The Orphan King (14 page)

Tiny John whistled. “I’ve caught the spires! Far, far off! But we can make it by eventide.”

“Only if I carry you, urchin,” William grunted. “And already you’re far too heavy for a knight as old as I.”

Tiny John dropped lightly to the ground and kept pointing. “That way, Thomas! I’m sure I saw the castle that way!”

Thomas said nothing. It was obvious by his eyes that he was mesmerized in thought.

William glanced at the girl, still several hundred yards back. He handed Tiny John the thin chain and locket. “Return this to her. Yet do not let her know that it was on my instructions or that I have seen it. Thus …” The knight searched for an insignificant reason that would not give Tiny John cause to think any more of the incident. “It will appear to her that you have honor, you scoundrel. Then, Tiny John, keep pace! We will do our best to reach Magnus before nightfall.”

Tiny John had been right. With the easy downhill walk, it took them less than four hours to reach the final crest that overlooked the castle of Magnus. The bells inside the walls surrounding the castle rang to celebrate the church service of
none
—three in the afternoon.

They paused at the crest to comprehend Magnus as it stretched out before them.

“All saints preserve us,” breathed William in awe. “Our mission is surely one of suicide.”

Even Thomas faltered. “The army—I have been told—is not large.”

William laughed a strained whisper. “Why maintain an army when you have a fortress like
that
?” He spread out his arms. “From afar, I wondered about the wisdom of a castle that did not take advantage of height to survey the valley. Now I understand. A force as large as one thousand might be useless in an attack against Magnus.”

The valley around Magnus differed little from those they had been seeing for the previous three days of travel. The hills were steeper, perhaps, but the grass and woods in the valley bottom were equally rich and dotted with sheep and cattle.

Magnus stood on an island in the center of a small lake. High, thick stone walls ringed the entire island and protected the village inside. The keep of the castle—home of the reigning lord of Magnus—rose high above the walls, but safely inside, far away from the reach of even the strongest catapults.

At the north end, a narrow finger of land reached the island. Just before the castle walls, however, it was broken by a drawbridge no wider than a horse’s cart. Even if an army managed to reach the lowered
drawbridge, soldiers would only be able to cross three or four abreast—easy targets for the archers on the walls above.

Water, of course, was available in almost infinite amounts. Lack of food might be the castle’s only weak point, because siege was obviously the only way to attack Magnus. With the foresight to store dry foods, the reigning lord of Magnus would never suffer defeat.

For several minutes, Thomas could only stare at his impossible task. He forced himself to remember and believe the plan given to him by Sarah.

He hoped the doubt in his heart would not reach his words. Wind carried each one clearly to the knight. “If it is so obvious to a military man such as you that a host of armies cannot take Magnus by force from the outside,” Thomas said, “then the way it
must
be conquered is from the inside.”

“That’s like saying the only way to fly is to remain in the air,” William said. “Of course it can only be conquered from the inside. That’s the only way to conquer any castle. Our first question is how to get an army. Then we can face the usual question of how to get that army inside.”

“There is something wonderful about a castle this impossible to overcome.” Thomas smiled. “Once we have it, it will be that much easier to keep.”

He marched forward.

W
illiam watched as Thomas returned to a stand of trees near the north end of the lake. Thomas was still limping as a result of the bandit attack. Now he moved without the burden of the bundle he had carried during their travels; obviously he’d decided to hide it before the final approach to Magnus.

“I think,” William said as greeting to Thomas, “it would serve us well to hide any signs of my trade.”

“Can it be that serious?” Thomas asked.

“More than you might imagine. Whatever your nurse taught you in that abbey could not have shown you how drastically the earls and lords of a land guard against any threats to their power.”

“But against a single man? I would have thought rebellion in the form of a peasant army or even a gathering of knights …”

William shook his head and lowered his voice. “Now is not the time to explain. Let it suffice to say that serfs and peasants have so little training and so little weaponry that they are considered harmless. So harmless that one man with training or weapons can rise far above an entire village in potential for danger.” William paused. “Aside from the expense of a war horse—five years’ wages—why do you think it is so difficult to reach the status of a knight? And why there are so few in the land? Those in power limit the number of knights—for their own safety, should the knights rebel.”

Thomas considered this and drew a breath to speak.

William waved him quiet.

