I wish you well, Maeb, in the trials ahead.’
He rose, and bowed toward the countess. ‘My lady, I beg your leave.’
She half raised a hand. ‘Before you go, Saint-Valery. What news is there? I know that overnight rumours have throbbed about this palace, but as yet I’ve had no hard report.’
‘The news is bad, my lady. Many die, from Dovre to Meddastone, and moving ever further west. This plague is so vicious that fields are left untended and the sick are left to die alone. Towns burn. I know you have heard of how terribly the plague kills.’
Lady Adelie gave a sharp nod.
‘People flee,’ Saint-Valery said, ‘seeking refuge elsewhere. Edmond fears that they will spread the sickness further. He has commanded that soldiers man the roads that lead into the south-east and turn all back who seek to flee. Cantuaberie is a catastrophe. Much of it has burned. There is unrest and brigandry where the plague strikes hardest. I … There are no good tidings, madam, I am sorry. Move west as fast as you can and as soon as you can. I pray God and his saints protect you.’
We three women simply sat and stared at Saint-Valery.
He looked us each in the eye, then he bowed and left us.
I wondered if I would ever see him again.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
We left very early the next morning. I was glad, for the king’s palace and military encampment at Oxeneford had become an unsettling place. I wanted nothing more than to journey westward, all the way into the Welsh Marches, where surely the plague could not follow and life would not be so complicated. Between what I had heard in the solar, the news Saint-Valery had given us (as well as his marriage offer), the imp I had seen, and the earl’s warning about the dark flood, I simply wanted to get away. I was growing ever more frightened, and I was not afraid to admit it.
I was not alone in my fright. I slept little on the night before we left, and I know Evelyn did not either. We lay side by side, wide awake, sometimes exchanging a word or two, but mostly lost in our thoughts as we contemplated the terror that had gripped the south-east of the country. When we rose, far earlier than we needed, it was to find that the countess and Mistress Yvette were also awake, dressed and pacing to and fro waiting for the horses to be saddled and harnessed and our escort to be ready.
Evelyn, the nurse and I had the children down in the courtyard well before dawn. Early it might be, but the courtyard was a bustle of activity. Torches burned feverishly in their wall brackets, grooms and servants hurried this way and that. Horses, sensing everyone’s underlying unrest, were nervous and difficult to handle. We kept the children well out of the way, and were glad when the groom who drove the cart the Lady Adelie and they were to ride in brought the cart to us and we could pack our belongings and the children inside.
‘Mistresses. Good morn.’
It was Stephen. He looked drawn and tired, and sterner than I had ever seen him. He wore a dark mantle about his shoulders against the chill, caught with a jewelled pin, but I was dismayed to see the glint of maille underneath and his coif folded down over the collar of the mantle. He was wearing his hauberk, and a sword and dagger besides. Nothing indicated the seriousness of our situation more than that he was armoured.
‘Are you ready to leave?’ he said. ‘Evelyn, are you riding or journeying in the cart?’
‘Riding, my lord,’ she said. ‘My back is well enough, and it will do me good to ride.’
He nodded, then looked at me, the merest hint of a smile on his face. ‘Dulcette is saddled waiting for you, Maeb. I think she has missed you, for she is stamping her feet in impatience to be off.’
I could see something of the man he would become in his face this morning, and it calmed me. ‘And I am anxious to see her, my lord, and set her head to the road.’
He looked over my shoulder. ‘Ah, my lady mother and lord father.’ He walked over to them, helping his mother into the cart, then engaging in a conversation with his father.
A groom came over, leading Dulcette along with Evelyn’s horse and he aided us both into the saddle. Dulcette was eager to go, jittery on her feet, skidding this way and that and tossing her head. I hoped we would leave soon, for it was proving difficult to keep her calm in this crowded courtyard. From the corner of my eye I saw Stephen mount up, barking out an order to the column of men already mounted.
I pulled Dulcette to one side, not wanting to get in the way. I was looking to the centre of the courtyard, watching Stephen and the mounted knights and soldiers, and jumped when someone grabbed Dulcette’s rein and pulled us closer to the wall.
‘Maeb.’ It was the earl. He stood close by Dulcette’s shoulder, looking up at me. ‘You will be safe at Pengraic.’
‘Yes, my lord. Thank you.’
‘Listen to Stephen. Do what he commands. Until you travel beyond Glowecestre you will not truly be safe.’
‘Yes, my lord.’
He hesitated, then moved very close and spoke quietly. ‘Remember your vow of silence about the imp, Maeb. Never speak of it to anyone: not Evelyn, not Stephen, not my wife, not any priest you may feel like confessing to, or impressing.’
‘I will not speak, my lord.’
Again he looked at me searchingly.
‘I will not,’ I said. ‘I vow it.’
‘Very well. Make certain you keep that vow.’
‘My lord, what if another imp comes back? I worry —’
‘You will be safe enough, Maeb. You will not be troubled by such again.’
‘Truly?’
‘Truly. The imps are after other prey than you.’
Something in the way he spoke made me relax. I believed him utterly. There would be no more imps. ‘Thank you, my lord.’
He patted Dulcette’s neck and released her rein. ‘Go then, Maeb. May God and His saints travel with you.’
He stepped away and vanished into a shadowy doorway. I looked a long moment, trying to find him again, but Stephen rode his courser near. ‘Maeb! Pull over here by the cart. And stay close to it. Do not wander to this side or the other. Yes?’
‘Yes, my lord.’
He was off, shouting to Evelyn and to his sister Alice to also keep close, then we were moving, the horses skittering and snorting, the carts rumbling, and on the road to Pengraic Castle.
As we left the courtyard I twisted in the saddle, thinking to see the earl again, and perhaps even the king, for some small conceited part of me fancied he would come out to see us (me) off, but there was no sign of either man. I sighed, and looked to the front and the journey ahead.
We were a goodly company. In addition to the cart which carried my lady, Mistress Yvette, the nurse, Rosamund and John, there were the twelve other carts carrying
