Still, this was a form of choosing. Stephen came into the hall, blinking sleepily, and Isobel measured him for a moment in the low light. He wore only a shirt that came to his knees, open at the throat, the laces hanging loose to show a chest gilded with golden hair. She felt a queer stirring in her middle, looking at the tumble of his curls and the sleepy, beautiful face.
She stepped from the shadows. "I could not sleep," she whispered.
Immediately, he reached for her, concern in his bright eyes. "What might I do?"
Isobel let herself be enfolded. She had not even allowed him to kiss her before this, and she saw his surprise and pleasure. "Will you walk with me awhile?"
"Of course." He fetched a cloak and rejoined her, and they walked into the gardens, where trees cast deep shadows. There, he put an arm around her, and seemed about to speak, then hesitated.
At last he turned to her. "Are you grieved over that peasant? I have long suspected you harbored some feeling for the beast."
Isobel swallowed a smile and made her move. She lifted a hand to his face, and was surprised to find there was pleasure in the feeling of smooth young flesh prickled with the lightest of beard. "Nay, my lord," she said, and lowered her gaze, and dropped her hand, as if in maidenly shyness. "I dreamt of you." She raised her eyes and whispered, "kissing me."
For a long, long moment, Isobel feared she had misjudged him. That he scented a trick. Then his breath left him on a longing groan. "A kiss I can give," he said.
As if her quiet request had shattered some wall he kept about him, Stephen de Kivelsworthy, that boy, swept Isobel into a fierce embrace, hauling her body close to his as if to absorb her flesh into his, and he caught her head in his hand and lowered his head and—
Kissed her. Not gently. Not sweetly.
Isobel gasped, going utterly still for a moment, seeing the face of her dream love suddenly become clear. Ever had she searched the faces of men, looking always for that man who haunted her, whose lips fit her own exactly, who anticipated what she wished before she'd bare formed the thought. She clasped his face in her hands and pulled back, breathing hard. "It was you, all along," she said in wonder, and then kissed him again with a burst of joy—
And when he laid her on the ground there in the autumn-chilled garden and warmed her with his ardor and his strong, youthful body, Isobel gave freely, sealing her fate gladly.
It was only when she crept back to the women's bower that she realized she had also accomplished her other plan—to wear down the energy of the knight most likely to kill Thomas. And when Stephen learned Thomas was not to be executed, but would fight in a tournament today, he would be very angry.
She slumped on the wall, thinking how ironic it would be to lose her dream lover when she had only just found him, and over one of the only unselfish things she had ever done.
Weary, she entered the chamber. What was done was done.
Chapter 22
The day was overcast and humid. As Lyssa allowed Mary to brush her hair, she watched tents behind erected in the wide field behind the castle. Already a crowd of Londonites gathered at one end for the long anticipated tourney, herded there by guards who would carefully separate the lower classes from the nobles who would watch from a sheltered dais furnished with benches.
Lyssa felt numb as she stared at the grassy field. By sunset, her fate would be decided there. Her love might lie dead in that very grass, or he might stand triumphant. Pressing a hand to her ribs, Lyssa breathed, "How can we bear the waiting?"
"We have no choice, my lady," Alice said. She had covered her head with a clean white wimple, and her large, beautiful eyes were sober. "'Tis in the Lady's hands now."
They had to rouse Isobel from a deep sleep, but managed to get her dressed and moving, and went down as a group to the fields and took places on the dais. Bread, fruit, and various wines and ales were offered, but Lyssa felt she could choke nothing down past the terror in her throat. She ached to see Thomas, and peered anxiously toward the knots of flags and standards waving over the heads of knights in bright clothes.
Already the excitement was palpable. Minstrels played lively tunes, and loud chatter spilled into the air from the gathering crowds. Horns pierced the air at intervals, and there was the usual clanging and clanking and swearing as horses were armored and weapons were tested.
The tournament had been slated long before the discovery of Thomas's background, and knights had come from far and wide to test their skills. Most of it would be for show, knights jousting singly or in pairs with blunted weapons, but there would be true contests as well, and a melee at the end, to mock battle between the knights.
