Faerie

by Jacobs Delle

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “Then what did happen to her?”

  The earl’s black eyes studied her solemnly. “She walked into the woods one day and was never seen again by the likes of man.”

  “That is a word puzzle,” she said. “You say she was not seen, but not that she died. A woman would not likely survive long alone in the woods. But you do not say she stayed in the woods. Or is the puzzle with the word ‘man’?”

  “Clever lass.” The black-eyed Black Earl focused on the narrow dirt road, refusing to look her way.

  “Without a trace. It makes no sense. Even if she had been devoured by wild animals, something would have been found. So my father thought she was alive, too. And you know, don’t you?”

  The muscles in the man’s dark face drew tight. “She’s gone, lass.”

  Now she was sure. He was the key. “But you know, don’t you?”

  De Mowbray didn’t answer. A strange thing for a man who otherwise talked so freely.

  “Do you know where she is?”

  “I do.”

  “Then can you not take me to her?”

  “I know where she is, but not how to find her.”

  “Another game with words.”

  “Nay. I know the place, but one such as I cannot find it.”

  “Then would you if you could?”

  “Nay. Let it go, lass. It is not for you to know.”

  “She’s my mother.”

  He shook his head. “’Tis not for you to know. If it is meant to be, it will come to be.”

  “Your outrider comes,” Philippe said.

  “Aye,” de Mowbray replied as they watched the dust kicked up on the road ahead. “Arm yourselves.”

  Leonie had kept her bow strung, though why she had felt the need among so many armed men she did not know. But she positioned her quiver forward near her waist so the arrows could easily be drawn.

  The outrider was easy to distinguish, wearing de Mowbray’s black-and-silver crest of battling wolf and dog. She watched the man race up to the master and turn. The horse whuffed heavily.

  “’Tis Fulk,” the rider said. “The bishop rides with him.”

  A shiver jolted her, remembering the last time she had seen Fulk. But they were all Normans, were they not? Surely he would be civil.

  “Haps he brings news of Malcolm,” replied Philippe.

  “Malcolm it was who laid the cornerstone for Durham’s new cathedral, not a month past. Do you think that makes him friend or foe?”

  “Not a comforting thought,” Philippe muttered.

  “Aye. More like, he wants to know what Rufus is about, to tell to Malcolm. Best mind your words.”

  “There’s no other route to the castle?”

  “Nay, unless you mean to swim the river twice and scale its walls. ’Tis well sited, the river on three sides and the steep hill ahead of us. Look ahead. They approach now.”

  She guessed as she watched the oncoming riders that they outnumbered de Mowbray’s men, but not by much, and if she must stake her life on the ferocity of warriors, her chances were probably better in her present company. But Fulk, facing her and riding in the fore with his great black horse emblazoned with his colors of red on black, was considered a mighty knight. She would not take anything for granted.

  On the opposite corner, the Bishop of Durham, wearing a crimson cloak. Strange that he wore a miter when traveling, although this one, William of St. Calais, was well known for his pomp.

  “Odd to have the bishop with him,” Philippe said.

  “Aye. It means something,” the Black Earl replied in a low growl.

  “He’s there to give validity to something.”

  “Something they mean to do.”

  “Something they want the Church to back. Keep a close watch. I trust neither of them. Leonie, behind me.”

  “They will not harm me. I know Fulk. Haps I can talk—”

  De Mowbray frowned. “’Tis for men to parley, lass. Stay out of the way.”

  She didn’t like it, but they were right. She did know Fulk, and he had not listened to her the last time. He would not be different now.

  Fulk’s knights had a sameness to them, with their bright red tabards over their mail and mail coifs. She had seen them at Brodin. All of them wore the backs of their heads shaved in the same old-fashioned way as Fulk wore his.

  The horses came to a halt a few lengths apart. The men called out their wary greetings.

  “What brings you from Durham, Your Grace?” Philippe called out across the gap.

  Glances shot back and forth between the bishop and his warrior.

  “Turn over the Lady Leonie to us and your lives will be spared,” said the bishop.

  “For what purpose?”

