Great Maria (18 page)

Maria set her teeth together, determined to learn it. She watched how the other woman stretched the linen in her fingers while she sewed, to keep it straight.

“Who has visited the butcher?”

The needle flashed through the cloth. “Several people. Two men from Occel came here, but they stayed with us and seemed to be no more than merchants. There was a small man, with a limp, who spent most of the day with Fulbert yesterday.”

Maria shook her head. “I know no small man with a limp.”

“Also, there were two men, father and son, very like—the older much the taller? No. And a needle-nosed young man, on foot, but wearing a short coat, like a knight. He came yesterday. Fulbert—”

“Yes,” Maria said. She nodded once. “Haimo. He is one of my hostages from Iste.” She had wondered when she marked him leaving: such a one would have no innocent business outside the castle.

The two women smiled at each other. Turning back to her work, the ostler’s daughter took stitches along the ox’s horn. Maria sat still. The warmth and light of the kitchen soothed her.

“And Fulbert has been sending our smith—Galga is his name—sending Galga off into the countryside, now and then. I think he may be taking messages to Count Theobald, up on the fen.”

Maria grunted. “I will deal with Haimo.” She got to her feet; now that she had an enemy within reach, she felt charged with strength.

“Have you heard any new word of your husband?” the ostler’s daughter said.

“No. Nothing.”

The woman looked quickly away from her. Maria pulled her cloak up over her shoulders. “Thank you. I will remember what you have done for me.”

“Such things as I do. Bring me some needlework when you come again, and I will show you that stitch.”

Maria went out to the common room. Half a dozen men sat around a table below the window, wine flagons scattered around them. They turned owlishly toward her. Robert raced to her side.

“Mama, come meet my new friends. I told them all about you.”

Maria took his hand. The men at the table were making her uncomfortable with their stares. “No—we must go home.” She led him to the door and out the wide plank steps into the yard.

A wagon blocked the gate. Two oxen stood steaming in their traces before it, their split feet half-buried in the mud. Maria held Robert back on the steps.

“Robert,” she said. “You must help me. I need a knight’s help.”

The boy spun toward her. “Tell me. Oh, Mama, oh, I swear I’ll do good.”

She laughed. She crossed the yard toward her horse, walking carefully to keep from muddying her shoes. Robert leaped around her.

“Mama! Tell me—”

“Ssssh. It is a secret matter.”

He pressed his lips together. Maria gave him a strong hug and kissed his forehead. The ostler led up her mare by the bridle. She climbed up into her saddle, smoothing her skirts under her.

“Here you go, little prince,” the ostler said. He boosted Robert up behind the mare’s saddle, and Maria rode around the wagon toward the gate. The drover got back into his seat, shook out his whip, and shouted. The oxen shouldered into the harness. The ostler cried out, dismayed, and with a crunch the wagon smashed into the steps of the inn. Maria rode out to the street.

“Mama, now can you tell me?”

“When we are home again.” Of the three knights in the Tower, only one could walk. She wished the bald cook from her home castle were here: him she could have relied on. Birnia’s cook, the only sound man in the castle save Haimo himself, wheezed when he walked and spoke endlessly of spiritual matters.

They rode out the gate of the town. Maria nudged the mare into a long canter. She thought of waiting until Jean or Ralf returned, but Haimo might do other mischief, or he could escape. She could not endure it if he escaped.

Robert held onto her waist, and she urged the mare into a full gallop up the hill. The wind streamed in her face. They raced up the hard, rutted road, past the dead fields and the oak trees finally turning red. While they climbed, the air cooled to a wintry chill. Before them on the knob of the hill the Tower stood up dark gray against the sky. The gate was open. She jogged the mare through it and dismounted.

There was no one in the ward. Robert leaped down from the horse and went to take the reins. Maria said, “The secret is that Haimo is a traitor, and we must take him prisoner.”

“A traitor!”

