Lionhearts

by Nathan Makaryk

  Marion did not have the energy to do anything but stare at him. “Henry de Bohun.”

  Robert’s lips pursed in confirmation.

  She had guessed as much. The great Earl of Hereford, and father to Lady Magdalena. He was by far the most important man who had actually answered the invitation, bringing with him his other two daughters and their husbands—the Earls of Warwick and Oxford. Marion had no difficulty imagining the heated family argument that must have taken place upon their arrival, chastising Magdalena’s negligence. The answer to their dilemma was so obvious Marion couldn’t believe she’d been blindsided by it. By shifting the blame of the council onto Marion and her already infamous rebelliousness, they maintained their protection from the council’s fallout while still exerting their control over its purpose.

  And Marion was sworn to continue playing the puppet.

  “You’ve a wretched family,” she accused Lord Robert.

  “They’re not my family.” He threw his hands up in a polite surrender. “They’re Maggie’s. But yes, sometimes, wretched isn’t inaccurate.”

  He did not elaborate, so she stared at him until he realized he should.

  “Lord Henry made it clear that no one in his family could be tied to this. I thought Maggie would have fought him on that, she’s so hard-willed at times, but she was more than happy to abandon her own plan. Part of me wonders if she expected it to fall this way.”

  “I have no doubt,” Marion answered, because of course she had. It was why Marion had been asked to greet the guests. If the invitations had garnered greater attendance, no doubt Lady Magdalena would have gladly welcomed each one personally. “She admitted that she penned those invitations weeks ago. Why do you think she waited to send them until I was here? She knew I’d make an easy scapegoat in case her plan faltered, which it did.”

  “It’s not so bad as all that, though, is it?” His neck twisted, as if he might look further down her eyes into her very brain. “This council, isn’t it something you want, too? The Chancellor and his corruption, that’s why you were out there, doing what you do.”

  It was Marion’s favorite thing—her very favorite—when men explained her own motives to her.

  “You may very well be the best person to rally this cause,” he continued. “And it doesn’t put any additional danger on you. In the eyes of many, you’re already an assassin and a traitor, aren’t you? It can’t exactly get worse.”

  She hated that she laughed at that, but he was right. And she didn’t have the energy to argue. His intentions seemed genuine, if poorly aimed. Hopefully it was true that he hadn’t known his wife’s plan beforehand. “Thank you for coming, I do appreciate it.”

  Robert stood and straightened himself, but his face slacked. “I was afraid you’d be angry with me. If I could have sent you a warning, I would have. Lord Henry is a wise man, but holy God is he stubborn. Maggie has clearly learned it from the very best.”

  He sighed softly, as a moment of fatigue washed over him. For a man who always seemed poised and performing, it was a relief to see that he too bore the burden of human frailty.

  “Tomorrow will be difficult, to say the very least.” He fidgeted. “You should know that they won’t participate—any of them. Lord Henry, Maggie, Warwick, Oxford—they’ve all decided to watch and listen but not contribute. I am … obligated to do the same. It’s all on you, Marion. But anything I can do to help … you know, behind the scenes … you know I’m there for you.”

  “You could beat them to a pulp,” she suggested, only barely joking.

  “Oh.” He grimaced. “I just washed my hands.”

  She stared at him. “What?”

  “I can’t beat them to a pulp, because I just washed my hands. I’d get blood on them. And have to wash them again.” He blinked. “Don’t make me explain it again.”

  “You know you’re not very funny, don’t you?” she asked.

  “I don’t, actually.” He grinned. “If I knew that, I’d probably stop trying at it. Anyways, I’ll leave you to eat.”

  “No, stay,” she said before meaning it, her fingers reaching out to the empty air between them. It brought a tear to her eye to realize how much she needed a bit of basic connection with another human being. “If only for a bit. I have no idea how to handle this thing tomorrow. I am desperate for advice.”

