The Fifth Knight(53)

A great shout of many voices rose up, followed by a heavy crash that shuddered through the cobbles beneath them.

“Let’s be off. Every minute here is a minute we could be seen.” He boosted her up into the saddle before she could reply.

♦ ♦ ♦

The first tiny snowflakes stung like sand as the strengthening wind flung them into Theodosia’s face. She rode atop the heavy-boned bay gelding, Benedict behind her in control of the reins. Astride a horse once more, she found her body moved in time with the animal, her muscles knowing how to balance in its rhythm.

The night sky had no moon, and the weak starlight was banished by the arrival of the snow clouds. Oh, the cold, the cold. She buried her cheeks in her shawl and tried to contain her teeth’s relentless chatter. She and Benedict had ridden across barren open scrubland for the last couple of hours, and the stiff breeze had found its way into every gap and opening of her clothing. Now the snow brought with it a new level of discomfort.

Frigid too was the atmosphere between them. They’d not spoken except for a terse exchange in which she relayed where the pilgrims had said Polesworth was.

“You see those?” His voice came as a surprise as he pointed ahead to where the dark outline of trees showed through the sheets of powdery snowflakes. “From here on, there’ll be many miles of dense forests.”

“Won’t that slow us down?” she said, her words muffled by her shawl.

“Yes,” came his short reply, “but it should protect us from the worst of the weather.”

“Do not seek protection on my account.”

“I’m not. We have to stop on Quercus’s account. I don’t want to wear the animal out and have him die on us.”

The gelding too had his head lowered against the onslaught of the weather, but he walked on, bearing his heavy load without hesitation.

“Better that than Fitzurse and his knights catch us up.”

“That’s not likely.”

She half turned in the saddle to catch his eye. “Then you admit I did the right thing by talking to those pilgrims?”

“Fools like that, wasting their lives parading around the country, looking for pieces of dead saints to pray to?”

She pushed her advantage home. “Of course you’d see pilgrims as fools. But you haven’t answered me. They knew where Polesworth Abbey was, so I did the right thing.”

“I’d rather you did as you were told. It was a risk. And I suppose it paid off,” he added ungraciously.

“I am glad you acknowledge my quick thinking.”

“More like mine, Sister. The knights are scouring Knaresborough for a chain-mailed knight and an anchoress in cream wool clothing.” He patted their bundle of clothing behind him. “They’ll find neither us nor our clothes, and this noble animal takes us well beyond their reach.”

“Noble except he was bought with tainted money?”

An odd look came across his face. “A gelding like this can eat up the miles.” He began to talk of horses, of distances.

Theodosia faced forward once more. Doubt nipped at her, but she could not voice why. Something was not right with Sir Benedict Palmer. Every time she mentioned the moneylender, he changed the subject, made her busy. Distracted her. What was he up to? She needed to think, to concentrate, to try and figure it out. If he thought she could be easily fooled, he’d be wrong.

♦ ♦ ♦

Fitzurse crossed the cobbled town square of Knaresborough with care, the stones beneath his boots covered in a slick of freshly fallen snow.

“Any sign of them?” said de Tracy.

Fitzurse scanned the homebound crowds, noisy still after the excitement of the fire. “No. We’ll start to ask in there.” He set off for the brightly lit inns. “Le Bret, you stay out here, ask around.”

Le Bret gave a nod of acknowledgment and set about his task.

Fitzurse pushed open the first inn’s door and was met with a wave of warmth that carried with it a loud clamor of voices and the smell of boiled mutton and onions. Long wooden benches and tables were crammed with travelers and pilgrims who supped ale and tucked into bowls of steaming food. He wrinkled his nose in disgust. “They might as well set a big trough down in the middle of this room,” he murmured to de Tracy as a sweating, harassed-looking innkeeper bore down on them, pots of ale in each hand.

“Oh, I don’t know,” said de Tracy. “Looks all right to me.”

“What can I get you, sir knights?” The innkeeper set the ale down in front of a group of weather-beaten farmers and their dreadful women.

“Only some information, my good man,” said Fitzurse. “Have you seen a townsman and his wife come in here?”