The Warrior's Game (15 page)

Enguerran gaped as if his free bride, and the means to shield his theft, had already slipped from his one-handed grasp. “But sire,” he began to protest.

John threw up his hands as if to ward off the complaint. “Tut, Sir Enguerran. Haven’t We done enough by agreeing to rescind her fee? Oh, there’s one last thing you should know. If she reaches the abbey alone, even only moments before you or Sir Michel, she has the right to choose a different fate for herself.

“Go now,” John shooed Sir Enguerran toward the door with a wave of his hand. “What with your injury, it’s only fair We hold Sir Michel here for a half hour to give you a bit of an advantage.”

“Aye sire,” Enguerran said, then shot a look at Michel. Tangled in his expression was disdain for a common-born mercenary, surprise that Michel hadn’t exposed his thievery and the idiotic certainty that he could still hide what he’d done by marrying Amicia.

John waited until the door closed behind the man, then shifted to face his mercenary. All the amusement and warmth left his expression. Outside the wind still howled. A coal snapped in the brazier. Bertha snored gently, having done as her king commanded and fallen asleep.

“You left Winchester when I commanded you to stay.” John’s accusation was a quiet growl.

“I was right to go, sire,” Michel retorted, barely preventing himself from accusing John of trying to swindle him. “The lady is impoverished, her every moveable item gone. Whether her belongings have been sold or were taken to d’Oilly’s estates, I cannot say. Based upon their reactions to the news that I am now her administrator, I suspect two of her bailiffs colluded with the knight in this stripping of her wealth.”

“Well well, the worm has more spine than I thought,” John said, pretending surprise. Then he smiled, the movement of his mouth tight. “It would serve you rightly if I forced you to marry her and left you to rot in penury. I am your king! You dared to defy me.”

Michel only waited. He wouldn’t excuse himself or apologize when all he’d done was see to his own affairs. Only a fool went blindly forward without watching where he put his feet.

When royal rage won him nothing, John sighed. “Damn you, de Martigny, but you’re as bold as the lady. I don’t know why I tolerate either of you. So now that you know her estates aren’t what you expected, have you decided you don’t want her as a wife?” As John asked the question all expression left his face.

That gave Michel pause. How would admitting that he couldn’t afford the lady serve John? He countered with a ploy of his own.

“Sire, you’ve already made me part of the competition for the lady’s hand.” He touched the parchment in his belt. “Are you saying I’m not to play the role you gave me and seek to make her my wife? Perhaps you intend that I should give her to d’Oilly if I find her first?”

Frustration danced through John’s gaze then was gone. “She seemed very upset when I mentioned earlier today that you’d asked for her hand some weeks ago. Then, when I suggested she surrender to you here so she might avoid the rigors of travel in this day's weather, she refused you most vehemently,” John added, as if that might explain or excuse the cruelty of his game.

It didn't surprise Michel that Amicia had again rejected him, not after her rejection last night. She was what she'd born: a gentlewoman with all the arrogance and prejudice her blood demanded. Michel only waited. John gave a gentle shake of his head.

“Shame on you, de Martigny. All those times she sought you out. You avoided her. Why, she even went to the goldsmith’s house to find you, only to leave cursing, or so I’m told. Not much of a swain, are you?”

Michel wished he hadn’t played the part of swain at all. Taking the parchment from his belt, he offered it back to John. “Then you’d rather that I left the game so d’Oilly might have her?”

The king stared at his missive as if it were snake about to strike. Snatching his crown from his head, England’s king loosed a blistering breath. “Damn you. All I want is the shred of triumph that is my due,” he complained. “Tell me you desire her. Tell me you care what opinion she has of you. You cannot be as impervious to her as you maintain.”

Michel shrugged. “Sire, it doesn’t matter what opinion I hold of the lady, or what I want from her. The fact remains she is now impoverished.”

John tossed the symbol of his regency into the seat of his chair. It fell with a ringing clatter. “Then, since you won’t have her, will you take Lady Sybilla?” he demanded, naming the heiress he had wanted Michel to wed.

“I will not,” Michel returned, all the more certain of his decision after forced attendance at the wards' table.

