The Rogue Knight (14 page)

Richard would never have so obviously eavesdropped on a noble conversation. Nor would he have interjected a comment unless asked for one. The worst offense, making Alice blush, would have mortified Richard if he’d been the serving squire.

Cord suddenly sat back in wonder.

All this time I’ve had noble blood
.
Maybe Richard realized that all along. Maybe that’s why he’s taught me so much about knighthood
.

Cord smiled, and with renewed curiosity, he examined his ring before taking another swallow of beer.

I am a knight’s son. I, therefore, can someday become a knight
.

He abruptly studied Sir Walter’s son again. The lad fidgeted. Then he rolled his eyes as the steward leaned over and said something to Walter.

Cord smiled. Richard had done likewise before Baron Hugh had taken him in hand and trained him in courtly behavior. Squires and knights sometimes spent a lifetime serving more powerful nobles. Unless one knew the rules of etiquette, such service could only bring shame. Boorish behavior could also lose one the hard-to-acquire positions.

Lords and ladies, Cord knew, often showed their high station by the rank of the person who served them. Conversely, a person gained standing by being allowed to serve and help a highly-ranked person. Cord had heard how Baron Hugh once held the stirrup for Earl Mortimer when the other had mounted his horse in the presence of the King. Even better, two years ago the Baron had poured wine into Prince Edward’s cup when the latter had toasted Earl Mortimer’s health. The Baron had bragged about that for months. And because he’d been well-versed in courtly manners, the incident had been one of refinement and therefore true nobility.

Unlike Sir Walter’s son, Richard waited on his lord’s table with perfect grace. The porters brought him the dishes and he bent on one knee in order to hand the food to his superior. Then he stepped back, standing at ease, not laughing at the eaters, not rolling his eyes, and not picking his nose nor spitting or playing with the dogs. Visitors had often extolled Richard’s skillful manners to the Baron, which of course had rebounded onto the teacher.

In fairness to Sir Walter’s son, this was probably his first time at table-serving. Soon he would begin his long years of training in a castle other than his father’s. Everyone knew that a father was too soft on his own blood. Hard knocks and knightly sternness were needed in order to bash home the lessons that a squire needed to learn. Cord envied the boy, but tried not to.

Envy was a sin, and if he were to become a knight, he’d need God’s help. Sinning all the time surely wasn’t the way to gain that help.

Lady Alice clapped her hands.

Along with everyone else, Cord looked up to see what she wanted.

Alice arose, a beauty in mourning white. Her features showed her sadness, and in her hands, which were folded in a prayer-like poise, she held a large silver cross.

“Dear Sir Walter,” Alice said, “may I ask a request of you?”

Lady Martha whispered into her husband’s ear.

Walter nodded to whatever his wife had said. Then he answered Alice. “Please, milady, feel free to speak your mind.”

“Since this is our first meal without our dear departed lord,” Alice said, “I thought perhaps that we could have a moment of silence. Then, I request that Father Bernard say a prayer for the Baron’s soul.”

Murmurs of approval rose.

Alice kissed the crucifix. All knew that now she could only speak the truth.

“While it is true that at first I only remained at Pellinore because of the Baron’s insistence,” Alice said, “in time the baron became a second father to me. He was a bluff and powerful man, but he feared God and protected his people with a vigilance that none could ever fault.” Alice raised her voice. “We will miss you, Baron Hugh. I will miss you.” She lowered her head.

Cord heard those around him saying that she wept for him.

“Truly, the Lady Alice loved him like a father,” said a mason to Cord’s left.

“She mourns him more than any of his knights, that’s for certain,” said the mason’s wife.

“I’ve been wrong about her,” said another woman. “I’ve always heard that she hated the Baron.”

“Hush! What a foul thing to say. Look at her. She’s so lovely, so pure and innocent. No, she loved the baron.”

“I’m not so sure—”

“Look! She wipes her eyes. And now she speaks again. Quiet all of you. Listen!”

The babble died away. Cord, like those around him, strained to hear what Lady Alice would say next.

“Please, dear God,” Alice said loudly, with her eyes closed, “protect Sir Guy as he rides for Pellinore. Protect him from the armies roaming the Marches. And most of all, dear God, give him wisdom and strength as he attempts to pick up the mantle laid down by his glorious father.”

Abruptly, Alice sat down, with her head lowered and her shoulders trembling.

For a moment silence ruled, except for two hounds fighting over a bone. Finally, Father Bernard stood and said a loud amen.

Lady Martha hugged Alice, and everyone saw how she whispered comforting words to Alice. It moved many of the women to tears, and many of the men roughly drained their jacks of ale.

