The Iron Castle (Outlaw Chronicles) (44 page)

Sir Benedict started forward as this unfolded. He managed to shout, ‘What! What! What is the meaning—’ before Little John, who was seated beside him, snapped a heavy elbow into the side of his head, knocking him off his stool to crumple unconscious to the turf.

I had not moved. My goblet was still in my hand for Robin’s toast, which of course had been the signal for the huntsmen and servants to secure Sir Joscelyn and his men. I lifted the goblet towards him: ‘Death to traitors,’ I said, and drank.

‘All that dirty chit-chat about his daughter was a bit beyond the pale,’ said Robin, frowning at me. ‘I don’t remember that being part of the plan.’

‘It is all true,’ I said. ‘It didn’t change the outcome of today; and it doesn’t change the way I feel about Tilda.’

‘What is all this about? Why have I been insulted and restrained? Why have my servants been bound and my good friend Sir Benedict beaten unconscious. I demand to know this instant!’

Sir Joscelyn had summoned up a little bluster.

As Little John hauled the unconscious Sir Benedict away to be bound and laid on the grass with the other two prisoners, Robin poured me another goblet of wine.

‘All this?’ said Robin. ‘All this is about loyalty to your comrades. All this is about honour. Not that you would understand the term, you treacherous cock-socket.’

‘I have no idea what you are talking about. Are you all mad? I demand that you release me this very instant. This is an outrage. The King shall hear of this.’

‘Which king?’ I said. I looked steadily at Sir Joscelyn and his face seemed to close like a shutter. I had been pondering his crimes since I read his name on the parchment in the Seigneur’s strong box. On that royal charter Philip had promised him the rights to half a dozen castles and towns scattered across Normandy and the lands that went with them. His seal had been attached to the document, he had even signed his name on it in his own hand.

I had absolutely no doubt about his guilt. I took a long breath.

‘You were given the charge of defending the town of Petit Andely,’ I said in a quiet, measured tone, ‘but you did not defend it. Instead, you evacuated the town after a token resistance and encouraged the citizens to seek refuge in the castle. That was an act calculated to weaken Château Gaillard. All those Useless Mouths, all the food stores they ate up in the weeks with us. An act of mercy, in your hands, became an act of war. And, when Philip was away from the siege, and his men, out of their goodness, let the Useless Mouths pass through their lines, you got word to the King – probably by some secret system of signals with lanterns on dark nights – and he promptly stopped the exodus and all those harmless people starved. Because of you.’

Sir Joscelyn said nothing. He stared at me blankly, his bluster abandoned, giving me nothing at all.

‘You told the French that the mortar in the walls was wet in the outer bailey, and when the belfry failed, you told them they would have more success if they tried to undermine the walls. You opened the window in the chapel and let the enemy into the middle bailey – and caused the death of my young friend Kit. You told them about the counter-mine – you encouraged me to dig the counter-mine, come to think of it, after the high council had considered it and rejected the idea, knowing it would weaken the walls of the inner bailey fatally. You stole the castle’s stores, with the help of that silly, lovestruck cretin Malet, and you ate them, knowing each mouthful you consumed weakened the defence a little more. And, finally, when we still would not surrender to your master, you unbolted the door and let the enemy into the keep and surrendered yourself into the grateful arms of the King of France. And you did all this because you wanted to be a great man in Normandy. You caused the deaths of so many, so very many of your comrades because you wanted more land and wealth…’

‘I chose a side.’ Sir Joscelyn spoke calmly, quietly; I sensed he was speaking from the heart. ‘King John is a weakling and a fool – we all know that. I realised very early on that he could not hold Normandy, and when Normandy fell my family lands would be forfeit. I have nothing in England. I am a Norman, I have always been a Norman. And if Normandy has a new master, I must serve that master or perish. I chose a side, that is all. I chose the winning side.’

‘You chose the wrong side,’ Robin said.

‘And for that, I suppose, you would murder me in cold blood,’ said Sir Joscelyn, with no emotion at all in his voice.

‘Yes, that’s exactly what I’d do,’ said Robin cheerfully. ‘But Sir Alan here will not have it.’

I spoke up: ‘You will face a court of swords, a trial by combat – you will fight me, here, now, to the death, and God Himself will judge whether you are fit to live.’

