BURY ME DEEP an utterly gripping crime thriller with an epic twist (Detective Rozlyn Priest Book 1)

by Jane Adams

  “You were late last night,” Treven said as Hugh joined him by the fire.

  Hugh shrugged. “You were snoring when I returned. How would you know?”

  “I woke when you near fell on top of me. I could smell the ale on your breath and when I went outside to piss, the moon had almost set. You were late enough almost to be early.”

  Hugh laughed. “What of it?” he asked lightly.

  “Were you with Cate?”

  Hugh sighed, impatient with this ongoing refrain. “For some time I was with Cate,” he acknowledged. “We argued about that husband of hers. She said she must return home before he missed her, so I found someone more willing.”

  “Hugh, this will not do. Leave the lass alone, for the love of Christ.”

  Hugh cut himself another chunk of mutton and folded it inside his bread. “Ay, well, on that score, you’ll be getting your wish. She told me last night, she’d not see me again.”

  “She’s said that before.”

  “She has, but last night she meant it and I must respect her word, though it grieves me to think of her in Eldred’s bed. The man is an oaf and an ingrate. If you’d any sense, my friend, you’d be rid of him.”

  “And what good would that do any of us? Eldred is coming to see I have the best interest of the community at heart. You can’t expect change overnight, Hugh. The man and his brother have been effective lords here these past years. To them, I am a usurper.” And you even more so, he thought, but he chose not to say this aloud. “I’m glad the girl has seen sense, though,” he added with feeling. “Your relations with her could only lead to grief.”

  “She’s with child,” Hugh blurted suddenly.

  Treven stared at him. “Yours or his? Or don’t you know?”

  Hugh didn’t answer at first. “It could be either,” he admitted finally. “She had to tell him. She told him also she'd done nothing with me to be shamed of and she thinks he believes her, or, at least, chooses to seem to.”

  “God above, Hugh. When will you learn?”

  “The man is an animal, Treven.”

  “And you’re not? You rut like one. You yourself told me you went from this lass to another’s bed.” He shook his head and then rubbed hard at his belly as it cramped painfully. “Christ curse it!” He poured more of Osric’s mint fragrant potion into his cup and drank, fighting the urge to vomit.

  Hugh watched him with narrowed gaze. “If this continues, you should return to Winchester and seek help,” he said. “I do not trust Osric’s skills. Treven, I’ve not seen you cramped like this, even when we’ve been forced to eat rotten food and carrion leavings.”

  Treven waved his concern away. “It will pass,” he told Hugh. “It is better than it was.” He had not told Hugh about his dream or the sense that it was the omen of something so very wrong. Hugh’s way of thinking was not like Treven’s. He would either laugh at his imaginings or tell him to see a priest.

  And thinking of priests . . . Reaching for his pack, Treven withdrew the leather wallet that had been sent by the King. Inside were the deeds to this land and a command signed by Aelfred himself that Abbot Kendryk of Storton Abbey should respect Treven as King’s Thegn and leave off troubling him. It was an honour Treven had never looked for, that the King should name him as one under his direct command and he had read the words practically off the page in the days since the messenger had arrived bearing it. There was a sanction attached, of course. Treven, as King’s Thegn, would have to spend each third month in his Lord’s house, but Aelfred had put off this demand until Eastertime the following year, to give Treven time to settle affairs on his lands and for this, Treven was doubly grateful. He recalled the words of the Heliand that he had read the night before and felt a moment of exaltation. Perhaps, after all, the reward for service was not only night terrors.

  Kendryk was due today. He’d lodge at the Scrivener’s home, it still being more fitting to his status and comfort than Treven’s half-finished hall. There were grievances to be heard, disputes held over from the Shire Court and directed to Treven’s judgement and Treven was glad that Kendryk had come to observe the proceedings. Not only was it good timing for Treven to show this new covenant, but Kendryk would see, also, that Aelfred’s newly drafted laws were to be implemented without delay.

  Glancing up as a shadow blocked the light from the door, he saw Osric standing in readiness.

