“I am well aware of my vows, but a marriage can be dissolved if it isn’t consummated. I never shared my bed, let alone my body with Amandine. I might be making assumptions here, but wouldn’t I have been in my right to divorce her?”
Sampson could scarcely believe what he was hearing. “You would have done that for Merton?”
Garren nodded.
“Why?”
“Because, when I was a slave I learnt…” He shrugged — lessons learnt as a slave had no place in a church. “Alden needs Merton, more than he needs me and, by the sound of it, so did my wife.”
“Alden needs you both,” Sampson corrected. “You need to show him that he can have you both.”
“I will show him,” Garren promised.
“You are a good man Garren du Lac.”
“You sound surprised,” Garren said, feeling a smile tug at the corner of his mouth.
“I am. Merton didn’t exactly sing your praises. He called you a womanising bastard who was slow in wit but always quick with a fist.”
Garren should have felt offended, but he found himself laughing. “Is that what he said?”
“As adults, we don’t always see the impressions we leave on a child until it is too late,” Sampson said. “Merton watches people. He watched you when he was a child, and that is what he saw.”
Garren sobered. “I am not the same person I was, and Merton will see that when we are reunited.”
“Let’s hope so,” Sampson answered. “May I ask you a question? You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to.”
“Ask away.”
“What happened to you in the years you were gone? You don’t have to talk about it if you would rather not,” Sampson added hastily when he saw a look of terror race across Garren’s features. “It really is none of my business.”
“I went to Hell. Or a version of it anyway,” Garren said quietly.
“I cannot imagine Hell has a place in The Holy Lands. That is where you were, wasn’t it? The Holy Lands?”
Garren scoffed, for the young monk sounded like he was reprimanding him. But then, he supposed, Sampson had an idea in his head of what The Holy Lands were like. Garren was pretty sure that Sampson would be disappointed with the reality. “Have you ever been to The Holy Lands?”
Sampson reluctantly shook his head.
“Rome?”
“I hope to go there one day,” Sampson spoke with passion.
“I have been to both,” Garren stated. “Rome is gilded with gold, and the priests hide behind their high walls, while they judge everyone else.”
“That is blasphemy,” Sampson warned. And although Sampson had never lost his temper, he would not allow such vile lies to be spoken in the House of God. “I will not hear another word. Leave,” he pointed to the door.
“The Holy Lands are different,” Garren continued for he had no intention of leaving. Sampson had asked a question. It wasn’t his fault if Sampson didn’t like the answer. “I do believe God has abandoned the place, that’s if he was ever there at all. In those first few years of captivity, I convinced myself that one day my brothers would come for me. I would wake in the morning, look to the horizon and think this is the day. But then night came and another night and another.”
“You lost hope,” Sampson stated, his indignation with Garren temporarily forgotten as his heart overflowed with compassion.
“Hope in them coming for me, yes. But I still hoped that one day I would be free. I tried to escape many times with disastrous consequences.” He rolled up the sleeve of his tunic and showed the monk an ugly looking scar.
“They branded you,” Sampson said in disgust.
“I was branded in Rome, and the priests stood by and did nothing. Even though I appealed to them, begged them to save me. They turned the other cheek. Looked away. They were Christians. I was a Christian — I spoke to them in Latin, I know they understood me. Should they not have come to my aid?”
Sampson didn’t say anything, but he knelt back down on the floor again and raised his hands, bowed his head and began to pray.
“What are you praying for now?” Garren asked.
“I am praying for the priests who abandoned you in your hour of need. I am praying that their eyes will be opened to their sins, and I am praying that they will never repeat the same sin again.” Sampson closed his eyes and prayed while Garren leant against the wall and watched. Finally, Sampson finished, and he rose back to his feet.
“Did you try to escape again?” the monk asked.
“My body is littered with scars, a monument to all my failed attempts. I was branded, burnt, whipped, starved. You name it. They did it to me. And in the end, I realised it wasn’t worth my effort. They were always going to win.”
