Kevin laughed softly, looking over at young William, who appeared both defiant and sheepish. The squire had gotten taller since the last time he’d seen him, now even taller than Kevin was. William was in his sixteenth year and he was filling out, becoming big and muscular. He was already a master with a sword and his father was so proud of him that he could speak of nothing else.
But William had a naughty streak in him, hence the reason for his presence.
It was something that had seen him sent home from his training ground of Kenilworth Castle a couple of years ago and something that continued to this day. William had a penchant for gambling, but his skills were in high demand as a squire nonetheless and he squired for Caius at the man’s seat of Hawkstone Castle north of Shrewsbury. For the past several months, however, he’d been serving the de Lohr brothers, Christopher and David, because they’d declared that they alone could break de Wolfe of his bad habits.
Kevin was coming to think that perhaps they hadn’t been successful.
“Who did de Wolfe win the stallion from?” he asked.
Alexander started to chuckle. “He is so good these days that he only bets with high stakes,” he said. “You would not believe it if I told you.”
Kevin was laughing because Alexander was. “Let me guess,” he said. “Chris?”
Alexander shook his head. “Nay, but you’re close,” he said as they started to walk towards the great hall. “In the time de Wolfe has spent between Canterbury Castle and Lioncross Abbey Castle, the seats of both de Lohr brothers, he has managed to acquire a small fortune from the soldiers and others who were stupid enough to play games of chance with him. He has three horses, enough weapons for a small army, and more coinage than he could ever spend.”
Kevin shook his head. “I thought the de Lohr brothers were going to break him of that.”
Alexander shrugged his big shoulders. “They tried,” he said. “We all tried. But William is brilliant and cheeky, like the naughty younger brother you love and cannot bring yourself to discipline, but David took one last stab at it. He swore he was going to win all of William’s ill-gotten gains in a game of bones that ended up lasting a full day and a full night. In the end, David lost ten pounds, a sword, an expensive dagger, and that big, black stallion to William before David’s wife put an end to it.”
Kevin was laughing so hard at that point that he could barely breathe. “Is that why William is with you?” he asked. “The de Lohrs are banishing him from their company?”
Alexander put his arm around Kevin’s broad shoulders. “He is being sent back to Hawkstone with Cai,” he said. “The de Lohr brothers have failed for the first time in their lives and they have washed their hands of him. Someone once said that de Wolfe is an evil genius – and I think they were right to a certain extent. He’s only evil when it comes to stealing everyone’s money and possessions, but already, he can handle a sword with the best of them and his heart is noble. A little mercenary, but noble. He is England’s future and the future is bright. God help the enemies of England with de Wolfe at our right hand.”
Kevin was still chuckling as they passed through the yawning entrance of the great hall. Sean and Gareth and Bannon were trailing behind, with Peter and Cal following behind them, and William bringing up the rear. The knights were preparing to gather, an unexpected event, and Kevin sent servants running for watered ale and refreshments.
The smell of stale rushes and smoke greeted them at this time of day because the servants were going about their chores. The hearth was being swept out but they hadn’t gotten to the old rushes yet, so Kevin took them over to the dais where it was relatively clean and light, with sunlight streaming in from lancet windows cut high into the walls.
It was a pleasant gathering as the men settled in. Kevin smiled with them, laughed with them, conversed with them, but all the while, his mind was working. It was true that he was concerned about his brother’s unexpected appearance, but he also had something else on his mind –
Juliandra.
Given that she was his chatelaine know, she would hear there were guests and make an appearance, as a good chatelaine would. Kevin knew, at some point, that he would have to explain her presence and sought to do it sooner rather than later. He wanted to be proactive with the situation and the many questions that would come with the introduction of a young and beautiful Welsh chatelaine.
He wasn’t sure why he felt nervous about it, but he did.
About her.
As Kevin sat at the table with men who were his close and true friends, he had to admit that their appearance had him on edge, but it was more than just their appearance or the fact that he would have to explain the situation with Juliandra.
