Crown of the Realm (A White Knight Adventure Book 2) (16 page)

Throwing his head back against the tree trunk, Drake inhaled slowly. “Very well. I’ll tell you, insofar as I can. To force me into an action against my nature.”

“—Which prudence makes you hesitate to say,” Gaucelm guessed. “And so, to avoid the
routiers
’ mandate, you have been seeking your brother’s whereabouts—what man would not?—but with little success since he could be locked up in any one of a thousand dark dungeons for any one of a thousand dark reasons by any one of a thousand dark men. Not esteeming your noble motives, which undermined their own, the
routiers
wished to speed you on your course.”

“And paid with their lives,” commented Guiraut.

The burial mounds, tamped down and covered with rocks, were prominent in their freshness.

“But the man
or men they served … for
routiers
never serve themselves as such … still thrive, do they not?” Gaucelm asked, holding his gaze on Drake. “Do you know who they might be?”

“
I cannot say with certainty.”

“But being an astute man, as I can tell you are
, you have hazarded a guess or two?”

He shrugged. “All I know is that Botolphe … the one claimed by the river … said my brother was handed off to another. Someone calling himself Gui
, who was supposed to transport him to the Île de France.”

Intrigued
by this, Gui d’Ussel leaned forward and asked, “Gui is a common enough name.”

“A Gui from
Nevers, he said. With brown hair.”

“Perhaps I dyed mine like loose women do.”

“I beg your pardon, Gui d’Ussel,” said Alamanda.

“As I do yours,” Gui said, causing his brothers to laugh.

“Whoever this Gui is,” Alamanda said, “you must do as the
routiers
have bid or your brother will be lost forever.”

“If he is not lost already.” Drake smiled glumly. “In the end, Botolphe boasted of killing Stephen himself.”

Gaucelm said, “Likely, then, he lied about everything else.”

Drake stared into the pyre and nodded.

Alamanda of Gascony wasn’t as young as first impressions told, nor was she a fragile member of her sisterhood. The fustian gown she wore had faded to a grayish-purple. Little jewelry adorned her and no powders spoiled the freshness of her sun-kissed complexion. Yet she was potently feminine. Her eyes wandered astutely to the weapons, wiped clean and returned to their scabbards. “Twin swords. Twin daggers. Twin rings. Therefore twin brothers. Identical twins? Naturally. I’m already getting headaches from seeing triple. You are alike, then, in every way?”

“Except he is a man of thought and afterwards of action, whereas I am a man of action and afterwards of thought.”

“You would be wise, Drake fitzAlan of Winchester, to not trouble yourself over our wicked-tongued Alamanda,” Peire commented. “She takes neither doubles nor triples into her skirts. Singles possibly, but not often enough for that, nor with the right single.”

The other brothers gibed
Gui with catcalls while Guiraut and Gaucelm remained prudently silent.

“Do you remember, Guiraut?” Alamanda queried her fellow troubadour. “It was said
that twin brothers served Duke Richard as his squires. Men, and women too, often jested over it.”

“
Did
they?” Feeling a twinge of insult, Drake never thought of himself as a curiosity to be mocked by strangers.

“Do not take offence. People have little in their lives, and when they can make little of other men, it gives them
big dreams.”

“And so,” Guiraut said, “you had to kill the
routiers
as you did. Probably they would have done your squire in, no matter.” He exchanged a meaningful look with Gaucelm.

Taking heed of the prompting, Gaucelm said, “You realize the
routiers
have led you, wittingly or unwittingly, into a part of Aquitaine where feelings run high against Richard. And perhaps you know, or perhaps not, that Aimery, the vicomte of Limoges, had once been staunchly loyal to Old King Henry since he grew to maturity under his aegis and because the king later presented the young heir of Limoges with a Plantagenêt heiress for his bride. In later years though, when the ongoing squabbles between the English king and his wayward sons exposed weakness, Aimery united with his half-brother Ademar of Angoulême. Together they rose in rebellion against King Henry and Duke Richard, and used
routiers
to wreak havoc. Each time the price exacted for defeat was the destruction of citadels and the forfeiture of ancestral lands. The
routiers
’ price was higher. They were often blinded, drowned, or maimed. Hence they harbor no love for Richard.”

“Or anyone who serv
es him,” Guiraut added.

“The decisive break came i
n ’82,” Gaucelm continued, “when Ademar and Aimery joined their older brother Guilhem in a fight that threatened the very survival of the Taillefer family. In dispute was an innocent child: Matilda of Angoulême, the daughter of their dead brother Vulgrin. Ah, you recognize her name.”

Shrugging,
Drake said nothing in response.

