Midnight Magic by Shari Anton

votive candle, allowing all to think he did so in honor of the old lord. If the pretense didn’t aid his cause, for certes it could do him no harm.
    He dismounted near the church steps.
    The children’s curiosity got the better of them, and when they gathered around to ogle the men in chain mail and to admire the horses, the women and the few men about crowded around, too.
    Alberic smiled down at one particularly grubby, flush-faced urchin, remembering his own early childhood spent in a village not unlike this one. Barefoot, garbed in a tunic of rough weave, he’d once chased with other children around a common well.
    A hitch in his heartbeat accompanied the many memories.
    Most of them were of his mother, scraping out a living as the village brewer. He’d never doubted her love for him, or that she did all she could to make them comfortable, and done very well. Not until near the end had she told him about his father, and of the few pence the earl sent each month to keep her from telling others of his youthful misadventure.
    At times Alberic wished she’d kept her secret. At others, like now, he felt grateful. He’d endured much growing up at the fringe of Chester’s shadow, but the final gain was well worth the hardships he’d suffered. He now had the means to prove himself worthy of the earl of Chester’s acknowledgment, and he meant to make the most of the opportunity.
    Alberic squatted down to face the boy nose to nose. “What is your name, lad?”
    The boy’s eyes went wide, likely surprised to hear English from his lord rather than Norman-French.
    “Edward . . . milord.”
    “A good English name.”
    “Me mum says she named me after the great Confessor.”
    “Then you must strive to do justice to the name.” He tilted his head. “Your nose met the ground today. Did it hurt?”
    The boy rubbed at the smudge of dirt. “Nay.”
    A woman’s work-worn hands landed on the boy’s shoulders. Alberic looked up to see a short, round female, gray streaking her otherwise brown hair.
    “Beggin’ yer pardon, milord. Did me boy do somethin’ he ought not?”
    Alberic realized he probably shouldn’t have given in to the urge to talk to the boy. Most lords didn’t bother to notice a peasant child, much less deign to talk to him. In doing so, he’d frightened the boy’s mother.
    Alberic rose up. “He has done nothing wrong, mistress. Indeed, he seems a fine lad.”
    Relief and pride mingled in her toothy smile. “I believe so. If I can be so bold, milord, might I ask after the ladies of the castle?”
    “All are well.”
    “Lady Emma, too?”
    “I believe I heard someone say she recovers.”
    “Praise be. Poor dear. She suffers so. Would you be kind enough to tell Lady Gwendolyn—”
    “Mistress Biggs, his lordship is not a messenger!”
    Sedwick’s admonition pricked Alberic’s ire, hearing again the haughty Norman treatment of the English. He might look Norman, might speak English with the undertones of the Norman-French he’d been forced to learn and use after coming under Chester’s influence. But Lord above, he couldn’t bring himself to forswear his peasant roots, or treat this woman with less courtesy than he would a noble lady.
    He shot Sedwick a disapproving glance before addressing Mistress Biggs. “What is it you wish Lady Gwendolyn to know?”
    Unsure of herself, she pressed her lips together before gathering her courage. “That we miss her, milord.”
    “You are accustomed to seeing her often?”
    The woman nodded. “Once a sennight, at the least. She . . . she brings out medicines and spare clothin’, and bread what’s got burned on the bottom.”
    “She tends to the villagers’ needs.”
    Another bob of head. “Seems she does not mind tendin’ the likes of us, like Lady Emma. Hard to say how we would get along without Lady Gwendolyn’s care.”
    “What of Nicole?”
    Her smile returned. “Betimes she comes with Lady Gwendolyn. The girl likes to play with the