The Jester

Chapter 21

IT TOOK SIX MONTHS for me to find my way home.

From Antioch, I headed west, toward the coast. I wanted to get as far away from my murderous battalion as I could. I stripped out of my bloody clothing and donned the robes of a pilgrim whose corpse I had stumbled upon. I was a deserter. All promises of freedom made by Raymond of Toulouse were now revoked.

I traveled by night, crossing the barren mountains to St. Simeon, a port held in Christian hands. There, I slept on the docks like a beggar until I managed to convince a Greek captain to let me hitch a ride aboard his ship to Malta. From there, I traded my way onto a Venetian cargo ship carrying sugar and spun cloth back to Europe. Venice … It was still the trek of a lifetime from my little village.

I earned my passage recalling my days as a jongleur with the goliards, reciting tales from La Chanson de Roland and entertaining the crew at their meals with raucous jokes. No doubt the crew had their suspicions of me. Deserters were everywhere, and why else would an able, penniless man be running from the Holy Land?

Every night I had dreams of Sophie, of bringing something precious back to her. Of her blond braids, her delicate, happy [72] laugh. I kept my eyes fixed on the western horizon, her image like a soft trade wind bringing me home.

When we reached Venice, my heart leaped to set foot on European soil. The same soil that led to Veille du Père.

But I was thrown in jail, turned in by the suspicious captain for a fee. I barely had the time to hide my pouch of valuables on the quay before I was tossed in a narrow, stinking hole filled with thieves and smugglers of all nationalities.

The guards all called me Jeremiah, a crazed-looking man in a tattered robe who clung to his staff. I did my best to keep my good humor and pleaded with my jailers that I was only trying to get home to my wife. They laughed. “A lice-filled beast like you has a wife?”

But luck had not run out for me yet. A few weeks later, a local noble paid for the release of ten prisoners as expiation for an offense. One died during the night, so they chose the affable, crazy Jeremiah to round out the number. “Go back to your wife, Frenchie,” the bailiff said as they handed me my staff. “But first, I advise you to find a bath.”

That very night, I found the pouch with my valuables where I had hidden it and began to walk. West across the marshy road to the mainland. Toward home.

I headed across Italy. Every town I came to, I told tales at the local inn for a meal of bread and ale. Farmers and drunks listened spellbound to the siege of Antioch, the ferocity of the Turks, and my friend Nicodemus’s untimely end.

I climbed through the smaller hills and then the Alps. The winds there blew cold and strong. It took a full month to cross them. But finally, as I descended from the peaks, the language that greeted me was French. French! My heart leaped, knowing I was near my home.

The towns became familiar. Digne, Avignon, Nîmes… Veille du Père was only days away. And Sophie.

I started to worry about how it would be. Would she even recognize the haggard mess I had turned into? So often, [73] I pictured her face as I would stand in front of her for that first time. She would be heating soup or making butter, wearing her pretty patterned smock, her blond braids peeking through her. white cap. “Hugh,” she would gasp, too stunned to move. Just Hugh, not another word. Then she would leap into my arms and I would squeeze her as if I had never left. She would touch my face and hands to make sure I was no apparition, then smother me with kisses. One look at my face, my rags, and my sore, bare feet, and Sophie would know immediately what I had been through. “So…” She would do her best to smile. “You have not quite returned a knight after all?”

It was in a damp rain that I finally reached the outskirts of Veille du Père. I went down on my knees.

Chapter 22

THOSE LAST MILES, I almost ran the entire distance. I began to recognize roads I had traveled, sights I was familiar and comfortable with. I tried to put aside everything bad that had happened to me. Nico, Robert, Civetot, Antioch . All of the misery seemed so distant now, unconnected. I was home.

My plight was over. I had arrived, no knight or squire, not even a free man. Yet I felt like the wealthiest noble in the world.

I spotted the familiar bubbly stream and the stone wall that bordered it, which led to town. Gilles’s barley field came into view. Then a bend I knew so well, and the stone bridge up ahead.

Veille du Père …

I stood there, like a beggar over a feast, just a few moments to take it in. I was filled with everything that had happened, the horrors I had put behind me, the many miles and months I had traveled, dreaming only of Sophie’s face, her touch, her smile.

How I wished it were July and I could walk into town bearing a sunflower. I searched out the square. Familiar faces, doing their work. It all seemed just as I remembered. My old friends Odo the smith and Georges the miller… Father Leo’s church…

Our inn…

Our inn! I fixed on it in horror. No, it cannot be…

In the blink of an eye, I knew that everything had changed.

Chapter 23

I BOLTED TOWARD the village square, the pallor of a ghost upon my face.

Children stared at me, then ran toward their houses. “It is Hugh. Hugh De Luc. He’s back from the war,” they shouted.

All that could have seemed familiar about me was my mane of red hair. People rushed up to me, neighbors I recognized, whom I had not set eyes upon in two years, their faces caught between shock and joy. “Hugh, praise God, it is you.”

But I pushed past, barely acknowledging them. I was drawn on a direct path to our inn.

Our home… My heart sank as I came to the spot.

A burned-out hole was left where our inn had once been.

Among the cinders stood a single charred support post that had once held up a two-story structure, built by the hands of my wife’s father.

Our inn had been burned to the ground.

“Where is Sophie?” I muttered, first to the charred ruins of the inn, then to faces in the gathered crowd.

I went from person to person, sure that any moment I would spot her coming back from the well. But everyone stood silently.

My heart began to beat insanely. “Where is Sophie?” I shouted. “Where is my wife?”

[76] Sophie’s older brother, Matthew, finally pushed out of the crowd. When he saw me, his expression shifted-from surprise to a look of deep concern. He stepped forward, hurling his arms around me. “Hugh, I can’t believe it. Thank God you’ve come back.”

I knew the worst had happened. I searched his eyes. “What’s happened, Matthew? Tell me, where is my wife?”

A look of deep sorrow came onto his face. Oh, God … I almost did not want him to tell me the rest. He led me by the arm to the remains of our home. “There were riders, Hugh. Ten, twelve… They swept in, in the dead of night, like devils, burning everything they could. Black crosses on their chests. They wore no colors. We had no hint of who they were. Just the crosses.”

“Riders …?” My blood was frozen with dread. “What riders, Matthew? What did they do to Sophie?”

He placed a hand gently upon my shoulder. “They burned three dwellings in their path. Paul the carter, Sam, old Gilles, their wives and children, killed as they fled. Then they came to the inn. I tried to stop them, Hugh, I did,” he cried.

I seized him by the shoulders. “And Sophie?” I knew the worst had happened. No, this could not be. Not now …

“She’s gone, Hugh.” Matthew shook his head.

“Gone?”

“She tried to run, but the men took her inside. They beat her, Hugh…”He pursed his lips and bowed his head. “They did worse. I heard her screams. They held me as they beat and raped her. Knights tore up the place, ripping it post by post. Then they dragged her out. She was like a lifeless thing, barely alive. I was sure they would leave her to die, but the leader threw her over his horse while the others released their torches. It was then that…”

I could barely hear him. A distant voice was echoing, No, this cannot be! My eyes welled up with tears. “It was then that what, Matthew?”

[77] He bowed his head. “They dragged her away, Hugh. I know she is dead.”

All strength drained from my legs. I sank to my knees. Oh, God, how could this-have happened? How could I have left her to this fate? My Sophie gone… I gazed upon the charred ruins of my former life.

“Norcross did this, didn’t he? Baldwin …?”

“We do not know for certain.” Matthew shook his head. “If I did, I would go after them myself. They were beasts, but faceless ones. They wore no crests. Their visors were down. Everyone ran to the woods for cover. Yours was the only house they entered. It was as if they came for you.”

For me … Those bastards. I had fought two years for Baldwin ’s own liege. I had marched across half the world and seen the worst things. And still, they took from me the one thing I loved.

I grabbed some dust from the rubble and let it slip through my fists. “My poor Sophie…”

Matthew knelt down beside me. “Hugh, there’s more…”

“More? What could be more?” I looked into his eyes.

He put a hand on my face. “After you left, Sophie had a son.”

Chapter 24

MATTHEWS WORDS HIT ME like a stone wall, collapsing over me. A son…

For three years Sophie and I had tried to conceive, to no result. We had wanted a child more than anything. We even spoke of it that last night we were together. I had left her, and never even knew I had a son.

I turned toward Matthew, a flicker of hope alive in my heart.

“He is dead, Hugh. He wasn’t even a year old. The bastards killed him that same night. They tore him from Sophie’s arms as she tried to flee.”

A wall of tears rushed at my eyes. A son… A son I would never know or hold. I had been through the fiercest battles, the worst of all horrors. But nothing could have prepared me for this.

“How?” I muttered. “How did my son die?”

“I can’t even say it.” Matthew’s face was ashen. “Just believe me when I say that he is dead.”

I repeated my question, this time fixed upon his eyes. “How?”

His voice was so quiet. “As they threw Sophie’s lifeless body over his mount, the leader said, We have no room for such a toy. Toss him in the flames.’ ”

I felt a pressure building up, an anger clawing at me as if my insides were ripping through my skin. God had smiled on us [79] after all that time. He had blessed us with a son. Now He spat at me with the sharpest mockery.

How could I have left them? How could I still be alive if they were dead?

I looked at Matthew and asked, “What was his name?”

Matthew swallowed. “She named him Phillipe.”

I felt a lump catch in my throat. Phillipe was the name of the goliard who had raised me. It was her tribute to me. Sweet Sophie, you are gone. My son too … I felt the urge to die right there amid the charred ash, the ruins of my old life.

“Hugh,” Matthew said, lifting me up, “you have to come.” He led me up the trail to a knoll where I had just stood over the town. A small slate stone marked my son’s grave.

I sat down under a shroud of tall poplars. “Phillipe De Luc, son of Hugh and Sophie,” was scratched into the stone. “Year of our Lord MXCVIII.”

I laid my head on the earth and wept. For my sweet Phillipe, whom I would never see, not even once in my life. For my wife, who was surely dead.

Was this why I was spared? Was this why the Turk had not swung his murderous sword? So I would live to see all that I loved lost? Was this why the laughter had saved me? So God could laugh at me now?

I took off the pouch that contained the things I had brought back for Sophie: a perfume box, some ancient coins, the scabbard, the golden cross-and I dug a hole next to my baby’s grave. I gently placed my “treasures” in it. They were worthless to me now. “They belong to you,” I whispered to Phillipe. My sweet baby.

I smoothed out the earth and once more laid my head on the ground. I’m so sorry, Phillipe and Sophie. Slowly my grief began to harden into rage. I knew Baldwin had ordered this. And Norcross had carried it out. But why? Why?

I’m just an innkeeper, I thought. I am nothing. Just a serf.

But a serf who will see you dead.

Chapter 25

A CROWD GATHERED around us as Matthew and I came back into town. Father Leo, Odo, my other friends… Everyone wanted to comfort and bless me. And hear of my two years in the war.

But I pushed past them. I had to go to the inn. Its ruins… I sifted through the charred wood and ash, searching for anything that breathed of her, my Sophie-a piece of cloth, a dish, a last memento of what I had lost.

“She spoke of you all the time, Hugh,” Matthew told me. “She missed you terribly. We all thought you were lost in the war. But not Sophie.”

“You are certain, brother, that she is dead?”

“I am.” Matthew shrugged. “When they took her she was already more dead than alive.”

“But you did not actually see her die? You don’t know for sure?”

“Not for sure. But I beg you, brother, not to cling to false hope. I’m her flesh and blood. And I damn well pray she was dead as they dragged her out of here.”

I met his eyes. “So she may not be dead, Matthew?”

He looked at me quizzically. “You must accept it, Hugh. If she was not then, I’m certain she was soon. Her body could have been left somewhere along the road.”

[81] “So you searched the road? And did you find her? Has anyone traveling from the west come upon her remains?”

“No. No one.”

“Then there’s a chance. You say she never doubted me. That she knew I would return. Well, I do the same for her.”

I found myself in the part of the inn where our living space had been. Everything was cinder. Our bed, a chest of drawers… On the floor, I noticed something reflecting light.

I dropped to my knees, swept away ash. My heart almost exploded with joy. Tears welled in my eyes.

It was Sophie’s comb. Her half of the one she’d placed in my hand the day I left. It was charred, broken; it almost crumbled in my hand. But in my blood, I felt her!

I held it up, and from my pouch hastily removed the other half. I fitted them together as best I could. In that moment, Sophie came alive to me-her eyes, her laugh-as vibrantly as when I had last seen her.

“These knights, Matthew, they didn’t leave her to die in the same flames as my son. They took her for a reason.” I looked up at him, holding the comb aloft. “Perhaps it is not such false hope after all.”

Outside, my old friends Odo and Georges the miller were waiting.

“Give us the word, Hugh,” Georges said. “We will hunt the bastards with you. We’ve all suffered. We know who is responsible. They deserve to die.”

“I know.” I put my hand on the miller’s shoulder. “But first I must find Sophie.”

“Your wife is dead,” Odo replied. “We saw it, Hugh, though it seems more nightmare than real.”

“You saw her dead?” I waited for the smith to answer.

I looked at Georges. “Or you?”

They both shrugged guiltily. They glanced at Matthew for support.

[82] “Sophie lives as my own Alo lives,” the miller said. “In Heaven.”

“For you, Georges, but not for me. Sophie still lives on this earth. I know it. I can feel her.”

I picked up my staff and pouch and slung a skin of water around my neck. I headed toward the stone bridge.

“What are you going to do, Hugh, jab them with that stick?” Odo hurried to my side. “You are just one man. With no armor or sword.”

“I’m going to find her, Odo. I promise, I’ll find Sophie.”

“Let me get you some food,” Odo pleaded. “Or some ale. You still drink ale, don’t you, Hugh? The army didn’t cure you of that? Next I’ll hear you’ve been going to church on Sundays.”

From his guarded look, it was clear he thought he would never see me again.

“I will bring her back, Odo. You’ll see.”

I took my stick and headed into the woods.

Toward Treille.

Chapter 26

I RAN IN A BLIND HAZE in the direction I had come. Toward my liege’s castle at Treille.

Grief tore at me like wild dogs. My son had died because of me. Because of my stupid folly. Because of my foolishness and pride.

As I ran, a swell of bitterness surged inside. The thought of that bastard Norcross, or any of his henchmen, having my poor Sophie…

I had fought for these so-called nobles in the Holy Land while they raped and slaughtered in the name of God. I had marched and killed and followed the Pope’s call. And this was my wage. Not freedom, not a changed life, but misery and scorn. I had been a fool to trust the rich.

I ran until my legs gave out. Then, exhausted and blind with rage, I fell to the ground, covering my sores in dirt.

I had to find Sophie. I know you are alive. I’ll make you well. I know how you’ve suffered.

At every turn, I prayed I would not stumble over her body. Every time I didn’t, it gave me hope that she was alive.

After a day of traveling, I looked around and didn’t know where I was. I had no food and had run out of water. All that pushed me on was rage. I checked the sun. Was I heading east or north? I had no idea.

[84] But still I ran. My legs were like heavy irons. I was dizzy and my stomach ached for food. My eyes were glazed over with tears. Yet I ran.

Passersby on the road looked at me as if I were mad. A madman with his staff. “Treille …” I begged them.

They scurried to get out of the way. Pilgrims, merchants, even outlaws let me pass for the fury in my eyes.

I knew not if it was one day or two. I ran until my legs gave out again. As I came to my senses, darkness clung to me. The night was cold, and I was shivering. Ominous sounds hooted from the brush.

From deep in the woods, I heard the rushing water of a stream. I clawed my way off the road and into the woods, following the sound.

Suddenly I lost my footing. I grasped for a bush, but my hand slipped. I started to tumble. I clawed for anything to hold, a vine, a branch. The ground disappeared beneath me.

Jesus… I was falling.

Let it come. I deserve it. I will die out here in the night.

I called to Sophie as I hurtled out of control down the ravine.

My head smacked against something hard. I felt a warm and viscous fluid fill my mouth. “I’m coming,” I said one more time.

To Sophie.