  “Now that,” he smiled, pointing a finger and a smirk at her, “I don’t believe. In all the time I have known you, I’ve never once seen you helpless.”

  A gasp pushed through her, a tear escaped to roll down her cheek. “Are you making fun of me? I was the very definition of helpless. Why do you think I came here? Why did I bring my people to you, starving and dying? We had nowhere to go, I had nowhere to take them, I had failed them in every way.”

  “You led them here,” he said, his voice broken with admiration. He caught her eye with such sincerity that she could not look away, while a lump caught tight in her throat. “You saved them, every one of them. You convinced me to bring in a group of outlaws during already difficult times—and for the life of me, I’m still not sure how you did that. You are … a bear, Marion Fitzwalter. You are ferocious and unrelenting, you find possibilities where others would find surrender. You’re the type of born leader that I constantly only pretend at. People are drawn to you, they’re drawn to help you, to believe in you. If you ask me, you’re the only person to lead this council tomorrow. If Maggie were to lead it, it’d be a prickly business, or her father…? He’d bore them to mass suicide. You can light them afire, Marion, you’re good at that. You don’t need my help.”

  The compliments deflected away, she had no use for them. “I do need your help,” she replied, pained that he couldn’t see that. “Now, as I did then. I needed you to lift me up.”

  “But not because I reached down for you from on high.” He smiled wide. “All I did was let you step on my back. You’re above me, Marion, you always will be. Just speak from your heart tomorrow, and see how they fall in line.”

  It could have been the late hour, or the tireless day, or the merciless winter, but Marion’s heart clenched and she let herself cry. It almost shamed her to realize how much she’d needed to hear something like that.

  “You’re sweet,” she said once she was able, sniffing. “Right until the point where you called me a bear.”

  He laughed. “You didn’t like that?”

  “Don’t ever call a woman a bear, there’s literally no woman alive who would appreciate that.”

  “Bears are strong!”

  “Bears are huge and hairy,” she exclaimed, wiping her face. “I don’t know how on earth you’ve managed to keep a wife.”

  His hand, gentle but certain, found her shoulder. She startled at it and he retracted, but he was only saying a goodbye. He chuckled and gave a mocking apology, and left Marion to her thoughts.

  She could only hope he was right, that she might find the words to turn the next day into a success. She had to pivot away from the mindset of a hostage, she knew that. It was blinding her, this feeling of being cornered. If she took on this task as a responsibility rather than a passion, she would fail. If she did little more than help Lady Magdalena save face, then she would deserve this subservient position she had found herself in.

  But if she met this challenge fully—as a lionheart—she might just flip the tables on the countess entirely.

  THIRTY-TWO

  CAITLIN FITZSIMON

  NOTTINGHAM CASTLE

  “FIND THE SIMONS.” CAIT stared at the gord’s teeth. “Let him know his daughter has come to see him.”

  The greasy watchman rolled his eyes into the back of his head, where there was plenty of room. It was a look that said look who thinks she gives the orders here, and Caitlin hated with every inch of her soul that he was right. She had made a demand instead of a request, forgetting to play the sad helpless daughter.

  The walls of Nottingham Castle in the morning sun were the golden color of piss, and the three
scruffy Guardsmen that manned its pedestrian gate had attitudes to match. Still, one of them swallowed his pride and shuffled within to go find her father, while the other two snickered from a distance.

  “We’ll have to open the main,” one muttered to the other, gesturing to the wide carriage gates to the right. “This one won’t be big enough.”

  Caitlin pretended not to hear.

  “Get off it,” the other grumbled back, making a particularly guilty eye contact with her. “That’s The Simons’s daughter.”

  “Wonder who the mother was?” the first giggled under his breath. “A fuckin’ … a fuckin’ horse, or … a fuckin’, a fuckin’ pig? I dunno, what’s a big fat animal?”

  Caitlin ground her fingertips into the palms of her hands. This fannybaws couldn’t even make a joke right.

