Part 56

1215

Richard went to an Inn some mile or two distant from the meeting place, but close to the army barracks. He settled down for a quiet dinner and a drink, his aim to reach his lodgings by nightfall and then head back home to his wife the following morning. How he had missed having Constance by his side. How he had wished that her body lay beside his every night. He had been home for Christmas, Constance had been a little off colour due to the unfortunate circumstances of Tristan's death. But they had shared intimacies and much treasured time together before he had to leave once more for the city of London.

There was a ruckus between three men at the other end of the room, something that he didn't want to be involved with, in anyway at all. Unfortunately the noise and the fighting moved across the floor of the pub, tables were turned and ale flew across innocent punters, some of them too joined in the melee. Richard stood and eyed the scenario with some distaste, why couldn't a man have some peace and quiet to eat his meal? He deftly sidestepped as the ball of men crashed into where he had been sitting. One of the men on the perimeter of the group accidentally caught Richard and pulled him into the throng. He tried desperately to get out. It felt as though he was drowning in a freezing cold pond as he pushed forward to free himself. Then he went for plan B and let himself be downtrodden to the floor, here he hoped to crawl away from the kicks and punches.

Richard thought he had made it, and began to feel jubilant inside. Then one last man crashed into his side and he felt a sudden pain. Managing to crawl into the corner he sat panting for breath. He had felt triumph prematurely it appeared. Looking down to where his hand covered the pain, he was the first to witness the blood seep through his digits and he groaned and rested his head against the wall. The fight continued and when it was over no one would remember what had been the cause. But Richard knew one thing, he needed help and fast.

Voices, visions flashed through his mind, he was not sure if half of them were real or imagined. He could see Constance standing there on her wedding day, smiling at him, time seemed to move in reverse for the next thing he knew he was a boy, and then he saw himself in a cradle with his parents proudly peering in. What was happening to him? He couldn't seem to control it, he wanted to cry out and yell to ask, but no words came, just a white blanket of love and peace. It surrounded and covered him, making him feel surreal. The light was a brilliant white and he felt himself being called, not back to earth to Constance but to heaven.

The instigators caught in the fight were of the King's army. When the men had battered each other so that they were unconscious or unable to move, the young serving boy had run and fetched the Captain. The Captain was well respected in these parts and he was welcomed into the Inn with open arms on arrival.

"Oh Captain!" The serving wench proclaimed. "They fought until they could fight no more and they harmed an innocent young man who has been lodging down the road. He is badly."

Seth stood in the doorway blocking out the light, his presence alone filled the room and the customers remaining sober shrunk back as he moved forward. With a disdainful stare he regarded the men of his unit, then summoned his right hand man into the room to escort the soldiers back to their barracks, where they would be consequences for their actions. No one in Seth's unit disobeyed the rules like this and got away with it. He was a stickler for following the rules. Moral rules which had been engrained in him by his mother and Lady Gladstone, for fear he might just turn out like his father.

It was after he had dismissed the men that he caught sight of the injured man and recognised him instantly. Richard of Doncaster, wife of that beautiful maiden of Robin Hood if memory served him correctly. He could still see her now offering to help him as she rode alone with her maid through the forest to Locksley. He, with a little regret feared her had teased her a little too far that day, but truth was he liked her.

Kneeling down at Richard's body he felt his neck for a pulse, it was weak. Turning he spoke abruptly to the landlord to fetch a physician immediately. Seth ran his hands down the man's body and came into contact with the wound. He wasted no time in lying Richard flat on the floor and ripping open his shirt to survey the damage. He had been stabbed with a dagger between the ribs, puncturing a major organ if the loss of blood was anything to go by. The poor man had very little time and no physician however fine was going to be able to help him now. Seth touched his face to see if he could rouse him, Richard's eyelashes fluttered and for one moment Seth thought he might rally round, but death claimed him instead.

Seth sat there silently for a long moment aware of the innkeeper awaiting his next order. Not until the physician and more soldiers arrived did he move. The doctor agreed with Seth that nothing could have been done to save the man's life. That the wound he had sustained had be almost instantly fatal.

"Sir," a soldier asked his captain gently for it seemed that the great Captain Seth was moved by the death of this man.

"Prepare his body back at the barracks, then have an escort take him to ..to.." he faltered he was not sure where Constance lived so instead he added. "To Locksley, in Nottinghamshire."

"And you Sir?"

"I have to impart the grave news to his wife. You," he pointed to the innkeeper. "I want a precise account of events, spoken to my scribe and myself."

He ran a worried hand across his face, he hated death, he especially hated unnecessary death as this had surely been. He had imparted news such as this before but never to one as beautiful or as lovely as Constance, daughter of the Earl of Huntingdon.