Sir Walter called for their attention, then said, “Henri, play us a song about the Baron.”

The minstrel rose, and in his liquid way he strode to the front of the Knight’s Table. He strummed his lute as he thoughtfully studied the clouds. Suddenly, his sweet voice began the song. It told of a baron who manfully attempted to accomplish his duties. Alas! Death took the baron before his goals could be attained. Now the lord baron, Henri sang, watched over them from within the clouds above. Yes! Even now, he could see the Baron as he smiled down on his people of Pellinore Fief.

Cord and others gazed up at the clouds in awe. A shiver of supernatural dread shot down Cord’s back. Did the Baron watch him even now? If he did, what did the Baron say to the angels? What did the Baron think about?

“The Baron ain’t up there,” the stable boy hissed. “He kicked me in the arse too many times for him to go straight up. I say he’s still in Purgatory.”

A smith cuffed the stable boy across the head and told him to shut his yap.

Cord frowned and studied the clouds anew. Maybe the stable boy was right. Besides, how could Henri see the Baron? Not even Father Bernard had been able to, or the Lady Alice? Surely, because of her sorrow God would grant
her
the vision before that woman-chasing minstrel.

Someone tapped Cord’s shoulder.

“The bailiff wants you,” said Sir Walter’s eldest son, the one who had taken Richard’s position today.

“Now?” asked Cord.

The lad jerked his thumb at the Knight’s Table. Sir Walter and the bailiff spoke together.

“All right, I’ll be right over,” said Cord.

People rose, some wandering back up the hill toward the castle, others breaking into separate clumps as they gossiped before renewing their day’s work.

Cord checked the tables and tossed a few extra scraps to various hounds, kicked two snarling brutes in order to break up their fight and pushed his way toward Henri. He grabbed the small minstrel’s arm and pulled him away from two serving maids.

“Easy, Cord. I’m not one of your hounds.”

“Sorry,” Cord mumbled.

Henri massaged his arm as he smiled wryly. “What has your temper up, dog boy? Why are you hauling me away from the ladies?”

“Did you really see the Baron?” Cord blurted.

“You mean up in the clouds?”

“Tell me the truth.”

“The truth?” Henri asked. “All you want is the truth? Bah! Why not ask for the moon, or sacks of gold, or a ship full of naked virgins.”

“Then you didn’t see the Baron?”

“Shhh,” Henri said, glancing around as he pulled Cord away from those nearest them. “What are you trying to do? Set me up for a beating?”

“What? A beating? You’re not making any sense.”

“Is that a surprise? I’m the minstrel after all.”

“Everyone was in tears. Even I felt something.”

Henri gave Cord his trademark smile.

“How could you see the Baron when Lady Alice couldn’t, or when even Father Bernard didn’t?” Cord asked.

“Cord, Cord,” Henri said, shaking his head. “Sometimes you’re wiser than a pope. At other times, you’re a simpleton looking for a thrashing. I could see what the guileful Alice couldn’t or the simple-minded Father didn’t because I study hearts.”

Cord frowned, trying to understand.

Henri leaned near and whispered, “The truth, which is what you asked for, is that Baron Hugh is dead. What happened to his soul?” Henri shrugged theatrically. “Up, down, here, there, never, always. Who knows? The priests say they do. But they whore, guzzle and gorge themselves as much as any man. So I don’t know why they should have any inner secrets over us.”

“Henri!” Cord said, outraged by the minstrel’s blasphemous words.

“Ah, I forgot. You pray, tithe and listen to priests with the best of them. As for me....” Henri glanced around, then leaned closer yet and whispered, “Where do souls go when men die? Who knows, really? What I do know is this: Men live on in people’s hearts.” Henri poked Cord in the chest. “There lives the Baron. Yes, right there.” He poked harder. “That’s what I saw when I said the Baron watched us from above.”

Cord tried to speak.

“Yes, dog boy, I saw the Baron peering out of your heart.”

“You’re mad,” Cord whispered.

“Am I? Then why did everyone shed tears at my words?”

Cord shook his head.

“Because I saw the truth, that’s why.”

“I...I don’t understand you, Henri.”

The small minstrel smiled sadly, much of the wit for once drained out of his face. “I know you don’t. But like me, you sometimes see things for what they are. It’s why you control hounds better than any man alive does. You spoke of love the other day, but that can’t be why the hounds obey you so well.”

“No?” Cord asked, feeling better because now they talked about something he understood.

