Brother Cadfael 09: Dead Man's Ransom

says hold them and find your man. But there's more. How recent is the news you have from the south? I fancy Owain has his eyes and ears alert up and down the borders, where your writ can hardly go. He says that the empress is likely to win her way and be crowned queen, for Bishop Henry has let her into Winchester cathedral, where the crown and the treasure are guarded, and the archbishop of Canterbury is dillydallying, putting her off with he can't well acknowledge her until he's spoken with the king. And by God, so he has, for he's been to Bristol and taken a covey of bishops with him, and been let in to speak with Stephen in his prison.'
    'And what says King Stephen?' wondered Hugh.
    'He told them, in that large way of his, that they kept their own consciences, that they must do, of course, what seemed to them best. And so they will, says Owain, what seems to them best for their own skins! They'll bend their necks and go with the victor. But here's what counts and what Owain has in mind. Ranulf of Chester is well aware of all this, and knows by now that Gilbert Prestcote is dead and this shire, he thinks, is in confusion, and the upshot is he's probing south, towards Shropshire and over into Wales, pouring men into his forward garrisons and feeling his way ahead by easy stages.'
    'And what does Owain ask of us?' questioned Hugh, with kindling brightness.
    'He says, if you will come north with a fair force, show your hand all along the Cheshire border, and reinforce Oswestry and Whitchurch and every other fortress up there, you will be helping both yourself and him, and he will do as much for you against the common enemy. And he says he'll come to the border at Rhyd y Croesau by Oswestry two days from now about sunset, if you're minded to come and speak with him there.'
    'Very firmly so minded!' said Hugh heartily, and rose to embrace his glowing cousin round the shoulders, and haul him out about the business of meeting Owain's challenge and invitation, with the strongest force possible from a beleaguered shire.
    That Owain had given them only two and a half days in which to muster, provide cover for the town and castle with a depleted garrison, and get their host into the north of the shire in time for the meeting on the border, was rather an earnest of the ease and speed with which Owain could move about his own mountainous land than a measure of the urgency of their mutual watch. Hugh spent the rest of that day making his dispositions in Shrewsbury and sending out his call for men to those who owed service. At dawn the next day his advance party would leave, and he himself with the main body by noon. There was much to be done in a matter of hours.
    Lady Prestcote was also marshalling her servants and possessions in her high, bleak apartments, ready to leave next morning for the most easterly and peaceful of her manors. She had already sent off one string of pack ponies with three of her men, servants. But while she was in town it was sensible to purchase such items as she knew to be in short supply where she was bound, and among other commodities she had requested a number of dried herbs from Cadfael's store. Her lord might be dead and in his tomb, but she had still an honour to administer, and for her son's sake had every intention of proving herself good at it. Men might die, but the meats necessary to the living would still require preservatives, salts and spices to keep them good and palatable. The boy was given, also, to a childish cough in spring, and she wanted a jar of Cadfael's herbal rub for his chest. Between them, Gilbert Prestcote the younger and domestic cares would soon fill up the gap, already closing, where Gilbert Prestcote the elder had been.
    There was no real need for Cadfael to deliver the herbs and medicines in person, but he took advantage of the opportunity as much to satisfy his curiosity as to enjoy the walk and the fresh air on a fine, if blustery, March day. Along the Foregate, over the bridge spanning a Severn muddied land turgid from the thaw in the mountains, in through the town gate, up the long, steep curve of the Wyle, and gently downhill from the High Cross to the castle gatehouse, he went with eyes and ears alert, stopping many times to exchange greetings and pass the time of day. And everywhere men were talking of Anion's flight, and debating whether he would get clean away or be hauled back before night in a halter...
    Hugh's muster was not yet common gossip in the town,