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

by Jude Chapman

  “Are they?”

  “How often have they placed themselves on opposite sides of swords crossed at mid-blade?”

  “True,” said Drake. “But they have also drunk together and laughed together and played chess together. And adjudged each other allies, and more than that, brothers.” Drake ran his finger round the rim of his empty goblet. “The battles they wage every now and again are but games.”

  “Games where other men pay with their lives.”

  “Games, nonetheless.”

  Louis harrumphed and slammed a fist to his chin, his stubborn eyes taking in the dying embers.

  Drake said, “Your eyes are like hers, you know.” Louis blinked. “Queen Eleanor, votre grande-mère.”

  “And if they are?”

  Louis had a way of drawing his brows together much like Stephen did and, Drake supposed, much like he himself did. Shrugging, he said, “Only that you have more in common with the profligate side of your family than you know.”

  A fresh pitcher delivered by Devon brought Louis’ defenses down more, and soon Drake and he were exchanging other riddles suggestive of that most beguiling entity in all the world: womanly flesh. After they had exhausted their poetic imaginings, satisfying their humors but not their loins, Drake spoke reverently of his lord, entertaining Louis with some of the more outrageous stories of the rash and ruthless duke of Aquitaine. Such as the time when Richard routed his own father from Le Mans, the town of his birth, and sent him running like a dog with his tail tucked between his hind legs.

  “Of course,” Drake said, “Richard was sorry for it. His father died soon thereafter, of a fistula in the lower bowels. It seems King Henry thought his son a pain in the arse, and I, for one, would have to agree with him.” Drake glanced up, grinning, and met the equally grinning face of his cousin.

  * * *

  As Drake gathered the reins of his Arabian, the comtesse of Blois said, “Drake, cher, are you sure about this?”

  They had assembled in the gatehouse, a scene of confrontation the day before but a place of conciliation this day.

  Drake flourished a blithe hand. “I can cover more ground alone.”

  “That’s not the reason.” Standing staunchly next to her Breton, Aveline said, “He’s going to carry out what he failed to do at Chinon. Aren’t you?” And when he didn’t protest. “Aren’t you!”

  “I can’t abandon my brother.”

  “I can’t let you do it.”

  “You can’t stop me.”

  “No … but they can.”

  The challenge was one that a king’s marshal and three king’s knights could not easily ignore. Their hands drifted to the pommels of their swords and twitched.

  Stepping away from the dappled gray, Drake deliberately released his dragon sword, metal scratching and sunlight caressing its honed blade. “I may not be able to cut down all of you, but I can cut down at least one. And will. Who wants to be the first? Chauvigny? Béthune? Anyone? Come, there must be at least one dead hero amongst you.”

  “I fear, mon cher,” said the comtesse, “even if you take this lonely path, Stephen will not be restored to you. Surely there must be another way.”

  “Dear cousin, what do you suggest? Storm the Cité Palace and hold a dagger to your other brother’s throat until he confesses his sin? Search all of France’s dungeons whilst Stephen is moved from one to another? Become a recluse, and for the price of a sou, spin out fortunes, praying that one of them one day will be my own?”

  She was at a loss for words. Tears glazed her eyes, and for the first time, Drake saw the years of living she had endured, years that took a toll. Her husband and her son stood supportively near her but did not speak.

  “Drake …”

  He spun on a heel. “Spare me the force of your logic, Rand. Logic has been abandoned, though not by me.”

  “You forget … the routiers … they know where to find Stephen.”

  “Ah, but where to find the routiers. For I promise you, they no longer serve Mercadier.” He swept his eyes from man to man, his comrades-in-arms, knights who had come with him this far but could go no farther. The long trail was for Drake to travel alone. “Tell me how I may save my brother without sacrificing my king, or save my king without sacrificing my brother. No one? Then get out of my way or face the sharpness of my blade. And afterwards, hold a requiem mass for Stephen and Drake fitzAlan, who served their king well.”

  As one, king’s marshal and king’s knights stood down, their sword arms returning benignly to their sides.

