Chapter Eighteen
March (Spring)
They had returned everything to Kenton but his weapons. They’d even returned his horse. Several days after his defeat at Manchester, Kenton and Saxilby and about five hundred men had made the trek back to Conisbrough Castle, including a couple of hundred of Kenton’s men who were prisoners.
They departed Manchester on a bright day, nearly the first of spring, but it was still terribly cold.
The roads, because of the late snows and wet weather, were terrible and nearly impassible at points, but the Saxilby army managed to move through or around anything that seemed like a blockade.
Travel was slow-going, however, due to both the road conditions and the number of wounded they were carrying, and a trip that should have taken two days in decent conditions ended up taking four.
Kenton had seen Conisbrough Castle many times from a distance but he had never been inside the structure, which was quite vast. Much like Babylon, it had an enormous keep with mural stairs that led to different levels, and a great hall in the bailey.
While his men had been shuttled to a protected area next to the hall, Kenton had been taken inside the keep.
Surprisingly, Saxilby didn’t put him in the vault, which is what he had mostly expected.
He was a prisoner, after all, and a valuable one, so Saxilby treated him with a goodly amount of courtesy by placing him in a small, guarded chamber on the fourth floor of Conisbrough’s keep.
His armor was taken from him, however, and he was left with nothing but his clothing.
He was not allowed to attend meals in the hall or outside of his room, but the meals were generous and he did not want for food.
He was given no utensils at all, nothing that could be used as a weapon, but it didn’t particularly bother him.
In fact, nothing seemed to bother him any longer.
Nothing seemed to matter to him any longer.
Kenton was a career knight from a long line of career knights.
His grandfather had been the great Richmond le Bec and his grandmother a bastard daughter of Henry IV, so he was distantly related to the current king.
From the time he was old enough to understand, he knew what had been expected of him – serving men sworn to the king and making a difference in his world.
He had earned a great reputation alongside The Lion of the North, Atticus de Wolfe, but he’d amicably parted ways with Atticus years ago to pursue his career with Warwick.
Atticus was more concerned with holding down the north and the Scots borders while Kenton headed into heavy battles flying Henry’s banners.
It was a life he had been trained to do and something he did very well.
But the most recent events in his life, particularly with a widowed lady whose husband had once served Edward, seemed to have sucked everything out of him.
Everything he thought he ever knew was unimportant any longer.
Nowadays, instead of plotting his escape, he seemed content to be a prisoner.
As long as they were treating him well, there was no real reason to try to break from Conisbrough, which he couldn’t do anyway.
The place was virtually impenetrable and, not knowing the layout, he would be foolish to try and escape.
Until he knew the place a little better, or perhaps until he had more of an opportunity to escape, he wasn’t going to make the attempt.
He’d find himself worse off than he already was and he knew it.
He had their trust for the moment and wanted to keep it.
But it was more than that. He simply didn’t feel the urge to escape.
What was there to escape to? The woman he loved had betrayed him and he still couldn’t believe what she had done.
He’d tried not to think back to the stolen kisses they had shared, or the joyful times in Manchester shopping or even the gaiety after they had returned home.
Everything had been more delightful and satisfying than he’d ever known.
Spending evenings supping with Nicola and her children, or helping the boys learn to fish…
it was a life he’d never known to exist, a life that revolved around a beautiful woman and her intelligent boys whom he was quite fond of.
He was quite fond of them all so to know that what he had enjoyed so much, that fleeting taste of heaven he’d experienced, was all a lie was something he could not accept.
So he stood next to the tiny lancet window of his tiny chamber, peering out into the sky and thinking of things he probably shouldn’t think of.
He could hear the bailey down below, the hustle and bustle of it, and at night he could hear the sentries on patrol, but he didn’t pay much attention.
His mind wandered back to Babylon every night, remembering how difficult it had been for Nicola to put the boys to bed because they wanted to remain in the hall and watch the knights play their games of chance.
