“Good God, Mother,” Val entered the room, his unhappy gaze on his mother. “Is that what you have been discussing with Lord du Reims in my absence? I cannot tell you how ashamed I am.”
Tevin stood up as Val approached, grinning at the man. “Do not be,” he said. “My wife does the same thing. ’Tis good to see you, Val. You are looking well.”
Val smiled wearily at the old earl, a man he genuinely liked. When Tevin extended a hand to him, Val took it strongly.
“My lord,” he greeted amiably. “We are deeply honored by your visit. It has been some time since I last saw you.”
Tevin nodded, shaking Val’s hand a moment before releasing it and moving to reclaim his seat. “It is unfortunate, I know,” he said. “I usually spend my time at my home of Thunderbey Castle, but Henry has had need of me as of late. In fact, I have just come from Winchester. I realize you have only just arrived home and surely have many pressing duties, but I wonder if I might have a private conversation with you before the evening is out?”
So much for pleasantries; du Reims wanted to get right to the meat of his visit, which Val appreciated. He, too, wanted a serious conversation with the man and there was no time like the present. These were men of business and of action, and social proprieties took second to those things of importance in their lives. He motioned for Tevin to follow.
“Of course,” he said. “My solar is more comfortable. Let us speak now so no one will say I kept the great Earl of East Anglia waiting.”
As Tevin stood up again, Margaretha spoke. “Valor?” she said, her tone anxious. “Are you… are you well, my son?”
Val paused to look at her, hearing the concern in her voice. She knew where he had been and the serious nature of it, although she clearly had no clue as to what had actually transpired. Still, she was concerned for her son, as a mother would be.
“I am well,” he said. “I am sorry I did not greet you properly when I entered. Let me speak with Lord du Reims first and then I shall attend you.”
Margaretha shook her head. “No need,” she said. “If you are well, then I am content.”
Val’s gaze lingered on her a moment, knowing how worried she had been for him. He thought he might have even caught a glimpse of a tear. But Tevin was right beside him and he would not keep the man waiting, not even to show some concern for his mother, so he took the man into his solar, which was cold and relatively dark. He quickly went about lighting the bank of tapers near his table before moving to the hearth to ignite that as well.
“Thank you for being kind enough to receive me, Val,” Tevin said as he stood by Val’s big table. “I know how busy you are. Administering justice for Henry must take a good deal of your time.”
Val glanced at him, grinning, as he moved from the bank of tapers to the hearth. “Did my mother tell you that?” he asked, listening to Tevin chuckle. “I do apologize for her. She is singular-minded these days about the lack of grandchildren. I am surprised she did not ask you if you have any eligible daughters.”
There was a seat next to the table and Tevin took it. “She did not, but I am under the strong impression that the conversation was heading in that direction,” he said. “Alas, I have two daughters and they are both spoken for.”
“Excellent,” Val said firmly. “As much as I would like to be related to you, I will not have my mother press the both of us in that regard.”
Tevin watched him as he sparked the kindling in the hearth. “I will admit, I wish I had another daughter for you,” he said. “You are a fine man, Val. I have always thought so.”
Val could sense that they were coming to the root of Tevin’s visit; something about the look on his face bespoke of both admiration and sorrow. “And I have great admiration for you as well, my lord,” he said. Then, he stood up and faced him. “Did Henry send you here to discover if I have arrested Canterbury?”
Tevin’s brow furrowed slightly, confused. “Arrest Canterbury? What do you mean?”
Now it was Val’s turn to be confused. “Did Henry not tell you that he sent me a missive commanding me to arrest Canterbury and bring him to Winchester?”
Tevin’s eyebrows lifted. If he was only slightly confused before, now that confusion was growing by leaps and bounds. “A missive –?” he repeated. “Henry sent you a missive to arrest Canterbury?”
