Prologue
Pelinom Castle, Northumberland
The battle had been raging for nearly two days.
It was one of the most desolate, brutal things Julian de Velt had ever seen.
He’d been in battles before, too many times to count, but he’d never had his home attacked as it was now.
Pelinom was his family’s home. He’d been born there, as had his siblings and even his mother.
Certainly, they had trouble with Scots now and again, but those had always been quick or unspectacular raids because no man in his right mind would go after the seat of the most feared warlord in England.
The man known as The Dark Lord.
Except for, perhaps, the King of England himself.
That’s where this bombardment came from.
John Lackland, as he’d once been known, had been waging a horrific scorched earth campaign against his own warlords, those who were opposed to his rule and had been after more than fifteen years of dealing with a king who had little respect for the men who were sworn to him.
Years and years of a king who refused to keep his word to his own vassals, who lied and cheated and swindled his way through his reign.
When the warlords, like Jax de Velt, could take no more and refused to fight for John any longer, the king raised an army of mercenaries from the darkest corners of the earth.
Men who had only come to kill for the money it would bring them.
It was their only motivation. John paid them well with ill-gotten funds to kill his enemies and that’s exactly what they did.
They had no regard for England or her warlords, no respect for the land or the people.
They’d moved from Winchester to Nottingham to York, fighting their way northward, before finally descending on Berwick Castle.
Berwick was an outpost of the de Velt empire, at least temporarily, and Julian’s older brother, Cole, was the garrison commander.
But Cole fought valiantly against John’s hired army of thugs so they moved off to the west, along the River Tweed, tearing into any castle they came across that wasn’t loyal to John.
Northwood.
Wark.
Roxburgh.
And finally, Pelinom.
Northwood, Wark, and Roxburgh held against the onslaught, but not without significant damage.
Northwood, in particular, had suffered a great deal, but in the end, John’s army moved away, heading for that jewel called Pelinom.
If they could take down Pelinom, the line of castles holding the Scots border would break and they very much wanted it to break.
John was prepared to move into Scotland, all the way to Edinburgh and the Highlands, but he had to break the border first.
But the warlords held strong.
That only seemed to infuriate him.
Now, on the dawn of the third day, Julian stood at the keep entry, though the doors themselves were bolted and the iron grate, like a portcullis, had long been lowered and secured.
Even if John’s mercenaries made it into the bailey, there was no way to make it into the keep.
The doors behind the grate could be burned, but the grate was too big and too heavy to be moved or destroyed.
The nearest windows were slender lancet openings and unless a man was as thin as a reed, there was no way to slip through them.
The keep of Pelinom, containing Julian’s mother and sisters, was tightly secured.
But that meant the army had been out in the open, exposed to the projectiles that John’s army flung over the walls from time to time.
At first, they were bundles of wood, tied together and soaked in oil and then flung over the walls in the hope of catching some structure on fire.
All they managed to do was create nice, warm piles of kindling that the de Velt army warmed themselves on.
Then came the human cargo.
Literally, the mercenaries started flinging terrified squires or drunken soldiers over the walls in an attempt to get men on the inside.
Pelinom’s walls were so incredibly tall, with great crenelations that Jax himself had put all the way around the wall walk, that mounting the walls was a near impossibility.
The mercenary army had tried for two days.
They were still trying. The men who had come flying over the walls had all been killed either during the endeavor or shortly thereafter.
Jax had ordered their bodies slung back over the walls and into Pelinom’s substantial moat.
It had both demoralized and enraged the mercenaries.
And everyone knew it.
The smoke was heavy in the air as the sun began to rise, the smell of cooking fires mingled with the heavy, oily smell of burning bodies.
It wasn’t that anyone in Pelinom was burning bodies, for they’d suffered no casualties, but more that the mercenaries were burning their dead, unable to provide for storage or a place to bury them because the ground was frozen.
It was the beginning of the third day of an increasingly unpleasant standoff.
“Were you able to sleep?”