  “She is the lawful betrothed of Fulk of Durham, and you have taken her against her will. We have heard of your treatment of her, and we will not tolerate such shame to a lady. But all will be forgiven if you relinquish her to her rightful husband.”

  Leonie gasped. Could he have mistaken her so thoroughly? “You have misunderstood me, Lord Fulk,” she said. “I gave you no promise. I told you instead the choice of my husband belonged to the king, my guardian, and I would abide by his choice.”

  “Nay, lady, you gave me your promise, if only the king would grant our wish,” said Fulk, giving her an almost beatific smile. “We know you are coerced and cannot speak freely. I shall save you from these beasts who abuse you for their own purposes.”

  “You lie, Fulk,” Philippe said. “Before I left the king at Castle Brodin, he told me he had rejected your suit. You already know he will not permit her to marry you.”

  Leonie’s jaw dropped open. He had not said this. Fulk had come to Brodin with his suit after Philippe had left. Could Fulk have gone to the king in Gloucester after seeing her, then hurried back to Durham? It was possible. Or had Fulk lied to her, saying he was on his way to see the king, when he had already been there and been rejected? What would he gain by such deception? Rufus would call him traitor. But Fulk had the Bishop of Durham here as witness, and it was well known the Bishop of Durham did as he pleased, almost as if Durham were its own country.

  The Earl of Northumbria guided his massive horse ahead of Philippe. “I have heard her pledge her troth to this man, Philippe le Peregrine,” he said. “And that is as good as a marriage in the law. She belongs to the Peregrine.”

  “Nay,” retorted the bishop, oddly agitated, his eyes strangely bright and wild, and his hands shaking. “It is not valid, for her promise was already given to Fulk, God’s Warrior. She cannot give it again to another. We will take her for her own safety, or all of you will die, your souls consigned to Satan himself.”

  She caught the malice in Fulk’s eye as he focused on Philippe, and she saw the plan. Fulk would first kill Philippe, then there would be no husband to contest him. He had the bishop here to lend sanctity to his scheme. If she didn’t do something quickly, all the men who protected her were at risk. A shiver traversed her spine with the realization that Fulk was the most evil of all the men here, Warrior of God or no.

  All of a piece, she raised her bow, the arrow already nocked in the string, with three more in her bow hand waiting. She drew and aimed, straight at Fulk’s throat.

  “Turn around!” she demanded. “Go back to Durham. You do not mean to rescue me, you mean to imprison me. I call you liar, Fulk of Durham, for I never gave you my troth. I have no such right, and so I told you clearly. The king and my uncle will both support me.”

  “Don’t be absurd, girl,” said the bishop. “Put down that silly weapon before you hurt someone.”

  “That is my intention. If you move so much as a hoof forward, I shall shoot.”

  “What little can you do with one arrow, lady?” said Fulk. “You cannot kill us all, and we outnumber you. They will all be dead.”

  “Ah. A pity. Then I shall have to settle for killing only you. Move back or my arrow will pierce your throat. Haps for g
ood measure, one through your eye.”

  “I’d listen to her if I were you, Fulk,” said Philippe. “You know her repute with a bow. One arrow will kill you before any of you can raise your sword. You have to kill all of us to win. We only have to kill you.”

  “This is nonsense,” the bishop shouted.

  Leonie pulled that last inch of bowstring, her ivorywood bow flexed to its limit. “So be it. I claim Fulk and the three men on his right. They are close enough, their mail will be of no use. Philippe, you may have the bishop’s guards, and the bishop too, if he raises his hand in battle. My gift to you, my Lord Northumbria, and to your men, the remainder.”

  “My pleasure, lady,” de Mowbray said with a growl. “We’ll acquit ourselves as well as you.”

  All around her, she could hear the jingle and clopping of horses sensing the tension that rose before a battle, as eager to lunge forth as their riders.

  “You, Lord Fulk, you will be the first to die,” she added. “And then how will you force me to wed you?”

  “You would not dare.” Fury spun blackly in his eyes, but his hands did not move to his weapons.

  “I will not give myself to you. I will happily die fighting.”

