Rosehaven (32 page)

At least thirty men were sleeping in the hall, wrapped in their blankets, snoring as loudly as the wolfhounds.

Hastings had never before in her life wondered about silence, but now it was all she could think of. They could not make a sound. If one of the soldiers awoke, all would be lost.

When Severin reached the wide double doors, he turned and motioned her to follow him. He led her down a narrow corridor and opened a short, thick door. It led into a small granary. There was another door.

Once they were in the inner bailey, pressed against the side of the keep, deep in the shadows, he whispered, “I
learned everything about Sedgewick when I gave it over to Sir Alan. He and his men should be within the stables just beyond. Then we will lead the horses through the postern gate.”

“But the horses—”

“I know. Alan has told all his men to hold their nostrils so they won’t neigh. We need luck in this, Hastings.”

And she thought: I have you, what need I of luck?

But she was soon to change her mind. She heard a man shout.

Severin simply pressed her behind him, whispered for her to stay close. He raced toward the single scream. Just inside the stable door a man was on his knees, Sir Alan over him, a dagger pressed against his neck.

“The fool screamed. I will kill him.” With no more words, the knife went into the man’s throat. He gurgled loudly, then fell onto his side.

“The other stable lads are bound and gagged. Let us go, my lord, and quickly. My lady, I am glad to see you well.”

Hastings followed Severin, her fingers securely fastened against Marella’s nostrils. She kept tossing her head, but Hastings knew that one neigh might do them all in. She didn’t know how she did it, but she kept hold.

Slowly, it took so very long for them to go through the postern gate in a single line. Many of the men were staggering with illness but they knew now that they had a chance to live. None fell. None spoke. They all just moved slowly forward, one after the other, until Sir Alan, the last man through the postern gate, turned and quietly closed it.

Still they walked the horses until Severin raised a hand. “Quietly,” he called out. “Quietly.”

He lifted Hastings onto Marella’s bare back, then swung onto his stallion. The moment the horses’ nostrils were released, three animals neighed loudly.

“Onward!” Severin shouted.

They were away. They rode hard until the horses were lathered and panting. Severin then called a halt. “All of you remain here, rest your mounts.” He nodded to Sir Alan and they rode back along the narrow rutted wagon trail.

Hastings was patting Marella’s neck, speaking softly to her and telling her how brave she was, when Severin pulled his horse beside hers. “No one follows. By now de Luci must know of our escape. But he isn’t a complete fool. He knows that we can reach Oxborough before he can catch up to us.”

He leaned over, kissed her hard, then patted his palm to her cheek. “You have done well, wife,” he said, then kicked his stallion in his heavy sides.

They were safely within Oxborough’s gates before dawn.

It wasn’t until they were in the great hall that they discovered that someone else from Sedgewick had escaped with them.

32

“M
Y LORD,
”
LOTHAR SAID
,
STEPPING FORWARD
, “
I HAVE
something to tell you.”

Severin, tired, hungry, and so weary he wanted to lie down beside Edgar the wolfhound, turned to the large burly soldier who was one of Sir Alan’s trusted men. “Aye, what is it, Lothar?”

“You see that I am very healthy, my lord, my three friends as well. It is not because of chance that this is so. It is because of something entirely different, something that I ask you think about carefully before—”

“Speak, man!”

“Lord Severin, Lothar brought me with him.”

Eloise came from behind one of the other men. She was dressed like a little boy.

“She saved us, my lord. Before Lord Richard came upon us with stealth, the child was friendly to me. When I was thrown into the dungeon, she brought me food. I shared the food with the men close enough to me that I could reach them. We all survived. We are well. Eloise couldn’t feed all the men else de Luci would suspect.”

Hastings walked slowly to Eloise, pulled back the coarse woolen hood. She smoothed the child’s braids. She lightly ran her fingertips over her thin cheeks.

“I do not understand, Eloise. Come drink some milk and eat, then you will tell Lord Severin and me everything.”

Eloise spoke even as she stuffed MacDear’s sweet white bread into her mouth. “He told Marjorie he would kill me if she did not do just as he said. He hurt her as much as he hurt me. She tried to protect me. I thought if I left, then he could not force her.”

Lady Moraine, who was pressed tightly against her son, afraid to let him go to the jakes by himself for fear he would disappear, said, “I will take care of you, Eloise, but you must promise me something.”

The child was chewing more slowly now on a piece of mutton. She nodded.

“You will not treat Hastings badly.”

Eloise bowed her head. When she looked up, Trist was sitting on the trestle table in front of her. He reached out his paw and patted the back of her thin hand.

