William blocked a stroke on the shaft of his spear and returned a strike at his opponent’s head; the Moor ducked. Continuing the momentum, William spun around and swung another blow at the Moor’s legs, who jumped just in time. The Moor then jabbed a quick thrust at William's chest. William was forced to lurch back to avoid the blow.
In the short pause this created, William had to decide. With sudden clarity he realized how distracted he was with this opponent and how precarious the situation of his men actually was. His decision was made. William shouted to his lieutenant, “Sound the signal! Sound the signal!” His opponent advanced on him with malice in his eyes. William’s lieutenant dispatched another enemy and fumbled with the horn tied over his shoulder. Putting it to his lips he blew a great long note. Then, after a short pause, he blew another. It was answered by a distant note from a similar horn.
Most of the men were far too involved in the battle to pay any heed to the horns, but William’s opponent heard it. The intensity in his eyes drained away and was rapidly replaced by fear. He realized what was happening and turned toward his own line of men. “Retreat!” He shouted. “It's a trap, retreat!”
Fearing he would alert the Moors to the imminent third strike that was about to take them by surprise, William lunged at him. The Moor’s attention was no longer on William but on sounding the alarm for his people. He drew breath for another call and William's spear sunk deep into his lung. He gurgled something unintelligible and dropped. None of the men of Damietta had heard his warning call, and they were not prepared for the new force that fell on them.
The new wave of crusaders swept down onto the field, and the tide turned quickly against the defenders. As the last of the men were being routed, William paused amid the chaos. He looked for the Angel of Death, but he was not interested in William on this night. Perhaps now, through all these years of service, William had atoned for his wrongs. Perhaps he had been forgiven after all, and there was mercy and peace while still in the flesh.
CHAPTER SIX
“Milady, I thank you for seeing me unannounced.” Leah glided into the room followed by her handmaid, Edith.
“Of course, Henry. What is it?” she asked, noting with some concern his paler than usual complexion and agitated manner.
“It is an exceedingly personal matter, milady, and I would beg leave to speak with you alone,” he said, looking between Leah and Edith. His request was quite unorthodox and not the sort of request a respectable lady would frequently grant if she intended to remain respectable. Nevertheless, Leah turned without hesitation to address herself to Edith.
”Edith, my dear, would you be good enough to leave us for a short while?” she asked in an apologetic tone. Edith looked as though she would protest but only flicked a dark glance at Henry and withdrew.
“Please sit down,” he said to Leah as soon as the door had closed, leaving them alone. She did as she was bid while Henry continued to pace in a feverish manner.
“Henry, please, sit a moment and rest, for you are discomfiting me with your manor.” He sat down rigidly on the extreme edge of the sofa.
“Henry, what is it that has you so upset; are you unwell?”
“No. Or rather, I am most unwell, milady,” he said, grasping at this to try to articulate his thoughts.
“I must call someone to tend to you at once.” Leah started to rise.
“No, please,” Henry said, quickly extending a trembling hand to her shoulder to urge her to reclaim her seat. But he did not dare allow himself to touch her, and withdrew his hand. “What I mean to say is that I am most unwell, but there is no medical man whose arts could have any power over my ailment. My sickness is of a very different kind. Please,” he interrupted her protest. “Please do not deign to speak until I have said what I came to say, for if I do not express what I have purposed to express here and now, I may never find the will to do so.” Leah remained quiet with a solemn expression of concern furrowing her smooth brow.
“As you may be aware, I will be departing for Persia on the morrow to combat the Moor scourge on that quarter…” Henry was once again pacing, pulling on his fingers anxiously. “I am giving myself over, as it were, to the whims of fate and do not know but that I shall be overcome and struck down by the blade.”
Leah put her hand to her mouth in a gasp of shock. “Do not say such things, Henry.”
“Please,” he said. “Leah, you are of too wise a temperament and pragmatic a disposition to dispute such a point. And I only state the former as a motivation for appearing before you now in such a barbarous fashion, not as any call for remonstrance.” He sighed and sat again but was just as quickly on his feet a moment later.
“Leah,” Henry's voice was trembling. “In this last year since William left—” He hesitated, cursing himself for the slip of the tongue as he always made an active effort to avoid mention of that name to her. “In this last year, I have come to value your friendship very highly. I regard a word from you more highly than anyone else, I dare say.” He laughed nervously at this admission.
“Oh Henry, I too am grateful we have had the opportunity to become friends. It would have been my misfortune if I had never come to know you better.” She smiled warmly at him.
Henry was encouraged by this. “You are like none other I have ever met. In the all too few moments I have had the pleasure of your company, I have never heard you utter a single ill word against anyone. Your fair countenance is rendered moreso by your delightful disposition.” Leah blushed and dropped her eyes at this.
“I am afraid you do me too much credit,” she returned. “I am afflicted by a great many flaws that you are too good to mention.”
“Never!” Henry almost yelled. “I could never hear a word uttered against you, not even from your lips. You are too good and too wonderful. I cannot and will not brook such villainous lies.”
Her fine eyebrows perked up a bit. “Surely you would not deny me the privilege to acknowledge my own faults.”
