Warrior's Surrender

by Elizabeth Ellen Carter

Sebastian watched the reaction of the crowd closely. Those lords who refused to pledge their support for him ahead of time showed little emotion. His own supporters openly jeered Drefan, with the exception of Lumley. Was the man wavering in his support? Sebastian had no time to speculate on what that might mean. The earl was highly influential among the Saxon nobility who remained in Northumbria. The support of Saxons hinged on his opinion.

  Drefan’s prosecution continued. Damn it if the man didn’t look like he was enjoying himself, Sebastian thought.

  “Have you never wondered why a knight as renowned as de la Croix retires to a quiet backwater when he might have had his pick of the Welsh marshlands or even a holding in France itself?” he asked.

  “Then let me give you the facts of the case. This shameful affair has its origins during the Harrying of the North. In the Year of Our Lord 1070, in a battle outside this very city, a pact was established. A young, ambitious squire, de la Croix, disobeyed his lord’s orders to secure a hay barn where Earl Alfred sought refuge.”

  Sebastian’s heart turned cold.

  By God, the man would try to damn him with the truth.

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  Frey examined her reflection in the length of polished steel. As Lady Aldgyth’s maids tied the stays of the deep blue kirtle, the gown formed itself across her breasts and waist. The two young women gasped at the color and, begging her ladyship’s pardon, could not help but remark that the fabric matched the color of her eyes.

  Frey brushed down the sleeves, fitted tight to the elbow then slashed wide to reveal the bloodred lining that also edged the square neckline as well as the edges of the sleeve.

  The same fabric formed the underskirt and, as she turned and sat on a low stool, slashes of red peeked from the beneath the rich blue of the kirtle. Gold brocade ribbon decorated the neck, elbows, and sleeves.

  The weight of the gold-and-garnet-trimmed chain, Sebastian’s gift on New Year’s Day, settled across her décolleté. The other maid fastened soft leather shoes to her feet.

  Finally, a gossamer-fine veil in white covered her braided blonde hair, held in place with a gold circlet.

  One last lingering inspection in the mirror and she was satisfied with her preparation. Frey, wearing the colors of Tyrswick, was dressed for battle.

  Escorted by two of Walcher’s own household guards, with Friar Dominic by her side, Frey stood at the entrance to the bishop’s Hall. Part of the new wing of Durham Castle, the large room was sumptuously appointed with wall hangings and tapestries and long rows of highly polished brass candelabras that shone with the morning summer sunlight streaming through the transom windows set high in the wall.

  Her eyes sought out Sebastian. He stood as a soldier at ease, as did Drefan opposite. Each was dressed in their finest court attire, but neither could out-do the bishop in splendor.

  The white robe worn by William Walcher, bishop of Durham, was simple in cut but not in fabric. His garb was snow-white linen, almost blinding in its intensity, over which he wore elaborate mulberry-red vestments embroidered in gold. A small miter made of cloth of gold covered his graying head.

  He sat on a high-back oak chair on a dais a foot higher than the stone floor.

  His throne, though made of quality oak, seemed plain on first glance. The back resembled the arched stained window behind, its relative austerity relieved by red and gold embroidered cushions. A smaller chair was placed at his right hand for his chaplain Leobwin.

  Frey became conscious that her presence at the far end of the hall was causing a stir.

  “When the bishop signals, walk toward him and do not look at Sebastian or Lord Drefan,” Dominic instructed softly at her ear. “Remember, ‘God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of love, of power and of a sound mind.’”

  Frey gave a single nod of acknowledgment and promptly ignored Dominic’s instruction. She kept her eyes on Sebastian as she had done a summer ago. This time, instead of suspicion, his mesmerizing green eyes greeted her with love, encouragement, and pride.

  This time, instead of in defeat, Frey walked toward him victoriously with an equal measure of love and pride.

  Only when she traversed the hall did she stop before the bishop, where she curtsied and kissed the sacred gold signet ring engraved with a miter and the appointments of his office.

