The Lord's Bride Read online

  “Smart dog,” Martin said, finishing with a hearty pat which left the animal’s tail beating against the ground. “Edward, I will need you this evening. We have a bandit to flush out. The bailiffs have failed in the task.”

  “This is the forest bandit?”

  “It is. He took five hundred gold pieces from a merchant this morning.”

  “Five hundred gold pieces? He must have deep pockets, this bandit. And broad shoulders. That is a heavy load. This must be a large man.”

  “Or one with friends. Regardless, we shall find the knave this night. Word of these robberies is beginning to spread. I do not wish the king to hear and find us incompetent.”

  Having given instructions to his squire, Martin retired to his offices. The memory of Mary’s face danced before his eyes, enrapturing him as he sat in his chair and stared off into space. For such a long time, Mary had been part of his life, but somewhere in between the unfortunate demise of the elder de Vere and his own marriage, Martin had lost touch with her. She had quite disappeared after her own sad marriage. Many had supposed her dead; indeed, Martin had grieved her loss himself until it was revealed she had turned up at Tawston, entirely unharmed by her lost years.

  Seeing Mary again had reminded him sharply of what he once was—and what she once was. “Lord, you have made her more beautiful than ever,” he murmured heavenward. “I let her go once. I will not do so again. If she will have me, I will have her. If it is your will for us to be together, deliver her unto me, my Lord.”

  The Lord made no reply.

  * * *

  Much later that evening, the moon rose in a golden crescent, passing behind clouds with a swift regularity that made the forest shadows flicker back and forth.

  Martin, Edward, and a bailiff by the name of Nathan waited in darkness at the side of the road. In the distance was a light, a lantern swinging back and forth on a pole. It was designed to mimic the light of a merchant making a night run through the trees. It moved slowly, as would an easy, lard-laden target, rich with gold. There were two men traveling with it, a “merchant” and his “apprentice”. Both were men of the law, both quite capable of apprehending a man.

  The robber had been growing bold of late. Martin hoped to trap him by his own hubris and greed.

  Sure enough, a cry soon rang out from the shadows.

  “Stand and deliver!”

  Moving forward under darkness of night, Martin, Edward, and Nathan began making their way down the forest road with a swiftness. Whilst the robber was distracted with his dummy quarry, they meant to set upon him.

  Covering a half mile in three minutes, Martin was surprised to discover no robber at the scene of the crime. The circle of light emanating from the lantern made the forest around quite dark, so much so that there was no seeing anything in the blackness.

  “Where is he?” Martin addressed the question to the bailiff who had been posing as a merchant. His assistant was cowering at a distance, quite unable to speak.

  “He came from the trees and went back to the trees,” the bailiff said. “He was like a bird. He flew.”

  “Preposterous!”

  “It is true. He made the demand from the sky, like an angel.” There was a tremor to the man’s voice. Whatever had waylaid him had certainly put the fear of God into him.

  “Angels do not rob merchants,” Martin said dismissively.

  “Mayhap it was a daemon then. This forest is a haunted place—all know it. Mayhap this is no man that steals gold, but an evil creature.”

  The men were terrified by their own imaginings, and in spite of all Martin’s entreaties to search for the robber, could not be persuaded to stay in the forest a moment longer. With every passing moment, the robber was taking on greater supernatural powers. The younger of the two men was saying that it had flown on silver wings, whilst the man posing as merchant had begun to insist that it had spoken in a voice like fire.

  Martin had no choice but to abandon the forest before complete panic set in. They had been bested, not by any angel or daemon, but by a very clever man. He was certain of it. The miscreant had not borne himself on wings; he had likely performed from ropes strung between trees, but saying so did little to soothe the nerves of his men. They seemed to cling to the notion of the supernatural over more reasonable explanations, almost as if they cherished the terror.

  Unfortunately, Martin was equally certain that he should have no chance of capturing his quarry now, for the ill-doer was most certainly alerted to the trap. They had missed their chance, and most vexing it was. Now the bandit would be wary of future attempts to trap him.

