Gwendolyn's Sword Page 15

  10

  HOUNDS OF HELL

  William rode up and down the line, checking in with each of the men, learning their names and observing their demeanor with one another. Their new captain’s casual conversation would have a relaxing effect on the men, but Gwendolyn knew, as she watched William, that his chatting had a purpose and that he was discovering more about the new men in his command than they were telling him. He had taught her that the strength of any fighting unit lay in the cohesiveness between its members; hidden rivalries, old wounds, and personal scores to settle were as life-threatening as a faulty shield strap. As she followed his movements while he reviewed the ranks of the Tower guard, she realized that she had learned more in William’s company than the mere wielding of weapons.

  Behind her, Nigel settled into his new charge as second in command, given to him by William as they had loaded up to leave. Nigel had taken stock of all the weapons and given orders to the squires and pages for their duties during the stops they would make to water the horses and to give the armed riders an opportunity to dismount and ease the stiffness from their limbs. No one spoke to her, which suited her for the moment. With time, the Tower guard would come to see her as one of them, as her own men at Penhallam had. She smiled to herself, imagining the first opportunity to train together in the morning and the fun of taking advantage of the errors these new men would make in underestimating her.

  They had traveled maybe a half-dozen miles when it was time to stop and take shelter, before nightfall overtook them. William picked a flat meadow alongside a stream, and as soon as they stopped, all of the travelers hopped down from their carts or dismounted from their horses and went to work. Fires were lit, wood gathered, water carried. Gwendolyn walked through the bustling camp, leading Bedwyr to water at the stream, and listened to the light-hearted remarks and raillery exchanged by the men of the Tower guard as they efficiently built a pen for the horses, dug a latrine, and staked tents. She had a moment of nostalgia for Penhallam and the fellowship of the manor garrison, but she walked on, tending to her own duties. By the time Gwendolyn had watered Bedwyr, removed the saddle, and checked the mare’s hooves, her private tent was already erected and outfitted with a soft pallet to sleep on, a basin and jug of fresh water on a small trestle table, and a brazier ready to receive coals from the fire that was now burning at the center of their encampment. Tall, iron stakes in the ground held up tallow candles that gave the inside of the tent a soft, inviting glow. Her maid, Sybil, followed her into her tent and made to reach for her armor and then paused, her eyes smiling. Gwendolyn realized Sybil would have no idea what to unbuckle first or how many layers she would find beneath.

  “You’d better call for one of the squires,” Gwendolyn suggested, and Sybil curtsied and wordlessly darted from the tent. Gwendolyn unfastened her cloak and began to unbuckle her sword belt when the tent flap moved again and she turned around to see William ducking his head to step in.

  He paused just inside the opening, stooping slightly so as not to brush his head on the canvas above, and took in the comforts provided by Eleanor with raised eyebrows. But then he turned to face her, and his surly scowl dropped back into place.

  “You might have told me,” he said curtly.

  “It was none of your business,” she replied, matching his tone.

  “Your safety is my business.”

  She looked him in the eye; she could not fault him for his loyalty. But there were some things that were hers, that were private, and always would be. “You choose to take folklore as truth, that you are the prophesied guardian of the heir of Caliburn. That is your prerogative, but don’t—”

  “I made a promise to Robert. I gave him my word, if it ever came to it. My life for yours.”

  Gwendolyn stopped where she stood, her mouth frozen in mid-argument. A moment of astonishment blocked all other thought.

  “He had no right to ask that of you.”

  William held her gaze, unflinching, unmoved. “He didn’t ask. I offered. He accepted.”

  Gwendolyn felt her chest rise and she took a long breath and let it out slowly.

  “I didn’t risk my life to save you when I was not yet a man so that I could stand by the next time you were in peril,” he continued.

  Gwendolyn backed up a few steps and settled herself down onto the pallet behind her. She leaned forward and rested her forehead against her palms. “Save you,” had been his words, and she felt rebellion against them welling up inside her, solid and undeniable. She had been a girl then, a child. But not now. She was not his to save. The easy banter of the camp carried on outside her tent, but she paid no attention to it. There was a slight rustling at the tent flap, and one of the squires leaned in, smiling, but when he saw their faces, felt the tension between them, he mumbled an apology and withdrew. Gwendolyn sat upright and faced William again.

  “I am no man’s to save. Not yours. Not Robert’s.” William began to protest, but she silenced him with a flick of her hand. “And if I had told you, it wouldn’t have changed a thing. We would still be exactly where we are now.” Her voice was reasonable, calm. “Anyway, you’ve kept your own secret—you and Robert. This deal that you made without my consent or knowledge.”

  “You knew I was responsible for protecting you.”

  “Not like this,” she argued back to him, her voice low. “This is different. You believe this pact you have made gives you authority to know and direct every part of my life.” William looked down to his feet and she knew she had struck on the truth. “Admit it. This has been the one, the constant point of contention between us, William.” She held him with her gaze. “Understand this now. Your sacrifice does not give you control over me.”

  “Gwendolyn. I …” William paused, calmer now, and she saw him struggle for words. “I should have been prepared for the risk you took. I should have known.”