Again her fear and anticipation jumped. If Thomas were successful through the jousts, he might well end the day a far richer man, and not only for winning her hand. He'd have claim to the ransom of any knight he captured, and the claim on their horses as well.
But most of the knights had entourages made up of squires and pages to do their bidding, to bring them new weapons if a lance was broken, or carry their flags. Thomas had no one.
"My lady, look!" Mary cried, pointing. "There he is."
Lyssa forced herself to remain seated, her hands clasped tightly in her lap. She had woven ribbons through her hair to give him, but as he came into view, she saw that he already carried a token: the weaving of a hunt scene that she had given him was tied to his chest, where there might have been the heraldic marks if he had earned them.
He was well outfitted, and it somehow comforted her to see him stride into the milling knights, his chin high, his helm under his arm. He stood head and shoulders above most of the number, and Lyssa saw more than one man look uneasily after him, plainly measuring the breadth of those shoulders, the uncommon size of his powerful arms. Here was a man, they all knew, who would not be easily worn down or wearied.
Behind him, leading the great black destrier that had belonged to the elder Thomas of Roxburgh, was Robert. And behind him walked John Tyler, as straight and sober as any squire on the field. Lyssa found herself oddly moved to see him, and behind her, Mary made a soft sound.
"Robert was so angry last night," Lyssa commented. "What changed his heart, I wonder?"
"Look to your girl, there," Alice said. "She had a mysterious errand last even."
In surprise, Lyssa looked to Isobel. "You?"
Isobel shrugged. "Who else would he listen to?"
Lyssa took her hand and squeezed it. "Thank you."
Isobel shrugged, then went stiff as Stephen strode out, mailed and adorned, his head full of golden curls shining like sunlight even in the dark day. He moved with purpose toward the dais, intent in his eye. "Oh, God," Isobel breathed. It was an utterance of plain terror, and her hand tightened convulsively on Lyssa's.
Lyssa looked at her curiously, but before she could question the girl, Stephen was upon them. "I come, my lady," he said, "to ask a token from you to carry with me."
"From me?" she asked meekly.
He smiled, a rich and knowing expression. "Who else, my sweet?"
Isobel hastily took the scarf from her head, and pressed it against her mouth. "Take this, then."
Holding her gaze, he accepted the offering and carried it to his own mouth before giving a courtly bow and moving off toward his men.
"It seems you have discovered some fondness for your betrothed after all," Lyssa said, curiously.
"Aye. He has more passion in him than I suspected." But she raised anguished eyes to Lyssa. "Who will I shout for if he and Thomas come up against each other? How can I choose?"
"Do you yet harbor love for Thomas, Isobel? I'd thought you over that crush."
"Not for me," the girl said earnestly. "For you, my lady."
"Shout for your own man, my sweet," Lyssa said with a smile. "We three will do the shouting for Thomas."
Isobel put her head against Lyssa's arm. "No, I will shout with you," she said. "For if my man does not triumph, he will yet live, while yours will not."
&nb
sp; Just then a horn sounded, and with fanfare the king arrived. He spared no look at Lyssa as he took his place. She resolutely turned her attention to the fields as the lists began.
* * *
Thomas paced as the contests got underway. Paced to keep his body warm and his arms loose, paced to squelch the creeping panic that edged into his heart if he slowed. 'Twas a fierce group, and there were those who'd have his blood.
The king had made no announcement of Thomas himself, so only those who'd been in the hall last even knew the truth of him. He picked them out easily, those smirking or looking down—or as down as it was possible to look when a man stood a hand taller—at him. At first they bothered him, but in his first contest, he took the unfamiliar lance and found it weighed and swung much like a good scythe. He unseated his first opponent—and his second—on the first thrust.
The smirking stopped then.
Lyssa sat on the dais, clad in the green gown he thought made her eyes look like jewels, but he could not think of her now. 'Twas like the hunt; all of his being had to be on the work itself.
