The Dragon of Handale (8 page)

“Get to your cell, Sister Mariana. Now!”

“I beg of you, don’t chastise her,” Hildegard broke in as the nun hurried away. “She did not speak. The fault was all mine.” Putting on her most helpless expression, she said, “It is so very strange for me to find myself in a community with such strict adherence to Benedict’s Rule. You and your prioress are to be commended for following the saint with such remarkable zeal.”

The cellarer looked baffled for a moment, then decided to take it as a compliment. “We do our best,” she replied with a tightening of her lips. “Now I suggest you retire to your quarters until compline and pass the time in the much-needed discipline of prayer.”

“That is what I’m here for, sister. I do it with a glad heart.” Inclining her head, Hildegard backed away.

Sister Mariana. So what was she up to? Had she been sent to poke around Hildegard’s chamber by the prioress? Is that why the cellaress had prevented her from blurting anything out? But what did they hope to find? It was a mystery, but one she hoped would be solved very soon, because she did not doubt that the nun would try to explain away her actions before long.

Meanwhile, there was another visitor.

It was later that evening and already dark. The cloister lamp was lit, but its faint light did not go far, and the garth itself lay in darkness. Standing at her chamber window, Hildegard glimpsed a small shape materialise from the direction of the buttery, then vanish into the long shadows. A few moments later, there was a slight noise outside her door

She went to open it. “Come inside. Did anyone see you?”

The novice shook her head.

“Here,” said Hildegard, noticing how she was shivering with cold. “Wrap yourself in this cloak for a while. You’ll be going down with an ague next.”

When she was snug inside the woollen cloak, she gave Hildegard a frightened glance. “I shouldn’t be here. If they find out, they’ll torture me.”

“Torture?” Hildegard frowned.

“You’ve no idea. It’s only because you’re not one of them I dare risk speaking to you. Oh, mistress, I don’t know what to do. Please help me!”

Hildegard leaned against the window embrasure and gave her an encouraging smile. “I will if I can. It’s obvious you’re unhappy. But now you are here tell me how you come to be here against your will?”

“I’ve got to get away. I’m so frightened. Please say you’ll help?” She glanced nervously towards the door.

“You’re quite safe here for now. Just tell me how you come to be here in the first place?” Hildegard prompted. “Begin at the beginning.”

The girl took a deep breath. “My father was a vassal of the earl of Northumberland. We lived in a fortified manor in the Eastern Marches. Father was killed in a skirmish with the Scots when he was in the service of the earl. My mother had already died years ago from the plague. I scarcely knew her. I’m now completely alone.” Tears began to trickle down her cheeks. “I don’t want to be a nun. I just want to go home.”

Hildegard went to sit beside her. “Who sent you here?”

“My guardian. A hateful man. He sits in my father’s house as if he owns it. But it’s still at law. It should come to me and my brother. My father willed it so. My little brother is only nine. He can’t do anything.”

“And where is he?”

“He’s in the retinue of Sir Edward Umfraville, but it’s miles away, in the west of the county. I’m sure he doesn’t even know our father is dead. My guardian intends to wait until he has ownership of our property before he lets my brother know about Father. I’m so miserable, mistress. I think and think, but my thoughts run all over and I can find no way out.”

“Isn’t there anyone who’ll support your claim?” Hildegard asked. “What about your father’s steward?”

“He would help, but he was dismissed by my guardian on the day Father was buried. I have no idea where he is now.”

“Then we must find out. The law, fortunately for us, often takes its time. Tell me where this manor is.”

She named an unfamiliar place that was, Hildegard guessed, deep in Northumberland’s most northerly territory. A border stronghold. First to exchange hands in the dangerous game of barter and attrition being played out in the lawless region between Scotland and England.

“We’ve got to be quick,” the novice whispered. “They say they’re going to send me to the dragon as punishment if I do anything wrong. That’s where they send nuns and novices who need correction. None of them ever returns.”

“The dragon? But that’s just a story—”

“No, the novice who was here before me has been sent there. She’ll be his prisoner until he devours her. I’m so afraid—”

“Who told you this nonsense?”

