The Miracle Thief

by Iris Anthony

  The canon’s eyes had widened with alarm.

  The archbishop offered his hand.

  The canon kissed the man’s ring. “I will do my best.”

  “Do better.” The archbishop slid a look at me. “Come back with the relic.”

  The canon eyed me as well. “Is it not up to Saint Catherine whether she will go or stay?” He had posed the words as a question, but I knew he was directing the words at me. Telling me, warning me perhaps, what I should expect.

  “Of course it is. But why would she not wish the conversion of the pagan? Why would she not want to reside in Rouen? Rather, why would she wish to stay up in the mountains, where few can find her?”

  Because it was peaceful there. Because she was loved there. Because she belonged there. I defied them to tell me she could not decide for herself.

  “Bring her here, to me, and surely your reward will be great.”

  The canon bowed his head.

  “You have been faithful in many small things, Nephew. I do not see why you should not be given responsibility over bigger ones.”

  After making the sign of the cross, the archbishop bid the canon go. The cleric kicked his heels into his rouncey…or tried to. So long were his legs, so freely did they dangle, that he only ended by kicking himself.

  I smothered a laugh in my sleeve. The squires were not so polite, but one of them subdued his laughter long enough to grab the creature by the reins and pull it forward. As the horse began to walk, however, the sound of a great disturbance arose from the other side of the palisade. And soon there followed a shout as well.

  As the gate opened, I saw a black-headed horse. A Frisian with a long, waving mane, it snorted swirling, frosty breaths as it bobbed in and out of view. Close behind it was a second. And then there came a third. And as they rose up and pawed the air with hair-ringed hooves, it was not their odd appearance that disturbed me. It was their riders. They were mounted, all of them, by Danes.

  I shrank behind Andulf as I counted them. There were one, two…five of them. The canon stopped the squire’s progress. “Are those Danes? What can they want?”

  The archbishop cleared his throat as his gaze dropped to the ground. “Their chieftain has sent some of his men to accompany you. They’ll ensure you obtain the relic.”

  Dread settled in my belly. If the Danes accompanied the canon to Rochemont, my sole means of escaping the marriage had just disappeared. For as powerful as Saint Catherine was, regardless of her ability to discern the will of God, to plead with the Almighty on my behalf, how could she stand against them? How could anyone resist the Danes?

  ***

  The canon rode away from the villa surrounded by Danes. As I watched them, any hope he was going to the abbey to honestly inquire of Saint Catherine, to try to discern the desires of Providence, disappeared. He was going to seize her relic, and the Danes were going to make certain his success. I needed, at all costs, to speak to him at Rouen, to plead my case and appeal to his sense of justice one last time before his journey.

  Would that we had followed on his heels, but we did not.

  And once the count finally decided to travel, it was the archbishop who played the laggard. First, he could not locate one of his chests, and then he was dissatisfied with the feel of his saddle. It had to be taken off and the embroidered caparison beneath it repositioned. And since, by that time, the sun was overhead, he proposed we dine before leaving.

  We were well into the forenoon by the time we rode from the palisade. The count placed my retinue in the center of the procession. The better to guard me, he claimed. All I received from the honor was a throat choked with dust and the certain knowledge that my mantle would never recover from the offense. We rode at a pace more befitting cavalry than royalty.

  As my maids’ cart jounced along behind me, I could hear them both start to complain. The road was difficult and narrow. When it widened, I broke from the ranks, intending to speak to the count.

  Andulf raised a shout as he sped his courser to catch me.

  The count raised a brow when he saw me, but he did not halt the column.

  “I beg you for a break in our journey. My maids tire.”

  He only spurred his horse forward and fixed his sights on the road ahead. “Perhaps the king travels at your leisure, but you are not in your father’s lands. You are in mine. And I say we press on.”

  I was not used to such insolence. Not even from the queen. It was not my fault the sun had sunk in the sky. Had we left midmorning, we might already have finished our journey. So as the count continued, I returned to my carts. Pulling my palfrey off to the side, along with my maids, I signaled for Andulf to aid us.

  He rode up beside me, his courser towering over my palfrey by several hands. “I would not do this, my lady, if I were you.”

  “If you were I, then I should hope you would understand it is my father who is king, and not the count.”

  He glanced at the rest of the count’s men who rode by us. “It is not for lack of wishing, my lady. And make no mistake: here his word is taken as law.”

  “Do you say you will not help me?”

  “I am only one man, though I am a loyal man. I simply ask you to consider whether this is a worthy endeavor.”

  “I am not asking for him to pitch a tent and let us pass the night here. I ask only for a short respite.”

  He glanced up at the sky. “Night will quickly come.”

  “Someone will tell him we have stopped. He will not leave us here, but he will be forced to slow and to send someone back to inquire. By the time that happens, my maids will have taken their rest.”

  The count did not send a knight. He came himself. And when he questioned me, brow flaring, face enflamed with impatience, I played the fool.

