Prologue #3
The London townhome of William Marshal was an enormous, four-storied monstrosity that was built to withstand any onslaught.
The walls were of stone, not wattle and daub, and there was one fortified entrance on the bottom floor that opened up into a courtyard in the middle of the house.
The sentries on duty admitted the six knights, shutting the heavy oak and iron gates behind them.
As the younger knights headed back to their quarters, Tristan grasped Alexander by the arm and stopped him from going any further.
“What just happened?” he asked.
Alexander was trying to pretend it wasn’t anything of consequence. “Who knows?” he said. “A drunkard? A madman? London is full of them. I would not take it so seriously.”
He started to walk away, but Tristan’s voice stopped him.
“He called me by my full name,” Tristan said. “He called you by your name. He knew us, Sherry.”
“So we are famous. What of it?”
Tristan didn’t seem amused. “What did he mean by your being my protector?” he said. “And what is that ‘Prince Philip’ nonsense?”
Alexander shook his head. “I cannot tell you any more than I already have.”
Tristan stared at him a moment before closing the gap between them. “I am going to ask you one more question,” he said. “You will not lie to me.”
“I never have and I never will.”
“Do you know what he was talking about?”
That brought Alexander pause. Nay, he couldn’t lie to him.
He’d already said he wouldn’t. But Tristan was asking a question about something only a handful of people knew, and those that did know had been sworn to secrecy.
It wasn’t Alexander’s truth to reveal, but he could see by the look on Tristan’s face that the damage had been done.
There would be no avoiding this one.
Faintly, he signed.
“I do,” he said. “But before you ask me another question, you must speak with Pembroke. I cannot tell you any more than I already have.”
“You said that.”
“It is true.”
“Then you do know more.”
“Aye.”
“You simply cannot tell me.”
Alexander nodded. “If I could, I would, but this is something you must ask Pembroke,” he said quietly. “Only he can give you the answers you seek.”
Tristan continued to look at him, puzzlement rippling across his face. “God’s Bones,” he finally muttered. “Then there truly are answers to what just happened out there?”
Alexander could only point to the entry door that faced onto the courtyard.
Tristan understood the meaning, but he wasn’t ready to go yet.
He just stood there, feeling increasingly bewildered and having no idea why he felt that way.
But the feelings weren’t unfamiliar; he hadn’t felt that way since he’d been a very young boy.
Feelings of bewilderment he’d pushed out of his mind.
Until now.
“That’s not the first time that has happened, you know,” he finally muttered.
Alexander cocked his head. “What do you mean?”
Tristan lifted his shoulders. “That,” he said. “Someone mistaking me for someone else. Someone calling me by another name. It has happened before.”
“Oh?” Alexander said. “What have you been called?”
Tristan scratched his head. “Names,” he said after a moment.
“Names I’d forgotten because they didn’t mean anything.
It has been happening my entire life. I grew up in a poor household until I was about six years of age, you know.
On the Welsh marches. Then, one day, I was taken away by a knight and I never saw that place again. ”
“You told me. Erik de Russe?”
Tristan nodded. “Aye,” he said. “Sir Erik de Russe took me away, and I spent about two years with him at Pembroke Castle until I was taken to Bowes Castle and left with Juston de Royans and his wife. It was the first time I really knew a family life, you know. Ashton and Wynter and Brenton and the rest of them. They treated me like part of the family, and they were my brothers and sisters. That is why I bear the de Royans name.”
Alexander nodded. “I know,” he said. “You were trained by the best knights in the world at that point, my friends among them. I know your story, Pat.”
Tristan looked at him. “I haven’t thought of it in years,” he admitted. “But tonight… that man following us, calling me Prince Philip… it made me remember something.”
“What’s that?”
“The fact that I never questioned why a lad from a poor household should end up training as a knight.”
“You never asked?”
He nodded. “I did, once,” he said. “I asked Sir Erik. He told me that my father had been a great knight.”
“And the family?”
“Paid to take me in.”
Alexander bobbed his head in understanding. “That is not unusual, you know,” he said. “Especially when the child is a foundling.”
“Or a bastard.” Tristan shrugged. “I do not really care if I am or not. That does not define me, but I will admit that my obscure lineage has concerned me from time to time.”
