Crown of the Realm (A White Knight Adventure Book 2)

by Jude Chapman

  Bareheaded, with his reddish hair lit golden in the sparkling torches, Richard gesticulated broadly across the sky. Beneath his regal stance, the stars danced like glitter thrown out by his own hand. The king’s surcote, a brocaded samite of deep maroon, ruffled in the lightest of breezes. The king’s sable-trimmed mignons marshaled about their undisputed leader.

  “Like the yolk in the center of an egg remains stationary within the shell while the shell swirls about the yolk,” Richard was saying, “so too the world we stand on, the world we call Earth, remains fixed in a sky that daily revolves around us. And long has it done so.”

  The prowler gracefully released the bow stave from around his chest. The yew had been lovingly rubbed and polished. The riser was sleek in his firm grip. He braced the horn nock expertly against his foot and strung the weapon. Sagittarius, the archer’s heavenly counterpart—half man and half horse—gazed down from the heavens and bore witness to a mortal man fitting an arrow smoothly home and drawing it back in one lithe and practiced movement. If any one of the men below had chosen to glance up, he would have seen an assassin outlined starkly against the sky. He might also have had the chance, for the tiniest fraction of time, to shout a warning. Even then, it would have been too late. As it was, none looked up and no warning came.

  The single arrow, released into the sky, flew an elegant arching line. The arrow hissed. The feathers whistled. The air parted. One or two of the king’s mignons heard the familiar yet improbable trilling of danger. They gazed up, but by then the arrow had struck. The aim was true. The barb penetrated. Blood spread wide, turning the lustrous tunic black across the king’s left shoulder blade. The impact spun Richard around. Gazing up, he found the assassin. Betrayal attacked the wide gaze of his pellucid eyes. Fighting the inevitable, he stayed on his feet. An instant later, he collapsed into the outreaching arms of his stunned companions.

  Shouting went up. The hounds began to bark. Warning bells clanged. The castle came foully alive. Men ran to and fro. Torchlights trailed shooting sparks.

  The assassin had already returned to his perch and was lowering himself down the rope. He jumped the last ten feet. The stairs crumbled even as he raced down the steps two at a time. The palfrey waited patiently below. He hoisted himself over the rump and landed solidly in the saddle. Gripping the reins, he wheeled the horse around and savagely raked heels against its ribs. From where, moments before, he had targeted the king of England with a single arrow, a shower of arrows rained down on him. He drew his body alongside the steed’s left flank until the horse galloped out of range.

  His best chance for escape, the river, was reached only via the village’s byways. Gathering from the castle alarm that a handsome reward would be in the offing, the villagers emerged sleepy-eyed from their houses into narrow streets. Wholly disorganized, they sloshed through the alleys and thoroughfares after the dark felon who wielded a deadly sword. For the unfortunate many, the charger kicked sludge into their faces. For the stubborn few, a well-placed kick curtailed their trudging advances. The strokes of the sword touched none, but the fanciful tales yet to be woven would likely include a dozen or more near-fatal wounds.

  The way was clear. The assassin reached open ground. To his rear, the night watch screamed hellfire and galloped down castle hill. Concentrating on the scenery racing past, he had no opportunity to glance back at his pursuers or even to take evasive measures. The tumultuous outcry approached closer. Hoof beats drummed in harmony before splitting into factions.

  Arrows came whistling down a narrow corridor of flight. The rider ducked once more over the palfrey’s neck. A bolt sliced through the cloth of his arm and singed flesh. The scalp over his right ear was set afire with another barb.

  Like a great sinuous snake slinking on the back of the night, the river drew nearer. The palfrey came within steps of the shoreline.

  Something clouted the rider. The horse whinnied and screamed. The collision was powerful and immediate as the palfrey thudded onto his left haunch, trapping the horseman’s leg beneath agonizing weight. Squirming, legs flailing, struggling for his existence as much as his master’s, the arrow-pierced steed instantly released the assassin, who painfully clambered to his feet and raced for the water’s edge.

