Lord of Midnight Read online

  “If the champion loses,” Truda asked, very quietly indeed, “what happens then?”

  Nan’s eyes shifted all around and she leaned very close. “As I understand it, God will have said that the king can’t be king.”

  Truda blessed herself. “Lord a’mercy!”

  The champion returned to face his opponent and both men put on conical helmets, lacing them under the chin, and took up their long shields.

  “Do you call upon God,” the crier demanded, “to use your bodies to prove justice and right?”

  “I do!”

  “I do!”

  A priest stepped forward. No, not a priest but a bishop in his glittering robes and tall miter. He presented a golden crucifix for each man to kiss. Then he sprinkled holy water on each man’s bowed head. Finally, he dipped a thumb in holy oil and anointed them, so whichever died would have received the Last Rites.

  When he stepped back, the crier announced, “May God show the truth of your cause!” and the king raised his hand.

  As Lord Clarence of Summerbourne drew his gleaming sword, a cloud skittered across the sun, stealing any touch of brightness from the moment.

  It was slow at first. The men swung and blocked with shield or sword, but despite thud and clang, they were just testing each other. As they worked their way across the circle kicking up dust, the rhythm became almost monotonous.

  In a show fight the crowd would be jeering by now, calling for more action, but nothing here was for show. One of these men would die today, and if they wanted to tread the path warily, that was their right. A battle like this could take all day, and be decided in the end more by exhaustion than warlike skill.

  Truda didn’t think Lord Clarence would last all day. Something in the way he moved already suggested weary muscles.

  Then, as if contradicting her thought, he surged forward. His blows rang harder, striking sparks from that German blade and from the iron around the champion’s shield.

  Sir Renald held his own but no more, retreating steadily. Then he changed the rhythm and began to drive Lord Clarence back.

  The accused man stumbled. The crowd gasped and the champion swung backward against the edge of his shield. Instead of beating it aside, however, the sword bit deep, right through the metal band and into wood.

  And stuck.

  As the crowd gasped again, Lord Clarence seized his moment. He aimed a swinging blow at his unbalanced opponent, a blow designed at the very least to crack ribs. At the last moment, Sir Renald’s shield turned it away, but awkwardly, leaving him wide open to a thrust.

  But in the same movement he kicked Lord Clarence’s shield to free his sword, and leaped back out of danger.

  Like one body, the crowd let out a breath. The two men paused to gather themselves.

  “Oooh,” said Nan. “That was a nasty moment.”

  “I’ve never seen a sword cut through a shield like that,” said Truda. “German steel? Lord Clarence had best watch out. That sword could cut through mail.”

  “He’s got the right idea, though. Break some bones and it won’t matter if the champion’s bigger and stronger and has a German sword. He’ll be a dead man.”

  Truda stole a look at the king, whose fate apparently hung in the balance here. He sat still as a statue, hands relaxed on the arms of his chair, face almost contemplative. She liked that. A king should have dignity even in the face of disaster.

  Especially in the face of disaster.

  A clang told her it had started again and she turned back.

  Lord Clarence must have been encouraged. Now he swung mightily, pushing the champion back under a torrent of blows. Truda found she had her knuckle between her teeth.

  Trouble for kings always meant trouble for lesser folk.

  But then Lord Clarence’s furious swinging turned wild. Now he looked like Willy and his friends, playing with sticks and swinging without much plan or skill. The champion still had his strength. In a move that even she could see was graceful, Sir Renald turned the fight. Steadily he forced Lord Clarence to retreat.

  The accused man staggered, as if his legs were failing, and his sword drooped on a weary arm. Instead of surging for the kill, the champion checked his swing. Truda thought his lips were moving. What could there be to say at this point?

  Perhaps it was a taunt, for with a hoarse, defiant cry Lord Clarence revived and swung.

  Sir Renald blocked that wild blade with his shield, beating aside his opponent’s shield with his fist. Then he impaled Lord Clarence through chain mail right to the heart.