“So you gave up trying to escape?”
“Wouldn’t you?” Garren asked.
“I can’t answer that. I have never been a slave and, God willing, I never will be. What made you change your mind?” Sampson asked curiously.
“What do you mean? Change my mind about what?”
“You are here, so obviously you did escape.”
“Not quite,” Garren stated. “I came into the possession of a Jewish Rabbi. He was a good man. Hirsh was kind to everyone regardless of status. I was used to being beaten. I was used to being made to feel like I wasn’t a man. I was just an animal, something to be used and ordered around. No one was interested in who I was, or where I had come from. They looked at me and calculated how much work they could get out of me, or how much money I could make them in battle. They sent me to war, and I had to fight because if I didn’t I was beaten and I didn’t want to be beaten. I can tell you, it took me some time to realise that those days were over. I found that I wanted to please Hirsh. I wanted to work. My greatest fear was that I would displease him and he would sell me. You think that a cowardly thing to think?”
“No, of course not,” Sampson said. “You had been mistreated. You were right. You have been to a version of Hell. It is no wonder that you wanted to please someone who treated you with compassion.”
“With him, my future was not so bleak. I worked hard, and my work was rewarded. I was given more and more responsibility. He could trust me, and I came to trust him.”
“What made you betray his trust?”
“I didn’t,” Garren answered. “There was a fire.”
“What kind of fire?”
“The hot kind,” Garren stated dryly.
Sampson snorted in amusement. “I asked for that, didn’t I? Merton would have said something similar.”
“He is sarcastic?” Garren asked, wanting to know more about his brother.
“Not so you’d notice,” Sampson grinned, but the smile soon fell from his lips, and his expression became serious. “I apologise, I have interrupted your story. You were saying about a fire?”
“Yes. I had accompanied my master to his Beyt Knesset — the synagogue. I waited outside with the horses as was usual. It was an ordinary day, but then one of my master’s servants came galloping through the street towards me. When he pulled up his horse next to me, he could barely catch his breath. He managed to choke out the word fire, and I figured the rest out for myself. I ignored the rules and went into the synagogue to fetch my master. When he saw me, in that sacred place, I knew I was in trouble, so I spoke quickly, and hoped that he would forgive my transgression this one time. I had never seen my master run before, but he near flew out of the synagogue. We got on our horses, and we raced for home. By the time we got there, the house was ablaze, and my mistress was on her knees screaming for her daughter who was still inside. I didn’t stop to think. I ran into the building.”
“The one that was on fire?” Sampson asked with disbelief.
“There was a child in there,” Garren stated, not understanding the look on Sampson’s face. “Who wouldn’t risk their life to save a child?”
“I could think of a few,” Sampson replied. “I take it you found her?”
; “She had just turned four, and her favourite game was hide and seek,” he laughed softly. “She wasn’t very good at it, she always hid in the same place — the chest at the bottom of the bed — and that is where I found her. I guess she thought that if she couldn’t see the flames, then they wouldn’t find her.”
“Was she alive?”
“Yes, she was coughing violently, but she was alive.”
“You saved her?”
“And myself. My master and mistress were beside themselves with gratitude. My master granted me my freedom, even though I wasn’t a Hebrew-slave. Such a thing is almost unheard of over there; non Hebrew-slaves do not win their freedom. Hirsh said I had earned it. He also said that I would always have a home with him if I so wished to stay.”
“And did you wish it?”
“I thought about it. But Israel wasn’t my home. Too warm. And too many bad memories.”
“So you came home and—”
“Realised I should have stayed with the Rabbi,” Garren finished Sampson’s sentence for him and then he laughed.
“I don’t think this is a laughing matter,” Sampson stated seriously.
“What else would you have me do? I either laugh or give into despair and that, I will not do. Brother Sampson, I want to go with you to find Merton. I need to see him.”
