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2 Halifax, England 1197
By the time they arrived in Joseph's hometown of Halifax, Sorieya (or Suri as she had requested he call her after numerous mispronunciations), spoke fair English, Joseph's Spanish had undertaken a dramatic improvement, and he had a far greater understanding of the Moorish view of the Crusades and the Muslim way of life than he had ever expected to have. To make the situation worse, not only was he beginning to question the legitimacy of his occupation as a Crusader, but was thoroughly in love with the quiet Moorish beauty.
'Ah, Lancelot,' he thought. 'Now I know how you felt every time you gazed upon your queen. God give me greater strength than you possessed to not touch that which can never be mine. In Jesus' name, Amen.'
Joseph's family lived on the Northern outskirts of the town in a small keep overlooking a river and the road which led into the town proper. It was well fortified, being the first guard against possible invasion from the Highlands. His father was only a minor Lord, titled through his knighthood and vassal to the Earl not the Baron who actually held the town.
As they rode into the small courtyard, they were suddenly overwhelmed by several small children fascinated by the strange woman and the Templar knight in their midst. A pair of peasant women came out to shoo the children away, and one of them ran indoors immediately, and one of the older boys held the horses for them. As Joseph dismounted, a young woman of maybe fourteen came running out of the keep and threw herself into Joseph's arms. Three other women followed at a more sedate pace, waited their turn at greeting.
Sorieya examined them from horseback. They were all very English women, tall and willowy and three of them had Joseph’s dark hair and soulful brown eyes. The fourth woman stood next to the Matron, a gorgeous, listless red-head with distant grey-green eyes and an inordinate pallor to her skin. Sorieya realized that this must be the bride Joseph had told her about. There was also a pall of death about her that told Suri she had been touched by something.
Suri slid from the horse’s back and crossed to the woman. She took the woman’s right hand in her left and placed her right finger on the bride’s wrist. There was a chill to her skin, even through the heavy wool of her dress.
“Forgive me, great Doña, but, does she eat much?” she asked of the Matron beside her.
The older woman frowned at her. Joseph quickly untangled himself from his youngest sister and approached. “Mother,” he said, bending to kiss her cheek, “this is Suri, a nun I rescued in Spain.”
“Why do you bring her here?” she asked in a cold voice.
Suri politely turned from the statement, staring into Margaret’s listless eyes. There was a great deal of fear and pain written there.
“Because I am responsible for her and had no other choice. But what is wrong with Margret?”
“She has not slept, nor does she really eat much,” injected another young woman from behind Margret. She was closer to Suri’s twenty-two years and fairly pretty.
“Does she not wish to marry Michael?” Joseph asked.
“Until a few months ago it was the only thing she spoke of.”
“It is the Baron’s doing,” growled a voice that sounded like Joseph’s from behind him.
“Michael,” sighed an older man, “I have told you….”
The complaint was lost in the din of greeting and a great deal of back-slapping.
Suri turned to the woman who had spoken with her.
“My name is Kate,” she laughed. “Seeing as my brother is too busy for manners.”
“Ah, the widowed sister. Yes, he has spoke much of you,” Suri nodded, bowing slightly to her before turning to Margret. “But this one… she is wasting and weak. She must be fed a rich, beef broth; with steeped spinach if is available. And clover root tonic, that should thicken the blood,” she added, still thinking.
“Her blood?” questioned Joseph’s mother, still with disdain in her voice for the foreign woman who hid every part of her but her feet, hands and eyes. “What makes you think this is an ailment of the blood?”
Suri sighed softly, trying to find a way to ease the woman’s animosity towards her. She bowed, and remained half bent, one hand crossed over her heart, never once lifting her eyes to meet the woman’s cold gaze. “I humbly beg your forgiveness, great doña, but, she is pale and her skin cold to touch, colder than it should be even in this weather. By her choice of garb, which is heavier than the rest of you have chosen, I believe she is often cold. She is listless and weak and I know of few illnesses outside of loss of blood which cause such symptoms. I have seen such in patients who have been over-bled, and in soldiers who have been brought to my shrine in hopes of healing from the wars.”
“Wars? Which wars? I thought the crusades were over?” asked the youngest girl in wide-eyed excitement.
Suri turned to her with sad eyes. “They are. But violence wages still in Spain.”
“Spain has always had a bloody reputation,” the mother sneered.
“Elsbeth,” growled the older man, obviously Joseph’s father. “Let the woman be. If she can help poor Margret where our own physicians have not been able to, then let her. Besides,” he added as he drew his wife closer to his side, “I have heard that the Moors have doctors a damned sight better than ours.”
“A MOOR!?!” Elsbeth exclaimed suddenly, pulling away from Suri as if were contaminated.
Kate took Suri’s wrist and pulled her hastily towards the keep. “Quick, inside,” she whispered. Once inside the shelter of the main hall, she leaned against the wall and laughed. “I am terribly sorry about that, Suri. Mother has been bitter about the Muslims and the Moors ever since Joseph joined the Templars. She had such high hopes for marrying him off.”
“I do not think she likes me over much,” Suri observed, watching the argument outside through the still open door.
“Oh, she’ll like you well enough when she gets over herself. She resents you right now. When her baby son goes off to war to fight the…. Oh, I’m sorry… I did not mean to…”
Suri smiled, “It is quite all right. I have long ago accepted that the men of our religions will fight. I understand that Templars cannot marry. I take it that her Templar son coming home with a woman before his saddle upsets her?”
“You are quite perceptive.”
“I am a holy woman,” with an acquiescent tilt of her veiled head. “Wisdom is expected of me. Besides, when one’s life consists of little beyond visions and prayer, one tends to notice the slightest change in one’s surrounding. I learned to read people long ago. It amuses me.”
“And another thing,” Kate began as she led Suri deeper into the keep, “your not looking my mother in the eye makes her not trust you.”
Suri followed the tall, willowy woman, accepting without being told that she had been relegated to the woman’s care. “It is not proper in my faith for a woman to meet another’s gaze, especially a man’s, or a woman of rank,” she explained. “A chaste woman keeps her eyes downcast and reveals herself only within the home.”
“God, but that would drive me insane!” she laughed.
Suri smiled again and Kate decided she very much liked the expression in her companion’s eyes. “So I have noticed of English women.”
“Have Arabian women no fire?”
It was Suri’s turn to laugh. “Oh, Muslim women have plenty of fire. We simply reserve our fire for our husbands.”
The sound of laughter followed them upstairs into the living quarters of the keep.
Suri was offered to share Kate’s room and no amount of protesting would get her out of it. Joseph’s sister was a pleasant enough woman, full of life and joy, the near exact opposite of her soon to be sister-in-law, Margret. She showed Suri a place to wash and refresh herself and waited politely in the main part of the bedroom, though she continued to talk throughout. “So, why did you take orders?”
“Orders?” Suri asked, confused. “I am a holy woman. No one gives me orders but God.”
Kate laughed. “That’s what I meant. Why did you take the holy orders? Why did you become a nun?”
Suri’s voice drifted from the tiny side chamber with a hint of amusement in it. “You are very much like your brother. Even he insists that I am a nun. I am not. I am a Sufi Ascetic. A holy woman charged with the keeping of a shrine.”
