Mary Reed McCall (29 page)

“Is it to win our Mummy home again?” she asked tremulously.

Sympathetic murmurs rippled through the assembly, and the king looked as dismayed as if he’d just stepped into a steaming dunghill with his bare feet. “Nay, lass,” he finally managed to say. “’Tis to help Us to understand what happened the day that your dear Uncle was killed.”

“He wasn’t dear,” Ian said with a snort, finding his voice at last. “He was horrid to us and to Mummy. More than ever on that last day.”

Swiveling his head, Ian looked at Gray. “That knight was with us too,” he said, before addressing Gray directly, his little face wrinkling into a man-sized scowl, “And I believe you to be a good man, sir knight, for trying to help us escape my uncle. Yet ’tis only fair to tell you that if you intend to hurt my mother like Uncle Eduard and my Father did, then as her only champion, I shall have to challenge you to prevent it.”

A few titters mixed in with the renewed murmuring that arose from the crowd, causing the king to raise his hand again. Gray’s belly felt hollow as he looked at the lad, standing so small and defiant in defense of his mother. What must these innocent children think of men and their brutality if their
only real reference came from knowing Eduard and his equally cruel brother?

“Fear not, young Ian,” Gray answered, loudly enough for everyone to hear him. “I will never harm your mother. And while there is breath in my body, I vow that I’ll not allow any other to harm her again either. Never again.”

“That will be all, Lord Camville.” Henry’s tone was quiet but no less menacing. “Not another word from you, lest We be forced to remove you altogether from this chamber.”

Gray forced himself to bite back a retort; he breathed deep and willed his temper in check, knowing as he did the deadly consequences of tweaking the Royal Lion’s tail further at this point. A few tense moments passed. The king’s gaze remained hard on him, but eventually, his continued silence seemed to satisfy. Henry returned his attention to the twins.

“You understand, children,” he said, “that you are under solemn oath as loyal subjects to Us and thence to God, to share what you know of the day your uncle died, or of any other day, should it be asked of you.”

Ian and Isabel didn’t answer, only gazing at their sovereign solemnly before swallowing hard and nodding.

Henry stared down at them. “We are asking you now. Who was it that killed your Uncle Eduard?”

Gray felt every muscle in his body tense as he waited for the children’s answer.
Tell them it was me,
his heart raged silently.
Tell them I killed the bastard
.

Isabel looked like she was going to cry; she clasped her hands in front of herself and turned to
her brother. He gazed back at her, clenching his jaw mutinously. Then he shook his head to show that he would not speak.

“But we promised Mummy,” she whispered, a single tear spilling down her cheek. “We promised always to tell the truth.”

“Not this time.” Ian’s small hands fisted at his sides. “I’m not saying anything. Not unless Mummy tells me I have to.”

As if on signal, both of the children turned their heads to look at their mother. Catherine met their gazes; a calm, peaceful look crossed her features…

And at that moment Gray knew all was lost.

“Mummy?” Isabel asked, her voice choked with tears.

“Ah, my sweethearts. How I love you both,” Catherine murmured, her eyes welling as she tried to smile for them. “But you were right, darling. You must do as I’ve always taught you. Tell King Henry the truth.”

Gray’s stomach clenched and his heart beat shallow. His gaze locked with Catherine’s as Isabel clasped her brother’s hand, faced the king, and finally said, “Mummy said I have to say it, so I will. She’s the one who killed Uncle Eduard. He ran at her, and she stabbed him in the chest with that other knight’s sword.”

“Aye, it was Mummy,” Ian agreed, his gaze downcast.

The chamber erupted into chaos at the children’s proclamation; Gray wanted to roar with pain when Catherine mouthed the words, “I love you,” to
him, silent tears spilling down her face as the guards began to lead her from the tumult surrounding them.

King Henry resumed the dais, and the rest of the royal council stood. He and several of the others looked unsettled by what had just transpired, but he refused to meet Gray’s gaze as he prepared to lead his cabinet of advisors out of the room.

