The Last Knight

by Candice Proctor

  “It is Attica d'Alérion who deserves your thanks, not I, Your Grace. She's the one who first discovered the plot against you, and risked much to warn you of it.”

  “So your squire tells me.” A peculiarly harried expression came over the old king's face. “Although if she could have contrived to warn me without bringing the viscomtesse de Salers down on my head, I should have been even more grateful.” Crossing his boxer's arms across his broad chest, he went to stand at the edge of the terrace, his bowed horseman's legs braced wide as he watched some of his knights tilting at the quintain in the yard below. The afternoon wind tossed his short-cropped hair about his head, the bold ginger threaded now with gray and thinning noticeably at the back. “Tell me truly,” he said after a moment. “Has my son John joined the others against me?”

  “I know he has been approached,” said Damion, choosing his words very, very carefully.

  Henry's hand closed into a tight fist that jerked up, then relaxed. “Well, he would be, wouldn't he? The question is, were the letters patent you discovered confirmation of an agreement already reached or simply a temptation to treason?”

  “That I do not know, Your Grace.”

  A liver-colored bitch, one of the many hounds always to be found cavorting at Henry's heels, jumped up to put her front paws on the king's thigh, and whimper. He fondled her ears absently, his attention swinging back to the men. The air filled with dust and the thunder of galloping hooves, the thwunk of lances hitting the quintain, the men's hoarse shouts of encouragement. “Look at them,” said Henry. Beneath its scattering of freckles, his skin showed gray and pasty in the golden sunshine. “You say one of them may be conspiring with Richard against me.” He pulled the hound's ears thoughtfully. “But you don't tell me which one.”

  Damion thrust his fingertips beneath his belt as he considered his next words. “There may be a way to discover it,” he said, his gaze on the practice yard. He would not look at the battlements above, would not think of the possibility that the man betraying Henry—betraying them all—could be Attica's brother. “Philip communicates with his adherents by means of a musical code. A code I have broken.”

  “A musical code?” Snapping his fingers to call the hound, Henry turned to stroll along the river wall. Illness had slowed his characteristically restless, impetuous movements, Dam-ion noticed; the king walked as if breathless and in pain. Any other man would have taken to his bed long since, but not Henry. “Is such a thing possible?” he asked.

  “Yes,” said Damion as they crossed the drawbridge to the central fortress, chickens squawking and fluttering out of the way of Henry's ponderous stride. “The genius of the system lies in the ability of its messengers to pass unremarked from place to place. I understand there is a band of wandering minstrels in the castle right now, preparing to perform at tonight's banquet.”

  Henry stopped so abruptly that the small page following behind with a cup of ale almost ran into the king's heels. “God's bones,” he roared, his eyes flashing with a quick flare of temper. “I shall have them seized and put to the torture immediately. If there is a traitor in my household, I shall know his name before nightfall. His name, and his game.”

  “Your Grace,” said Damion calmly, “the minstrels know their songs, but not the messages they contain or even the code itself. It's doubtful they know who amongst all those seated at your table is actually in contact with Philip.”

  Henry rested his fists on his hips, his round head jutting forward intimidatingly. “Are you saying I should let the knaves go?”

  “I am saying that if you allow the jongleurs to play unmolested, then Philip will remain none the wiser to what we have discovered and we may continue to intercept his messages.”

  The king grunted in disbelief. “Out of an entire evening's entertainment, how can you possibly know which melody contains a message?”

  “The coded melodies always begin with the same series of notes. I'll know.”

  “Huh.” Henry seized the cup of ale from the trembling boy and drank deeply, his eyes narrowing in thought. “You will sit beside me at the banquet tonight, de Jarnac,” he said after a moment, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “We will let these damned traitorous jongleurs play. And then perhaps we shall see whether or not one of my men deserves to have his head on a pike, decorating my castle gate.”

  “Yes, Your Grace,” said Damion, bowing. For one moment he allowed his gaze to drift back to the battlements. But Attica and her brother had disappeared.