Eloise burst into tears, sobbing and hiccuping. “I want Marjorie!”

Hastings looked toward Severin, who was chewing a big hunk of yellow sweet cheese. She didn’t like this one bit. Now she had to feel sorry for Marjorie? That damnable witch with the black insides? It was not to be borne. “We have to rescue her?” she said, barely above a whisper.

“I will think about that,” Severin said.

Lady Moraine looked up at Hastings, then drew the child to her. She rocked her against her. Then she pressed her back at arm’s length. “It is difficult, Eloise, for anyone to want to help her. Marjorie tried to poison Hastings.”

“No, no, she did not.” Eloise brushed her hand over her eyes. She drew back her shoulders and took a deep breath. “It was I who put the powder in Hastings’s wine. And it wasn’t poison. It wouldn’t have killed her. I just wanted to punish her for making Marjorie’s nose grow large and red. Marjorie knew but she took the blame for me.”

“I really don’t like this,” Hastings said.

Severin was on his feet. “I don’t either. As I said, I will think about all this. I must go now, Hastings.”

“To find Gwent and our men?”

“Aye, I have prayed myself numb. They have to be alive. They have to be. When we are all together again, then we will make plans.”

She did not demand to accompany him. In truth she was exhausted, the babe making her nearly dizzy with fatigue. “You will be home soon,” she said a short time later when she stood in the outer bailey, waiting for all the men to mount.

“Aye, as quickly as possible. Sir Alan will take care of Oxborough. If Richard de Luci tries treachery, he will not succeed. You will consider Oxborough under siege until I return.”

She nodded, stood on her tiptoes, and wrapped her arms about his neck. “Be careful, Severin.”

He brought her close, his breath warm against her hair. “We will get through this, Hastings. You will see.”

“I know,” she said, and kissed him. “I know,” she said again against his open mouth. She felt a shudder go through him and kissed him yet again.

He stepped back, his breathing quick and hard. He smiled down at her, his eyes dark and vibrant. “I have sent a man to Lord Graelam de Moreton in Cornwall. God knows how long it will take for him to come, or even if he is able to come.”

“He will come. Will you send a messenger to the king?”

Severin shook his head. “No, I don’t wish to take a chance on Edward’s whim. I want Richard de Luci killed before any learn that he is still alive. All will be as we believed it to be before the madman came back from the dead.”

“My lord,” Sir Alan said, striding up to Severin, who was now holding Hastings in the circle of his arms. “Our messengers to your other keeps are well on their way. Men will begin arriving within two days. I doubt we will need Graelam de Moreton.”

“I know,” Severin said, pulling Hastings against him once more, as he could not prevent himself from doing so. “It is just that I promised him. He told me if I did not and he heard that I was ever in grave danger, he would stake
me out in the middle of a practice field and ride his warhorse over me.” He kissed Hastings’s nose, then grinned at Alan. “I believe him. I am not a fool.”

Hastings laughed. It felt wonderful to laugh, even for a moment.

“I must go. Take care of our babe and Alan will see to your safety.”

He slammed his fist into Sir Alan’s shoulder, all in good humor, and said something low to him that Hastings could not hear. Sir Alan nodded solemnly. Severin waved yet again to Hastings and strode to his warhorse. Hastings watched him leap gracefully astride.

“God be with you, my lord,” she called. He waved at her and was soon outside the massive Oxborough gates. She ran to the sturdy wooden ladder that led up to the ramparts. She watched him until he was gone from her sight.

When Alice came to her later, Hastings was on her knees beside a man whose belly was so shriveled he could only keep MacDear’s lightest broth down without vomiting. She looked up, her head cocked to one side. Alice looked utterly bewildered.

“I do not believe this, Hastings.”

“What is it?” She was on her feet in an instant. “What has happened?”

“We have a visitor. She has never come here. She has never left her cottage. All know she is a recluse. Yet she is here demanding to see you.”

Hastings turned to see the Healer walk briskly into the great hall. She was wearing shoes. Hastings’s own mouth dropped open at the sight of her.

The Healer waved everyone away, said nothing at all to anyone, and quickly knelt down beside a sick man. She continued silent, merely grunted at some of them, shook her head at one man who was already unconscious, and actually pinched another man’s wrist who just happened to grin up at her.

“Where is Alfred?” Hastings asked for want of anything better. She was as bewildered as Alice.

“My beauty is sleeping soundly in the sun. I left him a roasted chicken if he awakes and is hungry.”

“He is always hungry, Healer.”

