Masters of Medieval Romance: Series Starters Volume 1

by Kathryn Le Veque

  Next door in the main part of the stable block, Brandt had been inspecting three new chargers purchased in Caen, recently shipped to Guildford when he heard the smacking going on. The horses were nervous enough without the sounds so, lured by the noise, Brandt went in search of the source.

  Standing in the entry with his hands on his hips, he watched his older sons whack each other with long sticks. On a pile of fresh hay behind them were the two younger children, a three year old boy with his mother’s golden red hair and a daughter that looked like her father. Brandt watched the older boys swing away at each other.

  “Aramis? Trenton?” he called to them. “What are you doing?”

  The boys came to a halt, turning to their father with innocent faces. They lowered their sticks. “Playing, Father,” Aramis, the oldest boy, said. “I am fighting Trenton to rescue Edward and Isabeau.”

  “They need rescuing?”

  Trenton nodded emphatically. Younger than Aramis by fourteen months, he was the most aggressive of the four children.

  “I am the evil black knight,” he told his father. “If Aramis wants to rescue Edward and Isabeau, he must fight me.”

  “I see,” Brandt said, coming into the stable. “Where is your nurse?”

  “Sleeping,” Trenton said defiantly.

  “Aren’t you all supposed to be sleeping as well?”

  Trenton frowned. “We are not tired,” he declared. “Only babies sleep. We are not babies.”

  Brandt looked over at Edward and Isabeau, who were reclining on the hay pile, yawning. “Look at your brother and sister over there,” he said, pointing. “They are babies and they are tired. Let’s take them back to the keep where they may have their nap.”

  He started to move but Trenton turned the stick on him. “If you want them, you must fight me for them.”

  Brandt came to a halt and put his hands up to show he was unarmed. “I have no weapon, evil black knight. Will you let me pass?”

  “Nay,” Trenton barked. “You must fight me.”

  With a shrug, Brandt moved towards Trenton, who started whacking at his father with the stick. Brandt caught the stick easily, and his son, and grabbed the boy around the waist so he was facing away from his father. Thoroughly angry, Trenton started to kick and howl. That brought Aramis running, who began whacking at his father’s backside with his stick. Brandt yanked the stick away and tossed it, causing Aramis to plow into the back of his father’s legs.

  The man lost his balance and fell to his knees. Once down, Aramis began jumping gleefully on him while Trenton managed to wriggle free.

  Brandt laughed softly as his boys pounced on him. Behind him, he could hear the babies squealing as they climbed down off the hay pile and joined the fun. Soon, Brandt had his toddler in his arms, nibbling her fat little cheeks, as his three boys tried to wrest him to the ground. He ended up laying down just to make it easy for them.

  “There you are!”

  The cry came from the stable entrance. Five pairs of eyes turned to see Ellowyn standing there, hands on her hips and accusations written all over her face. She pointed a finger at Brandt.

  “What on earth are you doing?” she asked her husband. “They are supposed to be sleeping. Do you have any idea of the panic I have gone through for the past ten minutes when I went to check on them and found all of my children missing?”

  Brandt sat up with the baby still in his arms. He glanced at his boys, who were looking rather guilty, before looking back at his wife.

  “They did not want to sleep,” he told her. “We were inspecting horses.”

  Ellowyn knew better. She scowled at her boys. “Aramis, Trenton,” she snapped softly. “Upstairs, now, or you shall feel my wrath.” As the boys bolted past her, she called after them. “If I do not find you in bed when I get to your chamber, there will be trouble.”

  The boys yelled something back to her she couldn’t quite make out, but they were moving to do her bidding and that was all she cared about. Her attention then returned to Brandt, still on the ground, with their two youngest children in his arms. Ellowyn shook her head at him as she moved to collect Isabeau from his arms.

