HEARTLESS: A Medieval Romance (Age of Conquest Book 4) Read online

  As if his liege knew his thoughts, he snorted. “I speak of the red-haired and bearded Goliath.”

  Now sense made of him—and yet not. “Surely the leader of the Rebels of the Pale is not in the cave.”

  “He was, and quite the exchange we had.”

  Before or after William slew Vitalis to emerge from that place where he, like King Saul, encountered the rebel he hunted? More, how was it possible the clash between mighty warriors had not sounded across the cold air?

  “He is dead?”

  William shrugged his turned down mouth as he was wont to do in belaboring a lack of concern. “Non, I left him as I found him.”

  Then he had been perilously outnumbered.

  Thrusting back his mantle, Maël gripped his sword hilt. The answer to what awaited him and his men of greater import than the answer to why Vitalis and his followers had not slain the most hated Norman, he asked, “How many?”

  “They are gone.”

  Maël glanced at the cave that had swallowed and expelled the king alone.

  “They departed by way of what the knave told are numerous tunnels,” William said.

  Even so, they could not be so long gone it was impossible to overtake them, nor of great number to have eschewed the opportunity to slay or capture their greatest enemy. “How many?” Maël asked again to determine which of his men to take and which to leave behind to guard William.

  The king gripped Maël’s shoulder so hard, the links of his armor were felt through the woolen undertunic that was his last defense against Northern England’s cruel winter. “Leave it be, Chevalier. As told, they are gone.” He grunted, released his captain of the guard. “Vitalis but sought to take a piece of me. And that he did.”

  Maël lowered his gaze down William but saw no crimson upon his mantle, the over tunic visible between its lapels, nor his boots.

  “Not flesh,” William said. “Cloth.”

  “I do not understand, Your Majesty.”

  William drew forth the back of his mantle, the lower portion of which his wife had embroidered with black thread boasting a single strand of gold. Proudly worked among the stitched flourishes at regular intervals were the letters W for William and R for Rex.

  “As told,” the king growled, “the Goliath thinks himself David.”

  Maël stared at proof the Saxon had stolen upon the King of England the same as David had done the King of Israel who also sought privacy in which to relieve himself, both rebels cutting away a sizable piece of cloth as proof they had spared their enemy’s life.

  Great was William’s humiliation, and for that he directed anger at himself. Great was the blessing of escaping death, and for that relief. But what of satisfaction?

  “Oui, shamed,” the king said, and Maël was struck by the irony that, in setting an example his army could not match, he had been more shamed than ever they could be.

  William flung the ruined mantle behind. As if to mock him, it cast a swaying shadow that magnified the jagged gap center of its hem. “But never humbled,” he growled.

  Never, Maël silently agreed. “And yet something pleases Your Majesty,” he said. “You have plans to repay Vitalis’s offense?”

  William eyed the distant snow-covered peaks beginning to reappear now the storm had passed. “Would that I did, but foul weather, the rebels’ greater knowledge of these godforsaken mountains and valleys, and my army’s inability to keep pace stand in the way of justice. For now.”

  He returned his regard to Maël and smiled. Rather, smirked. Again. “Hence, pleasure found elsewhere. On one side, Vitalis’s fear of slaying the anointed one, whether by guile or open combat, serves as recognition of my right to the throne. On the other side, that I have so worthy an opponent.”

  Unlike Edgar the Aetheling and his advisors, the former having fled to Scotland to once more gain King Malcolm’s protection, the latter renewing their submissions to William weeks past when the king marched his army far north of York. It was then the first deserters had made their dissension felt, especially those who left not because of weather that threatened to take fingers and toes but in protest against laying waste to the region.

  Though the indiscriminate destruction of homes, food stores, and animals was intended to deprive rebels of supplies needed to continue opposing Norman rule, more it deprived the common folk. If men, women, and children did not quickly make their way south and take refuge, they might die of exposure to cold and starvation. Hence, many deserters had pronounced the campaign wicked and barbaric.

