Castles in the Air (24 page)

“M’lord, I must speak th’ truth. Ye’d be in our way.” Without apparent thought to their different stations, Tosti patted Raymond’s shoulder. “Ye don’t do th’ trackin’, an’ we won’t do th’ fightin’.”

Raymond clearly struggled, but at last he nodded.

“When you’ve found the trail, send a message to us. We’ll go back to Lofts and prepare to travel. If you find Margery”—Juliana drew a breath—“send word to us as quickly as you can.”

“What do you mean, we can’t go?” As Valeska helped Raymond don the chain-link hauberk that protected his chest and back, her booming voice broke the funereal silence of the great hall. “We always go with you.”

Raymond rubbed his eyes, sandy from lack of sleep. No one in the castle had slept all the night through, and now the old women were taxing him with their displeasure. “I’ll go faster if I go alone.”

“I’m going with you,” Juliana said.

He swore in languages he thought he’d forgotten.

“Don’t use those heathen tongues on me. I’m going with you.”

He stared at his wife. She looked better than any woman who’d passed such a night had the right to look. All night long, they had lain in bed, shoulder to shoulder, so alone they might not have been together. When Salisbury arrived, they came to their feet without a word, dressed and ready to go.

The toothless old man spoke to Raymond. “Didn’t find yer daughter or th’ youth. Found an area showed signs o’ a fight.” He stood before the fire, twisting his hat in his hand. “Two roods from th’ place where th’ castle folk ate. Proved th’ little lady didn’t know his plan. M’son’s waitin’ there.” Again he twisted his hat, and turned his head toward Juliana. He looked through her and spoke to the air, but the reassurance was for her. “Couldn’t see no signs o’ blood.”

Raymond glanced at Juliana, and he died inside.

His gentle wife looked hard and determined, like a commander who faced battle alone. He had betrayed her trust, and he knew what she knew—she no longer depended on him. Last evening’s sharing of the fault had been pretty words, no more, for if she willingly left the safety of her castle
walls despite her own ferocious fears, it could mean nothing less than the total collapse of her belief in him.

And after all, why else had she needed him? She had children, she had properties, she had food and clothing and servants. He wasn’t worth much as a husband, but he’d thought to ingratiate himself by giving her unconditional security.

He’d failed.

Yet now he had the chance, not to redeem himself, but to offer reparation, and he’d not allow anyone to get in his way. As he buckled on his sword, he repeated, “No one’s going with me to search for Margery.”

Juliana said, “Valeska, Dagna, I want you to remain for Ella. She’s come to depend on you, and when she wakes she’ll be wild if she’s alone.”

“Layamon represents security,” Dagna argued.

“He’ll be patrolling the walls with his men.” Conjuring a threat from thin air, Raymond warned, “Someone may hear of Margery’s plight and seize the chance to attack Lofts Castle. That’s why you must stay within the keep.”

Clearly uncomfortable with the presence of females, Salisbury added, “Rough terrain. No delicate castle women.”

Valeska snorted. “Delicate.” She looked at Dagna. “I’m flattered, sister, aren’t you?”

Made patient through weariness, Raymond said, “You’d slow me down.”

“I won’t,” Juliana said.

“You aren’t coming.” Raymond was adamant.

“I am.”

A man’s resolution, Raymond found, was for naught when placed beside a mother’s anxiety. The
night had not yet yielded to the sun when they rode over the drawbridge. The ride was silent, broken only when Raymond said, with some surprise, “Why Juliana, you have no hunting dogs.”

“Nay. My father did not hunt in his last years. They cost to feed, so he sold them and I never replaced them.” They had left the road and entered the woods before she thought to say, “We’ll get more this summer for your hunting.”

A sop, he thought, to keep her noble, useless husband entertained. “They would be useful
today
,” he said.

She agreed. “All the more reason to acquire them.”

When they reached the glade where the struggle had taken place, no one was there. Stopping his horse just outside the circle of trampled grass, Raymond asked Salisbury, “Where is he?”

“Don’t know. Gone on ahead.”

“In the dark?” Raymond said, but Juliana shushed him.

The old tracker looked worried. As the light had improved, he examined the ground. “Strange markin’s,” he said with a frown. “Some one here after I left. Lotta someones. On horses.”

