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A Shadowed Evil

A Hawkenlye Mystery

Severn House Publishers Limited

Josse d'Acquin looked up at the sky with anxious eyes. This morning, setting out from the House in the Woods, the weather had been mild, misty and damp. But the month was February: too early in the sun's year for unseasonal warmth to be reliable. Now the wind had changed, going round to the east, the clouds were clearing and the temperature was falling. Despite having made an early start, there were many hours of the journey still ahead.

He turned round in the saddle, looking back at Helewise, riding behind him. 'It's getting colder,' he said, despite himself unable to keep the worry out of his voice. 'Are you warm enough?'

'I am, Josse,' Helewise said with a smile, nudging her heels into her grey mare and coming to ride beside him. 'Thanks to you and your sensible precautions, I am wearing several layers of good wool, and my travelling cloak is sufficiently thick and heavy to keep out worse weather than this.' But he noticed that she, too, gave a swift glance up at the sky. 'How far have we to go?'

Only someone who knew her as well as Josse did would have detected the faint note of concern in her voice. Bracingly he said, 'We're well over halfway now; more like three-quarters, I'd say. We'll go through the gap in the downs, turn westwards for a few miles, and then we'll see the town ahead of us.'

She nodded. 'Let's get on, then.' She kicked Daisy, and for some time they went at a steady canter, eating up the miles.

Emerging from a winding track on to a wider road where there was room to ride abreast, Helewise broke the companionable silence. Perhaps, he thought, she was growing more concerned about the steadily increasing cold, and trying to take their minds off it ... 'Tell me about the house and its inhabitants, Josse,' she said. 'You used to visit when you were a boy?'

Eager to play his part, Josse replied, 'Aye, that's right, I did.' He broke off to rein in his horse, letting Helewise pass and then taking up a position on her other side – the eastern side, from which direction the wind was blowing with growing strength – in the hope that Alfred's big body would afford her some protection. 'Although my mother moved to northern France after she married my father, she never forgot that her roots and her kin were in England, and she dispatched me regularly to stay with her brother Hugh and his wife Ysabel.'

'And their children – your cousins – were all girls, you told me?'

'Aye. Three of them, Isabelle, Editha and Aeleis, and, although Isabelle was nearest to me in age, Aeleis was my favourite.' He smiled at the memory. 'She was the tomboy, the leader into mischief, and wherever she went, I willingly followed.'

'And what of the house?' Helewise's teeth were chattering, and Josse only just made out her words. He pressed his heels to Arthur's sides, subtly increasing their pace.

'Southfire Hall has been in my mother's family for many generations,' he began. 'The house is ancient, and they say there's been a dwelling on that spot, on the top of the rise of the downs to the south-west of Lewes, since time out of mind. The first time I went there, Uncle Hugh was having an extension built, which, as you'll imagine, made the most exciting playground for my cousins and me.' He glanced at her, then wished he hadn't, for her lips were blue with cold. 'We had the run of the place,' he went on in a tone which, even to his own ears, sounded far too hearty, 'exploring into all the strictly forbidden places, because everyone was much too busy and harassed to watch over us.' He smiled briefly. 'Aeleis always took it as a personal challenge when someone told her somewhere was not safe for children and strictly out of bounds.' His smile widened as the images formed in his memory: grubby faces and hands, cut knees, and his boyhood self trying to help a small girl restore a ripped and filthy gown before her nursemaid discovered the damage. 'The old undercroft – beneath the original building – was the best place,' he went on. 'It was vast and creepy, spooky with long-forgotten things and low, half-blocked doorways to subterranean passages and little rooms that nobody had seen in decades, if not more. It was as if –' he paused, thinking how to put a fleeting childhood impression into words – 'as if the whole site bore an imprint of every dwelling that preceded the present one, like old footprints half-obliterated by later ones. We once found what looked like an ancient hearth,' he added, the memory suddenly surfacing, 'and Aeleis pinched a flint and tinder from the kitchens so that we could light a fire.'

'And did you?' Helewise managed to sound as if, despite the increasingly uncomfortable and worrying conditions, she was enjoying the tale.

'No,' he admitted with a grin. 'There was no draught, since whatever hole had once provided for the flow of air had long been blocked up.' He chuckled, a sudden picture in his mind of Aeleis cursing and swearing as she rubbed her streaming eyes. 'We choked ourselves on the smoke.'

They had come to a place where the road descended a long, steep slope, and they turned their attention to their mounts, picking their careful way down. On level ground again, Helewise said with a sigh, 'And now it seems that your Uncle Hugh is seriously ill.'