  Brandt rolled to his knees, slowly reclaiming his feet. He wasn’t as young as he used to be and not nearly as agile since the injuries he sustained at Poitiers. But he was alive, and reasonably healthy, and that was all that mattered. He picked Edward up.

  “Are we all in trouble, Mummy?” he asked.

  Gazing up at her tall, handsome, and playful husband, Ellowyn shook her head with resignation.

  “What am I to do with you, Brandt?” she asked rhetorically. “You know I have enough trouble maintaining control with Aramis and Trenton without you acting as their partner in crime. And now you drag Edward and Isabeau into your escapades?”

  Brandt grinned and bent down to kiss her on the cheek. “You are right,” he said. “I am sorry. It will not happen again.”

  Exasperated, Ellowyn turned away and headed out of the stables. “Nay, you are not sorry and it most certainly will happen again.”

  He simply grinned at her. Out in the sunshine, they headed across Guildford’s bailey on their way to the keep, which had a third story added to it a few years ago to accommodate their growing family. Mother and father still had the big chamber on the second level but the new third level was now divided into two chambers for the children. But the de Russe clan wasn’t the only family growing within the walls of Guildford.

  It seemed that everyone was settling down and getting married. In fact, in the bailey, Brandt had three small cottages built to accommodate his married knights. Brennan and Bridget had married almost three years ago and now had an infant son. Alex, having spent a good deal of time comforting Annabeth after the passing of Dylan, had married the woman a year ago and they had a child on the way. Lastly, Rosalind and Magnus had married after Rosalind had spent a good deal of time nursing the knight back to health after his injury at Poitiers. They had no children yet but were hopeful that God would soon bless them. Guildford was filling up with children and they wanted to make their contribution.

  But that wasn’t all that changed. Evan St. Hèver now served the Duke of Exeter, a very young and enormous knight that was easily as skilled and powerful as his brother. He and Stefan had become very good friends and they had shared many single-man adventures together, much to the amusement of others. Margarethe had joined a convent shortly after her father returned from Poitiers. With Brandt’s connections and money, Margarethe had found a lucrative position at Westminster in London. Never fully comfortable with her father or with the path her sister had chosen, she had decided to join the cloister and Brandt had been happy to finance it.

  Lives that had happily moved on, existing in peace, even though the Prince of Wales continued his warring campaign. Because of the severity of Brandt’s injuries at Poitiers and because he was getting on in years, Edward had permitted him retirement. After all, the man had spent over ten years of his life fighting in France. He had put his time in. Now, it was his turn to enjoy his life and his family as he had never before had the opportunity. Aramis, Trenton, Edward, Isabeau, and Ellowyn were his very reasons for living and he thanked God daily that he’d been given the opportunity.

  And he planned to keep playing with his boys no matter what his wife said. The best things in his life seemed to happen when she was angry with him.

  * THE END *

  LESPADA

  A Medieval Romance

  By Kathryn Le Veque

  “And what is better than wisdom? Woman.

  And what is better than a good woman? Nothing.”

  Geoffrey Chaucer c.1343 – 1400

  CHAPTER ONE

  London, England

  The Ides of March, 1264 A.D.

  The evening was still and hushed, the hour late. The sounds of the gentle waters of the Thames drifted over the moonlit houses, roofs, and avenues like the caressing soothe of a lullaby. Hardly a soul stirred on the dirty, danger
ous streets. Even the Tower of London was bathed in nocturnal peace, a bastion normally wrought with violence and tension. But the tranquility belied the chaotic heart beating within the fortress, with friction pulsing through halls like the veins of a living body.

  It was a foregone conclusion that a variety of factions resided within the old stone walls of the Tower, and these days were particularly strained. There were those allied with the king, and there were those against. The ancient fortress had seen its share of political strife and the future could only threaten more of the same. Though the evening was peaceful and the mood still, there was an underlying element of pandemonium that threatened to explode. Each man and woman at the Tower lived moment by moment in anticipation of this. It was an exhausting existence.

