Strong as Death (Catherine LeVendeur) (39 page)

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Authors: Sharan Newman

BOOK: Strong as Death (Catherine LeVendeur)
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She put a hand on her stomach.
What do you think?
she asked the baby.
Will Saint James protect us?
Probably from harm, she concluded, if not from Edgar’s wrath. Well, it wouldn’t hurt if she just hurried after the two women to see which way they were going.
She used to have voices that warned her against such idiocy, but lately they were unaccountably silent.
 
Brother James knelt in a dark corner of the church, praying fervidly while keeping one eye on Gaucher, kneeling before the altar in the glow of the pilgrims’ candles. The knight had not moved since he arrived. His back was straight and his head bent in an attitude of submission that was oddly flaunted by the glimmer of the golden streak in his hair. James was beginning to think that he had been mistaken in his suspicions. He had requested permission to be excused from the Night Office for a private vigil, but the bells told him when Vigils began and ended. He recited it to himself as he watched the knight.
When the last tolling ceased, Gaucher’s head came up. He stretched his arms and slowly got to his feet, balancing on his
empty scabbard until the stiffness in his legs wore off. James remained in his place, but tensed to move.
Gaucher bowed to the altar and crossed himself. He then went directly down the nave and out the door, as if he had no fear of being challenged.
James got up quickly, his knees aching from the rough stone floor. He followed Gaucher out and nearly tripped over the dark figure of Mondete as she, too, got up to go after the knight.
The monk grabbed her wrist. “I should have known it was you all along,” he hissed. “Come with me. I’m putting you where you can’t harm anyone, and in the morning, you’re going before the abbot.”
He started to drag her away, wishing he had brought someone else to take charge of her so that he could follow Gaucher.
“Father,” a voice came out of the night, “let go of her. She’s harmed no one.”
Startled more by the form of address than the appearance of Solomon, James released Mondete.
“I’ll stay with him,” Solomon told her. “Will you go rouse Hubert and Edgar?”
Mondete hadn’t made a sound, not even when James fell into her. She made none now, but lifted her cloak clear of her feet and ran for the inn. Solomon turned back to James.
“Do you want to take me to your prison?” he sneered, “or help me catch the one who is really responsible for all these murders?”
James reached out to touch Solomon’s sleeve. Then he stopped. “I am not a priest,” he said. “You don’t call me ‘Father.’”
The silence grew and solidified. “I won’t,” Solomon said. “Not ever again.”
It was too dark for them to see each other’s face.
There was a pause. James stepped back. “Do you think that the murderer is interested only in finding the statue?” he asked his son.
“No, but I think it’s important to her that Gaucher not regain it.”
“Her!”
“Yes,” Solomon looked around. Gaucher had vanished. “Which way did he go?”
James pointed into the darkness. “That way,” he said. “He told me that they had hidden the statue in one of the caves up there.”
They hurried away from the church, down the road that hugged the cliffs. Most of the buildings clustered close to the abbey or the river. They were soon out of the village, and the pathway turned upward. Ahead of them was a narrow ridge along which there were a number of cave openings.
“I can’t spot him,” James said. “Did he take a lamp?”
“I don’t think so.” Solomon stopped again. “Neither did we. Are you sure he came this way at all?”
James looked up into the dark holes in the rock. “No,” he said. “I just assumed this is the way he would go since he said this is where they hid it.”
“And you believed him?” Solomon was aghast at his stupidity.
James slapped his palm against his forehead. “What’s happened to me?” he muttered. “I was never so credulous, especially when an Edomite spoke.”
“Then …” Solomon hesitated. “Then you don’t believe that everything the Christians do in the name of their Savior is right?”
“I never said that.” James’s voice was low. “I can only answer for what I do in His name.”
“Such as abandoning your wife and child?” Solomon bit his tongue. He hadn’t wanted to say it. He hadn’t wanted James to think it mattered to him at all.
“Yes,” James said. “That was my sacrifice.”
“No, you bastard,” Solomon answered. “That was ours.”
He raised his fist to strike, but they were both brought out of their personal acrimony by the clear, high sound of a scream.
“That’s not Catherine,” was Solomon’s first response. “I know her scream.”
“What difference does it make?” James said as they retraced
their steps as quickly as possible in the darkness. “I think it came from somewhere near the church.”
As they reached the space between the church and the rock, Solomon saw a growing crowd of people gathering around a still shape on the ground. From what he could see of the clothing, it was a woman.
“It’s not Catherine. It wasn’t her voice,” he repeated to convince himself. Then another thought struck him. What if the scream had been from Mondete?
He pushed his way through the people until he could see the face lying on the stone. Her eyes were open and empty. Solomon felt a wave of relief and then guilt.
It was Hersent.
 
