Hot Summer's Knight (25 page)

Berenice, his Lady of contradictions.  An innocent by day; a siren, a vixen, a houri by night.  She’d welcomed him into her body with gentle caresses and sweet kisses.  All her hesitancy had vanished, like mist in the morning.

Fulk, he reminded himself, wanting to concentrate on the problem at hand.  What was Fulk’s connection with the battle at the Horns of Hattin? 

Huon had last worn the ring, given to him by his mother at his knighting, at Hattin.  When he’d woken in the slave traders’ camp the ring was gone, taken, he’d always believed, by the slavers.  The vultures of the battlefield, they picked over the dead and the near dead.  If a body wasn’t worth resuscitating, they’d strip it of anything they could sell.

Berenice.  Her warm and welcoming body, her cries of ecstasy.  Twice more in the night she’d woken him, used her lips and her hands to arouse him.  She’d wrapped her agile body around his, demanding her own release, bringing him to his.

There’d not been the resistance he expected when he’d first entered her; no blood on the sheets this morning.

She’d not been a virgin, after all.

William had sworn, months ago, when Huon had first arrived at Freycinet, Berenice had never taken another man to her bed.  He’d know, because Esme would know.  Esme would have removed the stained sheets.

Was
that
the reasoning behind the farce of their wedding night?  She hadn’t been a virgin then, so rather than let him find out, she’d pretended to threaten to stab herself?

Was Berenice capable of such guile?

He remembered the woman he’d spent the night with.  So innocent and sweet her kisses had been, that day in the river, and again, on the hill above the castle, and in the forest.  The woman last night was barely the same person.  She’d led him to the bed, she’d made sure he knew how much she desired him.  She’d not been innocent then.

And she’d not been a virgin.

How she must have laughed when he’d said he’d make sure the pain would not be too bad.  How amusing it must have been those times she’d kissed him, feigning innocence, drawing him steadily into her trap, like any spider would a fat, juicy fly.

What had changed?  The answer was clear: she now believed herself a widow, free to share her favors and her bed with her troubadour.  The need for subterfuge had ended.

The turrets of Betizac came into view above the trees.  Only now, his temper cooled, did he consider it might not be wise to ride up to Count Fulk and demand to know the source of his ring.

It was too late.  He’d been sighted by a guard on one of the towers, who shouted to someone below.  Huon kept on going towards the castle, every sense alert, his left hand gripping the reins, his right hovering near the pommel of his Viking broadsword, strapped to his saddle.

The gates were open wide, the portcullis raised.  The tall English captain waited in the entrance, alone.

“I’ve come to see Count Fulk,” said Huon.

“Have you now,” answered the captain, “Have you broken your fast yet today?”

“No, I haven’t,” said Huon, thinking it a strange greeting.

“Well then, join me while I break mine.  Dismount, and I’ll see your horse is tended.”

Huon swung out of the saddle.  He glanced at his sword, unwilling to be without it.

“You’ll not be needing that,” said the Englishman.  He beckoned to a boy, who came running, and led the horse away.  This man had helped them last night; there was no reason for Huon to think he might betray him now.

Huon followed the man up a flight of stairs near the gate to a comfortably furnished room.  On a table beneath the window was a jug of ale, a round loaf and a slab of cheese.

“You’re welcome to share,” he said, pulling a three-legged stool up to the table, and ripping the loaf apart with massive hands.  “Now, tell me, what’s so important you come riding in here, alone, demanding to see the Count?”

Huon found another stool, and an appetite for breakfast.

“This is my reason,” he stated, extending his right hand.  The ring gleamed in the morning light, its intricate details catching the rays.

“Ah,” said the captain, “it’s yours, then.”  He wolfed down another chunk of cheese.

“Yes,” said Huon, “it’s mine.  My name is Huon de Fortescue et de Freycinet.”

“In that case, I suppose I should address you as ‘my Lord’.”  He drained a tankard of ale.  “You’ll be wanting to know how the Count came to be in possession of your ring.”

Huon nodded, and drank his own ale.

“The Count can’t tell you.”

“Why not?”

The captain ignored Huon’s question.  “I’ll tell you what I know, though, what he told me last winter, when the old Lord died.  In a nutshell, he paid someone to kill you, to make it look as if you’d died in battle.  Hattin, was it?”

“Yes.”