On foot without lance or horse, without full armor or following squire to tend his gear, William did not at first glance appear to be a knight. After the rescue at the gallows, the sheriff’s men had fled in terror, leaving behind only one of his swords and a leather bag—possessions, no doubt they had been hoping to keep for themselves. Sun’s disappearance or not, no sheriff would dare risk an earl’s displeasure by sending a knight with unknown allegiance forth into the land in full fighting gear.

William smiled a tight smile of irony. As much as he regretted the absence of the rest of his equipment, this was one moment he did not mind being without. A knight who did not declare himself as such when approaching the castle of a strange earl or lord could expect immediate death if discovered.

However, William did not feel safe from notice. The guards at the gate would be trained to search for the faintest military indications of any approaching stranger. The chain mail covering his belly, of course, was an immediate giveaway. William drew his shirt tighter and checked for any gaps that might betray the finely worked iron mesh. To be totally risk free, he should abandon the chain mail, but then he would be as vulnerable to the thrust of a sword as a piglet before slaughter.

His short sword—of the type favored for close combat since the time of the mighty Roman legions—hung in a scabbard tightly bound to his back between his shoulder blades. Once again, it would have been much safer to leave the sword behind, but it would also be next to impossible to find a weapon inside the castle walls. William would have to risk being searched.

And he could lessen the chances of search.

William dropped his cloak onto the ground and pressed it into the soil with his boot. He wrapped himself again without shaking it clean. He smudged dirt into his face and ran debris into his hair.

“Show no surprise when I become a beggar,” William warned. He turned to Tiny John with a savage glare. “Stay behind and hold the girl’s hand. One word, urchin, and you’ll become crow bait.”

Tiny John gulped and nodded.

The four of them made a strange procession as they moved from the cover of the trees to the final approach into Magnus.

“No castle is stronger than its weakest part,” William grumbled as they reached the finger of land that stretched from shore to the castle island. “And generally that is the gatehouse entrance. This does not bode well for your mission.”

Tiny John remained several steps back with the girl, head craned upward to take in the spires. His constant grin was dampened by those cold shadows. As for Isabelle, she said nothing. She’d protested frequently during the journey, but by now it was obvious her protests were useless. Still, anger and fear were obvious by the expression on her face. She’d finally insisted that if they were going to drag her into the castle, they all would pretend again that she was deaf and mute. She retreated back into her silence.

“Expert military advice?” Thomas said.

“Not advice. Sober caution,” replied William. “Unless a man can swim”—he snorted—“which is unnatural for any but a fish, as the lake is impossibly wide.”

“Nobody
swims
across,” Thomas argued. “That’s why there’s a drawbridge.”

“Not swimming
toward
the castle.
Away
. Defenders often force attackers into the water. Those who can’t swim drown. Those who can swim, cannot fight.”

William shuddered. “Especially weighed down with armor.” William pointed farther away from the castle. “Worse, this road is the only approach to the castle, and I’ve never seen a barbican that stretches an entire arrow’s flight from the drawbridge to the gatehouse. And nearly straight up!”

Lined with small stone towers on each side—small only in comparison to the twin towers of the gatehouse itself—thick walls guarded a steep approach to the castle entry.

“If this gives a hint of the defenses, I can only guess at the treacherousness of the gatehouse itself,” William said. He opened his mouth to say something, then paused as a new thought struck. “Not even
vespers
, the sixth hour past noon. Yet this road is as quiet as if it were already dusk. No passersby. No farmers returning from the fields. No craftsmen to or fro. What magic keeps this castle road so quiet?”

“What does it matter?” Thomas shrugged. “All we need to do is get within the walls as any passing strangers seeking a night’s rest. From there, we shall find the weakness of Magnus and complete my plan. As I have said, once we have this, it only makes it easier for us to keep—”

“Don’t be a blind fool,” snapped William. “I am bound to you by a vow, but I will not follow you to certain death. Lords of manors like this have power and wealth beyond your greatest imagination. Inside those walls will be soldiers to jump at his every whim. It is a rule of nature that when men have power, they use it with joy, and also use it mercilessly to keep it.”

“William,” Thomas said, unperturbed by the knight’s sudden anger, “not once have I given you any indication that I expected you to fight. I simply need your military knowledge.”

Thomas thought of his book, still hidden safely at the abbey. “With you as advisor, I have ways of using my own powers …”

“Then we shall proceed to the gatehouse,” William said. “But slowly. I do not like this situation at all.”