Shield of Three Lions (24 page)

Then the clappers ran in circles making a terrible din to announce the final number and the piper sounded the dove theme. Dangereuse mounted the platform, her elbows bent to simulate wings, her feathery costume shining silver in torchlight. Two viols soared together as she dipped and swayed in her graceful dance and the audience fell silent, for Dangereuse is an impressive performer. Then she bent to the ground and leaped forward as if she would truly take wing, thus releasing a hundred white doves hidden in her dress.

Instantly all the falcons in the room climbed above the fluttering doves to make their dives. Soon the doves turned to thousands of drifting feathers and dripping blood as the talons took their prey! The entire audience was on its feet cheering the climax to our program: everyone but the king and me.

King Richard was brushing crumbs from my curls with his long fingers. With pounding heart I watched bits of Jerusalem fall to my feet as his busy hand ruffled my Greek ringlets. I should respond—but how?

The king’s fanfare snarled and it was almost too late. The hand stopped as he rose to his feet. Desperately I turned and gazed upward. His glowing face was remote and distant as a December moon atop a tall pine, but he smiled at me.

“What is your name, boy?” he asked, as other dignitaries rose as well.

“Alexander of Wanthwaite,” I answered.

“Ah, Alexander.” He seemed to nod significantly, then was gone.

His feet were veiled by a band of gold orphrey as he marched slowly away. Vaguely I saw glittering groups fall into his train and follow as our band played lustily, but I was too entranced to move myself. Instead I turned to gaze on the throne so recently occupied by
his greatness, the red cushion still showing the imprint of his royal person.

I reached forward and touched the crimson hollow. Still warm. I edged my stool close and lay my throbbing head on the velvet: so close, so close, and yet so far because of the Scot’s perfidy. Never would the king deign to give me an audience now.

Then suddenly I forgot the king. I sniffed the cushion feverishly and looked upward. ’Twas my father’s own scent, the sweet woodruff he wore.

Was he near to me now? What did it bode? Aye, he’d come from his Limbo to console me for my failure. Or was it to chide? Again I buried my face in the cushion, this time to hide my tears.

MY HEMLOCK HAD DRIED TO powder and I couldn’t decide on what other method I should use to murder Enoch. We sat outside our tent staring at each other in the darkness, for I refused to go within.

“Dinna be sae blethered, bairn, fer ’tis no disgrace to fart. Ye mun learn to accept yer fate, to lean with the wind. Oh, no offense, I mean flow wi’ the current.”

“Now I’ll never see the king. Why didn’t you require it in my contract? You knew ’twas my whole purpose in coming. You betrayed me!”

“No point demandin’ what can’t be delivered. Richard mun decide such matters, but we were guaranteed access which ye have had.”

“Thanks to my own strong back, for you told Julian to seal me into that pie forever. You wanted to kill me as well as cheat me. You hoped I’d die, didn’t you?”

“Me?”
He pretended outrage. “Why would I hope a woodly thing like that? I had naught to do with the pie.”

“So you could steal Wanthwaite, that’s why. And in case that failed, you dangled me up in the sky hoping I’d drop like a stone and be splattered right before the king. You hate me! Want me dead!”

We both sprang to our feet.

“Now, Alex, ye be in one of yer tinty moods again like that time
ye tried to twist off my terse. Yif I remember rightly, on that occasion a small blow knocked sense into yer head. I’m sorry fer ye, aye, that I am, but not sorry enow to take yer wild insults. Do ye apologize or do I persuade ye?”

Even in the darkness I could see his raised arm. I’d had all the blows I could stand for one evening and dashed into the tent, pulling the flap behind me.

The next morn Enoch tried to cheer me with chilling talk about arranging his own audience with Richard through William du Hommet, constable to the king. It seemed Richard had made Earl David, brother to the Scottish king, to be Earl of Huntingdon in England which Enoch took as a sign that Richard would be willing for a Scot to own Wanthwaite.

“I promise ye, Alex, that Wanthwaite will be in our hands by tomorrow. Wait here now.”

After he’d left, I finally discarded my Cupid garb, replaced my treasure and tunic, then sat to think seriously about my next move. Though Zizka might not want me at this point, my only alternative was to stay with the jongleurs. As if on cue, Zizka called my name from outside.

“Alex, put on the heather tunic Pax made for you. We have an appointment with Ambroise.”

