Chapter Two #3
Mayne threw the knight onto his face, down into the muddy floor of the livery as he tied the knight’s hands behind his back with hemp rope.
With the suspect subdued, Val turned away from the scene and headed out of the livery to see what had become of the battle in front of the tavern.
He was feeling smug in his accomplishment, pride in a job well done.
He had his man. As soon as he emerged from the stable, he could see that the tavern battle had essentially come to a halt although there were still several men out front, including his own, who were talking and pushing each other about.
But at least they were no longer fighting.
Relieved to see that the skirmish had died down, he looked off to the north to see if Calum and Kenan had been faced with similar obstacles when raiding the tavern they were charged with.
He could see men milling around in the distance, out in the road, but he couldn’t really tell what was going on.
Given that Val had accomplished his goal, he sent one of his soldiers to The Peacock and the Flame to call off Calum and Kenan.
As he stood there and watched the man run off, he heard a quiet voice behind him.
“Wherever you go, trouble follows,” McCloud said quietly. “It has been a long time since I have seen the tempest that you bring about, Val. It reminded me of days of old.”
Val turned around to see McCloud and the young woman standing a few feet away. He’d completely forgotten about them. There was a smile on McCloud’s face, which caused Val to smile in return.
“This was nothing,” he said with feigned arrogance. “You should have been with me last week when we captured a gang of outlaws who had been robbing travelers on the road between Holybourne and Ropley. That was quite a fight, I must say. They were not very cooperative.”
McCloud laughed softly. “I remember now,” he said. “You are the law in this area. I had forgotten about that appointment until now.”
Val nodded. “Indeed, I am,” he said. Now, the arrogance was real.
“I have been the Itinerant Justice of Hampshire ever since I returned from France. There is not much that goes on in my jurisdiction that I do not know about. I am proud to say that I have made it a safer place for all, now with the capture of this murderer.”
McCloud could see the pride in the man. That was the Val he knew, prideful and confident. “Is the invitation still open to sup?” he asked.
Val nodded. “I would be hurt if you did not accept,” he said. Then, his gaze moved to the cloaked woman at McCloud’s side. “Your companion is welcome also.”
McCloud looked at the woman standing next to him, reaching out a meaty hand to grasp her arm and pull her closer, as she seemed to be standing off on her own. “This is my daughter,” he said. “I have been rude not to introduce her to you but it did not seem quite proper in the middle of your fight.”
Val grinned. “Now is the perfect time,” he said, his gaze lingering on the woman well hidden by the hood of her cloak. All he could see was her chin and part of her mouth. “My lady, I am Sir Val de Nerra. I am honored.”
McCloud beamed at his child. “This is Lady Vesper d’Avignon,” he said. “I am returning her home from fostering, in fact. That is why we are on this road.”
“Oh?” Val said, increasingly interested in the woman who didn’t seem apt to show her face. “Where did you foster, my lady?”
Since he was addressing her directly, it would have been poor manners not to reveal herself and answer.
A white hand with long fingers reached up to pull the hood away and Val found himself staring into the face of an exquisitely beautiful woman.
Her dark hair was long and wavy, the front of it pulled away from her face, and big hazel eyes sat above high chiseled cheekbones and a bow-shaped mouth.
“Eynsford Castle, my lord,” she said.
Her voice was deep for a woman, but smooth and silky. Val rather liked it. “I know it well,” he said. “I know your lord, William de Eynsford. How long were you there?”
“Since before my father went to France,” she said, looking at her father. “Eight years.”
“I do not seem to recall your father mentioning he had a daughter in all the time we served together.”
“It is easy to forget girl children.”
McCloud snorted, a forced laugh. “I could never forget my daughter. You will have Val thinking that I am neglectful.”
The woman didn’t reply. She simply looked at her father as if she saw no humor in his statement.
Val couldn’t seem to take his eyes off of her; the more she spoke in that deep, husky tone, the more he wanted to listen.
