Beast: Great Bloodlines Converge (44 page)

The mattress was new, stuffed with straw and great rolls of soft, spongy wool, and new linens made up the bed. As Bastian blew out one of the two banks of tapers in the room, Henry stood in the doorway, next to Gisella. He gazed at the room with a mixture of sorrow and apprehension.

“Is… is this where Sir Braxton died?” he asked Gisella.

She nodded sadly. “Aye,” she replied. “He went to sleep and never woke up.”

Henry looked at her. “He will not mind if I sleep in his bed, will he?”

Bastian answered. “He would be happy and grateful for you to sleep in his bed,” he replied. “You need not fear. Do you remember sleeping here a few nights ago? Gisella and I will be through the dressing room door should you need us.”

Henry nodded, eyeing the bed. Timidly, he pushed on the mattress, seeing that it was fresh and soft. He could smell the straw. Then, he turned to Bastian.

“When will we leave for Winchester?” he asked. “On the morrow?”

Bastian drew in a long, slow breath, one of reluctance. “Gisella and I will leave at dawn,” he said. “But Gloucester has denied you. You must return to the Tower with him.”

Henry features washed with panic. “But you said I could go!”

Bastian nodded patiently. “And if it was my decision alone, you could,” he replied. “But Gloucester overruled me. He does not want you to go.”

Henry was near tears. “Did you tell him we were going to Etonbury?”

“I did.”

“And he still denied me?”

“I am afraid he did.”

Henry was distraught. He plopped down on the bed, struggling not to cry. “But… but this is so important to me,” he said. “How can God know of my penitence if he does not see me help you bury the relic? He will think I do not care!”

Gisella went to sit next to the boy. “That is not true,” she said softly. “We will offer up prayers on behalf of the Maid and on behalf of you. We will explain to God why you could not come. He will understand.”

Henry looked at the woman, tears in his eyes. “But I
need
to do this,” he whispered. “My armies killed her. People who say they serve me killed her. I did not tell them to kill her. I am sorry that they did and God must know that. The Maid must know that, too. I must have her forgiveness as well.”

Gisella put a hand on his shoulder to comfort him. “I promise that I will explain to God why you could not come,” she said. “I will tell him that you did not tell your men to kill her. Bastian knew her very well. Let us ask Bastian if he supposes the Maid would understand that you did not order your men to kill her.”

They both looked to Bastian, who was standing by the corner of the bed. When Gisella spoke those few words, he thought back to the woman he knew, that poor woman huddled in her cold and dank cell, unafraid of death because she knew her cause had been true. Poor Henry was young and so much of this kingdom that belonged to him was out of his control. He was a very religious boy, very pious, much as the Maid had been. Forgiveness was part of their beliefs.

“Do you want to hear of something that no one else knows?” he asked softly. “Not even my father knew of this.”

Henry nodded although Gisella wasn’t so sure. She had been dealt quite a few revelations over the past few days and her heart wasn’t as strong as it usually was, especially with her husband speaking on his relationship with another woman. Oblivious to her reservations, Bastian continued.

“The day before she was put to death, I asked the Maid if she wanted me to help her escape,” he said softly. “She had tried before, you know, but I had always captured her and brought her back. I realize now that I should have let her go, but I am sure she would have been captured again. It was inevitable. Do you know what she told me when I offered to help her escape?”

Both Henry and Gisella were listening quite eagerly. “What did she say?” Henry demanded.

Bastian sighed. “She told me that it was foolish,” he said quietly. “She told me that she was grateful for my offer but that it was futile and that she was not afraid to die. She accepted her fate, you see, as God’s will. She was forgiving to me and to all else. Much like Christ, she was destined to die for her beliefs. You have asked me if I believe the Maid would forgive you for your role in her death and I can tell you without a doubt that she already has. She forgave you before you even asked.”

Henry didn’t know if he felt better or worse about that. “She was kind, wasn’t she?”

“She was very kind.”

Henry seemed to calm after that. He was still marginally distressed but not nearly what he had been. Now, he simply appeared sad. It was a lot to weigh on the mind of a nine-year-old boy.

“But I very much wanted to go with you,” he said, trying one last time to see if Bastian would somehow allow it. “I must seek her forgiveness myself and help you bury her heart.”

Bastian shook his head. “I am very sorry that you cannot,” he said. “But I will make sure God knows of your sorrow for what happened. I swear it.”

There wasn’t much more to say after that. Henry sat on the end of the bed as Gisella kissed his forehead and stood up, accompanying Bastian through the dressing room and to the chamber on the other side.

Even after he was alone, which was rare enough, Henry continued to sit on the edge of the bed, pondering the fact that he would not be riding to Winchester to bury the heart of the Maid. He knew he could never tell Gloucester why he wanted to go so badly and he knew, for a fact, that his uncle would not let him go no matter how much he begged. Once the man’s mind was made up, there was no changing it.

I wonder if he even has a free will?
Henry had never heard those words spoken by Gisella. All he knew was that tonight, he was going to make a decision that Gloucester could not change. He’d spent his entire young life being controlled and manipulated and, at this moment, he’d had his fill of it. Going with Bastian to Winchester was very important to him but he had been denied.

He was therefore going anyway.

