George Ascalon, earl of Grasmere, returns from the Fourth Crusade to learn that his father, a man who has forsaken his family and noble title to take up Holy Orders, has assigned him one last battle. There is an evil permeating a neighboring lord’s lands and George is called upon to vanquish it. With a band of followers that includes his sister, a knight, a fletcher’s wife and a mysterious noblewoman, George sets out to honor the pledge and in doing so discovers that he indeed has dragons to fight, and the person most in need of saving is himself.

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“IF YOU’VE no money to spend, best get on.”

Robert’s breath was wasted. The young stranger didn’t move and was still looking, his hands on narrow hips, when Robert repeated himself, this time in a less than cordial tone. The stranger shook his head and waved a hand at the shelves. There were plenty of swords—enough to array the king’s soldiers—and the price was good. There was something for every kind of man at arms: broadswords, daggers, Robert had them all.

The sun had crossed the smithy while the young man studied the cluttered shelves. Rays of winter sun threw dusty shafts of light over a head of tousled, golden hair that went from the brightest gold to burnished copper, highlighting the dust and mud of a long journey on clothes that had seen better days. His cloak still showed signs of its worth, but it had been patched once too often and the back was faded, as if it had been facing the sun for weeks. The white tabard beneath it was torn and rust-stained, and the crudely repaired arm of a Crusader’s cross sewn on the breast showed through a threadbare spot in the cloak.

“Did you not hear me, sir? If you’ve no money, you’d best—”

The stranger reached for the topmost shelf and pulled a fine sword from under a heap of lesser weapons. He hefted the sword, testing its weight, and tried a few moves, so that the sun flashed off it in bursts and sparks.

Robert laid aside the polishing rag he’d been clutching in his fist and smoothed his leather apron as he came from behind the counter. Now that the stranger was an arm’s length away and in better light, he looked much younger and nobler than Robert had guessed. His face was tanned and unlined, and his large, blue eyes looked like they were made of quartz. Robert could see his own face reflected back. He had heard people say that eyes were the windows to the soul, but this young man’s eyes were like mirrors. There were no glimpses into his soul.

“I see you know the best, sir,” Robert murmured. “But how you knew to look there . . . that sword was made on commission by the king for Lord Thomas’s son, Oswin FitzHugh. I suppose you heard of them?”

“Thomas FitzHugh of Great Langdale? I knew him. And his son. Oswin could never duck—neither in tilt yard nor on a field,” the stranger remarked. “I suppose that’s why the sword is still here.”

Robert snorted, and then laughed outright. “Bold enough words! You didn’t know the FitzHughs are great lords in these parts?”

“I know the cut of their cloth—though your words are bold indeed to make them so great.”

“Well, if you knew them—”

“I knew enough of Oswin to know there wasn’t much left of him after—how much?”

He raised the sword carelessly and swung it about as if it were a wooden toy. Robert reached for the sword and grabbed it by the leather-bound grip and beaten silver pommel, fearing the worst—that some harm would come to his best-made weapon in the hands of this foolish lad.

“If you have to ask you can’t afford it. The gold and jewels alone cost a gold angel!” Robert scoffed.

“How much for this? Would it be a fair exchange?”

The stranger loosed the sword hanging from a sheath on his belt and offered it. Robert knew the sword—he’d made it almost thirty years ago. He took a step back, sputtering as if the breath had been squeezed out of him. He suddenly dropped to one knee.

“George Ascalon! My lord of Grasmere! Pardon! I didn’t know you—that is, I didn’t know you’d come home; there’ve been stories going ‘round about how you were put to death in Constantinople . . .”

“How much, sir? There’s not a tradesman in Grasmere who’d turn away a sovereign or angel, even if it came from a dead man like me.”

Robert dared to glance up. “Wha—?”

“I said, how much for my sword—in fair exchange?”

“That’s the sword I made for your father when he was struck knight!”

“It’s not doing him much good these days, is it?”

“You couldn’t!”

“And who’s to stop me?”

“Two angels, then!”

“Come, man! A sword like FitzHugh’s is worth at least five. I can give you six if it’s a better profit you want.”
“An angel, that’s all I ask!”