  The River Vienne was narrow as rivers went and highly navigable for a practiced swimmer. Leaping, his knees pumping, his legs graceful and practiced, the archer skimmed over the shallows and dived into the water. The strokes came automatically, hand over hand, as his head bobbed and came up for breath, and bobbed again. Hoofs broaching the riverbank quickly found footing, stamping and splashing over gravel and stone. The shouts increased in urgency. One voice rose above the rest. The owner was closer than the swimmer adjudged. Soon afterwards, a harsh blow thudded against his jaw. A white light obliterated his sight. Momentum or stubbornness drove him on. Another thump at the back of his neck, mindfully placed, rendered him into submission. He instantly went limp. Water closed over his head. Darkness enshrouded him. Between lax eyelids, he glimpsed his hands, fingers fanned apart and floating motionless. Bubbles rose from his lips. His hair spread like tangled seaweed before his eyes. His vision darkened. Then someone, powerful of grip, snatched his wrists and yanked him out of the waters.

  His next sensation was of dangling belly down over an unmerciful saddle. He was hacking river from his lungs. Gentle waters lapped past arms and legs limply suspended. His ribs, bruised and violated, cringed with every ragged breath.

  Fight sprang to the surface: abruptly and instinctively. Until a broad hand pressed him between the shoulder blades.

  “It’s over, Drake,” Mallory d’Amboise said. “Le roi muert, le roi muert, vive le roi.”

  The king is dead, the king is dead, long live the king.

  Chapter 12

  IN THE GATEHOUSE, mercenaries swarmed around Mallory’s steed. Defying the captain’s orders, they dragged Drake to the rush-strewn ground in a pageant of fists and shouts. Two routiers, their faces vaguely familiar, did their best to dislocate his shoulders at the joints. Their yellow-haired compère took pleasure in using his knuckles with praiseworthy effect. Drake was forced on a brutal pathway through a crush of irate men. Mallory’s barking protests receded farther into the distance. Drake had already reached a place beyond feeling, and though fists eagerly struck out, he tasted none of the blows.

  A rope was produced. A noose was roughly fashioned. Clamors of encouragement resounded. His hands were tied at his back. The hangman’s rope was thrown to the upper reaches of the central tower and secured above. Crates were stacked. Drake was brought forward. A voice of authority, shouting orders, went unheeded.

  In a stampede of destriers, the king’s guard arrived with swords of fire. Malcontents were cut down in shrieks of agony, and man by man, the riot was quelled.

  Geoffrey Plantagenêt, perched on a snow-white steed, pushed himself into the center of the courtyard. Torches encircled him. “You will desist from beating that man to a pulp! And you will remove that rope from his neck! He is the prisoner of the king. The king will decide his fate.”

  “The king is dead!” someone shouted.

  “Richard lives yet! And until he can appear before you, consider me his voice.”

  “By whose authority?”

  Geoffrey held up his right hand, where a ruby glowed. “The ring of our dead father, King Henry. Now take him to the tower.”

  The path from the courtyard to the Tour de Moulin became Drake’s road to humiliation. The goons still held him fast. The others followed like vultures after carrion. Servants and cooks and chambermaids, their fists raised in scorn, watched him pass, retaliation on their minds. The queen’s ladies-in-waiting, pouring out from warm dwellings and cushioned boudoirs, stifled screams of horror with thrown-up hands. One—pleasing as a daisy ripe for picking—swooned into the arms of the others.

  In time, his mind put up its own defenses, and one by one his senses departed until nothing was left but the puddled walkway coming up t
o meet his face.

  When he awoke in the upper reaches of the turret—cold, wet, and hurting—three men loomed above him. Manacles were affixed wrist to wrist and ankle to ankle, the chains tethered to his waist and to an iron ring on the wall. His eyes wandered from the one man to the other, and finally to the last. The king’s nameless turnkey, who finished locking the chains; Mallory d’Amboise, captain of the Mortaigne guard; and John, brother of the king. Having secured the prisoner, the guard stood uncertainly.

  “This man,” pronounced the comte of Mortaigne, “is to be accorded neither succor nor mercy. The king lay dying, if he is not already dead. Notwithstanding the archbishop of York’s declaration, I am in charge here.” A cogent look passed from John to Mallory before the prince turned with a flourish and was gone.” After Mallory took a last mournful glance at the prisoner, he obediently followed. The heavy door clanged home with finality.

  When he was left alone in the chill and drafty tower, Drake gave into exhaustion. Time tripped by without him. Of dreams, he had none, except the one. The arrow striking and the king falling.