“What kind of horses?” Raymond frowned. “Farm horses?”

“Big horses. Knights’ horses. Seen th’ print o’ this one afore.” He got on his knees beside a mark almost invisible to Raymond. “From m’lady’s stables.”

“You’ve made a mistake,” Juliana told him. “No one left the castle last night. It couldn’t be from my stables.”

He peered at it again. “M’lady’s,” he insisted. Putting his face close against the ground, he sniffed.

Like a hound, he followed his nose around the ground until Raymond demanded, “What are you doing?”

“Blood.”

Brief and terse, but the one word galvanized the mounted couple.

“Whose?”

“Where?”

“New.” The old man prowled along, sniffing, stiffening with alarm. “Not here last night. Wish m’son was here. Good snout. Good wi’ tracks.” He quivered when he found something. “Holy Mother. Lookee this.”

He held a rope knotted with two bloody knots, and Raymond loosened the knife at his belt. Chills crept up his spine; he felt as if some malevolent presence watched from the surrounding trees. He slid out of his saddle as Salisbury crawled into the bushes, and Juliana swung her leg over and landed beside him.

Catching his arm, she said, “Nay, you don’t.” She didn’t speak aloud, but whispered as if the atmosphere affected her, also. “You’re not following him and leaving me alone in this eerie place.”

He wanted to tell her that this was why he hadn’t wanted her to leave the castle. He couldn’t concentrate on the business at hand when he must worry about her, but reproaches were too late. She was here and frightened, and quite right when she said she couldn’t be left in a glade that had proved to be a menace to someone. To Tosti? “Come, then.”

Bent almost double, they trailed Salisbury through the underbrush. A thin strand of blood led them, and Raymond thought he could smell it, too. Smell blood, or fear, or both.

Salisbury muttered as he scrabbled through the bushes. “Bad smell. Bad feeling. Wish Tosti—”

He broke off with a gasp. Raymond leaped forward. One horrified glance verified that the body stretched out on the green moss was, indeed, Tosti. Looming over Juliana to block her view, Raymond instructed, “Don’t look. Go back to the clearing.”

A keening rose from Salisbury, wild and forlorn, and she tried to push her way forward. “I’ve got to help.”

Raymond pushed her. “Tosti’s been tortured.”

She began, “Salisbury—”

“Salisbury wouldn’t want you to see him like this.” She wavered, and he pressed his advantage. “I’ll do what must be done. Go back.”

It went against her instincts, but she did as instructed. Salisbury had been good to her once, treating her with the care of a mother, and she owed him that same care. But Raymond was right. Salisbury would not appreciate her seeing him in his weakness; he was a man to whom weakness was an embarrassment. That explained why he seldom spoke to her; the memory of her collapse and his own compassion mortified him.

But now the knotted rope gained new significance in light of Raymond’s revelation. If the murderer had wrapped the rope around Tosti’s head and tightened it with those knots over his eyes—she grabbed a branch and swayed. Bile tasted sour on her tongue, and she whispered, “Margery.”

There were murderers abroad, and her daughter blundered lost through the woods with a skinny youth. Imitating Salisbury, she searched the edge of the clearing, looking for tracks made by two children.

She couldn’t find them. Only trampled grass and
broken bushes that signalled the passage of a troop of horsemen. “Raymond,” she screamed. “Raymond!”

He came dashing out of the underbrush with Salisbury on his heels and found her mounted on her palfrey. “They’re going after my Margery. We’ve got to go.”

“Aye, you’ve got to go,” he agreed, his mouth set in a grim line. “Back to the castle. When we started, we were seeking a boy and a girl. Now we’ll be following a troop of warriors. We don’t know what Tosti told them before he died, but I would guess the warriors will take Margery and Denys for ransom.”

She leaned from her horse. “You don’t understand. I’m her mother. I’m not going back.”

“Someone has to fetch Layamon,” Raymond said sharply. “I can’t defeat this troop single-handed and without the weapons I need.”

A sound argument backed by Raymond’s gimlet gaze dented Juliana’s certainty. Someone did indeed need to go for help.

