Chapter Twenty-Three
Mariel woke to a setting sun, her mind a haze. Where was she? Her neck ached. Someone was holding her body upright, and she soon realized she was clenched within Teàrlach MacGregor’s vise of a grip. At her stirring, he tightened his grip further.
Her nose throbbed. Had it been broken? Looking down her nose, however, nothing seemed out of alignment, though she could tell whatever had caused the pain had made it swell and her lips were fattened. Her father had done it, she remembered. She was lumbering on a horse. Men surrounded her, ahead of her, all wearing her father’s Crawford plaid. Teàrlach was holding her prisoner. Harold Crawford was taking her back to Ayr.
Finish him… Her father’s order rang through her mind. “Robert!” she exclaimed, her voice scratchy.
“Wheesht, woman,” Teàrlach spoke in her ear.
“Nay!” she said on a strangled cry. “What happened to Robert? Did that bastard kill him?”
She contorted herself in his grip, and he readjusted his hold to keep her in his lap.
Her father turned around and trotted his horse up to her. “Silence, lass!” Lifting his hand, he threatened to strike.
“Do you think your threats scare me?” she wailed, twisting fruitlessly in Teàrlach’s grip. “Strike me until I lie dead in a pool of my own blood, Faither, but I’ll never fear you! Do you hear me? I hate you! I hate you! But I love Robert! What have you done to Robert?”
She wailed and twisted for her freedom, except she knew she wore herself out and would soon lose stamina. And then her father’s mouth twisted up into a grin. It did not bode well of his next words.
“The Earl of Huntington is dead. Slain for his crimes against the Sheriff of Nottingham and his crimes against me. I watched his blood soak the forest floor. Ye’re a widow, and despite spoiling yourself like the filthy wee trollop ye are, I can still find you a suit of my choosing, because of my rank and name. Until then, you will learn your place! And that place is in my prison for shooting me, if I do nay kill ye first myself! Now shut up!”
He followed through on his strike, though thankfully it was an open-palmed slap and not his fist. Still, her face twisted sideways under the force and her head knocked into Teàrlach’s chest. It didn’t matter. His words had disrupted her anger. Robert was dead and she was frozen. She didn’t feel the sting of the slap smarting her cheek, didn’t feel the throbbing in her head she had been feeling moments ago. She felt like losing her stomach.
Surprisingly, Teàrlach eased his grip, as if he could sense her shock. She doubled over the horse’s mane and felt a fountain of tears bloom in her eyes as Crawford turned his reins to regain the lead of his contingent. A mournful wail worked its way out of her throat. Her father turned to look at her and nodded once at her agony.
“Good,” Crawford said. “Mayhap finally you’ll realize I control you and you’ll submit to my authority.”
As the men lost interest in her and her sobs turned into silence, Teàrlach gathered her back in his arms and tightened his hold. Then she felt his face lean down to her ear. Disgust roiled through her. Did he think to start taking liberties with her now? She would never want another after Robert, and most certainly not her father’s hated head guardsmen who followed his orders without ever questioning the right of them. Except he whispered something, and in her growing rage, she missed it.
She stilled, hoping he would repeat it. He did.
“He lies, Lady Mariel. Robert was taken alive as Nottingham’s prisoner. Even Nottingham knows he’ll be in too deep a pit with their king if he kills the earl. Have faith.”
She whipped her head around to beg more answers from him, but his head was back upright, facing forward, and he gave her a stern frown. “I said quiet, Lady.”
Harold turned back around. “Is she still arguing? Does she need more than a slap?”
“Nay, my laird. She was sniveling overmuch about her husband’s death. ’Twas annoying, ’tis all,” Teàrlach said. “She’s done well to silence her hateful speech.”
Harold nodded and returned to the front of his men again.
Mariel’s mind swirled. Was Teàrlach telling the truth? Robert had been taken alive? The relief that poured through her was euphoric, followed by the disbelief that her father could inflict such pain. It never failed to shock her that the man cared so little for her. Still, she could live in Crawford’s prison, knowing Robert was not dead. At least, not dead yet. And more the question, why was Teàrlach helping her? Why had he helped Robert before? What was it that drove him to do what he could to ease a bad situation?
