Squire's Honor

by Peter Telep

  THE DEAD LORD

  Had there been less light, Christopher would not have been able to identify the corpse draped across the back of the wagon. But when he saw the cross­ bow bolt, still buried in the blue neck …

  “A hunting party found him deep in the wood,” the wagon driver said. “Do you know who this is?”

  Christopher stiffened. Know him? I served him!

  “This is Lord Woodward! One of Arthur’s own battle knights! Sir Lancelot wants me to take the body to the king himself.”

  And the king will think I killed him. …

  Table of Contents

  COVER

  THE DEAD LORD

  TITLE

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  AUTHOR 'S NOTE

  PROLOGUE

  PART ONE 1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  PART TWO 1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  PART THREE 1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  PART FOUR 1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  EPILOGUE

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I am particularly indebted to Eyal Goldshmid, Georgia Howorth-Fair, Peter Ives, Christopher McClelland, Kip McGuire, Herb Middlemass, and Jim Poppino for their work on the prologue and first chapter of this novel.

  My editor, Christopher Schelling, my agent, Robert Drake, and my best reader (and wonderful writer herself) Joan Vander Putten, were there for me on this one-as they were on the first and second vol­umes. I know of no more comforting feeling in the world than to have the guidance and support of friends such as these.

  Associate editor Caitlin Deinard Blasdell had patient answers to my sometimes naive questions and was never too busy to talk to me. She’s a rare find in our world of answering machings and voice mail.

  Though I know Sara Schwager only through her blue copyeditor’s pencil, I would be deeply remiss if I did not thank her for the excellent work she did on all three volumes of the Squire series. She forced me to look at etymologies and ironed the wrinkles out of my prose, much to the betterment of the manuscripts.

  Rose and Vincent Palladino provided me with a roof over my head so that I would not have to write this novel in the rain. That helped! They have been much more than in-laws, and they have my Jove and deepest respect.

  AUTHOR ‘S NOTE

  The Arthurian legend contains many anachronisms and contradictions that are maddening to writers who wish to be technically and historically accurate. While the military strategy, accoutrements, and poli­tics were carefully researched, some were borrowed from other time periods for dramatic effect. The sail­ ing vessels known as cogs in this novel are actually late twelfth century German merchantmen used by a group of traders known as the Hansa League. I chose the Hansa League’” cogs because they not only suited the plot well, but I had a plethora of photos on which to base my descriptions. The port of Blytheheart, probably my favorite locale in the world of Squire, is purely fictional and only loosely based on several British ports of the period. With these details aside, lean back, quibble if you must, but most of all, I hope you enjoy this third volume of the Squire Trilogy.

  Peter Telep

  PROLOGUE

  Christopher weaved into the dense maze of tree trunks. The early evening storm had birthed in the wood a rank scent that reminded him of a foul well. He knew he should not complain about the smell of the forest, for if the forest had a nose, he knew he wouldn’t smell very good to it, either.

  He forged on, and despite his rustling and the mil­ lionscore sounds of the droplets wrestling through leaf and limb, an unsettling silence pervaded. It was a silence within him, a feeling that someone was near. He came upon a fallen beech tree that lay in his path. He lowered his gaze, stepped over it, then heard the approach of someone or something come from ahead.

  “Ho! Squire!” Though Christopher recognized the voice, there was something odd about it, a peculiarity he could not identify. He moved forward, then shifted around a tree.

  The forest opened up into a wide clearing, and Lord Woodward stood on the opposite side of it, facing him. Christopher moved uneasily toward his new master.

  Woodward’s gray hair was wet and disheveled, and his beard looked as if it had not been trimmed in a moon or two. The knight fingered the hem of his blue­ and-white surcoat, which he wore over a linen shirt. He pulled the garment down in an effort to remove the wrinkles from it. Christopher judged the act as futile. The removal of the wrinkles in his surcoat did little to better Woodward’s appearance. A burst of lightning picked out the knight’s eyes, which were narrowed by what might be anger. Darkness gathered around Woodward, but Christopher dismissed the image. It was only in his mind. It had to be.