It was his own uncertainty.
The last thing he wanted to do was fail at his first command. He didn’t want to be a failure in his brother’s eyes. So why had Sean come? To make sure he was going a good job? He wasn’t.
He knew he wasn’t.
For all outward appearances, Kevin was a confident man, but ever since the day he decided to lie to Juliandra about her father in order to gain access to information about his new world, that confident man had cracked. Not broken, but cracked. When he told his brother about Juliandra’s presence at Wybren, he was going to have to tell the man why. That would lead him to a confession.
A lie.
Kevin de Lara didn’t lie.
But he had.
That, to him, was the failure he was wrestling with.
“Kevin,” Sean said. “Everything looks peaceful and the castle seems to be well-organized. How would you say your first few months have been?”
Kevin tore himself away from his tumultuous thoughts. “There has been nothing terrible of note,” he said, trying to present a steady front. “When I first arrived, a delegation of local warlords told me that I did not belong, but that’s the first and last time I saw them. It has been quiet ever since.”
Sean and Alexander were listening carefully. “Who were the warlords?” Sean asked.
“Two men,” Kevin said. “Aeron ap Gruffudd and Glynn ap Hywel. They are two of the more powerful warlords in this area and they made it very clear they did not want me here, but they took no action. It has been quite peaceful, actually.”
Sean nodded faintly, rubbing his chin as he looked at Alexander. Concerned glances passed between them. It was Alexander who finally spoke.
“We may as well get down to business,” Alexander said. “Clearly, our visit is unexpected but there is a reason for it. Frankly, I’m surprised to see that there has been no hostilities or uprising.”
Now they were coming to the crux of the visit. “Why?” Kevin asked. “Do you know something I should be aware of?”
Alexander nodded. “A Welsh warlord by the name of Phylip ap Bedo has lands that border Chris’,” he said. “Ap Bedo is an older man and some say he has royal blood in him, the blood of the Welsh princes of Gwent. In any case, he and Chris tolerate one another but they are not what you could call allies. Chris has a spy in ap Bedo’s ranks and the man told us that ap Bedo received a request for assistance from his cousin to the north because the man wants to purge an English dog.”
“Who is his cousin?
“Aeron ap Gruffudd.”
“Ah,” Kevin said, not particularly surprised to hear that. “And I am the English dog?”
Alexander nodded. “Ap Bedo has thousands of men, Kevin,” he said. “Though he doesn’t seem to be apt to help his cousin at this time, the threat is real should he choose to support ap Gruffudd.”
Aeron ap Gruffudd. The same man who believes Juliandra belongs to him.
Juliandra had mentioned that Aeron had a few hundred men, which made him a low threat. But if he had access to thousands, that would change the dynamics drastically. The situation was going from bad to worse and, suddenly, Kevin wasn’t feeling so relaxed. In fact, he was starting to feel damned edgy. He abruptly stood up, motioning to Sean and Alexander.
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sp; “Come with me,” he said so the others heard. “I’ve something to show you.”
Peter and Gareth started to rise, but Kevin waved them off.
“Stay,” he said. “We shall return shortly.”
The pair sat back down, turning to the first of the powerful pear cider that began to arrive, as Kevin took Sean and Alexander out of the hall. The keep was across the small inner yard and he led them straight into the dark, cool recesses.
His destination was his tower chamber, and he took them up the spiral stairs, up five stories, to the tower room that overlooked the entire world. Sean, a head taller than his brother, had some trouble maneuvering the narrow stairs and Alexander, who was about the same size as Sean, nearly knocked himself silly on a low beam. There was some grunting and cursing going on. But they made it, finally emerging into the chamber that Kevin spent a great deal of time in. All they had to see was the view from the windows south to realize why they’d been brought here.
They were quickly mesmerized.
“God’s Bones,” Sean muttered. “You can see all the way to the sea from here.”
