Then, it began to occur to her. She’d told Maxton of the Mother Abbess, of her Staff of Truth, and of The Chaos. She’d told a man she didn’t even know about things that could kill her, but she’d trusted him right away. Perhaps it was only because he’d bought her a meal, but she knew it was more than that. There was something about the enormous knight that told her he was trustworthy. She didn’t know what it was beyond a feeling or an instinct, but she knew there was something in him that was honorable. He’d already tried to help her escape St. Blitha once, but she’d refused. Perhaps, he would know what to do in this terrible situation. Perhaps, he could even warn the king off of coming to St. Blitha for the feast day. In any case, she had to try.
She had to find him.
If you ever need me, my lady, leave word at The King’s Gout Tavern.
Gathering Lady Hinkley’s fine things, she left via the postern gate, quickly heading out to the road that led into the city of London.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Farringdon House
“Has he awoken yet?” William asked.
Maxton shook his head at The Marshal. “Nay, my lord,” he replied. “We plied him with much alcohol after he was already drunk, so it may take time to sleep this off.”
William sighed heavily. He was standing on the top floor of Farringdon House with Maxton, Kress, Achilles, and Alexander. The four men had just brought in an unconscious man who stank to the heavens of alcohol and body odor, tossing him into a bed to sleep off his binge before telling William who, exactly, the man was and why he was there.
It had been the catch of a lifetime.
William, who happened to be at Farringdon House because his meeting with the king and the marcher lords had dispersed early, stood in the doorway of the chamber that held the snoring drunkard, hoping that they’d found the key to the papal assassins in that smelly, slobbering Scotsman.
“Then I suppose we’ll have to wait until he decides to awaken,” William said. “There is nothing more we can do.”
“Nay, my lord,” Maxton agreed. “We will send a guard up to keep an eye on him.”
Alexander, who was still by the door, shook his head. “Nay, Max,” he said. “I will remain here. He is my quarry, after all. Moreover, I feel as if he is an old friend now. I must stay and greet him when he awakens.”
Maxton agreed with the wave of a hand and the men moved away from the chamber door to go their separate ways. Before they could get too far, however, William stopped them.
“Max,” he said. “I saw Sean at Westminster Palace earlier. It seems that John is, indeed, hunting tomorrow in the woods of Windsor, so you and your men may wish to shadow the hunting party for John’s sake. But he mentioned something else, too, because you asked to be apprised of his movements – John is going to St. Blitha in two days to take part in the feast day. St. Blitha is the patroness of hunters, as you know, and he intends to offer prayers so she will bless his hunting bloodlust. It might be wise to appear at St. Blitha as well.”
St. Blitha. There was that name again, that abbey that kept popping up. It wasn’t as if St. Blitha was the only abbey in or around London; there were several. But on this day, St. Blitha was the only one he’d heard of. First with Andressa, then with the drunkard Douglas, and now the king. Rather fortuitous, he thought. He would happily shadow the man to St. Blitha – he was only sorry it was two days away.
“Aye, my lord,” he said. “In fact, I was already at St. Blitha today. It is a very long story, but I shall do my best to make it concise – this morning, as I was returning to Farringdon House after my night of food and drink, I came across a young woman stealing bread. As it turned out, she was a pledge from St. Blitha.”
“So that’s what happened,” Kress said. “You mentioned St. Blitha this morning, but you did not say why. What in the world was a pledge from St. Blitha doing stealing bread?”
Maxton held up a hand, asking for patience as he continued. “Feeling pity for the woman, I fed her,” he said. “But what she told me… God help me, St. Blitha’s is a place of sin and sorrow. She said that the Mother Abbess sells the food meant for the nuns and pledges of St. Blitha to fill her own table with fine food, leaving her charges to starve. That is why she was stealing bread. The pledge further told me that the Mother Abbess murders women who displease her.”
That drew a reaction from all four of the men; eyebrows lifted in surprise. “A Mother Abbess who murders?” William repeated, shocked. “Are you certain? I have never heard such madness.”
