"I want you as sheriff, Geoff," William tried, ignoring his administrator's warning. "You've done a fine job creating order where there'd been but chaos before."
Geoffrey saw his escape and took it. "That rests more on this man's efforts than mine, my lord." He set his arm across Martin's shoulders and brought him forward. "The de la Bois family is centered in the shire. Sir Martin here, knows the place and its folk like none other. At every turn, it has been his suggestions improving our collections and straightening the accounts."
William's dark eyes shifted as he glanced from one man to the other. "Is this true, Sir Martin?"
"That my family is centered in the shire, aye," Martin said. "As for the success we've had, Lord Coudray is the cause—" Geoffrey's sudden fist in Martin's back made the young knight stutter. "I suppose I have been a greater help to him than another might have been," he managed.
"Hubert Walter is set on consistency of management for the shires. If you're convinced Sir Martin can reproduce this year's profits, I'll sell him the position," William said swiftly to Geoff.
"You'd sell it to me, my lord?" Martin's dark brows shot up. "I cannot afford it. I've not a shilling to my name, save for the value of my horse and armor."
"Ah, but you do," the bishop replied. "There's what you earned in profit this year. Give me that, and you'll own the position until Easter court. If the collection remains at its present level, we'll settle on a price. If not, then I'll have Geoff as sheriff once more."
"My lord, it’s your profit, not mine," Martin said to Geoffrey.
"No longer. It’s William's now, while you own all my best wishes. My lord sheriff, may you be blissfully happy at Crosswell." Geoffrey shook Martin's hand with fervor.
With that, Geoffrey went to William and knelt, kissing the proffered ring. As he rose, the bishop said, "Coudray, you continue as Freyne's warden. Take with you those men Crosswell can spare to see the king's peace restored to that place."
Geoffrey smiled. "My lord, you have my deepest gratitude."
The prelate only snorted. "So I should. When you see Rannulf tell him I think you as mad as your father's bastard. Now begone and let me sleep."
Reginald listened as the battering ram impacted with Freyne's gate. The thunderous retort said the beam had finally smashed through the thick, straw-filled pad the defenders had laid over their door. Spotters called a warning, but Reginald was beyond the range of the stones and arrows that rained down from the walls. A few of their men cried out in pain, but most of Freyne's projectiles clattered uselessly off shields and the ram's wooden, skin-clad roof.
In the short moment of silence that followed this attack, mist drifted down onto Reginald's mantle. Its steady descent washed the scent of death from the air. Hidden from him by the thick gray layer of clouds overhead he heard the call of geese on the wing.
Then the thick chains supporting the ram on its brace groaned as it was drawn back for its next blow. Stones clattered, crossbows were winched. Men shouted commands as the attempt at breaking through the door continued.
The trebuchet beside which Reginald stood, groaned as its thick, upright pole was drawn downward. Once a great stone was fitted into the giant sling, the engineer gave his call. The locking mechanism clicked back. The pole sprang upward and crashed against its stop, the sound of the impact echoing around the camp. The boulder soared free from the sling at the pole's top. Its impact within Freyne's walls offered up barely more than a thud.
"Another miss, sir," the trebuchet's engineer told him, his explanation unnecessary.
"Let me think a moment," Reginald replied.
"Take your time, my lord. We have all day." The man grinned, his big teeth and long face giving him the look of a horse.
As Reginald paused in thought a stab of resentment hit in him. Gradinton's plan had been impressive, even down to awakening the right tone of outrage in his vassals when he'd recounted the many wrongs done him by Coudray. However, success was achieved as much from the quality of action as froom the plan. Gradinton lacked the patience to achieve his aim.
Resentment grew, and in frustration, Reginald stared at Freyne's left gate tower. After three days of assault the wall top broken. The hoarding lay in the ditch below, naught but splintered bits of wood and bone. All Reginald would have needed was one more day of work against the tower and the whole gate would have dropped.
Instead, Gradinton intervened, saying that if the towers could withstand this much, they'd not soon fall. He'd ordered the trebuchet turned onto Freyne's hall. This was but a whim on Gradinton’s part. He wanted to frighten the women, even when all his men protested that his effort was but a waste of stone and time.