  “You may arise, my dear,” the bishop told her kindly, and then, with a sidelong glance at Drefan, added, “I had been told you were too ill to be presented to court. I’m glad to see for myself the report is untrue.”

  “I believe you’ll find there are many things you have been told which are untrue, Your Grace,” Frey responded.

  The bishop straightened and looked out among the audience for the hearing and addressed his next remarks so all assembled could hear.

  “My lady, do you swear by Almighty God to tell the truth to this assemblage?”

  Frey’s voice rang out confidently.

  “I do.”

  “Then be so good as to identify yourself to the court.”

  “I am Lady Alfreya of Tyrswick, wife of Sebastian de la Croix, baron of Tyrswick,” Frey answered loudly and with assurance.

  “Are you here willingly?”

  “I stand before you willingly today, Your Grace, but I was not brought to Durham Castle willingly.”

  Frey heard the murmurs of the assembled crowd but didn’t turn. She wondered whether the interest being shown here was as much related to the cause of justice as the amount of coin wagered on the result.

  “According to Lord Drefan, your testimony is you were taken against your will and subjected to outrages. Are you saying this is not so?”

  “It is so.”

  At the seeming contradiction of her words, the room erupted in a din that forced Walcher’s righthand man to yell for order. Frey remained silent at the interruption and kept her attention fixed on Walcher’s face. He was difficult to read; indeed, he seemed almost bored with the proceedings, as though he had something better to do and somewhere better he had to be.

  If she could convince him of Drefan’s perfidy in this, it would undermine the charge of treason against Sebastian. By providing Walcher a nice, neat resolution, perhaps he would be inclined to dismiss all counts.

  As the crowd hushed, she continued, “Lord Drefan is the man who took me against my will in a scheme to defame Sebastian de la Croix and claim Tyrswick for himself through me. I have been legally wed to only one man, and that is the baron of Tyrswick.”

  The volume of the hall increased again, but a couple of loud raps from the bishop’s shepherd crook on the tiled floor silenced the crowd.

  “What Lord Drefan does not know is that even if the baron were stripped of his title, the lands will return to Earl Alfred’s heir, Brice, who still lives.”

  Another thought occurred to Frey and, relishing the high drama, she turned to Drefan.

  “You set the trap for Brice that would have killed him from infection but for the healing of Brother Halig at St. Cuthbert’s Abbey.”

  His astonished expression lasted for a blink of an eye and no more, although she could see the man begin to recalculate his plans. Warming to her theme, a cascade of thoughts tumbled into her mind and flowed like a stream across her consciousness, leading her to a further conclusion.

  “The wolves!”

  Frey pivoted to look to Sebastian, who nodded in reply. It seemed he had come to the same conclusion the split second she did. She turned back to Drefan and pointed an accusing finger at him.

  “You created the land slip and drew wolves upon myself and the baron deliberately to kill one or the both of us!”

  The court was in uproar yet again, and no amount of rapping of a cane nor shouts for order could calm the crowd for minutes. Eventually order was restored, but not before Sebastian had enfolded his wife in an embrace, heedless of the crowd.

  “Welcome home, princess,” he whispered in her ear.

  She clung to him like a vine and he breathed in th
e smell of her. Wildflowers.

  “I love you with all my heart,” she replied.

  He responded by strengthening his embrace.

  “I’m looking forward to you showing me how much, but we’re not out of the woods yet. Be strong for a little while longer.”

  “I shall,” she assured him, “but Sebastian, Drefan has confessed to me he killed Diera. He disguised her murder—”

  “As one committed by the Beast of the North,” Sebastian concluded.

  She looked at him in amazement. “How did you know?”

  “I'll explain later,” he said as the crowd began to still. “We must retake our seats now.”

  “But I have something else to tell you—”

  She was silenced by the rapping of the crook, which was now winning over the babble of the crowd.

  Frey swallowed dryly and accepted Gaines’s hand to take her to his own seat.

