Travesty
Pain arrowed into Adelina’s neck when the metallic turn of the key jolted her awake. Dawn’s early light hadn’t yet penetrated the chamber, but it came to her she was still on her knees beside the bed, her head on the mattress, her mother’s cloak still around her shoulders. Exhaustion must have claimed her sometime during the night. She’d prayed for a miracle but the light from a single candle illuminated Glenda’s gloating face. No one had come to steal her away from this awful place.
She could think of only one reason her rescuers hadn’t come. They’d been apprehended. She remembered seeing Mandeville emerging from a farm building and wondered…
“Time to get wed,” Glenda crowed.
“But it’s still dark, and my clothes…”
“Thy groom doesn’t like the light. Bothers his eyes.”
Adelina swallowed any further protest when Glenda produced a lethal looking kitchen knife and touched the tip to Adelina’s nose. “Nary a word to yon major, or he dies.”
Adelina could only nod, her throat too constricted to utter a word in reply. Mandeville apparently wasn’t aware of the subterfuge. She didn’t want to cause his death if he was her only hope.
Still grasping the knife, Glenda linked their arms and draped an apron over the concealed weapon. The sharp tip nicked Adelina’s ribs as she was summarily whisked out of the chamber, down a dimly-lit hall and into another chamber that reeked of decaying flesh.
Holding her breath, she barely had time to glimpse Mandeville by the door. Before Glenda blew out the candle, plunging the chamber into complete darkness, she became aware of an enormous lump of a man even taller than the major standing beside him.
“Dearly beloved,” a thin voice announced as she was dragged forward, her trembling legs making contact with what she assumed was a bed. “We are gathered to join this man…”
As the voice droned on, she squinted at the dark shape covered by bed linens and furs. Her groom’s labored breathing echoed like a death rattle. Unable to see his face, she raised her incredulous gaze to Bertha standing at the opposite side of the bed. These malevolent women would be rid of her as soon as the dowry was handed over.
“I now declare ye to be man and wife,” the voice intoned.
Any attempt to voice her outrage that neither she nor the wretch in the bed had repeated vows was silenced by the point of the knife.
“The dowry, Major,” Bertha demanded.
Fearing she might swoon from fright, Adelina hoped the soldier realized a travesty had just taken place and that their lives would soon be forfeit.
* * *
If Harcourt had to inhale the fetid air in the wretched chamber for much longer, he feared he would faint dead away, which might be a better alternative to bearing witness to the travesty taking place. There were undercurrents swirling in the room he didn’t understand.
His heart bled for Lady Adelina, but the foul breath of the lout standing behind him served as a clear warning of the violent consequences of voicing any objection.
He was King John’s representative, though, surely, even the tyrant would be appalled at what was transpiring.
There wasn’t enough light to see the priest, and the bridegroom sounded like he was at death’s door. No one had uttered marriage vows as far as Harcourt had heard amid the cleric’s monotonous diatribe. And why was Adelina clinging to the cheeky maid she’d never seemed overly friendly with?
As dawn’s first rays crept into the chamber, the woman named Bertha watched him like a she-wolf stalking her next meal.
He was drowning, the dowry chest in his hands a rock pulling him down into the mirky depths.
Astonishingly, Adelina hadn’t swooned. Indeed, he was mildly surprised they were both still alive.
An absolute certainty chilled his blood. He had to think fast. If he handed over the chest, he and Adelina were as good as dead.
“It’s customary at court for a noblewoman to present the dowry to her husband,” he declared, pleased his voice didn’t betray his trepidation. He had no idea if such was the custom, but he suspected folks in this rural backwater didn’t know either.
After a moment’s hesitation, the scowling maid loosed her hold on her mistress. Adelina walked toward him as if in a trance, but he noted a gleam of defiance in her gaze. Taking it as a good omen, he passed the chest into her hands, drew his sword and pivoted, nigh on decapitating his guard with one swipe of his blade.
Things were a blur after that. As the gurgling giant crumpled to the floor, Harcourt grabbed the chest and urged Adelina to run.
The near-corpse in the bed sat bolt upright and shouted, “They’re fleeing.”
Harcourt didn’t have time to verify his suspicion that the voice sounded remarkably like one of the youths who’d served as his guides. Certainly, there was naught amiss with his lungs.