The Safe-Keeper's Secret Read online

  “But—a rich man like that—what was he doing alone on the road—here by Tambleham?” Elminstra said. “And who would have had reason to kill him if not to rob him?”

  Dirk was shaking his head. “My father says that no one killed him,” he said. “My father says he put poison in a cup and drank it down. There was a silver goblet lying on the ground not three feet from his hand, and my father said the smell of wine was tainted.”

  “But then—but who—” one of the neighbor women said.

  But Elminstra was staring at Angeline, who was taking a sip from her own cup. “A rich man riding alone at night a few miles outside our village,” the witch said slowly. “Could this have been the man who came to visit you last night, leaving a baby at your sister’s door?”

  “I suppose it could be,” Angeline said.

  “But why would he do such a thing?” Lacey demanded. “If he knew he had left the child in safe hands, why would he then take his own life?”

  Angeline said nothing, but Elminstra was still puzzling it out. “Because he wanted no one to find out where he had taken the child,” she guessed. “He wanted no one to question him so ruthlessly that he might accidentally reveal where the child had gone.”

  “But what child would be so special that a man would have to give his life to protect it?” Dirk demanded.

  And then suddenly, everyone in the room fell silent as they all stared at Angeline.

  “The man was on his way back to Wodenderry,” said Dirk slowly. “The royal city.”

  “Do we have a king’s bastard in our village?” Elminstra asked in a very faint voice.

  Just then, one of the babies began a slow, mournful howling from the other room. Angeline smiled at them all, giving away no secrets. “Royal bastard or village bastard, someone is calling me,” she said cheerfully. “Let me go see what my niece and nephew want.”

  And she disappeared into the room where her sister lay, tending to two infants. Dirk and the women were left staring at each other, their faces pale and their hearts scampering madly in their chests. What a tale to be told tonight over garden fences and barroom tables! What magic had visited their village last night—indeed, come to live with them, nestled into the corners and alleys of their town! A king’s bastard! Who would have believed it? Everyone would know by nightfall. This was a Safe-Keeper’s house, of course, but this was surely one secret that would not be kept.

  Table of Contents

  Part One

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Part Two

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Part Three

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  The Truth-Teller’s Tale

  Part One

  Chapter One

  Eiona had assigned names to all her dolls, and she was arranging them by how much she loved each of the people those dolls represented.

  Her mother, of course, was first, followed closely by her brother, Reed. Her aunt Angeline was next, then Elminstra, then Lacey and Isadora. Of all the people she knew, Thomas was the very last, the person she liked least, and she not only put him at the end of the long line of dolls, she tossed him across the room so that his head landed under the bed.

  Unfortunately, Thomas was visiting her mother’s house this week, and she would have to be polite to him even though she didn’t want to.

  She had always liked Thomas just fine, until the last time he had come to visit. He was a Truth-Teller, a wanderer who went from village to village answering such questions as were posed to him and volunteering information that people might not have wanted to hear. Fiona was not the only one who disliked him because he had told her something that she would rather have believed was not true.

  But Truth-Tellers could not lie. Falsehoods could not cross their lips. Anything they said had to be believed.

  “Fiona’s growing into a fine young girl, isn’t she?” he’d said to her mother last time he was here. They’d all been sitting around the table, eating sweet apples and enjoying the late light of a midsummer evening. All except Reed, who’d been off playing with one of Elminstra’s grandsons. “How old are you now? Eight?”

  “I’ll be ten this fall,” she had replied.

  “Ten! So old! A woman grown before you know it,” he had said. He had a way of laughing when he talked, even when he told unpleasant facts, which was one of the reasons people did not like him. They thought he mocked them with unpalatable truths. He was gaunt and weathered from so much travel, and his dark hair and his curly beard were both a little unkempt. His brown eyes were set back in deep hollows, as though he looked out from a place of shadow on all the verities of the world.

  “She’s going to apprentice with Elminstra in a few years,” her mother said in her quiet voice. “Learn about herbing. She’s already better in the garden than I am.”

  “Not that that would take much,” Thomas said with a snort.

  Fiona was offended, but her mother grinned. “I do well enough with tomatoes and beets. But Fiona can make anything grow.”

  “Maybe she’ll be the village witch, then, after Elminstra’s time is done,” Thomas said.

  “No,” Fiona said. “I’m going to do my mother’s work. I’ll be a Safe-Keeper.”

  Thomas had looked straight at her with those deep and knowing eyes. “No,” he said, “you won’t.”

  Fiona had cried out in quite a fit of anger, but he had merely shrugged and peeled another apple. “I will so be a Safe-Keeper if I want to be,” Fiona had said again, glancing at her mother for support. But her mother had merely given her that quiet smile, hiding all her thoughts.

  “You’ll be what you choose to be,” Damiana had said, refusing to get into an argument or contradict Thomas or even seem to worry about what he had said.

  “I hate you,” Fiona had declared, stomping from the room. And no one had chided her for that and neither had Damiana mentioned the whole incident later that night when she came to tuck the children into bed.

  But Fiona did hate him, and she wished he was not here at her birthday party. She would just as soon not turn ten with Thomas the Truth-Teller sitting there, watching her with his considering eyes.