Mayhap he truly cared for Madeline. She had seen it in his eyes. The heartbroken Madeline’s sister… She could only hope. And the only bright light of returning to Ayrshire was that she might see her wee sister again. Guilt for abandoning Madeline sliced through her once more. She had been an imperfect sister, always impatient that Madeline was so timid. And Madeline had begged the opposite of her, that she quit rolling her eyes and tame her behavior so their father might spare her his anger. She prayed as their horses lumbered onward over the English countryside that she would find Madeline in one piece.
…
Nottingham Castle Dungeons
One month later, December
Robert sat in his dungeon cell, the dank walls threatening to madden him. Feeble torchlight held steady upon one wall. A barred window down the corridor was his only indication as to whether or not it was day or night. Upon waking now, it was light, and therefore day.
He looked back at the walls enclosing him, at his feet shackled to the floor so that he only had a few feet of movement. His body ached less and less from the beating he had withstood at the hands of Nottingham’s men, but the soreness on his face and chest told him he had been badly bruised, and a gouge on his forehead indicated that either Nottingham or Crawford’s rings had sliced him during a punch.
Everything had been stripped from him, short of his trousers and undergarments. His tunic had been removed to examine for hidden weapons, his codpiece removed and no doubt the contents added to Nottingham’s personal coffers, leaving him fairly exposed, if not for the thin shield of his undergarments, which were now dingy and gray. His boots, too, had been stripped, his stockings removed, no doubt in search of more weapons that could be used to pick the locks of his bondage. He took immature pleasure in knowing the finely-crafted codpiece would never fit Nottingham and his pea-sized bollocks, for only a man with an inadequate appendage lorded so heavily over others.
His title had also been stripped. His castle and staff had been commandeered. But his woman…wife…Mariel. That loss stung the most, plaguing his restless mind. He had utterly failed her. And now she was gone.
He knew the days came and went, but it was growing harder to keep track of them. His stomach hungered, though he was given water, bread, and a slimy slop of old vegetables once a day. He also knew when someone entered the dungeon, even if they never came to his cell, because the torchlight upon the corridor wall would give a telltale waver.
I love him!
He heard Mariel’s plea as Crawford had threatened to murder him right before her. The words rang through his brain like bells tolling the matins, constantly, without mercy, without pause so he could collect his thoughts. Dammit, but couldn’t King Richard abandon Jerusalem and take over the care of his people? They needed him more than the infidels in the Holy Land. Why could he not leave war-mongering be and return to his kingdom and right Nottingham’s atrocious wrongs?
God, but there had to be a way out of this entire mess. He yanked against his chains. His thoughts were driving him mad. He loved Mariel. What he wouldn’t give for the chance to tell her. He had wanted to marry her, and he had wasted too much time pretending otherwise. He hadn’t married her to protect her. He had married her because he couldn’t imagine life without her. He had been too blinded by his aversion to the institution of marriage to see what a treasure it could be.
Protection. He shook his head. How laughable was that? Protect her, indeed. He had protected her right back into her father’s angry custody. God, what he would give to know if she suffered or not, what he would give to grow old together and never miss another day of telling her how much he loved her.
He thought of their wedding night. He thought of her in his bed made of furs, on the ground, in a hut, in his arms, and how content she had been, how much she had given to him. No lady he had ever met would have been happy to lie in an abandoned hut, deep in a forest, on the ground. No woman had accommodated the whole of him with such force as he used that night, so lost in his want of her, her nails scoring his skin that all sense of control, all sense of time, had fled. She had laid herself bare to him as he’d made love to her through the night. She had entrusted her heart to him and hadn’t shied away from the animal he’d become as he joined himself to her and made them one.
He should feel ashamed for his primal rutting, and yet he knew she would have been offended had he denied them both his full fervor. It would have seemed dishonest. She had always been his equal. She had always loved a challenge. She had never settled for less when she felt there was more.
I love him!
He shook his head violently to clear away her anguished plea.