Henri said, “Love is a myth, an illusion, a thing which men play with. Just as I played with the Baron’s memory.”

“No, Henri, love is the treasured something that men and women give.” Thinking of Bess, Cord sighed in the way children do after a long cry. “Sometimes, though,” he said softly, “love is spurned and trampled into the dust.”

Henri shook his head. “There is no love, only lies which people tell each other.”

Cord finally saw the pain in Henri. It shocked and surprised him. He saw the pain in the small minstrel’s posture, in the wry smile, in the eyes which seemed so deep but which were haunted with an almost unbearable affliction. Unconsciously, he reached out and squeezed Henri’s shoulder.

Henri jerked away.

“I...I think you’re a lonely man,” Cord said.

Henri’s mouth twisted with distaste.

“But I’m your friend,” Cord said.

Henri stared rudely, although some of the tension eased out of him. “I have no friends.”

“You have one,” said Cord.

Henri stared in obvious bewilderment. Then he asked softly, “Why would you be my friend?”

Cord thought about it. “Because I like you.”

“I can’t help you win back Bess, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“It isn’t.” But he wondered if that were really true.

Henri searched Cord’s face. “No, it isn’t,” he said in surprise.

“Cord!” the bailiff shouted.

Cord waved. Then told Henri, “I’m off.”

“Yes. Good bye.”

Cord wanted to say more, hesitated, but couldn’t think of anything to say. He felt awkward. At last, he chuckled nervously and strode away.

He left a frowning Henri, who mumbled softly to himself that all of life was a lie. When the two serving maids found him, he’d already put his protective wry smile back into place. Still, he played his game with the maids with less zest than before. Cord’s words troubled him, and he wondered if maybe
he
wasn’t the fool, not the earnest dog boy who claimed to love his hounds.

Maybe he’d have to stay at Pellinore a little while longer. If there really was truth, love and meaning, then surely it behooved him to find out.

The bailiff rode a spirited palfrey, a brown stallion with white forelocks. He sat tall in the saddle, his back straight, his shoulders squared and his head erect. His black hair had a tendency to swing down into his eyes, and his long jaw moved from side to side as he chewed over his thoughts. One hand held onto the reins, the other rested lightly on his sword pommel. As always, the bailiff wore chainmail, with a fine link hood, settled behind his head.

He was darker-skinned than the other Pellinore knights, and his pockmarked features made him look rugged. It was his gray eyes, however, which caused men to cower before him. It wasn’t bulging muscles or a large frame that frightened criminals and outlaws, but the calm assurance that the bailiff wore like a halo.

Sometimes Cord wondered if, in ordering others—peasants, slaves and outlaws—the bailiff hadn’t come to
expect
people to obey him, and so gained his masterly self-assurance.

The bailiff could handle weapons, but not in a dazzling display as Sir Philip or Baron Hugh could. Sir Walter won more bouts on the jousting yard and Richard had been able to outfight the bailiff on the practice field. Even so, by his plodding certainty, by his willingness to match stroke for stroke against better opponents, by his very
unwillingness
to admit defeat against better knights, the bailiff had beaten foes that were more skilled and even slain masters of the blade.

Cord trotted beside the bailiff, with Sebald beside him. Cord carried a sack and breathed heavily as they moved up a forested hill. A while ago, he’d given his trencher to One-foot Jake. The bailiff hadn’t said anything, although his thin lips had curved up in a slight smile of approval.

The bailiff now drew rein and dismounted stiffly, tossing the reins to Cord. He stretched his back with a groan, then strode in a circle and shook his legs. “I rode far yesterday,” he explained.

“Are your legs stiffening up again?”

The bailiff smiled sourly. “Age does things to a man’s body that only God in His mercy can halt. You’re still young, filled with vigor and fresh limbed. Be thankful.”

Cord didn’t feel so fresh. He’d also traveled far, if several days ago instead of just one. His traveling, however, had all been afoot, not mounted on a horse like a noble. His legs didn’t have their usual power and his feet still hurt. The cobbler had fixed his boot, but running barefoot several days ago had taken its toll.

The bailiff snapped a twig off the nearest tree and with his thumbnail began peeling bark. He seemed preoccupied, engrossed with a thought.

Cord scratched Sebald behind the ears, waiting.

The bailiff looked up. He began snapping the twig into smaller and smaller pieces. For once in his life, he appeared uncomfortable.

“Is something wrong?” Cord asked.

The bailiff nodded. “I’m troubled about something I’ve heard.”

Cord waited. It wasn’t like the bailiff to beat around the bush. Usually he came straight on like a sword thrust to the guts.