  Christopher reached the edge of the clearing, then took cover under a nearby tree limb. “Lord, I’ve come as ordered.” He gestured with a hand to their surround­ ings, then, with a frown, added, “But wouldn’t a tent near the ramparts have been drier”?

  Woodward rested his palms on the balled hilts of the spathas sheathed at his sides, then he stepped away from the pair of overhanging limbs buffering him from the storm. He moved into the center of the clearing. He ignored the rain that washed over him. “A tent back there would not have been as private for our conversation.”

  “What is it, my lord?” Christopher swallowed, then breathed deeply.

  “Come here. Into the clearing.”

  While biting the inside of his cheek, Christopher felt his heart beat a stroke much harder than it had before. The rain stung his head as he moved into the open. Water dribbled into his eyes. A chill wreaked havoc with his spine, then fanned out across his shoulders. He stopped an arm’s length away from the knight.

  “That’s better, boy,” Woodward said. “Men talk this way.”

  Christopher could smell Woodward’s breath; it was soured by ale. Now it was evident why they stood like dolts in the rain. Drunk men talk this way.

  “It’s cold,” Christopher blurted out.

  With an uncoordinated wave of his hand, and the vol­ume of his voice a notch too loud, Woodward said, “Pay nature no heed. Heed me. He belched.”The rumors about you that have pierced my ears make it impossible for me to sleep.” The banner knight took a step forward, putting his face only a finger’s length away from Christopher’s. “Are the rumors true, boy”?

  I am a true servant, to my heart, to my mind, and to God. It is my destiny. And my fate.

  He fought to keep his gaze on Woodward as a muscle in his neck twitched. He wanted to look away, to run away from everything. But he kept on looking, and Woodward’s stare gored him with the efficiency of a well-honed glaive.

  “I want an answer, boy! I demand one!” Thunder had clapped during Woodward’s shout, but even the unset­tled heavens had not stifled the knight’s words.

  Christopher found it hard to breathe, hard to stand. The moment threatened to choke the life out of him. What could he say? What could he do? He feigned innocence. “I don’t know what it is—”

  “How does a saddlemaker’s son like yourself become a squire to banne
r knights? How does filth like you get loose among us? Do you know that the word had trav­eled with a courser’s speed? How long did you think it would take until it reached me? All of those moons you had been lying to me! And to think at one time I had asked you to watch over Marigween! My God, boy. I had been betrothed to her. How could you have done it? Knowingly? How could you have had a child with her? And out of wedlock, no less? And all of it behind my back!”

  He knew that this moment was a part of his punish­ment for disobeying the king. He had saved his friend Doyle from the hands of Seaver, but in order to do that he had betrayed Arthur’s trust. Thus, Arthur had stripped him of his duty as squire of the body, squire to the king, and had given him to Woodward. Christopher had suspected that Arthur had done it to teach him a lesson, and to give him ample opportunity to confess his sin to Woodward.

  Where did those opportunities go?

  Christopher stood, armed only with an apology on the tip of his tongue. Death was a heartbeat into the future.

  Woodward took a few steps back, then clumsily with­ drew both spathas from their scabbards at his side.

  “My lord, this cannot happen. I beseech you. I ask for mercy and forgiveness. There is another way!”

  “No! Fight!” Woodward tossed the sword in his right hand.

  Christopher stepped out of the sword’s path and let it splash into a puddle behind him. “Pick it up!”

  “I will not.” Christopher had known from the first time he had kissed Marigween that a confrontation with Woodward would come. He had invented a millionscore ways to blanket the fact, and had justified what he had done an equal number of times.

  But now he knew bedding Marigween had been wrong. It had been against the church. It had been against the codes of knight—and squirehood. It had been lust. And then it had been love. And now they had a son, a son that Woodward probably felt should be his own. The relationship had been founded on deception. And Christopher had not only betrayed Arthur and Woodward, but his first love, Brenna. He had cast her aside for Marigween, and now felt as if he had betrayed himself. The great error he had made by courting Marigween now stood before him, six feet of sword­ clenching fury.

