Chapter Twelve #3
“I would not know. There hasn’t been anything I wanted badly enough, personally, to fight for it.”
“But you fought for William Marshal,” she said. “Surely, you fought for things that were important to you.”
He shrugged, taking another drink of that potent cider.
“My beliefs were my own, but I fought for a man I was sworn to,” he said.
“I fought whomever he told me to fight. But I cannot ever remember fighting for something that personally meant something to me. I’ve always been a tool for others. Never for myself.”
There was something sad in that declaration. At least, Juliandra thought so. Kevin was a career knight, but that career had always been devoted to others. Never to himself.
Until now.
“You are the Lord of the Trilaterals,” she said. “I am sure, at some point, you will fight for something personal, for something you believe in or something you wish to keep as your own. Or mayhap you will fight for peace. That is a noble cause, is it not?”
Kevin was lingering on the fact that he’d always done everyone else’s bidding and never his own. He’d been right when he told Juliandra that he’d always been a tool, someone who followed orders more than gave them.
But that had changed.
“Peace is always the noble cause,” he said, struggling to focus on her question.
“My family has always fought for peace and victory. It is a way of life. But to be truthful, I’d like a little less fighting and a little more peace.
I cannot recall when I’ve enjoyed it at any stretch.
You told me that you’d never experienced a battle. That is all I’ve ever known.”
Juliandra wasn’t quite sure to say to him. He seemed almost… lost. With a new English king on the throne, and a new title given to him by his brother, he’d reached a new and unfamiliar point in his life. She could see that tender heart in him, more than ever before, and it touched her.
Impulsively, she reached out and put her hand on his arm.
“You will know peace,” she said. “It may not be at Wybren, for you are in the middle of Welsh territory, but I am sure once you return to Trelystan, you will know peace. It seems to me that you have earned it.”
Kevin looked at her hand on his arm. She had pale skin and slender fingers with little nails on the tips, uneven but clean. He was still looking at her hands when he spoke.
“You have not yet answered me,” he said. “Would you be agreeable to a marriage?”
Juliandra could see where he was looking.
Her hand was still on his arm and she could have pulled it away, but she didn’t.
She didn’t answer, either, and when he finally dared to look up at her, she simply smiled coyly and looked away.
Kevin thought it might have been an affirmative answer but he was prevented from pursuing it as the minstrels suddenly appeared at the table, strumming on their instruments.
“Lady of the House,” the man with the citole said. “I am told you can sing like an angel. Will you sing for us, please?”
Those that heard the question began to roar in approval and Juliandra began to turn red in the face, embarrassed that the attention was on her.
Kevin, a grin on his lips, stood up and pulled her to her feet.
As she weakly protested, he put his hands on her waist and lifted her right up onto the table.
“Sing,” he commanded softly.
She looked at him, still reluctant. “But…”
He winked at her. “Sing for me.”
That wink gave her pause. It was sweet and subtle, but there was something deeper about it.
Personal.
He was asking her to sing because he wanted to hear her.
No one had really ever wanted to hear her before.
Taking a deep breath, she nodded and turned to the minstrels.
After a brief discussion, they began to play a lively song and Juliandra began to clap her hands so that the entire hall began to clap in rhythm, too.
Because she was at one end of the hall and she knew she wouldn’t be heard very well, she leapt off the table and beckoned the musicians to follow her.
“Harry McMerry came to town,
A lady fore to seek.
When Harry McMerry found a gown,
He begged her for a peek.
Oh, lady dear, be of good cheer,
My hand, I offer thee,
I promise to love you
Every day of my life
After I’ve had my beer!”
The men cheered and lifted their cups, and Juliandra encouraged them to sing the chorus with her.
“Harry, Harry, a man so merry,
A lady fore to seek.
Harry, my Harry, she’s a beautiful pip,
And she’ll give you a taste of her lips!”
Everyone in the hall was clapping and singing now as Juliandra moved around the vast hall with the musicians in tow, singing at the top of her lungs.
