A Mortal Bane (2 page)

“I had expected that,” he said. “But I will want to stay the entire night, since I have no place else to sleep.”

“You will be welcome to stay. I must lock the house and outer gate at dark, but your woman will let you out and wait to let you in again.” She rose to her feet and gestured to the group of stools. “Please, do sit down. We do not serve meals unless they are specially ordered ahead of time, but I can give you wine, or beer, and bread and cheese, possibly a slice of pasty or some cold meat if you are hungry. I must see what is in the kitchen.”

“Wine, if you please,” he said, clearly restraining a shudder at the thought of ale or beer.

Magdalene smiled and fetched a pair of stemmed pewter drinking cups from the shelf. Having set them on the table, she filled them from a polished pitcher and brought the cups back. She was amused again when the man sipped gingerly, as if he expected something unpleasant, then smiled and drank more deeply. It was good wine, she knew. It was supplied by William of Ypres, leader of all of the king’s mercenary troops. Lord William had been her patron and protector for almost ten years and had uses for her house that had little to do with her skill and beauty or that of her women.

For that matter, most of her regular clients supplied their own wine, which was stored in the guesthouse cellar, each cask marked with a sign only she and her women would associate with the owner. William, because of those other purposes, sent more than he would ever drink, and some was for her own use. It was from that store that she had drawn the pitcher earlier in the day, so she felt free to offer it.

“Something to eat?” she asked.

“I thank you, no. I had my dinner at a friend’s house not long before I arrived here. The wine is very good.”

“A gift from a friend,” she said.

Plainly, this client was not prepared to tell her his name or anything more than that he had come from somewhere in or around London. She had answered as she did, also naming no names, to indicate that she could be trusted, but she did not mind that he did not respond. If he came again, he would learn that secrets were generally kept quite secure by the women of the Old Priory Guesthouse. However, Magdalene had the feeling that this man was not settling in England. He had an air of “passing through” about him.

“We have been having a pleasant spring,” she said, setting her cup down on the floor beside her and looking at the design she was embroidering.

“It is colder than I like,” the man replied agreeably, resting his cup on his knee and smiling at her. “London never changes, though. Each time I come, I am surprised to find it just the same. It seems to me so large and busy a city would change more.”

“Perhaps you do not notice the changes because it is so large and busy. For example, if a street changed from housing pepperers to housing mercers, likely it would look much the same to a passerby.”

As she spoke, Magdalene rapidly made the tiny chain stitches that outlined a leaf and then began to fill it with green silk. If it had been larger, she would have chosen a darker green for the central vein and a medium color between that and the leaf itself for the smaller veins. As it was only one of many similar very small leaves on a tree, she did not trouble. Thin as her needle was and fine as her thread, there was no room for greater detail.

“I suppose you are right,” he replied and then leaned forward. “That is very fine work you do.”

“We are recorded as a house of needle workers,” Magdalene said with a smile. “That is less out of any desire to deceive than to escape having to mark the house as a stew. And that is to avoid men walking in from the street, expecting to be serviced and disturbing our clients. When a man has paid five good silver pennies for his pleasure, he does not expect to be rushed, annoyed by noise, or suffer any inconvenience.”

The guest whistled and shook his head. “I should think not. You told me you were costly, but five pence….”

“That includes lodging for the night, stabling and feed for your horse, and such an evening meal and breakfast as we ourselves take, but if the price is too much, please accept the wine as a friendly gesture, warm yourself, and go free as you came. The priory is close, will lodge you safe, and is very easy to find. Just ride down the road to the first turning to the right. Take that until you come to another turning to the right. Take that and in a few yards, you will see the gate.”

He laughed aloud. “You do not chaffer over your goods? Ah, well, you cannot blame a man for trying. No, it is not too much. I will stay.”

“I do not wish to be rude,” Magdalene said with an apologetic smile, “but you are plainly not a resident of Southwark or of London. I am afraid—

“You want me to pay in advance?” His hand went to his full purse without hesitation and he emptied part of the contents into his other hand. Having picked out the coins, he handed them to her.

