Season of the Raven (A Servant of the Crown Mystery Book 1) by Denise Domning

English as I am."
    "You offer up a servant?" Edmund shot back. "What proof is that?"
    Faucon pressed his fingers to his throbbing temples as his far-too-empty stomach groaned. Twenty pounds a year wasn't nearly enough compensation for keeping Edmund as his clerk, and so he would tell his uncle at the first opportunity.
    "Halbert came out of Essex and has only relatives by marriage in Priors Holston," someone shouted from the crowd in English. "How do we swear when we don't know how he was born?"
    Stephen glared in the direction from which the voice had arisen, shifting back into English. "Do you want to pay that fine, Jos?"
    Shifting back to French, he told Faucon, "My father may not have lived here all his life, but I can supply as many witnesses as there are men here, all of them willing to swear to his English lineage. What say you, Simon Fuller? Will you swear on my father's behalf?" Stephen demanded of his neighbor.
    He offered the man a sly grin. "Perhaps I should mention that my sire told me he saw the mill you described, the one being used to full cloth, when last he was in Coventry."
    The fuller's arms opened. His gaze clung to Stephen, the expression in his eyes wary. "Did he now? And what think you of such a use for your mill? Are you of a similar mind as your sire, that building such a machine on my side of the race would be a waste of time?"
    "On the contrary, I think anything that brings you more prosperity will also benefit me," Stephen replied.
    All the hostility drained from the fuller. He smiled, the movement of his mouth slow and pleased. "Then I have no doubt we'll be able to find all the witnesses this good knight needs from among this crowd."
    Stephen shot a smug look at Edmund. "This chore is better done at the front of the mill, where more can see and hear us. Come, Alf. Simon."
    As they crossed the race and made their way around the corner of the mill, the older monk who'd helped free Halbert from the wheel came to kneel at the dead man's side. With the water draining from his habit adding to the already substantial puddle forming beneath the miller, the brother pushed up one of Halbert's eyelids. As it rose a distinct edge to the cloudiness in Halbert's eye was revealed. The monk made a satisfied sound, then, as Faucon watched in surprise, put his face close to Halbert's and pried open the man's lips as if he meant to count the miller's teeth, then turned one of the miller's palms upward to look at it.
    "Brother Herbalist!" Edmund protested. "What are you doing? Move back from the corpse. When I agreed to let you accompany me to Priors Holston this morning, it was only to share our devotions while we traveled in the same direction. It was not an invitation for you to intrude in the matters of your betters."
    Faucon touched his clerk's arm. Edmund shot him a startled look, snatching his arm close to his side as if the touch pained him in some way.
    "Brother Edmund, the miller's son will soon be collecting those who can swear to his father's ancestry," Faucon said. "Where are your quills and ink, your parchment and knife? I thought your purpose was to record all the details of these events. How can you do that without your accoutrements?"
    Edmund expression shifted until he looked honestly stricken. "Fie on me! When the sheriff arrived, I left all inside the mill in my haste to stop him from treading where he is no longer allowed to go."
    Then he glanced around the small space between the millwheel and the axle wall. "Impossible! I cannot write here, nor can the jury of the inquest witness the miller's body at this place. The space is too small. He'll have to be brought into the mill courtyard. Come with me so you can instruct the miller's servant to fetch his master's body for us," this servant commanded of his own master.
    "In a moment," Faucon replied, but Edmund was already across the race and rounding the corner of the mill, all else forgotten save his own errand.
    Faucon lowered himself onto one