In a calm, succinct manner, Essien told Harald exactly what he thought of his attempts and also of how he’d treated his own daughter. By the time he was finished, there wasn’t anything left unspoken. Harald knew where he stood and Essien knew where he stood. Glad to be rid of his daughter and her unlikable husband, Harald signed the marriage contract without hesitation.
And so did Essien.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Awedding.
Lance wasn’t invited to Catalina and Essien’s wedding. He hadn’t expected to be. There had been a preliminary mass competition that afternoon, something he had participated in, but he didn’t have any friends at this particular tournament so he couldn’t get a group of them together to form a unit. That was what most of the knights did in the mass competition—they simply got together a group of their friends and went around like a gang of ruffians, beating other groups into submission and gaining the upper hand.
Some of the mass competitions could get rather dangerous because in some tournaments, there really were no rules, so the stronger competitors would capture the weaker knights and then ransom them back to their lords. There were also men that would thrash other knights and demand their money. Some even took weapons in payment. But this mass competition was a little more civilized because the Earl of Hereford wouldn’t allow the lawlessness that sometimes plagued these events. Therefore, it was simply a matter of knocking men to the ground because the rule was that if someone was knocked down, they couldn’t get upand were, therefore, out of the competition. That made it a little easier for those who didn’t want to be beaten to a pulp.
Lance was one of them.
But the fact that he had no real friends here meant that when the groups were formed for the mass competition, he was teamed up with men he didn’t even know, other men who didn’t have any friends or allies in the competition. They were usually the weaker or the newly knighted, so he didn’t have much faith in the members of his group, but he gave them a good lecture and discussed strategy with them. A couple of them didn’t want to be part of the group after that, so they departed to go it alone, which was figurative suicide in a competition like this. But Lance let them go because he didn’t want anybody that wasn’t going to actually try to win the event a part of the group.
As if they had a chance.
The biggest problem was the de Lohr group. The de Lohr sons partnered up with family friends, very seasoned and terrifying knights, and became the dominant group in the preliminary event. The only saving grace for the rest of them was that they weren’t part of the event very long before they received a summons from Lord Hereford himself. Lance heard other men talking about an impromptu wedding and discovered that the tournament champion himself was marrying the daughter of a de Lohr ally. It was like a gut punch to Lance to realize they meant Essien was marrying Catalina.
After that, he didn’t feel much like competing.
Walking away from the group that disintegrated without his leadership, he found his way into the bailey of Lioncross. The chapel was a half-moon-shaped structure built into the southern wall of the fortress. It could hold thirty people at any given time, so it wasn’t small by any means. As Lance found himself over by the great hall, he could see movement inside the chapel from where he stood. He saw clearly when they lit candles and thatsoft warm glow emitted from the lancet windows on the north side of the structure. He could hear the faint drone of scripture recitation as the mass was performed.
His pursuit of Catalina was over once and for all.
She officially belonged to another.
That realization drove him into the great hall, where he found copious amounts of wine in which to drown his sorrows, and he did so for the most part. He was seated by the entry door, watching people come and go, trying to summon the courage to ask Lord Hereford for a position or, at the very least, to refer him to someone who was in search of a decent knight. Perhaps courage would come in a bottle for him, because he wasn’t certain it would come any other way. He wasn’t usually a heavy drinker, but today, he was going to make an exception.
He figured that he’d earned it.
After pouring himself a third cup of wine, he was heading back to his seat when he noticed that same tattered figure just outside the great hall doors. Quite honestly, it looked like a beggar or some kind of poverty-stricken individual, but certainly not someone who belonged in a grand residence like this. They looked sorely out of place. Setting his cup down, he went outside to confront whoever it was. He probably shouldn’t have cared, but he did. Perhaps saving good people from a thief might endear him to Hereford and help his cause.
By the time he quit the hall, the figure seemed to have disappeared. Lance looked left, and looked right, and finally decided to go right because it was closer to the keep. There was a garden over there as well as the kitchens, and there were places to hide. The great hall of Lioncross had flying buttresses against the southern wall, great pillars that braced the stone wall, and he came around one of them only to spy the tattered figure, who was looking away from him.
Quietly, he came up behind him.
“You,” he said in a low voice. “What is your business here?”
The figure jumped, startled, whirling around to face Lance, but in doing so, the scarf around its face came away, revealing horribly burned skin and a missing nose. Like a living skull-face. Shocked, Lance reached out and grabbed a bony arm.
The figure, evidently a man, gasped.
“Please, my lord,” he begged in a rough voice. “I mean no harm. I truly mean no harm!”
Lance was having a difficult time getting over his revulsion. “What do you want here?” he demanded. “Who are you?”
The skinny, burned figure was terrified. “My name is Al,” he said. “More than that, I do not know. I suffered an accident that robbed me of my memories.”
He had a slow, deliberate way of speaking, halting and stuttering at times. He was so skinny, so wretched, that Lance was fairly certain he wasn’t a threat. A child could have taken him down. But he had to make sure the man wasn’t armed.
“Show me that you have no weapons,” he commanded.
The man held out his tattered cloak, showing his tunic underneath, and his belt, which had nothing on it. Lance yanked off the cloak, which smelled like rot, and had the man turn around to make sure there was nothing on his backside that couldn’t be seen. There was nothing, so Lance gave him back his cloak.
“Then what are you doing here if you have no memories?” he said. “Lioncross is not a charity. You’ll find no alms here.”
The man made sure the scarf was wrapped tightly around his face. “I am not looking for charity,” he said. “I am looking for Lord Eckington’s daughter.”
