“Are you the legendary Sir David of Radcliffe?”
A woman’s melodious voice broke his stupor and a toe prodded him in the middle of his back. Cautiously, David opened his eyes a slit. Tall yellow trees flooded his vision. Then he blinked, and the trees transformed themselves into straw spread on the floor around his head.
Groaning, he remembered. Sybil’s alehouse. A morning spent deep in a foaming cup. Then blessed, drunken oblivion.
He closed his eyes again. This was just where he wanted to be.
“I repeat myself. Are you the legendary Sir David of Radcliffe?” The lady’s voice lowered in disdain. “Or are you dead?”
This query came accompanied by a kick in the ribs, and before he could stop himself, he flipped over and grabbed the slippered foot in one smooth motion. “I’m not dead yet. But you will be if you don’t stop kicking me.”
The slender, white form above him didn’t shriek or flail her arms or gasp in fear. She simply shifted her weight to maintain her balance and signaled to halt the rush of the two men who guarded the door. Muttering and glaring, the burly fellows retreated, and when they had returned to their posts, the woman repeated patiently, “Are you Sir David of Radcliffe?”
He must be losing his touch. He didn’t even frighten her. His grip tightened, then he released it. Bringing his hands to his face, he rubbed them over his throbbing forehead. By the saints, even his hair hurt. “If I say aye, will you go away?”
As relentless as the famine which had destroyed his dreams, she asked, “Are you David of Radcliffe, the king’s own champion?”
Fury roared through him, sudden and cleansing as a storm across the Irish Sea. He found himself on his feet, shouting right in her face. “Not anymore!”
She considered him without flinching, her cool eyes as gray as a wash of winter fog. “You’re no longer Sir David, or you’re no longer the king’s champion?”
Clutching the scraggly locks at his forehead, he groaned and staggered backward, collapsing onto a bench. This woman could drive him mad. “No longer the king’s champion.”
“But you are the legendary mercenary who rescued our sovereign when the French pulled him off his horse; who kept a dozen knights at bay while the king remounted and escaped?”
“Fifteen.”
“What?”
“Fifteen knights at bay.” Moving slowly, each muscle aching from the effort, he leaned back until the table supported his back. With painful precision, he lifted his arms and laid them on the boards behind. Straightening out his knees, he dug his heels into the dirt and straw on the floor, slouched down on his spine, and examined his tormentor.
She was tall. He would wager she could stand flat-footed and stare down at the king’s widening bald spot. She was delicate. He doubted her fair skin had ever glimpsed the sun, or her slender fingers performed hard labor. And she was rich. Her white velvet gown molded her curves with a loving touch, and the white fur which trimmed the neckline and the long tight sleeves must be worth more than his entire estate.
Bitterly, he once more tasted defeat. Everything he’d worked for, all his life, had turned to ashes, and now disaster stared him full in the face. His daughter would suffer. His people would starve. And he couldn’t save them. The legendary mercenary David of Radcliffe had fallen at last.
His chin sank onto his chest and he examined his toes. His breath rasped painfully in his chest and brought the memory of childhood tears abruptly to mind.
“I have a proposition for you, if you are Sir David of Radcliffe,” the lady said.
Did she never give up? Blinking to clear his eyes, he admitted, “Oh, in sooth, I am David.”
“Very good.” Signaling Sybil, that slattern of an alewife, she ordered two brews, then seated herself on the bench at another table. “I have need of a mercenary.”
“For what?”
“I’ll be satisfied with nothing less than the best.” The noble lady accepted a full horn cup and stared into its dark depths.
“What would my duties be?” He reached for the cup Sybil held, but she snatched it back.
“Ye’ll pay yer bill afore ye get more,” she said.
“You’ll give me more before I pay my bill.”
Sybil sneered. “Or what?”
Pretending amusement, he grinned into her ugly face. “Or I’ll not drink here anymore.”
The men-at-arms who guarded the door chortled, and Sybil flushed with fury. Quick as a snake, she splashed the contents of the horn in his face.
Wiping the ale away, he observed her hasty retreat. She’d gone too far, and she realized it. Women, even free women who owned their own inns, could not treat a knightly baron with such disrespect. He rose and stalked toward her.
“Good sir, I beg yer pardon,” she cried when he towered over her and grabbed her wrist. “Me wicked temper’s ever gettin’ th’ better o’ me. Please, sir, don’t hurt me. Don’t hurt me. I’m just a poor old woman wit’ a child t’ support.”
