The damned witless woman had left without him.
David stood in the common room of the Crowing Cock Inn, cursing all women and Alisoun of George’s Cross in particular. He’d learned from his wife what idiots they were, but yesterday Alisoun had behaved like an average, rational person. Like a man.
Now here he stood with her money in his pocket and no way to deliver his services.
Well, if she didn’t want him, he wasn’t going to chase after her. True, she’d said dawn, and some might even say the sun was now approaching its zenith. But Lady Alisoun ought to realize that when a man drank as much as he had the day before, it would take time to sleep it off. Aye, how could he attend the silly woman with a head that ached and a stomach that rebelled? He’d been doing her a favor by hugging his pillow this morning. Furious, he swung his leg over the bench by a table and bellowed, “Bread!”
A girl scurried to do his bidding while her innkeeper-father watched with approval. “Will ye be needing more than bread?” the man asked. “We have a hearty venison stew.”
David looked around the Crowing Cock Inn. No dark, louse-ridden inn would do for Lady Alisoun. She stayed with the best and no doubt thought she deserved it. “Aye,” he snarled. “I’ll have a bowl, and some fine cheese as well.”
“At once, sir.” The innkeeper himself brought the cheese while the girl presented the bowl. The innkeeper examined David. “Godric, master of this house, at yer service. Ye’re Sir David of Radcliffe.”
Ah, they still remembered him in the streets. David preened until Godric added, “Ye’re Lady Alisoun’s mercenary, are ye not?”
David stopped his spoon just inches from his open lips. “Lady Alisoun’s mercenary?” He slammed the spoon onto the table and stood up. “Lady Alisoun’s mercenary? I’m my own man, and no woman owns me.” Glaring around him at the nearly empty common room, he saw the serving girl cower and Godric wring his hands.
“Of course, sir. Foolish of me, sir.”
“That’s better.” David started to sit, discovered halfway down he’d knocked the bench over when he’d stood, and barely caught himself before his arse hit the ground.
Godric raced up and settled the bench beneath David, all the while muttering, “Dreadful seat. Horribly unsturdy. Should have had it fixed.” He waited until David had inhaled several bites of the stew before he asked anxiously, “You won’t tell my lady Alisoun that I displeased ye, will ye?”
David wanted to spit the concoction at the stupid man. Then he faced the truth, swallowed and sighed. He’d been thrown out of lesser inns than this with just one look at his clothing. Godric should have done the same, or at the least demanded to see his coin before he served him. So it had to be Lady Alisoun’s influence. “Why’d she leave so early?” David asked gruffly.
Godric winced. “She didn’t show it, of course, but I believe my lady felt uncomfortable crossing the taproom yester evening. I tried to discourage the gossip, but the mortification must have been more than she could bear.” He nodded sagely. “What woman wouldn’t be chagrined?”
Obviously, Godric thought David held her confidence, and David hesitated to disillusion him. So he nodded back just as sagely and stuffed bread into his mouth.
“To be rejected so rudely!” Godric tutted. “And in front of all the court.”
Perking up at the thought of Lady Alisoun being taken down a peg, David chewed and swallowed. “And by whom? A nobody, that’s who.”
Startled, Godric protested, “I wouldn’t call him a nobody. Simon is earl of Goodney, with so much gold in his possession he has cobwebs over the coins, and he has a pedigree to make our sovereign blush. But that he should refuse King Henry’s order to wed the fair lady makes him nothing more than a pestilent knave.”
“By the saints.” David was awed. “Simon of Goodney refused her.” Godric flinched at David’s surprise, and David spoke hastily to ease his sudden suspicion. “I still can scarcely credit it, with him as thrifty as a Spaniard with a bottle of port.”
“Oh, aye.” Godric plucked the towel that hung from his belt and polished the table. “’Tis a fact well known among innkeepers.”
“What about her other suitor?” When Godric looked confused, David explained, “The one who plots to abduct her. Did you hear how he reacted to Simon’s disclaimer?”
“I hadn’t heard of Lady Alisoun’s other suitor.” Godric leaned closer. “Who is it?”
Good question, and one that Godric obviously couldn’t answer. David would have to find out another way. Acting virtuous, he said, “If it’s not common knowledge, mayhap my lady prefers to keep it that way.”
Disappointed, Godric drew back and David returned his attention to the bowl. Ever the clever innkeeper, Godric retreated to leave him at peace, and as David’s stomach filled, his honor twitched to life.
