by K. M. Grant
“I knew it, I knew it, I knew it!” He bobbed and bowed as his restraints allowed. “The king is here. What did I tell all you traitors?”
But John seemed unimpressed by the constable’s ecstasies. He fiddled with his reins. “I am glad to be here today,” he said with a smile that deceived nobody, “to bring you some good news. This squire—” he flicked his hand toward Hal in a gesture that he hoped was suitably judged as a polite but not subservient acknowledgment. “This squire, who was disgracefully captured by thugs on the coast road, was eventually brought before me. And he turned out to be the bearer of good news. My brother Richard, though a prisoner, is very much alive. The squire assures me that I will find the count of Hartslove with Richard’s seal and a quite unmistakable message that he is returning. Why Richard did not send the seal to me is a mystery, but that’s brothers for you.” He gave a small grimace. “I have since received a letter from the emperor in Germany. He now has my brother and is demanding a ransom.”
At this there was a loud clanking noise as de Scabious collapsed. He was utterly betrayed, betrayed on every side. He tried to catch John’s eye, but the prince would not look at him. “Over the past few months,” John continued blandly, “I have been badly misinformed. Terrible as it seems, there are people in the kingdom who wanted Richard to be dead, and I set too much store by what they told me.” He looked around as if to identify the culprits and warmed to his theme. “I have always wanted only what is best for this country,” he said, a tinge of bitterness coloring the edge of his words. “I am not like my brother Richard. I know this place. England cannot afford to be milked dry for the crusades. We must make him realize that. But nor can the country afford to be ruined by civil wars. Our father, Henry of blessed memory, taught us that, for it was his life’s work to create unity where there had been disunity. If I have been premature in claiming the throne of England, it has been only because I do not wish our father’s legacy to fall into ruin. Believe me, that has been my only concern.” He dared somebody to challenge this, but nobody did. “If peace and unity are your concern too, we should, in this courtyard, here and now, agree that each of us has acted as we felt was best for the greater good over these last difficult months. There should be no recriminations from anybody against anybody else. If we are all agreed, we will go forward together and in peace.”
He tried to wrest his horse’s rein from Hal, but Hal hung on for a moment yet. “Oh yes,” said John, forcing himself to smile, “and long live King Richard.” Hal let go.
However, John was not to escape so easily. Ellie was standing on the steps outside the great hall. The front of her dress was covered in blood, but though her face was dirty and her hair disheveled, she held herself like an empress. The crowd parted to let her through. She walked slowly, stopped briefly to embrace Old Nurse, then stood right in front of John. He shrank before her unforgiving gaze.
“It is all very well to talk of unity,” she said, raising her voice so that everybody could hear, “but Gavin de Granville, count of Hartslove, a better man than most here”—she dared anybody to contradict—“has died while you have been playing about with our loyalties. Not only that, but this man”—she pointed to de Scabious—“has fired a castle and caused the death of a valuable horse.” Her voice wavered slightly, but her bearing remained regal. “I demand that Constable de Scabious remain under lock and key until the king decides what is to be done with him.”
“I am sorry to learn of the count’s death,” said John, flinching a little. Then he recovered himself. “Perhaps the constable deserves death himself. Shall we hang him here and now?”
The girl gave the prince a look of utter disdain. “A prince should dispense justice, not lynchings,” she said. “Particularly a prince with pretensions to kingship.”
Will held his breath. John, well-known for sudden changes of mood, would surely not stand for that. But the prince looked uncharacteristically humble. He dismounted, approached Ellie on foot, and took her hand. “I am truly sorry about Gavin,” he said, and his sorrow was, to his surprise, genuine. “Any part I played in causing his death, I regret. He was a fine knight. I cannot bring him back, but as the guardian of the realm while Richard is away, I can do one thing of which I am sure both the count of Hartslove and Richard would approve.” He led Ellie back up the steps. “On behalf of my brother King Richard,” he said, and his lips only twitched once as he said the king’s name, “I grant Eleanor Theodora de Barre permission to marry whomsoever she pleases and to bestow her estates as she chooses. She is nobody’s ward, but her own mistress, and also on King Richard’s behalf, I grant the same privilege to any daughters she has.”