He hesitated.
Sensing weakness, she added, “A girl child.”
Disgusted with himself, he freed her and leaned close to her face.
“A wee girl.”
Her high-pitched whining made his head throb. “Just get me an ale, and hurry.”
“Aye, sir.” She bobbed a curtsy. “Now, sir.”
He turned away and took two steps before he heard her mutter, “Gutless arse.”
He whipped around, but before he could take her by the shoulders and shake her, the lady grabbed a hank of Sybil’s hair, forcing the alewife to her knees. “You’ll learn respect for your betters, good woman, or you’ll explain yourself at the hallmote.”
Sybil whimpered. “I didn’t know ye favored him.”
That wisp of insolence made David want to slap her, but the lady answered calmly enough. “The king favors him. That should be enough for the likes of you.”
Sybil opened her mouth to refute that statement, but she saw something in the lady’s face which stopped her. Instead she touched her forehead to the floor. When she came up, dirt blotted her skin. “Aye, m’lady. As ye say, m’lady. It’s just hard fer a poor widow t’ see bread snatched from her child’s mouth by a worthless ol’ mercenary wit’ a taste fer ale.”
Coldly, the lady answered. “I have gold with which to pay.”
Both the alewife and the mercenary stared.
“Gold.” She jingled the purse at her side. “I’ll pay his bill.” She looked him in the eye. “I’ll pay your fee.”
The promise of gold spoke to David as nothing else could. It spoke to the alewife, too, it seemed, for she rose and scurried off toward the pot which bubbled at the fire in the middle of the room. “If we don’t conclude our business soon,” David warned, “she’ll offer a bowl of her pottage, and a gruesome feast that is.” He looked again at the lady, noting how the determined set of her chin ruined the almost perfect oval of her face. She was not the delicate flower she had at first appeared, and it occurred to him to question why she sought him alone, without the help of her spouse or family. Because it was his nature to be suspicious, he wondered if she wished to use him in a clan dispute. “What is it you want?” he demanded bluntly.
“Protection.”
“For what? Your lands? Your castle?”
“Myself.”
Furious that the gold so quickly slipped away, he said, “I’ll not intercede between you and your husband.”
“I did not ask you to.”
“From whom else would a woman like you need asylum? Your mate will protect you from all the rest.”
She folded her hands together at her waist. “I am a widow.”
His gaze skimmed her again, and abruptly he understood what she wanted him to know. “A rich widow.”
“Precisely.”
“A new-made widow?”
“Are you interested in the job?”
Her very answer rebuked his curiosity, but he didn’t care. “Have you got an inopportune suitor?” he guessed.
She just stared, eyes gray as flint.
So she wouldn’t tell him what he wanted to know. Fine. He’d find out what he wanted soon enough. No woman ever kept a secret, and this one, for all her poise, was very much a woman. He rubbed the stubble on his cheek, and dirt from the floor flaked off into his palm. Carelessly he wiped his hand on his hose. “I am a legend, and legends come dear.”
“I’ll take nothing less,” she answered.
He named the exorbitant sum of three pounds of English money.
She nodded.
“Every month,” he added hastily.
“That is fair.”
Again he examined her. He hadn’t previously thought her a fool, but he should have known. All women were fools—but so were men who imagined they could collect such wages on the strength of a vanished reputation.
“One month in advance.”
Opening her purse, she counted out the gold and held it before his eyes. “Is this sufficient guarantee of my good intentions?”
But if she didn’t know, why should he tell her? She dressed well, she treated him as if he were a worm, she had guards who eyed her protectively…aye, she was wealthy, so what was the harm in shearing just a little of that fleece which cushioned her?
Cautiously, he wrapped his fingers around the money, trapping it and her hand. He felt the delicate flesh and the chill of the gold. He thought how easily he could break her and how much he needed that money.
Snatching his hand away, he polished the sensations from his palm as if that would polish away any deception. “I’m not the man you want.” He started for the door just as Sybil arriving holding steaming bowls, and he took a particular pleasure in brushing past her.
“Hey!” Sybil squawked. “Come back ’ere. M’lady, I require payment.”
“Pay her, Gunnewate,” the lady commanded from behind him, and one of her men-at-arms reached for his purse as the other stretched out an arm and blocked the exit.
David stopped and contemplated the arm, then the massive fellow to whom it belonged. “Move, or I’ll move you.”