  I have forsaken the truth.

  “Everyone knows what you’ve done, Christopher! And now your cry for mercy is a confession to me,” Woodward screamed. “I doubt even the king would blame me for slaying you. Pick up the spatha. And let God be the judge of what you’ve done.”

  “My lord, God has already judged me. I have since suffered the loss of my rank, the loss of one of my friends, and the loss of someone else close to me. I pray now for your mercy.”

  “Thanks to Saint George you will not be my squire! You’ve a yellow belly! And you’ve one last thing to lose.”

  He refused to let Woodward’s words goad him into combat. He leveled his gaze on the banner knight and tightened his lips. He listened to the drone of the rain, to the sound of Woodward’s panting, to his own ragged breath. Then a crack of thunder startled him.

  “Nothing to say? Well then, you are a coward. A boy of evil. And you deserve to die.” Woodward pulled back his arm, then lowered his spatha until it was horizontal and ready to run Christopher through. Then Woodward closed the gap.

  Christopher shot a look to the other spatha lying in the puddle. Even if the weapon was within reach, he fig­ured he wouldn’t have put it to much use against a knight of Woodward’s skill. A voice inside told him to tum and run; another one argued to stay and die, to meet the fate he had brought upon himself. Was it fear or guilt or a growing sense of hopelessness that tingled within him? Or was it a sickening blend of all of those things? His world would end soon. But was there atonement in death?

  He wasn’t going to find out. He turned, dug his right boot into the earth, about to—

  Fwit!

  “AHHHHHH—”

  Christopher stopped, then cocked his head.

  Woodward lay supine on the forest floor, an unmarked crossbow bolt half-buried in his neck. His arms and legs writhed spasmodically. His eyes were wide, locked open in the blank stare Christopher had seen all too many times on the faces of dead men.

  Fearing he might be the bowman’s next target, Christopher dropped to the slimy earth. His chest rever­berated from the impact. He looked up, focused his gaze on the low-lying brambles from where he sensed the bolt had come. No movement. Not a single rustle.

  Christopher’s breath slowed and grew even. He called out to the bushes several times. As moments passed, he grew cold and stiff and frustrated. Then he made the decision that whoever had fired the bolt was gone. He rose, his gaze on the brambles, but there was still no movement from within them. He wiped his muddy hands on his shirt, then flipped his hair off his forehead. He moved to Woodward, then paused to stare grimly at the dead knight. Once again, he looked to the brambles; then it dawned on him. He would be blamed. He closed his eyes as tight as he could, tossed his head back, clenched his teeth, then prepared to scream, a cry he knew would rise above the din of the storm.

  PART ONE

  HEIR TO MURDER

  1

  Above the eastern wood, the gray sky conceded to the deeper hue of night. Below, windswept tree limbs and shadows of branches mingled into one, making it hard for Christopher to see as he ran through the forest. He slipped on a bed of acorns and strayed into a bramble. His linen leggings tore open, and the tiny thorns of the bramble found his damp skin below. He paused to inspect the wound. There were a few thin cuts across his calf. He swore off the damage and moved on.

  Have to keep moving. Have to.

  He could not stop asking himself who had killed Woodward and why? Had it been someone out to save him from Woodward’s blade, or someone trying to see him hang from the gallows tree for Woodward’s mur­der? If the murderer was a friend trying to help, he had inadvertently become a foe. If the murderer was an enemy, then who? There were many senior squires who had despised Christopher because of his swift ascension to the rank of squire of the body, and they had rejoiced when he had lost that rank. Could one of them have wanted to see him suffer further? Who? There were more than a score of senior squires.

  Then there was the question of what to tell Arthur. But what was he doing now? Was he running from the place of a crime or running to get help?