  “Ho!” Martin cried to the dark trees. “I know you for what you are, miscreant! And I swear upon my life that I will find you and bring you to justice!”

  Silence followed his announcement, but somewhere in the rustling of the wind, Martin fancied he heard a laugh.

  Chapter Seven

  It was close to morning by the time postulant Mary emerged from the forest. She was quite exhausted, her plain dress all but shredded, her arms and legs covered in scratches and cuts. Making no attempt to hide her approach, she stumbled down the path to the convent, where she was met by concerned nuns who had, by their own account, been looking for her since the night before.

  “I am sorry, sisters,” Mary explained faintly. “I became lost in the woods. I had followed a jack rabbit in, for his pink nose winked at me so sweetly. But I found myself very deep and very far from home. When night fell, I curled up in a hollow as a fox might and waited until morning to find my way back.”

  The explanation was accepted easily by the kindly nuns, but not so much so by Sister Lucia, whose expression grew most sour upon a second telling of the story.

  “You are covered in scratches! Some of them are very deep. They almost look like sword wounds,” she observed, her keen, pale eyes drifting over Mary’s bare arms and legs.

  “Sword wounds!” Mary laughed delightedly. “Imagine such a thing! Perhaps I was assaulted by fairy folk whilst I slept.”

  “My brother often had marks like these after training with his master.” Sister Lucia said, her heavy brows drawing into one long line of suspicion. “What have you been doing, Mary?”

  “Nothing! Chasing rabbits in the forest, nothing more!” Mary’s smile wavered a little as Sister Lucia’s expression made it clear that she was not believed.

  Sister Lucia’s rough hand closed around Mary’s bloodied wrist. “Come along, postulant! You will see the abbess about this matter.”

  Mary was all too happy to see the abbess. The woman was most kind and compassionate, in stark contrast to Sister Lucia. Mary often wondered why the abbess had decided to put Lucia in charge of the postulants, given the woman’s propensity to sour temper.

  “You have returned to us, Mary,” the abbess said upon their appearance in her chambers. “We were most concerned.”

  “I am sorry to have worried you,” Mary said most sadly. “I was lost, you see, amidst the trees and the moss. In a forest, one tree looks very like another.”

  “Mother Tudor, you certainly cannot believe this story,” Lucia interjected. “This woman has tested us to the very limits of our patience, but we must surely find a limit here. These are not scratches from forest bushes.” She lifted Mary’s arm and pointed to a long, straight cut. “This is a defensive wound. I saw them often enough upon my brother’s arms when he tarried with his instructor.”

  “I have never laid hand on a sword in all my days,” Mary gasped. “Unless a needle counts as a sword of a kind.”

  “Sister Lucia, I am certain that Mary has not been involved in any swordplay,” the abbess said. “But I thank you for your conscientious care. An herb salve will go a long way toward resolving these marks. Mary, take yourself to Sister Bess. She will give you something to make sure none of those cuts turn septic.”

  “And then you can come and see me, and I will ensure that you never consider running off into the forest before dark,” Sister Lucia
said ominously.

  Mary trembled where she stood. It did not require much acting on her part, for though she had rarely felt Lucia’s lash, she remembered it very well.

  “You will beat me for chasing a bunny?”

  “I will thrash you for putting yourself in such danger,” Sister Lucia said. “I do not imagine the abbess has any objection to that.”

  Mary looked towards the abbess and saw her undoing in the venerable woman’s eyes.

  “On that matter, I must agree with Lucia,” she said. “It was very careless and very dangerous, Mary.”

  “But when Lucia strikes me I feel a dozen devils dancing on my backside.”

  The abbess hid a smile. “Even so, Mary. Even so. Do as you are told.”

  “You have heard Mother Tudor,” Lucia said. “Go and get your salve. Then come to my cell.”

