Adonis and Thomas began grabbing men as well and, fairly quickly, the entire table was vacant. They didn’t sit down right away, however. Like a dog guarding a bone, they stood with their backs to the table, daring any one of those four men to charge them. It was then that they realized they had not dislodged ordinary men– there was a lord and what appeared to be three guards. Kevin and his men could tell simply by the dress.
The lord was a very young man who was quite effeminate. In fact, he seemed to be wearing lip rouge. He was dressed in beautiful purple and red silks and it took Kevin a moment torealize that the young man had flowers in his hair. His entire aura was carefree and womanly, but the expression on the young lord’s thin face was quite manly in its seriousness.
“By what right do you touch me?” he demanded. “I shall have you killed, do you hear?”
His expression may have been powerful but his voice sounded like a woman screeching. Kevin wasn’t one to judge other men. He knew that he himself had become something of an oddity over the years, so he refrained from judging others. Each man had a story, he knew. Therefore, he faced the frilly young lord with a steady gaze.
“It is your right to try but I suggest that you do not,” he said. “My companions and I have just reached England after returned home from the Levant. We require rest more than you do, so find another table.”
The young lord flew at him, all slapping hands and screams. It was a temper tantrum, pure and simple, and when the young man drew near, Kevin reached out and pushed him away by his head. The young lord went sprawling and his guards put their hands to the hilts of their swords, but Kevin quickly held out a hand.
“I would not if I were you,” Kevin said to the trio. “You will not survive. Take your lord and find another table.”
The smell of a battle was in the air and the patrons of the tavern began to notice. In a herd, they began moving away from the conflict. The young lord, however, was still sitting on his bum, glaring up at Kevin in outrage.
“Do you not know who I am, you fool?” he yelled. “I am Roger Longespee, Viscount Twyford! That is correct; I am a viscount and my father is the Earl of Salisbury. My father will see that you are severely punished!”
Kevin didn’t react other than to turn for the table. He sat, heavily, in one of the chairs but he made sure he was facing theviscount and his bodyguards. Then he picked up a half-full cup of ale and drained it.
The young viscount, seeing that his threat had no effect on the massive knight, picked himself out of the dirt, brushed off his silks, and, once again, approached Kevin. He lifted a hand to strike him but Kevin reached out, grabbed it, and promptly snapped bones.
The young viscount began screaming and his bodyguards charged. Kevin took out the first guard with a devastating blow to the face, collapsing the man’s nose. As he fell away, Kevin lashed out a massive boot and kicked the second guard coming for him. The guard received a powerful kick to the gut and as he fell back, Kevin stood up and unsheathed his broadsword.
It was a heavy sword of the finest tempered steel and the blade had many hash marks on it. Kevin had taken up the habit a few years ago of marking his blade for every man he had killed on a sword that was as long as a man’s arm. The steel, so far, had one hundred and sixty-three hash marks on it, carefully scratched on the blade near the hand guard for the hilt. He did it as a reminder that, someday, he could be a mark on another man’s blade and he had no intention of his life becoming nothing more than a scratch on steel. Therefore, the weapon in his hand was more than something by which to take a life or defend it; it was his salvation in a sense. A reminder of his own mortality.
It was a reminder that was gleaming wickedly in the weak light of the tavern. As Adonis fended off the third guard, the second guard, the one that Kevin had kicked away, slashed at Kevin with his broadsword as Thomas vaulted over the table and went after the man. Now, a vicious fight erupted between the two of them as tables upended and the female patrons of the tavern screamed their fright. Kevin was watching Adonis make short work of the third guard when he felt a sharp pain in his arm.
Quickly, he put a hand up to feel the pommel of a dirk sticking out of his upper left arm. Grabbing the dagger and yanking it out of his flesh, his fury surged as he turned to see the frilly young lord standing a few feet away, gasping gleefully at what he had done. But that glee turned to fear as he watched Kevin rip the knife out and throw it aside. Now, the young lord quickly turned terrified as his attempt to injure the massive, shaved-headed knight failed. As Kevin watched, the young lord reached down and unsheathed the sword of the guard whose face Kevin had destroyed. Now armed with a heavy broadsword he was not accustomed to, he held it with both hands and aimed for Kevin’s midsection.
Kevin fended off the first swipe, sending the viscount off-balance. Infuriated, the young lord brought the sword up again, both hands, swinging it with all his might. He missed Kevin by a wide margin but that didn’t stop him from swinging again and still again. Kevin was able to easily deflect all blows. But seeing his lord in a fight, one of the viscount’s men kicked Thomas aside and lunged at Kevin, nearly making contact. Kevin was distracted for a moment as he fought the man off. It was enough of a distraction for the young viscount to take another swipe at him with his sword. Seeing it out of the corner of his eye, Kevin did the only thing he could do. He defended himself. Ducking low to avoid being hit in the head with the tip of a sword, he came up from beneath the viscount’s line of sight and plunged his broadsword straight into the young man’s belly.
The viscount screamed as a very large sword pierced his abdomen. It was clear early on that it was a very bad wound because blood was literally pouring from the man’s belly as an artery had been pierced. The young lord fell to the floor, howling, as he bled out all over the floor. His guards, distressed and injured themselves, yelled for help, calling for rags or moss or anything to stop the blood flow. Chaos ensued.
As the occupants of the tavern began to run about, some bolting for the door, Kevin quickly sheathed his sword and turned to his companions.
“We leave,” he said, swiftly collecting his saddlebags from the tabletop. “Now.”
Adonis and Thomas knew that tone; it wasn’t meant to be disobeyed or questioned. Somehow, they often found themselves escaping volatile situations because Kevin truly didn’t fight for the pleasure of it. He fought because it needed to be done. Now, he saw no need to remain in a tavern that was quickly deteriorating into pandemonium and, more than likely, more violence in response to the viscount’s death because his guards would seek vengeance for their foolish and immature lord. It would be their duty. Therefore, it was time, once again, to flee.
Onward to London and an audience with the king.
CHAPTER TWO
Thorney Island (Westminster Palace)
Three days later
“It is agift from your betrothed, my lady,” a severe-looking woman in a tight white wimple was holding out a section of brilliant green brocade across her arms as if she was holding out an offering. “The Duke of Dorset, Lord Victor, is sending you great gifts and riches, Lady Annavieve. Surely you will accept.”
It wasn’t a statement as much as it was a command. Seated in the small solar of the apartments she had been assigned at the royal residence at Thorney Island, the Lady Annavieve Fitz Roderick gazed at the magnificent green fabric with a mixture of interest and aversion. It wasn’t as if she had any choice in the matter even if she didn’t want it; just like everything else in her life, King Edward made the decisions. He’d been making decisions for her since she was an infant and now that she was almost nineteen years of age, the situation was no different. She had no choice, just as she’d never had any choice. She pointed to a long, padded bench that was against the wall.
“Put it over there,” she said.
The woman with the tight wimple cocked what remained of her left eyebrow, hardly a hair in sight. “Will you not inspect it?”
Annavieve shook her head. “Not now,” she said. “You may thank the duke for his generous gift.”
The wimpled woman obviously disapproved of the young woman’s unenthusiastic response, but Annavieve hardly cared. She dismissed the woman and the servant she had brought with her, sending them all out into the corridor beyond as if casting aside rubbish. She had no use for haughty royal servants. In truth, she wasn’t entirely sure what she had use for. Everything about her life was in upheaval at the moment, disorienting and unsavory, and she struggled not to give in to the general melancholy the situation provoked. She was still struggling to find her bearings in all of it.