Gaucelm
tipped his head back and drank from the handed-off wineskin. Licking his lips, he went on. “Richard claimed the child, but two years of age at the time, as his ward. And so the question of who owned the Angoulême came to fire and sword. Bolstered by alliances with the vicomtes of Ventadorn, Comborn, Torena, and Périgord, the Taillefer brothers fought valiantly. But Duke Richard does not entertain defeat. After devastating the Limousin, he carried off wives and daughters by force and made them his concubines against their wills, then handed them down for his knights to enjoy.”

“I don’t believe a word.”

“It does not matter whether
you
believe it, only that the people of the Dordogne believe it. To this day, the possession of the Angoumois is bitterly disputed between Richard and Ademar, who defies his liege lord by using the title
comte
. So you see, though these are Richard’s lands, you have wandered into enemy territory.”

Gui broke the stillness. “
What will you do now?”

“Find my brother.”

“Where will you look?” Gaucelm asked. “For even if you knew where to search, you’re not fit to travel for a week or more. Nor is your squire.”

“I have an idea,” said the lively Gui, who had become
even more animated with a liquefied bloodstream. “Why don’t you travel with us? Surely the monks at Tulle will tend to your injuries, yours and the child’s.”

Devon opened an eyelid.

“And after you’re fully restored, you can accompany us to Limoges. We travel slow, but we eat well.”

“And drink well,” added Peire.

“And drink better than well,” said Eble, holding up the wineskin and releasing a loud belch. “Guiraut knows well the truth of this and can vouch for us.”

“There is safety in numbers,” Gui said, lifting his cup. “We will defend your virtue with our lives if need be.”

“It is not my virtue that needs defending.” Drake agreed to the plan regardless, due in part to Gui’s wisdom, but mostly because of Gaucelm’s account. Though he was speaking over the heads of his three young companions but not over the heads of Guiraut or Alamanda, Gaucelm had not merely woven a fanciful story told round a campfire. He had told Drake where to find men who, even if they were not behind a plot to assassinate Richard Plantagenêt, certainly did not look kindly on one of his most trusted knights joining their landed niece in holy matrimony.

“Of course, there is a danger,” Gaucelm cautioned. “If these men are holding your brother, surely you will be recognized.”

Drake smiled winningly. “It’s a chance I’m willing to take. For the alternative is worse than death.”

AT THE MONASTERY
of Saint-Martin de Tulle, Bernart de Ventadorn eagerly greeted his old friend Gaucelm Faidit and just as eagerly welcomed his traveling companions. No longer regaled in the courts of Poitou, Limousin, and Toulouse, the former troubadour lived as a monk, his robes plain, his head shaven, and his voice raised in jubilant prayer instead of joyful song.

The infirmarian and three lay brothers saw to the wounds of a knight and his squire, and thereafter provided comfortable beds, plentiful food and drink, and vigilant care. Drake divided his time
between the infirmary, where Devon was recovering from a fever, and the guesthouse, where he and his cheerful comrades relaxed in austere though comfortable accommodations. Arriving a day later, the missing cousin Elias added a certain sobriety to the assemblage, one that was sorely needed given his talkative cousins.

On quiet nights between compline and matins
, when the rest of the monastery slept, Bernart regaled his guests with zestful tales about his days as a wandering troubadour and sang many of his exhaustive
cansos
,
which extolled in lyrical verse the virtues of courtly
fin’amor
.

Before leaving Tulle, Drake turned to profit the
routiers’ horses. Now that he and Devon could contribute to the cook pot, wine reserves, and conviviality without being burdensome invalids, they became part of the nomadic band as if they had always been.

On the way
to Limoges, Drake let his beard grow, borrowed a new suit of clothing from Guiraut, and blackened his hair with Alamanda’s assistance. The lady also gave him a haircut to better hide his identity as the twin brother of a man who was being held for ransom. “I don’t think anyone will mistake you for your brother,” she declared. “Or yourself, for that matter. You were much too pretty, in any case. Now you look a man of dubious background and parentless heritage.”

He didn’t know whether to take her comment as flattery or criticism. But when a grin touched her mouth, he kissed it.

Upon the party’s unheralded arrival at the Château d’Aixe, Drake was introduced as Grendel of Poitiers. Speaking to Vicomte Aimery de Limoges, Gui added with an unsmiling mouth, “Just another tourney follower we happened upon along the way. He’d been attacked by a gang of ruffians, hence the limp and bruises.” Pushing Devon to the fore, he added with soberer tones, “Also, my little cousin here, Roger of Maussac. At the tender age of four, his mother left him in the garderobe and promptly forgot him. A servant sent to clean the latrine some eleven years later discovered the filthy runt.”

“Twelve years,” Devon corrected him.

“And
now
,” Gui said, narrowing his eyes at Devon, “we can’t get rid of him, try as we might. The freckles,” he added with apology, “are from his father’s side of the family.”