  “Oooooooh.” The sound wove around the circle even as the traitor crumpled, dead before he hit the ground.

  The champion collapsed to his knees, and for a moment Truda thought he’d been injured as well. What would that say about the right of the king to the throne? But then the man blessed himself and started to pray.

  Chatter rose from the field like a flock of starlings.

  “Bit short,” said Nan, tucking her spinning into a bag.

  “Is he dead, Mam?” asked Willy.

  “Yes, love. And the king is proved to be the good and just man we know him to be.”

  “Didn’t last long.”

  “Long enough, Willy. Long enough to kill a man.”

  Truth to tell, it had been a strange sort of fight. Even as she steered her son to follow the crowd back to market stalls and houses, to breweries and smithies, she glanced back at the tableau in the dust.

  “Mam?”

  “Yes, love?”

  “I thought mail was suppose to stop a sword.”

  “It is, love. It is. I’ve never heard of someone being killed that way before. Normally it’s bash, bash, bash until one’s too bruised and broken to keep going. Neater this way, though …”

  Something about the scene around the body made her pause.

  Lord Clarence’s attendant was on the ground, his master in his arms. He’d taken off his lord’s helmet and pushed back his mailed hood so he could stroke the sandy hair. During the fight, clouds had gathered, weighting the scene with shadow, but now a chance beam of sunlight picked out the group.

  Picked out Sir Renald, still kneeling in prayer. Picked out jewels on the clothes of the three standing nobles who’d gathered, forming a backdrop to the men on the ground.

  Why, it looked just like the picture on the wall of St. Mark’s, the picture of Christ taken down from the cross! Truda hastily blessed herself in case she’d thought a sacrilege.

  The champion must have dropped his sword, for one of the other men picked it up. It was the High Champion—the one called FitzRoger—with his dark hair and rich, somber clothing.

  He cleaned the blade on a cloth which turned scarlet, then presented it to the kneeling man. The blade looked strangely shadowed, as if it ate the dull light. Everything froze, becoming like a painting, but then the victor pushed wearily to his feet and took the sword. After a moment, he kissed the hilt and pushed it into his scabbard. Then he turned and walked over to the dais where the king awaited.

  “Well of course,” said Truda, half to herself. “It’s that stone from Jerusalem. It was a miracle him being able to kill that way, that’s what it was.”

  “Mam!”

  She looked down. “Stop pulling my sleeve like that!”

  Willy let go, but jiggled around. “There’s a pie-man over there. Can I have a pie on the way home? Can I?”

  “No, you can’t!” But then she shook her head. “We’ll buy a few and take them home for all to share. Come on. Let’s hurry.”

  The rain had started, plopping heavily to make dark circles in the dusty ground. In one spot, it began to form a crimson pool.

  Chapter 2

  Claire of Summerbourne bent over her desk, trying to wipe the smile off the face of a cow. The ink had soaked into the parchment, however, so she picked up her knife and scraped down to a clean surface. She couldn’t do that often, or she’d scrape a hole in the page.

  Drat the weather. It had rai
ned for more than a day, and still it pelted down, gusted by winds. She didn’t dare open the shutters more than a crack, and no one could do fine work by candlelight.

  It was madness, she knew, to be trying to draw, but the rain showed no sign of letting up and she needed to do it. This work had been her solace ever since her father had ridden off to join the rebels. Against her dread of disaster, she had placed an act of faith. If she finished this work, finished writing and illustrating his favorite story, he would come home to see it.

  He would come home safe.

  She raised her head, chewing the bone hilt of the knife. He should be home by now. It was weeks since Duke Robert—the coward—had fled back to Normandy. Other local men had returned, and rumor said it was the same all over. A few of the leaders like Robert de Bellême had been exiled, but most of the rebels had merely been fined and sent home.

  A neighbor, Lambert of Vayne, had ridden over not long ago, his mood a curdled mix of bitterness at his penalties and relief to be pardoned. According to him, her father had survived the one brief skirmish. Lambert hadn’t known where Lord Clarence was now, however, or what punishment was likely.

