B00B9BL6TI EBOK (10 page)

Surely the space hadn’t been as wide as this when he’d seen it from above? He was exposed, expecting at any moment to hear shouts or the deadly hissing of an arrow being loosed. What did it feel like to be hit by one? An arrow or crossbow bolt would thump into his body, tearing into the flesh as it embedded itself deep inside him. He could virtually sense the searing pain … almost sobbing, he finally hit the ruined wall of a house, hard, and flung himself down in its shadow. His chest heaved as he sucked in huge breaths. He listened but he could hear nothing except for the beating of his own heart. He waited again. Still nothing.

He stayed in the shadow of the house until his breathing returned to normal – or, at least, as normal as he thought it was going to get – and he could marshal the thoughts properly in his head. He had survived the first stage, but now he had to continue, to the cathedral, then north to the church of All Saints. You need to do this for your lord, for your mother and for your friends.

Edwin stood up.

Edwin arrived at the house. This must be it. What if it wasn’t? What would he do? What if …? He raised his hand to knock, wavered, and then lowered it again. Then he lifted it once more. If he didn’t knock, where would he go? There was no way back, so he had better hope that the way forward was safe. He knocked, three times, three times, then twice.

No sound came from inside. He knocked again, but dared not do it any louder lest he wake everyone else in the street. What if there was nobody there? That was a possibility he hadn’t considered. But as he knocked yet a third time, he heard sounds of stirring in the house. He saw a glimmer of light behind the shutters and sensed someone on the other side of the door. That someone paused for a long, agonising moment, and then Edwin heard the sound of a heavy bar lifting. The door opened and Edwin felt a hand clutching his shoulder and pulling him inside. He staggered into the room and turned to see an elderly man dressed only in a shirt, who was already re-barring the door. He opened his mouth but didn’t get the chance to explain himself.

‘Who are you? What in the Lord’s name are you doing here? Do you not know that you could get us all killed?’ The old man’s voice wavered.

Edwin shifted his weight, but before he could move the man held out a knife in front of him. ‘Stay where you are! I will have out of you who you are and how you came to knock like that.’

The knife was a small kitchen thing and the hand holding it was trembling: Edwin felt a strange and unfamiliar confidence at the thought that here was someone he could probably overpower if he needed to. But he didn’t move.

‘I’ve come from the castle. The people there sent me, and I found out how to knock from Stephen who was the brother of Alan. Are you William the nephew of Warner?’ Now was the time to find out whether his nocturnal mission had been all in vain.

Rather unexpectedly, the old man let the knife drop, sank onto a stool and assumed an attitude of despair. ‘I am he. Alan was a brave man. I am afraid I am not so brave, and you are too late.’

Alys was so tired that she couldn’t keep the thoughts straight in her head. The last candle was burning low, and she stared at the increasingly waxy face of her father, the only part visible as he lay in his winding sheet. Tomorrow, even that would be covered as he went to his eternal rest. She would be in the dark soon, but it was nearly dawn so it wouldn’t be for long. She had plenty of time to think, alone here with the silent dead, and she drew her shawl closer to her as she shifted position, her knees becoming uncomfortable and stiff after such a lengthy vigil. It didn’t seem that long since she had watched over the body of her mother in the same bed, and she was drawn to reminisce as her head started to nod … Mama’s face seemed so distant now, just a passing shade in her mind, but she could still remember her gentle laugh and the comforting scent as she held her daughter close and safe. Mama had died of the childbed fever after Randal was born, and Alys had wondered how she would ever survive the loss. She had been totally bereft, beside herself with grief. She had cried herself to sleep for weeks and months afterwards, roaming the house during the day and looking in every corner in case Mama should suddenly reappear and everything would be all right.

Back then she could hardly have imagined that seven years later she would be kneeling in the same room, with no tears left to shed, looking back to that time almost with fondness: at least then she’d had Papa to tell her that she would still be looked after, and other family surrounding her. Thomas had just gone off to his apprenticeship with Peter of the Bail, but he wasn’t all that far away, and, of course, she and Nick had had each other to cling to as they tried to help look after the little ones. And yet now here she was alone. The children were still too young to fend for themselves, and she was the sole person who stood between them and the outside world, between them and starvation. How could she leave them, even for a while, to carry out her father’s wishes? What would happen if …

The candle guttered and the sudden flickering of the light made her come to. First things first: she was supposed to be here praying for Papa’s soul and imploring that his passage through purgatory would be short. Once he reached Heaven he would be together with Mama again, and Alys prayed with all her might that they might find each other; and that if Thomas and Nick had not survived, that they might all be together as they waited for her. It was so tempting to wish that she might be there too, reunited with them, resting, peaceful, and not having to struggle on, but she must put such thoughts out of her mind. She must. She would. It was ungodly and sinful to wish one’s life over, and no matter how she suffered, the fight to live must go on.

Edwin looked across the room at the old man, still sitting with his head in his hands. ‘When you say “too late”, what exactly do you mean?’ The relief of having reached his destination after being out in the streets was making his knees melt under him, and he eased himself down to sit on the floor.

William raised his head. ‘In short, nobody trusts me any more. When the city first fell, I was all for fighting against the invader, but then I saw their terrible power, those awful machines, the way they were destroying my town, and I realised that we must make an accommodation with them.’