  “Is there not a man among you?” Aveline, dressed in a boy’s costume though unlikely to be mistaken for one, spun to each in turn. “No?” Advancing on Devon, she took him by surprise. When next the squire reached for his side, his scabbard was empty and Aveline was brandishing his cumbersome sword. Sidestepping, she gamely placed herself between her man and his palfrey. “I won’t witness your beheading, Drake fitzAlan! I mean it!”

  Drake lowered the point of his sword. “I can easily take you.”

  “Then do it!”

  His blade came up, lightning swift, and sent Devon’s sword skittering across the straw. Aveline clutched her benumbed wrist. Drake sheathed his sword and advanced. She backed away, angling toward the Breton. He reached out and ripped the reins from her hands. She yelped from the burning scrape. He grasped her, forceful enough to imprint bruises on her arms. The fine tresses of her hair swirled about her head, but she refused to cry out, or to cry. Instead, she thrust her moon face upward, anger swallowing the defiant eyes, hatred sealing the hardened mouth, loathing lining the rigid brow. He tangled her unkempt hair into his twisting fingers and dragged her head back. Lowering his mouth close to hers, he lingered and inhaled her essence. Sweeping her into his arms, he flung her into the saddle of her Breton. And then whipping the binding thong from his hair, cruelly tied her flailing hands to each other and to the pommel.

  “You’re a brute, Drake fitzAlan! I will never forgive you!”

  “You won’t have to, for I will be in Hell.” Turning he said, “Marshal Clarendon, if you will kindly deliver the demoiselle Darcy to the queen at Chinon.”

  Rand scooped up the Breton’s reins. “She won’t like it.”

  “But I will. Sieur de Chauvigny! You have leave to return to your bride of the red château and bed her ’til the cock crows, afterwards to bed her until the noon hour, and if you have strength left, bed her until evensong. Consider that an order.”

  André cocked an eyebrow. “And may God have mercy on my soul.”

  “Sieur de Fors. Since you will soon have a bride to call your own, you may as well preserve your strength for the wedding night.”

  Guillaume bowed his amusement.

  “Sieur de Béthune. Because you lack an heiress, you have my permission to amuse yourself as best you see fit.”

  Baldwin bowed to Drake’s wisdom. “I will do my best.”

  “But I warn you all, do not show yourselves until Richard’s return.”

  Drake approached the comtesse, took her hand into his, and bent to kiss it. After mounting the Arabian, he wheeled the steed around. “Don’t let the Lady Aveline get the better of you, Rand.” As if to memorize her every feature, he allowed his eyes to caress the obstinate lips, the cherry cheekbones, and the throbbing throat.

  She balled up her bound hands. “If only I could slap you across that smug face of yours, Drake fitzAlan.”

  “You already have,” he said, rubbing his cheek. “Twice, if memory serves.” In a billow of upset rushes and dust, he urged the palfrey forward. Before the daughter of an alewife was able to muster a retreat, he leaned over and delivered a kiss, quick and savage.

  Drawing his horse around, Drake saluted all and galloped out of the gatehouse.

  * * *

  Two miles west, thundering hoofs plowed down the wheel-rutted road and caught up with Drake. He did not look at the lad, whose roan nickered and settled into a rhythmic lope at the gray’s left flank.
r />   “My place is with you,” Devon said. “And with Stephen.”

  Drake did not quarrel with him.

  Initially traveling west through Amboise and Tour, they bypassed Chinon and followed the River Vienne through Châtelleraut and Chauvigny before sidetracking west again toward the River Charente.

  “Where is Richard now?” Devon asked the first day.

  “Still in Chinon. In a fortnight he’ll work his way south. Angoulême is as good a place as any to wait for him. No doubt we’ll get wind of the king’s train long before he arrives.”

  “What will we do then?”

  “Pray.”

  Their pace was brisk but not onerous. They stayed over in towns along the way, taking a meal of an evening, bedding down in crude lodgings, and moving on before dawn broke.

  On the second day, Devon twisted in the saddle and gazed into the foreshortened distance. “We’re being followed.”

  Drake nodded. “They’ve been following us since Chinon.”