Ellie gave a wan smile. “I am not ungrateful,” she said, “it’s just that it’s a bit late.”
This was the last straw for de Scabious, who had clambered, as far as his shackles would allow, onto the wall of the well and was now precariously balanced as if he were a frog. Unable to help themselves, people began to laugh. The constable grew more and more agitated until, in the end, the inevitable happened. He lost his footing, teetered on the brink, and finally toppled clean into the well itself. Jerked up short by the chains on his neck and arms, he dangled above the drop, his face a nasty shade of purple.
With an alacrity that belied her age and condition, Old Nurse heaved herself to her feet. Summoning a man from the crowd, she pointed to some loose stones and bid him pick them up for her. Then she bent over the well until she was directly above the constable and, almost absentmindedly, dropped the stones, one by one, so that they bounced from his head and into the echoing depths. It was a long wait before any faint splash, and the constable’s skinny legs peddled furiously as tears of self-pity streamed down his cheeks. By the time he was hauled back from the abyss, his pompous oaths were reduced to faint quaverings, and when John ordered Will to oversee the transfer of the prisoner into the cart that would transport him south for trial, the constable resembled nothing so much as a deflated pig’s bladder.
Ellie did not watch her would-be husband’s final humiliation. She busied herself arranging for Gavin’s body to be laid on a trestle with due dignity. He would be buried at Hartslove, not here. Afterward she made her way through the general melee until she reached the gate. It felt strange walking through it unchallenged. Men moved out of her way at once, in awe of this proud but melancholy figure who had shamed a prince and got away with it.
She walked down the hill and stumbled through the Hartslove tents, now largely deserted in favor of the Hangem courtyard, and at last allowed tears to blind her as much as the dusk. Careless of her footing, she tripped, and as she put out her hand to save herself she dropped the broken green jasper necklace she had been clinging to since taking it from Gavin’s tunic. It was impossible to judge where it had landed, and her despair was so great she did not see the shadow in the dark until a voice in an accent Ellie had never heard before asked softly, “This was between the horse’s hooves. Is it what you are looking for?”
Two hands gently took hers and placed the necklace safely between them. The hands tried to withdraw, but Ellie kept hold. “Who are you?” she whispered, but she got no answer. Then from above her head came a sigh. It was too rich to be human. Ellie let go of the hands and patted the ground with her fingers until she met a horse’s leg. She followed the leg up, tracing its delicate veins until she reached the slope of a shoulder. Light as gossamer, her fingers curved round, searching and searching for things she could not believe she would find. But there they were. Quite unmistakable. Two wounds that Ellie did not need to see to recognize. Now she was on her feet.
“Hosanna?” she whispered as her fingers stroked his scars over and over. “Hosanna? Is it really you?” Her arms were around his neck, and when she felt the answering vibrato from deep within his chest, she had her reply. Hosanna stood like a rock as Ellie buried herself against him and drowned her sobs in the shrouding warmth of his mane. Eventually, she raised her head and exclaimed quietly, “Oh, I’
m so selfish. I must find Will!” But she could not leave Hosanna just yet. She put up her hand to touch his white star and found the other hand there also. “Please tell me who you are,” she begged.
“It doesn’t matter who I am,” came the reply. “Just take the red horse back to his master.”
Ellie caught her breath. “I think I know who you are,” she whispered. “If you call Hosanna the red horse, you must be the Saracen man that Will sometimes talks about. You are Kamil from the crusade.” Sudden understanding flooded her mind. “The constable told us Hosanna was dead, but somehow he must have given him to you. You must have had him all this time. Oh, if only we had known! Now we must find Will. Oh please, quickly, it’s so important, for he has been so unhappy.”
Kamil’s voice was barely audible. “I think that will not be necessary,” he said.
