Crown of the Realm (A White Knight Adventure Book 2) (21 page)

The bland eyes lit up. “She will act as regent. The queen does not
allow emotion to cloud her judgment. More to the point, she does not ride at the head of an army.”

“But you underestimate John. He has ambition.”

“But not an army.”

“Bringing us back
to Philippe.”

The grizzled eyebrows arched. “You are indeed a shrewd man. No wonder Richard values you and your brother so highly.” Then after a sigh,
he admitted, “
Oc,
Philippe. Otherwise ….” But he stopped himself from saying more.

“Otherwise,” Drake finished for him, “you would not have entered into a pact with the Devil.”

This time the eyebrows shot up without comment.

“It’s true,” Drake said. “Eleanor does not ride at the head of an army. John cannot win a sword fight, much less protect an empire. And Geoffrey is too
enamored of his mirror. You supposed Philippe would protect your interests. He would not.”

“If we are allies—”

“You are but a pawn, Aimery of Limoges, you and your brother. Anon, you would toast Richard’s tomb and reclaim your lost castles, if you dare. For I promise, Philippe would sweep into the Aquitaine and take it for his own. And you would find yourself kneeling before a French king instead of an English one.”

“You paint a pretty picture.”

“I paint the only picture there is.”

STANDING HIGH ON
a rocky plinth ten short miles south of Aixe, the Château de Châlus rose regally over a rugged landscape. The cylindrical
donjon
, mortared with native rock, stood lookout on the valley below, while in its bowels, Drake and Louis followed Aimery and two wardens down the wheel staircase, lit darkly by a single torch carried aloft. A key was produced. A door was thrown open. Within the cell, a chain stirred.

The occupant rose from a narrow cot. He held a shielding hand to blinded eyes and peered fearfully at the men converging on him. His complexion was the color of dried mud. He had lost weight. His hair was a tangle
. His beard had grown in brownish and sparse. Yet despite everything, he looked the same.

A second key was produced. The shackle tethering his leg to the wall was unlocked and cast aside.

Dread was yet imprinted on the prisoner’s seawater eyes until, as if awakening from a nightmare, he gradually brought into focus the man who had pushed himself to the fore. “If you expect hosannas …,” he said, his voice husky and fatigued.

“I had my own problems,”
came the blithe response. Drake moved a step closer.

“Two months … nearly three … my loving brother … a dilatory hero. Well, don’t expect any.
Hosannas, that is.”

“The hosannas I reap
are seeing you in such a bad mood. Are you well?”

“Well enough, considering.” He glanced up at the
vicomte and the turnkeys flanking him on either side. “Who are you? Where am I?” And when Aimery informed him, “Then you haven’t come to chop off my head?”

“Your brother has come to set you at liberty. He will not be prevented from doing so.”

“I was prepared to leave this world.”

Drake said, “Surely God will be just as glad to
gather you into His bosom eighty years from now.”

“Perish the thought.”

Closing the gap, they embraced, long and hard. If a tear or two had been shed, it would have been forgiven. “You don’t wish to live to a ripe old age?” Drake asked his brother.

“I wish to die at the end of a sword, quick and true.”

“Hah! You’re a romantic, like me.” Drake pointed over Stephen’s shoulder. “This is your cousin, Louis of Blois.”

And Stephen, leaving his brother’s arms, hugged Louis
, much to the lad’s astonishment.

The brothers walked out of the dungeon, arms clasped about each other. Stephen blinked into the blinding sun
and felt the warmth on his face. Then he blinked at the strangers gathering around him.

Holding up three fingers, Gui greeted Drake’s brother in his usual style. “How many fingers have I?”

“Eleven.”

“How so?”

“Ten on your hands and one down below.”

Slapping Stephen vigorously on the back, Gui exclaimed, “Huh! He is
indeed fitzAlan’s long-lost brother, never mind his paleness.” Then gathering him to his chest like his own brother, he kissed him on the lips. “It is good to make your acquaintance, Stephen fitzAlan, even if you do stink like a dungeon.”

Mounting his
palfrey, Drake looked down at the vicomte of Limoges. “Come. We ride for Angoulême. There to retract fangs, rectify grievances, and uphold the mighty scepter, not necessarily in that order.”

Aimery stood spellbound to the ground-patch beneath his feet.
He was a stubborn man. And proud.

“Unless
,” said Drake, “you wish Richard to employ his
droit de seigneur
on your high-born niece prior to our wedding night.”

The invitation was crude but taken.

