Where Love Has Gone

  Where Love Has Gone

  By

  Flora Speer

  Smashwords Edition

  Copyright © 2014 by Flora Speer

  Cover Design Copyright 2014,

  By http//:DigitalDonna.com

  Smashwords Edition, License Note:

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  Prologue

  The Warden’s Manor

  Island of Jersey

  Early March, A.D. 1117.

  “There is a bond between sisters,” Elaine said, forcing the words through quivering lips. She refused to weep. “Something is very wrong. Aglise would never leave without telling me.”

  Elaine and Lady Benedicta were in the linen room. Formerly the smallest of the guest chambers in the large manor house, the room had been converted by Lady Benedicta to suit her passionate desire for order and neatness. Wooden shelves were fitted to two walls and on them rested the household’s supply of carefully folded sheets. Below the shelves large, covered baskets held bulkier items – extra pillows and quilts, clean bed robes for guests who arrived with none, and even a few rolled-up pallets in case they were needed for visiting servants.

  The sunlight streaming through the open shutters of the double window illuminated the sturdy table in the middle of the room, on which linens could be folded.

  Elaine often thought the precise order within the tiny room reflected Lady Benedicta’s mind; she would not tolerate disorder, nor behavior that ventured beyond the rigid limits she had set for those around her. Even so, Elaine preferred the sometimes stifling linen room to her foster mother’s other great interest, the dovecot.

  She could not understand how a woman so driven by a need for cleanliness and perfect order could tolerate the messiness created by the several dozen birds housed in the round stone building near the mews. The molted feathers that tended to float in the air, the droppings and other debris that were inevitable wherever birds were kept cooped up, all made Elaine cough and sneeze until Lady Benedicta had one day forbidden her the dovecot, claiming her presence there disturbed the birds. Elaine could only be grateful for the command.

  “Nonsense.” Lady Benedicta’s response to Elaine’s remark about Aglise was typically brisk and firm, her manner even cooler and more controlled than usual. “Child, you are far too imaginative. I have often told you so. You would be better advised to pray for your sister to change her mind and return promptly to her rightful place, than to claim without proof that something terrible has happened to her. The girl is willful. Her absence is her own doing.”

  Elaine didn’t believe it, but she knew after the last two years of difficult experience that once Lady Benedicta had made up her mind, nothing would change it. So she stopped her tongue from further protests, bowed her head as if in meek submission, and quietly went about the daily chores that were the duty of the foster daughter of Lord Bertrand, Warden of the Island of Jersey, and his lady.

  Only later, in the nighttime privacy of the tiny room assigned to the sisters, did she dare to take action. Having lit a candle, Elaine took out the sheet of parchment she had begged of Lord Bertrand’s chaplain, Father Otwin, by saying she wanted to practice her letters. She sharpened the quill that she kept in the flat wooden box containing her personal treasures, then added a bit of wine to a half-dried bottle of ink and shook it well.

  Sitting on the side of the bed she had shared with her sister until two weeks ago, tongue caught between her teeth in concentration and using the box as a desk, she began to write. She had much to relate, several unpleasant suspicions to divulge, and she intended to phrase the message so no one who read it out of mere curiosity could guess the true meaning behind her words. When, some hours later, she was finished to her own satisfaction, she sealed the folded parchment with many drippings of candle wax and impressed the wax in two places with her late father’s old seal ring.

  In the course of her routine duties the next morning she spoke to Jean, the kitchen boy who had once sworn he’d do anything for her or her sister because, according to him, they were the only two people in the entire manor who treated him with kindness. When Jean left with the cook on an errand to Gorey village, to purchase fresh fish for the midday meal, Elaine knew her letter had gone with the boy and would find its way aboard a ship bound for Normandy. How long it would take the letter to reach Caen she could not judge with any certainty. Two weeks at least, possibly much longer. Then more weeks to wait for a response.

  Elaine began to pray, over and over, that the letter would safely arrive at the court of King Henry I of England, who was also duke of Normandy, and that it would without too much delay be delivered into the hands of the man to whom she had sent it. For Elaine believed that Royce, the baron of Wortham was the only person in all King Henry’s domains who was capable of helping her sister.

  Chapter 1

  The islands in the Narrow Sea between England and the continent of Europe belonged by hereditary right to the dukes of Normandy. When Duke William set out to conquer England, he appointed a loyal noble to hold the islands for him against any attempt by the king of France to seize them for his own. Thereafter, William, as king of England, kept dependable men in the post and his sons, King William Rufus and Henry I, followed his example.

  On a bright mid-April morning in the Year of Our Lord 1117, the large sailing vessel Daisy approached the eastern end of the island known as Jersey. Captain Piers stood at the helm, his sharp eyes watching the sea intently, for the waters there are treacherous, with cross currents, and strong tides barely covering rocks that can gut a ship and send it to the bottom.

