Free Shields of Pride by Elizabeth Chadwick Page B

there was satisfaction in seeing the de Rocher blood triumph in a fight. ‘What’s your interest in him?’
    Beaumont watched the steady rhythm of Ralf’s arm. ‘Lord Leicester wants the Montsorrel silver for our cause and your brother is its guardian.’
    ‘Ah.’
    ‘Is he open to bribery?’
    The sword sparkled on the grindstone as Ralf choked on mirth. ‘Good Christ, no!’ he spluttered. ‘Why do you think he’s in such high favour with the justiciar? Whatever you offered him would not be enough to make him bend his precious honour. He knows that you are Leicester’s man through and through.’ He scabbarded the sword. ‘The only way you’ll get that silver out of Joscelin is over his dead body.’
    Beaumont wrapped his fist around his own sword-hilt. ‘That can be arranged,’ he said, ‘but he is my adversary and I need to know more.’
    ‘You are taking a risk by asking me.’
    ‘I don’t think so. I saw the “brotherly love” you have for each other two nights ago. Look, come to the Peacock and we’ll talk over a jug of wine.’ Beaumont jingled the purse lying against his dagger sheathe.
    ‘Is that by way of a bribe to me?’ Ralf pushed his sweaty hair off his forehead. ‘Do you think I am more easily bought than my brother?’
    ‘You appear to have finished your work for the moment and you look thirsty.’
    Suddenly Ralf smiled, revealing fine white teeth that no chirurgeon’s pincers had ever been near. ‘The Peacock, you said. It just so happens that I am indeed a very thirsty man.’
     
    ‘Joscelin’s always been my father’s favourite,’ Ralf said and drew the shape of a dragon in a puddle of spilled wine on the trestle. His other hand propped up his head, which felt far too heavy for his neck. The task of sharpening his sword in the hot yard had made him so dry that he had gulped the first two cups of wine without moderation. The third had followed more slowly, matching pace with Beaumont, and he was now more than halfway down his fourth. ‘I know that if the Arnsby lands were not mine by right of legitimacy, he would give them to Joscelin - his precious do-no-wrong firstborn son.’ A querulous frown appeared between his eyes.
    ‘You said the other night his mother was a whore.’
    ‘She was. My father picked her up among the loose women of the army camp during some battle campaign. Supposedly she was a baron’s daughter but no decent woman follows the troops for a livelihood.’ Ralf lifted his cup and gulped. ‘After she died in childbed, my father built a chapel to her memory and endowed a chantry of nuns to sing her praises forever. God’s death, do you know how much it sticks in my craw to see him riding off to visit the place like a damned pilgrim? She wasn’t a saint, she was a witch!’
    Beaumont made sympathetic sounds and refilled Ralf’s cup before tipping the final half-measure into his own. Then he took a contemplative swallow and set his enquiries back on their original course. ‘So how did your brother come to be a mercenary? Surely your father could have found him an heiress with lands?’
    ‘Originally Joscelin was going to be a priest,’ Ralf said. ‘He boarded with the monks at Lenton for three years until one of them tried to make him into his bum-boy and Joscelin knocked his teeth down his throat. My father decided that his true vocation lay with the sword and started his training.’ Ralf resumed dabbling his finger in the spilled pool of wine.
    ‘And?’ said Beaumont, leaning forward. His curiosity was like the tip of a knife probing an open wound. Ralf began to feel nauseated.
    ‘There’s little more to tell.’ He shrugged. ‘When Joscelin was fifteen, he and my father quarrelled and Joscelin ran away. My father said he would be home within a month but we didn’t see him again for seven years. When he returned, it was at the head of his own troop of mercenaries. He was treated like the prodigal son, put on a pedestal and held up to me as