was, who would be strong enough to win? Wat was determined it would not be the man on the dais.
He had no personal dislike for Sir Hector; this was merely a matter of business. Sir Hector had produced good contracts for them over several years, had kept them all clothed and fed, and supplied with women. There was no cause for him or any of the others to complain, for all had shared in the general wealth created.
But Sir Hector was no longer the capable, astute man he once had been. One thing he could never understand was how a group of soldiers melded together. There was a sense that all belonged to the same family; esprit de corps counted for a great deal, but for it to work properly, their leader must be strong and seen to be fair. In his dealings with Henry the Hurdle and John Smithson, Sir Hector had demonstrated lousy judgment. He should have punished them for taking advantage of their fellows before matters got so out of hand. That way, the company might have held together, the men staying loyal. Sir Hector had forgotten that he depended on all of the men in the band; thinking he could rely on two to keep the rest in line, he unwisely hadn’t heeded the mutterings of dissatisfaction. It was foolish, Wat knew, for a leader to trust in a small number of advisers, for those plotting mutiny would carefully avoid talking to such men and would ensure that any reports getting to the leader through his nominated sergeants would be favorable. His gullibility had cost him the faith of the group.
Matters had come to a head after the robbery. When John and Henry were seen to be subjected to only a mild enquiry and, at least in the view of most of the company, inadequately interrogated, the men began to look askance at their leader. A captain who could not protect his own goods was not to be trusted with another’s life. How Sir Hector could expect them to put their confidence in him when he could not control two petty thieves who made money from blackmail, Wat could not understand. But there was more. Since losing his silver, the captain seemed to have withdrawn into himself, as if he had already accepted defeat. The men had noticed-and drawn their own conclusions. Their leader was grown insipid; he no longer had the edge he once showed.
Whereas Wat had the trust of all the men, and the support of over half of them in this battle for the leadership. He had always stood up against the two blackmailers and supported any new member who was persecuted by them. Gradually, he had found a following among his colleagues, for he was a man who could hold his tongue when told a secret. He had skills as a warrior, could fight with bow or sword, and knew how to motivate men who were almost at their last gasp to leap to their feet and follow him up the siege ladders.
He drank deeply and cast a cautious eye toward the man at the dais. Sir Hector had had his day, and now it was past. Even his title was fiction…“Sir” Hector, Wat thought, his lip curling. Most of the other members of the company didn’t realize he had given himself the title after a clash in Bordeaux. A knight had refused to fight him, saying that to draw sword against a commoner would be an insult to his chivalry and honor. Sir Hector had ambushed him the next day, killing the knight in a bloody ambush, then appropriating the man’s belt and spurs. He was no more chivalrous than Wat.
And now Sir Hector was to be retired. Whether he wished it or not.
Looking round the room, Sir Hector was aware of the eyes on him, and for a while he could not think what they reminded him of. He was so used to his absolute authority in all matters, that he had long since stopped taking notice of the opinions of his men.
There was a uniformity among them now, he noticed. Occasionally he would observe a covert glance, a fleeting expression upon a grubby visage, which he was sure did not augur well for his future. It was as he came to this conclusion that he could suddenly name the look on their faces: speculation.
His hand, as he reached for his tankard, was steady, he noted with inner satisfaction, and he brought the cold pewter to his lips with no sign of his sudden shock.
Not for many years had he seen such feral expectancy. His men displayed the same impassive interest that a wolf pack showed toward an intended victim, when the prey was slowing from cold, terror and hunger, freezing to petrified languor as it waited for the final attack, the sudden rush which would end in the kill.
He set the tankard back on the table. Outwardly calm, his brain raced with near-panic. It wasn’t only Wat he had to contend with, but the whole company. He must set his stamp on them all, and quickly. Otherwise there was no point in planning future campaigns.
If only she was still here, he thought regretfully. Then she might help him to make sense of it all. But she wasn’t, and that was that.