Suri stepped into the room, wearing only her pants and her knee length blouse, brushing out her long, straight black hair. Kate was stunned by the absolute beauty of the woman. Her face was flawless, though incredibly exotic. She was struck speechless.
Suri noticed her stare and paused. “What?” she asked. “Have I somehow offended? You said to make myself at home… Please, forgive me,” she said, reaching for her veil.
“No, no, it isn’t that,” Kate protested quickly, snapping out of it. “It’s just… I have heard of women like you.”
Suri stood frozen, confused, uncertain what error had been made and what could be done to correct it.
“More beautiful than the fey. Like Helen, the Trojan woman men killed for. It is no wonder now why you cover your face. I must confess that I would be so vain if I had a face like yours,” she added with a sigh.
“Vanity is one of your deadly sins, is it not?” she replied, blushing from embarrassment. No one had ever praised her beauty before, that she could remember. Kate nodded soberly. “Then it is a good thing that I grew up without access to mirrors,” she replied with a bow.
Kate’s eyes widened. “You mean you have never seen your own face before?”
“No. Not that I remember.”
Kate got off of the bed and, taking Suri by the shoulders, led her over to a low dressing table mounted on which was a polished steel mirror. Suri gazed at her face for the first time since she was a child. She touched her cheek quizzically. Its smooth surface had never been a source of fascination for her as it was now. Her eyes flashed brown and gold, like tiger’s eye, but more alive than any semi-precious stone. Her beauty was… distracting. She turned away quickly, unwilling to dwell in vanity.
She went to her chest, which had been brought upstairs for her, and put away her outdoor shawl. She folded the long cloth with a few snaps and laid it within the trunk, closing it. Draping her coined scarf over her, now, knotted hair, she carefully placed a smaller, indoor shawl over it and adjusted her veil.
“Do you ever wear anything else? Would you like to borrow something of mine?” Kate offered.
Suri shook her head politely. “Thank you, but no. It would not be proper for me to do so. Though I do not live in my country with my people anymore, I still live by my customs. Nothing less would be expected of me. If you were to move to the savannas of Africa where the women wear only a waist kilt, would you wear what the African women wear? Or would you retain your long skirts and your tight bodices?”
Kate laughed. “Point made. I think supper should be about served. Shall we go join the others?”
Nodding, Suri followed the willowy English woman downstairs. She found it easy to like the young widow, and assessed that she would not remain a widow long. She was far too charming.
Suri stopped halfway down the staircase as it opened up into the main hall. The room she had entered when she Kate had first pulled her into the keep was now filled with people. The rafters were nearly two stories above the rush covered floor, upon which cavorted several long legged hounds snuffling for scraps and chewing on each other’s ears. The room itself was easily larger than the kneeling area of her shrine in Lisbon, hemmed in on three sides by long oak trestle tables and benches upon which crowded all manner of men and women side by side.
Kate quickly realized she had lost her charge and backed up the stairs to take her by the arm and lead her down into the midst of the press of humanity. The smell of so many close, unwashed bodies, assaulted Suri’s senses, making her intensely grateful for her veil. She kept close to Kate as she brought her to a higher table at the back of the room, opposite the main doors. A great fireplace blazed behind the main table, where nine chairs stood facing the inner ring formed by the other tables.
The lord of the manor sat beside his wife on high-backed chairs covered by thick furs. Michael was easing himself into his chair on his father’s right hand, after helping Margret into her place next to him. Suri watched the girl look pleadingly at Michael for a brief moment, as if trying to tell him something, then faded back into her previous, near-catatonic silence. The younger sister was on Margaret’s other side and chatting merrily away with some besotted young knight to her right. Seated beside his mother, was Joseph, speaking softly with her, but in heated tones. Suri knew even before her approach silenced the pair that she was the topic of discussion. Under her veils, Suri blushed hotly, not wishing to be the bone of discord between Joseph and his family.
Kate sat her between her chair and that of her brother and smiled devilishly, slipping into her own seat before her mother could say anything. Joseph set his hand upon Suri’s for a moment, squeezed encouragingly. Still uncertain what was about to happen or what the customs were that she would have to observe, she smiled weakly at Joseph and turned to examine the table before her. There was a metal plate in front of her, a metal bowl, and a metal goblet. Looking out at the other tables, she noticed quickly, that, while the head table was laid in metals, the lower tables were bedecked in simple wood. Before she could ask a single question, servants began pouring in from the side door hauling trenchers of meat and large bowls and dishes of some sort of unrecognizable vegetable assortments.
A whole boar was placed upon the head table before the lord’s plate and servants began to walk around behind each person, filling the goblets with a heady wine. Suri felt herself shrinking inside, horrified by the choice of either insulting her hosts, or violating the tenants of her faith. Her hands slipped into her lap, pale and cold in spite of the raging heat of the fire behind them.
Lord Atley of Halifax stood proudly, beaming at the immense roasted pig displayed before him. Drawing a long knife, he began to cut deftly into the beast’s hide. Suri’s nose was assaulted by the heavy aroma of the boar as juice, thick and greasy, oozed from the cut and spilled to the trencher. Lord Atley cut meat first for his lady, then himself before a servant stepped forward to take up the assault. She was trying to control herself when a maid reach in between her and Joseph and took her cup, filling it with wine before Suri knew what the girl was about. Overwhelmed, she simply sat there in silence, feeling suddenly very shy and small in the midst of it all. The hall had erupted with the shouts and conversations of dozens of men at arms and the various women.
“So, father,” Joseph was saying next to her as he helped himself to a large portion of the boar and the various other dishes that were being handed around, “little Mary tells me you took this beast yourself.”
His father guffawed and launched into an immediate, gory telling of his hunt. He spoke around his mouth full of pork with reasonable diction, well watered by the wine.
Suri turned her attention away as Kate began to put food onto her plate whether she wanted it or not. Kate quickly noticed her companion’s pallor and touched her hand gently. “Suri? Are you all right?”
“I am … I am well, señora, I am just… I have never eaten in company before,” she answered in a small voice.
“Not even at your… convent?” she asked, shocked.
Suri smiled weakly. “I lived alone. Occasionally, one of the town women would stay with me and share a meal, but it was quiet and private and… well. My culture rarely sees men and women eat in the same room, much less at the same table, except for intimate family dinners and special occasions.”
“Barbaric,” she distinctly heard from the other side of Joseph, though the words were said in a low enough tone.
“What about the trip from Spain?” Kate asked, ignoring her mother and trying to help put Suri at ease. “You were traveling with Joseph and his squire.”
“That… that is different. Joseph is my guardian now, which grants him certain privileges.”
“Such as?” came a cold, imperial voice that insinuated all sorts of unpleasant and improper things.
Suri swallowed her uncertainty with a silent prayer and tried to explain. “The rights a father holds over his daughter, or a knight his squire, a man over his ward or his apprentice. He is responsible for my welfare, which grants him certain rights and responsibilities. Much like you, noble Don,” she said, bowing her head in the Lord’s direction, “hold over Señorita Margret at this time.”