They rode a few short miles and camped beside the Tardoire River. Stephen bathed in the chill waters, clothes and all, and waded out singing. Alamanda took a razor to his beard. He emerged like a sheered lamb, and grinned just as foolishly. Afterwards, she turned her attention on Drake, who subjected himself to the same razor.

As the sun set, they feasted on cheese, bacon
, and barley bread as if it were the most delicious and abundant banquet on God’s green earth. Gaucelm brought out his lute and sang a troubadour’s lament.

Stephen swept a hand across the night sky, flung thick with stars. “Why is it we can’t touch them?”

Head propped on saddle and blanket drawn about his shoulders, Drake was stretched out beside his brother. Nearby, the campfire licked holes into the dark. “Too far away.”

“If you stacked ten tall ladders, one on top of the other, could you reach them then?”

Clutching the lame arm close to his chest, Drake shook his head. “They say the pyramids of Africa are higher than a thousand oaks, but if you climbed to the top, still you could not touch the stars.”

Stephen turned onto a shoulder.
His eyes drooped. He was close to sleep. “What happened to your arm? Did you have to ram it up the vicomte’s arse for him to give me up?”

“Oh, it’s much better than that. Two women. A scullery maid and a kitchen servant. Sisters. Plump. Correction, fat.”

“Then it was worth the inconvenience.”

“It
most definitely was.” Drake let the night seep into his restored soul. To have his brother lying beside was to become whole once more. “The
routiers
are dead, every one.”

“Good,” was all Stephen
said. Drake thought the prisoner of Châlus had drifted off, but then he said, “When a man sits alone in the dark for days on end, he has a lot of time to think.”

“About?”

Lifting his arm, he traced the constellation Sagittarius—half archer and half horse—and let his arm drop. “Duty. Loyalty. Brotherhood.”

“And the conclusions he has drawn?”

“I will need more time for conclusions.”

A few
days of leisurely travel would bring the troupe to Châteauneuf, one of the many castles of Aimery’s half-brother Comte Ademar of Angoulême. Since there was no hurry, they took their time, stopping along the way for food, drink, conviviality, and restoration. On the third day, before the sun was to dip unseen behind a cloudy sky, Aimery goaded his horse and caught up with the brothers fitzAlan, riding point.

Because of the constancy of pain
in his arm, or more likely the change he experienced in himself—an odd alchemy that had nothing to do with broken bones or even with broken spirit—Drake was keeping to himself. Summerlike breezes cooled his face but not his temper. From the outset of the jaunt that morning, he hadn’t spoken to anyone, not even to his brother. When the vicomte appeared, something clearly on his mind, Stephen reined in his mount and fell back.

Their steeds in harmonized step,
vicomte and knight rode in silence for a mile or more before Drake said, “But for your petty feud, none of this would have happened.”

“But for a virtuous maiden.”

“For a virtuous maiden’s lands.”

“You make the case for me,” Aimery said. “They are one in the same.”

“Marriages of convenience. Isn’t that how alliances are formed? Hasn’t that been our way for hundreds of years?”

“Here in the Limousin, inheritances pass first to surviving brothers, and only then to offspring. When Matilda’s father died, my brother Guilhem
stood to inherit, and after his demise, Ademar. Richard chose to ignore this. For ten years, he has retained custody of our niece as a yoke about all our necks.”

“But isn’t Richard your liege lord? As his vassals, aren’t you and your brother obliged to obey his command?”

“He is. We must. But only because he has an army to force us. The duke of Aquitaine is presumptuous.”

Overhead, wood
-pigeons scattered amidst fluting beats of wings. “And what of Wido’s mother? Wasn’t she used in the same manner Richard proposes for the chaste Matilda of Angoulême?” When Drake caught Aimery’s glance, he drove home the point. “As was the lady vicomtesse of Ventadorn? For that matter, Queen Eleanor herself? Tell me, where lies the difference?”

T
hough not always a considerate man, Aimery was a considering one. “You forget. Eleanor took her husbands willingly.”

“Only to escape being raped by any suitor come to pay court
, including the sanctimonious father of Louis de Blois, who eventually accepted the queen’s infant daughter as consolation. My God!” Ruefully shaking his head, Drake said, “I have gained a certain respect for women. Above all, I admire them for accepting their place in life. But in truth, we are all pawns upon the game board, to be moved at will.” He let some time pass before saying, “We laid eyes upon each other once before. Two years past. When you and your brother were forced to sue for peace.”

“
Oc
, another failed rebellion.” Little surprised the vicomte, but Drake’s statement did. “You were with Richard? During the negotiations? But how? I don’t recall …”

“As his squires.”

