The Lady of Secrets Read online

  Whatever the gift was, Robbie seemed loath to hand it over. He thrust a small pouch into her hand and cupped her fingers around it. “Here take this. Hide it beneath your shift.”

  Maidred stared at the pouch, squeezing it gingerly. It seemed to be filled with some grainy substance.

  “What is it?”

  “Something that will make sure you do not suffer overmuch. It—it will take your pain away.”

  “Oh!” Maidred breathed. She feared the terrible agony of the flames more than she did death itself. “What am I supposed to do? Do I swallow some—”

  “No. Just tie the pouch around your neck and keep it close to your heart.”

  “Is it an amulet of some sort? Is it magic?”

  Robbie was unable to meet her eyes. “Yes,” he said hoarsely. “It’s magic.”

  His words were greeted with a high-pitched laugh that startled them both. Maidred spun around to discover that Tamsin had awakened, or perhaps she had been alert for some time. Knowing the wily old woman as she now did, it would not have surprised Maidred if Tam had been feigning sleep while listening in on their conversation.

  Tam leaned against the wall, her thin arms dangling over her bent knees, her eyes agleam with amusement.

  “Aye, powerful magic,” she cackled. “The kind that will scatter your soul clear up to the heavens.”

  Robbie rounded on the old woman. “Shut up, you old hag. You are the one who has been the ruin of my sister. This is all your doing.”

  “Truly?” Tam raised her thick gray brows in mock astonishment. “I thought you just said you were to blame. Anyone but dear little May.”

  “You were the one who filled her head with nonsense about sorcery, lured her to the church that night.”

  “Is the fisher to be blamed if the foolish wee fishy has a taste for its bait? There are worse things your sister could have done. She could have been stealing out to spread her legs for some lusty lad.”

  “Damn you!” Robbie clenched his fists and took a step toward Tamsin.

  Maidred seized hold of his arm. “Robbie, please. Just ignore her.”

  As I should have done.

  “You have no idea how much pleasure I will take in watching you burn, you loathsome crone. If you were not already bound for hell this day, I vow I’d snap your neck myself.”

  He meant it. Robbie’s arm felt like steel beneath Maidred’s grasp. The bitterness and anger in his face alarmed her. She would have never imagined her gentle brother capable of such hatred.

  “Robbie,” she pleaded, trying to draw him away from Tam.

  The old woman appeared unmoved by his fury or his threats. Tam got to her feet, shaking out her tangled mass of gray-white hair. She yawned, stretching her arms and arching her back like a scrawny cat.

  She smiled at Robbie. “Regretful as I am to disappoint you, laddie, I won’t be going anywhere. The devil will have to wait for me a bit longer. Nor will heaven be getting itself another angel in the form of your bonny sister. No one is going to die today.”

  “If you believe that, then your brain is as rotted as your soul. You have broken the sacred law against practicing witchcraft—”

  “Sacred law!” Tam cut him off with a contemptuous sniff. “That law has been writ down in the books since my grandmother’s time and how many witches have been burned? None, I’ll warrant you. Oh, I have been hauled up before the magistrate and condemned for sorcery before. I’ve been imprisoned, chained in the pillory. Once I was even flogged. But that is all that ever came of it.”

  She shrugged. “We are not like those barbaric English, hanging poor folk for a little magic. The Scots have a healthy respect for their cunning women.”

  “This time is different,” Robbie said. “The king himself is coming here today to witness the sentence being carried out.”

  “Aye, and that will be our salvation. King James will pardon us.”

  “Will he?” Maidred asked. Tam looked so confident, Maidred felt a flicker of hope, like glimpsing a far-off light in a night of unending darkness.

  Robbie pressed her hand. His face was still taut with anger, but his eyes gentled. “No, May, he won’t. This witch and her friends made a waxen image of the king to bring about his destruction. That is not just witchcraft. That is treason.

  “The king believes that when he sailed to Denmark to fetch home his new bride, the coven brewed up storms to prevent his ever returning to Scotland. Why would he pardon those he deems responsible?”

