Gwendolyn's Sword Page 21

  “Take these up there,” she said, handing him the extra rolls that she carried and gesturing with her chin toward the keep. “And be careful crossing over to the doorway into the keep. Keep your eyes about you. Tell anyone who asks that you are my page, and bring these to the women sitting with the infants in the hall.”

  Michael nodded and set off, readily distancing himself from Edmund. She watched until he had begun the ascent up the stone walkway atop the curtain wall and then turned her attention toward William. The man was streaked with mud and blood from head to toe, and he moved gingerly as he lifted his oilskin for a drink of water.

  “What happened?”

  William handed his horse’s reins to the groom who came to assist him and turned to her, his eyes flashing.

  “Where were you?” he countered. “I saw you coming up the hill toward us. And who was the boy walking with you?”

  “I went to town.”

  “Alone?”

  She set her jaw and stared back at him. Walter de Coutances walked past them on his way to the gatehouse and she reached out to put a hand lightly on the archbishop’s arm.

  “Your Excellency,” she said politely, “what happened?”

  De Coutances stopped and shook his head, running a hand through his silver hair.

  “The earl was thrown from his horse just as the boar showed. D’Aubigni would have been trampled if William hadn’t hopped on top of the boar in mid-charge to bring it down.”

  Gwendolyn turned back to William and crossed her arms. “And you quarrel with me for taking a walk in plain sight of the castle.”

  “Yours was an unnecessary risk,” he replied sharply.

  “Say that again after I tell you what I’ve discovered.”

  William had his back turned to her, loosening the straps on his saddle and retrieving his scabbard, but when he turned around to face her she saw the scrapes and mud again.

  “But it can wait,” she continued. “I’ll have new clothes sent to you, and warm towels in the kitchen so you can clean up. Are you injured?”

  She watched him make a show of rolling his shoulders and tilting his head left and right, working out the kinks. “Everything seems to be working.”

  She shook her head and sighed. “The boy’s name is Michael. He’s an orphan. And he’s my page.”

  She was sitting on the edge of the wooden pallet she slept on, waiting for him when he returned from washing up in the kitchen. He stood framed by the doorway, dripping wet and dressed only in his leggings, while steam rose from his body in the crisp autumn air. Looking at him, she could not imagine why he had not yet taken a wife. It was not unusual for men to wait until they had achieved a certain station in life, acquired a certain amount of wealth, so that they were in a position to bargain for an even greater gain in wealth and title from the match. Women, on the other hand, had no such prospect of increasing their wealth prior to marriage; their value lie in their ability to supply heirs. The arrangement resulted in many poor matches between older men and much younger girls. Thus the courtly joke that “love and marriage do not mix.” But William was in his prime; Robert had already granted him land at Penhallam’s northern border, and, short of a title, William’s thrift and position had made him one of the more well-off men in the area. But then another thought occurred to her.

  “Have you refrained from marrying because of me?”

  William paused in the doorway, startled, then narrowed his eyes.

  “Don’t flatter yourself.”

  Gwendolyn smiled at the retort, and William entered and crossed to the stack of clean clothes that Agnes had left for him. He picked them up and gave her a sarcastic look. Gwendolyn took the hint and retreated across the room to face the wall while he dressed.

  “I meant, is it because you believe in the prophecy, that you’re supposed to be my guardian, that you haven’t married yet?” This was not what she had planned to discuss, but considering how much time they had spent together lately, the question had begun to stand out in her thoughts. In any normal circumstance, William’s duties to Penhallam would leave him constantly in the company of men. But while he believed in and fulfilled his supposed duty under the prophecy of Caliburn’s return, he would be constantly in the company of a woman—not an easy thing to explain to a wife.

  “I don’t see where that‘s any of your business,” he said flatly behind her, grunting as he pulled on his shirt.

  “It’s not my business, William,” she replied, a little exasperated. “But am I not allowed to be concerned for your wellbeing? As a friend?”

  She heard William’s movements pause behind her, and a long silence passed between them while he finished dressing.

  “You can turn around now.”

  When she faced him again, he had seated himself on the bed to pull on his boots and he had on a pair of new leggings, expertly stitched.

  “I have no desire to marry. It has nothing to do with the prophecy.”

  They had always been direct with each other; she would not begin second-guessing him now. She decided the question was answered and moved on to the topic of actual interest for the moment.

  “There’s something you need to know about Edmund. All that carrying on when you returned from the hunt wasn’t just the concern of an overly protective son. It was an act.”

  She described for William the scene that she had walked into in the tavern, including the fact that Edmund apparently had his own gang of men from the garrison, no doubt enjoying the benefits of his purse while puffing him up with false flattery and thoughts of standing up to his father to demand an even larger purse. William’s jaw tensed when she told him about Edmund’s torment of Michael, but he breathed more easily and the corners of his mouth lifted when she told him about finding the boy and bringing him up to the castle.

  “Well, we shouldn’t be here for much longer. Eleanor will have spoken with John by now, by messenger if not in person. This plan of yours will come to its end, John will agree to stand down, or he won’t—either way Eleanor won’t need you here any longer, and we can return to Penhallam. And then maybe you’ll reconsider the prophecy, and might search in earnest for the sword. Tintagel is hardly a day’s ride from Penhallam.”

