by S E Zbasnik
The guards didn’t break, eyes of silver slicing into Hayley as she kept easing closer to her broken knight. He coughed into his fist, then looked to her. “What are you doing here?”
“I…” She took point of the three new friends circling like sharks. “I brought you a shirt!”
“Oh?” Gavin picked at the material with his not-broken hand and sighed.
“Here, let me help you put it on…” Hayley reached to snatch up the stolen tunic when Gavin’s manacles jangled in the dark.
“Child,” a guard thundered from deep in his helmet, “step aside. We must take the prisoner into the courtroom.”
“Not yet!” she shrieked. There was no chance Larissa even got to Benedict’s house, much less paid the bastard off. “I mean, um,” Hayley gulped again, her mind racing to find a way out of this, “I have to help my knight dress.”
“The prisoner…” the lead guard droned when Hayley interrupted.
“The King himself said so!”
Oh, she was so going to hell for that.
“His Majesty said to…?” They were skeptical, but the mere mention of Henry brought a trinket of legitimacy to Hayley’s claims. All she had to do was sell it.
“Ordered me to dress him, proper. Said that he was,” think you imbecile, “’Weary of suffering so much bare flesh in public.’ I’m only trying to do as told.”
The three faceless helmets turned to each other, practically clanking as they tried to huddle up for a discussion.
Hayley shrugged. “I guess you could go and tell the King why I wasn’t able to follow his command. He’ll be right there in front of you wondering why he’s got to once again…”
“Very well, but be quick about it,” the lead guard thundered.
Unraveling the tunic, Hayley drew the far too large neck hole over Gavin’s head. As she began to lower the stolen fabric like a flag at the end of battle, Hayley paused. The hems snagged upon his manacles. “Um…” She flicked her finger against the cold iron, the ringing no doubt amplified inside their helmets.
“We cannot remove the prisoner's restraints.”
“It’s just for a moment. There’s three of you guys. What can he do? He’s got a broken arm,” Hayley sputtered out fast. “And you guys are the royal guards, can stop anyone. Right?”
The flattery worked, or maybe the fact they wanted this over with. Hands rooted around for the keys, giving Hayley enough time to turn to her boss. “You seem flushed,” Gavin whispered, well aware anything he said would be overheard.
“I had a long night.”
His head rose, the amber eyes burning, “Were you with…that blonde woman?”
“No, redhead. Ran all over town talking to people to try and find your…shirt.”
“Hayley, you were supposed to…” Gavin hissed, his face wild as he realized she didn’t sit on her ass guarding Myra the whole time.
“Stand back, child,” the guard ordered, shoving Hayley away. “And you, Knight, do not try anything.” With a slow turn of the skeleton key, both manacles plummeted to the ground.
Gavin winced, his good hand trying to massage the bad one’s wrist. But he didn’t raise either any higher. The guard scoffed at the lack of a threat while Hayley clucked her tongue. If her knight wanted to, he’d have taken all three out. Maybe that’d been his plan before. Break out of jail, find Myra, and ride off into the sunset. That wouldn’t happen now, not with Myra stuck in Erin’s grip. No, their only chance was in a Friar anyone could buy.
“Get to it,” the guard hissed, dragging Hayley to Gavin by the collar of her livery.
She pawed at the air, doing her best to not smash into her knight, but part of her glanced off his broken bone. Tears of pain rose in his eyes, his teeth gnashing in his jaw, but Gavin didn’t cry out. Just held onto Hayley’s arm to keep himself safe and steady.
“Squire,” he gasped, shaking away the tears, “if you please?”
Gently, Hayley began to draw the great sleeves down his good arm. It was the bad one she wasn’t sure about. She’d never dressed a broken arm before. “Hold the wrist,” Gavin said. “Extend it out.”
She followed his orders, trying to be careful even as the guards all stomped around them. “Now work the shirt down it, slowly.” As she managed to hide away all of his bare skin, Hayley rocked back and forth on her feet.
