Tyrant of the Mind (8 page)

Juliana sat with head bowed, motionless, silent, her hands gripped together against her waist so tightly they looked bloodless.

Eleanor watched her father reach up and grasp his old friend’s arm, then gently pull him back into his chair and whisper in his ear.

Sir Geoffrey roared with laughter.

Chapter Eleven

Thomas could not sleep. Eating with Father Anselm was distasteful enough but sharing quarters with the man was more than Thomas could take, now that he need not spend his nights in Richard’s chambers. Indeed, he had grown accustomed to some seclusion at Tyndal, where each monk had a small but separate place to sleep, but such lack of privacy here was the least of his problems. Father Anselm was not only foul-smelling, he snored, and, to make Thomas feel further cursed, the priest was a light sleeper.

“Going to the chapel to pray, brother?” Anselm’s head popped up the instant Thomas’ feet touched the rush-covered floor. “I’ll join you.”

Thomas rubbed his hand across his aching eyes in frustration. “Sleep on, good priest. My eyes will not close and I hoped to walk by myself in quiet contemplation until they became heavy again.”

Anselm was already standing and adjusting the cowl of his robe around his neck. “Lonely contemplation for a meat-eating man is dangerous. It might lead to sinful thoughts and…” he gestured in the direction of Thomas’ crotch, “solitary abuse. You need the discipline of company.” The minor adjustment of his attire completed, he reached over and grabbed Thomas by the arm with greater strength than such a spare frame would suggest he possessed. “Together, let us go to the chapel and pray!”

Thomas was too tired to argue further nor did he care to explain to Anselm the reasons he rarely suffered from the sin of Onan. “Very well,” he sighed and wearily headed for the door.

At least the priest chose not to speak on the way down the dimly lit passage to the stairs that led to the inner ward. Foul though it might be, only his breath whitened the darkness as they rounded the outside wall of the great hall to the chapel entrance. For this lack of talkativeness, Thomas raised his eyes heavenward in silent gratitude.

Later, after they had each slid to their knees, Thomas found himself admiring Anselm’s ability to ignore the freezing stone floor. He might find the body of his companion thoroughly repellent, but, as the castle priest plunged into a prayer as lengthy and ardent as a lover’s plea, he felt a brief twinge of jealousy. This man might actually have had a calling to his vocation. Thomas had not come willingly to the priesthood.

As he felt the chill of the floor seep through his woolen robe to numb his knees, he looked up at the carving of the twisted body of Jesus on the cross. The moving shadows from the flickering candles blackened the hollows between the jagged ribs but hid whatever expression the artist had carved upon the face. Thomas knew that there would be no individuality of features. They were irrelevant. The artist’s sole focus would be the message of the Crucifixion. Indeed, Thomas did not need to see the face. Both agony and hope would be there. That he knew. The pain was understandable, the hope expected, but surely there would have been a hint of gratitude as well, indeed a joy that it would all soon be over? He thought so. After all, hadn’t Thomas once looked upon death with some sense of eager anticipation?

He shivered, but the cause was not the icy floor. In a flash of memory, he was back in prison. He stifled a cry as he once again felt powerless, bound and naked, while the jailer, grunting like a pig in rut, clawed his buttocks apart and raped him on the rotting filth of that jail floor. Thomas bit into his lip to chase the image away, but the metallic taste only reminded him of the blood trickling between his legs after the jailer had left him.

Heresy or not, Thomas found himself wondering if the jailers had raped Jesus too. The Gospels had said naught of such a thing, recording only the beating and the crown of thorns. Indeed, had a rape occurred, he knew no one would have spoken of it.

When one man raped another, it might be the ultimate humiliation for the victim, yet it tainted the rapist as well. Such feats were not bragged about in taverns or even confessed in secret, except on a deathbed with the red maw of Hell opening before a man’s failing eyes. Nevertheless, Jesus might have been raped. After all, such an act of degradation could well have been deemed proper for a man who preached love in a time when others were fomenting rebellion and war.

