A Murdered Peace
- Автор: Робб Кэндис
- Серия: A Kate Clifford Mystery #3
- Год: 2018
- Язык: английский
- Год: Pegasus Books
- ISBN: 9781681779270
- Жанр: Исторические детективы
Электронная книга - «A Murdered Peace». Краткое содержание книги:
England still in tumult at the start of the fifteenth century, as Kate Clifford finds herself working to prove the innocence of her longtime confidante.
It is deep winter in York, 1400, the ground frozen, the short days dimmed with the smoke from countless fires, the sun, when it shines, low in the sky. It is rumored that the Epiphany Uprising, meant to relieve the realm of the Henry the usurper and return King Richard to the throne has, instead, spelled his doom. As long as Richard lives, he is a threat to Henry. So, too, the nobles behind the plot. The ringleaders have been caught, some slaughtered as they fled west by folk loyal to Henry, and the king's men now search the towns for survivors.
A perilous time, made worse for Kate Clifford by the disappearance of Berend, her cook and confidante, shortly after Christmas. Her niece saw his departure in a dream – he said he was honor bound to leave. Honor bound – to a former lord? One of the nobles who led the uprising? Is he alive? She is hardly consoled when Berend reappears, wounded, secretive, denying any connection to the uprising, but refusing to explain himself. When he is accused of brutally murdering a spice seller in the city, Kate discovers a chest of jewels in his possession. Some of the jewels belong to her old friend Lady Margery, wanted by the king for her husband’s part in the uprising. For the sake of their long friendship, and the love she and her wards bear for him, Kate wants to believe his innocence. So, too, does Sir Elric. And he has the powerful backing of the Earl of Westmoreland. All she need do is confide in him. If only she trusted her heart.
“I expected you sooner,” he said. “I watched you arrive a while ago.”
Kate told him to step away from the window. “I want some light to see you while we talk.”
Berend moved aside as she crossed the room, still holding her dagger at the ready, and opened the shutters.
He eased himself down onto the bench at the foot of Kate’s bed with a soft sigh and bent and flexed his left knee a few times, then began to rub it. Limping on his left leg – yes, he would be. So he must be the one seen traveling with a woman and another man. How many trios like that could there be on the road to York?
“An injury?” she asked.
“You know what days on horseback are like.”
She crouched down in front of him, lifting his chin. “A new scar beneath your eye.”
“It is nothing.” The angry flesh twitched as he spoke, belying his casual tone.
Compared to missing toes, fingers, ear, that was true. But the cut had come perilously close to his left eye, and the flesh was still red, angry, likely still painful. He should be applying a comfrey or arnica cream to draw out the heat and keep the skin soft to minimize the scar so that it did not pull. But he did not seem in the mood to welcome advice, no matter how well meant. “Left knee, left eye. Battle wounds?” she asked.
“The knee is stiff from travel, that is all.”
His voice was hoarse, and Berend sagged as if he carried a great weight on his shoulders. Sitting back on her heels, Kate studied his shadowed eyes, sunken cheeks, filth caked into lines of weariness. His tunic, shirt, hose, cloak all needed laundering. He stank. As had Margery.
“You left abruptly without a word to me,” she said. “Why?”
He fixed his eyes on the floor just past his feet. “So I need not explain.”
That he had lost his bearings? That he meant to slaughter the king’s sons? She prayed he had not so betrayed his soul. “Why are you here now?”
“The Lancastrians I was watching – they are searching for someone,” he said. “Did they question you? Is it Margery Kirkby they seek?”
He had come to find out what the Lancastrians had said to her, nothing more. Her disappointment surprised her. Kate did not know what she had expected – had she thought he would say he’d come because he needed to see her, make sure she was safe, that when he’d seen her on Coney Street his heart had called him to her? Was she so foolish?
Margery Kirkby was uppermost on his mind. She was curious about that, curious about many things. She wanted to learn as much as she could before she told him what she knew of the men, and Margery, not simply spit it out and risk that he would vanish again.
“The spice seller, Merek,” she said. “What is he to you?”
Berend glanced up, surprised. “Is he still in York?” He nodded as if that was good news.