“I’ll go.” Salisbury looked right at her, acknowledging her for the first time and expressing himself so even Raymond understood without difficulty. “Ye go wi’ th’ knight, m’lady. Get yer child outa their hands. Men that’ll do such t’ a man such as Tosti’ll do worse t’ a helpless girl.”

Raymond’s breath hissed through his teeth. “Tosti must be buried.”

The old man met his gaze. “Tosti’ll not go anywhere. Take m’lady. I’ll go fer Layamon.”

Exasperation exploded from Raymond. “Damn it, Salisbury, she’s a woman. She shouldn’t ride into battle.”

Salisbury met Raymond’s gaze. “She’s strong. Ye trust in her, m’lord.”

Raymond’s eyes narrowed, then his expression went blank, and he carefully spaced his words. “If my lady wishes to ride on with me, then of course she must go. However, she must do as I tell her for her own protection.”

“I will,” Juliana said.

“Let us go, then.”

Salisbury pointed at the broken shrubbery. “Easy path. An’ m’lady?”

“Aye?”

He came to her and pulled a dagger from his belt. Weighing it in his hand, he said, “Not a pretty knife. Made it meself. Hew wood an’ cut rope an’ slice a man’s liver t’ hash.” He handed it up. “Take it. Use it fer me, fer Tosti.”

“We will avenge his murder.” It was a prayer and a vow.

Tears glinted in Salisbury’s eyes. He looked down at his shoes and dabbed his nose with his sleeve. “Yer daughter’s strong, too.”

Tucking the knife into her belt, she hurried to catch Raymond. They followed the trail of slashed foliage and horse droppings. The brown of winter still clung close to the earth, while high above them, the leaves of spring were making their appearance. The forest floor exhaled a damp, mossy scent as the morning became afternoon, and Juliana’s tension grew. Her neck ached from bending to avoid branches. Her eyes ached from holding them wide, sure that if she so much as blinked, she’d miss something important, some clue that would lead them to Margery.

She wanted to speak to Raymond, to ask him what
he thought, where they were going, what his plans were, but the stony cast of his face blocked the words in her throat. His resentment slashed her with the force of a gale wind, snatching her breath and her warmth, and she was sorry for it, but she wouldn’t turn back. She’d walked in Margery’s shoes. The longing for home, the anger, pain, and embarrassment Margery must be experiencing formed part of Juliana.

Raymond stopped in a clearing where an abandoned hut stood. “We’ll eat a hasty meal here,” he said.

“Should we stop? I thought we were closing in on them.”

Without a glance at her, he said, “We’ll need food to fight this battle.”

Grudgingly, she nodded and dismounted. Loosening the bag that held the food, she rummaged in it while he searched the area. When he hoisted one sturdy branch on his shoulder, she couldn’t restrain her curiosity. “Of what purpose is that?”

He smiled, and she eyed the savage gleam of his teeth uneasily. “Believing our expedition was a peaceful one, I brought only a sword. I take this as another weapon.” He leaned it against the wall of the hut. “Is there a bucket?”

She stared. “A bucket?”

“I hate to eat with hands so recently stained with blood. If you could fetch me water from the brook, I would wash.”

“Oh.” She bit her lip on the suggestion he walk to the brook and wash himself. After all, Raymond had the right to act as helpless as any horse’s ass of a man when he chose. “I don’t see a bucket.”

“Maybe there’s one inside.” Rubbing his fingers
together, he frowned. “’Tis a shame when I carry such proof of Tosti’s death.”

The sadness in him roused her guilt, and she volunteered, “I’ll go see if I can find you a bucket.”

“As you wish.”

He sounded so meek, she scrutinized him, but he was removing the extra bags from his destrier and she couldn’t see his face. The door of the hut opened with a creak, and she peered into the dark interior cautiously. Sunlight, filtered by leaves, entered through the door. One shuttered window put a feeble stripe against the wall, and she could see that whoever had left this place had stripped it except for a pile of wood left for weary travellers. “There’s nothing in here,” she called.

“Surely they left a bucket in a corner.”

He sounded closer, but when she glanced over her shoulder it seemed the horse had moved and he with it. Raymond was tightening the girths of the saddle, preparing for battle.

“I don’t see one.” Stepping inside, she wrinkled her nose at the musty odor. “Plenty of cobwebs and dust—” She squinted and started forward. “Wait. You may be in luck.”