“Completely understandable,” Lord Atley declared sagely. “Satisfied with the morality of the situation, oh harridan of my heart?” he asked of his wife, drinking deeply of his wine.
She ignored him, turning to Suri again, noticed that her food had gone untouched. Beside her, Joseph stabbed at his own meat with his dagger, wishing fervently that he was still in Spain and not here, caught between his mother and his charge. She effected a cold smile. “Tell me, Soria, is our food not to your liking?” she asked with the air of a cat who had caught her prey at last.
“Please forgive me, honorable Doña, but… my faith prohibits the consumption of pork or wine. It is not your hospitality which makes me uncomfortable, as you are quite generous to open your home to me, but that I have lived so long in seclusion I find myself at a loss amid so many souls.”
Suri bowed again in Lady Elsbeth’s direction, aware that half-suppressed snickers had broken out all over the hall. She was further confused as to why her sincerity provoked amusement, but said nothing. To try to placate her hostess, she tore off a small piece of bread and slipped it beneath her veil to eat it quietly.
Seething, the lady returned to her own plate, retorted coldly without looking. “My name is Lady Elsbeth, not Donya.”
Suri bowed again, “Forgive me, great Lady. I have only learned English on my trip here from Spain, and in the excitement of his reunion, Joseph never introduced us properly. In the Spanish tongue, Doña means Lady. I humbly beg your forgiveness if I have caused some unknowing insult.”
Joseph turned to his mother as he reached for an ewer of wine to refill his glass. “So tell me, mother, what are the plans for the wedding? Your delightful letter only said Spring.”
Suri breathed a tiny sigh of relief and turned to Kate as she felt the young woman’s hand on her arm.
“Deftly done, Suri,” she whispered in admiration. “I don’t think she is certain whether to like you or hate you more. I can’t honestly say as I would have handled the situation with as much diplomacy.”
Suri smiled, bravely reaching out for a dark skinned apple gracing a bowl before her. “I told you, señora, we reserve our fire for our husbands, not their mothers. For them there is only the sweetest of honey,” she whispered back.
Kate stifled a laugh and admired the small, Damascene dagger her companion was using to slice her fruit with. “That is beautiful.”
Suri shrugged lightly, sliding the curved blade deftly through the crisp white flesh to remove the core. “A gift from a supplicant. Apparently it was inherited by one brother whose other brother coveted it. Not wishing to tarnish the relationship, they gave it to me, so that neither would have it, and thus no argument.”
“You must have lived some life.”
Another light shrug as a slice of apple disappeared beneath the veil. Suri quickly learned to ignore the people surrounding her, in order to be able to eat with some sense of ease. It was difficult, but she forced herself to do it through her years of discipline. “Sometimes. Mostly it was peaceful and quiet. Ideal for meditation and study.”
“Oh? What did you study?”
Suri could not help but laugh, warming finally to a topic she could appreciate. “Everything I could get my hands on. I would borrow books from anyone wealthy enough or lucky enough to own them. Medicine, histories, philosophy. I have even read your Christian Bible."
Kate’s eyebrows went up. “And your faith’s elders did not object to this?”
“Know thy enemy, I suppose,” Joseph quipped softly, imparting her a playful smile before returning to his fencing match with his mother.
Kate was in awe, “If a Christian were to read your Bible, they would probably be accused of heresy.”
Suri nodded. “Were I to suddenly begin using your Bible instead of my Qur’an to guide my life, I, too, would be charged an apostate, the penalty for which, is death. But to read it to allow me an understanding of what comprised nearly half the population of Lisbon, that is in itself no crime. Learning is never wasted nor forbidden. It is what you do with it that matters.”
“Some knowledge is dangerous.”
“It is Knowledge without Understanding, Lady Elsbeth, that is dangerous.”
Sensing that the conversation was about to take a dangerous turn, Joseph leaned over and shouted a challenge to his brother. “All right, Michael, I’ve had enough. I’ve spent most of this afternoon hearing about how you used to whip me around like a toy when we were boys. I’m ready to take you out onto that floor and show you what a little warfare can do for a man’s wrestling.”
Michael seemed to hesitate for a moment, then noted something in his brother’s voice and manner that made him give in. That and the scores of men that began chanting and shouting for a match.
Kate pushed her chair back, turning to her mother. “My lady mother, I believe that is the ladies’ cue to retire to the solar?”
“Most assuredly,” she said in her usual cold voice as she rose to her feet.
Lord Atley stood, bent to kiss her, then sat himself back down as the ladies took their leave.
Sorieya paused a moment before her chair as Joseph held it for her. She bent and whispered to him. “Whatever you do, do not ride out with your brother tonight. Stay within the hall, please.”
He gave her a confused look, but silently agreed. He stood there watching a moment as she followed Kate and the other women back upstairs. Then his brother’s hand descended heavily upon his shoulder and he was being guided into the open floor before the tables. Lord Atley watched proudly as his two sons stripped to the waist and prepared to wrestle with each other.
Suri trailed behind at a respectful distance from Lady Elsbeth, not wishing to call attention to herself at the moment. She soon found herself in a small, close chamber with a single fireplace. A girl was adding wood to the blaze, disappearing into the shadows quickly as they entered. Kate went immediately to the loom in the corner and picked up her shuttle. Lady Elsbeth took up the chair nearest the fire and picked up a linen shirt whose edges she was embroidering. The younger girl, Mary, sat somewhere between her sister and her mother and pulled her embroidery frame close.
Sorieya watched the other women work for a few moments before she bowed, begging pardon for her leave, saying that she would return momentarily. Lady Elsbeth said little, merely acknowledged her politeness with a cold arch of her fine dark brows that said she could care less. Stepping out of the solar, she could hear the voices of the men below echoing up the open staircase nearby. There was a great deal of drunken merriment in their shouts of encouragement to the wrestlers, but she could feel an undercurrent to it all that spoke of things thought and left unsaid, troubling things. The whole keep had a chill to it, not unlike that of its mistress.
Suri had little problems finding her way back to the bedroom. Her memory was near perfect. It helped that she had grown up in a palace full of winding corridors and hidden passages. There were times when she dreamed of long ago games of sneaking up on her father and of hide and seek through the endless passages. By comparison, this keep was a peasant’s cottage.
She shook off her reverie, and entered Kate's room on silent, bare feet. She went immediately to her chest in the corner and took out a heavy box. It was about a cubed foot in size, and ornately decorated with mosaics of tile work in Spanish stone and Venetian glass. Cradling it carefully, she carried it back down to the solar. Kate stepped out of the solar door just as Suri approached, looking for her. "I was wondering where you disappeared to," she said. "What is this?" she asked, holding the door for her and closing it behind them.
"You have your crafts, I have mine," she bowed.
Just as she stepped into the room, she overheard Lady Elsbeth speaking to the other two young ladies. "It is women like her that give men intolerable ideas on how proper women should behave." She fell silent when she saw Suri, giving the distinct impression that Sorieya was the ‘women’ to whom she had been referring.
She politely ignored the comment and set her box down on the small, low table upon which had been placed a plate of fruit and cut meats.
"Whatever is that, my dear?" Lady Elsbeth asked coldly.