  “My mum’s dead,” she said loudly, affecting what she imagined was her saddest, poutiest face. “An’ I can hear you.”

  “Oh get off it,” the first one snapped at her. “I didn’t mean nothing. Fuckin’ crying at the gate now.”

  The other caught her eye again and mouthed sorry, but as soon as he turned away his chest shook in stifled laughter.

  They motioned for her to pass through, thinking it was a favor. She glanced upward at the carved stone castle crest over the entrance, which depicted two stags standing on their hind legs, fighting over whose cock was bigger. The passage through the gatehouse was nestled between two bulging, round towers that housed small rooms, and she had heard every euphemism there was for the entrance. Whether the two towers were breasts or thighs, every goddamned gord found some way to turn a simple gate into something carnal.

  Just stepping back inside the castle was enough to remind her of every small freedom the Red Lions afforded her that was unthinkable within these walls.

  “You’ll have to wait here,” the more-terrible Guardsman mumbled. “Can’t let you into the castle proper without accumpament.”

  “Accompaniment,” the other corrected him.

  “Without company,” the first balked. “I know what I meant.”

  If that exchange had taken place amongst her cubs, she would have smacked them both upside the head. Here, she had to thank them. Here, an idiot was considered the top of the barrel. She idled in a circle, taking in the long-familiar sights of the inside of the walls. The great lower bailey wrapped around nearly half of Castle Rock, its rolling terrain currently filled with tents and cookpots, wares and craftsmen—the same makings of any village, excepting the curtain wall that kept out the danger of a real world. A path to the left would eventually ramp up to a narrow bridge that reached the barbican to the middle bailey, where her father would be busy training the next generation of entitled rapists and murderers.

  Today, this section of the lower bailey was organizing into a market, though poorly attended. These vendors must have won some favor to set up here. Even if they lost money for a week waiting for the day of the contest, they’d make it all back and more in one afternoon. Some would sell food and drink, others were amateur craftsmen making flags and hats in a dozen colors and combinations to support the various competitors. Beyond, Caitlin could spy the makings of the wooden audience stalls being built off to the north, the din of hammers and saws providing a steady footprint under the heckling of the marketmen. One pocky woman pushed close, loudly claiming that Caitlin could probably eat her entire supply of dates in a single sitting. Caitlin huffed and moved away, hating how much effort it took to bear the hill.

  The archery field was built at the end of the lower bailey, where the long curve of the outer curtain wall took a straight turn inward to meet the higher walls of the middle bailey above. At the far side of the range were ten huge stuffed straw targets, already lined in a row. Any rogue arrows would crash against the stone, and if any sailed high they would leave the castle grounds entirely and fly off the backside. Down below was the French Ward, which could only be improved by a few falling arrows.

  But all Cait really saw was the danger. If anything went afoul—anything—there would be no escape from the archery contest. Battlements surrounded them on three sides, with towers regularly spaced within them. There was only one exit, which was the main gate she’d just entered. The moment Alfie entered these grounds, there was no guarantee he’d get out again.

  Mixed with those fears were memories. She’d been in this bailey a thousand times as a girl. When she might have been daft enough to call this place home. The occupants of the lower bailey always adapted to the castle’s needs, and she’d learned a new skill with each transformation. She’d sewn hems for tailors when a market like this one was in tilt, but she’d also learned to shoe a horse, or dig a posthole, or lie her way through a game of blind man’s hazard. The strangers to the castle were more valuable in her upbringing than her father ever was.

  And damned it all if that didn’t make the memories all the more bitter now. Because like or not, there was one opportunity she had that Alfie never would. If everything went sideways in the tournament and the gords started arresting them … Caitlin’s beast of a father could protect her.

  That fact scratched at her soul. Something fouler than death, there, something fouler.

  When her father found her, he was visibly angry. He apparently thought she must be in danger to call on him at the castle, and so he carried some large piece of firewood as a club to kill whatever her troubles were. As if some pervert had followed her and was still nearby, patiently waiting to be cudgeled to death by The Simons.

