by Chuck Black
Gavinaugh suspected that the Noble Knights themselves might not have realized it, but their desperation was becoming more and more obvious. On the whole, the people of Chessington had not accepted the Prince as the true Son of the King and were, in fact, more antagonistic toward the Knights of the Prince than ever. However, despite their resistance, they had seen true nobility personified by the Prince, and as a result, the glory of the Noble Knights seemed to fade with each passing day. As the Noble Knights lost the respect of the people, they also lost their purpose. An order of knights without purpose or a noble cause dies. And the danger with a dying man is the desperate measures he will take to stay alive—even if his death is inevitable. Gavinaugh feared what the Noble Knights might do …
Gavinaugh’s secret return was eventually revealed, and Kifus and the Noble Knights began to plot and search. Not all his ties with the Noble Knights had been severed, however—two knights had come to believe in the Prince and had remained to be the eyes and ears for the Knights of the Prince. As a result, Gavinaugh was always a step ahead of the fetters that bore his name, and Kifus’s frustration mounted.
One day Gavinaugh was training a group of new recruits on the outskirts of the city while Cedric, William, and the others were occupied with establishing a new haven not far from Chessington. Keanna had just brought some water for the knights when they were interrupted by an urgent voice.
“Gavinaugh!” Sandon ran to him from across the hill. Gavinaugh was alarmed, for he had never seen Sandon approach in such a rush.
“Gavinaugh!” he shouted again as he reached him. Sandon was out of breath and could hardly stand straight as he struggled to get his words out. His eyes were wide and filled with panic.
“What is it, Sandon?” Gavinaugh asked, impatient for him to catch his breath.
“In the square”—Sandon gasped—“Kifus is hanging a man.”
He took another deep breath and grabbed Gavinaugh’s arms. “It is Weston. They have captured Weston and are going to hang him.”
Gavinaugh ran to Triumph, and Sandon followed. As Gavinaugh mounted, Sandon seized Triumph’s bridle and tried to speak his final words.
“Kifus has Weston’s family too. He’s going to hang them all!”
“No!” Keanna looked frantically for a horse to mount.
“Keanna, stay here!” Gavinaugh said. He saw Sandon mounting a horse, but he did not wait. He pulled on the reins to set Triumph’s direction and bolted toward the city square.
The sweet faces of Marie, Addy, and Keaton filled Gavinaugh’s mind. He was overwhelmed by powerful emotions of anger and love. Triumph ran faster than he had ever run before, but it was not enough for Gavinaugh. With each passing moment he wondered if he would be too late. The shops on the streets flew by in a blur, and his anger toward Kifus became great. He approached the square, and Triumph leaped over the stone wall that bordered the east side.
Many people were gathered, and the entire force of Noble Knights encircled the large oak tree where Weston, Marie, Addy, and Keaton sat atop horses, with ropes about their necks. A Noble Knight stood beside Weston’s horse, waiting for the command to slap the animal and end his life.
Gavinaugh became enraged. “Kifus!” Gavinaugh shouted while still some distance away. “Kifus!”
The crowd’s focus shifted from the tree to Gavinaugh. He drew his sword, and the people separated to let him through. His approach was so fierce that even the Noble Knights hesitated. Gavinaugh dismounted and bounded toward Kifus. Many knights reached for their swords, but Kifus motioned for them to stand down. Kifus stood near Weston with his arms crossed, a smug smile on his face.
Sandon arrived just behind Gavinaugh, but a dozen knights quickly overtook him and held him captive.
Gavinaugh looked at Weston, whose face was badly beaten. Marie, Addy, and Keaton were silent, but tears streamed down their faces. It was more than Gavinaugh could bear, for he knew that they were experiencing this moment of terror because they had shown kindness to him.
“I was told these people are important to you,” Kifus said delightedly. “Now I know just how important.”
“Let them go, Kifus, or my sword will cut through every Noble Knight here until I reach your throat!”
Kifus’s smile vanished, and wrath filled its place. He drew his sword, and the men slowly began to circle each other.