Lady Alisoun had given him gold coin. He had taken it, and she did have the right to name the time and place he should fulfill his obligation. By the sound of it, she might have waited for him if not for Simon of Goodney. He supposed he should roar with merriment that the lofty Lady Alisoun had been humiliated, but he’d had his own encounter with the great Lord Simon and knew the extent of his conceit. “In fact,” he murmured into the empty bowl, “if Simon of Goodney refused her, that’s a strike in her favor.”
“Quite right, Sir David.” Hovering close as David finished, Godric whisked the bowl away and presented a dish of water.
David looked at it suspiciously, but when Godric indicated he should wash his fingers, he did so. After all, he had learned manners when he’d been at court as the king’s champion. It had just been long since he’d had to utilize them.
Godric handed him a towel. “One must suppose she is too fine for the likes of him.”
Rising much refreshed, David scratched at his belly and stretched. “Have your stable boys bring my destrier. I’ll ride after Lady Alisoun now.”
“She’ll be well protected with you at her side.”
Godric’s flattened, outthrust palm appeared in the periphery of David’s vision, and David thrust a coin in it. Godric impressed David when he didn’t bite it to ascertain its authenticity, but slipped it into his purse where it clanked with its mates. Oh, to be able to stay at such an inn! To afford its luxuries for his daughter! He coveted Lady Alisoun’s privileges, coveted them mightily.
Godric said, “I worried when she left with those carts, laden as they were with the purchases she had made, but your presence will set my mind at ease.”
“How many carts?” David asked.
“Three.”
“Three!”
Godric peered at him. “Lady Alisoun is efficient. She combined her homage to the king with her twice-yearly buying trip.”
David shook his head. “Women.”
Godric straightened and for the first time exhibited a little manly impatience. “Aye. Women.”
In the yard of the inn, two boys clung to the stallion’s reins while Louis tossed his head. One of them went flying and the other’s eyes grew big as he rode the leather strap. David caught the reins in his own grip and brought the warhorse to a standstill. The still-clinging stable boy dropped to the ground like a flea off a dog while the other scrambled out of the dirt and harm’s way.
Looking up into Louis’s magnificent face, David explained, “We have to join Lady Alisoun.”
With his normal good sense, Louis tossed his head and neighed, then tried to leap backward. David hung onto the reins and swore, taking his bad temper out on the horse with the comfortable security of knowing that the horse would return the favor.
King Louis hadn’t always been so capricious. In his younger days, the massive white stallion had been part of the legend of David. Unfledged knights related the story of how David had named his destrier after the French king, which so enraged the English-bred animal he had battled to establish his good standing and thus secured in the annals of history.
But six years of relative inactivity had left him with the attitude that tournament and combat were for younger horses. He wanted the comforts of his own stall. He preferred to have his personal stableboys caring for him, and he resented being called to duty when he should be lauded for his past glories.
All in all, Louis had much in common with his master.
Since David had ridden him to Lancaster, Louis showed his hostility by refusing to be mastered even by the one he adored. David had tried reasoning with him, but most of the time both of them had resorted to brute force.
Like now. David whacked Louis on the shoulder. Louis caught him a glancing blow to the shin. David’s high, heavy leather boot protected him from serious injury, but he swore and danced around while Louis bared his teeth in a grin. Then, satisfied, the stallion allowed David on his back. With a wave at Godric, David rode Louis north toward George’s Cross.
David knew the well-traveled road. How could he not? George’s Cross was considered the last bastion of civilization in the wilderness of fells and woods on the Irish Sea. His beloved Radcliffe was beyond that civilization, and David had had to ride through George’s Cross on his way south to Lancaster. Fishermen, sheep, and merchants had mingled in the prosperous hamlet. He had looked—he looked hard—but saw little evidence of the two-year drought which had wiped him out. Perhaps the drought had been less virulent farther south; perhaps the people of George’s Cross had had a cushion of plenty on which to fall back. He was glad to be going there, but at the same time envy gnawed at him.
Lady Alisoun had inherited George’s Cross and other estates from her parents, then inherited the dower’s portion of her husband’s estates when he died. David hadn’t inherited anything from his parents but an old shield and sword and an order to go out and make his way in the world, and while his wife had brought him his lands through the marriage settlement—a more whiny, frightened rabbit of a woman he’d never met. He’d suffered for every acre.
Now he was going to protect another whiny, frightened woman. True, yesterday she hadn’t seemed so, but she must be flighty or she’d have not left him chasing after her with a pocketful of her gold. When a man dipped deep into the well of ale, he didn’t leap to greet the day. She should understand that.
He remembered the austere, emotionless features she’d displayed the day before.
