Page 59 of The Captive Knight
Chapter Sixteen
“Come with me, Aliénor.”
Aliénor felt so numb she didn’t notice Jehan’s grip on her arm until she was halfway down the stairs. The fabric of her slippers caught on the rough surface of the stones, making her stumble. Only when they emerged into the courtyard, when the weight of a hundred stares struck her, did she manage to summon a measure of dignity to shake free of Jehan’s grip. She continued to follow him, this time under her own power.
They entered the donjon, passed through the great hall, and climbed the stairs all the way up to his tower room. There, Jehan shut the door behind them.
She blurted, “He doesn’t know what he’s doing, Jehan.”
He yanked his surcoat over his head. “His message was clear enough.” He balled the cloth and tossed it with force into a corner.
“He’s still a child—”
“A boy who gathers men-at-arms to fight under his banner is no longer a child.”
A scuff of a foot startled her and she realized they were not alone. His squire, Esquival, approached with a padded doublet in his hands. Jehan shoved his arms through the armholes of the garment.
Jehan was putting on armor.
“This is nonsense,” she whispered, as her heart skittered like a frightened mouse. “There are hardly enough men to threaten the castle—”
“And yet,” he interrupted, while his squire laced the garment, “too many to ignore.”
“You could capture them, subdue them.”
“Not without killing one or more. Think, Aliénor. How did your brother recruit those men?”
She shook her head, pressing fingers against an ache in her temple. She couldn’t fathom what had happened over the long, cold winter that would change Laury so much that he would emerge three months later to challenge a seasoned knight.
“Did he promise them gold, riches?” Jehan persisted.
“No.” She swallowed. “He wouldn’t pillage his own home.”
“Does he think he can control them if they were to breach these walls?”
“He would never put me in harm’s way, or any of his people.”
“How else do you lure sell-swords and mercenaries?” He tied off the ends of the laces as his squire fetched his chain-mail shirt. “What else do you offer them but plunder?”
She suddenly realized Jehan wasn’t asking questions in expectation of answers.
“Those men who follow your brother,” he continued, “were probably starving on the hills when he met them. Wondering where their next meal was coming from, or when the next war would start up so they might sleep under canvas again.”
She went very still, for he rarely spoke of such things. Once, in the middle of a cold night, she’d woken up to see him staring blindly at the wooden beams of this tower-roof.Sometimes,he’d said,I still think I’m sleeping on the hard ground with a hungry belly and the cold freezing my blood.
“But if I were a sell-sword who’d come upon your brother,” he murmured, “I could be talked into fighting for him.”
She blinked, nonplussed. “Why?”
“To regain pride,” he said. “For a chance to fight for a rightful cause.”
She pressed a finger to her temple harder as Esquival carried the heavy chain-mail tunic to his master.
“Those men see in your brother a position in his household,” Jehan continued, raising his arms. “It’s a chance for security as well as a rightful cause.”
“You’re making this sound like a crusade.”
“Exactly.”
