They narrow still further when Harry asks for a receipt of debts paid.
The final tourney of winter is in Newmarket, hard on the heels of Woodstock. It’s a hundred miles back east, past Dunstable, past Cambridge. Montagu hosts it; he has a castle nearby. The contest takes place over Rabbie’s birthday, and there is much ado among that faction of the King’s intimates.
Iain has developed a teasing camaraderie with the three elderly heraldry clerks, mostly based on their ability to insult each other in Latin, so he gives Harry’s bona fides for him. Harry is painting his star-and-hawk coat of arms on a blank shield when Iain comes running back to the pavilion, waving the stamped paper and grinning ear to ear.
‘Harry, you’re on the King’s team!’ he gasps, breathless.
Harry drops the paintbrush. ‘What?!’
Iain nods. ‘Lord Morris said!’ He counts off on his fingers. ‘Apparently it’s you and Rabbie and Morley and Sir Hugh and the King, of course, and the Bohuns, and Montagu, and Crocker, and Malachi and Morien, and somebody else. And Arundel’s captaining the other team. Percy is the only name I recognise there.’
Harry sighs. ‘Montagu is setting this up. He wants a win.’
‘Fuck,’ Iain groans, his smile disappearing as he understands what’s been done. He sits down next to Harry. ‘He wants someone to win other than you. He’s put you on a weighted team so you can’t shine.’
So much for a good end to the winter season, Harry thinks.
Newmarket makes Harry uncomfortable. Everybody seems to be his friend now, calling out ‘Sir Harry!’ as he passes. It’s nice, of course, being in the orbit of the King. But he can’t help feeling that none of this is real, that it will vanish as easily and suddenly as it’s appeared. In a camp of thousands calling his name, there is only one person he trusts.
And Alys.
Maybe Alys too.
The mêlée is dull. Arundel’s team fights valiantly, but they’re no match for the power and experience of the King’s men. Rabbie is ruthless, picking off easy targets one after another, and to nobody’s surprise he comes out of the group battle with the highest score.
Harry is so wound up afterwards that he drags Iain off to the practice field. They spar all afternoon, until the two of them can barely stand. When they hear the Vespers bells, he sends Iain back with his armour to clean it for the next day’s jousts. Before following his squire home, he stops to dunk his head in the nearest horse trough. It’s mid-February, but God seems to have blessed the Newmarket tournament with unseasonably warm weather. And Iain is an increasingly strenuous challenge to his swordfighting abilities.
Harry shuts his eyes and leans against the fence for a moment. Iain. His frustration, he admits to himself, isn’t just about the shoddy mêlée. It’s Iain. It’s always Iain. The distance between them makes Harry’s skin feel the wrong size for his body. He feels misshapen, out of sorts, and nothing can put him right again except his squire’s arms around him.
Harry shakes his head. The rational part of his brain screams that they can’t do this. That he has duties. But his heart whispers, find a way.
Sir Colin Crocker falls into step next to him on the way back to the pavilions, starting up some idle chatter about the weather. All the tension Harry had worked out of his body sparring with Iain seeps right back in again. He doesn’t like Crocker; he’s second of Montagu’s bullies behind Rabbie. Nothing good can come of his attention.
His instincts prove right as they reach a bend in the path, secluded by a few trees. ‘Word to the wise,’ Crocker whispers. ‘Rabbie’s going to win this tournament.’
‘He’ll have to get a lot better at jousting first,’ says Harry.
‘Nah,’ sneers Crocker. ‘He’ll do just fine as he is. What will happen is, you’re going to get a lot worse, or else Rabbie’s cousin the Bishop will hear about what you get up to with that squire of yours. Be a shame, to see a decorated knight hanging in Exeter Market like a common criminal.’
Harry is sure he’s gone completely pale, but he digs his nails into his palms and tries to remain as emotionless as possible.
Crocker pats him condescendingly on the shoulder. ‘You haven’t been with Montagu long enough, pup. You think the base of his power is money? No. It’s spies.’
When Crocker leaves, Harry waits five minutes, then throws up behind a tree.
In the end, Harry doesn’t have to make a choice. It’s taken out of his hands.
For two days he jousts through the twelve members of the Outsiders, and his insomnia and moral agonies manifest themselves in little more than dark circles under his eyes and monosyllabic replies.
He doesn’t tell Iain.
There’s no point. Iain would do something stupid, like try to kill Rabbie in his sleep.
(It’s tempting to tell Iain.)
The third day of jousting, it’s the top six knights riding against each other. Harry’s up against Crocker first. And Crocker cheats.
Harry feels the illegal iron tip of the lance slide off his shield and pierce his chest, feels his rib snap, and then he’s on the ground.
Somebody’s screaming.
He jerks back into consciousness to see, not grey Newmarket sky, but the jolly blue-and-white striped canvas of his pavilion. Iain’s hands are on his cheeks and Iain’s face is above his and Harry hears, ‘—don’t die, you son of a whore, you can’t die, God’s blood, stay with me—’ and outside a herald is shouting, ‘Can he continue to compete, yes or no?’ and Harry’s shaking his head no and Iain’s yelling, ‘Will you please shut up so I can find out,’ and then Harry mumbles, ‘Don’t talk about my mother like that,’ and then darkness closes in on him once more.
When Harry next wakes up, his armour