Suri opened the box and removed a small, thin piece of wood, bringing it nearer to the fire for light. The partially finished mosaic glinted in the fire light and the women gasped at its beauty. "My lapidary," Sorieya said, removing her shawl and veil, making herself comfortable on the floor before the table. There were more gasps from the women and Lady Elsbeth glared coldly at her.
"Why do you unveil? I was told it your custom...."
"There are only women here. It is permitted. It is only in unrelated, mixed company that a woman of my faith must keep herself chastely concealed.”
Suri distinctly heard the servant woman whisper, "Now we know why she hides her face."
She tried to ignore the comment, sat on her knees in front of the table and began to arrange the bits of tile, stone and glass beside the board in anticipation of gluing them down. The women watched as she worked, laying out the remains of her pattern, only half minding their needlework. As she began to cement the tiles down in her colorful, circular pattern, the younger sister, Mary commented, "It looks like one of those great stained glass windows I saw at the cathedral in London last summer."
"Yes, it does," her mother commented dryly. "Tell me, what use do you find for your lapidary?" she asked, biting off the thread of the shirt she was embroidering.
"Many uses. This will be a …trivet, I think you call it? To rest hot food on without burning one's table, yet keeping the food warm. Other uses are more purely decorative," she admitted, "such as this box in which I carry my supplies. I spent six years on the floor of the Mosque in Lisbon, but the time was well spent."
"Mosque?" Elsbeth sneered.
"It is the place where we go for prayer," she explained.
Mary's eyes grew wide. "You tiled the whole floor of your church with these tiny things?"
Suri smiled. "Some of the stones were a little bigger, but yes. As I said, it took me six years."
The door opened again and Margret entered. She moved like a ghost to an empty chair by the fire and sat, her frame untouched, staring into the flames. Suri watched her peripherally as she pressed the last of her tiles into the cement. Finished, she set it on the hearth to dry and poured a cup of tea from the kettle over the fire. She bent over Margaret’s wane form and pressed the cup into her hand. Gently, she guided that hand to Margaret’s mouth, praying in a soft tone in Arabic. Without conscious thought, Margret drank. Continuing her prayers, she touched a piece of meat to the woman's lips and coaxed her to eat it, nodding as the woman chewed automatically.
Suri was not aware of the sudden silence that had fallen over the room until it was shattered by a hiss from Lady Elsbeth. "Witchcraft!"
Suri looked over in confusion. "Nay, great lady," she said with a small bow. "Merely prayers."
"The tongue was not Latin."
"No, Lady. It was not. It was Arabic."
"How are we to know you were not casting some spell...."
"Oh, mother," Kate cut in. "What does it matter? If it makes Margret well...."
Suri turned on her in a flash. "It matters a great deal, señora," she said in a surprisingly firm voice. "Results for good or ill, sorcery always carries a heavy price. And it is usually the innocent who will pay it."
Lady Elsbeth looked at her with something akin to shocked respect, but the glimmer was fleeting. Suri fed Margret a little more before deciding to retire for the evening. She packed away her supplies and readjusted her veil, bade her good nights.
Mary picked up the newly finished trivet from the hearth. "You forgot your...."
Suri shook her head. "Give it to Margret when she is better. A wedding present." Bowing, she picked up her box and turned to the door. She paused a moment, turning back. "She might be just as well served by time on holy ground," she added as she left.
Sounds of music and laughter still rang from the hall, but they were more subdued, heavy with wine and physical exertion. Yet, even under the sounds of merriment, there was a pall upon the keep, something stifling that crept into Sorieya's bones and bit deep. She closed the bedroom door behind her and placed her lapidary box back within her chest.
She stood in the darkened room a long while before she moved, listening to the keep and the ghostly voices that rang through her halls. A knock at the door startled her. On silent feet, she crossed and opened it, found a small boy on the other side.
"Come ta light yer fire, milady," he piped, stifling a yawn.
Suri stepped aside and let him through, and went back to her place at the window. There was a clatter below her in the yard as two horsemen rode out of the gates into the night. She felt an overwhelming sense of foreboding wash over her. She watched the pair until they could no longer be seen, sick in her heart without knowing why. The first horse had a very familiar gait and manner.
As the fire blazed, she spoke to the boy without turning to him. "Do you know, Daniel, Joseph's squire?"
"Yes, milady?"
"Ask him to come. I need to talk to him."
If the boy found her manner or request odd, he said nothing, yawning as he stumbled out the door. "Right away, milady."
She was still staring out into the night when the knock came. She called out and Daniel slipped up beside her like an obedient shadow. Even more than his master, the boy had grown accustomed to her ways and manners. That she was something of a prophetic awed him, more than her beauty awed him; that she was still so pure and holy made him love her, looking up to her even more than to his knight. She had suffered so much at the hands of the crusades, and lost so much more, and yet there was no hate or hardness in her at all. She was as pure as a Madonna.
"Doña?" he asked in Spanish, bowing.
"Daniel. Do you know of an abandoned barn on the far South side of town?"
"No, my lady, but I can find it."
"Good. Tomorrow night..." she paused, focusing to maintain control of the information flowing through her. Her visions were sometimes very fleeting. "If we have not returned here by nightfall tomorrow, take the chest in the corner there, and Joseph's things. Put them on the horses and leave them in that barn for us."
"Where are we going, my lady?"
"You will stay here… if you value your life. Joseph and I are going to York."
"I thought we would stay until Spring?"
"We may not be able to, Daniel, if things go as I fear. Do not question, do not tell. Just do," she sighed. "It is safer for all that way."
Puzzled, but not daring to question, the boy slipped out of the room without another word.
Sorieya's sleep was fitful that night, unclear and filled with uneasy dreams. There were Turks in her dreams, a nightmare from long past and a tall man imposing himself upon her world. She saw chains and serpents’ fangs and blood and fire and heaven and hell battling openly upon the face of the earth. Just before waking, she saw the sun sink below the horizon to be replaced by a bleeding moon and knew she would never see the sun again.
The sun was rising over the highlands as she sat up with a start. Kate slept unaware beside her. She barely felt the cold flagstones beneath her feet as she crossed to the window to watch the sunrise before its red-gold glory was obscured by the near-perpetual bank of clouds that hung over England. There was an unexplained sadness in her heart as she dressed and slipped, unnoticed, down the stairs to the kitchen for breakfast.
One of the maids handed her a warm pasty and ushered her gently out of the way with a low warning. "Stay clear of cook this mornin', miss. With the Lord in a roar, he's in a roar, an' he'd as soon snap off yer head as thank ye kindly!"
Suri nodded, thanking the girl for her breakfast and slipped out again as silently as she had come. She sat down on a battlement stair in a shaded corner and ate in privacy. She grimaced as she bit into the handheld pie. There was something to be said for English cooking, and all of it greasy. She found it amazing that their soldiers were capable of fighting at all eating food this heavy all the time. She ate it, though, felt positive that it had been made from leftovers of the feast the night before. Finished, she licked her fingers as clean as she could and went hunting for water.