“Nor I,” Maxton assured him. “The pledge, whose name is Andressa du Bose, told me that the Mother Abbess carries a staff with her that she calls the Staff of Truth, but the bottom half of the staff is really a sharp blade sheathed in wood to make it look like it’s part of the staff. She sends those who displease her into the dungeons of St. Blitha, a place she calls The Chaos. No one returns from The Chaos alive because the Mother Abbess evidently murders them with the blade from her Staff of Truth.”
More shocking information. “My God,” William breathed. “A horrific tale, if true.”
Maxton shook his head. “I did not sense the pledge was lying. If you’d only seen the woman, my lord, you would believe her, too. It was a terrible story she told.”
“St. Blitha belongs to Essex, doesn’t it?” Achilles spoke up. Surprisingly, he was the most pious of the Executioner Knights, and often wrestled with that faith when carrying out his dark missions. “It is part of the Bishopric of Essex, and I am sorry to say that it is well-known that Essex is a man of questionable honor.”
“Exactly.” Maxton pointed a finger at him to emphasize his point. “He also has questionable morals. Remember the nun that was executed in Chelmsford the year we left for The Levant? She told everyone she was pregnant by Essex and was executed for her blasphemy.”
William pinched the bridge of his nose as if struggling with the dark and dirty deeds from people who were supposed to uphold the morality of the church. He’d had his own troubles with them, which made the story Maxton was telling more than believable in his mind.
“I remember,” he muttered. “I’d also heard through reliable sources that it wasn’t the first bastard of the Bishop of Essex. It was simply the one that became public knowledge.”
Maxton shook his head. “Given that quagmire of sex and lies, I tend to believe the pledge,” he said grimly. “She lives behind walls that hide that hell from the world. But more than that, remember that St. Blitha’s was the abbey that Sherry tracked Douglas to. He knows that Douglas spent some time there for an unknown reason.”
William nodded, remembering what he’d been told of the entire situation with Alexander and Alasdair Baird Douglas. He’d also been told of the ensuing conversation in the tavern when Maxton, Kress, and Achilles plied the man with drink and tried to interrogate him, a conversation that still had his head swimming. So much of it was leading, with very little answers. He felt as if they were no better off than they were before.
“We need to find out why Douglas was there,” he said. “If the man is our assassin, then we must find out all he knows. Your conversation with him in the tavern has brought us more questions than answers, unfortunately.”
Maxton leaned against the wall behind him, lost in thought. It was a conversation he’d been stewing over since it happened. “When we spoke to Douglas earlier, he said something that caught my attention,” he said. “He said that our prayers will be answered and we shall have a new king, so clearly, he knows about the assassination order. That was increasingly evident as we spoke.”
“But he also said that no man will answer our prayers,” Achilles put in. “He was very clear about no man answering our prayers.”
Maxton looked at him, his eyebrows lifted. “So we shall have divine intervention?” he asked. “A saint is supposed to answer our prayers for the death of a king?”
“He was at St. Blitha,” Alexander entered into the conversation. When the men looked at him curiously, he continued. “I know,
I said I was staying with Douglas. But the man is still unconscious and I felt the need to help. I have a guard watching him for now. You just finished telling us of the terrible darkness of the abbey, of a Mother Abbess who murders and pledges who starve. Mayhap Douglas went to St. Blitha to pray for a successful assassination, knowing of the evil of those who control St. Blitha. Think of it; the Holy Father has a devout servant in the Bishop of Essex, and Essex controls St. Blitha. There must be a connection there that we are not seeing.”
Maxton held up a finger as a thought formed. “Or…” he said, paused, and started again. “Or, given the fact that the Mother Abbess is a murderer, mayhap he sought her advice on how to proceed. Mayhap, she is part of the assassination plot, too.”
“Or mayhap she is the assassin,” Achilles said quietly. “Douglas said that no man would answer our prayers. The Mother Abbess is not a man.”
