She thought of Alex, trapped behind the walls. He must be desperate to leave! But until the illness ran its course, he could not. Perhaps he’d never even received her letters. The abbot could have kept them to himself, fearing Alec would rescind his vows if he knew of Clarise’s desperate situation.

She seized the explanation with relief. While it meant that Alec knew little of her plight, it also meant that he might still help her. If she found a way to reach him.

How long until the quarantine was lifted? Could she afford to bide her time in this trading town while every day brought her mother and sisters closer to death?

The sound of one woman scolding another roused her from her thoughts. “Megan, are ye mad?” hissed the woman, tugging at the other’s elbow. “Do ye want to live at Helmesly and be nursemaid to the Slayer’s son?”

At the Slayer’s name, Clarise gave a guilty start. She followed the direction of the women’s stares and spied a man sitting astride a horse. The man wore no armor in the afternoon heat. By the hopeless look on his battle-scarred face, he hadn’t met with any luck in his search for a nurse.

That can’t be the Slayer, Clarise thought, swallowing hard. A gooseberry seed moved painfully down her throat. As the women moved hurriedly away, whispering to themselves, Clarise eyed the Slayer’s representative.

The Slayer had spawned a son on the baron’s daughter. Ferguson wouldn’t like that at all, she thought with a faint smile. Yet it made her mission that much easier. For the sake of her mother and sisters, she needed to approach the knight and offer her services as a nurse.

I am not equipped to feed a baby, she silently resisted. Yet that was not exactly true. She’d fed her youngest sister goat’s milk when their mother suffered the birth fever. It wasn’t an impossible task. Besides, she couldn’t stay in this trading town indefinitely, waiting for the quarantine to lift.

With leaden feet, Clarise crossed the grassy expanse that separated her from the horseman.

The man caught sight of her and stared with interest. To her relief, he did not appear to be a vicious warrior. Below a full head of graying hair, his eyes were light and keen. Though his face was crosshatched by scars, one end of his mouth was caught up in a perpetual smile, giving him a congenial look. He dismounted as she approached him.

“Are you in search of a nurse?” she asked in the Saxon tongue. As Ferguson had suggested, she would play the part of a freed serf.

He took hold of his animal’s bridle. “I am,” he said, giving her a quick but thorough inspection.

“I can care for the baby,” she offered, sounding more certain than she felt.

He gave her a skeptical look. “Where is your child?”

My child? Mary’s blood, she was supposed to have birthed a child! “It . . . it died of fever just a day ago.”

The knight’s expression turned sympathetic. “And you would care for another,” he finished gently. “What does your husband think?”

Husband? She balked at the unexpected question. Having not intended to go through with Ferguson’s plan, she’d given little thought to what she would say under the circumstances. “I have no husband,” she answered automatically. At the knight’s odd look she added, “He died in a skirmish.”

The knight frowned and paused. “You have suffered much for one so young,” he said.

His sympathy gave her courage. It would be easier than she thought to find her way into the Slayer’s home. “I have no money,” she added pathetically. “No way of feeding myself. Please, take me to Helmesly Castle. Let me care for the baby.”

The man looked dazed by her enthusiasm. “Very well,” he said. “You wish to go now?”

“Aye, right now.” Her hopes rose anew. The hoary knight had fallen for her tale.

“Have you nothing to bring with you?”

“My goods were sold to cover my husband’s debts,” she said, thinking quickly.

“What is your name?”

“Clare,” she improvised. “Clare Crucis.” The last word from the inscription at the abbey sprang to her lips. She congratulated herself for being so clever.

“I am Sir Roger de Saintonge,” said the knight. He inclined a slight bow. “Shall we go?”

She approached the white destrier with mixed eagerness and dread. Sir Roger spanned her waist, tossing her pillion into the saddle. “You are not afraid of horses,” he remarked.

She shook her head and realized belatedly that most peasants were afraid of the giant warhorses. She would have to remember to think like a commoner.

The knight led his mount by the bridle through the thinning crowds. Clarise kept her gaze fixed on the road they were taking. It was a well-trodden path leading away from the town and abbey.

As they wound around a series of low hills, the Abbey of Rievaulx dropped from view. The hope that Alec would save her from her dreaded task died a painful death. Either she advanced Ferguson’s evil plot, or her mother and sisters would be put to death.