At the door, his shadow blocked the light. “I know I am, my lady.”

She whirled on her heel, but too late. The door shut with a wholesome snap, and she heard the thump as he wedged the log against the wood.

Juliana ran at
the door of the little hut, clubbing with her shoulder, and from the other side of the barrier, she heard, “Good English construction, good English oak. Farewell, my lady. I’ll be back for you when the fighting is over.”

“Raymond!” She struck the wood with her palm, but no one answered her. Running to the little window, she shook the shutters and peered through the crack that ran vertically between them. She could see him, preparing to mount his destrier, and shouted, “Raymond, you’ll not succeed with this.”

Satisfaction surged through her veins when he turned from his horse and started back toward the hut. He’d seen the error of his ways; he would release her. Too late she realized her mistake. Picking up another stout stick, he used it as a crossbar. She heard it thunk into the brackets that kept the shutters closed in windy weather. Standing on tiptoes, she met Raymond’s eye peeking through the upper end of the crack. His dry voice informed her, “You have my gratitude, my lady, for reminding me to secure the window.”

Cursing with words she’d forgotten since becoming
a parent, she fell back and tried to think of an escape. But not yet. Not now. It had been her mistake to show him her likely escape route. Now she had to discover another. The jingle of Raymond’s reins sounded like betrayal to her, and she ran to the window once more.

He was going. Leaving with a salute to her—or the hut—leaving her alone and half mad with worry. As he rode away, she gnawed at her knuckles and listened to the scuttle of some woodland rodent in the corner. It firmed her resolve to escape, and to escape before nightfall. Her eyes had adjusted to the dimness, and she made a slow circuit of the room. Exploring the wall around the door revealed an area where the mud had broken away from the woven frame of the wall. She scratched more of it away, but the woven wood beneath the mud held firm. With a smirk, she pulled Salisbury’s dagger from her belt—“It’ll hew wood, m’lady”—and went to work.

At last she sat down on the soft dirt floor and flexed her fingers. The dagger
would
hew wood, but not fast enough for her needs.

The thatch roof sagged; she jumped up and smacked it with her knuckles, bringing a shower of dry grass and dust down on her. Coughing, she went to the bucket and carried it to the low place. Climbing on it, she tugged on the sturdy cross timbers, releasing another shower and clogging her lungs, but bringing her no closer to the out-of-doors.

Dragging herself to the window for fresh air, she reflected grimly on her situation. She was locked in a filthy hut with no food or drink. Night was coming on. No one knew where she was except for one foolhardy knight who was riding into a battle against uncounted foes armed only with a small sword.

Sniffling, she wiped her nose on her sleeve. How could Raymond have done this to her?

Raymond, who was facing death. And her daughter, who had been kidnapped, probably twice, and faced unknown horrors alone.

Who had taken Margery? Why had they taken her? For ransom, or was this a repeat of Juliana’s abduction? Was this the result of a collision of the stars, or the culmination of some malevolent design?

Again she made a circuit of the hut. The sagging roof proved secure, and no small holes had opened in the walls in the short time she’d mourned her freedom. She stopped by the woodpile. Raymond had suggested he would use a log for a weapon, and she’d imagined some small, efficient battering ram. Was it possible? Could she smash through the door?

Reaching down, she selected a stout length of wood and hefted it in her arms, then dropped it with a cry and sprang back.

She’d found the source of the spiderwebs.

Controlling her shudders, she gingerly picked it up again, hoping the impact had dislodged most of the residents.

Except for the one that crawled up her sleeve, making her loose her grip once more, the log seemed uninhabited—and well suited for her needs.

“Stout English oak,” she muttered. “To counter stout English oak.” Puzzling about which end to ram with and which end to hold got her no closer to her goal, so after randomly deciding the wide end should meet the obstacle, she gripped it in her slippery fingers and ran at the door.

The log met the door and the blow knocked her backward. The log was wrenched from her arms; she
stumbled over the top of it and fell so hard it knocked the breath from her. When she could whimper, she whimpered. When she could speak, she said raspingly, “The door will not yield.”

A chatter from the resident rodent seemed like agreement.