Catherine had followed the two women through the warm night with a sense of being in some ancient story where, at any moment, a talking bird would swoop by, or a friendly wolf would trot up and lead her to the secret treasure. This was not the world she lived in every day; it was a strange country where magic survived, where children became swans, and river spirits gave up immortality for earthly princes. The flicker of the tiny oil lamp the two women carried was a talisman, part of the enchantment.
So she wasn’t surprised when Griselle and Hersent vanished through a narrow slit between the church and the rock. She followed them without fear, for how could stories harm you?
It was barely the space of a breath later when there was a scream and one of the women came stumbling out, falling all too solidly onto the hard earth.
Catherine ran to her and knelt at her side.
Hersent whimpered in pain, then made a noise in her throat horribly like the one Catherine had heard when Hugh was killed. The woman gripped Catherine’s arm.
“Save her!” Hersent begged.
The grip released as Hersent’s body went slack against Catherine. Gently, Catherine lowered her to the ground.
There was the sound of running feet. Catherine knew help was coming and so, reluctantly, she stood. Griselle was still in there. Someone had to go in and get her. Someone had to save her.
Catherine had intended to wait for someone with a torch and weapons. Then, above her head, a voice called to her from the dark. “Have no fear,” it said enticingly. “I’m here to help you. To fulfill your dreams. It’s what you’ve always wanted. Come up here. Follow me.”
Catherine looked up. Way above her, the lamp was shining, the flame dancing in the night breeze. As she watched, it moved farther up the side of the rock face.
Help was coming. But the voice was calling her. There had been no voice in her dream that she remembered. But dreams were so uncertain. What if she were meant to follow? What if she failed the test and this child died as well? Catherine stood in torment. What should she do?
The light moved farther up. The voice was fainter. “Hurry!” it urged her. “There isn’t much time.”
Catherine decided. If one wasn’t willing to take the leap, then faith had no worth.
But this was too much to ask of Saint James alone. Catherine clasped her hands quickly, then whispered as she entered the gaping crack in the cliff. “Holy Mother, I am trusting in you. please, don’t let anything happen to my child.”
There was no light inside, but Catherine didn’t have time to fumble around. She hit her shin almost immediately on a sharp edge. A step. She bent over and felt with her hands. There was another. She placed one hand against the rough wall and started to climb.
 
Edgar woke to the echo of the scream from the churchyard. He didn’t even need to reach out to know that Catherine was missing. He swung out of bed and grabbed his boots. Across the room, Hubert was doing the same.
“Where is she?” Hubert demanded.
Edgar’s heart sank. He knew. “Somewhere high up,” he answered. “I have to find her before she falls.”
Hubert opened his mouth to upbraid Edgar for his lack of care of Catherine. With an effort, he stopped himself. She had got past him as well.
Neither of them concerned themselves with knowing where to search. If they followed the commotion to where the noise and confusion were thickest, Catherine wouldn’t be far away.
They ran, almost literally, into Mondete, coming to find them. Her hood had fallen and her bald head shone in the torchlight, while her face was oddly shadowed, making her appearance that of a corpse, returned with evil tidings from beyond the grave.
“Gaucher has left the church,” she panted. “Solomon and his father are following him. No—” she forestalled their questions “—I don’t know where the scream came from. But Griselle and Hersent passed me as I was coming to get you, and Catherine followed soon after.”
“Why didn’t you stop her?” Edgar shouted.
“I promised Solomon that I would fetch you,” she answered. “Catherine will meet up with the others when she gets to the church. She’s in no danger.”
Edgar didn’t bother to answer her. He knew that Catherine was in danger, but he also knew that it was up to him to find her.
When they arrived at the church, they found a cluster of people circled about the body of a woman. Edgar’s heart lurched until he saw Solomon standing apart from the group. If the body were Catherine, he would have been next to her.
“Where is she?” Edgar gasped as he and Hubert reached Solomon.
Solomon knew instantly whom they meant. “I haven’t seen her,” he said. “That
desfae
monk and I went off in the wrong direction after Gaucher. He’d slipped into that hole in the rock behind the church. The monks here say that it’s an ancient stairway up to a ridge leading to any number of caves. But this is the only way out. He stabbed Lady Griselle’s maid on his way in. He may have taken the Lady as hostage. The monks don’t want to send their guards up in the dark for fear of getting her killed.”
“Solomon!” Edgar stopped him. “Catherine’s in there as well.”
Solomon stared at him. “No one mentioned her. How do you know?”
“Mondete saw her going after Griselle,” Hubert said. “She’s in there with a murderer. I’m going after her.”
Edgar looked at the darkness that he knew Catherine had vanished into. “No, I have to go,” he said. “She’s my wife and it’s our child. I have the right, Hubert.”
Hubert had already taken out his knife. He started to protest, then stopped himself again. Edgar did have the right.
“You go first, then,” he said. “I’ll come behind with a torch. She was my child long before you married her.”
“I’m following as well,” Solomon told them. “According to the monks, the passage is too narrow for more than one at a time.”
They hurried over to the opening but were impeded by a pair of guards, townsmen under the authority of the abbey. “No one is to enter,” the shorter one told them. “We’re here to see to that.”
Hubert sighed. “There’s really no point in arguing, is there?”
“None at all,” the guard answered firmly.
“Well, I suppose there’s only one thing we can do then.” Hubert sighed again and turned as if to move away. “Solomon?”
Solomon also turned, and then the both of them swung back, their fists connecting with the guards’ jaws before the men realized what was happening. More men rushed up to join in the fray.
In the ensuing confusion, Edgar slipped into the darkness and started up the stairs.
As she climbed the stairs, the voice grew clearer and Catherine realized that it was Griselle. She couldn’t understand how Griselle had managed to get ahead of Gaucher until she realized that Hersent had caught up to him at the entrance to delay him. Did Griselle know that the maid had given her life to obey her mistress’s orders?
Griselle’s melodic summoning led the knight up and up the staircase, in and out of the side of the cliff. Gaucher followed as if sleepwalking, his face turned perpetually to her light. Catherine wondered what they would do when they reached the top. From the darkness, Griselle answered for her.
“Come along, my dear,” she crooned. “You’ve been pursuing me since Le Puys, almost as long as I’ve been pursuing you. I couldn’t surrender to you with all the others around, could I now? Think of the scandal.”

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