  As if even some pervert would ever think she was worth his time.

  Once he calmed down, they exchanged pleasantries, such as one would call them. But Cait couldn’t even remember what she said a moment after the words were spoken. She was somebody else, playing the role of a daughter, and she thanked God that none of her cubs would witness her dealing in such heavy bullshit.

  “I just worried at you, Cay,” he said, after she gave him grief for the firewood. “I don’t know the last time you came to see me.”

  Never, was the answer, though she didn’t say it. “I can’t stay long, it’s why I came. But nothing to worry about none, I just had some questions for you.”

  “Questions?” He curled a lip into a smile. “Can’t promise I’ll be good at them. How about clubbing someone? I’m better at that.”

  If he thought a club could save her from her troubles, he would best start by smashing his head upon it.

  “Stop it.” She feigned embarrassment, knowing he’d seize the chance to laugh and pose a bit. Had that ever worked? Was there ever a time when she was young enough to be impressed by his braggartry? Probably when she was four or five, earlier than she could remember, she was like any little girl who laughed and smiled at her father’s antics. She hated that girl, and wished she could go back and save her.

  Some men thought that being the biggest and strongest was what made them men. Others like Will Scarlet thought they were made manlier by the amount of spit and spite they could throw at the world. But someone with grace and tact like Alfred Fawkes knew the truth—that anyone who measures themselves in terms of how much man they are can never be more than half a person. Man is, after all, only half the world.

  “I have questions about the archery contest,” she said at last, enjoying the look of disappointment that crawled over his face. “About how to sign up for it?”

  “The St. Valentine’s tournament? You want to be in the contest?” He nearly burst in laughter. “Since when do you know how to throw an arrow?”

  She had to bite her tongue. As if he knew the first shit about what she was capable of. But instead she answered meekly, “Not just for me, for some friends, too.”

  “Oh, I don’t think you should want it.” He turned serious. “It’ll be dangerous, that. I know the prize is something, ain’t it, but you’d be better off telling your friends to bandy wide. Ought to make for a good show at least, but you wouldn’t want to be on the field.”

  “Why is that?�
� she asked with every drop of dumb she had.

  “Well it’s who we’re expecting, see.” He twisted his head about to both sides, the universal symbol for needing secrecy. “You’ve probably heard about this gangman, Robin Hood, and his games of terror?”

  “I’ve heard the name.” Caitlin scratched at her head. I’ve fucked him, too. “He’s pretty bad, then?”

  “The worst.” Her father spat at the ground. Alfie would eat up every word when she had the chance to tell him later. “Thief and a murderer, he was behind the deaths of both Sheriffs last fall. Someone else is usin’ that name now, stealing and killing whomsoever he please.”

  That word was a splash of cold water. “Killing, you say?”

  “A couple of nobles, the Lord and Lady of Brayden, or something, a month perhaps back. Raped and murdered them both, sick fuck.”

  Cait’s mind reeled with the information.

  It had to be Will Scarlet.

  Fucking Scarlet.

  “You should watch with me!” Her father grabbed her shoulder in excitement. She recoiled from his touch by instinct. “Cay, if you want to watch the contest, you ought to do so from safety, with me. We’ll be there.” He pointed to one of the battlement walls above, where canopies had already been constructed for additional viewing. “Just like when you were a girl, you used to watch the boys training in the yard, you remember?”

  She didn’t. It roiled her stomach to even think of being a young girl around her father. To think of his massive paws holding her close to him, against the sweat of him.

  “I’d rather be on the field,” she pouted. “I know I won’t win, I just want to feel what it’s like. It may not sound interesting to you, but I’d never have a chance to do something like this in a thousand years, not without your help.”

  “I’d rather you stay out of it,” he said, a bit more firmly. “As I said, we expect there to be a dangerous element down there with you.”