  “I thought I had told you we continue on!”

  I was not some retainer that he should speak to me thus, and when my father returned, the count would be made to remember his mistake. “I thought I had told you we would stop.” I dismounted just in case he should mistake my meaning.

  Anger burned in his eyes.

  “My palfrey seems to be favoring a foot. I did not think I should ride it to exhaustion.”

  His eyes passed to Andulf and then back to me. “If your horse cannot be ridden, you should ride with him.”

  I would have demurred, but it was I who had chosen to speak an untruth, and the count did not look inclined to leave us. Even so, Andulf might have dismounted to aid me, but he only reached down a hand, making it plain he expected me to help myself up with a foot upon his stirrup. There is a reason the Holy Scriptures caution against lying.

  I settled myself before him as my maids climbed back into the cart, and we took once more to the road. After the count had returned to the head of the column, the knight turned around for a long moment. When he turned back, he spoke into my ear. “Your palfrey does not look lame, my lady.”

  I refused to answer.

  “But my courser might be if it has to bear the weight of us both for very much longer.”

  “Then perhaps you will have to acquire a new one.”

  “I might have, and done it long before now, but my monies have dwindled as my time at court has lengthened.”

  It was not my fault my father had given him to me.

  He spit onto the road.

  “What else would you have had me do? The count must be reminded he is not the king.”

  “It is said he thinks of little else.”

  Even if he did, what good would it do him? My father wore the crown. And if the message he had received were to be believed, he had Lorraine on his side now as well.

  I rehearsed the words I would use to entreat the canon when I saw him. It could not hurt to remind him of my father’s wish for me to go to Rochemont, or of Saint Catherine’s great power. I could not assume she did no
t want me to wed the pagan, but then neither did I wish to assume that she did. I assumed nothing at all, and neither should he. That was the whole reason for the journey. And in truth, he could do nothing but agree with me. Although, what good would my paltry words or appeal to his sense of fairness do when the archbishop had promised him some great reward?

  Stars were beginning to glitter in the gloaming sky as we ascended the hill toward the archbishop’s palace in Rouen. After a momentary stop to allow the archbishop to leave us, we descended toward the city.

  Beneath us on the river, the sails of a merchant fleet caught and swelled with the evening’s breeze, like swans adjusting their wings before bedding down to sleep.

  As we rode into the count’s palisade, there was a flurry of activity as his retainers came out to meet us.

  Once in the courtyard, Andulf dismounted and then helped me from the courser. As I slid to the ground, I requested he take a message to the canon, requesting his presence. I did not dare to wait until morning, for fear he might leave for Rochemont before I could speak to him.

  The knight’s face was the picture of bepuzzlement. “You wish him to come here, my lady?”

  “And where else? The hour grows late.”

  “But he has already made for Paris.”

  CHAPTER 16

  “Paris!”

  “He must be provisioned for the journey.”

  “I had thought…” I had assumed, in any case, that the preparations would take place here, in Rouen.

  “The count’s stores are in Paris. With the siege along the river so lately lifted, there can be little here to spare.”

  My maids were standing beside me, gaping at our exchange. “If the canon is going to Paris, then we must follow!”

  “I am afraid I cannot let you do that. Your father gave you into my care.”

  I whirled around at the voice, to find the count had joined us.

  He raised his torch by way of greeting. “But you will not find yourself mistreated here, my lady. Come.” He nodded to his men, who dragged my chests, my bed, and my table and stools from the cart. Another of his men had rallied my maids and led them off into the night.

  “But where are my maids?”

  “They will be provided for. Have no fear of that.”

  I might have expected to be welcomed by his lady wife, but instead my knight and I followed his men toward the back of the enclosure, where a great wooden tower rose like a mushroom high into the night. Up three stories we climbed before the steward threw a door open at the top.

  While his men assembled my bed and put my things about, the count gestured around the room. “Here you will be safe. None can come to you, but they will be seen by my men.”

  I had not thought myself endangered. Leastways, not by any but the Dane. And up here in the tower, safety seemed to me more of a confinement than a comfort. As the count swept the torch about, I could see no hay had been strewn across the floor. No fire burned in the grate that had been centered in the room beneath the opening in the roof. “Where are my maids to sleep?”

  “They will be lodged along with mine.”

  That was not so very great a hardship for me, for they were neither of them sound of slumber. “And what of my man?”

  “He can stay in the guardhouse with mine.”

  Until then, Andulf had kept a respectful distance, trailing behind us, but at the count’s words, he stepped to my side. “My duty is to my lady.”

  “She will not require your attentions. My own men are adequate for the task.”

  Maids could be replaced, but a knight could not. “I must insist my man stay here with me.”

  “Surely not. When your hand has been given to the Dane?”

  “It has not yet been given. I await to see what Saint Catherine has to say about the matter.”

  He bowed as if in apology, but there was no apology, and most certainly no humility in his manner. And his eyes said that he did not consider himself mistaken. “It is widely known your family has quaint ideas of propriety, but what would your father say if word of scandal reached him?”