The thought of destroying the place of his birth sent resentment flaring into anger, and Reginald freed a hot breath. He'd come to Freyne prepared to lose what he wanted due to fate, not to petty mismanagement. Ach, but what choice had he now?
In irritable acquiescence, he shut his eyes and in his memory counted the distance between himself and the wall, then from wall to hall. When he had the number he related it to Gradinton's trebuchet engineer, along with a new guess on the exact direction.
Men sweated and shoved to the tune of the engineer's calls. Once again the trebuchet's tree descended, and a stone was fitted into its sling. This time when the boulder flew, there was a thundering, splintering explosion beyond the walls.
"We've got it," the engineer cried in excitement.
"So it seems," Reginald said sourly, and watched the men drag down the trebuchet arm for the next blow against his home.
"Sir Reginald?"
"Aye?" He looked around.
A slinger stood behind him, the man's stone-filled pouch hanging at his waist. His weapon, a miniature version of the trebuchet's sling, was draped over his shoulders. Struggling against the man's grip was a thin boy, no more than fourteen. The boy glanced up at him, then froze as if terror-stricken at facing a mailed knight.
"We found this bit of offal creeping through our ranks. What should I do with him?" The man's French was so thick, his words were barely comprehensible.
Reginald opened his mouth to suggest a swift death, then caught back his words at the boy's strange appearance. The lad's pale brown hair had been shorn so closely to his head that it barely covered his skull. He looked closer and found the cause. A jagged scar, a recent wound by the pink look of it, crossed his crown. The lad lost his hair so the healer could close his skin.
Still trapped in consideration, Reginald's gaze dropped to the boy's face. Beneath sharply peaked brows, his brown eyes were wide with pleading, his full lips caught in a fearful grimace. There was something familiar about him.
Frowning, he studied the boy, searching his memory for some reason he might know the lad. The boy had reached the age where the man he would become mingled with the child he'd been. Although yet beardless, his shoulders broadened. His build suggested he'd eventually own the same powerful chest and narrow hips that Reginald claimed.
With that thought came recognition. It was Aymer's face he saw lurking here. Before him stood one of his brother's bastards from the village. Teased into curiosity by a sudden sense of kinship, Reginald said, "Ask him to explain his presence."
English words flowed around him as he waited. At last, the commoner turned on him. "He says his mother is very worried about his younger brother and his stepsister. His mother believes they've wandered into our camp, so she sent this lad asearching for him. He begs you to let him go, saying that he must return before his stepfather comes.
Reginald smiled thinly, the boy's words only confirming his guess; here was one of his brother's by-blows. Enjoying the power of life and death over one of Aymer's get Reginald chose to bestow life today. "We do not slaughter children in this camp. Nay, there's but one child to murder and that babe lies within Freyne's wall." This was a wry aside, aimed more at himself than any of the ears around him. To the slinger, he said, "Send him back to the village with a warning to keep his di
stance. His brother and stepsister will come home or naught on their own." He gave a dismissing wave of his hand and returned to the task at hand, pleased at his generosity.
Then his pleasure dimmed. What would he have to show for murder but a broken manor and years of debt to rebuild it? Ah well, it was too late for doubts or backward looks now. He listened without emotion as another stone found Freyne's hall.
***
"I am struck blind and deaf," Henry, Lord Lavendon told his darkened hall, his voice sour.
The draft from the door whispered through the room as if in gentle commiseration. Its chill breath lifted the few panels covering Henry's wooden walls then set the torches high above to sizzling. With a final soft sigh, it lifted the smoke from the hearthstone, sending it swirling upward toward the hole cut in the roof. Standing before that same stone, the plump nobleman crossed his arms and tried not to look around him.
His floor was laid deep with pallets on which the armies from Ashby, Meynell, Graistan, and Crosswell settled to their rest. Instead, he kept his gaze focused on all four of Graistan's sons. "Should anyone ever suggest that the FitzHenrys came here to wage war against Baldwin de Gradinton, I and all my servants will swear that such a thing never occurred. Now I and they are leaving this room, wanting to hear nothing we must needs forget."
