Chapter Two
The Lady Jocelyn sat pondering at her vanity, unraveling the coif she'd sported for the evening's merry-making.
"Will, there is something I'd like to ask you. I've noticed it before, but haven't mustered up the curiosity to truly take interest in it."
The said knight turned from his ministrations, pulling the coverlet back and looking toward is wife in inquiry.
"What a surprise Fox. You're usually so keen on figuring things out for yourself you don't need the assistance of others. So, to what do I owe such pleasure?"
She gave an unlady-like snort at his teasing smile. "Even someone as brilliant as myself does have minor flaws...but to come straight to the question, why does Lord Chaucer appear to be so keen upon perusing our dear Wat?"
Her husband frowned, not understanding. "Perusing? As in chasing? What do you speak of?"
She laughed and rose from the stool, coming to sit beside Will upon their marriage bed. She took his hand, tracing the beloved knuckles with a soothing caress. Lowering her voice, she gave in to the urge to kiss the corner of those wry lips, accentuated by the flickering of the candlelight.
"What I am trying to say, if you would only stop being so thick, is that I see a romantic intention in Geoffrey toward a certain former squire of yours."
Will sat, dumbfounded, scowling something fierce at the wall across from him. His wife smiled mischievously, whispering softly into his ear. "If you'll stop intimidating that poor wall over there, will you be so good as to answer my question?"
It seemed a tremendous strain to grate out each word from between his teeth, but somehow William managed it. "Are you telling me that you believe...you think...Wat isn't a bloody ponce, Joce!" spitting out that last, he refused t acknowledge the very large possibility that he was blushing like a maid.
Jocelyn couldn't refrain from the laughter, a sweet, girlish giggling bubbled up from her chest, one that left her husband further confounded.
"Oh, My Heart, the look upon your face! I'm sorry for the shock, but I do wonder. Have you not recognized it before? I don't see how you haven't; they're absolutely mad for each other, though I do believe only one of them knows it yet!"
Shaking his head at his wife's gaiety, Will unceremoniously flopped down upon a pillow, the mattress creaking slightly beneath the added weight. He waited until the she had calmed, though her eyes still glinted with devilish candor.
"Pray tell, how did you ever come by such information? It surely wasn't from polite conversation that you picked up such rubbish. For a lady to even know of what two men sometimes take fancy to do together....it's not right!"
Jocelyn's demeanor grew serious, her mouth twisting in an obstinate manner. Will was in for chastising, and he knew that it couldn't be avoided. "Oh, honestly, William. Please tell me that you, of all men who have struggled for great things, are not pigheaded about something as trivial as this. It doesn't change who either of them are, just adds one more dimension to the men you already know so well."
Turning over as a petulant child would, William Thatcher groaned, burying his face into the blankets as to shun the rest of the world.
"What was that? I'm sorry, dear, but I couldn't make sense of your unintelligible muttering."
"I said: 'No, I don't truly mind about the nature of their bond, but I don't want to be in the middle of the colossal fray if anything goes wrong.'"
Shaking her head amicably, the Lady curled up next to her lord, laying her head upon his pleasantly warm breast. "Do not quibble over it, Will. I don't believe that Wat and Geoff are two men that would ever needlessly involve anyone else in their relationship with one another, unless it was absolutely necessary. Now go to sleep and dream of fighting with large muscle-bound men with even larger sticks like the good lad you are."
Will chuckled, brown eyes twinkling with something other than contentment. "Am I mistaken, or is there a sexual connotation to that..."
Wack!
"Sweet Jesus! Woman that hurt."
"I know I intended it to. Go to sleep, William."
"How ever did I come to wed such a malicious harpy as you? God, I must have been out of my mind-"
Wack!
"Damnation, Jocelyn, I'm only jesting! Can't you just have some compa-"
"Go to sleep, Will!"
He slept.
***
Though physically exhausted from the events and conversations he'd just partaken of naught but three hours ago, Wat found that it was nearly impossible for him to relax in his bed. After trying many a position, and fumbling with his sheets for what felt as though the hundredth time, he succumbed to the inevitable.
He was going for a jaunt around the courtyard. Perhaps that would combat his jittery nerves into submission.
Creeping softly through the halls on bare feet, he shivered at the cold draft he felt at his back. With any luck, the stars would be out tonight; at least he'd have that to look forward to.