  She raised an eyebrow at him. “Don’t hold your breath.”

  Nigel stepped into the doorway behind her with his hand firmly on Michael’s shoulder beside him.

  “This fellow says he’s your page?”

  Gwendolyn’s expression softened at the sight of the boy, clearly distressed that Nigel was about to toss him back out onto the streets.

  “He speaks the truth. He’s with me.”

  Michael heaved a sigh, looked up defiantly at Nigel, and stepped out from under his grip. Nigel scoffed lightly at the boy’s cheekiness.

  “The procession to bury the four who died at the camp is forming in the yard. We should all be there.”

  Gwendolyn nodded. “Stay here,” she instructed Michael. “We won’t be long. Bar the door behind us,” she added, noting the carpentry that had been added to the door during the morning, no doubt at William’s insistence.

  Michael did as he was told, and Gwendolyn, William, and Nigel stepped out of the keep across the rickety planks to the battlements atop the curtain walls, and walked down the steep hill to the gatehouse and out into the yard.

  The men who died would have come from noble families of the court, families with their own burial plots or crypts at their parish churches in their home counties. It would have been understood when the men joined the Tower guard that their remains would be buried where they fell if they died in service. Nevertheless, they would receive a Christian burial, with their bodies intact, close to the holy altar of the Arundel parish church. Their souls would be sent out on their journey to Heaven’s gates by none other than the Archbishop of Rouen.

  The mourners, mostly the village poor who were paid with food and drink to walk beside the dead and chant prayers, stood beside the cart that carried the e
nshrouded bodies. The mourners held candles, heads bowed in prayer beneath their borrowed mourning cloaks. Gwendolyn, Nigel, and William joined the group, standing behind the others who had come from London with them. A biting wind had picked up from the northeast, and the mourners carefully shielded the flames of their candles to keep them lit, gritting their teeth against the stings of hot beeswax that blew against them.

  De Coutances raised his voice above the others, his chants ringing off the surrounding walls with a clarity and purity that Gwendolyn had not expected. Together with the gray shadows overhead and gusts of wind, de Coutances’s haunting voice brought a sense of bleak inevitability to the moment, a reminder that death eventually came for everyone. The mourners formed into a loose procession, and the men tasked with hauling the cart lifted up the wooden arms and leaned forward, starting the group on its own journey down to the village.

  Nigel and William stepped slowly on either side of Gwendolyn, and before long they found themselves bringing up the rear of the procession on their own.

  “People are still saying this was the Devil’s work,” Nigel said under his breath as they walked. “The ones who saw the wolves, or whatever those beasts were. I’ve been with them most of the day, checking on the wounded, getting the others back to arms and their armor repaired. They’ve been telling the Arundel guard that they were set upon by demons, called out by the Devil’s servant, and they’re looking for someone to blame.”

  The three of them kept walking, each with their own thoughts, and Nigel interrupted again. “And by Christ’s blood, William, what happened on the hunt today?” he hissed. “The boar is practically the Devil’s hearth hound. And now, the day after we arrive, one nearly tramples the earl?”

  “Boars are known to charge; it’s why men like the earl love to hunt them,” he answered in a harsh whisper.

  “That may be true, but most of the people here who carry weapons are as tense as a bowstring right now. They’re already ordered to war readiness, the king’s been gone for years, his brother’s running around saying he’s dead anyway, and now they have a company from the Tower joining them with four dead and twice as many wounded and no good explanation for what attacked them. And last night the earl’s son started in about John having a sorcerer.” Nigel stopped and faced them. They were standing alone far below the castle walls. “We are surrounded by fighting men, just arrived from across the county, itching to draw their weapons, and the earl is off hunting boar instead of drilling some discipline into them like he should be.” Nigel paused and shifted his weight, eyeing them both soberly. “I’ve seen this before. I don’t know how safe we are here.”

  William and Gwendolyn hesitated and looked at each other. They each had their own news to share with Nigel. As they resumed walking, now far behind the burial procession, William recounted for them the lecture and warning de Coutances had given him on their way back from the hunt.

  “He’s an archbishop,” Gwendolyn said, somewhat nonplussed. “What else would you expect from him? Why were you compelled to mention sorcery in front of him last night?”

  “These things are real,” William argued, and she sighed beside him.

  “It’s one thing for you to say that to a barely married, minor landowner from Cornwall; it’s quite another to say it to the Archbishop of Rouen and King’s Justiciar.”

  William shook his head. “We have no idea how John is going to react when Eleanor tells him she’s secretly holding the heir of Caliburn for him. William d’Aubigni is helping gather Richard’s ransom with collections across Sussex, and Walter de Coutances is her right-hand man. Arundel is one of her most important strongholds. If John finds out de Coutances has been sent here, it won’t be difficult for him to figure out you might be here as well. And right by the coast, an easy distance for any mercenaries or French armies and their ships.”

  “There won’t be any French armies,” Nigel said confidently.

  “You can’t be sure of that,” William retorted.