  The captain’s passengers seemed unaware of any danger. The squires remained below deck, but the two men who were their masters leaned on the rail, squinting against the sun as they watched the island. Captain Piers scowled at them, wishing he could hear what they were saying. The tall, sandy-haired man was known to him as one of Lord Royce’s best agents; he had several times transported Sir Desmond to France or to England. The second man, the near-giant whom they had picked up at Teignmouth on the previous evening, was a stranger to the captain. Telling himself all that mattered was the heavy bag of gold awaiting him when he reported to Lord Royce the safe arrival of his men at Jersey, Captain Piers shrugged, dismissing their conversation, and gave his complete attention to the water ahead.

  “What did Royce tell you about the mission?” Desmond asked his companion.

  “Not much.” Cadwallon turned a little to look at him. “I didn’t confer with him in person, you see, Royce being in Normandy with King Henry, and me being at home in Devon. Nor does he ever include details in his letters, lest they fall into the wrong hands,” Cadwallon finished with a knowing grin.

  Desmond frowned. He liked spying, enjoyed the thrill of knowing what others did not know, and he drew an almost erotic pleasure from the risk involved, from the realization that death could be upon him at any moment, with only his wits to stave it off. But he did not like working with another agent. Once, he had been betrayed by a trusted colleague; the long months of imprisonment and the ill-health that followed had taught him to be wary. He certainly was not going to trust an unknown man who, judging by his name, was Welsh. Not even if the man was hand-picked by Royce. Even King Henry’s brilliant spymaster could make a mistake.

  “I assumed you’d know what we are to do when we reach Jersey,” Cadwa
llon said, still grinning.

  “There’s a girl missing,” Desmond responded in his most clipped tone. “We are to find her.”

  “That’s all?” Cadwallon looked puzzled. “Having received a confidential letter written in Royce’s own hand, I thought there’d be an important matter of state to pursue.”

  “You can read?” Desmond asked, his full interest caught by Cadwallon’s second mention of the contents of Royce’s letter.

  “Of course. I can write, too.”

  Cadwallon was grinning again. Desmond wished he’d stop. He glared at the sea, so much brighter than the waters surrounding England, more clearly blue and green and glittering as if dark secrets lurked far below the surface, until Cadwallon spoke again.

  “How old is the girl?”

  “She’s sixteen.”

  “Old enough to be married,” Cadwallon noted. “Perhaps she ran off with a lover.”

  “That’s what I said to Royce. He doesn’t think so.”

  “Why not?” Cadwallon slanted a surprisingly intelligent glance at Desmond and spoke in a brisk manner distinctly at odds with his large size and his lazy movements. “If we are to work together effectively, you’d better tell me everything Royce has told you.”

  “The girl, whose name is Aglise, is Royce’s godchild.”

  “Ah,” said Cadwallon, “so it’s personal for him.”

  “Royce and the girl’s father, Lord Aldwynd, and Lord Bertrand, who presently holds these islands for King Henry, were all squires together in their youth and they became close friends. Aldwynd died a few years ago, leaving no sons. When his widow remarried she sent her two daughters to Jersey, to be fostered by Lord Bertrand and Lady Benedicta.” Desmond absently fingered the pouch he wore attached to his belt. In it rested several of the instruments of his trade: two metal lock picks, a block of wax, a candle stub, a wad of woolen lint and a pair of flints, a tiny vial of poppy syrup.

  “Go on, then,” Cadwallon prompted him.

  “A few days ago Royce received a letter from the older sister, Elaine, telling him that Aglise has disappeared and appealing for his help in finding her.”

  “Why didn’t she appeal directly to Lord Bertrand?” Cadwallon asked. “Or does she think her sister has left the island and, thus, Royce will be better able to locate her? But, if that’s so, why are we headed for Jersey?”

  “Because Royce wants us to talk to Elaine, and to Lady Benedicta and Lord Bertrand, to discover what information they may have. Apparently, Elaine thinks Aglise is still somewhere on the island.”

  “Does the missing girl’s mother know of this?” Cadwallon asked.

  “She does, and if Aglise is anything like her mother, you may be right in your assumption that she has run off with some fellow. Perhaps, an unsuitable fellow for a nobly born girl.” Desmond’s frown deepened. “Royce introduced me to Lady Irmina. Her second husband is eight or ten years younger than she, and remarkably handsome. She’s doing her best to hold his interest against all the flirtatious young creatures of the royal court, so she doesn’t have much time for concern about her daughters.”

  “Which may be why they are unmarried,” Cadwallon said.

  “Probably. I’m sure if she could arrange advantageous marriages for either of them, she’d do so, just to advance her own position. Lady Irmina is ambitious.” She was also shallow and silly, but Desmond was wise enough to refrain from further criticism of the lady to a man he didn’t know. Nor was he going to mention how Lady Irmina’s young husband set his teeth on edge. Too handsome, too charming, and utterly useless summed up Desmond’s opinion of Sir Lamont de Bruay.

  “How can a parent be indifferent to the plight of a child?” Cadwallon asked with great feeling. “If our child were missing, my Janet would be searching every inch of the kingdom to locate the poor thing. Even so, she’d be well behind me.”

  “You are married?” Desmond asked in astonishment.

  “Aye.” Cadwallon was grinning again. “Didn’t Royce tell you? It’s only thanks to him that I was able to marry my Janet. A few years ago, after I helped Royce to resolve a minor problem, he appealed to King Henry to grant me a little castle in Devon.”