As the day wore on, plain winners emerged in the single lists. Thomas was triumphant four times, and only once did he even find himself in a sweat before unseating his opponent. Once he took a nick to his chin, but for the rest he was well protected.
Between bouts, he stood with Robert and John Tyler, all of them silent as they watched the knights who might be troublesome. There was one beast who was as tall as Thomas but fat, too. At first, he seemed he be no worry, since his girth would slow him down, but as they watched, he repeatedly won his bouts with a surprising grace and superior timing. He rode as if the horse were his own legs.
"They call him The Mountain," Robert said, the first words he'd spoke since appearing this morning to help Thomas don his gear. "Even you will not unseat him, my lord."
"Robert," Thomas said, eyeing the enormous knight, "you need not address me thus till I have won the title for my own. You were right to feel betrayed, and I'll not hold you to some false standard."
Robert raised his eyes. "I spoke in anger." His chin lifted, and Thomas saw in that tilt the man the boy would become. "You've proved yourself knight to me already, sir."
"Well, thank you for that, boy." He clapped him on the shoulder. "Hold that thought steady." He took a breath and pointed. "'Tis time for the melee for the winners here."
This was where his throat was in danger. The jousts were man to man, and blunted weapons the rule. In the melee, there would be none to point a finger if Thomas fell, for who would know what knight dealt the fatal cut?
The two forces aligned themselves, fifteen men to a side. With Thomas were men from the northern provinces, men less rich than the king's group, but hardier, and more scarred. He saw in their eyes respect for his size and skill, and felt kinship with them in their hunger for the goods they might win here today. "I'm after that bay gelding, myself," said one, lifting his chin to a fine horse ridden by one of the king's men. "You?"
Thomas grinned. "All of them."
His comrade laughed. "Why not?"
Thomas narrowed his eyes as he looked back to the opposing army. The enormous knight wore the king's standard, and Thomas thought his destrier the finest horse he'd seen, but the man would not be easily captured. There were others, too, and fine harnesses of silver and gold. These were the richest men in the realm, and any would be worth a fine ransom.
But there were two that would prove the largest test. Kivelsworthy, on a chestnut, and Margrave in his black armor, astride a huge black gelding. Both men gazed at Thomas with fixed promise, and anticipation. Donning his helm, Thomas met their gazes with a challenge of his own.
May the best man win.
Lyssa managed to stay calm through the jousts, but as the men assembled in the clearing for the second part of the tournament, sweat broke down her back, and her uneasy stomach lurched.
Alice, perhaps seeing that Lyssa had gone green, fetched a cup of cider. "Drink, my lady. You'll serve none by fainting dead away."
The knights gathered in two long lines at opposite ends of the field. The crowd roared, all hoping secretly—or not so secretly—for blood to be spilled, or a fierce contest. The blood lust was so fierce it could be smelled, and Lyssa covered her face with a corner of her veil.
On the field, Thomas sat near the middle of his group, and as they waited for the signal, he looked toward the dais, and put his hand over the weaving she had made. A woman in the peasant clusters cried out, "Toss me a kiss, too, young stud."
The group laughed at her bawdiness, and roared approvingly when Thomas playfully did as she asked, lifting his gloved hand to his lips and tossing her a kiss.
Even here, Lyssa thought with wonder, he was master. And why not? Women, rich or poor, did not miss the pleasure of his form, and in his mail, with that black hair tumbling over his broad shoulders, he was a fine specimen. He'd fought well, too, with a kind of sure grace she should have realized would be part of his skill. He might not have fought in lists before, but he was athletic and graceful, possessed of a powerful talent for anything physical. Why would he not triumph here, too?
She glanced at the king and saw a bemused expression on his face. For the first time since Thomas had been taken away last night, she took a full breath. Perhaps this would end right.
Perhaps.