Kevin looked out over his domain. “Almost,” he said. “I can see everything I need to see, for miles around.”
“Meaning you can see the approach of a Welsh army who may try to sneak up on you.”
Kevin nodded but he didn’t reply right away. He was still looking at the view, still trying to figure out what he was going to tell them. It occurred to him that the only thing he could tell them was the truth.
His guard began to come down.
“I am in trouble,” he finally said. “Deep and terrible trouble and I do not know what to do.”
Both Sean and Alexander looked at him. “I had a feeling something was going on,” Sean said. “You have this look about you, Kevin. I cannot put my finger on it, but there is something in your expression. What is wrong?”
Kevin looked at them, then. “God,” he hissed. “I do not even know where to start. This is my command and I thought I would be flawless in my execution, but I have already gotten myself into trouble and I do not know where to turn.”
Sean was genuinely concerned. “Tell me, Keev,” he said, using the term of endearment he used for his brother when they were children. “What has happened?”
Kevin took a deep breath, trying not to feel stupid for what he was about to say. He was about to confess his failings to the one man he hadn’t wanted to fail.
But here he was.
“When I first arrived here, I already told you that ap Gruffudd and ap Hywel were unwelcoming,” he said quietly. “I did not let it trouble me, at least, not at first. I was determined to be the best lord Wybren had ever seen. I started by setting up a series of toll booths on the roads in the area, charging tolls to travelers and donating half of the revenue to the church. It was my way of showing the people of this land that even though I was English, I was doing something good for them.”
Sean and Alexander nodded in approval. “That was excellent,” Sean said. “You established your benevolence at the outset.”
“I did,” Kevin said. “At least, I tried to. I have also brought law and order to this area and I hear supplicants every Tuesday. If a man is wrong, I do not care if he is English or Welsh. I shall punish him. It was my further effort to show those on my lands that I am a fair and wise lord.”
Sean and Alexander were waiting for something more to come forth, the reason why Kevin was in trouble, but so far they hadn’t heard anything to support that declaration.
“Again, that was an excellent move,” Sean said. “Your vassals will come to know you and know they can trust you.”
Kevin grunted and hung his head. “That is where I have made a mistake,” he said. “A few weeks ago, a man named Gethin ap Garreg was traveling on one of the roads. He is a well-known and wealthy merchant with a stall in Pool. The man wouldn’t pay the toll even after he was told where the money went, so my guards sent him back the way he’d come. He tried to go around the road and was captured. In the struggle to put the man on a horse for transport, he fell off and landed on his head. It killed him instantly.”
Sean and Alexander looked at each other, trying to gauge how bad it was to have a respected Welshman killed in English custody.
“It was an accident,” Alexander said. “If the man was fighting you, then it is his own fault for falling off a horse, I would say. Surely you can impress that upon the locals.”
Kevin nodded, but it was clear that he wasn’t assuaged in any way. “It was an accident,” he said. “The man’s death is bad enough, but what I did afterwards is why I am in trouble. His daughter, told that her father was in my custody, came to Wybren to pay the toll for her father’s release.”
“And?” Alexander said, lifting his eyebrows expectantly.
Kevin sighed heavily. “And I could see, the moment I spoke with the woman, that my opportunity had come to find out what I needed to know about the lands I rule over,” he said. “She has lived here her entire life. She knows everyone, including the local warlords. I saw an opportunity and I took it. I told her that I would release her father if she remained here at Wybren, as my guest, and helped me acclimate to the local politics. You must understand that I have spent the past few months, ever since I arrived here, with very little information on anyone or anything. No one will speak with me because I am English in a land of Welsh. I saw in the lady the opportunity to know everything I needed to know, but she thinks her father is still alive and that is why she is here, doing everything I ask of her.”