He should have said it, should have said the words, I marry you because I want you, and want you always. It would have reaffirmed so much for her if she had only heard him say it, for she had asked him many times. Yet those simple words had been harder to say than any jest ready on his lips.
He pulled against the shackles fruitlessly, frustrated, restless, the ability to steal her away from her father’s wrath looming so far out of reach, and he racked his brain for the thousandth time as to who within his walls had betrayed him. His thoughts kept settling on John. John was close to him. John had disappeared after David had returned with news of Crawford’s pending arrival. Though, in spite of Jonathan’s anger, he couldn’t reconcile that his favored man and good friend would betray him over Mariel.
Yet the clues stacked up. Crawford had said he trusted those closest to him overmuch, and John was his closest friend, apart from Will. It was John who had been charged with posting soldiers in the woods that afternoon as Crawford and Nottingham were slated to arrive. And he’d never seen John again after that.
It had bothered Robert then and it made sense now. John had gone to inform Crawford that he harbored Mariel. Nottingham had likely promised to reinstate John’s castle and lands in exchange for information on Mariel or on the band of thieves. John had been angry when he discovered Robert was going to marry Mariel. John had made a fatal decision to help the enemy in a moment of anger.
There was no one else he could think of…Yes. There was. Wesley.
The pompous bookkeeper he had done so well to continue to employ had hated Mariel from the beginning. And he had hated being punished for cheating at the tourney. Yet he, too, had remained loyal, probably because he loved his position. Huntington was the wealthiest estate in England, aside from the House of Plantagenet, and Robert paid his officials accordingly. Wesley would never receive such a generous salary elsewhere. And though he had remained loyal to Huntington, he had favored Robert’s father, not Robert. The accountant might very well have taken a gamble to get rid of Mariel and Robert while hoping to maintain his position at Huntington.
John or Wesley?
“Be damned!” he cursed.
He shook his thoughts away again. Crawford was right. He had naively trusted his people too much, a sad but valuable lesson. He would never make that mistake again, if he ever got out of Nottingham’s prison alive, if he ever found Mariel again, if he ever saw his people again or held land and title again.
Despair threatened to darken his heart. What would his father do in this situation? His father would ruthlessly root out the traitor and drag him into the bailey for all to see, tie him to a post, and slice his neck. And he felt anger such as that begin to well within him. Yes. He would escape, and he would find the traitor who had ruined him and worse, fed Mariel to the very wolf she had spent months escaping.
The torchlight wavered on the wall. Like a hawk, his senses sharpened to the most banal of happenings and he focused on it, hastening the few steps he could to peer down the corridor and see who might be entering the dungeons. He stiffened. Jonathan was striding side by side with Nottingham.
He couldn’t believe it. He had been right. John, his friend, his head guardsman, his former peer, had turned on him. Over Mariel. It wasn’t possible, he thought, and yet he had come to the obvious conclusion time and again over the sennights of his incarceration.
John and Nottingham arrived in front of him.
“Good God, man, what did you let them do to you?” Jonathan asked, ignoring the frown de Wendenal leveled on him.
“Well, well. The traitor finally arrives,” Robert replied, standing tall, if not leaner, before his former guardsman.
John crinkled his brow, staring into Robert’s eyes. Robert felt his gaze cool with hatred.
“Has prison made you unwell?” John asked.
“It will do that to the best of us…and the worst of us,” Nottingham drawled. “There must be something betwixt you to which I’m not privy.”
“And you, a liar. I’m not surprised,” Robert said. If Nottingham would play daft to having turned John a spy for him, it didn’t really matter now. Neither man would live once he got his shackles off and lodged his hands around their throats.
“Indeed…mayhap there is,” John remarked, though his eyes looked confused.
In his most commanding voice, Nottingham continued, his dark hair framing his sallow face. “King Richard has finally returned and holds court. You, Robert, formerly the earl, now go before him to hear of your fate.”
“Can I at least be afforded a tunic?” Robert growled. “I’d hate to impress the ladies with my cock swinging freely like a breeding stallion.”