To the howling darkness…

Then the world went black on me, and that was much better, thank you, Lord.

Chapter 27

I CAME TO-not to the rush of water, or anything heavenly, but to a low, dangerous, rumbling sound.

I opened my eyes. It was still night. I had fallen into a deep ravine, far below the level of the road. My back was twisted against a tree and I could barely move. A wound ached horribly on the side of my head.

Again, I heard the deep rumbling from the woods.

“Who’s there?” I called. “Who is it?”

There was no reply. I focused on the spot in the darkness, trying to make out any shape. Who would be out here in the night? Not anyone I wanted to meet.

Then, I focused on a set of eyes. Eyes not human at all, but large as prayer stones: yellow, narrow, fuming. My blood froze.

Then it moved! I heard the brush crunch under its feet. The thing took a step out of the forest and came clear.

Dark, hairy…

Blessed Jesus Christ! It was a boar! Not twenty paces away.

Its yellow eyes were trained on me, inspecting me as if I were its next meal. I heard a snort. Then it was deathly still.

The thing was about to charge! I was certain of it.

I tried to clear my head. I could not possibly fight such a beast. With what? Its breadth alone was twice mine. It could slash me to pieces with its razory tusks.

[86] My heart was pounding, the only sound I heard other than the beast’s low growl. It took another step toward me. The boar’s murderous eyes never left my own, deliberate and tracking.

God help me, what could I do? I couldn’t flee. It would run me down in my first steps. There was no one to shout to for help.

I searched for a strong tree to climb, but I didn’t want to move, to set it off. The beast seemed to study me, bucking its head, snorting its deadly intent. I could smell its fierce, hot breaths, the blood from past conflicts matted in its hair.

I grabbed the knife at my belt. I didn’t know if it would snap against the beast’s hide.

The boar snorted twice and flashed its teeth at me, its jowls red and dripping. I did not want to die. Not like this… Please, God, do not make me fight this thing.

I felt so incredibly alone.

Then, with a last deep snort, the beast seemed to understand that-and it charged.

All I could do was leap behind a tree, barely escaping the first violent gnash of its fearsome teeth.

I stabbed wildly at it with my knife, tearing at its face and neck, doing everything I could to repel its snarling jaws. The beast lunged viciously. It came again and again. I clawed with my knife, backing around the tree. The boar’s jaws ripped into my thigh and I cried out. The air emptied from my lungs.

Good Lord, I was pierced.

I had no time to inspect the wound. The beast slammed into me again, this time goring my abdomen. I screamed in pain.

I kicked at it and slashed my blade. It backed and lunged. Its teeth clamped on my thigh and it shook its head as if to tear my leg out of its socket.

I kicked myself away from the boar. I tried to run, but my legs had no strength. Blood was spattered everywhere.

Somehow I limped across the clearing, my strength nearly sapped. My abdomen felt as if it were on fire. I was done here. I [87] fell to my side and backed myself against another tree, waiting for the end to come.

Beside the tree, I saw my staff. It must have toppled there in my fall. I reached for it, though it wasn’t much of a weapon.

I stared at the angry, snorting boar. “Come at me, offal. Come at me! Finish what you started.”

My mind flashed to the Turk who had spared me, a world away. This time, no laughter would save the day. I held the staff like a spear. “Come at me,” I shouted at the boar again. “Do me in. I am ready. Do me in.”

As if to oblige, the beast made another charge.

My breath was still. I offered no defense except to raise the staff at the shape flying toward me. Harnessing all my remaining strength, I thrust the rod with all my might at its eyes.

The beast let out a blood-chilling cry. I’d actually hurt it. The staff stuck in one eye. The boar staggered and shook its head madly, trying to rid itself of the staff.

I grabbed my knife and with whatever strength I had, stabbed at its throat and face, at anything I could strike.

Blood seeped out of its fur, each knife thrust striking home. Its growls diminished. It stumbled, still swinging its head to free the rod, while I continued to slash, tearing at its coat.

The beast’s blood mixed with my own. Finally its hind legs crumpled. I took the staff and forced it deep into the boar’s skull. A dying snarl came out of its awful tooth-filled mouth.

With a crash, the monster fell on its side. I just knelt there, depleted of strength. And amazed. I let out an exhausted shout.

I had won!

But I was badly wounded. Blood ran freely from my stomach and thigh. I had to make it out of the ravine or I knew I would die here.

Sophie’s face appeared in my mind. I know I smiled; I reached out to touch her. “Here is the way,” she whispered. Come to me now.”

Chapter 28

IT WAS QUIET, like any sleeping town. The dark riders brought their panting mounts close to the edge. A few thatched cottages with post fences, animals sleeping in their sheds. That was all there was.

This would be easy, mere sport for such men. The leader sniffed, shutting his visor. His helmet bore a black Byzantine cross. He had chosen only men who killed for pleasure, who hunted for spoils as others hunted for meat. They wore only the darkened armor of battle, no crests, visors down. No one knew who they were. They strapped on their weapons-war swords, axes, and maces. They looked at him, eager, thirsty, ready.

“Have your fun,” Black Cross said, a bit of laughter coming through his command. “Just let us not forget why we are here. Whoever finds the relic will be a rich man. Now, ride!”

The night was split asunder by the explosion of charging hooves.

The clang of a warning bell sounded. Too late! The first thatched dwellings went up in flames. The sleeping town came alive.

Women screamed and ran to cover their children. Aroused townspeople struggled out of their homes to protect themselves, only to be struck down by swords or trampled in the melee as the riders stormed by.

[89] These pathetic peasants, Black Cross mused, they run up and die like swatted flies, protecting their tiny clumps of shit. They think we are invading soldiers, come to take their cattle and steal their bitches. They do not even know why we are here!

Fire and mayhem raging, Black Cross trotted unconcerned through the street to the large stone home, the best in the town. Five of his riders followed.

Panicked sounds came from inside-a woman screaming, children being roused from bed.

“Break it in.” Black Cross nodded to a cohort. A single ax blow shattered the door.

A man in a white-and-blue shawl appeared in the doorway. He had long gray hair and a heavy beard. “What do you want here?” the cowering man asked. “We’ve done no harm.”

“Get out of my way, Jew,” Black Cross barked.

The man’s wife, in a wool sleeping shawl, rushed out and spoke fearlessly. “We are peaceful people,” she said. “We will give you whatever you want.”

Black Cross pinned the woman by her throat to the wall. “Show me where it is,” he demanded. “Show me, if you have any regard for his life.”

“Please, the money is in the courtyard,” the panicked husband whined. “In a chest under the cistern. Have it. Take what you will.”

“Search the house,” Black Cross screamed at his men. “Rip down every wall. Just find it.”

“But the money … I told you…”

“We did not come for money, filth.” Black Cross leered. “We are here for the jewel. Christendom’s precious relic.”

His henchmen stormed inside. They found an old man, his arms around two cowering children. A boy, perhaps sixteen, already with the locks of his race, and a girl, maybe a year younger, with dark, fearful eyes.

“What do you mean?” The father crawled on his knees. “I am a merchant. We have no jewels. No relics.”

[90] Piece by piece, the house was torn apart. The raiders smashed their swords into walls, dug with axes at stone, broke into chests and cupboards.

Black Cross pulled the husband up by the throat. “I will not trifle any longer. Where is the treasure?”

“I beg you, we have no jewels.” The trembling man gagged. “I trade in wool.”

“You trade in wool.” Black Cross nodded, glancing at the man’s son. “We shall see.” He took out a knife and pressed it against the boy’s throat. The boy flinched, revealing a line of blood. “Show me the treasure unless you want your son to die.”

“The hearth … underneath the tiles on the hearth.” The father bowed his head in his hands.

In a rush, two of the knights ran to the fireplace and, using axes, crashed through the floor tiles, unearthing a secret space. From it, they raised a chest, inside of which were coins, necklaces, brooches of gold and silver. And finally, a gorgeous ruby the size of a coin, in a gilded Byzantine-style setting. It gave off a luminous glow. The knight held it aloft.

“You have no idea what you hold.” The Jew blinked back tears.

“Don’t I…?” Black Cross grinned. “It is the seal of Paul. Your race is unworthy to even hold it. You will steal from our Lord no more.”

“I did not steal it. It is you who does that. It was sold to me.”

“Sold, not stolen…?” Black Cross’s eyes glittered. He turned back to the son. “Then it is only a small loss, compared to what your race has taken from us.”

In the same instant, he pushed his knife into the boy’s gut. A gasp emerged from the boy; his eyes grew wide and blood dribbled from his mouth. All the while, Black Cross smirked.

“Nefrem …” The merchant and his wife screamed. They tried to rush to their son but were held back by other raiders.

“Burn the place,” Black Cross said. “Their seed is dead. They can foul the earth no more.”

[91] “What of the daughter?” a knight inquired.

Black Cross yanked her up and looked at the girl measuringly. She was a pretty specimen. He ran his gloved hand along the smooth skin of her cheek. “Such a pretty pelt, wool merchant… I wonder what it’s like to be wrapped in such a cloth. Why don’t you tell me.”

“Please, you have taken everything,” the father begged. “Leave us our child.”

“I’m afraid not.” Black Cross shook his head. “I must have her later. And no doubt the duke’s mule cleaner will want to do the same. Take her with us.” He threw the girl to another knight. She was carried out of the house, screaming in horror and fear.

“Don’t be so sad, Jew,” Black Cross addressed the sobbing man. He tossed a coin at him from the chest of treasure. “As you say, I do not steal your daughter, I buy her.”

Chapter 29

“IS HE DEAD?”

A voice crept through the haze. A woman’s voice… I opened my eyes. But I couldn’t make out a thing. Only a shifting blur.

“I don’t know, my lady,” another said, “but his wounds are grave. He doesn’t look far from gone.”

“Such unusual hair…” remarked the first.

I blinked, my brain slowly starting to clear. It was as if there were a shimmering veil reflecting my sight. Was I dead? There was a lovely face leaning over me. Yellow hair, braided densely, tumbling from under a brocaded purple cloak. She smiled. It warmed me like the sun.

“Sophie,” I muttered. I reached to touch her face.

“You are hurt,” replied the woman, her voice like the delicate trill of a bird. “I’m afraid you mistake me for someone else.”

My body felt no pain. “Is this Heaven?” I asked.

The woman smiled again. “If Heaven is a world where all wounded knights resemble vegetables, then, yes, it must be.”

I felt her hands cradle my head. I blinked again. It was not Sophie, but someone lovely, speaking with the accent of the north. Paris.

[93] “I still live,” I uttered with a sigh.

“For the moment, yes. But your wounds are serious. We must get you to a physician. Are you from here? Do you have a family?”

I tried to focus on her questions. It was all too fuzzy and hurtful. I just said, “No.”

“Are you an outlaw?” the second woman’s voice intoned from above.

I struggled to see a lavishly robed lady, clearly royal, atop a stunning white palfrey.

“I assure you, madame,” I said, doing my best to smile, “I am benign.” I saw my tunic matted with blood. “Regardless of how I look.” Sharp pangs of pain now lanced my stomach and thigh. I had no strength. With a gasp, I fell back once more.

“Where do you head, Monsieur Rouge?” the golden-haired maiden asked.

I had no idea where I was. Or how far I had traveled. Then I remembered the boar. “I head to Treille,” I said.

“To Treille,” she exclaimed. “Even if we could take you, I fear you will die before you reach Treille,” the maiden said with concern.

“Take him?” the older lady questioned from above. “Look at him. He is covered with the blood of who knows whom. He smells of the forest. Leave him, child. He will be found by his own kind.”

I wanted to laugh. After all I’d been through, my life was being bargained for by a couple of bickering nobles.

I replied in my finest accent, “No need to fret, madame, my squire should be arriving at any moment.”

Then the young maiden winked at me. “He seems harmless. You are harmless, aren’t you?” She looked into my eyes. A lovelier face I hadn’t seen in a long time.

“Only to you.” I smiled faintly.

“See?” she said. “I vouch for him.”

[94] She tried to lift me, appealing to two guards in bucket helmets and green tunics for help. They glanced toward their lady, the older of the women.

“If you must.” The grand lady sighed. She waved and the guards responded. “But he is your charge. And if your concern is so great, child, you will not mind giving up your horse.”

I tried to push myself to my feet, but my strength was not there.

“Do not struggle, red hair,” the blond maiden said. One of the accompanying guards, a big, hulking Moor, lifted me by the arms. The lady was right. My wounds were severe. If I slipped back into unconsciousness, I didn’t know if I would ever wake up again.

“Who saves me?” I asked her. “So I will know who to bless in Heaven should I pass on.”

“Your own smile saves you, redhead.” The maiden laughed. “But should the Lord not feel as favorably… I am called Emilie.”

Chapter 30

I AWOKE, this time with a sense of peace and the warmth of a fire about me. I found myself in a comfortable bed, in a large room with stone walls. A bowl of water sat on a wooden table to my right.

Above me, a bearded man in a scarlet robe shot a satisfied grin at a portly priest at his side.

“He wakes, Louis. You can go back to the abbey now. It seems you are out of a job.”

The priest lowered his flabby face in front of mine. He shrugged. “You have done well, Auguste… on the body. But there is also the matter of the soul. Perhaps there is something this blood-spotted stranger would like to confess.”

I wet my lips, then answered for myself. “I am sorry, Father. If it’s a confession you’re looking for, you might get a better one out of the boar that attacked me. Certainly a better meal.”

This made the physician laugh. “Back among us for only a second, Louis, and he’s sized you up.”

The priest scowled. It was clear he didn’t like being the brunt of mockery. He threw on a floppy hat. “Then I’m off.”

The priest left, and the kindly-looking doctor sat down beside me. “Don’t mind him. We had a bet. Who got you-he or I.”

[96] I raised myself up on my elbows. “I’m glad to have been the subject of your sport. Where am I?”

“In good hands, I assure you. My reputation is that I’ve never lost a patient who wasn’t truly sick.”

“And where am I?”

He shrugged. “You, sir, I’m afraid, are truly very sick.”

I forced a weak smile. “I meant the place, Doctor. Where am I taken?”

The physician gently patted my shoulder. “I knew that, boy. You are in Borée.”

Borée … My eyes widened in shock. Borée was among the most powerful duchies in France. Three times the size of Treille. Borée was also a four-day ride from Treille, but north. How had I ended up here?

“How long… have I been in Borée?” I finally asked.

“Four days here. Two more along the way,” the physician said. “You cried out many times.”

“And what did I say?”

Auguste wrung out a cloth from the bowl and placed it across my forehead. “That your heart is not whole, though not from any boar wound. You carry a great burden.”

I did not try to disagree. My Sophie lay somewhere-at Treille. And Treille was a week away on foot. I still felt her alive.

I pushed myself up. “You have my thanks for tending my wounds, Auguste. But I have to go.”

“Whoa.” The physician held me back. “You are not yet well enough to go. And do not thank me. I merely applied the salve and cauterized the wounds. It is the lady Emilie who deserves your thanks.”

“Emilie … yes…” Through the haze of my memory I brought back her face. I had thought she was Sophie. All at once, flashes of my journey here came to me. The Moor constructed a harness for me. The lady gave up her own mount for me and walked behind.

[97] “Without her, pilgrim,” the doctor said, “you would have died.”

“You are right, I truly owe her thanks. Who is this lady, Auguste?”

“A soul who cares. And a lady-in-waiting at the court.”

“Court?” My eyes bolted wide. “What court do we speak of? You said you were commanded to my care. By whom? Who is it that you serve?”

“Why, the duchess Anne,” he replied. “Wife of Stephen, duke of Borée, who is away on the Crusade, and second cousin to the King.”

Every nerve in my body seemed to leap to attention. I could not believe it. I was in the care of a cousin to the King of France.

The doctor smiled. “You have done yourself well, boar-slayer. You rest in their castle now.”

Chapter 31

I SAT UP in bed, confused and shocked.

I did not deserve this. I was no knight, no noble. Just a commoner. And a lucky one at that-fortunate not to have been ripped to shreds by a beast. My ordeal came back to me, my wife and child. It had been more than a week since I set out to find Sophie.