  Mary’s lower lip began to tremble, and her eyes welled with tears. “Beat me now, if you are going to beat me, dear Sister Lucia. Lay your lash upon me and cleanse me of the evil that leads me so astray. Let our dear mother see my contrition.”

  “Very well,” Lucia said. “Here it shall be. Bend yourself over that chair, Mary, and lift what remnants of your smock you have. I will ply the leather against bare flesh or not at all.”

  It was not the reply Mary had anticipated. She had hoped Lucia would refrain from laying her vengeance in front of the abbess, but it seemed Lucia had no qualms about such a thing. She had already loosed her leather strap and was waiting for Mary to obey her orders.

  With a pitiful sniff, Mary made for the chair. She bent herself over it as Lucia had said and thence lifted her skirts. With her head lowered, she could see Lucia’s boots approaching. Then she felt the woman’s hand on her lower back, the other pressing her undergarments asunder to bare the crowns of her cheeks. With a flush of frustration and embarrassment, Mary knew she was about to be beaten before the abbess.

  As sure as night follows day, the leather of the lash landed upon her cheeks. She shrieked and reached back, clutching at her bottom and then collapsing to the ground, her mouth open in a loud, ear-splitting howl.

  “Oh it hurts! It burns like the very fires of hell! I am being consumed! Oh I am sorry, I am so, so very sorry!” she wailed, employing generous amounts of tears in the hope that they would earn her the abbess’ sympathies.

  “Get up!” Sister Lucia snapped most angrily. “Cease your hysterics.”

  “I will never so much as set a toe wrong again!” Mary vowed loudly between wails. “Oh, my flesh will surely not recover from such a blow. It feels even now as though a thousand pokers were pressing into my skin.”

  “Mary! Get up!”

  “Be easy, Sister Lucia,” the abbess interjected. “Do you not see what distress this poor postulant is in?”

  “There is barely a mark upon her,” Sister Lucia argued. “Do you not see how she twists the rules and evades her due punishment with these antics?”

  “I see that not all women are made the same. Whilst your hide might be more resilient, Mary is not accustomed to being struck. Remember, she is of fine, noble blood.”

  “We are never allowed to forget that,” Lucia said, her face falling into something akin to a pout. She was like a cat deprived of its pigeon prey.

  “I thank you, Mother Tudor, for your mercy, and I thank you, Sister Lucia, for your concern,” Mary said through sniffling tears. “You are too good to me. Everyone here is so kind in their many different ways. Sister Rose is kind with her soups and Sister Bess is kind with her salves and Sister Lucia is kind with her lash.”

  “You see?” The abbess smiled at Mary, but spoke to Lucia. “There is no need to whip a lady of Mary’s temperament. She understands her wrongdoing, I am sure.”

  “I understand that I caused upset, and for that I am deeply sorry,” Mary said. “I will do my very best to ensure that you never lift your hand to me again.”

  She caught Sister Lucia’s eye as she said those last words, and a look passed between them, a look of understanding, though not of peace.

  Chapter Eight

  All would have been well in the convent had Mary been the only danger lurking outside its walls. Unfortunately, Staffordshire was occasionally victim to wandering bandits, law breakers who traveled throughout the land, pillaging where they could and moving on before the law could find them.

  Several nights after the sheriff’s ill-fated attempt to catch the forest robber, an attack took place. There was no light when the rough men bashed through the main doors of the convent, wielding mace and steel. With rough hands and hard voices, they confronted the first nun they saw, a Sister Serafina, who had gotten up to the sound.

  “Where is the gold?” They made their demands with fists clenched, teeth gritted in vicious snarls. More animals than men, they had the notion of riches in mind and would stop at nothing to attain them.

  “We are dedicated to poverty,” Serafina cried. “There is no gold here.”

  “Lies! Show us to the gold, or we will leave this convent bloody.”

  The threat was real, but the imagined gold was not, and though the woman repeated many times that there was no treasure to be found, it did not stop the bandits in their quest. Stinking of mead and filth, they rampaged through to the chapel and stole the crucifix which sat upon the altar.

