Dark Corridor

by Margo Sorenson

CHAPTER ONE

When my father’s knights brought his body out of the forest, I knew my life would be changed forever. But even though I was almost a woman grown at fourteen years, I couldn’t have guessed the betrayal and sorrow that lay ahead for me…

I should have paid more mind to what my mother was doing when I entered her bedchamber for our embroidery session. When the knight ushered me through the great door, she hastily shoved some papers into the small cabinet to the left of her stool. I was so used to interrupting my mother in her reading and her constant writing of poems and letters, that it didn’t seem out of the ordinary, although her flushed face should have hinted that something unusual was transpiring.

But, I fear I am ahead of my story. That day, the day after which my life was never the same again, happened thusly…

“Anne!” my mother said, turning to greet me, color high in her cheeks. I caught only a glance of some papers disappearing behind the carved cabinet doors. “I thought you were riding to the hunt with your father as usual,” she said. Brushing her hair from her forehead, she lifted her chin in her characteristic manner and quickly collected herself.

“My father suggested I spend some time with you,” I explained. “He said we would ride on the morrow.”

“Hmmm,” my mother answered, raising an eyebrow. “Well, do sit, then.” Without another word, we began to embroider, something that didn’t please me greatly.

Of course, I would much rather have been out in the chase, hunting with my father, but, if truth be told, my father had said to me that morning, “Anne, spend some time today with your mother. I know she can be difficult, but she is your mother. With all that will be coming soon—a possible betrothal for you—it would be in your best interests for you to sit with her for a while.”

Like it or not, I had been banished to the realm of my mother, who could have cared less if I were there, so I bit my lip and took my embroidery hoop and threads and made my way to her solar. I resigned myself to an hour or two of captivity, during which my only hope of relief would be if my mother wanted to talk about the performances of the latest jongleurs or vagabond poets and troubadours who came to Longwood at her invitation. I found their songs enthralling, and indeed, I was enchanted by the romantic stories and fabulous verses they spun. My mother loved to discuss and exclaim over their pretty images and clever ways with words.

But–embroidery! Two hours of slaving away with needle and threads were a poor second to my father’s tutoring in the whiplash give-and-take of logic and debate as he and I rode in the chase. I always would much rather have been riding with my little goshawk in pursuit of ducks or the fallow deer–and in pursuit of the best argument with my father, as well. In embroidery, everything always tangled on me! But, in logic, the tangling of words and thoughts was fun to puzzle out–not so those glossy threads that I wanted to toss over the castle wall into the moat.

An hour dragged by, as my mother and I sat in silence. I punched the needle in and out of the fabric, wishing with all my heart I was in the forest with my father. After what he had just said about a betrothal coming soon, I feared my days in the forest were numbered.

I sighed. I knew a possible betrothal couldn’t be put off forever. Indeed, not even a year ago there had been that talk of my betrothal to one of the Earl of Stowford’s younger sons, a child of four years. Word had come from the earl that he would be pleased to consider me as the wife of his son. A baby! Married to a mere baby! I shuddered at the thought. My mother had pressed my father to finalize this appalling betrothal.

I glanced over at her impassive face as she knotted a turquoise thread, completely unaware of my thoughts. What was she planning for me, now?

I remembered that night after last Michaelmas, in front of the blazing hearth in the great hall, when she had urged my father, “It will be good for Anne and most helpful for you. You cannot keep her here forever, and, besides, she could use some discipline.”

Here, my mother’s level gaze had met mine. I frowned at her, but, as usual, I couldn’t find the courage to speak my mind to her as well as I could to my father. Somehow, her manner always seemed to freeze my brain and I couldn’t muster any of the perfect words that I wanted to use. I, who loved words as much as I did, was at a loss with my mother.

Why was my mother even considering this disgusting betrothal? I knew she longed to have closer ties with the earl’s family, the countess being her distant cousin. But how could she dare make me a pawn in her connivings? At least with my father’s clear judgment in force for any decision, my future bridegroom might be worthy and even palatable for me.

“And,” my mother had continued, turning back to my father, “your commitment would be certain to please the earl, your lord. In his gratitude, he may give you more of his forest for the hunt and perhaps even lower the scutage you must pay. It would be a most beneficial alliance.”

Stunned into silence, aghast, I bit my lip and clenched my hands inside my long sleeves. My own mother, urging me to wed a child! And it was not only because of her fervent and ill-hidden desire to improve our family’s noble standing, it was also because of the silver, I knew. My father paid the earl a great deal in scutage every year so he wouldn’t have to go to battle for him in some far-off place. I admit I often wondered if my mother was not worried more about paying out all the silver than about my father’s having to fight battles not his own and risking his life.