“Your care is most appreciated, Doctor, but I must leave. Please thank my gracious hostess for me.”

I got up out of bed but managed to limp no farther than a couple of painful steps. There was a knock at the door. Auguste went to see who was there.

“You may thank the lady yourself,” the doctor said. “She has come.”

It was Emilie, adorned in a dress of linen gilded with golden borders. God, I had not been imagining her. She was as lovely as the vision from my dreams. Except her eyes shimmered soft and green.

“I see our patient rises,” Emilie exclaimed, seemingly delighted. “How is our Red today, Auguste?”

“His ears are not injured. Nor is his tongue,” the doctor said, prodding at me.

I didn’t know whether to bow or kneel. I did not speak to nobles directly unless addressed. But something made me look [99] into her eyes. I cleared my throat. “I would be dead if not for you, lady. There is no way I can express my thanks.”

“I did what anyone would do. Besides, having vanquished your boar, what a shame it would’ve been if you had become the dinner of the next pest that stumbled by.”

Auguste pushed qver a stool and Emilie sat down. “If you must show gratitude, you can do so by permitting me a few questions.”

“Any,” I said. “Please ask.”

“First, an easy one. What is your name, redhead?”

“My name is Hugh, lady.” I bowed my head. “Hugh De Luc.”

“And you were on your way to Treille, Hugh De Luc, when you encountered the boorish boar?”

“I was, my lady. Though the doctor has informed me that my direction was slightly askew.”

“So it would seem.” Lady Emilie smiled. This surprised me. I had never met a noble with a very keen sense of humor, unless it was cruel humor. “And on this journey you set out alone. With no food. Or water. Or proper clothes…?”

I felt a lump in my throat-not from nerves but because of what must have seemed my enormous stupidity. “I was in a hurry,” I said.

“A hurry?” Emilie nodded with polite jest. “But it seems, if I recall my mathematics, that no matter how fast you traveled, be it the wrong direction, it would only widen the distance to your goal, no?”

I felt like an idiot in front of this woman who had saved me. I’m sure I blushed. “In a hurry and confused,” I replied.

“I would say.” She widened her eyes. “And the purpose of such haste… and confusion, if you don’t mind…?”

All at once, my being ill at ease shifted. This was not a game, and I was not a toy for amusement, no matter how much I owed her.

Emilie’s expression shifted as well, as if she sensed my unease. “Please know I do not mock you. You cried out in [100] anguish many times during the trip. I know you carry a heavy weight. You may be no knight, but you are surely on a mission.”

I bowed my head. All the lightness of the moment fled from me. How could I speak of such horrors? To this woman who did not know me? My throat went dry. “It is true. I do have a mission, lady. But I cannot tell of it.”

“Please tell, sir.” (I couldn’t believe it. She addressed me as “sir.”) “You are troubled. I do not belittle you at all. Perhaps I can help.”

“I am afraid you cannot help,” I said and bowed my head. “You have helped too much already.”

“You may trust me, sir. How can I prove it more than I already have?”

I smiled. She had me there. “Just know, then, that these are not the tales of a noble, the kind you are no doubt used to hearing.”

“I do not seek entertainment,” she replied, her eyes firmly on mine.

My experience with those highborn had always taught me to beware of their taxes and random killing and total indifference to our plight. But she seemed different. I could see compassion in her eyes. I’d felt it in that first glance as I lay by the road near death.

“I’ll tell it to you, lady. You have earned that. I only hope it does not upset you.”

“I assure you, Hugh,” Lady Emilie said with a smile, “if you have not already noticed, you will find my tolerance for the upsetting to be quite high.”

Chapter 32

SO I TOLD HER. Everything.

Of Sophie, and our village. Of my journey to the Holy Land, the terrible fighting there. Of my moment with the Turk… how I was saved, freed, to come back, to see Sophie again.

Then I told Emilie of the horrible truth that I’d found upon my return.

My voice cracked and my eyes filled with tears as I spoke. It was why I had been wandering the woods like a madman before they had come upon me. Why I had to get to Treille …

All the while, Emilie seemed riveted by my tale, never once interrupting. I knew that much of what I said must have brushed against the fantasies of her upbringing. Yet never once did she react as a spoiled noble. She did not question my desertion from the army, nor take offense at my ire toward Norcross and Baldwin. And when I came to why I so desperately needed to get to Treille, her eyes glistened. “Indeed, I understand, Hugh.”

She leaned forward, placing a hand upon mine. “I see that you have been truly wronged. You must go to Treille and find your wife. But what do you intend to do, go there as one man? Without arms or access to the duke’s circle? Baldwin is well-known here for what he is: a self-serving goat who sucks his own duchy dry. But what will you do, call him out on the field [102] of battle? Challenge him? You will only get yourself tossed in a cell, or killed…”

“You speak like Sophie would have,” I said. “But even if it seems crazy, I have to try. I have no choice in this.”

“Then I will help you, Hugh,” Emilie whispered, “if you let me.”

I looked at her, both confused and overwhelmed by her trust and resolve. “Why do you do this for me? You are highborn yourself. You attend the royal court.”

“I told you the first time, Hugh De Luc. It is your smile that saves you.”

“I think not,” I said, and dared to hold my gaze on her. “You could have left me on the road. My troubles would have died along with me.”

Emilie averted her eyes. “I will tell you, but not now.”

“Yet I have told you everything.”

“This is my price, Hugh. If you’d like to shop around, I can have you delivered back where I found you.”

I bowed my head and smiled. She was funny when she wished to be. “Your price is agreeable, Lady Emilie. I’m truly grateful, whatever your reason.”

“Good,” she said. “So first we must start work on a pretext for you. A way for you to get in. What is it you do well, other than that keen sense of direction I saw?”

I laughed at her barb, sharp as it was. “I am one of those with skills abundant but talents none.”

“We’ll see,” Emilie said. “What did you do in your town before the war?”

“We owned an inn. Sophie looked after the food and beds, and I…”

“Like most innkeepers, you poured the ale and kept the patrons entertained.”

“How would you know such a thing?” I asked.

“No matter. And during the war? From what I’ve seen, you were certainly not a scout.”

[103] “I fought. I learned to fight quite well, actually. But I was told I was always able to keep my friends amused with my stories and their minds off the fighting. In the most worrisome of times, they always requested my tales.” I told her how I had grown up, traveling the countryside, reciting verses and profane songs as a goliard. And how after the war I made my way home entertaining at inns as a jongleur. “Maybe I have a talent after all.”

“A jongleur,” Emilie repeated.

“It’s a modest one, but I’ve always had the skill to make new friends.” I smiled, to let her know of whom I was speaking.

Emilie blushed, then stood up. She straightened her dress and produced a demure look. “You must rest now, Hugh De Luc. Nothing can happen until your wounds have healed. In the meantime, I must go.”

A worry shot through me. “Please, lady, I hope I have not offended you.”

“Offended me?” she exclaimed. “Not at all.” She broke into a most wonderful smile. “In fact, your vast talents have given me a splendid idea.”

Chapter 33

THE FOLLOWING AFTERNOON, Emilie knocked on the door of the large bedchamber in the royal couple’s section of the castle. The duchess Anne was at a table, overseeing a group of ladies-in-waiting at work threading a tapestry. “You called for me, my lady,” said Emilie.

“Yes,” Anne replied. The quintet of women stopped work and looked up for a sign to leave. “Please, stay,” she said. “I will speak with Emilie in the dressing room.”

The duchess motioned her into the next room, adjacent to the bedroom, where there was a large dressing table, bowls of perfumed water, and a mirror.

Anne sat on a stool. “I wish to speak of the health of your new red squire,” she said.

“He recovers well,” Emilie replied. “And please, he is not my squire. In fact, he is already married and seeks to find his wife.”

“His wife! And that was where he was heading when we found him so neatly trussed in the woods? A curious courtship.” Anne smiled. “But, now that he is well…”

“Not quite well,” Emilie cut in.

“But now that he recovers, it is fitting he should be on his way. Anyway, the doctor tells me he has a will to leave.”

“He has suffered great injury, madame, which he seeks to right. The owner of his offense is Baldwin of Treille.”

[105] “ Baldwin.” Anne grimaced as if she had swallowed spoiled wine. “Surely Baldwin is no friend to this court. But this man’s affairs, lowly as they are, are no concern of ours. Your heart is admirable, Emilie. You have surpassed what anyone might expect of you. Now I want you to let him leave.”

“I will not shoo him away, madame.” Emilie stood tall. “I want to help him right this wrong.”

“Help him?” Anne looked shocked. “Help him what? Regain his title? His honor? A set of clothes?”

“Please, madame, every man deserves his honor, regardless of his rank in life. This man has been horribly wronged.”

Anne came up to her. As she was in her living quarters and not presiding at court, her dark brown hair was combed long and over her shoulders. She was just thirty, but in many ways she was like a mother to Emilie. “My sweet Emilie, where did you get such notions?”

“You know well, my lady. You know why I came to be here, why I left Paris and my own troubles there.”

Anne placed her hand tenderly on Emilie’s shoulder. She did love the girl. “You are as caring, child, as you are rash. Nonetheless, as soon as he is ready to travel he must be off. If my husband were to hear of this, he’d come back from the Crusade and thrash me blue. This Red, does he have a profession? Some skill other than boar fighting?”

“I am teaching him a profession-starting today,” Emilie replied.

“But not for here, I hope. We are overemployed with hangers-on as it is.”

“No, not for here, my lady. Once he learns what I have to teach, he will be on his way. He has a wife to find. He loves her dearly.”

Chapter 34

I RESTED FOR THREE MORE DAYS, until most of my wounds had healed.

Then Emilie knocked on the door, seeming excited. She inquired as to my health. “Are you able to walk?”

“Yes, of course.” I hopped out of bed to show her, though still a bit impaired.

“That’ll do.” She seemed pleased. “Then come along with me.”

She marched to the door and I hurried, with a slight limp, to keep up with her. She led me through the halls, wide and arched and adorned with beautiful tapestries, then down a steep flight of stone stairs.

“Where are we going?” I asked, pushing to keep up. It felt good to be out of my sickroom.

“To view your new pretext, I hope,” she said.

We traveled to a different part of the castle. I had never been so close to the abode of royals before.

On the main floor there were large rooms, with long rows of tables and huge hearths, guarded by uniformed soldiers at every door. Knights milled about in their casual tunics, trading stories and rolling dice. Mounted torches lit the halls.

Then we passed the kitchen, with an inviting smell of garlic in the air, maids and porters shuffling around, casks of wine and ale.

[107] Still we traveled, down a narrow corridor leading beneath the ground. Here the walls were of coarsely laid stone. The air grew stale and damp. We were in some sort of keep now. In the womb of the castle. Where was Emilie taking me? What did she mean by my new pretext?

Finally, when the halls were so ill-lit and dank that the only living thing must be some slumbering beast, Emilie stopped in front of a large wooden door.

“My new pretext is a mole,” I said with a laugh.

“Do not be rude,” she said, and knocked.

“Come in,” groaned a voice from deep inside. “Come, come. Hurry before I change my mind.”

Curious, I followed Emilie as we stepped into a cool room. It was more of a cell, or a dungeon, but large and candlelit; on the walls were shelves filled with what I took to be toys and props.

In the rear, on an ornately carved chair, sat a hunched man in a red tunic, green tights, and a patchwork skirt.

He lowered a yellowy eye toward Emilie. “Come in, auntie. May I have a lick? Just a lick would do…”

“Oh, shut up, Norbert,” Emilie retorted, though not crossly. “This is the man I spoke of. His name is Hugh. Hugh, this is Norbert, the lord’s fool.”

“Egad.” Norbert leaped out of his chair. He was squat and gnomelike, yet he moved with startling speed. He sprang up to me, almost smothering my red hair with his huge eyes, placing a hand on my head, then swiftly pulling it back. “Do you intend to burn me, ma’am? What is he, torch or man?”

“What he is, is no fool, Norbert,” Emilie cautioned. “I think you’ll have your work cut out for you.”

I looked at Emilie with consternation. “My pretext is a jester, my lady?”

“And why not?” Emilie replied. “You say you have a knack for amusing people. What better role? Norbert informs me that the jester at Treille is as old as vinegar.”

[108] “And his wit even more sour,” the jester croaked.

“And that he has lost the favor of your liege there, Baldwin. It should be no great feat for a youthful up-and-comer like yourself to gain his ear. Easier, I would think, than storming his castle in a fit of rage.”

I started to stammer. I had just come back from the war, where I had fought as bravely as any man. I was looking to avenge a misery that cut to my core. I did not think of myself as a hero. But a jester? “I can’t dispute your reasoning, lady, but… I am no fool.”

“Oh, you think it’s a natural thing to act this way?” The gnomelike man hopped up to me. “Unpracticed, not learned…? You think, carrot-top”-he stroked my face with his rough hands and batted his wide eyes-“that I was never as young and fair as you?”

He sprang back, narrowing his gaze. “Just because you play the fool, boy, doesn’t mean you must be thick inside. The lady’s plan is well-conceived. If you have the knack to carry it out.”

“Nothing motivates me more than the will to find my wife,” I insisted.

“I didn’t say the will, boy. I said the knack. The lady says you have a way about yourself. That you fancy yourself a jongleur. Jongleurs … oh, they can soften the blood of blushing maidens and patrons drunk on ale. But the real trick is, can you walk into a room filled with scoundrels and schemers and make an ill-tempered king smile?”

I looked at Emilie. She was right. I did need some way to gain access to Baldwin ’s castle. Sophie, if she was alive, wouldn’t be dressed up in the royal court, would she? I needed to snoop around, gain some trust…

“Perhaps I can learn,” I replied.

Chapter 35

“LEARN…” Norbert shook his head and bellowed laughter. “Learning would take years. How would you learn in a short time to do this?”

The gnome took a lit candle, waved his bare hand through the flame, not once crying out, then snapped his fingers, and the flame was snuffed as if by magic. “It’s what comes natural that I need to know. So tell me, whaddaya do?”

“Do…?” I muttered.

“Do,” the jester snapped. “What kind of student have you brought me, auntie? Has a rock hit his head? What do you do? Juggle, tumble, fall down?”

I looked around. I spotted a staff leaning against a table, roughly the same size as mine. I winked at Norbert. “I can do this.” I placed one end of the staff on the palm of my hand, balancing it there, then lightly transferred it to a single finger. For a full minute, it stood straight on end.

“Oh, that’s goood,” Norbert crooned. “But can you do this?” He snatched the staff from me. In a flash, he balanced it, just as I had, upon his index finger. Then, with almost no hesitation, he flung it in the air and caught it as before on the same finger. Then again, on only one finger.

“Or this?” He smirked and began to twirl the staff so fast it looked as if six pairs of hands were twirling it. I could not even [110] follow its path. Then he brought it to a stop and handed it to me in the same motion. “Let me see you do that.”

“I cannot,” I admitted.

“Then this, perhaps…” He winked at me with a bulging eye. “The lady said you were sprightly.”

In a motion that defied my eyes, this squat, curved man spun into a complete forward somersault, then backward again, landing precisely where he had started.

“What about jokes, then? The lady said you could make me laugh. You must know some fabulous jokes.”

“I know a few,” I said.

Norbert folded his arms. “So, go ahead, boy. Bowl me over. Make me laugh until I piss myself.”

Now I was eager to take the dare, eager to show the jester up. This I could surely do. I thought through my best inventory. “There’s the one about the peasant who is so lazy that as he watches a gold coin drop from the money bag of a knight riding by…”

“Knowit,” Norbert interrupted. “He says to his friend, ‘If he comes back the same way, this just might be our lucky day.’ ”

“Then there’s the one about the traveler and the whorehouse,” I began. “A traveler is walking down the road…”

“Knowit,” the jester snapped again. “The sign says, ‘Congratulations, you’ve just been screwed.’ ”

I went through two other tales that never failed to stir a laugh. “Knowit,” he said to both. He seemed to know them all. Emilie held back a laugh.