Then again, she wouldn’t understand. Maybe a woman like her was used to being obeyed. Maybe a woman like her…by the saints, he didn’t want to work for a woman like her. He just wanted to ride through George’s Cross and on to Radcliffe Castle, where his daughter and his people waited. He shuddered briefly as he fought the need to see Bert’s thin face light up when she saw her daddy. Louis, too, shuddered as if he comprehended, and picked up his pace. “Nay, good fellow,” David said aloud. “We’ve got a bargain to keep, even if we have to chase after the frivolous wimple-wearer to keep it.”
Louis sighed, a long, horsey exhalation, then lifted his head and neighed. A neigh answered him, and David realized that over the next hill someone else journeyed—Lady Alisoun and her escort, he hoped. But if he was unlucky, it would be road robbers, and he’d have to smash them to perdition. Loosening his sword from its scabbard, he grinned. He could use a good fight, especially one that he could win.
He placed his basinet helmet on his head, brought his shield forward, and leaned into the saddle. The big horse understood his desire and slipped into a canter. Louis might pretend to be surly, but his curiosity and confidence were as great as his master’s. Topping the rise, David saw not robbers but three heavily laden carts laboring along the wooded road. Massive oxen stirred up the summer’s dust as they strained to pull their loads. Their drivers walked beside their heads, poles in their hands. But nowhere did David see Lady Alisoun or her men-at-arms.
“Sweet mother of God!” Sure that calamity had found Lady Alisoun, he spurred Louis on and caught up to the carts just as they reached the ford of a brook. “Hey!” he shouted.
“Halt!” he heard from behind.
He twisted in the saddle and stared. In the shadow of the trees, two helmeted knights sat on their horses in battle-ready gear. One held a lance, one held a mace, and David’s heart sank. No doubt Lady Alisoun had already been robbed and murdered by these two renegade knights. God help him, he’d lost the moneyed goose before he’d grasped more than a few feathers. He eyed the sharp point of the lance. And if he wasn’t careful, he’d lose those feathers, too.
Without warning, he spurred Louis. The great horse leaped from full stop to full speed in the blink of an eye. David shrieked his war cry as he barreled between the two knights, knocking the lance holder to the ground with his shield and swinging his sword into empty air as the other ducked and yipped.
The expert assault David expected hadn’t materialized, and the momentum of his forward rush took him into the dense wood. “Idiots,” he growled, struggling to find a place to turn Louis. “They’re not knights. Must have stolen it all. Come on, Louis, we’ve got to—”
“Don’t.”
The woman’s voice stopped him in his tracks. He knew that voice. His ribs ached with the memory. “Lady Alisoun?”
The underbrush rustled and, calm as a nun, the lady stepped forward. “Sir David. I thought you had abandoned us.”
She was here. God in heaven, those were her carts, and she’d been in the hands of those villains for who knew how long. “Have they hurt you?” he demanded. Her slender beauty appeared unruffled. Her green velvet riding cloak fell in even folds from her shoulders, her hat curved over her head, and her draped wimple held it in place. Not a strand of hair slipped out of its restraint, and no tears marred the purity of her complexion. Nevertheless, guilt caught at David’s throat. If he’d gotten to the inn sooner…if he’d skipped the meal…if he’d ridden faster…God forgive him, he’d failed her. He knew full well what fate awaited her if he failed once more. “I’ll save you.”
“Save me from what?” She glanced toward the road.
He guided Louis in a tight circle.
“From Ivo and Gunnewate?” she asked.
He’d already prepared himself to charge when her words penetrated. “Ivo and…your men-at-arms?”
“The very same.” With the deliberation that marked all her movements, she disappeared again, then returned leading a palfrey. In a tone of censure, she asked, “Who else would guard me? You failed to arrive at dawn.”
“I failed to arrive at dawn,” he repeated calmly. Too calmly, if she had but known.
“When I give an order, I expect to have it obeyed. If you are going to be my man, David of Radcliffe, you must do as I say.”
He removed his gloves and urged Louis toward her at a walk. “So you left the Crowing Cock Inn to teach me a lesson?”
She hesitated, then inclined her head. “You might say I am not unhappy to have accomplished that, too.”
He tried to contain himself. He really did. But this…this woman had made him feel guilty. For nothing! She’d never been in danger. She’d been in command at all times, and he’d been charging around like a half-wit. “Me, a lesson? And if I were a thief and a murderer, my lady, who do you think would have learned that lesson?” She tried to speak, but he leaned far out of the saddle and caught her under the chin. Lifting her face, he glared down at her. “I just proved that a seasoned knight is more than a match for your puny bodyguards, and there are knights who prowl the roads. They would have taken your goods, killed your men, raped your body, and strung your intestines across a tree.” He let her go and shoved his hand back into his glove in one savage motion.
