Chapter Five
Mallus
Lara
Lara rode between the
brown-haired giant called Tree and a young soldier with dark hair
and serious eyes named Dardinel. Captain Guiscard rode ahead of
her, and his second, the blond-haired man from the river named
Phillipe, rode behind her as they made their way east, meeting up
with Sophie on the road in front of her and Lara’s home, a home
Lara had been away from for too long now. A growing crowd of villagers trailed
them along the way, until it seemed half the province followed them
through the gates of Oloron Manor, home of Count Nithard
Midered.
After dismounting, Lara stood between
her guards, plastering a brave smile on as she thanked all the
people who stepped up to wish her well, truly grateful to look on
their familiar faces and hear their concern for her. A few of them
even dared step up to the captain to vouch for her. Imposing in his
vest of mail ringlets, arm bands, and leather gauntlets, with his
short sword strapped to one side of his hips and his longsword to
the other, the captain was unfailingly attentive and polite,
assuring them he knew no ill of her, all the while flexing his
scarred, bandage-free left hand.
Too soon, the captain
nodded to Tree and Dardinel, who took their places to each side of
Lara and Wolf. Sophie stepped up behind them and Phillipe took rear
guard. Like the captain, his men wore arm bands of lacquered
leather and their soldier’s jerkins and breeches rather than the
Roman robes of court, each of them armed with waist knives,
short-bladed spathas, and longswords, though Phillipe was the only other one to
wear a vest of mail. After smoothing her best gown of dusky blue
linen with a matching undershift, Lara adjusted her waist belt with
the knife in its beaded sheath the captain had returned to her that
morning, though not the dagger she usually wore at her thigh, and
walked head high toward the manor house.
Both sides of the wooden door opened,
and she glanced back over her shoulder at Sophie, who hadn’t been
inside the manor house for over twenty years now. Lara had never
even been through the manor gate before. They entered the main
hall, a cavernous maw dank with heavy tapestries and dark, ornate
walls and furniture that seemed to swallow Lara whole. Her heart
beat in her ears and her breath quickened as she gathered her
skirts in her hands, ready to make a run for open air and freedom,
but Sophie was shaking her head, and a low voice sounded in her ear
as a firm yet gentle hand gripped her upper arm.
“Lara?”
She looked into the captain’s steady
gaze.
“Breathe.” He took a slow,
deep breath in, and she did the same, the two of them blowing their
breath out even slower. They took another slow breath in and out
together, and another. “Are you ready now?”
She shook her head no.
“Yes.”
He held on to her arm until they were
standing before a long table where the count’s stewards were
already seated, with two seats left empty in the middle. Lara began
to shake as a steward rose and announced the count, and her teeth
chattered as Count Nithard walked in, followed by his son, Ranulf,
the two men who hated her most in this world. Four men-at-arms took
their positions standing behind them as they took their seats.
Lothair, the biggest and burliest, and captain of the guard, stood
directly behind the count. Wolf nosed her fingers, and she laid her
hand on his head.
Lara hadn’t been this close to Nithard
since she was a young girl. His dark hair hung in loose ringlets
down to his shoulders in the Frank style, dyed black with kohl,
along with his beard. He wore a burgundy robe with silken hems
embroidered with the black and gold of the house of Midered over
his slight frame, and rings of gold set with onyx and rubies on his
slender fingers. His eyes were so dark in his thin face that they
too looked black, abetted by the kohl lining his lids. Ranulf, a
younger version of his father, wore a robe of the same colors,
though its hems weren't silken, and his fingers adorned with only
one ring of gold and onyx. The count’s gaze skimmed over Lara and
then fixed on Sophie behind her for a long moment before returning
to Lara. He smiled, quick and fleeting and so chilling that she
would have bolted right then but for the captain’s firm grip on her
arm.
Acknowledging the captain with a stiff
nod of his head, Nithard tugged at his hems and spoke low to the
steward Roumel at his left. Sitting at his father’s right, Ranulf
caught Lara’s gaze and smiled, sure and smug. Lara grit her teeth
and narrowed her gaze. Nithard, she feared. Ranulf, she despised.
Both men’s gazes were drawn beyond her, and Lara turned to see the
crowd of villagers filing into the hall. She gave a little smile of
her own, knowing how it must have aggravated the count to have so
many common people in his house.
The count raised his hand, and the
hall went silent. “Captain Guiscard, as count and magistrate to the
province of Oloron, I bid you welcome.”
“Sir Count.” The captain
dipped his head and gave Lara’s arm a gentle squeeze. “I present to
you the Lady Lara.”
