Threads of Treason

Prologue

England 1081

The Impostor was not used to convent ways or a nun’s habit. The clothes were harsh and the duties and prayers numerous here at the Priory of St Thomas the Apostle. But feigning deafness to avoid speaking had not been difficult – it was almost like a childhood game – and already the others seemed to hardly notice her. However, she’d only been allowed to clean the sewing room with Sister Gertrude and her patience was wearing thin. Waiting had made her nearly lose her mind and now she had her chance, she would take it, whatever the outcome.

The nuns were singing as they sewed; she could hear them from here. The corridor outside the chapter house, where she stood, was empty. Looking down at her white knuckles she examined the inkpot in her grasp – how long it had taken her to gather this dark liquid little by little and place it in this pottery vessel. Her fingers wrapped about its curved body and closed around its narrow neck.

This would be easy, she thought, speed was the answer. She mounted the winding wooden steps that led to the rooms above the south side of the cloister. Her walk betrayed the distinctive grace of an aristocrat as she made her way along the floorboards of the corridor. Even though the nuns needed every chink of light for their work, the door to the sewing room was shut for security. She went past it and slid into the stairway that connected a viewing area above her and, below her, the back yard access to the kitchens. This would be her escape route to her waiting lover, using the wood-pile to climb over the yard wall. But she would not put him at risk in any way.

Waiting for the nuns to take a break made every nerve in her body twitch. Any moment they were due to leave the sewing room and take a short exercise in the completed part of the cloisters. Although it was only moments before she was rewarded, it had seemed so much longer to her. She heard the door being unlocked and the nuns walking along the corridor and down the steps she’d just climbed. The click and clank of the door being shut and locked reached her, as did the shuffle of more nuns taking their leave. She heard Sisters Leofgyth, Winifred and Ethelburga among them. She slipped out of the tower entrance and felt along to the nearest of the row of stones under the windows that overlooked the cloister. There it was. Just as her lover had said it would be. One of the nuns had left it for her, it didn’t matter to her who it was. Her fingers scrabbled for the key.

The door, her last obstacle. The heavy, imposing wooden impediment faced her. Her lover had asked her to do this. This was for him, for her love of him. Just one last check round – the sound of nuns walking and talking in the cloisters whispered up to her in the air. Snow was on its way, surely? It so often snowed between the feasts of Saint Valentine and Easter. Lent had seemed so long this year. The Priory observed the fast much more closely than she was used to at home.

She smiled as the key turned. She was in.

The Impostor found herself close to the panel the nuns were working on. She wanted to look at the work, but stopped herself: if it was too beautiful or so intricately worked she might falter in her task. The stopper on the ink eased loose with a twist of her fingers. The sour smell caught her nostrils.

‘Don’t do it, Sister.’

She swung round. Prioress Ursula was standing behind the door. She froze for a moment. Ursula was not tall but she matched her height. Age had broadened the Prioress’s physique.

‘So you are not deaf,’ said Ursula.

The Impostor thought she could overcome her; though to be sure of success she had to act now. She went to throw the pot, but Ursula was there, gripping her wrist, forcing her hand up above them both, pouring the ink over them. Ursula’s strength was considerable. Some of the ink caught the Impostor’s mouth; she spat and spluttered to rid herself of the noxious fluid. She snatched her arm down, twisted it, and was free. The inkpot rolled away and she took to the corridor. Already the nuns were returning from their break, so she turned towards the tower steps, the kitchen and escape.

Below her on the tower steps, Sister Agnes was talking to a kitchen servant in her steady tone. So the Impostor’s only escape was upwards. She started to climb the stone steps, already fearing that there was no way out. Prioress Ursula was behind her. Her extra years might slow her down, but not by enough. Ursula had not had the pampered life style of the Impostor which made her breath short and her legs weak. She gasped in the freezing air and light above her. Cold, dry flakes of snow were falling steadily, chilling her. The viewing platform was already covered in a slippery layer of it. Ursula was only steps behind her. A castellated parapet wall was but an arm’s length from her. Her body rocked against it as it stopped her forward movement. There had to be a means of escape from here. Snatching glances across the rooftops she hoped to see where the masons had been working on the Priory. Perhaps they had left a ladder she could reach? But there were no steps or roofs near enough to climb to, let alone ladders.