“A bad business, that fight.”

“My men were all killed, good men, men I’d known since childhood, grown into manhood with.”

The captain shook his head in sympathy.

“I’ve always believed I was responsible in some way.”

“You weren’t.  The Count told me.  Your palfrey’s harness was sabotaged.  The Count’s man took your ring, as evidence you were dead.”

“The stranger!  The one I thought helped me.  He came from nowhere.  I thought he defended me, while I fought my way back to my men.”  Huon relived the memories, the scenes flashing before him as though it had been yesterday.  “I saw a Saracen out of the corner of my eye.  I’d always thought it was he who dealt me this blow.”  He touched his face.  “But it must have been the stranger.  After all this time…

“You must take me to Fulk.  I’ll challenge him, based on this, on the discovery of the ring.”

He got to his feet, looking around for his sword, before he remembered in was with his horse.

“Finish your breakfast, Sir Huon.”  The captain munched contentedly.  “Some people say your stomach should be empty before you see a sight like I’m about to show you.  Me, I believe you should have something to heave on.  Gives your guts something to do.”

Huon could see this man would not be moved until his stomach was full.  Taking his seat again, he filled a spare tankard with ale, and resigned himself to waiting.

CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR

The captain finished his breakfast, then he led the way down the stairs, and across the yard.  Sounds of laughter and raucous singing came from an open doorway.  Two men, a woman supported between them, staggered across the yard to the guard room near the gate.  Huon was sure they were all drunk, despite the early hour.

He followed the captain up the keep stairs until they reached Fulk’s door.  It was ajar.  A strange noise, half laughter, half sobbing, came from within the room.

“Hold onto your breakfast, Sir Huon,” said the captain, and pushed the door open.

The smell reached Huon first.  Warm blood and excrement, the smell of the battlefield, concentrated a thousand times by being indoors and behind closed windows.  There was blood, a great deal of blood, pooling in the rich carpets, dripping from the carvings around the fireplace, matting the fur coverlet, running down the girl sitting on the bed.  Her hair was matted with it.  Her shift stuck to her body with it.

“We think most of it’s his,” the captain stated, “but we can’t get close enough to her to find out.”

“But, Fulk…”  Before the words were out of his mouth, he knew the answer.  What was left of Count Fulk de Betizac was scattered around the room.

“Who?” Huon asked.  

“The girl.  Jessamine.”

“She did this?”

“So it seems.  He had a knife he kept in a scabbard in his boot.  We believe she used that.”

“What’re you going to do with her?” asked Huon.

“I don’t know.  Some of the others want me to kill her, but they respect her too.  Mad as she is, she did what none of us were brave enough to do.”

“You can’t leave her there, like that.”

“I know.  Any ideas?”

“There’s a convent about a day’s ride from here, towards Bordeaux, St.  Bernadette’s.  Do you know it?”

“I think so, yes.”

“You could ask the nuns to take care of her.  Did the Count leave any heirs?”

“None that I know of.”

“When I get back to Freycinet, I’ll arrange for a contribution to be sent to the nuns.”

“That’s settled then,” the captain sighed, “now all we have to do is get her there.”

“Good luck, captain,” said Huon, “you’re going to need it.”  He turned to leave.

“Gareth!” wailed the figure on the bed.

“She knows you? I thought you said your name was Huon,” said the captain.

“I was the troubadour at Freycinet, for a while.  Gareth was the name I used,” answered Huon.

“It’s the first time she’s recognized anyone today.”  The big man placed his hand on Huon’s shoulder.  “Stay, please.  Help me get her to the convent.”

“I can’t, I’m sorry.  I have business at Freycinet.”     

“Gareth,” she cried again, and began to sob, “don’t leave me!”

“No-one here will help me with her,” said the captain, “if you leave, they’ll probably kill her.”

“Gareth, please,” Jessamine sobbed.

It wasn’t her plaintive wailing made up his mind, so much as the force of the captain’s argument.  The mad, it was said, deserved our mercy and compassion.  He couldn’t leave her here to be torn apart by a drunken mob.

“Very well,” said Huon, making up his mind, “I’ll give you a hand.”

“Let’s get her cleaned up first.  We can’t take her to the nuns like that.”