“No, milady. I cannot hear such things. If fault there be with you, you must keep it to yourself, for it is not for mortals as myself to cast aspersions at the gods.”
“Henry, what is it that has worked you into such a state?” She laughed lightly at his behavior but at once quelled her mirth, sensing the impropriety of it.
“Please, Leah,” he said with a pained expression. “Please do not laugh at me now. While your laughter is musical and delightful, at this moment it cuts me to the very core.” He rushed on before she could reply. “I have thus to say as my heart compels me. But I fear at once that my lips would take it back before it is uttered.”
“I have found the mind to typically be the better judge in such moments than the heart,” Leah interjected, but he did not listen.
“I leave tomorrow and may never return. I must confess what is in my heart.” A tear of emotion stood in his eye as his voice quaked and trembled. He dropped onto one knee before her and took her left hand in both of his. Leah unconsciously recoiled slightly at the action, but did not dare interrupt him in such a passion. “I have said I am unwell, Leah, but it is because my heart is no longer my own. It has been wrenched from my breast as surely as any enemy may have done. I have endeavored to ignore the emptiness the absence has left. I have thought to control the emotion by force of will. But Leah, on this, the eve of my departure into the wastelands of the Saracens, I tell you that I could die a happy and contented man if I but knew my heart was held by one in whose esteem I was held equally high.” Leah was not aware of the expression of horror that involuntarily crossed her face. Henry noted it and hesitated, but plunged on despite his crumbling resolve. “Leah, I know you are an honorable and true maiden above all others, and you would never pledge yourself falsely, believing you might one day turn back to another. I am down on my knee before you, lady, to pledge my undying love and devotion to you. Will you accept this gift? Humble though it be, a deeper, more heartfelt gift I never could offer to anyone.” Henry bowed his head bef
ore her as if awaiting his sentence.
Leah took a few moments to recover herself, and when she spoke, she did so very carefully. “Henry, you have done me too much honor to offer such a gift as your devotion. Such an offer of a nobleman, a scholar, and a knight would be the pride of any woman in England to accept. And while you have my deepest admiration both as a man and as my friend, you do not have my heart.” Henry's head sank even lower, but he did not speak as the emotions overwhelmed him. He feared lest speech would betray the wound he had just received. “Trouble yourself not, Sir Knight, over one such as myself. I pray you not to give this one moment’s reflection upon your departure.” She gently raised his chin to gaze into his tear-filled eyes. “You are too good and too noble. I am not worthy of you.”
Henry quickly stood and wiped his eyes. “You say any maiden would be honored by an offer of such a pledge and that you are not worthy.” His voice had a harsh edge to it now. “And yet you have rejected me.”
Leah sat back in surprise at his words. “I assure you, good sir, that I spoke sincerely,” she said, her voice echoing the same surprise that showed on her face.
“Why do you rebuff me? Is it for William?” he demanded angrily. “He is dishonored and disgraced. If he is not already dead, he can never return here. He will never be anything but a cravenly dog. Would you give your heart at the expense of your name and the honor of your own family?” Leah put her hand to her bosom in shock at this abrupt change in manners. “Would you sacrifice everything on the vain hope of a memory of a departed child?” She crimsoned at this in anger and only bit her tongue and bowed her head humbly.
“Foolish woman,” Henry said, his shame making him angrier still. “When I walk out that door, my offer is withdrawn forever. I suggest you consider this carefully.”
Leah slowly turned her beautiful hazel eyes up to Henry's fuming countenance, her silence saying more than words could have. Henry turned and stormed out of the room angry, humiliated, and soul sick, feeling that perhaps Persia was not far enough for him now.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Annie stared up at Thomas, her mouth hanging slightly open, her dull eyes revealing nothing. Thomas returned her stare levelly. He was unsure if she had understood him or even heard him at all. “Do you understand?” he said, enunciating each word as if she were hard of hearing. “The children are playing in the wallow again. You must keep them out of there or they will get sick.”
Annie's expression clouded over. “You don't think I'm a good mother?”
Thomas rolled his eyes. “We are not discussing your abilities as a mother,” his voice rose slightly, but he forced himself to contain his anger. “I am trying to keep my children safe.” Annie turned away and did not respond. She was pouting. Thomas bit back a sharp comment. “Will you please fetch them?”
“Why don't you?” Annie responded in a sulky voice, hiding her round face behind her unkempt black hair.
“Because I need to call on my mother.”
“Of course. You walk out on your family at every excuse,” Annie said, still facing the wall.
“What are you saying? My mother is my family, too. I swear, Annie, sometimes I feel like I have three children. Just take care of Hannah and Harry and stop whining!” His irritation was clearly showing through now. He took a deep breath to collect himself. “Look, I will get them out of the mud and send them inside on my way out. Will you please see that they are bathed?”
Annie did not respond. Thomas took that to be as close to consent as he was likely to get when she was in this mood. He turned and walked out the large front door of his small estate house and around the side of the stone building to where a few animals were kept in pens. “Hannah, Harry, get out of there!” he said to his three-year-old daughter and his son that was almost two. His voice was louder and angrier than he intended even in his own ears. It occurred to Thomas that he sounded that way a lot lately.