“So that’s it? That’s your entire repertoire?” The jester shook his head. “Can you at least rhyme? A dour king cannot ignore, refusedly, a spicy tale about his wife if it is told amusedly.

“This stuff is easy, right? Hump your back, hop around like an ape, everyone rolls over in stitches. C’mon, Red, you must have something decent. You want a pretext? Well, I want to be a mentor. I want to be a mentor.” He pranced around and whined like a spoiled child. “You know, maybe on second thought, you [111] would have an easier time storming Baldwin ’s castle than making them laugh.”

In a fit of vexation, I searched the room. This was no sport to me. No stupid audition. This was about the fate of my wife. Then, in the corner of the jester’s cell, I spotted a ball and chain.

“That.” I pointed.

“What? Wanna play catch?” Norbert asked haughtily.

“No, jester. Fetch me the chain.” I remembered something I had seen on the Crusade. A captured Saracen did a trick to amuse his captors; it worked so well they kept him alive.

“Bind me with it,” I said. “Wrap it all the way around, tight as you can. I will extricate myself.”

This brought a worried look from Emilie. The chain was heavy. Wound too tight, it could squeeze the air out of a man.

“Your poison.” Norbert shrugged.

He went over and dragged the heavy chain back to me. I took several deep breaths, as I had seen the Saracen do when he performed the trick. Then the jester began to wrap. Slowly, heavily, the chain squeezed me. I lifted my arms and he wrapped it around my shoulders. And for good luck, between my legs.

“Your rubicund friend has a knack to kill himself.” Norbert chuckled.

“Please be careful,” Emilie said.

I pushed out my chest as expansively as I could as the jester circled it with the chain. I had to enlarge myself. I had to hold my breath. I had seen this done. I had questioned the Turk about it myself. I only hoped I could re-create the effect now.

“Time’s a wasting,” Norbert said after the chain was secure. He stood back.

The links felt heavy on my shoulders. Slowly, I released the captured air from my lungs. The slightest wiggle room developed around my chest. It was only a finger’s breadth or two.

Then I was able to shift my shoulders back and forth. Then gradually my arms. Every grueling minute advanced like an [112] hour. The weight of the chains pressed me to the floor. My hands were pinned behind my back, but finally I pulled one free. I twisted it like a snake through an opening up around my shoulders.

Emilie gasped. The jester looked on, finally interested in me.

It took all of my strength to get an arm free. My stomach and leg still ached from the boar’s attack. Each exertion was grueling, but gradually, with the arm free, I was able to unwrap the chain. From between my legs, from under my arms, from around my chest. Layer after layer came off. Then I freed my other arm.

As I kicked off the final loop, Emilie screeched a happy cry.

I doubled over, drenched in sweat. I looked up at my mentor.

Norbert drummed his fingers along the side of his face. He smiled at Emilie. “I think we can work with that.”

Chapter 36

I STUDIED WITH NORBERT for nearly a fortnight, until my wounds finally healed completely. My days were spent juggling, tumbling, and watching him perform in front of the court, and my nights with the telling and retelling of jokes and rhymes.

Step by step, I learned the jester’s trade.

Much of it came easily to me. I had been a jongleur and was used to entertaining. And I had always been agile. We practiced forward flips and handstands; in return, I taught him the trick with the chain. A hundred times, Norbert held out his arm, like a bar, at waist height, while I strained to flip my body over it. At first, I hit my head on the straw mat again and again, and groaned in pain. “You find new ways to injure yourself, Red,” my mentor would say, shaking his head.

Then slowly, surely, my confidence began to grow. I began to clear Norbert’s arm, though sometimes falling to my seat. On my last day, I made it over, my feet landing in the precise spot from where I had sprung. I met his eyes. Norbert’s face lit up in a monumental smile.

“You’ll do all right.” He nodded.

At last, my education was complete. There was an urgency to things; the image of Sophie was never far from my thoughts. If I had any hope of finding her alive, I had to go now.

[114] At the end of our final session, Norbert dragged over a heavy wooden trunk. “Open it, Hugh. It’s a gift from me.”

I lifted the top and pulled out a set of folded clothes. Green leggings and red tunic. A floppy pointed cap. A colorful patchwork skirt.

“Emilie made it,” the jester said proudly, “but to my design.”

I looked at the jester’s costume warily.

Norbert grinned. “Afraid to play the fool, eh? Your pride’s your enemy, then, not Baldwin.”

I hesitated. I knew I had to play the role, for Sophie, but it was hard to see myself wearing this outfit. I held the tunic up to me, sizing it against my chest.

“Put it on, then,” Norbert insisted, smacking me on the shoulder. “You’ll be a chip off the old block.”

I removed a set of bells from the trunk.

“For the cap,” said Norbert. “No liege wants to be snuck up on by his fool.”

The uniform I suppose I had to wear, but there was no way I could see myself tinkling about. “These, I must leave with you.”

“No bells …?” the jester exclaimed. “No clubfoot, no hunch of the spine?” Again, he slapped my shoulders. “You are indeed the new breed.”

I put aside my own tunic and leggings and slipped into the jester’s outfit. Piece by piece, I felt a new confidence take over my body. I had worn the robes of a young goliard, the garb of a soldier in the Crusade. Now this…

I looked at myself up and down and broke into a wide smile. I felt a new man! I was ready.

“Brings tears to my eyes.” Norbert feigned growing misty. “The lack of limp bothers me some-a jester needs a good strut. Oh, but you will appeal to the ladies!”

I sprang into a forward flip, stuck it, and bowed with pride.

“You are done, then, Hugh,” the jester said. He tugged at my tunic and skirt to adjust the fit. “Just one thing more… It is [115] not enough, boy, to simply make them laugh. Any fool can make a man laugh. Just fall on your face. The mark of a true jester is to gain the trust of the court. You may speak in rhyme, or in gibberish for all I care, but somehow you must touch something true. It is not enough to win your lord’s laughter, lad. You must also win his ear.”

“I’ll win Baldwin ’s ear,” I promised. “Then I’ll cut it off and bring it back to you.”

“Good. We’ll make a soup of it!” the jester roared. He pulled my hand soundly, as if trying to force me off my mark, then looked at me with some welling in his eyes.

“You are sure of this, Hugh? Of going to all this risk? It would be a shame to waste this valuable teaching on a corpse. You’re sure your wife lives?”

“I feel it with all my heart.” I looked into his eyes.

He raised his bushy brows and smiled. “So go, then, lad… To the sails … Find your beloved. You are a dreamer, boy, but, yikes, what good jester isn’t?” He winked and stuck out his tongue. “Give her a lick for me.”

Chapter 37

IT WAS A COOL MORNING as the sun broke through the mist, low in the sky. Emilie met me on the stone road outside the castle gate. “You rise early, Hugh De Luc.”

“And you, lady. I’m sorry to have brought you out so early in the morn.”

She smiled bravely. “It is for a good purpose, I hope.”

“I hope so too,” I said.

She had on her brown cloak, which she always wore for matins. She cinched the collar against the mist. I stood before her in my ridiculous jester’s outfit. I did a sprightly hop and a jump that made her laugh.

“I hear it is you I have to thank for the new duds.” I bowed.

“What thanks?” She curtsied. “A jester could not do his work without looking the part. Besides, your other clothes reeked of a particular smelly beast.”

I smiled, fixing on her soft green eyes. “I feel the fool in front of you, my lady.”

“Not to me. You look quite dashing, if I say so.”

“The dashing jester… Not what is normally thought of as right.”

Emilie’s eyes glistened. “Did I not tell you, Hugh, that I have a penchant for not doing what is considered right?”

“You did tell me.” I nodded.

[117] We stood and stared at each other for a long while, the space empty of words. A rush of feelings rose in my chest. This beautiful girl had done so much for me. If not for her, I would have been dead, a bloody mound on the side of the road. I reached my hand out to hers. There was a spark between us, a warmth against the cool of the morning.

I let my hand linger, longer than I could have dreamed. She did not pull away. “I owe you so much, Lady Emilie. I fear I owe you a debt I can never repay.”

“You owe me nothing,” she said, her chin raised, “but to be on your quest and to complete it safely.”

I didn’t know what else to say. For me there had only been Sophie. Each night I went to sleep with my mind dancing with a thousand images of our lives together, my hands aching to touch her skin once more. I loved my wife, and yet, this woman had done so much. And gotten nothing in return. I wanted to take her in my arms and let her know how I felt. The strongest surge swelled inside me; it gave me a trembling in every bone in my body.

“I hope with all my heart your Sophie is alive,” Emilie finally said.

“She is alive. I know it.”

My hand was still cupping hers. When I finally pulled it away, I felt a loss-but also a small object pressed inside my palm, wrapped in a linen cloth.

“This was in your clothes,” Emilie said, “when I first found you on the road.”

I unwrapped it. The breath froze in my chest. It was the broken comb with the painted edge I had found in the cinders of our inn. Sophie’s comb.

Emilie’s eyes were liquid and courageous, her voice strong. She took my hand. “Go find her, Hugh De Luc. I truly believe that is what you were saved for.”

I nodded. I squeezed her hand back with all my might. “In all the world, I hope to see you again, my lady.”

[118] “In all the world, I hope to see you again too, Hugh De Luc. It pains me that you leave.”

I let her go and tossed my sack upon my back. I picked up my staff and started south, on the true road to Treille.

I took a skip and a hop and twirled around to take a final look at Emilie. She was still watching me and smiled bravely. I wondered, with all the worlds that separated us, how I had deserved such a lovely friend.

“Good-bye,” I whispered under my breath.

I thought I saw her lips move too. “Good-bye, Hugh.”

Chapter 38

THE ARMORED RAIDERS SWEPT DOWN upon the sleeping manor. It was a large stone house in a neighboring duchy, miles from the nearest town.

I will make them pay, Black Cross promised. No man is bold enough to steal from God. Especially not the true relics of Christendom.

At first, there was a yip of dogs as the massive chargers thundered out of the calm night. Then torches lit up the darkness and everything went ablaze.

The horsemen set fire to the stables, horses bucking and neighing in fright. A few terrified workers who had been sleeping there ran out and were mowed down by the blades of hard metal charging by.

The manor burst alive with light. Six dark knights dismounted and two of them crashed through the heavy wooden door with their axes. Black Cross burst inside with his men.

The knight of the manor appeared in a doorway inside. His name was Adhémar. All France knew of this old man, this renowned fighter, who still stood with a strength that spoke of his past. Behind him, his wife huddled in a bed gown. The knight had donned his tunic. It bore the purple-and-gold fleur-de-lis of the King.

[120] “Who are you?” Adhémar challenged the raiders. “What do you want here?”

“A piece of gold, old man. From your last campaign,” said Black Cross.

“I am no banker, intruder. My last campaign was in service to the Pope.”

“Then it should not be so hard to remember. What we seek was plundered from a tomb in Edessa.”

“ Edessa?” The old knight’s eyes flicked from intruder to intruder. “How do you know this?”

“The noble Adhémar’s fame is well-known,” Black Cross said.

“Then you also know I fought with William at Hastings. That I wear the Gold Fleur, awarded to me by King Philip himself. That I have defended the faith at Acre and Antioch, where my blood still lies.”

“We know all of this.” Black Cross smiled. “In fact, that is why we are here.”

He signaled to one of his men, who bound the arms of the knight’s wife. Adhémar moved to defend her, but he was pinned by the blade of a sword to his neck.

“You insult me, intruder. You show no face or colors. Who are you? Who has sent you? Tell me, so I will know you when I meet you in Hell.”

“Know this,” Black Cross said, and lifted his helmet, revealing the dark cross burned into the side of his neck.

The old knight fell silent with recognition.

“Take us to the relic,” Black Cross said.

His henchmen dragged the couple through their house, the knight’s wife screaming futilely at her captors. They went through a stone arch leading to a rear courtyard, where there was a small chapel. Inside was a bronze altar with a crucifix hanging above.

“In Edessa, you looted the tomb of a Christian shrine. In the reliquary, there were crosses and vestments and coins. There [121] was also a gold box. In it were ashes. That is all we came for. Just a box filled with ash…”

Black Cross grabbed a war ax from one of his cohorts and raised it over the knight’s head. The knight closed his eyes. As the knight’s wife shrieked, Black Cross swung the ax in a mighty arc, narrowly missing the knight, smashing the stone floor beneath the altar. The rock crumbled under the mighty blow.

Beneath the masonry, a hidden space came into view. Inside was a gold ark wrapped in cloth. One of Black Cross’s men knelt and lifted it. He smashed the valuable chest as if it were a trinket.

He lifted out a simple wooden box. He opened the lid and gazed awestruck at the dark sand inside.

“It is blasphemy that you should hold such a thing in His name.” The old knight glared.

Black Cross’s eyes lit up with rage. “Then we shall let Him decide.”

Black Cross scanned the broken chapel, his gaze coming to rest on the crucifix hanging on the wall. “Such a spirited faith, brave knight. We must make sure such faith is recognized for all to see.”

Chapter 39

MY JOURNEY TO TREILLE took six days. The first two, the road was busy with travelers-peddlers dragging their carts, workers with tools and other belongings, pilgrims heading back home.

By the third day, the villages grew smaller, and so did the traffic.

By the fourth, at dusk, I huddled under a tree for a stingy meal of bread and cheese. I could not rest long. Treille was but a good day’s walk away now, and the anticipation of reaching there and finding Sophie beat through my blood like a restless drum.

I decided to travel a bit farther, until darkness completely set in.

I heard voices up ahead. Then shouts, and a woman’s cries. I came upon a merchant family-husband, wife, and son-in the midst of being attacked by two robbers.

One of the scavengers grabbed a prize, a ceramic bowl. “Look what I have, Shorty. A piss bowl.”

“Please,” the merchant begged, “we have no money. Take the wares if you must.”

The one called Shorty sneered. “Let’s have a trade. You can have your piss bowl back for a stab at your wife.”

[123] The blood pounded in my veins. I did not know these people. And I had my own pressing needs in Treille. But I couldn’t stand by and watch them be robbed and possibly murdered.

I put down my pack and crept closer behind some brush. Finally, I stepped out from my cover.

Shorty’s eyes fell upon me. He was stumpy and barrel-chested, balding on top, but very muscular. I knew I made a ridiculous sight in my leggings and skirt.

“Let them be,” I said. “Leave them and go.”

“What do we have here?” The fierce outlaw grinned toothlessly. “A pretty fairy come out of the woods.”

“You heard the man.” I came closer with my staff. “Take what you have. You can sell it in the next town. That’s what I would do.”

Shorty stood up, hardly about to buckle under a threat delivered by someone in a jester’s suit. “ ‘What I would do,’ eh, big shot? What I would do is run off now. Your bad jokes aren’t needed here.”

“Let me try another,” I said, stepping forward. “How about this one? Name the sexual position that produces the ugliest children.”

Shorty and his partner shared looks, as if they could not believe what was going on.

“Don’t know, Shorty?” I gripped my staff. “Well, why don’t we just ask your mother.”

The tall one grunted a slight laugh, but Shorty silenced him with a look. He lifted his club above his shoulders. I watched his eyes grow narrow and mean. “You really are a fool, aren’t you?”

Before all the words had left his lips, I swung my staff. It cracked him firmly in the mouth and sent him reeling. He grabbed his jaw, then raised his weapon again. Before he could swing it, I sprang forward and whacked my stick across his ^shin, doubling him over in pain. I rapped his shin again and he screamed.

[124] The other came at me, but as he did, the merchant rushed forward and thrust his torch into the outlaw’s face. His entire head was engulfed in flames. The man howled and smacked at his head to smother the flames. Then his clothing caught fire and he fled into the woods, screaming, followed by Shorty.

The merchant and his wife came up to me. “We owe you thanks. I am Geoffrey.” The merchant extended his hand. “I have a ceramics stall in Treille. This is my wife, Isabel. My son, Thomas.”

“I’m Hugh.” I took his hand. “A jester. Could you tell?”

“Tell us, Hugh,” his wife inquired, “where do you head?”

“I head to Treille as well.”

“Then we can go the rest of the way together,” Geoffrey offered. “We don’t have much food left, but what there is, you’re welcome to share.”