George Ascalon made ready to turn over his sword and paused, studying it. He glanced at the other for a longer moment and then carefully placed the FitzHugh sword back on its shelf. His own sword went back into its sheath. Robert made an exasperated sound, knowing he’d lost a sale that would thatch the roof and buy coal for the rest of the winter.

“Truly sir, I didn’t know it was you; it’s been a while, a year or two, hasn’t it? It’s been a long day—I wouldn’t have been so cross; take no offense.”

“None taken.”

A golden angel flew out of the young man’s palm and landed on the counter to spin wildly among swords laid out for repair. Robert snatched the precious coin before it sailed downward into the rushes.

“God speed,” George called over his shoulder. He made ready to leave and then wheeled about. “Is the Golden Vine still at the end of Butcher’s Lane?” he asked.

Robert nodded and came to the door, pointing the way up a lane flooded with an amber glow of sunlight.
“Just beyond the glover’s. You’ll see the apothecary first.”

“I know the way.”

Robert nodded and watched the broad, straight back of the young man as he trod up the lane, waiting until he was a speck in a maze of wattle and daub cottages before slamming the shutters on the coming night.

The noise made George turn and look at the cottages and shops behind him. His eyes darted from dwelling to shop and back again, waiting. The shout for lights made him glance into the west. What caught his attention then was a formation of clouds over the lake. They drifted lazily together and finally met in one cohesive shape, though it was hard to tell what the shape might be. First it was a boat, then a flower, and at last a beast of some kind. He paused a moment to study them and wheeled about, choosing to walk north toward Canterbury Street to a favorite haunt of past days, Deadman’s Last.

A year and a half had passed since he left Grasmere, yet all was the same. Every cottage and shed seemed to have been preserved in winter ice and snow, slumbering in the intervening days. This impression was never more so apparent than when George approached the inn and tentatively pushed the door open.

He sucked in a breath of foul, greasy air as he entered the common room, the same stale air he’d inhaled a thousand times before. If he were to go into the kitchen, he’d find Joan the scullery sleeping close by the coals of a dying fire. The meat would still be on the spit, dry and tough from turning all afternoon, and the ale would be flat. The bread, if there were any, would be stale or moldy. And the girls . . .

Ah, the girls.

The common room was filled with travelers stopping for the night, and a few had found spaces on the floor beside a hearth that belched clouds of smoke. George glanced about and saw Will Draper, the weaver from Kettle Lane, sitting at a table by the kitchen door. Beside him, as always, was Stephen Black, the sheriff of Cumbria. Off in the corner beside the hearth was the only vacant table in the room with an empty trencher and cup laid out. A lamp over it glowed like a beacon. George made his way through the cluster of patrons and sat down at the table. When he raised the cup, a perfect, dark circle lay underneath. He took the lamp of its hook on the wall and set it on the table.

“It’s true!” Ralf the innkeeper swore as he burst out of the kitchen. “I heard you’d been seen on the road from York!”

“How are you, Ralf?”

“Better than most these days. I suppose you’ll have stories to tell, eh, my lord?”

“That would depend on who wants to hear them. Broth and bread, some meat—if it’s fresh. Oh, and a clean bowl and cup?” A single coin fell out of the worn scriptied to George’s belt and he pushed it toward the man.

“Can I have the loft room? I’m not ready to go home.”

“It’s already yours! Welcome back, sir!”

The meal came quickly. George folded his hands before him; ready to give thanks for the food, then hesitated as he noticed one of the patrons watching him with too much interest: an old gentleman, who in the dusky light and shadows resembled a crow, the miserable birds that used to nest at his father’s castle and torment George when he was a boy. George reached for the pot of ale instead and drank deep, wiping his mouth on the hem of his cloak.

“That’s a Crusader’s sword!”

George ignored the rather loud whisper at first, but that one whisper was joined by many. He turned to see that they came from travelers seated by the hearth: a youngish man who wore the cloak and cap of a scholar, a pale boy, the old crow, and several Lombard merchants. He gave them all a look that warned silence and pushed bread across the trencher to sop up broth, took another drink of ale, and then filled his cup from the pot. These innocuous movements seemed to entertain, for George’s audience kept staring as if there was nothing else to do but watch a man eat.

“He’s been in the Holy Land!” the boy exclaimed. “I’ve seen those swords. Only Crusaders have them. Sir! Sir! Are you a knight of the Temple? A Templar?”