  When next his eyes opened, he awoke disoriented. Blissfully he had forgotten where he was, what he had done, and why he was left in this cold and dingy dungeon. Then everything returned in a sickening rush. He shifted with the rising discomfort. Directly, his senses became sharply aware of the clank and pull of the chains. The fetters were secure. Ease of movement was not an option. No camp bed, no pallet, no blanket had been afforded him. Instead, he lay in a cold tomb of anguish. One eye swollen shut. His jaw and neck where Mallory struck him, throbbing fiercely. And the injuries inflicted by the mob, swelling and bruising. None of it mattered.

  From then on, Drake was subjected to a subtle form of torture. Over the lonely hours, water counting out drop by drop somewhere in the chamber, the king’s guard entered on a regular basis. After checking on the prisoner’s chains, they would kick him, perhaps to test whether he was still breathing, certainly to punish him for what he had done. In a perverse way, Drake welcomed their contempt. It was no worse than the contempt he held for himself. After they left, he would drift off until the dark dreams returned.

  In time, the sentries brought food and drink, but he couldn’t eat and had difficulty lifting the cup, more mead spilling onto his tunic than into his mouth. Sleep took him at intervals. The dreams faded. Lethargy borne of abuse and fatigue took hold.

  The iron-reinforced door creaked open. Drake waited for manhandling. When it failed to arrive, he twisted his head around and opened his one serviceable eye. Randall of Clarendon, the sheriff of Hampshire, or rather the deputy sheriff, squatted against the opposite wall, his long-fingered hands forming graceful fans over bent knees. “You’re a mess,” he said in English, “which, come to think, seems to be the normal course of your short life.” A smile fleetingly swept his mouth. “Has your urine turned black?”

  Drake blinked. Breathing was wearisome. Speech was impossible. He had nothing to say anyway.

  “I take that as a no. ’Twould seem there’s no internal bleeding. Which means you’ll live, Drake fitzAlan, to face the punishment of your sins before man and God. Man first, God to come.”

  Running a hand through his hair, he stood and paced the cramped quarters. Older than Drake by a decade, Rand seemed ages older. Hard living and hard drinking contributed to the haggard looks of the deputy sheriff of Hampshire, the reeve of Winchester, the arm of the king and the king’s castle in what had once been the thriving capital of England.

  “Since you left Winchester, interesting handiwork has been at play. Maybe you’ve heard, maybe not.” The lanky limbs, the lank hair, the colorless eyes were the same, though he appeared older and more bitter. “Godfrey de Lucé, you remember his name? Our newly named bishop of Winchester, and not coincidentally, sheriff of Hampshire? Sailed for Normandy February last. You were there, weren’t you, at Nonancourt? Then you saw him. And you know that in his absence, Longchamp seized the county of Hampshire for himself. Thorough he was, the king’s loathsome chancellor, in stripping our dear bishop of everything but the bishopric, much good the title would do him without the income or the authority. As expected, there was Hell to pay. Amusing, if I were not in the middle of it. In all the confusion and with so many sheriffs to be had, no one in need of a deputy sheriff, I became persona non grata as it were. Richard rescued me from perfidy. Call it the draw of the short straw, but I arrived early yester eve and am now what you see, the king’s marshal. A dubious post with, God save me, limitless duties and responsibilities, exactly what I have always wanted to shed.” He smiled again, hoping to elicit something, anything, from the prisoner of Moulin Tower.

  Drake turned his head away and closed his eye.

  “Why is it, Drake, you’re always in danger of losing your neck?” He squatted on his heels and prodded him with a finger. “You cannot turn away. You are accused of a grievous crime. The king lies on his deathbed with only Eleanor and the king’s surgeon in attendance. He hangs on by a thread, I’m told. Arthur, the king’s nephew, and his mother, the dowager Duchess Constance of Bretagne, have been sent for. So too have Archbishop Baldwin and our dear chancellor. Richard, I hear, expressed the desire to make the boy his heir, which is as hapless as it gets, for you know a child of two can be quickly deposed. Dispositions, however, are being hastily written.”

  His sigh was genuine. Randall of Clarendon always carried with him his humanity, which was heavier than all the sins in England.