The question came from behind and Julian turned to see Sir Ashton de Royans approaching.
Ashton, or Ash as he was known, was the son of Sir Juston de Royans of Bowes Castle, about one hundred miles to the south.
Ashton and his older brother, Tristan, were both at Pelinom these days and had been well before any trouble with the king started.
Tristan was actually the bastard child of King Henry II and Alys of France.
Juston had taken the boy in and adopted him so the boys were raised together.
Ash had always considered Tristan his brother.
While Tristan had luscious auburn hair and a bristly beard, with big, white teeth and a temper to match those sharp looks, Ashton had the enormous blond comeliness of the de Royans men.
He was bright, powerful, calm in almost any circumstance, and had a bit of a wicked streak him in that Julian loved.
They’d been best friends for years.
“A little,” Julian said, his eyes twinklingly wearily. “One does not sleep much when one’s home is being attacked.”
Ashton snorted softly. “Attacked,” he said with disdain. “The nuns from Kelso could have done a better job of laying siege. Why don’t they simply leave us alone? They’ll never get in.”
Julian flashed a grin, big dimples carving through both cheeks.
“There is truth in that,” he said, looking up at the battlements that were heavily lined with men.
“My father was just saying how weak this entire attack has been but considering how many castles they have bombarded before us, there is little wonder that they have worn down.”
Ashton shook his head. “They did not take any of the castles from here to Berwick,” he said. “I have a feeling they may have expended all of their energy on Berwick. That fortress is key to holding the north. If John had captured it, he could use the river to bring more troops into the north.”
Julian’s grin faded. “I know,” he said. “We know that Berwick held but not much beyond that.”
“Your father has not received any reports?”
“We’ve been locked tight for the past three days. Nothing has been able to come through.”
Ashton could feel Julian’s concern. The de Velt family was inordinately close for the most part with the exception of Cassian, the youngest son, who spent his time in the south with the House of de Lohr.
Cassian had gone there to foster and had simply never returned.
It was well known that a certain de Lohr daughter was holding him there, leaving Cole and Julian to support their father’s empire.
Truthfully, Cole had his own agenda in life – garrison commander of Berwick, a wife, a family, and also serving William Marshal when the call came, but Julian was solely and exclusively devoted to his father.
He was, in fact, his father’s shadow.
Ashton had known Julian for a few years, ever since he was sent north by his father, Juston, to support Pelinom during a time of constant raids from reivers.
Ashton had liked the north so much that he’d remained, enjoying Jax and Julian and Cole when he came around.
He’d come with his older brother, Tristan, who was even now on the opposite side of the fortress, in the kitchen yard because there was a low, squat, and heavily defended postern gate there, the only possible way John’s men could infiltrate if they came across the moat and gained a foothold.
And no one would get in with Tristan at the gate.
In fact, Tristan had made himself indispensable to Jax since nearly his arrival, a bold and courageous man to the core.
Julian was technically Jax’s second in command, but Tristan was older and more aggressive and, truth be told, experienced.
Julian was rather quiet, introverted, quieter still when Tristan began to gain steam.
He was still young enough to be offended by forceful older knights, especially ones he saw as trying to take his father’s attention away.
Deep down, Julian de Velt had a confidence problem and Tristan only made it worse.
But Ashton knew something Tristan didn’t know.
Julian was smarter, better, and stronger than all of them.
He just needed the opportunity to show it.
“Well,” Ashton finally said. “I would not worry. John’s mercenaries are too exhausted to do much damage, so I do not imagine today will be much of an issue.
I would suspect at some point in the next day or two, when they realize they cannot breach Pelinom, that they will simply move on to the next castle and leave us alone. ”
Julian’s gaze came off of the battlements, focusing on Ashton again. “My father is not so sure,” he said. “He does not think that John will give up so easily. He needs a castle from which to launch his attacks into Scotland and Pelinom seems to be his last chance.”
Ashton shrugged. “There are others that he can probably take with more ease,” he said. “Smaller outposts.”