Castaways in Time (The After Cilmeri Series) (33 page)

David hadn’t yet looked at Valence himself.
It was petty of him, but he didn’t trust himself not to give the
game away. The less interaction he had with Valence the better.
David held up his hand to stop the men with him from continuing,
and rode the last yards to meet Valence alone. They were actors in
an ancient play, each reliving the role of innumerable men who had
come before them. Some traditions would have had them both
dismount, but neither side trusted the other enough for that.

Finally, David brought his eyes to meet
Valence’s. The hatred in them shocked him, and bile rose in his
throat at how much he shared it. Valence had been responsible for
more deaths, more disunity, than any baron he’d ever met, barring
King Edward himself. The two men stared at each other for a count
of ten, and then Valence said, “What are your terms?” Since Valence
had been the one to raise the white flag, it was his job to speak
first. He was the supplicant, though David wasn’t sure he knew
it.

“Total surrender to me,” David said. “Lay
down your weapons and end this war you started.”

“If I do not?”

David gestured to the fields around them
where men were lined up as far as the eye could see. “You are
outnumbered and surrounded. More men come every hour to join my
ranks. How many of your soldiers will you sacrifice to your
pride?”

Valence scowled. “What of my captains?”

“I will allow the common soldiers to go
free, without their weapons, of course,” David said. “I will decide
the fate of the noblemen among you on a case-by-case basis. Some
may go free; some may share your fate. It is up to them.”

“What does that mean?” Valence sounded
genuinely puzzled.

“You have attempted to incite my people to
rebellion,” David said. “You didn’t do it alone. Your captains may
have sworn fealty to you, but each has a soul and must answer for
his actions.”

“You will have their heads,” Valence
said.

“Did I say so?” David said. “Do I look like
King Edward to you?”

“If I surrender, what are your plans for
me?”

“I have chosen to remain detached from any
decision,” David said. “We are not rabble but civilized men. You
will be judged in a courtroom by your peers.”

Valence’s face paled, and some of the
belligerence seemed to leave him. But then he recovered himself,
and his chin jutted out defiantly. “And if I refuse your
terms?”

“You sign the death warrants of all of your
men.”

Silence fell between them. David watched
Valence, who was looking beyond him to the battlement of the town.
David didn’t turn to look too, but he knew what Valence was seeing:
the wall-walk was lined with the people of Windsor and David’s
men.

“This wasn’t how it was meant to end.”
Valence’s voice was soft, almost contemplative. It annoyed David.
Valence had proved time and again that he responded to little else
but overt displays of power. He had no business feeling regret.

“The moment you took up arms against me, it
could end no other way.”

“So be it.”

For a moment David thought he’d won—until
Valence gave him a wolfish grin and added, “We will fight to the
death rather than surrender our honor to you!”

Valence’s last words were shouted to the sky
as he turned his horse and raced back towards his own lines. The
men who’d accompanied him made an opening in their ranks for him to
pass through, pulling out their swords and raising their shields as
they did so.

As Valence raced away, a single arrow shot
from his lines, straight into David’s chest at the breastbone. That
the archer must be a Welshman passed through David’s head in the
second before he was knocked back in the saddle and thrown head
over heels off the horse by the force of the shot. He did a
complete flip, landing on his feet behind his horse.

The arrow stuck out from David’s chest, the
tip caught in a link of his armor. The padding beneath his armor
may have saved him without the ceramic plate in the Kevlar vest
underneath that. But with both, he’d have no more than a bad bruise
on his chest. Regardless, the arrow was meant to kill him. This was
more like what David had expected from Valence, and something for
which he’d prepared.

As his men converged on him, David
straightened and thrust his sword into the air. “Now!”

The trampled and distressed wheat all around
Valence’s soldiers burst upwards, revealing armed men. Horses
whinnied and reared, and chaos engulfed the field. Arrows flew from
Windsor’s battlement. One of Valence’s soldiers was hit in the
neck. Blood spurted from the wound, and he fell to the ground. Five
men had been given the specific task of subduing Valence’s horse
and capturing the renegade baron. At their sudden appearance out of
the grass, Valence’s horse spooked. The baron jerked at the reins,
while two men grabbed the horse’s bridle and three others hauled
Valence to the ground.

