The Knights Dawning (The Crusades Series)

by James Batchelor

  “What manner of fiend are you that cares for no life and deals death with relish?” The rogue was trembling now, seeing the likelihood of the jester’s words coming to pass. He knew his only chance lay in the forest.

  “I am merely the sum of your miserable life. Only think, the moment you had determined to rob my little party, your life was forfeit,” he pontificated as if he were not speaking of the rogue’s imminent demise. “Indeed, it might be said the moment you forsook honest society and went into this trade you were a dead man.”

  “Honest society?” the rogue spat. “What is that to me? I merely relieve you fat nobles of your purses,” he said, dropping all pretenses of politeness. “I do not rob you of your dignity, plunder your women, and murder you. My occupation may indeed be dishonest, but at least that is all it is, an occupation, and that I can change as a suit of clothing. The sins of the nobility are stains that pierce to the core, that cannot be washed from you. Strike me down then, oh noble knight. What can one more black deed do to soil the soul of a soulless, black-hearted noble?” At this the rogue dropped his sword to his side and stood upright as if to accept his fate.

  “That was quite a speech,” the jester said, relaxing against his spear that was now resting on the ground. “Your castigation of nobles is just and true, but you do err in your assumptions where I am concerned,” he said smirking wryly to himself.

  “Why is that, good sir?” he applied the title with much sarcasm. “Am I to believe that you are different from that of your class? That you are a charitable Christian man as I stand in the gore of my friends that you have cut to pieces right before my eyes? You have spilled Christian blood to save heathen blood. And for what? Your friends have robbed you and fled, leaving you to your fate. You have spilled the blood of my men to gratify your own pride! To prove you were better than common highwaymen! And you are about to tell me you are a better sort than they?”

  “Oh, I did not say I was better, I just said you were mistaken,” the jester said, not the least bit perturbed by the rogue’s scathing reproof of the class he assumed him to belong to.

  “And how, may I ask, are you different from the others of your ilk?”

  “I am not a knight,” he smirked broadly at the thief, and with that he swung his spear in an overhand arch to finish off the rogue, but he struck only air. The rogue darted to his left, his last hope in the trees. The jester took a step forward and spun in the opposite direction to give himself momentum and hurled his spear with all his force at the retreating back, but the fleet-footed rogue dodged behind a tree and the spear imbedded itself deep in the trunk of a large oak tree and stayed there.

  The jester raced after the rogue without hesitation. He dodged around trees and leapt over fallen logs and brush. The rogue was fast and familiar with the forest, but his pursuer was determined, and shortly he was almost within arm’s reach of his objective.

  The rogue looked over his shoulder and squealed slightly in consternation to see his pursuer directly on his heels. In a panic he swung a wild swing behind him with the sword he still carried. The jester, having nothing with which to defend himself, was forced to jump aside and had to throw his hands out to catch himself from running into the trunk of a large tree. He bounced off unharmed and whirled around the far side of it and continued the pursuit. The rogue, now ten paces ahead, turned sharply to avoid a large patch of heavy undergrowth, and the jester saw his chance. Racing out ahead to intercept the rogue, he got to a small clearing just a pace ahead of him. The rogue could not believe his fortune. He drew back to strike this foolish jester down from behind. But the jester did not stop as expected. Instead he ran two steps up the trunk, leapt into the air spinning, and delivered a devastating blow with his armored shin to the side of the rogue’s head. The rogue’s own determination propelled him straight into the blow, taking the full impact in the head.

  Light exploded before his eyes as he was struck, and a dull thud from hitting the ground shot pain through his head. He instinctively curled up protectively in pain and terror, holding his head. “What pit of Hell did such a devil spring from? Why are you doing this to me? Why are you so determined to destroy my life?” he pleaded.

  The jester stood over him and slowly drew a curved sword from under his robe. It was rippled with stripes all up and down the blade that made it seem somehow even more sinister than a highly polished blade would have seemed. “Destruction is all I know. It is the only thing I’m good at.”

  “I don’t deserve this,” the rogue whined.

  The jester cocked his head in confusion. “Everyone deserves this,” he said, and he raised his sword to finish off the now pathetic figure that only minutes before had been so self-possessed. But as he did so a memory stirred, a memory from long ago of his own father standing over a cowering peasant. On an impulse that he himself could not have explained, he reversed his swing and struck a blow with the hilt of his weapon to the rogue’s head, rendering him unconscious, and walked away leaving him injured but alive.

  He was very perturbed by this incident. It was not his habit to leave those that crossed him alive in his wake. It was a dangerous practice. But he was ever the more perturbed as he could not explain why he was suddenly and deeply so out of sorts. Little did he know that he was about to become far more vexed. He was returning to his mount grazing by the side of the road as the well-trained animal should have been when he recalled the Saracens rooting through his things. The singularity of this act had not registered in the heat of the battle. Were they such lowly opportunists that they had robbed him even as he was fighting the men who would have taken their lives? But if such was the case, why not take his horse, too? He threw the leather flap back from the bag and his heart stopped. Lying on top of his gear was an emblem he had not seen in many years. But he knew instantly what it was and could have guessed at its meaning even had he not seen the sealed letter underneath it. The letter was written on parchment and closed with a seal he did not recognize.

