Crown of the Realm (A White Knight Adventure Book 2)

by Jude Chapman

  The fight was lost from the very beginning. Stephen, like Drake, was routed by overwhelming numbers.

  “Take him away!” the cultured voice said.

  “Stephen!” Drake yelled. “Aveline!”

  Amid muffled grunts and shuffling footsteps, Stephen was spirited away.

  Drake struggled to escape his bonds. Fought to break free of the iron fists that held him fast to his chair. Strained to see through the entrapping blindfold, more confining than the ropes ensnaring his arms. On the rise and fall of his breath, a pathetic mewling cleft the air. On and on it went, nothing to stop it, not even the well-met slap of a hand across his mouth. Drake grasped, sickeningly, that the depraved noise was coming from him. He bent his head into his hands, bound before him, and stifled the sound.

  Restless feet meandered. Drake sensed the jerk of a head. The coercive hands withdrew. Spur-jangled footsteps pounded out of the salle. One knight remained, shifting restlessly from foot to foot. Drake waited, attentive. His adversary strolled a short distance away, the ambergris spiraling from his clothes like noxious fumes. Liquid was poured into two goblets. The returning footsteps brought the rim of one of the vessels to his lips. Reaching up his hands, Drake upended the cup and drank.

  As if disinterested in the wine and the circumstances, the gentleman settled himself in a chair and sipped idly from his own cup. “Alors,” he finally said, “you see the predicament in which you have been placed.” He spoke in the langue d’oïl, the mother tongue of France.

  For the past weeks, Drake had grown accustomed to speaking in the Norman-French dialect. Or in the lenga d’oc, the tongue of the Aquitaine, of troubadours, and of his king. Drake answered in that same tongue now. “You want something. Something I don’t wish to give.”

  The nobleman translated swiftly and answered in his native language. “Bon, vous comprenez.” The goblet slid to a perch on the table separating them. “You are to assassinate your king.”

  Drake held his breath.

  “You understand?”

  “I understand my brother’s life hangs in the balance.”

  He sat back. “Bon, let it be so. You wish more wine?”

  “I wish a feast.”

  “Regrettably, I cannot accommodate.” The nobleman rose and paced. Drake followed him with unseeing eyes.

  “Further, you are to make it seem as if you are a lone madman. Which you are, n’est-ce pas? You have had angry words with Richard, we are aware. You are enraged over his presumptions, are you not? It is so. Vengeance is to be yours and yours alone.”

  He refilled Drake’s cup to the brim. Drake flung it away. The drinking vessel clanged across the floor. Wine dribbled audibly.

  “C’est dommage. A waste of good wine.”

  “Let it be so.”

  The nobleman wasn’t dull-witted. Drake received a backhanded slap across his mouth. His lower lip welled and bled. Steadying his temper, the man meticulously returned the un-drunken portion of his own wine into the flagon. “If, after the deed is done, Richard’s supporters believe otherwise, that is, if they suspect you were not acting alone and that others were involved, the same fate awaits your brother as if you had not accomplished the feat. The same holds true if you try in any way to communicate beforehand with your king, or with his mignons, or his family. We have informants at the highest levels. We will know if you have tried to sidestep your assignment in any form. You understand?”

  “We’ve met before … haven’t we?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “And what of the woman traveling with my brother.”

  “A woman?” he asked his men.

  There was no reply.

  “Know this. Until and unless we are assured that everything has happened as we wish, you will not see your brother alive in this world, or by inference, the next.”

  * * *

  Dragging the gag from his mouth, Drake coughed. By the time he ripped the blindfold away, the beat of hoofs was far distant. He was sitting on his haunches, the ground beneath him damp. Unaccustomed to sight, he squinted into a woodland burnished by morning sun. Baldwin’s bay stood restlessly nearby, nickering impatiently and digging a foreleg into the turf. Drake was able to pick out familiar landmarks and reckoned where the knights left him: roughly five miles south of Nonancourt Castle beside a path that hugged the River Eure.

