Tavington/Carrenworth: The Narratives: Chapter Ten: "The Dangerous Dragoon
Division"
"He lived," Gen. Howe remarked.
They had been silent for so long that Howe felt himself in genuine danger of expiring from boredom. The journey from London to the Carrenworth's country estate was a long one and over such rough terrain that the carriage jolted back and forth so sharply that neither man had been able to sleep. Howe suggested that they stop somewhere to rest, worried as he was about the health of his young ally, but Victor Carrenworth had refused. The Grand High Golden Dragoon was eager to reach his ancestral home as soon as possible, and his seemingly endless reserve of energy did not appear to have been affected by the disease that was slowly consuming his lungs.
"Who lived?" Victor asked listlessly. He had been watching the countryside from the window, though there wasn't much of a view due to the relative darkness of the night. As he turned his head to face Howe the moonlight reflected off the edges of the golden dragon pendant. "Certainly you don't mean my father."
"No, I mean Col. Tavington."
"Tavington?" the young nobleman's eyebrows contracted in anger. "I received word of his death in a personal piece of correspondence from General Lord Cornwallis himself. Did he lie to me? How dare he lie to me!"
"I don't think he meant to lie, your lordship," Howe said quickly in an attempt to pacify the enraged duke. "He tried, when they brought him back from that battlefield, his injuries were so severe that no one expected him to last the night. There are few men who could last five minutes with bayonet wounds in their neck and gut and a bullet through their left shoulder."
Victor though this over for a moment, resting his chin on a thin, blue- gloved hand.
"It's impossible. No one could survive with injuries like that. We're both practical men, my dear general. The shoulder is minor, but wounds to the abdomen are nearly always fatal, let alone bayonets through the neck. Even if one were to survive, surely infection, gangrene, or some other such unpleasantness would be perfectly willing to finish the poor wretch off."
The general was reluctant to continue, Victor could sense, it was as though he was somehow ashamed. "Gen. Cornwallis wasn't going to risk leaving it up to nature. He ordered the surgeons to administer a fatal overdose of laudanum. Unfortunately, there were both inexperienced surgeons and a shortage of the drug."
"Damnation!" the duke struck the side of the carriage so hard that Howe jumped. "Fate seems determined that I kill the man myself!"
"Do you intend to kill him then, your lordship?"
"It's my duty. It is the sacred duty of anyone with the virtue of Carrenworth blood, to destroy all who bear the name Tavington. Though I must admit that the rewards for doing so have decreased significantly since the birth of that disgusting drunkard, William the Twelfth."
"My agents have tracked Tavington to London, and more recently, to the house of one of William the Eleventh's old associates, James Bordon. If it would please your lordship, we could end his life quite easily. We could send de Fleur, he's the best assassin in the Golden Dragoons."
"And deny me the pleasure of doing the deed myself?" Victor cried. "I think not, my dear general! Besides, I've no intention of killing him anytime soon. If he was as severely injured as you claim then he must be quite weak now. What would be the challenge in killing a man in that state? Where's your sense of adventure, general? Where's your sense of competition? I must give him at least two years to regain his skills and his strength."
Howe shifted his bulk a bit and loosened his collar. It was growing uncomfortably warm in the carriage.
"Two years? Are you quite certain you want to wait that long, your lordship? Are you so sure that you'll be," he hesitated, "alive in two years?"
"I have no intention of dying until at least four years from now," Victor replied with an eerily high-pitched laugh before resuming his careful scrutiny of the dark countryside.
Soon, they turned onto a well-maintained road. The carriage ride became considerably smoother, and Howe quickly fell asleep. Victor continued to stare out of the window, trying to ignore Howe's dreadful snoring and daydreaming about the day, sometime in the not so distant future, when the Golden Dragoons would reign supreme.
"William, you poor fool," he whispered in fanatical delight. "How little you really know. You are safe for now, but the day will come. The day will come, William Lucifer Tavington XIII, when you will be lying on the ground, the point of my blade at your throat. You will beg for mercy and it will not be granted. And when my blade pierces your neck, you won't live to tell about it."
