Joan Wolf - The Poisoned Serpent

Richard stood like a statue.

“I thought, my lady,” Hugh said delicately, “that you were going to marry me .”

Elizabeth, still carefully refraining from looking at Richard, spoke to Hugh. “That is what my father wanted me to do, but I was going to refuse the match. I had promised to marry Richard.”

“May I ask when this attachment between you and Sir Richard developed, my lady?” Hugh asked.

His voice was quiet, almost intimate, the sort of tone he would have used in the coziness of a family solar. Elizabeth visibly relaxed in reponse and began to talk more easily.

“Richard used to come to Beauté to visit one of our knights who was a friend of his. That is how I got to know him. We were on the brink of asking my father if he would allow us to marry when he made that agreement with Lord Guy for me to marry you.”

“You must have found such news disconcerting,” Hugh said sympathetically.

“I did,” she replied. “I told my father about my love for Richard and asked if we might marry. He was very angry. He said I would marry the man he chose for me and that man was not Richard Canville, it was Hugh de Leon.”

“Did you tell this to Richard?”

“Of course. But I promised him that I would not wed you, that even if my father forced me to the altar, I would not make the vows.”

Her chin lifted as she said these words and her voice rang with pride. For a moment, she looked like a woman, not a girl.

“Did Richard believe you?”

“I thought he did. Now I am not so certain. Listening to this evidence today, I feared…” Her voice ran out.

“What do you fear, Lady Elizabeth?”

Elizabeth whispered. “I am afraid that Richard killed my father because he stood in the way of our marriage.”

Pandemonium erupted in the courtroom.

“That is not true,” Richard said, his deep voice clearly audible over the tumult.

At last Elizabeth looked at him. “I don’t think you ever loved me. All you wanted was to be the next Earl of Lincoln!”

“Elizabeth,” Richard said, his voice like a caress. “That is not so. You know that I love you.”

“I don’t think I know anything about you at all, Richard,” Elizabeth replied bitterly.

A small silence fell while the two erstwhile lovers stared at each other.

The chief justiciar spoke. “We have heard compelling evidence against you today, Sir Richard,” he said sternly. “More than I believe can be attributed to Lord Hugh’s acting against you out of malice.”

“Let us put it to the proof, then,” Richard said. Color burned high in his face, and he laughed. “Are you willing to do that, Hugh? Are you willing to face me in a trial by combat?”

Behind him, Bernard heard Cristen give a little cry and then quickly stifle it.

“It would be my pleasure,” Hugh replied.

Richard looked at the chief justiciar. “I am weary of listening to these malicious charges against me, my lord.” His voice, clear as a bell, resounded throughout the cavernous room. “I demand a Judgment of God.”

AJudgment of God. Trial by combat. Two men fighting each other until death proved which one heaven found guilty. This was one of the most ancient tests for justice, and its validity was recognized by both Church and State.

Once combat had been called for, and accepted, the chief justiciar decreed that it must be accomplished that very afternoon, as he had business back in London and could not afford to be delayed. He announced the dismissal of the witnesses and requested Richard and Hugh to attend him in the sheriff’s office immediately. Then he departed. Gervase and Richard went out behind him.

The discharged witnesses did not leave the armory hall right away, but clustered in small groups, buzzing with excitement and casting speculative looks at Bernard and Hugh, who stood together in front of the justiciar’s table, talking intently.

“Let me be the one to fight Richard,” Bernard was saying to his young advocate. “I am the one who has been accused. I am the logical man to oppose him.”

Hugh looked amused. “Bernard, you are only just arisen from your sickbed. You are hardly in condition to oppose Richard.”

“Then let someone else fight for me. You don’t have to be my champion.”

The amusement died, and Hugh’s face turned deadly sober. “Bernard, I want Richard dead. He is like a snake who drips his venom on everything good that he touches. He killed his brother. He killed Gilbert de Beauté and William Cobbett and John Rye. He seduced and injured Elizabeth de Beauté. And that is just the damage that we know about. I want him dead, and I am the man most likely to accomplish that. So talk to me no more about taking my place.”

There was nothing left for Bernard to say.

Forgive me, Ralf , he thought as he stared into Hugh’s dedicated face. I have done an ill job of taking care of your boy .

A feminine voice tinged with annoyance intruded. “Really, Hugh, do you always have to be so dramatic?” It was Cristen, with Nicholas at her side, come to join them.

“The Judgment of God wasn’t my idea,” Hugh protested. “It’s Richard who wants to be the center of everyone’s attention, not me.”

Cristen’s lips curved into a smile, but Bernard could see that her large brown eyes were somber.

Hugh saw it, too. “Don’t worry,” he said lightly. “I really do believe that God will be on my side this afternoon.”

“Of course He will,” she replied instantly.

“Are you really going to fight him, Hugh?” Nicholas asked in awe.

“I am,” Hugh replied.

Nicholas looked Hugh up and down, his awe turning to worry as he said the words that everyone else was thinking, “But he is so much bigger than you!”

“He may be bigger,” Hugh returned with serenity, “but I promise you that I am better.”

Nicholas smiled, as Hugh meant him to, but the worry did not leave his eyes.

“Lord Hugh.” It was the clerk who had been transcribing the trial. “My lord, the chief justiciar wishes you to come to the sheriff’s office so he may settle the terms of combat with you and Sir Richard.”

Hugh nodded and looked at Cristen. “Go back to Ralf’s house,” he told her. “I will meet you there as soon as I can.”

She nodded, and Hugh turned away to follow the clerk.

Cristen said to Bernard, “What kind of a swordsman is Richard?”

Bernard hesitated, wondering how he should answer. He looked into Cristen’s eyes and realized the impossibility of lying to this girl.

He said, “Richard is one of the finest swordsmen that I have ever seen.”

“This is what I was afraid of,” she replied gloomily.

“I tried to convince Hugh to let someone else take his place,” Bernard said, “but he wouldn’t listen.”

“He never does,” Cristen said. She looked down and encountered Nicholas’s frightened blue eyes. She hugged the child and assured him, “Don’t worry, Nicholas. With all of us praying for him, he will surely win.”

“Aye, my lady,” Nicholas responded stoutly. “I know that he will.”

Hugh was crossing the Inner bail, on his way home from his meeting with the chief justiciar, when he spied Alan Stanham standing all by himself next to the horse stockade. After a moment’s hesitation, Hugh approached the boy.

Alan’s eyes were full of blank misery as they focused on Hugh’s face.

Hugh said, “I am so very sorry, Alan.”

Alan dropped his gaze to the ground and said, his voice stifled, “How did you know that I had seen him in conversation with John Rye?”

“I didn’t know,” Hugh replied. “I just thought it was a good possibility, and I trusted you to speak the truth.”