The signal was given, and the knights charged toward one another. Lyssa wanted to throw her hands up over her ears at the tumult of sound—the thundering of horses and the cries of the crowd, and the clanking, sickening sound of clashing engagement. The crowd on the dais came to its feet, and Lyssa cried out in frustration when she lost sight of Thomas. She leapt to her feet and pushed at the man in front of her, trying to get a better view.
But it was impossible to see anything, to pick out any one man in the melee. Horses reared and whinnied and swords flashed and clanked and the people cried out, and behind it all, music as wild as the fight itself played at an hysterical pace. She saw Margrave in his black mail, and the fat knight who rode so surprisingly well, but could not pick out Thomas. She clutched Alice. "Where is he?"
"I cannot tell."
* * *
There was no thought, no voice but the cry of the hunt in his throat. There was the smell of blood and horse and sweat in his nose, and the clashing of metal and the whinny of horse and the guttural sound of blows and the higher noise of shouts and cries of triumph or defeat. There was heat in his arms and wild power in his chest, a blood lust not unlike the hunt, which was the fight for life, as this was. His own life.
In the midst of the battle, he fought with a mindless power, slashing and lunging and ducking. A slash across his cheek opened and stung and bled. He unseated a king's man with a violent lunge, and snatched the man's horse, capturing the standard attached to his neck before warding off the attack of another from behind.
It seemed they fought for an endless, breathless, mindless, bloody time, until his arms were so weary with lifting the great sword they shook, till the horses were blowing and foaming, till his voice was hoarse with crying out.
Capturing another horse, he bolted for the sidelines to give the reins to Robert, who rushed forward to take them. "My lord!" he cried, and pointed, and Thomas turned and sped to his left, away from the edges of the field where the trees and shrubs would make the fight more dangerous still. The knight they called The Mountain pursued him, and Thomas whirled to meet the challenge. He found himself crying out as he spurred his horse and raced headlong to meet the brute. The lance caught him sharply across the side, a blow of no mean weight, and Thomas gasped, circling and fighting to maintain his mount. The knight came again, lance upraised, his sword thrust out, as if he meant to swing at Thomas's head.
But Thomas had watched the man in the jousts, and he raced hard, then turned suddenly, swinging back with his sword to lay a brutal blow across the knight's shoulders. It would have sent another man to the ground, but the fat knight only roared, shaking it
off before he whirled.
From the corner of his eye, Thomas saw the others come forward, and dread shot through him. Four riders, indistinguishable in their helmets but for Margrave in his black, converged upon Thomas and the big knight, and there were thrusts from all sides, and more shouts.
His horse leapt and shivered, then reared all at once—a disaster that made the crowd cry out in terror. Thomas fought for control of the beast, knowing he would be crushed if he were thrown. He clung to the reins and held on with his legs. In the fight, he lost his sword, but when the horse went down, Thomas still rode him—leaning down over its neck as the beast broke for an opening the gathered knights could not close quickly enough.
Sword lost, horse mad with fear, Thomas knew he faced death if he could not find some answer. In sudden inspiration, he spurred the horse to a run and bolted for the forest, ducking low branches as the horse raced into the woods.
They were not thick, but there was cover enough for his purpose. Thomas leapt free of the beast and ducked behind an ancient oak, holding there till the others burst into the forest behind him, following the riderless horse by its noise. As the last man came by, Thomas sprung, and by sheer virtue of his size, hauled the rider off, nabbing the reins. The man leapt for him, and managed a good blow with the flat of his sword across the vulnerable part of Thomas's shoulder before Thomas hit him, hard. He fell, senseless, and Thomas plucked the sword from his hand.
The others had spotted him and turned back, and Thomas leapt astride the new horse and raced back the way he had come, bursting onto the playing field to a roar of approval from the crowd. He raised the stolen sword in acknowledgment, and the roar grew louder still, but Thomas heard the riders behind him and spared no more thought for glory.
John Tyler had recovered Thomas's sword and held it, hilt up, as Thomas raced by, plucking it with his left hand as he raced to the middle ground. Here, he faced less chance of murder, even three on one, for all would witness the fight.
Heart Of A Knight Page 27