Page 9 of Lord of the Forest

“I know that. But why?”

Ah, he’d made her frown again. “Because you smell so different from the scents of the forest.”

“As I should. I don’t roll around in um… ah… dead leaves, or never wash my shift.”

He sensed she was trying to arouse some emotion in him—guilt, mayhap? But it was hard to know. He’d long since lost the ability to recognize nuance in conversation—or to care about it.

“You’re mistaken. I wash my shirt, but not too often, lest it fall apart. It’s easier to wash oneself than one’s linens.”

Her eyebrows shot up. “You have only one shirt? How can a man with so high-quality a doublet have but one shirt to his name? You puzzle me greatly, Lancelot.”

“I came here with naught but the clothes on my back.”

“You ‘washed up’ here?”

“I’ll say no more. Shall we break our fast?” He’d set a net to catch pigeons, and if he was lucky, there’d be a fresh clutch of duck eggs on the little island further upstream. He would visit his traps, too, and see what was in them.

“Pigeon nets? But you’d have to climb so high.”

“I’m good at climbing.” He had bird arrows, too, stolen from the village, but it was so hard to find the arrows in the undergrowth once they’d been used. He was saving them until he felt desperate.

She was still staring at him in apparent fascination. “You don’t say much, do you?”

“Nay.” He had little reason to speak at all. Occasionally, he felt the sting of loneliness, the need for the company of his fellows. But until his memory returned, he had no idea of his place in the world.

“Have you any other clothes? Shoes? Rings, chains, badges—anything to show your estate?”

“Why?”

“I think you might be a great nobleman. There’s gold thread in the expert embroidery on your doublet. The under-cloth showing through the slashes in your sleeves looks like satin, and the better part of the top-cloth is dyed black. Do you know how expensive black cloth is?”

He didn’t, and he didn’t see why it mattered. “A nobleman?”

She tilted her head to one side. “Aye. You know—a fellow who dresses up like a peacock and struts about in finery and jewels, with a feather waving from his hat. Lives in a grand house, with an array of servants, has his meals cooked for him, enjoys multiple courses and removes, entertains his friends, and has his coffers filled with gold. Why am I telling you this? You’re teasing me. Of course, you know what a nobleman is.”

He scratched the back of his head, his nails running over the puckered skin at the rear of his skull, where his hair always grew more thinly.

“No jest. I think I have forgotten much that I once knew. The nature of a nobleman included.”

“That really is most irksome. And intriguing. But you haven’t answered my question. Do you have any other tokens that might indicate your true origin?”

There were his shoes, of course but showing them to her might be unwise. He kept them carefully wrapped and hidden, avoiding their use so as not to wear them out. In winter, he protected them by wrapping dried furze over them and securing it with strips of cloth. He made sure first to dip the rags in animal grease to keep out the damp. He’d become used to the smell. Which reminded him—he’d said he would wash.

“Can you light a fire, Maid?”

“Of course, I can, Sir Lancelot. Just show me where your strike stones are, and your kindling.”

He chuckled. “Sir Lancelot? Mayhap I should call you Elaine.”

She looked shocked. “Nay, never that. I always despised the Lady Elaine. My name is Clemence Fitzpayne from Clairbourne Manor, Brocking Hundred.”

“Clemence.” The name rolled smoothly off the tongue. “Are you a noblewoman?”

She threw her head back and laughed. It was a delightful sound, like the tinkle of raindrops on the brook in spring.

“Minor gentry, sir, although my stock is good, and my dowry fair. Times are nonetheless lean for us at present.”

He resisted the temptation to ask her more. They needed food, not conversation. Survival was fundamental—speech, a luxury.