Alexander cracked a smile. “Why should it concern you?” he said. “You’ve made your way in life. You’re a powerful, seasoned knight who serves the Earl of Pembroke. That is nothing to be ashamed over.”
Tristan shook his head. “I did not mean that,” he said.
“I meant it has cost me a wife. Her family was not interested in a knight with no familial background, and I doubt anyone else will be, either. That’s why when something like this happens, with the man who thought I was someone else, I wonder if the man might not be wrong.
If he might know who my father was. He said I looked just like him. ”
Alexander wasn’t sure how to answer. “I think we should go inside now,” he said. “Come along, lad. Pembroke awaits.”
Tristan didn’t ask any further questions, knowing Alexander wouldn’t answer.
The man had made that clear. But that didn’t mean his curiosity was sated.
Quite the contrary, in fact. As they headed indoors, his interest was growing.
Odd how something he’d simply pushed into the recesses of his mind for many of his thirty-seven years upon the earth was now at the forefront because of a skirmish in the street.
But the man who had spoken so strangely had called him by his full name.
Philip Alexander Tristan.
Very few people knew that was his full name, but a stranger had.
Perhaps it was time for some answers.
*
“Speak up. I did not hear what you said.”
“The Pox, my lord. He found us at The Pox.”
It was one of the younger knights speaking, part of the group that Tristan and Alexander had chased out of the notorious tavern that had just been named. The young knight, the spokesman for the group of very contrite-looking warriors, had been forced to confess their location to their liege.
And William Marshal didn’t look happy.
A tall man with white hair, enormous hands, and brown eyes that had yellowed over the years, he eyed the collection of strong, young men from good families most disapprovingly.
They were in the first-floor solar of Farringdon House, a chamber that covered nearly half of the floor, and it was a very big floor.
There was easily room for fifty or more men in the chamber with its great stone hearth, exposed beams overhead, and painted walls.
The floor was made from wide slats of wood, thick, but pocked from the heavy boots of men who had walked upon it with their spurs.
But the truth was that it was a spectacular room, meant for men of greatness, and the old walls had seen much of that over the years, including the man who was sitting by the hearth.
Christopher de Lohr, Earl of Hereford and Worcester, was listening to everything.
The Marshal knew that. And he knew that de Lohr was silently laughing at him.
It wasn’t any secret that he forbade his knights to go to The Pox, and it wasn’t any secret that they disobeyed those orders.
Regularly. The Marshal didn’t really care with some of the more seasoned veterans, but the young knights needed the fear of God put into them from time to time.
And he was just the man to do it.
“I see,” he said with abnormal calm. “Then you disobeyed a direct command, du Reims?”
The young knight who had handled the dagger so ably was also a big man, with blond hair and intense, dark eyes. “We saw no harm in it, my lord,” he replied. “The other taverns were quite busy for the evening, and—”
“And you picked one that was also quite busy, the exact one I have told you repeatedly to stay out of,” William finished for him.
He frowned, a gesture that was designed to terrorize.
“You are related to the Earl of East Anglia, du Reims. The man is your uncle. You are also related to Hereford, the very man in this chamber, who is your cousin. And your companions—d’Vant, de Bretagne, and de Leybourne—are all from some of the finest families in England.
Your pedigrees are impeccable. Yet you disobey a direct order from me.
A man who controls England. I simply want to be clear about this. ”
Sir Lukas du Reims had no recourse. He had nowhere to turn and no one to blame but himself. With a sigh, he nodded his head.
“We did, my lord.”
“Was it worth it?”
Du Reims shook his head. “It was not, my lord,” he said. “I lost my broadsword to a swindler. It was an extremely expensive lesson.”
The way he said it had the Marshal fighting off a grin because his words were like a verbal punch to the head—his own.
As if he was the biggest fool on the planet.
He glanced at Christopher, who was facing the flames of the hearth, and he could see the smirk on the man’s lips.
That nearly did him in. Clearing his throat loudly, he turned away from the four remorseful knights.
“Get out,” he said. “Get out before I lose my temper. Go to your quarters and do not leave until I send for you. If you do not obey me, I will send de Sherrington and de Royans after you, and that is something you do not want. Do I make myself clear?”
“Aye, my lord.”
“Get out of my sight.”