Once a Knight

  She resented admitting her ignorance. He understood that. She was more than a little frightened, and he understood that, too. That explained why she lashed out at him, and he maintained his composure. “I don’t know for sure that you carry a babe, and to the best of my knowledge, I have no bastards on my estate. But with our nightly activities and the symptoms you’re displaying, it seems likely you’ll bear me a child before the first planting.”

  “Some women don’t bear children for years after they begin mating.”

  He grinned, he couldn’t help it. “A lusty planting in a fallow field, my lady.”

  “It’s not funny!”

  “I smile for joy, not because I’m amused. Making a child is a moment to celebrate.”

  “For you. Your job is done. Mine’s just begun.”

  He began to lose patience, although he’d had dealings with pregnant women before and well knew their uneasy temperaments. “It’s true that in these next few months you will indeed bear the burden, but a father’s duties do not end with conception.”

  “Yours do.”

  Her cruelty struck at him like a well-aimed blow. He took a quick breath and let it out slowly. “I know you had originally thought to raise my babe alone, but surely you’ve seen the error of your plan.”

  “What error? There is no error.”

  “Do you deny the pleasure we find in each other’s company? Not just in the bed, but in the evening when we speak together?”

  “Do you think I should take a husband based on the pleasure of his conversation? I’ve lived alone for a long time, and no one treats me like an equal except you. No one dares argue with me because I’m the lady and have a sharp tongue. Now a crude mercenary sits at my table and tells me what he thinks of me, my management, and of our world without constantly bowing to my superior status.”

  Her tongue lashed him, and he fought his resentment. “I didn’t realize I offended you.”

  “You don’t offend me.” She rose to her feet slowly, walking her hands up the tree trunk behind her. “I enjoy it. It’s a powerful enchantment, this companionship, and you’ve used it to destroy the efficient functioning of my mind.”

  She’d as good as labeled him a wizard. Incredulously, he said, “It’s called honesty, my lady, and if you’ve been so seldom exposed to it you call it enchantment, I pity you.”

  “Pity me? You envy me. You want to marry me. You want to use this child to control my…my twelve sacks of wool. To control my life!”

  “Your money? Your life?” She confused him. She infuriated him. Didn’t she know what was important? “This is a babe we’re talking about. I do want to marry you, and I know you said—”

  “I said I wouldn’t, and I never change my mind.”

  Her eyes were gray as flint, and just as hard and cold, and he lost control of his temper. After all, he’d failed in the greatest gamble of his life. “You said you wouldn’t, but when I covered you at night, I thought I’d found a woman, the true woman that you were. I was mistaken. You used me just as I use Louis to cover a mare, and now my duties are accomplished.”

  “You don’t have to wait for accounting day.” She scrambled for her keys and shook the one which opened her strongbox at him. “I’ll give you the gold at once.”

  “Double the gold.” He could hurt her, too. “Gold for being your mercenary, and gold for being your stud.”

  “I’ll send Eudo with it and you can be gone.”

  “Send Eudo with half of it. Keep the other half for my son, and tell him it is his patrimony, to be used anytime he wishes, to travel to Radcliffe and be with me, his father.” Tapping his finger on his chest, he said, “You might be able to keep my child from me, but you can’t take that. I am his father and always will be.”

  “Be gone with you, then.”

  “I wouldn’t stay if you begged me.”

  They stood facing each other, panting, as if they’d run a race and exhausted all their energy. Alisoun’s wimple sat cocked on her head, her cheeks flamed, and she smelled of brimstone. He didn’t look much better, he supposed, and he knew one brief moment of chagrin, one moment of wanting her last glimpse of him to be Sir David of Radcliffe, the legendary mercenary.

  Instead, anger and hurt had stripped him of all pretense. She tossed her head and strode away, putting as much distance between them as quickly as she could. He whirled and stormed in the opposite direction.

  He’d gone only a short distance before conscience brought him to a halt.

