Free The Wicked and the Just by J. Anderson Coats Page B

conversation. I cannot hear any words over the stream’s murmur, but their lips are moving.
    â€œHey!” William leaps past me like a roebuck, his short sword drawn and brandished. “I’ll see the lot of you in the stocks for a se’ennight!”
    One of the men shouts something in tongue-pull and they scatter in six directions. William is knee-deep in the stream when they’re all out of sight.
    â€œBastards,” he mutters as he wades out. He slams his sword into its scabbard and squishes up the bank.
    I crane my neck, but naught remains of the men save swaying branches and trampled mud.
    I hurry to catch up with William. “I agree with you. Welshmen should all be put in the stocks.”
    He shrugs, but his face is still dark. “Men who follow the law ought to be left to their business. Those who break it must pay.”
    â€œStanding on a riverbank is unlawful?” My father certes does not want to see the inside of Justice Court again.
    â€œIt is for Welshmen,” William replies grimly, “should they gather in groups. Twice over, should they be armed. As that lot was.”
    All at once the world seems very large, away from the castle and town walls and armed sentries who incline their heads.
    Emmaline does not seem shaken. She even hums as she spreads a blanket where the grass is dry and bids the maids set out pasties and apple tarts and slices of cold meat and cheese. Piles and piles of everything, straight from the kitchens of Croesus de Coucy.
    I drop to my knees and pick up two pasties and a tart. Evilbeth puffs out her cheeks like a pig. I take a third pasty and stick my tongue out at her ere I can stop myself.
    Aline is still standing, her arms cinched tight as a girdle. “It’s not safe here. Let’s go back.”
    â€œThey’re gone, love,” William tells her. “Half a league from here by now. Welshmen want no part of the law, believe me.”
    â€œThey were here,” Aline insists. “They might come back.”
    William eats a pasty in two bites. “Not today.”
    â€œYou don’t know that. Who can know what they’re capable of?”
    If Gwinny is any indication, the Welsh are quite capable of airing linen and laying fires and scooping dog leavings onto the midden.
    â€œCome now, Aline,” Emmaline says. “Surely you’ve seen Welshmen ere this. You’ve been staying in Shrewsbury for months.”
    William sighs. “Really, love, Em’s right. You may as well fear the cattle.”
    â€œYou’re cruel to mock me.” Aline wrings her hands in her sleeves. “Both of you. I would go home. Not just Shrewsbury, either. Home to England.”
    I grab two wedges of cheese and another tart. I’ve not even put my feet in the water and this whiny little mouse would drag us back to the sweltering town merely because she fears her own shadow.
    William takes her hand kindly. “I should never have allowed you to come. The fault is mine. But Belvero and Whetenhale would never spare me to bear you home to Warwick, or even to our lodgings in Shrewsbury. The part of the fifteenth we collected back at Easter was barely adequate, so the October sum must make up for it.”
    â€œI’m weary to death of hearing of this fool tax!” Aline shakes off William’s hand and folds her arms like an ill-mannered child.
    I’m weary to death of hearing her fool voice, but I’ll not be rude about it.
    William selects the biggest apple tart, gently untangles Aline’s arms, and tucks the pastry into her hand. Her surly pout cracks, then she cuts her eyes to him and takes a bite. He grins and plants a smacking kiss on her cheek.
    If we were still at Edgeley, there would be ten kind, comely souls like William lined up outside the door, every man of them begging for the chance to become the heir to a well-run manor like Edgeley.
    But we’re not at Edgeley.
    I shove the last of a