'He's dying, Helewise,' Josse said gently. 'My cousin Isabelle would not have sent word to come had it not been so, given the season and all that it carries with it.' Bad weather, winter-damaged tracks, short daylight, he reflected morosely.

'You cannot be sure he is dying!' Helewise protested. 'All the message said was that he was sick, and wandering in his mind.'

'He is an old man,' Josse said, struggling with a sudden, unexpected surge of emotion. 'Old men die.'

She let that go without comment. 'When did you last visit?' she demanded.

'A while back, now.' He tried to work it out. 'It was at Christmastide, and, even then, Uncle Hugh was grown stout and balding. It was just before we had that business with the heretics. Must be all of ten years.'

He heard her laugh softly. 'Dear Josse, that was twenty years ago.'

Twenty years? He spun round to look at her, aghast. Had so much time gone by, then? He studied her – the clear grey eyes, the wide mouth always so ready to smile, the modest headdress of spotless white linen beneath the hood of her heavy cloak, the straight back and square shoulders that did not bend under heavy loads. I do not believe it, he thought, although in truth he did. You look exactly the same as you did when first I set eyes on you, and I believe I have loved you every day since.

It was not a sentiment for expressing aloud; not when they needed more than anything to press on to Southfire Hall as fast as they could. So he just smiled and murmured, 'Is it really so long?' and they rode on.

Presently they came to the town of Lewes, and made their way across the bridge over the river Ouse that linked the two parts of the settlement. The waterfront was lined with warehouses and taverns, and several craft were tied up along the quays. The river was vital to the town, for it was the means by which the many businesses transported their produce and their goods to the rest of the world. Now, however, the port lay quiet and there were few signs of activity, for the rapidly falling temperature had driven most folk indoors.

They passed the castle, up on its imposing rise to their right. Then, descending to ride for a while beside another, smaller, waterway, they saw the great spread of the priory over to the left. Josse, watching Helewise, observed her close attention to the network of buildings, gardens, stables, streamlets and ponds. Her eyes were wide with awe, for it made Hawkenlye Abbey look like a small rural convent.

Leaving the priory behind, they headed towards the higher land to the south-west of the town. 'This area is known as Southover,' said Josse. Helewise nodded. Reaching the steeply rising track that wound its way up Southfire Hill, they began the long, weary ascent. 'And now,' he said encouragingly, 'we are very nearly there! The place where my father Geoffroi first met my mother is perhaps half a mile ahead. He —'

'He had returned from crusade,' Helewise interrupted, 'and made his way to the household of his good friend, Herbert of Lewes, to break the news of Herbert's death in Damascus to his family.'

Whilst he was gratified that she remembered the tale, nevertheless Josse felt it was his role to tell it. 'Geoffroi found a compact stone house up on the ridge of the downland,' he went on, 'for this was many years before the extension was built, and the dwelling was modest. He saw a courtyard wall decorated with bisected flint stones, and, within, shallow steps leading up to the stout door of the house. And, once inside, he met Herbert's widow, her son Hugh and her daughter Ida, who, quite soon afterwards, became his wife and my mother. Although,' he added hastily, 'naturally there was quite a long gap between the two events.'

'Naturally, Josse,' Helewise said primly, although there was laughter in her eyes. 'As if I would imagine any different.'

They were at the top of the track now, and the house stood before them. The flints in the courtyard wall glistened with a light frost, and the reddish-gold stonework looked bleached by the cold. From somewhere within the large and inviting bulk of the house, smoke rose. Candlelight glittered through a narrow window. Josse led the way through the gate and into the yard and, just as a young lad and a wiry, older man hurried out from a low stable block to the left of the entrance to take their horses, the first snowflakes began to fall.

The cold and the long ride had stiffened Josse's joints, and for several moments as, with brisk efficiency, the man and the lad set about their task, all he could do was mutter his thanks while he tried to rub the deep ache out of his hips and knees. Helewise, unsurprisingly, had remembered her manners, and was responding politely to the old man – a head groom, perhaps – as he enquired about their journey.

'Lady Isabelle said to notify her the moment you arrived,' he was saying, 'and I've already sent one of the stable boys to do just that.' He turned to Josse, a sympathetic smile on his face. 'She'll soon have you warm and snug, with good, hot food inside you.'

He led the way across the courtyard. Josse stared about him, trying to reconcile memory with actuality. There was the original building, and there, to the left, the first extension. But now the dwelling had been extended again: on the opposite side, a tall, graceful wing rose up, set against the original hall and projecting out in front of it.