Memory came surging back. “Dear God. I remember now. Twin brothers, so alike. Gangly. Almost pretty. And fawning. But it can’t be.”

“But it is. My mother, now dead, was the daughter of Queen Eleanor’s baseborn brother Joscelin.”

On a sudden movement, the many-times vanquished Aimery de Limoges twisted in the saddle and sought out Louis of Blois, riding at the head of his guard. Noting the subtle similarities between the future comte of Blois and his distant cousin, he shook his head, chagrined. “You perhaps do not know that Wido’s mother Sarah is the daughter of Rainald, Earl of Cornwall. You perhaps are too young to know that Rainald was one of the countless bastards begot by the first King Henry, Richard’s great-grandfather.”

Drake was
becoming too versed at connecting complicated lineages through the generations. “Making your son second cousin to Richard by half as I am also cousin to him by a different half. We are strangely related, Wido and I. In a similar way that Eble of Ventadorn and I are related.”

The fact penetrated slowly
, but penetrate it did. “It seems I am mocked. It seems the enemies we make are not enemies in the least. It seems, in whatever season, water naturally seeks its source. It seems no matter which side we place ourselves, we are all connected to the same unholy family, may they and we be damned to everlasting Hell.”

“Yet you still fight each other.”

“Who else do we have to fight but each other? We are all one big happy family.” The vicomte laughed in way he had probably not laughed for years. A deluge of tears—some elated and others sorrowful—streamed down his face. “Among us … my brother Ademar, Eble, and I … we have managed to lay siege against ourselves. How ironic. The Plantagenêts have practiced courtly love to a fine art, spreading the yellow broom of their badge far and wide. God Himself could not have planned any better. If we are not already, soon we will be a nation of one family, each of us a distant cousin to any man we may meet on the byway.”

The
vicomte’s laughter went on a good deal longer, while Drake, not seeing the humor in quite the same way, kicked his dappled gray and spurred ahead, leaving Aimery in a wake of dust and aborted spirit.

AND SO IT WAS
that the vicomte of Limoges rode among a subdued party of troubadours, lordlings, knights, and stray sons, hardly any of the mismatched travelers having much in common but all of them possessed of a fixed goal, that of witnessing history unfold.

A
fter a march of several days, they met up not unexpectedly with Richard, by the grace of God duke of Aquitaine, whose far-reaching duchy included the many and diverse comtés and vicomtés of La Marche, Auvergne, Périgord, Agenais, Quercy, Saintonge, Armagnac, Béarn, Ventadorn, Comborn, Turenne, Angoulême, and Limoges, disregarding when one or the other was in rebellion or under siege. On his way back from the southern territories, the duke had been duly intercepted by courier, as ordered by Drake and agreed to by Aimery, who had little choice in coming face to face with the overlord he had repeatedly betrayed.

In greeting, twilight spread its elongated shadows and brought the separate parties into safe harbor
, the bailey of Châteauneuf. Since the castle had been spectacularly captured in ’76 by Richard after a fortnight’s siege, old grievances were bound to be resurrected. But what Richard did not yet know was that he had been waylaid here, fourteen years later, to assuage the feelings of the Angoumois and Limousin nobility and, by way, to put an end to the trials of Drake and Stephen fitzAlan.

After acknowledging the
vicomte of Limoges and his half-brother the comte of Angoulême as if no bad blood flowed between them, Richard greeted Drake and Stephen with brash hugs and fierce kisses. He looked them over top to bottom, commenting on their various states of disability. “It’s a good thing,” he said to Drake, “you did not break your sword arm.”

A
different man than the one who left England those many months ago, Drake said in a droll and bitter manner, “Truly, it does not matter which arm is broken, so long as they both serve the king.” And presented Richard with his departing back.

Evensong found Richard sitting down with Ademar and Aimery. To put them in their proper places, he berated them with a heated discourse having to do with loyalty, fidelity
, and allegiance. And lectured them against treasonous acts carried out on their overlord and their overlord’s knights. And went on to threaten all manner of destruction and ruination by altogether unpleasant means.

In the end, he made certain compromises.

Restoration of a slew of castles surrendered to Duke Richard and King Henry more than a decade ago was rejected out of hand. Widomar was to remain under the comte of Blois’ protection until he took the cross and sailed for the Holy Land. The proposed marriage of Matilda of Angoulême to Drake fitzAlan was not withdrawn.