He didn’t even notice that Vesper seemed to be looking at her father rather hostilely as McCloud gazed at his daughter with a mixture of anxiety and humor. It was an odd combination.
Had Val had eyes for the situation at that moment and not Vesper in particular, he would have seen the mixed signals between father and daughter.
But he didn’t. His inspection of the lady was cut short when his men emerged from the livery with the prisoner, heading into the corral where their horses were.
“I am afraid that I must attend to some business at the moment, but please continue on this road until you come to a fork,” he said.
“Take the fork to the right and that will take you directly to Selborne Castle. My mother is in residence. Tell her I have invited you both to feast with us tonight and she will make you comfortable.”
“We shall look forward to it,” McCloud said. “Thank you for your hospitality.”
Val smiled although it was clear he was distracted with his prisoner. He bowed briefly to them both.
“I am eager to return home and hear of your adventures since I last saw you,” he said. His gaze inevitably moved to Vesper. “My lady.”
With that, he excused himself, heading towards the corral where his men were gathered. McCloud and Vesper watched him walk away, a very big man with a brilliant smile. Confident, seasoned, he radiated power.
He was a man with the world at his fingertips.
*
He was also a man that Vesper wanted nothing to do with.
When the big knight was finally out of earshot, heading back to his men and their struggling prisoner, the lady turned to her father.
“Why did you accept his invitation?” she hissed. “We must go home, Papa. We cannot delay.”
McCloud’s gaze was on Val in the distance. “Nay, Daughter,” he muttered. “Not yet. Did you not hear the conversation? God has put us here, today, so that I could see my old friend, Val. This moment could not have been more fortuitous.”
Vesper sighed heavily, hanging her head. “It is not fortuitous,” she insisted. “Why would you want to walk into the lion’s den? He is the law in this area. Or did you not hear him?”
“I heard him.”
“Then why must we sup with him?”
McCloud took his daughter by the arm and, together, they began to walk out onto the road.
They had no horses to transport them; horses were expensive and they had not the money to spare on them.
The only horse they had belonged to McCloud’s son and Vesper’s brother, Mat, and he needed the animal for his activities.
Unspeakably dark activities concealing a ghastly family secret.
“You are not looking at this as a great moment,” McCloud said.
“I firmly believe that God put us here, today, so that we could meet with Val. I have not seen him in two years and, suddenly, here he is right in front of us. This is the answer to our prayers, Vesper. You cannot know how I have prayed for… help with your brother.”
Vesper shook her head. “It is not the answer to your prayers,” she said, coming to a halt and facing him.
“And it is not help you ask for Mat, but absolution for his heinous deeds. Do you know why I am coming home, Papa? Do you even understand? It is because you and Mat have gotten yourself into a terrible situation that must be stopped.”
McCloud tried not to look too remorseful, guilty at his daughter’s scolding. “Mat is doing what he needs to do in order that we should survive,” he said quietly. “I have told you that.”
Vesper was growing angry. “You are not surviving,” she hissed.
“What you are doing… Papa, it is horrific. We have had this conversation many times over the past week, ever since you came to Eynsford and revealed this horrible life you and my brother lead. Now, we must have this conversation again – are you so blind that you do not even realize that what Mat is doing is wrong?”
McCloud was having difficulty looking her in the eye now. “If you were starving, you would see things differently.”
Vesper threw up her hands in frustration. “Are you truly so complacent?” she asked. “Do you truly not know right from wrong? Mat is killing in order to survive and he is going to be caught. You will be hanged with him because you do not stop him!”
So she had spoken of the situation aloud, the truth behind the horrible family secret. It was painful to the ears, like a stab to the eardrums, but now it was out in the open; Mat is killing.
Was it true that the House of d’Avignon had sunk so low?
Truth be told, McCloud had been wrestling with the very same conflicts. He had for some time now, ever since he and his son began to starve and Mat, in order that they should eat, had taken to murdering men, women, and entire families in order to take whatever they had to bring home to his father.
Simply put, Mat killed so that he and his father could survive.