Beyond the wood she knew her lover would be waiting for her. He would not show himself, and she would not call him. After his allotted time he would leave. That was what had been arranged and that is what would happen. She would not betray him.

Ursula came up, out into the daylight. The Impostor leapt on her, but Ursula seemed to expand underneath her, pushing her off. The Impostor found herself bending backwards over the low part of the castellated parapet and looking down, straight down, through the swirling snow, at the ground. To contemplate jumping to her death was to contemplate suicide – a sin. To be forever damned. If she did not do so, then her lover may be compromised, and had she not already sinned for his love? Her condemnation would be his salvation.

‘Don’t be a fool, little one,’ said Ursula. The endearment was typical of Ursula, always kind – and trusting. Ursula stood with her arms slightly out from her sides, the palms of her hands open, like a welcoming angel.

The Impostor looked at her.

‘Who is behind this? This was not your idea, was it?’ wheedled Ursula. She moved forward half a step.

The Impostor frowned.

‘Was it an Anglo-Saxon?’ asked Ursula.

Even a small movement of her head could put her lover at risk. The Impostor stepped onto the parapet.

‘No,’ said Ursula moving towards her.

There was also the nun who’d left her the key to the sewing room to protect. By protecting her, she would hide the path to her lover. Only Ursula had seen her in there; she too would have to die. She would take her with her. The Impostor grabbed at Ursula and jumped. The calm of knowing she was going to die was replaced by the fear that wracked her body from the rush of air and the endless fall. She screamed until the scream was killed by the harsh ground.

Chapter One

The masons had been asked to stop work as the morning shadows from the pillars touched the darker shadow of the grave.

Just outside the chapel, Bishop Odon de Bayeux was introduced to the first two nuns in the procession of mourners by the surveyor monk, Richard of Caen. The surveyor’s plump hand gestured towards the front of the convoy of nuns, tracing a path from the priory. There stood two women who were tall and about forty years of age. One of them held herself tightly and, although handsome, with intelligent blue eyes, she had the appearance of an eagle watching its prey. She was Sister Ethelburga. The other nun was Sister Winifred, whose face was kinder and softer. She also had blue eyes but these were of a warmer hue. Sister Winifred had a dainty elegance that was unforced. She greeted him with a smile. Bishop Odon held out his hand to them and they bobbed down in turn to kiss his ring of office.

He also recognised Sister Agnes who was openly weeping at the back of the eleven women. He knew her to be a friend of the Prioress. No one comforted her.

The mourners were to walk from the unfinished Priory of St Thomas through the gatehouse to the back of the chapel where the builders were working on the next phase of the building. They had already laid the foundations and built up the inner wall to seal off the priory from the outside world. The rest of the construction was barely started. Structural timbers and stones were arranged about the building site. The hole in the floor created here was to be the late Prioress’s grave. The late February snow had been piled up on each side of the path from the gatehouse to the grave for the funeral procession. At the grave the snow had been scraped to the side and then the earth from the hole had been mounded on top of it. The builders had dressed all with planks of wood. A small area of ground had also been cleared for the mourners to stand on.

Bishop Odon led the troop of mourners from the gate-house. Stopping by the grave, he adjusted his bear-skin lined cloak about his shoulders, and noticed Alfred, Prioress Ursula’s brother. There was a certain measured lack of expression on Alfred’s evenly featured square-shaped face. He looked up and then bowed in acknowledgement of the high-ranked clergyman. The body had already been laid in the bottom of the grave, which the mason had lined with five pieces of stone to make a coffin. A stone slab stood ready to cover it on completion of the service.

Odon looked down at the wrapped body. How small people looked in death. And he started praying. The words were so important to him. When the words stopped he took a moment to reflect; winter took so many victims. But how could such a thing have happened when he was only a few miles away in Rochester? Prioress Ursula was a good woman, had been a good woman, he corrected himself. A pillar of this small community of nuns, surely she had been innocent? He tried to ignore the rumours as he looked round at them. He knew they were all Anglo-Saxons, or English as his half-brother, King William of England and Duke of Normandy, called them, but their religious conviction was without fault. He had to accept, though, that at least one had already proved to be a traitor and her burial was to be without ceremony or attendance, conducted on unsanctified ground.