  She sat beside the grassy banks of the castle's moat, her heart heavy with worry as she watched a couple of knaves work to haul in the wicker eel traps and empty them into baskets. It was early evening now, the light spilling across the countryside in a rich, golden flood.

  The water here ran clear, kept fresh by a stream that spilled into the Vienne. She drew her knees up to her chest, conscious of the heavy folds of soft midnight blue wool about her ankles, the weight of her woman's girdle lying low on her hips. It seemed strange, somehow, to be dressed as a woman again. She felt feminine, almost beautiful even, and yet, disturbingly, less free. A breeze swelled, shifting the tall reeds beside her with a faint sigh that sounded sweet and soft and vaguely melancholy.

  And she knew he was there.

  She turned her head, a smile touching her lips as she watched de Jarnac cut across the meadow, his stride lean and long-legged, the wind stirring the dark hair on his bare head. He wore a woolen tunic of rich brown trimmed at the neck and cuffs with bands of fine cream work embroidery. His chainse showed white at his throat, contrasting vividly with the dark tan of his skin. He looked magnificent.

  He sank down into the grass at her side, a sparkle lighting up the depths of his green eyes as he let his gaze travel over her own finery in a way that reminded her how seldom he had seen her dressed as a woman. “Sergei said I should find you here.”

  She wrapped her arms around her legs, hugging them closer. “I won't ask how Sergei knew.”

  Damion laughed softly. “No, don't.” He sobered quickly, his gaze searching her face. “I take it your brother still favors your betrothal to Fulk?”

  She nodded, turning half away to stare off across the river. “I will speak to him again tomorrow, after he has had time to think about it more calmly. He is angry now. He's been so afraid that something must have happened to me on the road here.” She paused. “I have not told him of our feelings for one another. I fear that would only enrage him further.”

  There was a heavy silence. Then de Jarnac said, “And if Stephen still insists you fulfill the marriage agreement? Have you thought what you will do then, Attica?”

  She hugged herself tighter, as if she could somehow hold herself together, as if she could keep her world—keep herself from flying apart. “Then I shall approach Henry and throw myself on his mercy.” Stephen would never forgive her for it, of course. Her heart ached with the pain that thought brought, but she knew she could bear it, if the alternative was to lose Damion. The problem was, she didn't know what she would do if Henry refused to support her. She was afraid Damion would ask her that, but he didn't.

  “Attica?”

  She swung her head to find him watching her, his face taut with desire and need. Reaching up, he touched her cheek with his fingertips, his eyes taking on that hooded, sleepy look she knew so well. His head dipped toward her. Beside them, one of the knaves called out to the other, then laughed as the eel trap they were emptying fell into the water with a splash. Damion flashed her a quick smile and let his hand drop.

  “I must get back,” he said, pushing to his feet. “Henry is an impatient taskmaster.”

  She rested her chin on her hands, her breath easing out of her in a long sigh as she watched him stand up. “I was sitting here, wishing we'd never had to come to this place. That we could simply have kept riding, just the two of us, forever.”

  “Our forever will come,” he said. “You'll see.” But then he left her there, to her thoughts, and t
o the lonely whispers of the wind.

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  She stayed beside the stream for a long time, reluctant to return to the crowded ladies’ chamber where she had been given a place. Slowly, the shadows began to lengthen and the church bells to ring. She knew it was time to go.

  She had just risen to her feet when she heard a woman's voice behind her saying, “I've been looking for you.”

  Attica turned to find herself confronting a handsome woman in her early twenties, richly gowned in crimson silk trimmed with gold braid. “I have brought you this,” said the woman, holding out a circlet of fine gold, wrought into the shape of entwined leaves and flowers with centers of precious and semiprecious stones. Standing on tiptoe, the woman placed the circlet on Attica's short-cropped hair, then stepped back, her head tilting critically to one side. “There, the effect with the curls around your face is quite pretty.”