He remembered sitting with Tab when the crazed old woman burst out of her closet and explaining to the terrified young lad that the frightful creature in white tatters was not, in fact, a ghost. He helped the child to grow, to realize that there was nothing to be afraid of.
He’d liked that feeling of accomplishment.
He couldn’t even become upset at himself for letting him grow close to Nicola’s boys because there had been no way to prevent it.
For some reason, he had been drawn to the boys and they to him, and he had enjoyed every moment of Tab’s boldness, of Teague’s sweet lisp, and Tiernan’s expressive silence.
It made him want sons just like them, sons from Nicola, but that had been a fool’s dream.
He had been foolish to even think such things.
Nay, he couldn’t muster the strength to become angry with himself in any fashion for what had happened.
He kept going back to his conversation with Nicola in the storage vaults of Babylon when she had screamed at him.
It was at that moment that he realized things between them had changed and he was convinced someone, perhaps one of his own men, had convinced Nicola that his intentions were dishonorable.
That he was dishonorable. He didn’t blame her because she didn’t know any better.
She was a woman, after all, and a very smart one, but their relationship had been so new and so tenuous.
It hadn’t even been a relationship at all, to be truthful.
It had simply been his dream.
Therefore, he stood against the wall, gazing from the window and reflecting on what could have been.
He hadn’t the strength or need or urgency to do anything else and on this dusky evening as the sun set against the western sky, his thoughts and intentions were no different.
He didn’t even know how many days had passed since he’d been brought here; he hadn’t been keeping track.
But he knew, by the color of the sky, that soon his meal would be brought to him, another meal in an endless line of meals that he wouldn’t particularly eat.
Food made him think of Nicola. In fact, everything made him think of Nicola.
As he lingered by the window, the bolt on the outside of his door was thrown.
Kenton turned just about the time Saxilby entered the chamber.
The man was combed and shaved, which was far more than Kenton could say about himself.
In fact, he had a bit of beard growth that he kept scratching on his chin and he hadn’t bathed in weeks.
He stood by the window in his filthy clothes as Saxilby closed the chamber door and pulled up the only chair in the chamber.
He settled himself, getting comfortable.
“Greetings, le Bec,” he said. “Have you been content in this chamber so far?”
Kenton nodded. “For a prisoner, I am astonishingly comfortable,” he said. “And the food has been plentiful. You have my thanks for your kind treatment.”
Saxilby waved him off. “It is no trouble,” he said.
“Moreover, I would not send you to Edward half-starved and exhausted. That would not do for a man of your status. Speaking of half-starved, however, it has come to my attention that you have not been eating well. Is something the matter? Are you ill?”
Kenton exhaled slowly. “Nay,” he said, his tone rather dull. “I am simply not hungry these days.”
Saxilby grunted. “I suppose that I can understand that,” he said. “Captivity is not normally an appetite inducer, which is why I have come to escort you on a walk about the grounds. I thought you might like to see some of Conisbrough while we discuss a few things. It might help your appetite.”
Kenton came away from the window, arms folded across his big chest. “What things did you wish to discuss?”
Saxilby was treating it all very casually. “The changes that are coming in the near future,” he said. “In fact, you are to have a visitor, although I am not entirely sure this will be good news to you.”
“Visitor?” Kenton repeated. “Who?”
Saxilby wriggled his eyebrows as if about to relay particularly interesting information.
“I received a missive from Brome St. John on the day we arrived from Manchester,” he said.
“If you do not know the name, you should. He is the garrison commander of Conisbrough and also the man who led the successful recapture of Babylon. He wanted to know what happened at Manchester and if we had managed to capture you. I sent a missive informing him that we had.”
Kenton mulled over the information, finally turning away and going to his bed, where he sat heavily on the end of it. “I have heard the name of St. John,” he said. “I do not know him personally. But what does this have to do with me having a visitor?”