The arrows continued to fly from both camps,
adding to the carnage. David leapt back into the saddle. Standing
in the stirrups, he raised his sword high again and bellowed,
“Hold! Hold I say!”

David’s cry to
hold
, combined with
the sight of him plucking the arrow from his chest and throwing it
to the ground, stopped all the action.

The men David had tasked with taking Valence
wrestled him towards the spot where David waited. Valence had lost
his helmet in the struggle, and his normally well-coifed hair was
askew. He was a blonde man going gray, with a paunch and jowls.
With a wolfish grin of his own, Bevyn reversed Valence’s sword and
handed it to David.

“This is an outrage!” Valence said. All he
had left was words, so David didn’t begrudge him the opportunity to
speak them. “I spoke to you under the white flag. You have no right
to take me!”

David dismounted and walked to stand in
front of Valence. He knew he was making his retainers uncomfortable
by approaching his prisoner, but Valence couldn’t harm David
now.

“I have every right,” David said.

Valence spat on the ground. “You have no
honor!”

“On the contrary,” David said. “It would be
far less honorable to allow you to sacrifice more of your men and
mine when you are already defeated.”

“No lord will ever parley with you again!
You—”

David cut him off with a laugh. “Why?
Because I was prepared for you to throw the peace terms back in my
face? To betray the white flag yourself? That arrow that hit me
was—what?—a mistake? You have no leg to stand on.”

Valence wasn’t used to being interrupted.
“Among noblemen—”

David cut him off with a bark. “I am far
less concerned about the sanctity of the white flag than winning
this little war you started. The next time I face another baron in
battle, he will treat with me for the same reason you did: because
he has no other choice. And he will wonder as he does so if I will
do to him as I’ve done to you.”

“You—”

“What you don’t seem to understand is that
the laws of chivalry don’t apply to a traitor. You seem to think
that you have the right to stand before me and speak your mind as
one free man to another. You do not.” David lifted his voice so
everyone within hailing distance could hear what he had to say. “By
capturing you now, I have sent a message to any other baron who
resents my kingship. I was chosen by the people to rule them.”

Valence tried to sputter a response, but
David stepped closer and took Valence’s chin in his hand. “Your
rules don’t apply to me. You, and every other baron who defies me,
should look upon this day and
fear
.”

September, 1289

David

“
K
eep your eyes
closed and open your mouth.” David obeyed his wife from his supine
position on a blanket with Arthur asleep on his chest.

The family had gathered for a picnic on the
lawn by the Thames River: Lili and David, Math and Anna, Bronwen
and Ieuan, plus all the children. David missed Cassie and Callum
acutely, for they should have been here today. His mother and
father were absent too, as they remained in Wales, and he resolved
for all of them to journey there before winter came. Maybe they
could celebrate Thanksgiving at Aber.

Lili popped something cool and juicy into
his mouth, but as the taste hit him, he gagged and half sat up.
“What
is
that.”

Lili stared at him, but Anna giggled. “It’s
a cantaloupe!”

David spit out the offending piece of fruit.
“Not a moldy one, I hope!”

“Of course not.” Lili took Arthur from
David, looking disgruntled. She laid the baby on his back on the
blanket. “We saved one for eating. I think it’s lovely.”

“What David isn’t telling you, sister of
mine,” Anna said, “is that he has always despised most fruits and
vegetables. The fact that we can’t get the same variety here as we
did in the modern world has never bothered him in the
slightest.”

“I’m with you.” Bronwen raised a hand to
David, who slapped her palm. “In graduate school, my four food
groups were diet Coke, coffee, onion rings, and doughnuts.”

“And pizza,” David said.

Bronwen laughed. “Clearly, I’ve been
starving since I got here.”

“You two are disgusting.” Anna pinned her
brother with her gaze. “Enough with the stalling. You need to tell
us everything that happened since you left Windsor. Start at the
beginning and talk until I don’t have any more questions.”