Sybilla was no different than Amicia in how she despised him but that was their only similarity. The young noblewoman was a reed in the wind, her opinions changing with her companions. Anyone with half a wit would easily twist her into a tool to use against him and she wouldn't have the sense to realize she was being used. Any marriage Michel made in England would be unpopular. His wife needed to be bright enough to understand if she betrayed him she also betrayed herself.

John eyed him warily. “So, if not Lady Sybilla, then what?”

That was John’s final move. It was time to end this game.

“Sire, I never said I no longer wanted Lady de la Beres, only that she’s impoverished. I’ll take her, but only if her properties are restored to the state they held prior to her entering your wardenship. Do this for me and I’ll participate in this competition of yours. Refuse, and for all I care Sir Enguerran may have her and be well rewarded for defrauding you. Meanwhile, I’ll humbly request you release me from your service so that I might seek a wife and estates in the employ of some other prince.”

John’s eyes widened. His mouth opened and closed as if he were a fish out of water until he caught himself. “God take you,” he snarled, his voice lowering into a whisper, then he threw up his hands in defeat. “Ach, you have my solemn and holy vow. The de la Beres properties will be restored to the same state they owned four years ago.”

“And this restoration will be completed within six months’ time,” Michel added, in case John thought to drag his heels.

“In six months’ time,” the king agreed, but his eyes narrowed in affront. “Do you trust me so little? Perhaps you’d like me to scribe my words as a merchant pens his contracts?”

Michel would have very much liked that, but to ask it was to suggest that John’s word was no good. Even if that were sometimes true, to speak such a thing aloud was an insult beyond any man’s bearing. “Sire, I trust you to carry out your vow to its every syllable. All I’m saying is that her lands are so poor that without immediate restoration those who work her home farm could starve next year.”

The pique faded from John’s eyes. “If it’s as bad as that then I hope Sir Enguerran hasn’t spent too much of what he’s stolen. It’s he, not me, who’ll restore her lands. He’ll do better than restore, he’ll pay an additional sum to soothe the injury he’s done me and my ward, which you and I will split.”

“He may protest innocence of your charge and blame me in his stead,” Michel countered, blocking the only remaining avenue of escape for John.

John dismissed this with a lift of his brows and a snort. “That worm won’t say a word. He dare not, not when I can prove what he’s done then outlaw him, taking his properties for myself.” The king caught himself and smiled. “Now that’s an attractive thought. Rather than force him to repay you, I’ll exile him and make you warden of his confiscated lands. Use his profits to restore the lady’s property. Then, when her income has recovered you’ll still have his profits until such time as I see fit to forgive him.”

“And if he has heirs, sire?” Michel warned. “I’d not have the world believe I’m no different than Sir Enguerran, stealing from the properties I’m charged to protect.”

“His heirs will become your wards. You’ll have the control and the use of their income until they reach their majority. Should they choose not to remain in your custody, they may pay you some fair amount to be released. Either way, the lady’s lands will be restored and you’ll have a tidy sum to keep you.”

Here John paused. “Against that I must then warn you not to kill the worm when you meet him on the road. I can’t put heirs into the custody of the man who killed their father. You may, however, break his other arm if you like.” John’s sly, sidelong look said he knew very well it hadn’t been a fall from a horse that had caused Sir Enguerran’s injury.

It was more victory than Michel expected. Amicia and her restored lands would be his. To his surprise it was his body’s longing to once again know hers that rushed through him. Not even the reminder of her prejudice and rejection could dampen it.

“Then, I’ll be on my way to Thame, sire.”

“Not yet,” John stopped him. “There are a few details about this game I've saved just for you. First, although I warned the lady her escort would withdraw if she left the game and the road to Thame, I fully expect her to turn her horse in some other direction.”

John’s gaze warmed as he savored the thought of Amicia’s defiance. Dislike for the man who was England’s king stirred in Michel. A ruler should have more concern for his subjects than to leave a fragile woman alone on the road in such weather for no reason save his own enjoyment.

“If she does separate from her escort,” John continued, “I’ve commanded all but two men to turn back. Those two will follow her at a distance, leaving marks for their tracker. He and those marks will lead you to her. Once you have her, bear her directly to Thame and marry her.”

