Shades of Red (14 page)

The young woman waited at the door and allowed Darrell to hold it open for her before sweeping inside.

Darrell took the initiative right away. “My name is Dara,” she said quickly. “And the fellow being sick outside is my — my brother, Paris.”

The young woman smiled and her face lit up like a beacon. “
Une de mes villes favori
,” she said merrily. “One of my favourite cities. And yet I have never heard of anyone named for the place, except the famous Paris from Greek mythology, of course.”

“I'm afraid we have become a little lost,” Darrell said quickly. “Can you tell me exactly where we are?”

“Of course I can,” came the pert reply. “You are in the gamekeeper's cottage in the forest of Windsor, and fortunately enough for you, it's haunted.”

Paris returned after a few moments away and managed to keep his stomach settled for the duration of the young woman's visit. She identified herself as Nan Bullen, a lady-in-waiting to Queen Katherine, wife of King Henry VIII.

“Henry the Eighth,” said Paris. He glanced at Darrell in astonishment. “What have we gotten ourselves into?”

Darrell widened her eyes at him, and he fell silent. Nan watched the exchange with interest, all the while adjusting her heavily ruffled black gloves. She looked over at Paris expectantly. “Do you feel better? You must tell me all you can of Brother Socorro.”

“He has helped friends of mine in the past,” said Darrell, not sure how much to give away. “The man I am truly looking for may have worked as an assistant to Brother Socorro.” She took a deep breath and decided to risk all. “He helped
conversos
escape during the Spanish Inquisition,” she said in a rush.

Nan ducked her head out the window and then carefully pulled the shutters closed. “It took long years for Socorro to escape the Inquisition,” she said quietly. “He was in the clutches of the Inquisitors themselves for many months. But after his escape to England his interests broadened, and since we met, I have found his line of thinking to be very similar to my own.”

She gestured around the room. “It was convenient for Socorro to use this cottage to help those who needed to leave the area because of persecution. A few well-placed rumours of hauntings kept the local villagers at bay, and since then this has been a safe place to help those in need.”

She stood up and reached for a small, clothwrapped package she had set on the table earlier. “I'm afraid it is not much, but you are most welcome to it,” she began. “The friar had not warned me of your coming, but I often carry a little something just in case.”

Paris waved his hand, declining the offer. But Darrell was starving, so she helped herself to the food in Nan's bundle while the young woman continued chatting.

After the arduous journey and the work cleaning up after Paris, the grainy roll of bread, piece of hard cheese, and tiny, wrinkled apple tasted like a feast.

While Darrell ate, Nan stuck her head out of the shuttered window again. “Still no one about, thank the lord. What are your plans now that you are here?” she asked.

Darrell chewed a mouthful of apple.

“I am not sure,” she said, choosing her words carefully. “I would most like to find Brother Socorro.”

Nan shook her head. “I'm afraid that will not be possible. My apologies — I should have told you earlier. Brother Socorro is dead.”

“Dead?” The taste of the apple turned bitter in Darrell's mouth. “How?”

“He was taken and killed by members of his own order in France. After the Lisbon Massacre, he was forced to take the escape route through which he had directed so many other souls, and he fled first to Turkey and then here to England. But he persisted in returning to France, and it was there he was exposed as an abettor of heretics. He was put to death by the sword.” She dropped her head for a moment.

Darrell felt stunned. “I am so sorry,” she whispered. “He was a good man.”

“He was a saint,” said Nan. “But his work carries on. I myself am very interested in the writings of Luther.”
Nan looked at Darrell quizzically. “As a friend to Socorro, you are a follower of the words of Luther, are you not?”

“I have read of him,” Darrell answered cautiously.

“So have I,” said Paris from his darkened corner. Darrell jumped a little, having forgotten he was there. “He wrote ninety-five theses of complaint against his own church and was sanctioned for it by the pope,” he said.

