A tear coursed from the woman’s eye to her temple as she fought to open her eyes. For a breath she succeeded, gazing up at Owen, then Lucie. The palest blue. ‘Who …?’ Her eyes closed and she went limp. Owen carried her up to the small chamber, holding her until Lucie drew down the blankets, then setting her on the soft mattress.
‘Go back to Michaelo, find out all that he knows. I will undress her,’ said Lucie.
‘Shall I send Kate up to help?’
‘No need. I grew accustomed to this with Aunt Philippa at the end.’
Owen kissed her forehead and withdrew with a whispered thanks.
Michaelo started awake as Owen eased down beside him. ‘The woman. Where—?’
‘Up in the solar where she will be safe and at ease.’ Owen took a long drink of ale. ‘Here is the problem. I am no longer the keeper of the peace in the minster liberty. The dean and chapter still resent me for acting as such under Thoresby’s charge, so I must have a care. Now if they should come to me, request my aid, I will assist them. Until then, for the safety of my family, I need to learn what I can about the young woman and why she is in York.’
Owen had of late assumed two roles, one as Prince Edward’s spy in the North, and one as the captain of the city bailiffs, called on to resolve incidents requiring the skills he had honed as Archbishop Thoresby’s spy – crimes of a complex and violent nature, crimes that might endanger the city at large, or the realm. Both the prince and the mayor and aldermen welcomed the dual role, as, to his surprise, did Owen. After a year of mourning John Thoresby, he had undertaken an investigation at the request of an influential family in York. He’d been startled by the ease with which he resumed the work. He had missed it. But without the authority and connections to power that the archbishop had conferred on him, he had felt at sea.
As the prince’s eye and ears in the North, Owen was expected to provide regular reports to the royal household, which required a secretary. And who better for the job than the late archbishop’s personal secretary, Brother Michaelo? What Owen had not expected was Michaelo’s keen powers of observation.
‘I pray you, tell me all that you have noted about her,’ said Owen.
Michaelo took a drink of the ale he had set aside. ‘She was singing a particular hymn for Advent,’ he said. ‘Missus est Angelus Gabriel. That and how she holds herself – I believe that she is either a professed nun or at the least convent-educated. How she phrased the lyrics – she understood the words, took care to express the meaning. What I am trying to say is that the song has become a part of her, as if she has sung it many times. I do believe she has taken vows.’
‘Do you think we can trust her?’
‘I cannot say. I know too little. But it was plain when I found her in the chapter house that she was frightened. Not of me, but – someone lurking above?’ He paused, as if deciding whether or not to mention something. ‘She said she’d slept there, curled up, afraid, but her clothing was wet, and she had smudges of mud and perhaps blood on her face, hands – I thought she might have fallen. But I noticed nothing that might account for her sudden weakness.’
‘Lucie will be able to tell us of any wounds and other injuries. She told you someone was above?’
Michaelo considered. ‘No, it was Theo. He thought he heard something. But the knife. I forgot the knife.’ He drew a dagger out of his sleeve and handed it to Owen.
‘You forgot something like that up your sleeve?’
‘I often carry things there.’
Owen studied the weapon. The wooden hilt was cracked, a small piece missing, the sharp edges not yet smoothed. ‘You might find some splinters in your arm.’ And might he find a piece of wood up on the roof of the chapter house? He thought it worth a look.
Michaelo’s expressive brows drew together. ‘Whether the danger she fears comes through this Master Ambrose she mentioned, or if he was her protector, I have no way of knowing. Nor can I say whether or not she had been up on the roof.’
‘I see your point.’ A man on the roof of the chapter house, a woman found inside, two such unusual incidents must be connected. And now, knowing that her clothing had been wet when Michaelo found her, it did beg the question of her part in the man’s fall. ‘What else have you noted about her? Is her speech that of the North?’
Michaelo raised his eyes to the ceiling as he considered. ‘No. I would say the south of England. Well spoken.’
‘If you are correct about her vows, an important question is why she left the nunnery. If this Ambrose is who I think he might be, and is the white-haired stranger who traded cloaks with Ronan, she did not leave for his sake. He shares your nature regarding women.’
Michaelo met Owen’s gaze. ‘If you are right about his identity, I would say, seeing the way he rested his hand on Ronan’s shoulder, it might have been true of the vicar as well.’
So Ronan preferred to lie with men rather than women. ‘That might be helpful.’
Michaelo’s thin lips curved into a smile. ‘Soon you will wonder how you ever managed without me.’
Though Owen grinned, he agreed. Thoresby had once referred to his choosing Brother Michaelo as his personal secretary as donning a hair shirt, a penance. And for ten years Owen had believed that to be Michaelo’s worth. But in the past month he had discovered that Michaelo had been, instead, Thoresby’s bloodhound. He might never have discovered the man’s worth had Archdeacon Jehannes not urged him