Val nodded, seeing the surprise in the man’s features. “Evidently, he did not tell you,” he said. Then, he moved to the saddlebags he had placed upon his desk and opened one, then the other, finally coming across the rolled piece of vellum he sought, the key to all of his troubles. He extended it to du Reims. “See for yourself, my lord.”
Tevin took the vellum and quickly unrolled it, reading the contents once, then twice. Then, he simply stared at it. “Val,” he said after a moment, hesitantly. “When did you receive this?”
“Over a week ago.”
“Who brought this to you?”
Val didn’t sense anything other than raw confusion from du Reims, which was understandable if the man knew nothing about the missive. “Hugh de Morville,” he said. “He came to Selborne and delivered it. Henry truly did not mention any of this to you?”
Tevin was still looking at the missive, an overwhelming sense of foreboding filling him as he stared at it. He recognized the writing as that of one of Henry’s clerks and the seal was most definitely Henry’s. Even the signature looked like Henry’s. But he knew for a fact that Henry didn’t write it. He began to feel a rock in the pit of his stomach, weighing down on him, as he struggled to figure out what had occurred.
“Val, tell me what happened from the beginning,” he said. “I want to know what de Morville said when he delivered this missive. Tell me everything.”
Now, Val was starting to wonder if there wasn’t something wrong in all of this. He thought du Reims looked rather pale.
“I was not at Selborne when Hugh delivered this, but his brother, Calum, was,” he said. “You know Calum, do you not? He has been my second for two years now, a very fine knight. But I digress; it was Calum that took the missive and spoke to his brother. Hugh told Calum that he and FitzUrse, le Breton, and de Tracy were to go ahead of me to attempt to talk Canterbury into surrendering to me. After receiving the missive, I followed as quickly as I could but by the time I got to Canterbury… my lord, I thought that you had come on behalf of Henry to discover what happened when I went to arrest Canterbury. In fact, I was going to head to Winchester myself this very day to inform the king personally.”
Tevin was looking at Val with great distress on his features. “Canterbury is dead,” he said. “Henry was told of it this morning by soldiers from Canterbury Castle. That is why I am here, Val. My God… I do not even know where to begin with all of this.”
Val was coming to sense that something was very, very wrong but he wasn’t sure, exactly, what it was. “What do you mean?” he asked. “My lord, I know I failed in my duty to arrest Canterbury. I have no excuse other than I did not arrive in time to prevent de Morville from murdering the man. Hugh told me that Canterbury resisted arrest and, in the process, Hugh and the others killed him. I will take responsibility for that if I must, since I was ordered to arrest the man, but….”
Tevin threw up a hand to quiet him. “Val, listen to me,” he said urgently. “The soldiers from Canterbury Castle that came to deliver the news of the archbishop’s death said that you were the murderer. The men involved in the assassination were wearing de Nerra tunics. Nothing was said about de Morville and the other knights.”
Val wasn’t particularly shocked by that. “I brought a contingent of men with me who were, indeed, wearing my colors,” he said. “But we stopped de Morville from hacking Canterbury to pieces. By the time I got there, Hugh and Reg and William and Richard had already killed the man.”
Tevin’s mouth hung open; he couldn’t help it. Now, the pieces of the puzzle were starting to fall together and he was having a difficult time comprehending it all. Something dark an
d horrible had been afoot, an undercurrent of treachery that no one had sensed from knights who had closely served Henry. But now, it was starting to come clear and the realization was devastating.
“Oh… God…,” he breathed. “So that was where those four went. De Morville, FitzUrse, le Breton, and de Tracy… we were only speaking of them this morning because Henry had not seen them. No one seemed to know where they had gone.”
Val cocked his head curiously. “Gone? Who? De Morville and the others? They went to Canterbury on Henry’s orders.”
Tevin was shaking his head slowly, back and forth. “Nay, Val. Not on Henry’s orders.”
Val looked at the man a moment, dumbfounded, before his eyes widened. “Then on whose orders?”
