E. M. Powell

by The Fifth Knight

  Palmer allowed himself a wide, wide grin. Low as a whore, eh? But one that was keeping all the rewards. Lullworth would have been proud of him.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  The steps led down past floor after floor. Palmer hurried, taking the steps two at a time on the curved staircase, careful to make no noise.

  Finally he reached the bottom and stepped off the last stair into a poorly lit stone corridor. The last flight of steps had been far older than the rest, worn in the middle to a smooth curve. The changed air told him he was underground: stale, damp, a mushroom-like smell. He must be near the dungeon now. Or dungeons. In a castle this size, de Morville could have any number of people locked away. And any number of guards to watch them.

  He put his hand to his belt and drew his dagger, cursing he didn’t have his sword. But that lay beside his bed. He couldn’t risk going back for it. He might wake the sleeping le Bret or de Tracy, or, worse, meet Fitzurse and de Morville on the stairwell.

  Palmer took cautious, quiet treads. The corridor sloped down to take him deeper underground. Black mold spread thick on the flags under his feet, and close on either side the walls oozed damp. Ahead, the wall curved to the left and orange light flickered from beyond. He halted. That would be the guards. He cursed his lack of sword again.

  He couldn’t rush in blind, not as badly armed as he was. He needed to judge his foe first. Sticking his dagger back in his belt, he raised his chain mail hood and straightened his surcoat. He stepped forward with definite strides and rounded the corner.

  “Stop right there.” The bulky guard who stood outside the iron-hinged wooden door held a hefty axe. But there was only one of him. And only one door.

  The man raised his weapon, and the blade caught the torchlight, a large K for de Morville’s Knaresborough engraved on the shiny metal.

  Palmer held up a hand. “Hold, soldier. I’m Sir Benedict Palmer, sent by Sir Hugh. A disturbance has been heard upstairs. We’re checking the whole castle.”

  The guard kept his weapon up. “Why haven’t they sent the regular watch?”

  “Because in that cell behind you is no regular prisoner, is it?” Palmer kept his look firm.

  “No. De Morville usually keeps his girls upstairs.”

  He’d found her. “Exactly. This one must be kept secure. That is Sir Hugh de Morville’s direct order. I hope you’re not questioning your lord, fellow.”

  “My apologies, sir knight,” said the man, lowering his axe. “All has been quiet down here.”

  “Good. Make sure it stays that way.” Palmer gave him a stiff nod and went to retrace his steps back around the bend in the corridor. “Stay alert. You understand?”

  “Yes, sir.” The guard gave him a sharp salute.

  Palmer went back the way he had come, with loudly echoing steps. He gave a quick look back. The man hadn’t followed. Palmer bent to the floor and scooped up two handfuls of the mildewed rubble and mortar that lay scattered there. Rising to his feet, he stepped silently back to the curved corner.

  He flung the debris hard at the ceiling. It clattered against it and fell back down.

  “What’s to do?” The guard came round the corner, eyes up to the source of the noise.

  Palmer drove his fisted knuckles into the man’s face, and he went down, palms to his nose. The axe fell to one side and Palmer was on it. Handle grasped in both hands, he pointed the weapon at the writhing guard. “Open the cell. Now.”

  Blood seeping from his nose, the guard got to his feet, his sight only for the axe. “You sapless cur. I knew you was off.” He sought out by touch the bunch of keys that hung from an iron loop on his belt.

  “Another word and I’ll have your head,” said Palmer.

  The guard glared but nodded. With Palmer close behind, he retraced his steps to the cell, where he unlocked the door, then twisted the rusty handle. The door opened to a scuffling sound inside, but darkness so complete Palmer could see nothing.

  “Take down the wall light,” Palmer said. “Enter before me. Slowly.”

  Again, the guard did as he was told. As he followed the man into the cell, the torch’s flare lit the blackness.

  “Oh, please have mercy, I beg you, I beg you.” Theodosia’s voice, below him. The clink of a chain.

  Palmer looked down.

  She was on her hands and knees on the filthy floor, scrambling away from him and the guard, pulling a chain with her. It stopped taut from her neck to the wooden post that secured it. She gasped hard.

