Free The troubadour's song by Patricia Werner Page A

into the cobbled inner courtyard. While she waited for Jaufre to dismount and come to help her down from the great horse, she glanced around anxiously. To her immense relief several of her own grooms and other of the household servants stopped their work to stand and stare at her. Normally they would nod or call out greetings, but the presence of the French soldiers muted them.
    Once on the ground, she turned to find her steward, Julian Farrell, having come down the steps from the hall to greet her. He was a middle-aged man of thin build, but tall. Even in such a crisis, he possessed a bearing of competence and honest de-

    meanor. His gray eyes were anxious, and his mouth pressed into a straight line beneath his long, arched nose. She rushed to him.
    "Oh, my God, Julian, what has happened?"
    The lines of regret and worry in his face seemed to have aged him ten years.
    "I'm sorry to inform you, my lady, that our castle has been overtaken by the French. It happened just this morning."
    She struggled to quell her anger. "It is my fault. I should not have rushed to the aid of Count Raymond, for all was lost at Muret as well. If I had been here to defend my home . . ."
    Her eyes lifted to the wall walk where more guards were posted and the hated French pennants on long poles flew above the towers.
    "Do not blame yourself, my lady. Your household guard fought bravely. They were simply taken by surprise and outnumbered. The French penetrated the gatehouse by stealth before we could get the portcullis down and the drawbridge lifted."
    True, she had sent as many knights as she could to help Raymond in the field, leaving only a small corps to defend this place. She thought her men were needed in the field. How wrong she had been. Rage and humiliation overwhelmed her, but she kept a dignified demeanor before all those watching her.
    She inhaled a long, steadying breath. "And who is it led this attack?"
    "The knight Gaucelm Deluc, a vassal of Simon de Montfort."
    Her eyes opened wider. The same man! New humiliation filled her. How he would gloat that he had outfoxed her. How he would laugh at her feeble lies! Standing in the growing shadows of the end of day, she came to realize the terrible truth. She was his prisoner.
    In the next moment, worse fears plagued her. "My men-at-arms, were they all. . . ?"
    "Two died bravely," reported Julian. "The wounded are being attended. The rest are taken prisoner in the tower."
    "There have been no vengeful atrocities committed, then?"
    "No, madam. The victor has been most reasonable."

    "Thank God for that."
    Julian cleared his throat, the creases in his proud face deepening. "I am to bring you to him as soon as you arrive."
    She straightened. "Where is he?"
    "In the great chamber, my lady."
    Again she fought the despair that swept over her. Gaucelm Deluc had wasted no time installing himself in the chamber that had been hers and her husband's before he had died in battle two years ago. She was undermined at every turn. But she summoned some pride.
    "I will see him when I have changed into proper clothing and refreshed myself."
    Julian would say nothing to counter his mistress, but she could see from the unhappy look on his face that he'd been ordered precisely to bring her before the conquering Gaucelm immediately. Still, she made a show of her own authority. She was still a noblewoman in a place that had been her home since her marriage.
    She turned and started for the entrance to the keep. With Julian following her, they mounted the steep stone stairs. The guards at the heavy nail-studded door stood aside to let them enter. Passing through the antechamber, she swept across the large hall, but she was stopped on the other side where she would have taken the circular stairway in the tower that led to the solar.
    "Let me pass," she ordered through clenched teeth to the implacable man-at-arms with short-cropped brown hair who barred her way to the tower.
    He did not move, his fixed gaze staring