“Lady,” Ranulf scoffed,
and the captain’s grip tightened on Lara’s arm.
“She is the accused?” the
count asked, though he knew she was.
“She is,” the captain
answered.
“And your man?” Nithard
glanced around. “The injured soldier?”
“Is not yet able to
travel. I will speak for him.” The captain pulled Fulrad’s written
statement from his jerkin pocket and laid it on the table in front
of the count, who tapped it with the tapered nail of his index
finger.
“His injuries must be
severe indeed,” he said, “if he is still unable to travel so short
a distance.”
“They will keep him abed
awhile longer,” the captain said.
“What, exactly, were his
injuries?”
The captain cleared his throat. “His
knee is broken, his shoulder out of joint, and his throat
pierced.”
“His throat was pierced?”
The count pretended to be shocked, though he and every other person
there had known the extent of Fulrad’s injuries since almost the
day he’d acquired them. “How was his throat pierced?”
“By the dog, Wolf.” The
captain glanced down at Wolf, standing at Lara’s knee, alert and at
the ready.
The count made a show of looking Wolf
up and down before picking up Fulrad’s written statement, reading
it silently, and then out loud. “It says, my name is Fulrad
Demonte, king’s soldier and cousin.” He paused as gasps filled the
hall, and Lara realized that the captain and his men had kept that
fact a secret until now. “Who,” Nithard continued dramatically,
“having been lured into the stables by the witch whore called Lara
with promises of her favors, was partaking of them when I caught
her trying to cut my purse.” He paused again with great effect.
“When I tried to stop her, she and her wolf attacked me with
murderous intent, leaving me crippled and useless to my king and
country.” He laid the parchment back down with a flourish and
beaded his black gaze on Lara. “What do you, the accused, have to
say?”
“The soldier, Fulrad, was
drunk when he came upon me in the stables,” Lara answered, her
voice as shaky as her legs. “I asked him to leave me be, but he
would not. He—” She stressed the word, her voice stronger, her legs
steadier. “—attacked me. I only defended myself and the hound his
mistress.”
Nithard arched his black brows. “He
was drunk you say?”
“Aye, his breath smelled
as strongly of wine as his judgment was affected by it.”
“You were close enough to
smell his breath and tarried long enough to know his
mind?”
“One only had to be
downwind to smell him. And it took but a moment to know his mind,
for he was most specific in his threats before he grabbed me and
threw me down into the straw.”
Muffled laughter crept in behind her,
but before her the count didn’t look amused.
“Were there any
witnesses?” he questioned.
“No,” Lara admitted.
“There were none.”
“What of witnesses to his
character?”
Captain Guiscard stepped forward.
“Fulrad is well known by me and his fellow soldiers to be a
drunkard and a bully, and his purse, still attached to his belt,
was empty of coin. None of which was found on the lady’s
person.”
“If that is true, I wonder
that you keep him in your company, Captain,” Nithard said. “I had
been led to believe you do not normally tolerate drunken behavior
in your men.”
“We all have our duties,
Count.”
“And yours is to play
nursemaid to the king’s cousin,” Nithard said with a thinly veiled
sneer. “Is it not?”
The captain gave a slight dip of his
head, and a muscle ticked at the side of his clenched jaw as
whispers rose and fell behind them.
“You have given us an
account of this Fulrad’s character as you see it,” the count said
to the captain. “What of the… lady’s? Has she given you any reason
to doubt her word or virtue?”
Lara closed her eyes and pressed her
lips tight. Why had she gone and told the captain that her prize
had been claimed? That she was a witch? She opened her eyes to a
loud snicker and Ranulf practically squirming in his seat. She
glanced sideways at the captain, the muscle in his jaw ticking
double time as he flexed his scarred hand.
“The lady has given me no
reason to doubt the truth of what she says happened with Fulrad,”
he told the count, and Lara released the breath she hadn’t realized
she’d been holding. Sophie was right about him. He played this game
with much more skill than she. He’d defended her honor most ably,
if not her virtue. Which was her own damned fault.
Count Nithard sat back, a small smile
playing at the corners of his thin lips as he addressed the hall.
“Do any here know of any instance in which the accused has acted
other than right and virtuous?”
Ranulf stood and smirked at Lara,
whose blood went cold. She swayed on her feet and was steadied by
the captain’s big, warm hand cupping her elbow.
“The floor is Ranulf
Midered’s,” his father, the count, said.
Ranulf strolled around the table,
stopped in front of Lara and the captain, then turned his back to
them as he presented himself to the stewards. “As you have all