  “It’s time we were on our way,” he told Hugh. “It wouldn’t do to keep the Abbot waiting on us. At least, not for too long.”

  * * *

  Abbot Kendryk had set up court in the Scrivener’s yard. A massive oak chair, carried from the abbey, had been set atop the steps and from this vantage point, Kendryk surveyed his subjects. He lifted his gaze to observe Treven and Hugh and their little entourage as they trotted into the yard and Treven was struck by the political play in which this man of God involved himself.

  “He seeks to lord it over you,” Hugh commented.

  “He requires the trappings of authority,” Treven said simply. “I do not. He must bring twenty monks plus their servants and lay brothers with him to make a point of his own importance. He’s welcome to them. I hold power here, Hugh, and the Abbot knows it.”

  He was conscious of Hugh’s sideways look. Of the little doubt in his friend’s mind. Treven had not been one for such game play, but he had observed it at close enough quarters to understand it. Kendryk had his entourage; Treven had the authority of the King. Both Abbot and Thegn were required if the peace was to be kept and the region prosper and the two were equally aware of that.

  Hugh laughed briefly and softly. “Since when were you a reader of men’s minds?”

  “Since I had reason to be. Come, let us get to business.”

  They dismounted and crossed the open space. Kendryk did not move to greet them. Hugh, raised with customs that Treven saw as Frankish and demeaning, knelt to receive his blessing while Treven looked on, meeting Kendryk’s gaze; the man’s attention on Treven even while he murmured the Benedictus over his companion.

  Kendryk was an old man but he had lost nothing of his strength or sinew. His grey hair curled softly about his tonsure, but that was the only moderated aspect. His skin, stretched tight enough to outline his skull, was tanned as dark as that of a farmer, the sharp planes of his cheek bones jutting and cadaverous and his hands, leathery on their backs, scuffed and calloused at the palm like a pair of well-worn gloves that fitted tight to the bone.

  He motioned to one of his followers. “Bring seats for their lordships,” he said, and it was done in the next instant. Two monks returning with the carved chairs belonging to the brothers. They set them beside Kendryk on the topmost step and Treven sat, then looked about him wondering where the Scriveners could be.

  “Edmund and his brother will return presently,” Kendryk told him, noting his interest. “There was some disturbance they were called to investigate.”

  “Oh?”

  Kendryk shrugged, a tiny lifting of one shoulder, though Treven noted also the fractional irritation that flitted across his death’s-head features.

  “They were not here to greet you?” Treven guessed.

  “They left instructions for our comfort with their serving men.”

  “And Cate. She was absent also?”

  Kendryk turned his head to look at Treven. He registered faint surprise, as though the woman’s nonattendance had not registered with him before. “Yes,” he said. “She too was gone.” He frowned. “Let us hope that her disappearance is a temporary one. One woman missing from the Scrivener household is misfortune enough.”

  “You heard of that?” Treven was not surprised. “They say she fled with her lover?” He made a question of the comment and Kendryk thought before replying.

  “Some say that.”

  “And what do you say?”

  Kendryk held Treven’s gaze for a moment more, then he turned his head slowly away and scanned the scene before him as though considering. “I say that i
t was Allis Scrivener’s skill that kept this land intact and this vill from suffering.” He registered Treven’s surprise without turning back to him. “You don’t think those two oafs have the slightest notion, do you? Or the father, for that matter. He’s been sick with grief since his wife was taken from him.”

  “So Allis ran the estate?”

  “Allis and her sister. Their mother before that. The land came down from the female line and the women had sense to keep it that way.”

  “You knew the mother?”

  “I have been here for many seasons, King’s Thegn. Oh yes,” he replied to Treven’s unspoken question. “Aelfred sent a copy of your deeds to lodge in the Abbey library. For safekeeping, so he told me, but also, I am sure, to emphasise his reckoning of your territories. But to return to our discussion. I knew the mother while she was still a child and watched the girls grow into women. Had Edmund sense, he would have clung and cloven to his woman like a limpet to a rock. She was the wealth of this land, the knowledge, the healer and the wise woman after her mother went. The man was a fool not to take note of another’s interest or to give Allis reason enough to remain.”