  That Maël would not argue, nor had his youngest cousin who was threatened with imprisonment when he refused to lead a contingent to wreak those atrocities. William had relented, likely more because Theriot was a D’Argent than that Maël cast off his habitual indifference and defended him.

  Thus, the young chevalier was charged with searching out pockets of resistance as his brother, Dougray, had done before the harrying. He had agreed, and yet in all the weeks since, no word nor sight of him.

  Some said he had deserted the same as other cowards and weaklings, but it was not true. Maël was not Theriot’s brother by birth, but raised alongside him, he knew his cousin well. Ill had to have befallen him.

  Thus, as much as possible before William led his army west to extinguish the Cheshire uprising, Maël had sought an answer to the missing D’Argent. Finding none, he had sent word to his other cousins upon Wulfenshire, and great the hope they had succeeded where he failed.

  “Vitalis is far worthier than the Aetheling and his advisors,” the king said. “Could he be turned, he would serve me well, but after what the resistance forced me to do…” He shook his head. “Never could I give him my back.”

  Tempted to remind him he had given Vitalis his back and yet he stood here rather than face down in a pool of blood, Maël set his teeth.

  “You are to hold this close,” William said.

  What of Vitalis and his rebels? Maël wondered. Would they hold close a tale that could rekindle a rebellion nearly reduced to ashes, proof of it a piece of the extravagantly embroidered mantle the king had worn to his coronation?

  “I assume Vitalis took the cloth with him,” Maël said.

  “He did. Would that I had donned my simple mantle this day.”

  Which was of lesser weight and warmth than this one with its fur collar. Had he worn the other that was unremarkable but for exceptional wool in which many a noble indulged, Vitalis would not possess great proof the piece was taken from the king.

  “Best I wear it now.” William stepped toward the horses draped with blankets. None but Maël would know he exchanged one mantle for another to prevent any from questioning the ruin of the first. It would be assumed abatement of the storm caused the hearty conqueror to cast off excessive warmth.

  A moment later, the king broke stride and turned. “Though it offends Vitalis makes of me a messenger, curiosity bids I pass along words he asked be delivered to you.”

  Maël tensed. “Your Majesty?”

  “He said I should tell the captain of my guard he shall continue to watch for him.”

  That did not surprise. During their last encounter, one rendered impotent by the need to save the life of the woman his cousin, Dougray, later wed, Maël had warned the leader of the Rebels of the Pale he should keep watch for this Norman. Though that truce was forced on Maël and he would not as greatly begrudge it now, still he would do William’s bidding.

  Within godly reason, added a conscience so desperate to survive it clung to him as if it were the last of his humanity.

  Regardless, Vitalis was surely laughing. He had kept watch as warned, and for it could have slain the conqueror.

  “Explain the meaning of that, Sir Maël.”

  “It is the warning I shouted at the Battle of Stafford when I could not get near enough to engage him at swords.”

  “During the battle, you say?”

  Afterward, and there the lie. “Oui, my liege.”

  The king shrugge
d his mouth again. “I am thinking you should make good that warning and retrieve what Vitalis stole from me.”

  Then once more he would detach his captain of the guard from his side, entrusting him with matters beyond the protection of his person.

  Maël would not argue. Not only was he eager to give teeth to his warning Vitalis keep watch for him, but there was no settling of one’s soul in the company of the man who had commanded unspeakable acts these past months.

  William tapped his temple. “A plan forms, faithful chevalier.”

  “I await your orders, my liege.”

  Hours later, the front rank of the dispirited army appeared in the distance. Upon catching sight of the Normans at the base of a hill gently rising toward a cave’s mouth, they ceased trudging and quickened their pace.

  Rest here for them—providing William, who assured Maël he would think on making camp, was sympathetic following his own shaming.

  He was, though it was dusk before he gave the order for his army to set their fires and make their beds.