He exited the estate, the cold, crisp wind renewing his vigor and bringing a flush of color to his cheeks. Strolling about the garden was sometimes such a pleasure he often wondered if it should be deemed sinful. When the night lilies would bloom, and the scent of jasmine would begin to permeate the air, Wat sincerely believed that there wasn't a man or woman living that could resist the allure that the scene provided. He himself knew that every time he allowed his guard to slip out here, alone and at peace, his heart would grow amorous, and he would find himself thirsting for a good rut with the nearest harlot he could find.
All in all, a rather dangerous place.
It had been when he began making his way over to the thicket of myrtle trees that he knew he was not alone. There was someone skulking about behind the granite fountain, and if the former squire Fawlhurst had anything to say about it, the ragamuffin wouldn't be doing so for long.
Feeling the affects of unease grip his heart, he bristled as the hair stood on end at the nape of his neck. Wat felt as every muscle in his body began to harbor tension, waiting for a reaction or reason to fight or flee.
Reluctant to ever be called a coward, he piped up, attempting to put a note of menace into this voice. "Show yourself! Whoever you are! Show yourself or prepare to be fonged within an inch of your life!"
Whoever was spying him on the other side of the fountain let loose a chortle, giving away his presence. It seemed to be farther now, as though the intruder were moving off into the relative camouflage of the trees.
Wat suddenly was possessed with the realization that his adversary was going to jump the garden wall if he didn't get a hold of his own fears, and on a near savage impulse, howled with an abandon rarely shown by any Roman gladiator, and rushed the almost clear outline of his victim against the foliage.
There was an 'oompf!' of pained exaltation as the figure fell to the ground, though he nimbly jumped out of the way when Wat scurried to grab the man about the ankle. Spitting out mud that chanced to find its way into his gasping mouth, the red-haired man put up a devil of a fight, fingers curling cruelly into the soft flesh of the man's lower calves.
"Damn you, rascal, get the bloody hell off of me!"
An incredulous pause from the dirtied red-head.
"Geoff? Is that you, you great cow?"
Wat could almost taste the rancor on his tongue with which the man responded.
"A cow? Do I honestly look like a tossing cow to you?"
Wat considered this solemnly for quite awhile.
"Oh for God's sake, fool, release your grubby paws from my beautiful ankles. I have better things to do than wallow about here in the mud with a mad man."
Chaucer shook his foot free from the other's grasp, wrapping his cloak more tightly about himself and gathering the satchel that he'd dropped when accosted by Wat.
"What do you have in there anyway? A severed hand?"
Without missing a beat, the writer sneered. "No, a head actually. And not the kind that sits atop your shoulders."
Appalled, Wat stepped back, hand moving instinctively toward his groin in sympathy. "Must you make such jests? That's somethin' that I'll be thinking about for the rest of the week."
The first genuine smile of since their interlude began tugged at Geoffrey's lips. "Oh, but you do know that you thoroughly love my sarcastic wit, Squire Fawlhurst. I dare say that I may teach you to love some other things that you've yet to learn of me as well."
Cocking his head to the side slightly, Wat pondered on this. What was the man getting at? Must he always be so puzzling with his fancy talk and pomp?
"Er...right. Anyways, where did you think you're going with that, and at this hour?"
Geoff smirked, an air of swarthiness about him that Wat was finding increasingly difficult to ignore. "To gamble in the village taverns, where else?"
He cast a black scowl at that man in front of him, standing so nonchalantly, a stranger might have thought that he owned the world.
"Truly, at this hour?"
"Do not act the part of my mother, friend, it doesn't suit you. So if we are quite finished with this tête-à-tête, I must off. You're perfectly willing to join me, of course, if you can keep your fists to yourself for the remainder of the evening."
It was more than obvious the blonde man was using this as an 'out' for Wat, not at all expecting for him to comply with his suggestion.
That was just what Wat was waiting for. No one would ever say that he was a predictable old dodger!
"Fine, then. I guess it's only proper that I might keep a bit 'o an eye on you, as you have a pen chancy for getting yourself into all sorts of mayhem. Lead the way, Geoff."
Wat would forever relish the look of shock that had plastered itself onto his companion's features as they made their way over the courtyard's wall and stole into the village streets, though he would eventually come to hold dearer the feel of the other's hand as it kept fortuitously brushing against his.
Author's Notes: I'll say it once, and I'll say it again: feedback is the air I breathe, the food I eat, and the love of my heart. Grant me this desire and I'll grant yours.