“Go up to the knights’ room,” Maria said, “and wait for me.” She struck him lightly on the shoulder to hurry him off. Haimo was coming out of the stable to get her horse. While he walked he pulled on his short coat. Her heart knocked on her ribs. Robert disappeared into the Tower. The young man came up and took Maria’s reins.

“Good afternoon, Haimo.” She looked him in the face.

“My lady.”

He led the mare off toward the stable. She locked her fisted hands together and hurried over to the Tower steps.

The knights’ room stank of liniment and myrrh. Half the castle’s dogs lay in the rushes on the floor in front of the hearth. Two of the sick knights snored in chorus. The other stood at the foot of the bed, stiffly trying to get his crippled arm into his shirt. Robert was helping him. The old knight pushed his head through the neck of the shirt and tugged it down with his left hand. He had been a huge man once. Now his muscles hung wasting from his rack of bones.

“My lady,” he said, “what is this my knave here tells me?”

Maria went up to him. “Haimo—a hostage, he is the groom—he has been spying on us for Theobald’s sake. Can you help us? There’s nobody else.”

The old knight grunted. “Get me my sword,” he said to Robert. His right arm dangled from his sprained shoulder. “I’ll never get this into mail. Where is Haimo now?”

“In the stable.”

Robert brought the sword in its scabbard. The old knight took it by the hilt in his left hand. He threw off the scabbard in a coiling stroke of his good shoulder. “Let’s go.” He strode off toward the door.

They went down the stairs single file, Robert just ahead of Maria, and the old knight leading them. Maria said, “Robert, you must go to the stable and ask Haimo to come into the ward. Be careful. Don’t warn him that we are waiting for him.”

The knight opened the door out onto the stairs. The sunlight poured in past him. “Robo, look the bastard in the eye and say,
My mother wants her mare again.
No more. Go on.”

Robert dashed past him and down the outside stair to the ward. The old knight let Maria out before him. They followed the boy toward the stable door, walking in the rut the hoofs of horses had worn into the path. Just before they reached the stable door, it burst open, and Haimo came flying out.

He skidded to a stop and flung himself straight at Maria. The old knight bawled, “Run, you dog!” Maria raised her arms between them to shield herself, and the young man seized her by the wrists.

“I’ve got her, I’ll kill her, if you—don’t—I’ve—”

Maria kicked him, struggling against his grip. She rushed toward him and bowled him over. They fell together into the dirt of the ward. Haimo whined, his breath hot in her face. He struck her nose hard with his fist. An instant later he was torn away from her. She sat up, dazed.

“Mama,” Robert screamed. He dropped his bloody dagger and flung his arms around her. “Mama, are you hurt?”

“No.” She patted his back. Her eyes were watering. Her nose hurt with a pulsing sharp pain. Haimo lay in the rut before the door, his mouth open. The old knight planted one foot on his chest and drew the sword out of the young man’s body.

“You damned dog,” the old man murmured. He came toward them. His face was green with pain and he held his bad shoulder stiffly hunched against his neck. His fingers were slimed with Haimo’s blood. He daubed Robert’s cheeks and forehead with it.

“Your grandfather would have been proud of you, boy. I do not mean old Stephen d’Alene, either.”

Maria’s nose hurt. She said, “Robert, you warned him.”

“Maria,” Eleanor called from across the ward.

“Mama, I didn’t do anything. I just did what you said.”

“He guessed.” The old knight sagged down weakly to sit on the ground. “It was not the cleanest kill I have ever seen.”

Maria got to her feet. “Can you walk? Let me help you.”

“I can walk. Just let me sit here a while, and I will come up by myself.” He lowered his head.

The steps to the Tower door were clogged with people staring at them. Eleanor called her again. Maria put her hand on Robert’s shoulder. The boy was staring at Haimo’s body. He twisted his blood-streaked face up toward her.

“Are you all right, Mama? He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

She touched her nose gently. “No. I am fine.” She had not meant Haimo to die. Now there was only Fulbert. Her knees quivered, and she laid her hand on Robert’s shoulder. “Go tell Eleanor what happened. I have something to do now, back in the town.”