“Such cheek is unbecoming, Robert. You go as you are. If it humiliates you, more’s the pity.”
Nottingham produced the keys and turned the lock, passing the keys off to a prison guard to do the unseemly task of bending at Robert’s feet to unlock his chains. If he was as confident as he was acting, Robert thought, then King Richard might already be tainted by Nottingham’s lies.
“Why are you here?” Robert snapped, his attention returning to John.
Jonathan, his brow still confused, stepped back as Nottingham’s guard walked him out, a hand clenching his upper arm. “I gained royal permission to accompany Nottingham, to determine your state of health. To ensure you had not been abused. I told the king that your former men-at-arms feared for your welfare. Nottingham agreed to let me come to inspect, in case he lied.”
Robert wanted to laugh at the genuine lack of guilt John portrayed…unless he spoke the truth. Unless he, as a loyal man to Huntington, had truly begged to see his former lord, now fallen from grace. The possibility that it had not been John who betrayed him niggled. What if he was wrong? What if it had been Wesley? What if he had allowed the blackness of prison to seed mistrust in his heart?
They walked as a group down the corridor, past the filth and stench of other men in other cells, and Robert was grateful for having had the use of his legs in his cell, no matter how limited his radius of movement, for he was able to walk with ease. They emerged into the light of midday, the sun peeking through rain clouds and piercing his sensitive eyes. He closed them as they watered, producing tears to glaze over the stinging.
Nottingham’s inner yard was filled with the typical stench of waste, workers, and animal dung, and the air was frigid. His bare chest stung as icy winter wind lapped across him. Winter was truly arriving and Christmastide would begin soon. Huntington would have been festive this year had he been there to ensure it was celebrated with the proper traditions. Pine boughs, holly berries, Yule logs. More indeed was the pity.
Thankfully, they rounded to the front of Nottingham’s keep to enter, blocking the wind, and Robert noted the royal red banners bearing the king’s three lions-passant, dressing a contingent of horses. Unstabled in this cold wind? Either Nottingham had a horrible groom or his stables were too small to accommodate the king’s horses. Interesting. Just looking around, he could tell Nottingham’s castle and lands were thinly stocked and pathetically run, despite the castle being proudly built. Huntington must have seemed like a treasure vault to the bloody urchin now strutting ahead of him like a peacock. Cock was to be certain. As was pea. That part of the comparison was correct. He was a giant cock of a man with a pea-sized appendage.
His muscles felt weakened from the exertion and as much as he wanted to drag his escort down while simultaneously strangling Nottingham with the chain between his manacles, he knew the rest of the guards on the parapet and flanking the main doors would have him tackled once more. And with King Richard here to watch, the act might make him look guilty of Nottingham’s claims.
The great hall of the keep was vast but poorly tended, and the rushes he trod barefoot upon appeared stale and in need of sweeping out. A cur in the corner, rummaging through the hay, eating bits of leftover food confirmed it. He would likely have worms or a festering sore on his soles by the time he left.
A royal contingent filled the hall as well as Nottingham’s ladies, soldiers, and an unmistakable gaggle of whores. Crawford, draped in his red-and-green Scottish tartan, sat along the periphery with some of his guardsmen, though Robert noted that Teàrlach wasn’t there.
And to his surprise, Will, Alan, and David, stood in attendance, too, luckily all with boots on to protect their feet from the cesspit within the rushes. And there was King Richard, sitting at the head of the main table at the dais, food and drink placed before him. His beard was a well-kempt ginger. He looked more mature than when he had left to fight in the Third Crusade. Still, the man was formidable, poised, and regal in his red surcoat trimmed with gold threading and bearing the three lions of the Plantagenet house. To his irritation, Crawford leaned forth, seething, as Nottingham walked to his side. Did he and Nottingham hope to skewer him together?
The king watched as Robert was dragged down the aisle between the trestle tables, but waited until he reached the space before him.
Robert bowed. “Your Highness. You return to a broken kingdom.”
“That I can see, Robert. And imagine my surprise when Sir Jonathan Naylor delivered to me a missive all the way in Aquitaine, stating your duress,” King Richard replied.