  “Stop!” The abbess, roused from her bed, came forward to defend the sacred object. She had nothing but the force of her will. It was not enough. As she reached for the cross, clasped in the great greedy hands of a robber, she was roughly shoved back and fell with a high, thin cry.

  “Enough.”

  The word was growled at the rear of the chapel. The bandits turned and saw a figure with drawn sword silhouetted against the arch of the entrance. It was not a tall man, or a broad man, but it was a man who moved with skill and speed when he rushed forward to take the crucifix from the robber.

  Sounds of clashing steel echoed through the chapel as the ill doer defended his haul. Blades flashed, the small figure spun, and a great cry of terror went up from the robbers as their leader’s head was separated from his shoulders. It bounced upon the floor and rolled, making merry chase of the rest of the robbers as they fled, preferring their heads to the promise of gold.

  The victorious figure, face masked, bent down to assist the abbess up from the floor where she had remained for the duration of the fight.

  “Are you alright, my lady?”

  “Much more so than I would be had you not come to our aid. Will you not show your face so I might thank you properly?”

  “I need no thanks. I must go now, for those knaves must surely be brought to justice.” The figure sheathed its sword and ran in the same direction as the robbers had gone. Kid boots made no sound on floor or path. As quick as he had come, he was gone, a fleeting, flitting shadow.

  All the convent was in an uproar—a quiet, restrained uproar, but an uproar none the less. The nuns were roused, carrying lights about the place to light the candles, whispering to one another and telling stories not just of the events of that evening, but of similar events on other evenings in other convents. It was roundly agreed that they had been most fortunate in their escape, for had they not been rescued, they might have lost more than their meager riches.

  The fallen man in the chapel was soon given belated last rites, his body cleaned and wrapped neatly in linen bandages. The abbess recovered from her shock quite well and oversaw the recovery and restoration of the convent. Several nuns worked on placing planks of wood over the main doors, shifting heavy furniture to keep them in place until tradesmen could come with the necessary tools.

  “Sister Lucia,” the abbess asked as the woman came past. “Are all the ladies accounted for?”

  “All but Mary de Vere,” Lucia said. “That is no surprise. She was no doubt out trying to catch the moon, or perhaps chase the clouds.”

  “This is not a time for levity,” the abbess said. “We must find Mary immediately. She may have fallen vict
im to those men before they came to our doors.”

  “I am sure Mary has only fallen victim to her own dull wits,” Lucia replied. “She is never harmed.”

  “I hope that you are correct,” Abbess Tudor replied. “For I find your attitude most un-Christian. If she is harmed, it will be on your head. Now, go forth and find her!”

  * * *

  Having been roused from his bed by news of the convent’s misfortune, Martin de Stafford had his men out beating the countryside for signs of the bandits. Those bold enough to attack a convent were dangerous and must certainly be found immediately. Half of the village of Stafford had joined in the hunt.

  Martin spied a young man he did not know, a slim, mustachioed fellow with a tellingly bloody blade. He was stalking the line of the forest, far from the men beating the bushes closer to the town.

  “Ho! What mischief is being done this night?” He called out to the young man and beckoned him close. For a moment the fellow looked as though he might run, but he turned and came toward Martin. The sheriff saw that a thick mustache and beard obscured much of his callow face. There was something familiar about the young man, though Martin did not know him. Perhaps he was the younger brother or a cousin of someone he did know. Certainly he was well dressed and bore himself as a noble.

  “What mischief! A band of brigands breaching the convent!” The young man spoke with outrage clear in his husky voice. “I will ensure they make amends with their maker.”

  “Justice is not the duty of the individual,” the sheriff said. “If you spy them, you will call out, understand?”

  “Justice is not the duty of the sedentary man who stands in the way of her work,” the young fighter responded. “I will dispatch them, and the world will be well rid of them.” He turned and made to leave the sheriff’s presence, clearly done with Martin and his warnings.