  But not all allowed themselves to be sucked into the tension that surrounded them. In the tower wing on the eastern wall, two brothers shared a fire and a carafe of blood-red wine from Sicily. These men were key components to the political strife enveloping the Tower, and one man in particular. He was the one with the heavy yellowed vellum in hand, his jaw ticking with disbelief as his eyes perused the writing.

  “I do not believe it,” he growled.

  “Believe what?” asked the other.

  The man continued to stare at the missive until finally settling it in his lap. There was a long sigh.

  “Mother.”

  “What has she done now?”

  Davyss de Winter handed his brother the message. Hugh took the vellum, reading the contents hesitantly as if fearful of what it might say. When he came to the end, he closed his eyes in acquiescence. The vellum collapsed in his lap.

  “God give us strength,” he muttered. The deep brown eyes opened to look back at his brother. “She has been threatening you with this for months. I did not believe her to be serious.”

  Davyss gazed steadily at his younger brother, a knowing smile playing on his smooth lips. “You should know her better than that, little brother. The Lady Katharine Isabella Rowyna de Warenne de Winter never threatens. Her oath is more trustworthy than that of any knight I know.” He took back the vellum, eyeing it with something of regret. “I just thought it would be later rather than sooner.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  Davyss glanced at the missive one last time before setting it aside. It had been a harried day and this had been the first chance he’d had to sit in one place and unwind. Yet in his position, relaxation could be deadly. He didn’t think he’d truly relaxed in fifteen years.

  “I am not entirely sure that I have a choice in the matter. Should I refuse, she will deny me my inheritance. She has told me thus.”

  “So you will do it?”

  Davyss fell silent. His thoughts revolved around his overbearing mother, ill with age and bitter with life, and the inheritance that was his due. Nearly everything the de Winter family had come from his mother’s side, including the castle in which she currently resided. As the only sister of the Earl of Surrey, she had been granted Breckland Castle in Norfolk by her brother. It was a glorious stronghold, well-regarded and well-fortified near the dense Thetford Forest.

  The de Warenne fortune came with it from his mother’s sire. Davyss had worked too hard in the course of his thirty-four years to watch it all slip away to Hugh because he was too stubborn to do as his mother bade. It wasn’t often that she dictated to him, but when she did, she meant it. He understood her want for her heir to marry and bear offspring to carry on the name. It wasn’t unreasonable. He just wished he had some say in the matter.

  He heard his brother snort. He glanced at him. “What is it?”

  Hugh’s handsome face was contorted in a smirk. “I suppose I find all of this ironic.”

  “How?”

  Hugh snorted again, just for effect, and rose from his over-stuffed leather chair. He moved to the hearth and tossed another hunk of peat onto the blaze. Sparks flew up into the dim room.

  “Because you are Henry’s champion, for Christ’s sake,” he poked at the smoking fire. “The king of the mightiest country on earth turns to you for protection. Men are humbled at your feet and your reputation is second to none. A weak man did not achieve this. You have the will of the nation to command by sheer strength alone, yet your mother issues forth orders and suddenly, the champion is subdued like a submissive child.”

  The irony wasn’t lost on Davyss. Hugh wasn’t attempting to be condescending but that was the message.

  “I cannot be selfish in this matter,” he said simply. “I have the de Winter lineage to think of. I do indeed want sons to carry on my name”

  “So you let dear Mummy arrange a marriage?”

  Hugh was becoming taunting now. A long look from the quick-tempered Davyss quickly curbed any thoughts of furthering the torment. Under no circumstances would Hugh tangle with his older, and by far larger, brother.

  “According to Mother, she is a woman of good bloodlines. Her father is Lord Mayor of Thetford and Sheriff of the Shire.” He sounded suspiciously as if he was attempting to talk himself into the agreeable arrangement. “So I will marry her, she will bear my sons, I will stay in London and still collect my inheritance, and everyone will be happy. I see no issue with this.”