  They left his sword and dagger behind. He made short work of the bonds. After rubbing feeling back into his hands, he attended to necessary chores without thought and numbly accomplished, exhaustion the overriding factor. He unsaddled the bay and led him to grass. Watched him eat his full while his own belly stayed empty. Gave the steed his fill of water as Drake likewise afforded himself the same, the two leaning side by side over the river embankment and dipping their heads in unison. The Eure rippled on its course downstream, unaware of the knight scrubbing his face of stinking sweat, blood encrusting his wrists, and rust left by the helm. He threw his hair back and looked out at the lonely landscape.

  He had no time to waste.

  Just outside Dreux’s north gate, Drake came upon the trails of the Arabians, one bearing the hefty weight of a knight, the other transporting the slimmer build of a lady. A mile distant, the hoof prints of trailing horses—three in number—converged from different directions like the spokes of a wheel and obliterated the tracks. A quarter-mile later, the Arabians split up, the lighter one veering east. In the clearing beyond, the haphazard imprints of energetic hoofs marked the spot where Stephen must have been overpowered. The fight wasn’t much of a fight, but blood had been drawn.

  Drake found where the hoof prints entered the River Eure and disappeared into the shallows. He waded up and down both embankments and eventually picked up the hoofs of a single palfrey emerging a mile downstream on the eastern shore. The horse had galloped over several miles. Inevitably the stride shortened and progressed into an easy trot and easier lope. He found his dappled gray grazing on dry land but without rider. Grabbing up the loose reins, he crossed and re-crossed the position, calling out for Aveline until his voice became hoarse. No one ever answered.

  He returned to the scene of Stephen’s abduction and followed the course the captors had taken. For a short distance, the tracks of one Arabian and three palfreys showed a clear route south. Drops of blood marked part of the way. One by one, the horses split off, and one by one each led to a cold trail.

  He backtracked and picked up the trail of his own abduction, several miles north of where Stephen had been taken, and tried to follow the signs. But the knights had obscured their route well by trolling in and out of streams, riding up rocky hills, down granite cliffs, and circling repeatedly.

  At nones low clouds blew in from the north and blanketed the sky with unending gray, readily covering the stealthy movements of a lone knight skulking and scurrying about a castle’s perimeter. Though neither elaborate nor majestic, Nonancourt stood the test of time and served its purpose well. Four towers described the square keep. Crenellated battlements crowned it. The barbican housed gatehouse and stables. The walls, twelve feet thick, were constructed of flint, rubble, and stone mixed with lime, sand, and water. Parts of the outer surfaces—corners, window arches, and portals—were fashioned of hewn stone. Wooden stairs on two sides led up to the barbican. Laid down the middle, a graveled embankment allowed passage for horses and carts.

  On first glance the castle appeared deserted, but to the discerning eye the barbican was more than active. Two riders, or sometimes three or four, rode out every hour, circuited the grounds in opposite directions, and met again at the main gate for a last reconnaissance of the river and the southern approaches. Sentinels toured the ramparts. Archers manned turrets and arrow slits. The castle watch was on the lookout for trouble. Odds were that a certain white knight was that trouble.

  Moving a king’s court from castle to castle was an elaborate affair. Drake learned soon enough that the old days—when the duke of Aquitaine was struck with the sudden notion to
mount a skirmish, put down a rebellious comte, or simply tour the far-reaching borders of his beloved Aquitaine—were gone forever. Then the baggage was light, needs minimal, and travel fast. No longer. Not in the days of a king, where queens, princesses and ladies-in-waiting, princes and bishops, cooks and maids, provisions and beds had to be transported from place to place at a frustratingly leisure pace. If the king and his royal retinue had indeed left earlier than planned, a single knight riding a single horse could easily catch up.

  To bear out his suspicions, Drake stayed to the forest curtain, scouting the castle grounds, noting the scant evidence, and watching the comings and goings. Smoke escaping from the hearthfire louvres was sparse and infrequent. The Calais road, which would have returned much of Richard’s court to England, and the western road along the River Avre, which would have delivered the remaining Norman court to Chinon Castle, both revealed recent and decidedly heavy traffic. Other than the castle guard, no one else ventured out of doors.