“That man, Master Fulke. He was the one who brought me here through the woods on the last stage of the journey.”

“Be reassured. I won’t let any dragon get hold of you. I don’t believe in them. And as I’m used to fighting for what I do believe in, you can rest assured that will not happen. These days, the theft of an inheritance is a familiar one, unfortunately, but there’s usually a way out for those who are determined to find one. Abduction is a crime punishable under the laws of England. No one should be forced to marry against her will. It cannot be allowed.”

“They’ll kill me if they find out I’ve been talking to you.”

“It won’t come to that. Believe me. Now, I want you to promise me you’ll say nothing to anyone, not even to your best friend. Do as you’re told by the nuns, as if nothing has changed, and if anything happens to alarm you, let me know at once.” Hildegard stood up. “You’ll be missed if you stay much longer. Let me make sure there’s no one around to see you leave here.”

She went over to the window and peered out through a corner of the blind. The garth was deserted. Trusting that no one was watching from the cloister, she doused the candle so that the girl could slip invisibly back through the shadows. “Go,” she whispered. “Trust me.”

Poor little creature, she thought as the girl slid nervously into the darkness. Hildegard paced the floor for some time after the novice left, until a plan began to form. She would need outside help, but how to obtain it was the question.

The doleful bell began its summons again. Compline. She let herself out and crossed the garth.

“Next morning, she hurriedly broke her fast, then went to see the mesons. Matt sheered her then blurted, Giles probably died because of me. I was hankering after a really good-size piece of beech and he said he knew just where to find one. That’s where it happened. By the great beech.” Matt’s every-ready smile had faded and his eyes clouded over.

Before Hildegard could offer any remark, Carola put a hand on his shoulder. “That’s a sot-witted thing to say and you know it.” She turned to Hildegard.

“I’m sure Mistress York would like to see some of your work.”

“I would indeed.” The two women exchanged a look.

Matt, oblivious, stood up. “This chair,”—he indicated the one he had been sitting in—“What do you think to it?”

“Did you make this?” Hildegard ran her hand over the silky wood. It was a fine piece of craft work.

“Oh, he’s that proud of it. You’d think nobody had ever made a chair before.” Carola punched him teasingly on the shoulder.

“I haven’t made one before, and that’s a fact, so give me leave to strut in my achievement.” He smiled faintly.

Carola said, “I hope that there fat prioress appreciates it.”

“You don’t think I’m leaving this for her to sit on and turn to matchwood, do you?”

“You’ll be copping it, then. She’ll have you up for stealing priory property.”

“She owns all the wood God grows, does she?”

“All that on priory lands, yes.”

“She’ll get it returned in its former state, then, as a lump of wood. See what she does with that. My craft isn’t for sale to any old barterer.”

Despite the apparent good nature of their exchange, there was heaviness in their humour. It was apparent that the death of their fellow mason weighed on them all.

“Show Mistress York your little figures,” suggested Dakin.

Matt went to a shelf and lifted down some pieces carved from wood: an angel, a grotesque, and a stag at bay, its antlers as graceful as the real thing but in delicate miniature.

“All wood from hereabouts,” he explained.

“And this one?” asked Hildegard, noticing another one on the ledge.

They all looked at it in silence. Matt made no move to get it down.

It was a dragon, unfinished, but its claws and the scales on its back gave testimony to what it was.

Dakin broke in. “Mistress York, come and look at our edifice. If Matt can strut, so can we.”

He led her outside. “He’s taking Giles’s death hard, both of ’em being of an age and mates, like,” he confided. “We’re all cut up, of course. It shouldn’t have happened. We’re still waiting to hear back from the master. He’ll root out the culprit, sure as hellfire. It’s the waiting for justice that’s getting us down.”

“I notice the coroner hasn’t shown up yet,” Hildegard said.

“It’ll be the weather that’s holding him up. Until he shows his face we’re stuck here in this hellhole.” His voice, though not much above a whisper as they stepped inside the shell of the building, echoed round the half-built stone walls with frustrated rage.

