The Embers of Daylight, page 18
“You can go after you've shown us to this convent,” Stephen told the staggering, sobbing man.
Even with their reluctant guide slowing them down, they still managed to pass Rambirch and make their way into the forest while it was still light. Edward was glad he'd decided to bring the man with him, for the path here was very narrow, little more than a hunting trail, and the fallen leaves had obscured it even further. It was hard to believe there was anything in this part of the forest, let alone a convent worth delivering a bag of silver to. After a while, they glimpsed a dark stone wall through the bushes, and Edward called a halt. Their captive fell to his knees, weeping and gasping for breath. His wrists had been chafed raw by the rope.
“See, Lord, see?” he moaned, nudging his head lethargically toward the wall. “There.”
“Are we done with him?” Stephen raised an eyebrow and touched the hilt of his sword.
Edward glanced from Stephen to the kneeling man and shook his head. He untied the rope from his saddle and pointed back the way they'd come. “Get out of my sight.”
For a man who'd been on the verge of collapse for the past hour, the miner managed to stagger down the trail with surprising haste.
“He probably deserved to hang,” Stephen commented as they watched him limp away.
“Probably, but his own lord can deal with that. I don't want to be bothered by the sheriff if that wretch has relatives who'll make a fuss if he disappears. Let's go and see who's inside this convent.”
They rode up to the wall and followed it until they reached a gate. The heavy oak boards were reinforced with iron bands and studs. It didn't look like there was any other way inside.
“Open up!” Edward yelled as he dismounted. When no one answered, he pounded on the gate with his fist. He heard the sound of wood rasping and looked up to see a woman's face peering through a narrow doorhole just above his head.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“I am Lord Edward, the baron of Rosepath, and I want to speak with your prioress.”
“On what business?”
“On my own business,” Edward said tersely.
The nun told them to wait and drew the wooden slat back across the hole. When it opened again, a different hooded face stared down at them.
“God be with you, my lord. I am Mother Emily.”
“Do you mean to make us wait out here while you talk through a doorhole?” Edward asked.
“I am afraid no men may enter the convent.”
“Then you should come outside.”
The prioress shifted position to get a better look at Stephen. “You must forgive my caution, but I would rather not open our gates to armed men. Two travellers were attacked on the path here recently, and I have only your word that you are who you claim to be.”
“Do you think outlaws wear clothes like ours?” Edward snapped. It would be dark soon, and he wanted to get back to Rambirch before then.
The prioress said nothing.
Edward scowled at her, realising there was nothing he could say to change the woman's mind.
“Fine. I'll have words with the bishop over this. But before I leave, you can tell me what business you had with two messengers who came here a while ago. They were carrying a great deal of money from the mine at Stoneover at the behest of my wife, the lady Cristiana.”
“We receive many donations from many benefactors. If your wife sent us money then she would be able to tell you more about it than I.”
“Don't play the fool with me. It was almost three gold crowns. No one forgets that much money.”
“If you would like I can consult the records in our treasury, but it will have to wait until morning.”
“I'd like you to do it now.”
“My lord,” the prioress spoke with an infuriatingly patient tone, “the church's finances are its own business. I have offered to accommodate your request as best I can.”
“Just tell me what the money was for. Are you giving it to Count Peter? Is his wife Kaylein involved?”
The prioress gave him a thin-lipped look. “I am sorry your journey here was a wasted one. We treasure our solitude here in the forest, and it has been disturbed enough lately. Now, if you will excuse me, I must prepare for evening prayer.”
“If you don't tell me what I want to know–” Edward began, but the doorhole shut before he could finish. He banged on the gate in anger. “Open up!” He banged again, then began to stalk along the convent wall looking for another way in.
“Are we finished here?” Stephen asked.
“Not after all the trouble we've been through. Couldn't you tell she was lying?” His fruitless search over, Edward returned to the gate and gave it a kick. “Open up!” Who did these nuns think they were, shutting him out like a stray dog? They couldn't ignore him forever. He kept banging on the gate and yelling until he heard voices on the other side. He grabbed both circular iron handles and rattled them violently.
“I'll come back with the bishop himself unless you open this door!
The doorhole slid halfway open. This time it was the previous nun who looked out.
“Please stop shouting and banging,” the sister said in a low voice. “We have children inside, and you're frightening them.”
“Then get your prioress back here.”
With a fretful shake of her head, the nun said: “You shan't change her mind. Please, you seem a respectable man. There's no need for this.”
Edward rattled the gate again. “I'll go away when you tell me what I want to know.”
“If I tell you who one of those visitors was, will you stop making so much noise?”
“I might.”
“He was a lord, like you. It wasn't my place to ask his business, but the prioress let him stay overnight, given how he and his lady had been attacked on the way here.”
Edward smiled triumphantly. “Count Peter.”
“No. I think it was the lord Isaac. The blonde nobleman from Tannersfield? I saw him at the castle when I was delivering a letter to the count last year. The man who came here looked very much like him, though he didn't dress as richly as you. Please, will you go now?”