  “No one told me that you are a baron,” Desmond said accusingly. “Or that you left your domain and your wife to come on this mission.”

  “Well, I’d do almost anything for Royce, and have done a bit of work for him now and then,” Cadwallon said. “Besides, I was glad to leave for a few weeks. I have recently learned that Janet tends to be a bit testy when she’s with child.

  “I didn’t leave her alone,” Cadwallon continued in hasty response to Desmond’s shocked look. “Her sister is visiting. Janet told me to go. She doesn’t like me to see her hanging her head over a basin every morning. By the time I return, she’ll be glad to have me back again.”

  Desmond could think of nothing to say to these domestic revelations, or to the information that Cadwallon had not only worked for Royce in the past, but had earned a castle by his efforts. That meant Cadwallon must possess sharper wits than were evident on short acquaintance.

  The realization that Royce had paired him with a man who had a wife at home and a child on the way irritated Desmond beyond reason. He didn’t like the idea of having to protect Cadwallon along with two young women, if it came to that, as he feared it would. Married men, and prospective fathers especially, ought not to be spying.

  For Desmond was sure spying was involved in his present mission. Although Royce hadn’t said anything specific about the state of affairs on Jersey, he had mentioned the persistent French interest in the island. Desmond did not believe Royce would send two experienced agents to search for a missing girl on a small island unless some unspoken purpose lay behind the assignment. Lord Bertrand’s men-at-arms, who must know the island well, could search for Aglise more easily than two strangers.

  Desmond regretted that he hadn’t insisted on reading the letter Aglise’s sister had sent to Royce. There had to be another reason why he and Cadwallon had been dispatched to Jersey in such haste. He’d been eager to prove to Royce that he was recovered from imprisonment and the resultant ill health, so he hadn’t asked enough questions about this, his first assignment in two years.

  The manor house that guarded the eastern end of Jersey was perched high on the cliffs of a small mountain. Gazing up at the stone walls, all he could see from sea level, Desmond judged that the men-at-arms who patrolled the enclave would have a fine view of not only most of the island, but also the sea approaches and, in clear weather, the coast of Normandy, just fifteen miles away.

  Captain Piers brought the Daisy into the harbor of a little fishing village, berthing the ship at the seaward end of a long quay, so the horses could be unloaded.

  “This will be the village of Gorey,” Desmond said in response to Cadwallon’s question. Before he could continue, Captain Piers interrupted.

  “I’ve timed it aright,” the captain informed his passengers. “The tide’s at flood now, but ‘twill soon turn and I need ta be well out at sea before then, or I’ll find meself marooned here until the next high tide. So, ye’d best gather yer belongings and be ashore as fast as ye can go. An’ good luck ta ye.”

  The squires were already leading the horses down the gangplank to the quay.

  “I see they’ve saddled our horses,” Cadwallon said, watching the action. He spread his huge arms, stretching with lazy ease. “It looks as if your squire has packed your saddlebags, and Ewan never unpacked mine. What’s your squire’s name, by the way? In case I have to call him.”

  “Richard,” Desmond said, his manner curt. Turning to Captain Piers, he added in the same tone, “I will expect a message from you in seven days, as we agreed.”

  “I’ve never failed Lord Royce,” said the captain with some asperity, “nor any of his men, neither, as well ye know. I’ll come back one week from this day and I’ll send an ordinary-lookin’ fella, who won’t attract undue notice, up ta Warden’s Manor with a
sealed letter fer ye. Ye can send word by him of when ye want ta leave the island, or ye can use the letter as an excuse ta leave at once, if ye need ta do that.”

  “Better send two men,” Cadwallon suggested, “and arm both of them.”

  “Aye, I’ll do so,” Captain Piers said, nodding his approval of the idea. “‘Tis never safe ta send a man alone inta a strange place. Now, mind ye remember about the tides here. They come in strong and verra fast. Ye don’t want ta be caught walkin’ upon the wet sand when the tide turns.”

  “We won’t forget.” Desmond bid farewell to the captain, then headed for the gangplank with Cadwallon following.

  “Jersey looks to be a pleasant spot,” Cadwallon remarked as they rode through the village and onto the narrow path that led upward to Warden’s Manor. “I like the warmth. My Janet would enjoy seeing all these pretty flowers.”

  Desmond spared only a glance for the springtime beauty of the plants growing in rocky crevasses along the way, filling the open spaces with delicate colors. As the path wound higher he could see the Daisy standing out to sea and he noticed how the tide was already receding from the shore of Gorey village, leaving an ever-widening strip of wet sand.

  Neither he nor Cadwallon wore chainmail, their armor having been packed into the saddlebags. Being ostensibly on a peaceful visit, both men were clad in woolen tunics, hose and boots, with only their swords and eating knives for protection. Both wore mantles slung over their shoulders, though they didn’t need them. As Cadwallon had noted, the air was pleasantly warm, and it was sweet with the scents of many flowers. The early afternoon sea breeze ruffled Desmond’s short, sandy-colored hair.

  “I neglected to ask you,” Cadwallon said in a companionable way, “whether Lord Bertrand knows we are coming?”