  On one of the reconnaissance rounds, a lookout detected something skulking behind a brake. His steed impatient beneath him, the man sniffed the air while his eyes scanned the horizon. By the time he reached the position, he saw a roe scooting into the distance, and failed to notice, hiding in that brake, an overworked bay palfrey, another dappled gray, and a knight holding the muzzles of both horses to keep them still.

  The sentry returned to the castle. Drake road the horses several miles distant and found a clearing surrounded by a creek on one side, a hilltop on another, and woods at his back.

  Night fell. Drake spread a horse blanket over a mattress of leaves and tethered the Arabians to a stalwart oak clawing a placid sable sky. The fire, begun by striking flint against dagger, ignited the tinder with a single spark. He fortified the wee flame with his breath, and fed leaves and wood chips into the nascent combustion. Faggot upon faggot, the inferno built and solidified until the pyre singed away the gloom of night. His eyes became transfixed by the dance of firelight, while his hands, burning with heat, fed the blaze as if it were a living thing.

  Gripping a lengthy limb, he danced around the fire just as men in the days of old must have leapt around similar flames, worshipping the invisible gods. Mystical spirits played with man. And man, in his ignorance, tried to conjure the power of those gods, believing as men believed today, that ritual, obeisance, and empty promises would dispel the fear, fill them with power, and make them just as invincible. It was a tantalizing thought. And a fool’s game. Man was weak, especially when there were other men who could subjugate them at will.

  Above, the dome of heaven and the twinkling stars watched this lone man, this knight who thought himself invincible mere days before but was now bereft of kin, heart, and soul, wail at the moon and rail against the fates that had brought him to this fork in the road, where no direction was the right direction. He flailed at the fire with his wooden sword and tried to attack those who would dare make his brother a pawn in an unwinnable game. He regretted the day when he believed being a knight gave him stature, meaning, and a place in the world. Out here in the wilderness—cut off from those he held most dear—he was merely a man gripping a sword that could not inflict mortal wounds against his enemies but only against his friends and his king.

  Diminished in size and stature, and rendered into a helpless child, he cried out against his fate. After the anguish had been spent, he turned into a beast, wounded and feral, and yowled with the wolves until they sang together.

  Their complaints died on a whimper. The flames burned the night away. Drake expended his grief in the same way and awoke with the cool sun tickling his brow. A chaffinch greeted the dawn with song. An osprey dived for the catch of the morning. A woodpecker burrowed safe haven into a nearby birch.

  The campfire smoldered, and Drake again fed it with deliberation. He broke his fast with a leveret, sacrificed with bow and arrow. And tormented himself with the notion that he was probably destined for Hell by breaking the Lenten fast. Until he remembered that he was destined for Hell anyway—for his heathen ways and his unbelief—and so what did it matter, a little meat for his belly when his soul was starving.

  He slept again in the quiet of the day. Toward evening, biting spring showers descended. He huddled beneath a horse blanket and stared blankly out at the woods, teeming with living things. And contemplated death. The death of his brother, which would mean the death of himself. Or the death of his king, which likewise would mean the death of himself. And the death of the woman he loved beyond all other women, for by now, Aveline must be dead or wished she were.

  The sky cleared. Night overturned day. And he prayed. A heathen praying is a pitiful critter, for it means he has run out of hope and turned to walk the only path left him. Knowing himself to be a fraud, he grasped the silver crucifix Aveline had given him as a talisman against danger and mouthed words he learnt as a child, words unspoken for nearly a decade, and prayed for deliverance.

  Finally he settled down beneath a blanket of leaves and wool and slept the sleep of the damned. His future was laid out. He saw no other way. Come failure or success, his life as he knew it was over. If he had to sacrifice one, let it be his king. For if he let his brother die, he might as well take the dagger to his chest, here and now.

  ~ Part II ~

  Where Love Gets Its Name

  Love gets its name (amor) from the word for hook (amus), which means ‘to capture’ or ‘to be captured’, for he who is in love is captured in the chains of desire and wishes to capture someone else with his hook.

