Rose of Hope (31 page)

“Hold this,” he said as he thrust the torch into her hands.

***

Fallard caught the flash of movement from outside the door. The skin on his nape tingled. He wore not his sword, believing it unneeded inside the wall, but pulled a knife from its sheath inside his boot.

“Stay here,” he ordered.

“Fallard, what do you do?”

But he was already halfway up the steps, moving with the stealth of a warrior prepared for sudden battle. At the entrance, he abruptly dropped and dived low through the blind opening onto the grounds of the orchard, careful not to land on his bad leg. As easily as a cat, he came to his feet in a crouch several feet away, knife at the ready. With a single flicker, his eyes took in the entire area. Naught was visible that should not be there. Yet, he had seen movement.

He stepped to peer around the side of the crypt, ready for aught. As far as the chapel, there was naught to be seen. He spun in a rapid circle, certain of his perception. The movement had been too high against the doorframe to be an animal, and was similar to the drawing back of a head from around the jamb of the door. He still felt the tingle that had so oft in the past saved his life. From somewhere, someone watched.

Whoever ’twas remained hidden from his sight. He decided never to leave the hall without his sword, at least not until they caught the traitor. He had been a fool to do so this morn, but he had thought them safe enough inside the wall. He would make not that mistake again, and was grateful he had survived to learn from it. Too oft, such errors cost a warrior his life.

“Thegn D’Auvrecher! Is all well?”

He looked up to see a young hearth companion staring curiously at him from the wall walk.

“Saw you aught move nigh these doors?”

The sentry shook his head. “Nay, my thegn, but I fear my gaze was more upon the woods.”

Which is where it belongs. Good man.

“Look you now all around, as far as the hall and the chapel. See you aught, even an animal?”

From his high position, the guard searched the grounds with keen eyes, but turned back to Fallard. “There is none anywhere nigh you. Aside from those in the shelters, I see naught out of place but a pig rooting in the kitchen garden. Someone has left the gate open.”

“That pig is likely to become supper do Alewyn or Alyce catch him there,” he called.

The guard laughed and saluted as he turned away.

The touch at his nape that signaled the presence of a hidden watcher faded. He forced himself to relax as he returned his knife to its sheath. Had he imagined it? He was not a superstitious man, but mayhap his awe at standing nigh to Wulfsin the Wanderer had influenced his perceptions more than he knew.

Returning to the crypts, he found a nervous Ysane waiting for him nigh the bottom of the stairs.

Her eyes were big as trenchers. “What was it, Fallard, what saw you?”

“Naught but imagination, ’twould seem.” He noted the taut, pale lines of her face and kept the tenor of his voice light. “Not even the sentry saw aught. Come. Be not afraid. ’Tis but this place. In here, ’tis easy to imagine that which is not real.”

“You limp,” she said.

“’Tis naught.”

Her lips tightened, but she made no further comment.

He took back the torch and resumed the exploration of the burial niches. Favored articles of each entombed individual had been placed into the alcoves with them. Goblets and other eating utensils of precious metals, oft studded with gemstones, lay beside musical instruments, and in one case, a decaying book.

This last pulled him as an insect to light. He stepped close, trying to read the exquisitely wrought title on the leather cover. The language was runic, and unfamiliar, and it helped not that thick dust obscured much of the writing. He was reluctant to touch it, fearing the entire book might crumble beneath his questing fingers. Taking a risk, he blew gently, removing the worst of the dust.

“None today can read the runes,” Ysane said from beside him, sadness in her voice. “’Tis a great pity, that. But ’tis written in the records left by Wulfsin that the book is a chronicle of the deeds of one Creoda Icelingas, a true king of Mercia. Little is known of him, for he was one of the first of the Mercian kings in this land. ’Tis difficult to be sure, for much of that period is lost in time. The scops sing that he was close descendent of King Icel, who first brought the
Angle
people across the sea to their new home here, to what is called
Angelcynn
in the old tongue of my people.”

Fallard lifted the torch between them to stare at her face, for her voice was hushed, and filled with the same reverential wonderment he himself felt. The sense of a history ancient beyond their ken swept them both with its powerful brush.