So he did know him. “He is. And he seems far too interested in you – where you’ve been, how long ago you left,” she said. “Shall we trade stories? You first.” Kate leaned against the wall, too agitated to sit, her arms crossed, holding her breath as she watched Berend, who worked his stiff knee.
In the silence, she could hear a cart clatter by down on the street, a woman shouting, “Stay out in the middle, you blind arse!”
Berend looked up and met Kate’s eyes, grinning at the woman’s cry. Kate did not mirror his smile.
“Merek,” she said.
“I know him,” he admitted. “From long ago. He carried messages for the lord I served at the time, but I knew him to be slippery. He would not flinch about betraying anyone for a price. He came here on a mission for the son of my former lord.”
So Merek had come here in the service of John Montagu, Earl of Salisbury. Kate had not expected that. “Is he in York because of you?”
Berend winced as he stretched out his left leg. Kate fought her instinct to offer to send for Matt’s cousin Bella, a skilled healer.
“Well? Is he?”
“I was his original purpose. Or one of them. Had delivering the message to me been his sole purpose, he would be gone. I fe– I thought he would have been long gone.”
Feared he would be long gone, that is what he’d begun to say, what his face expressed, and the relief when she’d said he was still in York. “He frightened Griselde with questions about you,” she said.
Berend leaned back and rubbed his eyes. “I will talk to him.”
“So he came to find you for the Earl of Salisbury? What was the message?”
He looked stricken. “You already knew of my connection to Salisbury?”
So it was true. “That you were in his father’s household. Yes, I just learned of it, and I know that Salisbury was one of the leaders in the plot to assassinate Henry and his sons. Were you part of that?”
A subtle squirm. “I would never agree to the murder of children. His sons are boys – fourteen, thirteen, eleven, eight. It was madness from the beginning. To think they might put Richard back on the throne by committing such a heinous act – madness.” Berend sat up straight enough now, his eyes on fire, challenging her and all the world for questioning his honor. But he knew much, that was plain. And the question had discomfited him.
Kate felt she was at last seeing his sincere emotions – outrage, pain, exhaustion. And something else – guilt? For what? He had been among the rebels. She sank down on a bench across from him and leaned back against the wall, closing her eyes. “I could not imagine you harming a child,” she admitted. “But when you left without a word I doubted what we had. What was the message?”
“The earl wanted something of me, but when I learned what it was, I refused him. I did not mean to cause you pain.”
“Refused to murder the king’s sons?’ she asked softly.
Her question was met with silence.
“What are we doing, Berend?” When he still did not answer, she opened her eyes and sat up, reaching for his hands, his scarred, strong hands. For the first time in her experience they were cold. He looked away, as if rebuking her gesture of friendship. “You are in danger,” she said. “I know that much. I know the king believes you were part of Salisbury’s conspiracy.”
“Sir Elric told you that?”
“Yes.”
Still he did not look her in the eye. “What do you know of the Lancastrians we saw today?” he asked.
She told him what little she knew, including the description the men had given Griselde. “It was you, wasn’t it? With Margery and her manservant?”
Berend bowed his head, whispering a curse.
“What has this to do with you?” she asked.
“Nothing but that I chose the worst time to return.” His voice was rough with weariness.
“Because you are known to be connected to the Montagu family, now marked as traitors to King Henry? And traveling with Lady Margery Kirkby, whose husband was marked as a traitor?” She did not mention Berend’s known itinerary, the most damning piece.
He withdrew his hands – gently, not in anger – and looked her in the eyes. “Salisbury, Montagu, Kirkby. It is dangerous to be associated with any of those names at present. Even you look at me differently.”
“I am angry about how you left. And – what I said – I doubted everything, the trust I thought we had. And what I’ve learned about you since – there is so much I did not know.”
“You have been investigating my past as you do potential customers?”
“No! It is not like that. Your disappearance has been noticed. People talk. And I feared for you.”
“How much do you know?”
She chose which details to share. “I know that at one time you served John, Baron Montagu. I know that he left you a piece of land in his will. Which made me wonder why you came to work for me. A cook who owns land? Why would you so humble yourself?”