She found a pitcher on a trestle table in the great hall and washed her hands, sipping from her cupped palm to wash the heavy taste of the meat pie from her mouth. She wished she could go out into her garden for an orange from her trees, but she remembered that the crusaders now had possession of that. She sighed, putting the past behind her, where it belonged, but could not dispel the pall of ill omen that hung heavily over the castle.
She heard raised voices nearby, paused to listen as they came closer. Joseph and his brother were arguing rather loudly with their father.
"I am only telling you what I saw with my own eyes!!" Joseph bellowed as they entered the hall.
Lord Atley was sandwiched between his two sons, his face red with barely contained outrage. He stormed up to the tables and poured himself a glass of wine, draining it with one swallow before pouring himself a second. "And what did the Abbot say? When you told him of this?" he said tightly, staring straight ahead and not at his sons.
Michael threw up his hands in his brother's direction, stalking away and began pacing. Joseph scoffed. "That fat abbot would not know Satan if he were to offer to shave his tonsure!"
"What did he say?!"
"He said that the Baron was a holy enough man, and to leave the matter be. But the Baron is NOT a holy man, he is an unholy agent of hell here to steal Margaret’s soul!!"
"Michael, are you so certain you wish to marry a girl you just witnessed walk through the woods in her nightdress to another man's arms??" their father demanded.
"She had no choice, father! It is obvious the girl is under some sort of spell and I know the man who has cast it upon her!! I have told you again and again that the Baron was doing something untoward, now your favorite returns from the crusades and tells you it is something unholy and you still won't listen!!"
Lord Atley turned on Michael. "If the abbot did not believe you, there is nothing to be done!" He looked over at Joseph, "BOTH of you will drop this subject at once!! If the church will not back you, no one will! Nothing can be done and you will cease your accusations at once!!"
Sorieya saw the look in Joseph's eye and knew whence her foreboding came. "You are wrong, father," he said stiffly. "I am a Templar Knight. I answer only to the Pope. The baron will answer to me, and then to God."
There was a woman's scream from upstairs. Michael bolted for the stairs, taking them three at a time. Joseph just stared once more at his father, then stormed out of the keep. Lord Halifax pressed his palms to the table and hung his head.
"That boy will be the death of me," he muttered.
"No, my lord," Suri said in a soft voice drifting in from her quiet corner. "He will be his own death... and mine. He will be your greatest pride and your greatest sorrow, and you will die a very old man. Keep what is left to you close."
The lord of the keep watched the Moorish woman walk silently up the stairs after Michael, glancing back only once. Meeting her piercing gaze, he folded, weeping without knowing why, burying his head in his arms.
Margaret’s room was crowded. It seemed that nearly everyone who had heard the cry had come to investigate. Sorieya began to quietly shoo people away with an authority that none dared to question. Entering the room she found Mary in the arms of one of the guards, fainted dead away. It was her voice that had awakened the entire keep. Lying on the bed, was Margret, sheets bathed in blood and sweat and the girl tossing in a fever. Michael was holding on to her, trying to take from her a knife that she had somehow gotten a hold of.
"Unholy, unholy," she kept muttering. "Kill the unholy. Release the poisoned blood. Drain away the evil. Cleanse. Purify....." It was the first words anyone had heard from her in some time.
Sorieya crossed to her immediately, pulling the end of the sheet from the bed and throwing it at Michael. "Wind her tightly, so that she cannot move."
"Get the knife from her first," Michael growled, trying to do just that and still hold onto her. There was a surprising amount of strength in the girl.
Suri went around the bed, came up behind Michael. "Hold her still." She placed two fingers along side Margaret’s throat and held them there a long moment. Her struggles increased, trying to get away from Suri's touch, but held tightly against the breast of her betrothed, there was no where she could move. Not a sound came from her open mouth. After a few tense moments, Margret went completely limp and Suri removed her hand.
"What did you do?" Mary screamed as she came to, saw only Suri's hand on the girl and Margaret’s faint.
"I simply kept her from breathing until she fainted," she said, taking the knife from her limp hand and using it to cut bandages from the torn sheets. She wound them swiftly and tightly around Margret’s slit wrists and did what she could to stop the bleeding. She helped Michael wrap her up in the sheets, tight enough that she would not be able to move should she awaken. "Now, take her to holy ground and lay her on your altar. Prayer alone will save her, prayer and isolation. I would make immediate arrangements to get her to one of your convents as soon as she can travel. Feed her a liver broth with clover root and a marrow-rich stew if you can get her to drink it. She must not be bled under any circumstances. She has lost too much of her own as it is."
Michael gathered her in his arms and obeyed without question. Daniel slipped in under Lady Elsbeth's arm as Michael headed for the chapel, watched Suri clean herself and the knife in the nearby basin.
"Will she live, Doña?" he asked her.
She shook her head, her visions half clouded, the blood on her hands both providing a source for her visions and clouding them at the same time. "I am not certain. Her life is in her own hands, and Michael's. Gabriel will only take her if she allows it. But she must be kept where she cannot harm herself again, before her body can heal and her mind with it."
Sorieya was aware of Lady Elsbeth glaring coldly at her from the doorway. In the corner, now in a maid's arms, Mary was sobbing uncontrollably. "I would recommend a touch of poppy syrup for the little one," she advised. "Perhaps in a chamomile tea. It will calm her and help her to sleep for a while," she added as she bowed to Lady Elsbeth and swept past her.
Lady Elsbeth caught her arm in a bony, vise-like grip. "And where are you going, witch?" she asked.
Sorieya met the woman's cold eyes with her own fiery ones for the first time. "To stop your son from doing something rash." There was something in those tiger's orbs and in her cool, silk voice that made the Lady let her go. Suri walked down the hall with Daniel close at her heels. Lady Elsbeth watched them go, hugged herself to ward off the sudden chill she had gotten from the woman’s incomprehensible eyes.
Suri only stopped in Kate’s room long enough to grab her shawl. Wrapping herself within its voluminous folds, she headed for the stable, Joseph’s squire still silently in tow. At the stable, Suri indicated a placid looking grey mare and asked that it be saddled for her. Daniel took the animal out of the stall with a frown, not certain what Sorieya was up to. When the mare was saddled, he obediently placed Suri on her back and swung up behind her.
"Daniel...."
"Forgive me, Doña, but you yourself have said that you do not ride. And in this country, it would not be safe for you to go somewhere without an escort, all things considered." Suri sighed, relented knowing he was right. "Now, where are we going?" he asked.
"Into town," she said. "To stop Joseph if we can." She clung tightly to the mare as Daniel kicked her into a swift gallop and rode out of the gates without another word.
Though it was nearly noon, the sky was heavy and oppressive by the time they arrived into the town, weighed down by a thunderstorm that would not or could not break. Joseph was standing on the steps of the church, bellowing his accusations of the Baron to the gathered townspeople. Suri sighed, hung her head. Too late. She slid from the horse and into the crowd, working her silent way to the front edge of the mob.
"I have seen the man with my own eyes! Drinking the black covenant! He has taken the innocents of our village and made them his sacrifices! You say that shepherd boy was torn apart by wolves? I tell you I saw the remains of his body on the Baron's unholy altar assembled not a mile from his very door!"