Nottingham’s head whipped up. Clearly, that was a fact unknown to him.
“But…my king,” the sheriff said, “what missive did he bring to France? I thought you returned to England from war and traveled here so that I might brief you.”
“Sir Wendenal,” the king said. “I might have let you think that. However, I wish to get to the bottom of this, and disclosing Sir Naylor’s plea to you would have compromised my investigation.”
Nottingham’s face was white, shocked, and Crawford turned a glare on him.
“Your Majesty,” Nottingham began again. “You heard all I had to say. You heard how he attacked me, how he stole from me, disguised as a robber of the hood—”
“Silence!” boomed the king. “You are the one whom assumed I came to hear of the news of England since my departure, and you have had ample time to explain the dire suffering of my country. I left you in faithful charge, but you have overstepped your bounds! And included a Scottish lord in your schemes—who might very well be my cousin, distantly—with no more claim to any power in this country than a common beggar. I’ll have more from you when I ask it.”
Nottingham nodded, bowing low and backing away, and Ayr seemed to fume at him with vexation. Mayhap they had both been expecting a sympathetic ear.
“Rise up, Robert. Imagine my surprise,” the king said, “when Sir Jonathan showed up in France, having run a perfectly good horse into the ground after bribing his way across the channel, only to barge through my guardsmen to brief me with such news.”
Robert’s brow crinkled. He looked to the side of the room where Jonathan stood watching him. “What did he do?”
“He left Huntington with haste to inform me of your precarious state.”
Crawford, appearing to come to the conclusion that he would not find the sympathy here that he had expected, stood and began striding to the door. The king flicked his finger at two of his soldiers, and they moved to bar Crawford’s exit.
“Not so fast, sire,” the king remarked. “You’ll wait until I’ve finished questioning Robert, for I then have questions for you.”
Having turned to watch Crawford go, Robert turned back around, glancing at Jonathan again. He was confused.
“Your Majesty, if I may speak,” Robert started, “I would like to know how John came to know you were in France and where to find you, when no one knew of your imminent return before Nottingham forced his luxurious hospitality upon me.”
The king nodded. “Mayhap Sir Naylor would like to explain.”
He gestured for John, and his friend came forward, bowing again, then turned to Robert. “After you left with Mariel and didn’t return before dawn, as expected, we grew worried. Our searches of the forest and of Creake Abbey turned up nothing. A royal messenger then arrived at Huntington to inform us that His Majesty was in Aquitaine, examining his holdings there and would be returning to England to hold court in the coming sennights, requesting all the peerage in England to attend.
“That’s when David returned, reporting signs of a struggle on a forest path. He followed the tracks and determined that one set belonged to Crawford, and one to Nottingham. He followed Wendenal’s trail here to learn that you had been beaten and captured. He reported to us such news, and that’s when I made haste to find King Richard and bid him return immediately.”
“But where did you disappear to before that? The news came that Crawford and Wendenal were riding to Huntington, and you disappeared shortly after our disagreement.”
John’s expression turned sheepish. “I sought out the maid Bridget and spent the evening in one of the abandoned crofter’s cottages. She’s, eh, treated me well during my months at Huntington. Your intentions with Mariel filled me with jealousy and I needed female distraction. I did as you bade, posted sentries in the woods, and went to the bed of another to ease my anger.” He looked down, swallowed, then back at Robert. “I’m not proud of it, but I needed to cool my head before I saw you again. But I realize now how much you and Mariel care for each other. I never did stand to gain ground in her heart once she met you. Still, the revelation stung. I’m sorry I abandoned you, Robert. ’Tis all the more reason I went with haste to France. For my own atonement.”
Robert felt ashamed. He had thought the worst of John. But John had been loyal…which meant Wesley had been the traitor.
“Lord Crawford said someone close to me betrayed me. You were angered and disappeared on me. I could only conclude that either you or Wesley was the turncoat. I thought the worst of you, man, locked in that cell. My apologies.”
John nodded.
