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And beckoned, voice loud
to come to him.
“I left my cloud and flew to earth
But it was not my fate.
I died since I’m an angel,
Not meant to pass through earthly gates.”
“I have never heard that song before. Your voice is acceptable, but your song is too sad. It is the saddest song I’ve ever heard.”
“Sad? Aye, I suppose that it is, but surely not the saddest. I wrote it myself and I will tell you, it is not easy to make rhymes.” And then she puffed right up. “I sang it to our jongleur and he praised it.”
“I did not know there was a jongleur at Wareham.”
That chin of hers shot up. “There was a jongleur where I once lived.”
“Mayhap I’ll change my mind and demand the truth from you once I have seen your list.”
“Mayhap, if you do not leave me be, I will not show you my list.”
“You may go back to Miggins now and sing your songs. I will see you and your list on the morrow.” He nodded, turning away from her to stare out over the North Sea. “Do you know, during dinner, I heard laughter and arguments and belches. It was a fine sound.”
She turned, climbed carefully down the ladder, raised her skirts, and ran back across the inner bailey to the great keep. He called out, “An angel? Did your father believe you an angel?”
She paused a moment, shouted back at him, “My father believed the sun rose only to shine upon my head.”
17
Robert Burnell chewed the last bit of sweet brown bread, patted his belly, and said to Garron, a bit of a frown on his aesthete’s face, “The king finds you useful. He believes you still innocent of guile and slyness.”
Innocent of guile? Garron didn’t think he liked the sound of that. Was he as useful to the king as Merry was to Wareham?
“The king also told me once you had remarked that violent intent had a distinctive smell to it, that you had smelled it on every man who had tried to attack him. I told him that sounded too mad not to be true.”
Garron merely nodded.
“I am sending two of the king’s men to Furly and Radstock to see if this Black Demon attacked them. When they return, we will know if your keeps are safe and what are the inclinations of your castellans before we ourselves visit them upon your return from Winthrope. If Sir Wills and Sir Gregory know what is good for them, they will readily accept you as their new lord. Now, do not argue with me, the king wishes me to ensure that you will be safe. I will guard Wareham in your absence. The king also said you have a rich and cunning brain.”
Garron liked that better than smelling violence.
“I wonder what will next year bring?” Since Burnell was vigorously rubbing his buttocks as he spoke, Garron grinned. No matter the number of blankets atop the straw-filled mattress, a cold stone floor wasn’t what Burnell was used to.
“I will use all of my rich and cunning brain as well as prayer that next year brings renewal to Wareham,” Garron said. “Walk with me, sir.”
“A thorough prayer, I have found, requires a good deal of exertion to be done correctly. Sometimes a thorough prayer, one of great length and complex composition, makes one chafe.”
When they stepped into the inner bailey, Garron said, “But look, sir, every able-bodied person is working—yon, a man is drilling holes in a plank of wood with an auger, another is wielding a pitchfork, digging into sheaves of hay to make new mattresses, another carefully makes pegs to be driven by hammers into wood for benches and tables.”
“Aye,” Burnell said, “and I know men are bringing in trees cut from the Forest of Glen, supervised by that that old gizzard Inar, a man of great talent, so his equally old sister told me when she served me ale.”
Garron said, “Tupper told me it was good to see Inar smiling again. He is calling out orders, there is a bit of a strut in his walk.”
But he needed more skilled men. Garron felt himself worrying again until he heard the loud braying of Eleanor’s goat, Eric, who was trying to tug an ancient boot from the little boy Ivo. His brother Errol was stuffing a piece of bread into his mouth, as if he feared there would be no more. He saw the boys’ mother, Elaine, speak to each of her sons, then walk briskly across the inner bailey toward the weaving shed, her arms filled with bolts of woolen cloth. Her shoulders were back, her head held high. He was pleased. Her husband had been one of Arthur’s best archers, Tupper had told him, a fine man, and they’d buried him with great care. Now it was time to have new looms made. Old Borran told him two of the looms could not be repaired.
He watched Merry skip down the stone steps, watched her speak first to Miggins, then to every single woman she passed. They all nodded and smiled. She was the mistress, he thought, and they accepted her as such. She’d taken over so effortlessly. He wondered for an instant what it would be like if Merry weren’t here, if it was only Miggins. It was a thought to make him shudder. Ah, but he had a brain, a rich and cunning brain according to the king, and he would have managed. Garron saw that Burnell was watching her as well.
