Uncovering The Merchant's Secret. Elisabeth Hobbes

Church, a light shone out to sea. The church was on the clifftop set a short distance from the village. It was visible from the sea, so sailors and fishermen would know they were being watched over, but the purpose of the beacon was far from holy.

      Blanche had been preparing for bed, but could not ignore this. She muttered an oath under her breath. She tore off her chemise and began to dress in breeches and a shirt. Over the top of her padded, sleeveless gambeson she threw a heavy cloak, then tugged on her knee-length leather boots. She did not have time to braid her hair, but simply gathered it, twisting and piling it under a wide-brimmed sailor’s hat, and strode down the stairs, gathering a flaming brand from the iron ring in the wall. When she reached the path that led to the beach she broke into a run, arriving on the beach slightly out of breath.

      The bodies of drowned men littered the shore. When the moon slid from behind heavy, black clouds, the rocky shore looked like a battlefield. Blanche felt her stomach heave. She swallowed down the bile that rose to her throat and tightened her grip on the torch. She strode to the shore and peered out across the black rocks that glistened wet and sharp, only slightly visible above the surface. The rocks stretched out well into the sea and had been guilty of causing more deaths than Blanche could imagine over the centuries.

      Barrels bobbed, surging in and out as the tide dragged at them. Wine. This had most likely been a merchant ship. All around her, the villagers hauled the debris from the sea to carry it away or load it on to the wheeled carts they had brought in preparation for such finds.

      Was she the only one who felt a twinge of guilt at the way they treated the dead? A little way along the shore, a short, wide man was standing up to his knees in the water, heaving a cask back to shore. Blanche recognised him. Andrey was her cousin by her second marriage and the Captain of Blanche’s ship White Wolf.

      Blanche intercepted him as he dropped his salvage on the shingle and stood upright, stretching his arms to relieve the cricks in his neck.

      ‘Who ordered the fires to be lit?’ she demanded.

      Andrey scowled and spat into the sea. ‘Who do you think? Ronec did.’

      Blanche’s fist tightened around the flaming brand she held. Jagu Ronec was the landowner whose property neighboured Blanche’s. He was also the Captain and part-financier of Blanche’s second ship, White Hawk. He was wealthy, powerful and—as Blanche had found out only after she had allied herself with him—cruel and unprincipled. She counted to ten in her head, breathing deeply before she answered, wishing she had never thought to involve him in her crusade against the French forces. Even with this attempt at controlling the repellent emotions Ronec’s name conjured, her voice was tight and full of fury.

      ‘And you obeyed him?’

      ‘Not I,’ Andrey said. ‘But the crews are growing tired of waiting for your command to sail and your insistence on only taking French ships. They look to Ronec, anticipating an alliance between you.’

      Blanche flushed. There was an implicit criticism in Andrey’s words and it was not without reason. Ronec had already had more of Blanche than she had wanted to give and marriage was an alliance she was determined to resist to the last. The villagers’ discontent was something she would have to address soon. Ronec was not present, of course. He would not venture out to wallow in salt water in the dark when others could do it on his behalf.

      ‘Take the bodies to the castle,’ she commanded Andrey. ‘They deserve a proper burial.’

      Andrey nodded and began relaying the order to the men who had gathered round to watch them speaking. Andrey’s loyalty to Blanche was unquestionable and she knew that the dead would be laid to rest with respect.

      Blanche began to roll the barrel up the sloping beach to add it to the pile of salvage. The methods were dishonourable, but she would not let the salvage be wasted when it could be used to improve the lives of the tenants on her land.

      The barrel was heavy. Blanche paused for breath beside a corpse that had been washed further up the beach than most. The man was lying on his back, one arm tangled inside a heavy cloak that must have hampered his efforts to swim and should by rights have dragged him to the bottom of the sea. Yet here he was, lying on the beach, his long limbs sprawled out carelessly. He could have been napping on a riverbank on a warm summer afternoon.

      He was not a youth, nor as old as Andrey. Blanche guessed he was somewhere around his thirtieth year, only a handful of years younger than she was. Unbidden, her mind went back to her first husband who had died before his time. This man looked nothing like Mael, but the thought of stolen years upset her more than she was expecting, sorrow creeping around her heart like a winding cloth.

      She knelt down next to him, barrel of wine temporarily forgotten, and held the brand close to his face. He would have been handsome when alive and it struck her as unfair that he had been snatched from life in such a brutal manner. A deep gash split his right eyebrow and ran across his temple into his sandy-brown hair. It was stark red against the paleness of his skin, though the cold and seawater had staunched the blood flow and now it was a livid, ragged-edged wound.

      The laces of his shirt were untied to the middle of his chest. He must have been caught by surprise and had no time to dress properly before the cog was dashed on the rocks. By the flickering light of the brand, Blanche noticed the glint of gold among the fine, light brown hairs. She, reached beneath his collar, hooking her finger under the chain and drew out a delicate cross.

      The wreckers would simply rip it from his neck, snapping the chain, but Blanche could not bear to do that with something so beautiful. She stuck the torch into the sand and cradled his head, easing it forward to slip the long chain free. Red stones glinted on the surface. Something this beautiful was too fine to leave for the wreckers to break and waste on drinking, gambling or whoring. Blanche had little care for the treasures she stole from the French beyond what good they could do to aid the cause of Brittany or her tenants, but she was gripped with the need to make sure the unknown man’s treasure survived as a memorial to his life. She would not share this with anyone else so she slipped it around her own neck, tucking it deep into the bodice of her dress where it nestled between her breasts. An odd frisson made her shiver at the feel of the object that had been intimately touching him.

      As she rested the man’s head back, his eyes flickered open and he uttered a weak, breathy moan. He was alive! The strength of relief and joy that flooded her heart took her by surprise. He gave a heaving cough and water bubbled to his lips. Blanche pushed her hands against his ribs, pushing upwards to force any remaining water out. He bared his teeth and hissed. Mortified at having added to his pain, Blanche slid her hands gently up to his cheeks and pulled his head into what she hoped was a more comfortable position. His eyes opened once more—a little wider this time—and he peered at her. His eyes were light blue and full of confusion and pain. Though hazy, they were captivating in their intensity and Blanche could not tear her gaze away.

      Blanche’s hat had become dislodged when she had jerked in surprise. She pulled it off. As her thick, black locks fell freely about her, the man smiled and whispered something in a language she thought was English.

      ‘I don’t understand,’ she replied in Breton, then repeated it in French.

      He reached a hand out towards her hair, fumbling and clumsy. Blanche instinctively recoiled, as she did at the advances of any man, but as his fingertips brushed against her cheek with the lightest of touches, her heart fluttered.

      His strength was almost spent and his arm was seized with a tremor that made it shake violently. He could not be long for this world and the awakening was only delaying the inevitable. Blood loss and shock would claim him before the night was out. Already his hand was so cold with the clammy texture of a corpse. Instinctively, Blanche wanted to pull away, but remorse and guilt flooded her once more. Her people bore the responsibility for his death, so the least she could do was bear the discomfort and act as witness to his passing. She owed him that much. She covered his hand, holding it to her cheek and feeling the quiver that raced along his arm.

      He tried to pull her down towards him, tilting his head back and parting his lips as if he intended to kiss her.