Linda Barlow (59 page)

The woman looked once more in his direction, then turned and exited the inn.

"Do you know her?" Roger asked Francis, who was still rooted to the floor by his side.

There was a pause, and Roger glanced up at him. His expression was strange—Roger couldn't quite place the emotions at play there. Anger? Dread? "Do you?" Francis countered.

"I don't think so. She seemed to know me, though."

Francis drew a tense breath, saying, "She's a dissenter. She and her husband came once or twice to prayer meetings I was holding in the area. She was startled, no doubt, to see me in the habit of a friar."

"She recognized you?"

"I don’t know. She gave that impression."

"She behaved strangely, that's certain. Still, if she's one of your hapless heretics, she won't betray us."

"I think I may just have a word with her all the same."

"Be careful of the husband," Roger said, losing interest. "He'll probably think you're a lecherous friar."

Francis nodded grimly as he followed the woman out into the night.

* * *

As he hurried out to the stables behind the inn, Francis Lacklin's guts were cramping so badly he thought he was going to be sick. He'd recognized the woman instantly. He knew her far better than Roger did. The last he had heard, Priscilla Martin been living in Oxford, where, although he'd ordered her watched, he had left her alone. At one time he had considered taking more stringent action, but in the end he'd decided not to have her killed. She was a Protestant, and it went against the grain to harm the elect of God. Besides, although her hurried disappearance from Whitcombe suggested that she had guessed the truth, he was reasonably certain she had no proof.

Why had she returned to the north? What was she doing here, only a day's ride from Whitcombe? Had she come to meet with Alexandra Douglas, or someone in the Trevor household? If so, how long would it be before Roger heard what she had to say?

There was only one thing in life Francis Lacklin feared: the look that would transform his old friend's face when Roger learned the truth about his brother's death. He would go to any lengths to ensure that Roger never found out. He would silence Pris Martin. If necessary, he would even silence Alexandra.

"Have you seen a woman?" he demanded of the sleepy-eyed ostler at the entrance to the stables. "Dark hair, young?" He broke off as a horse erupted from the stable yard, the woman in question clinging to its back. She came right at him; both Francis and the ostler, cursing, were driven back against the wall. Her face was a pale blur of ill-concealed terror as she thundered by, racing her mount toward the London road.

"A fresh horse, quickly," Francis demanded, tipping the ostler generously, which brought rapid results. "If I don't return, tell the other friar, my fellow traveler, that I'm off to the south on an errand of mercy. Can you remember that?"

"An errand o' mercy, aye, Father," the boy repeated, his broad peasant face displaying neither irony nor curiosity.

"Tell him to go on without me. I shall meet him in a couple of days at our destination."

"Aye, sir. 'E'll 'ave yer message, I promise ye."

"Good." Within minutes Francis was hard in pursuit, riding down the rough road in the rain, chasing the young woman who rode so foolishly without an escort, without protection of any kind. Neither her horse nor her riding skills were any match for his. Less than two miles of roadway were eaten up before he was alongside her, reaching for her reins, fighting to bring her desperate flight under control.

"No!" she screamed, striking at him with her riding whip. The leather caught him across the eyes, blinding him momentarily, streaking his nerves with pain. Francis lunged at her in fury; there was a jarring impact as their two horses crashed into one another. Francis' mount reared as Priscilla's crop struck again and again. Her own horse wheeled to get out of the way, but not quite in time. The animals collided again, and Pris was knocked to the muddy ground. Francis had to fight to restrain his panicked horse, to keep the animal from trampling the woman who lay crumpled and still beneath him. At last he calmed his mount, slid from its back, and knelt beside his prey.

She was unconscious but alive. It appeared that she had struck her head on a rock. The rain poured down upon her, washing away the blood on her forehead. Francis' hand closed over his dagger, drawing it from the sheath in his friar's belt. He hesitated. They were not two miles from the inn, and both Roger and the ostler had seen him go after Pris Martin. If her body were found here, throat slashed, it would take little in the way of wits to settle upon the prime suspect.

He resheathed his knife and dragged Priscilla off into the high grasses at the side of the road. He need not kill her. It was chilly and wet and she was hurt; without attention she would very likely die before dawn. His bowels griped again and he set his teeth against the pain.
You'd leave this woman to die on the side of the road?
the voice of his conscience assailed him. He silenced it.
At least he wasn't driving six inches of steel through her heart.

Methodically he searched her, having no clear idea of what he expected to find. What he did find held him transfixed, truly sickened now. He had to strike flint to read the papers she'd folded so carefully and hidden in her bodice. He read every incriminating line, saw the two signatures at the bottom. He recognized the bold and fluid handwriting even before he saw her name. Alexandra Douglas. She knew.

Francis buried his face in his hands. He did not pray; he could not. God would not listen, he knew, to the empty pleadings of a damned soul.

Ten minutes later, Francis Lacklin stealthily passed the Cock's Feather Inn again, riding northwest, toward Westmor. He would ride through the stormy night. He would reach Alexandra many hours before Roger. Reach her and confront her. There was little doubt in his heart about the way such a confrontation would play out; he knew Alexandra too well now to think he could deceive or manipulate her. No. When his good friend Roger arrived at Westmor, his red-haired sweetheart would be dead.