A scream was building in her spine. This close she could smell the rot on his breath. He’d been drinking water sponged off the ground, or the rivulets that dripped between moldy stones. Doubtful there’d been any food in the three or four days since his capture. Along with a broken arm and however they beat him, it was a wonder he could still stand. He deserved better. He shouldn’t even be here! He was…
When a calming hand cupped Hayley’s shoulder, she looked up in surprise to find tears in her eyes. Her knight chuckled a dirge at the sight as he whispered, “It will be all right.”
“Hands out!” the guards interrupted, once again picking Hayley off. Not caring about the pain it’d cause, the man yanked out Gavin’s wrists and once again manacled them together. Before Gavin had a chance to catch his breath from the handling, he was shoved towards the door that’d open onto his sentencing.
Hayley folded her hands together and gulped as his bent form vanished into the light of judgment. “I pray so, Ser. I really do.”
By the time Hayley jabbed her way through the standing crowds to resume her spot on the balcony she expected to find the judgment already in motion. Gavin stood in his same spot, though quite a few spectators were complaining at his half-dressed state. They spoke as if they expected to find him stripped clean naked. The bastard Chapman was there as well, pacing on the right side of the room and tenting his fingers. He needed to grow a mustache, one of those waxed ones. Or horns. Something to warn people what monster lurked inside.
True to her word, Erin brought Myra in. Quite a few heads craned to get a look at the woman so beautiful she’d bring the most promising knight to his knees. The general conclusion seemed to be that she wasn’t worth it, going off the harried whispers. Though, Myra looked a mess today, as if she’d been up the whole night crying her eyes out. Red as a rash, they were now dried while Erin walked her up the aisle. But the moment she caught sight of Gavin, Myra tried to rush to his side.
Swords from the guard contingent all pointed towards the woman who simply wanted to be his wife. Myra glared at the eye slits, her fists folded as if she intended to take every cut to her body just to hold Gavin. With a slow shake of his head, he begged his wife, “Please. Don’t do it.”
Squeezing her eyes tight, Myra and Erin both slipped off to the side, leaving Gavin directly in the path of an empty chair. All the pieces were in place save one — the King. And no one seemed to have a clue where he was. Hayley heard the bells toll ten from outside. Then they struck the fifteen-minute mark. And the thirty.
Her little stalling plan seemed fruitless if the King wasn’t even going to show. The groundlings were growing restless and overheating. It felt as if half the city packed in to watch this show, no doubt before they’d return to the festival. But they were getting sick and tired of having to wait for a simple monarch to get his ass in the chair. Some of them were shoving their faces through the banister bars calling for Gavin’s head. Screaming he was guilty.
What would happen if the King didn’t show? Would it fall to the Magistrate or… Hayley gulped deep. Would they just default to guilt? Would he be tossed to the mob? Would this have all been for nothing?
And where the hell was Larissa and Benedict? She thought it’d be close, maybe a ten-minute delay, but they’d been given a half hour and there was no sign of them. A dark thought played through Hayley’s brain of Larissa, overladen with so much coin, running off into the night. Day. Vanishing, while she left the squire she hated and the man who took her knight from her to hang.
Shit. That sounded like her. What were you thinking?! Hayley pounded on her head like an empty coconut, trying to knock some
semblance of sense into the pudding.
It should have been you. Why wasn’t it you to get Benedict? You can’t trust her. But no, you had to see Gavin. Had to talk to him one last time just in case it all went tits up. And it will, because of you.
No. There was still time. Maybe if Hayley ran to Benedict’s. She didn’t have the coin but sod that. She’d stick her sword into his back until he agreed to do it. Set in her plan, Hayley began to slide out when the trumpets of death blared from below her.
The sound rolled up her legs, deadening her nerves as her teeth knocked together. With all the fanfare available to a man being fashionably late, the door blew open to King Henry waltzing down the aisle. He waved to his public who were all cheering like mad because something could finally happen.
That appealed to the vain king, who took his time to take in the unwashed masses calling for him to kill an innocent man. He’d dressed to the nines for this — a velvet and fur-lined robe of ivory trailing off his shoulders and fanning around his legs. With a toss of his shoulders, Henry twisted the robe behind him and plopped onto the chair.