  Saturday, the 31st of March, in the Year of Grace 1190

  Chapter 11

  STRETCHING ALONG A steep plateau overlooking the River Vienne, Chinon Castle had once belonged to the great comtes of Blois who, as a gift of solidarity in the year 1044, gave the castle to Richard’s grandfather. Passed on from father to son to grandson, Chinon became the favored palace of Old King Henry, and now of Richard.

  Before memory, a village had sprung up along the snug southern reaches between castle hill and the river, its survival and prosperity owing to the château. In his wisdom, Henry built a bridge connecting Chinon to the other side of the river valley, turning the village into a vital spoke of the greater Loire Valley and vitalizing commerce from Saumur to Tours.

  The curtain walls of Chinon extended across the natural curve of the chalky castle heights. Most of the construction having taken place during King Henry’s long reign, the more prominent structures grew haphazardly from west to east. The round tower of the castle keep, some three storeys high, guarded the far southwestern corner of the castle precincts, while a gatehouse, portcullis, drawbridge, and moat protected the eastern flanks. Between these major guard posts lay the necessary accommodations of a thriving community. Extending westward from a third tower, built on a prominence midway between keep and guardhouse, lay the royal apartments. The kitchen, armory, wine cellar, and a common room occupied the ground floor. The main floor, divided into private chambers, served as the living quarters for the king, queen, extended family, and guests of high rank. Access to the great hall was through an outside gallery running alongside the open courtyard.

  The main approach to the castle proper lay via the northern slope by roads advancing from east and west, and converging at the moat and drawbridge. In former times, other approaches had been hacked into the hillside on the steeper southern slope, but memory and willful destruction had rendered these to disuse.

  One remained.

  The most secretive entry into the château, where the guard least expected encroachment and where visibility was poorest, lay halfway between the gatehouse and the royal apartments. If someone of evil intent knew where to look, he could find a hewn stairway lying in deplorable ruins. If he were agile enough, he could climb halfway up castle hill without being detected. And though the crumbling steps led precisely nowhere, they provided footholds suitable for scaling walls.

  A sliver of moon barely illumined the stealthy prowler. He hauled
himself hand over hand up a thick coil of hemp, secured high above by a deftly aimed grappling hook. Bracing feet against the curtain wall, the tips of his boots found purchase on narrow ledges and against random cracks. Night sounds rustled on a nimble breeze: the crackling of torches overhead, the murmur of distant voices, easy laughter, and the king’s hounds barking inside Dogs’ Tower.

  Sweat sluiced the trespasser’s face and neck. He hissed in a sharp breath and hauled himself the rest of the way up. The narrow allure behind the parapet gave way to easy footing. He released the rope and gathered his bearings.

  Just below lay one of two castle wells, and adjacent to these, a walkway leading to the great hall and royal apartments. Beyond the flagged avenue spread the courtyard. Lit up by evenly spaced rush lights, gravel pathways crisscrossed lawn and garden in geometric formation. Wooden benches interspersed the lanes. From the great hall, voices snorted. Other voices, even nearer, pierced the dark. Crouching low, the intruder squatted on the rampart and waited.

  The moon slipped behind a wispy cloud, then shimmered and gulped stars into its ladle.

  Booming laughter punctuated the dusky braids of the witching hour. Only one man laughed in that unique way, as if he owned the world and every creature therein: Richard Cœur de Lion. His voice carrying the distance, he verbosely related a whimsical tale. As only lesser men can fawn on a greater man, his courtiers laughed encouragement but without true conviction. As an actor in a play, Richard fine-tuned his performance, the celestial voice rising and falling, and irony inflecting every word.

  The voice careened down a pathway of destiny and drew nearer. First ejecting on a heated current from the great hall. Then losing amplification and traveling into the cool night: trailing past stone staircases; gliding beneath an arcade; walking past ivy-trellised archways; tripping along a cobbled promenade; and finally lurching into the open yard, above which the constellations sailed their nightly course.