Fulk The Reluctant. Elaine Knighton

over his chest and covered him with a heavy blanket. “Allez! To the chateau!”

      She is a commander worthy of any fighting force, Fulk thought fuzzily. Why did she have to come? The merciful thing would be to simply let him die. But he was too weak to do anything but submit, as blessed oblivion reclaimed him.

      Chapter One

      England, 1237

      “With all due respect—a pox upon thee, milady!” The young man’s voice cracked with indignation.

      Fulk de Galliard wiped his sweaty forehead in the crook of his arm and glanced up from examining his charger’s legs. Bryce, squire to the Duke of Warrick, was not normally given to cursing women. But then again, women were not usually found in the combatants’ waiting area, especially at such a throat-parching tournament as this.

      The apparent object of the lad’s ire stood out of sight, on the off-side of the great-horse he attended. All Fulk could see was a pair of small, well-shod feet, their soft leather boots wrinkling at the ankles—with bronze spurs strapped thereon.

      In a grim tone “milady” responded, “Squire, you made a promise, and now it must be kept. Else look well to your own arse, for I will not be denied.” The small feet broadened their stance.

      After a moment’s hesitation, Bryce gave a resigned sigh and held out the charger’s reins.

      A gloved hand took them. “Many thanks, sir. I will care for him well. Rest easy, the duke will forgive us.”

      “You, perhaps, but not me.” The squire sounded close to despair.

      The young woman stepped into view. Garbed in a dusty crimson overgown, her skirts hiked into her belt, she led the restless white stallion away. Her thick plait of hip-length, sun-bleached hair swung to and fro as she walked, and with each confident stride, steely gleams escaped from beneath the uplifted folds of her kirtle.

      She wears a mail shift? Fulk stared and wondered what to make of such a beguiling spectacle.

      “Oh, Lord! I am dead!” Bryce groaned as girl and beast disappeared into the noisy confusion of the tournament grounds. “She has as good as stolen the duke’s finest tourney horse. Why do I allow her to do this to me?”

      “Why, indeed?” Fulk released his own mount’s near front hoof, satisfied that none of the nails on the cleated shoe were loose. “Take the animal back. She is but a lass, after all.”

      The squire shook his head. “Sir, she has a veritable armory under her gown, for that, sir, was the Iron Maiden of Windermere.”

      “Ah.” Fulk had heard of this golden-haired virago, who fought like a man and rode the hills heading a pack of armed young women. He did not approve of such goings-on. It was bad enough that men had to shed blood in the pointless and ignoble causes of their lords.

      Women should have the good sense not to follow suit, but here was an obvious exception. “What is her intent?”

      Bryce put a hand to his brow. “She means to fight in the mêlée, on my lord’s charger.”

      “It is obvious the lady is deranged. If she is not slain, the horse might be.”

      “Aye, she must be stopped. She is a menace to all good men.”

      Fulk could not help but smile. He had never yet met a woman who was not, in one way or another.

      The squire brightened. “If anyone can do it, ’tis you, Fulk de Galliard. I shall recommend you to my lord duke as soon as I recover from the beating with which he shall no doubt honor me.”

      “Leave me out of it. If I do well today, this will be my final tourney, for I’ll have my sister’s dowry in hand at last.”

      And high time, for Celine, fully ten and seven, was as comely and graceful a maid as ever lived. Once Fulk saw to her marriage he would be free of these endless, exhausting feats of arms.

      “Ah, the Lady Celine.” The squire’s expression grew dreamy.

      Fulk narrowed his eyes at Bryce. “My young friend, do not form a single carnal thought with her name upon your lips.”

      “Em, nay, I would not dare.” The young man pointed at a sudden commotion. “Oh, the saints have smiled upon me after all.”

      He dashed off in the direction of the thoroughfare, where the duke’s stallion trotted loose, creating havoc among the ale and pasty vendors, scattering musicians and jugglers. The charger allowed the squire to catch him, and as if to hide, jammed his great head under his captor’s armpit.

      The horse thief too had been caught. A defiant, unapologetic thief, if her expression and demeanor were to be believed. A tall, daunting knight propelled her from behind. One of his huge, gauntleted hands clamped the back of her slender neck. Only a father could maintain a look of such fury while handling a maid as fair as she, Fulk thought. But what manner of daughter behaved thus? He decided it was unkind to watch her humiliation, though by all appearances she was not perturbed. She held her head high, wincing now and again. Fulk knew exactly what such a neck-grip felt like, and had to admire the girl’s fortitude, despite the sad evidence of her addlepatedness.

      “It would seem the lady has surrendered to her parent.”

      “She drives Sir Alun mad, she does.”

      “So I gather.” Fulk paused, not quite ready to turn back to his horse, after all. The maiden’s thick, padded underjacket did not completely hide her subtle curves, and the lithe grace of her walk was all the more apparent for the lack of skirts.

      Women. He never tired of looking at them. This one was certainly an eyeful, and probably more than a handful.

      Or two, he amended, as she straightened her shoulders.

      At this sign of resistance her lord father shoved her forward, and she stumbled. Fulk’s chest tightened. No matter the provocation, a man of worth did not treat a woman thus, be she sane or otherwise. He had certainly never found it necessary. But he could not upbraid the girl’s own sire, Sir Alun, Baron of Windermere.

      “Beware that one, Galliard,” Bryce cautioned. “The Iron Maiden is an angel on the outside, and hellfire within. She might even try your sweet temper. Of course, chances are the lady will never be breached, so ’tis moot.”

      Fulk shot the young man a quelling look. Sweet temper, indeed. If he only knew the effort it took to make it appear thus. But the lad needed a lesson in manners.

      “I might suggest, Bryce, that you do not gossip about women. Especially ladies who have favored you with an intimate experience, but also those who have not. That would no doubt include all in attendance here, as well as the rest of Christendom and beyond.”

      The knights and other squires within earshot chuckled.

      Bryce’s grin faltered and he turned away in silence.

      “Best not to cross tongues with Fulk de Galliard, he’s quicker’n the likes of you.”

      Fulk looked up and nodded to his friend, Malcolm Mac Niall, a man alongside whom he had faced death more times than he cared to recall. Dark and hard as weathered oak, the Scot sauntered over and made a seat of an upturned bucket.

      Fulk regretted his cutting words. He had long suffered the cruel wit of his brother Rabel, who had taken his example from their father, God rest them both. As ever, at the thought of them, Fulk’s heart took an instant leap of grief and fury.

      As ever, he soothed his pain with images of beauty. Rose petals on clean linen. Soft, white skin flushing pink beneath his hands. Shy smiles and ever-willing arms—and legs—opening to him. And now a new vision, of a fair, fiery lass with tangled, dark-gold tresses…

      Fulk shook his head. The mêlée loomed ahead, and every detail of his equipment must be in order. He could not allow himself to be distracted by such an unlikely tidbit. Satisfied his stallion’s legs were cool and tight,