Dragon's Lair Read Free Page B

English Street.
    Turning onto the Fleshambles, where the city butchers had their shops, Justin was dismayed to see so many people still out and about. He reminded himself, though, that John was not a man to pass unnoticed. The streets were narrow, crowded with passersby, and Justin had to keep ducking his head to avoid sagging ale-poles and the overhang of buildings extending out into the roadway. When he saw a smithy close by the fishmongers' market, he hastily dismounted and soon struck a bargain with the blacksmith: a few coins in exchange for a stall for his stallion in the farrier's stable.
    He decided to search the docks next and turned into the first alley that led toward the river. It was not much wider than that length of his sword, and he had to squeeze past a couple who' ducked into the alley for a quick sexual encounter. The man was too preoccupied to notice Justin, grunting and thrusting with such force that the woman's body was being slammed against the wall; she made no protest, gazing over her partner's shoulder at Justin with indifferent, empty eyes. She was so young, though - barely old enough to have started her flux - that Justin felt a flicker pity as he detoured around them. Luke would have called him a softhearted dolt - and often did - but Justin had a foundling's instinctive sympathy for the downtrodden, God's poor, the lost, the doomed, and the abandoned. He saw no harm in offering up a brief prayer for the soul of this child-woman selling her body in Southampton alley.
    As he emerged from the alley, Justin came upon a lively waterfront scene. There were a few ships moored at the quays, but the larger vessels were anchored out in the harbor. Several small lighters were shuttling back and forth between these ships and the docks, where sailors and passengers mingled with vendors and merchants come to supervise the unloading of their cargo. Although Vespers had sounded more than an hour ago, the crew of a French cog was still hard at work, using a block and tackle to transfer wine tuns into a waiting lighter. The casks were heavy and unwieldy and one was balanced so precariously that Justin would normally have lingered to watch. But now he gave it only a glance, for his attention had been drawn to a cluster of well-dressed men gathered on the West Quay.
    Stepping back into the mouth of the alley so he could observe without being seen, Justin had no difficulty in picking out the queen's son. The highborn were always magnets for every eye, even in these dubious circumstances, and John was surrounded by the curious, the hopeful, and the hungry. Peddlers cried out their wares, ships' masters jockeyed for position as they offered the hire of their vessels, and beggars huddled in the outermost ring of the circle, being kept at a distance by hard-faced men in chain mail. Justin found himself wondering what it would be like to live his life on center stage, like an actor in one of the Christmas plays. John would never be a supporting player; for him, it must be the lead role or nothing.
    John started toward the alley and Justin withdrew farther into it. The first part of his mission had been easy enough to accomplish. But Durand de Curzon was as slippery as a conger eel and not even a forked stick would be enough to pin him down. Justin still remembered his shock upon his discovery that Durand was not John's "tame wolf," bur Eleanor's. He had never loathed any one as much as he did Durand, and it vexed him no end to have to give the other man even a sliver of respect. He could not deny Durand's courage, though, for if John ever discovered his betrayal, death would come as a mercy.
    Justin was so intent upon his surveillance that he was slow to heed the muffled sounds behind him. He did not swing around until he heard a choked-off scream. At the end of the alley, the young prostitute was struggling to get away from her customer. She kicked him in the shin and almost broke free, but he caught the skirt of her