Doomsday Book (Oxford Time Travel, #1) - Connie Willis Page 0,106

the reins. Agnes leaned far forward to grab them.

“Not Mother’s mare!” Rosemund said. “The roncin!”

“We will ride to the church, Saracen,” Agnes said, “and tell Father Roche we would go with him, and then we will go riding. Saracen loves to go riding.” She leaned much too far forward to pat the pony’s cropped mane, and Kivrin had to keep herself from grabbing for her.

She was obviously perfectly able to ride—neither Rosemund nor the boy saddling Kivrin’s horse gave her a glance—but she looked so tiny perched up there in the saddle with her soft-soled boot in the jerked-up stirrup, and she was no more capable of riding carefully than she was of walking slowly.

Cob saddled the roan, led it out, and then stood there, waiting.

“Cob!” Rosemund said rudely. He bent down and made a step out of his linked hands. Rosemund stepped up on it and swung into the saddle. “Do not stand there like a witless fool. Help Lady Katherine.”

He hurried awkwardly over to give Kivrin a hand up. She hesitated, wondering what was wrong with Rosemund. She had obviously been upset by the news that Gawyn had gone to Sir Bloet’s. Rosemund hadn’t seemed to know anything about her father’s trial, but perhaps she was aware of more than Kivrin, or her mother and grandmother, thought.

“A man as powerful as Sir Bloet,” Imeyne had said, and “his goodwill may be sorely needed.” Perhaps Imeyne’s invitation was not as self-serving as it seemed. Perhaps it meant Lord Guillaume was in even more trouble than Eliwys imagined, and Rosemund, sitting quietly at her sewing, had figured that out.

“Cob!” Rosemund snapped, though he was clearly waiting for Kivrin to mount. “Your dawdling will make us miss Father Roche!”

Kivrin smiled reassuringly at Cob, and put her hands on the boy’s shoulder. One of the first things Mr. Dunworthy had insisted on was riding lessons, and she had managed fairly well. The sidesaddle hadn’t been introduced until the 1390s, which was a blessing, and mediaeval saddles had a high saddlebow and cantle. This saddle was even higher in the back than the one she’d learned on.

But I’ll probably be the one to fall off, not Agnes, she thought, looking at Agnes perched confidently on her pony. She wasn’t even holding on but was twisted around messing with something in the saddlebag behind her.

“Let us be gone!” Rosemund said impatiently.

“Sir Bloet says he will bring me a silver bridle-chain for Saracen,” she said, still fussing with the saddlebag.

“Agnes! Stop dawdling and come,” Rosemund said.

“Sir Bloet says he will bring it when he comes at Easter.”

“Agnes!” Rosemund said. “Come! It is like to rain.”

“Nay, it will not,” Agnes said unconcernedly. “Sir Bloet—”

Rosemund turned furiously on her sister. “Oh, and can you now sooth the weather? You are naught but a babe! A mewling babe!”

“Rosemund!” Kivrin said. “Don’t speak that way to your sister.” She stepped up to Rosemund’s mare and took hold of the loosely looped reins. “What’s the matter, Rosemund? Is something troubling you?”

Rosemund pulled the reins sharply taut. “Only that we dawdle here while the babe prattles!”

Kivrin let go of the reins, frowning, and let Cob make a step of his laced fingers for her foot so she could mount. She had never seen Rosemund act like this.

They rode out of the courtyard past the now-empty pigpens and out onto the green. It was a leaden day, with a low blanketing layer of heavy clouds and no wind at all. Rosemund was right about it being “like to rain.” There was a damp, misty feeling to the cold air. She kicked her horse into a faster walk.

The village was obviously getting ready for Christmas. Smoke was coming from every hut, and two men were at the far end of the green, chopping wood and throwing it onto an already huge pile. A large, blackened chunk of meat—the goat?—was roasting over a spit beside the steward’s house. The steward’s wife was in front, milking the bony cow Kivrin had leaned against the day she tried to find the drop. She and Mr. Dunworthy had had a fight over whether she needed to learn to milk. She had told him no cows were milked in winter in the 1300s, that the contemps let them go dry and used goat’s milk for cheese. She had also told him goats were not meat animals.

“Agnes!” Rosemund said furiously.

Kivrin looked up. Agnes had come to a stop and was twisted backward in her saddle again. She obediently moved