  * * *

  “We have dismissed the charge of abduction and ill-use of Lady Alfreya of Tyrswick as one without basis,” continued Walcher. “Now we come to the more serious matter of an accusation of treason against Sebastian de la Croix, baron of Tyrswick, by Lord Drefan D’Aumont of Angou, cousin by blood to Edgar the Atheling, cousin by marriage to Robert Cuthose, son of William our king.”

  Sebastian was surprised.

  An indirect connection to the Crown? Well, that explained the man’s arrogance. It also settled another matter.

  Regardless of the truth, regardless of the good opinion of Sebastian's peers, Drefan unchecked could bring this charge again and again, even before King William himself.

  There could be only one way for this nightmare to end—a wager of battle.

  Sebastian drew himself up taller. If that was his only recourse, then it was what he would do.

  He would be ready.

  “We have all been deceived,” Drefan paused dramatically. “I thought I was doing my duty to bring justice to a woman once pledged to be my bride, but I now see I am the one who is being ill-used by two conspiratorial families.

  “Let the court ask if the Lady Alfreya will recall that fateful day for herself, when her father Earl Tyrswick and her younger brother sheltered in a hay barn in a village not far from here,” said Drefan.

  “Is it not true that Sebastian de la Croix, then a young knight, willfully ignored his oath to the Crown and failed to report to his lord that the rebel Earl Tyrswick and his offspring were hiding in the barn? And further, that he allowed them, even guided them, in their escape from the rightful custody of the Crown?”

  Walcher's eyebrows had risen during the telling; in fact, they had risen so high they had disappeared beneath his miter.

  “Lady Alfreya, is this true?”

  The noise of chairs scraping back on the stones sounded harshly.

  Sebastian met Frey's eyes and read the fear in them. He knew with a certainty that just the merest indication from him and she would lie for him.

  No. He would not let her.

  “You will know the truth and the truth will set you free.” He would not be responsible for damning her soul and his.

  “The truth, Frey.”

  Anguish crossed her face. She knew as well as he did what her answer would do.

  “Courage, my love.”

  He watched as Frey licked her lips just once, squared her shoulders, and answered with passion.

  “My father, brother, and I were spared that night by a knight who is the exemplar of chivalry and valor.”

  There! That’s the beauty and bravery he fell in love with that night all those years ago. His own spirits lifted. A flicker of delighted malice flittered across Drefan’s face before his features settled into a practiced neutrality.

  “Evidence of my veracity, my lords, from the damsel’s own lips!”

  Drefan went on.

  “What was promised between the participants on that night can only be a matter of conjecture, so I leave it to you to speculate why the baron entreated London for approval of a hasty marriage with no effort to find whether the man who had prior claim on Lady Alfreya still lived. After all, it’s not like the woman breeds.”

  Sebastian opened and closed his right hand slowly, the small action a tool to master his anger when his immediate desire was to bury his fist deep into the face of the man before him.

  “Day after day, as drunk and as maudlin as Lord Alfred was, his story did not vary. His lands held a king’s ransom and were at disposal to any who would liberate England from the, ah, foreign invader.” Drefan paused to ensure he had everyone’s full attention.

  “King Malcolm of Scotland was very interested indeed.”

  Bishop Walcher was unimpressed with the theatrics.

  “Hearsay,” he dismissed with an offhand wave, “from a man no longer alive—”

  “Answer me this,” Earl Lumley interjected, rising to his feet. “Why would any knight with land relinquish his title and everything that goes with it to support an invasion against his liege? It’s suicidally preposterous.”

  “Not if he thought the rebellion was going to be successful,” Drefan answered without missing a beat. “King William is, I regret to say, occupied trying to quell rebellion from his own son. England is vulnerable.”

  Belatedly, Walcher reasserted his authority.

  “If you have genuine proof of any wrongdoing by the baron of Tyrswick, I suggest you bring it now, because I’m beginning to think that you’re wasting our time, my lord, and I have better things to do.”

  “Pardon, my Grace,” murmured Drefan with an obsequious bow. “An honest knight once in the employ of the baron approached me, concerned that his lord was withholding from the Crown a trove of silver, which might well be payment from Malcolm of Scotland.”