* * *

Roger went to bed soon after Francis left, falling asleep with his head full of erotic images. It wasn't until dawn that he discovered his friend hadn't returned to their room during the night. He'd ridden out after a woman, the ostler in the stable yard informed him. South, back in the direction from which they'd come. Neither he nor the woman had yet returned. "'E said 'e 'ad an errand o' mercy to perform. If 'e didn't come back, 'e said to tell ye 'e'd meet ye at yer destination, Friar," the boy told Roger. "Shall I saddle up yer 'orse?"

If Francis had been some other man, Roger might have shrugged at the urges that will drive a man out into the rain in pursuit of a pretty woman. As it was, he concluded that the meeting with the heretic woman had drawn Francis into some business concerning the Reformers and their problems up here in the north. "An errand of mercy," was code for heretics to succor, or pray with, or scheme with, or whatever Francis did with these people. Still, it was too bad; there always seemed to be an inordinate number of people making demands on Francis, and he really did have a hell of a cold. It was a shame he'd had to backtrack to the south on such a wet and dismal night.

Roger mounted his horse and began the final leg of his journey alone. For some reason the anticipation of the night had decayed into a strange heaviness around his heart. He would see his lover again, yes, but he was also going to have to face his father, a prospect that never failed to disquiet him. The nearer he got to the home of his youth, the more the ghosts rose up to assault him—that cold, stern giant who'd stood so often over him with a leather strap in his hand; his Gypsy-eyed, laughing mother, who had defended him, as he had tried to defend her; his older brother, always more loved, always more favored; his younger brother, the baby of the family, so much younger and weaker and, until recently, not a very amusing companion.

And Alix. Six years younger and a girl, but closer in spirit to him than any of them. It came to him with a jolt that even Catherine, his mother, hadn't been as dear to him as Alix.

He would see her, touch her, make love to her. So why was he so fretful? Why did his blood pound and his palms slicken with sweat? She would not reject him, of that he was certain. She loved him. So why was he as nervous as a young man on his way to his first woman?

With increasing dismay he remembered the last time he had experienced this degree of dread. He had been smuggling heretics out of England while Geoffrey de Montreau was torturing Alix on the rack. Body of Christ! Digging his heels into his horse's flank, he set a furious pace.

Chapter 34

That afternoon in Westmor Forest, Alexandra was tramping through the woods on her way to Merwynna's when she thought she heard a voice call out to her. She stopped and clutched at a tree, feeling dizzy and slightly queasy. Her condition. She was tired all the time and out of sorts. She listened, but heard nothing more.

Puzzled, she walked on. A few moments later she heard it again. A hoarse masculine voice muttered something that sounded like, "Go home."

"Merwynna?" She looked around, but the wood was silent. The weather was cool and foggy, reminiscent of the day a year ago when she had found Ned's body in the cave. She heard a whispering that seemed to come from inside her own head. Goosebumps rose on the nape of her neck, and then spread down her arms. After the threat made by Merwynna's familiar spirit during the witch spell on the day before yesterday, the last thing Alexandra wanted to hear was voices in her head!

"Danger," it whispered, very softly. Or was that only the wind?

Was there some danger to Merwynna? She began to run toward the wisewoman's cottage. Within minutes she had stopped beside the lake, her nerves crawling with the strong belief that all was far from well. The fog was thicker here, and everything seemed unnaturally still. A thin wreath of smoke was rising from the chimney on the wisewoman's tiny cottage, but otherwise there was no sign of life.

She will need your protection soon.
Sweet Jesu, what was wrong? Don't let any harm come to Merwynna, she silently pleaded with God.

She walked to the door of the cottage and pushed it open. For a moment she thought it was empty, for there was no Merwynna seated at her usual place at the herb table. Then she saw the man standing in front of the fire, stirring the coals with the tip of his sword. His head turned as she stiffened on the threshold. "Come in, Alexandra."

It was Francis.

Alexandra had to clutch the doorjamb to keep herself erect. "Francis?" Her voice didn't sound like her own. "What are you doing here?"

Her words hung in the air between them. He stared at her.
He knows I know.
Alexandra's knees went weaker still. Merwynna wasn't here; the Voice had tried to warn Alexandra away, but she, stubborn as usual, had not listened.

"Why are you here at this time of day?" He sounded angry. His face was drawn and pale. He coughed once, then continued, "I expected to have to come to Westmor. I didn't expect you to come to me."

Sweet Jesu! Alexandra whirled as if to run. She heard him move and felt the touch of metal on the side of her throat. His sword. "No. Shut the door. You're not going anywhere."

Numbly she obeyed. She couldn't seem to think of anything else to do. Her wits had turned to smoke.

Francis lowered his weapon and gestured to the stool at the herb table. "Sit down. You're paler than an unbaked pudding."

She sat. "You frightened me."
Think, Alexandra. How would he expect you to act?
Deliberately she widened her eyes, trying to practice the guilelessness she'd cultivated at court. "I thought I was seeing a specter. You're supposed to be in the Middle Sea with Roger. Where is he? He's not in England, surely? He hasn't risked his neck to come chasing after me?"

"I'm afraid so. I left him last night at an inn a few hours' journey from here." He paused. "'Twas the same inn where I fortuitously met up with Priscilla Martin."

Alexandra made a soft, agonized sound.
Your destiny awaits you. Tarry no longer, but ride out to meet it!
She closed her eyes, but for only an instant. Keep your wits about you, fool! "Pris Martin? But I thought she'd left the north a year ago."

Francis shook his head slightly. "My friend, you needn't playact for me." He looked stricken—more beset by raw emotion than she had ever seen him. "I have read the documents she was carrying on her person. I know your handwriting, and I have seen your signature."