Chapter Thirteen #2
“You don’t understand.”
“So tell me. Help me understand why.”
He beckoned an index finger forward, urging her to come near.
She pressed against the iron bars, leaning in close. Her voice was soft. “Was someone making you do it? Did someone have something over you?” She looked for his eyes but saw only darkness.
He spoke not a word.
“Did someone make you do those drawings of the empress?” she asked. “Did they threaten you if you didn’t?”
She waited. One moment, two. She sighed and shifted when a cold hand grabbed a hold of her fingers.
The brewer’s face was inches away from hers, as he screeched, “A ghost. A ghost walks among us,” he spat, spittle hitting her cheeks.
“It once was a man, but now it walks and visits me in the night. It promises to kill me if I get out, but I die if I stay here. Maybe I will become a ghost.” He cackled.
“Let her go!” Theobold shouted. “Guards.”
“Beware the ghost that walks among us,” Peter warned. “He walks and threatens death to us all. Do not cross him or you will die.” He cackled gleefully.
Bronwyn tugged at her hand, but the brewer refused to let go. “You’re hurting me,” she said as the air filled with the loud thumps and thuds of the pair of guards hurrying over, spears at the ready.
Seeing the guards aim their spears at him, Peter let go and flung himself back into his cell, giggling.
“He’s mad,” one guard said. “You all right, girl?”
“Yes, I’m fine.” She pulled her hand back and wiped spittle from her face.
“Bronwyn,” Theobold said.
“What?” She turned around.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes.” She rubbed her hand. “Thank you,” she said to the guards as she followed them out.
So what did this mean? Someone had been standing over Sir Robert.
That much was clear. But why, and why had he run away when Sister Joan had come in?
If he had been innocent, then he wouldn’t have run away.
Unless he was scared. And what was that nonsense about a ghost?
Sister Joan had mentioned seeing one, and now the brewer.
But that didn’t make sense. Tristan was dead.
She’d seen his body herself. She’d felt him when he had still been warm to the touch. He was dead, wasn’t he?
Back in the kitchen, she joined the pot boys, scrubbing.
She earned a few looks and glances, but no one said anything.
Bronwyn worked in the kitchen that day and hardly spoke a word to anyone.
It was a relief, scrubbing pots, in a way.
The day seemed to be passing peacefully, until one of the cooks said, “Bronwyn.”
She looked over.
The cook, an older man, stood with a page. “That’s her,” he said.
A small shiver of alarm came over her. What did the page want?
The page, a youth aged about in his early teens with acne on his nose, approached her. “You are Bronwyn the cook?”
She nodded. His face wasn’t friendly.
“You are summoned to William of Ypres. He wants to speak with you. Now.”
She wiped her hands on her apron. “Lead the way.”
He left and she followed, feeling the other cooks’ eyes on her. There were a few murmurs and muted talk, but she held her head high and followed him.
The page led her through the corridor and into the great hall, where a group of men sat around a long table, drinking. Servants stood by and held pitchers and jugs of wine and were silent as the men talked. Heads turned as the page brought her farther into the room.
Bronwyn waited for the page to bring her to the men, but instead, the lad escorted her to where a middle-aged man in his fifties sat by the fire, drinking alone.
A large, burly man, with a head of thinning hair and a sword and scabbard hanging at his belt, he sat stiffly on the stool and spun a sword around, the pommel twisting in his hands as the point spun into the wooden floor.
“My lord, this is the cook.” The lad bowed and left.
The man had a grizzled look about him; he needed a shave.
A swarthy man, with a set frown on his face, he looked up and surveyed her.
He did not speak for a moment, so she stood, her eyes on the floor.
Then slowly, she raised them to meet his gaze.
He rubbed at his eyes. “You are the cook? Brawnwinne?” he asked.
His accent was different from the English and French ones she’d heard in her nineteen years. “Bronwyn Blakenhale. From Lincoln,” she said, with a slight lift of her chin.
Again, he was silent.
“Why do you not sit with the other men?” she asked.
From their watchful gazes, it was clear the knights were keeping an eye on them both. A few kept talking and drinking, but others were openly watching.
He grunted. “They do not like me.”
She blinked. Oh. She’d always thought that the men fighting on both sides were friendly with one another, but perhaps working as a team didn’t necessarily mean everyone was friends; they simply worked together for a common cause.
