“I make this statement freely, not coerced in any way. I came here of my own accord under the escort of Chatelaine Dhuoda. You know who I am. I am called Alain. I was born here in Lavas Holding and grew up in fosterage in Osna village. Count Lavastine of blessed memory believed I was his illegitimate son and named me as his heir. I sat in the count’s chair for some months before King Henry himself gave the county into the hands of Lavrentia, daughter of Geoffrey. This you know.”
Geoffrey was white, shaking, and strangely it was his young daughter who brushed her small fingers over her father’s clenched fist to calm him.
“This is what I must say to you now, so you can hear, and remember, and speak of it to others who are not here today. I am not Lavastine’s heir. I am not the rightful Count of Lavas.”
“Nay! Nay! Say not so, my lord!”
“We won’t believe such lies—!”
“I knew he was a grasping imposter.”
“What of the testimony of the hounds?”
“I pray you!” said Alain. “Grant me silence, if you will.”
They did so. There was another cough, a shuffling of feet as folk shifted position, a handful of murmurs cut off by sibilant hisses as neighbors shushed those who whispered, and, from outside, a chorus of barking, quickly hushed.
“I will depart this place by sunset with nothing more than what I came with, all but this one thing: this pledge made by Lord Geoffrey. That his daughter, Lavrentia, will rule as Count of Lavas but will stand aside if one comes forward with a claim that supersedes hers and is validated by a council of respected church folk or by Biscop Constance of Autun.”
“I swear it,” growled Geoffrey. The hounds growled, in unison, as if in answer or in challenge.
Geoffrey wiped his brow. The girl bit her lip but did not shift or otherwise show any fear in the face of the fearsome black hounds. Pens scratched as a cleric, seated by the fire, made a record of the proceedings on vellum.
Alain descended from the dais and went over to the bench where his pack lay. He hoisted it, whistled to the hounds, and before any person there could react, he kissed Blanche, made his farewells to Cook, and walked to the door. He came outside past the brace of guards and was out into the courtyard and practically to the gates before he heard the rush of sound, a great exhalation, as the folk inside the hall rushed outward to see where he was going.
They crowded to the gate and some trailed after him to the break in the fosse that met with the eastbound road. A handful kept walking behind him all the way into the woodland until it was almost dark and at last he turned and asked them kindly to go back before it was too dark for them to see.
There was a lad, weeping, who sidled forward, grasped his hand, and kissed it.
“I pray you, be well,” said Alain. “Do not weep.”
There was Master Rodlin, without the whippets, who stared at him and said, “What of the hounds? They follow you still. Is that not the mark of Lavas blood? And if not, then what is it?”
“They cannot answer, for they do not have human speech,” said Alain. “They chose to follow me long ago to help me on my path. Serve the rightful heir, Master Rodlin, as faithfully as you did Count Lavastine.”
“When will that one come?” he demanded.
“Like the hounds, I cannot answer. If Lavrentia is the rightful heir, you must serve her with the same loyalty you showed to Count Lavastine.”
Rodlin frowned but grabbed the lad’s hand and led him away. The holding was hidden by the trees and the stone tower by a twilight that caused colors to wash into one dim background.
One remained, wringing her hands. “Do you remember me?” she said. “Will you curse me, for teasing you when you first were come here? Do you hate me for it?”
Her eyes were still as startling a blue as when he had met her years ago. She had a well-fed look to her and her belly curved her skirts in such a way that he supposed she was in the middle months of pregnancy.
“Did you ever meet the prince in the ruins?” he asked her.
Her lips twisted into a resigned smile. “Did you lie to me that night when we both went up to the ruins?”
“No, I did not. I saw him.”
“Then you saw more than I did! I looked, but I saw nothing. Or maybe that’s just how it goes when a girl is young and stupid. I married a good man who works hard and can feed me and my younger sisters and our child. There are only shadows in those ruins now.”
“Have you walked there since?”
“I went there at midwinter, just a few months back. Because I thought of you, in truth. Because we saw you in the cage. I didn’t think that was right. It was Heric done it, and I cursed him for it.”