  Hugh didn’t believe him, but he did not let on. When pushed to the breaking point, Davyss’ temper was unpredictable and, at times, deadly. He had no desire to be cuffed. He sat back in his chair.

  “So what is my new sister’s name?”

  Davyss stared into the fire, digging deep into his memory. His mother had told him, once, during the few discussions they had exchanged on the subject.

  “The Lady Devereux Allington.”

  “Family?”

  “Saxon lords. A grand sire, several generations over, was king of the ancient Kingdom of Dremrud. She comes with some wealth.”

  “What does she look like?”

  Davyss lifted a dark eyebrow. “You can tell me that upon your return.”

  “Return from what?”

  “My wedding.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  Thetford, Norfolk

  The only man not in attendance at the wedding was the groom.

  Unwilling to leave London with the current political situation between Henry and the volatile Simon de Montfort, he remained at his post. Moreover, his absence was a statement to his mother that he could not be so easily pushed about. So he sent his knights, all five of them, to attend the marriage for him. Most importantly, he had sent his sword with Hugh. The lady would marry the weapon, by proxy, and become Lady de Winter. Davyss would therefore have a wife he’d never even met, a very neat arrangement for someone who did not wish to be married at all.

  If the groom was reluctant, the bride was positively adverse. Hugh had been the first man to lay eyes on her, a petite woman with the body of a ripe goddess and luscious blonde hair that fell in a thick sheet to her buttocks. He had been momentarily dumbfounded by the glory of her face, so lovely that he was sure the angels were jealous. She had enormous gray eyes that were brilliant and bottomless, and a rosebud mouth that was sweet and delectable. But his glimpse of unearthly beauty had been fleeting as she slammed the door in his face. That action set the tone. The de Winter knights had, therefore, broken down the door and set chase to the fighting, scratching animal otherwise known as the Lady Devereux D’arcy Allington.

  Hugh led the group with enthusiasm. One of the shortest knights, he was built like a bull. His dark hair, dark eyes and square jaw gave him a youthfully beautiful appearance and he was no stranger to women’s attention. Usually, he could soothe any manner of female fits. Much to his chagrin, however, his brother’s betrothed had not fallen under his spell. As she fought him like a banshee, his enthusiasm waned and he backed off to let the rest of the group have a go at her. He was embarrassed she had not swooned at his feet but would not admit to it, not even to himself.

  Sir Nikolas de Nogaret was the next in line to deal with the hysterical lady. A tall man with blue ey
es and wide shoulders, he ended up with a black eye when the lady swung a broken chair leg at him. Sir Philip de Rou took over when Nik acquired the hit to his face; a slender, blonde man with a decidedly suave manner, Philip was as over-confident in his persuasive abilities as Hugh had been. The lady opened a door into his nose when he had chased her into a wardrobe and, in that gesture, damaged his fragile ego as well as his face.

  With two knights down, the final pair took over. Sir Andrew Catesby and his younger brother, Sir Edmund Catesby, were ten years apart in age. Andrew and Davyss had fostered together and were the closest of friends.

  Cool, calm, and exceedingly collected, Andrew stepped over Philip’s prostrate form on his way to corral the lady and was met by a flying taper. Her aim had been true and almost put his eye out. Edmund, young and newly knighted, tucked in behind his older brother and used him as a shield. When the brothers finally cornered her in her father’s chamber, it had been Edmund who had taken the glory of finally subduing her.

  Victory was attained for the moment but there was more bedlam to come. Carting her, bound and gagged, to Breckland Priory had been no easy feat. Though small, she was oddly strong. The men didn’t want to injure her but the woman struggled like a wildcat. They were frankly astonished at the resistance they met and tried not to look like vicious brutes as they carried her through the town. She screamed and fought as if they were taking her to be hanged. The entire berg turned out to watch and their procession transformed into a bizarre parade, with knights on foot carrying a reluctant captive.