It took Edward a moment to process this revelation. So it wasn't Peter, but Isaac who Cristiana was in league with. That made sense, too. She'd always had a soft spot for her wretched brother. The nun seemed to take his silence for acquiescence, for the doorhole slid shut before Edward could press her any further.
“Well well,” he said to Stephen, swinging himself back into the saddle. “I think we'd better speak to my wife about this.”
“Are you sure it's worth the bother? Hasn't Isaac caused us enough trouble?”
“I'm not afraid of him,” Edward said pointedly.
Stephen scowled. This wasn't the first hint Edward had dropped about the strength of his character in recent months.
“Neither am I. Him and the sheriff threatened to put a red hot iron on my arm. I wasn't going to hold my tongue just to save Harald's wretched life.”
“Then let's find out what he's up to. Maybe he's the one who'll end up shackled in the sheriff's cellar next time.” The idea of Isaac being tortured brought a smile to Edward's lips. He felt like he was on the cusp of uncovering some secret plot. For the first time in ages, he sensed the thrill of victory at his fingertips. Whatever Cristiana and Isaac were hiding, he was going to be the one who uncovered it.
Some dim part of Edward cautioned him against reigniting old tensions, but he ignored it. He was too enthralled with the idea of shaming Isaac and proving him an unworthy heir to Cairnford County. That was what he really wanted. If Edward could show Duke Francis that his fealty was stronger than the ties of blood, he would never have any reason to feel ashamed or uncertain again. He would have proven himself once and for all.
Inexplicably, his thoughts turned toward the memory of his father's funeral. A dreadful, painful longing gripped Edward as if he'd lost something that day that he now needed to reclaim. He wasn't an introspective enough man to decipher such complex feelings, so he kicked his horse forward and rode back to Rambirch. Along the way, he caught sight of his former captive fleeing into the forest. Edward paid him no heed and rode on. He just wanted to talk to Cristiana now. His concerns about her evasiveness had been subsumed by his desire to uncover the truth.
They reached Rambirch at dusk and stabled their horses outside Baron Elfric's manor before heading inside. Several other noble guests had come to attend the feast of winter solstice. It certainly wasn't the great crowd that Peter and Kaylein drew whenever they held an event, but Edward still felt jealous when he saw the two dozen guests seated in Elfric's hall. He was lucky if he managed half that number when he invited his peers for a celebration at Rosepath.
Elfric's hall was plain and homely. The vaulted wooden roof was thatched rather than tiled, and the floor was covered with so much straw it looked like a roadside inn. As a result, the only safe sources of light were the roaring hearth and the candles on the table, which gave the room a soft, shadowy look. Cristiana said the dim ambience was charming, but Edward thought it looked squalid. He'd grown up in a house that looked like this and had no desire to revisit those memories. Stephen found himself a place at the end of the table while Edward joined his wife near Lord Elfric. It didn't take long before she asked where he'd been all day.
“I went to Stoneover,” he said, studying her face for a reaction, “then a convent in the forest.”
His words caught Cristiana off guard. Her eyes momentarily widened, and she paused with her trencher of roast pork halfway to her mouth. Then she took a bite, gave herself time to chew, and, as if taking everything in stride, said: “Father Gregory mentioned that you'd seen that letter from the foreman.”
“So you admit it! You sent Isaac to collect that money.”
“Of course I did,” Cristiana said dismissively. “He spent some time working as a courier, you know. He's always liked riding around the kingdom. He mentioned he wanted to get away from Emilia for a while, so I asked him to go to the mine for me.”
“Why? What's he up to, collecting money from one of the king's mines?”
Cristiana shrugged. “He isn't up to anything. It was some errand of Peter's. He didn't tell me the details, only that he was looking for a good courier. I wrote to Isaac and asked if he'd like to help.”
Edward sensed his wife's cloying shrewdness closing in on him, but he wasn't ready to give up yet. “Why all the secrecy? Why go through you, then Isaac? Peter must have something going on at the convent if he's sending so much money there.”
“Oh, yes, nuns are well known for their involvement in devious plots. Honestly, Edward, I knew better than to ask. One doesn't keep the favour of their count by prying into his private business.”
Though she was being flippant, Cristiana's words made Edward realise something. The convent had been unusually secluded. It wasn't the sort of place people would go to buy wine or medicine or any of the other things nuns usually sold. There hadn't even been a proper road leading there. The secrecy intrigued him, making him imagine all sorts of scandalous mysteries behind the convent walls. It might be dangerous to meddle in Peter's affairs, but if he had something sensitive going on at the convent, Duke Francis would want to know about it. Now Edward was hungrier than ever for the truth.
Knowing he wouldn't get any further with Cristiana, he pretended to drop the matter and waited until he could move up the table to sit with Baron Elfric. He clapped his rotund host on the shoulder and congratulated him on another splendid winter feast. Harald had taught him the value of always complimenting his host, even if the food was bad and the wine tasted like piss. Elfric grinned through his thick moustache and turned to give him his full attention. Edward told him about the visits he'd made that day, though he refrained from mentioning the part where he'd dragged a man through the mud behind his horse.