They came to several crypts in which the openings were sealed with a wall of stone, upon which the word ‘
Forbidden’
was scribed.

“Why are these tombs sealed in this way?”

“’Tis told they died of a terrible disease that spread quickly to others, some sort of pox unknown to the healers. ’Twas believed at the time their bodies should be burned, but the family could bear not such a pagan end to the ones they loved, so they were sealed into the wall. ’Twould seem the sealing was sound, for afterwards the strange illness went away and came not again.”

He shuddered. When he was young, there were rumors of the same sort of affliction in lands east of his own. ’Twas said now and anon, whole villages were found dead, the ugly marks on the peoples’ skin the only clue as to their untimely end. He believed not, as did many, that ’twas a curse of the devil and the villagers had practiced black magic. Still, when this happened the bodies, and everything associated with the village, even the fields, were burned. Betimes, survivors were also found wandering dazed and lost close by. More oft than not, they were killed where they stood and burned, too.

Shaking off the unwelcome sense of horror engendered by the sealed tombs, he moved on. He found the crypt where lay Vane, the fourth thegn, under whose guidance many of the most recent changes in the burh had been made. His wife lay beside him, and above them were the coffins of Vane’s young brothers who had perished in the hidden corridor beyond where he and Ysane now stood.

The burial niches went on for quite some distance, until he noticed the curvature of the walls. They were approaching the far end of the crypts, where the outside wall curved around to follow the perimeter of the island. Here, the shrouds covering the coffins were newer, less decayed. These were the more recent of the hall’s deceased.

Ysane stopped beside a row of crypts on the right side. She grew very still, almost as if she no longer breathed. Moments passed. She seemed turned as if to stone, staring at the coffins. Only her eyes moved, searching, he knew, for that which was not there, but should have been. Her pallor increased.

“Who are they?” Fallard had already read the names, but wanted her to speak.

Finally, she blinked a single time, and her lips moved. “These are my grandfather, Thegn Lyolf, my mother, Lady Edeva, and my brother, Sir Kennard. I miss them.”

He waited. She said no more, and he knew then she would not, though she must be greatly perplexed, and hurting.

He took the initiative. She must face a grievous truth, though it would increase her sorrow. He would help her all he could. “There is a thing of which I would speak, since we are here.”

Her lips tightened and her face grew taut. Her head turned and she looked at him with moss green eyes gone blank. ’Twas as if an inner shutter had slammed shut.

“Ysane, I see not here the body of your daughter. Know you what happened to her after that night?”

As he had expected, a spasm of pain twisted across her features, wiping away the emptiness. She stepped back from him and turned away, her body grown stiff as if by sheer will she could hold back the truth.

“Little rose, forgive me. I regret the necessity, but ’tis important. Your child should be here, but she is not. ’Tis my thought you know naught of her, since that night.”

He thought she would not respond.

As if returning from a place far away, she said, “None have spoken to me of…of what happened, and nay, I have asked not.”

“Then ’tis time you were told. Are you willing to bear it?”

She nodded, but stiffly, as if movement pained her.

“The day I took Wulfsinraed from Ruald, I went on the wall with the first marshal to take measure of the burh. In the course of our walk, the events leading up to that day were discussed. I asked for a full account. According to Domnall, Ruald ordered one of his men to take the babe into the forest and bury her where none would find her place of rest. After, the man was killed in the fighting without ever revealing the burial site. I questioned Ruald’s men, but if they knew, they told not. I sent my own men to seek any sign, but they found naught. I am sorry, my rose, but none now knows where lies Angelet’s grave.”

A keening, as of an animal in pain, escaped her lips. Tears slid in slow course along her cheeks from eyes shut tight upon receipt of his words. She reached blindly, finding the stone above the middle crypt where lay the carving of the name, and ran her fingertips over the letters.

Kennard.

“Mayhap,” he said, “her name can be carved here with that of your brother, or better, above the alcove where one day I will lie, and you with me. A short explanation for her body’s absence may be added, something simple.”