Thomas shook the thought from his mind. Heresy indeed! He looked upward. No bolt of lightning had struck him for the thought, however, nor could he feel any honest guilt at his wondering. In the icy silence of that chapel, the only thing Thomas could feel was a kinship with the man on the cross. If he could not offer God a true calling to the priesthood, he could bring compassion born of torment for those who suffered. Perhaps God would be willing to tolerate that until a deeper faith took its place?

The rough stone was cutting into his knees and he shifted backward to sit on his heels. Father Anselm was so deep in prayer he did not notice. Thomas admired the man’s ability to concentrate so. When Thomas had first arrived at Tyndal, he had been unable to pray at all. Even now, he could not approach God with the submissive speech of a good vassal to his liege lord. Instead, he had begun talking to God as if He had been a boon companion, a respected one, and spoke of his day, his doubts and his problems. No burst of flame had shattered the East Anglian sky to fry his body and hurl his soul into Hell. If such presumption was another instance of heresy, God was being quite tolerant of him, Thomas thought, but he did feel some envy over the pure faith of men like Anselm.

Or women like the one he now noticed in the shadows some distance from him. He rubbed his eyes and looked again. Or were there two figures in the darkness, one an indistinct double of the other? He blinked and one seemed to fade. Surely his tired eyes were playing a game with him, he decided.

The figure he could see with more clarity was slight and the length of the robe, sufficient to drape over the feet, suggested a feminine style. It must be a woman. Perhaps it was the Lady Isabelle, or more likely the Lady Juliana. The former seemed a woman more attached to the delights of the here and now, the latter more likely to long for the joys of the hereafter. Thomas shook his head. Robert’s designated beloved was indeed a somber one.

He knew it could not be either Sister Anne or his prioress. The former was too tall, the latter was too short, and he was sure either or both were with Richard. The boy might be improving, but they had each told him they planned to split the watch over the lad that night when the air was more malevolent.

Ah, the lad! The thought of Richard brought some warmth back into Thomas’ soul. Marriage and any legitimate issue had always been out of the question for Thomas. As a by-blow, albeit of an earl, he had had a comfortable enough home as a child but no hope of title, and, since he had not been his father’s only son born on the wrong side of the blanket, he had had little chance of land. His father might have provided him with a good horse and armor if he had asked, but the life of a mercenary or landless knight, pillaging and jousting for his dinner, had never appealed. At the time he had doubted his father’s wisdom, but now he knew that his best hope of a comfortable future had been that of a clerk in minor orders.

Like most of his fellow clerks, Thomas had enjoyed the favors of many women before he fell into the priesthood, but he had never desired to father a child, especially one out of wedlock. With no family to whom he could have taken such progeny for proper care, he had tried to avoid joining his seed with a woman’s. Still, there had never been even a hint of any issue of his own even though he had not always been sober enough to remember to withdraw in time.

Despite all that, he had taken one look at the sick little child of his prioress’ eldest brother and immediately loved him as if he had sprung from his own loins. He might not understand why, but love the boy as a son he did and he warmed with the thought of how the lad’s eyes would brighten when he saw the hobbyhorse.

Tomorrow I will get the remaining leather, cloth, and rags to finish the horse’s head, he thought. Richard must have his toy soon or he will be reluctant to take that bitter medicine. He quite understood. He’d hate taking the vile stuff too.

“God is gracious!”

The words startled Thomas and he shot back to his knees.

“You are smiling,” the priest said with an explosion of rotting breath. “God must have given you the peace you prayed for.”

“Aye, that He did, priest. Now we may return in tranquility to our beds.” Thomas wasn’t sure his eyes would stay closed even now, but perhaps his companion would fall into the deep sleep that avoided him and he could eventually slip away in peace from their shared room.

Anselm rose from his knees as quickly as a youth. Thomas took a little longer. His legs were numb. As he rubbed his shins and calves to bring some feeling back, he glanced in the direction of the shadowy woman he had seen before. She was no longer there. Either she had moved deeper into a more private gloom when she heard Anselm’s voice or she had left the chapel entirely. He shook his head. Perhaps he had only imagined her just as he had imagined her twin. Then he nodded to the patiently waiting priest and the two men walked in silence out of the chapel.

