Knights of de Ware 01 - My Champion

by Glynnis Campbell

  Before Margaret could answer, Linet stumbled against the beggar’s weaving body. He clutched at her shoulders for support, nearly knocking her to the ground.

  “Didn’t get past me, he didn’t,” Margaret rattled on. “I was ready for him, the slippery rascal.”

  “Margaret,” Linet said, trying to remain calm. “Put down whatever weapon you’ve got and light a candle. I fear you’ve attacked a friend.”

  “A friend?” Margaret shrieked. “He’s not a thief?”

  “Nay, Margaret, and why you must toddle about in the dark when we have plenty of candles?”

  “Candles won’t help these old eyes of mine,” Margaret complained. “If he’s not a thief, then why was he sneakin’ about like that?”

  There was a painful ringing in Duncan’s head that wouldn’t go away. Only when a candle was finally lit did he discover the origin of that pain.

  He almost wished he hadn’t. To his chagrin, a tiny woman at least seventy winters old clung tenaciously to a huge iron cooking pan, wielding it like a cudgel. Despite Linet’s reassurances that he was not the enemy, suspicion lurked in the woman’s bright, beady eyes, particularly when she perused his already battered countenance.

  “You should sit down,” Linet said in concern as he cradled his forehead. She pressed him carefully into a chair. “Margaret, I hope you’re satisfied. You’ve addled his brains.”

  To Duncan’s horror, Margaret looked rather pleased with herself.

  She sniffed. “Looks like I’m not the first to take a whack at his head. If he’s not a thief, then who is he?”

  “He’s—“

  “Sir Duncan de Ware,” he supplied, ignoring Linet’s surreptitious kick at his shin.

  Margaret’s eyebrows rose. “Sir Duncan?”

  “Nay!” Linet blurted.

  “Aye,” he countered, pressing a palm to his throbbing forehead.

  Margaret lifted a fluttery hand to her cheek. “Well then,” she said, nervously clearing her throat, “I’ll fetch the servants and fix up a proper meal.” Aside to Linet, she whispered loudly, “Why didn’t you tell me, m’lady, that ye were comin’ home early and bringin’ a guest? A proper knight. Imagine. And me near brainin’ the poor lad.” She turned and marched to the pantry, her iron pan in tow.

  Linet stood with her mouth agape. The scoundrel had told Margaret he was a knight. And worse, the old woman believed him.

  “Why did you tell her that?” she hissed.

  “What?”

  “That you were Sir Duncan de Ware?”

  “What would you have me tell her?”

  Linet ran her fingers through her mussed hair in frustration. She didn’t know. It had been her idea to shield the servants from the mortifying truth. After all, she couldn’t very well dance in with a stranger on her arm, proclaiming him a beggar and the possible father of her child. But she feared the tide of deception was going to grow deep around her ankles if she didn’t stem it now.

  Three pairs of curious eyes peered around the corner of the pantry screens. Margaret had obviously just broken the news to the servants—supper was going to be graced with the presence of a real knight.

  Linet glared at the whispering girls. They ducked their heads back into the pantry.

  “Perhaps you shouldn’t have come here so soon,” Linet muttered. “After a few days, after things have settled—”

  “Linet,” he whispered, “you’ve killed El Gallo. He has accomplices everywhere. I can’t leave you defenseless.”

  “I can—”

  “Defend yourself? Alone? I don’t think so.” He quirked a brow upward, then rubbed at his forehead. “Although the old woman might do a fair job with her pan.”

  The “old woman” made her entrance from behind the pantry screens, maids in tow. She sang out, “I hope you like mutton, m’lord.”

  Did she have to call him that? Linet wondered peevishly.

  “It’s one of my favorites,” he assured Margaret.

  The girls fairly beamed.

  The brash beggar picked up the candle Margaret had brought in and began lighting all the others about the room, like King Midas turning every object he touched to gold. They were nearly as costly as gold, Linet thought, distressed at the way he lit so many of them.

  She wondered how long he intended to maintain his pretense at nobility. Already the maidservants cooed over his bruises and flitted flirtatiously about him, taking his cloak, questioning after his every whim. Damn him—right before her eyes and in her own household, he was usurping her authority.