“I have been looking forward to this for a very long time,” Kifus said angrily. “You were my best, Gavin. I gave you my trust … I gave you my honor … I gave you my sister … and you have become a traitor to all. The traitor you helped me kill has poisoned you, and now you are an enemy of Chessington!”
“Look around you, Kifus,” Gavinaugh said. “The kingdom is embracing the truth of the Prince, and you can’t stop it. You speak of honor, but you have resorted to killing children!” He pointed to Addy and Keaton. “The order of the Noble Knights is dying, and your desperate attempt to keep it alive is never more evident than what we see here today. As I was, you have now become—a tool of the Dark Knight!”
Kifus yelled and attacked. Their swords met with the ferocity of two tigers battling to the death.
“You never could defeat me before, Gavin, and now you fight left-handed. Not only are you a traitor, but you have also become a fool.”
“A fool for the Prince is better than a hero for Lucius,” Gavinaugh rebutted, and his words fueled another onslaught of powerful blows.
The crowd watched in astonishment as Gavinaugh thwarted every attack Kifus initiated. With the exception of the stranger, Kifus had never been defeated. Gavinaugh experienced the best Kifus had and began to advance with the power and speed he had learned from the Prince. The fight turned in Gavinaugh’s favor, and Kifus struggled to maintain control—Gavinaugh could see the anxiety in his eyes.
Kifus renewed his fight and nearly landed a deadly thrust, but Gavinaugh thwarted it at the last moment. He then brought a heavy crosscut that Kifus only partly deflected, and the blade sliced his chin and then tore into his breastplate. Kifus retreated, blood spilling from his chin through his fingers. Victory for Gavinaugh was now just a matter of time, and Kifus seemed to fully understand it. He looked at Gavinaugh with renewed hate and then turned to the knight beside Weston.
“Hang them!” he said and pointed to Weston with his sword.
Before Gavinaugh could react, the knight slapped the horse. Weston’s face contorted into the pained visage of impending death as the rope jerked tight. Marie screamed, and the children cried as they witnessed the execution attempt of their father. The crowd gasped, and Gavinaugh could hear Sandon scream in protest.
Gavinaugh could hardly believe the nightmare unfolding before him. “Triumph—to Weston!” he shouted. He then turned upon Kifus with such fury that a legion of knights would not have been able to stay his sword.
Triumph quickly whisked beneath Weston and gave him his back to relieve the suffocating strain of the rope. The knight guarding Weston attempted to stop the horse, but Triumph ignored him. The man slapped his hindquarter, but Triumph quickly turned his hind legs to the knight and kicked him. The knight flew ten paces and remained motionless on the ground.
Kifus had no defense against the mastery of Gavinaugh’s sword. With the speed of lightning, Gavinaugh blasted Kifus’s sword from his hand. Before other Noble Knights could come to his aid, Kifus was pinned against the tree with Gavinaugh’s sword pressed against his throat.
“Release them, Kifus, or I will finish this cut!”
“You will die too, traitor,” Kifus said, straining against the razor-sharp edge of the sword.
Gavinaugh looked into Kifus’s eyes and felt the rage coursing through his veins. “Do not be a fool, Kifus,” Gavinaugh said. “We both know that I am already a dead man. You, however, can choose to save your life by sparing theirs. Choose quickly, for my patience with you is gone!”
The Noble Knights had all drawn their swords and were awaiting Kifus’s bidding. He hesitated to answer.
“I have who I want,” he said with a wry smile. “Release them.”
Once Weston’s family had been released, Weston and Sandon hesitated to leave Gavinaugh in such a hopeless predicament.
“Go!” he commanded.
Gavinaugh did not release his grip on Kifus until Sandon, Weston, Marie, and the children were far beyond the square. Once he dropped his sword, the Noble Knights descended on Gavinaugh harshly, but they saved the brunt of their brutality for later, out of the sight of the citizens of Chessington. Gavinaugh was beaten and cast into the prison that he himself had once filled with Followers.