  “It was private,” she said, an angry edge rising again in her voice.

  William opened his mouth to say something more, paused, and then turned his back to her, pacing the few steps that the tent allowed.

  “Why … why did you and Robert never …”

  She watched his back as he crossed his arms. He already knew the most personal part of it. He might as well know the rest.

  “Because I never wanted to.”

  William turned and lifted his face to her, his eyes softening as his brow relaxed. He did not know Robert well, and he had assumed that her husband would have the character of any other son of a wealthy baron—spoiled, entitled, not the sort to set aside his husband’s right and body’s desire over the reluctance of a young wife.

  “And Robert accepted that?”

  “Robert de Cardinham is the best man I have ever known.”

  William stood quietly, patiently, while Gwendolyn explained the circumstances of her marriage, the bargain that she and Robert had made with each other: that he would leave her in charge of Penhallam, with her oath to protect its people and see the land and the estate to greater prosperity, while he won the king’s favor and reward in service in Outremer. Gwendolyn did not share with William whether any real affection existed between herself and Robert, because the fact was that she was unsure herself. And after having been apart for so many years and the gulf she had crossed from that time to become the woman she was now, she was not sure that she was even capable of that kind of affection. Her woman’s life thus far had been full of hard work and struggle and not much else. There was no time or even a desire for any sort of companionship other than that of Penhallam’s household. The romantic songs of the troubadours held no interest for her, and she had never felt the longing or desire that they sang about. For his part, she had no idea how the years of war, the cruelty and predation of repeated siege and battle, might have changed Robert. She stood up and shook the tension out of her arms. None of this would interest her constable, in any case.

  “When he returns—” William began, but then stopped and looked away.

 
“When he returns, I don’t know what will happen,” she admitted.

  William paused to look at her, as if he had not really seen her until that moment. She was not, by any measure, the same woman Robert had left years ago. He turned to face her squarely and took a step closer so that he stood before her, almost eye-to-eye. She stood her ground, unsure what to expect, and saw the flinty expression he gave to his men-at-arms when they lined up in full armor for his inspection. She braced herself in case she was about to receive the stiff shoulder slap William usually reserved for Penhallam’s men-at-arms.

  “I’ll see you at training tomorrow,” he said, then shook his head and sighed before turning to step outside of her tent.

  The following morning, Gwendolyn awoke to moonless starlight and roused Sybil, asleep on the straw across from her. She could hear the Tower guard outside stirring and she was eager to dress and join them for their morning exercises before camp broke to resume the journey to Arundel. When Sybil held up the new green dress to her to put on, Gwendolyn told her to put the garment away. She needed no reminder of her sex and the loss of freedom that had almost come with it.

  She emerged from her tent comfortable in leggings and a belted tunic borrowed from the squires, her hair pulled back again into a single braid. The stars had disappeared and the liquid glow of pale dawn began to spill across the sky from the east. They would have friendly weather that day for their travels. She sucked in a deep breath of fresh air, happy to be out of the noise and clutter and stench of London. Her hands had begun to grow soft from lack of training, hard calluses had sloughed away, and she followed the sounds of William’s and Nigel’s voices to where the Tower men were assembled, her spirits high with the prospect of rough exertion and physical challenge against new opponents.

  When she arrived, the men of the Tower guard had already faced off against one another in pairs. With the addition of Nigel they were an odd number, and as soon as he saw her William called to her to take position against the odd one out. She scanned over the heads of the sparring men and spotted one who was standing to the side, waiting his turn to practice with the others. She picked her way carefully through the men until she stood before him, a slender young knight by the name of Tristan. Tristan cast an uncertain glance in William’s direction as Gwendolyn took a wooden staff from one of the squires. She was about his height and build, slightly more lithe, a good match for training. She assumed a combat posture, and Nigel tossed Tristan a wooden sword.

  “She’ll take your head off, soldier, if you keep standing around like an idiot.”

  William called out for the paired fighters to shift positions and start again, and Gwendolyn’s staff struck out and smacked her opponent on the side of the leg, dropping him onto one knee before he realized what had happened. She quickly completed the well-known series of moves in her attack: staff against collarbone, tip thrust under jaw. She had held back from actually inflicting injury with the last two blows, but it was clear enough that he would have been instantly killed had the battle been real. And although her assault had been utterly predictable, the young knight had hardly moved his sword, which in this setting was the same as an insult. Gwendolyn withdrew her weapon and extended a hand to help the man up, which he refused. Looking around her, she realized the other men had stopped their combat practices and were staring at her and her opponent. Their hardened faces reminded her that these were some of England’s best fighting men, part of a company of men hand-selected by William Marshal himself to guard the very blood that ruled England. Not only was she a newcomer from the relative backwater of Cornwall, she was a woman, and she had strolled into the middle of their training and dropped one of them without receiving so much as a scratch. Not that Tristan had made much of an effort to defend himself.