“Why not?” I agreed. “But I think we’d better put some space between us and the night crawlers. My pack’s just over here.”

Geoffrey’s son asked, “Are you going to Treille to be a jester at our court?”

I smiled at the boy. “I hope to, Thomas. I’ve heard the one there now has grown a bit dull.”

“Maybe he has.” Geoffrey shrugged. “But you’ll have a difficult job in front of you. How long has it been since you have been to our town?”

“Three years,” I answered.

He lifted the handles of his cart. “These days, I’m afraid you will find Treille a hard place to get a laugh.”

Chapter 40

WE HAD BARELY CLEARED the forest two mornings later when Geoffrey pointed ahead. “There it is.”

The town of Treille, glistening through the sun, perched atop a high hilltop. Was Sophie truly here? There was a cluster of ochre-colored buildings knotted on the rise, then, at its peak, the large gray castle, two towers thrust into the sky.

I had been to Treille twice before. Once to settle a claim against a knight who would not pay his bill, and the other with Sophie to go to market.

Geoffrey was right. As we approached the outlying village, I could tell that Treille had changed.

“Look how the farmers’ fields lie fallow,” he said, pointing, “while over there, the lord’s demesne is neatly planted.”

Indeed, I could see how the smaller plots of land sat unworked, while the duchy’s fields, bordered by solid stone fences, flourished.

Closer to town, other serious signs of decline were everywhere. A wooden bridge over a stream had so many holes in the boards we could barely pass. Fences were broken and run-down.

I was dumbstruck. I remembered Treille as thriving and prosperous. The largest market in the duchy. A place of celebration on Midsummer’s Eve.

We climbed the steep, windy hill that rose toward the castle. [126] The streets stank from waste, the runoff from the castle lining the edges of the road.

The pigs were out. Each morning people got rid of their garbage by tossing it out on the streets. Then pigs were let loose to feed on the waste. Their morning meal was enough to turn my stomach.

At a crowded corner, Geoffrey announced, “Our stall is down the street. You are welcome to stay with us, Hugh, if you have no other place.”

I declined. I had to get started on my quest-which lay inside the castle.

The merchant embraced me. “You’ll always have a friend here. And by the way, my wife’s cousin works in the castle. I will tell her what you did for us. She’ll be sure to save you the best scraps of meat.”

“Thanks.” I winked at Thomas and hopped around a bit until I got a laugh. “Come visit me, if I get the job.”

I waved as I left them behind, then walked through town, making my way up the hill. People stared, and I grinned and juggled my way into my new role. A new jester was like the arrival of a troupe of players, festive and gay.

A crowd of raggedy children followed me, dancing around with shouts and laughs. Yet my heart pounded with the worrisome task that lay ahead. Sophie was here … I could feel it. Somewhere in all this stone and decay, she clung on.

It took me nearly an hour to wind through the streets and finally make my way to the castle gates. A squad of uniformed soldiers in milk-pail helmets and Baldwin ’s purple-and-white colors stood manning the lowered drawbridge, checking people going in.

The line had backed up. Some passed through. Others, arguing their case, were rudely pushed away.

This was it, my new pretext… my first test. My stomach churned. Please, let me be up to this.

Taking a deep breath, I stepped up to the gate.

And once again, I could feel Sophie.

Chapter 41

“WHAT’S THIS, jester? You have business here?” a brusque-looking captain of the guard eyed me up and down.

“I have, Your Grace.” I bowed to the guard and smiled. “It is business I have come for and business I will do. Important business… Not as important as yours, Your Grace, but the stuff of lords, I mean laughs …”

“Shut your trap, fool.” The guard glowered. “Who awaits you inside?”

“The lord awaits me.” And my Sophie.

The guard scrunched his brow. “The lord? Awaits you?”

“The Lord awaits us all.” I grinned and winked.

Some people waiting in line began to chuckle.

“Lord Baldwin, then,” I went on. “It is he who awaits me. He just does not know it yet.”

“Lord Baldwin?” The guard screwed up one eye. “What do you take me for? A fool?” He roared laughter.

I bowed humbly. “You’re right, sir, I am not needed if such a wit as you is already here. You must truly keep the barracks up all night in stitches.”

“We already have a fool, jester. His name is Palimpost. Not Your lucky day, eh? It seems we’re all fooled up.”

“Well, now we’re two-fooled, aren’t we?” I exclaimed. I had [128] to say something that would gain me support. Even this mold-worm must be able to be charmed or swayed.

I knelt down to a farmer’s boy. I poked at his chin, his nose, then snapped my fingers, and a small dried plum appeared in my hand. The child squealed with delight. “It is a sad day, boy, is it not, when a laugh is barred with a sword. Don’t tell me the great Lord Baldwin has something to fear from a laugh.”

There was a trickle of applause from the bystanders. “C’mon, sergeant,” a pretty, fat woman called. “Let the fool in. What harm can he cause?”

Even his fellow guards seemed to give in. “Let him through, Albert. The man’s right. Things could use some lightening up around here.”

“Yes, Albert,” I added. “I mean Your Grace. Things could use some lightening. Here, hold this.” I gave him my sack. “That’s much lighter. Thank you.” I folded my arms.

“Get your ass through,” the guard growled at me, “before it ends up on the point of my lance.” He thrust my sack back into my ribs.

I bowed a last time, winking thanks to the woman and the farmer as I hurried through.

A tremor of relief passed through me. I was in.

The drawbridge groaned under my feet; the walls of the castle loomed high above. Across the bridge, I entered a large courtyard. Busy people were scurrying to and fro.

I didn’t know where to go. I didn’t know if Sophie was here, or even alive. A knot tightened in my chest.

I stepped up to the castle entrance. The sun was high. It was before noon. Court would still be in session.

I had work to do. I was a jester.

Chapter 42

BALDWIN ’S COURT WAS HELD in the great hall, down the main corridor through tall stone arches.

I followed the official traffic: knights dressed in casual leggings and tunics; pages scurrying at their sides, holding their helmets and arms; courtiers in colorful robes and cloaks with plumed feathers on their hats; petitioners of the court, both noble and common. And everywhere I walked I searched for Sophie.

People caught my eye and smiled. I, in turn, responded with a wink or a juggle, or a quick sleight of hand. My role was working so far. A man in a patchwork skirt and tights, juggling a set of balls… who would believe such a man could be up to any harm?

The din of a large crowd ushered me toward the great hall. Two tall oak doors, engraved with panels depicting the four seasons, stood at each side of the entrance. Soldiers holding halberds stood at attention, blocking the way.

My blood was pounding. I was here. Baldwin sat on the other side. All I had to do was talk my way in.

A herald wearing the lion shield of Baldwin seemed to be keeping track of appointments. Some were told to sit and wait; others, brimming with self-importance, were allowed in.

[130] When it was my turn, I stepped up and announced boldly, “I am Hugh from Borée, cousin to Palimpost the Droll. I was told I could find him here,”

At the herald’s quizzical gaze, I whispered to him, “Family enterprise.”

“I pray, from the funny side of the family.” The herald sniffed. He gave me a quick once-over. “You’ll no doubt find him snoozing with the dogs. Just keep out of the way while business is in session.”

To my shock, he waved me in.

Through the wide doorway, I stepped into the great hall. The room was enormous-at least three stories tall, rectangular and long. It was filled with a throng of people, standing in line for the duke’s attention or sitting idly around long tables.

A voice rang out above the din. From behind a huddle of merchants and moneylenders arguing about ledgers, I pushed to a vantage point where I could see.

It was Baldwin!

He was sitting, more like slouching, on a large, high-backed oak chair elevated above the floor. A totally uninterested look was on his face, as if these boring proceedings were all that held him from a preferred day of hunting and hawking.

Beneath him, a petitioning commoner knelt on one knee.

Baldwin …! The sight of him sent a chill racing down my spine. For weeks, I had thought of little more than driving my knife through the base of his neck. His jet-black hair fell to his shoulders, and his chin was sharp, with a short black beard. He was wrapped in a purple-and-white robe over a loose-fitting blouse and tights.

I spotted my new rival, Palimpost, in similar garb to mine, reclining on a step to Baldwin ’s side, throwing dice.

Some formal matter was under discussion. A yellow-clad bailiff, pointing toward the kneeling serf, said, “The petitioner seeks to deny the right of patrimony, lord.”

“The right of patrimony?” Baldwin turned to an adviser. “Is [131] the right of the firstborn not the foundation of all property law?”

“It is, my lord,” the adviser agreed.

‘‘For nobles, for men of property, yes,” the petitioner said, “but we are humble farmers. This flock of sheep is all we have. My older brother is a drunkard. He hasn’t done a day’s work at the farm in years. My wife and I… this farm is everything to us. It is how we pay our fief to you.”

“You, farmer.” Baldwin peered at him. “You are a working man at all costs? You do not drink yourself?”

“On holidays, perhaps…” The farmer hesitated, not knowing how to answer. “At feasts… when we celebrated our vows.”

“So it seems I am forced to decide how to divide these sheep between two drunkards.” Baldwin grinned. A wave of laughter echoed through the cavernous room.

“But my lord …” The farmer rose.

“Be still,” the duke cautioned. “The law must be obeyed.

“And to do so, the flock must be transferred to a firstborn,” he continued. “Is that not right? Yet your reserve is warranted, I think, farmer. Should the flock be wasted, we will not be enriched in any way. It occurs to me that there is an option.” He beamed at the room. “I am a firstborn…”

The petitioner gasped. “You, my lord?”

“Yes.” Baldwin smiled broadly. “The first of the firstborn, wouldn’t you say so, chamberlain?”

“You are the lord, my liege.” The chamberlain bowed.

“Therefore, it seems the law would be upheld nicely should these precious sheep revert to me,” Baldwin declared.

The horrified farmer looked around for some support.

“So I take them,” Baldwin announced, “in the name of Patrimony.”

“But my lord,” the farmer pressed, “these sheep are all we have.”

Anger swept through me. I wanted to lunge at Baldwin, plunge my dagger into his throat. This was the man who had [132] stolen everything from me, with the same ease and indifference with which he now ruined this poor farmer. But I had to restrain myself. It was Sophie I came for, not revenge against this pig of a man.

A page leaned over to Baldwin. “Your hawks await, my lord.”

“Good. Is there any more business before the court?” Baldwin asked, implying he wanted none.

I swallowed nervously. This was my chance. Why I had come. I pushed my way to the front.

“I have business, my lord!”

Chapter 43

“THERE IS THE MATTER of your western lands,” I called out from the throng of petitioners.

“Who speaks?” Baldwin asked, startled. A surprised buzz worked through the crowd of petitioners.

“A knight, your lordship,” I shouted. “I have taken a raiding party and sacked and burned all the villages of your enemies in the west.”

Baldwin stood up. He leaned over to his seneschal. “But we don’t have any enemies in the west…”

I took a breath and edged myself out from the crowd. “I am sorry, lord, but I fear that you do now.”

Slowly, steadily, a trail of laughter wound through the room. As the joke became clear, it grew heartier.

“It is a fool,” I heard someone say. “A performance.”

Baldwin glared and stepped toward me. His icy stare made my blood run cold. “Who are you, fool? What has prompted you to speak?”

“I am Hugh. From Borée.” I bowed. “I have studied under Norbert, the famous jester there. I am informed that your court is greatly in need of a laugh.”

“A laugh? My court hungers for a laugh …?” Baldwin squinted uncomprehendingly. “You are certainly fool-born, [134] man, I grant you that. And you have come all this way from the big city to amuse us.”

“That is so, my lord.” I bowed again, nerves flashing through me.

“Well, your journey is wasted,” the noble said. “We already have a fool here. Don’t we, Palimpost, my droll pet?”

The jester sprang up, an old, clubfooted man with white hair and thick lips who looked as if he had just been jolted awake.

“With all due respect,” I said, stepping into the middle of the room and addressing the court, “I have heard that Palimpost couldn’t get a laugh from a drunken sot. That he has lost his touch. I say hear me out. If you are not happy, I will be on my way.”

“The boy sports a challenge to you.” Baldwin grinned at his jester.

“Restrain him, my lord,” Palimpost said. “Do not listen. He means to create unrest in your duchy.”

“Our only unrest, my dizzy-eyed fool, is from the dullness of your wit. Perhaps the lad is right. Let us see what he brings from Borée.”

Baldwin stepped down from his platform. He made his way across the room toward me. “Make us laugh, and we will see about your future. Fail, and you’ll be practicing jokes for the rats in our keep.”

“It’s fair, my lord.” I bowed. “I will make you laugh.”

Chapter 44

I STOOD IN THE CENTER of the huge room. A hundred pairs of eyes were on me.

In a group of lounging knights, I spotted Norcross, the duke’s military man, his chatelain. I eyed him tremulously, though he did not look my way. Every sense told me this was the man who had killed my son.

“You have all no doubt heard the tale of the cow from Amiens,” I crowed.

People looked at one another and shook their heads. “We have not,” someone yelled out. “Tell us, jester.”

“These two peasants had a single denier between them. So to enlarge their fortune, they decided to buy a cow, and every day they would sell its milk. Now, as everyone knows, the best cows in the land come from Amiens.

“So they went there, and they traded the denier for the best cow they could find, who yielded lots of milk. And they sold the milk each morning. Soon, one of them said, ‘If we can mate this fine cow, we’ll have two. We can double our milk and our money.’ So they searched their village and found the finest bull. Soon, they were going to be rich.”

I scanned the room. Everyone seemed to hang on my words. A hundred smiles… knights, ladies-in-waiting, even the duke himself. I had them. I had their ears.

[136] “The day of the mating, they brought in the bull. First, he tried to mount the cow from behind, but the cow wiggled away. Then, the bull came at her from the left, but the cow wiggled its rump to the right. If it came from the right, the cow wiggled left.”

I spotted an attractive lady and went up to her. I smiled and wiggled my own rump. Just enough to be considered cute. The crowd oohed with delight.

“Finally,” I said, “the peasants threw up their hands in frustration. There was no way this cow from Amiens would mate. But instead of giving up, they decided to consult the smartest person in the duchy. A knight of such rare wisdom, such vision, he knew why all things were as they were.”

I noticed Norcross reclining on his elbow, following the tale. I strode up to him. “Someone like you, knight,” I said.

The crowd cackled. “Your story errs there,” said Baldwin, laughing, “if it’s brains you want.”

“So I’ve heard.” I bowed to the duke. “But for the purpose of the tale, he’ll do.”

Norcross’s amusement began to sour and he glared at me, red faced.

“So the peasants came to this very wise knight and they told him of their problem with the cow. They moaned, ‘What must we do?’

“The wise knight replied, ‘You say if the bull tries to mount it this way, it wiggles left? And from this direction, it wiggles right?’

“ ‘Yes!’ they cried.

“The knight thought it over. ‘I do not know if I can solve your dilemma,’ he said, ‘but I know one thing. Your cow is from Amiens, is it not?’

“ ‘Yes, yes,’ the peasants shouted. ‘It is indeed from Amiens. How could you possibly know?’ ”

I turned back to Norcross. I perched on the table next to him. ‘“Because my wife,’ the knight muttered, ‘she is from Amiens as well.’ ”

[137] The hall burst into laughter. The knights, the duke, the ladies. All except Norcross. Then the vast room echoed with applause.

Baldwin came up and slapped me on the back. “You are indeed funny, fool. You have other jokes like this?”

“Many,” I replied, to punctuate the point, I sprang into a forward flip, then one backward. The crowd oohed.

“They must laugh well in Borée. You may stay, my new companion. You are hired.”

I raised my arms in triumph. The large room echoed with applause. But inside, I knew I stood inches from the very men I had sworn to kill.

“Palimpost, as of this day you are retired,” Baldwin declared. “Show the new fool your spot.”

“Retired? But I have no desire, my liege. Haven’t I served you with all my wit?”

“With what little you have. So you are unretired, then. I grant you a new job. In the graveyard. See if you can cheer up the audience there.”

Chapter 45

TWO DAYS AFTER my arrival, Baldwin announced a great feast at court, with counts, knights, and other noble-born invited from all over the region. The duke knew how to waste what had been earned by his poor serfs.