***

The air was sharp but heavy with snow. Anselm was as silent as he had been on the journey to the chapel, but Thomas was sure he saw a smile on the man’s lips. He shut his eyes briefly. They burned with fatigue. By the time they got back to their shared room, it would almost be time for the Night Office, something he was sure this priest would observe. Would he never get the sleep he longed for?

They had just begun the torturous climb up the stairs to the private quarters above the great hall when they heard angry voices below them in the castle ward.

“You are a murderous, lying knave!”

“Fool! Have you buried your head so long in oxen dung that your wits have rotted?”

Thomas gestured to the priest to remain where he was and slipped quietly to a narrow window. He peered down into the darkness. Just below him he could distinguish moving shadows but could see little else, even against the lighter mounds of freezing slush. Two men must be there, or so he guessed from the noise they made, but surely no more than two.

Father Anselm was at Thomas’ side in an instant, tugging fiercely at his sleeve. “We must stop them, brother,” he said. “Or else they will be killing each other!”

“Hush!” Thomas ordered, but it was too late.

“’S blood, man! Someone’s near,” one voice called out.

“Then you’ll live this hour, but more I cannot promise,” the other said. In an instant both shadows had faded into the surrounding gloom.

“We must tell the lord baron about this!” Anselm continued, now clutching Thomas’ arm so tightly it hurt.

“Who shall we say they were, priest? Did you know their voices?”

Anselm hesitated. “No. I could not say for cert. I fear I was lost in thought when we heard them.”

“Most likely they were two drunken soldiers who will forget their mutual grievances sooner than they will their aching heads on the morrow. The baron would pay no heed to such a trivial matter.”

“But a man of God must…”

“Pray, priest. We must pray for their souls that they will see their folly in the light of God’s good day.”

“You speak well, brother.”

Thomas hoped he had, for he was quite sure he had recognized the voices of both Robert and Henry in the shadows below him.

Chapter Twelve

Thomas jolted straight up from a deep sleep. Despite the cold air, sweat broke out on his body. He would have sworn a loud noise had awakened him, but, when he looked over at the sleeping priest, Anselm was snoring gutturally, his breath filling the chamber like the stench of a dead Welsh dragon. Perhaps the sound had been from a dream.

“Will I ever leave night terrors behind me?” he mouthed silently as he rubbed his forehead with his fingers. If only he were at Tyndal, he could walk away his pounding heart and aching head in the peace of the cloisters, but Anselm would wake the minute he put foot to ground. Indeed, assuming he could escape there alone, even the chapel was no place for serene thoughts as the tortured image on the cross came to mind. Perhaps a tranquil spot could not exist anywhere in a place of war and blood. As soon as that thought took form, Thomas shook his head in amazement that he would even have such an idea. Was he turning into a bloodless priest?

A woman screamed.

Thomas was on his feet. This time he knew the sound was real, not his overheated imagination. He ignored a muffled question from the noisome priest and hurried to the door. As he rushed into the hall, others were crowding into it as well.

Baron Adam was immediately ahead of him, fully dressed, sword in hand.

Prioress Eleanor, with Sister Anne behind, emerged from Richard’s chambers to join Adam.

Thomas glanced over at her door just as the Lady Juliana opened it and looked out. Her eyes were large with unspoken questions, but she stood in the partially open doorway and did not join the crowd in the passageway.

In front of him, he could see a few rumpled, sleepy-eyed servants staggering out of the stairwell.

“Please, God, no!” the prioress cried out as she came to an abrupt stop behind her father. Her voice was sharp with alarm. One hand rested on her father’s back for support, the other at her mouth.

Thomas stared with equal horror at the scene over the baron’s shoulder, just as unwilling to believe what he saw before them.

Standing at her chamber door was the Lady Isabelle, a fur blanket wrapped tightly around her body, her face as pale as a corpse.

On the stone floor in front of her, lying in a pool of darkened blood, was the body of Henry, heir to Lavenham. Kneeling beside that body, glistening dagger in hand, was Robert of Wynethorpe.

Chapter Thirteen

Adam and Geoffrey stood facing each other in the dining hall, just feet apart in front of the blazing fireplace. Years of friendship forged first in childhood, later in battle, and after in the companionship of shared interests and views now warred with grief and anger over the fates and actions of their respective sons.