“Aye, he deserves to be, not like these louts sprawled about in your great hall, Hastings. Well, I’ve done what I can for them. The man yon will die soon. I cannot help him. The others will survive with your care.”

“Healer, how did you know we needed you?”

Hastings stared at the Healer as the woman looked down at her long fingers, twisting the odd gold ring about on her finger, a magic ring perhaps, one older than England itself.

“Healer?”

Her braids flew as she raised her head. “Bedamned to you, Hastings! Where is Gwent? I had prayed he would be here, but he is not. Where is he?”

Gwent? The Healer despised men. All knew it. Gwent?

Hastings noticed for the first time that the Healer did not look quite like the ragged woman that she normally did. No, her gown was a soft yellow, she was wearing leather slippers, her thick, long hair was braided loosely and tied with a yellow ribbon. She looked remarkably young.

“My son has gone to find him and another dozen of our men,” Lady Moraine said.

“He is a man but surely he would not lose himself apurpose.”

“No, he and all the other men were drugged,” Hastings said. “Richard de Luci swore that it would not kill them. But he captured us and we were forced to leave all of them unconscious on the ground. Severin is very worried. We will know by the end of the week.”

“That dim-cockled lout,” the Healer muttered to herself. “I warned him that this journey to Rosehaven would bring him low, but would he listen to me? Does any man ever listen? No, the cocky little bittle sticks just strut about and expect all to transpire as they wish it to. I told him not to go. Even Alfred jumped on him and tried to hold him down.”

Hastings could but stare at her. “But you did not tell me
that the journey would bring me low, Healer. Yet you told Gwent. What is this?”

“I did not know about you, Hastings. You are here, after all, standing in front of me all smiling and well, and Gwent is likely in some dungeon somewhere rotting like a meat under maggots. By the Devil’s shins, I will make the overgrown pus-head regret this once he returns.”

“Saint Catherine’s eyebrows,” Lady Moraine gasped, staring at the Healer, “I see the truth now. You are besotted. You are acting just like Hastings does with my son. You and Gwent. But how can that be? He hates Alfred. I suspect he even fears him. He jumps whenever the cat leaps at him.”

The Healer’s chin went up. Hastings saw that her neck was firm. No, the Healer wasn’t old at all. Certainly no older than Lady Moraine or Hastings’s own mother. “Gwent now has great affection for Alfred. Alfred even once sat on Gwent’s legs whilst he ate some of my special broth. Alfred did not try to steal the broth. There is now a bond between them. That miserable crockhead.”

“Healer,” Alice said, “Alfred would steal the meat off your plate. Surely he would not show pity to Gwent?”

The Healer turned on Alice. “You will not talk about my tender Alfred like that. He is a sweeting. It is Gwent that is a hulking cretin, so sure of himself and his prowess that he must needs follow Lord Severin. Now he will die in a dungeon, rotting.”

“But I thought you hated men,” Lady Moraine said.

“Of course I do,” the Healer said, staring darkly at Lady Moraine. “They are all useless, windy bladders, concerned only with themselves. But you, lady, you blather nonsense. You will say no more about it. I will leave now. I will return tomorrow to see if there is any news. That lack-witted oxhead had better return to Oxborough well enough so that I can fix him.”

Without another word, the Healer marched out of the great hall, everyone staring after her, even one man who was too weak a moment before to raise his head.

“Well,” Hastings said, shaking her head, “this is a remarkable thing.”

“Aye,” said Alice, “more than remarkable. Gwent kept his distance from me when I told him I would consider bedding him and giving him a man’s pleasure. He did not seem interested. Well, he was interested, but something held him back. I could not understand him. By the Devil’s horns, does the wind blow that way?” She just shook her head and carried a mug of milk to one of the ill men, saying a silent prayer now for Beamis, who rode with Lord Severin.

Hastings was laughing even as she lightly rubbed her palm over her belly.

Within two days fifty men from Severin’s other keeps had arrived at Oxborough.

“We will starve if they long remain,” MacDear said as he stirred a giant caldron of stewed pheasant with cabbage, onions, and leeks.

Steam curled up about his massive head, wreathing him in gray mist.

“I will tell them they can only eat every other day,” Hastings said, poked his huge arm, and returned to the great hall. The sick men were nearly well, the one man who had died shortly after the Healer had come had been buried in the Oxborough graveyard.

Sir Alan was dealing well with the three castellans, drawing Sedgewick keep on a large square of parchment so they could see what they would face as soon as Lord Severin returned.

The Healer returned the morning of the third day.