  “Doubtless, more for his comfort than those of whom he demands the nearly impossible,” muttered the second in command of the king’s guard who had come alongside Maël after aiding quaking soldiers in erecting the royal tent.

  Maël glanced at the chevalier who was not kin, though he was kin to Maël’s illegitimate cousin, Dougray, then returned his regard to the king and saw he berated a nobleman beneath a canopy that kept lazily drifting snow off the anointed one’s head. It did not reflect well on William that one of his esteemed companions had brought up the rear of the army despite being astride.

  “But then, he himself has not fully recovered, has he?” Sir Guy said somewhat slyly.

  Maël looked at the one who would assume charge of the king’s guard when William revealed his plan to recover what had been taken from him. “What say you?”

  The chevalier cupped gloved hands over his mouth and warmed them with his breath. When he lowered his arms, his chapped lips curved. “I but confirm what you suspect. I saw the mantle ere he shoved it in his pack. What I do not know is how so prized a garment was ruined.”

  Maël had hoped his fellow Norman’s ignorance was not feigned when he returned from scouting the area just as William removed that mantle, and surely the king hoped the same.

  The chevalier’s report of glimpsing snow tracks in the distance that seemed of a sizable animal, if not a man, had been received with little concern though William and Maël knew who was responsible and the tracks would dig deeper when Vitalis exited the cave’s outlet to return to his horse and men. Hence, of no use to give chase since the rebel leader's numbers were likely greater at that time.

  “Certes, the captain of the king’s guard is not responsible,” Sir Guy said, then jerked his head toward the cave. “Are there bears in these mountains?”

  Maël nearly laughed as he would have done before being ruined in this godforsaken country, instead told himself there was nothing humorous here. Still, he could not entirely suppress a smile nor words that wanted off his tongue. “I know there are bears here. I just never expected they would be red of fur.”

  The chevalier’s smile broadened, causing his upper lip to crack and a line of crimson to appear. “Red, hmm? I hear those are the most ferocious. Hence, quite the miracle our liege lives.” His eyebrows rose. “What I would give to know how he found such favor with God.”

  As would Maël who, not for the first time, considered that if such a man had found favor with God, he might himself.

  Was redemption possible? If so, surely not whilst he served one who was more terrible than great.

  Chapter Two

  Lillefarne Abbey, Wulfenshire

  Spring, 1070

  She had thought she understood Gytha’s hatred of Normans, but what she had felt when last she saw her grandmother hardly compared to what dug deeper with each arrival at the abbey. And more so this day.

  It was not that this morn’s refugees numbered more than expected now the passing of winter saw fewer Saxons fleeing south. It was that they were children lacking an adult to aid in their journey until the day past when, blessedly, they were overtaken not by Normans but the Saxon warrior who delivered them here.

  Not all were orphans, some separated from families during their flight from the devastation ordered by the one who so coveted England he had risked being burned alive to gain a crown. But even if the parents of some of these children yet lived, orphans their sons and daughters would become were it impossible to reunite the families.

  The woman who had mostly shed the person of Mercia of Mercia these three years shifted her forehead against the cold stone floor. Spread before the altar and the simple wooden cross that had replaced the gilded one when William the Tyrant ordered raids on monasteries and abbeys to fill coffers from which to pay his army, she resumed her prayers. And once more strayed in marveling at how many were answered considering the lie of Abbess Mary Sarah, next bemoaned how many were ignored considering how great her people’s suffering.

  “Cease,” she hissed and beseeched the Lord’s forgiveness for disrespecting the audience granted her. “Almighty, I am tired,” she rasped. “Tired of broken and stolen lives. Tired of questions I cannot answer. Tired of being what I am not and never wished to be. Tired of tidings that deliver much pain and little relief.”

  Again, her thoughts drifted, this time to news of William’s most recent victory. Just as his rule had been strengthened by his devastation of the North, stronger he was for ending the latest uprising in Cheshire.