He glanced up at the congregation. Next to Sister Agnes was a wide nun who was very short and of ruddy complexion. The rest were just young women who could sew. He had to, at least, show them respect for the work they undertook at his direction. The words of parting to the next life completed, he raised his large pale hands to bless the cold group of eleven nuns and Prioress Ursula’s brother, Alfred. He had stood throughout the ceremony like a carved rock wrapped in his cloak, but bare headed in the freezing wind exposing his fair, weathered skin and silvered hair. Odon remembered when it was corn yellow.

He wanted to speak to the East Anglian after the service, but Alfred was already leaving. A groom had brought out a black cob which he mounted. Before Odon could call or move, Alfred had turned his horse and was heading towards the builders’ encampment in the valley.

Who was behind this outrage, Odon wondered. The last panel of the embroidery was almost destroyed, but the nuns involved were dead. He looked again at those before him. A couple of the young women were clearly twins with matching light brown hair and dull eyes. They had large, big fingered hands and he considered the cleanliness of their clothing inadequate for the occasion. They were clearly not involved in the sewing. They stood with their bodies slightly turned towards each other as if an invisible piece of string was trying to pull them together. Two or three of the girls could be described as beautiful. Of those, two were clearly Anglo-Saxon in build and colouring and the third was a dark haired girl possibly a Britain from the west of the island. The wide one wiped her nose on the back of her hand and coughed while Sister Agnes lent her a small clean square of cloth. Sister Agnes was a friend of Prioress Ursula. He could trust no one in England anymore. There was so much more at stake than the embroidery.

‘Bishop Odo,’ said Sister Ethelburga, suddenly beside him. He noted her expectant voice using the English version of his name. He would have to choose a successor for Prioress Ursula in the absence of Abbess Eleanor. No doubt this was why she was here. He tried to avoid her cool, azure stare. ‘Yes, Sister,’ he replied.

‘I want to talk to you before you leave for Normandy.’

‘I will meet you in the chapter house in a few moments,’ said Odon. He wanted to collect his thoughts. Having removed his vestments he took himself up to the first floor rooms on the south side of the cloister and used the Prioress’s keys to gain entry. Lifting the protective sheet, he gazed upon the last panel of embroidery being worked; all the threads were neatly finished, all the stitches small and full coloured. These women were truly skilled. The panel was, at least, undamaged. Not a drop of ink had reached it. He gazed at the wooden screen at the end with the threads arranged in order of their colours. Everything looked in general good order but his frown deepened. When he commissioned this great work he’d wanted it finished in time for the completion of the Bayeux Cathedral. But, with the warring in Normandy at that time, it did not seem to matter that the embroidery was progressing so slowly. It seemed like a blessing. Now, with this terrible incident occurring in the Priory, he regretted not getting the work completed sooner. Still, the Royal Court would be in Bayeux for Christmas and he was determined that the embroidery would be there too. At present he couldn’t risk the work continuing. He was short of time so he left the sewing room and locked the door. Outside, instead of turning right to go down the steps towards the chapter house he went left and up the stone tower steps.

Looking over the white blanket of snow across to the coppiced woods, he wondered whether he ought to move the embroidery, but that may be more dangerous than leaving it here, if the Anglo-Saxons were keen to attack it. And if he spoke of this to King William there would be yet more deaths. Odon himself had been a man in his prime when he’d fought alongside his half-brother to take this land, but he knew God did not want him to waste life. He sighed and ran his fingers through his greying red hair. Secrecy was best, as always. He needed to talk to Abbess Eleanor. This priory was, after all, under her jurisdiction. He would arrange for her to investigate this matter herself, and at that time the work could continue.

Odon’s gaze was attracted by activity below. People were setting out from the infirmary with a handcart. The servants and a nun he took to be the one of the Infirmaries toiled through the snow down the hill and along the edge of the coppiced wood in the valley. A burley man was pulling the shafts while the others pushed when needed. This was the other body being taken out to its resting place. He turned away. Now it was time to see Ethelburga and give her due authority. Under the circumstances she seemed the right person for the job. He could no longer delay his trip across the small expanse of ocean to Normandy.