“I never said your traitor was a man,” Crawford grumbled, but said no more, his eyes cold as Robert turned to look at him.
Indeed…no he hadn’t. But what he now implied was that the traitor was a woman. Who knew of his affection for Mariel? Anna and Charlotte. Who knew he wanted to marry her? There was only one answer, and it sank in his gut like a ship’s anchor.
Charlotte.
He had trusted their friendship, but then again, Charlotte had wanted to be Robert’s woman. He had always been good to Charlotte. He had compensated her handsomely when he severed their relationship. He had thought their friendship ran deeper than her ambitions for his bedchamber. Perhaps there would come a time to confront her about that, if he ever got out of his blasted manacles…unless it was Anna.
He had dismissed Anna unkindly and she had clearly exhibited her dislike for Mariel. Anna might not have known he intended to marry Mariel, but she certainly knew he favored her. Mayhap, she had crossed Crawford and his men’s path on the roadside as she traveled northward to York and mentioned a female archer at Huntington holding Robert’s interest.
God be damned, but his brain felt like bursting.
He turned back to King Richard.
“I’m guilty of stealing from William de Wendenal, Your Majesty,” Robert said. “But only because his coin was ill-gotten from your loyal subjects, both rich and poor, people he evicted and terrorized. Every shilling, every pence was returned to people who needed it, or sits in an account for such charity. I took people in, offered them shelter and work. I donated purses confiscated from Nottingham to Creake Abbey, Newstead Priory, and Barking Abbey, and sometimes I felt like my men and I were the only ones trying to hold the world together whilst waiting for your return. Punish me as you will, but I did what was right when no one else could. I stand by my convictions.”
King Richard leaned back, propping his reddish beard between his pointer and thumb. “Surprisingly, your grand thieving scheme isn’t what concerns me. But more precisely, whose permission did you seek to marry? Not mine. And it seems you usurped a betrothal to William of Nottingham by stealing the woman promised to him. It seems nothing of Nottingham’s was safe from your thieving.”
Ah, there it is. My marriage. To someone other than one of Richard’s eligible English noblewomen. Although, why now did he care? Robert was no longer an earl. He was no longer much of anything. Unless King Richard enslaved him or had him executed, there was not much more the king could do to him. He took a deep breath, glancing at Nottingham, who smirked at him, and began.
“I married Mariel Crawford, the daughter of Harold Crawford of Ayrshire. She fled the man’s violence, and I offered protection in marriage. We were already going to elope when I discovered Crawford had promised her to William. And with all due respect, I decided waiting for your consent might not come soon enough, for no one knew when you might return to England.”
Robert shot a glance at Nottingham and continued. “After hearing how William would be happy to put her in her place, I followed through on taking her to wife, for his deeds have been dark since he was left in charge of England, and I knew Mariel would fare no differently at his hands than your kingdom has fared. Mariel is my wife, like it or not, and our marriage is bound and sealed. There is no annulment possible. The only thing possible is to see me killed and her widowed.”
“Don’t tempt me.” Richard stood and the hall hushed. “So you, my most eligible earl, married someone of your choosing with no familial clout in England without your liege’s consent when I needed you to secure a good alliance?”
Robert kept his eyes locked on his king’s, then nodded. “Yes.”
“Can this be proven?”
Again Robert nodded. “Yes. Father Tucker, a lowly priest at Creake Abbey. He keeps the register. Which Mariel and I both signed.”
Richard said nothing, then rubbed his beard. It seemed both anger and admiration warred on his brow.
“I do have familial clout in England!” erupted Crawford. “I am second cousin to you and your brothers!” He rounded on Robert. “And you had no right to take Mariel! She was never meant for you!”
“No,” Robert countered, whipping around to face him. “I didn’t have the right. And you did, in fact, have the right to marry her off to any man you chose. You thought that after months of searching for her, forcing her to wed Nottingham would strengthen your ties in England, just as forcing her to wed my father would have done, had he not died. But can you not see that betrothing her to my father is what sent her fleeing in the first place? She lives and breathes just like any man, and you terrified her. You relied on your growing friendship to Ranulf de Blondeville, your friendship with Nottingham, and your unrecognized ties to King Richard to validate the power you sought and still seek. You ride through King Richard’s lands, as if you have some claim to authority.” He scoffed incredulously. “And is it not true that you hope to see King William the Rough of Scotland dethroned? I’d say that borders on sedition.”