  Fulk’s big black horse danced like a nervous spider as the knight pulled unevenly on his reins. Fulk had to know he could not move fast enough to save himself. He had moved too close, expecting a battle of swords, for no one shot a bow from horseback. No one save Leonie of Bosewood, but he could never have expected that.

  “You will burn in Hell for your perfidy, lady,” Fulk said. With a jerk on the reins, he wheeled his horse and leaped into flight down the road, his men and the bishop’s men turning and galloping after him.

  “Since I have committed no such betrayal, I believe I’ll leave that to God,” she said. “In any event, I think I would find burning in Hell a pleasanter experience than being married to him.”

  “By the devil and all the blessed saints!” said de Mowbray. “A battle fought without a shot, by one woman, and not a man to raise his weapon. I’ve never seen the like. What do you think you’ll do with the likes of her, Peregrine?”

  Philippe flashed a wary glance at her, but the odd upturned corner to his mouth betrayed something more. “Haps I’ll have her train my archers.”

  Her heart still pounded, though she had not realized it before. Whence had this come, this sudden notion to play, nay, to be, the warrioress? It had just come. And something in her heart sang, that she had done something that pleased the Peregrine.

  “Then,” said de Mowbray, turning his massive warhorse toward the Castle of Bosewood, “if you mean to have a castle for archers to defend, you’d best hie there quickly. There’ll be an army at your curtain wall before you can sneeze.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  “IT’S A PIGSTY!”

  Leonie stared, her mouth hanging open. The tiny village surrounding the castle was pitifully neglected. It had been bad enough crossing the narrow drawbridge that looked flimsy enough to collapse from the weight of more than one horse, but this—

  “A stinking, decrepit pigsty,” Philippe added. “De Mowbray’s right. Let’s burn it.” His mellow brown eyes turned harsh as he scanned the curtain wall from the inside. His knights, along with some of the king’s, and villeins of all stations gathered around them as they dismounted.

  Leonie followed his example, looking at the fortress from a warrior’s eyes, and her heart sank. They would be in serious trouble if they faced an attack. The stone wall was nearly complete, but toward the upper slope of the ground, one large gap was blocked only by huge wooden pickets. The wooden parapets, from which men could defend the walls, were incomplete, leaving some places without protection.

  “Lady! My lady!”

  Leonie turned and saw Ealga running toward her. Her heart suddenly racing with joy, Leonie dismounted, ran to Ealga, and threw her arms around the woman who had been more mother than maid to her, as long as she had lived.

  “I feared for you, my lady,” said Ealga. She smoothed her hands over Leonie’s high shoulders and tucked the wayward pale curls of her charge’s hair back behind her ears.

  When they separated again, Leonie spotted a hidden tear gleaming in the corner of the woman’s eye. Ealga’s lower lip quivered. “They said you had been found and were coming, but I was afeared.”

  “I am well. Only a small injury to my ankle, and I have already forgotten that.”

  “My lady, this place, ’tis filthy. We have been cleaning since we arrived, but ’tis no place for one gently born.”

  “Aye, so I see,” Leonie replied. “’Tis no place for any of us. No matter. We shall make it fit.”

  “Leonie!” From the crumbling smithy, her favorite little boy came running.

  “Sigge!” He landed in her arms with the colliding force of a big dog. She laughed. “You can speak now! How did you get here?”

  “I can, Leonie, most times, that is. I came with my brother. The king said the Peregrine needed a blacksmith, and Lord Geoffrey didn’t want to send Papa, so the king asked him for Modig and me. Only I’ve got to help in the forge, and it’s a mess.”

  Leonie glanced at Philippe, who shrugged. Had he known about her attachment to the boy? If Sigge were here, and Ealga, it would be almost like home. “It looks like everything here is a mess, Sigge. We’ll all have plenty to do to set things right.”

  “Now that we have the happy reunion out of the way, may I have a word with you, beloved bride?”

  Leonie startled at Philippe’s voice. She lifted her chin and narrowed her eyes at his folded arms and honey-brown eyes gone dark beneath glowering brows. Her chin went up as her back stiffened as straight as the lances his knights carried. “You wish to speak, esteemed lord?”