The man-at-arms didn’t stir. David threatened him with a straight and evil stare. The man stared back, jutting his chin. David placed his hand on the hilt of his knife. The man drew his blade. David stepped back to make room for the fight.
Then the lady said, “Let him go, Ivo.”
Without a sign of regret or relief, without hurry or distress, Ivo brought his beefy arm back to his side and left the way open for David to leave.
David couldn’t believe it. The big oaf submitted, not under the menace of David’s blade, but under the threat of a woman’s scolding. It wasn’t respect for a mercenary legend that made Ivo obey, but a single word from his mistress. Stepping close to him, David measured himself against Ivo’s chest. Ivo was taller, broader, younger, in every way David’s physical superior. Speaking into his face, David said, “Arrant coward.”
Ivo flinched under the blast of stale, ale-laden breath, and he sneered. “Poltroon.” Then he bowed his head and slipped backward along the wall.
Resentment cramped David’s gut. He could have used the combat. He needed to take out his hostility on somebody. Instead he marched through the door, prepared to storm off and leave this farce behind.
Instead the sunlight hit him and he staggered. Damn, it was bright. Bright and unseasonably hot, just as it had been for the last two years. The drought. The damned drought had driven him from his home. Would it never end?
The rays beat into his brain through his eyes, and even when he closed them, the lids proved inadequate protection. Clutching his face, he leaned against the wall and mumbled, “Bloody ale.”
“It is not the ale, but your excessive intake that is at fault.” The lady’s precise voice ground at his nerves like a grindstone against Toledo steel.
Bravely, he opened his eyes and shielded them from the sunlight with his hands. “Who are you?”
“I am Alisoun, countess of George’s Cross.”
She had appeared fair in the dim light of the inn, but now she positively glowed. White gown, fair skin—and were those freckles that marched across her nose? He squinted. Aye, definitely freckles—in defiance, no doubt, of Lady Alisoun’s desire. It cheered him to think something escaped the lady’s mandate.
Persistent as David’s daughter and almost as fearless, Lady Alisoun asked, “Are you not Sir David of Radcliffe?”
“I told you I was, and I didn’t lie about that. I told you I was no longer the king’s champion, and I didn’t lie about that either.” He turned away, ashamed, not wanting to see the contempt on her face. “’Tis the king’s champion you wish to hire, my lady, not me.”
“You have truly lost the title?” Surprise lifted her voice from the deep richness which had marked it before to a more normal woman’s tone. “When did this occur?”
“This morning.” His stomach roiled as he remembered. “On the tourney field. The legendary David of Radcliffe fell in defeat.”
She was silent for so long, he looked back at her.
At last she said, “’Tis tragic that you failed just when I have need of you, but I need a legend, not a one-time hero. I want you.”
In a voice harsh with pain, he said, “By the saints, woman, don’t you see? I’m not the man I once was. Every fledgling knight in Lancaster has challenged me these last days just to brag they fought the greatest mercenary of our times. I defeated every one of them—beardless boys with more bravado than sense. But when I came up against a seasoned knight, I lost.”
She excused him. “Your other trials exhausted you.”
He paid her no heed. “I suffered abject, humiliating defeat.”
She caught his hand and opened it, then placed the coins in it and closed his fingers around them. “Here are your first moon’s wages. The innkeeper has been paid as well. Should you decide to accept my employment, I’m at the Crowing Cock Inn. Be there by dawn.”
“M’lady,” her man Gunnewate remonstrated. “Ye can’t give a scoundrel money like that and think ye’ll see him return!”
David glared, wanting to kill him for his insolence, and realized he could see better now. Glancing up at the sky, he saw clouds gathering. Blessed, blessed clouds, here to break the drought.
Lady Alisoun noticed them, too, and demanded her wooden shoes from Ivo. Lumbering like a trained bear, Ivo brought them and went down on one knee to place them over her leather slippers. Answering Gunnewate, Lady Alisoun said, “He is the legendary David of Radcliffe. He shall not disappoint me.”
Sir David had better not disappoint her. If he did, this whole wretched journey and uncomfortable visit had been in vain, and she would have to return to George’s Cross bringing little more than a rainstorm.
Without expression, Alisoun observed King Henry III hold court in the great hall of Lancaster Castle just as he had done every morning since he’d traveled north. Patiently, she waited for her chance to present her petition, all the while trying to ignore the presence of Osbern, duke of Framlingford, the king’s cousin and her most dreaded enemy.