Geoffrey leaned back on the bench he'd claimed from atop the stack at the wall. "Henry, although I am sheriff no longer, Hereford has sent me to keep the peace." His voice was hoarse in exhaustion. After a day and a half in the saddle, stopping only to feed and rest the horses, every inch of him cried out to shuck his mail and sleep. But rest would be impossible until he knew Freyne's status and had set himself on some course of action. "As Freyne is the court's property Baldwin breaks the law here."
"Wondrous," Lavendon said with a frown. "I'll tell him you said so when he comes to wreak his vengeance on me. My borders are far too vulnerable to him."
Richard cleared his throat. "When this is done, Henry, you must come and visit me at Meynell. I would be honored to show you my new home and my wife." Geoffrey glanced at his eldest brother. Also armed and haggard in exhaustion, Richard strove to smile at their host. "I am forest warden there."
"A sop, Richard," Henry said. Nonetheless, he relaxed against it. "I will consider your invitation. Now, if any of you want aught to eat or drink, best you say so before I take my folk all away with me."
Dressed in a chestnut-colored tunic, Geoffrey's youngest and full brother, leaned back against the wall behind him, stretching out his long, booted legs. "Nothing for me, thank you, Henry." Tall and massive, Gilliam FitzHenry's voice was deep beyond his two and twenty years. It was in Gilliam's face that Geoffrey found his closest kinship. Beneath curling golden hair, his younger brother owned the same length of nose and breadth of brow and jaw, his eye color a lighter blue.
"Nor I," said Rannulf, Lord Graistan, wearing a simple tawny tunic. "Take heart, Henry. Think what friends you make of we FitzHenrys by this boon." Only four months younger than Richard, Henry of Graistan's elder heir shared both height and build with Geoffrey, but he was dark where Geoff was fair. His features were long, his eye color the same translucent gray Cecilia owned.
"You were friends to me already," Lavendon replied, a new caution in his tone as if he feared he might no longer be.
Rannulf smiled; it was this smile that named him Geoffrey's brother. "Henry, you are an old woman, nattering on without cause. Go you to your rest and cease your worries. Are we not foster-brothers?"
Henry gave a pleased huff, then turned and left the room. His servants trooped behind him. The logs on the hearth snarled and shifted as Geoffrey waited for the upper chamber door to close. When it had, he smiled at the circle of his family, including Elyssa's son Jocelyn, who sat at Gilliam's feet. "I would thank you all," he said to his brothers.
Rannulf glanced at Richard, then to Gilliam. "For being your family, I hope. Anything else would be an insult."
"Aye, so I am at long last remembering," Geoffrey replied. "How stands it with Freyne?"
"For that you must ask my squire," said Gilliam.
"Why your squire?" Geoffrey looked at Jocelyn, who, God willing, would soon be his stepson.
Gone was the babe of last autumn with his whining and his tears. Jocelyn, his pale brown hair still short after April's injuries, now sat among his betters wearing a quiet confidence that spoke well of the man he would become. "Because, my lord, each day I enter Gradinton's camp to view how their siege progresses."
Geoffrey raised his brows in surprise and looked to Gilliam. "You send the one who is Freyne's heir into the hands of a man bent on destroying that house?"
If Gilliam laughed softly, Jocelyn's grin was cheeky. "I was never known at Freyne and what soldier looks askance upon a ragged village lad?" the boy asked him in fluent English.
While Rannulf and Richard laughed, Geoffrey turned to Gilliam, the only one of them unfamiliar with the commoner's tongue, to translate. Gilliam cocked a brow. "I know what he said." If his accent was heavy, it was still passable English.
"Good lad, 'twas past time you learned," Rannulf said, the lad he complimented bigger and heavier than he, then turned his attention back on Jocelyn. "Tell Coudray what you saw, child."
"Lord Gradinton has felled wood enough to fill the dry moat, making a bridge. He sets his ram against Freyne's gate, working it without pause the day long."
"What sort of defense does Freyne use against this attack?" Geoffrey asked.