  “Be sure, precious bride, you never again do what you did this afternoon.”

  “What was so foolish? Did Fulk not turn his tail?”

  “You would have been killed in a melee. You were lucky. You will never put yourself at risk in such a way again. Do you understand?”

  She sniffed. “You would be dead if I had not.”

  “I do not mean to say it did not work out well. But that matters not. I am a knight. As of this day, precious bride, you will begin conducting yourself in a wifely manner.”

  “And if I do not?” She gritted her teeth as her anger steamed her blood like water splashed into a fire.

  “Do you wish for me to take that bow you value so much away from you? I’ll do it if I must. You are not a warrior, nor a man. You will not act as if you are.”

  Fury heated her face and spread down her neck. If he ever dared.

  But nay. She glanced around. All in the bailey—knights, soldiers, ladies, villeins—were as quiet as the dead. None of them would have sympathy for a lady who acted like a man, not even Ealga, who knew her secrets.

  “If you are through, then, honorable lord, we ladies appear to have much scrubbing to do if we are to have a hall suitable for our delicate breeding.” Before he could reply, she whirled away and stomped to the hall doors.

  Hugh of Hatterie stepped ahead of her. “Haps, my lady, you might want to wait until—”

  “Until what, sir? Until the rats have finished eating all the garbage? If I am to be a lady, I shall have a hall worthy of ladies. Step aside.”

  Wincing, Hugh pulled on the door, and Leonie saw that the upper hinge was broken. A death-dealing stench rolled out.

  Leonie held her breath, forcing herself not to gag.

  “Jesu and the saints,” said Philippe behind her. “Let’s tear it down and start over.”

  “You might tear it down, honored husband. I would clean it. Leave me to my task. You surely have plenty of manly tasks to perform.”

  She heard his grumbling, heard his footsteps, and knew he had turned and stomped away. Something in her heart sank.

  Nay, pigsty did not begin to describe it.

  She snapped off her veil and wrapped it around her face to dispel th
e foul odor. Seeing a rat scurry past her foot, she snatched a woman’s broom and swung at it, but the act was futile, for the rat dived into the pile of refuse. She clenched her teeth and promised herself there would be no rats in her hall.

  “Open the shutters and let some of this stench out.”

  “But lady,” said one of the ladies sent by Aunt Beatrice, “Sir Hugh ordered them shut to keep the stench within.”

  “Open them,” Leonie repeated. “I want the stench without. I shall have the keeping of the hall, not some lofty knight, and they will have more than bad smells in their bailey this day. We shall clean this place out if we must use shovels. Ealga, show me the solar. I hope it is better than this.”

  “It is not, lady,” Ealga replied. “But come and see. Mayhap we’ll soon have it fit to unload your dowry train, but I think not today.”

  Leonie signaled to the other women to continue their work on the hall and followed where Ealga led her to the solar, a chamber behind the hall. She lowered her hand from her nose to force herself to become accustomed to the wretched odors.

  The solar was worse beyond belief, with strewn refuse occupying most of the floor. The bed was a mass of filthy rags and, she did not doubt, vermin. “Burn the mattress,” she said. “Burn everything in the chamber, save the furnishing.”

  “Aye, ’twas my thought,” Ealga responded. The old woman glanced over her shoulder, then began a whisper. “Lady, tell me true, are ye all right? Ye said ye were injured. Did ye heal it?”

  Leonie shook her head. “All would have been well, and I would have evaded the Peregrine by walking through the night, but when night came, I discovered the sight was gone. I could see no better than anyone. I stopped to rest, but in the night a boar attacked me. I escaped into a tree, but he gored my ankle.” She raised her skirt and showed the gash. “The Peregrine stitched it when he found me, else I would not have been able to walk. But it doesn’t hurt now because it doesn’t gape open.”

  “A boar? They dinna attack folk wi’out they are disturbed. Let me see.”

  Leonie propped her foot up on a stool, and Ealga bent to examine the wound. “’Tis not festered,” she said in her assessing voice that sounded a bit like humming. “’Tis well stitched. But why did ye not heal it before he found ye?”