“I will ask Yrre if you can come with us,” Sampson spoke cautiously. “But I guarantee nothing. If he says no, then that is the end of it.”
“Even if he says no, I am still coming,” Garren answered. “Merton is my brother. Do you believe in fate, Brother Sampson?”
“I believe in the will of God.”
“I am wondering if it was fate that brought me home. My brothers, both Alden and Merton, are lost. Maybe I am the one to find them.”
21
Trevena, The Kingdom of Cerniw. Twelve days later.
“We will head into town and secure ourselves some lodgings for the night,” Yrre said pointing to the flickering lights in the distance.
Yrre had said very little in the last few days although Garren could sense his anger and his growing frustration.
Yrre had sworn long and loud in Saxon when he realised that not only would Garren be coming with them, but a pregnant woman — whom he didn’t like — was going to come with them as well.
“I know, Yrre. I know Merton’s alive and I want to see him,” Garren had insisted.
“So you can punish him for daring to love your wife? I don’t think so,” Yrre answered back, his voice scathing and disdainful. “He has suffered enough.”
“I know what he has suffered. But I am coming, with or without your consent. Merton is my brother.”
Yrre’s hand rested dangerously close to the axe that was hooked through his belt. Garren deemed it prudent to keep a wary eye on that hand. He didn’t come all this way to be struck down by one of his brother’s knights in the Foreigners Lands, of all places. He would not take his last breath in Dyfed — he promised himself that. When the time of his death was near, then he wanted his feet firmly planted on du Lac soil.
“If you hurt him,” Yrre said, balling his hand into a fist and putting it in front of Garren’s face. “I will kill you.”
Garren leant away from the threat, his eyes glaring with contempt. “I am not going to hurt him,” Garren snapped back, his patience wearing thin. Who did Yrre think he was? Who was Yrre to say who could and couldn’t search for Merton? For God’s sake, Merton was his brother. He was blood. He had more claim to him than Yrre ever could.
“If you do, I will make you regret it,” Yrre snarled the words.
“So I can come?” Garren asked with hope in his eyes, for he knew it would be easier to find Merton if he was with Yrre.
“Against my better judgement, but only because you are his brother. But, she,” Yrre pointed to Josephine, “is not coming. She is a filthy liar. And besides, she cannot sit astride a horse. She will not be able to keep up. We are hunting Merton, you bring her, and we will become the hunted. Do you think Budic will sit and do nothing while you steal his wife away in the night?” Yrre stepped back and regarded Garren critically. “I cannot believe you and Merton are even related. He wouldn’t bring her,” Yrre stated, stabbing his finger in Josephine’s direction again. “He hates her.”
“If you bring her we will have to bring a cart. Which means we will have to use the main road,” Sampson stated, joining in the heated conversation. “If you use the main road then Budic will more than likely catch up with you. And I know for a fact that Merton would not have used the main road, and it is him that we are looking for.”
“Take my horse and another,” Garren urged, for he had already given this problem some thought. “Let Budic think we are going through the forest. You are clever enough, Yrre, I am sure, to put him off your scent. Josephine and I will take the main road, and we will meet you at the crossroads in Gwent,” Garren answered.
“You have got it all planned, haven’t you?” Yrre scoffed. “She will get us all killed. She isn’t worth it.”
“I am not leaving her here,” Garren replied. “And I don’t think Merton would either if he knew the danger she was in.”
“How dare you tell me what Merton would and wouldn’t do. I know him better than anyone. That bitch is trouble. Merton detests the ground she walks on. If she were dead, he would spit on her grave.”
“Budic will kill her and her child if she stays,” Garren said, hoping that he could sway Yrre’s thinking by telling him about the danger Josephine was in.
“It is no more than she deserves,” Yrre answered, his eyes ablaze with rage. “Some people need putting out of their misery. She is one of them.”
