Maze of Moonlight by Gael Baudino (top 20 books to read txt) 📗

with the stones. Father and Aunt Catherine liked them. Mother didn't, but she went along with it.

Berard was staring. If Jehan was raving like this, then how much of what he had said about the secret passage could be correct? “They . . . ah . . . used the tunnel?”

Jehan chuckled. “All the time.”

“And the tunnel . . .”

“Goes up from the spring. They were nice people, really. Natil could certainly play the harp. . . .” He stared gloomily at the torchlight as cheering broke out among the men gathered outside. “They probably don't approve of me, either.”

Berard groped. “I'm sure that . . .their feelings are in keeping with . . . ah . . . their feelings . . .”

“I suppose so.” Jehan finished the wine in his cup. Berard did not offer a refill. The lad had obviously had too much already. Elves, of all things!

“Why don't you go to bed, Jehan?” he said. “I think sleep will do you world of good.”

“Yes . . . bed . . .” Jehan eyed Joanna. The girl gave him an anxious look and curled up even more tightly.

He left the tent, staggering. Berard watched as he wandered drunkenly away, threw up several times, and finally crawled into his own tent. Did he have a girl in there? Maybe. But if he did, she would be cleaning up after him for a while.

Joanna uncurled at a word and a slap, and Berard smiled as he nestled between her thighs. “Ah, my little sweet,” he said, sliding his hands beneath her smooth shoulders, “you shouldn't be so frightened. It turns out that you've come to be among religious men.” He listened to the singing and the clapping that came from the roistering men of the Fellowship. “Pilgrims, in fact.”

***

Ruprecht insisted that Christopher take a sizable escort when he went to see Yvonnet. Christopher countered that anything that looked remotely like a threat would ensure that Yvonnet would stay safe within the Château. They compromised: a small party, but large enough to befit Christopher's status as a leading baron of Adria.

Christopher needed clothes, too, as did Natil. And though the baron of Aurverelle fretted over the resulting delay, he saw the wisdom in Ruprecht's counsel. As much as Yvonnet would be terrified by a show of force, he would be equally unimpressed by a ragged beggar of a nobleman and an equally bedraggled harper—though Christopher doubted that Natil could ever look bedraggled, even in sackcloth.

It was after a week had passed, therefore, that the party left Maris, and four more days before they took over an inn two miles from the north gate of Hypprux and sent the frightened host to the Château to request the honor of entertaining the baron Yvonnet a'Verne. Christopher made sure the invitation was polite, but he also made sure to include enough of a veiled reference to the status of Lengram a'Lowins vis-à-vis the baronial bed to ensure that Yvonnet lost no time granting such a . . . polite request.

The business was delicate and of extreme urgency. Alone with Yvonnet in an upper chamber, then, without secretaries or witnesses of any kind, Christopher first casually made sure that the door was barred, then turned and smashed a jeweled dagger into the tabletop directly in front of Yvonnet's face. “You damned idiot!”

His unexpected action, coupled with his reputation for madness, produced the desired effect. Yvonnet was terrified. Mutely, he stared at the dagger as the jeweled hilt quivered in the afternoon light.

“What have I done/” he said, his basso dwindling of a sudden to a whisper.

Christopher kept his rage firmly in place, gesturing widely, stomping up and down the room. “I was asking myself the same question! Just when I think I'm dragging your little promiscuous prick into some semblance of family honor, you have to go and stick it somewhere else!” Weighing his actions carefully, Christopher decided to kick a chair across the room. It tumbled and cracked in two quite satisfactorily when it hit the opposite wall.

“I . . . have soldiers . . . downstairs. . . .” Yvonnet's basso dwindled even more.

Christopher leaned across the table, flicked the dagger with his finger. It quivered again. “So do I.”

“What . . . do you want me to do?”

Christopher told him. The companies of mercenaries were to be gotten out of Adria as quickly as possible, regardless of costs, promises, or humiliation. Maris and Aurverelle would help. Shrinerock, doubtless, could also be counted on.

“You'll have to work fast,” said Christopher. “They're not going to be satisfied with Ypris for long. They'll start to splinter, and then we'll have different companies going off in different directions . . .” Saint Blaise! Dear Lady, Vanessa is in Saint Blaise! “. . . raping and pillaging and leveling towns. Did you know that they sometimes break up mills and ovens and tools just for the pleasure of destroying them? What in heaven's name were you thinking of when you dragged twenty-four companies right up to your doorstep?”

Yvonnet suddenly glared at him. “I was thinking of my soul, Christopher. Perhaps you ought to think of yours.”

“And what's that supposed to mean?”

“I saw the Maris livery on your men. You've been dealing with Ruprecht.”

Christopher sighed, passed a hand over his face. “Yes, yes . . . the Antichrist. Excuse me, I forgot.”

Yvonnet's face was rapidly giving way to anger. “I don't forget,” he said. “The schism is the greatest challenge to the Church of Christ in all of recorded time. The Devil is triumphing while people like you go about . . .” He pulled the dagger out of the table, sneered, tossed it away. “. . . playing with knives.”

Christopher's initiative was slipping. He let it go, dropping one weapon for another. “I imagine you don't forget something else, too,” he said. “Like who sleeps in your bed.”

Yvonnet went white, then red. “You wouldn't dare!”

Christopher let the silence grow, let it lengthen painfully. Yvonnet began to