  Harold came in through the back door.

  “Wipe yer feet!” Margaret yelled from the pantry.

  “And a good evenin’ to ye,” Harold muttered back. He apologized to the beggar. “She’s a good-for-nothin’ old woman, m’lord. I hope she’s made ye welcome?”

  The beggar massaged his temple. “Aye, Harold, that she has. Already offered me the hospitality of the kitchen.”

  “So I heard. Is there anythin’ I can do for ye, m’lord?”

  Before Linet could make a bid for Harold’s attention, the beggar began making demands.

  “Aye, Harold. If I’m going to offer you protection, I’d like to meet the servants so I can learn their faces, know them by name. Will you invite them all to table for supper?”

  “Aye, m’lord,” Harold said, his eyes gleaming.

  Linet drummed her fingers on the back of a chair while Harold left to do the beggar’s bidding. “You can’t just order my servants about,” she said under her breath. “I manage this household.”

  “Wouldn’t your servants think it strange if Sir Duncan de Ware didn’t exercise the authority he was born to?”

  Duncan could sense Linet’s irritation, and he flashed her a cocksure smile. With so many witnesses bustling in and out of the room, she could do little more than glare at him.

  He turned his back to her and took a moment to survey his surroundings. Even by his standards, the cottage was impressive. The main chamber was large with a floor made of neatly fitted flagstones. The walls were of light plaster, and the screens dividing the hall from the pantry were painted with vines and flowers of red and gold. In one corner of the room rose the staircase leading to the upper story, where the sleeping quarters were.

  A half dozen chairs were placed about the room, as well as a large carved chest with matching cabinet, a desk furnished with parchment, a quill, and some sort of ledger, a stack of finished wool beside a loom, and a trestle table that could be set up for meals. The copious candles about the room lent a cheery glow to the cottage.

  He opened a single pair of shutters and peered through the unglazed windows. The night was quiet, and the first stars of evening were winking on their points of light.

  When Harold returned, the two of them assembled the trestle table. Margaret and the serving girls brought in great platters heaped with food and a bottle of expensive French wine. Duncan could see by the tense curve of Linet’s mouth that she didn’t approve of the maid’s generosity.

  “I’m going to check the outbuildings,” she said tightly.

  “It’s dark. Wait here,” he insisted. “I’ll check the outbuildings.” He bent to pile kindling on the hearth.

  Margaret hummed as she fetched pewter goblets from the cupboard, and Linet hissed at Duncan out of her hearing. “This is my house. Please don’t order me about in front of the servants.”

  Duncan blew on the coals till the kindling caught fire. “Nonsense, my lady, don’t worry about me,” he said, loudly enough for Margaret to hear, “although it’s kind of you to express your concern.”

  Linet muttered an oath.

  He grinned. “Best watch your language,” he whispered, nodding toward the servants fetching napkins from the cabinet. “There are ladies present.”

  With a wink, he swept past her, past the screens, out the back door, and into the night to the outbuildings.

  How Linet suffered through supper she didn’t know. The impudent beggar
, obviously relishing the authority he’d appropriated, played the role of de Ware to the hilt, inviting even the filthy stable boy to the table and impressing everyone with colorful tales of his fictional past.

  “My father was furious, of course, when I came home empty-handed,” he told them as he picked at the mutton in his trencher. “You see, I’d given my first kill to a hungry crofter I met on the ride home.”

  The stable lad’s eyes grew round in admiration. The serving girls giggled adoringly. Linet frowned. The way the beggar told stories, shealmost believed him.

  Then it struck her. She realized now how he made his living. She should have figured it out long ago, with his penchant for disguise, his ability with a sword, his quick wit.

  He was a player. A player’s very profession was deception. It was no wonder he could convince Margaret he was a gentleman, Sombra he was a reiver, El Gallo he was the cousin of King Philip. He’d spent a lifetime perfecting his acting skills. She sat back, smug in her newfound knowledge.

  “Pray tell us more, sir,” Margaret bubbled, refilling his cup.

  “Oh, nay!” Duncan wiped his mouth with his napkin and looked pointedly at Linet. “I fear I begin to bore my audience.”