Eleanor and Sister Anne sat in chairs at the high table and watched the men’s eyes shifting back and forth under hooded lids, their mouths working almost imperceptibly as they struggled to find words that each could say to the other. Eleanor longed to break the silence and comfort both her father and Sir Geoffrey, but resisted. They had been raised to scorn the comforting touch as weak and womanish, thus each alone must weigh the strength of their mutual friendship against that of grief and recriminations. Alone each must discover how the scales did balance when one man’s son murdered that of the other. Indeed, she might share their agony as sister to Robert and friend to Henry, but she was a woman, allowed the luxury of public tears and the comfort of soft arms. Only before the eyes of God might a man bred to war be permitted to weep.

As if she had read Eleanor’s mind and knew her struggle, Anne reached over and gently touched her hand.

Adam coughed and looked down at his feet.

Geoffrey cleared his throat and turned his head away. His voice husky with swallowed tears, he finally whispered, “I cannot believe Robert killed my son.” There was not the slightest hint of accusation in his tone.

“Yet he held the dagger and Henry’s blood was on his hands and cloak. How can I say he is guiltless?” As his friend opened his mouth to speak further, Adam shook his head. “Nay, Geoffrey, do not say more. You are generous to hold back your condemnation of my son, but he must and will answer for his deeds like a man. Any son of mine must take full responsibility for his actions, whether good or evil. I will send a messenger for the sheriff.”

“Has Robert said anything in his defense, father?” Eleanor asked quietly.

The two men looked at her in surprise as if they had forgotten she was there.

Adam straightened his back. “He claims innocence.”

“Then perhaps he is innocent.” Eleanor hesitated. “I, for one, have never known him to lie. Of all of us,” she said with a slight smile at her father, “he is the one who took most after you in plain speech.”

Even in the flickering light of the fire, Eleanor could see her father’s face turn pale with the effort to control conflicting emotions. A father’s love was clearly at odds with the baron’s wish to honor justice.

“He will have the opportunity to tell his tale.” Her father’s voice broke. He stared into the fire for a long moment, then continued. “The king’s justice is equitable.”

“Of that, there is no doubt,” Eleanor said, then gestured at a shuttered window. “But the snow has already begun to fall thick and fast, and I fear the road may be impassable even now. No messenger can get out while this storm rages. Justice in the form of a distant sheriff will therefore be much delayed.”

Adam scowled. “Then my son will have both the time and solitude to think on his sins.”

“If I may be so bold, I would like to suggest that we could learn something about the one who truly committed this deed if we had a knowledgeable person look at Henry’s corpse. Sister Anne has much experience…”

“A nun?” Sir Geoffrey’s contempt was palpable.

“She is sub-infirmarian at Tyndal and her reputation…”

“I have heard the tales, Lady Eleanor. I have no doubt that her skills with sick children and birthing women are highly prized. My son, however, was neither.”

Not exactly what you suggested yesterday at the midday meal, Eleanor thought as she felt the heat of her fury burn her face at the man’s scornful dismissal of Anne. “My lord, she did learn physic from her father and she is skilled…”

Sir Geoffrey’s face too had turned scarlet. “I do not care if she is a saint, my lady. She is a woman and thus, by definition, a fragile and illogical creature. As such, she has neither the ability to rationally examine in detail what she sees nor the fortitude to look on the mutilated body of…” He sobbed, turned his head and covered his face with his hand.

“Surely…”

“Enough, Eleanor!” her father barked. “Wynethorpe Castle is not Tyndal. You have no authority here. Whatever Sister Anne’s skills may be, and she has indeed done great service to this house,” he bowed in the direction of Sister Anne, “Sir Geoffrey does not wish her to examine his son’s body. Therefore, she shall not do so.”

Eleanor glanced at Sister Anne as she fought down the impotent rage twisting inside her. Although Anne’s head was humbly bowed, she managed to look sideways at her prioress, then give her a quick wink. Eleanor wished she had Anne’s talent for humor and tranquillity in these situations.