He felt the cold steel of the prison bars and remembered his first encounter with William. It lifted his despair, for he would not trade sides of the prison bars for all the gold in the kingdom if it meant giving up the Prince. His face was bruised and his brow was bleeding, but he was free and he was healed. No man could take that from him.
That evening, Leisel came to Gavinaugh in the prison and commanded the guard to leave them. She looked into the cell, and he rose to greet her.
“Hello, fair Leisel,” he said tenderly.
At his words, her sober countenance softened to one of heartache.
“Gavin, why did you do this? I could have made you happy. We could have been together and made a paradise to live in. Didn’t you ever care for me?” Leisel clutched the bars that separated them.
Gavinaugh came close to Leisel and put his hands on hers. He looked into her eyes. “Yes, Leisel, I did.”
For a moment she looked hopefully into his face. “It isn’t too late, Gavin!” she said, but then stopped and gazed at him. “But I can see in your eyes that you have since given your heart to another.”
Leisel turned her head away and withdrew her hands from his. “Is she pretty?”
Gavinaugh did not answer, for he could not be so cruel.
“Is she nobility, perhaps a princess?” She began to cry.
“Leisel, the Prince came first to the people of Chessington … to people like us. But we refused Him. He desires for you to follow Him, and so do I,” he said.
“What does that imposter have to do with you and me?” she asked, wiping away her tears.
“Everything, Leisel! The Prince breaks the bonds of slavery and lifts the peasant to nobility.”
Leisel looked disgusted and walked away from him. She turned around abruptly. “What has happened to you? You were the pride of Chessington … Gavin, the mighty Noble Knight. Now look at you!” She motioned with her hand to remind him of the prison he was in.
“I met the Prince, and He restored my broken soul,” Gavinaugh said. “He makes things new, Leisel, and He is calling you too. All you have to do is listen and follow.” Gavinaugh hurt for Leisel. She was a prisoner behind the bars of religious devotion to a false concept of nobility.
“I had to come and see for myself if what they said of you was true, but it is worse than I had imagined.” Leisel straightened her back and walked with an air of dignity toward the stairs that exited the prison. She turned toward him one last time.
“Good-bye, Gavin. Enjoy your foolish new life, for I will have no part of it or of you.”
“Good-bye, fair Leisel,” he said softly, but she did not hear him. Her elegant gown flowed about her slender form as she ascended the stone steps and exited the prison chamber.
A KNIGHT’S FAREWELL
Two days before the official trial in the Great Hall, Kifus commanded that Gavinaugh be brought to him in his private chamber. Gavinaugh stood before him, not as a man who had been beaten and imprisoned—although the fetters were still securely fastened about his limbs—but as a man at peace with his heart. The contentment on his face seemed to anger Kifus, who looked away and took a deep breath, apparently to quash his anger. When he looked back at Gavinaugh, there was genuine pity on his face.
Kifus turned to the guard who had accompanied Gavinaugh. “Remove his chains and leave us.”
The guard looked questioningly at Kifus and then complied.
Kifus stared at Gavinaugh. “Why, Gavin?”
It was a simple question, but it revealed much to Gavinaugh. “Please don’t think me insolent if I first ask a question of you before I answer.”
Kifus nodded.
“Why do you want to know?” Gavinaugh asked.
Kifus was silent for a moment. “Because I loved you as a son, and I knew you to be a man of honor, integrity, and loyalty. Of all the Noble Knights I have served and who have served under me, I would not have expected you to betray our cause. That is why. I need to know how such a thing could happen to one of our best.”
Gavinaugh looked on Kifus with compassion. “Lord Kifus, I am humbled by your words, and with them I present my answer to you. The same heart beats within my chest, and the same mind orders my thoughts. The man of honor, integrity, and loyalty that stood before you then stands before you now in all completeness of mind and soul. I know that you believe this to be true of me still or you would not have ordered my chains removed just now, knowing that I have the power to kill you. You know that all of my character is intact, or I would not be standing before you. Therefore consider this, Kifus. If one of your best has not diminished in any way that makes a man a Noble Knight, then the cause to which he now has dedicated his life cannot be the fabric of foolishness or deception, but simply the truth.”
