Winter Song

by Roberta Gellis

  Ernaldus trembled with fury, but at the core of it was a cold dread. The accent of this Lord Raymond was of Provence, but the voice and manner were too like Rustengo de Soler—and Rustengo was Raymond d’Aix’s kinsman. Could God’s curse be on him for his murder? Could this be Raymond d’Aix? Could the ghost of the blonde bitch have mysteriously driven her husband from Bordeaux to this place and made him turn away the bringer of good news without a suggestion of recompense? Ernaldus wanted desperately to keep the remaining information to himself and give it to a more generous recipient, but he dared not. Any delay would cause dangerous suspicion of both the information and himself.

  “My lord!” Ernaldus cried.

  Raymond looked back at him, and it was well that Ernaldus could not read the expression on the shadowed face. “Yes?”

  “There is more,” Ernaldus said, lowering his voice, “but I-I am a poor clerk, and I have lost my place, and…”

  “If you know something that will save lives and, more especially, save time in freeing Lady Beatrice, you will receive a just reward, I promise.”

  Deliberately, Raymond had not said “my wife and Lady Beatrice”, despite the fact that bringing Alys out of Les Baux was far more important to him than bringing out Beatrice. If this was Ernaldus, he was too likely to make the connection between “Lord Raymond” and Lady Alys, and that would be the end of any voluntary information. More could be extracted by torture, but that would take time and might not be reliable.

  There was a perceptible pause. A just reward. Ernaldus did not like that. He would rather have heard “a rich reward”, but he had gone too far to turn back. Cursing under his breath, he felt under his robe and held out a key.

  “This opens the Sow’s Tower in which Lady Beatrice is imprisoned,” he said.

  He expected a cry of joy, but Raymond only stared at him and then held out his hand for the key. Ernaldus whimpered, seeing his reward diminish to nothing as this foul, dishonest lord took the credit and left him with nothing.

  Raymond hefted the key in his hand. “It might be worth its weight in gold—if I were inside Les Baux and had a way out,” he said. His voice was low and sounded indifferent, but that was because his heart was up in his throat, pounding.

  “There is a postern, a way through the walls,” Ernaldus offered, a small hope breaking through because of Raymond’s mention of gold.

  “So it often is,” Raymond remarked, his voice still stifled as excitement grew in him, “but such ways are locked and guarded.”

  “One is not…not now.”

  Ernaldus forced the words out through his teeth, terrified at Raymond’s lack of reaction. But Raymond was only fighting the desire to grab Ernaldus and drag him to the secret entrance without the necessary preparation. Raymond knew this could not be a trap. Guillaume needed no hostages because he already had in his hands the most valuable hostage in Provence. Thus, what Ernaldus offered was truly a path to Alys, now, this very night. To move or speak until he crushed his violent joy and eagerness, Raymond knew, would only lead to failure of the attempt through rash action.

  Finally Raymond gained enough control of his voice to ask, “Where is this open door?”

  “It is not an easy door,” Ernaldus faltered.

  “I do not care if it passes through hell,” Raymond exclaimed, “so long as it takes me into Les Baux.”

  The violent intensity of Raymond’s desire had broken through that time, and Ernaldus jerked with surprise. It frightened Ernaldus even more. It seemed clear to him that Raymond had not wanted to say what he did say, and the sudden about-face in intention startled Ernaldus. He shivered as Raymond caught his arm.

  “Where?” Raymond demanded, his voice shaking.

  “On the west, where the cliff is lowest, there is a way up the rock, not a path but a clear way of handholds and footholds,” Ernaldus gabbled.

  Raymond had leaned closer, and Ernaldus had finally seen his face. That, too, had a look of Rustengo. It was Raymond d’Aix! And the pale eyes frightened him. They seemed fixed and blind, like the eyes of one possessed. Ernaldus recalled the horrible notion he had had about the ghost of Lady Alys. He shivered again and checked that thought. Could he hope to placate the vengeful spirit?

  “But the door is not there,” Raymond said.