But s
ince his son would serve God’s holy mission, the vicomte of Limoges was formally restored his title. And should Widomar conduct himself valiantly on the battlefield, he would be allowed possession of the familial home of Limoges upon his return and all rights of inheritance. The biggest prize, the comté of Angoulême, was formally granted to Ademar, irrespective of the forthcoming nuptials of his niece. Drake, it seemed, was not destined to become a comte in his own right, which did not disappoint him in the least.

Afterwards, and for the most part satisfied, the half-brothers sought out the elder fitzAlan brother who brought the concession
s to pass. Obviously they were pleased with the outcome but not so pleased as to gloat, though it seemed prudent to welcome the knight into their family. In no mood to receive gratitude in whatever form, Drake also showed the comte and vicomte his petulant back.

The officially recognized
comte of Angoulême graciously extended hospitality to Richard and his mighty entourage numbering nearly fifty, and also to the brothers fitzAlan and his mélange of troubadours, vagabonds, and men-at-arms.

Trestles were arranged in the great hall and laid out with linens, candlesticks
, and assorted flower arrangements. The forthcoming meal was slaughtered, gathered from the fish weir or brought up from the cellar, and roasted and cooked and boiled with precious spices, tasty creams, and succulent sauces. Bacchus was consulted, and flagons of Moissac wine, brewed ale, and spiced mead were provided. The comte’s gracious and charming wife proudly introduced their cranky infant daughter, Isabella, who was quickly spirited away amidst wailing shrieks.

The smell of good cooking tumbled hungry bellies. Guiraut, Gaucelm
, and Alamanda, along with Bertran de Born who voiced his pleasure in finding the brothers fitzAlan hale if not hardy, provided abundant entertainment as did the brothers d’Ussel, who contributed merriment of their own especial qualities. Accompanied by splendor, the food platters arrived.

Drake ate in moderation. The ale was passable and the mead more than tolerable, but the wine
was splendid and became tastier as the evening progressed. The only sounds escaping his otherwise occupied throat were unintelligible grunts and curt affirmations or denials. At one point, he gave out a hopeful, though as it turned out lone, request for the saltcellar, and barely noticed the disappointed sighs pouring out from his table companions.

Richard’s voice overtook the chatter and music as peals of thunder overtake
a storm. Drake heard his name spoken with something more than a whisper. Only after the tables had hushed did he look up to hear his name repeated as a curse. “Drake fitzAlan is a gadfly in my soup. He is overly sullen and given to staring at his trencher.” The godlike voice reverberated from the king’s high table to Drake’s mindfully chosen perch at the far end of a sideboard.

“Drake fitzAlan,” said
Drake, “begs milord’s pardon.” He did not have to raise his voice for its petulance to resonate throughout the hall. With controlled care, he lay his table knife down on the snowy table linens and beside it, his useable hand, which matched the other resting on the opposite side of the trencher, fingers trapped in their wrappings.

“Where is the gaiety? You have returned the conquering hero. Yet you surround yourself with jongleurs and minstrels, whereas your brother,
sitting here at the high table, collects knights and lordlings. A disparity lies there, symbolic of something, as to what I am asunder.”

Drake inhaled sharply. “But you have formed an opinion.”

“
Oui
, I have formed an opinion. So why not live up to it? Or rather down to it?”

“Because … whatever your opinion regarding jongleurs and minstrels … they saved my life more than once. I am indebted to them.”

An eating knife thrown in pique took wing in the direction of Drake’s head but failed to reach him. Gui d’Ussel, with agile finesse, gathered it up from its landing position in the rushes, wiped it clean with his elbow, and sidestepping the dogs, quietly approached the dais, there to deposit it pristinely before the king. By now, no one was eating, even though the
blancmange
had arrived. 

The king
had not finished. “Have I said they oughtn’t be praise? They deserve all my praise and more, and shall have it. But you set yourself apart and lick your wounds in solitary company. Your brother here has gathered as many scars as you. He does not stick his nose in his cups and mope for all to pity.”

Drake said levelly, “Truth be known, my brother has gathered many more scars, scars that cannot be seen.” He continued to stare downward, not daring to show Richard his face, nor seeking to look into the wide eyes of those surrounding him. “Kings demand too much from those who serve them. Take Louis of Blois. His one uncle is the king of France. His other, the king of England. Which is he to play true?”

Richard scraped back his chair. “But you serve only one king.”

Drake said levelly, “Tell me that you did not intend to draw the
brothers fitzAlan into your web as a spider draws a slug, and I shall believe you.”

The king was on the move.

