Cursed in the Blood: A Catherine LeVendeur Mystery (40 page)

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Authors: Sharan Newman

BOOK: Cursed in the Blood: A Catherine LeVendeur Mystery
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“I’m sorry,” he said. “I never should have—”
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I should never have—”
They both stopped at the same time.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“No one has hurt us, but Willa is missing,” Catherine said.
“We found her. Everything’s fine, now,” Edgar told her. “I’m taking you back to Durham with me. Then we’re going to Wearmouth and take the first boat home.”
“Margaret, too, Edgar,” Catherine said.
“Yes, of course, if she wants.” Edgar would have agreed to anything.
Catherine buried her face in his musty tunic. It smelled of damp and mold and Edgar. She inhaled deeply. Then she forced herself to address the situation.
“What happened to the men with Alfred?” she asked.
“Trussed up and thrown over horses,” he answered. “Robert and Æthelræd are guarding them.”
Alfred was still weeping in his grandson’s arms. Algar gave them a pleading look.
“I can’t get any sense out of him,” he said. “He just keeps begging me to take him to the sanctuary.”
“Which sanctuary? Durham?” Edgar asked. “It’s overrun with soldiers. No one will find sanctuary there. But Algar, tell him I won’t have him punished. He was only doing what my father ordered and no one here was hurt. He doesn’t need sanctuary from me.”
At this Alfred’s grief only increased. He clawed at Algar’s sleeve.
“Make them give me safe conduct to Hexham,” he said. “Sanctuary there and I will tell him everything.”
Algar looked at Edgar, who shrugged.
“Very well,” he said. “But I’m taking my family back to Durham now. My uncle and brother can escort you to Hexham.”
“No!” Alfred switched his pleading to Edgar directly. “You mustn’t go back there! The danger is too great. You don’t know what they have planned for you.”
Edgar lost patience.
“Then tell me!” he commanded.
Alfred leaned back on his heels.
“Sanctuary,” he said.
Edgar explained to Catherine what the old man had said.
“Alfred must be terrified of what my father will do to him,” he concluded. “But I won’t have you spending another night in the open just to indulge him.”
“We could go back to Finchale tonight,” Catherine said. “Isn’t Godric’s church a sanctuary of a sort? The journey won’t hurt us. It hasn’t so far. James can sit up now, you know. And Willa’s cough is almost gone. Alfred says that Durham is dangerous and I agree. Your father and brother Duncan could be planning some sort of ambush for you.”
Edgar thought.
“Yes, it seems the most sensible plan,” he decided. “Algar, will you tell the others?”
A cry from near his feet made Edgar look down. Margaret had put her arm over James to keep him from rolling away and he was resisting with all his might.
Edgar picked him up.
“Well, he doesn’t seem to have been starved,” he commented. “Thank you for watching him, Margaret. Margaret?”
“She’s been like that since Alfred drew his knife,” Catherine said quietly. “She won’t speak to us. We can’t get her to eat. I don’t think she should go to Durham, either. The hermit helped Willa. Perhaps he knows something that will soothe your sister’s poor spirit.”
“Take the baby,” Edgar said. “I’ll carry her.”
He bent down. “Margaret? I’m going to take care of you. Catherine and I won’t let anyone hurt you again.”
He picked her up, wrapping Alfred’s cloak around her.
“Alfred did this to her? He does need sanctuary. If I hadn’t promised it to him, I might make him account for this tonight.”
“Edgar, not now. When everything is sorted out, then we can assign blame,” Catherine said. “There’s too much we don’t understand. He didn’t mean to do this, I’m sure of that.”
At that moment, with his sister lying stiffly in his arms, Edgar didn’t care what the intention was. The result was all that mattered.
They followed Algar and Alfred to the spot in the woods where Robert and Æthelræd waited with Willa. The four men that had come with Alfred were now trussed across two horses, hands and feet tied with the rope looped under the horses’ bellies to hold them on.
“They turned green when they saw us.” Robert laughed. “I don’t think they were expecting a fight.”
Æthelræd wasn’t so cheerful. He kept walking around the men, shaking his head.
“I don’t know them, but they’re all of our blood,” he said. He poked one of them. “You. Bastard. Did my brother promise you could have Wedderlie when he died?”
The man just groaned.
“Perhaps it was Duncan,” Edgar suggested. “Alfred, are these the men who killed Adalisa?”
“Sanctuary,” Alfred said. “I’ll tell you what you want to know at Hexham, in the church.”
As they set off again Catherine remembered the most important question she wanted to ask Edgar.
“What’s happened to Solomon?”
 