Jocelyn gave a sorry shake to his head. "They padded the underside of the drawbridge, but the pad gave way before noon. Beyond that, they've sent down only stones and bolts, but far too few of those to have an effect. They've not much chance against the ram as the trebuchet has cleared the hoarding. But, that isn’t what most concerns me." The lad glanced at the men around him. "My uncle, Reginald of Freyne, leads Lord Gradinton's men in their efforts to destroy what is mine."
Geoffrey drew a sharp breath. He saw again the man's detailed account book. Without doubt, Gradinton knew every item Freyne had in store and would have prepared against those attacks. "No doubt Gradinton pays him well to betray his home. You are certain it’s him?”
The corners of the squire's mouth lifted in a smile reminiscent of his foster father's. "We came eye-to-eye. I think he did not remember me as I have changed a mite."
"Just a wee bit, Jos," Gilliam laughed, dropping a huge hand onto the lad's yet thin shoulder. Jocelyn almost crumpled beneath its weight but his face was alive with a pleased grin.
Geoffrey nodded as he digested what he'd heard. The need to be done with Gradinton and his threats grew. If he couldn't succeed without his brothers' help, neither would he involve them in what could hurt them.
"Hear me out and decide for yourselves. I have had enough of Gradinton's harassment. When we attack it will be my intention to do more than drive him off. I would end this, here and now. If he attempts to retreat, I will not let him go. It’s his death I now seek." Such a thing was surely dishonorable, if not tantamount to murder.
There was a moment's silence between these men. The youngest of them spoke first. "If one man attacks another, he does so in full knowledge of what it might cost him," Gilliam said. "Who will fault you for seeking to keep your family from further harm? I, for one, am content to aid you in this aim."
Geoffrey's gaze slipped to his elder brothers. "And, you?"
"In a battle the outcome is always in God's hands, not ours," Rannuff said. "If the boy counts as well as he creeps, then our numbers are evenly matched, making the fight fair. I say it will only be murder if Gradinton kneels before you, pleading for peace as you cut him down. Should such a thing occur, I must stop you. Other than that, I can imagine no other need to interfere. Richard?"
"Nor can I," the eldest of them agreed.
"Aye then," Geoffrey said in relief, "we must be quick about what we do. Gradinton concentrates on the gateway because there is no portcullis, only a set of wooden
doors and the drawbridge. If the defenders cannot harass the ram as Jocelyn suggests, I cannot believe the doors will long stand. It’s paramount that we stop Gradinton before he breaches the walls."
"Why?" asked Richard.
Geoffrey's smile was grim. "Remember, Gradinton seeks not to own Freyne, but Cecilia. Should he gain the interior under our attack, he'll set his men to holding us at bay while he pries open the keep. Once he has her our hands will be tied. I must let him retreat with impunity, fearing that Cecilia might be hurt if I attack him."
"Against the possibility that he takes the bailey while we are after him, what sort of defense stands between him and the keep?" Rannulf asked.
Geoffrey leaned forward and braced his forearms on his knees to ease his back's ache. "Freyne is made in the old style, with the keep set high upon a motte. Between the keep's hill and the bailey there lies a secondary dry moat, fully ringing the tower's mound. The motte's sides are mined with wooden stakes, and it wears a wooden pallisade around its crest, with the access from bailey to motte by drawbridge. While this sounds efficient enough, you must remember who leads this siege. Reginald will know every step to opening that second gate."
"Then there's naught left to us but an open assault as soon as possible," Gilliam said with a certain morbid glee.
"That is my thinking exactly," Geoffrey replied. "Tired as I am, I’d not wait past tomorrow's dawn to be finished with this."
"I see no other choice," Rannulf agreed.
"Dawn suits me very well," Gilliam said as he rose and stretched. "Aye, it will be a joy to fight this battle with my brothers at my side and Jos at my knee."
"You'll not take the lad to battle. He's too young," Rannulf protested.
Jos rose swiftly to his feet. "Lord Graistan, this is my home that Lord Gradinton destroys with my uncle's aid. He threatens my mother and my brother. Thus is it my right to fight in their defense."
"Well spoken, lad," Rannulf said, his voice warm with admiration, "but what can you do against men twice your age and three times your bulk?"
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