Forsaken Soul

Chapter Thirty-Six

Tibia clutched her staff with such force that her knuckles shone bone-white.

“You must go to the priory hospital,” Signy urged as she eased the tortured woman onto an inside bench near the inn door. “I will take you there.”

Her jaw tight and eyes squeezed shut, Tibia shook her head with the impatience of the suffering.

“You need not fear walking. We will find a cart or men to carry you.”

Tibia’s groan was like the cry of an animal, uncomprehending yet instinctively fearing the cause of its torment. She opened her eyes and turned her pale gaze on the innkeeper’s niece. “You’re a good woman. My son should have married you. He’d have lived then,” she gasped through lips thinned by pain.

Signy said nothing. What merit was there in reminding this woman, whose mind seemingly wandered with grief and agony, that she had been too young to wed when Tibia’s son had died?

“Methinks it’s easing,” the old woman whispered. Indeed some color was returning to her face.

The innkeeper’s niece gently pushed a steaming bowl of pottage toward her.

“I can’t eat.”

“You must.” Gently, Signy rested her hand on a bony arm.

“The Devil’s coming soon enough for my soul. I don’t mind if it be sooner than later. Give this to another in need, one whom God might love more.” The old woman sucked in her lips. With so few teeth, her sharp nose almost touched her chin. “Is it true the crowner thinks you killed Martin and his whore?”

“I do not know what he thinks. We rarely speak.” Signy’s words sounded brave enough, but her trembling lips betrayed her fear.

“He must know better!”

The innkeeper’s niece shrugged. “He thought Ivetta killed Martin, but she has proven her innocence by dying herself. Perhaps I’ll be next. If so, I needn’t fret about the hangman’s mercy or whether my uncle will show kindness and pull my legs to break my neck as I dangle and choke.” She laughed in bitter jest.

“What reason would anyone have to kill you?” Tibia’s eyes narrowed.

“Why murder Martin, or why Ivetta?”

“Does anyone mourn them? Martin was a skilled cooper, but he was a cruel man and another will come to take over his trade. Ivetta was evil. Simple as that.”

“My heart held no love for either,” Signy said, reaching out to stroke the old woman’s arm, “and confessed as much to Prioress Eleanor. Perhaps I should not have done so. My honesty may suit our crowner well if he cannot catch the murderer but must find someone to hang.”

“You’re innocent! Unlike the man before him, this crowner’s an honest man.”

“The crowner before was honest enough, but he did make mistakes. Is Ralf so different?”

“Honest?” The old woman snorted. “Perhaps he was for those who could reward him for it. Since I couldn’t, he ignored my son’s death. I don’t think the current king’s man is as blinded by the glow of a coin.”

“So you believe our current crowner is less fond of gold or inclined to error? In the past, we did think him different from his two brothers, but hasn’t he come back from court a richer man? Methinks he is now beholden to the powerful and become much like you think his predecessor was.” Her voice cracked on that last and she bent her head, perhaps to hide tears.

Tibia drooped wearily. “You think he’d find an innocent guilty of murder then?”

“Have you not heard the tale?” Signy asked, rubbing her eyes.

“I hear little from my hut.”

“The thatcher said the butcher told him that Ralf had gone to seize both Hob and Will for the murder of Martin.” Signy turned thoughtful. “Although the fishwife did claim she heard the men arguing, she said there was no mention of any arrest. In short, the crowner did not take either into custody because Hob struck him on the head and hurried Will away. Now Will has disappeared, and even his brother does not know his whereabouts. Or so my uncle has said.”

“Do most think either is guilty?”

“No one does, except our crowner. Why should they have killed Martin? The blacksmiths and the cooper have been like brothers since they were all lads.”

“And Ivetta, their sister,” Tibia muttered, her eyes glowing with anger. “Incestuous whore!”

“Well, she is dead in any case, and Will is gone. If he has any sense, he is on the road to the west. Of those our Ralf thinks guilty of murder, only Hob and I remain. I think he prefers me to Hob in this.”

“Why?”

“Because the weapon was poison, a woman’s instrument according to the crowner.”

“Most of the women in the village could poison a man if they wished. It’s a poor wife that doesn’t keep a good herb garden well tended for her family’s ills. There’s no reason for our crowner to set his mind on you in particular.” Tibia shook her head as color began to fade from her cheeks again. “Methinks no one will be arrested for murdering either Martin or Ivetta.”

Signy raised a questioning eyebrow.

“Satan owned their souls. If the crowner wants an arrest, he better try to set his chains on the Evil One for ‘twas the Fiend that called them to Hell.”

“Surely a mortal hand helped?”

Tibia lurched forward, groaning with a spasm of pain.

Signy cried out as she reached out to comfort the woman. “Please! Someone find Brother Thomas and tell him that old Tibia desperately needs his potion!” she shouted to a nearby table of men.

The herb woman began to cry out with agonized moans.

A young man rushed to help. Another ran from the inn in the direction of the priory.

“Carry her back to her hut,” Signy begged.

The man nodded, then carefully lifted the trembling old woman into his arms and took her home.