  “Unlock her,” said Palmer.

  The guard bent and yanked the chain to him with his free hand.

  Theodosia gave a strangled cry and fell onto one hip. Her hands went to her throat as the guard hauled her back to the post like a dog. A rusted collar was tight round her neck, and she clawed at it to ease her breathing, gray eyes wide in panic as she sprawled on the floor.

  “I don’t want her throttled.” Palmer showed his axe to the guard, and Theodosia ducked from it with a scream, arm across her face. “Sister, I’ve come to free you. But stay quiet.” She lowered her arm and looked at him as if she’d not heard right.

  Palmer nodded to the guard. “Do it.”

  The man went to carry out the order, hauling her up into a seated position. The torchlight lit her tear-flushed face as he struggled with the rusted lock on the collar.

  Her eyes flicked from Palmer to the guard. “Please don’t let him take me, please.”

  “Wench, he’s already broken my nose.” The guard’s voice came thick from his injury. “He’d have my head too. Far as I’m concerned, he can do what he likes to you.” He straightened up and dangled the open collar from one hand. “Sir.” He gave Palmer a surly glare.

  “Thank you, soldier.” Palmer spun the axe and hit the man on the side of his head with the handle. He folded at the knees and slumped to the floor, torch clattering beside him.

  Palmer picked it up. “Hold this.”

  Sitting stock-still, Theodosia stared at him, hands to her throat where the collar had been.

  He looked at the unconscious guard. “He won’t be out for long.” He thrust the torch at her. “Hold it. We haven’t much time.”

  She held out one trembling hand as she stood up and took it from him.

  Palmer laid down the axe so he could grab the guard’s legs and maneuver him nearer to the wooden post. His shoulders knotted with effort, it took him two or three hauls. He knelt down and fitted the iron loop around the man’s neck. He locked it swiftly, then hooked the door key from the loop on the guard’s belt. “That’s him done. Let’s go.” He looked up at Theodosia. And a sheet of flame hit his face.

  Theodosia flinched back and almost dropped the torch as the knight dodged away from her with a yell of pain.

  “You’ll not take me.” She screwed up her nose at the acrid smell of his burned hair and swiped again.

  Sir Palmer slapped at the side of his cheek. “What are you doing?”

  She moved between him and the axe, heart pounding. If he reached it, she was dead. “Stay away from me.” Her voice shook almost as much as her hands as she held the flaring torch close to the knight’s face. “God has given me this weapon against the darkness of your sin. Hand me the door key. This will be your prison while I make my escape from here. If you don’t, I shall, I shall burn you again. You mark my words.” She braced herself for his quick lunge, for his powerful hands to knock away her defense.

  To her surprise, Palmer lowered his head with a snort of contained laughter, then looked up at her again. “Oh, then I surrender, Sister.” He held up both hands but got to his feet and took a step toward her. “Or maybe not.”

  “Stop where you are.” Theodosia shook the torch at him, but he kept coming, his height a head and a half above her.

  She backed away, kicking at the axe handle with her heels to keep it from him, praying it was hidden under her skirt.

  Palmer stepped again. “Sister, you’re being as foolhardy as you were with de Morville in the c
athedral. I might get a bit singed if I were to go for that axe, but believe me, I’d get it.” He glanced down at the guard and around at the doorway. “We haven’t much time. You must come with me.”

  She backed again, and her shoulders hit the wall. “So that you can kill me, like you did my lord Becket?” Arms straight out, she waved the flames again. “Give me the key.”

  “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  “Liar!” She lunged with the flame at his face.

  He swerved aside with an oath. “Would you shut up? I’m trying to save your life, and your noise will call down the whole place.” The knight looked around at the doorway yet again and, with a hand up, went quickly over to it to listen out.

  His claims to save her made no sense, and he seemed nervous. She’d seen his quick moods, his shift to anger. Maybe he also shifted to madness.

  But now she had a chance as he stood in the doorway. If she delivered a hard swipe with the torch, she could get past him. Then run. The axe still lay on the floor and would be in darkness. Theodosia adjusted her grip on the torch and moved forward with small steps. She brought it round to slash at the knight, teeth gritted for his howl of pain, the stench of burned flesh.

