The only sound in that great hall was of her skillful lute playing. Juliandra dropped her eyes from the tapestry, seeing a host of enthralled faces.
Her bravery surged.
“In the beauty of the spring,
He gave me a ring,
That spoke of his great love for me.
He promised to return,
And gave me his word,
But the ring was all I would ever have.
The ring was all I would ever have.”
The end of the song was a few strummed chords, tapering off at the end of her sad song. Timidly, she looked to the men around her, who were still staring at her as if dumbstruck, before they broke out in thunderous cheers. Juliandra actually jumped at the sound, startled, but when she realized it was because they liked her singing, she couldn’t help the grin on her face.
Slightly embarrassed, she wasn’t sure what more to sing when they started demanding more songs. The truth was that she knew many songs but, at the moment, she couldn’t think of one.
Her mind had gone blank.
Men began shouting for a song of laughter, which she took to mean a song with humor in it, so she reverted back to her twelve-year-old self who had written a song about a girl who had stolen the eye of the only boy in the entire village that Juliandra thought was handsome. It was rather funny, but it was also cruel. Still, it was the only thing she could think of at the moment.
Quickly, she began to strum the lute in a fast-paced, almost silly manner.
“She was lewd and shrewd,
That pasty wench,
Who walked with bowed-out knees.
Myrtle had a girdle
No man would hurdle
Because she smelled like a fish!”
When she abruptly finished, the entire hall burst out in cheers and roars, greatly approving of a song that could be considered quite bawdy. Juliandra started laughing because they were, pleased that her song about Myrtle ferch Bierce was so well received. It was, in some small way, a victory for the boy Myrtle had stolen away from her those years ago.
Now, it was eight years later.
But her silly song brought calls for more humorous songs and Juliandra had heard many over the years, some just plain foolish. But that seemed to be what her audience wanted, so she sang a song about a lost dog with a missing leg, a child who refused to eat his mush, and an old woman trying to pretend she was a young maiden in order to catch a husband.
Every foolish song she could think of was played and her audience loved every minute of it, and she grew bolder with each successive tune. She began to walk a circle around the fire pit, singing her songs, some of which she repeated twice, and all the while men drank and cheered and threw coins at her. At the end of each song, she would rush around the fire pit, collecting the coins, and thanking the men for their generosity. She was enjoying herself quite a bit, and making a good deal of money, until the inevitable happened.
A man made a grab for her.
That was when the frivolity stopped and she screamed, beating at the man to release her and his colleagues jumped in to separate them. As she staggered to her feet, someone threw a punch at the man who had grabbed her. Suddenly, the table erupted in a brawl.
That was Juliandra’s time to exit.
As the entire hall deteriorated, she managed to dodge a few other grabbing hands and make it back to Megsy without any damage being done. The old servant grabbed her fearfully.
“We must get out of here,” Megsy said. “Hurry! Out the way we came!”
“Nay!” Juliandra said. “I came here to speak with Lord de Lara and I am not leaving until I do.”
“But…!”
“This will have been a wasted effort if we go now!”
Megsy wasn’t sure about any of it. She had a good grip on Juliandra, fearful that the woman would run off and leave her behind. But she didn’t hold tightly enough because as the chaos in the hall was going on and knights were shouting at the men to stand down, Juliandra spied a servant and rushed over to the wench, asking her who Kevin de Lara was. The wench pointed at a table next to the fire pit. She indicated the only man that was still sitting at the table.
Evidently, he had been close by all along.
Juliandra made her move.
While everyone at the table was up, dispersing the fights that had broken out, Juliandra came up behind Kevin as he sat there, watching his knights as they knocked heads together. The soldiers were drunk and unruly, which was nothing abnormal at a feast. Kevin didn’t seem particularly concerned with it, but he was watching the activity. With the lute still in one hand and her coins in the other, she marched up to Kevin’s table.
“My name is Juliandra ferch Gethin,” she said. “You put my father in your vault for failing to pay a toll. You may have all of the coinage I earned tonight if you will release him to me.”
She was standing right next to him as she spoke and Kevin, perhaps a little too close, startled when she began to speak. Suddenly, he was out of the chair and on his feet, looking at her with an expression that suggested suspicion and disapproval until he realized who it was.
His features loosened.
“You are the singer,” he said.
Juliandra nodded, nervous now that she had gotten a good look at him. He wasn’t a tall man, but he was powerfully built, with big hands and big muscles. His upper arms were as big around as her waist and, suddenly, she wasn’t quite so confident in her demands of Kevin de Lara.
He was enormous and frightening.
“Aye, my lord,” she said. “And… and you are Lord de Lara.”
He simply nodded as his suspicious expression returned. “What did you just say? Something about a toll?”
Juliandra opened her mouth to reply, but a soldier suddenly landed on the table, bouncing across it. Had Kevin not reached out and grabbed Juliandra, the soldier would have crashed right into her. As she yelped fearfully, another soldier crashed onto the table, too close for comfort, and Kevin started to pull her away.
“This is no place for you,” he said. “Get out before someone takes your head off.”
But Juliandra dug her heels in. “I will not,” she said. “I mean no disrespect, my lord, but I have come here tonight for a reason.”
“Your reason was to entertain my men.”
Juliandra shook her head. “Not at first,” she said. “I came because I wanted to speak with you, but your men told me to come back on Tuesday when you hear supplicants.”
“That is true.”
“But I am not a supplicant. I simply want my father returned to me.”
He eyed her for a moment as he realized what she was saying and his disapproval returned. He didn’t like sneaky women.
“If they told you to go away, how did you get into the hall?”
“I told them I had come to sing for my meal and they let me in.”
He grunted unhappily as he realized the entirety of the situation. “So you smiled prettily, mayhap even flashed a soft, white shoulder at them, and they let you in,” he said. “Is that it?”
She shook her head. “Nay, my lord, I swear that I did not flash… anything,” she said. “That is something I would not do. I just want my father and took the opportunity to gain admittance to the castle to speak with you.”
Kevin started to say something but the rolling pair of fighters on the table crashed onto the ground and rolled right into Kevin’s feet. As he teetered off balance and kicked them away, Juliandra lifted her borrowed lute and smashed it over the head of one of the fighters.