Rubbing the place on her ribs where the log had bruised them, she dragged herself to her feet. “My mistake,” she said aloud, “was not trying the door before I assaulted it. Perhaps…” She staggered to the window and shook the shutters. She could not see even a shiver in the gap between them, but something did rattle. Something. She shook them again, watching the line of sunlight for movement. The stick Raymond had placed pressed tight against the shutters—the line remained stable, but somewhere in the window frame something was loose.

She smiled, her first real smile for a full day.

This was it. Rubbing her scraped palms together, she searched for her battering ram and hoisted it up again. She hesitated, then put it on her other side. Might as well be evenly bruised, she reasoned. She backed herself clear to the other side of the hut, took a breath, started forward—

And stopped. That fall had been brutal and confidence-reducing. Some part of her quivered at a repeat of the pain. Some cowardly bit of her mind suggested she was better here in the dark with the rodents than in the midst of a battlefield where she could be raped, mutilated, murdered.

The battering ram—nay, it wasn’t a battering ram, it was only a log—sagged in her arms. Tears dribbled down her cheeks, and defeat beat through her veins. She shouldn’t have come. She wouldn’t have come,
either, but for Salisbury. What was it the old tracker had said? “She’s strong. Ye trust in her, m’lord.”

He respected her, and she respected his opinion. But even he wouldn’t expect her to overcome such odds. Nay, he wouldn’t. He wouldn’t.

Devil fly away with him. He would.

Lifting the ram once more, she placed it against her side. She held it steady with her hands and took good, deep breaths of good English air. That would combat the strength of the shutters. Aye, it would.

Aiming at the place where the crossbar rested, she glared at the window, pawed the ground, and charged with all her might.

The log hit square on her target. The end met the shutters, held firm by the crossbar, and the entire frame, shutters, crossbar, and brackets flew out of the window, and Juliana flew out behind them.

Salisbury hung on to Layamon’s sleeve and gasped in agony. His heart swelled nigh to bursting; his head throbbed with the rhythm of his rushing blood.

“Hold up, ol’ man,” Layamon urged. “Wot happened? Is it m’lord an’ lady?”

Salisbury nodded. “Tosti…dead. Troop o’ men…murdered him. M’lord…after th’ girl.”

“Where’s m’lady?” Layamon looked out to the road.

“Went…too. Gave her…me dagger. Keep her safe.”

“Ye gave m’lady a dagger, an’ that’ll keep her safe?” Layamon shook Salisbury. “Are ye daft, man? No lady knows how t’ use a dagger.”

Salisbury pulled himself erect. “She’ll learn.”

Swinging on his heel, Layamon said, “I have no time t’ argue wi’ ye, ye ol’ fool. I must…” His brow knit.

Swaying, Salisbury whispered, “Go after…m’lady.” His vision clouded, and he collapsed in the dirt.

Juliana’s hips struck the wall; she somersaulted in the air, smacking her head on the side of the hut and landing with an audible
wump
. As she slowly recovered her senses, her first emotion was amazement, then triumph. She was outside.

She lay panting beside the shutters. Her palms were well paved with gravel. Her chin had acquired a scrape. Her elbows were bruised.

Once more she gained her feet, spreading her arms wide to heaven, but a glance to the west cut her celebration short. She hadn’t escaped to get lost in the woods at night. And how quickly could she move without a horse? She would soon find out. But first…

But first she had to eat, for her head still spun, and the pain of her scrapes and bruises made her almost nauseous. Spring greens dotted the woods, and with a little searching she could provide herself with…with the bags Raymond had left hanging over a stump at the edge of the clearing. She rubbed her eyes. How odd—it was almost as if they were waiting for her. She stumbled to her knees beside them and opened them with greedy fingers. One loaf of bread was missing, one hunk of cheese, and a skin of wine. He’d taken what he needed and unloaded the rest. To ease his horse’s burden, she supposed, and was thankful for the consideration, no matter how accidental.

The food put heart back into her, and she started down the path marked with the passage of many
horses. Walking, she assured herself, would keep her bruised muscles from stiffening, and a horse wouldn’t be an advantage in the woodlands, anyway. She rubbed the bump on her head and sighed.

Rounding the first corner, she kept her gaze on her feet and concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other. A whinny interrupted her meditations; she froze. Had she wandered close to the battle without realizing? Had a knight, posted as guard, seen her? At once she saw the horse, minus a rider, and jumped into the bushes. But before the creature could whinny again, she jumped back out. She stared and said aloud, “You’re my horse.”