Someone in the crowd shouted back at him. "How come you didn' stop it ifn you saw it as you say? Why didn' you save that boy!!"
"Yeah!"
"The boy was already dead when I arrived! The midnight mass was already said and drunk! I watched him take the woman’s blood and drink it himself, before sharing his own blood among his men! I watched the end of the mass! I did nothing then because I felt it was a matter for the church. But the church wouldn't listen to me, refused to even hear my case! The Abbot has turned his back on me! On you! The Abbot bows to that devil worshipper and will not lift a hand against him because of his gold!"
"You say that girl went to 'im last night? I 'ear tell she's 'alf dead as is! 'Ow could she've gone anywheres?!" a man yelled.
"Because of the baron!" Joseph bellowed. "There!" he pointed, "there rides the devil himself!"
The mob turned to see the Baron ride forth amid a company of well armed, black clad men. He sat stiff and proud on a massive black charger, not a fragment of color anywhere on his garments. Even his tack had been stained to match his livery. Suri looked at him and felt a chill run down her spine. An overwhelming urge for silence crept over her and she tried to hide in the crowd. But the dark eyes found her, leered. A dark tongue wet his lips beneath his black mustache and his black gloved hands tightened on the reins as he guided the horse through the crowd and up the steps. His pitch-black hair was slicked back from his face, oily and glistening in the torch-light illuminating the front arch of the church.
Joseph faced the man down, undaunted by the hot breath of the animal snorting in his face.
"Welcome home, Joseph," the Baron said. His voice was cold and calm, serpentine as it flowed smoothly over his tongue. There was a distinct Norman accent to his speech. He looked around at the gathered crowd, at Suri who was now pressed back against the archway of the door, then back down at Joseph. "It has been too long. It seems I have waited far too long to extend my hospitality to you. You have already begun to listen to your brother's boundless accusations against me, which, I might add, are simple flights of his imagination fueled by his jealous nature. It is true that I desired the girl, Margret, same as he. But she made her choice. I respected that. That her father allowed her to choose her own groom is truly none of my concern." He raised his voice high enough to be clearly heard by the masses. "Let this matter be forgotten and all will be forgiven."
"I cannot forget what I saw last night!" Joseph hissed. "I saw with my own eyes an unholy communion!"
"And how would you know? Have you personal knowledge of such blasphemies?"
The Baron was entirely too calm. Sorieya crept behind Joseph, squeezing his hand to encourage his silence. This was not the way, of that she was certain.
"I know only that what I saw was a mockery of the Catholic mass, therefore unholy!"
"Enough, Joseph," Suri whispered. "He can be dealt with, but not this way!"
The Baron laughed, deep in his throat. "I would heed the words of your Moorish slave, Templar. She is far wiser than you." He turned his horse's head and started back down the steps.
"You are a heretic and an infernalist!" Joseph roared.
The Baron stopped. "You have no proof of either."
"I have myself and my brother as witnesses!"
Suri tugged on Joseph's arm. "No," she hissed.
He ignored her.
"You and your brother were both drunk last night, as is to be expected by two brothers freshly reunited after so long."
"Sober enough to know the smell of blood! You have a demon in your employ. A man in dark robes who hides his face and makes no sound. But he lives off of blood and observes your masses for his true master!"
Sorieya noticed a slight change in the Baron's manner as he turned in the saddle. "Provide your proof, Templar, or shut your mouth!"
"I have the proof! In the grove less than a mile outside of your own keep! Go there and I will show you the altar and the blood stains and...."
"And if you are wrong...." the Baron intoned, the ominous threat in his voice silenced everyone, "then you will hang in that grove and everything you own will belong to me by right of false testimony."
Joseph ground his teeth. “So be it,” he hissed.
The Baron backed his horse away, leaving room for Joseph to get to his own mount. He gestured magnanimously with his gloved hand. “Lead the way, Templar.”
Joseph took Suri by the hand and pulled her after him, mounting her behind him. Daniel quickly remounted the grey mare and followed in dread. Suri found she could not take her eyes from the dark man. He was a sorcerer and a devil’s man, and she knew without a doubt that no trace of the night’s activities would be found.
The crowd that had gathered at the church steps followed, accompanied by the Abbot on his own sleek horse. Joseph led them the three or four miles to the forest that bordered the Baron’s private grounds. The woods had a different look to them in the changed light, though it was still dark enough for torches and the suppressed thunderstorm had yet to break. At Joseph’s indication, the mob fanned out, began searching through the woods for signs of his black mass.
On his horse, the Baron watched with irritated amusement. “What, Joseph, you can’t even remember where the dirty deed was done? Or were you so drunk you do not remember?”
“Everyone knows the woods have a different feel to them from day to night. But rest assured, I will know the place when we cross it. Even you cannot hide a scene so grisly without leaving some trace.”
“You cannot find what is not there, Joseph,” he taunted.
Joseph turned away and began to search, trying to remember the path he and his brother had taken. About an hour into the wood, he dismounted, handing his reins to Daniel who drew close enough to take the bridle and comfort both horse and woman.
The searchers beat the bushes for several hours, searching for a small grove or a clearing or anything that might match the Templar'’ description. They were beginning to weary and mumble. “I know these woods like my own house,” someone mumbled, “an’ I tell ya, it’s like I’ve walked inta tha wrong house. Everything looks… different.”
“It will be all right, Doña,” Daniel whispered to her as he stroked her horse’s face, sensing her unease. “Joseph will find it.”
She shook her head slowly, lowering it. Her voice was low and soft. “No, Daniel, he will not. The Baron is too good a sorcerer, too smug. He knows the place cannot be found, and he has nothing to fear and everything to gain.” She looked over at the man in question who sat watching Joseph with eager amusement. “No, Daniel, what has been done cannot be undone. It is Allah’s will,… and Joseph’s rashness.” Her tigery eyes began to glaze slightly as another vision pressed itself upon her. “When all this is done, return at once to Lord Atley and tell him what has happened. Then slip away and do as I bade you last night.”
The Baron suddenly turned and leered at her, looking her over with anticipation. Her eyes widened as a realization hit her. She grabbed the reins and pulled the horse’s head free of Daniel’s easy grasp, kicking the horse towards Joseph. She rode awkwardly, clinging tightly to the reins and saddle, sending the horse very confused signals. As she neared him, Joseph stopped, bent, examining a small clearing he had just found. Suddenly, the horse screamed, leapt sideways into a tangle of brush and started to bolt. The horse was frothing at the mouth as if he had been hard ridden and his eyes were wild and white. The horse could not run fast or far in the thickness of the woods and reared, trying to escape whatever it was that had spooked him. Suri hit the ground hard as the Baron himself rode up to grab the beast. She pulled herself loose from the tangle she had fallen into and ran to Joseph.
The abbot was standing near him, out of patience and breath. “Well, is this the place or not, Joseph?”
Joseph sighed. “It is and it is not. I am certain on my faith that this is the place, but… it looks so different.”
“Probably because you were never here,” he snarled. “I warned your brother to leave the matter be, now he has dragged you into this as well, and to a far more bitter end.” He turned his head and spat. “Well, I see no evidence here of any mass, no stone altar as you and Michael described to me in such bloody detail. I see no alternative than to declare….”