She reflected on this. If Christopher’s kitchen was any example, she felt rather similar to Sir William of Ypres in that moment.
“The men in the kitchen do not like me, either.”
“I overheard a few of the squires say that too. Why?”
“What?”
“Why do they not like you?” he asked.
She shifted her feet. “I don’t know. I think it…” She paused. “You did not call me here to ask about me. What is it you want?”
His expression did not change, but he straightened on the stool.
He wore a long-sleeved shirt despite the lingering summer warmth outside, despite it being September.
“You are direct. I like that. I hear that you alerted the guards that Sir Robert was ill, and a little nun disturbed someone coming to see him at night.”
“That is true.”
“Why? Are you allied with Sir Robert?”
“No.” She looked at the floor. She was not allied with Sir Robert, who had made no bones about the fact that he did not like or trust her, and if the queen was to be believed, may have ordered the attack that had uprooted her family and perhaps led to their deaths.
And she was most definitely not allied with his squire, Theobold. “No, I am not.”
“Are you allied with King Stephen?” he asked.
She hesitated, a moment too long. A smarter young woman would have said yes, instantly, just to save her own hide. “I don’t know.”
“Why not?”
“Because he and the queen imprisoned my father for a crime he hadn’t committed, and I had to find out who had done it and prove his innocence. Even with my investigation, they would have killed us both that morning but for the Battle of Lincoln that happened. They didn’t trust me and—”
“So why are you here?”
“I fell in with the empress after the battle and she liked my cooking. She treated me well enough, so I stayed, but then during the last battle, I was captured with some others. The queen freed me and sent me to work in the kitchens.” It all came out in a great breath, as if she had been holding it in.
He looked at her thoughtfully. “You are acquainted with a man I know. Sir Nicholas.”
Bronwyn’s eyes widened. “The head of the guard for the king and queen. How is he?”
“Dead.”
A flash of pain went through her. Sir Nicholas had been like a stern uncle or grandfather to her. He’d disliked her at first, but then they’d worked together to find the culprit behind the crimes her father had been imprisoned for. She felt his loss like a blow to her stomach. “How?”
“Died in battle at Lincoln. He fought well.” Sir William of Ypres reached down and picked up a cup of wine, drinking.
“Why did you want to see me?” she asked.
“When I heard your name, I wanted to meet you. The day he died, Sir Nicholas had asked me for a favor.”
She cocked her head. “What was that?”
He drank again and set the cup down. Sir William motioned for a page to bring a pitcher forward, but none came.
She watched carefully. It was not that they did not see him; they just avoided looking in his direction.
And when some did boldly look at him and ignore his motioning for their attention, Bronwyn’s eyes opened at the sleight.
She understood the behavior well. If questioned, the servants could simply deny they had not seen his request, and no one would be the wiser.
It would all be dismissed as an innocent mistake.
But Sir William of Ypres would know. He grunted in displeasure.
“Excuse me.” She marched up to a servant and said, “Pardon, I need to borrow this.” She did not wait for an answer and instead took the pitcher of wine. Ignoring the pairs of eyes on her, she brought it to Sir William, filling up his cup. She set the pitcher down beside him.
He gave her a ghost of a smile. “That servant won’t like you.”
“I don’t care. I’m not here to be liked.” She’d proven that in the kitchens.
“The queen likes you. Well, as much as she likes anyone. Sir Nicholas liked you. He asked me to look out for you if you survived. He’d learned from Sir Baldwin’s squire where you were.
Said you were likely to be an orphan, and a pretty one.
If you lived past the battle, I should seek to raise you up, like the king did me. ”
Bronwyn’s heart warmed. Rupert had told Sir Nicholas about her. It made her feel like someone actually cared for her. That very thought would keep her warm on a cold night. “What do you mean?”
He scratched his chin. “What do you know of me, Bronwyn?”
She shrugged. “Only that you are the main commander of the king and queen’s forces.” She added after a beat, “And you are not from around here.”
The right corner of his mouth curled into a smile. “That’s true enough. I’m Flemish.”
“Where’s that?”
“Flanders. Far from here.” He drank more and set down the cup. “I can see why Sir Nicholas liked you. All right, girl. Tell me what you know about this business. He said you attract trouble like fruit does flies. How fares the empress’s half-brother?”
“He was sleeping when I last saw him.”