After a night in which both Gisella and Bastian slept like the dead, wrapped in each other’s arms, Bastian roused his wife shortly before daybreak. Neither one of them had packed for their trip so after rising and struggling to clear the sleep from her mind, Gisella went about packing a satchel while Bastian swiftly donned his armor and went down to the stables to have the grooms saddle their horses.

Exhausted, Gisella stumbled around, washing her face with cold water from the previous day and dressing in a heavy dark blue woolen traveling dress with hose that were the same dark and heavy color. She laced up her doeskin boots, the only pair of boots she had, and struggled to comb her hair when there was a soft knock at the chamber door. Gisella opened it to find Sparrow standing in the doorway in her dressing gown.

“You are up so early,” Sparrow hissed.

Gisella shushed her and pulled her into the room, shutting the door. Then, she yawned and plopped down onto the dressing table chair. “Help me, please,” she begged softly. “I cannot seem to do anything this morning. Will you dress my hair?”

Sparrow picked up the comb and began to pull it through Gisella’s silken tresses. “What on earth are you doing up at this hour?” she asked. “I could hear you from across the hall. And where is Bastian?”

Gisella yawned again. “We are leaving,” she said, watching Sparrow’s brow furrow with confusion. “We are going to Etonbury.”

“Etonbury?” Sparrow repeated. “Why are you going there?”

Even though Sparrow had heard most of what Armand le Foix and Braxton had talked about during that terrible night, including mention of the relic, Gisella didn’t want to tell her the truth. Perhaps he had been correct when he said that he had kept the information of the relic to himself because of the significance of it. The more people who knew about it, the more danger there was to them. Since Sparrow would be left behind, she didn’t want the woman to know the truth of the matter should Gloucester decide to interrogate her for some reason. Or, in case the information accidentally slipped out. Nay, it was best for Sparrow not to know the truth, as difficult as that was.

“Bastian’s mind is overloaded with grief,” Gisella finally said. “He and his father were going to journey to Etonbury before his death, but now those plans are dashed. Bastian feels that he must get away for a few days to clear his mind and he wants to see Etonbury. Bedford granted it to him but he has not seen it yet. It will be a nice little journey for us. I… I think we need to be alone, he and I. We need to heal after what has happened.”

Sparrow had no reason not to believe her friend. She began to plait Gisella’s long locks. “How long will you be gone?”

“A few days at most.”

“Are any of the knights traveling with you?”

Gisella shook her head. “Nay,” she said. “So you are free to pursue my brother, as he shall remain at Braidwood.”

Sparrow smiled coyly. “He stood with me at Braxton’s mass,” she said. “Did you see him?”

Gisella laughed softly. It felt good to laugh after days of grief. “I did,” she said. “I would expect a proposal of marriage from him by the time I return from Etonbury.”

Sparrow giggled, securing the end of Gisella’s hair. “I will do my best to coerce it from him,” she said. “Now, what else can I help you with?”

Gisella put her on packing a satchel for her while she finished up with her dressing. By the time Bastian returned to their chamber, she was ready to depart and the sun still wasn’t up yet. Checking on Henry to make sure the boy was well, Bastian noted the sleeping figure in his father’s big bed and was glad the lad was asleep and not following him around, begging to go. It was one less thing to worry over.

Asking Sparrow to see to the king when he awoke, they bid the woman farewell and made their way down to the stables where the white stallion and a gentle, gray mare stood, waiting. Bastian strapped his wife’s satchel on his saddle along with his own saddlebags, feeling surprisingly relaxed considering the seriousness of the journey they were about to take. He attributed it to the fact that Gisella was with him, and she was smiling, and all was well in the world again. It gave him strength. Mounting the horses, they plodded off into the coming dawn, enjoying the morning while it was still new and fresh.

What they didn’t see was a small figure slip out of the dining room door of Braidwood, adjacent to the kitchen. As Gisella and Bastian headed out of the main gates and to the road beyond, Henry made his way as stealthily as he could to the stables and cornered a groom, demanding that the man saddle a horse for him. Realizing it was the young king, the groom did as he was told and saddled a leggy mare for the boy to ride. Henry stole a dusty old riding cloak, hanging on a peg just inside of the stable doors, and mounted his steed.

Feeling wicked, and wildly free, Henry told the groom that if he told anyone about his presence, that the man could be guaranteed a lifetime in the Tower for betraying the confidence of the king. That threat alone kept the groom’s mouth shut for most of the day, at least until Gloucester began screaming about Bastian abducting the king, and the terrified groom spilled the information to Aramis. The groom may have been afraid of the young king, but in his view, Sir Bastian had been through enough without false accusations of abduction. It was his conscience that caused the confession at the risk of angering the young monarch.

Gloucester ordered his men mounted, and the knights did so, realizing that Henry had followed Bastian of his own accord and not because he had been snatched. Fearful for the young king’s life and lacking any clue whatsoever as to why the young man would have ridden off alone after Bastian, Gloucester and the knights took off north towards Etonbury, the way they assumed Bastian and Gisella, and subsequently Henry, would have gone, hoping they could catch the king before something terrible happened to him.

But they realized very quickly, based on the distinctive markings of the shoes of the white stallion bearing Gloucester’s mark, that Bastian and Gisella, and eventually Henry, had not gone north. They had headed to the southwest, and their confusion grew.

Now, the race was on with everyone heading to Winchester, knowingly or not.