Suri came up, her veil askew and the tail of her white shawl trailing behind her. “Wait until dark, Joseph!” she gasped in Spanish, too desperate to remember her English. “The glamour will only last until dark!”
He took her by the arms and tried to calm her.
“What is that filthy, Arabic Salomé babbling about?” snarled the Abbot from his horse.
She tried to slow down, spoke English, but heavily accented in Spanish. “This is the grove, Joseph, but the sorcerer has cast a glamour upon it.”
“A glamour?”
“A spell, something to change appearance. Why else does it look so different? Even the townsmen claim they hardly recognize the wood. Get them to wait until dark! Glamours do not last long and this one will fade with the sun.”
“How do you know?”
She looked pleadingly at him, knowing even as she urged that it was not possible. “I saw it when I looked into his eyes just now. Make them wait. Another hour.”
“Wait? Wait for what?” the Baron sneered as he rode up leading Joseph’s horse. “For this slave to weave her glamours? For the spirits which haunt this place to emerge and make us lose our way and our souls if they can?” There was a fearful mumble from the townspeople who were beginning to ring about the small clearing. “I think we have wasted enough time, Abbot.”
“Yes, humph, quite,” the Abbot mumbled, still staring at Sorieya, at her beautiful though disheveled appearance.
Suri pulled her veil higher up her cheek, drew the hood up over her dark hair.
“Would it hurt to wait the hour, Abbot?” Joseph pressed.
“I see nothing to be gained in wasting any more time. I myself would like to be back in the church by Vespers.” He raised his voice for the gathered crowd to hear. “I hereby declare, by lack of proof, all charges and insinuations of heresy or witchcraft against Baron Lucien Montmorcey invalid and dropped, and the life of Joseph, son of Lord Atley of Halifax, and all his possessions the sole property of Baron Montmorcey by forfeit of false witness. Good day, Baron. Do as you will. There are witnesses enough here should there be some question later.”
With that the Abbot turned his horse and proceeded to ride off.
Joseph snarled after him. “Were he any other man, or woman, you would not hesitate to pry a confession from him from under the weight of the inquisitor’s hand! Why stay it now? You are a blind, and impious ape, Abbot! God sees your indiscretions and you will burn for it! In hell if not on this earth!”
Suri tried in vain to silence him, but he kept her behind him, holding her back with one arm. Suddenly she was lifted away from him from behind with the shrill scream he had heard from within the Mosque so long ago, only now there was true terror in it. He turned, saw her being hauled by the hair before the saddle of one of the Baron’s men. Before he could lunge, another was grabbing him, trying to bind his arms behind him.
“Hang this blasphemous lout,” the Baron said casually. “And stop his mouth that he may not continue to affront God with his tongue.” Someone stuffed a rag into his mouth and tied another one about his head to keep it there. The Baron then drew his horse back to the edge of the clearing to watch. “Take the slave girl to my castle and see that she is more properly attired.”
Suri found herself held tight against the chest of a thick, black clad soldier who reeked of garlic. She did not struggle, knowing it was useless. She simply closed her eyes to the inevitable and prayed as the soldier kicked his horse into a gallop.
Joseph tried to lunge after Suri, found his arms being pulled back near the breaking point as two more of the Baron’s men-at-arms grabbed hold. His hands were tied and someone rigged a noose with a length of coarse rope and threw it over the nearest limb. One of the men tried to force him onto a horse, but he kicked out, still trying to win free. The horse reared, dancing sideways. The Baron watched with amusement, leaning back in his saddle.
“If he insists upon being difficult, then do it the slow way,” he said smoothly.
The soldiers shrugged. It did not make any difference to them. One slipped the noose around his neck, and the men holding him let go suddenly, grabbing hold of the loose end of the rope. It took all of them to haul Joseph’s struggling form into the air.
Once the deed was done, the townspeople began to disperse. The thunderhead was threatening to break and no one wanted to be in these woods after dark. The Baron sent most of his men on ahead, but himself remained until after dusk. He watched, a smug grin on his face as Joseph twitched in the air. The rain did not come, though thunder could be heard in the distance, and the sky grew darker as the sun began to set. As darkness descended, the grove around Joseph began to shimmer and change in the torchlight. Not far from where Joseph’s feet kicked a stone table faded into view, deeply carved and older than anything in Joseph’s imagining. The grooves and carvings were stained a dark brown, with some of them still glistening a sticky red in the dim light. Joseph began to thrash again in an impotent rage, yelling unintelligibly against the gag.
The Baron chuckled. “It is a shame your brother was not tricked so easily. I would love to have him where you are. Nothing against you personally, really, Joseph. Though I promise you I will immensely enjoy the use of your slave girl tonight.”
He turned his horse’s head towards the manor, laughing deep in his chest at Joseph’s helpless rage. “Stay with him until he is dead, sargent. Let no one cut him down, and do not, under any circumstances, hurry his death.”
With a nod, the man-at-arms took up a post against a tree where he could keep an eye on both Joseph and the surrounding wood as his master rode off.
The Baron’s castle was a large granite monstrosity. It was dark, even though torches burned everywhere, and there was a chill which pervaded the bones and threatened the soul that niether sun, nor earthly fire could banish. Sorieya was brought through the iron spiked gates into the courtyard. Two men came forward at a gesture from her captor and she was roughly passed down to them.
“Take her to the tower. The master wants her properly attired and waiting for him when he gets back. And I would suggest you keep your own needs unmet as far as she is concerned. We do not know if the master is willing to share this one.”
One of them, holding her arm with unnecessary force, leered through blackened and missing teeth. “How’s he to know?”
His companion ripped Suri from his grip, tearing the cloth from her shoulder and exposing the soft white blouse she wore beneath it. He glared. “You’ll learn soon enough, pig-breath, that the master ALWAYS knows.” He pushed Suri ahead of him. “I would advise you not to try anything, wench. I know the master’s orders. Those who find you might not yet.”
Praying beneath her breath, Sorieya allowed herself to be taken to a high, cold tower room. As she surveyed the sparse furnishings, she heard the door lock behind her. She did not bother to turn, or to scream and bang upon the door. She knew there was nothing there to help her. The room contained only one narrow window, as the room encompassed only a portion of the tower’s girth. There was a bed, of decent width and apparently stuffed with goose down. On one wall was a small dressing table with a mirror and basic toiletries. A chamber pot peeked out from under the edge of the heavy woolen blanket. The few tapestries on the walls were dark and hard to see in the fading light, but what little detail Suri could discern made her blush and shiver. Stopping to look out of the window, she realized that it was very nearly sunset.
She took the blanket off of the bed and laid it upon the floor near the window. She looked around, found a small basin and pitcher with water in it, and washed her hands and face. She dried herself upon the bedsheet and refastened her veil. Tightening the wrap about her shoulders, she knelt, facing east as near as she could calculate, and bowed to her prayers.
She was still praying when the bolt was drawn and the darkness was broken by a trembling rushlight. Suri ignored the light and the footsteps, completed her prayers before sitting back on her heels and looking up at the three thin and haggard women staring down at her with their arms loaded. She bowed politely, realizing that these women were as much victims in this as she. “Buenos noches, effendi. How may I serve thee?”