Maxton’s eyes widened as the logic of that statement made complete and utter sense. “The nun,” he hissed. “And John is due to St. Blitha in two days.”
The hammer had fallen. Now, the pieces of the puzzle were falling in line and the astonishment was clear on their faces. An assassin nun? It seemed far too outlandish but, given the clues, it made sense.
No man shall answer yer prayers, Douglas had said.
But a woman could.
“God’s Bones,” William hissed. “Is it true? Do we have to protect John from a nun?”
No one had a definitive answer for him because they were all swept up in the shocking possibilities. As Maxton opened his mouth to speak, a guard from the manor gate appeared on the stairs, distracting them.
“My lord?”
William responded. “What is it?”
The guard shook his head. “Nay, my lord,” he said. “I meant Sir Maxton.”
Maxton looked over his shoulder. “What do you want?”
The guard gestured with a thumb down the stairs. “There is someone asking for you at the gatehouse,” he said. “He says he’s from The King’s Gout. He wants to talk to you.”
Maxton didn’t react for a moment, but then his eyes opened wide and he flew down the stairs without another word. As the guard ran after him, William, Kress, Achilles, and Alexander looked to each other with some concern.
“The King’s Gout?” Kress repeated. “That’s the tavern over by the Street of the Bakers, isn’t it?”
Alexander’s brow furrowed, as if a thought had suddenly occurred to him. “Didn’t Max say that the pledge this morning was stealing bread?”
The light went on in Kress’ eyes. “And then he fed the woman a meal. It must have been at the nearest tavern.”
“The King’s Gout,” they all said in unison.
Soon, they were all moving down the stairs, thinking there must be a connection between The King’s Gout and the pledge from St. Blitha. So many pieces to a puzzle that was pulling together, but all of them were thinking the same thing – there had to be a connection between the pledge and the tavern, and now someone from the tavern had come to give Maxton a message.
There wasn’t one of them that didn’t want to know the details of that message.
The mystery deepened.
Maxton recognized the messenger.
It was the son of the tavern keeper at The King’s Gout, a tall and pale young man who was half the size of his blobish father. Maxton remembered the young man because he was evidently somewhat of a loaf and when Maxton had been at the tavern earlier, the father had been yelling at the lad because he hadn’t moved fast enough for his liking. There was also a swat with a shovel involved.
But the young man appeared healthy enough, with no imprints of shovels on him. Unless he’d been hit in the head, of course, which was a possibility because he had crossed eyes, making it difficult to know where, exactly, the young man was looking. Maxton had the gate guards usher him into the shadowed courtyard.
“Well?” Maxton demanded. “Why has your father sent you?”
The young man looked at him; or, at least, one of his eyes looked at him. “Are ye Loxbeare, m’lord?”
Maxton nodded sharply. “Do you have a message for me?”
The young man looked him up and down. “I do, m’lord,” he said. “From a lady. She wants to know if ye’ll see her.”
“What lady?”
“She gives her name as Andra… Andra…”
“Andressa?”
“Aye, m’lord.”
The mere mention of the name seemed to set Maxton on fire. He reached out, grasping the young man by the arm. “Is she at the tavern?” he demanded forcefully. But just as swiftly, he let go of the young man’s arm. “I shall go with you. Let me collect my things.”
But the young man put his hands up to slow Maxton down. “She’s not at the tavern, m’lord,” he said. “Wait here. I’ll bring her.”
Maxton’s eyebrows drew together. “Bring her here?” he said. “Where is she?”
The young man kept his hands up as if to beg patience from the enormous knight who seemed quite fired up by the mention of the lady. He dashed away, heading for the fortified door where the guards were and, at Maxton’s urging, the guards opened the door and the young man ran through it.
Puzzled, Maxton was heading for the door himself to see what was going on when the young man suddenly reappeared with a figure in tow. It took Maxton less than a brief second to realize it was Andressa.
