brought Corbett a fresh tankard of whatever Montrose had been drinking. He continued, “I understand that you feel you must right wrongs and heal hurts. You have been trained to this task for so long it is second nature to you. I tell you now that there are many questions that will never find answers in this life. Do not trouble yourself with what you cannot mend.” He glanced at the table where her needle and thread lay upon the folded silk.

Nadira shook her head. “Ah, that I will not do. I will trouble myself until I have done all I can.”

“And I am telling you that you already have done so.”

“But you and your men helped us. We would be cold and lost had you not arrived. We would be in the hands of the French, bound and beaten. When I saw you and your men gallop up on us on the road I thought you had come to join the French. If you had not engaged them and driven them off, the baron would be dead and I would be in Paris.”

“Do not misunderstand, Nadira. I am not speaking of worldly help. We must all attempt to help our fellows with food and strength and warmth. I am speaking of the hurts you cannot see.”

Nadira made a fist in her lap. “I can see his hurts in his eyes, and in the lines around his mouth. The pain is as real as if he had a great gash in his side. He will not forget his brother's murderer.”

Corbett leaned back, stroking his chin. “And you can heal such hurts?”

She blinked at him. “I will try.” She turned her head to see William, bent over his book beside Alisdair, his sandy brown hair over his eyes and his stubbled tonsure sticking straight up. “But the friar's hurts…” she trailed off, thinking about William. “Your words have more truth there. I have no salve for his pain. I do not know where to start, and I fear for him more than for my lord. His,” and she tilted her head towards the snoring Montrose, “will heal with or without me. We have all lost someone we love. We all heal in time.”

“I have known many men like your lord and your friar. They travel an arc from birth to death, each seeking something they sense but cannot see. Often not knowing when they have found it, as both your men have discovered.”

“'Both my men',” Nadira laughed softly.

Corbett gave her a pointed look and Nadira stopped laughing. She said, “You can't mean…”

“Open your eyes. You will not be able to heal them both, and I do not wish to see you try. I have more to show you and would have all of your attention.”

Nadira was still staring at William across the long room. He looked up as if he could feel her eyes upon him. He gave her a weak smile in greeting, and then returned to his book. She shook her head. “I do not believe you.”

“He is careful. You will never catch him watching you. Never.”

“No.”
It can't be true.

Corbett's eyes were kind. “We are leaving tomorrow to retrieve the
Hermetica
. Thanks to you, we know exactly where it is. We shall return in three or so days, then make for the coast.”

“We? I will go with you?”

“I doubt your baron will permit it. No, I will take my men and Montrose. He knows what it looks like; he will know we have the right one. There will be many books and our plan is not to raid the library.”

“Five men will be enough?”

He gave her an enigmatic smile instead of an answer.

She nodded. “I will be here, then?”

“Yes.

Corbett was true to his word and the next morning, Nadira found herself locked in the sleeping room with a vigilant and unassailable guard.

“Ach, lass. Ye must be kind. Robin is thinking about Richard.” Alisdair turned his dagger over and began working on the other edge, one long leg braced against the footboard of her bed.

Nadira scowled as she lay on her belly on the soft blankets. She plucked at the knots that suspended the thin mattress over the floor. “He wouldn't listen to me!” she snarled. “He treats me like a little child. Like I am helpless. I wanted to explore the village down the road and talk to the servants here in the inn. Now I am locked in a tiny room. For what? Days? How is this different from before, when I was the prisoner of Father Bertram? Or Monsieur Conti? Or Senor DiMarco? Or…”