Michel’s brows rose at the amount of time and thought John had invested in this. “You never intended to force Lady Sybilla on me.”

“I would have if you’d flinched even a little,” John retorted, “but you wouldn’t budge. Then I discovered what d’Oilly had done.”

John stripped off his belt and tossed it into the chair with his crown. The pearled surface pattered gently as it slid down the chair's back. “Here’s another vow for you, Michel, as holy and true as my last one. I won’t tolerate d’Oilly marrying the lady, for once those vows are spoken they cannot be undone. Fail me and I’ll have your head, then make the lady a swift widow so I may take her for myself.”

Frustration caught Michel in its grip. “Sire, for all we know Sir Enguerran has already captured the lady, given his head start. How am I to take her back from him when you’ve bound my hands by asking me not to kill him? He’s not likely to give her up, believing as he does that marriage to her will shield his crime.”

John removed his jewel-studded chain. Like his other princely accoutrements, it flew toward the chair with careless disregard for the wealth decorating its face. It slid halfway off the seat before it caught. His tunic followed. Dressed only in his shirt and chausses, he turned toward Michel. John’s expression was closed and considering as he rubbed a finger against one temple. A muscle worked along his jaw. Creases appeared at the corners of his eyes as disgust mingled with respect filled his gaze.

“You truly won’t lift a finger to make her yours, will you? You want me to give her to you on a platter.”

Michel rocked back on his heels a little. “That is what you promised me at Nantes, sire.”

John’s expression soured. “Here’s the price I pay for giving way to a moment of heady triumph. I won that battle but lost the war. But promise I did. As you will. Here’s your assurance you’ll have your bride should things go awry and the lady arrive at the abbey in that thief’s custody, or by herself, something I cannot fathom her doing. There is a phrase the abbot and I share, a code of a sort. All you need do is speak it to the abbot, albeit where none might overhear. By this phrase he will know you come directly from me and that the commands you convey are mine and meant to supersede all other commands.”

John fell silent, once again massaging his temple. A moment passed. His eyes closed as if giving Michel the bride he wanted pained him.

Michel waited, his impatience growing with every breath. The need to be on the road after Amicia gouged at him. Only when she was in his arms could he be certain she was his.

The king’s eyes opened. The skin along the jut of his cheekbones darkened a little. “He and I were discussing the flight of birds. The abbot said something about an owl’s knuckles, that being the name he gave to the place where the bird’s wing bends and from which feathers stretch like fingers. That is the phrase: owl’s knuckles. Once you’ve used it, forget it. If you reveal it to anyone your life will be the forfeit. Now go.”

Michel breathed out in triumph. Amicia would be his. He bowed and retreated, closing the antechamber door behind him.

Without a glance at the chamberlain, Michel exited onto the balcony, then descended the stairs. Outside the hall, sleet spattered against the closed shutters. A gust of wind whistled through the big room’s open door, blasting around the screen and across the hall with enough force to carry the smoke from hearth to ceiling vent with nary a curl or swirl. Amicia was out in this, no doubt already separated from her escort.

Driven inside by the weather, folk crowded in the room, laughing and talking, a few coughing against the damp. With the only source of light the flames leaping upon the central hearthstone, their forms were but gray hulks spiced by the occasional flash of color from a tunic or cap. Some people gamed, but most worked on personal projects, a bit of whittling, basketry or sewing, as was the wont for the winter months.

Michel located his troop near the door where it was coldest, that being no hardship for men already dressed to travel in the foulest of weather. Just as Michel soon would, each man wore two tunics beneath their cloaks, and braies--the heavy leg covering men in the northern reaches of England preferred for warmth--rather than chausses on their legs, and boots. Roger, a man who hailed from the English hinterland, had introduced the garment to Michel.

As he joined his troop he discovered Amicia’s maidservant nestled in the crook of Roger’s arm. If the maid’s face was as water-stained as her cloak, Roger’s ugly visage owned a not so subtle pleasure. Michel sent his captain a vexed look; a good master didn't allow his men to seduce maids. Not that Michel had any right to chide. It hadn't been Roger doing the futtering on the landing last night.