Osbern didn’t make it easy. He watched her with a smirk. Anyone who didn’t know them would believe them to be lovers. Certainly Osbern had taken care to represent them as such, and his power and influence were such that her dignified haughtiness only fed the rumors.
After all, she was the widow Alisoun of George’s Cross, powerful and influential in her own way. Never mind that Osbern’s wife had been her best friend, and that her unexplained disappearance still created gossip. When coupled with Osbern’s insinuations and his rather spectacular masculine beauty, Alisoun’s extended sojourn as a single woman created speculation and made her long for the safety of home.
Now she could go, for David would fulfill his duty. He had to, for he was the legendary mercenary. He even looked the part. His rangy form and grace proclaimed his strength. The threads of gray in his dark hair proclaimed his experience. Hard heavy brows lent a severity to his expression, and his eyes had seen much. Yet his mouth saved him from the ruthlessness of most mercenaries. He grinned, he grimaced, he pursed his lips in avarice. Every thought that crossed his mind, he expressed with his mouth, and without saying a word.
She liked his mouth.
Seeing that King Henry had finished with the lesser folk, Alisoun stepped forward and curtsied. Not too deeply, for her family’s bloodlines were no less ancient and noble than his, but a modest, respectable curtsy.
Hale at forty-five, with a superficial charm that covered his capricious nature, King Henry responded with a nod. “Lady Alisoun, how good to see you at our court again. You attend every morning, flattering us with your attention. Have you some instructions to share this day?”
He had a distasteful inclination toward sarcasm, especially with her. She didn’t understand or like it, for she knew full well an unhappy monarch could create problems for her and the lands which she held in her custody. So she smiled with constrained charm and said, “I take my instructions from you, my liege—”
He snorted.
“—And have only a humble request.” He looked her over critically, and she was glad she had worn her best scarlet velvet for this interview. It weighed on her like a knight’s armor, keeping her safe with its bulk and brazen beauty.
“What request is that?”
“I wish to retire from your most gracious court and return to my duties at George’s Cross. I have been away too long, basking in the sun of your presence.”
He cocked his head and examined her. “You are getting rather freckled.”
Laughter rippled through the courtiers.
“I was already freckled,” she replied.
Laughter grew and the king dropped his head as if in despair.
She stared at him, and then, in confusion asked, “My liege? Have I displeased you?”
“Never mind. Never mind. So you wish to withdraw, do you? Is there nothing you wish to take back to George’s Cross with you?”
Wetting her lips, she tried to appear unaware of his meaning. “What would that be?”
“A husband, of course.” His arm swept the great hall, indicating the courtiers who lined the walls.
Her heart sank. King Henry was mad for marriage. He had used it as a diplomatic coup, uniting England with Provence in his marriage. He used it on lesser nobility, too, to advance his cause within the kingdom and out of it. Those successes gave him an immodest estimation of his own good sense—a good sense he had not proved in his rule of England nor in his choice of grooms for her. Now she dwelled at court, renewing the appetites of the men for her wealth and the appetite of the king for an alliance.
Henry persisted, “You see here the flowers of my kingdom, the best of England, Normandy, Poitou, France. Is there not one here who fulfills your demands?”
She could scarcely say that they did not, and so she protested, “My requirements are reasonable, my lord. Surely you agree to that.”
He held up three fingers and counted them down. “Wealth, bloodlines, and responsibility. Isn’t that right?”
Her throat caught in dismay at the way he beamed in triumph, but she cleared it and answered, “That is correct.”
“Then I have a suitor for you.”
He had caught her unprepared. “That’s impossible! I’ve been to court every day, watching to see who might petition to wed me, and—”
“Is that why you’ve been here?” He looked down at his hand, clenched in a fist. “To give me guidance, should any man dare?”
She didn’t like this. She didn’t like the king’s attitude nor Osbern’s superior leer. Someone had been whispering malicious rumors in the king’s ear, and she knew the culprit. An importune pang of longing for George’s Cross struck her like hunger for a wholesome broth after a diet of sweetmeats, but she fought it away. The solemn facade she’d created after so much youthful training remained in place, and she said, “I would not dream of offering you my advice. I am only a lowly woman, and you are the king of England.”
“You do remember,” he said. “Then listen well, Alisoun of George’s Cross. For husband, I give you Simon, earl of Goodney. Can you think of a more suitable mate?”
