The Greatest Knight Read Free Page B

had gone ignored in the heat of battle now began to strike him like chords on a malevolently plucked harp, especially across his right shoulder.
    “Wounded?” Gadefer asked as William caught his breath. “That’s a nasty gash in your mail.”
    “It’s from a thatch gaff,” William replied. “It’s not that bad.”
    De Lorys grunted. “I won’t take back the things I’ve said about you. You’re still a slugabed and a glutton, but the way you fought today…well, that makes up for everything else. Perhaps my lord Tancarville has not wasted his time in training you after all.”
    ***
    That night the Sire de Tancarville held a feast to celebrate a victory that his knights had not so much snatched from the jaws of defeat, as reached down the throat of annihilation, dragged back out, and resuscitated. Badly mauled, the French army had drawn off to lick its wounds and, for the moment at least, Drincourt was safe, even if the neighbouring county of Eu was a stripped and pillaged wasteland.
    William sat in a place of honour at the high table with the senior knights who f êted him for his prowess in his first engagement. Although exhausted, he rallied beneath their camaraderie and praise. The squabs in wine sauce and the fragrant, steaming frumenty and apples seethed in almond milk went some way to reviving his strength, as did the sweet, potent ice-wine with which they plied him. His wounds were mostly superficial. De Tancarville’s chirurgeon had washed and stitched the deeper one to his shoulder and dressed it with a soft linen bandage. It was sharply sore; he was going to have the memento of a scar, but there was no lasting damage. His hauberk was already in the armoury having the links repaired and his gambeson had gone to the keep women to be patched and refurbished. Men kept telling him how fortunate he was. He supposed that it must be so, for some of the company had left their lives upon the battlefield and he had only lost his horse and the virginity of his inexperience. It didn’t feel like luck though when someone inadvertently slapped him heartily on his injured shoulder in commendation.
    William de Mandeville, the young Earl of Essex, raised his cup high in toast, his dark eyes sparkling. “Holà, Marshal, give to me a gift for the sake of our friendship!” he cried so that all those on the high table could hear.
    William’s head was buzzing with weariness and elation but he knew he wasn’t drunk and he had no idea why de Mandeville was grinning so broadly around the trestle. Knowing what was expected of him, however, he played along. The bestowing of gifts among peers was always a part of such feasts.
    “Willingly, my lord,” he answered with a smile. “What would you have me give to you?”
    “Oh, let me see.” De Mandeville made a show of rubbing his jaw and looking round at the other lords, drawing them deeper into his sport. “A crupper would do, or a decorated breast-band. Or a fine bridle perchance?”
    Wide-eyed, William spread his hands. “I do not have any such items,” he said. “Everything that I own—even the clothes on my back—are mine by the great charity of my lord Tancarville.” He inclined his head to the latter who acknowledged the gesture with a sweep of his goblet and a suppressed belch.
    “But I saw you gain them today, before my very eyes,” de Mandeville japed. “More than a dozen you must have had, yet you refuse me even one.”
    William continued to stare in bewilderment while a collective chuckle rumbled along the dais and grew in volume at William’s expression.
    “What I am saying,” de Mandeville explained, between guffaws, “is that if you had bothered to claim ransoms from the knights you disabled and downed—even a few of them—you would be a rich man tonight instead of an impoverished one. Now do you understand?”
    A fresh wave of belly laughter surged at William’s expense, washing him in chagrin, but he was accustomed to being the butt of jests