Oblivious to her desperate thoughts, the knight strode alongside the horse, keeping hold of the reins. The sun sank lower into the troughs of the hills, bringing Clarise the worry that she might be alone with him come nightfall.

“How far is it to Helmesly?” she inquired.

He slanted her a startled look. She realized with dismay that she’d spoken in the language of the upper class.

“You speak French!” he commented. His eyes gleamed with interest. “And you’re not from Abbingdon, are you?”

Her spirits sank to new depths. She was not as adept at subterfuge as she’d imagined. “I served in a Norman household,” she muttered, as that was the only logical answer. Few peasants, free or bound, knew how to speak Norman French.

“Which household?”

Ferguson had instructed her not to mention Heathersgill. “Glenmyre,” she said, naming Alec’s estate. It was best to keep close to the truth, she told herself.

“Ah,” said the knight, looking suddenly grave. Crickets added a melody to the tempo of the horse’s iron shoes. “Was your husband one of the peasants recently killed?” he inquired gently.

As he persisted in speaking French, she answered in the same, being more at ease with her first tongue. “Nay,” she said slowly, though she knew the peasants to which he referred. Just before she left, Ferguson had boasted that he’d cut the peasant population at Glenmyre in half. She had no wish to be associated with that slaughter. “As I said, my husband was killed in a skirmish.”

They continued the journey in silence. Clarise used the time to sketch a rough history for herself. She imagined what it would be like to care for a warlord’s baby. Rather like playing nursemaid to the devil’s spawn, she thought, recalling what she knew of the Slayer.

The mercenary had once been the master-at-arms for the Baron of Helmesly. The baron had wed him to his only daughter and then departed Helmesly on pilgrimage to Canterbury, leaving the Slayer behind as his seneschal. Rumor had it that the Slayer had plotted to kill the baron and his lady wife, for they did not return alive from their pilgrimage but in coffins. The Slayer was left ruling Helmesly, not as rightful lord but as a usurper.

Much the way Ferguson had acquired Heathersgill, Clarise thought with a sneer.

She cautioned herself to disguise her disdain. In masquerading as a freed serf, she would need to be humble and respectful. “What is the Slayer’s proper name?” she asked, realizing she didn’t even know it.

The knight looked up at her sharply. “Have a care that he doesn’t hear you call him that,” he warned. “He doesn’t like the name Slayer.”

Clarise paled at the warning.

“His name is Christian de la Croix,” answered the knight, “and despite what people say of him, he is a devout man.”

Christian of the Cross? She nearly hooted aloud at the devout name. With difficulty she swallowed the lunatic laughter in her throat. Still, she couldn’t resist questioning the knight. “How comes it, then, that they call him the Slayer? Did he not kill every living soul at Wendesby, or is that a lie?”

The knight’s crooked smile flattened to a seam. “If you value your post as the baby’s nurse, you had best keep silent on the subject.”

She bit her tongue at the reprimand and looked away. The knight was clearly loyal to his liege lord. She would do well to be cautious in his company.

Gazing toward the horizon, she sought sign of a fortress standing over the next hill. For just a second she imagined what it would be like if Sir Roger spoke true. What if the Slayer weren’t the monster rumor painted him to be? What if he hadn’t killed anyone at Wendesby, or the Baron of Helmesly, or even Alec’s father?

She shook her head at her wishful thinking. There were far more villains in this world than good men. She’d be doing everyone a favor to rid the borderlands of the notorious Slayer. If she wished to see her mother and sisters alive, she had best accomplish her task and do it quickly.









Chapter Two


















“ ’Tis beautiful,” Clarise admitted with surprise.

“Aye, it is,” Sir Roger concurred.

The object of their admiration stood in a field of wildflowers, just behind a swift-running moat. In the coppery hues of evening, the moat was a golden disk from which the outer wall rose clifflike. It stood at least twenty hands high and twelve feet thick. The entire castle had been built on ancient earthworks, making the second wall visible as well.

The inner wall was flanked by towers. Four of them! Clarise marveled. Her own family’s home of Heathersgill touted just one tall building. The closer Sir Roger urged them, the more overawed she became. With the sun plunging down behind the castle, shadows engulfed the drawbridge. She felt as if she were being swallowed into the maw of a great beast.