“You've travelled from one corner of my estate to the other,” Elfric said.
“So, this is all your land?” Edward asked. “Everything around that convent?”
“If you're talking about Saint Saina's, then yes. Those nuns have never troubled me. Scarcely even made a peep when Larmond's law cut them off from my taxes.” Elfric chuckled into his wine.
“I had a hard time getting there,” Edward said. “You might consider clearing a road to that convent. Maybe you could make a second one connecting it to the king's road as well.”
“I don't see why. The nuns treasure their privacy.”
Let's hope they treasure it enough to strike a bargain, Edward thought. If Elfric agreed to build a road, he would have something to threaten the nuns with the next time he visited Saint Saina's.
“I would insist,” Edward said under his breath. “It would bring new prosperity to the convent.”
Elfric blinked slowly, the wine-muddled mirth clearing from his eyes as he realised that an offer was being made.
“The mother superior would object.”
“Do you care for the favour of a gaggle of women living in the forest, or that of Duke Francis's son-in-law? I have his ear, you know, and it would greatly please me to see this road built.”
Elfric held Edward's gaze for a moment, then smiled and lifted his cup in a toast. He'd always been quick to grant favours.
“A new road, then, so that you might visit Saint Saina's more easily in the future.”
Edward cast a glance in Cristiana's direction. She was good at hiding it, but years of marriage had taught him to notice when she was paying attention. Just like before, she hesitated before she took a bite from her trencher.
There was more to this than some trivial errand for Peter. It wasn't often Edward got to feel the satisfaction of having outsmarted his wife, but every now and again he had his moments. Whatever was happening at Saint Saina's, it wouldn't stay a secret for long.
Chapter 13
It was January, the beginning of the fourteenth year of King Fendrel's reign. James Bright, so called because he was said to have the keenest eyes in the county, spotted the differences along the path to Saint Saina's first. He was one of the men-at-arms Elizabeth employed as bodyguards, three of whom were accompanying her to collect the first copies of Kaylein's book. They were loyal men, but Elizabeth knew loyalty was only as virtuous as the cause it served. When she hired former soldiers, she made sure she found ones who possessed a conscience alongside a willingness to fight for money. They hadn't done her wrong so far, and she felt confident that no more outlaws would trouble her with them at her side.
Elizabeth had been hoping for a quiet journey, but, as James pointed out, the sight of uprooted trees around the path indicated that something unusual was going on. It wasn't a large-scale project–Elizabeth had grown familiar enough with the process of road building over the past few years to recognise that much. Merchants were the people who typically paid for roads to be maintained, for they were the ones who needed them to be safe and reliable. Most of the time, the process involved removing undergrowth and laying down logs where the ground was soft, then packing the space between them with earth or gravel. The latter option was expensive, so it was usually done only in towns. Most importantly, roads needed drainage so that heavy rainfall didn't turn them into rivers. The wear of traffic invariably made well-trodden paths sit low in the surrounding land, so ditches had to be dug nearby. There was an entire order of royal workmen dedicated to the task of draining the king's road, and even their efforts were not enough to keep it from flooding, as last year's downpour had demonstrated.
It was the sight of a shallow drainage ditch near a low part of the path that confirmed Elizabeth's suspicions. Not many trees had been cleared, only those that would have made it difficult to squeeze a cart through, but the drainage ditches and logs in low-lying areas were clear evidence that someone was building a road to Saint Saina's. She picked up the pace and hurried on. Sawdust wasn't with her that day, but she'd brought a pack horse for the books. James Bright strode ahead while the two other men walked on either side, with the pack horse following on a halter at the rear. Though James was not a man of imposing stature, he had a wiry physique and a quick sword hand. Elizabeth doubted any harm would come to them with him leading the way.
They hadn't gone far before they heard the rattling of twigs and the soft thunk of axes biting into wood. A group of workmen hove into view at the side of the path. They had a wagon full of logs and shovels with them, and they were in the process of clearing out an awkward bend so that the new road could run straight rather than twisting into a furrow.
“Ho there,” Elizabeth called. The workmen stopped. Some of them gripped their tools nervously when they saw that Elizabeth's men carried swords. She waved James back to show that they meant no trouble. An older man with a shovel came to meet her. He must have taken her for a travelling noblewoman, for he bowed and removed his wool cap before speaking.
“Milady.”
“What's going on here?” she asked, taking her most authoritative tone. Sometimes it was useful to be mistaken for a noble. “Who put you up to this?” She hadn't heard anything from the Rambirch merchants, and she sincerely doubted Mother Emily was responsible for the new road. The sisters of Saint Saina's valued their privacy more than gold and silver.
“The baron, milady,” the workman answered. “We're to clear out the path all the way to Saint Saina's Mill and then make a new one heading north to the king's road. I wouldn't expect it to be finished soon, though. At this rate, we'll be working well into next year.”
Elizabeth chewed her lip anxiously as she gazed down the path in the direction of the convent.