* * *
"You've studied the paintings, no doubt?" Bordon inquired. Tavington nodded, so the captain continued. "Undoubtedly you've noticed that there are two men who bear the name William IX. It is with them that this conflict began. I don't know the exact details, what I know I heard from Mooreville, he was the only one who your grandfather ever really trusted."
"Damn Mooreville," Tavington snapped. "Why didn't he tell me any of this?"
"Mooreville's reasons are his own. Who knows why Mooreville does the things he does? Though I would suspect he wanted to protect you. He didn't want you attacking the Duke of Fairenvail and getting yourself killed. The Golden Dragoons are known for their unmatched skill in sword combat."
"Golden Dragoons?" Tavington asked skeptically.
"I'm getting to it," Bordon answered quickly before continuing. "Deep down though, I think that the whole reason Mooreville never told you was that he didn't want to relive the memories. It was too painful for him. He always blamed himself for your grandfather's death.
"He told me that it all began around the English Civil War. Your grandfather's grandfather, William Edgar Tavington had presented a challenge to the ancient tradition of the dragoons. William Edgar had a twin brother, William Victor Tavington. According to the codes and regulations set down by William the Green upon the founding of the order, the title of Grand High Dragoon is bestowed upon the oldest son of the House of Tavington. You could say that William Edgar was older, by about two minutes.
"As dragoons were are sworn to protect, serve, and preserve the British Empire regardless of the actions taken by the army. In the 1640's, when Oliver Cromwell plunged the country into civil war, William Edgar took up his saber in defense of King Charles. He offered his brother the position of second-in-command, but William Victor would have none of it. He resented his older brother and was eager to prove his worth, so he left his family, changed his name, managed to marry some minor princess since he was considered one of the most handsome men in England, and founded what we call the Golden Dragoons. He became Victor Alexander Carrenworth the First, Victor the Red, and Duke of Fairenvail. Then he pledged his loyalty to Cromwell.
"I suppose it was inevitable that the two brothers would meet on the field of battle. There was a great contest, but in the end William Edgar Tavington prevailed. He killed his brother, who he considered a traitor. One would think that would be the end of it, but fifteen years later William Victor's son murdered William Edgar. Thus began the feud that claimed the life of your grandfather. For generations the two halves of the Tavington family, the two factions of dragoons have sought to destroy one another. The Golden Dragoons have used their titles of nobility and their fortunes to try and prove their superiority. There are many who would see them as the only hereditary order, despite their traitorous origins."
"And you kept all this from me?" Tavington asked, horrified, disgusted at his own ignorance. "We are engaged in a feud and you never told me?"
"I thought you knew," Bordon protested, holding up his hands in a gesture of surrender. "I thought Mooreville told you. He is the one who kept you in the dark."
"I can't believe this." Tavington collapsed back into his chair and began massaging his temples.
"Not that it matters now. The Duke of Fairenvail is dead. The war is over. We've won. William Victor's bloodline has finally died out."
A sudden revelation struck Tavington with the force of a bullet through the heart.
"The Duke of Fairenvail. that means that Karenna was. my Karenna was my enemy?"
"I'm afraid so," Bordon uncorked a bottle of wine and poured a glass for himself and one for Tavington. "Her sister, Anna, still lives but we've nothing to fear from her. Now, drink this. You'll feel better."
Tavington took the wine and downed it in a couple of gulps.
"Tonight, we drink to the victory of the Green Dragoons!"
He filled Tavington's glass and they drank. Bordon was jolly as ever, but William felt this was the hollowest victory he had ever celebrated, mostly because he'd had nothing to do with it.
"How much more is there that I don't know?" he wondered, afraid, for the first time in his life, to ask.
Then another, more horrible possibility occurred to him. What if Karenna had known? What she had been part of some plot of her father's? What if, in asking him to marry her, she had only been leading him to his own demise?