I was instructed by the lord’s chamberlain that I would be a main act at the festivities. Baldwin ’s wife, the lady Heloise, had heard of my audition and was eager to see my act.

This would be my first real test!

The day of the gathering, the entire castle bustled with activity. An endless army of servants wearing their finest uniforms, tunics of the same purple and white, marched dishware and elaborate candelabras into the great hall. Minstrels practiced on the lawn. Giant logs were loaded into the hearths. The luscious aroma of roasting goose, pig, and sheep permeated the castle.

I spent the day polishing my routine. This was my coming out, my first real performance. I had to shine, to remain in Baldwin ’s good graces. I juggled, twirled my staff, practiced my flips back and forth, went over my tales and jokes.

Finally, the evening of the feast was at hand. Nervous as a groom, I made my way to the banquet hall. Four long tables filled the room, each covered in the finest linen cloth and set with candelabras engraved with the duke’s lion shield.

[139] Arriving guests were greeted with a flourish of horns. I sauntered up to each, announcing them with playful epithets. “His bawdiness, the duke of Loire, and his lovely niece, er… wife, the lady Kate.” It was all meant to trump the husband and praise his wife, no matter how plain she might be. Everyone played along.

Only when the room filled did Baldwin and his lady, Heloise, make their entrance. One glance made it obvious to me that Baldwin had not married for looks. The couple waded through the room, Baldwin hugging and joking with the men, Heloise curtsying and receiving lavish praise. They took seats at the head of the largest table.

When their guests were all seated, Baldwin stood and raised a goblet. “Welcome, everyone. Tonight we have much to cheer. The court has been enriched by a new flock. And the arrival of a fool from Borée. Hugh will make us laugh, or else.”

“I have heard my husband’s new pet is quite the rage,” Lady Heloise announced. “Perhaps he will set the tone with a few jests.”

I took a deep breath, then I hopped around to the head table. “I’ll do my best, my lady.”

I scampered toward her but then threw myself into the lap of a fat old man seated down the row. I grinned, stroking his beard. “I would be honored to perform for you, Your Grace. I…”

“Here, fool,” Lady Heloise called. “I am over here.”

“Gads.” I shot out of the man’s lap. “Of course, my lady. I must’ve been blinded by your beauty. So much so, I could not see.”

There was a trickle of laughter.

“Surely, fool,” Lady Heloise called, “you did not have the crowd shouting your name the other day with such mild flattery. Perhaps it is I who am blinded. Is that Hugh I see there or Palimpost?”

The room chuckled at the hostess’s wit. Even I bowed, warming to the challenge.

[140] At the end of the table, a potbellied priest was sucking down a mug of ale. I hopped onto the table in front of him, plates and mugs clattering. “There’s this one, then… A man went to a priest to confess his many sins. He said he had much to share.”

The priest looked up. “To me?”

“We’ll see, Father, how you feel about it at the end. First, the man confessed he had stolen from a friend, but added that this friend had stolen something back of equal value. ‘One thing cancels out another,’ the priest replied. ‘You are absolved.’ ”

“It is true.” The priest nodded.

“Next,” I went on, “the fellow said he had beaten the man with a stick, but had received equal blows in return. ‘Again, these both cancel each other out,’ the priest replied. ‘You owe God nothing.’

“Now this penitent sensed he could get away with anything. He said there was something else to confess, one more sin, but he was too ashamed. When the priest encouraged him, he said. ‘Once, Father, I had your sister.’

“ ‘My sister!’ the priest bellowed. The man was sure he was about to feel a holy wrath. ‘And I have had your mother on several occasions,’ the priest said. ‘Again, they cancel each other out. So we are both absolved.’ ”

The guests clapped and laughed. The embarrassed priest looked around the room and clapped as well.

“More, fool,” Lady Heloise shouted, “in the same temper.” She turned to Baldwin. “Where have you been hiding this treasure?”

The room bubbled with good cheer. Food was served-swan and goose and pig. Goblets and mugs were filled by servants scurrying about.

I leaped up to a server carrying a roast on a tray. I took a whiff of the meat. “Superb.” I sighed. “Who knows the difference between medium and rare?”

Diners at the tables looked around and shrugged.

[141] I went up to a blushing lady. “Six inches is medium, my lady. But eight is rare.”

Again, they roared. I had it going. I spotted Baldwin taking congratulations, seeming delighted with the performance.

To much fanfare, a train of servers marched in from the kitchen carrying prepared plates. Baldwin stood. “Lamb, guests, from our new flock.”

Baldwin stuck a knife into a slice of lamb and chewed off a piece in front of his server. “Delicious, server, wouldn’t you say?”

“It is, my lord.” The server bowed stiffly.

To my horror, I realized that the dejected servant was the same farmer from whom Baldwin had chiseled the flock just two days before. Suddenly my blood stirred in rage.

“Please, jester, do continue,” Baldwin said with a mouthful of meat.

“I will, my lord.” I bowed.

I spotted Norcross at the end of Baldwin ’s table, stabbing his meat among a row of other knights. “Is that my lord Norcross I see stuffing his face over there?”

Norcross looked up, then his eyes narrowed on me.

“Tell me,” I asked the crowd, “who is a greater hero to our lord than the brave Norcross? Who among us could be more forgiven for conceit? In fact, I have heard this good knight is so conceited, that during climax he calls out his own name.”

Norcross put his knife down. He stared at me, juice running through his beard. Laughter ensued, but as the knight’s face tightened, it trickled away.

“And there are those who ask,” I continued, “what do a holiday decoration and my lord Norcross have in common?”

This time there were no amused mutterings. A tense silence hung in the air.

“You will find,” I said, “that their balls are just for decoration.”

[142] With that, the knight shot up, drawing his sword. He lunged around the crowded table toward me.

I pretended to flee. “Help me, help me, my lord. I have no sword, yet I fear I have struck too deep.”

I did a flip and ran around the table toward Baldwin. Norcross pursued, weighed down and slightly drunk.

I easily avoided him, circling the table to the merriment of the crowd, who almost seemed to be making bets as to whether the knight would catch me and cut my throat. Finally, I threw myself in the protection of Baldwin ’s lap. “He will kill me, my lord.”

“He will not,” Baldwin replied. “Relax, Norcross. Our new fool has managed to get under your skin. A good laugh, not a killing, should soothe the wound.”

“He insults me, my lord. I stand for that from no man.”

“This is no man.” Baldwin cackled. “He is but a fool. And he provides us much entertainment.”

“I have served you well.” The red-faced knight seethed. “I demand to fight the fool.”

“You will not.” Lady Heloise rose. “The fool has acted on my bidding. If anything untimely happens to him, I will know the author. You may feel safe, Hugh.”

Norcross exhaled a deep, frustrated breath, the object of all eyes in the room. Slowly he let his massive sword slip back into its sheath.

“Next time, fool,” he said, “the laugh will be mine.” He went back to his seat, never once removing his stare from me.

“You have picked an adversary who is not one to anger.” Baldwin chuckled as he ate his lamb. He tossed some bits of fat off his plate to the floor. “Here. Help yourself.”

I looked across the room at Norcross. I knew I had made an enemy for life.

But so had he.

Chapter 46

I HAD NO TIME to waste. I set out to find Sophie. She was alive. I knew it.

My confrontation with Norcross had given me instant status among the castle staff. I was given a name, Hugh the Brave, or, I was told, with respect to Norcross’s wrath, Hugh the Brief. People who I sensed served the duke only out of fear or obligation came and whispered their support. I was able to make a few useful friends.

There was Bette the cook, a chubby, red-faced woman with a sharp tongue who kept the kitchen running like a spotless ship. And Jacques, the upstairs valet du chambre, who took meals next to me in the kitchen. Even a cheerful sergeant at arms at the court, Henri, who chuckled at my jokes.

I questioned all of them, asking if they had heard of a fair, blond woman held captive in the castle, keeping my reasons close to the vest. No one had. “Checked the brothels?” The sergeant winked. “Once the nobles have no use for ’em, they’d be sent there.” So I did. I made the rounds, pretending to be a choosy customer. But, thank God, no one fitting Sophie’s description was among the poor whores at Treille.

“You look a little drawn in the face, for a jester,” Bette, the cook, observed one morning as she pounded out her dough. “Your lost sweetheart again?”

[144] I wished I could take her into my confidence. “Not mine, Bette, but a friend’s,” I lied. “Someone asked me to inquire.”

“A friend’s, you say.” The cook eyed me skeptically. She seemed to play with me. “Is she highborn or common?”

I looked up from my bowl. “How would a rogue like me know anyone highborn?” I grinned. “Except you, perhaps…”

“Oh yes, me…” Bette cackled. “I’m the duke’s own blood. That’s why I slave in this hearth until dark every day.”

She laughed and went about her chores. But when she returned lugging a pot, she crept behind me and said confidingly, “Perhaps it’s the Tavern you want, love.”

I looked up. “The Tavern?”

She reached on her tiptoes for a bowl of garlic heads high on a shelf. “The dungeons,” she said under her breath. “They’re always filled with mouths to feed. At least for a short while. We call them la Taverne. Everyone goes in on their own two feet, but usually it takes a team of four to carry them out.”

I looked to thank her, but Bette quickly breezed to the other side of the kitchen, peeling the garlic for her soup.

The Tavern. For days afterward, I spied on it in the courtyard while taking my daily stroll. A heavy iron door, always guarded by at least two soldiers from Baldwin ’s reserve. Once or twice, I sauntered over, trying to warm up the guards. I did a little magic trick, tossed some balls in the air, twirled my staff. I never got as much as a snicker.

“Bug off, fool,” one guard barked at me. “No one here even remembers how to laugh.”

“You want a peek,” another barked, “I’m sure Norcross’ll find you a room.”

I hurried away, pretending his very name had sent me trembling. But I continued plotting. How to get in? Who could help me? I tried the chamberlain. I even tried to play my liege, Baldwin. One day, after court, I sidled up to him. “Time for a drink, my lord. How about I buy you one… in la Taverne?”

[145] Baldwin laughed and said to his coterie, “Fool wants a drink so bad, he’s willing to risk the pox to get it.”

One night, as I took my meal in the kitchen, Bette sat down with me. “You are a strange sort, Hugh. All day you’re smiles and tricks. But at night you sulk and brood like a lost lover. Why do I think this loss you feel is not a friend’s?”

I could no longer hide my sadness. I had to trust someone. “You are right, Bette. It’s my wife I seek. She was taken from my village. By raiding knights. I know she is here. I can feel it in my blood.”

Bette did not show surprise. She only smiled. “I knew you were no fool,” she said. “And I can be a friend,” she added, “if you need one.”

“I need one more than you can know,” I said, desperate. “But why?”

“Be sure, not for your silly tricks, Hugh, or your flattery.” Bette’s expression changed, grew warmer. “Geoffrey and Isabel, Hugh… They are my cousins. Why do you think I always saved you the best scraps of meat? You don’t think you’re that funny, do you? I owe you their lives, Hugh.”

I grasped her hands. “ La Taverne, Bette. I have to get in. I’ve tried everything, but there’s no way.”

“No way?” The cook stared at me a long time, searching my intentions. “For a fool, maybe. Only a fool would want to get into la Taverne. But there’s a saying here. The best way to end up in the soup is to ask the cook!”

Chapter 47

IT WAS CHILLY for a summer night in Borée. A breeze blew over the gardens. The lady Emilie huddled in her cloak. At her side was the jester, Norbert.

Emilie had tried to read her book of chansons de geste that night, but the pages turned emptily, her thoughts drifting into space like wisps of smoke. The rhymes of poets and the tales of imaginary heroes no longer captivated her. Her heart ached with a confusion she had never known before. It always came back to one thing. One face.

What is happening to me? she wondered. I feel I am going mad, Norbert had noticed it. The jester had knocked on her door earlier that night. “I know laughter, my lady, and to know that, I must know melancholy too.”

“So you are a jester and now a physician too?” She pretended to scold him.

“It takes no physician to see what ails you, lady. You miss the lad, don’t you?”

With anyone else, she would have bitten her tongue. “I do miss him, jester. I cannot lie.”

The jester sat across from her. “You’re not alone. I miss him too.”

This was something new for Emilie. She was used to feeling that men were like flies, nuisances, always buzzing around her, [147] too concerned with their boasting and their deeds to be taken seriously. But this was different. How had it happened? She had only known Hugh for weeks. His life was a world apart from hers, yet she knew everything about him. Most likely, she would never see him again.

“I feel I have sent him on this quest,” she told Norbert. “And now I wish I could bring him back.”

“You did not send him, lady. And with all respect, he is not yours to bring back.”

No, Norbert was right. Hugh was not hers. She had only stumbled upon him.

So she huddled in the garden that night. She needed to feel the air on her face. Somehow, out here, under the same moon, she felt closer to him. I don’t know if I will ever see you again, Hugh De Luc. But I pray I do. Somehow, some way.

“You risk a lot to have such feelings,” Norbert said.

“They are not planned. They just… are.”

He took her hand. There was a moment between them, not as lady and servant but as friends. Emilie blushed, then smiled. “It seems my heart is owned by jesters from all around.”

“Do not worry, my lady. Our Red is canny and resourceful. I taught him, you know. A chip off the old block. I’m sure he’s fine. He’ll find his wife.”

“A jester and a physician and now a seer too?” She hugged the jester. “Thank you, Norbert.” Then she watched him go back inside.

It was late. The garden was still. She had promised the priest she would wake early for morning prayers. “Be safe, Hugh De Luc,” she whispered, then turned back toward the castle.

She headed along the loggia above the gardens to the living quarters. Then, out of the night, voices came to her from below.

Who could be out here at this hour? Emilie hid behind a column and peered into the deep shadows below.

A man and a woman. Voices raised.

[148] She strained to hear. “This is not it, knight,” the woman said. “This is not the treasure.”

It was Anne. Out there in the dark with a man. He didn’t look like a knight. More like a monk. In robes. But with a sword.

Emilie thought she had stumbled across something she should not have seen. Anne was angry. She’d never heard her mistress’s tone this hard.

“You know what my husband wants,” she said. “Find it!”

Chapter 48

A FEW DAYS LATER, as I took my evening meal, Bette the cook winked and drew me aside. “There’s a way,” she said. “If you still want to see the Tavern.”

“How?” I asked, leaning in close. “And how soon?”

“It’s not exactly a state secret, jester. People have to eat, don’t they? Guards, soldiers… even prisoners. Every day my kitchen brings the evening meal to the dungeon. Who would mind if it was brought by the fool?”

My eyes lit up. The fool doing errands for the cook. It could work.

“I will give it a try,” Bette said. “The rest is up to you. If your wife is there, Hugh, it will take more than luck to get her out. Just don’t bring the duke’s awful wrath down on me.”

I took her hand and squeezed it. “I would bring nothing down upon you except my gratitude. I owe you much, Bette.”

“I told you, I owe you my cousins’ lives.”

“But somehow, I think it is more than what I did for Geoffrey, Isabel, and Thomas on the road here.”

She smiled and tossed a turnip into the pot. “ Baldwin is our liege.” She sniffed. “But he can never rule our hearts. I see why you have come. I can see you are in love. These hands may be rough and ugly, but I am not so removed from matters of the heart.”

[150] I began to blush. “Am I so transparent?”

“Don’t worry, love, no one else would notice. They’re too busy grabbing their sides and laughing at your silly jokes.”

I raised an onion the way one would raise a mug to make a toast. “We will keep each other’s trust, Bette.”

She lifted a turnip. We tapped them together.

“I feel a headache coming on.” She frowned. “Tomorrow eve. Be here at dusk.

“And something else, Hugh. You asked if a woman was being held in the cells. I checked. There is a lady staying in the Tavern. One who might fit your wife’s description. Fair-haired. And she keeps talking about an infant.”

These words… They were like the most exquisite magic for my soul. What was only a hope for so long now sprang free. Sophie was here! I knew it now. I would see her tomorrow night. At last!

I hugged Bette, almost knocking the poor woman into her pot of soup.

