Alys Clare - Out of the Dawn Light

Reminded, he brought his thoughts back to the most pressing issue. Sibert must be dispatched; there was no other way. Whatever it took, the crown must not return to the boy or his family. They too had a claim on Drakelow; an older and stronger one than Baudouin’s, although he would never have admitted that to a living soul. The king was in a strange, unpredictable mood, they said. Because his sympathies were rumoured to lie as much with the old religion as with the priests and the Church, it was just possible that an appeal by the original owners of Drakelow just might tickle his fancy and meet with success.

Then Drakelow, the new house and castle, the land, the outbuildings, would all be lost to him.

That was unimaginable.

It must not happen.

With Sibert dead, it was not going to happen.

Sibert will die, Baudouin told himself. The crown will be returned to me, and with it I shall buy back my manor.

The crown. .

Apart from its crucial use as a bargaining tool, Baudouin found increasingly that he longed to possess it for its own sake. He had seen it only briefly, held it for an even shorter time when he drew it out of the youth’s leather bag and held it up. Nevertheless, it had already taken hold of him and sometimes he woke from uneasy dreams in which it encircled his brow so tightly that his head ached and, when he put up his hands to ease it off, it would not move. And, despite his efforts not to dwell on it, he could not help remembering that terrifying moment when it had seemed to strike him dumb. .

The crown.

The crucial aim of making Romain believe that he alone knew about the wonderful treasure hidden at Drakelow had been achieved very well. Romain, indeed, deserved credit for perseverance, for he had encountered that mysterious man, Roger, and, refusing to give up, had finally heard from his own lips the strange tale he had to tell. Romain had been an innocent, Baudouin reflected, and did not seem to have suspected for an instant that his uncle had his own private ways and means of keeping abreast of virtually everything that happened at Drakelow. Much of what happened was at his personal instigation.

Baudouin now suspected — as he was almost sure Romain had not — that Roger deeply regretted having sold his ancient secret to a Norman newcomer. Well, that was too bad. If — when — Baudouin regained the crown, then nobody was going to wrest it from him and prevent him using it for his vital purpose. Especially not a turncoat who, in his attempts to ingratiate himself with his new Norman overlords, had even changed his name.

Baudouin let out the breath he had been holding and felt the tension seep out of him. It will be all right, he told himself. Then, calmer, he turned his horse and trotted back along the track towards Lakehall.

I set off with Hrype that night. They’d undoubtedly have stopped me if I’d waited to ask permission and I could think of no excuse to offer to my sister to release me again from her service so, given the great urgency of doing something to help Sibert, overall it seemed simpler just to go. I hoped to be back before anyone became too anxious about me.

I was not worried about my safety at all. I felt secure with Hrype. It’s always a sound plan, if you’re going into possible danger, to have a sorcerer with you. There was danger; I hadn’t forgotten how I’d heard someone in the undergrowth the previous day, when I’d been on my way back to Goda’s after my visit to Lord Gilbert. I told Hrype about this and he said nothing, merely nodding briefly.

I had imagined we were going to have to walk all the way back to that clearing where the fat woman had sat by her well. I was very surprised when, a short distance along the track, Hrype dodged in beneath the trees and returned leading two horses. Well, a horse and a pony, actually, but nevertheless I was delighted.

‘Are they really for us to ride?’ I demanded eagerly. I had put my hand out cautiously to the pony — a bay — and he was snuffling his lips against my skin in a friendly sort of way.

‘They are.’ Hrype risked a smile.

‘But they don’t belong to you.’ I was pretty sure of that.

‘No, I have borrowed them,’ Hrype replied shortly.

‘ Borrowed them?’ I wondered who, among Hrype’s acquaintances, could possibly have offered such largesse.

‘Better that you don’t know any more.’ Hrype’s words had a distinct finality about them and I did not dare pursue the matter.

I hoped it was going to be all right. The penalty for horse theft — if we were caught, would anyone believe that the horses had really been lent to us and we were fully intending to return them? — was hanging.

I realized then, if I had not done so before, just how far Hrype was prepared to go to save his nephew’s life.

We rode our purloined mounts as hard as we dared. Fortunately they were fresh and frisky, fat on summer grass and, it seemed, more than ready for an outing. We stopped for a couple of brief rests to refresh ourselves and water the horses, and late in the evening of the following day we were on the road east of Diss and I was straining my eyes to find the place where the track up from Dunwich joined it.

I found it at last, but by now it was too late to go on and approach the fat woman we had met by the well. She would doubtless have returned to her tiny hamlet and turned in for the night and we would not increase our chances of success by scaring her in the middle of the night.

Early the next day we were on our way.

We must have missed the place where Romain attacked Sibert and subsequently met his death, for before I knew it we were entering the clearing with the well. There was no one about. We dismounted and tethered the horses, then began searching down the faint tracks leading out of the clearing.

She found us before either Hrype or I managed to locate her cottage. We never did find it and for all I knew she could have been some spirit of the woods, only taking mortal form when people had need of her. That’s the sort of fanciful thought you tend to have when you travel with a sorcerer.

She looked at me with a smile of recognition. ‘It’s the little runaway!’ she exclaimed, dumping her empty vessel and reaching out to the chain that held the bucket, deep down inside the well. ‘Did you and your young man escape all right?’

I looked at Hrype. He nodded. Taking this as a sign to tell her, I did. ‘We reached the safety of our home, yes, but Sibert — that’s his name and he’s not really my young man — has been arrested for murder.’

Her eyes rounded in horrified fascination. ‘ Murder! Who did he murder, then?’

‘Nobody,’ I said emphatically. ‘But someone says he did. This someone says there’s a witness to the killing and since it happened not far up the track that leads to the coast road, I — we — wondered if you might have been that witness.’

She was already shaking her head and I knew we had wasted our time. ‘I’m sorry, my lass,’ she said kindly, ‘but I saw nothing. I certainly saw no murder, and I thank the good Lord above for it.’ She was still shaking her head, from time to time repeating ‘Murder!’ softly under her breath, as if she scarcely believed it.

Hrype moved a few paces closer to her and, with a polite bow, said, ‘I am Sibert’s uncle. His mother is desperate. Is there anything you can tell us that might help?’

She looked at him, her face clenched in sympathy, and after a pause she said, ‘I saw this girl here and the young man. Sibert?’

‘Yes,’ Hrype and I said together.

‘Sibert. Yes, the two of them passed through the clearing and they both took a drink, although the young man seemed very nervous, very keen to be on his way. Yes.’ She put her hand up to her mouth, frowning in concentration. ‘Then a little later another young man came along and I remember I remarked to him that sometimes I don’t see a soul from one week’s end to another and here we were with three visitors in one day.’