  He cracked the seal and read the letter. He was sick to his stomach. His first impulse was to ride after the Moor ‘pilgrims’. There were very few roads they could turn off on in this heavily forested part of the country, and he might just catch them. But that was unlikely on his English palfrey. Their Arabian animals could run faster and longer than his New Market steed that was bred for an entirely different purpose. But it really did not matter; catching the messengers could yield but little. This was much bigger than those two, and he alone could not handle it. But how had they known who he was? He looked at the pennant attached to his spear. What foolish impulse had prompted him to affix that? “No one will see it,” he had told himself. “But you must have wanted people to see it, else why attach it at all? Of all the stupid, vain—” He stopped himself, realizing the futility of this line of thought, and climbed into his saddle. With a heavy-hearted sigh, he turned the nose of his animal toward the home to which he had sworn never to return.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  “I will drink the blood of William Dawning while sitting on the throne of Dawning Court!” Baron Braddock roared and swung the sword in his right hand wildly in the air, sloshing the contents of the mug of ale in his left hand over the sides.

  “Of course,” Rafiq had seen enough of Baron Braddock’s drunken rages to know better than to get excited about anything he said while in this state.

  “You doubt me?” Braddock glared at him on unsteady feet.

  “Of course I support my lord,” Rafiq said with easy obsequiousness. “I would encourage you in such an endeavor. With Richard Dawning a continent away and John Dawning disgraced, now is the perfect time to move against them."

  Braddock continued to stare at him. “But no William?”

  “William has not returned,” Rafiq admitted.

  “William is the one I want!” Braddock swung a wild blow at Rafiq, which he easily avoided, and hit the coat of arms hung over the shield on the wall, sending it crashing to the floor with a terrible clatter.
“He is the one that robbed me of my most beloved son.” His attitude instantly went from violence to tearful melancholy in his inebriated condition.

  “But have you lost sight of what the real goal was?” Rafiq reminded him. “The goal has always been to control the Dawnings’ lands also. If you were to act now, that can happen. The Dawnings are weaker than they have ever been.”

  “I don’t care about lands anymore. I only care about vengeance!” He turned and cleaved a chair in half with his aging but still powerful arms.

  “Is everything all right?” Hans, Braddock’s second son, came running in upon hearing the commotion.

  Rafiq began to make excuses for his master but was interrupted by the baron. “No, everything is not all right!” he shouted at his son. “My best son is dead, and those who are responsible still remain unpunished; and all I am left with as a reminder of him is this,” he gestured in disgust at Hans. “If you were any kind of real warrior, you would have already avenged him and taken Dawning Court for your own! Collin will do my bidding. Where is Collin?” He said looking around for his eldest son. “Collin!”

  “Your Lordship's eldest son is leading your armies overseas,” Rafiq reminded him quietly.

  Hans flushed at the tirade. He was used to it, having heard them from his father all his life, but they had grown even more frequent since Vincent’s death. Still, it shamed him each time. “Father, I assure you, if I knew where to find William Dawning, he would be a dead man.”

  “Everyone knows where to find William Dawning! It is the worst-kept secret since you were born a bastard to a serving wench. Can there be any doubt he is this William of York?”

  “So you would have me travel a thousand leagues to discover if a person who may or may not be a legend is the boy who killed your son in a joust almost five years ago?”

  “I would have you,” Braddock said in a quiet voice and then suddenly shouted, “die! You are not fit to be in a world where Vincent is not!” He dropped his ale cup and drew back his sword in an overhand swing, but the remnants of the chair clung to it, and he began wrestling with it in a mad rage to tear it free.

  “Father, what can I do? If you would have me ride to Egypt, I will do so.”

  “You can die!” Braddock was still swinging his weapon wildly, but the last piece of wood was too light and would not dislodge from his blade.

  “Baron, why not have Hans ride at the head of your remaining army to destroy Dawning Court!” Rafiq suggested.

  “I will ride, father,” Hans added quickly, stepping toward his father. “Is that what you desire? I will take Dawning Court and burn it to the earth! Not a stone will be left standing when I am finished.”

  Braddock dropped his weapon as his dizziness got the better of him, and he fell on the step of the dais. “I only want my boy back!” He broke down into sobs, and Rafiq motioned for Hans to steal away while Braddock was distracted.

  Rafiq waited patiently for the old fool’s sobs to surrender to unconsciousness, and he had the baron placed in his chambers on his bed.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  “I’m not going to do that anymore. The knight’s life is the refuge of thugs and murderers. It’s couched in terms of nobility and valor to justify the things they do, but it just makes them feel good about being another’s lapdog,” Henry blurted at Mary’s insinuations that she was not impressed with the chivalry of the country as she had seen it.