A humorless man nearing fifty, Aimery asked no questions and accepted Grendel and Roger as tang and heft of the eccentric d’Ussel party.

After being in the company of the vicomte of Limoges for mere minutes, Drake determined he was tough as they came, in any climate and on any road. His unimpressive fortress, some five miles southwest of his one-time familial home of Limoges, was his dubious reward for defiance against his liege lord. Forced to turn over the citadel of Limoges to King Henry as punishment for his part in the rebellion of ’76, having forfeited another set of strongholds in the summer of ’82, and having all those losses reaffirmed with yet another defeat two years ago, Aimery was an embittered and self-righteous man. Precious few lands and châteaux were left him, and those that were his by rights belonged to Richard by claim, including the one he presently inhabited.

His taciturn son Widomar, a few years older than Drake, seemed to have inherited his father’s disposition.
It scarcely mattered whether he remembered the glory days of old or had vicariously lived them through oft-repeated tales. As a young man whose birthright had been stripped away, he experienced the hardships and deprivations nearly every day. During subsequent meals and evenings of entertainment, Wido usually took up a corner of the great hall somewhat like a decorative statue. And like a statue, he rarely drank, ate, or took part in the festivities, except for participating in the tournament. He also studied Drake with the keenest of eyes.

His mother, Sarah of Cornwall, managed to rise above the underlying acrimony, warmly welcoming all to her hearthside, even while
managing her peevish lord and lordling.

T
hough the days were warmed by the sun, the nights turned chilly. Come sundown, the hearth of Aixe Castle filled the great hall with swirling feathers of smoke. The cellars from last autumn’s harvest were dwindling and the availability of root vegetables, dried fruits, grains, and nuts were running dry. But platters upon platters of beef, veal, venison, and chicken, cheese and plover eggs, lampreys and salmon more than made up for the lack of stores. If these were not enough, overflowing pitchers of mead and wine filled in where the dishes lacked.

On the days preceding and following Drake’s arrival, many visitors straggled into the hill
top castle. An army of knights armed for the games. Aimery’s half-brother Comte Ademar and his wife Alix de Courtenay. Aimery’s daughter Humberga, whose husband Geoffrey de Lusignan had been banished to Jerusalem on the orders of Richard. Aimery’s cousin Geoffrey de Rancon, who watched Richard destroy his castle of Taillebourg and would have been serving penance alongside Lusignan were it not for a ransom paid in lieu. Comte Élie of Périgord, who lost his castle to Richard five years earlier. Raimon of Toulouse and his bride Beatrice of Beziers, both of whom had also experienced their fair share of clashes with the Plantagenêts.

But it was
Hugh of Lusignan, nephew of the banished Geoffrey, who made the evenings bearable for Drake. Being his contemporary, the young Lusignan was eager enough to match faces to names and describe, often in jocular detail, the tragic histories of these men of power, powerful no more.

During the tourney,
Hugh and Drake teamed up as a formidable pair, preserving their wits and indispensable body parts while purchasing a fair amount of victories. If Drake fitzAlan of Winchester, or rather Grendel of Poitiers, had been a modest man, he would have arranged a run of bad luck. But he wasn’t a modest man.

Riding in from the
mêlée
of the second day, heady and grimy from their triumphs, Drake and Hugh trotted in review past Aimery, perched on his black steed. Riding a few paces back, Elias, his brown curls slicked down by sweat, urged his horse abreast Drake, and imparting a cautionary look, threw a secondary glance toward the vicomte of Limoges.

The expression beneath the chestnut eyes and sparse hair
of the vicomte held more than common interest. Drake only then grasped his stupidity and realized too late that he appeared overly talented on the field; that he was too highly skilled for the borrowed hauberk he wore; that his sword looked as if it had been stolen from a nobler knight; that the garnet ring on his finger spoke similarly; that despite recent injuries, he and his considerable talents stood out; and above all, that he and Hugh had captured too many knights and reaped too much bounty for their own good.

Bad luck
finally caught up with Hugh de Lusignan and Grendel de Poitiers. On their third and final outing, they lost all the gains of the first two. Captured handily by Widomar de Limoges, the two knights ransomed themselves for everything they had brought to the field. By chance, Drake left in the castle stables his stylish Arabian, his gold-gilt sword, and the rest of his personal belongings and borrowed equipment. Claiming lameness of the palfrey, he rode a borrowed horse, armed himself with winnings culled from previous outings, and advised his partner to do the same. At the conclusion of the games, Grendel and Hugh were no worse off than when they arrived. Neither were they better off, but Wido was in fine temper.