  This was only good sense, a soldier’s knowledge of correct tactical precaution, but Ernaldus shuddered violently. To him it seemed like unnatural prescience, a thing only a supernatural being would know. He shook so hard that Raymond noticed and called out for someone to bring a dry blanket or cloak. The creature might be sly and slimy as a snake, but Raymond did not want him too chilled to show the path.

  Still, he did not wait for the cloak to come but repeated, “Where is the door?”

  “Do you not know?” Ernaldus quavered.

  And suddenly Raymond laughed, because in a way he did know. Unless there was some special difficulty, the door should not be visible from the path that led to it. In this case, it would probably be around the corner of a tower or bend in the wall.

  “Perhaps I do,” Raymond acknowledged, not comprehending at all the terror he was fixing into Ernaldus’s mind and soul, “but tell me anyway.”

  Nothing could be hidden from the spirits of the dead, Ernaldus knew, and Lord Raymond had all but admitted he knew what was impossible for him to know, unless his dead wife possessed him. Ernaldus’s eyes rolled up in his head and he dropped unconscious.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Raymond was somewhat surprised when the clerk who called himself Bernard fainted dead away, but he attributed it to the man’s fear of being harmed now that all his secrets had been extracted from him. He could not be troubled with that and merely called the men nearest to him and bade them take Ernaldus to a tent and see if some warm wine would revive him. All Raymond’s attention was now concentrated on the practical aspects of entering and leaving Les Baux.

  Handholds and footholds were not too bad going up, Raymond knew, for he had done some climbing in the mountains near Gordes. However, they were very dangerous going down, and for Beatrice and Margot, impossible. Alys? Well, Alys might have difficulty, too, Raymond conceded grudgingly, he was rapidly approaching the state of mind in which he resented admitting there was anything Alys could not do. But the area around Marlowe had no mountains, and Alys could have had no experience with cliffs. Accordingly, seven men, all from mountainous areas with climbing experience, were chosen and every piece of rope in the camp was collected.

  These orders caused a good deal of grumbling. Arnald and his men came near to insubordination when they were told they could not accompany Raymond. Only the strongest representations of the fact that they would be a great danger to their mistress if they fell quieted their protests. By the time the ropes were tied together safely, the rain had stopped, but the night was considerably advanced. There was some danger that dawn would come before the rescue was complete.

  Raymond weighed that danger against the chance that Ernaldus’s absence would inspire a thorough search and the discovery of the unbarred secret way. Had he such a rat in his entourage, treachery such as opening a path into the keep would be the first suspicion in his mind, Raymond thought. On those grounds, it seemed the lesser risk to go at once.

  When Ernaldus was brought from the tent, he made no more protest than the single cry, “Will it not soon be light?” But he saw Raymond’s pale eyes flash, and his mind’s eye made out the fixed—possessed—eagerness of the face he could not really see. As he was set upon a horse, Ernaldus heard a command in a language he did not understand but recognized. The voice was familiar, too. It was the voice and language of Lady Alys’s master-at-arms. Ernaldus nearly fell off the horse, but the man behind whom he was riding felt him sway and gripped him tight.

  Now Ernaldus was so sick and frozen with terror that he could not scream, could not try to wrench himself free. He saw everything that had happened to him since that meeting with Lady Alys under the walls of Blancheforte
as one great pattern. Ernaldus knew he was evil. He knew he had not given mercy or caritas to his fellows. He had always told himself that there would be time to confess, to repent, to give to the Church and pray. When he had amassed sufficient wealth, when he had reached a position of honor, when he was content, then he would amend his life and make his peace with God.

  But he had been given a warning and had not heeded it. When Lady Alys reviled him for his wickedness, instead of taking warning and making restitution, he had arranged for her death. Ernaldus tried to find contrition, but what rose in him was hatred, only hatred, which was beaten down into terror but rose again. The blessed did not walk the earth after death nor possess other bodies. Thus, the blonde bitch, Lady Alys, was accursed, too, an emissary of Satan come to fetch him.

  Vaguely Ernaldus felt himself removed from the horse and prodded forward. There was brush and loose rock, and he was pushed and pulled, forced to crouch, even to lie down, then pushed and pulled onward. The trek seemed endless. Then there was a steep wall before him. He looked around in a dream. Was this hell already?