  Devon settled back. “Who are they?”

  “The routiers.”

  The boy’s eyes, not as innocent as they were mere weeks before, threw Drake an interested look. “Is that why you sent the others back?”

  “One of the reasons.”

  “What are we going to do about them?”

  “Naught. They’re only making sure of one thing. Otherwise they shan’t bother us.”

  “But you’re hoping they will.”

  Drake studied his squire with a keen eye. “’Twould seem serving time with three king’s knights in Nonancourt Tower has favorably influenced an impressionable lad of limited experience.”

  The boy blushed as red as his hair. “’Twould seem so.”

  “Then it was time well-spent.” He let out a resigned sigh. “Aye, they may get careless with just the two of us and lead us unintentionally to Stephen. If not, my hand will be forced, and the rest of you will be well out of it. Worry not. I’ll send you back to England long before then.”

  “I won’t go.”

  Again Drake regarded knight’s squire Devon of Wheeling with mounting respect, and nodded lamentably. The boy beamed.

  In Angoulême, after seeing to their horses and making arrangements at a local inn, knight and squire picked their way through the town’s labyrinthine streets and found a bustling tavern serving hot meals. The hungry men made short work of the salty pork, beans cooked in the tasteless monastic fashion, and stale barley bread. Equally unimpressed by the watered-down wine, they liberally consumed it anyway, at first just to wash down the meal and then for the poorest of excuses: simply to get drunk.

  “As long as we’re in the district, you’ll want to look up your betrothed and see what she looks like.”

  “I know what Matilda of Angoulême looks like. Plain, pale, and shapeless. She also has a bad temper.”

  “You have met her?”

  “In my nightmares.”

  The smoking fingers rising from the central hearth snaked to the vented roof. The walls were gray with soot. Lamps distributed among the ten or so tables illumined only the nearest faces, some pocked, some scarred, and others grizzled. The talk had been boisterous early on but in the late hours descended to occasional mumbles and chance commentary. Couvre-feu was not far off. Flea-infested pallets awaited Drake and Devon, but they weren’t in any hurry. Devon excused himself for a needed trip out back. Drake went on contemplating his sediment-ridden cup when a gentil-homme, loosely defined as such, took up Devon’s unoccupied stool.

  Drake glanced tiredly up and smiled without conviction. “I believe the name is Botolphe.”

  The yellow-haired routier grinned. He carried no visible weapon and was light of baggage or other encumbrances, such as tunic and cap. His hair glittered gold in the cresset light and his eyes, violet and translucent, radiated a glow of their own. “Does the rib I broke still torment you?” His Norman-French was accented.

  “Only when I turn over in bed.” Drake noted the curious object glistening brightly on the routier’s left hand. “You weren’t wearing that at Chinon.”

  Botolphe flexed his fingers, where a blood-red almandine cabochon inlaid with a golden cross sparkled in dim lamplight. “You must think me stupid.”

  “Never that.”

  The routier signaled for drink. The proprietor came over, took one look at the fearful dawn-tinted eyes, and served him briskly before retreating to his watchful perch.

  Drake coolly scraped back his stool but remained sitting. “Have you come to inquire about my health? Or to tell me where I can find my brother?”

  The mercenary chortled. “Neither. Regarding your brother, he was given over to other men, who can rightly tell you where to find him. But as to where you can find these men …?” He rolled his shoulders. The grin had never once left his lips.

  “Yet you follow me.”

  Scratching a clean-shaven jaw, the routier laughed hollowly. He had the ways of a girl, and the face of one, too, without the faintest deformity unbalancing the crass beauty except for his nose, which bent slightly askew, favoring the fist of a right-handed man who must have taken a disliking to him. “You know why.”

  Drake casually braced his boots on the floor. His sword lay adjacent to his right foot. “You hate Richard so?”

  “Many men scorn the man. For each, there is a reason. But that is not why we hound him … or you.”

  “To put coin in your purse then?” The lavender eyes were marked with something Drake could not read. “Whatever they’re paying you, I will pay you twice.”

  “You don’t have enough silver.” Madness hid behind the round-eyed glimmer.

