The Assassin's Wife (8 page)

Meg was captured in an instant. “How?”
 

“It’s a game.” Judith sprang to her feet, eager as a young hind. “We’ll need a bowl of water and some greenery.”

“I’ll fetch the water.” Pert, little Sarah already by the door, hopped from one foot to the other with excitement. “I’ll ask Betsy to put some in a bowl.”

While she scampered off to the kitchen, Judith handed Meg and me one of the green branches from the garland over the fire-place. Already the leaves were dry and curling.

“Break off the leaves and flower petals,” she said. “But try to keep them whole.”
 

By the time Sarah returned, I’d filled my lap with leaf dust.

Solemnly, Judith set the basin of water on a stool. “Now, we must sit round it and be very quiet.” She threw Sarah a warning glance. “Each will take a turn. You must take some of the leaves and petals and throw them into the water. Betsy says if you ask Green Jenny, she’ll show you the first letter of your true love’s name amongst them.”

“Who’s Green Jenny?” Sarah’s lips already twitched with laughter.

“Sssh!” Judith put a finger to her lips. “She’s a water spirit.”

Though her eyes sparkled, the gravity of her words alarmed me. Hadn’t I promised Brother Brian not to speak of spirits? But how could I gainsay my elder cousin?

We gathered about the bowl, kneeling among the rushes, quivering with guilty anticipation. Our eyes fastened on Judith.

“I’ll go first.” She spoke in a breathless whisper. She picked up some broken greenery. “Green Jenny, Green Jenny, show me please, the name of my true love. I cast these leaves into the water and call on you to reveal the secret. Green Jenny, Green Jenny, show me please, the name of my true love.”

Tension kept me rigid. The twirling leaves and petals bumped and spiralled in the cloudy water. Gradually they stilled. A tingling sensation coursed through my limbs, heightening my awareness. Imperceptibly, the room grew colder. A curious vibrancy filled it, subtly altering its usual cheeriness to an eerie, watchful atmosphere. Smoky darkness thickened about the shivering candle-flames. We leaned close over the bowl, shoulders touching.

“It looks like a J,” whispered Meg. “Or perhaps a T.” A nervous giggle trembled in her voice. I knew Judith was betrothed to someone named Tom Proudley and supposed Meg teased her.
 

“Sssh!” Judith’s hissed warning set the leaves bobbing. The pattern changed. But I no longer saw leaves or petals. Instead, I saw a long stretch of flat, furrowed land, and a man with a team of stout horses. Beyond the hedgerows I heard the melancholy low of cattle.

“What else? What else can you see?” Judith’s voice seemed urgent, fearful. The chamber pulsed with energy. I must have spoken out loud.
 

“Inside the house there’s a baby in a cradle—a little boy with hair the colour of a fox’s coat—and there’s a woman sewing by the fire—”

“Me next!” Meg scooped the leaves from the water and threw in some petals of her own. Vaguely, I realised she must have selected these before the game began. In a shaking voice, she invoked Green Jenny’s aid, while I watched the pictures begin to form beyond the foolish scatter of dried roses.
 

“Trays and trays of loaves,” I said. “The place is as hot as a forge but I can smell new bread. There’s a young man carrying a sack of flour on his shoulders. He has brown hair and a scar on his left cheek—”

“Harry!”
 

A scuffle and a giggle followed. Amidst some stifled protests, Sarah dipped her head, stretched out a hand to remove the petals—but before she could take her turn, I gasped. The girls froze.

“What is it?” Judith’s voice yelped.

Too engrossed in watching a face form in the water, I didn’t answer. A dark masculine face stared out at me—a strong, rugged face with shockingly blue eyes. Surely I’d seen this face before? It seemed so familiar I couldn’t tear myself away. A secret grin curved his mouth. But when he opened it to speak, I screamed.

Shouts and footsteps on the stairs scattered us, knocking over the stool; the slop of spilled water mingled with an unpleasant, spinning sensation. I must have fainted.
 

When I came to, my aunt bent over me holding a lavender soaked cloth under my nose. A scared Betsy gaped. One of the girls sobbed as my uncle’s growl punished all of us with questions.

