Golden and Robert the Welshman had joined later, along with a few local villagers who had no scruples about where they earned the coin needed to feed their starving and oppressed families. The bulk of Randwulf de la Seyne Sur Mer’s men had embarked from Brittany under the capable leadership of Sir Richard of Rouen, arriving in England more than two months after the Wolf had established himself in the forests of Lincoln. This second group numbered some eighty-five of the queen’s trusted guard and, like their comrades who had adapted to their garb of lincoln green, would have followed their fearsome captain—the Scourge of Mirebeau—to the edge of the earth without question.
It had been Friar’s suggestion to keep the two groups separate, and to have some of the original “outlaws” enter the castle grounds by various means and measures designed to blend them in with the guests and inhabitants of Bloodmoor. The rest of the “foresters” had been instructed to set up camp nearby and to alert those inside the castle should there be any sudden influx of either the sheriff’s or the prince’s men to the vicinity.
Alaric had also suggested his own disguise, the vestments and trappings acquired from the real Bishop Gautier, who was at that moment a guest in a nearby village. It was a risky business, shared by the six companions who had assumed the roles of clerics. Balancing out the danger, however, was the fact that he would be able to get close to Lady Servanne, and to remain close in the event of some unforeseen trouble arising.
Unfortunately it also meant he would be pressed upon to preside over morning mass for the visiting nobles, and to remain prominently in attendance in the great hall until such time as the host chose to depart for the tournament grounds.
Thus, dressed in magnificent black and crimson robes, Alaric was accompanying the Dragon’s party to the outer bailey even as the wooden cell door was being slammed and bolted shut behind the semiconscious Servanne de Briscourt. He was not concerned. He was, in fact, relieved to see she had been able to follow Lucien’s instructions and persuade the Dragon to leave the main keep without her.
The rest of the Wolf’s men were not so assured by what they were seeing. They all paused in what they were doing to stare in amazement at the black and gold crested knights of Lord Randwulf de la Seyne Sur Mer’s guard who filed slowly out of the massive castle gates. In their midst was a child with bright blonde hair and regally uptilted chin, but nowhere in the heavily armoured troop of men was there a sighting of a black silk hood.
“What do you suppose it means?” Sparrow asked Gil.
Gil shook her head, her eyes worriedly searching the four-abreast riders for Friar’s face. She was still in her monk’s robes, her vision tunneled and restricted by the shape of the hood, but she was fairly certain she had seen all of the knights’ faces, and Alaric FitzAthelstan’s was not among them.
Sparrow, perched on a cart loaded with straw, looked enough like a pixie in his garishly coloured jongleur’s tunic to draw the eye of several of the grim-faced knights who rode past. His frowned question drew no answers; a great deal of smouldering anger and frustration, but no answers.
“Something has gone wrong,” he surmised sagely. “Have the tents been struck?”
“Nay,” said Robert the Welshman, bending to dislodge a pebble from the sole of his shoe. He was passing by the cart, not wanting to draw any more attention to the peculiar sight of a dwarfish imp and a monk standing together. “Nay. I were just by the green and the tents are still in place. Pennants an’ shields as well, an’ a squire scrubbin’ at a bit o’ armour. Summit’s amiss, though. Ye can smell it in the air.”
He moved on, his mantle furling out from his brawny shoulders like the wake after a broad-beamed ship. He strolled casually into one of the small cramped laneways and peered over the heads of others who were vying for grilled bits of rabbit, fish, and mutton.
“Trust Lumbergut to think only of his belly at a time like this,” Sparrow muttered.
“If things have gone wrong, we will need Robert’s strength,” Gil pointed out. “We will all need our full strength and wits about us.”
Sparrow gazed past Gil’s shoulder and winced at the rusted shriek of the chains beginning to lower the huge portcullis