  Surely no worse than Lambert’s. After all, her father and the king were old friends. She was in her father’s study, where she always worked, and she looked at the shelf holding a precious goblet set with jewels. It had been sent by the king a year ago, shortly after he seized the throne of England. Sent to his friend.

  Ad dominum paradisi de rege angelorum it said around the rim. To the lord of paradise from the king of angels. That was because Henry had loved to visit Summerbourne and had called it a little bit of paradise. The king of angels bit referred to an old joke between the two men.

  Claire had heard Henry Beauclerk say that her father’s stories and riddles were worth the whole treasury of England. Surely they were worth a pardon.

  “It’s too dark to read.”

  Claire grimaced at her young brother Thomas, who was sprawled on a bench, a precious book almost sliding out of his hands. He was supposed to be reading to her, but she’d become so absorbed, she’d not noticed when he stopped. It was hard to get an active twelve-year-old to study, even one mired in rainy-day boredom.

  “Come a little closer to the window,” she said.

  “I’ll get water on it and you’ll nag me.” He closed the book and put it carefully away in its chest. At least he was thoroughly trained to that. Then he came to lean against her desk. “I’ll read some more later. Honest.”

  She gave him a look. “Later, the rain will stop and you’ll be out with your friends.”

  “I like those kittens. What story’s this?”

  “Read it for yourself,” she said as she leaned closer to redraw the cow’s mouth.

  Haltingly, tracing the words with his fingers, he did so. “‘And so the Brave Child Sebastian set out from his home, leaving behind his cat, his hound, and his favorite cow …’ I don’t think anyone has a favorite cow, Claire.”

  “I do. The one with the white horns.”

  “Oh, that’s the one you’ve drawn! It looks just like her. You’re good at this.”

  Claire laughed at his astonishment. “Thank you, kind sir.”

  “I wish you’d draw me.”

  Claire leaned down to find the sheet she’d been working on the day before. She’d not shown her brother yet because she wasn’t sure how he’d react. “I have,” she said, laying the sheet out on a clear surface. “You’re the Brave Child Sebastian.”

  He looked at the picture of the sturdy youth with the curly blond mop, staff in hand as he marched off to face the enemy. “Do I look like that? He looks brave.”

  “You are just like that. Upright and brave.”

  “I’d rather have a sword than a staff.”

  “You will in the later ones.”

  “Oh yes, when I face the evil Count Tancred and strike him to the heart.” He swung an imaginary blade, almost sweeping her ink pot to the ground.

  “Thomas!”

  “Sorry.” His cheerful face didn’t show much repentance, but then sank into a scowl. “I wish I had a real sword now.”

  “Why?”

  “‘Someone has to be able to fight if we’re attacked.”

  “No one ever attacks Summerbourne.”

  He gave her a look that suggested he wasn’t as blind to the situation as he sometimes appeared. But then he leaned over to study the picture of himself again. “It is a grand tale, isn’t it? One of Father’s best. I love it when Sebastian challenges the evil count to a court battle, and everyone laughs. Not that they laugh, but that they’re so wrong. Have you kept that part?”

  “Of course. It’s just as Father tells it.”

  “And when Sebastian kills Lord Tancred, and the warrior looks so surprised as he dies! That’s the best bit. And Sebastian being proclaimed a hero, of course.”

  “And everyone being able to practice their Christian faith.”

  But he ignored the inner meaning. “If an enemy comes here, God might strengthen my arm as he strengthened the Brave Child’s. Then I’ll smite them all.”

  Claire bit back a protest. It would never happen. She prayed daily that it would never happen.

  But her father had turned traitor. Or at least, he had opposed the king. Who therefore must be wrong, because her father must be right. So it wasn’t treason. Not really. But sometimes people suffered for being right. Like the holy martyrs.

  What was right? What was wrong? Last year, the old king, William Rufus, had died of an arrow while hunting. An accident, they said. A very convenient accident, with his younger brother there ready to seize the throne.