Hannah looked up in shock as if she had just been apprehended selling state secrets. Her bright red hair was completely covered in mud. Chubby little Harry grinned at him from where he was sitting naked in the mud. “You will get sick if you keep playing in there! Now go inside. Mother is going to give you a bath.”
“No!” Hannah screamed defiantly and threw the mud in her hand at him.
“Get inside now, or I will beat your bottom!” Thomas did not bother to try to control his anger at her reaction. Harry grinned and smeared mud all over his bare belly.
Hannah ran for the house, letting out a blood curdling wail. “Moooomy! Daddy yelled at me!”
Thomas went to the fence and attempted to pick Harry up, but he was just out of reach. Cursing to himself, he took a step into the ankle-deep mud, leaned over, and snatched his filthy son from the mire. Extending his son out in front of himself at arm’s length, he carried him back inside. At times like this, Thomas frequently pondered on the irony of a great warrior doing such menial and silly tasks. This was beneath him, but he knew if he did not do it, no one would. He really needed to employ servants like his mother did at Dawning Court, but other than the cook and the maid, his mother would not fund anymore. She always claimed she could not afford loan requests from Thomas, which they both knew he would never pay back, but then she lived in the lap of luxury with ten times the number of servants in her house as occupants. Nevertheless, because of her unwillingness to give up any of her own personal luxuries, Thomas was forced to live on a small estate on the outskirts of Dawning Court with only two servants, one of which he had to pay himself. It angered Thomas that he had to pay his own way simply because he was not the first son. Of course, John had not fared too well either, marrying that peasant girl as he did. But that made it all the more detestable that his mother was withholding support from Thomas even after denying John the inheritance that was rightfully his.
Thomas scowled at his muddy boots as he rode toward Dawning Castle. His boots were expensive, and he did not know if they would come clean. Some spectacle of a nobleman he must be, knee deep in the mire. That did not fit his image of what nobility was all about, but then he was not so sure he fit the image of what nobility was all about. He often wondered if it had not been some accident at birth that landed him in nobility. While he felt entitled to a life of privilege by his right of birth, he did not feel he shared the attributes of his brothers that gave them distinction over the common man. John and Richard were brave warriors that nature had imbued since birth with great size and strength. Thomas was the only brother who was overweight and who had always been so. Henry and Edward had sharp intellects, and William had fine aristocratic features to which the girls had always been partial. One female in particular showed a keen interest in the fortunes of Thomas’ youngest sibling. Thomas, it was said, was the funny one. Though he had served honorably in a crusade of his own, he had returned without distinction. He had been knighted for his efforts, but he felt in his heart that he was not as good as his warrior brothers. Though he was no coward, he had always preferred to avoid battles rather than charge into them as his brothers seemed to. He had served the minimum time required by honor and returned and married quickly.
His brothers still in the field, however, had all far exceeded their requisite time, and new stories of their heroics poured in each day. As their reputation grew, Thomas’s diminished in his own eyes, not only because of their exploits but because he no longer wielded a lance. He stayed at home with his family, tended his estate, and petered into oblivion. His own exploits, few though they may have been, were noble and had been trying for him, but who remembered that when Richard was taking on armies of Saracens with only a handful of men like some biblical prophet, and William was being dubbed the Saracen Scourge? They were unstoppable forces. That is what noblemen were supposed to be, but Thomas had never felt that he fit into that mold. He privately wondered if it was to be taken as a sign that he felt more at home in a tavern with the commoners than with his own kind.
Thomas rode up to Dawning Castle on the prete
xt of acquiring news regarding his family. But he was actually escaping the frustration he was feeling for his life. Ordinarily he sought out John’s company when these moods beset him. John was of similar sentiment to his own and could commiserate, but invariably they just ended up drunk. Thomas was yet grappling with his problems and was not yet prepared to surrender to vice. Later, perhaps, but not now.
Thomas found his mother in her customary spot in the library at her writing table, clothed in her gray dress with her widow’s cap in its usual place atop her graying head. It had been so long since he had seen her in anything other than drab colors, he began to wonder if she owned anything colorful any longer. “So what’s the news?” He asked without preamble upon entering and dropped heavily down onto the leather sofa. He was currently the only Dawning boy that routinely saw his mother, and much of the formality was gone, which was fine with him as he stretched out over the length of the sofa, putting his muddy boots up over the arm.
Martha Dawning looked up from what she was doing. “Hello, Thomas. William of York was a holy shadow on the battlefield at Damietta and single-handedly routed the entire town’s foot soldiers.” Martha repeated the news as it was relayed to her, but was unable to keep the irony out of her voice. They both knew the stories, as they filtered over the hundreds of leagues between them and the Crusades, were distorted, but there was real information to be gleaned from them. One could learn from this tale that William, if this was their William as his description had led them to believe, was alive. The Christians had won the day, and he had, at least to some degree, distinguished himself on the battlefield.
The Knights Dawning (The Crusades Series) Page 6