Gavinaugh let his reply marinate in the logical mind of Kifus for a few moments. Kifus appeared to consider his words carefully.
“Lord Kifus, I do not lie, and yet I tell you that I have seen a dead man appear to me and tell me that He is the King’s Son. You have called me one of the best, and yet I stand before you to tell you that I am the least worthy of all, for I know and have seen the perfection of the Prince. The man we killed is indeed the Son of the King, and yet He is willing to forgive all if only we believe in Him and follow Him. Consider this with all gravity—if what I have said is deceit, then nothing for you changes, and I will have wasted my life in the pursuit of folly. But if what I have said is true, then you are hanging by the thread of a web above the fires of Sedah.”
Kifus’s eyes slowly widened and his face became as a dying man, full of fear. He went to a chair and sat heavily upon it, and it seemed as if his legs had lost their strength. He was silent for a moment and then appeared to recover himself slightly.
Kifus looked up at Gavinaugh. “Almost … almost you convince me, Gavin.” He then stood up. “Guard!”
The guard entered the room, and Kifus turned his back to Gavinaugh.
“Take him back to his cell.”
Two days later, Kifus called Gavinaugh into the Great Hall before the assembly of the Noble Knights, and there was much discussion as to what should be done with him.
“He is a traitor, and traitors deserve death!” Jayden said, and many agreed.
“He was a Noble Knight,” another knight said. “We would disgrace ourselves by killing one of our own, no matter what his crime.”
There was great division among them, and Kifus was clearly at odds about what to do. Sir Camden rose to speak.
“Lord Kifus … Gavin is truly an enemy of our great city, but let us not forget the lesson we so painfully learned in our handling of the stranger. By our execution of Him, we created a martyr, and His treachery now has born a life of its own that we cannot seem to kill. Let us not foolishly do the same with this man.”
Camden allowed the knights time to reflect on his words. “I suggest we make Sir Gavin disappear quietly,” he said finally and then sat down.
Kifus rose and approached Gavinaugh.
“Sir Camden, you have spoken wisely. The last thing we want is for this traitor to become famous in his death.”
He walked a circle around Gavinaugh and stopped before him.
“I have an association with the Namorians that should serve us well in regard to this criminal.” Kifus looked into Gavinaugh’s eyes briefly and then turned away. “Put him back in prison until Ca
ptain Dante arrives from Namor,” he commanded, then exited the Great Hall.
Gavinaugh was five days in the prison cell with only water to drink and dry bread to eat. One evening, the chamber door opened and the guard escorted Leisel and another whose head was covered by a hooded cloak that hid the person’s body and face.
“You may leave us,” Leisel said to the guard.
“But my lady, I have been given orders by Kifus not to allow him any visitors. I am already jeopardizing …” The guard became silent as Leisel glared at him.
“As you wish, my lady.” He bowed and exited.
Leisel and her companion were still at the far end of the aisle that led to the cells, where Gavinaugh was held. She turned and spoke quietly. Her companion stayed behind, and Leisel came to Gavinaugh. He was surprised, for he had not thought that he would ever see her again. They looked at each other through the iron bars and were silent for a moment.
“It is a pleasure to see you again, Leisel.”
She allowed herself to smile briefly.
“I have found her,” she said. “Or rather, she has found me.”
Gavinaugh tilted his head slightly at her comment.
Leisel lowered her voice to almost a whisper. “She is simple … but very pretty. I can see why you are taken with her.” She lowered her eyes.
Gavinaugh could not imagine what Leisel’s intentions were, but he became apprehensive as he considered the possibilities.
“What is this about, Leisel? What have you done?”
Leisel looked up into his eyes, and he saw the pain of unrequited love in her countenance.
“I am not a spiteful woman, Gavin. And although her heart could never long for you as mine does, I cannot change the cruel ways of love. I do this not for her, but for you.” She stepped back and looked away. A single tear trickled down her cheek, which she quickly wiped away.