  Attica put up one hand to touch the gold circlet. “But you mustn't lend me something so fine.”

  The woman smiled and shook her head. “It's not a loan. It's a gift from Henry. An expression of his gratitude for your loyalty and courage.” She held out her hand. “I am Alice of France. I hear your name has been joined to mine on the list of reluctant brides to be handed over to their anxious grooms.”

  Attica was surprised into letting out a quick laugh that ended on a wry note. So this was Alice, Princess of France. Daughter of the late French king Louis VII, and sister to his son and heir, Philip II, she had been betrothed as an infant to Richard. Only that had been twenty years ago, and the marriage had never taken place. Henry simply kept her at his court, ignoring Philip's demands that Alice either be made a bride or be returned to Paris along with her dowry— a particularly strategic and therefore valuable bit of French soil within a day's march of Paris.

  Some said Henry delayed Alice's marriage because he wanted her wed to his son John, whom he doted on, rather than to Richard, who was already too dangerous. But others whispered that Henry delayed Alice's marriage so that he could keep her in his own kingly bed.…

  Puzzled, Attica searched the princess's face. “I don't understand. Are you saying Salers has applied to Philip for aid in securing my return?”

  Alice nodded, and the two women turned to walk together along the water's edge. “The viscomtesse accuses Henry of deliberately withholding her son's betrothed. She wants you back, and Philip is standing behind her demand.”

  At the other woman's words, Attica had the strangest sensation, as if the world around her had suddenly dimmed and blurred. She was aware only of the slow, heavy beating of her own heart, sending the blood pounding through her body until she felt as if she were shaking, shaking on the inside with a terror such as she had never known. If her betrothal had become a matter of state …

  In the meadow beyond the castle, some boys were playing knight, the smaller boys mounted on the shoulders of the bigger ones, each pair trying to unhorse their opponent. The two women stopped to watch, the French princess laughing gaily when one of the half-grown “knights” went sprawling into the grass. Then she glanced at Attica, and the laughter faded from her lips.

  “Mon Dieu, you are reluctant, aren't you?” She reached out gently to touch Attica's hand. “I see it in your eyes. I'm sorry. I only made a jest before.”

  Shaking her head, her throat suddenly too full of tears to risk saying anything, Attica swung her betraying face away.

  “It is not, in truth, a proper subject for jests,” said the French princess, her voice suddenly and surprisingly harsh. “We women are not born to find happiness in this world, are we? Only to do our duty and bring honor and glory to our house.” She stared off across the river, her last words little more than a whisper. “However miserable it may make us.”

  Attica looked down into the other woman's face and saw the strain of worry there, and the sadness, and a trace of the anger the French princess probably didn't acknowledge even to herself. “Will Henry do this thing?” Attica asked quietly. “Will he hand you over to Philip as part of a peace settlement?”

  A pair of wild geese flew above them, the sinking sun touching their outstretched wings with gold. Alice tilted back her head, watching them a moment, her features carefully erased of all emotions before answering. “If he decides it is in the best interests of his people, then, yes, Henry will do it.” She brought her gaze back to Attica's. “To me, and to you.”

  The weight of the delicate band of gold on Attica's head suddenly felt unbearably heavy, weighing her down. She understood now the meaning of this precious gift. She understood that Henry Plantagenet had paid what he considered his debt to her. Now, if she wished to escape her marriage to Fulk, she could expect no support from him. For the sake of peace, he would see her returned to Salers— against her will, even, if that became necessary.

  Overhead, the geese dipped and wheeled, their twinned voices filling the evening sky. But Attica could not bear to look at them.

  ∗    ∗    ∗

  “I hate these damned banquets,” growled Henry, his hands curling around the carved arms of his high-backed chair. “It's inhuman, expecting a man to sit still for so long.”

  Seated at the place of honor on the king's right, Damion laughed softly, while Alice put her hand on Henry's arm and said, “If you had any sense, you'd be in bed.”

  Henry growled again.