Normandy, France

‘Sister Therese, wake now,’ said Sister Miriam. ‘The Abbess is asking for you.’

‘It is not time. Go away.’ She’d lived in this abbey all her life, but still the place felt foreign to her. ‘There are hours before our next prayers, Sister Miriam.’ Therese lowered her blanket and gazed at her fellow novice. There were rules for every part of their day, mostly of silence. She’d never heard Miriam so excited. Her friend’s round face was beaming like the midday sun and her eyes were like polished walnuts. Miriam was almost bouncing in front of her.

‘Bishop Odon has been here all night talking to our Abbess.’

Therese threw her blanket on the floor and Miriam helped her on with her habit.

‘Why is she asking for you, Sister Therese?’

‘I don’t know, Sister Miriam.’ Therese straightened her novice’s veil. It was so dull and insignificant compared with the full veil she would get when she finished her noviciate.

‘You look fine, Sister Therese. All soft blue eyes and rosy cheeks, you could look innocent of the most heinous crime without any effort. Just watch that pointy stubborn chin; and those eyes don’t always look straight ahead and slightly down as they should.’ Miriam adjusted the position of Therese’s head.

‘Do you think I’m in trouble?’ asked Therese.

‘Who can say? We are young, foolish and brave. We are expected to get into trouble.’

‘If I listened to you I would always be in trouble,’ Therese admonished her friend and tried to tie her rope girdle.

‘Quick, they are in the visitor’s hall.’ Miriam set off through the door and along the passage so quickly Therese had to run, despite her naturally long strides. Running along corridors, she knew, was forbidden. She tried to walk a few paces, but could not. Sister Miriam stopped by a wall hanging.

‘What have you stopped for?’ asked Therese.

Miriam pulled back the wall hanging and revealed a door. ‘It leads into the visitor’s hall.’ She opened it so a crack of fading firelight fell on them.

‘I never knew that was there,’ said Therese.

‘Hush, I can hear voices. I can hear Bishop Odon and Abbess Eleanor talking,’ whispered Miriam.

The Novices leaned their heads towards the stonework. They heard a man’s voice. It was gravelled like a voice that had been worn down by much use and deep from age and his authority clipped a little at the words. ‘Abbess Eleanor, I need you to leave here and go to England. A guard of my knights will escort you.’

‘Sister Miriam, we should not be listening,’ scolded Therese quietly.

‘Wait, Sister Therese.’ Miriam caught her arm. ‘Listen.’

Abbess Eleanor could be heard saying in her level tones, ‘I can’t believe Prioress Ursula is dead.’

A curl of dark hair came loose as Miriam nodded at Therese. ‘You are right. We should not be listening,’ she said. Miriam pushed back the unruly strands of hair, closed the door and set off up a stone stairway.

Therese pointed to the door. ‘Where are you going?’ she asked. ‘Why can’t we go through this door to the visitor’s hall?’

‘Because the Abbess will know we heard them from here. This door is not meant to be in use. There is nothing that woman cannot work out. I cannot afford the penance for such a sin.’

‘A sin is still a sin, whether you’re caught or not. The truth is always the truth,’ said Therese following her.

Miriam turned, straightened Therese’s veil, divided the fair hair falling in front of her face evenly and tucked each piece neatly into the edges of the veil. She stood back to examine her work. ‘There, that’s better,’ she said.

A few more strides took them to the main entrance door to the visitor’s hall. Therese was in front. She looked around to tell Miriam how nervous she was and found herself alone. After a moment she pulled herself straight and opened the door.

Bishop Odon and Abbess Eleanor were sitting opposite each other by the fire. The glowing embers cast shadows across their faces and picked out the reds and golden colours of the brightly painted walls.

‘Come in, Sister Therese,’ said the Bishop.

Therese rushed towards him and nearly fell at his feet, eager to show her deference, her obedient respect. He stretched out his hand and she kissed his ring of office.

‘You may sit,’ he said. Abbess Eleanor beckoned her to a stool