“Well,” he began as if he was right on time. “I believe it is time to make a decision. And we’re all here. Lord Chapman. The daughter. Excellent. But…there’s someone missing.”
Henry patted a finger to his lips, plumping the thin line up as he thought. “Ser Gavin, was it not your intention to prove you were in fact married to the Lady Myra?”
“Uh,” Gavin coughed, more phlegm scattering down his slightly damp shirt. “Yes, your Majesty it is.”
“Interesting, because I don’t see a priest here. Was there some other member of the church you intended to have speak for you? Perhaps a bishop performed it in the bushes outside the cathedral. That’d be delightful. To drag an archbishop from his warm bed for your whims.” He was toying with him. The bastard found it hilarious that he’d trapped Gavin, locked Myra away from helping, and watched as the two lovers stared across an impenetrable void less than a foot wide.
“Milord, please, if you will give it but a moment,” Gavin pleaded.
The King sighed. “It is nearing noon. Long past the time I gave you,” he threw off as if he hadn’t been late, as if Gavin was the one who made him wait instead of the other way around. Hayley didn’t care, shoving her way back to the railing. She was gonna leap down there, fight off the guards, and free both Gavin and Myra if need be.
As she hooked her leg over the banister, the King declared, “Since I see no proof of a marriage, I shall have to rule…”
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
“…in clear favor of—” the King’s damnation speech was cut off as the door crashed open. Hayley smashed her chest into the banister, her head craning to make out a pair of heads striding through the aisle. One was tonsured and the other red as a sunrise. The entire audience fell silent as Larissa clung to the arm of the dear Friar. What took her so damn long?!
Hayley wanted to fume in her face when she spotted a glint of steel in the folds of the Friar’s cassock. Larissa pressed it slightly closer to the man when he got a good look at just who he’d be lying too.
“You, your Majesty!” Benedict gasped, his rotund body folding to the floor in total abdication.
That tickled Henry, who seemed to forget he was about to send an innocent man to the gallows. After buffing up his beard, Henry said, “Rise, I assume a man of the cloth.”
“Yes, yes, your Highness. I am Friar Benedict.”
Henry seemed impressed. “A good name. Come. Give us your testimony.”
“Yes, yes.” Benedict’s partially bald head bobbed like a water-birds before his eyes darted to Larissa. She didn’t smile, but the dagger slipped back a bit and the dear Friar began.
“I am here, before his Perfection, to admit to my part in wedding Ser Gavin to his blushing bride, Lady Myra.”
Hayley was impressed. She figured the best Benedict could cough up was an insistence that he was there that night. That they said the right words to lawfully wed them and he took some gold for it. Remembering any names beyond the clink of coin seemed beyond the Friar. Had Larissa been ‘teaching’ him?
“You,” Chapman snorted, “you’re nothing but a two-bit charlatan whose greatest contribution to our fair city is increasing the rate of blindness due to your backstreet liquor.”
That was the wrong thing to say. Benedict’s shoulder rose higher, extending his reach beyond that of Lord Chapman’s. The girth made him even more imposing, all of it climbing up as the friar rounded on him. “I have served in the name of our most cherished God for over seventeen years, Sir. Prayed to his holy name upon my knees for ten and seven years, bled for the one who died for our sins. What gives you the right to accuse me of such blasphemy?”
“I…” Chapman hissed, clearly wanting to yank Benedict’s hair out and shove his face into a baptismal font. But he had enough presence to temper that anger. “Milord,” he turned to the King, begging the man in his pocket to see the trick.
“Seems to me that a young knight and the woman he coaxed out of a window would pay for the services of someone such as Friar Benedict. And he wears the robes of the church. I’m sorry, Chapman. It appears that a wedding did in fact occur.”
Yes! Hayley punched her fist in the air, wanting to run a lap around the audience box before leaping into Chapman’s face. Take that you slimy snake! She’s not yours anymore! She’s free!