“Indeed, my lords,” she said at last with a calm remarkable even to her own ears, “I forgot myself and do beg forgiveness.” However, she decided with grim determination, if you will not have Sister Anne, then you shall surely have someone else of my own choosing.

Adam nodded abruptly.

Sir Geoffrey was wiping his eyes with the sleeve of his cloak.

After a long moment of silence, Eleanor continued. “May I ask, my lord father, where you have imprisoned my brother?”

“In the tower by the bridge over the moat. We are holding no other prisoners so the chamber is comfortable enough. I have a guard outside his door. He cannot escape.”

“May I speak with him?”

Adam raised his eyebrows. “Whatever for, girl?” His tone was gentle.

“Does not a loving sister have the right to speak with her dear brother and offer comfort to him before the king’s justicular judges him innocent or guilty?” she replied, her tone quite meek. Her father might be willing to put honor above family feeling and thus accept the possibility of Robert’s guilt. She was not. Of course her brother might kill a man in self-defense. That she would concede. Or he could do so in the defense of an innocent victim. He would never kill out of malice, however, and, if Robert said he was innocent, he was. As far as Eleanor was concerned, it was all just that simple.

With luck, this fierce snowstorm would continue long enough to keep any messenger from being sent to the sheriff and she might yet convince her father to turn his considerable tactical skills to the defense of his son. To do so, however, she must hear the full tale from Robert as soon as possible so she might present his defense in terms her father would have to concede.

“Of course you may see him, child. I will have a soldier accompany you.”

“A soldier is unnecessary, father.” Eleanor glanced at Anne. “Brother Thomas will accompany me.”

“Robert may be your brother, but he stands accused of murder. I cannot not take the chance that he might seize you as a hostage to gain his freedom…”

Eleanor closed her eyes to control her temper. “I assure you that Brother Thomas is sufficient protection against any such thing. He has already proven his courage and resourcefulness during the dark days just after my arrival at Tyndal.”

“Robert has trained as a knight and no monk…”

“Brother Thomas is no frail ascetic,” she snapped.

For the first time this day, her father’s eyes briefly sparkled with laughter. “I had noticed that, Eleanor.”

“I do believe he and your brother have quite taken to each other, or so Brother Thomas has said to me,” Anne interjected, glancing modestly at her prioress. “There is no reason to believe the Lord Robert would hurt either one of you, and indeed he might find comfort in having a priest with him at this time.” She looked over at the baron. “And should there be any problem, my lord, I do assure you that Brother Thomas is quite capable of defending your daughter. More able, perhaps, than Father Anselm, who does appear quite slight of build, if I might be so bold to say?”

Eleanor hid her smile of delight at her friend’s clever speech.

Adam shrugged, then looked at Geoffrey, who nodded.

“Very well,” the baron said. “Go and take your monk with you but exercise due care. I do not want to lose a daughter, or her broad-shouldered priest, in addition to Geoffrey’s son.”

Eleanor knew from the warmth in her face that she was blushing at his description of Thomas but drew herself up and looked back at her father with dignity. “Thank you, my lord,” she said, then turning to Sir Geoffrey, she added, “and I would also like permission to bring comfort to your good wife.”

“Comfort? What for? She is well enough.”

Eleanor shook her head with a dismissive gesture. “It is a woman’s matter. I do not doubt your wife’s resilience after seeing her stepson’s bloody corpse outside your chamber door this morning, but women often find a special consolation from…”

“She has Father Anselm.”

“…the company of another woman.” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Anne bite her lip. Her friend had seen through her ruse. She prayed Sir Geoffrey had not. Eleanor hoped the Lady Isabelle knew something important about the relationship between Robert and Henry that would prove the innocence of her confined brother. She had to talk to her.

Geoffrey hesitated.

“Let the girls talk, Geoffrey,” Adam said. “What’s the harm? They have known each other since childhood, and your wife might well find more comfort from my daughter’s words than from those of our priest.”

Geoffrey shrugged. “Very well. I will tell her to expect you.”

Eleanor modestly lowered her head in thanks to her father and his friend, then squeezed Anne’s hand to acknowledge her calming influence. At least, she thought with less than humble glee, she had won more of this war of wills than either of the two men realized.