  Sebastian frowned. Who the hell?

  At the end of the hall, a familiar face appeared. Baldwin, dressed in the olive and ochre colors of Drefan of Anjou’s household retinue, carried a small yet weighty casket, judging by the strain on his arms.

  At the Bishop’s nod, he approached and placed the casket at his feet and, with great ceremony, turned a lock and opened the bowed lid. To be sure, silver streamed across the floor and glittered in the sunlight.

  Leobwin picked up one of the coins and passed it to Walcher, who examined it.

  “Baron?”

  Walcher tossed the coin to Sebastian who caught it deftly.

  Sebastian ran his thumb over the impression on one side and then the other. Definitely silver, definitely a Roman denarius with the head of Septimius Severus on one side and VICTORIAE BRIT on the other.

  He tossed it back to bounce with a chink and settle among what looked to be at least two hundred more coins.

  “Do you recognize these, Baron?”

  Sebastian answered firmly, “I do not.”

  “One of your men says differently,” Drefan responded mildly.

  “A man I stripped of rank and sent packing—”

  “A man grievously wronged for defending the interests of the Crown and daring to question the relationship of his lord and a woman who a few days earlier was supposed to be his sworn enemy!”

  Sebastian glanced rapidly between Walcher and Drefan, ensuring he had both men’s full attention. “This man has the temerity to accuse me of deception and dishonor, when he abducted my wife and embarked on a campaign of terror against Tyrswick, including the brutal murder of the young woman who was Lady Alfreya’s companion!”

  Sebastian let a quiet satisfaction settle into his spirit at the look of sudden alarm in Drefan’s face.

  He pressed his advantage.

  “This man sought to hide his vicious crime by disguising it as the work of the Beast of the North.”

  “Lies!”

  “The truth!”

  Silence descended at the unexpected intervention of a feminine voice.

  Frey had risen from her seat and walked to beside Sebastian. The scent of wildflowers filled his nostrils, the warmth of her presence a palpable thi
ng.

  “Drefan of Angou admitted his crime to me, that he sorely used my maid and friend Diera, then killed her with his own hands.”

  “Do you accept the word of a woman?” demanded Drefan.

  Sebastian watched Walcher's expression wavering to uncertainty as Drefan continued to vehemently protest his innocence.

  Enough.

  “If Drefan of Angou does not yield,” called Sebastian, “then I demand trial by battle.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  His chamber was in darkness by the time he returned to it, with only the glow of the banked fire to relieve the overwhelming blackness. By it, he could see the shape of Frey unstirring beneath the linens.

  They had been separated immediately after the court hearing, with no chance to speak.

  Gaines informed her that he had to go with Earl Lumley and escorted her to his chambers.

  That was hours ago.

  Frey was understandably upset by his demand for a trial by battle. Another sin to be heaped on his shoulders.

  He recalled the afternoon.

  “Sebastian, no!”

  He had ignored Frey’s protest and kept his eyes fixed on Walcher. The bishop turned to Leobwin and conferred in low voices for several moments.

  Walcher sat back in his chair and addressed Drefan.

  “Do you withdraw your charges against the baron of Tyrswick?”

  “I do not.”

  “Do you deny the accusation of the murder of”—Leobwin supplied the name—”the maid Diera?”

  “I do.”

  Walcher turned to Sebastian, his face grave.

  “Do you deny the charge of treason against the king of England?”

  “I do.”

  “Will you withdraw the charge of murder against Lord Drefan of Anjou?”

  “I will not.”

  The Bishop issued a put-upon sigh and rose. “Very well. A trial by battle two days hence, and may God be with you both.”

  Now Sebastian undressed quietly and slipped between the sheets. Indeed, his wife was deeply asleep. Dried trails of tears marked her cheeks and he rubbed the offense away.

  Frey’s eyes opened sharply—the past two months having left her wary—then threw her arms around him. If she wept, she covered it.