And so, on what was to be their last night at Aixe, celebrations abounded.
Hugh de Lusignan, though, was in a foul mood. He didn’t appreciate losing all the bounty he had gained on the previous two days, but gathering that the ploy was a matter of recompense for their host’s generosity, drowned his sorrows with goblet upon goblet of tasty Saintonge wine. After witnessing Widomar’s energized face and boisterous voice, he patted Grendel of Poitiers on the back for his shrewdness, for it was far better to leave behind friendly allies than resentful foes. 

Presently l
eaning into Drake’s ear, Hugh whispered of yet another
gentil-homme
in bad temper. “For years, Raimon of Toulouse has been squabbling with the Plantagenêts as to who has the more rightful claim of Toulouse. Rightfully, Toulouse belongs to Raimon. But since Eleanor and Raimon are cousins to the third degree, Richard seized Toulouse on behalf of his mother. Raimon has since crawled into bed with Vicomte Aimery and Comte Ademar for comfort and protection. By night they cry into their cups and by day they plot against Richard. So goes the game of kings and the restiveness of nobles.”

“Is everyone at war with Richard?”

“Only the men. The women would sooner climb into his bed.”

But for his resplendent clothing, Raimon could have been mistaken for a highwayman on the lookout for easy prey. His
tangled hair, frowning mouth, and cunning eyes were enough to put anyone off, especially when those eyes were focused on Grendel of Poitiers.

“
He seems to know you,” Hugh said. “Have you met before?”

“Not that I’m aware
.”

“He doesn’t trust anyone, especially strangers.
He’d sooner slit a man’s throat than chance a traitor in his midst.”

D
espite Gaucelm’s insinuation that the enemies of Richard might be found here and that the castle dungeons could very well be sequestering the twin brother of an assassin, Drake wasn’t any closer to sniffing out Stephen’s whereabouts. No prisoner was locked in the dark depths of the chateau. He had searched. No dark conspiracy was whispered behind shielding hands. He had eavesdropped. No bets on the duke of Aquitaine’s premature demise had been laid, even though wild speculation on the identity, motive, and sanity of a lone assassin and apostate knight abounded. And neither the comte of Angoulême nor the vicomte of Limoges nor any of their noble guests spoke of the brothers fitzAlan.

The last to arrive
and most fashionably late were two eagerly expected guests: Vicomte Eble of Ventadorn and Vicomtesse Maria de Torena. When the couple first entered the great hall, freshened from their dusty journey, Drake and Hugh rose from their bench in unison. Hugh’s eyes were beaming but not from the hearthfire. “She’s an uncommon beauty, is she not?”

Drawing the stares of every breathing man in the vicinity, Maria was a
dark-haired exemplar of her sex, possessed of a clear olive complexion, delicate nose, heart-shaped face, and eyes as dark as her hair.

“I suppose,” Drake said,
tasting his wine, “it depends on your definition of beauty.”

“There,” said Hugh. “There is
everyman’s paragon. Look no further.”

Her splendid gown was
made of spun gold. The diaphanous sendal shimmered as brightly as the
torchères
. The low-cut neckline revealed bronze skin made ruddy by the hearthfire. Suspended from a chain of gold above the tantalizing cleavage of her breasts rode a great amber bead, nearly as large as an egg and of the same shape. As befitting her marital status, she wore a veil on her hair, but its short length enhanced rather than concealed her resplendent brunette tresses. 

The last thoughts of
a condemned man always include a full belly and satisfied loins. Though Drake ate and slept and conversed amiably enough with his new friends, he lived on borrowed time, facing gibbet or dungeon, he knew not which. Whatever his fate, he was sure that he would never again glimpse Aveline, nor lie with her, nor kiss her lips, nor sniff her fragrance, nor even exchange heated barbs with her. The vision of this comely woman made him dare to hope there was, after all, something worth celebrating, even if it was only a dream, and an unattainable dream at that.

“
Ventadorn stands on the very tip of a narrow spur.” Gui and his long-lost cousin Roger had joined Drake and Hugh, and like them, admired the quiet woman with expressive eyes and proud posture. “High above the river valleys converging at its feet—Dordogne tributaries—with a lone tower rising picturesquely above the trees. Bernart de Ventadorn was born there. They say he’s the son of a kitchen servant and Eble the third, the grandfather of the current Eble, not to be confused with our own Eble. Maria de Torena, or more rightly de Ventadorn, is cousin to our hosts Ademar and Aimery. After bearing two sons, she has grown tired of her husband, and quite rightly, since he is a bore
and
a boar, and she is the object of desire of every man she meets. But alas, she doles out favors to only a select few. Maria, beautiful Maria, gay Maria,” Gui waxed longingly. “We are all madly in love with her, are we not? We would fall at her feet if only she would cast her gaze at any one of us just once. Alas, she never does. She has a discriminating eye, does Maria. Of course the child,” Gui said, glancing at Devon, “would not know the first thing about passion.”