He was just wondering how large the family had grown, to require so much space, and, indeed, how prosperous his kinsmen must be to be able to afford so much new construction, when, at the top of a flight of shallow stone steps, the main door of the house was opened. A tall, deep-bosomed and wide-shouldered woman stood in the doorway, her comely face creased by a happy smile. 'Josse!' she cried, flinging her arms wide and flying down the steps. 'Dear Josse, you're here!'

Then she enveloped him in a tight, warm hug, kissing him resoundingly on each cheek. Filled with affection, his head flooding with happy memories, he hugged her in return. 'Oh,' he said softly, 'you haven't changed at all!'

He disentangled himself and, holding out a hand to Helewise, drew her forward. For a brief moment he looked right into her eyes, feeling as he always did the familiar upsurge of love. 'This,' he said, 'is my Helewise. Helewise, this is my cousin Isabelle.'

Isabelle took Helewise's hands in hers, and her smile disappeared into a look of horror. 'Oh, but your hands are icy!' she exclaimed, squeezing all the harder as if she would comfort Helewise with her own warmth. 'Didn't you have any gloves?'

'Yes!' Helewise replied with a laugh. 'Here.' She held up the thick, fur-lined gauntlets. 'The worsening cold proved too much for them.'

'Come inside at once!' Isabelle commanded, ushering them up the steps in front of her. 'I have prepared a private room for you –' there was a definite note of pride in her voice, for such an arrangement was a luxury afforded by only the best households – 'and now you shall get warm, refresh yourselves with a little food and drink – not too much, for there is to be a welcoming feast for you tonight – and then you must rest.'

She reached round Josse to push the heavy, iron-studded oak door wide open, and side by side he and Helewise entered Southfire Hall. The door opened into the first extension, but little could be seen of it just then, for daylight was fast fading and few lamps had yet been lit. Josse had an impression of passages winding away, arched stone doorways leading off them. Isabelle turned to her right, going under an archway in a thick stone wall, and now the original hall that Josse recalled spread out before him.

It was an old structure, rectangular in shape, long and low. A row of stout pillars ran down each of the longer sides, and it was oriented east–west, with the north side facing the courtyard and the gates. Down the middle of the floor ran a deep, stone-lined hearth, in which a bright fire burned. Josse had an impression of quite a lot of people over on the far side of the hearth. Some were seated on an arrangement of benches and settles; one or two sat apart. A trio of children played with their dolls on the stone-flagged floor.

Isabelle cast a quick look across to the little gathering, but hurried Josse and Helewise on down the length of the hall, keeping to the near side of the fire. 'No need just now for introductions,' she said with kindly tact, 'for you are exhausted and chilled to the bone; in no mood, I'm sure, for courtesies and the effort of remembering a dozen names. There will be time later for —'

Suddenly one of the children leapt up and ran around the end of the hearth, turning back on herself to skid to a stop in front of Isabelle. She planted her feet firmly and stared up at the newcomers. She was about eight, Josse thought, and enchantingly pretty.

'May not even one of us be allowed to say hello and welcome, Grandmamma?' she whispered, with a knowing smile up at the newcomers as if she knew perfectly well whispering wouldn't prevent them overhearing.

Isabelle crouched down before the child, her wide skirts fanning out round her. She brushed the child's fair hair off her broad forehead with a gentle hand, then briefly held the little face in tender hands and kissed it. 'Be very swift, then, Cecily, for our guests have endured a long ride in the cold and have more need of peace and quiet than grand speeches of welcome,' she whispered back.

The girl grinned up at Josse and Helewise. 'Sorry,' she said, 'I should have realized. Welcome! I'll save the rest for later.'

She turned and skipped away. His eyes following her, Josse now noticed that another of the group had also come towards them. She was a short, round-faced woman, and she took very small, precise steps, moving with an odd, jerky action. 'I tried to stop her, Isabelle,' she said with an edge of self-righteousness, 'but, as usual, she had her own ideas.'

All the affection that had warmed Isabelle's expression as she greeted Josse and Helewise, and crouched to pet her granddaughter, abruptly vanished. 'Thank you, Cyrille,' she said neutrally. 'No harm done.'

Then, her shoulders stiff, she strode on down the hall and led Josse and Helewise out beneath a second arched entrance at the far end. This gave on to a stone-walled passage that extended to right and left, with one or two elongated slit windows and several doors opening off it. Isabelle walked on to the furthest doorway, and, going on inside, stooped by the lively fire burning in the small hearth to light a taper, with which she set a flame in two lamps. 'Now,' she said, 'please, relax and make yourselves comfortable.'

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Excerpted from A Shadowed Evil by Alys Clare. Copyright © 2015 Alys Clare. Excerpted by permission of Severn House Publishers Limited.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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