He sent us to bed in disgrace. His harsh, unjust words rang in my ears.
 

“I’m not sleeping with Nan,” snivelled Sarah. “She frightens me.”

“You can snuggle up with us.” Judith wrapped a comforting arm about her.
 

“I’ll not have anyone conjuring spirits under my roof,” my uncle raved. His fiery beard and hair cast sparks about the darkened room. “What did I tell you, Grace? You and all this so-called fortune-telling? I warned you about encouraging her! This maid will bring shame on all of us! She puts our house in danger!”
 

No one listened to me. I lay alone in my bed planning a tearful revenge. If only I could turn time back and avoid that foolish game so that everyone still loved me!

Chapter Ten

In the bleak chill of a winter’s morning Aunt Grace rushed me through the winding streets to the Chepe where the busy market stalls and shops touted their wares. I suppose she was too frightened to defy my uncle, but it seemed as if she couldn’t wait to be rid of me. How I despised her weakness!

On the corner of Bread Street, always warm and fragrant with fresh baking, we stopped at a big shop. Aunt Grace pushed me inside.

“Is this the maid?” The stout woman in the bleached linen apron turned to stare. From the open bake-house door wafted a mouth-watering smell of new bread, and the sight of heaped loaves and pastries on the shelves caught my greedy eyes.

“Aye, this is Nan.”
 

Aunt Grace nudged me forward like a horse for inspection.

“How would you like to help me in the bake-house?” the woman asked. She regarded me shrewdly. “I could use an extra pair of hands.” Ignoring my sullen silence, she nodded to my aunt. “She can sleep in Philippa’s chamber.”

This news alarmed me. Was I to be a servant now? Who was Philippa?
 

Still smarting with the injustice of my exile, I feigned indifference. As their punishment, Uncle Will denied my cousins the royal procession, but he sent me away to work. It wasn’t fair. But then a little, niggling doubt sprouted like a weed. Suppose I
was
to blame for all the things that had happened? Suppose I was a witch? What should I tell Brother Brian when he came to visit?
 

A dusty young man with a scar on his cheek appeared from the bake-house.
 

“Take Nan to your father,” Mistress Mercer said. “He’s expecting her.”

The sight of the bake-house immediately brought back the vivid pictures I’d seen for Meg. Motes of flour floated in the air, and a blast of heat as if from a great furnace enveloped me. Out of searing mist appeared Big Hal, Mistress Mercer’s husband, a giant in a straw-coloured jerkin, his face powdered thick and white like a spectre’s. Nodding and smiling, he scraped out crumbs and ashes from the ovens with huge, dust-dried hands, while Harry, the sturdy, brown-haired youth with the kindly face, lifted trays heavy with hot loaves on to a trestle just as I saw in my vision.

Wiping floury hands upon his apron and inky-coloured hose, Harry gave me a friendly wink. “These will be delivered to the rich houses in the city. My father bakes the finest bread in London. No one has a reputation to match his. Mercer’s bread is famous.”

Scorched by the breath of the ovens, I watched Harry’s strong hands kneading and shaping dough. The lad’s cheerful manner put me at ease and I listened hungrily as he confided to me the secrets of Mercer’s famous bread. Though the big man with the powerful shoulders said little, his eyes twinkled with good humour. I felt an immediate desire to earn his approval. Perhaps, Brother Brian was right about things happening for the best. Here, in the heart of the pie shop, I’d learn new skills and meet new people.

But I learned quickly that Mercer’s pie-shop wasn’t just famous for its delicious breads and dainties. It bubbled with juicy morsels of gossip in a city teeming with rumour, and throughout my first week the shop buzzed with talk of a fearful battle in the north in which the Duke of York had been killed.
 

“They stuck his head on Micklegate Bar in York so he could over-look the city,” a talkative matron said, twitching at her brown hood. She opened her eyes wide in pretended horror. “And his son’s too.”

Astonished, I listened avidly. Had Brother Brian heard this tale? And would he think of me?