“Gwent is four days hard riding away,” Sampson stated, trying to bring a level of calm back to the conversation. “You’ll never make it.”
“If we are not there when you arrive, ride on.” Garren looked back at Yrre. “I am not asking you to wait. But I can assure you; we will be at those crossroads.”
Yrre said something in Saxon, which Garren didn’t understand, but he well understood the anger in Yrre’s eyes.
“I don’t like this, Garren,” Sampson said as he took Garren’s arm and led him a few steps away from Yrre. “I don’t like it one bit. Don’t trust her. The girl is corrupt. She is a sinful, immoral, woman.”
Garren refrained from looking at Josephine. He didn’t want to look into her eyes and see fear and rejection. He had seen enough of that to last a lifetime. “She needs my protection. Just like I needed the protection of those monks in Rome. Unlike them, I cannot turn the other cheek. I cannot leave her behind.”
“She will stab you in the back. And Yrre is right in what he says, Merton does hate her.”
“And what is the reason for his hate?” Garren asked.
Sampson glanced over at Josephine. “Maybe you should ask her that. Mark my words, she will stab you in the back,” Sampson said, repeating his warning again.
“And how do you know she will do that?” Garren asked. Josephine was just a woman, a pregnant woman. She wasn’t some sort of she-devil.
“Because she has stabbed everyone else,” Sampson answered. “She stabbed Merton and then she twisted the knife. She kept their child a secret and then blamed him when her daughter died. What kind of woman would do that?”
“They had a child together?” Garren asked, shocked by such an admission.
“One that she kept from him. I tell you, watch her. Or you will find you have another scar to add to your collection. When she cuts, she cuts deep. Garren, what those monks did to you in Rome was wrong, but this isn’t the same situation.”
“She will die if she stays,” Garren argued.
“I don’t believe that. Budic is many things, but he wouldn’t hurt her, he loves her. I was the one that married them. I know what I am talking about. Josephine’s tongue is as smooth as butter, but her words are poisonous. Her venom is deadly. I advise you to think twice when it comes to her. She made her be
d—”
“And now she needs rescuing from it. I cannot believe what you are saying. I didn’t think it was in your nature to spread rumours and speak deceits — maybe it is your venom I should be cautious of.”
“I am concerned, that is all. You must not allow yourself to be taken in by her. She knows how to play a part—”
“I have heard about your mercy, Brother Sampson, but does your mercy only include those you deem worthy of it? Or is it because she is a woman?”
“I have no idea what you are insinuating, but whatever it is, you are wrong. I know her. I know what she is capable of. She can manipulate people. She is a master at it. I am concerned for you Garren — that is all. I am offering you wise council. You would do well to take heed.”
“I don’t need your council, I didn’t ask for it,” Garren ground out.
“That is what Merton said as well, but it turns out he did. If she must come then don’t let your guard down, for she will manipulate you, and use you, and throw you away when she is finished with you. You have been warned. Now, that is all I have to say on the matter. It is up to you to decide what you want to do.”
Garren sighed heavily as Sampson walked away from him.
“Garren?” Josephine’s frightened voice called to him, and he looked to where she stood. Josephine was waiting by a small grove of birch trees. She looked like a prisoner awaiting sentence. Her hands were clasped protectively in front of her stomach, and he couldn’t help it. His heart broke for her.
When he first sought her out in her chamber, she had given him a knowing smile, dismissed her ladies and welcomed him inside.
“I told you, you would be back,” she stated as she began to undress.
“Stop,” Garren said, crossing the distance between them and putting his hand on her arm.
“Why? Do you want to undress me?” she asked, as she wrapped her arms around his neck and tugged on his hair to pull him down for a kiss.
“If your child is not born with red hair, then Budic vows to kill it.”
“What?” Josephine spluttered on a laugh as she threaded her fingers through his hair and tried once more to bring his lips down to hers.
The Du Lac Princess: (Book 3 of The Du Lac Chronicles) Page 24