Tevin sighed sharply. “I am not sure how to tell you this,” he said, holding up the vellum in his hand, “but Henry did not sign this warrant. He never gave these orders. You have been lied to, Val. Someone has pulled you into a plot to assassinate Canterbury and now they are trying to name you as the murderer.”
So there it was, out in the open. An assassination plot. Now, Val was coming to understand why Tevin had been so distressed and why this entire discussion had been so confusing. But on the heels of that realization came another, more devastating realization – Henry hadn’t ordered the arrest of Canterbury. Henry never gave the command that Val had so diligently carried out.
An assassination plot!
Val looked at Tevin as if his entire world had just come crashing down around him.
“Sweet Christ,” he muttered. “Are you certain of this?”
Tevin nodded, feeling ill. “Aye,” he said. “Henry did not order Canterbury arrested or assassinated. He only learned of the man’s death this morning and had you been there, you would have seen how shocked he was. It was not a performance; it was the truth.”
Val was still trying to grasp at the last traces of hope that this might not be some grand plot he’d fallen in to; he was in denial. Surely this could not happen to him.
Surely there was another explanation!
“But if he wanted to keep it secret,” Val said, sounding as if he was pleading. “Surely he would have known that his advisors would have taken a stand against Canterbury’s arrest. Mayhap he sent the warrant and you simply did not know of it.”
Tevin could see that Val was trying to find justification for that which could not be justified. He shook his head. “When we received the word of Canterbury’s death this morning, no one was more shaken than Henry,” he said. “I do not believe he sent that missive. But you must come with me to Winchester immediately to clarify all of this, Val. There is some kind of plot afoot and you have been pulled into it. Henry will want to hear this.”
Val had gone from denial to the horror of realization all in one breath. So, it was true… Henry really hadn’t sent the missive. The more he thought of it, the more devastated he became.
“I had no reason not to trust Hugh when he delivered the missive,” he said, a hint of pain in his voice. “He has delivered dozens of warrants from Henry and this was just another one, although the seriousness of it did strike me. I thought to confirm it with Henry, in fact, but Hugh and the other knights had already gone on ahead to Canterbury and I was convinced that Henry wanted this warrant carried out swiftly, so I went ahead with it. You can see for yourself in the missive that I am threatened if I did not carry out the orders.”
Tevin nodded, looking back to the missive and seeing the clear threat within. “I understand completely,” he said. “As you saw it, you had no choice.”
“And now you are telling me that Henry did not send the missive?”
“I truly believe he did not.”
Val turned away from the man, pacing across the floor and snapping his knuckles with agitation. “I cannot believe it,” he muttered. “I have been tricked.”
“You have, indeed.”
Val swiftly turned to Tevin. “It must have been Hugh,” he said, teeth clenched. “He was the one who demanded I follow through on the orders so quickly and he is the one I saw delivering the death blow to Canterbury. He must have been the one who forged this missive to me. But why? Damnation, why?”
It was a cry of anguish, something that seemed to go right through Tevin, piercing his heart with the power of Val’s agony. He stood up, facing Val.
“I do not know,” he said honestly. “But you know Hugh… he is rabidly loyal to Henry, always one to seek royal favor. Mayhap, he thought he would be given the king’s favor by ridding him of a man who has caused Henry such grief.”
Val was so angry that he was trembling. “Except he sought to pin any blame on me,” he said. “If I have the arrest warrant, then I am responsible. Hugh could say he was simply following my orders.”
“Possibly,” Tevin nodded. “In any case, we must go to Henry immediately. He… he is sending men to arrest you and bring you to Winchester, Val. It would be better if you went to him before he sends his army to remove you in front of your own men. You do not want your men to see you being arrested.”
Val shook his head. “Nay, I do not,” he said. Then, he paused, thinking on the situation he now found himself in. It was like a nightmare. “I have lived my entire life in service for Henry. I have done everything right. I have chosen the right path. I have demonstrated my fealty to the best of my ability. And now this. I feel like everything I am and everything I have worked for is unraveling before my eyes and I cannot stop it.”