"He lived," Gen. Howe remarked.
They had been silent for so long that Howe felt himself in genuine danger of expiring from boredom. The journey from London to the Carrenworth's country estate was a long one and over such rough terrain that the carriage jolted back and forth so sharply that neither man had been able to sleep. Howe suggested that they stop somewhere to rest, worried as he was about the health of his young ally, but Victor Carrenworth had refused. The Grand High Golden Dragoon was eager to reach his ancestral home as soon as possible, and his seemingly endless reserve of energy did not appear to have been affected by the disease that was slowly consuming his lungs.
"Who lived?" Victor asked listlessly. He had been watching the countryside from the window, though there wasn't much of a view due to the relative darkness of the night. As he turned his head to face Howe the moonlight reflected off the edges of the golden dragon pendant. "Certainly you don't mean my father."
"No, I mean Col. Tavington."
"Tavington?" the young nobleman's eyebrows contracted in anger. "I received word of his death in a personal piece of correspondence from General Lord Cornwallis himself. Did he lie to me? How dare he lie to me!"
"I don't think he meant to lie, your lordship," Howe said quickly in an attempt to pacify the enraged duke. "He tried, when they brought him back from that battlefield, his injuries were so severe that no one expected him to last the night. There are few men who could last five minutes with bayonet wounds in their neck and gut and a bullet through their left shoulder."
Victor though this over for a moment, resting his chin on a thin, blue- gloved hand.
"It's impossible. No one could survive with injuries like that. We're both practical men, my dear general. The shoulder is minor, but wounds to the abdomen are nearly always fatal, let alone bayonets through the neck. Even if one were to survive, surely infection, gangrene, or some other such unpleasantness would be perfectly willing to finish the poor wretch off."
The general was reluctant to continue, Victor could sense, it was as though he was somehow ashamed. "Gen. Cornwallis wasn't going to risk leaving it up to nature. He ordered the surgeons to administer a fatal overdose of laudanum. Unfortunately, there were both inexperienced surgeons and a shortage of the drug."
"Damnation!" the duke struck the side of the carriage so hard that Howe jumped. "Fate seems determined that I kill the man myself!"
"Do you intend to kill him then, your lordship?"
"It's my duty. It is the sacred duty of anyone with the virtue of Carrenworth blood, to destroy all who bear the name Tavington. Though I must admit that the rewards for doing so have decreased significantly since the birth of that disgusting drunkard, William the Twelfth."
"My agents have tracked Tavington to London, and more recently, to the house of one of William the Eleventh's old associates, James Bordon. If it would please your lordship, we could end his life quite easily. We could send de Fleur, he's the best assassin in the Golden Dragoons."
"And deny me the pleasure of doing the deed myself?" Victor cried. "I think not, my dear general! Besides, I've no intention of killing him anytime soon. If he was as severely injured as you claim then he must be quite weak now. What would be the challenge in killing a man in that state? Where's your sense of adventure, general? Where's your sense of competition? I must give him at least two years to regain his skills and his strength."
Howe shifted his bulk a bit and loosened his collar. It was growing uncomfortably warm in the carriage.
"Two years? Are you quite certain you want to wait that long, your lordship? Are you so sure that you'll be," he hesitated, "alive in two years?"
"I have no intention of dying until at least four years from now," Victor replied with an eerily high-pitched laugh before resuming his careful scrutiny of the dark countryside.
Soon, they turned onto a well-maintained road. The carriage ride became considerably smoother, and Howe quickly fell asleep. Victor continued to stare out of the window, trying to ignore Howe's dreadful snoring and daydreaming about the day, sometime in the not so distant future, when the Golden Dragoons would reign supreme.
"William, you poor fool," he whispered in fanatical delight. "How little you really know. You are safe for now, but the day will come. The day will come, William Lucifer Tavington XIII, when you will be lying on the ground, the point of my blade at your throat. You will beg for mercy and it will not be granted. And when my blade pierces your neck, you won't live to tell about it."