“We will retire in private for sentencing!” one of the Court Officials announced. As if from a great distance, Gray felt someone click the lock on his manacles. A guard murmured, “You are free to go,” and then Gray’s hands fell limp to his sides. His breath rasped harsh in his ears, his vision cluttered with a myriad of colors and images as he gazed first at Catherine, then the king, then at the twins and the crowd that was moving en mass to the doors at the back of the chamber.

Stop!
his agonized brain screamed. It couldn’t end like this. There had to be another way. Something he could do to keep them from taking her away. Something…

“Wait!” He shouted, pushing through the crowd and racing toward the dais where King Henry still stood. “My lord, I ask a moment’s indulgence, that I might offer a proposal.” He looked up at the king, fisting his hands and pressing them into the rich fabric draping the dais near his sovereign’s feet. “Please, Sire, I beg of you to hear me.”

He added the last bit gruffly, not caring anymore that the eyes of all of the other nobles and barons in the court were on him. Not caring that such a public
plea would humble him unforgivably in their perception, likely costing him all of the power and influence he’d managed to amass in his years at Court. Nothing mattered now but saving the woman he loved.

The chamber hushed again as Henry turned with a swish of his lustrous robes. “What is it, Camville?” His voice sounded flat, resigned as he looked down at Gray.

“I ask of Your Highness a boon. Allow me the right of
wergild
, my lord. I will pay whatever you deem fair for the loss of Lord Montford’s services to the Crown, if in return you restore Catherine’s freedom from the debt of his murder.”

“Wergild?”
Henry scowled, staring down at him from his regal height. “You wish to invoke that ancient and barbaric ritual?” He shook his head. “The paying of man-money for murder was a Saxon practice, Camville. It has not seen use in England in nigh on three centuries.”

“Then restore it.”

Henry waved his hand. “Impossible. Even if We chose to allow such an outdated code of law, Lord Montford’s worth as one of Our High Champions is virtually incalculable. ’Twould amount to an enormous sum.”

“Perhaps,” Gray nodded, feeling more hopeful with every passing moment that kept Catherine from sentencing. “And yet I am willing to pay whatever you ask, here and now. Allow me that privilege, my lord, as your faithful servant.”

King Henry had gone still. He looked at Gray and
then to where Catherine stood near the door, surrounded by guards. But Gray didn’t trust himself to meet her gaze himself yet.

Not yet.

Desperate to have this one, last chance, Gray added quietly, “I have never asked a personal boon of you, Sire. Not in all of the seventeen years I have served you. But I do so now, before these gathered here to witness your justice. Invoke your God-given power, Sire. Issue the command for
wergild
in this case, and name me your price.”

Henry’s gaze narrowed. The crowd remained hushed, every person teetering on the edge of anticipation as they awaited the king’s response to his greatest Champion’s strange request.

All of a sudden, the king folded his arms across his chest, his expression shifting to one of cold cunning. The change made Gray’s gut twist, reminding him again of his sovereign’s penchant for fickle and often petulant behavior. He only prayed that he hadn’t overstepped his bounds this time, for the results would surely be fatal.

“So you insist upon a man-price for Montford, do you, Camville?” Henry finally clipped. “Very well, then, you shall have it. You must forfeit all of your titles.
All
of them, along with all of your estates, lands, and the taxes and income they entail. Surrender your entire wealth, every last piece of gold that you’ve earned since the day that I knighted you as a youth on Danbury Field.”

The murmurs in the chamber swelled with disbelief, mingled with a few scandalized gasps.

“Do this,” Henry continued, “and Catherine de Montford will go free from the charge of murder.”

Gray felt his heart beating steadily in his chest. Air seemed to rush into his lungs once more, pure and sweet. Even the chamber torches burned brighter, somehow. And for the first time since this whole nightmare began, his lips edged up in a smile.

Raising his arms, he lifted from his neck the thick gold chain that secured the disk of his baronial seal—the emblem that marked him as a powerful peer of the realm. Removing it over his head, he set it on the dais at the king’s feet. Then he grasped the top edge of his surcoat, emblazoned with his device of a golden eagle clasping a thunderbolt in its beak. With one swift motion, he rent the garment in two, pulling it off to lay it next to his discarded seal.

“It is done,” he said, his voice firm. “I accept your price, Sire, and I pay it in full, most gladly.”