  “Because the king was present in the court the day I was examined.” Tam smiled slyly. “I whispered a few private words in his ear, showed him exactly how powerful a cunning woman I am.”

  “Then you sealed your own doom, you old fool.”

  “Nae, our king is a soft man, afeard of his own shadow. How many times have the great lairds of this land plotted and rebelled against the king? And how many of them have been put to death by the king’s command? Very few. The king is always quick to forgive, eager for reconciliation.

  “That’s because our good king Jamey has no stomach for violence.” Tam grinned at Maidred. “So don’t you fret, lass. Just watch me and do as I do. When the king arrives, drop to your knees, fake a few tears and a little repentance. Cry out to His Majesty for his mercy and we’ll both come out of this all right. You’ll see.”

  Maidred trembled. Weep, beg, and appear contrite? She would have no difficulty with that because her tears would be genuine, her remorse sincere. But could the king be so easily moved?

  Maidred wanted to believe Tam, but she had placed too much faith in the old woman’s assurances before to be comforted.

  She looked instead at her brother and it was Robbie’s expression that heartened her. His face had gone still, but his eyes blazed with the same hunger that threatened to consume her.

  The hunger of hope.

  ROBERT BRODY SHOVED HIS WAY THROUGH THE CROWD MILLING in the streets. Jostled and pushed from all sides, Robert thrust back, jabbing his elbow sharply into the paunch of a burly merchant.

  “Oof! Easy there, lad,” the man said. “No need to be so impatient. There should be space for all of us to get a good look. These two witches are only the first to die. There will be many more trials, many more burnings to come.” He chortled. “So if you don’t manage to squeeze to the front of the crowd today, you can come earlier and gain a better position for viewing next time.”

  Rob gritted his teeth, fighting the urge to drive his fist into the man’s jovial countenance. But if he ever started punching, he feared he’d never stop. This sea of smiling faces and merry voices infuriated him, sickened him.

  A holiday mood prevailed, as though they had all come to attend some harvest-day fair instead of watch an innocent girl burn alive. Many of these fools had even brought their children to witness this horror.

  Rob shook with the effort to contain himself. He had been perishing to lash out at someone ever since the sentence of death had been passed upon Maidred. But he couldn’t afford to do anything rash that might get him injured or arrested.

  He still had two other sisters waiting at home, dependent upon him. Taking deep breaths, he conjured up an image of Brenna and Annie until he was able to check his anger.

  He loved his two younger sisters, but they were not the same as Maidred. She was his twin. Born in the same hour, fashioned of the same blood and bone, she was the light to his shadow, the keeper of the dreams he had long ago abandoned. How could he endure to lose her?

  But maybe he wouldn’t have to. He had tried to pay no heed to anything Tamsin had said, but maybe the old crone really was a witch. Her words seemed to take possession of his mind.

  No one is going to die today. The king will pardon us.

  He was afraid to believe her. He had steeled himself to accept Maidred’s death and now that miserable old woman threatened to breach his armor, giving him hope. A hope so sharp, it was painful, pressing like a dagger tip against his heart, threatening to draw blood.

&n
bsp; He sought refuge in his reason. Was there any rational basis for thinking that the king might pardon Maidred? Rob tried to recall all that he had ever heard about James Stuart, sixth king of Scotland.

  A cradle king, they called him, elevated to the throne when a mere babe after his mother had been deposed by her rebellious Protestant lords, who had risen up against the Catholic queen.

  Mary had fled to her cousin, Elizabeth Tudor, for refuge, only to find herself the captive of the English for the next eighteen years. She had finally been charged with treason and beheaded by the English four years ago. The same Scots who had once reviled Mary as a Jezebel and a Papist whore cried out at her death and elevated her to martyrdom. The entire country had gone into mourning.

  Lost in grief for his own father around the same time, Rob had barely noticed. Now he wondered about the king, what effect losing his mother in such a fashion had had upon James. Perhaps knowing what it was like to have a member of his family executed so unjustly would render James more compassionate.