* * *
"You've studied the paintings, no doubt?" Bordon inquired. Tavington nodded, so the captain continued. "Undoubtedly you've noticed that there are two men who bear the name William IX. It is with them that this conflict began. I don't know the exact details, what I know I heard from Mooreville, he was the only one who your grandfather ever really trusted."
"Damn Mooreville," Tavington snapped. "Why didn't he tell me any of this?"
"Mooreville's reasons are his own. Who knows why Mooreville does the things he does? Though I would suspect he wanted to protect you. He didn't want you attacking the Duke of Fairenvail and getting yourself killed. The Golden Dragoons are known for their unmatched skill in sword combat."
"Golden Dragoons?" Tavington asked skeptically.
"I'm getting to it," Bordon answered quickly before continuing. "Deep down though, I think that the whole reason Mooreville never told you was that he didn't want to relive the memories. It was too painful for him. He always blamed himself for your grandfather's death.
"He told me that it all began around the English Civil War. Your grandfather's grandfather, William Edgar Tavington had presented a challenge to the ancient tradition of the dragoons. William Edgar had a twin brother, William Victor Tavington. According to the codes and regulations set down by William the Green upon the founding of the order, the title of Grand High Dragoon is bestowed upon the oldest son of the House of Tavington. You could say that William Edgar was older, by about two minutes.
"As dragoons were are sworn to protect, serve, and preserve the British Empire regardless of the actions taken by the army. In the 1640's, when Oliver Cromwell plunged the country into civil war, William Edgar took up his saber in defense of King Charles. He offered his brother the position of second-in-command, but William Victor would have none of it. He resented his older brother and was eager to prove his worth, so he left his family, changed his name, managed to marry some minor princess since he was considered one of the most handsome men in England, and founded what we call the Golden Dragoons. He became Victor Alexander Carrenworth the First, Victor the Red, and Duke of Fairenvail. Then he pledged his loyalty to Cromwell.
"I suppose it was inevitable that the two brothers would meet on the field of battle. There was a great contest, but in the end William Edgar Tavington prevailed. He killed his brother, who he considered a traitor. One would think that would be the end of it, but fifteen years later William Victor's son murdered William Edgar. Thus began the feud that claimed the life of your grandfather. For generations the two halves of the Tavington family, the two factions of dragoons have sought to destroy one another. The Golden Dragoons have used their titles of nobility and their fortunes to try and prove their superiority. There are many who would see them as the only hereditary order, despite their traitorous origins."
"And you kept all this from me?" Tavington asked, horrified, disgusted at his own ignorance. "We are engaged in a feud and you never told me?"
"I thought you knew," Bordon protested, holding up his hands in a gesture of surrender. "I thought Mooreville told you. He is the one who kept you in the dark."
"I can't believe this." Tavington collapsed back into his chair and began massaging his temples.
"Not that it matters now. The Duke of Fairenvail is dead. The war is over. We've won. William Victor's bloodline has finally died out."
A sudden revelation struck Tavington with the force of a bullet through the heart.
"The Duke of Fairenvail. that means that Karenna was. my Karenna was my enemy?"
"I'm afraid so," Bordon uncorked a bottle of wine and poured a glass for himself and one for Tavington. "Her sister, Anna, still lives but we've nothing to fear from her. Now, drink this. You'll feel better."
Tavington took the wine and downed it in a couple of gulps.
"Tonight, we drink to the victory of the Green Dragoons!"
He filled Tavington's glass and they drank. Bordon was jolly as ever, but William felt this was the hollowest victory he had ever celebrated, mostly because he'd had nothing to do with it.
"How much more is there that I don't know?" he wondered, afraid, for the first time in his life, to ask.
Then another, more horrible possibility occurred to him. What if Karenna had known? What she had been part of some plot of her father's? What if, in asking him to marry her, she had only been leading him to his own demise?