  “This is the west cliff face,” a voice said in his ear. “Where are the climbing holds?”

  The clouds had drawn off, and there was a glimmer of moonlight. Ernaldus had never seen this place in the dark, although he had come more than once by daylight. It was instinctive in him to seek a back door. He had not used this path to flee because he had been afraid to climb down, but he had marked the way well. He himself did not realize how well he had marked it.

  “Where?” the voice prodded.

  Ernaldus went forward, moving aimlessly along the cleft and fractured rock face farther west until he found a dark crevice. “Here,” he said. He did not care. They could only kill him, but he knew they would not. Worse was coming.

  The best climber came forward, hunchbacked under the great coil of rope. He felt around, grunted with satisfaction, and began to creep upward. Ernaldus watched without surprise. He was quite sure that had he chosen any other crevice, the handholds and footholds would have appeared there. It would be no trouble to God, or to the devil, to order such a thing. There was a profound silence. From the place where he had been pulled and forced to squat, Ernaldus looked out and around. There was soft breathing, but otherwise he would have sworn he was alone. At last there was a sound, a dull, soft, thumping slither. The rope had come down from above.

  When it did, Raymond took a half-step, then gritted his teeth and stepped back into the deeper shadow. He was so eager to get up the cliff that his breath would not come evenly. He smiled tautly, thinking that it took more strength and courage to wait at this moment, than to charge into the set lances of an opposing army. But wait he must, as he was the worst climber and more heavily burdened with steel mail and heavier weapons than his men.

  Waiting… Raymond’s head turned toward the clerk. Was that what was wrong with the man? Raymond knew there had been a change in him, but he hoped he had not exposed his suspicions. Perhaps Bernard either feared entering Les Baux again or feared heights. Or perhaps, Raymond thought, he had given some sign that he did not believe Bernard was an innocent clerk. The last thought made Raymond order that Ernaldus be gagged and bound. If he cried out or got away from them, they would be undone.

  Ernaldus submitted without objection to the gagging and having his hands bound, which Raymond thought peculiar, but when the man-at-arms reached around him to fasten the rope that would pull him up the cuff, he began to struggle, kicking and writhing. It was in restraining him that the hard rolls of gold coins fastened around his waist were discovered, and these were stripped away at once. Ernaldus went limp after the gold was gone. His struggles had been instinctive. Now he thought he should have expected it. The priests said a man could not take his wealth through death’s door, whether it led to heaven or to hell. He felt no fear as he was hauled swiftly up. Not yet. Worse was coming.

  The discovery of the gold virtually killed Raymond’s suspicions. It was reason enough for all the man’s peculiar behavior. Some of the nearly unbearable tension drained out of Raymond. It had been a strain to think he might be so close to the person who had tried to kill Alys and still keep a calm exterior instead of choking the man to death. And if Ernaldus was in Les Baux, they would get him easily when Sir Guillaume surrendered, as he must when his hostages were gone.

  Raymond went up directly after Ernaldus, not hauled but helped by the rope, and finally the last man reached the top and drew the rope up after him. Then they crouched and listened. They had not made much noise, and the crevice was in deep shadow. Unfortunately, the moon was out now, very low, but it sent a thin, cold light against the cliffs. That light struck them, and all crouched as close as possible to the foot of the wall. They did not expect to be noticed. Each man hoped the guards’ attention was on the woods at the foot of the road where the camp was.

  No cry of alarm rang out, and one at a time, they moved farther west along the wall and then around a sharp bend. Here there was shadow, the moonlight being blocked by the curve of the wall. Not much farther along was the heavy iron grating. One of the men took a pot from his pouch and applied a liberal coating of grease, working it in between the frame and the grating itself with his knife blade. He stuck his hand through and greased the hinges too, breaking his nails as he pushed the grease in and around. Another man joined him, greasing the latch, which was, as promised, unlocked. Satisfied at last, the men pushed cautiously. There was a low groan but no loud screech. They paused to listen, but Raymond gestured impatiently and they pushed the grating open all the way.

