The Illuminator Read Online Free PDF Page B

against the afternoon sun, she thought longingly of her cool, dark bedchamber. But not yet. First, she must see the steward to receive his quarterly accounting of the wool receipts and the rents. He was already late with the collections by a fortnight, and she would not feel easy until she felt the weight
of
the coin in her hand. She knew at the first indication of a womanly weakness or lapse in vigilance, he would strip her clean as a beggar’s bone.
    Her supply of gold florins already plundered, she had been forced to satisfy the priest’s third extortion with her ruby brooch. He had shown up on the Feast Day of Mary Magdalene and suggested that, if she paid for prayers for King Edward’s soul, the loyalty of her household could not be questioned, even by those who might wish her ill.
    And now—today. Today, the greedy priest had taken her mother’s pearls. Smiling greasily, Father Ignatius had slid them into his cassock. They are only pearls—she’d steeled herself against the loss—only pearls. A creamy strand of gleaming stones, the necklace that her dying father had pressed into her hands in a rare display of affection.
I gave them to your mother on our wedding day. Wear them always near your heart,
he’d said. And she had, putting them on every morning like some good-luck charm, some angel’s token of her mother’s guardianship. They had become as much a part of who she was as the chatelaine’s keys that nestled between the folds of her skirt. But they are only stones, she reminded herself. Not brick and mortar. Not lands.Not deeds. And she had no daughter whose hands she could press them into saying,
Wear them next to your heart. They belonged to your mother and her mother before.
    â€œI have nothing left to pay for prayers, Father Ignatius,” she had said, her voice husky with unshed tears. “I trust our souls and our persons are now divinely protected. You have no further cause to trouble yourself on our account.”
    He had inclined his head in what she hoped was silent acquiescence, but as she ushered him to the courtyard where he mounted his horse, he spoke to her in the unctuous voice she loathed.
    â€œLady Kathryn, in a household such as yours,” he said, looking down at her from his horse, “with a breath of scandal hanging over it, you would do well to wear your
natural
piety like a garment. A
resident
priest is a requirement of a truly devout household. I’m sure your friend, the abbot of Broomholm”—the sly smile, the veiled gaze beneath the scraggly black line of brow—“would agree. Would he not?”
    So. He had found her out. He knew she had no friends at the abbey.
    That was when she first felt the familiar, squeezing pressure around her left eyeball. He would try to plant some spy so that he could keep a tighter grip upon her purse, or, worse yet, insert himself into her household on a permanent basis.
    He didn’t wait for her reply, but pulling on his horse’s reins, said over his shoulder, “Think about what I’ve said. We’ll talk about it when I return, next month.”
    Next month! By the saints and by the Virgin, too.
    There must be some way to rid herself for good of that extortionist priest.

    When the steward finally waited upon her an hour later in the great hall, Lady Kathryn’s left temple throbbed. She could not concentrate.
    â€œIf my lady is indisposed, I’ll just leave the bag with the rent receipts. She need not bother herself with the details of the reckoning. Sir Roderick often—when he was busy—”
    She picked up the bag and weighed it in her hand.
    â€œSir Roderick was more trusting than I, Simpson,” she said evenly. “You would do well to remember that.”
    â€œI meant no offense to your ladyship. My only desire is to serve you well.” The words were right, but not the tone. There was an insolence about the man that made her