  “Nay!” the servants cried.

  “Yer stories are marvelous,” Margaret gushed. “Are they not, m’lady?”

  “Oh, they’re quite imaginative,” she dryly agreed. “But Gwen’s head has nodded thrice now, and Elise’s eyes will scarcely stay open. We have large orders to fill in the weeks ahead. I need you at your looms at dawn with your heads clear and your eyes sharp.”

  Margaret clapped her hands. “Lady Linet is right, girls. Maeve and Kate, ye may remain to help clean up. The rest of ye, off ye go!”

  The girls protested softly, but rose to obey.

  “Harold,” Duncan said, “please accompany them to their quarters.” Then he added under his breath, “And tonight, keep a dagger close at hand.”

  “Aye, m’lord. Where will ye bed down?”

  Linet stiffened. She wondered just how presumptuous the beggar would be. Would he dare to demand her father’s chamber? The chamber that lay but a thin plaster wall from her own?

  “I’ll sleep here by the fire,” he decided.

  She should have been relieved. He obviously didn’t intend to compromise her under her own roof. But for some curious reason, she felt a twinge of disappointment.

  “Very good, m’lord,” Harold replied. “I’ll bring ye a pallet.”

  Maeve and Kate began clearing the remnants of supper from the table while Margaret fussed over a cauldron hung over the fire.

  “Sir Duncan’s bath water is ready, m’lady,” she announced with relish.

  Horror blossomed in Linet’s eyes. Duncan’s smile broadened. It was considered, of course, an irrefutable honor for the lady of the household to bathe visiting nobles.

  In her solar, Lady Alyce tapped the rolled parchment upon the table with a great deal of satisfaction, making the candle flame dance merrily upon its perch. This afternoon a boy from the village had brought word of Duncan’s safe return and El Gallo’s demise. And less than an hour later, the parchment bearing King Edward’s seal had arrived.

  The king had approved the match between Linet de Montfort and Duncan. Whether it was Lady Alyce’s flattering entreaty or her surrender of Holden to Edward’s cause that convinced him, she didn’t know and didn’t care. The two lovers—and if she knew Duncan, they were lovers by now—could be wed with the blessing of the king.

  Her eyes gleamed as she imagined what a handsome couple they’d make, and what beautiful children, her grandchildren, children dressed, she thought wryly, in the most fashionable and fine woolens. Oh, aye, it would be especially delightful having a wool merchant in the family.

  She slid a fresh piece of parchment across the table, dipped her quill in the bottle of ink, and began writing up the banquet order for a lavish wedding feast.

  Margaret dipped a wrinkled finger into the cauldron of steaming water hung over the fire. “Do tell us, m’lord, how the two of ye came to meet at the fair.”

  Linet stiffened as the beggar stretched his arm out possessively across the back of the bench he shared with Linet.

  “It was love at first sight,” he confessed.

  Maeve and Kate sighed. Linet drowned her irritation with a generous swig of wine.

  “Aye,” he continued, toying with the end of Linet’s waist-length braid, “she took one look at me and said she couldn’t live without me.” He shrugged. “What else could I do but comply with her wishes?”

  Linet choked on the wine.

  “Are you all right, my love?” Duncan asked, patting her on the back a few times.

  She longed to throttle him.

  Margaret clapped her hands together suddenly. “Sir Duncan de Ware! Why, ye must be related to Lord James de Ware himself!”

  “Aye,” he replied without embellishing the fact. “Are you certain you’re well, Linet?”

  “I’m fine,” she managed to choke out.

  “Well, then,” Margaret said, actually giving the beggar a little wink, “I’ll gather the linens. Then, m’lady, ye may have the honor of bathin’ Sir Duncan.”

  “I’m sure Sir Duncan can—”

  “Haul in the buckets of rinse water, of course,” he finished smoothly, laying his napkin down upon the table.

  Margaret screwed up her wizened face. “Did ye say how ye’re related to Lord James?”

  Linet held her breath.

  “We’re kin,” he said with an evasive smile, downing the last of his drink and handing the cup to Kate. “This wine is excellent, Margaret. I commend you on your choice. My own steward could not have selected better.”