“You’ve a good eye, boy,” George said between bites. “Now leave me to my supper.”

“You didn’t answer me. Are you or aren’t you?” the boy demanded, coming close and standing over George. The roundness of the boy’s still childlike face was made more apparent by the flickering lamplight. He looked no more than fifteen, if that. His peat-colored hair cast ruddy highlights and his eyes, though wide for the moment, looked tired and dull. George knew he was of some consequence in the world, for when the boy opened his mouth his teeth were white, clean, and even. He stank of garlic and onions, not of decay.

“I suppose you killed a fair number of Saracens with that?” the boy queried, reaching for the sword.

“I suppose,” George answered. “It could kill a few more. Or a boy who won’t leave be.” George rested his fingers on the hilt and used them to gently remove the boy’s hand. “Look you, sir, I’ve been a long way from home, and I want to finish my supper quietly. Surely you know from your betters how to leave be?”

“Master Adam, be quiet and sit down! Leave well enough alone!” his companion hissed.

“Perhaps he should ask questions!” the old crow rasped, heaving himself up on a fine walking staff carved with ancient symbols of the Old Ways. He leaned heavily on the table, jostling George’s pot of ale. “Let the boy ask. Or maybe you don’t want to talk of it. After all, there’s no pride in coming home a coward.”

“And who might you be, to say what may be my lot?” George demanded quietly.

“It doesn’t matter who I am. All that matters now is what you’re going to do,” the man replied, though George paid more attention to the blue velvet gown he wore than the words spoken. The gown fell in large folds over an emaciated frame, as if it was cut for a larger man, and the gold embroidery was tarnished from wear and age. Dull patches marked where jewels once graced the fabric. Pushing the lamp towards him, George got a better look.

“I think I should know you,” George murmured, pulling the lamp back.

“You just might—”

“—I tell you again, my lady must have a room for the night! Not for herself, alone, mind; her maid has taken ill and must rest. It’s too far a ride to Arkengarthdale!”

The shout made George and his interrogators look toward the common room door where two travelers had their entry blocked by Ralf.

“There’s no bed for miles! Surely you’ve one room left!” the man continued.

“If the lady wants to stay the night, I can give her new straw and a good blanket. We can clear away the kitchen and she can sleep there if she wants privacy,” Ralf replied.

“A room! Do you know who her father is?”

“Her father could be John the blessed bloody Baptist and it wouldn’t do her any good tonight!”

“And what if the girl dies? What then?” the man shouted, and silenced the room. “It would be an act of charity—my lady would not expect such favor for herself alone.”

“The lady may take my lodgings,” George spoke up.

The man glanced around the heads of the patrons to see who had spoken and nodded deferentially when George rose and came forward.

“George Ascalon, earl of Grasmere, sir,” Ralf introduced. “And do you know who his father is?”

“Who does not?” the man gushed. “Sir, my lady and I are indebted to you for this small kindness.”

George looked at the girl standing to one side, her face shadowed by a hood and the now dim light. He could see that she was fair of color and her eyes, though smudged with lack of sleep, looked bright enough, perhaps blue and perhaps slate. What he noticed most of all was the serenity. In the midst of chaos, she was calm and looked otherworldly.

George nodded in greeting. “No kindness is ever too small.”

“May I present Lady Richildis of Eskeleth,” the man announced. “I am Stephen Langley, steward of the Golden Tower, her father’s castle.”

The girl threw back her hood, stepping forward into better light. She looked directly at George and, although he’d loved or bedded a number of women, he’d swear an oath on twenty Bibles that none were as beautiful as this young lady.

George was fair of eyes and hair, but Richildis of Eskeleth was fairer. What caught his attention more than her eyes was her hair. It was so pale gold it looked transparent. He imagined what it would be like with the sun streaming through it, and wondered if her pale skin was as incandescent.

“Madam, you do me honor,” George took her hand to kiss it. To his surprise she withdrew her hand and enclosed it in the folds of her cloak.

“My thanks are in proportion to your offering, sir,” she said, her voice soft, low, and musical. George now imagined how it would sound in song, perhaps a chanson de virelai. He was tempted to take the fantasy further, to a bedchamber in a castle somewhere in France, when the boy called Adam shoved his way into their circle.