  Surely Rob had heard from someone other than Tamsin that James was reputed to be a merciful man, and who could fail to take pity on Maidred? She was so young, so innocent, and a comely lass.

  James would have to have a heart of stone not to be moved by Rob’s sweet sister. And yet Rob had heard darker whispers about the king, that James’s heart was far more apt to be touched by the sight of a handsome lad than that of a maid.

  Naught but a scurrilous rumor, surely. Had not James recently married a lovely Danish princess? He had been such an eager bridegroom, he had done something unheard of for a king. He had not waited for his beloved Anne to come to him, but had risked leaving the safety of his kingdom to sail to Denmark to secure his princess.

  And almost died. Violent storms had battered the king’s fleet, nearly sending the king and his bride to a watery grave. Storms that were attributed to the witches’ coven gathering at the kirk, weaving their foul spells. What man would not want vengeance against those who had threatened the life of his young wife?

  But the king was said to be a scholar, a man of vast intelligence and knowledge. He was likened to the great King Solomon. No matter what old Tam claimed she had whispered in the king’s ear, could any man so wise truly believe in her nonsense? Could the king look upon Rob’s childlike sister and imagine Maidred possessed of an evil power to brew storms and sink ships?

  Rob’s head swam as he weighed the possibilities, balancing reason against his own desperate wishes. The scales of his mind teetered, leaving him torn between hope and despair.

  Lost in his thoughts, he was taken unaware when the crowd fell back, nearly knocking him off his feet. Righting himself, he saw the cause of the commotion. A horse and cart had emerged from the castle, two women tied in the back.

  “Witch! Witch! Devil’s strumpet!” The cries went up.

  As the wagon lumbered past, the prisoners were pelted with clumps of mud and rotting cabbages. Rob tried to put a stop to it, but there were far too many in the crowd hurling abuse.

  Rob’s only comfort was that most of it was aimed at Tamsin, although he was astonished to see that there was someone who cared about the crone’s fate as well.

  Two slatternly-looking wenches with red hair trotted alongside the cart and stretched out their hands to the old woman. “Granddam! Granddam!” they wailed.

  Rob supposed he should have felt some pity for the two girls when the guards drove them back. But his jaw hardened. Tamsin had had no compunction about luring his innocent sister into danger, but obviously the wily old woman had taken care that none of her own kin should be put at risk. Those two strumpets had not been among those arrested at the church, but surely they must be as steeped in witchcraft as their grandmother. If there were any justice, they should have been bound with Tamsin in the cart instead of Rob’s sweet sister.

  Like Tamsin, Maidred had been stripped down to her shift, and her hair … those wayward silky curls that Rob had oft tugged at and teased his sister for being so vain. That golden brown mane had been shaved to a stubble, leaving Maidred looking like a shorn lamb. So young, so scared and lost.

  Thrusting himself forward, Rob waved his arm so that she might see him, know he was there. Her lips curved into such a brave little smile, it nigh broke his heart. She touched the front of her shift where the pouch he had given her was concealed. Despite the hope Tamsin offered, he had insisted Maidred wear it and his sister had not resisted, believing it to be magic.

  Rob felt sick. What kind of man did a thing like that? Fastened a lethal dose of gunpowder around his unsuspecting sister’s neck. No man at all, only a boy too weak and ineffectual to do anything but help his sister to a less agonizing death. He should have tried harder, found some way to rescue her even if it cost him his life.

  The king was Maidred’s only hope. As the cart trundled onward, Rob kept pace, trying to keep in her view, a difficult feat with so many people milling about him.

  Caught up in the crowd, Rob followed the cart through the city gates, toward an open stretch of field. He could see the stakes mounted on the rising ground, the faggots heaped and waiting, all a safe distance away, where no stray spark could bring disaster upon the buildings of Edinburgh.

  As the cart was reined to a halt, Rob craned his neck, looking desperately about him. Where was the king? Surely James should have arrived by now. Perhaps he wasn’t even coming.

  Had not Rob also heard that the king had an abhorrence of crowds? Perhaps James had changed his mind about attending. Perhaps the rumors were untrue and there had never been any possibility the king would come.