  “It’s rumoured she was barren.” It was the first contribution Hugh had made to the conversation.

  “It is rumoured, also, that she chose not to encumber herself with an infant until she was certain that the peace would be lasting.”

  “She chose?” Treven was confused. “How can a woman choose?”

  Hugh laughed aloud. “I’m told there are ways,” he said. “Certain herbs. A sponge soaked in oil or honey. I’ve never encountered such,” he added quickly, his face and mood growing solemn as though suddenly recalling that he was discussing such matters with an Abbot.

  Treven looked to Kendryk for confirmation.

  “Allis once told me that she’d seen too many babes die of lack of milk when their mothers starved and too many infants perish with the cold,” he said. “She told me she would choose a time to bear Edmund’s children, when she could be certain there was a future for them in which to grow.”

  “And you condoned this?” Treven was not sure what to think. “Surely, the gods . . .” He broke off and began again. “Surely,” he repeated. “God grants the right to have a child.”

  Kendryk’s lips tightened, though whether in disapproval at his slip or in amusement Treven could not quite decide. He suspected the latter and was irritated with himself that the beliefs of his pagan mother could still insinuate when he least expected.

  “Perhaps another time might be better in pursuit of this,” Kendryk said. “Since the brothers have not returned, we should proceed without them and hear the disputes we came here to judge.”

  Treven nodded. Kendryk was right, the morning was well advanced and the string of petitioners reached now back almost to the forest fence. Kendryk spoke to one of his entourage and the monk went down into the crowd and brought a man forward to speak.

  * * *

  It was almost noon when a shout from somewhere in the crowd distracted them. Treven rose to his feet and laid a hand on the pommel of his sword, looking towards the cause of the disturbance.

  Along the path from the wood came a bullock cart, the animals urged forward by a frantic Edmund. Eldred could be seen, bending over something or someone in the pit of the cart and following on behind a straggled knot of villagers.

  Treven ran down the steps and went swiftly to meet them on the path.

  Hugh, on his feet now, remained beside Kendryk atop the steps. The abbot himself did not move but gestured to two of his monks to follow Treven.

  “What is it?” Treven demanded.

  Edmund turned to him, his face stricken and pale. “It’s Cate,” he said. “She’s badly hurt.” He lowered his voice. “I don’t give much for her chances, but Eldred will hear none of that. Gwan!” he urged the cattle forward, the hazel rod across their flanks prompting greater speed, though Treven could see that the animals were at full pace. He came around the back of the cart and looked down on the flat bed to see what Eldred was tending. Cate Scrivener, pretty, neat little Cate, lay like a bundle of blooded rags across her husband’s legs. He clasped her close to him and Treven could see from his face that he had been weeping. Now, though, that grief had transmuted into slow burning and dangerous rage.

  “Where did you find her?”

  “Ranuf found her beside the trackway this dawn.” He jerked his chin towards those following the cart. “She’d been all night in the open. Her clothes were wet with dew and the ground soaked in blood. Ranuf carried her home and send the boy to fetch me.”

  “At dawn?” It was now almost noon. Why had this taken so long? “How far away was this?”

  “The place is not easy. Ranuf burns charcoal. He and his son had been watching the clamp all night. When his brother came to relieve him, he found her, close by the main track. We had to send to fetch the cart.” He took a deep uneven breath. “This is your doing, Treven.”

  “Mine?”

  “You brought him here. He used her, discarded her, left her like this to die and lie like wolf bait.”

  “Hugh. You’re accusing Hugh of doing this. On what grounds?”

  Eldred laughed wildly. “Are you blind and stupid? You know his interest in her. I know she’s crept out at night to lie with him. She roused once, when we came to her. She spoke his name.”

  The cart had halted now and Edmund come round the back to help lift Cate. “This is true,” Treven questioned. “She accused Hugh?”