Darrell grinned. “You've been paying attention.” Paris nodded. “I have good teachers,” he said quietly. Darrell smiled a little.
Chalk one up for Gramps.
Nan turned back to Darrell. “Now that you know

Socorro has passed on, you must keep your thoughts of Luther and his ideas to yourselves,” she said. “There are those that would have you treated as Socorro was, though I sense the times may well be changing.”

She stood up. “My suggestion is that you find work at the castle. There has just been a terrible bout of sweating sickness through the town, and many of the servants are still ill and are unable to work.”

She cast a critical eye over Paris. “As soon as your brother is feeling better, come up to the castle. I will see that work is found for you there. And together with the new friar, we can have many talks about the works and ideas of Luther.”

“Thank you so much for your help, Nan,” said Darrell gratefully. “Let me walk you out. Just a moment ...”

She sat on a low stool and bent to adjust the material that bound the wooden foot and ankle to her leg. Glancing up, she was surprised that Nan did not turn away in disgust but stepped nearer to watch the process with interest.

“You were born this way?” she asked, adjusting the glove on her right hand as she spoke.

Darrell quickly resettled the cotton padding between her leg and the wooden casing. “No, I had an accident,” she said, concentrating on rewrapping the cloth as tightly as she could. “I — uh,” she looked up again and saw Nan's face, burning with a strange curiosity. “I fell off a horse and broke my ankle badly. It would not heal, and so the surgeon removed it.”

“You are lucky to be alive,” Nan said abruptly, tucking her hands under her arms. “With the drunken butcher that passes for a surgeon here, you would never have lived.”

Darrell stood up. “Thank you again for helping us.”

Nan waved away her thanks. Her black eyes sparkled in the candlelight. “This cottage will be a safe place for you to stay until we get you settled at court,” she said. “The truth is, life with Katherine is so dull, conversing with Brother Socorro brought me a little excitement and certainly some knowledge I could get from no other source.” She grinned, showing perfectly shaped white teeth. “I have missed it since he is gone, though Friar
Priamos looks like he will take over now that his mentor has gone. And besides ...” Her eyes twinkled merrily. “I have caught the eye of a new beau, a
very
powerful man. Who knows what will happen at court?”

The walk through to the village the next morning brought many memories back to Darrell, and she spent the time filling Paris in on some of the finer points of not giving either of them away.

“Just use the language as it comes naturally to you,” she said with exasperation after he spent too long searching for a word when trying to tell her a story. “The slang we use every day isn't in this variety of English.”

“I'm just not used to speaking Old English,” complained Paris. “I keep trying to find the words to say what I mean and I can't.”

“Believe it or not, this isn't Old English. It's modern English — the same English that Shakespeare will write in less than a hundred years.”

“Shakespeare is considered modern? That's a good one. I can hardly manage ‘to be or not to be.'”

“Paris, trust me, you'll be able to do it if you just relax and let it happen. How do you think I felt last year when I landed in fourteenth-century Scotland and found myself speaking Highland Gaelic?” She grinned. “Don't worry, you'll figure it out. And the sooner you relax, the sooner you'll stop feeling so sick.”

For Paris was still showing signs of time sickness, though his vomiting had slowed to once every two or three hours. “I'll be fine,” he assured Darrell after being sick immediately upon waking in the morning.

“I don't care about it, really,” he said as they walked into town. “It's worth it to get to see this amazing time. I'll just make sure no one knows why I'm sick.”

“Oh, yeah, they'd really understand that,” said Darrell, snickering. “I'm sorry m'lady, I'm just puking in your petunias as a result of some kind of negative interaction within the time-space continuum. Don't worry about a thing.” She paused, feeling more serious. “The big worry is if they think you have the sweats or whatever they call dysentery in this century. They won't hire us if they think you are sick.”

“I'll keep it under wraps,” Paris promised through clenched teeth.

They entered the village and were immediately the subject of curious stares from the locals. Looking at the tiny thatched cottages reminded Darrell of the
visits to Mallaig that seemed so long ago. The sight of the village square almost made her feel at home. Almost.