“I am very sorry to seem so untrusting,” she said, slipping her hand through the slit in her skirt and finding the pocket tied around her waist, “but we see so few strangers in this house. Usually one client brings another.”

The man shrugged. “A decent inn would cost two pennies, and the companions I would find in my bed—even those with only two legs—would be less pleasant.”

Magdalene laughed. “I promise you will find no companion with more than two legs in any of our beds, and you may bathe if you like also. Your woman will help you. They are all equally skilled.”

“For the price, I imagine they must be,” he remarked, but there was no sharpness to his voice, rather, a good-humored acceptance. “What I cannot understand is how such an establishment came to be in this place.”

“That is easy enough to explain. The order of nuns that founded St. Mary Overy was very strict. The nuns would not permit men, except their priest, into their convent walls. When the order failed and the brothers took over the convent, they found a guesthouse outside the walls to be hard to manage. Moreover, a wealthy guest, who came often, found it inconvenient, so he contributed a sum that permitted the brothers to build a new and more comfortable guesthouse inside the walls. Since the brothers had no more use for this house, it fell back into the hands of the then Bishop of Winchester.”

“And he felt that what the priory needed was a whorehouse sharing its wall?”

Magdalene could not help laughing at the wry expression and tone. “It was not the current Bishop of Winchester who made the decision, so I never knew the man, but I can understand his problem. He could not rent to anyone who had a trade that was noxious or noisy, and in any case, there are few who would find this house useful or convenient, having no place for a stall on the road, two rows of small cells for sleeping, and no area fit for a workroom. And the building is too good to throw down. It is stone-built, with a good slate roof. Moreover, there are not many who could afford the rent for such a building—

“Ah, you pay a good rent, do you?”

Magdalene cast her eyes up to the ceiling and sighed. “Indeed we do, and—” She stopped speaking and cocked her head, then nodded. “I think that will be Sabina’s client leaving. He likes to get home before dark, and the light is almost gone. I will get some torches for us now.”

She rose and took from the highest shelf several torchettes made of rounded blocks of herb-scented wax, each with a many-stranded wick, affixed to a wooden holder. These she set into iron loops on the walls, one at each side of the room and one near the door, before she lit them from the fire with a wax-tipped spill. As she moved about, she noticed her guest looking at the corridor with considerable interest; Magdalene turned away to take candles down from the other end of the shelf. If he expected to see someone who frequented the establishment, he was doomed to disappointment. All guests were shown out through the back door just so they would not need to pass any other client waiting in the common room. He seemed to realize this, because a second brief glance told Magdalene that he was smiling too, and had lifted his wine cup to his lips. A few moments later, footsteps came down the corridor. Magdalene set the candles into the holder on the table but did not light them and returned to her seat.

“I am here by the fire, Sabina,” she said to the tall, slender woman who entered the room, “and we have an unexpected but most welcome guest.”

“Welcome, indeed,” Sabina said, turning toward them and coming forward slowly.

Magdalene’s gaze flashed toward the man and saw his eyes widen, but she was not sure what had surprised him. Sabina was very beautiful. Her skin was flawless, its delicate pallor almost luminous, and although her thick hair did not reveal its rich red highlights in the dimmer light, it still flowed in waves and curls over her back and shoulders down to her hips. Moreover, her short nose and her full lips, turned up at the corners in the bare hint of a smile, gave that loveliness a look of saucy merriness. Still, the man might have expected beauty for the price she had set, so likely it was the fact that Sabina’s eyes, although her head was turned in their direction, were closed. The doubt was settled when he jumped to his feet and extended a hand, not to take her arm, but to touch it gently.

“Let me help you find a seat,” he said.

Sabina smiled and raised her hand to take his. “Thank you, my lord. Not only are you kind, but you know how to offer help to a blind person. My seat is the one with the lute. Since I cannot embroider, I make myself useful in another way. Would you like me to sing or to play?”

She allowed him to seat her, although Magdalene knew she was perfectly capable of finding her stool and removing the lute from the seat without knocking it to the floor. And when he said he would like to hear her, if she was not tired, she laughed in a low, musical murmur.