“Go without me,” I managed to say thickly.

The flap opened. “Nonsense. Yesterday you spoke of nothing else and the meeting’s called specifically for you. Holy St. Martin, boy, wipe that woeful look from off your face and get dressed.”

He stepped out as I obeyed, now washing the stale egg white from my face as well.

“That’s better,” Zizka approved when I emerged. “You may snatch success from failure yet, though it wasn’t entirely your fault. Julian was so afraid of his towers toppling that he used burnt sugar which is hard as mortar when he should have used egg white.”

We walked to the far end of the castle where the king had his apartments. Zizka cleared us with the guard, whereafter we climbed the stair to a small airy chamber. A rotund man stood against the
window with his back to us as he studied a manuscript in the light.

“God’s blessing, Ambroise, I’ve brought our protégé, Alexander of Wanthwaite.”

“You’re up early, old friend, for a performing man, but I appreciate your punctuality So much to be done in only two days!”

Ambroise skimmed toward us, airy as a bubble, and took my hands in his small moist palms. The sunlight caught the fur on his bald pate like new asparagus, and his watery blue eyes beamed welcome. I thought him kindly, crafty, curious. ’Twas hard to fix his age for his plumpness hid wrinkles, as his genial mask hid his character.

“Well, boy, I hear you have unique talents, not the least of which I witnessed last night when you showed yourself to be an angel-clown.”

I winced at the jape.

“Are you soothly literate?”

Only long apprenticeship of Enoch’s arrogance made it possible to reply, for I boldly claimed that I was highly educated for my age.

He smiled at my manner. “Tell me of your languages, how rapidly you can write, everything.”

I couldn’t imagine how this information would get me an audience with Richard but I took no chances, listing languages, travel, study of law and logic, even the smattering of medicine I’d learned from Dagobert. Ambroise nodded and glanced at Zizka.

“Come to the window seat, boy, so I may see you better.” He stared in the same friendly fashion, but I felt uneasy beyond my shame for last night. Something was askew: ’twas as if nothing that was said or done was exactly what was meant. “Well, Zizka, you didn’t exaggerate.”

“Aye, he’s a comely lad,” Zizka said dryly.

Ambroise continued to study me, his genial mask dropped for a more calculating expression: no doubt about it, he was weighing me as carefully as a gold-changer.

“Alex, I’m told you want to meet the king,” he said at last.

“Aye, oh yes, more than anything. ’Tis why I’m here.”

The troubadour nodded. “Just so, just so. Well, you’re fortunate.
King Richard has a little time available this evening in his chamber after he has met with the Archbishop of Canterbury.”

I gaped upward, not comprehending.

“Well, Alex, aren’t you going to thank Ambroise?” Zizka prodded rudely. “After all, ’tis not every day …”

“Thank you! Oh, thank you, Sire! ’Tis my dream, my hope, I mean I’ll ne’er forget your kindness. Are you certain? What hour should I come? Should I—”

Zizka covered my mouth. “Don’t overdo it, boy. I told you, didn’t I?”

Ambroise chuckled. “A fortuitous choice, Zizka. I like his enthusiasm. Yes, all will go well.”

Zizka stayed with the troubadour as I wandered in the courtyard, dazed. Despite my freakish performance, despite Enoch’s tricks, I was to see the king after all! I gazed at diagonal cloud streaks behind the round tower, listened to the persistent barking of a dog, breathed deep of horseflesh and leather, for I must remember this moment forever and ever, when my Fortune turned me back to Wanthwaite.

And I ran to the chapel to thank my father and mother.

After I’d finished praying, I met Zizka as he was leaving Ambroise.

“Alex.” He put an arm o’er my shoulder and drew me to a stone bench behind a pile of saddles. “Alex.”

I waited. Zizka had ne’er been tentative before.

“Alex,” he said a third time, “I hope you get whatever you want from the king, but you’re very young, more innocent than most. A spoiled pet in our group.”

Puzzled, I still waited for the point. What had any of this to do with my success?

“The king is …” Again he foundered. “Well, he’s beautiful as you can see, chivalrous, courteous, elegant and talented in the arts as well as in arms, but … You must remember at all times that he’s the king.”

I was getting frightened. “What are you trying to say, Zizka?”

“I’m trying to warn you for your own good. Let the king decide whatever issues come between you; don’t argue.”