“Ah, you wait and keep silent,” the bailiff said. “Most people talk too much and give themselves away. You’ve depth to you, Cord. I like that, and I admire how you train your hounds. It’s one of the reasons why I told the Baron you’d make a good forester. I still think you’d make a good forester. But despite my blessing, I don’t think you’re going to become one.”

Cord’s stomach tightened. The bailiff was seldom wrong about anything, and he only spoke if he believed something to be true.

“Sir Philip isn’t your friend,” the bailiff said.

“I mean him no ill will,” said Cord.

The bailiff frowned.

“Well, at least I didn’t until a couple of days ago,” Cord amended.

“That’s better. Speak only the truth to me, or don’t speak at all. I have no interest hearing lies.”

“What troubles you, Sir?”

“Did you plan the Baron’s death?” the bailiff asked.

“What? No! How could I possibly plan that?”

The bailiff rubbed his jaw, studying Cord. “I’ve heard rumors, and I heard Philip swear before Saint Hubert that it was your
plan
to harm the Baron.”

“That’s madness!”

“Do you call Philip a liar?”

Cord opened his mouth. Then he recalled Hob’s warning. He shook his head. “I think Sir Philip loved the Baron. To see him slain by Old Sloat—I think it broke Philip’s heart. In his grief, he lashed out at me. You know as well as I that Sir Philip never had any fondness for me. Why that’s so, I don’t understand—”

“I do,” the bailiff said, interrupting.

“Milord?”

“He hated your father.”

“You knew my father?”

The bailiff turned away, reaching out and snapping off another twig. He peeled part of the twig, then snapped it in two and threw the halves away. “Your father was a tough man, strong and handy with a blade.”

“Why did Sir Philip hate him?”

“Your father defeated Philip once, badly. He gave Philip his first scar, the one across the bridge of his nose.”

“In a fight?”

“In a joust.” The bailiff faced Cord. “It was at a tournament held at Wigmore Castle. Earl Roger Mortimer’s father gave the tournament. Your father and Philip, both newly knighted, tried to win the hand of the same lady. Oh, she was a cunning lass that one. She smiled, flirted and gave many a token to many a knight. When Sir Philip tried to woo her, she laughed at him and said that your father had already won her heart. Philip swore to defeat him in a joust. She said that no man could beat the Saxon.”

“Did she love my father?” Cord asked, drinking up the tale as he would sweet ale.

“I think she enjoyed watching two men fight over her. Philip, even more so as a young man, had a violent temper. In any case, they met the next day on the field. In the first pass, each man splintered his lance against the other’s shield. In the second pass, your father shifted his lance at just the right moment. Sir Philip was sprawled backward onto the dirt. When the judges pried off his helmet, blood flowed from his nose and face.

“The lady only danced with your father that night. She even turned down young Roger Mortimer. We were all jealous. And I was only a page in those days, a young brat awed by his elders.”

The bailiff shook his head, apparently lost for the moment in his memories.

“Is that why Sir Philip hates me?” Cord asked, glad to learn that his father had beaten Philip. He’d known that his father had been fond of the ladies—although his mother had told him that father had always treated her well. She’d died when outlaws had attacked their village.

Cord shook off the memory. It pained him thinking about his mother.

The bailiff said, “Philip hates you for more reasons than that. I don’t believe I know the full story about your father and Philip. I know that you’re the spitting image of your father. You have the same stare, the same width of shoulders, the same odd way with animals. And the girls....” The bailiff laughed softly. “The girls look at you with the same gleam in their eyes.”

Cord thought bitterly of Bess.

The bailiff said slowly, “Baron Hugh, and even more so Philip, often spoke about what a delight it was to have you as his dog boy.”

“What do you mean?”

“The Baron knew your father, although he never hated him like Earl Roger or Philip did. Still, the Baron remembered that your father had Saxon blood, not Norman. It pleased the Baron that a Saxon knight, one as strong and bold as your father, was brought so low that his son served in a Norman castle as a common dog boy. I think Philip enjoyed the thought of that even more than the Baron, although he tried to hide it from us.”

Cord narrowed his eyes into slits. “They mocked me,” he whispered.

“Not you, but your father,” the bailiff said.

Anger burned in Cord. “Why are you telling me this?”

“So you’ll know what you’re up against. Sir Philip means to kill you, or see you killed.”

“Will you let that happen?”

“Not unjustly, no.”

“But otherwise, yes?”

The bailiff looked away, his halo of assurance momentarily shaken.

“Philip never wanted to kill me before,” Cord said. “Why does he now?”