  She smirked slightly at him as they strolled together through the garden on the grounds near her lodgings. “I’m surprised to hear one of the order make such professions,” she said. Henry had called on her as promised and had rapidly been taken with her seemingly insatiable interest in him and his stories. He expected she would grow bored shortly, but she never seemed to; she just kept probing deeper and further, and Henry found he was looking forward with more excitement to each successive visit with her. There were few people that were interested in exploring the intellectual mysteries as he was, and though Mary did not participate much in these philosophical discussions, she did seem to understand him and seemed to be interested in his insights.

  “My knighthood is by default, not by choice. There were certain things I had to do being a Dawning because of my family’s religious traditions. The knighthood was conferred as a result of those things.”

  “You would turn your back on those traditions that have made your family great?” she asked with a seemingly detached interest.

  “If they are foolish and silly traditions, it is folly to continue with them at any cost, would you not agree?”

  Mary shrugged casually. “It is easy to disdain established tradition but much harder to distinguish oneself while charting a new course of your own.”

  “I am sure that is true.”

  “One would need a good woman by his side to make such a mark,” she said again with a detachment that made it seem as though they were casually discussing some unrelated person rather than Henry himself.

  “How so?” Henry asked and immediately wished he could take it back. But Mary took it all in stride as if he had said nothing amiss.

  “I suppose having the father you have described to me, who placed little value on his family, it would be easy for you to miss this, but can you not see that a smart and clever woman is instrumental in re-establishing a different order? Her charms will avail where his steel may not. She keeps company that he would or could not and has the ears of other influential women. If one truly wanted to dislodge an entrenched evil from a community, say a barony, a good woman is a necessity.”

  “Ah, yes,” Henry said placatingly. “You are correct, of course. I fear I simply had not considered all the sides of such a quandary well enough.” He had no intention of admitting to this charming little woman—for fear of seeming a coward—that he never planned on trying to get anyone else to change; he was simply planning to retire quietly to lead a life of intellectual and scholarly pursuits.

  “If you want the mind of a lady,” Mary segued into a new subject, “I could never be wed to anyone who was simply content to be a knight. A woman needs a certain amount of virility to be certain that she could be… satisfied. Such virility is often coupled with ambition.”

  Henry was startled by the boldness of this statement. Was she saying she wanted to marry him? Or was she implying that she believed he wanted to marry her and was setting down the conditions? Or was she actually suggesting he not bother to pursue her because he was not ambitious enough? He had scarcely given the idea much consideration as he had only known this girl—lady—a few short weeks. She was pretty enough, and she was quite clever. But he had only really imagined himself with one woman by his side for years. But that woman had rejected him outright twice. He could not suppress a smirk when he imagined returning back to Dawning Court with a wife, showing her that he had put her behind him and moved on. She would not be able to toy with his affections any longer. He would be insulated from that—from her. Mary would be a suitable match. Martha could not complain of her station, and she would surely make as favorable an impression on everyone in the family as she had on him. He grinned wider as he considered showing her off to his brothers and their jealousy over her. For her beauty far exceeded that of either Annie or Lindsay, and he had watched with disgust the way they fawned over Leah, often right in William’s presence. All at once this wild idea excited him. And she had approached him? How fortuitous was this for someone that did not have a great deal of success with the opposite sex thus far in his career.

  “Henry?” Mary broke him from his reverie. “Are you listening?”

  “What?” he asked, startled. “Oh yes. I was only considering the portent of your words.”

  “And what do my words portend?” she asked, a little more sharply than before.

  “Uh, perhaps portend is the wrong word. Perhaps, implications of your words.”

  “Humph,” she pouted in an adorable way. “You are making fun of me.”

  “What? I would never dream of
it!” he insisted a bit too forcefully. “I hold your person in the highest reverence, milady, and I could never be anything other than candid with you,” he gushed, in fear of displeasing her when he was on the verge of something momentous. Henry’s heart was beating fast, and his hands were sweating. A wild idea had occurred to him, and he was quite uncertain of whether he should act on it.

  “Well then,” Mary said, suddenly perking up again and hugging his arm to her as they walked. “All is forgiven.”

  He loved it when she did that. He loved how much easier she was to read than Leah. She was bold and straightforward, and it was refreshing. Henry tried to say something, but the words caught in his throat and he walked stiffly along beside her. He was excited, but what if he was wrong? What if he was about to make another miscalculation as he had made with Leah? What if he was about to be humiliated? Forevermore this woman would be laughing at Henry Dawning. Any time he or his family was mentioned within earshot, she would laugh and relay the story to all about her. Could he take such mockery? Henry forced himself to push those thoughts aside.

  “Why do you not speak?” Mary asked, looking up at him with her dark eyes. “Have I said something to displease you?”

  Henry swallowed hard and made up his mind. “If I don’t speak, milady, it is only because I fear words will fail me.” His voice cracked on the word ‘fail’ and he cursed himself. Mary looked up at him, but said nothing. “Milady,” he stopped walking and turned to face her. “Though I have only known you a short time, I can think of no one that I so admire as I have come to admire you. Your beauty, your wit, your charm are not to be equaled by any I have ever known. Will you accompany me to Dawning Court?”