Now, Sean and Alexander were starting to see the issue, but to the seasoned veterans, it didn’t seem like the dire issue Kevin thought it was. But theirs had always been a world of shadows, spying, and deceit. Especially Sean; he had spent nine years as the shadow of King John, pretending to be his bodyguard and greatest advisor when he was really spying on the man. Sean had lived a lie for nine solid years.
But Kevin hadn’t.
His younger brother was the pious, virtuous one. The man grieved over every little event he considered a flaw or a failure of character, so this situation was indeed dire to him. Sean understood that.
Finding the nearest chair to sit in, he lowered his bulk down into a thoughtful heap.
“And you are concerned of what will happen when she discovers you have lied to her,” he finally said, summing up the situation.
Kevin appeared genuinely miserable. “Her father, by all accounts, was well-liked,” he said. “When she discovers I have lied, it will ruin whatever chance I had of building trust with my vassals. She will tell them that not only did I kill her father, but I lied to her about it. Every day that passes, the more guilt I feel, and I do not know what to do about it.”
Sean considered the situation, impartially, he hoped. He had that gift. “You have nothing to feel guilty over,” he said. “You did what you had to do, Kevin. Sometimes situations are not always so clearly defined as good or evil, or right or wrong. I tried to tell you that for years and I understand that deceiving does not come naturally to you. But in this case, you did what you needed to do. You need information she can supply to keep you and your men safe, so that you know what it is you are dealing with here in Wales. I wholly support what you have done. You must consider her a tool and nothing more.”
Kevin looked at him. “Sean,” he said softly, “it is not that. It’s… well, her name is Juliandra ferch Gethin and she is… God, I cannot believe I am saying this, but I think I feel something for her. She is bright and beautiful and witty, and she has been great company. I do not want to lose that. I do not want to lose her.”
That had Sean and Alexander looking at him with varied degrees of surprise. “You feel something for her?” Sean repeated. “As in… affection? Romance?”
Kevin nodded, embarrassed and despondent. “As in affection and romance,” he said quietly. “I always knew I would marry someday and I want to marry someone that I like. I see what you and Dani have, Sean, an
d I want that, too. But I had no idea I would see that in a Welsh lass who is at Wybren under a false pretext, a pretext that I created. When I said I was in trouble… that is what I meant.”
Both Sean and Alexander had wives that they loved dearly, so they understood what it was to feel emotions for a special woman. Given that they understood, they felt a great deal of sympathy for Kevin. It was difficult to surrender to unfamiliar emotions under any circumstances, but Kevin was surrendering to something built on a lie.
That made it a problematic situation.
“Does she know you feel something for her?” Sean asked.
Kevin shook his head “Nay,” he said. “We have been friendly and cordial towards each other but nothing more.”
“How long has she been here?”
“About two weeks.”
“How long did you tell her she had to remain?”
“I was not specific, but I told her until I was satisfied with whatever knowledge she imparted to me.”
“So it could be weeks or months.”
“Aye.”
Sean cleared his throat softly as he leaned back in his chair. “Then you need to consider that the longer she remains here, the more you are going to feel for her,” he said. “That will make it harder to tell her the truth.”
“I know. But there’s something more you should know about her.”
“What’s that?”
“Aeron ap Gruffudd has offered for her hand, numerous times, and her father has always turned him down,” Kevin said. “In spite of that, Aeron feels that the lady is his property. I am expecting a visit from him any day now to that regard, to be perfectly truthful.”
Sean cocked an eyebrow. “That might prompt a response from ap Bedo,” he said. “If ap Gruffudd feels that you have stolen his woman…”
Kevin held up a hand, silencing him. “I know,” he said. “That was the first thing I thought of when you told me that ap Bedo had been discussing Wybren and his cousin’s request for help to purge the English dog. Until you told me that, I was unconcerned with Aeron’s response. But now… now, there is reason for concern because when Aeron demands I release Juliandra and I refuse, I am certain it will prompt some kind of military response.”
The Agents of William Marshal Volume II: A Medieval Romance Bundle Page 75