One of them giggled. The older of the three nudged her silent. “Actually, lass, it is we sent ta serve thee.” Her voice was older than her body, even though her face wore more years than it had a right to wear. Her speech bore an accent that Sorieya had never heard before, strangely soft and hard in the same breath. She fidgeted with the bundle of cloth in her arms. “We were told ta see that ye were properly attired fer the master. Now see that ye don’t fuss an’ don’t fight. As we can call in the guard outside the door ta help, and ye certainly don’t want his hands bruisin’ yer tender skin.”
Something in her manner told Suri that she herself had been through this particular ritual before. Suri rose, glad she had not put on her few bangles that morning nor the coined scarf her father had given her. She bowed her head and spread her hands. “I understand your position, señorita, but I beg you to understand mine. Though I will not help you, neither will I hinder.”
The three women breathed a collective sigh of relief. The youngest of them dropped her bundle on the bed and began to light two more of the small rush lights and hang them in rope slings from wall hooks Suri had not noticed before. The second woman began to lay out the garments on the bed, straightening them as the first began to shyly, but efficiently pull away Suri’s outer clothing. Suri just stood there as promised, neither aiding nor impeding her progress, until she stood in just her blouse, pants and veil. The woman stepped back for a moment to stare at the strange garments, so like a man’s and yet nothing like them.
“Are they… are they comfortable?” the youngest asked timidly from behind the older woman.
“Very,” Suri answered simply.
The middle woman reached over and took down the veil from behind, unknotting her hair and shaking its length out of its coil. She looked around when she noticed the widened eyes of her companions. “What? OH!”
Suri blushed, lowering both head and eyes, realizing that same reaction would be her undoing when the Baron came up to visit unless she could convince him she had other, more important uses.
The first woman looked her over critically, gauging the dusty bloom on her creamy cheeks to the tawny gold of her perfect skin. She nodded to herself. “Jen, the russet. An’ the gold shift.”
The girl snapped out of her stare and raced to the bed, separating the called for garments from the pile.
“Maeve, I’ll get her out a these, you get the brush and pins.” Sighing, she stepped forth and began to delicately work Suri out of her remaining clothes, not certain how best to do so, but not wishing to damage the fine cloth.
Once Suri stood naked before them in the cold room, Jen came forth with a soft linen shift dyed a deep gold. She paused a moment, closed her eyes to what she saw, and Suri thought she saw a tear in her eye. Suri refused to give in to despair. God would not abandon her. And even if she was allowed to come to harm here, there was reason for it, even if that reason was only to test her.
Jen drew the loose garment oven Suri’s head, and she felt her hair being pulled out of the collar from behind by Maeve’s gentle hands. On the floor, the older, as yet unnamed woman adjusted the hem and waited patiently for the overdress.
Maeve handed a woolen dress of a deep reddish brown to Jen and took up the back hem, drawing the garment over Suri’s head. The color reminded her of dried blood. On the floor, the older woman pulled the hem over the gold one, adjusting it so that the embroidered edge of the shift showed clearly beneath the hem of the overdress. Jen tugged and twitched the sleeves so that the tighter gold sleeves did not ride up, but showed clearly beneath the broader, belled sleeve of the russet dress. Behind her, Maeve pulled as she threaded the lacings through the holes at the back, literally sewing Suri’s slim form into the garment.
Almost without break, they drew her over to a crude stool before the mirrored table and sat her down. Maeve picked up the heavy brush and applied a scented oil to the stiff bristles. This she dragged through Suri’s thick, black hair as she examined herself in the glass.
The dress was scandalous, even by English standards. The shift had a v-shaped yoke that revealed and accentuated the soft, upper curves of her breasts. The over dress plunged past that to a point an inch or so below her most enticing curves, leaving them all but exposed beneath the tight, thin linen. Jen reached around her waist and fastened a length of elegant chain about her hips, leaving one end to dangle freely.
After brushing out her hair, Maeve stared at the reflection over Suri’s head a moment. She piled a length of it up, looking again in the mirror, then let it drop. She tried drawing part of it aside, then let that drop. She turned. “I give up, Bronwyn. What do you think?”
She stepped aside as the woman approached, looked over both woman and reflection. “Leave it down. We’ll set a veil over it with a fillet and leave it at that.” She absently ran her hand through a length of the ebony tresses in question. “Such angelic beauty,” she whispered. “Thoroughly wasted in this hell. And on th’ devil what lords over it.”
Shaking her head, she brought over a thin band of gold and piece of pale yellow material so thin one could see straight through it. Maeve quickly brushed her hair out and moved out of the way. Bronwyn set the veil upon Suri’s head, its embroidered edge just touching her delicate brows, and then slid the fillet into place to hold it.
Jen took Suri’s chilled hands and drew her up, turned her to face the three of them. They sighed almost in one breath. “You have quite the eye for color, Bronwyn,” she said. “I don’t think the queen’s maids could have chosen better.”
“It helps to have an extraordinary creature to dress,” answered Maeve sourly, as she gathered the clothes that were not selected from the bed and adding Suri’s own snowy garments to the pile.
They began to retreat to the doorway, but Bronwyn went back, hugged Suri and whispered, “God be with ye, child. God be with ye.”
Suri smiled sadly, and touched her dusky fingers gently to Bronwyn’s pale, freckled cheek in blessing. “He always is, my sister. Even in hell, as long as we trust in him, he will always be with us.”
Bronwyn looked at her, startled. She allowed Maeve to pull her out of the room, but continued to stare at Suri with wide blue eyes until the door was closed between them.
Suri stood there a few moments more. The wind blew through the narrow window, stirring the tapestries. There was no fire in the room nor any place to make one and it was cold here, even through the heavy wool of the dress. Suri turned, going back to the mirror. She thoroughly disliked the feeling of her legs naked against one another beneath the loose skirts of the garment she now wore. It was not something she was accustomed to, nor was it something to which she wished to become accustomed. Even the color repulsed her. “A harlot’s shade,” she whispered in Arabic.
The wind hissed through the room again, but this time, she was certain she heard something on that wind, a whispered word in Arabic. ‘Princess’. The sound more than the cold sent a shiver down her back.
Out of a protective instinct, she removed the fillet and pulled the veil down until it covered the whole of her face and the most exposed part of her breast before putting the thin band of gold back on. She could see easily out of it, and knew it provided little protection against a man’s eyes, but it was better than nothing.
With little else to protect her from the cold, she picked up the blanket again from where, Jen had folded it and wrapped herself within it. She knelt in the corner, using the dressing table to provide her some protection from the wind, unwilling to go anywhere near the bed, however inviting. She shivered, steeled herself to endure the hunger in her belly. She remembered very keenly now, that all she had eaten was a small, greasy meat pie earlier that morning. The wind carried with it the smells of a feast being devoured somewhere below, and the raucous laughter of lecherous men sampling of evil things. Suri closed her eyes and bent to her prayers, determined to drive all fears out of her mind. “All will be as Allah wills.”
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Cassandra Kildow