  Rob watched as his weeping sister was dragged from the back of the cart. He bowed his head, feeling overwhelmed by despair. He should never have listened to Tamsin, should never have for a moment allowed himself to believe …

  “The king. The king!”

  The excited shouts brought his head whipping back up. His heart thudded as he saw the approaching contingent of horsemen, the royal pennant flying. The knife of hope returned, piercing him more painfully than ever.

  The crowd drew back respectfully as the horsemen rode into their midst and drew rein, some half dozen in all. Rob scanned the faces of the mounted figures, trying to pick out James Stuart.

  “Which one is the king?” He didn’t realize that he had spoken the question aloud, until someone answered.

  The genial merchant Rob had jostled against earlier pointed a thick finger. “There. The wee man in the center.”

  Rob would never have described the king as a wee man, but James Stuart appeared dwarfed in the midst of the strapping, rugged lords who attended him. A slender young man with a trim beard, his dark clothing was unremarkable, bearing none of the regal trappings one might expect of a king.

  His gloved hand fidgeted with the clasp of his cloak. He was clearly loath to be here, not eager to witness the grim spectacle to come. The thought increased Rob’s hope.

  Tamsin wriggled free of her captors. She flung herself to her knees before the king, crying, “Mercy, great king. Take pity on a poor old woman who repents the error of her ways and would serve you forever as a grateful and loyal subject.”

  Maidred followed suit, sinking down beside Tamsin. His sister was unable to speak for her sobs. She held up her bound hands in a pleading gesture that to Rob was more eloquent than any words.

  The king stared down at his reins, patting the neck of his chestnut mount. He refused to look at the two women and Rob’s heart sank.

  Knocking several people aside, Rob fought his way forward and knelt beside his sister. Of the two of them, Maidred had always been the bright weaver of words, Rob more awkward in expressing himself. But with Maidred’s throat clogged with tears, it was up to him to find the words to move the heart of a king.

  “Please, Your Grace,” he stammered. “Have mercy. My sister is but fifteen. She was misled. I beg you. Just look at her and you will see her innocence and goodness. She is no witch. She would never seek to harm
anyone, especially not you, our gracious king.

  “I have already lost both my parents. Maidred is everything to me. If I am to lose her too—I cannot bear it.”

  Rob’s voice cracked. It was difficult for him to beg, to bare his raw emotions to the impassive young man who towered above him.

  But his plea induced James Stuart to look at him, the king’s dark eyes roving over Rob with an expression of interest and compassion.

  The king’s gaze flicked from Rob to Maidred and then back again. Rob sensed the king’s hesitation and held his breath.

  It seemed to him the gathered throng did as well. The only thing that broke the silence was a loud snort. Not from one of the horses, but one of the king’s retainers.

  One of the lords who attended upon the king leaned forward to pass a remark to the rough-hewn knight mounted next to him. Both men smirked.

  Rob could not hear what had been said, but it obviously had been audible to the king. James flushed a bright red. His face hardened and he lowered his hand.

  “Proceed,” he commanded.

  “No!” Rob’s throat burned with the force of his protest. But the single syllable was lost beneath Tamsin’s cries of outrage and her granddaughters’ howls of fury. Maidred sobbed as she and Tamsin were seized by the guards and wrenched to their feet.

  The iron hold that Rob had sought to keep on his emotions snapped like a rusted dagger. He leapt up, fighting to wrest Maidred from her captors. He succeeded for a moment, straining his weeping sister close to his heart before she was wrenched out of his arms.

  “Robbie!” She wailed as she was dragged away to be bound to the stake.

  All reason forgotten, Rob lashed out in a blind haze of fury in an effort to get to his sister. Punching, kicking, gouging, he hardly felt the blows being dealt him from all sides until a hard club to his temple caused him to reel.

  Strong hands forced him to his knees and a gruff voice rasped in his ear.

  “Stop, lad. You’ll do neither her nor yourself any good by this. You canna save her.”