“My lady, I have better quarters at the abbey. Why should you be given a bachelor’s rooms? They’re bound to be full of lice or vermin! I gladly offer the guest house leased to me, for it befits your station and beauty,” Adam pronounced. He grinned boldly and made a sweeping gesture so that his hair almost dusted the floor when he bowed.

“Would you, indeed?” George murmured.

“Forgive the young man, Lady,” the boy’s companion hissed, “he is Adam Middleton, heir to the lordship of Gawthorp, and thinks his title gives him leave to speak whatever comes out of his mouth!”

“Most of it foolishness,” said George. “His father would be ashamed to hear it.”

Adam’s dull eyes flared a moment and he placed a hand on his sword hilt, being careful to show the lady he carried such a weapon. He turned to George and offered a look of flint, though he was forced to crane his neck, for George was taller than most men.

“Do you presume to know my father?” Adam demanded.

“I do. I fought beside him many times.”

“Ah! Forgive me! You are the celebrated George Ascalon!” said Adam with a tinge of sarcasm and adolescent bravado. “My grandfather says you fled the taking of Constantinople, that you left your men to die by Byzantine swords and atrocities. How foolish was that? How did it feel, to take flight on a ship from Byzantium, getting away free and clear?” Adam continued, his voice and stance growing bolder.

“Young lord, you are mistaken!” George hissed, trying hard to keep his temper. “Good night.”

George pushed his way out of the common room. He let the door bang against him and waited there on the threshold to take in the stinging cold night air. Without thinking, George repeated words he’d known since childhood: “Christ before me, Christ beside me, Christ above me, Christ below me.” Words from an ancient prayer. He crossed himself and stepped out into the lane, walking toward St. Cuthbert’s Abbey in the northeast part of town.

The streets were quiet, save for a stray dog sniffing piles of midden and a wolf growling from a hiding place among the trees against the abbey walls. Yet George heard the unmistakable sound of boots and spurs on the path behind him. Gripping the hilt of his sword and closing the other hand around a dagger at his waist, George slowed his pace, straining to hear as the wind picked up. The footsteps quickened and George drew his sword, spinning a half circle to find a pale, diseased Crusader staring at him, the soldier’s breath rising in noxious, billowing clouds from his mouth.

The Crusader rasped something unintelligible, struggling for air and it was apparent why. His neck was covered in a bloody bandage and a great wound was visible at the throat.

“What?” George demanded, taken off guard and unsure of what the man had said. His knowledge of Greek was excellent, but the words were meshed together, more like a cry in pain than a sentence.

He muttered it again, then adding in French: “Vous méritez de mourir pour vos péchés!”

You deserve to die for your sins.

George understood now. He raised his sword and, with a shout, let it fall rapidly—on nothing.

He looked about, puzzled, turning a full circle, listening but only hearing the wind in his ears and the soft padding of a dog as it hurried across the street to get out of George’s way. The street was empty, quiet. Trembling from cold and confusion, and some shame, he sheathed his sword and waited. When nothing unexpected or strange happened, George continued on towards the abbey. From time to time he glanced back and was glad to see no one.

As expected, the postern gate was unlatched, although it was past dark. The Benedictines were accommodating to travelers and thieves who passed in and out of the borderlands, paying no mind to their business or the hour. George walked a familiar path among the vegetable and herb gardens, past the infirmary, to the abbey church. He went in and sat in one of the choir stalls, the wood groaning under his weight, and was there for some time when a door opened and fell shut, and footsteps echoed.

“Benedicte, friend: have you need of food or lodging—George? My blessed saints, is that you?”

George barely turned at the voice. He watched the candlelight dancing off the polychrome Virgin in her vestibule and then began whispering the prayer again, letting the words fall in their familiar pattern.
Christ before me, Christ beside me, Christ above me, Christ below me, Christ behind me, Christ around me . . .

The footsteps grew close and then stopped.

“It is you. I thought it was; I didn’t want to hope—I recognized the footsteps. You’ve grown some.”

George looked out into the shadows where a man stood. “How is it with you, Father?”

