Her Christmas Knight

Pivoting, she strode towards the exit. She had lost in the battle of love, but there was more to her than her heart. There was her loyalty, her honour, her determination.

Throwing the apple core onto some shrivelled clippings, she made her decision.

To hell with Hugh and her heart. No more distractions, deliberations or confusions.

She had a traitor to catch.

Chapter Three (#ud4ecfd27-1e7f-5b50-8510-d07054141f9e)

November, 1296

Of course, making the decision to be a spy and knowing how to do it were two different matters entirely.

Alice walked purposefully through the town square to the widest house in Swaffham. Icy rain pelted against her. She clutched her green cloak tighter. It was a futile gesture. The rain had already found gaps around her neck and cuffs, and her dress lay coldly sodden against her trembling skin.

She sped up her walking, aware of other unfortunate drenched souls jumping out of her way.

Two weeks of wasted time at Court and travelling to Swaffham and she only had vague ideas of what she could do to find the Seal. It wasn’t as if she could ask anyone how to spy. She was sworn to secrecy.

At least she knew what she had to do first. She needed information about the people in town—which meant she needed to be around them and invited into their homes. And there was only one place to go for those types of invitations.

Pushing open the door, she walked quietly into the building that held many town meetings. The hall was a simple large room, filled with chairs and tables. The walls were covered with plain unembroidered panels of green linen cloth. A fire blazed in the hearth under the hood of a huge chimney, and showed light that the narrow windows fitted with oiled parchment could not.

Fresh rushes crunched under her feet and alerted the men whispering in different corners to her presence. Some of them looked up, but most kept to their heated conversations and ignored her.

She pulled her hood tighter around her face and walked briskly to the stairs leading to her sister’s living quarters.

When she reached the landing, she knocked on the large wooden door. The moment the servant had ushered her into the private solar her sister Elizabeth flew down the narrow stairs at the back of the room.

‘Oh, Alice! I am glad you returned. You would not believe what I have been through in the last few days.’

Alice tried to untangle her wet cloak, but her fingers were swollen and red from the cold. The maid who had let her in concentrated on the knot and Alice gratefully lowered her trembling hands.

‘What has happened now?’ she asked.

Elizabeth took the remaining steps. ‘The town council will not listen to John.’

This was a familiar argument to Alice. Her brother-in-law might not have the respect of the town, but her sister had the respect of her husband. ‘Do they ever?’

‘They should!’

‘Because he’s your husband or because he’s the mayor?’

Elizabeth shook her head and gave a tiny exasperated grin. ‘Both.’ She strode across the hall, her slippered feet slapping against the bare wooden boards. ‘He is trying to initiate a law so that householders and shopkeepers are required to clean the streets in front of their houses and shops.’

The maid removed the cloak and herself from the hall.

Alice rubbed the cold from her arms. ‘That seems like a reasonable request, given previous laws that have cleaned the inside of the businesses and moved others farther away from residences.’

‘I thought so—since it is their own waste they wade through in the streets! With all this rain it makes everything slippery and dangerous. It is a wonder more children do not drown when they fall.’

‘You and John have done so much to clean this town, you would think they would listen to this.’

Elizabeth shook her head. ‘That is the penalty of working with the bureaucracy of officials and magistrates. Great for regulating guards to watch the ramparts and patrol the streets by night, but if they have to actually do something, like clean their own homes, they argue and fight.’

‘What will you do?’

Elizabeth winked. ‘I have some ideas—but John says they could land me locked in irons.’

‘Doesn’t that make them good ideas?’

‘Oh, I have missed you!’ Elizabeth grabbed Alice’s hands and a frown marred the smoothness of her brow. ‘You are freezing!’

She pulled Alice’s hands away from her body and looked in earnest at her gown.

‘And you are soaking wet. Where have you been?’

Alice looked around at the house. The servants were trying to be discreet, but they were everywhere.

‘Is there anywhere we could go that’s private?’

‘Of course—my bedroom has already been cleaned and—’

She didn’t wait until her sister had finished answering, but immediately set out for the second and more narrow flight of stairs towards the family’s private rooms.

These rooms were warmer, filled with thick rugs, bright embroidered linens and cushions. It was her sister’s touch, but Alice didn’t take any comfort in the softness of the room, and she didn’t wait for the click of the door before she started talking.

‘I walked from the town’s gates—’ Alice started.

‘Why would you do such a thing? It is winter. Is there something wrong with the coach or the footmen? Is it the horses? Father did not order the leaking roof repaired and they are terribly sick! What do you need me to do?’

Used to her sister’s rapid-fire questioning, Alice walked to the hearth and poked at the fire to increase its heat. ‘No, no, it’s none of those things. I merely needed to talk to you in private and didn’t want my presence to be noted.’

‘Something happened to you in London?’ Elizabeth pulled a red and green woven blanket from a chair and draped it over Alice’s shoulders. ‘You should not have gone there alone.’

She had always been glad that Elizabeth had stayed in Swaffham. She couldn’t imagine confessing about going to dances to their oldest sister, Mary, who married into a family with even more land, and who only liked to talk about sheep. Not that she liked confessing anything. She’d rather depend on herself and not communicate any of her worries.

Which was probably why, now that she was here, she didn’t know what to say. She couldn’t lie and she couldn’t tell the truth. Her sister was cunning and knew her too well. She would have to talk in half-truths in order not to raise her sister’s suspicion. And she would have to find a reason to get invitations into everyone’s homes.

As a wealthy merchant’s daughter, she used to receive such invitations, but she had been refusing them for so long she was no longer offered any.

Now, not only did she need to be invited, she needed a reason that she wanted to be invited. Unfortunately, the only thing she could think of would force her to swallow her pride. But what was pride compared to a king’s order?

‘I think it’s time...’ she began.

‘Time for what? Do not be coy with me. You know I cannot stand it.’

She had expected Elizabeth to interrupt. In fact she needed her sister to interrupt so she would have time to prepare each sentence.