She looked frightened and a little dazed, wrapped up in her dirty woolens like a shield from the world at large. The young man had her by the arm, urging her forward, but when she saw Maxton, she needed no urging. Their eyes met and she scurried through the open door.
“My lady?” Shocked, Maxton moved quickly to her. “Are you well?”
Andressa gazed up at him with an expression that told him all he needed to know. No, she wasn’t well. Something was very wrong, and he immediately noticed that she was trembling. As she struggled for an answer to his question, he dug into the purse at his belt and gave the young man a coin. When the young man dashed off, Maxton took Andressa by the arm and gently pulling her into the courtyard.
“I… I am sorry to have come uninvited,” Andressa finally said. “You said that I could leave word for you at The King’s Gout, but… it could not wait for you to receive it. I asked the tavern keeper if he would tell me where you lived and he had his son bring me here. I am very sorry to be such trouble, but…”
Maxton interrupted her. “It is no trouble at all,” he said. “I am glad you found me. How may I be of service?”
Andressa looked around; they were in the interior courtyard of a very big manor house and there were people all around, people she didn’t know. People who could tell the Mother Abbess that she’d come to this place. Suddenly, her fear had the better of her and she began to back away.
“I should not have come,” she whispered tightly, tears filling her eyes as she tried to pull her arm from his grip. “I should go. Forgive me, please.”
There was something desperate and almost incoherent about her manner, concerning Maxton a great deal. As much as she tried to pull away from him, he would not let her.
“Do not be troubled,” he assured her calmly. “No one will hurt you, I promise. What is so important that you had to come and find me?”
Andressa was coming to realize he wasn’t about to let her go so she stopped pulling. But she didn’t want to speak in front of all of these people even though they appeared not to be paying any attention to her. She couldn’t be sure they wouldn’t overhear what she had to say. She was trying very hard not to cry.
“May we… may we speak privately, please?” she whispered. “I do not have much time, my lord. Quickly, please.”
His reply was cut off as men suddenly surrounded them. Kress, Achilles, Alexander, and William were suddenly there, all around them, and Andressa panicked at the sight of so many armed men. She shrunk back from the big knights, struggling to pull away from Maxton again, so much so that he grabbed h
er with both hands and pulled her against him, trying to give her some comfort.
“Have no fear, my lady,” he assured her quickly, backing away from his friends to put distance between the frantic lady and the strange knights. “They will not hurt you, I swear it. They are simply clumsy, but they mean you no harm. Please meet my close and good friends Sir Kress de Rhydian, Sir Achilles de Dere, Sir Alexander de Sherrington, and William Marshal, Earl of Pembroke. Surely you have heard of Lord William? He is a very great and important man.”
Andressa was looking at all of them with big eyes, caught up in a web of men that had her rethinking her idea to seek out Maxton. It didn’t seem like a good idea any longer, but she felt like she was trapped now. She couldn’t even respond to his introductions. She looked at him, her big eyes pooling with tears.
“Please,” she begged again. “I must speak to you privately.”
Maxton simply nodded, holding a hand out to the four men hovering around them, silently pleading with them not to follow. They obeyed, but it was clear they didn’t want to. Seeing the very poorly-dressed woman in Maxton’s grip suggested this was the very pledge Maxton had been speaking of throughout the day, something that had their curiosities sharpened. She was from St. Blitha, and they all knew that St. Blitha was the key to this entire mystery.
Maxton knew that, all too well. He knew exactly what they were thinking as he put a big arm around Andressa’s shoulders and led her back into the house, into the darkened ground level. The only thing down here were armories and kitchens and servants’ rooms, so he took her up the great mural stairs and into the first chamber they came to, a smaller receiving room that was next to the massive solar.
The receiving room was generally meant for retainers of the great men who would attend The Marshal in his solar, so it was comfortable and well-appointed. It was also private, with only one door and one window that faced out over the inner courtyard. Maxton escorted Andressa inside and turned to close the door, but the moment he released her, she drifted over to the other side of the chamber and collapsed in the corner.
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