  “I cannot be lenient with you. I cannot offer you succor. But I can, if told the identities of the men with whom you conspired and the names of the accomplices who aided you, see that you do not suffer before you’re hanged. For you will hang.”

  Drake was not sure whether he slept or descended into a stupor. Or if Rand left and returned, or remained at his station, back braced against the wall. He only knew that the king’s marshal eventually brought over a bucket of cold water and a rag.

  “It is only because the sight of blood appalls me. Else, I have judiciously been informed, John would heartily disapprove.” His laughter was laced with acid.

  More than one bucket was needed. The surface wound above his ear had bled liberally but pained him no more than a bee sting. The ripped flesh of his upper arm had not bled as much but stung worse.

  Once again, Drake became disoriented, unsure of the sequence of events and unaware of the passage of time. He only knew that it was impossible for him to stay awake and attentive, and that it was the ex-deputy sheriff of Hampshire’s one-sided conversation that lifted him from apathy from time to time.

  “We shall talk, you and I,” Rand said, pacing. “We shall talk for as long as it takes.”

  Drake gazed wearily up. He had learned from experience that the king’s new marshal was a patient man. And stubborn as a mule.

  “It won’t do, Drake, your silence. Not by a ha’penny in Hell. For instance ….” Rand again took up residence against the wall. “You and Richard had a disagreement, I’m told, over a marriage of convenience. Convenient most of all for the king, least of all for his loyal knight who, unlike most, has little ambition. Your first try at assassination happened that very day. An accomplice—Tancrede d’Évreux—was later found dead under your hand. A lady-in-waiting was poisoned in her bed, purportedly by you. Your other accomplices—Béthune, Fors, and Chauvigny—once righteous men, remain under lock and key at Nonancourt. Along with Devon, your squire, who is as innocent as they come.”

  Drake shifted onto his side, the chains rattling in his wake, but the voice persisted.

  “Of course I don’t believe a word of it. Not for a trice can anyone convince me any of you are guilty of regicide, especially Drake fitzAlan. As the eldest son of a lord, he knows what’s expected of him, no matter that he loves the daughter of an alewife. It’s different for a man like me. I can pair with whatever damsel I take a fancy to, so long as she doesn’t mind loneliness and foul language.”

  Something approaching a sm
ile touched Drake’s lips.

  “Ah,” said Rand, “something yet lives inside you. I was wondering.” The marshal was sitting on his heels beside him. “Where is Aveline, by the bye? Her ma and da and brothers miss her. Especially her green-eyed little Pippa. Ever since she left January last, all of Winchester’s been a-titter with gossip. Is that where Stephen is? Escorting her back to Winchester?”

  He examined Drake’s hands, trapped as they were inside the manacles.

  “Is this rope burn I see? Not long past, by the looks of it. They almost hanged you, didn’t they? That must account for it.” Again his expression begged for explanation. “Talk to me, Drake. Where’s Stephen? Something’s amiss here. I feel it where it counts, in my gut.” He left off rubbing away the migraine that was Randall of Clarendon’s constant reproof for living an honest, and more times than not, celibate life. “As you can see, I have no answers, merely questions. Are you thirsty? I’m thirsty.”

  As if deciding something, he abruptly stepped out of the cell and barked an order. Soon he returned, flask in hand. He poured wine into two cups and offered one to Drake.

  Had he been able to sit up on his own, Drake still would not have taken the cup.

  “Please yourself.” Rand drained one cup, drained the other, and immediately refilled both. This time, he used a supporting arm to help the prisoner drink.

  The temptation was too great. Drake gulped the contents to the dregs, closed his eyes, and settled back.

  The one-sided interrogation went on. In its perpetual drone, Drake drifted in and out of sleep, only to be brought back to Rand’s queries, surmises, concerns, and conundrums. “Where’s Stephen? You still haven’t said. On the queen’s orders, we’ve been scouring the countryside for him. Where there’s one fitzAlan brother, so says Eleanor, the other is not far away. Though it goes without saying that as soon as he steps one foot inside Chinon to rescue you, there’ll be two fitzAlans chained to the wall of this chamber.” His voice dropped off. Rand was thinking again. The half-moons under his eyes were smudged to a dour blue-black. Drake wanted to tell him to stop thinking, that he would wear himself out thinking. “Are you hungry? I’m hungry.”