Her horse. Her palfrey. Left staked to a tether beside the path and munching grass while waiting for her to arrive. She circled the animal and asked incredulously, “What are you doing here? Raymond abandoned you?”

She didn’t believe that. Raymond’s reverence for armor was only slightly less than his reverence for horses. His steed made him a knight, and he never forgot it. So—“He left you for me to find, didn’t he? He thought I would escape.”

Her aches miraculously eased, soothed by the recognition that Raymond hadn’t left her to molder in that hut. Raymond had faith in her, a faith as strong as Salibury’s. Maybe he wanted her to miss the battle but was anxious for her to follow.

She squinted at the sun, still dipping only halfway down to the horizon, and queried the absent Raymond, “You didn’t think I’d escape so soon, did you?”

Her saddle had been placed over a log. Although she hadn’t done it for years, she could saddle a horse, and she put her back into the job. As she mounted,
she hesitated. She should go back for the food bags. No doubt she would want for food before this journey was over. But she couldn’t spare even those few moments. She had to get to Margery and Raymond, and her sense of urgency grew.

On the path, she kept a keen eye out for signs of passage. Once she thought she heard an animal shriek, and shriek again, but the woods deadened the sound, and she could not tell from whence it came. She had suspected the troop of horsemen was close when Raymond locked her in the hut. Soon, too soon, she found the evidence.

A sunlit meadow beckoned her just ahead. On its outskirts, hoofprints proved the presence of horses. A thread of white wool had caught on a branch; she removed it and fingered it. She couldn’t prove its origin, of course, but she recognized local wool, and she noted its fineness.

Hers? Nay, it couldn’t be, but her palfrey stirred as if she’d transmitted her uneasiness. She paused among the debris and looked out into the clearing.

She could see no one, but the grass had been trampled as if a battle had been fought here—and she feared one had. Listening, she heard the birds calling in their chirpy springtime manner and determined the hazard had moved on. She urged her horse into the meadow, moving slowly, looking for signs she could read.

And she found one, but only one.

In the shade of a yew, the dark, still body of a youth rested without moving.

With a gasp, she urged her horse toward him. At the sound of the cantering hooves, the body moved as if jerked by strings. Arms rose, then fell. Juliana jumped to the ground and ran to him.

It was Denys. He had no visible wounds, no marks of sword or mace, but the color and texture of his skin looked like those of a fowl, plucked and left for weeks untended.

“Don’t step…on me,” he whispered.

“I won’t.” She touched his forehead.

His lids fluttered open; his eyes focussed with difficulty. He cried, “My lady! Forgive. Forgive…”

“Of course.” Glancing around, she found the brook that gave life to the meadow, and pulled off her kerchief. She wet it and wiped his thin face.

It seemed to revive him, for he sucked in a difficult breath. “Don’t promise forgiveness…until you know…”

“Until I know what you’ve done? I do know. You were stupid and greedy, but you could hardly have realized—”

“Stupid. Took Margery…because Satan himself…tempted…” Tears sprang to his eyes. “My mother…I’ll never see my mother…because I sinned.…”

Wetting her kerchief again, she let him suck the moisture. When he seemed to have trouble swallowing, she tried to lift his head.

He screamed.

She sprang away, horrified, and more horrified when he babbled, “Sorry. No courage. No knight…after all.”

Cautiously, she took his cold, clammy hand, but that provoked no outcry. “Where are you hurt?”

His deep, quivering sigh frightened her, made her wonder if it would be his last. “Rode over me.”

Lifting his chainse, she began whispering the prayers for the dead. Hoof marks crisscrossed his chest, marking it as clearly as they marked the virgin forest floor. It
looked as if someone had stood their horse above the lad and danced for pleasure. She credited youthful strength and a merciful Providence for the life still lingering in him, and she said, soothingly, “You’ll be with your mother again. She awaits you on the other side.”

His head flopped from side to side. “Mother…good. Honest. Taught me…better.”

“Mothers forgive all. I promise you”—she perjured her own soul, perhaps, but she had to ease this boy’s death—“she’ll forgive you.”