McCloud was complacent. Indeed, he was. But he was a sick, old man who was no longer worth anything with a small farm his family had kept for over one hundred years all dried up.
The orchards no longer produced and the livestock had gradually been killed for food.
Everything the d’Avignon family had stood for was gone now, as if it had never existed, leaving a starving man and son, as desperate as desperate could be.
And Mat… poor, simple Mat… had never been smart enough or diligent enough to train as a knight.
God knows, McCloud had tried. He’d sent his son away to foster only to have the boy sent home because he was dense.
He had no skills, no way of learning anything that would elevate his status or create a future for himself, so he’d gone out one night in search of food and had ended up killing a shepherd who had been tending a flock of sheep.
Mat had stolen one of the sheep, which had kept him and his father fed for almost a month.
McCloud had been horrified by the event but his hunger had been stronger than his horror.
He ate the ill-gotten sheep because it was all they had.
But when there was nothing left but the hide, Mat had gone out again to seek food and had come across a farmer and his wife taking their produce to market.
Mat had strangled the wife and bashed the husband’s head in with a rock, taking the cart of produce back to his father’s home.
The produce went into the root cellar and the cart was used for kindling.
The vegetables had lasted even longer than the sheep had, but once they were gone, Mat was forced to go out and procure food again.
And kill again.
It was a horrific cycle that McCloud, as a seasoned knight, should have stopped.
He knew he should have stopped Mat and that he should have brought his simple son to justice.
He began to hear whispers from those in the towns surrounding his farm that an angel of death was on the loose.
People were living in fear. But the will to do what was right had left McCloud when he realized he could no longer feed his family.
So his son continued his killing spree unimpeded.
Still, McCloud had one hope in a child who had been sent away to foster eight years earlier.
A daughter who was more of a stranger to him than a child he was close to or fond of, but a daughter who could marry well and carry them all out of poverty.
Aye, she was his only hope. But instead of being sympathetic to their plight, all he’d found when he’d visited Eynsford after all those years was a daughter who was repulsed by what her father and brother had become.
She hadn’t been sympathetic in the least.
Now, she was once again speaking loud of their plight and McCloud didn’t like it.
He didn’t like feeling judged. He needed her help in all of this and he was going to get it.
She was going to do her duty as a daughter should.
With the reacquaintance with Val de Nerra, perhaps that opened up an entirely new world of opportunity.
It was all he could think of.
“Let us not speak of such things now,” McCloud said after a moment, pondering what was to come. “We have the opportunity to eat a fine meal and sleep in a warm bed this night. Let that be the only thing we think of this day.”
Vesper looked at her father; he seemed far too calm about the situation, as if nothing in the world was amiss.
He spoke of a fortuitous meeting with the Itinerant Justice of Hampshire.
She was starting to wonder what he meant.
Even though she didn’t know him very well, something in his manner bespoke of a man with more on his mind than the fine meal and warm bed he spoke of.
“So de Nerra is your friend,” she said, studying his face for any hint of what he might be thinking. “I fail to see why you think this is such a fortunate meeting. Why do you not think that supping with the law in this land would not be opening yourself up for trouble?”
McCloud simply shook his head. “Because he is my old friend,” he said.
“We shall not speak of your brother this night. I will ensure that nothing suspicious is discussed. We will speak of our adventures in France. Look, now, a sparrow has flown across the morning sun. That is a good omen. It will be a fine day.”
Vesper lifted her eyes to the sky, seeing a variety of birds flying overhead.
It seemed to her that her father was trying to distract her now, unwilling to speak any more on Val de Nerra.
Truth be told, she had about all of the arguing she could handle with her father.
This journey had been an exhaustive one and the more she thought on a warm bed and a fine meal, the better she began to feel.
It would be lovely to experience those things because she knew that once they left the Justice’s home, they would be faced with cold nights and hardship until they reached Durley.
God only knows what they’d find when they got there.
Vesper couldn’t even think about it.
Spending the night in a safe and warm haven was looking better and better.