Chapter 49

ALL THE NEXT DAY I waited for dusk to fall. Time passed with agonizing slowness. To make things worse, Baldwin called for me to entertain him while he got new boots measured by a shoemaker. What scum he was. I had to keep him amused while I thought of plunging a dagger into his heart.

Yet all the while I could barely count the time. I kept repeating Bette’s words to myself. I went over in my mind what I would do. How I would pull this off. I dreamed of Sophie’s face-the face I had known since I was a child. I imagined us back at our inn. Rebuilding it from scratch… Starting our life again. Having another child.

I sat on my bare mat as the afternoon wound down, watching the sun descend. Finally, the light from the slats above my space grew dim. It was dusk… It was finally time to see Sophie.

I made my way down to the kitchen. Bette was bustling about, complaining to the staff, a damp cloth pressed to her head for effect. “I’ve got to lie down. I’ve got the duke’s meals still to prepare. Who will carry over the soup to the Tavern? Hugh, what luck,” she said, spotting me. “Will you be a dear?”

“I am but two hands,” I joked to the staff, “and one …” I wiggled a finger and sniffed with a wrinkled nose. “… I use for scratching.”

[152] “That’s all I need.” Bette led me away. “Just make sure the other stays out of the soup.”

She took a covered pot from the hearth and announced, “Give it to Armand, the jailer. And give him that jug of wine. You’ve done me a good turn, fool.” Then she gripped me conspiratorially by the arm. “I wish you luck, Hugh. Be careful. It’s a bad place you go to now. It is hell.”

I carried the pot and the jug of wine across the courtyard. My arms trembled a bit. Two guards stood at the door of the keep, different ones than those who had booted me away the other day.

“Ding, ding, ding … dinner bell,” I announced ceremoniously.

“Who the hell are they putting to work in the kitchen now?” one of them asked.

“I do it all… jokes to dessert. The duke’s expenses must be trimmed.”

“The duke must be bankrupt if he sent you,” the other guard said.

To my relief, they didn’t question me. One opened the heavy door. “If you had nicer tits, I’d carry it down for you.” He sniffed.

The door slammed shut behind me. I felt a tremor of relief. I was in!

I stood in a narrow stone corridor lit only by candles. A narrow stairway leading down.

A draft hit me, then noises-the clang of iron, someone calling out, a high-pitched wail. I stepped down cautiously, my heart nearly bounding out of my chest, my neck beaded with cold sweat.

I descended one step at a time, the pot clanging against the narrow walls, the wine jug pressed to my chest.

The fearsome noises intensified. The smell grew horrible, like burned flesh. It made me think of Civetot.

I winced. Poor Sophie. If she was here, I had to get her out. Tonight.

[153] Finally, the passageway leveled off into a low, dungeonlike setting. The foul stink of excrement was all around. There was shouting from within, like that of mad people, terrifying moans and shrieks. I saw a hearth, and in it iron instruments, their tips white with heat.

My stomach grew hollow. Suddenly I did not know what to do-if I found her.

Two soldiers sat straddling a wooden tabletop, stripped down to sleeveless tunics and skirts. A swarthy one with hulking, imposing shoulders snickered at the sight of me. “We must be fucked. Look who brings our dinner.”

“You’re Armand?” I lugged the pot over.

He shrugged. “And if you’re the new chef, the duke’s really got it in for these poor bastards. Where’s Bette?”

“Down with a headache. She sent me instead.”

“Just set it here. There’s a pot from this afternoon you can take back up.”

I placed the pot on the table by a stack of wooden bowls. “How many guests tonight… in la Taverne?”

“What’s it to you?” the other asked.

“Never been down here before.” I looked around, ignoring him. “Cheery. You mind if I take a look?”

“This isn’t a marketplace, fool. You’ve done your chore. Now bug off.”

My chance was slipping away. I felt I only had a moment more to make my case. “C’mon, let me take in their food. I spend my day making silly jokes and spinning around like a top. Let me take a look. I’ll bring them their bowls.”

I placed the wine jug on the table in front of him. “Anyway, you guys really want to touch that slop?”

Armand slowly pulled the jug toward him. He took a swig of wine, then passed it along.

“What the hell.” He shrugged and winked at his partner. “Why not give the jester’s dick its rise. Take what you want in there. It’s free for the asking.”

Chapter 50

I TURNED A CORNER in the dungeon and then I could make out the cells. The odor here was beyond belief, nearly unbearable. My God, Sophie …

I finally set down the soup pot and started to work. These people had to be fed, and while I did the task, I would search for Sophie in every dark corner.

I began sloshing thin, murky gruel into bowls. My heart beat like a warning bell swung furiously back and forth.

I carried two bowls to the first cell. My hands were trembling. Soup splattered on the floor.

At first glance, the cell seemed to be empty. It was like a cave opening, dug out of solid rock, just a few feet deep. No light or sound, just the reek of human filth. A wet rat slithered out in front of my eyes.

Then, in the back, I saw the glow of eyes. They flickered, tremulous and afraid. From out of the shadow-a head. Hairless, gaunt, a sunken face covered with runny sores.

The prisoner crawled toward me, wild-eyed. “I mus’ be dead if it’s a fool come for me.”

“Better a fool than Saint Peter.” I knelt and shoved a bowl under the bars.

His thin, palsied hand darted out and grabbed the wooden bowl. A momentary sadness ran through me. I had no idea [155] what he had done to put him here. In Treille, there was no reason to assume he was guilty of anything.

But I was not here for him. …

In the next cell was curled a Moor. He was naked and filthy; rats nibbled at sores on his legs. He muttered in a tongue I did not understand. He barely looked up at me, glassy-eyed. “Take heart, old man.” I passed the bowl under the bars. “Your time is almost up.”

I moved on to the next cells, not even going back for more soup. As with the first, the captives looked more like hunted animals than men. They groaned, peered out at me with beaten, yellow eyes. I took a breath against the urge to violently retch.

Then, from farther along, came a wail. A woman! My body tensed. Sophie? I did not know if I could go on.

“There’s your date, fool,” Armand brayed from his post. “Feel free to slip inside if she suits you. She has a magical tongue.”

I clenched my fists and made my way toward the woman’s cries. Inside my belt, I grasped the hilt of my knife. If this was Sophie, I would surely kill the guards. Norcross too.

The woman’s wail echoed again. “Go to her, fool. The bitch doesn’t like to be stood up,” yelled Armand.

I held my breath and stepped in front of the woman’s cell. The stench was worse here. Unbearable. Why was that?

She was crouched in a tight ball deep in the cell. A beam of light slanted across her hair, which was long and straggly. She seemed to clutch a doll or toy, whimpering like an abandoned child herself. “My baby,” she said, no more than a whisper. “Please… my baby needs milk.”

I could barely see her. I could not make out her age or her face. I gathered myself and said, “Is that you, Sophie?” Fear shot through me. My breath froze. To be kept like this-it Would be better if she was dead.

The woman sputtered out nearly incoherent phrases. “Poor baby,” she muttered. “Baby needs milk.” Then something that sounded like… Phillipe.

[151] Oh, God. I froze. I stepped closer to the bars. What had they done to her? “Sophie,” I called. My tongue grew dry on her name. It seemed her shape, her hair. Please, turn toward me. Let me see.

“Little one needs milk…” she mumbled again. “What can I do? Breasts are dry.”

Tears welled in my eyes. I still could not see. “Sophie,” I said again.

I rammed myself up against the bars. “Baby needs milk,” I heard her say again, then suddenly she emitted an ear-splitting, wrenching howl. It was like a blade running through me.

I reached out, and her eyes finally caught sight of me. The breath froze in my chest. Her strawlike hair was falling over her face. But her eyes locked on mine. Yellow. Veins running through them. The nose flat and pocked.

Oh, God! It was not her.

My legs buckled. It was not her. Part of me was giddy with joy; another, crestfallen and disappointed.

“My baby …” the woman called, pleading. She held out the doll for me to see.

Oh, God. I recoiled. It was no doll. It was real. A tiny newborn child, bound in a caul, clearly dead, stillborn.

“How can I help you?” I whispered. “How?”

“Can’t you see?” she pushed the infant toward me. “The child needs milk.”

“Let me help.”

“Milk!” the woman shrieked. “Feed him.”

There was nothing I could do. The poor woman was raving mad.

I stared for a moment more, then flung myself back down the corridor toward the stairs.

The jailers laughed as I went by. “Leaving so soon, fool?” cried Armand. “What, no jokes?”

I bolted out of the dungeon and up the stairs.

Chapter 51

I RAN IN A COLD SWEAT back to the castle and my alcove under the stairs. There, I threw myself on my mat. My breath raced panicked and wild.

It was not her.

My beloved Sophie must he dead after all.

For the first time, I knew what had been understood all along by the people in my town, Sophie’s brother, even Norbert, my mentor. There was no hope. She had been ripped from her child, raped, and left to die on the road. I knew it now, the darkest lesson in my life.

I buried my head in my hands. This silly charade was over. I had clung to a hope and now that hope was dashed. I must go. I ripped off my jester’s hat and threw it onto the floor. I was no jester. Just a fool! A bigger fool had never lived.

I sat there for a long time. Letting the truth sink in.

I heard footsteps near my bed, then a voice. “Is that you, Hugh?”

I raised my head… to see Estella, the chamberlain’s wife.

She had winked at me in court. Many times. She’d grabbed at me and teased. Tonight, she had a loose shawl covering her shoulders; thick auburn hair, which I had only seen braided and pinned until now, fell all about her neck. Her eyes were [158] round and mischievous. And her timing-couldn’t have been worse!

“The hour is late, my lady. I am not at work.”

“Perhaps I did not come for work,” Estella said, stepping into my bed-space. She let her shawl drop, revealing a loosely fitted bodice.

“What striking red hair,” she whispered. “Now how is it such a fiery fool can look so sad?”

“Please, my lady, I am not one for jokes this night. I’ll be funny again in the morning.”

“I don’t need to laugh right now, Hugh. Let me feel you in another way.”

She sat down beside me. Close. Her body was scented with fresh lavender and lilies. She reached out and stroked my face. I moved away from her touch.

“I have never seen such hair.” She seemed fixed on it. “It is the color of a flame. What are you really like, Hugh, when you are free of all those jokes?”

She pushed herself even closer. I felt the fullness of her breasts against my chest. One of her legs straddled mine.

“Please, my lady.”

But Estella pressed on. She wiggled her shoulders, letting her blouse fall to her waist. Her breasts tumbled forward. Then I felt the hot tip of her tongue dance on my neck.

“I bet other parts of you contain the same fire as your hair. Touch me, Hugh. If you do not, I’ll tell the duchess you tried to grope under my dress. A commoner touching a noble’s wife… Not a role you want to play.”

I was in a trap. If I resisted her molestations, I would be charged with molesting her. She nibbled at me. Then her hand entered my tunic, probing for my cock.

At that moment I felt the tip of a blade digging into my neck. I held very still. A male voice boomed, “What mischief have I stumbled onto?”

Chapter 52

THE KNIFE SLOWLY DREW BACK and I turned to face Norcross. The monster was grinning down at me.

Norcross dug the blade in again, and I felt the warmth of blood trickling down my neck.

“A nasty situation, fool. The lady Estella is the wife of the duke’s chamberlain, a member of the court. You must be mad to wag your dick at such a lady.”

Panic pumped through my chest as I realized I had been set up. “I did nothing, my lord.” My heart pounded wildly.

“The little dick had no urge.” Estella sighed. “It appears our fool’s only ardor is in his hair.”

Norcross grabbed me by the tunic and raised me, blade under my chin. Suddenly the bastard’s eyes lit up with recognition.

“His hair … I do know you from somewhere else. Where, fool? Tell me.”

I saw that I was doomed. I shot a glare back in his face. “My wife… What did you do to Sophie?”

“Your wife.” The knight sniffed. “What would I do with the wife of a lowly fool? Except fuck her.”

I lunged toward him, but he gripped me by the hair, and with the leverage of his arms and the blade stuck firmly under [160] my chin, forced me down, slowly, to my knees. “Listen good, fool. I have seen you. But where? Where have I seen your face before?’

“Veille du Père.” I spat out the words.

“That little shithole.” Norcross snorted.

“You burned our inn. You killed my wife and child, Phillipe.”

He was thinking back. The tiniest smile cracked his lips. “I do remember now… You were the little red squirrel who tried to stop me from dunking the miller’s son.”

Norcross’s smile widened. “And what of the vaunted Hugh? The jester of jesters who studied under Norbert at Borée?” His grin deepened into a roaring laugh. “You? You are an innkeeper! A fraud.”

I pressed toward him again, but his blade stabbed into my neck. I felt it cut skin. “You took my wife. You hurled my son into flames.”

“If I did, all the merrier, you lowly worm.” Norcross shrugged. Then he winked at Estella. “I can see you are greatly offended, my lady. Go now and report the affront.”

She righted her blouse and scurried away. “I will, my lord. Thank you for coming when you did.” She ran out of the room. “Guards …” I heard her shout echo. “Help me! Guards!”

Norcross turned back to me. His eyes were hard-set and victorious. “What do you say, fool? It seems the laugh is mine after all.”

Chapter 53

I WAS HURLED, hands bound, into a dark, empty cell on the castle’s first floor. There I nervously passed the night.

I knew my fate was sealed. Lady Estella would play the offended role, just as she had played me last night. Norcross, the vindicated hero. It would be my word against that of nobles. All the laughter in the world couldn’t save me now.

I was jolted by a loud rattling at the door. A sliver of light appeared beneath it. It was day. Three brawny guards in Baldwin ’s uniform came into the room. The captain yanked me up. “If you know any good jokes, carrot-top, now would be the time…”

I was pushed roughly into the great hall. The court was buzzing with knights and courtiers just as it had been the day I arrived. A messenger was informing the court about some renowned knight who had been slaughtered by outlaws in a neighboring duchy.

Baldwin slouched in his elevated chair, chin in hand, and beckoned the man forward. “The vaunted Adhémar… killed in his own home?”

“Not just killed, my lord…” The messenger was clearly uncomfortable, forced to deliver such news. “… Impaled to the wall of his chapel by his own limbs, his wife next to him. The lord was crucified.”

[162] “Crucified,” Baldwin rose slowly. “You say he was roused from his own bed by bandits?”

“Marauders was more like it. They rode in armed and dressed for battle, their faces hidden behind their headpieces. They bore no markings on their armor except for one, a black cross.”

“A black cross?” Baldwin widened his eyes. I could not tell if his shock was sincere or pretended. “Norcross, do you know of such a band?”

From the crowd, Norcross stepped forward. He had on a long red surcoat and his war sword hung in his belt. “I do not, my liege.”

“Poor Adhémar.” Baldwin swallowed. “Tell me, messenger, what treasure did these cowards seek?”

“I know not.” The messenger shook his head. “Adhémar had just returned from the Holy Land, where he had been wounded. He was said to have come back bearing valuable spoils. I had heard the very ashes of Saint Matthew.”

“The ashes of Matthew,” Baldwin said. “Such a prize would be worth the price of a kingdom itself.”

“Only one relic is holier,” Norcross said.

“The lance of Longinus.” Baldwin ’s eyes flashed. “Whose blade was dipped in the Savior’s own blood.”

Hidden riders, burning and slaughtering. I did not doubt Norcross was behind these murders too. How I wanted to cut his throat.

“Lord,” Norcross continued, “Adhémar’s fate is sealed, but there is other business to be done.”

“Ah, yes, the fate of our little fool.” Baldwin waved the messenger away, then sat back down and with his finger motioned me forward.

“I am told, fool, your little dick was wagging itself around where it does not belong. You seem to have offended a great many people in your short stay with us.”

[163] I glared at Norcross. “It is I who have suffered the greatest offense.”

“You? How so?” Baldwin chuckled. “Was Briesmont’s wife so unpleasant?” He picked a fistful of nuts out of a bowl and began to munch.

“I never touched the lady.”

“And yet the evidence says otherwise. You contradict the testimony of a member of my own court. The offended party as well. Against the word of a fool… from what I am now told, not even a true fool.”