  Surprisingly, it was not difficult to slide in, although the opening was very small, as long as one went slowly, either hips first or with arms stretched above his head. After that discovery, everything was so easy that everyone, except Ernaldus, began to pray that so much good luck would not lead to bad. Behind the grating was no narrow crawl space but a reasonably commodious tunnel. This was utterly lightless, but feeling along the walls led them to the lower chamber of a tower. In this, the door to the bailey was open, and a thin gray light came in, enough to show the blacker shapes of tubs and barrels and save them from bumping against anything.

  Instinctively every man paused and drew weapons. It seemed too easy, as if it had been arranged to accommodate them, to draw them farther in. But it was too late to worry. Cautiously, Raymond stepped out into the bailey, tensed for a shout of alarm and a rush of defenders. But there was nothing. It was not complete silence, but the normal sounds of a nighttime keep, a vague medley of animals moving in pens somewhere, the low rustle of banked fires in the cooksheds, an occasional yap from the kennels. Raymond stepped back into the tower and murmured, “Bernard.” A man pushed the bailiff forward. “Which way is the Sow’s Tower?”

  This important question was the reason Raymond had brought Ernaldus with them. Unlike “square tower” or “north tower”, the name of this one gave no indication of shape or position. There was enough light near the doorway for Raymond’s eyes, now adjusted to the dark, to make out the blankness of Ernaldus’s face. “The Sow’s Tower,” Raymond repeated. The face remained blank, but the head turned and the dead-looking eyes gazed across the bailey.

  At first Raymond did not know whether the gesture was an answer—the only answer a gagged and bound man could make—or whether Ernaldus was looking away as a refusal to answer. A moment later, following the direction Ernaldus had looked, Raymond saw that it was an answer. Between the tower in which they stood and the one at which Ernaldus had looked were two others. Both of those showed black holes where doors stood open. The tower Ernaldus had indicated showed the dull reflection of moonlight from a surface, a closed, doubtless locked door.

  Raymond cursed softly under his breath. He was a fool, for he had not needed to bring the clerk after all. He felt foolish, too, about being alarmed by the open tower doors. Naturally those doors would be open. If an attack was expected, they would be left open so that the men could rush up to take their places on
the walls without wrestling with heavy doors.

  “Take Bernard back to the passage,” Raymond said softly to one of the men. “Tie his feet so that he cannot get away but tie them loosely so he can work himself free in a few hours in case we cannot come back for him.” Raymond did not like the clerk, but he would not condemn any man to die slowly and agonizingly of thirst and hunger.

  They traversed the bailey without causing any alarm. One of the men shuddered and crossed himself. Another mouthed silent prayers. It was easy, too easy. Raymond’s hand gripped his sword hilt until the knuckles showed white. Too smooth, too easy. He wondered if perhaps the key would not fit, but it did fit, and it turned without a screech. Raymond ground his teeth and pushed. The door swung back with only the faintest groaning.

  It was after the door was closed behind the last man that the signs of the end of the halcyon period began. First, the stench smote them. None of the men had a delicate nose, nor did Raymond himself, but it was rare for a tower to smell like the shaft of a garderobe. Then a man slipped on something and fell, his sword striking a barrel with a loud thunk. All froze, listening, but the sound had not betrayed them. Raymond snarled an order to take better care, but he did not ask who had slipped, knowing it could have been he as easily as another.

  In the pitch black, they felt for the stair, but Raymond went up alone, thinking it would be less frightening for the women since all knew his voice. The odor was worse as he climbed, and he almost fell off the stair altogether. “Enough,” he murmured under his breath, “we have had our ill fortune already. It is enough.” But he had a strong suspicion it was not going to be so easy, and when the inner door would not move upon lifting the latch and pushing, he stood for a moment fighting a sinking heart.

  First he cursed Bernard, thinking this door, too, was locked. Then he bethought himself that the same key might easily open both locks, and he began to feel for the lock plate, but the door was smooth from top to bottom. Last he tried throwing his weight against the door in case it was warped and stuck. Still, the door would not open. It moved inward just a little, then sprang back. Raymond stood thinking for a few seconds and realized the door must be barred on the inner side. But that was ridiculous! Prisoners do not lock themselves in! And then Raymond snarled softly. Three young women might indeed have good reasons to lock themselves in.