“Why would I argue?”

He shrugged but wouldn’t meet my eyes. “Because you don’t know any better. You haven’t been schooled as the rest of us have, I see that now. No king will be crossed or tolerate what he perceives as lying, breaking one’s oath, and other things. All I’m saying is that you should approach Richard as the most kingly of kings; he’s been known to be harsh.”

After he left, I sat considering his words. If I hadn’t known him so well, I would have sworn that Zizka felt guilty about something and was trying to make amends. Let him worry if it pleased him. As for me, I was going to see the king!

COMPLINE HAD RUNG HOURS AGO and still I’d not been admitted to the king’s chambers, after I’d rushed there directly in my new Alexander the Great costume from tonight’s performance. I was the only person still awake in the antechamber: the king’s secretary slept across his desk, knights slouched on the floor and Enoch snored beside me. Outside, summer lightning flashed through the arrow slits and in the far distance the faint rumble of thunder sounded. I gazed around the dozing company with a sense of superiority: every heartbeat brought me closer to the transformation from Alex to Alix and not one of these oafs realized the momentous occasion at hand. Most important, I was beating Enoch to the king; by the time the Scot met with him tomorrow, I would be firmly reinstated.

A crash and blast of air startled everyone upright as Baldwin, the Archbishop of Canterbury, hurtled forth from the king’s door like a great black raven. Just as quickly he feinted, turned and vaulted to the desk where the secretary, Sir Roger, sat up groggily

“Send in the next applicant,” the archbishop snapped.

Sir Roger bent a bleary eye to his book and ran his finger down the page. Enoch stepped forward as I sidled around the archbishop who hadn’t moved, noting the black hairs in his nostrils, the putrid stench of his robe.

“Alexander of Wanthwaite be next,” Enoch informed Sir Roger.

“Ah, yes, Ambroise’s boy, I had forgot. Come, child, I’ll announce you.”

Enoch squeezed my shoulder hard and I glanced up, trying to control my trembling lips, then followed the secretary’s thick short legs into the arched dimness beyond.

I was alone with King Richard.

He stood on the far side of the vaulted chamber gazing through a dormered window into the humid night. A rising breeze bent flickering flames of tapers and torches, fluttered his white silk robes around his powerful figure. He turned finally and approached, the aroma of sweet woodruff numbing what little sense I still had so that I barely remembered to bow.

“Stand, boy, so we may see you.”

I tried to obey but was suddenly hurled to the left and struck the sharp corner of a chest with my elbow so that I almost swooned. Clinging to the wood and choking back nausea, I saw that I’d been pushed aside by the Archbishop of Canterbury who had returned and now stood in my place, trembling with fury

“My Liege, you cannot do this rash act, cannot, I say. Think of the consequences, I beg you: of the Crusade, if not yourself. The greatest enterprise since the world began, ruined for cheap vengeance!”

Richard’s white figure burned like fire and his voice thundered. “How dare you question my act or my motive? I was the first monarch to take the Cross, the only one who has the acumen to defeat Saladin, and it has nothing to do with Princess Alais. Apologize at once for your presumption; for your stupidity there can be no amends, but my patience with your arrogance runs short, Sire. Remember Becket.”

Archbishop Baldwin seemed querulous and weak before King Richard’s awesome authority, but he didn’t back away. “Indeed I remember Becket, and I hope you do as well, for his sainthood triumphed, did it not? As for my presumption, my first duty is to God: this Crusade
must not fail
, but surely it will if you insist upon insulting King Philip before you even start.”

Richard smiled grimly. “Philip will contribute nothing to the Crusade, as you will see, so to insult him is to lose nothing. However, to protect Alais in Rouen’s tower until we return to wed her is hardly insulting.”

“You bandy words,” Baldwin answered. “Call it what you will, the tower is prison.”

I gasped at the word
prison
and their two heads turned.

“Who’s there?” the archbishop demanded. “Stop skulking in the shadow and come forward like a man.”

Trying to pretend I was Enoch, I stepped forth as boldly as I could.

“Jesu,
what knavery is this?” the prelate asked scornfully, eying my scant costume as Alexander. “’Tis hardly appropriate, Your Highness, to permit cheap jongleurs in your chamber during state meetings.”

“He might well ask what right you have to interrupt his appointed audience,” King Richard replied icily. “He’s here at my command, a protégé of Ambroise.”