“It seems close to being finished,” observed Hildegard, looking about. “When does the roof go on?”

“Not yet awhile. Foundations laid last summer. Walls half-built before the bad weather set in. Two storeys. A spiral stair, half-built. The whole to be roofed in slate. We’re making use of the weather to construct the wooden centring to support the stone/work. We can’t get on with the rest of it until the weather improves. Too wet now. The mortar won’t set. Then we have to bash a hole through the enclosure wall so the prioress can have her grand entrance. She wants a wall round her enclave so she can have the privacy of her own garden. And”—he grimaced—“to keep her safe from the wild beast of Handale, of course. It’ll be a neat little setup.”

“Plenty of work for you to be getting on with.”

“Nice profit for our master. Carola’s working on carvings for the corbels, along of me. Matt works in wood, as you saw. We tell him it’s because he’s soft. Riling him, like. He knows we mean it in jest, poor sot.”

For all his attempt to be cheerful, he had a sad expression. He looked up at the opening above their heads. Rain was beginning to spot down. The stone pavers at their feet were soon wet. He gave an openly wistful smile. “Are things well with you inside that place?”

“Not well, no,” she admitted. “I’m troubled by one or two matters, which is partly why I wanted to speak to you this morning.” She told him about the young novice whose inheritance was at risk, although she made no reference to the intruder in her chamber. “I need to leave the priory for a few hours but have no wish to draw attention to the fact. There must be a way in other than the main gate and that little track through the woods? How do the nuns obtain their necessities? That path I came by looked rarely used.”

“There’s the beck. They use a boat.”

Hildegard frowned.

“It comes now and then with stuff they can’t grow or provide. Not often, though. They seem to provide everything they need for themselves.”

“Have you any idea what’s going on in there?” she asked abruptly, gesturing towards the enclosure wall.

Dakin shook his head. “Is anything going on?” He eyed her closely.

“I think so.”

“We’re forbidden to enter—except now we’re allowed to mourn for Giles in their mortuary. They’re a secretive lot. They hate anybody from outside. I can see that. I’m amazed they allow guests.”

“Maybe they had no choice?” She was ignorant of what strings might have been pulled from Swyne and from the archbishop’s palace to get her in here. It was already dawning on her that until she found out why, she would have to stay.

She had another question for Dakin. “Do you think Giles’s murder has anything to do with the priory?”

“I wondered that. But why? It doesn’t make sense.”

“Could he have stumbled on some secret?”

“He said nowt to me if he did.”

“Can you tell me, have any of you been back to the place where he was found?”

He shook his head. “It may seem we’re lackadaisical, but we work hard during daylight hours. They’re short enough at this time of year and our lady prioress wants a deal of fancy decoration in her new house. It’s exactly the sort of thing to keep us busy. At night, when our time’s our own, I doubt any of us would dare set foot in such a thicket.” He grimaced. “Not from fear of dragons. We’re not lily-livered. It’s just that none of us wants to be lost in those woods forevermore. You’ve seen how dense it is? It’s like a maze.”

“I know. I felt lost almost as soon as we set foot in there.”

“Maybe there’s something I ought to show you.” He led her across to where the timbers, felled to make room for the prioress’s new lodging, were stacked and waiting for the woodman’s axe. He pointed to something behind them, Hildegard approached.

Under the sheltering trees waiting to be felled, it she saw a print in the mud. Three claws.

She turned.

Dakin was watching her carefully.

“It would have to be a very large deerhound,” she said. “I had a lymer like that once. When did it appear?”

“The morning after Giles disappeared. Almost,” he added, “as if it was looking for another victim.”

He turned and went back towards the lodge. With a glance into the woods, Hildegard followed.

Dakin stood under the eaves, out of the rain, which was falling faster now. “Why did you ask if we’d been back to where he was killed?”

“I’d like to have a look myself. Will you take me there?”

C
HAPTER
8

They took some persuading. None of them wanted to accompany her. When they saw she was going to go anyway, they eventually agreed. Dakin refused to enter the woods alone, however; he wanted one of the men to accompany them. “Safety in numbers.”