  The knight slanted a glance at me and then bowed toward the count. “I will sleep on the stair outside my lady’s door. She can bar it from within and I will bar it on my side as well.”

  “Sleep on the doorstep? And allow it to be said the Count of Paris would not lodge you? You cannot think me so ungracious as that.”

  I had not ever liked the man, but I had not known he was so disagreeable as this. “Then you mean to strip me of both my maids and my man?”

  “I strip you of nothing. You will be quite comfortable here. You may have anything you like, my lady. You have only to request it.”

  “Then I request to be served by my own people.”

  “I am certain you will find my hospitality surpasses even the royal court’s.” He smiled and bowed, taking Andulf with him.

  Though he left the torch in a cresset that had been fixed to the wall, the chests had been deposited on the opposite side of the room. Not able to see for the darkness of the night, I took the chests by their leather handles and dragged them, one by one, toward the light. In the third, I seized upon one of my furs. Pulling it out, I recognized it by the musky smell: my otter mantle. Pulling it on, I bundled myself into its glossy folds and slipped beneath the bed’s counterpane. I watched the torch birth shadows that flared and then turned upon themselves to flit about the room.

  I had never slept alone before, and I could not decide whether it was better to keep my eyes open and brave the torch’s eerie light, or to keep them shut and pretend myself elsewhere. Anywhere seemed a more comforting place than here, so I screwed my eyes up tight and summoned visions of the abbey at Rochemont, comforting myself with thoughts of that peaceful, lofty place and the woman I had spoken with there.

  But then a scrabbling sound came from outside the door.

  Had I secured it?

  I could not remember.

  Alighting from the bed, I clenched the robe close about me with a trembling hand and crept to the door. Feeling along its solid frame, I found the bar, lifted it, and then let it drop into place.

  Fleeing back to the bed, I pressed my back up against the bed frame and drew my knees to my chest. Then I shut my eyes and began to recite a prayer.

  As I finished the words, the torch sputtered, throwing flares of light and darkness against my shuttered eyelids. I opened my eyes to see a fluttery, flapping creature drop down from the hole in the roof. The torch flickered bright once more as the creature reeled about the room. And then the flame guttered and died. I screamed, drawing my fur up over my head, and plunged beneath the counterpane as the creature beat about the rafters, but no one came to my rescue.

  ***

  The count was true to his word. He sent up one of my maids the next morning to help me dress. The room was not dark in the daylight, for the hole in the roof let in no little light. There were windows too, but they were narrow and set just above my head. I could not see from them. Once I was dressed, I followed my maid down the narrow circle of stairs to find Andulf at the bottom.

  He pushed away from the wall where he had been lounging and bowed. “My lady.”

  “I do not wish to stay here any longer.”

  “We might have some trouble leaving.” He nodded toward the gate, where a contingent of the count’s men sat their horses. They were staring in our direction.

  “Does he mean to make me his ward?”

  “He means to keep you in his care until your father returns in December.”

  “I am not his prisoner, that he should treat me thus.”

  “And should he allow you to leave, would your father not be enraged to hear his word had been violated? That you were not allowed to travel to Rochemont?”

  “Yes!” That was my point exactly. Although… I thought
about it for a long moment. “The count cannot let me leave, or my father will know his orders have been countermanded.”

  The knight’s gaze traveled to the count’s men, and then back to me, before he gave me a long, slow wink.

  “This is madness! He cannot keep me captive, hidden away in some tower!”

  “And who will free you?”

  “You.”

  “My lady?”

  “You must.”

  “And how can I? I may be your man, my lady, but I am only one man. And what would you do if you left? Where would you go?”

  “I would…” What would I do? “I would ride to join the canon and insist upon accompanying him to the abbey.”

  “By now he has gained Paris.”

  “Surely the two of us could travel fast enough to overtake him.”

  “How would that change anything, my lady?”

  “Change anything?”

  “You wanted to beg Saint Catherine’s blessing upon the marriage. Is not the canon doing the same thing?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Then what is to be gained by slipping away from the count? It will only anger him further, and once His Majesty the king is told, it will provoke more enmity between them.”

  “Precisely so!”

  “Pardon me for saying, my lady, but to my mind, the terms of the treaty with the Dane have already been decided, otherwise the king would not have left.”

  “I am not asking for your opinion.”

  “I am not offering you my opinion. I am only reminding you of the king’s opinion.”

  “Speak plainly.”

  “He agreed to allow you to consult the relic.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “So now you must let Saint Catherine decide.”

  Could no one understand? The canon was not going to let the saint decide. My fate had already been determined by men. I did not think there was anything God could do now to intervene. “You will not help me, then.”

  “You appealed to Saint Catherine, my lady. If you wish to be saved, then it is to her you must look.”

  I had been mistaken in his loyalties. Apparently he had already become my father’s man.