  He couldn’t leave her to navigate the woods alone. His month of stewardship hadn’t ended yet. Quietly, so she wouldn’t notice and draw false conclusions, he followed her through the woods, where he halted in the shadow of the trees. From there he watched her walk across the clearing and into the stream of people moving from the village to the castle.

  She never looked back.

  And he didn’t care. With a curse, he punched both fists into a tree trunk, then grabbed his scraped and aching knuckles and swore ever louder. Damn the woman! She had him doing stupid things for stupid reasons. He stomped back into the woods, sucking his bleeding wounds. He hadn’t meant to lose his temper, but by Saint Michael’s arms, he’d not return and beg her pardon when she’d been the one who insisted on following her asinine plans. He circled through the trees. Aye, she’d warned him, but he’d thought she’d see the good sense of marrying him. He’d thought she was an intelligent woman. He should have realized those two terms were mutually exclusive. When a man—

  “God…”

  David stopped and cocked his head. That sounded like an animal in pain.

  “Saint…John help…”

  An animal who groaned. An animal with a vocabulary. His senses suddenly went on the alert. He scanned the area, noting broken branches on the underbrush and a dribble of some dark substance marking the leaves. He leaned closer.

  Blood. His earlier itch returned, the sense of being watched, and he glanced around at the green enclave. He could see no one, but that broken voice called again.

  “Help…please.”

  Determined, wary, he followed the dark speckled trail. The sound of labored breathing grew louder. Then he saw him. Sir Walter. A bloody wound where his mouth should be. Eyes swollen shut. Leg bones cocked at an ungainly angle.

  “By Goddes corpus!” David leaped over the barrier of bushes and knelt at the battered man’s side. “What happened?”

  Sir Walter lisped, “David?”

  “Aye, it’s me.” David grimly ran his hands over Sir Walter, seeking more injuries and finding them. “I need to get help.”

  “Nay!” Sir Walter clawed at David’s arm. “Help.”

  David glanced around.

  “Help,” Sir Walter insisted.

  David understood. If he left Sir Walter, what would be left when he returned with assistance? Carefully he reached around the stocky man and hoisted him onto his shoulders. Sir Walter didn’t make a sound, making David respect him for his fortitude. Standing up slowly, David adjusted Sir Walter’s weight to ease his suffering.

  Then Sir Walter moaned in a burst of pain. Or David thought it was pain until he caught the name.

  “Alisoun.”

  And David grasped the fact that someone had attacked Sir Walter and beat him brutally. If that someone would do that to a seasoned warrior, what could he do to a woman alone?

  “Alisoun,” he whispered. Where was Alisoun? She’d been headed into the castle when last he’d seen her, but had she continued on her way? He started jogging.

  Sir Walter gasped for breath as if he were dying, but when David slowed, he urged, “Go…on.”

  They broke free of the forest and into the cleared area around the castle. Villeins from George’s Cross and strangers visiting the market walked the road from the village to the castle. They gaped at the mercenary and his gory burden, swerving aside to avoid him, but David paid them no heed. Heading straight across the drawbridge, he bellowed, “Lady Alisoun. Where’s Lady Alisoun?” br />
  No one answered at first. The servants stood transfixed as he hurried on into the inner bailey and toward the keep. “Did she come back? Where’s Lady Alisoun?”

  Two women stood on the landing of the steps, and he shouted, “You stupid cows! Where’s your mistress?”

  “I’m here.” Alisoun spoke from the door of the dairy, and David swerved that direction. She looked as cool as the first time he’d met her, and her gaze was as cold as a winter’s breeze. In a voice that should have frozen the marrow in his bones, she began, “How dare you return after…?” Then her eyes widened, and she gasped in horror. “God his soul bless, ’tis Sir Walter.” Without pause, she ran for the keep, calling, “Get out my medical supplies! Warm water and blankets. Prepare the solar, we’ll put him there.” She returned to David and reached out a gentle hand to Sir Walter. She touched his head lightly and spoke to him with a caress in her very tone. “Good Sir Walter, who did this to you?”