The king gazed down at his former High Champion as if he were sure that the man had lost his mind.

“Do you know what you are saying, Camville? If you do this you will be left a pauper. A man without title, without fortune…without power of any kind. You will be left with nothing when you leave here.”

“Nay, Sire,” Gray answered, shaking his head. “I will walk from this chamber the richest of men. For when I leave here, my lady will walk beside me.”

Henry tried and again failed to keep the look of burgeoning shock and dismay from his expression. “
Your lady
is not even legally your wife, Camville, thanks to her duplicity. Do you not think such a sac
rifice, noble as it may be, is excessive, considering the circumstances?”

A tender smile still curved Gray’s lips. “The answer is nay again, Sire.”

In that moment, Gray finally dared to shift his gaze to look at Catherine, to take in the vision of the woman who was the true wife of his heart, the woman to whom he’d long ago surrendered the keeping of his soul. Her trembling hands were pressed to her mouth, her eyes glistening with tears of joy and love. Love most beautiful and sacred.

Love for him
.

An incredible sweep of emotion rushed through him, blocking all else. “In truth, my lord,” he added quietly, still gazing at her alone, “for Catherine’s sake I would give up everything that I possess, everything that I am. God in heaven, but I would give up my very life for her if you asked it of me.”

The chamber echoed with renewed murmuring. Only King Henry seemed rendered completely speechless. Catherine, however, wanted to cry aloud with happiness, feeling that her heart must burst from the surge of love and pride that swept through her at that moment.

She gazed at Gray, at this magnificent man who was her destiny and her life, and she knew without a doubt that there was nothing more on earth that could ever again come between them. He had faced down the entire English Court and its king for her, pledging to forsake his vows as a knight in order to be
her
warrior,
her
champion alone. He was willing to renounce all that had ever mattered to him. To
give up prestige, wealth, the positions of power that he craved—even his own body and blood, if need be—all in order to save her.

But oh, if only he knew…

If he only knew that he’d saved her long ago. From the very first day he’d taken her into his arms, he’d been saving her, one tender step at a time. Aye, he’d pulled her back from the brink of destruction, freeing her soul with the awesome gift of his love.

Straightening, Catherine shook off the hold of her guards. They released her without argument, almost as if they too felt the magic, the power, in this moment. She crossed the chamber to Gray, walking with slow, measured steps, until she stood tall and proud before him. Then she took his hands in hers, raised his palms to her lips and kissed each in turn before sliding her arms up around his neck and throwing herself against him with a happy cry.

He held her tight, and she reveled in the feel of him as he cradled her close, in his murmured endearments as he buried his face in her hair. When he finally pulled away, it was to let Ian and Isabel join in their embrace. But he didn’t fully release her yet, keeping his arm linked round her waist as the twins nestled in.

Catherine held onto her children and to the man she loved, overflowing with emotion as they faced their king once more. Faced him together, as they were meant to be.

Gray’s face shone with a supremely happy expression, she thought, considering that he’d just forsaken all of his earthly possessions for her. But in
the next instant she realized that she’d underestimated him yet again. Her heart flopped in her chest and her breath caught when he arched his brow in that infernally devilish way of his, matching it to the tilt of his smile.

“Have we your leave to go now, Sire?” he murmured.

Still holding her breath, Catherine waited for the king’s answer, relieved to see that his incredulous look seemed to have faded. More encouraging, even, was the warmth lighting his gaze as he looked at them now. His mouth looked softer, his face relaxed. He seemed almost…well, almost
happy
.

But then he surprised her by shaking his head and answering sternly, “Nay, Camville, you may not leave. Not until We have put to rest this messy business of
wergild
that you foisted upon Us today.”

Gray stiffened. “What else needs be done?” he asked calmly, though she recognized the tone of steel in his voice, saw the gathering storm clouds that turned his eyes to green ice. “I have already surrendered all that I possess into your keeping. What more do you seek from me?”

In a magnificent swirl of capes, the king stepped down from the dais again to stand before them, this time unable to mask his repressed glee, like a child who thinks that he alone knows the answer to some great and wonderful secret.