I wrestled in my bonds toward Norcross. “This noble member of your court has killed my wife, my lord. My wife and child…”

There was a hush in the crowd.

Norcross shook his head. “The fool has it in his mind that I ruined him as punishment for abandoning his obligation to you when he ran off to the Crusade.”

“And did you, knight?” asked Baldwin.

Norcross merely shrugged. “Truly, lord, I do not recall.”

A trickle of the cruelest laughter sprinkled through the room. “The knight does not recall, ex-fool. Do you contradict again?”

“It was him, your lordship. His face was hidden, just like it was to this poor knight spoken of today.”

Norcross stepped toward me, reaching for his sword. “Again, you incite me, fool. I will split you in two.”

“Be still.” The duke put up his hand. “You will have your chance. You make a grave charge, fool. Yet I am informed the Crusade continues, that the armies of Raymond and Bohemond are now in sight of the Holy City. Yet you, somehow, are here. Tell me, how was your service there discharged so soon?”

I was about to stammer back a reply, but to this charge I had none. I dropped my head.

A convicting silence filled the room.

[164] Baldwin curled a smile. “You claim injury, fool, yet it seems it is your offenses that begin to add up. To the crimes of adultery and fraud, I must add desertion.”

A rising anger swelled in my chest. I lunged, in my bonds, toward Norcross, but before I had gone a step, the duke’s men kicked me to the floor.

“The fool wants at you, Norcross,” Baldwin said.

“And I him, my lord.”

“And you shall have him. But it belittles you, knight, to take him in contest. I think I have let you suffer ill from this squirrel once too often. Take him away.” He waved. “At noon tomorrow you may chop off his head.”

“You honor me.” The knight bowed.

Baldwin shook his head sadly. “Fool, innkeeper, spy… whatever I should call you, it is a great shame. We will have to deal with Palimpost once more. For your stay here, you certainly provided a good laugh.” He stood, wrapped his cloak around himself, and prepared to leave. Then Baldwin turned. “And Norcross…”

“Yes, my liege?”

“No need to waste a sharp blade on the fool’s neck.”

Chapter 54

I WAS HURLED down the stairs to the dungeon, my knees and ribs scraping against the hard rock floor.

My nostrils were forced to suck in that same repulsive stench from the night before.

I heard laughter and the clang of a heavy door as two burly guards grabbed my arms and tossed me into an open cell.

When my eyes cleared, I saw Armand, the jailer, with a mocking grin. “Back so soon, jester? You must have liked the accommodations after all.”

I was about to tell him to go to Hell, but he kicked me in the stomach and the air rushed out of my lungs. “This time I’m afraid we’ll be supplying the stew.”

The guards laughed. Armand, with the strength of a beast, yanked me up to a sitting position. He knelt next to me and shook his head. “Always the scum they bring me. Never a noble accused of a fancy crime. Just the whores and the motherfuckers, church thieves, beggars, a few Jews… But a jester… That’s a new one.”

Armand’s partner came in, lugging an armful of heavy chains. “So we must bind you, jester. And for such a short stay… But the duke has paid for the deluxe room, so chains it is.”

Armand held me up, pinning my hands behind my back. [166] “You’re a lucky fool. The blade’s painless. Just a little pinprick… here.” He pinched my neck. “If you stayed here a while, I could show you some real fun. Ball crackers, nostril rippers, eye screws… red-hot pokers, right up the old ass. Sure cleans out the sinuses.”

He nodded toward his partner, who slowly wound the first ring of chain around my chest.

My mind flashed to attention. “Please.” I put up a hand to distract them. “Wait a minute.” I took a deep breath, quietly sucking in a chest full of air.

“I know.” Armand sighed. “It’s a little confining at first. But when you get used to them, you’ll be sleeping like a log.”

I put my hand up for another moment, then I flashed him a smile of thanks. I took in three more deep breaths, forcing as much air as I could into my lungs. I felt my whole chest expand.

“Ready?” The jailer arched his eyebrows.

I nodded. “Ready.”

Chapter 55

INSIDE THE TINY CELL, I twisted and squirmed on my back, and I ground my arms against the tight chains.

I had no idea what time it was, how long I had been here. I only knew that if I was still here when they came tomorrow, I was a dead man.

I let out all my breath. And the slightest space opened to move my arms.

Hours passed. A finger’s breadth of freedom came. Then another. I felt the chains loosen some, but not enough.

I narrowed my shoulders and tucked my chin inside the chain. For the first time in hours, I took a breath with ease. I snaked an arm through the bonds. Then the other, and a loop of chain went over my head.

Then I heard the echo of voices coming down the stairs. Someone delivering dinner. Time for soup. The guards were taking their meal, laughing as they ate.

Other prisoners were grumbling, calling out. Then footsteps… a last meal arriving for me.

“So,” a familiar voice said with a sigh, “it seems I am back in business.”

I raised my eyes. It was Palimpost, the deposed jester, standing in front of my cell. He carried my staff.

[168] “Come to gloat,” I muttered, swallowing the bitterest taste of defeat.

“Not at all.” He dangled a set of keys. “In truth, I have come to set you free.”

I widened my eyes in surprise. I was sure this had to be some kind of cruel joke. Payback … I waited for the guards to come and laugh. But they did not.

“Bette and I have drugged the guards with the soup. Quick now, let’s get you out of here.”

“Bette … and you … ! I could not believe what he was saying. This was the man I had had sacked. Now he was dangling my freedom before my eyes. “Is this real?”

“It is real, if you can get up off your ass.” He inserted a key into the lock and turned it, the door creaking open.

I still could not believe it. But it did not matter. Even if this was just a cruel joke, even if Norcross hid a few feet away, set to cut me in two, I was dead tomorrow anyway.

“Somehow we have to get you out of those chains.” Palimpost exhaled.

“Not a problem,” I said. I wiggled my shoulders and arms, and before his eyes, slithered through the top links. Then, I began to unwrap the chains until they fell to my ankles. I kicked them free.

The jester looked astonished. “Damn, you are good,” he exclaimed. “Quick … come.”

I held him back. “Why … why are you doing this for me?”

“Professional courtesy.” The jester shrugged.

“Please, do not joke.” I put my hand on his shoulder. “Tell me why…”

He looked at me with pained eyes. “You saved the loved ones of a friend of mine. You think you are the only one who would risk everything for love?”

I stared at him in disbelief. “You… and Bette?”

“What’s so hard to believe, man? Besides, it would have been a shame to waste you. You really weren’t half bad.”

[169] He handed me my pouch of belongings, my staff, and a dark-colored cloak. I removed the knife from my pouch and put it in my belt, under my tunic. Then I donned the cloak and headed for the stairs.

“Not that way,” Palimpost cautioned, taking my arm. “Follow me.”

He led me deeper into the dungeon. The jagged cavern widened, then narrowed again into an opening no bigger than a small cave. At a spot he knew, Palimpost knelt and pulled a stone from the wall near the floor. A passageway appeared.

“There’s a fork halfway through. When you reach it, head left. It empties into the moat. Head toward the forest. In the darkness you’ll be safe. Go right, and you’ll end up back at the castle. Remember-left.”

I crouched down to the passage. “You are a good man. I am sorry that I caused you any harm.”

“Oh, what’s a little risk of one’s life when there’s love in the air?” He grinned. “Tell Norbert he should not sleep easy. Next time, it will be I who presses the attack.”

He pushed me forward and I steadied myself with my staff. The passage was low ceilinged, narrow, and jagged. My feet struck cold water up to my shins. It smelled foul. I bumped into floating objects. I was sure they were dead rats.

I waved good-bye and, leveling my rod, hustled through. Left, Palimpost had said, beyond the castle walls. To the forest. And freedom.

But when I got to the fork, I didn’t hesitate. I turned right. I headed along the dark, murky walls. Back to the castle…

There was one last thing I had to do.

Chapter 56

THE DARK TUNNEL LET OUT, of all places, in the hearth of the great meeting room deep inside the castle.

I pushed a stone slab out of the way of the opening and wormed my way through. Sleeping knights lay all around. If they woke, I was as good as dead.

I crept silently about the room, lifting a sword from one knight who snored dead to the world. I snatched a piece of cheese off the floor and ate the morsel furtively. Then I hurried out of the room.

I knew not what hour it was, but the castle halls were dark and completely quiet. Declining candles flickered against the walls.

I rushed toward the castle’s main entrance, careful not to encounter anyone.

Outside the entryway my heart relaxed; I had not been seen. Soldiers milled about the dark courtyard. Guards paced on the ramparts. A horse neighed as a rider galloped in from outside. I quickly crossed the courtyard huddled in my cloak.

I knew the room where Norcross slept, one near the barracks. It lay up a narrow stone staircase, torches lighting the walls on either side.

I made my way to the door. Then I took several deep [171] breaths. A flash of nerves slithered down my spine. From inside the room came curious noises. Giggling and squeals. The bastard was in, all right.

I removed the sword from under my cloak. This was for my wife and child.

Chapter 57

I UNLATCHED AND PUSHED OPEN the heavy door to Norcross’s room. It was dimly lit. A mound of clothes lay on the floor. Norcross’s… and a lady’s…

There was the sound of heavy panting and grunts.

On the heavy-posted bed, I saw a partially clad woman bracing her arms against the headboard with her legs akimbo. Norcross, wearing only his undertunic, hammered her from behind.

It took me a moment to recognize the lady Estella. Her and Norcross’s ardor was so great, I wasn’t spotted until I was well into the room.

The knight turned first. “Who goes?”

I stepped forward into the light and winked at Estella. “My lady.” I bowed. “It seems you are once again offended. As often as possible, it appears.”

“You…” Norcross said. His eyes lit up as if he were staring at a roasted side of beef.

“Me,” I replied, a smile on my lips.

Norcross pulled himself off Estella, who covered herself with bedsheets. He stood up, his prick still quivering, and crudely wiped himself with his own shirt. “However you got yourself free, you have great balls to come here.”

“Good. Then at least one of us does,” I said, glancing down.

[173] Norcross curled a smile. In no hurry, he reached for his sword. “I might as well take your head tonight. Then I can sleep late tomorrow.”

Estella grabbed her garments and ran, half naked, toward the door.

“Do not go, Estella,” Norcross said. “Nothing perks my prick like spilling a man’s guts in front of him. I’ll be back inside you before you’re dry.”

Norcross chuckled. He seemed in no great hurry as he circled away from the bed, flexing his chest muscles, looking at me contemptuously, as if I were a bug he was about to squash. “Here, fool, have your justice.” Then he let out a fierce cry and swung his sword at my neck in a mighty arc.

I stood my ground and his sword clashed against mine with a loud clang. At the impact, I swung underneath, but Norcross parried as if his sword had no weight.

He was a skilled fighter. I could see that from the first blows. I had learned well in the Crusade-I was certainly frightened of no one-but it flashed through my head that he was far more experienced than I… a knight! And a killer of women and children.

Norcross grunted and swung his sword fiercely, as if to cut me in two. I leaped backward, the blade slicing by with a loud whoosh.

Norcross swung the weapon in a continuous motion and charged at me again. I breached my sword to take the blow and forced his to the floor. We stood there, eye to eye, our swords pinned. “You fight like a woman.” He grinned.

Then he butted me in the forehead and sent me reeling.

I caught myself on the bed, Estella scampering out of my way. He charged again, this time hammering his sword twice at my shoulders. Somehow I blocked both blows.

Sparks flew from the clash of steel on steel. The chilling clang of death reverberated in my ears.

I swung back. Norcross blocked it with ease. He stood up [174] my sword almost effortlessly. Then, as he pushed it downward, it grazed across my arm, taking a slice of flesh. I let out a howl. Singeing pain sliced through me. The wound ran red on my forearm.

“Know the feel.” Norcross grinned assuredly. “That will be your neck a moment from now.”

He came at me, swinging his mighty sword back and forth. I blocked it two, three times, but the weight was overpowering.

I felt my arms growing weary. Each blow I found myself parrying late. I was a mere instant from having his sword plunge through my chest. I wanted to kill him. I wanted him to die. But I was losing. Any moment might be my last.

Finally, he forced me back into a corner. Frantically, I swung one last time, and he blocked me with ease. He was laughing, knowing he had me. His stale breath was in my face. The smell of his sweat tormented me. The awful sneer on his face could be the last thing I ever saw.

“Go to your grave knowing that I fucked your wife. I shot my seed into her, and when I finished, she asked for more.”

My sword was slipping in my grip. His was closing on my neck, inches from slicing through the bone. With my free hand, I reached into my belt. My knife there … My last chance.

Norcross’s eyes were fiery and determined. “Listen close, fool. That is the last thing you will ever hear.”

“For Sophie… for Phillipe!” I yelled in his face.

In that instant, I shoved the knife upward into his chest. I felt sinew tear, bone crack, but he did not move a muscle in his face.

I pushed the knife harder and harder, but his gaze bore down on me. Incredible! He continued to press his blade into my neck.

Then Norcross opened his mouth as if to add one last thought. This time a stream of blood rushed out. I saw his hands loosen on the sword. Then he took a step backward. A stagger, actually.

[175] I pushed him away, my knife buried deep in his chest.

Estella screamed as if the knife were sticking in her.

Norcross was trying like a drunken man to regain his balance. He wobbled, then he fell to his knees. He looked up at me, disbelief in his eyes, cupping his own vitals in his hands. Then he keeled over dead.

I felt overcome, at first with relief and then with sadness. I had avenged Sophie and Phillipe, but I realized there was nothing for me now.

I picked up my sword. I had to get out of here. I took Estella by the hair. She had set me up. She’d nearly cost me my life. I held her pretty head back and ran the tip of my sword across her neck. “Do not shout or call out. Do you understand?”

She nodded, terror in her round eyes.

“You are most lucky,” I said, forcing a smile, “that I am a gentle-fool.”

Chapter 58

EXHAUSTED, AND AFRAID that Estella would sound the alarm, I staggered from the fallen knight’s room. I was now a murderer.

I took my staff and sword and was able to climb down the ramparts from an undetected spot near Norcross’s chamber. The moat was dry, and I crossed it on foot.

From there, I ran. Ran in the shadows through the darkened streets of the surrounding village. Ran until I found the woods.

My arm hung like a roast sliced open. The wound was bleeding profusely. I came upon a stream and cleaned it as best I could and tied it with a strip of cloth from my tunic. I was an outcast again, a criminal now, not just a deserter from a far-off war but a murderer-a killer of a noble. No doubt Baldwin would come after me. I needed to put as much distance as I could between me and Treille. But where would I go?

I hid in the woods, keeping off the main roads. I was hungry and cold, but the knowledge that I had avenged Sophie and Phillipe warmed me inside. I felt vindicated, restored. I hoped God forgave me.

Just after first light, I heard a loud rumble. I hid in the brush as a posse of armed riders, dressed in Baldwin ’s colors, galloped by. I didn’t know where they were heading. Veille du Père? Sweeping the roads and villages?

[177] I headed east, tracking the main road, through the deepest part of the forest. I avoided any travelers I saw. I didn’t know where I was going. My arm ached and throbbed.

A day out, I came to a fork in the road that I now knew well. I had passed here on my recent journey to Treille.

To the east lay my old village, Veille du Père. A day’s trek. My inn was there, Matthew, my brother-in-law, what family I still had. My friends… Odo, Georges… Memories of Sophie and the grave of my poor baby son…

They would welcome me there. I was Hugh, spinner of tales. I made everybody laugh. Surely they would welcome back a lost son.

Then a sharp sadness came over me.

I couldn’t go back there. My village lay in Baldwin ’s territory. They would look for me there. And it was not my home, not anymore. Just a place where memories would haunt my dreams.

Like a good song, life has verses, the goliards had taught me. Each verse has to be sung. It takes all of them to make a song. It is the entire chanson you name, but when you think of it, when you smile, it is a favorite verse that delights your ears.

Sophie … for me, you will always be that verse.

But now I must go … I must leave you.

I gripped my staff. I took a deep breath.

I chose the trail north, toward whatever new life lay ahead.

Toward Borée.