Forever His(2)

“Tournament?” Gaston snarled. “It was not a tournament but an ambush. Exactly as you planned it to be. You lured my father and brother with your challenge to tourney for glory and ransoms—and they never suspected that a lord who had sat at our tables and broken bread with us and spoken of honor and friendship for years would so suddenly prove himself a knave!”

“They knew the risks when they agreed to the tournament,” Tourelle countered. “You all did. With a hundred men on each side fighting over a ground of fifty miles for three days from morning until dusk—it is to be expected that there may be breaches of the rules. ‘Twas a fair combat.”

“My father and brother were too skilled and experienced to be killed in a fair combat. What you hoped was to wipe out the entire Varennes male line.” Gaston narrowed his eyes. “How long had you been planning it, Tourelle? Years?”

Tourelle straightened, his mien all innocence. “Had it been my intent to kill every last one of you, Varennes, you would not now be standing before me.”

“Aye, how disappointed you must have been when I did not arrive.”

“And where were you, Blackheart? Why did you not join them? Why did you break your word?”

Gaston’s temper slipped its leash as Tourelle’s barbs found their mark and brought an unwanted rush of grief and guilt. “Allow me to make clear one vow that I will keep,” he said with a feral smile. “The souls of my murdered father and brother demand justice. My brother’s widow demands it. The villagers whose homes and fields were ransacked and burned demand it. The women who were brutally raped demand it.” Gaston thrust himself away from the table. “I vow that I will reclaim all the lands you have stolen and make you pay for the blood upon your hands!”

Tourelle reached for his scabbard, only to find it empty. With an oath, he launched himself over the table. Gaston crouched into a fighting stance.

“Hold!” A booming voice rang out behind them before they could land a single blow.

They froze, turning to find that their host had arrived at last—and his expression at the moment reflected naught of the name his features had earned him: King Philippe the Fair.

Slowly, Gaston dropped to one knee, bowing his head. “Sire.” Beside him, Tourelle did the same.

“Rise, Sir Gaston,” the King commanded, his voice deep with anger that rivaled the thunder outside. “Rise, Duc Alain.”

Gaston straightened, but did not flinch from his lord’s wrathful gaze or stormy tone. He could not pretend remorse he did not feel for a war he did not regret.

“You will both be seated,” the King ordered flatly, sweeping off his fur-lined velvet mantle, spattering rain across the small tent.

Gaston moved slowly, reluctantly, but obeyed without a word, as did Tourelle.

The King came to stand at the table, an equal distance between them, glaring from one to the other in turn. “I have sent missives to you both and they have been ignored,” he began in a quiet voice all the more ominous for its softness. “More than a fortnight past, I declared again that there would be peace between you, and yet you fought on. Did you both believe that I hold your past service in such esteem and your present counsel so valued that you could defy your King?” He slammed a fist on the table with such force that any lesser wood than oak would have split asunder.

“Sire,” Tourelle said. “My claim—”

“Silence!” Philippe demanded. “I will hear no more of claims and thievery and tournaments gone awry. I have decided the matter, and there will be peace.”

“My liege, one cannot make peace with a viper,” Gaston insisted.

“It is the way of these times, Gaston,” the King assured him with a bitter laugh. “One finds oneself making peace with all manner of creatures. I married my own sister to the English King not two years past to seal a treaty of peace.”

“Sire,” Tourelle bit out, clearly displeased at being likened to a viper ... or to an Englishman. “It is I who have been wronged in this. I did not start this war. I merely defend myself. This knave attacked my lands without warning!”

“And what would you have done in his place?” Philippe snapped. “A mere knight engaging a duc who possesses much larger holdings and more men? His strategy of surprise was his only hope of succeeding. It is not with polite, mild ways that Sir Gaston has earned the name The Black Lion, Alain. And it is no accident that I have come to depend upon his military counsel. You would be wise to remember that.”

Any pride Gaston might have felt at the King’s words vanished when Philippe turned his furious gaze upon him.