“We are not overburdened here,” she said. “If I were tired, I could have gone directly back to my room. My ears are keen. I heard that Magdalene was talking to someone. I came because I was willing to entertain you in any way you desire.”

‘Then I would like to hear you sing,” he said, and when they had decided on a song, he settled back to listen with clear pleasure.

By the time the song was done, two other women had entered the room. They stood quietly by the table, and Magdalene grinned when she saw her new guest look from one to the other with astonishment. Each was as beautiful as Sabina in her own way, but totally different. One was tiny and as dark as a Moor. Magdalene had always assumed Letice’s parents must have been Saracen captives taken in the Crusade and brought back to England as slaves instead of being ransomed. Her skin was a warm olive-brown, her almond-shaped eyes black, and her hair a raven curtain that hung to her knees, so dark and shining that it shimmered with glints of green and blue. The other was her opposite, with milk-white skin stained with crushed strawberry on the cheeks; large, round, cornflower-blue eyes; and a pursed, cherry-red mouth. Her hair was golden and fell into curls and ringlets to her waist.

When the song ended and the women saw the guest’s eyes on them, they both curtsied. “I am Ella,” the blonde said, coming forward with a broad smile. “I am so glad you could come.”

The dark woman came forward, too, but said nothing, only nodded her head in greeting and took a seat beside Magdalene, reaching down for her sewing basket.

“And what is your name?” the man asked the dark woman.

“Her name is Letice,” Magdalene said, “and she is mute, so I am afraid she cannot make light conversation. However, she is a very skilled…embroideress and dances exquisitely. She is expressive enough about what is important here.”

Letice looked sidelong at the guest under her long lashes, and her lips parted a trifle. “So I see,” he said.

Magdalene chuckled. “I will go and tell Dulcie to bring our evening meal now. Why do you not go to the table with the women and speak with them a little. That should make your choice among them easier.”

He shook his head. “Nothing can make a choice among three such beauties easier,” he said as he rose, but then he bent to touch Sabina’s hand. “That was a lovely song, Sabina. May I show you where the table is?”

“Oh, she can find it herself,” Ella said in her little girl’s voice as Magdalene started down the corridor. “We are never allowed to move anything lest Sabina bump into it. She—oh, Letice, stop! You know Magdalene promised that I could light the candles tonight.”

Magdalene heard Sabina replying, reminding Ella that she had nearly set her hair afire the last time, and then, as Ella began to whimper, suggesting that if she would allow Letice to tie back her hair, Letice would let her light the spill, but she must be very careful. Magdalene sighed with relief. There would be no need to explain to their guest that Ella was simple.

She found, when she returned from making clear to Dulcie that there would be five at the table and nodding approval of the dishes the maid suggested, that she would not need to assure her guest that Ella was not being used against her will either. Having required the guest’s help to light the candles—as evidenced by his removing his hand from hers just as Magdalene entered the room—Ella frankly rubbed herself against him to display the virtue that made her so popular as a bed partner: her wholehearted and single-minded delight in sex.

“Ella, my love, we do not urge ourselves on guests,” Magdalene reproved gently.

Ella sighed and moved away. “But he is such a pretty man,” she said. “Sabina does not care how they look. She does not need to look at them.”

Sabina laughed. “But I know how they look all the same, love. My fingers tell me. And there are so few who know how to help a blind woman without pulling and pushing at her. What is more, he has a lovely voice. So do not be a greedy little bird. We all want this one.”

“Now, now, you will make the poor man blush,” Magdalene said just as Letice came forward and touched the tip of a pointed finger to the guest’s lips, following the gentle touch with an even gentler kiss. “Sit down, all. You are getting in Dulcie’s way.”

As the maid stepped through the corridor door and went to lay five large rounds of stale bread on the table, two at each long bench and one at the head, the man handed Sabina to a bench and sat down beside her. Ella, pouting only a little, sat on the other side of the table, while Letice went to the shelves and took down five cups, three knives, five spoons, and a ladle. She placed the ladle at Magdalene’s seat and left no knife at the guest’s or Ella’s; he had his own, and Ella would not touch a knife.