“However,” Henry continued, causing all the air in the audience to suck down lungs in the form of a gasp. “It is not a legal wedding without a witness. Where is that man you mentioned? He must prove that all binding words were spoken true.”
“Sire, I assure you, I would never have…” Benedict began, his reputation on the line, when the King’s glare burned through the friar. “As you say,” he backed down instantly.
Henry glanced around the room slowly. “Well, where is he? This Frederick you spoke of?”
“He is not fit to be in your presence,” Gavin growled to himself. “To be in anyone’s.”
“An interesting choice to put your trust in, then. Still, it is the law of the land. And without him here to prove that no one was forced into the marriage, I’m afraid there is only one conclusion.”
That horse screwer! He didn’t care that Hayley spent all night burning her feet on the cobbles gathering coin to pay off a Friar. Didn’t matter if she didn’t find Gavin’s actual priest to speak for him or not. He was going to hurl her knight to the gallows no matter what she did, no matter what anyone did. ‘Cause they knew Frederick would never say a word to help Gavin. They had to know what happened at the Tourney.
They knew and they were in it together to destroy a good man.
“Ser Gavin Frey, I find…”
“Wait!”
“Who dares speak?” The light mood snapped in an instant, Henry glaring up to watch as the audience shifted away to reveal a lonely Hayley standing in place. Her body froze, screaming that she just invited the burning look of the King — a man who’d crush her under heel without looking back once. What was she thinking?
Get down. Hide. Run back outside before anyone calls the hunters on you!
Her hand swiped over the tattoo, following the twists and turns.
We Are One.
With narrowed eyes, Hayley glared at the vultures circling her knight, the men unaware that a snake was going to strangle them both. Gripping to the banister, Hayley pulled herself over it and fell to the ground. That brought shocks and gasps for her actions, the guards with swords at the ready rushing towards her.
Before the kebobing could begin, the King laughed. “Wait, let her speak. Who are you?”
“I am…Hayley, your Majesty, squire to Ser Gavin.” Ahe tried to act humbled while stepping closer to the big man in the chair.
“A child,” Chapman scoffed. “No doubt as much a miscreant as her master.”
They were going to label her before she had a chance to even speak. To tarnish her words and tar her as a
liar before she could get a single lie out. No. “I was at the Battle of Camden. I saved the entire contingent of knights. I am no child.”
Chatter rose from the audience, people jabbing fingers at the scraggly girl rising as high as she could and glaring the King in the eye. It seemed quite a few people knew what happened at Camden, and just as many weren’t happy about it. For a moment, the King ran his tongue over his teeth, then he smiled.
“Ah yes, you were in the tourney. Fought with a bit of sword stuck in your thigh.” He failed to sum up her life right, but Hayley wasn’t about to correct him. Instead, she nodded. “Impressive. She may speak.”
“But your Majesty…!”
“I have given my command. Please, say what you came to say.”
This was it. She had to get it all exactly right or they’d drag Gavin away. They’d murder the only person to ever make her stick around, to keep her even after learning about the bad. Do it right, Hayseed.
“I was there the night Gavin and Myra wed. I was their witness.”
The amount of gasping threatened to rip off the roof, but what she watched were the King’s eyes narrowing to pinpricks. Both of them darted over to Lord Chapman, who was snarling as if he would rip out Hayley’s throat himself. “You were…”
“Yes, your Lordship,” Hayley bowed her head.
“Then why did the knight claim his only witness to be this Ser Frederick?”
“Because,” Hayley sucked in a breath and glanced towards the ceiling, “he didn’t know I was there. I snuck out of my bed, in the middle of the night, and followed him. I had no idea what he was planning when I trailed him to a garden, but I sat there hidden in the bushes where no one could spot me.”
Hayley spun to look at her knight. “Myra wore a beautiful blue dress, her hands locked around Gavin’s as they both happily vowed to remain by each other’s side for an eternity.” As her tale ended, Hayley caught tears brimming in Myra’s eyes while Gavin remained pensive. Together, all three turned to the King. He was scratching his beard in contemplation.