She nodded. From inside her girdle she withdrew a piece of linen to wipe her eyes. “’Tis good to know,” she said, in between bouts of sniffing. “’Twas a question I have wished to ask, but….” She shrugged. “I almost feared to know. ’Twas my hope Ruald had found the decency to place her here, yet I knew he was capable of aught. I feared, when none spoke of it, mayhap he had…not buried her at all, that he had done to my daughter that which he had planned for me.”

“Put her into the river, you mean.”

“Aye, or worse.”

She turned to him and he wrapped his arms about her, holding her close, seeking to comfort. “Ysane, I made it my purpose to ask, and learned the man who buried her was not an evil man. ’Twas told to Domnall by one who knew him well that he was angered and grieved by her death. Methinks we may be certain he treated her with respect.”

“Yet she lies unblessed,” she said, grief quivering in her tone.

“Nay. You must see Father Gregory. I have spoken with him of this. He will tell you in detail, if you wish to hear it, of the ceremony of blessing he made for Angelet, how in light of her baptism and innocence, he entrusted her to the loving mercy of God, who alone knows where she lies.”

“He spoke not of this to me. Why?”

“Because I asked that he not, until you were ready, and he agreed.”

She turned her face into his tunic, and wept.

He let her cry, his hand gentle upon her head, until she found an end to tears. As her body quaked in his arms, the strangest feeling overcame him. For the first time in his warrior’s life, he wished ‘twere possible to take into himself another’s pain, and bear it for them. ’Twas similar to the awkward sympathy he experienced when he soothed his sisters as they cried—and what man was ever easy around a woman’s tears? But ’twas different, too. He felt less ill at ease, less anxious for her to hurry through the storm. Somehow, it mattered that he not only comfort her, but find a way to alleviate her sorrow. Still, what could mere man do to relieve the pain of a lost child? He decided the best thing was to keep her busy and mayhap, focused on himself, and the life they would make together.

“Come, let us complete our purpose here,” he said then, taking the linen and drying her face. “Or do you desire to return to the hall? I give you leave, if that is your wish. The secret of the tunnel may be learned another time.”

“Nay. Methinks it best if we continue. Fallard?”

“Aye, my rose?”

“I thank you.”

He slipped a hand around her nape beneath her headrail and deposited a kiss on each downcast eyelid, still damp with her tears. Then he kissed her lips with gentle caress. He caught hold of her hand once again, his touch warm against the chill of her skin.

As they moved further down the hall, they passed only empty crypts where one day he, Ysane, and their descendents would be interred. He hoped that time was far, far away. She had earlier read aloud the names above the recesses, but now she grew silent as the charnel reek of new death became more noticeable.

He saw a brand new shroud covering a long coffin, and ’twas from here the unholy smell emanated.

Renouf!

His grip on her hand tightened as they covered their faces with their cloaks. Beyond the vault where lay her former husband, were numerous further empty crypts. There was room here for many more generations of Wulfsin’s descendents.

“Would it please you, my rose, did I remove Renouf’s body and send it to rest with his family?”

“Aye, ’twould please me greatly. He belongs not here with my kin, though he was thegn. But I fear ’twould be seen a great insult to them, though ’tis said Ruald’s intent was the same.”

“Then it shall be done. Let insult fall where it may. Think no more on it.”

“My lord,” Ysane began. She did not look at him.

“Go on. Fear not to ask me aught.”

“My father. He should have been buried here, with my mother. ’Tis where he belongs, for he was born here, and he was true thegn in a long line of Wulfsingas. He loved Wulfsinraed, and he loved his family. We never had chance to mourn his passing. I…I understand he…that is, his punishment was banishment, and that King William meant he should never come home, even in death. But I would not have him forgotten in the place of his birth, in the twelvemonths to come. I have given much thought to what might be done to preserve his memory, if such ’twould be acceptable to you. Mayhap, such could also be done for Angelet.”

Now she glanced at him, as if seeking to read in his face what his response might be. She seemed to gather her courage. “You are familiar, my lord, with the Viking custom of runestones?”