“Your mother told me she received a letter full of nonsense and rambling, how you quit the crusade.” A Benedictine brother materialized in the glow of a lantern and settled into the stall beside George’s. “It’s good to see you.”

After a painful silence full of innuendo, he reached up to tousle George’s hair as if he was a small boy, but George grabbed the hand. A thin, white scar that looked like a tree branch spanned Aubrey Ascalon’s palm and did not go unnoticed by his son.

“What’s here? I don’t remember this. Cut yourself making parchment for bibles?”

“An old battle wound,” Aubrey explained.

George wrestled free and in doing so, the icon hanging around Aubrey’s neck caught his attention. The image was visible in the candlelight—an enchanting and beautiful Madonna. George stopped the icon swaying in its course with a thumb and forefinger and studied it more closely.

“I’ve seen this woman before. Is it Mother?”

“A woman important to no one except to God. A gift from one who was once a friend. How you stare at it! She was uncommonly beautiful . . .”

George now glanced at the man sitting to his left. It was like looking into a still pond at his own reflection, he thought. The only difference was the span of twenty years that separated father and son.

“You’re unhurt? No wounds?” Aubrey queried, holding the lantern close.

“None a man can see,” George murmured, and then, “You’ve done well for yourself, Father. Lord Abbot, I hear. Some say you’ll be Archbishop of York.”

“I suppose your mother hates me now.”

“No more than any wife whose husband gives up all, exchanging one lord for another.” The statement was just that, a statement; not a conviction, nor accusation.

“And you?”

“Doesn’t matter what I think, does it?”

“Yet you returned.”

“Not because of what you did. It’s not important. I’m home.”

“Much will be made of your return . . .”

“It’s a foolish undertaking,” George stated. “Surely not what our Lord intended when He asked us to love one another!”

Aubrey leaned closer, gripping George’s hand. “George, people are whispering evil things about you, of what happened in Constantinople, and there are stories—”

“I came home because I was sick of war and sick of watching people die, of killing men. Where is the dishonor in that? I came home because rather than let your lands and revenues fall to the king or his favorites, I want to claim them for myself, as is my right as your son, if you must know. Besides, my sister and mother have no one to protect them.”

“Not fair, George; not fair!”

“Was it fair when you left the note for Mother and said not even a word of goodbye, or a truthful explanation?”
“When the call comes it’s one that you don’t ignore or dismiss lightly. I’d pretended for so long.”

“Ah, that would explain why you sent me off to murder in the name of Christ. You wanted someone else to do your dirty work while you prayed away the hours.”

“You don’t understand—or don’t want to!”

George waved away further explanation. “Tell me this. Am I the earl of Grasmere, or did you sell the entitlement to purchase your holy orders?”

“Look there.”

George glanced to where his father’s elegant hand directed, a hand muscular and large that used to wield a broadsword and now held a prayer book. The hand’s shadow fell on the smiling, docile Virgin.

“At the foot of the Virgin there is a loose paving stone. Beneath that is the title and warrant for your lordship.”

“Why do you hide it?” George wanted to know, rising up and taking a step. Aubrey held him back.

“Leave it. If anything should happen to you, your family is safe.”

“Not our family, Father?”

“All is provided for; I saw to it, made sure it was done.”

George was ready to argue and tell his father he was a fool for giving up an ancient birthright but the abbey bells struck the hour and Aubrey embraced him. “Come and see me again, George, for I have missed you!”

The familiar embrace made George’s heart pound. The father he remembered, the gilt giant with merry blue eyes, the man who laughed and played with him, the man who smelled of leather and sandalwood, was nowhere to be found in the pale contemplative now hurrying off to Chapter, leaving behind a scent of frankincense and a lifetime of regret. George waited for the footsteps to die before he left the abbey church. For the second time that day he would leave a familiar place with a heavy heart.

Out beyond the postern gate, George pulled his worn cloak about him to stave off the wind that now brought a light snowfall. He stamped his feet against the cold and tried to decide which way to go—back to the inn or on to Skelwith Castle, his family’s home at Little Langdale. Looking to the west, he saw the reddish glow on the horizon and frowned. The tang of burning wood and fiber filled his nostrils as a new wind assailed him. A house in the poor neighborhood of Butcher’s Lane had gone up. George sprinted to the market square and rang the bell, then headed towards the conflagration.