My father leaned back in his carved chair, the firelight playing on his features. “Margaret, Margaret, must you be in such a hurry to divest yourself of your daughter?” He reached over and patted my arm. “I know many young women are married by now, but leave her be. She is beautiful, but she is not yet ready, and she has much to learn, still.”

I colored a bit at my father’s reference to my beauty. I confess I wish it were true, but I thought my nose a bit too short, and although many told me my brown hair was becoming, sometimes it was a bit too unruly for my taste.

“Much to learn!” my mother exclaimed. “She knows how to read and write, thanks to my efforts.”

My mother spoke truly, for she had taught me much of lyric poetry and enchanting stories.

“She can embroider, speak passable French, read Latin, play the lute, and is learning chess. She deals well with the bailiff and the rents and the household affairs with the marshal, and I send her to plan for the provisioning of the kitchens with the cook.”

Of course, I told myself. Any training I had in the household arts and the management of the castle was only because she didn’t want to do those tasks herself. But I held my tongue. This was not the time to berate my mother, and that was a battle I could only lose.

“She is more than capable,” my mother finished.

“Capable, yes,” my father agreed, closing his eyes for a moment. Then he looked at my mother. “But I wish her to learn more of the art of logic, of questioning, of judgment–more of Aristotle.”

“But why?” my mother demanded. “She’ll not be anything but a lady, tending to matters of the castle and serving her husband. Logic, indeed!” she expostulated. “You already have her nose in Aristotle too frequently for my liking.”

This old argument, I sighed. I looked at my father, and, once again, he came to my defense.

“Now, Margaret.” my father reached over and patted her knee. My mother stiffened for a moment, but then relaxed. “You’ll see the wisdom of it, soon. Remember, she must marry, and when she does, she takes a dowry of some of our lands with her. She will be managing those and other lands, too, depending on whom she marries.”

Ugh, I thought. Besides being most disagreeable, marriage was going to be work, too.

My father went on. “She will be arranging marriages of her own children and making alliances. Having a sound knowledge of logic and rhetoric will serve her in good stead. I want her to be able to deal with these matters with well-chosen words of clarity, not ruled only by emotion and heart.” My father looked at my mother with a level gaze. “We know too well the unusual power of words do we not, Margaret?” he asked.

My mother colored above her collar, but at the time, I thought nothing more of it. She may have spent too much time writing, but my father loved her despite that. That night, I had no idea of the implications of what he had said to her.

From what my father said, it sounded as if there wasn’t going to be a great deal of frolicking ahead for me in my life. Why couldn’t I just read, write, and play my lute, feed my little dogs, and hunt with my goshawk, as I pleased? Of course, I had then no way of knowing how dearly I was going to have to count on that same logic and rationality when the dark events that were to come began to unfold in my life.

My mother sighed, and then smiled a little at my father. “You are her father,” she said. “If it is your pleasure, so it shall be.”

Remembering this scene, I wondered if indeed my future betrothal would be to the Earl’s younger son, after all. I knew I dared not ask my mother, though, in case my question might prompt her to act more quickly on a betrothal. Ugh! I could not bear the thought!

Suddenly, a commotion arose outside the door. We both looked up from our embroidery to see one of my father’s knights appear before us, unannounced, bringing an abrupt and brutal end to our embroidery session. The knight knelt before my mother, wordless, holding my father’s hunting horn and bloodied cap. I couldn’t speak—I couldn’t even breathe.

“No!” my mother cried out. She stood up, her face white, and fled down dozens of stairs, down, down, and into the castle courtyard. Stunned, I left my threads and needles scattered on the floor and followed her, blindly. Thoughts spun dizzily through my head. Dead—my father was dead? How? In his own forest? By whose hand?

I halted at the top of the long flight of stone steps leading down to the courtyard. As long as I live, I will never forget that sight—my father, Hugh, Baron of Longwood, lying across the saddle, his blood staining the white coat of his favorite hunter. His strong arm would never again squeeze my shoulders, as he told me to “Bear up, little one.” His dear face, creased with the lines of hearty laughter, would never smile again. He would be telling no stories in front of the blazing hearth to everyone who came often to enjoy his hospitality. My mother always fretted and moaned about planning the feasts for which my father was known, but now, those wonderful occasions would be no more. My father was no more. I swallowed hard.