  He turned back as she hit out. He shot out a long arm and grabbed the torch’s shaft. “Forcurse you, woman.”

  She’d lost her chance. Now he’d have her. She tried to wrench the torch free.

  Palmer swore again. “Listen to me. For one minute. Your life depends on it.”

  “I am sure it does, for you have been sent here to kill me.”

  “Not this time.” His dark eyes bored into hers through the quivers of heat from the torch.

  She saw no madness there. Her throat tightened. “What do you mean?”

  “Have you ever heard of a Brazen Bull?”

  Pictures in her illuminated manuscripts. Saint Antipas, Saint Pelagia, Saint Eustace. Martyrs all, roasted alive inside terrible metal contraptions. “Yes.” The word stuck in her throat.

  Palmer leaned closer to her and lowered his voice. “Fitzurse is having one worked at the forge on the morrow. Within a day, two at most, he’ll have you put in it to make you tell what you know.”

  Theodosia’s mouth could barely form her words. “Know about what?”

  “They want to know where your mother is. And once you’ve told them, Sister, he’ll finish you off in there.”

  She’d sworn to resist the knights, not to tell what she knew. The torch prickled raw heat onto the backs of her hands, mocking her vow. To have burning metal against her face, her breasts, her arms, her legs, have it secured there, with no release. Resist that? She let go of the torch with a stifled cry.

  Palmer held the flame aloft. “I’m glad you see sense.”

  “But why are you suddenly my savior?”

  “Because he wants me to do it to you.”

  He’d tricked her. Theodosia whirled round. The axe, she had to get to the axe.

  Palmer was quicker than she. With two long strides, he jammed his foot on its handle as she flung herself to the floor to grab it.

  “You sinful, evil liar.” She hauled at the axe handle but could not budge it.

  “I’m not lying.”

  Theodosia stood up and shook her head. “Do not make it worse. At least have the courage to speak the truth.”

  “Sister, I know you don’t trust me, but believe me when I say I can’t carry out Fitzurse’s order.”

  She gave him her most distasteful look. “You carried them out in the cathedral. At the inn. Yet now you tell me you have reformed. Repented. Seen the evil of your ways, so you would rescue a helpless nun. I do not know what you are up to, but I am not a complete fool, Sir Palmer.”

  The knight took a deep breath. “I worked for Fitzurse for his money. But I can’t do what he asked to you.” His look hardened. “But neither am I about to risk my life for naught. You, Sister Theodosia, are worth a pretty penny to me. If I save you, I’ll ransom you back to the Church. That way, I can still collect. See?”

  She summoned another look. “But by the way of the cross, you are truly an ignoble soul.”

  The man on the floor groaned and stirred.

  “Our friend is about to wake up, Sister. Ignoble as I am, I am your only hope. Are you coming with me?” He jingled the key. “Or do you want to stay in here with him and wait for Fitzurse to come to you?”

  EPISODE 2

  CHAPTER 6

  Theodosia clambered up the narrow staircase with her skirt clutched to keep from tripping, the muscles in her legs weak from effort. But she carried on as fast as if Fitzurse were two steps behind her, ready to roast her alive.

  Ahead, Sir Palmer’s long legs made easy work of the climb up many stairs.

  What if he lied? What if she were running toward an even worse fate? The pictures from her manuscripts flashed before her again. Her prayers as she’d read of the martyrs’ deaths imagining their agony, their hell. No. There could be no worse.

  The next flight had an iron handrail to one side. She reached for it with sweated palms and used it to lever herself up, grasp by grasp. Palmer could have easily killed her in the dungeon, if that was his plan. But he hadn’t, not even when she’d burned him with the torch, horrifying herself. His story of ransom must be true. An ignoble, base act, but one that would keep Mama alive. Would keep her, Theodosia, alive and deliver her back to the safety of her beloved church.

  He halted on the landing above and looked back down at her, finger to his lips.

  Theodosia nodded her comprehension as she steadied her breath.

  He gestured toward a half-open door as she climbed from the top step.

  They went through the doorway.

  A stone open range, banked for the night, gave poor light to a large shadow-filled room. The castle kitchen.