As the maid saw him she gave a gasp and thrust away from the man who held her. Rather than retreat from Michel in fear as she had done just days ago, she dropped to her knees and caught Michel’s gloved hand in her own. “Oh, sir,” she cried, “you must help me. It's my lady. You must save her. The king’s men came and took her. They wouldn’t let me accompany her. Oh sir, she’s going to die.”

“Stand up, lass,” he said, half-lifting her as he spoke. “Tell me what you expect of me and why you think your lady might die when she's in the escort of the king's men.”

“What? Do you think she’ll let our king force her where she doesn’t wish to go? Not my lady,” Maud cried, a touch of pride in her voice even as her chin trembled.

She stepped back from him to boldly wind an arm around Roger’s waist and continued. “Sir, I’ve never seen her so angry. Lord, but the things she said as she prepared to travel, about the king and game-playing.” A hint of a frown flashed across her brow. “She said things about you, too, sir. Not very kind were they, but you should know she doesn’t mean them else she wouldn’t look at you the way she does.”

Michel barely had time to blink at this aside before Maud rattled on.

“I know her, sir. She said the king has commanded his men to let her go if she chooses to leave them. It won’t matter to her that she’s a woman alone, not as angry as she is right now.

“Oh sir, I begged her. I said that only pilgrims travel alone, that she’s a gentlewoman with a repute to maintain. That only made her angrier. She said she had no more repute, that you, the king and Lady Roheise had stolen all she had left to protect, taking even her dignity. Please, if you have any care at all for her in your heart, help her. She’ll die by herself.”

Again the maid's words startled Michel. Lady Roheise? What connection did Amicia have with that haughty lewd bitch? As for stealing Amicia's dignity, he hadn't stolen anything from her. She had given all to him of her own free will.

Or had she? It wasn't free will when she was being driven beyond all sense by her body's need for him. Of a sudden the image of her turning her head to the side on the landing took new meaning. Where he had seen rejection last night today he saw shame.

Michel released a slow breath. Amicia was right. He had stolen her dignity. When he left her standing alone on that landing without a word or gesture he had turned her honest passion for him into a whore's pantomime.

“Sir, are we free to offer aid to Lady de la Beres?” Roger asked.

“Indeed, it is our mission,” Michel replied. “The king commands me to find Lady de la Beres and escort her to Thame Abbey.”

“Thank the holy Mother,” Maud breathed, sagging against Roger in relief. Scrubbing the tears from her face with the backs of her hands, she added, “Hurry, sir. Catch her before she leaves the main road.”

“Why would she leave the road?” Michel asked, surprised to hear the maid echo John's words.

“Because she's going home,” the girl replied as if he'd asked a nonsensical question.

Michel almost smiled as tension drained from him. Of course she was going home. Where else would an unaccompanied gentlewoman go save into the protection of her home guard?

And with that he saw it all, how he would catch himself a wife and secure the future he so craved. All he needed was a distraction to keep d'Oilly looking in the wrong direction while he accomplished this miracle.

Another gust of wind screamed down the slope of the rolling hills in front of Ami. It tore across the plain toward her, through copses of white-barked birches along the way. Already stripped of their leaves by the season, the trees rattled, woody skeletons.

In a pattern made familiar over the past hours, Ami turned in her saddle to put as much of her back as she could to the wave of stinging rain that pelted her. The moment she shifted, her mount stopped. The mare’s head hung, her mane and tail streaming.

Ami hunched her shoulders and waited. The frigid air penetrated her woolen cloak, then passed through her hunting attire--sensible and sturdy woolen gowns of forest green--as if the garments didn’t exist. The hem of her cloak escaped from where she’d tucked it around her legs for warmth’s sake. Her hood fluttered around her cheeks, straining against the scarf tightly wound around her face to keep the hood over her ears.

If only she hadn’t been so angry this morn she might have listened to Maud and worn her mantle beneath her cloak. Aye, the garment would have acquired a few mud stains, but she would have had a layer of fur between her and the wind. That she might actually freeze to death out here, doing so because she’d been vain about her attire only made her angrier.

