A Dark Champion Read Free

crown.
    “I’m sorry I’m late, milord,” Druce said as he grabbed a stool and dragged it toward Stryder. “There was a storyteller who came and she was fantastic. I could have listened to her all day as she spun stories of lovers betrayed by the Fates.” Druce climbed onto the stool and reached to unlace the back of Stryder’s armor.
    Stryder grunted at that as he dipped lower so Druce could reach the fastenings more easily.
    Stryder knew the instant Druce became aware of Christian’s presence. The boy tumbled off the stool and almost knocked Stryder over as he went sprawling onto the floor.
    The boy looked up, his entire face contrite. “I’m so sorry, Lord Stryder. Did I interrupt something?”
    “Nay,” Stryder said, helping him up. “Christian and I were only talking of inconsequential matters.” Stryder introduced the lad to Christian. “Christian of Acre, meet Druce, my ward and squire.”
    “Greetings, Druce,” Christian said before meeting Stryder’s gaze. Christian’s eyes were troubled even more than before. “Did something happen to Raven?”
    “Nay. He was knighted a few months back and is sleeping off a night of misbegotten youth.”
    His face relaxing, Christian grunted at that as Druce returned to disarm Stryder.
    Druce meanwhile prattled on about the woman he’d been listening to. “Have you ever heard of the Lady of Love, milord?”
    “Nay,” Stryder answered.
    “I have,” Christian said as he took a seat at the desk and poured himself a cup of ale. “She’s just your type of lady, Stryder. A troubadour of great renown, she despises knights and writes only of courtly love and how needed it is in this day and age of great violence.”
    Stryder curled his lips at that. If there was one thing he hated above all, it was those who purveyed the virtues of courtly love. That so-called noble sentiment had cost more lives and strife than any sword ever had. “A pox to all of her ilk.”
    “Nay, milord,” Druce said, his face dreamy. “She is more beautiful than Venus and holds the voice of the sweetest lark. Surely the lady has no equal. You should listen to her as she tells how the world could be if only we strove for peace with the same passion we use to pursue war.”
    Stryder exchanged a knowing look with Christian. “You are young, Druce. One day you will realize that all women are the same. They want nothing more than a man to care for them so that they can pesterand pick until a man is nigh mad with their nagging. They have but one use.”
    “And that is, milord?” Druce asked.
    Christian’s eyes danced with merriment. “That you will soon discover on your own, boy. But for now you are too young for it.”
    Druce’s mouth formed a small O that said the boy already had an inkling of it as he gathered Stryder’s mail pieces.
    Stryder tossed his squire a bag of coins. “Drop the armor off with the armorer to be polished, and then take the rest of the day and enjoy it.”
    Druce beamed. Thanking him, he dashed off with the mail armor draped over his shoulder and the money cradled carefully in his hand.
    “You spoil him,” Christian said.
    Stryder shrugged. “Children should be spoiled. Would that we had known such at his age.”
    Christian’s gaze turned haunted at that and Stryder wondered if his own eyes showed the scars of his past so plainly.
    Like him, Christian had been raised with the single principle of “spare the rod, spoil the child.”
    Stryder could fell a full-grown man with a single blow. The idea of striking someone so much smaller than he sat ill in his gullet. With one reckless strike, he could kill the boy. Indeed, Stryder’s own lord had broken his jaw when he was Druce’s age for nothing more than dropping the man’s sword.
    It was a chance he’d never take. He’d sooner cut off his arm than ever prey on someone weaker than he.
    Stryder reached for a towel at the same time his tent flap was slung backward. He half expected to see a maid coming