David saluted his sister.

“Yeah, David, do tell,” Bronwen said. “And
what’s with the empty duffel? You bring us back another ream of
paper and nothing else? Where’s my Chapstick? My coffee?”

“I was incarcerated and sick the whole time
I was there,” David said, “as you already know.”

Bronwen rolled onto her stomach and put her
chin in her hands. Ieuan and Math had taken Cadell and Catrin to
the river to throw rocks into the water, so she was momentarily
childless. “Did you ever consider not coming back?”

David scoffed. “Of course not.”

“You could have been killed, you know,”
Bronwen said.

“I was nearly killed about a dozen times,
both here and there,” David said. “Today is the first day since I
returned that I’m not wearing the Kevlar, and you can bet that I
will wear it under my armor from now on.”

“Do you think we’ll ever discover who
informed Valence that you were sailing for Ireland?” Lili sat
cross-legged, slathering butter on a slice of bread. “Or who
sabotaged the rudder of your ship?”

“Only if we’re very lucky,” David said. “Dad
is pursuing all leads from the Cardiff end, but it’s hard to think
that finding the individual saboteur matters. Like the Welsh
archers who fought for him, he was paid by Valence, and Valence is
going to pay for his crimes.”

“You hope,” Bronwen said. “You and your
justice system. You should have hanged him from the battlements
like everyone wanted.”

“That I didn’t is Anna’s fault.” David put
out a hand out to his sister. “If Valence is exonerated, it will be
a miscarriage of justice, but I rule by the law, which isn’t
something I should use when I feel like it and not when I don’t.
Besides, Clare took Valence’s castle in Ireland, and all of
Valence’s supporters have come crawling to me asking for
forgiveness. He’s finished.”

“Valence has pride,” Anna said, “I’ll give
him that.”

“His trial is already a circus and it hasn’t
even started,” Bronwen said.

“I don’t know what a circus is,” Lili said,
“but I think I know what you mean anyway.”

David mumbled to himself. “I was arrogant
enough to think I could control the situation.”

Anna punched his shoulder. “When are you not
arrogant?”

“Hey guys!” David called over to Math and
Ieuan. “The girls are ganging up on me. Again!”

“It’s only what you deserve,” Anna said.

“I thought the whole point was that you
didn’t control what happened next,” Bronwen said. “You aren’t even
going to testify against him, are you?”

“No,” David said. “That would be unfair to
the jurors. Bad enough that many of Valence’s crimes were committed
against me and mine.”

“You’re probably right,” Anna said. “This
isn’t a true democracy. Your barons can’t vote you out of office if
they don’t like what you do, but you can punish them if you don’t
like what they do.”

“You can only change so much so quickly,”
Lili said.

“I’ve told myself that for years. I don’t
know how much longer I can continue to believe it,” David said,
turning serious.

“You are too hard on yourself,” Lili
said.

“If I’m not hard on myself, who will be?” He
took back his son and lay down, adjusting Arthur’s little shirt,
which was warm from the sun. A hat shaded the baby’s face, and he
slept with his little fist just touching his lips. “Not you, I
don’t think.”

“Bevyn always tells you what you don’t want
to hear,” Lili said.

“Less so than in the past.” David had never
told Lili—or anyone else—how Bevyn had conspired on his behalf, but
without his consent, in the run up to David’s coronation. He didn’t
intend to either.

“You’ve still got me,” Anna said.

David laughed. “Thank God for that!”

For a moment, they sat quietly, and then
Bronwen said, “I hope Cassie and Callum are okay.”

“I have to believe they are,” David said. “I
could say
I wish things had been different
a million times
but it doesn’t help. I’ve gone over and over again in my mind the
events leading up to my departure from that world, but at the time,
our choices made sense.”

“Bad things happen,” Lili said. “They happen
all the time. That’s what I’ve been trying to explain to Anna. But
as you well know and have said many times yourself, it’s how you
respond to the bad things that determines what kind of man you are.
Or woman,” Lili amended.