Ellie looked up, saw a light bobbing toward her, and heard a piping voice bidding Will not to be such a doubting Thomas. She felt the green jasper in her palm and called out, “Will! Will!”
“Ellie!” His voice was full of anxiety and longing.
“Here,” she cried. “Come here. It’s all right. Hosanna—”
But her voice was no match for Elric’s. “I told you, I told you,” he sang out, and suddenly they were there, Elric holding up the light, Will speechless, and Hosanna whickering his greeting over and over again.
In the flurry of arms, exclamations, and questions, it was Hosanna who alerted them to the fact that Kamil was loping away into the night. Will grabbed the torch and ran after him. “Kamil,” he called. “Kamil, don’t go!”
Kamil stopped. “I have done my duty,” he said to Will. “Now it is time to return to my own land. I cannot stay any longer.”
But Will would have none of it. “You must stay,” he said. “I don’t know how you came here. I know Elric said—but in all the commotion I didn’t—and Gavin never had time—and Elric just dragged me out here before—” Will knew he was jabbering, but at least Kamil was still standing there.
He looked at Will. “You don’t know,” he said quietly. “I am your enemy. I wanted to ride the red horse away this evening. I wanted to break my promise to the girl Marissa.”
“You met Marissa?”
“It is a long story,” said Kamil. “And I don’t know it all. But yes, I met Marissa. You will find out that she saved the red horse’s life when I could not, and that I only agreed to come here with your brother because if you died, I could take the red horse away. But your brother died, and not you. Nonetheless, I thought maybe…” Kamil’s voice trailed off.
“But you couldn’t take Hosanna, because it didn’t seem right?” Will hardly needed to say it. “That is what Hosanna does to us, Kamil. I don’t understand it, perhaps nobody does, but I do understand one thing, that different as we are, enemies even sometimes, you feel the same as I do when Hosanna is near.” He tentatively touched Kamil’s arm. “Please come back with us to Hartslove,” he said. “I must bury my brother, and I would like you to be there.”
“I can’t,” said Kamil. “Hosanna may unite us in some things, but I am still not your friend.”
“You are tonight,” said Will. He could feel Kamil’s reluctance as if it were a physical thing. He waited patiently. “I owe you something for your bravery today, Kamil. In the name of honor, not sentiment, and in the name of Hosanna, I ask you to come home with me.” Kamil bent his head. “There is a place at the hearth for you at Hartslove,” Will said gently, and walked back to the tents. He could do no more.
Kamil heard the words, and when he looked up, by the light of the torch Hosanna’s star shone like a homing beacon.
15
After a night spent mourning the gallantry of the Hartslove dead and celebrating the stories of the living, Prince John and Will made an uneasy peace. They agreed to meet in a fortnight to discuss the collection of Richard’s ransom. It would be a huge undertaking, but John could do little except appear keen to get started. “Once it is collected, I will supervise the delivery of it myself,” Will told him, and John made suitably grateful noises before gathering his forces together and leaving. Will and Hal watched him go.
“I think he will do his duty,” Hal said rather unexpectedly. His expression, like Will’s, was graver than it had once been, and he was reluctant to tell anybody all that had happened to him while in the clutches of the mercenaries. “They treated me badly,” he said, and a spasm crossed his face. “But the day I was brought before John as a lying traitor because I said Richard was alive, the letter from the emperor arrived. It was strange. John didn’t seem angry. It was almost as if he was expecting it. He’s an odd man whose ambitions test his loyalties. I dread to think what will happen if he ever does become king.”
Will shook his head. “If he saved you from death at the hands of those thugs, I at least owe him something,” he replied. “Now, Hal, send for the Hangem villagers. We’d better make things right with them.”
Most of the villagers appeared, however reluctantly, and their number included a scowling Peter, the cowherd. From now on, Will told them, the village of Hangem was to be renamed Granville and would be under the protection of himself as Earl of Ravensgarth, at least until King Richard returned. The villagers did not cheer—one master was much like another in their experience—but when soldiers were sent to chop all the gallows into firewood, they began to look a little more optimistic. The earl, they muttered to each other, seemed more decent than most, although you could never really tell.