  “Where are You, Lord? On the road back to us? Or does that road not exist? Will You forever keep Your face turned from us?” Chest pained by the sob held there, she gasped, “Amen,” and flipped onto her back.

  Opening her eyes, she searched the rafters for the bird who had flown in days past and had yet to find its way out though doors and windows had been opened. If not for the bread she left near the chapel’s entrance alongside the font of water, the little thing might have expired. Hopefully, soon it would escape God’s house.

  “As I cannot,” whispered its abbess.

  There—a blink of light. The drab little bird roosted just off center above dust-scattered sunshine that lit an eye which seemed to return her stare. Then it spread its wings and flew toward a corner too dark to follow its progress.

  It was silly to feel abandoned, but Mary Sarah did, and for a moment as abandoned as when the two Saxon women upon whom she most depended to aid with the refugees had departed England to journey to Normandy with their husbands.

  That was silly as well since less and less she required help beyond that given by nuns, novices, and convent residents. Too, it was past time Lady Aelfled and her babe met their in-laws and made their home with them alongside her husband, Cyr D’Argent. As for Em who had wed Dougray D’Argent last December, once he reconciled with his sire, the two would return to Wulfenshire—for a short time only since lands awaited them in Derbyshire.

  Still, she would have the aid of Chanson and Nicola of Stern Castle, as well as Lady Hawisa of Wulfen, though long the latter had cast a suspicious eye on Mary Sarah who assumed the position vacated by the aged abbess following the Battle of Hastings.

  I am not alone, she told herself and wished it were true. One who played a part—who deceived no matter the reason—could never be well enough known to feel as if she belonged among others.

  “Accursed Normans,” she whispered. “Every one of them spawned by—”

  Not every one, she corrected. Like pearls to be found in one of a thousand shells pried open, there were some good Normans among them, as proven by many of the D’Argent family—ladies Chanson and Nicola, and brothers Cyr, Dougray, and Guarin, the latter the husband of Lady Hawisa. As for the other D’Argents, surely the odds were against them the same as the Godwines.

  Had not King Harold’s treacherous brother, Tostig, contributed to the Saxons’ defeat at Hastings? He had, so much it was likely his betrayal han
ded the victory to the Normans. But even before then, great her hope Tostig was not the one her grandmother would reveal had sired her.

  Returning her thoughts to other D’Argents of silvered dark hair, she considered Theriot who had accompanied the tyrant north last autumn in answer to the resistance taking the city of York and slaying its three thousand Normans. Also at that devil’s side, and even nearer for being the usurper’s captain of the guard, was one she knew better—in a manner of thinking, since she was more acquainted with Maël D’Argent than he with her.

  When first she had looked upon him and his ruined face at Westminster, she had seen him only as a nameless Norman who aided the duke in taking their country at the cost of thousands of their men folk. But when he allowed the two women to depart the way they had come, preventing them from being exploited by William, the one then called Mercia had been unable to match her grandmother’s hatred for him though he had not known how great the kindness shown them. Worse, something in the weak of her had reached out to something in the emptiness of him. Blessedly, the certainty she would not see the chevalier again had allowed her to mostly banish him from her thoughts—until he rode on Lillefarne a year and a half later and demanded its abbess send out one of the convent’s residents accused of collaborating with the resistance.

  Standing atop the wall, Mary Sarah had lost her breath when she recognized the handsome face disfigured one side of it and known beneath his mail coif was the silvered dark hair of a D’Argent.

  Though fairly certain at the coronation he had been unable to look as near upon her as she had looked upon him, she had kept her chin up and, peering down her nose, refused to send out the one he was to collect for his cousin. Had not Aelfled herself yielded under threat to her grandmother, the chevalier and his men would have had to force their way into the abbey to take her.

  In that moment of being bested by Maël D’Argent and fearing for Aelfled, Mary Sarah had tried harder to hate the tyrant’s man as Gytha would deem proper—and might have succeeded had she not been doused with fear over her own fate when he asked if they had met before.