“We’ll likely be bedding down on a stone floor,” Ransom said.
“It doesn’t matter. I have an ill feeling about this. I don’t wish to leave you alone.”
The request was touching, and Ransom nodded his acceptance. “Very well. Take the others to a meadow, Dearley. Be careful. I don’t want any of the knights to start a brawl or be involved in one.”
“I’ll keep them away from the village,” Dearley promised. He ordered the other knights to turn and follow him back down the hill, taking Dappled with him as well as Dawson’s destrier.
“Are you worried about the king, Lord Ransom?” Dawson asked in a low voice.
“Aye,” he replied simply.
“He treated you with great disrespect.”
“Keep your voice down,” Ransom warned.
Dawson had always been hotheaded, but he was a formidable knight and an excellent soldier. He was brave and dependable.
All things the king was not.
Ransom stared at the prisoners again and noticed a young man carrying water to them. At first he thought it was a page, but he realized with a start it was Drew Argentine. He dipped a ladle into a bucket and offered each man a drink. The looks the captured knights gave him were full of gratitude. There was a knight wearing the Eagle badge of North Cumbria who shadowed the boy and kept watch over him.
Dawson followed Ransom as he approached the young man. It took Drew a moment to notice him, but then the boy offered an exhausted smile.
“Lord Ransom, it’s good to see you again.” He dipped the ladle again and handed it to the next man. “Some of these men haven’t eaten in two days.”
“I’ll talk to the castellan,” Ransom promised. Pride swelled in his heart as he watched the lad attend to the captured. He had his mother’s countenance, and her compassion too.
“Thank you.”
Drew had smudges of dirt on his own face and a look of utter weariness, but he kept going, moving from man to man until the bucket had emptied. When the boy walked to the well in the middle of the courtyard, the knight attending to it didn’t offer any assistance with the bucket as he lowered it down. Before Ransom could step forward, Dawson took over, retrieving the bucket, sloshing with fresh water, with a few tugs of his strong arms.
“Thank you,” Drew said to him.
Dawson shook his head and looked over the scene, his expression brooding. It was obvious what he was thinking. Such a lack of courtesy was dishonorable—it went against the vows Jon-Landon had taken at his coronation, the ones required of him by the Fountain. But Drew was proving his own character, and Ransom was proud of him.
“I wondered, Lord Ransom,” Drew said, “if you could send a message to my mother. Tell her where I am. That I’m safe and well.”
“Will they not let you send a message?” Ransom asked with concern.
Drew looked at the knight, who wore the sigil of the North, and shook his head. “The king has forbidden me to send word to her. But you’re on the king’s council. Would you do it?”
“I will,” Ransom promised. He knelt by the boy as Drew clenched the handle of the bucket. Putting a hand on Drew’s shoulder, he offered a nod of encouragement. “Have courage. Your mother will ransom you. I’ll make sure she knows where you are.”
A relieved sigh came from Drew. “Thank you, Lord Ransom.” He looked around the courtyard. “There are many thirsty still. I’d better go.”
“Your mother would be proud of you,” Ransom said, meaning every word.
“I try to make her proud,” Drew said softly, looking down. “I’m grateful to be away from Pree. I liked it even less than here. But I miss Ploemeur. I miss it so much.”
Ransom’s heart ached for him. “You’ll be back soon.”
The boy looked into the distance. “I don’t know. I don’t think the king will ever let me go.”
The blunt statement, spoken by a youth, cut Ransom to the bone. Yet he could not deny that he shared the boy’s worry. Drew wasn’t just Jon-Landon’s nephew. He was his rival. The king would make Ploemeur bleed before he released Constance’s son.
Ransom stood up and gave the young man a knightly salute. Drew smiled and then hefted the heavy bucket back to where he’d left off. With a jolt, Ransom noticed one of the prisoners was staring at him from across the courtyard. Guivret. The look he gave him was one of loathing.
“Talk to Guivret,” Ransom said to Dawson. “See what you can learn from him.”
“Aye, my lord,” Dawson said.
Ransom left the courtyard and then entered the castle. The daylight was beginning to fail, and he was bone weary. He sought out the castellan and found him speaking with Lord James, who wore a fresh tunic and had a freshly trimmed beard. As he approached, James wrinkled his nose.
“By the Lady, Ransom, you stink!”
“The prisoners haven’t been fed,” Ransom said, ignoring the taunt.
The castellan’s hair and beard were threaded with silver. “I’m trying my best, Lord Ransom, but the soldiers keep stealing from the larders. We’re nearly out of food for ourselves.”
“Have you posted a guard?” Ransom asked.
The castellan frowned. “I wouldn’t go that far, my lord. They wanted to celebrate a remarkable victory. The king said he’d make a feast for everyone when he returns, and I have no idea where the meat will come from! I wasn’t expecting to hold a three-day-long celebration.”
“I understand, but the prisoners need some bread,” James said to the castellan. “I didn’t know they’d been deprived so long.”
“I’m hoping supply wagons from Kingfountain will be here soon,” the castellan grumbled. “As for yourself, Lord Ransom, I have a small room . . . hardly more than a closet. It’s the best I can give you, but I can’t house your men right now.”
“I’m having them camp in the meadow,” Ransom said. “I just have one with me.”
“Good! I have things to attend to. If you’ll pardon me, my lords.”
James nodded in dismissal and shifted his attention to Ransom, giving him a wary look. “Are you going to ask the king to take Lady Constance’s son as a ward?” he asked. “I know you’ve been on friendly terms with the duchess . . . in the past.”
Was he hoping Ransom would say no?
“I don’t think the king looks at me very favorably at the moment,” Ransom admitted. “If I did ask, I’m not sure what he’d say.”
James nodded and looked over his shoulder. “He wants me to take the boy to Dundrennan. He wants to keep him as a hostage, but he’s afraid someone will be sent to rescue him once the truth comes out. I personally agree that he should go with me back to the North, but I didn’t want to argue with you about it. Not in front of the king anyway.”
Ransom felt a heaviness in his heart. “I don’t think he would listen to me anyway.”
“Why do you say that?”
“The way he treated me at Auxaunce. He ordered me to return here so he could accuse me of being in league with the Occitanians.”
“You?” James said with exaggerated surprise. “Everyone knows you hate Estian.”