Medieval 03 - Enchanted

muck,” Sven said blandly.
    Simon looked at the two men, who watched him
expectantly in return.
    “Would that I had been the one to do
so,” Simon said dryly, “but I wasn’t. Who dealt
the fair knight his comeuppance?”
    Without answering, Dominic turned and began taking
the staircase with the smooth coordination of a highly trained
warrior. Simon and Sven followed, matching Dominic step for
step.
    “If I had to guess who sent Geoffrey crawling
naked through pig dung,” Sven said as they emerged into the
forebuilding, “it would be Marie.”
    “Weren’t you there?” Simon
asked.
    “Nay. I am weary of watching him grunt and
sweat over her at night and her over him. When she is with him, I
wait in the bailey until I see her leave.”
    “But why would she leave him naked in pig
mire?” Simon asked, smiling at the thought. “She has
been like a leech on him of late.”
    Sven shrugged. “Marie is a woman. Who knows
what moves her?”
    “You’ve spent too much time in the
company of Erik,” Simon said dryly. “You begin to sound
like him.”
    “A man of rare wit and learning,” Sven
agreed, smiling.
    “I believe Sven is right about Marie,”
Dominic said. “When I went to see Geoffrey for myself, I
recognized some of the marks on his body from my stay in that
sultan’s cursed prison.”
    “Geoffrey had been tortured?” Simon
asked.
    Dominic smiled wolfishly. “You could say
that. Or you could say that he had been used very thoroughly by a
cruel harem girl.”
    “Marie,” Simon said simply. “She
never used those tricks on the three of us, but the rest of the
knightslearned at her hands just how close
pleasure and pain could be.”
    “Aye,” Dominic said.
    “But why Geoffrey?” Simon said as they
stepped into the forebuilding. “What had he done to attract
Marie’s vengeance?”
    “Ask your wife,” Sven said.
    Simon’s eyes widened. “What does Ariane
have to do with Marie?”
    “I don’t know. I do know that your
squire saw her go to Marie’s room rather late ten nights
ago.”
    “Ten nights…?”
    A curse hissed out from between Simon’s
teeth. He stopped dead in the center of the forebuilding.
    “Aye,” agreed Dominic, stopping as
well. “The squire had heard about what happened in the
armory, when Ariane drew her dagger.”
    “I will teach Thomas the Strong not to
talk.”
    “It could have been Marie.”
    “She knows better.”
    Dominic smiled rather grimly. “Aye. Your
Edward was afraid that Marie would do something rash to
Ariane.”
    “Or vice versa,” muttered Sven.
    “When Edward couldn’t find you, he went
to Sven,” Dominic said.
    “I got there just in time to see Ariane run
up the stairs to the battlements as though her skirts were on
fire,” Sven said, carefully not looking at Simon.
    A flush that had little to do with the bracing
temperature of the forebuilding tinted Simon’s
cheekbones.
    Sven laughed out loud, clapped his friend hard on
the shoulder, and said nothing more about what had happened on the
battlements between Ariane and Simon.
    “Knowing that Ariane was safe, I went back to
being the shadow of Geoffrey’s shadow,” Sven said.
“Suddenly Marie appeared in the stable where he sleeps. She
had his breeches undone before he knew what was happening. It was
like that every night thereafter.”
    “No wonder you have looked short of
rest,” Simon said blandly.
    “Marie has some interesting techniques. And
tools. But in the end,” Sven said, shrugging, “it is
all much the same.”
    Simon waited, but Sven said no more.
    “So how did Geoffrey end up in the
muck?” Simon asked.
    “I don’t know. The past three nights,
when Marie came to Geoffrey, I went to the gatehouse and dozed,
knowing that Geoffrey wouldn’t be getting into trouble until
well after dawn.”
    Simon shook his head in silent sympathy for
Sven’s long, cold vigils.
    “At dawn yesterday,” Sven concluded,
“the swinelerd found Geoffrey in the muck. He told Harry the
Lame, who came to me. I went to Dominic.”
    “What did you do?” Simon asked his
brother.
    “Geoffrey looked quite at home,”
Dominic said, smiling narrowly. “I left him there.”
    Simon laughed out loud. After a moment, he had a
thought that wiped all laughter from him.
    “What of Deguerre?” Simon said.
“From what Ariane has said, Geoffrey is like a son to
him.”
    “And you are a
brother to me. If Deguerre objects to Geoffrey’s quarters, he
can teach Geoffrey to be less of a