Our chief forester, Roger de Bateley, my father’s favorite hunting companion, stood in the center of the courtyard, the bridle of my father’s horse in one gloved hand, his own huntsman’s cap in the other, his head bowed. Servants hurried down many stairways and through doors into the courtyard, voices low and murmuring. Somewhere—in the kitchen outbuildings, perhaps—I could hear wailing. Word of my father’s death must have spread through the castle like a fire through the thatched-roof village.

“My lady,” Roger de Bateley began, his voice shaking. He shifted his feet uncomfortably. I had never seen him at such a loss. “By your leave, I bring you the body of my lord and your husband, Hugh of Longwood. He—he was killed by villainous poachers who shot him.” Here, Roger gestured at some arrows, and I grimaced, not wanting to look. The arrows piercing my father’s neck and back had drained his life’s blood out of him.

“Poachers?” my mother asked, her face taut with disbelief. “What happened?”

Roger sighed heavily, his eyes on the ground again. “My lord and I were hunting the fallow deer in the chase, as usual. Far away, we heard voices and hunting horns. Lord Hugh and I mounted our horses, leaving the others, and followed the sounds of the voices.”

Roger looked up reluctantly, seeming not to want to meet my mother’s accusing eyes. “You know very well how my lord wants the chase guarded, and he was angry. Indeed, we caught the poachers with a wounded stag in a dell, and they were just sharpening their knives. I did not recognize them,” Roger added hastily. He must have seen the question written in my mother’s face. “They must be from another place, not our village. Even with my lord’s great courage, for which he is renowned in all parts of the realm, we could not fight them off, once we challenged them and they attacked us.”

“And how, then, came you to escape?” My mother bit off the words. In her cold anger, she was indeed a fearsome sight.

Roger de Bateley’s face turned a shade of crimson that matched his surcoat. “M-my lord’s knights came riding up at the sound of the conflict, and the poachers fled. I, too,” he showed a rent sleeve and a bloody gash across his arm, “was wounded, but not so grievously as Lord Hugh.”

I shut my eyes against the horrible scene. My father, for once, his courage useless? It didn’t seem possible. How could he have been slain in his very own forest? Certainly, robbers and thieves were known to hide in forests, and poachers were always hunting deer and wild boar, despite the fact that now, in the Year of Our Lord 1300, the Law of the Forest decreed they could be blinded or have their hands chopped off for their crimes. But—had one of these outlaws killed my father?

Slowly, my mother walked toward my father’s body. With a cold, hard glance at Roger, she deliberately turned her back on him, as he stood, still holding the reins. Reaching out a hand, she stroked my father’s hair. Then she laid her cheek next to his for a moment. All I could hear in the courtyard were shuffling of feet and the scraping sound of horses shifting their hooves. Even the castle servants stopped their crying; only the sounds of a few muffled sobs and clearing of a throat or two met my ears.

“Anne?” My mother turned, as if finally remembering that indeed someone else besides her might mourn my father’s passing. She reached out her hand to me and pulled me to her side. “Bid him farewell, Anne,” she said, her grey eyes glassy with unshed tears. “Life will be different for us, now.”

It was then that I began to sob, causing the knights and Roger to look away. Certainly I, Lady Anne of Longwood, should not show that kind of emotion in front of those below my station. As my father had so often told me, “Ah, Anne, be yourself and be proud, strong and proud.”

As if in a dream, I walked forward and touched my father’s shoulder, letting my hand linger there for a moment. His muscles already felt cold and hard under his surcoat. No! This couldn’t be! I quickly wiped my tears with the sleeve of my gown. Then I lifted my chin and straightened my shoulders. I had to bear up under this calamity, most certainly I would. It was what my father would have wanted.

The knights led the horse with its impossible burden to the stairway leading to the great hall, and they hoisted my father’s body off his horse. It took eight of them to carry him up the stairs on a pallet; he was almost as imposing in death as he had been in life.

My mother clutched my hand, and we made our way up the stairs to the great hall. Servants would prepare his body in his rooms and our priest would come. Word would have to be sent to the Earl of Stowford, my father’s lord, whose vassal he was.
I stopped short on our way through to the great hall. The Earl of Stowford—it was he who would now have final say over everything in our lives. Without my father to protect me now, what would become of me? A shiver ran up my spine.
As we entered the great hall, following the body of my father, I thought again of that conversation about my betrothal to the Earl’s son. My mother had been placated at the time, but that was because of my father’s own skill in logic and the personal power he held over her, by the grace of God. I had neither. Far worse, I had no father at all. What was to happen to me?

I was at the mercy of my mother.