How dare John and that common good-for-nothing mercenary misuse her this way! Ami drubbed her heels into her horse as the wind died back to a mere howl. The mare stumbled back into a sluggish walk, the fastest speed this horse could manage.

John’s men had refused Ami her own horse, putting her instead on the oldest, most spavined mount in the royal stables. Ami was sure they’d done it to limit the distance she could put between herself and her pursuers. After all, the longer she was on the road, the better her chance of capture.

It was to make herself more difficult to find that Ami had taken the least direct and longest path to her nearest manor. However, an hour after turning off the main track she regretted her decision. Above her boiling black clouds, so thick that they seemed a solid mass, seethed in the sky. It was the promise of more rain, or possibly an early and unusual snow, that filled the biting air. This, when her diversion left her still more than twenty miles from home.

With no sun Ami’s growling stomach told the hour, claiming that she’d now missed the day’s main meal. She pressed her fingers to her purse, which hung from her belt beneath her cloak, right where John’s men had left it, thank God. There’d been an alewife in the last village who’d called out the offer of a cup of stew for two pence.

Ami had almost accepted, as much for the stew as the prospect of being within walls for a time. Only she couldn’t afford to pause, not even to consume a cup of stew. It was dangerous enough that she traveled alone these few miles to her house. At the rate she was moving, it would be deep night before she reached her manor house, what with the days so short this time of year. A lone woman traveling at night was insanity, and Ami had a much more distant goal than Sussex in mind. Which was why she needed to go home.

Once she had her own escort at her back, men whose loyalty was to Richard de la Beres and not the king, Ami meant to depart for England’s northern reaches. It wasn’t any of Roheise’s discontented and rebellious nobles, men like Eustace de Vesci who ruled the northern stronghold of Alnwick, that Ami intended to seek out, but a young woman she’d met at the wedding she’d attended last summer. No one at court knew Katherine Godsel, or that Ami was acquainted with Kate. That meant no one would think to look for Ami at Glevering, Kate’s manor house, especially when Ami knew Kate’s husband, Sir Rafe Godsel, was presently in London on business.

Once she reached Glevering, what then? Ami grimaced, again damning John and his mercenary, and this horrid game of theirs. Running to the north might put her beyond Sir Enguerran’s reach, but not Michel’s and surely not John’s.

Again the mare slowed and, again, Ami drubbed the poor old creature’s sides until it returned to plodding. If she couldn’t escape her pursuers, she could make it as difficult as possible for them to find her.

For Michel de Martigny to find her. The thought of ever again having to face him made Ami’s stomach clench. Over the hours she'd replayed his rejection in her mind time and again. Now that she’d had time to absorb the news that he’d asked for her hand, the way he'd turned and walked from her without a word took on a new meaning. Men didn’t marry lewd women who carried out trysts in full view of some stranger’s hall while fully dressed.

In which case, she shouldn’t need to worry about Michel pursuing her to Thame Abbey, much less into the north.

Something too close to hurt stirred in Ami. Damn him. If Michel had always intended to marry her, why had he taunted her, stirring her senses until she’d given way to sin and ruined herself in his eyes?

The answer lay in the echo of Mistress Hughette’s warning. Michel had no patience with her kind, the goldsmith’s wife had said, as if being born a gentlewoman were akin to having leprosy. Ami tried to grit her chattering teeth. Just as Sir Enguerran would surely beat her to ease his degraded pride, commoner that Michel was he’d needed to prove himself superior to her.

Once again the wind rose to a scream. Ami shifted in the saddle to put her back to it. The mare stopped. This time, when Ami applied her heels, the poor old thing only grunted in exhausted refusal and stayed where it stood.

Ami would have screamed if doing so would have accomplished anything. Instead, she dismounted. No matter how desperate, she didn’t have the heart to drive a horse to its death.

Forcing her frozen gloves to bend, she curled her fingers around the reins, then walked, leading the horse into the wind. It was like pushing through brick walls, but push Ami did, even after her legs tired and her vision began to swim with exhaustion. She wouldn’t give in to defeat, just as she wouldn’t marry Sir Enguerran, she wouldn’t bed John, or become a nun.

That left her only options marriage to Michel de Martigny and death. Death was surely the better choice.