Chrystobel’s brown eyes widened. “You went on Richard’s Crusade?”
He nodded as if not at all impressed with himself. “I was with the king when he captured Cyprus,” he said without a hint of pride in his tone. “I was in command of the first of four garrisons charged with holding the island for Richard and the French king, Philip Augustus. The island was a place of warm weather almost the entire year. I enjoyed it immensely.”
Chrystobel was still lingering on the fact that he had gone on crusade with King Richard. She had never met anyone who had actually participated on the legendary crusade that ended five years earlier. He did not seem at all impressed with himself but she certainly was.
“Forgive me, my lord, if this is not an appropriate subject to speak of,” she said respectfully. “But for a girl who has hardly ventured out of her home, I find the fact that you fought in the Holy Land fascinating. Could I beg you to tell me more stories of your adventures?”
Keller hadn’t talked of his duty in The Levant since almost the day he had returned. He didn’t like to talk about the friends he had lost or the struggles he had endured. They had been unimaginably brutal and difficult. But gazing into Chrystobel’s eager face, he found that he could not deny her request.
“Well,” he settled back with his wine, thinking a moment. More soldiers clamored into the hall and begin filling up the place with noise and stench, but he didn’t notice. He was focused on Chrystobel’s enthusiastic expression. “The first true battle I saw was outside of a city called Apollonia. It was the first time I saw camels.”
Her eyebrows lifted. “Camels?”
He tried to outline the shape of the animal with his hands. “’Tis a strange creature with humps on its back, long legs and big lips. The savages in the Holy Land even sleep with the beasts sometimes. They are treated like pets.”
She was properly awed. “A camel,” she repeated the odd name, listening to the sound of it. “Do you eat it?”
He shook his head. “No,” he moved to pour himself more wine as he warmed to the conversation. “The savages ride them, milk them, even race them. They can go for months without drinking water, which is a good thing considering the land does not see rain for months at a time.”
“Truly?” she was impressed with the animal’s ability to go without water. “What does it eat?”
“Grass, grain,” Keller looked around. “Speaking of eat, are we to be served? My men have been on the road since before dawn.”
Chrystobel suddenly leapt up. “My apologies, my lord. I was so swept up in conversation that I… forgive me. I shall see to it immediately.”
She fled as if the devil himself had just made a request of her. Both Keller and William watched her race off with some astonishment. Wellesbourne turned to Keller.
“What in the world did you say that would make her run like that?” he wondered out loud. “She was so….”
“Fearful,” Keller said before William could finish. He thought on her odd reaction a moment before putting it out of his mind. Women, as he’d always known, were strange creatures. He didn’t understand them. He downed a healthy swallow of wine, lingering thoughtfully over the rim. “So what do you think of the place?”
Wellesbourne turned his attention away from the spooked lady to the hall around them. “Impressive. But where is Nether’s liege?”
Keller scratched his face and shrugged. “Who knows?” he had more wine. “The man did not greet us when we arrived. Unless he is dead or incapacitated, I am not sure what his excuse is.”
“Do you suppose he’s hiding?”
“Bad manners either way.”
Wellesbourne pursed his lips. “No matter what deal The Marshal made with him, I still say we should be on our guard.”
The sentence wasn’t yet out of his mouth before they both began to hear a great commotion, rising in the distance like a storm. It wasn’t long before everyone in the hall heard it also and the servants began to scatter. Keller and William turned in the direction of the hall entry, waiting for the storm to announce itself.
It wasn’t long in coming.
Chapter Four
The entry door suddenly blew open and slammed back on its hinges as a big man with blond hair and piercing brown eyes entered the room, bellowing loudly for wine. The servants, already in a panic, fell over themselves to fulfill his request. He slapped a woman who handed him a half-empty goblet, insulted that it was not completely full. As another woman rushed forward to fill the cup, the man continued across the floor towards the dais. His expression was both curious and hostile as he eyed the strangers seated at his table.
Keller and William instinctively rose to their feet as the man approached. It was a bit of an odd standoff as the young man came to a halt next to the table, his gaze openly inspecting the two knights. They gazed back steadily in return. After a moment of intense dissection by both parties, like dominant cocks preparing for a fight, the young man finally removed his rain-soaked cloak and tossed it off to the nearest cowering servant.
“I am Gryffyn d’Einen,” he announced. “Who is de Poyer?”
Keller didn’t like the man’s manner or stance from the very second he entered the hall. There was something arrogant and vain and dark about him. Although handsome and tall, there was something about the man that sang of distaste. Keller couldn’t put his finger on it but he could sense it. It put him on his guard.
“I am de Poyer,” he replied. “Is Trevyn d’Einen your father?”
“He is.”
“Where is he?”
Gryffyn cocked an arrogant eyebrow. “Indisposed at the moment,” he sat down, eyeing the knights when they continued to stand. “Do you intend to eat standing up?”
Wellesbourne emitted something of a disapproving growl, looking to Keller for a reaction. Keller’s only reaction was to slowly sit, his eyes riveted to the brash young man. Servants began falling all over themselves in an attempt to serve Gryffyn before anyone else.
“So,” Gryffyn was the first one at the table to receive a meal in spite of the fact there were guests. “You are to be my sister’s husband, are you not? Then there are things you should know about her. She is sassy and willful. She is also quite disobedient. I hope you are prepared to beat some sense into her.”
The more Gryffyn talked, the more Keller didn’t like him. “She has shown none of those qualities since we have become acquainted,” he replied evenly. “But you, on the other hand, have so far displayed all of that and more.”