Will made no further speeches. He asked only that they should continue to build their church and pray for those who had perished. As the villagers dispersed he drew Peter to one side and asked if Elric might come to work as a squire in his household. The offer was a good one, and Peter was lucky not to meet the same fate as the constable, but the man was surly. He had seen too many knights come and go to have much faith in any of them. Moreover, when Elric was far away, drinking fine wine and eating rich food with Will, would he remember his parents, eking out a subsistence living from the stony soil? He shuffled his feet.
Will tried to be good-natured. “Elric has proven himself to be both courageous and steadfast,” he said. “England needs him—I need him. We have freed the prisoners here, but King Richard is still captive, and we will live in dangerous times until we can ransom him home. Since my brother is dead”—Will’s jaw tightened—“I shall be basing my household at Hartslove in future rather than in my lands to the west. There will, of course, be generous rewards for those Hartslove squires and knights who fulfill their service to me with loyalty.”
His earnest, honest gaze made it hard for Peter to carry on scowling. Nevertheless, he was not going to give in easily. “The boy didn’t show much loyalty to me,” he muttered, and Will saw from whom Elric had inherited his occasional obstinacy.
“He was loyal where he felt loyalty was due,” he responded. Then he changed tack. “Do you love your son, Peter?” he asked.
“Of course.”
“Then tell him to come with me.”
But it was not Peter who answered, it was Morwenna. She had come up to the tower, for laundry always has to be done. “We must let him go, Peter,” she said, looking nervously at her husband.
Peter growled at her. “You weren’t so keen when we talked of sending him to the constable.”
Morwenna smiled and once again looked a little like the girl Peter had married. “Look at the bonfire where the gallows once stood,” she said, “and tell me he will not be better off with this man here.”
Peter growled some more, but it was clear that the matter was settled.
The tower was not difficult to secure, and Will wisely left a garrison of soldiers, for there were understandable tensions between the Hartslove knights and those who had been in the constable’s pay. But he himself could not wait. He needed to go home.
It was a sad procession that wound down the track. In the first wagon sat Old Nurse, singing psalms and occasional nurser
y rhymes, her sea-deep voice intoning the ancient melodies to the steady shuffle of the horses’ hooves. The villages through which the procession passed, when asked for hospitality, gave it gladly, but there was no dallying. Although news of King Richard was spreading, danger still hovered. John may have been found out and the constable taken prisoner, but the prince still harbored ambitions, and de Scabious was not the only villain in England. Until Richard returned, nothing was certain. From the corner of his eye, Will watched Kamil on Sacramenta and Ellie steadying Gavin’s coffin over the bumps. He himself could barely look at the wooden box. The wounding words he had tossed so carelessly over his shoulder as the smoke rose above Hartslove’s keep beat in his head and drove a deep furrow down between his eyes. Years later the furrow was still there, and Will never forgot why.
Ellie had not shrunk from overseeing the process of embalming, although it was the first time such a thing had been asked of her, and just before the coffin lid was nailed down, she had slipped into Gavin’s hand the little wooden dog he had given her years before. “For company,” she had whispered. The thought of the dog nestling in Gavin’s folded fingers comforted her. She too watched Kamil and noted how well he and the mare suited each other.
Will had offered Hosanna for the ride back to Hartslove, but Kamil had turned the offer down. “It’s better I don’t,” he had said shortly, without rancor but not without effort. Ellie could see that although he knew in his head that Hosanna could not be his, his heart still did not want to believe it. During the journey home she puzzled over how to smooth away the jangled edges of this aloof, touchy man who, for all his Eastern exoticism and self-contained confidence, seemed a little lost. Now she decided. She would give him Sacramenta to keep. The mare was not Hosanna, but looking at the easy way they swung along the track together, she might provide at least a little solace for his sore heart.