Darrell dropped her voice as she continued to tell Paris about what he might expect at the castle. “Just be polite and do what they tell you,” she said. “I really need to talk with Nan about the friar she mentioned. I have the feeling he used to know Socorro. Maybe he can lead us to Conrad.”

Paris started to look a little green again. “What is that smell?” he choked.

“I guess the sewage technology hasn't exactly advanced since my last trip,” she muttered, fishing a lace handkerchief out of her pocket as they walked the high street up to the castle. Delaney capered at her heel, ears forward and eyes bright, doggishly enjoying the walk and all the smells that went with it.

Paris nodded. “Don't tell me that I'm seeing what I think I'm seeing running down this gutter.” He stuffed his own handkerchief over his mouth and nose.

“Yep,” said Darrell. “But it could be worse. In Scotland the women would call out ‘gardy-loo' and then throw the contents of their chamber pots out into the streets at the same time every afternoon.”

Paris grimaced at the thought. “I think they might still be doing that here,” he said, trying to look anywhere but the gutter.

Darrell grinned through her lace handkerchief. “Yeah, I had a few narrow escapes. Talk about being in the wrong place at the wrong time! But don't worry. You'll get used to it.”

Though there was no sign of any new greenery on the bare trees, the afternoon sun shone, and there was a hint of warmth in the air. True to his word, between bouts of time sickness, Paris had found a few rough tools in the shed behind the cottage. He had put them to good use and fashioned a walking stick for Darrell out of a fallen branch from a rowan tree.

Darrell threw her cloak back over her shoulders, feeling the warmth of the sun. “Thanks for the cane, Paris,” she said gratefully. “It's really helping on these slippery cobbles.”

“Sorry I didn't have time to make it look any nicer,” he replied.

“It's just fine,” she said firmly. “The part where I hold it is so smooth I'm sure I won't get a blister, and the bottom is just rough enough that it keeps me from slipping.”

“How is your foot?” asked Paris, curiously. “It looks a lot harder to walk on than that cool machine you wear at home.”

Darrell swung the leg forward and put all her weight on it. “Bit creaky, but not bad. You should have seen the peg leg I had to wear in Florence — it looked like someone had sawn it off a piano!”

Paris put a cautious hand on Darrell's arm to stop her, and they watched in wonder as a man, his clothing in shreds, limped down the street in front of them. As he walked, he slapped his own back with a long scourge, and the blood from the wounds trickled down behind him into his footsteps as he staggered away.

“What was that?” Paris's eyes were wide.

Darrell shook her head. “I've only read about it,” she whispered. “He must be a flagellant — a person who believes that his own misery can counteract the sins of the world.” She wiped her mouth with her handkerchief, still feeling a little faint from the sight.

“A pretty sickening way to get into heaven,” said Paris as he steered Darrell back onto the road.

“Not for a true believer, I guess,” she replied.

The village high street ended at the gatehouse to the castle, and they stopped there, uncertainly.

It sure looks different than the pictures I've seen,
thought Darrell. Windsor Castle, home to the kings and queens of England since the time of William the Conqueror. She quailed a little at the thought of what, or more precisely
who
, they faced inside.

A small soldier, almost a full foot shorter than Paris, stepped out to greet them. His startled look passed from Paris to Darrell, but he addressed his remarks to Paris.

“'Od's blood,” he said breathlessly. “Just wait until the commander sees you. Lady Anne tells me you are here to join the castle guard?”

Darrell widened her eyes at Paris and mouthed, “Lady Anne?”

Paris shrugged and turned back to the soldier. “We are here to join the castle staff and help in whatever way we can,” he said, glancing at Darrell for her approval. She nodded. “This is — er — my sister, Dara. She is — uh — under my protection.”

Darrell glowered down at the small soldier. “I don't need anyone's protection,” she hissed belligerently at Paris.

“Yes, miss — I can see that with my own eyes,” said the little man. He quickly summoned a pair of small pages. Paris, Delaney trailing at his heel, was sent off to meet the captain of the guard, while Darrell was escorted into the main courtyard for the afternoon petitioners session with the queen.