She had no cause to tell the tale, and the Archbishop should know that. She would speak with him tomorrow. Today. It must be close to dawn, though the rain kept the sky dark.
As she stared out into the wet darkness, the door opened behind her. She imagined Bess looking in, worrying over ber, and smiled to herself despite her fears.
Bess would be pleased to see her taking air. Stealthy footsteps crossed to the bed. A moan.
'I am too late? Oh, Nicholas, you are too cruel. Why did you not wait for me? You call me and then you do not wait. I have crossed through Hell this night to come to your side.'
Lucie shivered. It was the Archdeacon, the architect of all her sorrow. Owen must have gone to sleep. And Bess. Lucie could count on no one.
The man's breath wheezed and rattled like that of one wounded or very ill. 'I heard you, Nicholas. I heard. They tried to stop me. But I got away. Beautiful Nicholas. They closed your eyes. They did not want me to see them again.'
Lucie groped her way to the little table, holding her breath for fear she would kick something on the way. She felt for the little spirit lamp, turned up the wick. A bright flame flared out.
Anselm gasped as he was discovered and shielded his eyes with a twisted, swollen hand. Nicholas lay across his lap, peeled from his winding sheet. The Archdeacon looked hideous. Blood trickled down his forehead. He reeked of blood and the sweat of fever. A dark red stain spread across the winding sheet on his lap. He gave up shielding his eyes to hold Nicholas tighter, clutching his pale nakedness. 'I burned you. How did your spirit get free? Get thee hence, she-devil!'
'This is my house, you monster. And Nicholas was my husband.' Lucie moved closer.
Anselm bared his teeth and growled at her like a wounded cat, crushing Nicholas to him.
It was the stuff of nightmares. One dead, the other mad with pain and grief and looking as much a corpse as the dead man. The madman muttered something in Latin, prised open Nicholas's right eyelid with his swollen, twisted finger, and bent to kiss him on the mouth.
'In the name of Heaven, leave him alone’ Lucie trembled with rage.
Anselm lifted his eyes to Lucie. 'Heaven? What do you know of Heaven, she-devil?' He stroked Nicholas's hair, his stomach, his thigh, watching Lucie, enjoying her discomfort.
'Stop that!' she hissed. She tried to calm herself, to think of what she might use as a weapon. She remembered the knife she used for bandages. It was on the table beside the bed.
'I have a right to say my farewells.' Anselm bent to kiss Nicholas again. 'He loved me. I protected him.'
'Love?' Lucie edged closer. 'Nicholas feared you. He said you were mad. Evil.'
Anselm screeched and put Nicholas down with trembling arms.
Lucie grabbed the knife and held it behind her, backing away.
Anselm reared up. 'You are the spawn of the evil that poisoned the soul of my Nicholas’ he cried. 'Nicholas loved me. It was a pure, innocent love. And then she turned him away. Amelie D'Arby. The French whore’
'And so you tricked innocent Nicholas into killing her’
Anselm grinned. 'It happened just as I prayed it would’
'You coward. You had your beloved commit the sin for you. So Nicholas will burn for it. Not you’
'She will burn. Not my Nicholas. She died horribly. Haemorrhaging, life gushing from her. Such pain. Such fear. And she was unshriven, did you know that? Unshriven. She burns in Hell now, my little she-wolf. Do you think of her there? Writhing in the eternal fire?'
Lucie slashed out at his face with the knife. But she was inexperienced. She opened the side of his face, not his eye.
Anselm shrieked and lunged for the knife.
Lucie kicked at him’ but her skirts hampered her.
He knocked the knife out of her hand.
She grabbed a chair and rammed his side with it. He tottered’ but came back at her almost at once. He was bleeding from the stomach, the side of his face, his forehead. She could not imagine where he got the strength to continue.
He grabbed her. Got her neck in his hands. One hand pressed into her. The other did nothing. Lucie twisted in the direction of the bad hand. He drove her head against the wall. The impact stunned her and her knees buckled beneath her. Anselm yanked her up and slammed her head against the wall again. She screamed as she felt her knees go out completely. He grabbed her up and pressed her against the wall, the good hand round her throat.
Footsteps came pounding up the stairs. Dear God, give me the strength to kill him. For my mother. For my husband, Lucie prayed. She dug her nails into Anselm's hand. He rammed his head against hers. Her ears rang. She could taste his sweat and blood.
'Stay back, Dame Phillippa’ Owen called from outside the door. 'Stay out of the way.' The door crashed open.
Anselm hissed and clutched Lucie to him. Owen tore her out of the Archdeacon's broken hand. She crawled towards the knife.
Anselm, howling in anger and pain, lunged for Owen, who turned, caught him in his powerful arms, and threw him against the wall. Anselm hit it with a sickening sound of breaking bone and slumped to the floor, his head sinking down on his shoulder at an unnatural angle. Phillippa screamed.
Owen hurried to Lucie.
She knelt with the knife raised, staring at the broken body of the Archdeacon. 'You have killed him?' A touch of breathlessness. Disbelief. 'He was mine to kill. Mine.'
Owen knelt beside her, touched her chin, gently turned her face towards him. 'You put up a good fight, Lucie. He is dead now. He can hurt no more of your family.'
She twisted her head to look back at Anselm. 'He uncovered Nicholas. Kissed him and — '
'Let me take you downstairs’ Owen said gently.
'He — ' Lucie pulled away from Owen and struggled to stand by herself. 'He snarled and snapped like a wounded animal. I did not — He did not seem human. And the way he held Nicholas, I — ' she took a step towards Nicholas, his naked corpse lying on the sheet fouled by Anselm's blood. She put her hand to her mouth. 'The way he held him. Touched him. Taunting me. I — Nicholas died fearing him. And that monster held him there when Nicholas could not fight him.' Her body trembled.
'Lucie?' Owen touched her arm.
She backed away, went to stand over her husband's body, hugging her elbows to her sides, the knife trembling in her hands. 'My God. Even in death the man clutched at him. Such a terrible, suffocating love. More hate than love. What was my husband's sin, that he should suffer so long?' She lifted the bloodstained sheet. 'What right had he? What right?' All the blood. Her mother's gown had been heavy with blood, the skirt pooling on the rushes, so wet and cold. Her skin so smooth and cold. Owen went to her. 'Let me take you down to the kitchen.'
Lucie shook her head. 'Bess will have a clean sheet. She will have a clean sheet.'
A door opened down below. Footsteps crossed the kitchen, mounted the stairs. Voices murmured on the landing.
Bess stepped through the doorway. 'Merciful Mother,' she whispered at the sight of Nicholas's nakedness against the bloody sheet. 'What happened?' Her eyes searched the room, took in Lucie's blood-smeared face, the bloodstains on Owen's shirt, and rested on the body of the Archdeacon. 'Holy Mary, Mother of God,' she breathed, leaning down to him, then turning away as she caught the stench of his ordeal. 'You cannot have done all this?' She looked Owen in the eye.
'He was wounded already.'
Their voices seemed to wake Lucie. She dropped the knife. It clattered on the floor.
'Lucie?' Bess said. She dabbed at the blood on her friend's face.