She touched her chin where the marks of his fingers showed on her fair skin. “I see.”
“Those men would make your fear of abduction by a suitor look tame. Next time you hire a mercenary, wait for him.”
“Aye, of course.”
“What would it have hurt you to wait? Or to send one of your servants for me?”
“It seems my judgment was at fault.” She mounted her palfrey, urged it toward him, and stopped at his side. Looking right into his eyes with her cool gray eyes, she said, “Forgive me, David of Radcliffe.”
As she moved toward the light of the road, he stared after her. She’d taken his rebuke so well! She’d weighed his complaint, analyzed his logic, and without making excuses, agreed that she’d acted foolishly. Then, just like that, she’d apologized, sincerely and pleasantly. He pursed his lips in a silent whistle. No wonder she hadn’t wed again. Every man in England must tremble when confronted with her sensible attitude, for she made it very difficult for a man to feel superior.
“Ivo,” she called. “Gunnewate! Pick yourselves up off the ground and let’s move along. If we’re to make George’s Cross in only four days, we’ll have to use every moment of sunlight.”
David rode out of the woods to see Ivo trying to hoist the armor-clad Gunnewate onto his feet. He guided Louis around the two men. The steel clanked, out-of-tune notes against the harmony of the forest.
“Hurry!” Alisoun clapped her hands lightly, her leather riding gloves muffling the sound. “The carts have gone ahead and as Sir David aptly demonstrated, we’re vulnerable to attack.”
Smiling, David lingered behind and told them, “Aye, you’d best hurry, my good fellows. The way you’re lolling around here, you’d think a knight’s armor weighs eight stone.” Setting Louis in motion, he called back, “It can’t weigh more than five.”
He chortled at the cursing he heard, then galloped ahead. Alisoun had reached the creeping carts and now moved along beside them, seeking the open road where the dust would not bother her. Following her, David spoke to her drivers as he passed them. The surly peasants stared as if they’d never heard a nobleman who could converse in their vulgar English language. He spoke again, wanting them to answer, knowing that in this possibly hazardous situation he might have use for their strength and their stout poles. Each tugged on their forelocks and muttered greetings, and he counted that brief communication as a success. Then he rode to join Alisoun and said, “My lady, your men-at-arms are not knights, so why do you let them cavort in knight’s armor?”
She cast him a troubled glance. “They do not carry the armor well, I know, but my chief knight, Sir Walter, remained behind at George’s Cross as a safeguard against whatever trouble might be brewing. Two of my mercenary knights, John of Beauchamp and Lothair of Hohenstaufen, accompanied me to Lancaster, but they spoke of receiving a better offer while in the town.” She lowered her voice. “Apparently, they accepted it, for they failed to return to the inn two days ago, and they took six of my men-at-arms with them.”
“That’s what you get for hiring a German mercenary. They’re an unsavory lot, good for nothing but slitting your throat while you sleep.” He ran a finger across his neck as an illustration. “But…John of Beauchamp? I’ve fought alongside John. He’s a good man. I can’t believe he’d abandon his pledged lady until he’d finished his obligation.”
“Yes.” She turned in the saddle and examined the carts as if she could protect them with her gaze. “So I thought, also.”
“Did you—” He hesitated. Did she search for John? How did a lady search for a mercenary? Visit the alehouses and lift every drunkard’s head? She’d done that with him, but—
“I sent Ivo to look for John and my men, but he heard a tale that they had all ridden for Wolston with their new master.” She shrugged, an elegant lift of the shoulders. “It’s difficult, sometimes, for a mercenary to take orders from a woman.”
“Aye.” David had sympathy for that, and he scratched the half-grown beard that prickled his skin. “So you dressed Ivo and Gunnewate up in armor. Where did you get the armor?”
“One suit is mine for one of the squires in my household. He’ll soon earn his spurs, and I outfit all the boys I have fostered.”
Impressed in spite of himself, David said, “That’s good of you.”
“The other…Ivo found it.” She watched the road intently. “It’s John’s.”
Pulling Louis in front of Alisoun’s horse, David grabbed the reins close to the palfrey’s mouth. They halted in the middle of the track, and he said, “There’s foul play.”
“So I suspect.”
“John would never leave his armor. Do you know what a full suit costs?”
“I just said I had purchased one.”
“It’s too expensive for a landless knight to abandon.”
“Much too expensive.”
The serenity of her expression never changed. Her demeanor never changed. She had all the vivacity of a stone statue on Ripon Cathedral, and he swore long and eloquently. “Don’t you care that a good man in your employ has probably been murdered?”