  Theodosia scanned the room for another door. The walls held only the range and wide shelves with earthenware and copper pots of every size and shape. “There’s no way out of here,” she whispered.

  Palmer pushed past her and went to a large wooden table on which half a dozen pottery pitchers stood. He peered into the pitchers and gestured to her. “Go and look on that back wall.” He kept his voice low. “There’s some aprons on there. Get one and put it round you. Hurry.”

  He made little sense. Theodosia looked at him as she crossed the wide kitchen. Now he poured dregs of wine into his hand and rubbed it on his face and neck.

  To trust this man may have been a huge mistake. She rummaged amongst the hanging clothes covers, the cloth sticky and foul with grease. She looped one on over her head as she went to his side.

  Palmer continued to search the pitchers. He glanced at her. “No, not like that. Put it around your head and shoulders, make a cloak.”

  She did as he said, the stained cloth reeking with splashes and stains of a hundred meals.

  He thrust a jug patterned with glazed green leaves into her hands. “Drink some of that. Wet your clothes with it too.” He moved quickly over to the range.

  Theodosia stared at it. A sheep’s face fashioned into the clay as a spout stared back. “Wine is a pleasure of the flesh. I cannot sip a drop.”

  He hurried back to her with a deep scowl. “You won’t have any flesh left if Fitzurse gets hold of you.”

  She took a deep breath and raised it to her lips. The sharp liquid flooded her mouth, and she spewed it from her lips in disgust.

  Palmer made an impatient sound. “Put some of it on your clothes.”

  Splashing it across her, she wrinkled her nose at the foul fumes. She was as foolish as the animal on the jug to carry on like this. She’d agreed to follow a madman. Replacing the beaker on the table, she looked up at him in trepidation.

  He brought his hands to her cheeks, and she twisted in his hold as he rubbed her skin hard.

  “What are you doing?”

  He let go of her and showed her his hands, filthy with ash from the range. “You look as dirty as these, Sister.”
<
br />   Theodosia brought a hand to her face and looked at her fingertips. She was indeed smeared with new filth. “Sir knight, you have no intention of saving me. You only want to play some horrid jest. I was a fool to follow you.” She looked toward the door, waiting for the dread figures to show there.

  “I thank you for your trust in me.” He grasped her by the elbow.

  “Why should I trust you?” She shook him off. “I am not doing anything else until you tell me what your plan is.”

  “It’s simple.” Palmer gave her a humorless smile. “We walk out the front door.”

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  No bloody drink left. Sir Hugh de Morville shoved at the dead ashes of the hall’s fire with the heel of his boot. No bloody heat, neither.

  He was supposed to be lord of this castle. Instead he sat here like a turnip-headed peasant, without sup nor warmth. At least bed would bring one of those. Rising to his feet, he swayed to balance.

  Fitzurse had not long since retired, with his stuck-up “Go easy, my friend” as he’d gone abed.

  De Morville hawked on the floor in disgust. He was in charge here, it was his castle, his land. Not Fitzurse’s. Who did Fitzurse think he was, issuing orders all the time? We’ll have Palmer, we’ll do this, we’ll do that. You’ll not do the girl.

  De Morville went toward the door with careful steps. He cursed Fitzurse for the arrangement to meet at dawn in the forge. Up with the bloody cockerel, and nothing to do except watch Fitzurse take up the castle blacksmiths’ expensive time with some metal bull.

  “Some bullshit would be more like,” he muttered to himself. His own joke set him off into a long wheeze of a laugh, and he clutched the doorjamb for support.

  He finished in a spasm of coughing as he considered Fitzurse’s plan. It would get the information they needed from the girl, no question. Fitzurse would get his pleasure too. The gleam in his pale eyes as he’d described the workings of the bull meant only one thing.

  De Morville shook his head. His own pleasures were much more straightforward. He liked a virgin more than anything, especially one who fought her taking. The girl wouldn’t be up to much fighting if she was half-cooked. He belched long and hard. Then why not do her now, eh? Pissed as he was, his cock warmed in his breeches. It might take her mouth first to get him fully up, but he’d have no problem with that.