Edwin felt his stomach lurch. ‘An accommodation?’ He wanted to rise again, but found he couldn’t.

William sighed. ‘I am an old man and I have lived in Lincoln all my life. I am the mayor. I am supposed to look after the city and cherish her. Such a wonderful place, but look what they have done to her. If any more damage is done she will never recover. And so much bloodshed. My son is dead, and I must stop others from being killed also.’ He sounded weary.

Edwin tried to speak, but the fear which had been building up over the last few hours had finally got the better of him, and his tongue simply wouldn’t move. He stared dumbly at William.

The old man looked over at him. ‘Oh, never fear, I will not denounce you to them. I am not a traitor, just a man who wants peace. But you must leave here, now, and you must not come back.’ He started to haul himself up off the stool.

Something had to be done. He had to speak, to be eloquent, but nothing would come out. As William stood, putting one hand to his back and grimacing, Edwin was almost ready to let himself be shepherded out of the door, out into oblivion and despair. He must speak.

‘No.’

Not exactly the best start, but it was all he could manage, and at least it had made William pause. He forced his throat to push out more words, to make his wooden tongue move. ‘No. I’ve come to help you, and you must have hope. An army is on the way, coming to relieve the city. And Dame Nicola is holding out – you may have given up, but there is a woman who will not fold so easily.’

William stopped suddenly. ‘Dame Nicola? She is still alive?’

‘Yes.’ The words came more easily now. ‘And her … she has also lost her son, but she won’t let it deter her. She cares about this city as much as you do, and I am telling you that you must help!’

This seemed to sway him for a moment. ‘Dame Nicola is … well, I have always held her in the highest regard, for she has been the castellan for many years, since we were both young. If she still believes that there is hope then there must be. Perhaps the Lord has not deserted us after all.’ He paced up and down, his knees creaking. ‘But how can I help? After I went to the French and said that there would be no trouble if only they would leave the town in peace, nobody trusts me. There may well be a secret resistance somewhere, but I do not know who. To start with I was in contact with Alan, as he had a way to talk to his brother in the castle, but after what happened to him …’

Edwin said nothing, partly as he was content to watch the ideas forming in the other’s face, but mainly because he couldn’t bear to bring up what had happened to the man Alan, in case it pushed him over the line between fear and madness.

William had reached a decision. ‘We will try.’ He drew himself up as straight as his frame would allow. ‘For Dame Nicola, I will try.’

‘Good. So I may stay?’

‘You may stay. We will have to think of some plausible excuse, for it will look suspicious, you turning up out of nowhere like this. It will make people even less likely to trust me. And we will have to think of some plan – there is no point just going about the town and asking people if they are in league against the invaders: they would not say, for fear that we might be on the side of the French.’

‘I’ll think of something.’ Edwin hoped he sounded more confident than he felt. ‘But we must act quickly. I only have two days to find out all I can and to get back to the castle.’

‘Then let us begin.’ William moved to the shutters and peered out. ‘It is still dark, but there is no point in going back to bed. Wait here while I dress, for the cold seeps into my bones more these days than it ever did. Then we will decide what to do.’

He shuffled off, taking the rushlight with him, and Edwin was left in darkness. He sat still, eyes closed, trying to rest his limbs and his aching mind. He hadn’t had the chance to look about him properly since he came in, and he couldn’t see anything, but now he realised that the room was scented with the exotic tang of spices. William must deal in them – of course, there would be many merchants in such a large town as this. The warm smell of cloves, cinnamon and powder douce, together with the sharp counterpoint of ginger and pepper comforted him, and he was transported back to the steward’s office in the castle at Conisbrough, where he had spent many a long hour adding up accounts for his puzzled uncle. Life had been simpler then. He breathed deeply, inhaling the scent, and was calmer by the time he saw the flicker of light again and heard William tottering down the stairs with aching slowness.

William beckoned to him to come through to another room, and Edwin followed him towards the back of the house. He stumbled over something.

‘Shh! You will wake the rest of the house. Stand still until I have made more light.’

Edwin stood while William moved about the room, fetching another rush and lighting it from the one in his hand. Then he stood it in a pricket on a table and Edwin could see that he was in a kitchen. He righted the stool that he had kicked over on his way in and sat on it, while William lowered himself into the chair at the head of the table.

‘Now then. The best I can come up with at the moment is that we will tell everyone you are my nephew. Men who have known me some while will be aware that my sister married a man from the north, so that will explain your foreign accent.’

Edwin nodded. It was as plausible as anything else and he couldn’t think of anything better right now.

‘However, this does not explain why in the Lord’s name you would be foolish enough to come to Lincoln at such a time. You could feasibly have entered the city, for the French are not actually preventing anyone from doing so, but as you can imagine, travellers are scarce at the moment.’ William sighed. ‘Still, it will have to do for now.’ He shifted in his seat and then rose, stiffly. ‘These days I cannot sit in one place for too long.’ With one hand on his back he limped over to the shutter and peered out. ‘Dawn is breaking. Here, help me with this and we will stoke up the fire before my daughter-in-law comes down. Better that she first sees you in the light.’