The Princess Who Rode on a Mule (5 page)

As
Steward, Robin had always carried a large ring of keys, attached to the leather
belt around his waist. This ring had been taken from him by the King’s men ere
he was brought to the Tower. But, it appeared, there were several keys
concealed about his person as well. She and Tom Browne had been greatly
surprised when Robin doffed his left boot and shook out a thin silver wedge
that he said would open not only the gate to the kitchen garden, but the door
to his Majesty’s privy. It was ornately carved, this key. One could see at a
glance that it pertained to Court.

The key
that Hadley held now was of plain iron. It came into her possession when she
was at the Tower. She had mounted her mule and was preparing to ride back to
Court, when Robin called her name. He crossed the distance between them in two
long strides, and grasped her small hand, cradling it for a moment within his
large one, before closing her fingers over a piece of hard metal.

 “Prithee
keep this to remember me by,” he said. “It was wont to ope the door to my
father’s shop.”

Hadley
looked closely at the key. Two letters were faintly inscribed on its
kidney-shaped bow. “J…B,” she murmured.

“My
father was called ‘John,’” said Robin.

“And
his surname?”

“If we
live to meet again, I shall tell thee…I would that thou had gone to
Wilgefortis.”

He had bade her
farewell then, and turned away, his broad shoulders bent, and Hadley had heard
nothing of him since. Now, she doffed the light, climbed into bed, and placed
the key under her pillow, that her head might rest upon it. “I love thee well,
dear Robin,” she murmured, and then she slept.

~~~~

She
awoke, with a start, at dawn, to shrieks and shouts and thundering footfalls.
She sat up quickly, but ere she could rise from her bed, the chamber door was
flung open, and Susannah burst in, cap askew. “His lordship’s knights!” gasped
the maid, running to the casement and throwing open the shutters.

Hadley
arose and stumbled to the window. Mayhap Susannah had mistaken the matter.
Mayhap the King’s soldiers had returned.

One
glance convinced her otherwise. The palace was rimmed by armored riders in
crimson-crested helmets, holding shields marked with his lordship’s
coat-of-arms. And behind the tier of mounted men was a vast horde of foot
soldiers that seemed to extend beyond the palace gates. How Lord Vardis had
come to command such a monstrous army, she could not know.

She
clasped Susannah’s hand, and they stood together like sisters for a moment, ere
Hadley recollected that she must dress.

“’Tis
strange,” she remarked, while the maid helped her into her gown, “That they do
not come within. Have they made no attempt to force the doors?”

“Belike they wait
for his lordship,” said Susannah.

~~~~

When
Hadley entered the Great Hall, she found it full of persons, yet strangely
quiet. As if by common consent, no one stood by a casement. The King sat, like
a statue, at the head of the long, empty table, and waved away his ministers
when they tried to speak to him. The courtiers clustered in corners, talking
quietly or not at all, their faces pale and frightened. The servants hovered
near the door and made no attempt to do their daily tasks. ‘Twas odd, Hadley
thought, to see Cook without a ladle.

Hadley
went to her mother, and grasped her hands. “We are lost,” whispered the Queen.

There
was a slight noise, and the Queen gasped. “’Tis naught,” Hadley said, for she
knew the noise came from within. But when she looked up, she saw Lord Vardis
entering the Hall, supported by his two henchmen. He was pale, but fully
dressed, and on his face was a smile of triumph.

“I know
not why my knights have not yet joined us,” his lordship said gently, as he
slowly made his way across the Hall towards the heavy barred door that led to
the courtyard. “I shall go out to greet them.”

“Stop
him, Father!” shouted Hadley. “We must keep him here!”

“I can
walk unaided,” Lord Vardis said to his henchmen. “Lift your halberds.”

 They did
so, and none dared confront the steely blades that were swung so efficiently.

“Lord
Vardis’s knights are welcome here!” shouted the King in a faltering voice.
“Hail to Lord Vardis, Regent of Glerny!”

Hadley
ran to the door and put her back against it, but Joan and Ingrid pulled her
aside ere his lordship’s men could reach her. Now one of the men was raising
the bar of the great door, while the other guarded Lord Vardis with his
halberd….Now Lord Vardis was passing through the entry….A knight came forward
to take his arm….Quick! Shut and bar the door!...Nay, too late! Another knight
had come to hold it open….Now all the knights would storm into the
palace….Naught could be done! Naught could be done!

All
eyes were fixed upon the door. Some faces were despairing, others full of fear.
The seconds passed, each seeming like a minute. And then it seemed an hour had
gone by. ‘Twas hard to wait for what was surely doom. A minute must have
passed, or mayhap ten. When would they come, and why did they delay? One knight
stood stiff against the heavy door, but where were his fellows? They could not
be seen.

Mayhap
it was Princess Ingrid who first ran to the casements, but others—lords and
ladies and servants alike—soon followed, pressing themselves against the
windows, and rising onto their toes, to have a better view.

“They
ha’ surrounded his lordship!” shouted a manservant, who was taller than the
rest. “I see the halberds….Methinks they have ta’en the halberds of his men.
And now they are passing them o’er the crowd.”