  Sir Walter didn’t answer. Only David felt the sigh of relief that shuddered through the grizzled warrior and turned his body from an anguished sack to an comatose burden.

  When Sir Walter didn’t answer, Alisoun took her hand away and smeared the blood between her fingers. “Carry him upstairs,” she told David. “Let me work on him before he regains consciousness.”

  His burden dragged at him as he climbed the stairs to the keep. The women had disappeared, and the corridor inside seemed miraculously clear of obstacles. A few moments ago he’d thought never to see this great hall again, now he barely glanced around as he headed for the solar. Someone held the door open, and hands assisted him as he lowered the unconscious man onto the mattress. Then Alisoun pushed him back, and he moved to the far corner of the bed where he could be out of the way, yet watch the proceedings.

  He didn’t enjoy them, especially not when Alisoun set first the bone in one leg, then the bone in the other. Menservants had to hold the now-conscious Sir Walter, and the screams drove mighty Hugh from the chamber to empty his gut outside. Alisoun’s face was the color of parchment, but she tugged, cleaned and splinted before she stepped away from the bed.

  If David had any doubts about Alisoun’s strength, her courage in the face of blood and pain reassured him. Life in all its vicissitudes would never defeat this woman.

  As she stepped off the dais, she staggered and he sprang forward, ready to assist her.

  Something hit him from behind, knocking him aside. He spun around, fists up, and found himself face to face with Lady Edlyn.

  “Don’t touch her!” the girl shouted. “Everyone knows what you did.”

  Everyone knew of their quarrel in the woods? He glanced at Alisoun, but she looked as amazed as he felt. “What did I do?”

  “You did this to Sir Walter.” Lady Edlyn skittered back as if he were an animal about to attack. “You quarreled with him, followed him into the woods and you—”

  “Wait!” Lady Alisoun stepped into the fray. “Sir David didn’t hurt Sir Walter. To say so is absurd.”

  Philippa stood in the doorway, clutching her baby. “He’s a dangerous, angry man.”

  “He spent his time with me,” Alisoun said.

  “The whole time you were gone?” Philippa asked.

  “Nay, but—”

  “Who else has the skills to beat Sir Walter?”

  In the moment of silence that followed, David glanced around the room. Alisoun’s servants stood in a sullen circle watching him. Some simply looked confused, but some held knives and pokers in their hands.

  Alisoun saw them and declared, “This is ridiculous.”

  “I’ve done nothing,” David said.

  Dismissing his objection with a gesture, Philippa said, “He quarreled with Sir Walter, and when you returned to the castle, you made it clear he quarreled with you. You’re not safe, Alisoun, and you know what men are like.”

  David swallowed his instinctive protest. He would never forget this scene. Like the climax of a passion play, it stood alone as the apex of an eventful day. In his mind, this moment remained fixed, highlighted by powerful emotions. Somehow, somewhere in this morass of fear and accusation rested the kernel of fact which would explain his presence here and the danger which threatened his lady.

  Alisoun stood still, letting the heated emotions swirl around her while soothing her people with her very tranquillity. “I have every faith in Sir David. He was angry, true, but he has an impeccable reputation, and he has always treated me with honor.”

  Lady Edlyn gestured toward him. “Look at him, my lady! His hands are scabbed and bleeding. How else could he have done such a thing except by beating Sir Walter?”

  Holding up his hands, David flexed them in chagrin. Everyone saw, and the servants stepped forward with a growl.

  “David!” Stepping close to him, Alisoun gathered his hands in hers. “You didn’t do this in the practice yard.”

  Fearing the prick of a knife against his neck, David trailed behind her as she tugged him closer to the light. “It’s nothing.”

  In a voice clogged with fear, Lady Edlyn said, “Lady Alisoun, please move away from him.”

  “They need to be bandaged,” Alisoun said.

  “They’re fine.” He tried to wrench them free. Again the servants stepped closer, their weapons raised, and he hastily ceased resistance. He was going to have to tell her what he’d done, admit his stupidity, and he slumped in embarrassment. “I hit a tree.”