Unfortunately, she couldn’t. Simon of Goodney carried his nobility, his wealth, and his responsibilities well. A distinguished man and a recent widower, Lord Simon held lands in Poitou where the king wished to strengthen his ties.
She’d been paired with him at the table. She’d listened to his nasal voice. Her stomach had churned when he’d breathed and chewed through his open mouth. She’d seen the food which encrusted his eating knife. And she’d dirtied her eating knife with a drop of his blood when he’d groped her breast with his filthy fingers.
Nevertheless, she knew where her duty lay. Regardless of her feelings, she had to protect George’s Cross, and a husband would be an asset. More, this precarious and dangerous situation which plagued her would surely vanish in a husband’s custody.
But a husband would also increase the possibility of discovery and the chance she would be unable to fulfill her vow. Dread ran in her veins, but, God help her, she could see no relief from her dilemma. “The earl of Goodney is indeed a fitting husband for me, and I thank you for consideration.”
“Does that mean you’ll not chase him away?” the king demanded.
“Chase him away? I do not understand.”
“Five men I’ve sent to you.” King Henry struck the arm of his chair. “Five! And not one has been able to withstand your lashing tongue.” When she would have spoken, he pointed his finger into her face. “One even went on Crusade and never returned.”
“He was not worthy.”
“And the other four?”
“They were not worthy, either.” When he would have spoken, she swept over his objection. “My liege, I am no green stalk of wheat who wavers in the contrary breeze.”
He seemed to ponder that. “That’s true. You’re more like a stalk of yellow wheat stiff with overripe grains.”
“Exactly.” She congratulated him on his apt simile, then frowned at the stifled giggles that sounded from the crowd. What did the foolish creatures find so amusing?
“How old are you now?” Osbern slipped the question in like a thin knife through her ribs.
She ignored him. It was rude of him to step between her and the king in their conversation. Rude, typical and…menacing.
“She’s twenty-six.” King Henry answered for her. “The oldest widowed virgin in England, and probably the Continent.”
Charm oozed from Osbern’s dashing figure, giving him a sheen most men envied. His short dark hair shone almost purple, like a blackbird’s wing. His blue eyes blazed with the heat of interest. His sleek body rippled with muscle when he moved, and when he smiled at Alisoun.
Dear Lord, how she hated him. Hated him, and feared him.
“Not still a virgin, surely,” he said.
King Henry froze, then turned slowly to face his cousin. “Do you have personal knowledge of this?”
In that drawling, detestable tone, he said, “Personal knowledge of the Lady Alisoun would be—”
“Death.” King Henry interrupted. “I would kill the man who claimed to have deflowered the finest example of English womanhood.”
Osbern didn’t move. Only his eyes moved, flicking from King Henry to Alisoun and back again, and she saw realization dawn. His desire to insult and implicate her had taken him beyond the bounds of courtesy and into the realm of royal displeasure. He might be Henry’s elder by five years, but Henry was the king and now Osbern would have to scrape. With the grace that characterized his every movement, he swept a bow to Alisoun, a bow that somehow included King Henry and the whole court. “No doubt the Lady Alisoun is yet fit to bear the very symbols of purity which distinguish the Virgin Mary herself, and I would fight the man who insinuated otherwise.”
King Henry seemed to accept the apology, but Alisoun did not. How could she? She had guarded her reputation and her virtue as a sacred trust, and her name would now be on the lips of the gossips because of one short visit to the court. A mere apology could not wipe the stain away.
But she had been too well trained to waste time mourning what couldn’t be mended. Instead, she answered the king. “Five men you have ordered me to wed, my liege, but I am a mature woman with simple requirements of my spouse, requirements which have not wavered through the years of my widowhood. I am a noblewoman of royal descent, so my husband must be noble. My wealth is considerable, so my husband must noble. My wealth is considerable, so my husband must be wealthy. I am responsible and dedicated to maintaining my wealth and position, so my husband must be equally dutiful. I tested those men who were noble and wealthy to see if they could be molded into fit and responsible mates. Invariably, they fled, but Simon, earl of Goodney will show his nobility by his consistency. I thank you, my liege, for—”
Running footsteps interrupted her. Before Alisoun could see him, she could hear him—Simon of Goodney, shouting in nasal tones, “Stop. My liege, stop! I refuse! I will not marry that woman.”