Doomsday Book (Oxford Time Travel, #1) - Connie Willis Page 0,164

his feet on the table. The monk had one of Sir Bloet’s waiting women backed into a corner and was playing with her kerchief. Gawyn was nowhere to be seen.

Kivrin took the sheets and coverlid to Eliwys, then offered to take bedding out to the barn. “Agnes is very tired,” she said. “I would put her to bed soon.”

Eliwys nodded absently, pounding at one of the heavy bolsters, and Kivrin ran downstairs and out into the courtyard. Gawyn was not in the stable nor the brewhouse. She lingered near the privy until two of the redheaded young men emerged, looking at her curiously, and then went on to the barn. Perhaps Gawyn had gone off with Maisry again, or joined the villagers’ celebration on the green. She could hear the sound of laughter as she spread straw on the bare wooden floor of the loft.

She laid the furs and quilts on the straw and went down and out through the passageway to see if she could see him. The contemps had built a bonfire in front of the churchyard and were standing around it, warming their hands and drinking out of large horns. She could see the reddened faces of Maisry’s father and the reeve in the firelight, but not Gawyn’s.

He was not in the courtyard either. Rosemund was standing by the gate, wrapped in her cloak.

“What are you doing out here in the cold?” Kivrin asked.

“I am awaiting my father,” Rosemund said. “Gawyn told me he expects him before day.”

“Have you seen Gawyn?”

“Aye. He is in the stable.”

Kivrin looked anxiously toward the stable. “It’s too cold to wait out here. You must go in the house, and I’ll tell Gawyn to tell you when your father comes.”

“Nay, I will wait here,” Rosemund said. “He promised he would come to us for Christmas.” Her voice quavered a little.

Kivrin held her lantern up. Rosemund wasn’t crying, but her cheeks were red. Kivrin wondered what Sir Bloet had done now that had Rosemund hiding from him. Or perhaps it was the monk who had frightened her, or the drunken clerk.

Kivrin took her arm. “You can wait as well in the kitchen, and it is warm there,” she said.

Rosemund nodded. “My father promised he would come without fail.”

And do what? Kivrin wondered. Throw out the churchmen? Call off Rosemund’s engagement to Sir Bloet? “My father would never allow me to come to harm,” she had told Kivrin, but he was scarcely in a position to cancel the betrothal when the marriage settlement had already been signed, to alienate Sir Bloet, who had “many powerful friends.”

Kivrin took Rosemund into the kitchen and told Maisry to heat a cup of wine for her. “I’ll go tell Gawyn to come get you as soon as your father comes,” she said, and went across to the stable, but Gawyn wasn’t there, or in the brewhouse.

She went into the house, wondering if Imeyne had sent him on yet another of her errands. But Imeyne was sitting beside the obviously unwillingly wakened envoy, talking determinedly to him, and Gawyn was by the fire, surrounded by Sir Bloet’s men, including the two who had come out of the privy. Sir Bloet sat on the near side of the hearth with his sister-in-law and Eliwys.

Kivrin sank down on the beggar’s bench by the screens. There was no way to even get near him, let alone ask him about the drop.

“Give him to me!” Agnes wailed. She and the rest of the children were over by the stairs to the bower, and the little boys were passing Blackie among them, petting him and playing with his ears. Agnes must have gone out to the stable to fetch the puppy while Kivrin was out in the barn.

“He’s my hound!” Agnes said, grabbing for Blackie. The little boy wrenched the puppy away. “Give him to me!”

Kivrin stood up.

“As I was riding through the woods, I came upon a maiden,” Gawyn said loudly. “She had been set upon by thieves and was sore wounded, her head cut open and bleeding grievously.”

Kivrin hesitated, glancing toward Agnes, who was pounding on the little boy’s arm, and then sat down again.

‘ “Fair maid,’ I said. ‘Who has done this fell thing?’ ” Gawyn said, “but she could not speak for her injuries.”

Agnes had the puppy back and was clutching it to her. Kivrin should go rescue the poor thing, but she stayed where she was, moving a little so she could see past the sister-in-law’s coif. Tell them