Rising, he made his way to his solar and shut the door, locking it securely with the heavy bolt. He gazed at the symbol of safety with a wry twist to his lips that was nearly a smile. Before, he had always been safe because of the strength of his little force, secure in the knowledge that any attack must first beat through his men before reaching his solar. Now his safety depended on locking himself away from his own troops.
As the first clap of thunder exploded overhead, Margaret leapt upright, eyes wide in alarm. She had never grown used to the fierce demonstrations of the elements. Edith, sleeping by her bed, began to wail, and Margaret forgot her own fear enough to climb from her bed and step cautiously through the rushes to collect her child, holding her close as she crawled back between her sheets, pulling them up close round her daughter’s body while trying not to disturb her husband.
A fresh blue-white flare lanced through the gaps in the wooden shutters, closely followed by another report, and Margaret heard a hound set up a mournful howling. The dismal sound made her shiver-it reminded her all too well of the wolves on the moors, and she recalled the stories of how the Devil rode with the wolves, pointing out the houses which held the youngest children for the beasts to devour, while he took the innocent souls.
Edith murmured drowsily, comforted by her mother’s warmth, but at another crackle she stuffed her thumb in her mouth, squirming furiously.
“Has she only just woken up?” Simon asked.
“Yes. I tried to keep her still so she wouldn’t stir you, but-”
“Don’t worry, Meg,” he said, and she nearly gave a groan of relief, it was so good to hear the gentleness in his voice. She smiled as he rolled onto his back. As the lightning flickered, illuminating the room with its cold blue- gray light, she could see his face.
Hearing a low moan, which rose to a keening scream, he half-rose from the bed, and only subsided when her hand took his shoulder. “There’s nothing you can do to help him, Simon. Let him be.”
She was right, he had to admit. The boy was inconsolable-and seeing the bailiff, a man he associated with his mother’s death, would certainly not help him. Then Simon heard a stealthily opened door, a faint creak as someone stepped out into the hall…followed shortly by the clatter of a falling polearm and a muttered curse. He could recognize the voice of Stapledon’s rector. It was typical of the young man that he would want to go to the aid of a scared child, and equally typical that the three-footed clumsy fool should wake the household in so doing.
“Will he ever get over it?” he wondered aloud.
“Of course. We all do.”
He studied her profile. Her face glimmered under the benign glow of the dying fire, giving her an orange-pink flush, and he smiled when she looked at him with feminine confidence. “You have great faith in his powers of recuperation, but I’m not so certain. He’s seen his mother slaughtered before his eyes, and that’s something I don’t think many children could cope with.”
“Really? And do you not know that all the people in those alleys are as poor as beggars? How many of them have had to watch their mothers and fathers, children, wives and husbands, as they died?”
“That’s not the same! Someone dying of natural causes is hard to take, but it’s not the same as seeing someone stabbed to death in the street.”
“No. If the boy had seen his mother fail slowly, if he had seen her fade with weakness over weeks instead of falling quickly, he might have been torn by disgust. He might even have come to hate her, if he had to wipe her wounds, wash her, feed her, clean away her soiled bedclothes, and still try to find food to feed himself. He would have hated her all the more for the food and water he had wasted on her, just keeping her alive for an extra day or two, when that same food might have fed him instead of her illness.”
“You think him seeing his mother die quickly is better?” he frowned.
“Yes. In time he will know that nothing he could have done would have saved her. He will not hate her; he will remember her as a caring mother who never begrudged him a mouthful of her food or a sip of her water. Judith gave him life, and for that he will always be grateful. And now, because her death was unnecessary, he can enjoy the satisfaction of seeing her avenged. Not only that, he can participate in condemning her murderer.” Her voice was quiet, but absolute in her conviction. “And in years to come he will feel stronger for having helped bring her killer to justice. His healing will begin when he sees the killer hang, for then he will see that the fears of his boyhood are unfounded.”