“They
pass the halberds?” asked one of the King’s counselors, who was not at the
window.

“Nay,
the men! They pass them over, hand to hand, helpless as babes. They are bound,
methinks!”

“Nay!”
scoffed several.

“’Tis
true!” shouted the manservant. “And his lordship also! The large knight hath
him well in hand!”

“They
betray him!” cried Ingrid.

“’Tis
not possible,” said some courtiers, pushing forward and trying to gain a place
at the casements.

“Lord
Vardis in irons,” said Ingrid. “A sight I never thought to see!”

The
watchers fell silent, until one cried out, “They are coming,” striking dread
into the hearts of all.

“Nay.
‘Tis but one knight,” said Ingrid, craning her neck. “Mayhap he hath led them
all to revolt against his lordship.”

Then
came the sound of heavy footsteps, and a familiar voice called out “Sire! Sire!
‘Tis Robin Cope!”

And so
it was. When he entered the Great Hall, Hadley knew him by his size and shape
and style of walking, though the armor made him seem another man. The knight
who held the door, came in behind him, and the heavy door fell back, with a
thud, shutting off all noise from the throng without.

Robin
doffed his helmet and let it drop upon the floor. “Sire,” he said, approaching
the King, who was still seated at table, seemingly lost to all the world. His
Majesty blinked and turned his gaze to Robin. “Art thou a traitor, Master
Cope?”

“I am
thy faithful servant e’en now,” said Robin.

“I am
an old man. Help me to my chamber.”

Robin
held out his arm, and the King grasped it and rose slowly to his feet.

The
other knight approached then, and removed his own helmet, which he placed under
one arm. “King Valentine of Glerny,” he said, making a slight bow. “I am Tom
Browne. And I depose you in the name of the people.”

“Wouldst
have our crown?” gasped the King, as he leaned on his Steward’s arm.

“Nay.
Keep your crown, but henceforth, it is a worthless thing. There shall be no
more of kings and crowns in Glerny. I shall be Chief Counselor for a fortnight,
and then we shall take a poll and the populace shall appoint new governors.”

“Hast
thou ought of noble blood?”

“Nay.”

“But
those who wait in our courtyard...there are some, mayhap, who are noble.
Vardis’s knights, methinks, are highborn men.”

“Nay.
There are no knights without. Some hours past, we waylaid his lordship’s men
and robbed them of their plated mail, which we then put upon ourselves that we
might more easily approach and pass through your defenses. But be not dismayed.
No blood shall be shed here.”

“We do not say you
are i’ the wrong,” murmured King Valentine. “’Their wives and babes,’ I heard
him say.”

~~~~

Tom
Browne served as Governor for two years, and then was replaced by Dame
Cardonell, who served four. Despite much opposition from the nobility, and some
setbacks, the land of Glerny endured, and its people prospered.

‘Twas
pleasant for Hadley at Basingham Manor, though the household was much reduced
from what it had been at Court. Most of the servants, and nearly all of the
courtiers, departed when they discovered how straitened the royal family’s
means had become. The Queen and her daughters were forced to perform household
tasks themselves. Ingrid found this irksome, but Joan and Hadley did not mind.
Hadley oft worked in the large kitchen garden, and Robin worked with her, when
not called upon to serve her father.

King
Valentine was ever full of humors, but his choler bred no terror now. He had
grown old and weak beyond his years, and rarely stepped outside his bedchamber.
Some said his days were numbered, and they spoke true, for he did not long
survive his dethronement.

Queen
Maud, at last, was sovereign of her house, and her daughters were given leave
to plan their futures. Joan did not wed James, who had returned from exile, but
instead journeyed to Wilgefortis, where she took up orders and in time became
an abbess. Ingrid surprised everyone by wedding the noble Prince Tristram of
Verimot, who was so besotted with her lively charms that he overlooked her lack
of title…and her wayward nature.

And
Hadley, of course, married her father’s Steward. After the King’s death, Robin
purchased a small plot of land in a nearby village, which he and his wife and
her mule worked together, until ‘twas a prosperous farm. They begat nine
children, who became fine men and women, and the name of “Cope” grew much
respected in the village. Robin never resumed his original surname, which was
“Bullock.” “Though I am a great hulking creature,” he told his wife, “I’d
sooner not be called an ox.”

Lord
Vardis ne’er would take a wife, but was kept in captivity always, for he had
been tried and convicted of murder and many other heinous crimes. His chamber
was near the top of Glerny Tower, that he might ope the casement and look out
far and wide upon the world he had lost…and that he might be near the great
bell now hanging within the tower belfry. Its peal was mighty, and he would
hear it ring out, once at dawn and once at dusk, every day for the rest of his
life.

**************************

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“The
Princess Who Rode on a Mule” is the ninth story in “Nine Princesses: Tales of
Love and Romance,” available for $3.99 on Amazon.com. Have you read the others?
An excerpt from the first story, “The Melancholy Princess,” is below.