  Tristan hesitated, his boyish blue eyes prematurely aged by a deep scar that crossed from his brow to his cheek. He had probably been quite handsome, she thought to herself, and wondered if he resented the loss of his looks to his vocation. Perhaps she reminded him of a love who had abandoned him after the injury. Then again, perhaps he was glad to be free of such fickle affections. As all of these thoughts crossed her mind, he still would not raise his sword against her. This would not do. But there were other ways she could get him to fight her. As the clatter and grunts of men fighting with wooden weapons rose around them again, she tried to rouse him to anger to encourage him to fight her.

  “I met your sister yesterday,” she said evenly, holding his blue-eyed gaze coolly. “I was given a tour of the Tower stables. She said she likes her oats very much.”

  Like her attack with the staff, the taunt was unoriginal and well known, but it succeeded anyway. Tristan snarled, raised his weapon, and lunged. She deflected the clumsy attack with her staff and spun to face him again as he stumbled past her. He lunged at her again, swinging his weapon downward in rapid hacking attacks. She watched his eyes and anticipated every movement, blocked them all smoothly, and when he hesitated to catch his breath she smacked the staff hard against his ribs.

  William, who had been walking among the men to observe their skill and technique, stepped in behind her opponent and tapped him on the shoulder.

  “Stings, doesn’t it?” he asked Tristan.

  “My side is fine, sir,” he replied sourly.

  “Not your ribs. Your pride.” William approached the knight, and Tristan stood up straight at attention and glared past Gwendolyn into the distance. William leaned in close to speak into his ear in a low voice.

  “If you think you are looking at a woman,” he said and paused, gesturing toward Gwendolyn, “you are wrong. You are looking at a killer, and that is all that matters.”

  Gwendolyn felt herself blanch at the words, but they were true. She held her ground as Tristan regarded her with narrowed eyes as he weighed William’s description of her as a “killer.” William took off his shirt and took the man’s wooden sword from him. He signaled to the attending squire, who dashed over with a similar wooden sword for Gwendolyn and took her staff from her. The other men stopped their exercises and gathered into a loose circle around them, watching with curious anticipation. Another squire handed William and Gwendolyn each a round wooden shield.

  William turned to face her again, grinning, fully transformed from the man she was coming to know as her fussing guardian into the lethal warrior she had first met at Penhallam shortly after her wedding. The effect was almost feral as he circled her with predatory grace. He stopped and moved his sword arm in a smooth arc, weapon extended, defining the space around him.

  “This is where I can kill you.”

  She and William had not faced off against each other in years, William preferring to observe and comment as she fought with Gerald or Tom rather than engage her directly himself. She stepped toward him to the tip of the wooden blade and measured the distance. When she knew his reach, she looked up again and nodded.

  He crouched low to the ground, spreading his stance, a smirk inviting her to advance. The wooden sword in her hand was clumsier than her weapon, and poorly balanced. But the point of the exercise was timing, judgment, movement, tactic. She stepped in, swinging low, causing him to lower his shield to block her, and she used her weapon alternately as a club and a spear, beating and jabbing, and blocking his return blows with her own shield. But then William unleashed himself. He rained down his blows with such force that splinters flew from the shield and he pushed her back. She stumbled and fell over flat onto her back, limbs and thoughts disorganized in the confusion of finding herself lying on the ground. The point of his sword immediately went for her neck before she could roll or raise her shield to protect herself.

  “Like that,” he said to Tristan, as she raised herself back up to standing again. Tristan nodded and stepped forward, but she was enjoying herself too much. William’s war experience made him the best opponent she had ever faced off against. She shifted back to battle stance, shook a lock of hair out of her eyes.

  “One more time, Wil
liam,” she said with a toying grin. “See if you can do that again.”

  In spite of the chill his battle-ready leer sent through her, Gwendolyn took position facing him again. All eyes of the Tower guard were fixed on them now. She realized with unexpected pride that William was truly a master of combat, of his sword, and of himself. For a moment it was easy to imagine how terrifying he could be in the pitch of battle, streaked with blood, roaring with his weapon high.

  As she approached to his right, swinging and hacking with more force than she realized she had in her, he shifted his rear foot half a step backward, expanding his reach and increasing his stability. But he had also exposed his forward leg just enough, and she adjusted the swing of her blade to strike the target he offered. Too late she realized that he had anticipated her movement; he had simply baited her. His foot went out and she was sent sprawling into the dirt, to the laughter and amusement of the surrounding men. She hit the ground hard, opening a cut in her chin and knocking the air from her lungs. Slowly, she rolled over, pushing dirt and gravel from her lips with her tongue and spitting it out onto the ground beside her.

  He was not holding back, and she understood immediately. He was giving her the chance to prove herself to the Tower guard, to earn their respect by refusing to give up or walk away from a fight.

  Gwendolyn stood up and brushed the dirt from around her face and clothes and found her footing again, her cheeks flushed. Without a thought, her far hand formed a fist and flew out to slam squarely into William’s jaw. She noted with satisfaction how quickly she had recovered—quickly enough for her fist to catch him by surprise. She shook the sting from her hand, hoping the crunch she had heard was only the knuckles and not her recently mended bones cracking. William steadied himself and turned to face her, a pleased smile spreading across his face.