“Nonsense you speak.” Crawford growled with a dismissive wave.
“Is it? You met with my father about your intentions to usurp your Scottish monarch when you betrothed Mariel, did you not? Little does anyone else know, but those parchments are still locked in a chest at Huntington upon my detainment. Sadly for you, both my father and I saw value in saving them. He, because he was just as vile a man as you, and I…because they seemed like they might become valuable in the future, should you ever pursue your ambitions.”
“Is this true?” asked King Richard, his eyes narrowing.
Crawford glowered at Robert, trying to determine if he bluffed, but was wise enough not to say anything.
“You admit that you dislike your king and think little of his leadership. The proof is at Huntington,” Robert said, seething.
“Nothing of such was found there,” Nottingham assured Crawford. “My men searched every room.”
“Except the vaults,” Robert said.
Nottingham gauged him, a snarl curling his lips, indicating Robert had nudged a sore spot. “Your guardsmen said you kept the keys to the vaults.”
“Then my guardsmen are loyal to me and lied to you like a rug on your floor.” Robert chuckled. “Normally, I do keep the keys, but I made arrangements with my steward the night I eloped, in the event my capture or worse, death, should come to pass. I assure you the proof is still there.” He returned his attention to Crawford. “You knew from the day you met me that I wouldn’t be your pawn, and little did you know, I was hiding Mariel all along. ’Tis why you took your leave so soon, for Mariel was not there, or so you thought. Yes, I took bold liberty and married Mariel, and unless you plan to execute me or have already done so to her, our union is binding.” Robert glared, his chest rising and falling with coursing rage. “And you couldn’t stand seeing your daughter happy with me.”
Crawford snapped and lunged at him. “You stole from me, you cocky upstart bastard—”
Royal guardsmen charged forth to rein him back, but not before Robert met the threat with his manacled hands and whipped them over Crawford’s head, cinching the chain about his neck to lock him under control.
King Richard jumped to his feet, and the guardsmen tried to pry his chain free, but he held fast.
“Release him, Robert! You, the lad that I’ve known all my years, are better than this,” the king scolded.
“Not until I know he won’t take a swing at me!” Robert bit out, straining against Crawford’s force.
He knew he looked like a gladiator on display. He knew that his trousers and undergarments slouched so that his nether hair was sprouting just above the waistline. He knew that he ground his bare feet into the soiled rushes beneath him. But he wasn’t letting go until he knew Crawford submitted.
The guards managed to break his death grip and shoved him back. He stumbled, seeing Crawford taken to the floor and subdued, and turned to the king, his chest rising and falling from the exertion. “I love her, Your Majesty,” he declared, his voice shaking with both rage and emotion. “I know my decision didn’t carry your blessing and doesn’t carry your favor, but knowing she suffers is making me mad. She should be at my side, penniless as I now am. From the moment I met her, I wanted no other. I have nothing left, but if you release me, I’ll walk to Scotland barefoot, if I must. I know not who betrayed me if it wasn’t Jonathan, but none of it matters now. My wife belongs with me.”
“What have you to offer her?” Richard asked. “With no castle and no servants, no money and no property. Not even a horse. As poorly as you claim she was treated, she is still a Scottish noblewoman requiring, at bare minimum, a title.”
Robert held out his manacles as if revealing his soul. “I have nothing but myself. But I’d rather see Mariel poor and free than trapped one more minute in a dungeon cell, for I don’t believe the good Sheriff of Ayrshire is the type to accommodate her with a bath and warm hearth.”
“And why should I release you, Robert, formerly Earl?” the king asked, sitting down.
