Hence, the sapphire dragon.
Juliandra found herself contemplating the sapphire dragon, so much so that she was startled when one of the soldiers spoke to her.
“What’s your business, lady?” he asked.
Juliandra came to an abrupt halt and Megsy plowed into the back of her. After steadying her maid, she looked to the group of soldiers. Now, all of them were looking at her curiously, if not a little lasciviously. It was the lascivious looks that began to rile her.
“I…” she stammered, took a deep breath, and started again. “I wish to see Lord de Lara. I have business with him.”
The soldier waved her off. “Lord de Lara hears supplicants on Tuesdays,” he said. “If you want to speak with the man, you’ll have to come back on Tuesday.”
Juliandra didn’t want to come back on Tuesday. She wanted to speak with him now. “But I do not wish to petition him,” she said. “I have important business with him.”
Now that the soldier knew why she had come, he was increasingly disinterested in her. “I told you that de Lara only conducts business on Tuesdays,” he said. “That is when he hears grievances or anything else requiring his attention. You Welsh needed law and order, and he has brought it. If you want to talk to him, then come back on Tuesday.”
“But…!”
He cut her off. “He’ll be fair with you, I assure you. Fairer than any Welsh lord would be.” The soldier eyed her a moment longer before turning away. “Come back Tuesday, lass.”
Juliandra didn’t know what to say. She wasn’t coming back on Tuesday, that much was certain. She was here and she wasn’t leaving until she saw Lord de Lara. Perhaps she had been too polite with them; perhaps she’d not been firm enough. As she prepared to take a harsher and more demanding stance, Megsy suddenly piped up.
“She sings, m’lords,” she said. “She’s come to see Lord de Lara about entertainment. She sings!”
As Juliandra’s eyes widened in shock, interest returned to the soldiers. They looked between the maid and Juliandra.
“Sings?” the soldier in command said. “Is that the business?”
Megsy nodded eagerly. “Aye, m’lord,” she said. “She’ll sing for the hall tonight in exchange for food and a bed, and keep any money that is thrown her way. What better entertainment than to have an angel sing while you eat?”
Now, the soldiers at the gatehouse were mostly looking at Juliandra as the thought occurred to them. The lure of a beautiful woman singing for her supper was attractive, indeed.
“So you can sing, can you?” the soldier looked her over, more closely this time. “Sing something for me. Let me hear you.”
Had she thought she could get away with it, Juliandra would have throttled Megsy at that moment. Her hands were fairly aching to wrap around the old woman’s throat, but she restrained herself.
Barely.
The old woman had certainly gotten them into a bind.
“I… I will only sing for the lord,” she said.
The soldier shook his head, folding his arms over his chest. “Sing or I will turn you away,” he said. “It could be a trick to get into the castle, so prove it to me. Sing.”
She was stuck now, with no way out. It was a trick to get into the castle, but if she wanted admittance to see Lord de Lara, then she would have to make a good effort of sounding like a singer or wait until Tuesday when she could join everyone else seeking the man’s attention.
Perhaps she could bluff her way past these English buffoons.
“My love gave me a ring of gold;
In his eyes, I would never grow old.
He pledged his troth, his love divine;
And in my heart, he would always be mine.”
It was short and sweet, but enough of a taste of her voice to prove her point. It had been slightly rushed, and she hadn’t put forth a good effort, but the truth was that her voice was really quite angelic. Megsy’s suggestion that she was an entertainer wasn’t a fluke, for Juliandra did like to write songs and sing them, but only to herself or to her family. She never sang outside of her own home. She could even accompany herself on the citole her father had given her for her day of birth a few years ago, but singing in front of an audience of strangers…
That was a fresh, new terror.
But it had worked. The soldier looked pleased and so did his colleagues.
“Very well,” he said. “You can sing for your supper, lass. One of my men will show you where you can sleep.”
With that, he motioned to one of his men, who immediately broke off from the group and motioned for Juliandra and Megsy to follow. As they walked past the soldier in charge, he spoke.
“Would you sing better with a lute or harp?” he asked.
Juliandra paused, looking at him. “I can accompany myself on a citole or a lute, but I… I failed to bring mine with me.”
The soldier waved her off. “We have enough men with musical instruments that they can play for you. All you need do is sing.”
Juliandra nodded, moving quickly to catch up with the soldier and Megsy, who was having a difficult time keeping up with her twisted leg. Juliandra took the little maid by the arm and helped her along, following the long-strided soldier across another bridge and through a larger gatehouse.
Beyond that was a bailey, crowded with outbuildings and an enormous keep, which had turrets on the northeast and southeast corners, extending at least two stories beyond the top of the keep.
Those turrets were why the fortress was called the Castle of the Sky. They were so high that, to some, they literally touched the sky. Anyone viewing the land from the windows of the turrets could see for miles and miles into Wales, a powerful vantage point that had once belonged to the former family, now belonging to the English.
Juliandra found herself looking up at those turrets as they passed by. She wondered if a man could see into heaven from that height. Perhaps he was closer to God up there. As she pondered that question, she was distracted from her thoughts when the soldier led her and Megsy into the kitchen yard and the turrets faded from her sight. But it didn’t matter; she had seen enough.
Wybren Castle was as impressive and frightening as she had remembered it to be.
She had to find her father and get out of there.
CHAPTER FIVE
“I am not Caius d’Avignon and we are not at The Pox,” Kevin said flatly, referring to the infamous London tavern that was as seedy as they came. “That big Englishman may thrive on such things at that tavern with the dregs of humanity, but I do not. I will not engage in any drinking games, with any of you. If you must embarrass yourselves so, then keep it to yourselves. Leave me out of it.”
He was sitting at a massive feasting table in the hall of Wybren, watching the men around him snicker and snort. They were already fairly drunk and one of them – a young and brash knight named Caledon “Cal” de Poyer – had brought up drinking until the last man standing. That wasn’t an unusual game within these walls, but Kevin wanted no part of it.
It wasn’t exactly dignified for a man in command, in his opinion.
“The great Viscount Trelystan is too noble to match us drink for drink,” Gareth said in a way that was both defending Kevin and insulting him. “You should never ask your liege to compete on a knight’s level. Seldom does it ever work out in the liege’s favor and then you will find yourself without a home, wandering the roads of England as a knight errant because he has thrown you out on your ear.”