  Torchlight gleamed on upraised brass as some half a dozen liveried trumpeters stepped forward. A fanfare rang out, bouncing off the vaulted stone ceiling of the hall and heralding the entry of a procession of pages bearing basins, ewers of water, and cloths.

  Only by leaning forward was Damion able to look down the long swath of white linen-covered table to where Attica sat on the king's far side, beyond the French princess. She had her head turned, listening to something Stephen was saying. Damion willed her to glance his way. She did not.

  The noise of the crowded hall swirled around him; voices rose in greeting and laughter, benches and stools scraped over the rough floor, dogs barked and chased one another beneath tables. But he was aware only of the honey-haired woman with big brown eyes and a sad, winsome smile who would not turn and look at him.

  She wore a gown of soft midnight blue wool that molded itself to her high, round breasts and bared the long, smooth line of her neck. A gossamer white veil held in place by a circlet of jeweled gold framed her face in graceful folds that fell back when she raised her goblet to her lips. He watched her throat work as she drank, watched her neck arch and her breasts lift, and felt his need for her fill him until he was shaking with it, shaking with his want.

  He wanted to bury his face there, in the curve of her neck, and breathe in the heady fragrance of her hair. He wanted to take her hand and lead her someplace far away from this noisy, crowded hall, someplace where he could undress her slowly and wondrously, where he could lay her down and make sweet, wild love to her. He wanted to make her his, all his, forever and ever. He wanted these things with a savageness that tore at his gut and filled him with terror. Because he was so afraid, so achingly afraid—

  “I don't think you're a very gallant knight,” said a young, petulant female voice at his side.

  He turned to find himself staring down into the malevolent blue eyes of a pale-haired, flat-chested girl of perhaps thirteen years who sat on his other side, her head held high and haughty.

  “I beg your pardon, my lady.” He flashed the disagreeable little girl his most charming smile.

  The girl tossed her long, straight hair so that it floated in a silken cloud around her thin shoulders. “I am Lady Rosamund of Carlyle,” she said, “and this is Lady Ermengart.”

  Murmuring politely, Damion raised his gaze to the stern-faced woman who sat on the child's far side.

  “You can't say you don't remember me, monsieur le chevalier,” continued the king's ward.

  Damion shook his head, not knowing whether he wanted to laugh or groan. Because the truth was, he had forgotten
all about the king's ward, had forgotten that Henry had promised to reward him for his loyalty and service by giving him Rosamund of Carlyle and the rich English earldom that came with her. Everything Damion had ever wanted suddenly lay within his grasp.

  But, it was no longer what he wanted.

  “I am better born than you are, you know,” said the girl petulantly.

  Damion reached for his wine and drank deeply, his eyes meeting hers over the rim of his cup. “Alas,” he said with a sigh,“’ Tis sad, but true.”

  “Lady Ermengart says most ladies are better born than their husbands. The problem is too many ladies and not enough husbands.”

  Damion felt his smile fade as he reached for his cup again. So someone had already told the girl what was planned for her, and she wasn't very happy about it. Another unwilling bride to be thrust into the arms of a man more interested in her lands than her person. He almost felt sorry for her.

  Rosamund fixed him with a critical stare. “How old are you, anyway?”

  He was surprised into letting out a short bark of laughter. “Last time I stopped to think about it, I was seven and twenty.”

  The girl sniffed, turning away to rinse her fingers daintily in the rose-scented water presented to her by a page on bended knee.

  “I suppose that sounds terribly old to you, doesn't it?” Damion said.

  She reached for the towel to dry her hands. “Actually, no. I was hoping for an old man, so that I should soon be a widow. I think I should far rather be a widow than a wife.”

  Caught in the act of taking another drink, Damion choked.

  “Still,” said the girl thoughtfully, “you might very well die in war, or at a tournament.”

  Damion pulled back his lips from his teeth in a smile that was not at all charming. “One can always pray,” he said, then ostentatiously bowed his head as the king's chaplain began to say grace.