The Service of the Dead

Born and raised on the northern border where she need but step out the door to find vast open spaces, Kate Clifford experienced the city of York as an openwork cage in which no matter where she paced she was watched, her movements noted and judged according to the decorum expected of a young widow of considerable means. Or such means as her late husband had led his fellow merchants to believe he had accumulated. It suited her purpose that members of his guild and fellow citizens of York continued to hold Simon Neville in high esteem. Their respect for his memory extended to her, his widow, and bought her time. But Simon’s creditors knew the truth. So far she had managed to keep them quiet, satisfied with small, regular payments, but for how long? One wrong move could undo her. So could Lionel’s tongue, should he see an advantage in ruining her. And now, as King Richard’s troubles muddied the distinction between friend or foe, Kate had moments when she could not breathe. Or sleep.

Which was why she was stealing down the stairs in stockinged feet, trying not to wake her wards. She moved down to the hall where she lit a lantern from the embers in the hearth. Oh yes, a hearth. Simon had insisted. No fire circle in his hall. Such airs! He had laughed at the horror his brother expressed upon seeing the vertical loom Simon had given Kate, how he had placed it beneath the east window so she might work in the morning light. “Fine ladies do not weave,” Lionel had exclaimed. “Katherine would say, ‘What is that to me? I am no lady fair,’” Simon claimed to have replied. It was all very well for him to laugh at his brother’s pretentions, but in truth all the Neville family considered themselves of noble blood, and Simon’s own extravagance was the cause of Kate’s current financial unease. The lantern light was reflected by the polished pewter plates displayed in the wall cupboard. She could make do without them, she thought, though guests might wonder at the empty cupboard. Perhaps she might replace them with plates of lesser quality…

From the cabinet at the cupboard’s base she withdrew a quiver of arrows and a bow, then took a seat on one of a pair of elegantly carved high-backed chairs. As she strung the bow the wolfhounds Lille and Ghent circled her, their noses cold, their fur warm from their bed near the embers. Some time at the butt in her garden before the neighbors woke would steady her. She let the hounds out to gambol in the fresh snow while she secured her squirrel-lined cloak to give her arms the freedom to shoot, then at last stepped into her twin brother’s boots, closing her eyes and imagining his smile. When her parents had purged her room of Geoff’s belongings – the treasures, the memories – they had missed the boots and a few other items that had been out in the stables. She had hidden them in her trunk when she came south to York. They wanted her to let Geoff go. But he was her twin. They shared souls, life force. There could be no letting go. Not even his death could separate them.

Settling the quiver over her cloak, bow in one hand, lantern in the other, Kate stepped out into the eerie whiteness with the sky just beginning to lighten. She paused a moment beneath the eaves, taking a deep breath and remembering snowy mornings up north, doors frozen shut by the drifts. This was nothing. Trudging out to the butt, she placed the lantern on a stone where it would illuminate the target, then backed away, sensing the direction of the wind, sticking out her tongue to catch a flake and feel it melt. She called softly to Lille and Ghent, beckoning them to her side. The wolfhounds knew the mood in which she had come out into the snowy predawn garden. They knew to be still until her arrows were spent or her mood shifted. Ready now, she reached for an arrow.