Asked about queen, awfully erudite, taking time out (7)
I believe the answer is:
queried
'asked' is the definition.
(querying is a kind of asking)
'queen awfully erudite taking time out' is the wordplay.
'queen' becomes 'q' (abbreviation for queen in chess).
'awfully' indicates an anagram.
'taking' indicates named letters should be taken away.
'time' becomes 't' (abbreviation).
'out' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'erudite' with 't' removed is 'erudie'.
'erudie' is an anagram of 'ueried'.
'q' placed within 'ueried' is 'QUERIED'.
'about' is the link.
(Other definitions for queried that I've seen before include "Expressed doubt about" , "Questioned" , "Marked with "?"" .)