She wasn’t nervous or reluctant any longer because they were so happy to see her, and so receptive to her singing, that she felt comfortable and flattered.
It was quite fun. She ended up over by the table where Kevin was sitting and started to sing the verse again, encouraging him to sing.
“Harry McMerry came to town,
A lady fore to seek.
When Harry McMerry found a gown,
He begged her for a peek.”
Smiling, Kevin shook his head, begging off because he wasn’t much of an exhibitionist, but he’d had too much to drink, so he gave in to her pleas and joined in as she sang the last part of the verse.
“Oh, lady dear, be of good cheer,
My hand, I offer thee,
I promise to love you
Every day of my life
After I’ve had my beer!”
Unfortunately, Kevin couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket, as his friends all knew.
He was tone-deaf and off-key, but he sang because Juliandra had begged him to.
About four words into the second part of the verse, however, Juliandra could hear his terrible singing and she tried very hard not to laugh because he was making a valiant effort at it.
Instead, she winked at him and headed back towards the center of the hall where men were loudly singing because Kevin’s off-key singing was starting to throw her off. The hall was just singing the chorus, the part about giving a taste of her lips, when someone reached out and grabbed her.
“Give me a taste of yer lips, dearie!” a big soldier cried.
He had her around the waist, trying to kiss her as she fought him off. His friends were laughing and cheering him on, and now they, too, were trying to kiss her. The good humor of the song quickly turned to panic for Juliandra as she slugged one man in the face.
The mood of the hall suddenly became tense and uncertain.
Juliandra was fighting for all she was worth, trying to free herself from a man who held her tightly. He tried to kiss her again and she slapped him, hard, demanding he release her. He simply laughed at her. She wasn’t sure she could ever get away from him.
But then, a strange thing happened.
Juliandra caught sight of Kevin as he loomed behind the soldier, but it was merely a flash of his face.
Suddenly, she was being jerked around as Kevin threw his arm across the soldier’s neck, yanking the man out of his chair.
The soldier abruptly released her, but it wasn’t because he was fighting with his liege.
It was because Kevin had snapped his neck.
In a flash, the man who had grabbed her was dead.
Juliandra was on the ground, on her arse, as she looked up at Kevin, who stood over the dead man with a remorseless expression. Suddenly, he didn’t look or act so drunk. He seemed very sober. He kicked the man aside as he faced the entire room full of stunned soldiers.
“The next man who lays a hand on her gets the same,” he bellowed in a tone Juliandra had never heard from him before. “Touch her and you die. Consider yourselves warned!”
The soldiers were genuinely shocked. A couple of the dead man’s comrades began to speak up, to possibly condemn Kevin for his hasty action, but Bannon and Cal were there, in the midst of everything, scolding every man at the table, demanding they clear the hall.
They did, dragging their dead friend with them.
As Cal made sure that table cleared, Bannon began to pace around the fire pit, explaining the need for discipline that was brutal and harsh. Men who had no discipline were as good as dead.
De Lara’s knights had established the law.
Still raging and struggling for control, Kevin looked at Juliandra, who was still sitting on the ground. Reaching down, he pulled her to her feet.
“Did he hurt you?” he asked.
Juliandra was deeply shocked by what had just happened. “You… you killed him.”
Kevin’s jaw ticked faintly. “Answer me,” he said. “Did he hurt you?”
“Nay,” she fired back, almost angrily. “Why did you kill him?”
He still didn’t reply but, instead, grasped her by the arm. “Retreat for the evening,” he said. “My men evidently cannot keep themselves under control with you cavorting in front of them. Though they understand now what will happen to them if they molest you, it is better not to tempt fate.”
Juliandra couldn’t seem to make her legs work. She watched soldiers drag away the dead man, who had traces of vomit coming out of his mouth. It left a trail on the floor.
Dead…
It occurred to her that she’d never really seen a dead man before. Dead because of her. She didn’t even know what she’d done wrong. She’d only been singing and having a good time, and suddenly, a man was dead because of her.
God, she felt sick.
The world began to dim.
Kevin caught her before she could hit the ground.