The Innocent Read Free Page B

brought her back. “Here, child. Look into the water, tell me what you see…”
    That startled the girl awake. “Me? Will you not do the scrying, Deborah?”
    Her foster mother’s voice was pitched low now, soothing, almost humming. “Look into the bowl, Anne…. Concentrate. Just look into the water…. What do you see? What is there for you…”
    Perhaps it was the last of a dream still clogging her mind, perhaps it was the tone of Deborah’s voice, but the girl felt warm and secure—a child about to drift away to dreams in a warm bed as storms raged outside on a winter’s night…
    “There is a face…”
    “Describe what you see.” Again Deborah’s voice had that strange humming tone.
    Anne hesitated then her face cleared in relief. “Look. There he is. I see him. I can’t see his eyes, though…that’s because of the battle helm. Oh!” The girl then sat up so quickly she knocked the salt-glazed pottery bowl out of her own hands and the water spilled all over her dress. “Blood! Blood everywhere!”
    Her scream had cut through the buzz of the feast; the villagers fell silent, staring at the two women under the great oak. Deborah waved cheerfully. “Too much good ale! And a young head!” she had called, and laughter washed away the moment—uneasy though it was. Everyone knew Samhain was an uncanny time.
    Defiantly Deborah had locked glances with the priest as she’d helped Anne to her feet.
    “Do not worry, Father, she’s only tired. It’s been a long feast.”
    From that moment things had changed.
    Later, Deborah told the girl that with the spring it would be time for her to go to London and into service with a pious household. There she could complete the education that had been begun in the forest, for Deborah had no more to teach Anne in their small, safe world. The girl had cried herself to sleep for many nights, but Deborah was implacable, though it broke both their hearts. And so now, miserably, weighted with a sense of the abandonment to come, the girl followed her foster mother deeper and deeper into the city until they stood before the closed door of a great, dark house.

Chapter Two

    “You say you can both read and write Latin?”
    The man in the thronelike chair looked suspiciously at Anne as he smoothed the surface of the fine silk carpet covering his worktable with a capable, broad hand.
    “Yes, master, I can—and a little French and some English—and calculate also. And besides this, I have a knowledge of simples and dying, I have been taught to dress and tan leather, to cook, and embroider, to make tapestry, to prepare and weave flax and—“Enough.” A wave from the large hand and a hard look silenced the girl. Her throat tight with nerves, she dropped her eyes from his to disguise the fear.
    Mathew Cuttifer frowned at her. These were remarkable claims for any woman, and this girl was a peasant. He turned to the girl’s foster mother, a handsome woman with the permanently suntanned skin of the poor, who was also respectfully looking down at the floor.
    “Mistress…Deborah, is it?”
    Without raising her eyes, the woman nodded.
    “Are these claims true?”
    “They are, sir.”
    “And who has taught her?”
    “I have, sir—the domestic skills she speaks of. And the good priest of our nearby village. He believed my foster daughter warranted teaching. He gave her letters, and the numbers. And the Latin. He also spoke French and she picked it up. She learns quickly and he is an educated man.”
    Mathew raised his eyebrows at that. An educated man giving his time to teach a peasant girl? He looked the girl up and down. Plain, neat dress of homespun cloth—finely woven though it was—and abundant dark, tawny hair pulled back tightly from a high forehead.
    The girl’s eyes were unusual too; they had the surprising jeweled flash of kingfisher feathers, or topaz, the whites so clear they shone. True, she did not have the smooth egg-shaped face considered beautiful, for hers