  Her hands tightened on his. “What?”

  “I hit a tree.”

  Everyone heard that time. Alisoun stared at him as if he’d run mad. “You mean you…walked into a tree with your fists?”

  Philippa said, “My lady, surely you don’t believe that.”

  “Why would you hit a tree?” Alisoun asked.

  “To avoid striking you or Sir Walter or one of the serving maids or kicking a dog or any of the other lovely ways a man picks to display his anger.” He swept an accusing glance around at the men, and one or two coughed and shuffled backward. “I didn’t beat Sir Walter.”

  Then Alisoun did it. The thing he’d dreamed of all his life.

  “I know that.” She laid one hand on his chest and looked up into his eyes, her own calm, sure and trusting. “I was never in doubt.”

  And Sir David Radcliffe fell in love.

  16

  The solar filled with a silence that lapped up and over everyone, and they were silent, David knew, because of the awe and reverence he displayed. Only now, when Alisoun showed her trust, did he realize—he was living the legend his crazy old great-grandmother had told him.

  “David?” Alisoun raised her hand to touch his face. “Have you hit your head?”

  Hit his head? He almost laughed. Aye, Alisoun would think something like that. The truth was, he had all the symptoms his granny described—unusual strength, a sense of rightness, a glow from within. He didn’t even have to be around Alisoun to feel the effects. Granny had called them signs of a great love.

  “David, no one’s going to hurt you. You don’t need to look so—” Alisoun cocked her head, at a loss for a description, “—preoccupied.”

  Granny had entertained him and the other children in the long winter nights, and the best story, the one they always asked for, was the one about their grandmother and grandfather, and how they’d come through trial and sorrow to a special place, a special feeling, just for each other. Not everyone had it, Granny said. Most people never witnessed such a phenomenon in their whole lives, but it had shone through his grandmother and grandfather’s everyday activities. It had warmed the whole family and every servant and serf. It had been precious, inviolate, and it had worked miracles. Even after Grandfather died, Grandmother carried the glow with her to her grave.

  “I think it would be best if you sat down.” Alisoun tried to steer him toward a stool, but he took her hand off his arm and just held it.

  Aye, it had been his favorite story, but he’d grown up. By the time he reached the great age of
eight, he’d realized what nonsense Granny spouted. After all, she wasn’t his grandmother, she was his great-grandmother, so old he had believed his mother when she said Granny had lived through four kings. Granny didn’t remember what she’d eaten two hours before. She didn’t remember his name, or his mother’s, or even her own maid’s. She was nothing but a crazy old lady who told crazy old stories, and he’d scarcely thought of her since the day she died.

  Now he couldn’t forget her, because he was living that story she told. His union with Alisoun was almost mystical, as if they had been separated long ago, lost to each other across time and space, and now reunited to form one being, one self.

  “I wish my Granny were alive to see this.” David brought Alisoun’s hand to his lips and kissed it respectfully, then turned it over and kissed her palm with the passion of a lover.

  Her puzzled frown faded; she must have seen something in his demeanor that hinted of his thoughts, for she stepped closer and placed her hand on his chest once more. “David?”

  His heart pounded from the contact, and the glow from his reflected in her eyes. They drew closer and closer still, caught in the precious moment of recognition and dedication—until Sir Walter coughed.

  Alisoun turned away from David at once, and he let her go without a qualm. There would be time and place for this later. Now Sir Walter needed tending, and Alisoun took that responsibility seriously. She went to his side and took his hand, then leaned close to his battered, swollen face. “It’s Lady Alisoun. Did you want me?”

  The sounds Sir Walter formed weren’t words, not really, but he spoke urgently, as if he needed to make himself heard.

  Alisoun winced and reached for an icy cloth to place over his puffy eyes. “Pray you, Sir Walter, don’t speak if it gives you pain.”

  “Must!”

  Moved by the urgency in that one word, David came closer.