***

Fulbert was a large, handsome man. His face pebbled with sweat, he kept his eyes pinned to the floor. Twice he tried to speak, and she raised her voice and rode over him and forced him silent again—if he spoke, she knew, she would forget the speech she had made up on the way back to Birnia. Her hands trembled. She tucked them in her skirt and said, “I am not vengeful, but how am I to know you will not do it again?”

He cleared his throat. Abruptly he tilted his head up to meet her eyes. “By what right do you rule over us here? You are nothing but robbers. A man can defend himself against robbers.”

Maria said, “I will defend myself against you, if I have to. We killed Haimo.”

His face yielded a little, the rusty color fading from his cheeks. In the stock pens outside, a sheep baaed. Fulbert’s hand jerked toward the hilltop. “Whoever sits in that Tower brings me only misery.”

“You are a man of consequence in the town,” Maria said. “I am much loath to lose your service. Give me your promise you won’t work against me. I swear I will be just to you.”

“Justice,” Fulbert said, contemptuous. Gracelessly he went down on one knee. “I swear.” Taking her hand he put a dry kiss on her knuckle.

“God keep you,” Maria said. She pulled her hand out of his grip and left the shed. He followed her; she heard his footsteps behind her but did not wait for him. So late in the autumn most of the stockpens were empty. She walked between them to the gate, where her mare stood with her reins tied to a post. Three of the butcher’s boys squatted there against the wall and gawked at her while she mounted.

“Good-bye, Master Fulbert.”

The butcher mumbled some farewell. Maria rode off across the town toward the gate.

On her way back to the Tower, a band of horsemen appeared, riding toward her from the east. Maria drew a deep breath to steady herself. She reined up to wait for them, wishing Eleanor were there with her long sight to tell her who they were. One of the riders raised his arm and called to her.

It was William. She galloped off the road toward him.

He and his horsemen cantered toward her across the slope. The frosts had killed the green of the hillside. The sky was a smoky autumn color, like wool in the fleece. Maria reined up. She was afraid to ask him about Richard. He trotted his tall stallion over to her and leaned out of his saddle to kiss her.

“William,” she said. “What is it?”

He took her by the hand. “I’ve come to do the Devil’s work,” he said, “but it can’t be helped.”

Confused, she swung her mare around to trot along shoulder to shoulder with his horse. “What do you mean? Richard—is he alive? Are they holding him to ransom?”

In the creased map of his face, William’s bright colorless eyes narrowed. “Ransom? Oh. You mean the Saracens.” He smiled. “Richard talked his way out of it. They have made a peace with us, those people. They are helping us now. No one told you?”

Maria’s voice failed. William laughed at her. “He never sent you any word that he was set free?”

“Mother of God.” She lifted her reins. The mare picked up speed and William’s big Roman-nosed roan stallion moved out into a canter to keep up. “I thought he was dead,” Maria said. “The wretch. He doesn’t care about me at all. I thought he was dead. Where is he? Why did you come, and not him?”

“They are both fighting. Some of the Iste barons have rebelled against us—I have to deal with their hostages. How have you fared with Theobald?”

“Pah. He has taken up residence in the fen.” She glanced at the score of knights galloping behind them. “He has lots of men, many more than we do, and one of the hostages was bearing tales to a man in the town who is in touch with Occel. We had to kill him.”

William coughed. He banged himself in the chest. He sat heavy and loose in his saddle, the slate-red stallion lumbering along beside her. “Theobald’s still in the fen? I’ll take care of him.” He faced her, amused. “Richard never told you he was let free, and you thought he was dead.”

“Do not laugh at me, William.”

William laughed at her.

***

Stopping only long enough to eat his supper, William took his men out after Theobald. For two days Robert haunted the Tower gate for words of the fighting. Theobald and William maneuvered up and down the fen; abruptly Theobald marched away north. William and Jean harried him over the border and fell back to the Tower. Robert pouted, robbed of his war.