Tevin went to him, putting a hand on his shoulder. “Henry will understand when he sees that missive,” he assured him. “Do not lose faith, Val; that missive proves that you were unknowingly pulled into something you believed Henry wanted.”
It was difficult for Val to have faith at the moment. He felt like a piece of fragile ice that had just been smashed into a thousand pieces, leaving remnants of what he once was. He wondered if he could ever pull himself back together again.
His professional life was ruined.
“Please… do not tell my mother,” he finally muttered. “I would not have her know what has happened. It will only destroy her and will serve no purpose in the long run. We will simply tell her that we are going to see the king.”
Tevin nodded. “We will do whatever you feel is best.”
Val’s mind was off in a thousand different directions, just like those smashed pieces of what he once was. He smiled thinly.
“Oddly enough, I do not want my mother to lose faith in me,” he said. “I know it sounds strange, but she has always been very proud of me. I could lose that if she knew what has really happened. That I have been made a fool of.”
Tevin was feeling deeply sorry for his friend. “She loves you,” he said. “She would never lose faith in you, but I understand. She will not hear this from my lips.”
Val simply nodded, feeling emptier inside than he’d ever felt in his life. There was a big, gaping hole where his heart and soul had once been, indicative of the depth of the betrayal he felt. But upon thoughts of treachery, and his mother’s admiration, something more heady came to mind. Thoughts that had been his constant companion for weeks now, so much so that he couldn’t even remember when they hadn’t occupied nearly every waking hour.
Vesper….
She was waiting for him to send her the necklace he’d purchased for her, a symbol of a future between them… or not. Could he even send that to her now when his entire life was verging on destruction? Was it fair to her to pull her into this maelstrom he found himself in the middle of? With increasing sorrow, he knew what the answer was.
He could not.
“There is also another young woman whose respect means a great deal to me,” he said quietly. “I had hoped… I suppose it does not matter what I had hoped. I must clear my name before I can even think of her.”
Tevin looked at him with some interest. “I was not aware that you had a young lady,” he said. “Your mother acted as if you did not.”
Val lifted his eye
brows in resignation. “She does not approve of her, I think.”
“Who is it?”
Val considered telling him but ultimately decided not to. Perhaps it was the best thing he could do, keep Vesper removed from what was happening to him. He didn’t want her name associated with his right now. He waved Tevin off.
“It does not matter,” he said, quickly changing the subject. “There are other men who know of the missive, who went with me to Canterbury to arrest the archbishop. I should tell them what has happened so they understand. They were part of this, too.”
Tevin squeezed his shoulder, respecting his wishes when it came to not revealing a young woman he was evidently fond of. “Your men should accompany us to Winchester to give their accounts to Henry of what they saw,” he said. “That can only work in your favor.”
Val took a deep breath, struggling to pull himself together. “Then I shall find Calum and Kenan and inform them of our plans for going to Winchester,” he said, his tone dull with sorrow. “But it is growing dark now. Would it be acceptable if we left before dawn?”
Tevin gave him a final pat on the shoulder and released him. “Not only acceptable but preferable,” he said. “I am famished, so a good meal and a warm bed would be most welcome. I am an old man, Val; I need my rest.”
Val glanced at Tevin; even at his advanced age, he was still powerfully built. He smiled weakly. “You are not so old that you could not fight men half your age and still win,” he said. “I will not fall victim to your pleas of old age.”
Tevin grinned. “You flatter me.”
“I speak the truth.”
Tevin gave him one last pat on the back and handed over the vellum he still held. “Speaking of truth, I would not let that out of your sight,” he said, indicating the vellum that Val was still holding. “Let us go now and speak to the men who accompanied you to Canterbury. We must tell them what has happened. I would also like to hear what they have to say about it.”
“Gladly.”
With that, Val and Tevin quit Val’s solar and headed out into the deepening night where the smells of the evening meal were heavy upon the cold air.