  Christopher hadn’t decided that yet. It depended on how guilty he felt he was, or rather, how guilty he felt the others would think he was. He reached up, bent a wiry limb out of his way, ducked under it a bit, and con­tinued.

  He thought about the murder, about his part in it, about his defense. Christopher did not own a crossbow, but that meant nothing. The bolt was unmarked and the murder weapon would never be positively identified. His accusers would say he borrowed or stole a bow, then hid it after he shot Woodward.

  The person who killed Woodward obviously had known about the meeting. That person had killed the banner knight out of hatred for Christopher, or out of love.

  Which of his friends knew?

  There was Neil. The stubby archer had become a trusted friend after Doyle had been banished. Christopher had not believed he would ever get as close to another friend as he had been to Doyle, but Neil’s warmth and consideration, along with his admiration, had made Christopher think otherwise. Yes, Neil was a longbowman, and probably as handy with a crossbow, but if Neil had killed Woodward, why hadn’t he come into the clearing? Had he been too scared?

  Orvin knew about the meeting. Yes, the old knight was at his camp on the ramparts near the castle of Shores. Orvin had warned Christopher to temper his distrust of Woodward. He had urged Christopher to lis­ ten to the battle lord, and to confess his crime to the man. Despite his eccentricities, Orvin was a wise man. Could he have killed Woodward? His hand was not too wizened to squeeze the trigger of a crossbow. He would have done it to help Christopher, of course. Yet he would have come into the clearing and admitted his wrongdoing; Christopher was certain of that.

  Who had Woodward told abou
t the meeting? Christopher could only guess. Perhaps the murderer had followed Woodward into the forest, had waited for the right moment, then had seized the opportunity. But the bolt had been fired at a moment when Christopher’s life had been threatened. If the murderer was not a friend trying to help, hadn’t he waited too long? Why hadn’t he simply shot Woodward before Woodward and Christopher had even had words? And after shooting Woodward, why hadn’t he shot Christopher? The more he thought about it, the more it seemed like a friend had been trying to help him. Once the friend realized what he had done, he had fled the scene. That could be true.

  Or not.

  Christopher reached the edge of the wood. He discov­ered he was a score of yards north of the tree where he had tied his courser. He jogged toward the silhouette of the horse, kicking up mud and blinking the rain from his eyes.

  Why did this have to happen?

  The courser whinnied as he untied its reins, crossed around it, and stuck a muddy boot into a stirrup. He slapped a damp hand onto the pommel of his saddle and swung up onto his mount. He wheeled the courser around just as the sky thundered so loudly that Christopher swore he felt the earth shake under him. His courser reared and threatened to throw him. Christopher tightened his grip on the reins and leaned forward.

  “Easy. Easy now!”

  The horse came down onto all fours, bucked a bit more, then grew calm.

  Thunder rumbled again, far off this time, a distant relative of the first crack. Christopher dug his heels into the flanks of his mount. In the unrelenting deluge, he started for home.

  The ruins of the village of Shores were on Christopher’s southern horizon, and lay in a shallow valley encompassed by a very thin dotting of trees. The rain had finally given way to a mist. It was only a short ride north to the castle, and soon he’d be riding by the infantry and peasant levy laying siege to the fortress. And then—perhaps—he would report to the king what had hap­pened. He craned his neck and took one last, longing glance at the village behind him, the village where he had been born, the village that had been pillaged and burned by the Saxons twice in his lifetime. Instead of the even-shaped silhouettes of the gabled roofs along Leatherdressers’ Row, the place where his father had once built their home, he now saw the jagged black teeth of destruction. A traveler did not have to get any closer than this to know that Shores was no more. But Christopher knew in his heart it would be rebuilt. This time, however, the Saxons wouldn’t destroy it. The invaders would either be living peacefully among the Celts or they wouldbe driven from the land. Christopher hoped he lived long enough to see either one of those futures. He turned his thoughts from the moons to come to the pending hours. He knew one thing. He needed to tell someone what had happened. The cage of his mind was not strong enough to contain the knowledge. His own guilt, he knew, would free the news.