‘You are most kind,’ said Sir Joscelyn. I believe he meant it.

Robin’s men-at-arms, huntsmen and servants – most of them Wolves but with a few old familiar faces from years gone by, too – formed a large, loose circle around Sir Joscelyn. A few of the Wolves were bowmen who had arrows nocked on bowstrings; others had drawn blades. Giffard was given his sword back and his dagger, but when he looked around the circle of men, men whose comrades he had betrayed, he saw death in their implacable faces. They knew his crime; they were here to see him pay for it. I took off my cloak and tunic and drew Fidelity and my misericorde. Like Sir Joscelyn I wore no mail and I carried no shield. I wanted this to be an even match. I had insisted on this in the long letter I had had a rider bring to Robin from Paris before I departed. I did not want to murder this man, I wanted to fight him fairly – then show the world the colour of his bowels.

Sir Joscelyn hefted his sword and dagger and looked around the circle of Wolves in the clearing in the heart of Robin’s territory. ‘So you invited me here, Locksley, to Yorkshire, Tilda and myself, just for this – this ridiculous duel,’ he said disbelievingly. It was not quite a question, and nobody answered him. Then he said, ‘And I have your word, my lord, that if I can defeat Sir Alan in this combat, you will let me go free.’ He looked directly at Robin.

‘Certainly, you may believe that if you wish,’ said my lord, smiling genially at the traitor.

‘Robin! This must be a fair fight,’ I said. ‘Swear on your honour that you’ll let him go if he wins. If I yield – or if I cannot rise and continue the fight. Swear it.’

Robin frowned but he nodded. ‘Very well, Alan. I swear on my honour that if you win, Sir Joscelyn, I’ll let you go.’

This seemed to satisfy Sir Joscelyn. He gave his sword a few experimental slashes to loosen his muscles – then he came at me.

He had a decent style, I must admit, and he had evidently been very well trained. He attacked down my left side, a succession of pounding strikes at my shoulder and head. I dodged to my right, keeping his blade away with the stout iron of the misericorde. I counter-attacked, sliced at his head with Fidelity, and he parried with the sword, a sharp, discordant clang in the quiet of the glade. We were circling, getting the feel of each other, exchanging short probing blows with our swords. I had his measure, I was certain. I knew I could take him. He was older than me, and slower – and God must surely be on my side. There seemed no point prolonging the fight. I stepped into him, feinted with the misericorde at his face, stepped forward for a fast chop to the back of his left knee – a favourite move of mine – trod a patch of slick mud and slipped. My right foot skidded forward and I thumped down hard on my arse.

He was on me like a fox on a sleeping dove.

His sword flashed down towards my head, a clean powerful vertical chop. It seemed to be coming down at me for ever, the sunlight glancing off that bright sliver of steel; a grim look of triumph on his face, his sleeve flapping with the force of the blow – and sometimes in my nightmares the blade connects cleanly and splits my head like a melon from crown to chin – but somehow I got my misericorde between it and my skull. The sword snapped cleanly through my dagger and crashed into my left shoulder, cutting deeply into the flesh, the blood running red.

He drew back his arm for another strike. But I kicked out savagely from the ground and he had to hop backwards. Then I was up on my feet again. Me and Fidelity against his sword and dagger. My shoulder was throbbing and the blood had soaked through my chemise and was running down my arm in sheets. I could barely raise my left arm and had nothing with which to protect my body on that side.

I had been overconfident and had paid the price.

He came at me like a madman in a whirl of jabs and slices from sword and dagger. Fidelity had to be everywhere, parrying, blocking, lunging at his body to try and keep him away. I dodged and ducked, my shoulder screaming in red agony. But his blows were wild; he was tiring, he was slowing. He swung his sword at my head and I blocked it with the high lateral guard, the hilt forehead-high in my double grip, Fidelity’s blade extending in a straight line out to the left. He was performing a set manoeuvre, a series of actions that came to him purely on instinct thanks to hours of practice with a master-at-arms; a forehand slash with the sword in his right hand to distract the opponent; step in and thrust with the dagger in the left, which aimed to catch the enemy up under the ribs; then step back out of range. There is nothing wrong with the move, I have taught it to many a man myself. Indeed, I had taught it to Wolves in the ring around us. But it must be done swiftly and with perfect timing. One-two, three-four. Sword-slash, step in, dagger-thrust, step back. Feint and step in, strike and step back. But, as I have said, he was slow. And he had used this move twice before. The moment he opened his stance for the right-hand slash, I knew where his left wrist would be a few instants later. So I blocked his sword with the high lateral guard, then whipped Fidelity down hard to my right. The blade sliced neatly into his hand as his dagger licked out towards me, severing the thumb and first finger, the digits pattering to the ground in a splash of gore. He screamed once, horribly, but I was already moving past him on his now unguarded left side. I stepped past, half-turned and swung Fidelity, chopping savagely into the back of his neck with all my remaining strength. His head leaped from his body at the strike. Blood gushed from the stump. The knees on the headless torso folded and the body flopped to the ground, still pumping gore.