Huon approached the bed, his boots squelching in the carpets.  Great fat tears rolled down Jessamine’s face, but she giggled, the closer he came.  Eventually, he could reach out his hand.  She put an ice-cold hand in his.  Her trembling hand surprised him at first, until he realized her whole body was shaking slightly.

“Come, Jessamine.  It’s time for you to leave here.”

“Sir Peter’s taking me, I know.”  She sounded almost normal.  He wondered who Sir Peter was.  The Englishman?

“We’re taking you to bathe first.”

She looked down at her blood-soaked shift.

“Yes,” she said, and climbed down from the bed.

“We’ll take her to the laundry,” said the captain.

“You’re Peter?” asked Huon.

“Yes, but they call me Gilbert here.”

Jessamine shrank away when Gilbert went to touch her, so he went ahead, to ready the women in the laundry.  Huon held Jessamine’s hand, and led her down the stairs and across the yard, following Gilbert’s directions.

They stood together in front of a huge, steaming tub.

“We have to get her out of the shift,” Huon said.  The ties were matted together.  Gilbert drew his knife, intending to cut it from her body.

“No-o-o-o!”  The thin, pitiful sound started the hairs rising on the back of Huon’s neck.

“Get behind her, Gilbert, where she can’t see the knife.”

Gilbert nodded.  Without her being able see Gilbert, they were able to get the garment off her, so that Huon could help her into the tub.  The women had left soap, and a rough cloth to wash her with.  The men set to work, Gilbert behind her, Huon at the front, while she shook like a leaf in autumn gales.

Huon had seen many gruesome sights in his travels, but Jessamine was in a bad way.  He wondered how she’d managed to keep body and soul together.  Her skin was a mass of purple bruises and scratches.  There was a deep cut at the base of her throat.

“Look at this,” whispered Gilbert, and showed him the line of the lash across her buttocks.

There was barely a patch of skin unmarked in some way.

They persuaded her to sit in the warm water, and they washed her hair.  Gilbert found a comb, and while Huon held her hands, he gently untangled her knotted tresses.

They helped her out of the bath, and while she trembled, dried her off with the cloths left for the purpose.  A dark trail on the inside of her thighs had them confused for a moment. 

“Women tie rags there, don’t they?  Has she got her monthly flow?” said Gilbert.

“No, I think it’s what Fulk did to her,” answered Huon, “Jessamine,” he said, and a spark of recognition gleamed briefly in her eyes, “you must tie the rags on yourself, you’re bleeding.”

She nodded, and taking the cloths, bound them around herself.  Gilbert produced a shift and dress the women had left.  They were old, too loose and too short, and made of rough, brown, undyed cloth, but they were clean.  Sturdy boots went onto her feet.  A kerchief was tied around her hair, to keep it out of her face.

The girl let them dress her without protest.

Death was too good for a man like Fulk, Huon thought, too clean, too simple.  He hoped the Count was roasting over a slow fire in hell, for the harm he’d inflicted, not only on this girl, but many others.

Jessamine reminded him of a bitch, whipped too many times.  She stood where they’d dressed her, her head hanging.  She’d been a nuisance most of the summer, but he preferred that to this shell of a girl, who shook at the sight of a knife or the sound of a word spoken too loudly or too harshly.

He hoped the nuns would take good care of her.

Gilbert brought Huon’s horse and his own out of the stables.  A bundle was strapped to the back of his saddle.

“I was leaving anyway, at first light,” Gilbert explained, “you may remember.  If we take her up before us, turn and turn about, you won’t have to bring a horse back here later.”

Huon agreed, and they set out, Jessamine in front of Gilbert.  She’d lost some of her fear of him when he’d helped bathe her.  Now she leaned on him a little.

The day passed uneventfully.  Huon wondered whether it was really necessary for him to be there, but then, what was another two or three days, when he had eight lost years to make up for?

The voices of his dead men were silent now.  The information Gilbert had given him had convinced him Fulk was to blame for the events at Hattin.  He may not have wielded the sword that scarred Huon’s face, he may not have killed Huon’s men, but his evil influence had been behind it all.

Now he could return to Freycinet, and reclaim his name and his rights.  But did he want to?  The man who’d wandered most of the known world for eight years was tempted to join Gilbert, to seek more adventures in the legendary lands of Cathay and Africa.  He’d heard the Vikings speak of another land, vast and wealthy beyond imagining, on the far side of Iceland.