  “Philip’s too busy scooping up every territory he can closer to home right now. He wants all of his armies in France, to bring more lands back to his command while Richard is indisposed. If John were worth anything, he’d be over there protecting his legacy instead of looking for favors in overthrowing his brother. Every person in contact with the prince is playing him for a fool.”

  William folded his arms while they walked, thinking through what Nigel had said. It occurred to Gwendolyn that the two men were having a civil discussion, sharing information and each weighing the other’s opinions. The rancor of their earlier days seemed to have disappeared entirely. “John could still send mercenaries to kidnap her for himself, but d’Aubigni’s men can handle them. Which leaves a sorcerer, if John has one.”

  “Which leaves nothing,” Gwendolyn interrupted. “I’m safe here. Now about Edmund.”

  She told Nigel about finding Edmund in the tavern, entertaining himself and some of the drunken garrison by tormenting a boy. Nigel listened to the story wordlessly until she was done.

  “One of the Lusignan brothers did nearly the same to me when I was a boy,” he finally said.

  “Seems we’ve both been the sport of spoiled sons.”

  Nigel fiddled absently with the clasp of his scabbard as they walked, and he questioned her for more detailed descriptions of the men from the garrison that she had seen in the tavern with Edmund. They had entered the muddy lanes of the village and were within a few blocks of the parish church.

  “The Arundel garrison may be divided,” she warned. “From the way he greeted Edmund last night and his preference for the distractions of hunting boar, the earl is either unaware of the faction forming against him in his own garrison, or he’s unconcerned. Either way, he’s made himself, and us by extension, vulnerable and exposed.”

  Nigel nodded. “I’ll keep an eye on it. The garrison captain’s a good man. Even if the earl’s unaware, the captain will keep his men in line or he’ll make an example of the troublemakers.”

  She stopped and turned to face them.

  “I won’t leave Michael here when we leave. Edmund will kill him.”

  “Agreed,” William replied, and Nigel nodded.

  By the time they joined the others again in the churchyard, the shrouded bodies had been laid in a pit dug for those who were not wealthy enough to have bought a final resting place inside the church. Gwendolyn shook her head picturing it, the generations of families plundering the country, carrying out bloody sieges in service to some would-be sovereign, burning villages and fields and bringing famine and destruction in their wake, all to gain the favorable reward of a duke or king. Then these same families used a portion of the plunder, filthy with the blood of their victims, to establish churches, abbeys, and priories and continue the cycle of plunder and bloodshed all over again. In return the Church treated them as venerated saints when they died, their bodies laid out beneath the stones and their souls prayed over daily. It was a routine that the Church benefitted from, thrived upon, and elevated with all of the trappings of Christian glory. These men going into the pit now deserved better for their sacrifice. She grunted and turned on her heel to return to the castle and Michael.

  For the rest of the afternoon, Gwendolyn walked Michael around the castle grounds, making sure that he was widely seen in her company. She had given him one of her own shirts, which he wore belted with a rope, and she had cleaned his face and hands with well water. With a little polish he had turned into a respectable looking boy, and as they made their rounds the older women patted him on the head sweetly and some of the men patted him on the shoulder or gently teased him for his oversized shirt, telling him they had worn the same when they were boys. Michael had brightened up, and when they got to the gatehouse to meet with Nigel, he even flashed a brief smile.

  “Show him how to polish the rust off the weapons, starting with the axe,” she told Nigel. Michael’s eye’s widened as Nigel reached for a battle-axe that hung on the wall. The weapon
’s staff was nearly twice Michael’s height.

  “You can start with this,” he said, showing Michael how to position himself safely in a seated position with the blade lying across his lap and handing him a soft, worn stone and a rag.

  “Nigel will be within earshot of you at all times. Not that I’d expect Edmund to ever set foot inside an armory,” she added with a crooked smirk.

  By the time she arrived back up in the castle keep, Arundel’s kitchen staff had set out stacks of bread trenchers and two large pots of stew in the hall for the evening dinner. The boar had been put on a spit over an open fire down in the lower yard in the midst of the tents and campfires. Music and singing could be heard through the two windows that looked out over the grounds below. Many of those who had been in the hall the night before were now down around the fires, enjoying the crisp autumn evening. The clouds had finally moved past, revealing a glittering, moonless sky.

  “Thank you for saving my life today, William,” d’Aubigni said casually as he approached with a cup of ale. Edmund still shadowed his father, and he glanced at William with a sour expression.

  “I was simply in the right place at the right time, my lord.” Gwendolyn walked up to William’s side, nodded curtly to Edmund, and greeted the earl. Edmund hardly looked at her.

  D’Aubigni smiled graciously. “I’ve always considered false modesty a sign of a duplicitous nature. But on you, William, I think it’s genuine. You don’t seem the sort to take praise easily.”

  “It’s hard to imagine it’s ever really warranted.”

  The earl nodded. “Spoken like a true man of combat. You know as well as I do that today could as easily have ended with two men dead. Except that it didn’t,” he added, gesturing toward William with a piece of bread in his other hand. “And you risked your life for mine,” he said. “For that, you do have my deep gratitude.”