I found I was panting, my body sheeted in sweat. My left shoulder was on fire. But the cheers of the men in the circle, the glowing faces of the Wolves who had witnessed my vengeance on their behalf, well, that gave my soul wings.

Justice had been done.

I rode to Kirklees Priory a few days later. The joint of my shoulder, thank God, had not been damaged, but the thick pad of muscle that covered it had an inch-deep gash in it and any sudden movement was very painful. Nevertheless, I rode to Kirklees as soon as I was able. I did not want the news of her father’s death to come to Tilda from some other mouth.

The Prioress, a kindly half-blind old gentlewoman, greeted me and showed me into the meeting room where Tilda was waiting to see me.

Her first words were: ‘Oh Alan, have you come to take me away from this awful place?’ I had never seen her look so beautiful, in her black novice’s gown, her raven hair bound up in a white headdress. Her lips were red as a summer rose; her blue-grey eyes as big and wild as the sea.

‘I will if you want me to, my darling,’ I said. ‘But you must hear what I have to say first. It may change your mind.’

I told her about her father. That he had been a traitor in the pay of King Philip and responsible for the deaths of so many good people during the siege. I told her about the way in which he had died, at my hand.

‘It was a fair fight, my love. It was no execution or murder. If it helps you, you may think of it as the judgment of God on his sins. And, while I know it must grieve you to hear of his passing, I hope what I tell you next will ease your suffering. I love you with all my heart, dear Tilda. If you will have me, I would take you as my wife.’

I paused and looked at her. He face was set like a rock, just as cold, hard and unmoving. She did not seem sad or happy or stirred at all by what I had told her. I wondered if she understood.

‘I will take you away from this place, if you wish it. You will come to Westbury with me and we will wed in the little church on my lands and we can be happy together. I know about you and Sir Benedict, and the musicians in Caen, and the others. I do not care. I forgive you. I forgive you because I love you. Tilda, my darling, will you be my wife?’

‘Are you quite mad?’ Tilda’s voice was low and, but for the words she uttered, she sounded quite normal: ‘Are you completely fucking moon-crazed?’

She took a deep breath, I thought at first to calm herself, but she continued in the same foul-worded but reasonable-sounding manner: ‘You … You arrogant, dung-brained, war-mongering clod! You come here with the blood of my father still staining your clothes’ – the ride had opened the wound on my shoulder and a little red was showing through my thin summer tunic – ‘and you tell me that my father was some sort of traitor – so you killed him. Do you think I really care what side my father was on during your stupid battles and idiotic wars and tedious sieges? Do you really think I give a ha’penny arse-fuck who slaughters who and in what stupid cause? You killed my father! God damn you. And you have the nerve to tell me you forgive me! You. Forgive. Me. For the things I have done with my own body – a body you drooled over impotently for months before finally summoning up the courage to touch. And now you ask for my hand, and say you forgive me. God damn you to Hell! God damn you for a fat-headed, cowardly, murdering, slack-witted bastard…’

I confess I was moving back towards the door by this point, more than a little alarmed. The door opened behind me. I saw the Prioress in the passageway and two of her nuns bustled into the meeting room. ‘That’s quite enough, Tilda!’ said the larger of the two women, laying a hand on her arm. But Tilda was still spitting her quiet venom at me as I edged out of the room.

‘I’ll make you regret this, Alan Dale, if it’s the last thing I do. I promise you. I’ll make you and your bloody master pay for what you have done. You and Locksley killed my father together and I do not forgive that. I will never forgive you for that.’