“’Tis a misdeed I deplore deeply, and I lit candles in his name, praying for his safe return and his soul, should it have departed this earth.” She controlled her horse easily, her gloved hands light on the reins. “What else would you have me do?”
He didn’t say it, but he thought, Wail a little. Wipe a tear from your eye. At the least, profess terror for your own safety. But that was stupid, and he knew it. He abhorred women who behaved so melodramatically, and he didn’t want to be saddled with one now.
“The carts will be on us if we don’t proceed,” Alisoun reminded him.
He released her horse and they moved along the road. It wound upward now, going deeper into the wilds of Northumbria. Englishmen spoke of this area—the looming Cumbrian Mountains, the wild strips of beach along the coast—as barren, frightful, forbidding. While it could be harsh, given to sudden fogs and ocean storms, it also gave great gifts to those who dared to challenge it. Lofty moors fed herds of sheep, the forest provided game and fuel, and the sea gave up its bounty on a regular basis. Until the drought, David had been adding comforts to his tiny castle, bringing new breeding stock in for his peasants. Now his crops were withered, his stock and his peasants dead or dying, his daughter…he couldn’t think of his daughter and her pinched cheeks.
“Why didn’t you hire someone else when your men disappeared?” he demanded.
She flashed him a look of disdain. “I thought I had.”
Gaining sympathy for the missing mercenaries, David wished again another post had presented itself. Still, he was lucky to have one at all, so he applied his equanimity with Herculean restraint. “I meant three days ago. True, you hired me, but surely even you can see that one knight is insufficient to defend three carts and a marriageable widow.”
“No other knights were available.”
He couldn’t believe she would use such a lame excuse. “No other knights? Lady, there are always younger sons, men who seek employment to fill their bellies lest they starve.” They reached the top of the rise, and he used the height to look both forward and back. “I know. I was one.”
“None were interested in coming to George’s Cross,” she answered steadily.
In a hurry to reclaim their positions as defenders of their mistress, Ivo and Gunnewate galloped up the road after the carts. David grinned, knowing how their defeat, especially to him, must eat at them. Satisfied that this stretch of road, at least, was safe, David turned back to Alisoun. “You must not have asked the right men.”
“Perhaps not.”
As before, her expression never changed, her voice retained its calm, low vibrancy, but somehow, he thought she was…worried? Afraid? Straightening, he studied her again. Why did he think such a thing? What had he seen? She met his gaze confidently, but her eyes…didn’t they have a sheen? Hadn’t the gray color darkened just a little?
And to think he’d longed for a woman who didn’t wail with every passing emotion. Comprehending this woman took concentration. He had to try and wiggle through the complex byways of her woman’s brain. That was a warrior’s nightmare, but she told him nothing, so he had to think.
Why would she be apprehensive? She’d lost her men, possibly through foul play. No other knight would hire on with her. Yet she paid well. He knew that from personal experience. He knew, too, that money, freely spread around, eased the sting of working for a woman.
Something wasn’t right. Only a very influential man could make it impossible for her to hire other mercenaries. Thoughtfully, he observed while she directed Ivo and Gunnewate to ride behind the carts and protect the rear, then instructed him to continue his surveillance.
She’d never admitted to having a suitor, and no shrewd man who sought a wealthy wife would put her on her guard by stealing and murdering her men one at a time. So perhaps his first surmise had been wrong.
“You must have offended a dread lord.” He waited for her to explain, knowing that women loved to talk about their troubles.
She ignored him.
He tried an unjust accusation. “You were probably flirting with him, then refused him. Women like to make men suffer like that.”
Glaring, she opened her mouth.
But some of his triumph must have shone through, for she shut it again and sealed her lips firmly.
Finally, he appealed to her good sense. “It would help if I knew how and why you were threatened. Are we likely to be overwhelmed by a large force?”
“Nay.” She gave up that information grudgingly. “If anything, there will be a small force, but usually this creature prefers to perform his deeds alone.”
“Has he tried to kill you?”
“If he wished to kill me I would be dead. Nay, this beast stalks for pleasure, to invoke fear and loathing.”
And she did loathe the man, whoever he was. That slight curl of the lip looked like blatant emotion on Alisoun’s still face, and David congratulated himself on reading her so well. “He’s doing a good job, in sooth, but I still want to know—”
She interrupted him. “Your job is to keep me safe, not to indulge in ineffectual speculation. If you must know more to properly perform your duties, then return the gold at once and be on your way.”
By Saint Michael’s arm, she was a cold and ruthless she-demon! But—he fingered the leather pouch which held the precious coins—for this money he would do as bid. At least for the moment.
Sarcastically, he pulled his forelock. “As you say, my lady. You are always right.”