  Reed came to find her in her room a few minutes after she had rearranged her dolls, putting Isadora before Lacey after all. They shared the small upstairs loft, its sloped ceiling so low that Reed would not long be able to stand upright under its beams. A sturdy wall divided her neat half from his untidy one.

  “Fiona! Where are you? What are you doing? It’s almost time to eat.”

  “I’m just playing,” she called out.

  He bounded through the door and landed with a bounce on her bed. Almost instantly, he changed his mind, scrambled to his feet, and dropped to the floor beside her. He could never sit still, this brother of hers; he was always charging off in one direction or another.

  “Well, aren’t you done playing by now?” he asked, his voice carefully patient. He had learned a long time ago that it was very difficult to hurry Fiona. If she wanted to sit here till dawn of the next day, dressing and organizing her dolls, sit here she would, even if the whole town gathered downstairs for a feast in honor of her birthday.

  “Almost. Who’s here?” she asked.

  “Elminstra and two of her daughters and three of her grandchildren, and Dirk and his wife—oh, and their baby!—and his dad, and Josh and Ned—”

  “Is Angeline here?”

  He jumped to his feet and began to circle the room, touching the curtain, the oak dresser, the nightstand, in turn. “Not yet. But she said she might be late. She said not to wait dinner for
her.”

  “But I don’t want to eat without Angeline!”

  “Well, everybody else does! It smells really good and everyone is hungry.”

  “I don’t want to have to sit by Thomas.”

  “Fine. I’ll sit with Thomas. Greg and I will trip him if he tries to come over and talk to you.”

  Greg was Elminstra’s grandson, three months older than Reed. “I didn’t say I wanted you to do anything to him—”

  “Just come downstairs and eat,” Reed said impatiently, coming to a halt in the middle of her hierarchy of dolls. “It’s your birthday! We can’t have the feast without you!”

  She glanced up at him and smiled. For children who were not related by blood, they looked surprisingly alike. Both had fair skin and silky blond hair, Fiona’s hair finer and whiter than Reed’s, and both had slim, wiry builds that concealed their true strength. Reed was inexhaustible, able to run or play or even work tirelessly throughout the day. Fiona was not so active, but she knew she could endure almost anything. She had nearly cut a finger off one morning, slicing sweetroot at Elminstra’s, and she hadn’t even cried out when the knife went in. She had suffered every childhood disease without the smallest protest, and once, when she had fallen off a broad stone fence that she had been climbing, she had cracked her head open on a rock buried in the ground. She had not complained about that, either, not the littlest bit.

  “It’s your birthday, too,” she said. “They can’t have the feast without you either.”

  “Yes, but I’m going downstairs right this minute,” he said. “Please come? Make it a special day?”

  She put her hand out and he pulled her to her feet. Already he was an inch or two taller than she was; everyone predicted he would be a big, strapping boy, one of those fair, happy yeomen who could be found standing at the ale booth at every county fair.

  “It is a special day,” she said, and kissed him on the cheek. “Happy birthday.”

  She followed him downstairs to find everything ready for the feast and the thirty or so neighbors gathered there quite ready to begin eating. A little cheer sounded when she and Reed appeared, and they were pushed to the front of the line that had formed around the table. “Birthday children are the first to eat!” someone cried. Fiona loaded up her plate and took it outside to where a grand mismatch of tables and chairs had been arrayed on the lawn, and she and Reed both settled in. Soon enough everyone was gathered around them, Damiana sitting next to Fiona, Greg beside Reed, Elminstra on the other side of Damiana, and all the other neighbors falling in as they chose. The food—potluck supplied by all the visiting friends—was delicious, and there was so much of it that nobody felt too greedy going back for seconds, or even thirds.

  Thomas, who could usually be found right by Damiana’s side any time he was in town, spent most of his time in conversation with Dirk and his father, a fact that Fiona viewed with darkling satisfaction. He must have realized that he had offended her on his last visit and was making amends by keeping out of her way now. That pleased her very much, but not so much as it would if he took back his words altogether.

  “Mmm! This cherry pie is heavenly! Who could have made it?” Elminstra exclaimed.

  “Ned’s wife, I think. She said she had a new recipe,” Damiana replied.

  “Well, she came by to get cherries from me last week, but she didn’t say she was going to make anything this good.”

  “I liked the baked chicken,” Lacey put in. “What spices do you suppose she used? Mine never turns out quite like that.”

  “Dill and thyme,” Elminstra and Fiona said in unison, because it was the sort of thing any herbalist would know, and Fiona was taking pride in her ability to recognize all sorts of plants by their smell and flavor.

  Elminstra beamed at her. “That’s my girl! I’ll have to send you to my sister over in Merendon some day. She can grow a whole field of crops that won’t take purchase here.”

  “Yes, please,” Fiona said. “I’d like that.”

  Her mother reached over and tugged one of Fiona’s blond braids. “Not for a while yet,” she said. “You’re so little and Merendon is so far away. I want you to stay with me a while longer yet.”

  “Oh, of course I will,” Fiona said earnestly. “I’ll stay as long as you need me.”