In these early days, clever Margaret Mercer made no attempt to win my confidence. She kept me busy and asked no questions. But bit by bit she lured me into the circle of her affection. Though Aunt Grace came to see me often, sometimes bringing a sheepish Sarah with her, I greeted her with grudging courtesy, listening behind the bakery door and gloating when she wept: “ I’d have her back at the house, Margaret, but Will—I treated her like one of my own and she was just beginning to settle when—”

“There, there,” Margaret Mercer would say, “She’ll come round in time. She’s doing well, and Hal enjoys her company—and as for Harry—She’s an uncommon child. Just leave her be a while. Let her grow used to us. It’s not been easy for her.”

Clever Margaret Mercer—I think she knew I listened but I didn’t care. I was still a novice in the art of dissembling. No one had considered my feelings before. I’d not come here willingly, but now I determined to stay. Harry had won my heart.
 

It was easy to love the homely youth who treated me with simple kindness. He entertained me with stories about the city and in his leisure time let me watch him carving animals from bits of wood. The little, knock-kneed horse he gave me became my greatest treasure. I hung on his words and followed after him, longing to confide my secrets. But mindful of the priest’s solemn counsel to ask the Virgin to take away my “dark fancies,” I said my prayers and struggled on alone.
 

Harry first took me through the warren of streets in the Chepe and taught me about the city. Gradually the sights and sounds grew familiar. Delivering baskets of succulent, golden pies, and honey-glazed pastries allowed me opportunities to see the market traders at their stalls, and explore the lanes bustling with shops. The tangy stink of the fishmongers, the pungent butcher’s stall, and the aromatic scent of leather from the shoe-maker’s filled my nostrils. I revelled in the sharp odour of resin from the carpenter’s shop and learned to distinguish the mingled smells of beeswax, honey and wine. By degrees I grew proud to belong to this family of tradesmen. I loved to watch the milling people. Peddlers, hawkers, pilgrims, ragged vagrants begging for alms, raucous apprentice boys with impudent faces, blousy women in draggled skirts accosting burghers, painted players, cut-purses and jugglers formed only a part of the throng which filled my daily life with colour and noise.

On one of these occasions I met Maud Attemore, the cutler’s wife, who kept the shop in Forster Lane.
 

“You’ve a new helper, Harry?”

The woman’s handsome, weather-roughened face smiled down at me. Harry grinned back as if sharing a joke.

“This is Nan, Mistress Attemore. She’s learning her way round the city so she can make deliveries on her own soon.”

“She’s a lucky maid then.” Mistress Attemore, a striking figure in a garnet gown with mole-hued sleeves, picked coins from a worn leather purse. “She’s got the best of guides.” She winked as she counted the money into Harry’s dusty palm. “What do you think of London, Nan?”

The bright expression encouraged confidence but I wouldn’t answer.

“Shy, is she?” Mistress Attemore darted a bold glance at Harry. “She’s a bonny, little thing. Lovely grey eyes—just like wood-smoke.”

“She’s from the country,” said Harry. He dropped the pennies into a cloth bag and tied it fast. “It’s a bit strange to her here, but she’s learning fast. Shall I put these pies on the shelf?”

“Aye, there’s a good man.” She craned her neck to watch people passing in the street—a habit I got to know well, for Maud Attemore never missed a thing.
 

“Well, look at that!” She smiled with satisfaction. “See that fine lady just outside, Nan –the one in the rose-coloured gown?”

She turned me by the shoulder and pointed to a stately figure in velvet standing by a jeweller’s shop across the way.

I nodded, holding my breath with wonder. The woman stood straight and slender, her hair hidden beneath gold nets decorated with pearls on each side of her face, exposing the white sweep of her brow and finely arched eyebrows. On the top of her head sat a fantastical heart-shaped cap draped with a gauzy veil in palest rose. The gown itself hung in shimmering folds, the wide sleeves cut into points that almost swept the ground. Below the skirt I glimpsed purple leather shoes with high wooden soles and heels.

“One of the queen’s ladies.” Maud laughed at my amazement. “See the two men-servants in blue livery? No noblewoman goes out without someone to protect her. There’s always something going on in the city, Nan. You’ll soon learn to love it as we do.”