Solomon and Samson had been swept up in the general exodus from Saint-Giles. They found themselves in the uncomfortable company
of various monks and secular clerics sent ahead to Bishopton along with household goods and accounts. They landed in the courtyard there, safe but unable to get through the attackers outside.
“Edgar is going to kill me when he learns I’ve misplaced his wife again,” Solomon repeated.
“It’s not your fault if she insists on wandering off all the time,” Samson insisted. “I can’t believe she was even allowed on such a journey. Our women stay home and manage the business instead of taking to the road like wantons.”
“At the time it seemed safer than leaving her in Paris,” Solomon said. “We thought she’d have stone walls about her for most of the stay here.”
“From what I’ve seen of that one, they’d have to be door-and windowless to keep her in.” Samson snorted.
“True enough.” Solomon winced as memories rushed at him. “But, to her credit, except for the sail here, I’ve never heard her complain about the inconvenience of travel. She likes seeing new places.”
“Perhaps this trip will cure her of that,” Samson said. “Do you see her husband among the soldiers there? All these people look alike to me.”
Solomon scanned the crowd. He didn’t expect to see Edgar with the defenders. He hoped his friend would have the sense to stay behind the parties that had emerged from Durham to harass Conyers and Saint-Barbe as they worked their way back to Bishopton. There was no one among the people around him that he recognized.
Wait. That man.
“Samson, do you know who that is?” he asked. “No, not the one unloading the packhorse, the one on the other side, trying to keep out of our sight.”
“I don’t think I’ve seen him before, although,” Samson said, scratching his chin through his beard, “there is something familiar about him. Why?”
“That’s the man who was on the boat from France with us,” Solomon said. “I saw him in Berwick a few weeks ago.”
“Well, what of it?”
“I’m not sure,” Solomon answered. “He said he was going to York for trade, but I think he’s been following me.”
Samson was alert at once.
“You’ve been posing as a Christian,” he said. “What do you think they’ll do to you if they find out you’re one of us?”
“I don’t know,” Solomon told him. “I’ve never been found out before. I’m more worried about what would happen to Catherine and my Uncle Hubert if this man returns to France with the information.”
“The situation is getting worse there, then?” Samson asked.
“Paris is unsettled these days,” Solomon said. “Since the king’s war with the count of Champagne, people are more inclined to suspect their neighbors of everything from theft to heresy. We need a strong ruler and Louis isn’t it.”
“At least you know who the ruler is,” Samson grumbled. “We have a king one day and a ‘lady of the English’ the next. No wonder people are thinking of putting their own faces on the coins. So, what should we do about this man?”
“Just watch out for him,” Solomon decided. “And help me keep up the illusion of being an Edomite.”
Samson grimaced. “You want to spit on me? That might convince him.”
“I might,” Solomon said. “Even better, I think I’ll leave you and consort with monks. I see that friend of Edgar’s that Catherine went to find. He may know where she is. Keep an eye on our friend, would you? I want to see what he does when I move.”
Solomon strode over to where Aelred was conversing with another Cistercian. He waited until he was noticed, then introduced himself and asked after Catherine.
“You needn’t fret about her anymore,” the monk told him. “I, myself, saw her safely to the hermitage at Finchale before we left Saint-Giles. By now she should be back at Durham with Edgar. I told his father where she was.”
“You did what?” Solomon asked. “Where did you even see Waldeve?”
“I was behind the rest of the bishop’s party and some of the soldiers stopped me,” Aelred explained. “It would have gone badly with me if Waldeve and Duncan hadn’t arrived. They vouched for me. I gave them the information to take to Edgar then. What’s wrong?”
This last was at the sudden change on Solomon’s face.
“Everything,” Solomon answered. “But how could you know? You may have delivered her to her death.”
He went on to explain their growing belief that Waldeve or Duncan had plotted against the rest of the family and were responsible for all the murders. Aelred was horrified at the possible consequences of his helpfulness.
“We need to return to Finchale at once,” he said. “I pray we’re not too late.”
“You do that,” Solomon said as he went to get his horse.
He told Samson where he was going.”
“There’s an army out there,” Samson remonstrated with him. “Either side could kill you.”
“I know,” Solomon told him, “but I’ll be traveling with a cross.”
“What makes you think that will help?” Samson grunted. “Oh, the man was certainly watching you. He seemed nervous while you were with the Cistercian. I wonder if he’s fool enough to go after you now.”
“I hope so,” Solomon answered.
The monk had not forgotten how to sit a warhorse and those they met were reminded that he was not only a man of God but had once been an official at the court of the king. Solomon was impressed at the authority this humble man could command. He was reminded of Abbot Bernard in France.
They arrived at Finchale only to find that Catherine had come and gone, come back and gone again.
“But Edgar and his family were with her the second time,” Godric told them. “And I sent Lord Waldeve and his man after them. They’ll be well protected.”
Solomon and Aelred looked at each other, thanked the hermit and set off for Hexham.
 
Alfred’s refusal to say anything until safely within the sanctuary limits at Hexham was equally true of the men with him. No matter how many times Edgar explained to them that he wouldn’t judge what they had done in his father’s service, no matter how many threats Æthelræd menaced them with, none would speak.
Edgar carried Margaret before him, while Æthelræd took Catherine and the baby. James was enchanted by the handfuls of hair he could pull on his great-granduncle and enjoyed the ride more than any of them.
It was late in the day when they arrived at the town. Alfred was
swaying with exhaustion. Meldred, the porter, came out to see what the commotion was.
“Grandfather!” he cried. “What have they done to you? Why are you bound? Algar, what’s the meaning of this?”
Æthelræd lowered Catherine to the ground. “That crafty old goat,” he said to the world. “Well, now we know why he wanted to come here.”
As Meldred fussed over Alfred, the other men were untied and led into the churchyard. Someone sent for Prior Richard.
“Yes, they may have the traditional thirty-seven days of sanctuary,” he said when the situation was explained. “Do they understand that they may not step from the precincts of the church for any reason during that time?”
Alfred nodded. He leaned against Meldred. As they made their way to the church, Meldred bent over him and whispered, “What went wrong, Grandfather? I thought we were going to win.”
“We may still,” Alfred answered. “But a sacrifice is needed and I’m the one laid upon to make it. I want no interference from you. That is my wish and my command. I’ve let the others know, and you shall obey me as they do. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Grandfather,” Meldred said. “For the others, I will do it, but I don’t like this.”
 
“Edgar,” Catherine said as they left the church to find a place for the night. “Do you think it would be possible to find a bath and a bed without fleas?”

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