  This caused the other women to laugh, which caused Fiona to scowl. But she didn’t have long to pout, because from the front of the house came the sound of a wagon creaking and a horse whickering.

  “Is this the party?” came a woman’s voice, somewhat faint as it carried around the house.

  “Angeline!” Fiona shrieked. Reed was on his feet even before she was. They raced around the vegetable garden at the back of the house, ducked under the branches of the kirrenberry tree, and leaped over the gate without bothering to unlatch it. Angeline was just then climbing down from the wagon, and she flung her arms out to offer them an embrace.

  “Look at you two! Reed, have you grown again? Fiona, your hair’s so long! It’s only been three months since I’ve seen you—how can you have changed so much?”

  They hugged her and danced around her and swore that they hadn’t changed, not on the inside, and look, didn’t she want to come in and see Reed’s new slingshot, Fiona’s new dolls?

  “In a bit, yes, indeed, I want to see everything,” Angeline said with a laugh. “But first I must get my bags from the cart and say good-bye to my friends—”

  Damiana spoke up from behind them, having come around the house in a more leisurely fashion. “Well, hello there,” she said in her warm voice. “I didn’t realize Angeline was coming to town with the two of you. Are you staying for dinner? There’s so much food!”

  Till now, Fiona had paid no attention to the couple sitting in the front of the wagon, but at her mother’s words, she looked up to see if she recognized them. The man and the woman looked pleasant enough, but Fiona was sure she’d never met them before. The woman was fair-haired and fragile-looking, wearing a fashionable blue dress over her brittle frame. Her companion was more hearty and robust, a well-dressed, wealthy-looking man with a kind expression. Fiona thought he was probably a merchant, since he certainly didn’t appear to be a laborer. She thought his wife looked boring.

  “We can’t stay,” the woman said in a faint voice, seeming to need all her energy to summon a smile. “I want to go to the inn and lie down.”

  “Victoria tires so easily,” the man said, apology in his voice. “But I understand you’re having quite a party here! A birthday celebration for these two young folks, is that right?”

  “Yes, sir. We’re ten, sir,” said Reed. He had already moved to the front of the wagon and was inspecting the horses. “I like your team! Matched bays! May I pet them?”

  “Very gently. The gelding on the left is a little edgy, but the mare on the right won’t mind.”

  Fiona was still looking up at the new arrivals, thinking no one should be tired if all she’d done all day was sit in a wagon, when her aunt’s voice came gently in her ear. “Fiona, you remember Robert and Victoria Bayliss, don’t you?” she said. “They live near me in Lowford, and they came by to visit two summers ago when you were staying with me.”

  “She wasn’t home that day,” Reed volunteered, his hand busy against the arched neck of the mare. “Remember? She’d gone off to the dress shop with your friend. But I was home. I remember you.”

  “Well, and I remember you! You’ve grown half a foot since that day, though,” Robert said genially.

  “You’re sure you won’t come in just for a bit?” Damiana said. “I could brew some tea, Victoria. It will pick up your spirits a little. And there’s wonderful pie.”

  “Thank you. It’s not my spirits but my body that’s frail,” Victoria said, again making the effort to smile. “If I could rest for just a while—”

  “I’ve got everything I need,” Angeline said briskly. “Go on into town. Thank you so much for the ride!”

  “We’ll be back in a few days
to pick you up,” Robert said, gathering the reins. “Young man, if you’ll step aside, we’ll be on our way. Happy birthday to the both of you!”

  And with a wave, he set the horses in motion. Victoria could not be bothered to wave, but she did smile again and give them a little nod before the wagon pulled out of sight.

  Reed went running back to the party, but the two women stood there a moment as if to gossip, and Fiona stayed beside them to listen.

  “She’s no better, then?” Damiana asked. Fiona supposed she was referring to the wan Victoria.

  “I do think she is in pain much of the time,” Angeline said. “I try not to hold it against her that she is such a poor and sickly thing. But Robert is so hale and energetic! It is a little sad to see him tied to her like that.”

  “Though I think he loves her,” Damiana said.

  “He is certainly good to her,” Angeline replied.

  “Who is she? Who are they? Why does she act like that?” Fiona interrupted.

  The woman exchanged glances and private smiles. “They are friends of mine from Lowford,” Angeline said, her hand coming to rest on Fiona’s head. “Robert is my landlord, and charges me almost no rent at all. Victoria has me sew all her clothes, because she says only I know how to set a stitch that doesn’t scratch her. Indeed, their patronage has made it very easy for me to live in Lowford all alone and not worry very much about money.”

  “But why does she act that way?” Fiona asked. “All bent over and hurt-looking like that?”

  “I suppose because she really does hurt,” Angeline said. “There was an accident when she was a young woman. She got swept out of her father’s boat and washed downriver. She was missing for weeks, and everybody thought she was dead. But then she returned, bruised and broken, having fetched up some miles downriver in a town where she knew no one, too sick to speak. It was only when some kind people there nursed her back to health that she could tell them where she belonged.”

  “Robert was quite taken with grief in the weeks she was missing,” her mother added.

  “Why?” Fiona said. She didn’t think Victoria seemed like the kind of person anyone would miss.