“
You
slew Old Sloat. Only a powerful and lucky man could do that. The wild boar killed our Baron, and it killed the old forester, too, a tough old man. The person who killed Sloat, that person would be dangerous. Not only that, but slaying Old Sloat has brought you renown. It has made you more than ever like your father.”

Cord digested that.

“Now you wear your father’s signet ring, the ring with the arrogant seal of a roaring lion. You have given Philip cause to fear and hate you. Such a combination means he’ll try to kill you.”

“Why tell me all this? What’s your stake in it?”

The bailiff’s features hardened. He opened his mouth in the manner he usually did before giving a swift rebuke.

Cord knew he’d asked his question too sharply, not in the manner of a lowly dog boy to a knight. But he wasn’t just a dog boy anymore. Didn’t he wear the lion ring?

Whatever the bailiff had planned to say went unsaid. He closed his mouth and thoughtfully rubbed his jaw. “Yes,” he said at last, “I suppose you deserve to know my reasons. Someday I will have to stand before God’s Judgment Seat. Then I will have to give an account of all that I’ve done in this life, show God that I’ve acted fairly. Is it fair for a knight like Philip to know so much about a young man? Is it fair for the knight to hate the young man and want to kill him, all without the young man knowing what he’s up against? By warning you, I’ve balanced the scales.”

Cord thought about that. “Thank you for the warning. Now what do you suggest I do?”

The bailiff shook his head.

“Should I run away as others have told me to?”

“You will be branded an outlaw if you run away before Sir Guy can pass judgment upon your actions.”

“I know.”

“But if you don’t run, Philip will see to it that you’re killed.”

Cord nodded. Philip feared him, or he’d feared his father. But
he
had slain Old Sloat.

“Why do you grin?”

The bailiff’s question startled Cord. He hadn’t realized that he’d been grinning. He spoke before thinking. He said, “I’m going to defeat Sir Philip.”

The bailiff’s eyes widened. Goosebumps rose on his neck. “By all the saints, your father once spoke those same words. I remember them well.”

Cord’s grin grew.

“No, don’t smile. Your father swung in the end, all his boasts come to naught. You must try to walk a different path or you’ll end up hanging from a tree like he did.”

Cord reined in his heady emotions. “Thank you again, Sir Knight. I appreciate your warning.”

The bailiff nodded.

“Should we continue the journey?”

“A good idea.” The bailiff remounted the palfrey and they continued up the hill. As the trail became steeper, the oaks and beeches gave way to pines and spruces. Cord twice sipped from his beer-skin. The bailiff dismounted every so often and walked the stallion in order to rest him. Together they scaled the tallest hills in the fief.

These rocky hills rose in the fief’s southeast corner, a last bastion before the land settled out into the lowlands that sprawled all the way to the Severn River. The Severn divided the Western Marches from England.

The bailiff and Cord trekked toward Rhys’ place. Rhys was a Welshman who had once done the Baron a decided favor. More than ten years ago, Rhys and his mother had stumbled into Pellinore Castle. The stooped old woman coughed and hacked the entire night. Rhys had tried to help her, but the cough had worsened into a terrible bray of death. At last one of the knights, a man no longer living, had roared at the old crone to shut up or take her useless husk elsewhere.

Young Rhys rose with rage blazing in his eyes.

Only half Welsh and a bastard to boot, his father, it was learned later, had been a Norman man-at-arms who’d raped the old crone in her better days. Rhys had been raised as a Welsh freeman who, unlike English freemen, were never servile, and openly spoke their thoughts even to the greatest. Firm friends, Welshmen made implacable foes. Young Rhys, who knew only the highland Welsh customs, had drawn his dagger and challenged the knight to a duel to the death.

The hall had grown silent, and the old knight had turned red with wrath. The stripling Welshman, surrounded by his blood-foes, hadn’t shown a trace of fear or dismay.

“My lord,” the Lady Eleanor had said to Hugh, “you must not allow this boy to be hurt.”

“He is Welsh and has insulted one of my knights,” had said Hugh.

“No, milord, he is a boy who had the courage to stand up to a boorish insult against his mother.”

Baron Hugh, after further argument, had agreed with his wife. The knight had been made to apologize to the boy and to the old crone.

She’d died that night, but in the Baron’s bed in the living quarters above. Why Lady Eleanor had shown such kindness to a Welsh crone no one had ever learned, although all had agreed that it had been a true act of Christian charity. Everyone had noted how Father Bernard had preached the next morning on the Good Samaritan, using the Lady Eleanor’s example.