Drake raised his voice. “Tell me you did not know from the beginning who was behind the assassination attempts, and I shall believe you.”

Richard drew inevitably closer.

With an even louder voice, Drake said, “Tell me you placed the virginal Matilda of Angoulême on a platter, thinking only of my welfare, and I shall believe you.”

Richard was standing on the other side of the trestle
, fire licking his eyes, turbulence tumbling his hair, and temper raising his hackles.

“Tell me,”
Drake said, nearly shouting, “that you did not intend to lure one or the other of your brothers into the same web with me and Stephen, and I shall believe you.”

Bracing fists on hips, Richard thrust his beard forward.
His face colored with rage. His nostrils flared like a bull on the attack. His jaw macerated uneaten gristle.

Close to a whisper, a king’s knight finished his indictment, “Tell me that you did not mean to expose all your enemies
, near and far, so you could put yokes about their throats, and I shall believe you.”

With a broad arm, Richard swept everything
within reach off the trestle. Cups, platters, utensils, and candlesticks crashed to the floor while diners scrambled for safety.

“And still you will not say!”
Drake had not budged but kept to the table, the palms of both hands flat on the surface but the knuckles white with tension.

“Do you always stand up for your brother?”
Richard swept an arm toward Stephen while staring down at Drake. “Cannot he speak for himself? Is he not a man as you are a man?”

Stephen stood. “He can speak for himself.”

“Now that the mouth has opened, what does it have to say?” Richard took in both brothers with cutting eyes.

“That when you consult one, you
should consult both. But in truth, you consulted neither.”

“Your accusations dishonor me. Both of you!”

“It would do well for my king to be informed,” Stephen said, “his enemies do not make distinction between knights. Or pawns, as it were. One is like the other. In this case, one is exactly like the other.”

“You swore an oath of fealty!” The king’s fist pounded the table, upsetting the remaining wine goblets
, which toppled and stained the linen. “Do you take your oaths so lightly?”

Drake continued to stare at his hands, trembling
with unspent fury. More than anything, he wanted to punch out both hands, broken arm or not, traitorous action or not, and beat his king to a bloody pulp. Wiser caution prevailed since he would have wound up in a dungeon deeper than the one Stephen had occupied, there forgotten for all time.

Richard
was on the move. Drake watched him warily but miscalculated his intent. On a sudden thrust, he reached across the table, grabbed Drake by the arm, the good one, heaved him over the trestle, hauled him across the floor, and flung him against the wall. His cheek pressed to the chill of the limestone, Drake suffered a twisting agony that brought him to tears. He lashed out his bad arm but with little effect. Richard increased the pressure on his good arm. “Do I need to break the other arm to teach you respect!”

Crippled beyond pain, Drake
barely had breath enough to speak. Speak he did, his voice forced through bellows of agony. “Better a cripple! Than a pawn to your caprices!”

“Caprices, you say! Pawn, you say!”

Fury bent the twisted arm farther. Drake sank to his knees and sobbed. He had nothing to fight with except reproach. “Break it and have done with it! At least then our enemies will have a marker to tell the fitzAlan brothers apart.”

“One a knight
and the other a coward, you mean?”

Drake smelled the
putridness of fear: his own. “You call me a coward!”

“No!”
And then more calmly, as if he were speaking to himself, “No. You are anything but. Either of you. You have sacrificed yourselves ten times over. But either you are with me or you are not. Go! I don’t need you!” Richard released his grip.

“I intend to.”
With a groan, Drake painfully untangled himself and crawled into a corner in which to cower. Hunched over lamed arms, one throbbing and the other aching, he rocked back and forth.

Richard prowled the planking beside h
is groveling knight. “Where would you go? Hmm? What would you do? Run away to a monastery and hide in a cloister like your brother secretly craves? Or travel the countryside and sing songs of unrequited love like your minstrel friends? When you care for nothing and love no one.”

“I love,”
Drake said.

“
Who? Jezebels? Catamites? Or—?”

“No!”

“Then yourself? Because only a selfish ingrate would speak to his king the way you speak to me.”

Drake
gazed up through the sweat-soaked fringe of his hair and met the eyes of his king. “Stephen. My father. And you, damn you to Hell! You!”

The pacing halted.

Like a conch, Drake twisted more tightly into his protective carapace. Speaking from beneath sheltering arms, he said, “The next time you send Stephen and me on a king’s mission, do us the courtesy of informing us. At least then we can look over our shoulders.” The disquieting hush in the hall was broken only by the crackling of the hearthfire.