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the barns. They drove off or slaughtered the livestock. Many of our folk were killed. Others fled. My da and mama put me in a tunnel with Elsbeth and Beiste. The horses were already waiting for us. They told us to flee.”
    “Who told you that the king sired you?” he asked her, curious.
    “Mama, but Da said I was still a Radcliffe, and should be proud,” Adair answered him. “They said the king would protect me. And Mama said that the queen had told her when Mama left her service that Mama would always have her friendship. I was to ask the queen that that friendship be offered to me, for it was my mama’s dying wish.”
    The duke nodded, then turned to Elsbeth. “You are certain both the earl and his wife are deceased?”
    “Aye, my lord,” the serving woman replied. “I went up to the hall myself the day after, before we departed for London. I saw both of their murdered bodies lying slaughtered in the courtyard of the hall. I had to leave them there, and it has troubled my conscience ever since, my lord. But I had no means of burying them, and no one to aid me in such an endeavor. The earl had ordered me to get my little lady to safety, and that was my first obligation.” Elsbeth wiped the tears that had begun to flow from her eyes.
    “You did your duty well,” the duke praised her. “You have naught to regret, mistress. Why, though, I wonder, was Stanton attacked?”
    “When word came of King Edward’s victories and the final defeat of the Lancastrians, one of the Percys decided to attack the few Yorkists in the region in an effort to avenge King Henry. And, I expect, to steal their lands. The Radcliffes were more prominent than most, and the earl, while never involving himself in the politics of it all, had also never hidden the fact that he stood with King Edward.”
    “Why was Stanton not better defended?” Duke  Richard wanted to know.
    “Stanton Hall is not a castle, my lord,” Elsbeth explained. “It was a large stone house alone out on the moor. It had suffered destruction in the past, but was always rebuilt. I once heard my father bemoan the fact  that the Radcliffes could not get permission to fortify our home or build a castle. The house was built upon a hillock. And a moat had been dug around the bottom of the hillock. The Scots who came calling over the border were usually just looking to steal our cattle, our sheep, or a pretty girl.”
    “You are not near Berwick then?” the duke asked.
    “Lord, no!” Elsbeth exclaimed. “We are closer to Cumbria, on the border with Scotland. The region is very desolate, my lord. Those who attacked us were not near neighbors. But if the Radcliffes were killed then the land was for the taking.”
    He nodded and then, looking down at Adair, smiled softly. The child had fallen asleep in his lap. “Poor little mite,” he said, stroking her dark hair. Then he looked to Elsbeth. “Listen well to what I tell you, mistress. My brother will accept his responsibilities with regard to this daughter of his. And the queen will not move against the child for the promise she made to Jane Radcliffe. But do not trust the queen. She is a cold and venal woman whose clever wiles managed to ensnare my lustful brother into wedlock. Even her own children fear her. Her first husband was a Lancastrian knight. Her grown sons from that union are dissolute and greedy, as are most of her relations, save her eldest brother. Did your master give you any coin for the child?”
    Elsbeth nodded. “I wear a pouch beneath my skirts, my lord,” she told him. “And there are gold coins sewn into the hem of one of my little lady’s gowns.”
    “Keep a few for your mistress, but tomorrow you will give me the bulk of your funds. I will place them with Avram the Jew in Goldsmith’s Lane,” the duke said.
    “A Jew? In England? I thought there were none,”
    Elsbeth said, surprised.
    “There are exceptions to every rule, mistress. London is a city of great mercantile importance,