Free Here Be Dragons - 1 by Sharon Kay Penman Page A

Conqueror was himself bastard born."
Philip saw the light. "And as a priest, he would, of course, be barred from ever laying claim to the crown. Clever, John, very clever. But risky. What's to keep Richard from concluding that Holy Orders might do your soul great good, too?"
Richard laughed until he choked, sputtering something unintelligible about
"Father John." John laughed, too, but his eyes narrowed on Philip with sudden speculation. Philip, he decided, was one for muddying the waters. That would indeed bear remembering.
"You did arrive just in time, John. We are about to lay siege to Tours, for its fall is sure to force the old fox from his lair. This campaign has dragged on far too long. It's nigh on two years since I did take the cross; I'd hoped to be before the walls of Jerusalem months ago." Richard paused, then said with sudden seriousness, "Philip will be leading a French army, and we expect men to flock to our standards. You ought to give some thought to taking the cross yourself, John. What better quest can a man have than pledging his life to the delivery of the Holy City from the infidels?"
John was appalled, forced a strained laugh. "The truth now, Richard," he said with what he hoped would be disarming candor. "Can you truly see me as a pious pilgrim on the road to Damascus?"
Philip laughed; so did Richard. "No," he admitted, "I confess I cannot, Little
Brother. You'd disappear into some Saracen harem, never to be heard from again!"
John smiled thinly, marveling that Richard should dare to sneer at another man's sexual habits, given Richard's own vulnerabilities in that particular area. There were, he thought scornfully, worse vices than liking women overly well. But all at once he found himself thinking of that ugly scene at Chinon, remembering the fear he'd felt when facing down Martin Algais. That would, he knew, never have happened to Richard. Men did not defy his brother. The foolhardy few who'd dared were dead. He had a sudden wild impulse to tell
Richard that their father was dying, wondering what Richard would say or feel.
Nothing, he suspected. Everything was always so damnably easy for Richard.
JOHN was the youngest of the eight children born to Henry Plantagenet and
Eleanor of Aquitaine. His sisters had been bartered as child brides to foreign
Princes, were little more to him now than time-dimmed memories. His brothers had been, by turns, indifferent and antagonistic to this last-born of the
Angevin eagletswith one exception. William
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Longsword was, like Geoffrey, a bastard half-brother. But Will had somehow missed his share of the Angevin temperament; his was a placid, unimaginative nature, sentimental and straightforward, an unlikely drab grey dove in that family of flamboyant hawks. Will had been amiably interested in the little brother born within days of his own tenth birthday, had taken it upon himself to wipe John's nose, to pick him up when he fell, to be for John a good-natured guide through the pitfalls and passages of childhood. He'd become quite fond of the dark little boy so eager to please, had watched rather sadly as John was utterly ignored by his mother, overly indulged by his father, as the twig was bent, twisted awry, seeing the distortion but not knowing how to set it right Yet the bonds of boyhood had proven to be enduring ones, and Will and John did to this day enjoy a relationship remarkably free of strain in a family notorious for its internecine rivalries.
It was nightfall by the time Will reached Rouen and was escorted up to John's chamber. John greeted him with a grin, with genuine pleasure, at once sent to the castle buttery for wine, even dismissed an uncommonly pretty bedmate so they could talk alone.
Richard had that day departed Rouen for Gisors, where Philip awaited him, and
John and Will joked now about the exorbitant price Philip was likely to claim for his support in securing Richard the crown. Will could not help thinking that John, too, had profited