  Margaret blushed with pride, effectively distracted.

  “Let me do that,” he offered as Kate and Maeve began to dismantle the trestle table. “You two get some sleep. Young hearts need time to dream.”

  The girls sighed dreamily and scurried off.

  Linet sat stunned. Curse his arrogant hide! It was enough that she’d accepted him as a peasant, that she’d sworn her love for him despite his lack of lineage. But for him to put on the airs of a blue-blooded noble… He’d certainly outdone himself with this guise. And now he’d made accomplices of her servants. It annoyed her beyond words that everyone was so gullible to his charms. No doubt Duncan was enjoying himself immensely with her maids fawning all over him.

  Dear Lord, now she was calling him Duncan.

  “I’ll prepare yer room, m’lady,” Margaret said with a curtsey.

  When everyone else was gone, Linet finally found her voice. She rose and wheeled on the beggar. “You may bathe yourself!” she hissed.

  “I thought you’d say that.”

  “Duncan de Ware indeed! I know what you are now.” She poked him in the chest. “You’re a player, aren’t you?”

  He grinned that disarming, lopsided grin of his, but Linet held firm.

  “Don’t try to deny it. I’ve discovered your secret.”

  He leaned back against the cupboard and crossed his arms, apparently eager to hear her conclusions.

  “You had me puzzled for a while, I admit, with your lack of skills and your abundance of coin,” she told him frankly, “but I haven’t survived in the wool merchant’s trade without a nose for this sort of thing.”

  He sighed dramatically. “Alas, you’ve found me out. Where did I go astray?”

  Linet smiled smugly. “It was in your choice of roles, my lord. If you were going to pretend to the nobility, you should have chosen a fictional title, not one known in these parts.”

  “Margaret believed me. Harold believed me.” He blinked. “Gwen and Elise and Maeve and Kate—”

  “Pah! They wouldn’t know a king from a kitchen boy. They’re—”

  “Mere servants? Of inferior intellect?”

  Linet pursed her lips. It sounded so harsh when he put it like that. “They simply don’t understand these things. B
ut I…”

  “You can tell the difference,” the beggar said with a nod, digesting this information.

  “Of course.”

  “Well then, I hope I can rely on your guidance concerning my performance. You’ll tell me if you spot any grave blunders?”

  “You can rest assured,” Linet threatened with a triumphant smile. “And now I’m off to bed.”

  Duncan watched her as she ascended the stairs, her hips swinging victoriously. “Margaret won’t approve, you know,” he called after her.

  “Approve of what?”

  “Your declining the privilege of bathing me.”

  Linet cursed him with her eyes. “The devil take Margaret.”

  Duncan chuckled and shook his head as Linet disappeared behind her chamber door. He went outside to fill the pair of buckets at the well, working quietly, alert always for stray sounds that might indicate an intruder. Then he hauled them inside.

  The tub, cached in a corner of the buttery, was large and well-padded with linen. As he lugged the heavy wooden thing across the flagstones, he could hear the dissonance of feminine argument coming from above. He poured the cauldron of simmering water into the tub, tempering it with a bucket of the cold, and still the conflict continued.

  The angry voices were muffled by Linet’s door. After several minutes of serious battle, the victor emerged. Margaret strutted out of the chamber and down the stairs, toting a stoppered bottle, a ball of soap, a stack of linen towels, and a deep blue velvet robe, which she pressed into his hands.

  “There ye are, m’lord,” she said sweetly. “The lady of the house will be down shortly to do her duty.”

  Duncan stifled a grin. “Thank you, Margaret.”

  “Well, then, if ye’ll not be needin’ me, I’ll go to my bed now, clean things up in the mornin’.”

  “Fine.”

  “Ye’re certain ye won’t be needin’ anythin’ else? I won’t be peepin’ my head out again,” she said with a meaningful wink. “And, well, I wouldn’t wake up to the Crack of Doom.”

  Nonplussed by the wily old maid’s frankness, he watched her bustle upstairs and into Linet’s chamber. Shortly afterward, Linet boiled out of the room, looking as if she’d like to poison someone. Duncan wondered what vile threat Margaret had made to ensure her mistress’s cooperation.