The two knights were the only customers in the tiny inn, which was really just an ale shop, nothing like the bustling establishments they had visited on the long road home.
Nicholas put both elbows on the table and stared into his empty tankard. “Aye.”
“Then, let’s be off, man. I warrant there’s a lady or two who’ll be anxious to see your pretty face again.” He glanced at the serving girl, who had not taken her gaze off Nicholas. “Mayhap more than one or two.”
Nicholas offered the girl another smile and she turned scarlet. She bobbed up and down, holding the tankard in one hand and her sopping dress in the other. “Would the gentlemen, ah, my lords, ah…shall I draw another flagon of ale?”
Nicholas sighed and pushed himself back from the table. “Nay, sweetheart. My friend is right. ’Tis past time for me to reach home.” He stood. “You will accept the hospitality of Hendry Hall this night before traveling on, Gervase?”
Gervase nodded. “I’d like to meet your father. He’ll be a proud man to welcome back a hero son.”
Nicholas gave a humorless laugh. “Surviving makes us heroes, is that it?”
Gervase reached for his gloves and stood. “All returning Crusaders are heroes, Nick.”
“We’ve won nothing, accomplished nothing more than sending a few poor heathens to their own heathen hell. But we’ve struck a blow for Christendom and lived to tell the tale. Aye, you may be right. It might be enough to make my father proud of his son. If so, I don’t know whose will be the greater astonishment—his or mine.”
The two knights started walking out of the inn, Nicholas weaving the first two steps until he gained his equilibrium. “Surely not,” Gervase protested, steadying his friend with a hand on his elbow. “How could a father not be proud of a son like you—a superb horseman, deadly with a sword, quick-witted, not to mention that devil’s countenance that has melted the hearts of half the maidens between here and Sicily?”
“There’s the rub, precisely. My father was always disappointed that I neglected those first attributes you mentioned in favor of the last.”
“He disapproved of your female conquests?”
Nicholas squinted as they walked out into the sunlight. “’Twas a vacillation between disapproval and disgust, I believe. He claimed I curried trouble by what he called my ‘irresponsible attachments.”’
His companion gave Nicholas a sideways glance. The lean, blond Gervase was only a couple of years older than Nicholas, but his expression was much less world-weary. His blue eyes were clear and innocent. “There were many, then?” he asked, his voice softly curious.
“Aye. Many.”
They’d almost reached their horses when the girl who had been serving them in the inn came running out the door and called to them, “Begging yer pardon, my lords.”
They turned toward her. “What is it, girl?” Gervase asked.
Her eyes on Nicholas again, the girl, shuffling her feet in obvious discomfort, said, “The master said ye was to pay fer the spilled ale, my lords. I’d not ask it meself, but he said ye was to pay.”
Gervase looked toward the inn, then at Nicholas. “Do you know the owner, Nicholas?” he asked.
Nicholas shook his head slowly, as if trying to clear it. “It’s been nearly four years. I don’t remember. Who’s your master, sweetheart?” he asked the girl.
“Master Thibault, sir,” she said. “I’d not ask it myself,” she repeated with another nervous bob.
“Thibault the brewer?” Nicholas asked. “Phillip Thibault is master of this place?”
The girl bobbed in confirmation.
“You did spill the drink, Nick,” Gervase said. “Pay the chit and let’s be on our way.”
But Nicholas shook his head. “Tell Master Thibault we’d speak directly with him.”
“Very good, milord.” The girl turned and ran into the inn.
“I’ll give you the coin,” Gervase offered, “if it will get us on the road.”
Nicholas didn’t answer his friend. His eyes were fixed on the door of the inn, but the person who emerged was obviously not Thibault the innkeeper. It was a woman, tall and slender. As she marched toward them, Nicholas could see that her features were finely chiseled, her nose straight and narrow, her cheekbones high.
“Might this be one of your conquests, Nick?” Gervase asked under his breath. “Because methinks the lady has had a change of opinion since your departure. I see daggers in those blue eyes.”
“I know her not,” Nicholas answered, puzzled himself by the woman’s obvious animosity.
She didn’t speak until she was practically on top of them. Then she said, “So ’tis truly you. I didn’t believe it when they told me. We’d thought you dead. I’d hoped you dead.” As she finished speaking, she set her feet apart, rocked up on her toes and spit square in his face. Then she whirled around and stalked back into the inn.
The two knights looked at each other in astonishment, Nicholas wiping the spittle from his face with the back of his hand.
Finally Gervase broke the silence with a shaky smile. “My friend, I’ve had second thoughts about asking your instruction in matters of the heart.”
“I swear, Gervase, I never set eyes on her,” Nicholas insisted as the two knights rode side by side along the dusty road to Hendry Hall. After the young woman had disappeared inside the inn, Gervase had argued Nicholas into continuing on their journey at once, rather than waiting to see if the innkeeper shared the lovely spitfire’s hostility. “Do you think I’d not remember a woman like that?”
“She seemed to know you right enough.”
“Aye. And I’ll have an answer to that mystery, but now I’m for Hendry Hall.”
“Am I seeing at last a glimmer of eagerness to be home?”
Nicholas shifted in his saddle. “They said at the inn that they’d thought me dead. No doubt my arrival will be a surprise.”
“We six were all counted among the departed when we didn’t come back directly at the end of the fighting.”
Just six. Of the two hundred knights who’d ridden off four years before proudly flaunting the banner of the Black Rose, only the six comrades-in-arms had returned. Level-headed Simon, the natural leader of the group; Nicholas, the charmer; Bernard, battle-hardened from humble squire to deadly conquerer; Guy, the outlander who was rightfully the lord’s son; Gervase, the innocent who’d taken a vow none of the others would dare; and Hugh, whose soft-hearted manner disguised a warrior’s strength.
“I thought the news of our miraculous survival would make our welcome all the merrier,” Gervase continued when Nicholas remained silent.
“Hendry Hall is not a merry place, Gervase, which is perhaps why I was wont to seek friendlier diversions away from home.”
“By the saints, Nicholas, if all your diversions were like the one we just met, I’d say you’d find friendlier ground back fighting the infidels.”
Nicholas shook his head. “And still you refuse to believe me. The lady was not my lover.” He stared ahead at the gray stone manor house that had come into view around the bend in the road. He’d always favored buxom maids with pleasing smiles and easy ways. The woman at the inn had had a strength to her, no matter how willowy her form. And there’d been steel in her gaze. “Trust me, Gervase,” he said softly. “I’d