Catherine Coulter

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Authors: The Valcourt Heiress
Tags: Fiction, General, Romance, Historical, Fantasy, Knights and Knighthood, Crusades, Eighth; 1270
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man. How did you know of this man’s silver, Arthur? How did you manage to steal it ? How did you keep it a secret? Arthur’s master-at-arms, Elkins, was dead, killed in the fighting, he’d been told, before he could be tortured. Surely he’d known of the silver, surely he’d helped Arthur steal it. A cache of silver coins would be impossible for one man to handle.
    Miggins, boar grease slicking her face, sidled up to him, and grinned hugely, showing the few remaining teeth in her mouth. “Is your belly happy, my lord?”
    “It is.”
    “Iffen ye have money, my lord, Merry can buy all the provisions we’ll need at Winthorpe. Ye surely remember, Winthorpe is a goodly sized town right on the coast, so the trading is brisk. She said we must buy wheat for bread. And since our miller died, we must find a new man and rebuild the millhouse. We must plant seeds for vegetables and find young fruit trees to plant. We must have cloth, or wool to weave into cloth. Borran, our weaver, is alive, thank Saint Whisken’s bonny head of hair. What say you?”
    “I say if there is enough meat to last for a couple of days, then we will travel to Winthorpe in the morning. Merry, I will even buy some parchment and ink so you may make formal lists.” Garron paused a moment. “I have trained my memory to keep my lists in my head, a skill you should learn.”
    “Aye, a useful skill. I have always had parchment to write down my lists, but I will try.” She looked out over the great hall. “There is so much to be done, mayhap too much for me to remember since I am but a female.” She turned back to him and gave him a fat smile.
    Whatever else she was, she wasn’t afraid of him. He said, “I have always believed females have too many brains.”
    That was a novel thing for a man to say, especially a man who was a warrior, and she could but stare at him. Then she got to her feet and gave him a small curtsey. “I think you are wise to acknowledge it, my lord.”
    He waved away her words. “The hall is no longer an airless, filthy tomb. Aye, it is better now.”
    It was indeed, she thought, it was indeed.
    “Is there enough meat to feed everyone until we return from Winthorpe with provisions?”
    “Aye, there is.”
    “I am not surprised Father Adal succumbed to matters of the flesh. Even the pope has bastards, herds of them, I’ve heard.”
    She allowed a small smile. “That is what my father told me when he at last confessed to me I was his bastard. ‘A priest is naught but a weak man withal, despite his Latin.’ That was what he said.” Merry knew that to be true. The Valcourt priest, Father Minsk, was a learned man who loved God and women, in equal measure, and mayhap not in that order since he was particularly pleased when the young maids of Valcourt confessed to him in private.
    “What happened to your mother?”
    Merry’s brain blanked for an instant. “Did I not tell you? She died birthing me.”
    “I see.” He was testing her, she realized, and that meant he suspected she wasn’t what she’d said. Oh dear. She needed better lies, ones she could call up with no hesitation. She needed to have Miggins ask her questions so she could fashion believable answers before she left with Lord Garron on the morrow for their trip to Winthorpe.
    Garron turned away from her to speak to his master-at-arms, Aleric, his bald head a beacon in bright sunlight, so shiny it was. She wondered if he polished it.
    Merry looked toward Miggins, who was wiping meat juice from her chin with the back of her veiny hand. She was laughing, punching an old man on his shoulder.
    She hated lies.
    But they didn’t journey to Winthorpe the following morning.

12
    A fter breaking his fast the next morning with a boar steak and the last of his ale, Garron looked up to see Merry pacing, obviously anxious to leave. She looked, he thought, young and fresh and eager.
    Where had she come from?
    When he rose, she nearly danced to him, so excited she couldn’t

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