“Because Nottingham has abused your people,” Robert proclaimed, confident, standing tall despite his humiliating lack of dress and decorum. “Because my band of men and I, who I refuse to reveal, were the only ones attempting to speak for the masses. And I’ll never come to court to attempt to flatter you into restoring my title. What’s done is done and I’m at peace with it, even if Nottingham’s treatment of me and your people was unfair. All I ask is that my people—the people of Huntington,” he corrected himself, for they were no longer his, “are treated well. I only want my wife. I have no horse, no coin, not even a bloody pair of boots, but I’ll walk to foking Scotland if I have to!”
King Richard’s face split into a grin at Robert’s passionate exclamation.
“You’ll do nothing of the sort!” the king announced. He flicked his finger at his official, who then withdrew a ring of keys. “These, Robert of Huntington, were handed over to me by William de Wendenal…but they belong to you.” He tossed them across the room, and Robert snagged them out of the air with his chained hands, turning them over to look. “I believe those unlock Huntington Castle’s gates.”
“Your Majesty! I must protest!” Nottingham exclaimed, his face splitting into a rage. “Robert’s fate was to be decided here, not my guilt! He attacked and stole from a royal official, and he encouraged Mariel Crawford to shoot at her father!”
“Huntington,” Robert thundered. “She bears my name now!”
Nottingham shook his head in frustration and continued. “Much of what he says is false! I only evicted those who would not pay the rents—”
“And who made those rents so high that none could afford it?” said the king, rising up once more. “You invite my wrath, sire. What neither Robert nor you know is that many more accounts of your cruelty reached me in the Holy Land. His story is, in a saying I’ve brought back with me, simply the final straw upon the camel’s back.”
He turned back to Robert, flicking his finger at the guard who had brought him in. The man brought his own key from the ring on his belt and unlocked the manacles at his wrists. Freedom. Robert pulled his arms apart and rolled his shoulders as the metal clanked away.
“What exactly does this mean, my king?” Robert asked.
King Richard, grinning again, stood tall. “It means, Robert, that you have proven your worth. You’re no longer the famed young bachelor who likes to dally with the willing females. You stood up to injustice as my loyal subject and have grown up.
“It also means your band of thieves may disperse.” The king leveled a glare, his grin turning sly. “There will be no more need to illegally patrol the forests, and may I never catch you doing so again…because you are now appointed to the head of my East Anglian guard and custodian of the Huntington Alms Charity, to which I am donating one thousand pounds.” The king’s grin broadened into a chuckle at the surprise on Robert’s face.
“No such charity exists, Your Majesty,” Robert said.
“It does now,” Richard replied, standing tall. “It also means you are reinstated as the Earl of Huntington and returned all estate and land that accompanies such.” He turned to Nottingham. “If there are any missing properties or finances, I shall be deducting those deficits from your coffers, for despite the pitiful state of this grand castle, I have it on account your personal vaults are wealthy.
“Lock both these men away,” the king said, waving his hand at Crawford and Nottingham. “I have many a question for them before I decide their fate, but in the meantime, Robert…” The king descended from the dais and came to stand before him, not quite as tall as Robert but broader from carrying a broadsword, and laid a hand on his shoulder. “You’ve become a fine young man. One I am proud to call one of my nobles. In a time of duress, your tactics might have been, eh, debatable, but ingenious, and I have it on account your woman is both as unconventional and skilled as you. She was not my pick for you. But it is clear to me now, I should not have been the one picking. I bid you retrieve your Lady Huntington in all haste and bring her to court to present her to me. I offer a contingent of a score of men to assist you on your quest for her and will pen a missive to King William so that he knows of the traitor that was in his flock. Be on your way.”
Robert grinned for the first time in a month, and he bowed low. “My king, if William de Wendenal could see fit to return my codpiece, intact with its contents, I would be much obliged. I don’t think the man has need of one tailored to that, eh, particular size.”
King Richard rolled his eyes. “Mayhap you have yet to become the fine young man I thought… I hope I don’t regret this,” he muttered, and turned to Nottingham to demand where Robert’s effects had been stored.
Nottingham glowered at him as he left the hall at the hand of his own prison guard. Robert winked at him, tipping his head back, and laughed a merry laugh.