  That younger brother was Claire’s father’s friend, Henry Beauclerk. Rufus’s older brother, the Duke of Normandy, had invaded to assert his right to England, and many lords had ridden to support him. Not enough, however. Duke Robert had assessed his chances and let his brother buy him off, then run back home leaving his supporters to their fate.

  Supporters like Lord Clarence of Summerbourne.

  King Henry was a clever man, however, and had made peace with most of the rebels. He’d merely demanded their oath, fined them, and sent them home.

  Her brother wandered over to the chess board to slide the stone figures around like toy soldiers. “I wish Father would come home.”

  “So do we all.”

  “Lord Lambert’s home. Why not Father?”

  Claire wished she knew. “Perhaps the fine Father has to pay hasn’t been settled yet.”

  “I heard Mother talking to Gran.” Thomas looked up, unusually somber. “She’d heard Father was in a tower because he wouldn’t swear the oath to the king.”

  Claire cleaned her brush. She’d hoped Thomas hadn’t heard that. “In the Tower,” she corrected. “It’s a great keep the Conqueror built in London.”

  “But how long’s the king going to keep Father there? It’s not fair!”

  “We don’t know it’s true. It was only a tinker’s tale.”

  “Tinkers are usually right. So how long?”

  “Until Father swears the oath, I suspect.” She turned on her stool to face him. “You know Father. He’s the gentlest, kindest, sweetest man on earth, but once he decides something is right or wrong he’s like a rock.”

  “The king’s going to keep him there forever?”

  “Of course not. Father will have to give in. He won’t want to sit in prison for years.”

  Thomas, however, threw her own words back at her. “You know Father!”

  “Yes. And I know Father’s clever. He’ll think of a way around the problem.” She resolutely turned back to her work. “When he does come home, I want this ready for him. Without a smiling cow!”

  As she’d hoped, Thomas shrugged off his bleak mood and came back to study the picture. “But you know, I think that white-horned cow does smile.”

  Claire leaned back. “By the angels, you’re right. Why does it look so silly on parchment?” Thomas poked at h
er gold leaf. She slapped his hand and answered herself. “Because the parchment world isn’t real, so it has to be more real than real.”

  “That’s silly.”

  “‘Tis not.” She hunched over the writing desk to add the slightest touch of a smile to the cow’s face. She had it finally as she wanted when the watchman’s horn blared, and she dripped a blob of ink.

  “Jesu!” At least it hadn’t fallen on words or pictures.

  “Someone’s coming!” Thomas shouted, turning toward the door. “Bet it’s Father!”

  Claire threw down her cloth and chased after him into the great hall of Summerbourne, with its mighty wooden posts and warm central hearth. “Who comes?”

  They were all there in the smoky hall, shutters closed tight against the weather, busy with tasks that didn’t need much light. Her mother was spinning, her aunt Amice plucked flower petals for a perfume, and her aunt Felice played her harp. Her grandmother sat hunched close to the fire, her swollen joints probably agony in this damp weather.

  “Comes?” her mother asked, catching her thread.

  Claire flung one set of shutters open to the rain-pounded bailey. “The horn. I heard the horn!” Surely she hadn’t imagined it. No, the dogs were barking. She ran over to the big doors.

  “Is it Clarence?” asked Amice behind them.

  “Of course not,” replied Felice, continuing to riffle a tune. “In this weather? Our brother likes his comforts.”

  Claire halted by the closed doors, hope shriveling. How true. Her father wouldn’t struggle home in this weather when in a day or so it would clear into summer. Even so, she pushed open one of the doors and stepped outside, where the overhang of the thatched roof still sheltered her from most of the rain. Thomas came up beside her.

  “It could be Father.”

  She shivered in the damp chill. “Certainly someone’s out there. See, the guards are going onto the walkway to check.”

  As she spoke, one guard turned and climbed down the steep wooden steps to wade through the bailey toward them.

  Not her father, then. They’d have opened to him immediately.

  Disappointment was chased by foreboding. Who would travel in such weather?