  “If it’s not silver …” Drake ran his finger along a crack in the age-worn table. “… then it must be a seductive kind of coin.”

  The routier showed his white teeth.

  Drake asked casually, “Where are your friends?”

  “Taking your squire on a long ride. But—”

  Drake had already crashed back his stool, drawing attention from the patrons, but also drawing a dagger, braced now in the arch of his hand.

  The routier did not flinch. “But … if I do not catch up with them within the hour, they bury him.”

  Drake aimed for the mercenary’s pulsating throat. “Then I will bury you.”

  “Except you will be minus one squire.”

  Drake’s hand worked the haft of the dagger. The deadly point had made an indentation in the routier’s yielding flesh and was drawing a thread of oozing blood.

  Arms held in abeyance, the mercenary rose cautiously to his feet. The blade followed the distance. The shock of yellow hair, catching candlelight, shone like a halo about the placid face and insane eyes.

  Drake withdrew his weapon.

  “Go do what you have to do, Drake fitzAlan, and all will be well.” Taking his leave, he retreated into the tavern’s caliginous shadows and made a silent exit.

  Chapter 21

  THE WAY WAS slow-going down the crags and crevices of a steep and sometimes hazardous descent.

  Drake had been following the routiers for six days. They didn’t know it. They didn’t know it because he had been trailing them at least a half-day behind.

  They chose the narrow wheel-rutted paths to travel, sometimes picking up an old Roman road or a forgotten pilgrim’s way. But their horses—one high-stepping Arabian with a familiar gait, one gentle roan, and three others—marked the trail well enough with hoof prints and foul matter.

  The routiers filled their stomachs with what they killed on the road. That and their generous stores of wine were all they needed to lose themselves without once venturing into town or village. By the third day, Drake could not say where exactly he was or where they were leading him. One path was like another and one stream or creek like all the rest.

  At the start of the sixth day, they aimlessly ascended rocky cliffs skirting a fast-moving river. From beneath the hoofs of Drake’s gray, loose rocks and pebbles tumbled over the precipitou
s drop-off. The sun was high and unencumbered by clouds but the air was refreshingly cool this high up. By day’s end, numb and exhausted, Drake alighted into the valley below, muffling trees thickening before him, jackdaws cawing behind, and night descending.

  Making camp beside the river, Botolphe and his band settled in with banter and drink. By then Drake had closed the gap. If they had pointed their noses in the right direction, they could have smelled him.

  They left Devon lashed to a broad oak, his arms secured at his back, the ropes drawn tight across his chest, his feet spread out before him. Grudgingly they fed him something resembling squirrel. They laughed often and laughed hard, and huddled like filthy hounds about the campfire, flames licking their vapid faces as they stared at nothing but their own meager lives. The wine revivified briefly and eventually stupefied. Then the rains came.

  The Brabançons wrapped themselves in canvas and drew close to the sputtering campfire. While they grumbled in restive sleep, the winds and pelting storm dowsed the flames to sizzling embers. From his cramped perch above, Drake listened to the ping of the raindrops, felt the biting wetness course down his upturned face, and waited for the far-distant but rhythmic snoring to deepen. Every bone ached. Sleep, which he desperately needed, had to wait. The thought of hot food made his belly grumble. He caught himself dropping off once but forced himself awake by grisly means. Round about midnight, he embarked on an uncertain road which, once begun, granted no retreat.

  Calling on his reserves, he let the night sounds mask his final descent. Climbing down a steep and slippery escarpment in the black of night was an arduous race against time. When at last he reached bottom and sniffed the routiers upwind, he chose not to launch his attack, at least not directly. Drake was a patient man when he had to be.

  After the storm blew off, he used the pitter-pat of rain-drenched leaves and the hoot of the tawny owl to cover his deeds.

  Drake clamped his hand across Devon’s mouth. Bleary-eyed, the lad tried to focus. But only after his nightmares scattered into the misty dark did he recognize the mud-stained phantom. A damascened dagger efficiently dispatched the ropes. Putting a silencing finger to his mouth, the specter moved stealthily off.