  Edmund hesitated. “As my brother said. She spoke his name. Gently now, let us get her inside. Gently brother. Tend to your wife first . . .” But Eldred had seen his enemy and was out of the cart and running for the steps. Treven leapt after him, grabbing him by the arm and then wrestling him to the ground before he reached his goal.

  “Let me be!”

  “So you can cut him down and have your own life forfeit?” Treven whispered furiously. “Eldred, think on, just for an instant.” He hesitated. There was no kind way to say this. “What if her speaking of his name was not in accusation. What if . . .Eldred, if as you say they were lovers . . . is it not possible she roused and hoped to find him there?”

  It was a painful, terrible question and he saw in Eldred’s eyes that it was one he had already asked himself. So much easier to believe Cate spoke of guilt.

  Treven looked towards the steps where Hugh still waited, uncertain. His eyes widened as he saw the bundle lifted from the cart. “Cate? Cate! Oh Sweet Jesus. What have you done to her?” This last was aimed at Eldred and he leaped for the man much as the brother had leaped towards Hugh. Treven was forced to release Eldred. He grabbed at Hugh, calling to Osric and his servants for aid. Osric seized Eldred’s wrists and held them fast behind his back while Treven took charge of his recalcitrant friend. “There is nothing to be gained by this! Now calm, both of you, or I’ll have you bound and set under guard.”

  “I want to go to my wife.”

  “Then go. Peaceful!”

  Osric released him reluctantly but followed close behind as Eldred mounted the steps and followed his brother into the hall. “Osric is skilled with herbs and healing,” Treven told him. “Let him see.”

  Eldred looked back, his face dark and closed and his eyes cold as though he might refuse. The he nodded and gestured Treven’s man inside. “If she dies,” he told Hugh. “I’ll see you pay with your life, law or no law to back me.”

  CHAPTER 17

  Rozlyn arrived at the Queen’s just before eight o’clock. It had begun to rain, a light, soaking drizzle fine as yellow mist in the sodium light. She paused outside to switch off her mobile. She didn’t think it would improve relations should it ring during her audience with the king of Queens.

  This time the silence on her entering the pub was only momentary; a mere dip in volume as she was assessed and recognised. Big Frank was seated in his accustomed place and he raised a bottle of beer in welcome as Rozlyn came in. He was pouring it by the time
Rozlyn reached the table, tilting the glass with that skill Rozlyn had never quite mastered so that the head floated light and even. Whenever Rozlyn tried she had to pause to let it settle first before she could fill the glass. Usually, she just drank from the bottle, but didn’t think Big Frank would approve of such uncouth behaviour.

  No one spoke until Frank had placed the glass in front of Rozlyn and raised his own.

  “Cheers,” Rozlyn said.

  Big Frank acknowledged with a slight inclination of his head before drinking deep. “Did you find that girl?” Frank asked when at last he came up for air.

  “Girl?”

  “The one who lived in that shit hole of a flat.”

  “Oh. Clara. No, not yet.” She took another sip of her drink and then asked, “How did your boys know I’d be there today?”

  “I put out word to keep an eye open for you, so they could tell you that I expected you here at eight.”

  Ah, Rozlyn thought. Well that was comforting — that Big Frank’s boys were keeping an eye open for her. She merely nodded, as though this was expected and changed the subject.

  “This Thomas Thompson you wanted to know about. Talk to me.”

  Rozlyn considered. She had an inkling that Frank already knew as much as she did and that this was as much a test of honest intent as it was a need to know. In truth, Rozlyn thought, there wasn’t much to tell, and she didn’t see harm in letting Frank know what they had. There would be far more harm in withholding.

  “He owns at least two houses, probably more. He uses them to house illegal immigrants. We think. And there’s precious little proof. We know that Charlie Higgins cleaned for him and that Thompson paid him well and used him regularly. I’ve got reason to believe that Clara Buranou was one who came into the country with the aid or otherwise of this Thomas Thompson. That Charlie got involved with her somehow because of that. I figure he felt sorry for her. Whatever, he helped her find work.”