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  Next to Kevin, Case and Corbin de Bocage, also very young men with a thirst for devastation, nodded eagerly. They were like wild bulls sometimes, and Troy held up a hand to ease their fiery blood.

  “The wise elders are working on the problem, gentle knights,” he said evenly. “This is the task that has been assigned to them. Let them work through it.”

  Although the more seasoned knights were willing to do that, the younger knights were very impatient. They liked fighting the enemy and the thought of thirty Scots hiding out in the tower was exciting to them. They wanted them out so they could defeat them, hand-to-hand. Nothing fed their bloodlust more than killing Scots.

  “Ridiculous,” Kevin said, pushing past Troy and his brothers. “I will make them come out.”

  Case and Corbin followed him, but Troy stood back with Patrick and James, watching and waiting. Undoubtedly, the three were going to do something foolish, something their fathers and the older knights wouldn’t tolerate. It was always great fun to see the arrogant younger knights get their ears boxed. Fighting off a smile, Troy folded his big arms across his chest and watched the situation play out.

  “I will bet you two marks of silver that Kieran throws a punch at his son,” Patrick muttered.

  Troy reached out, shaking his brother’s hand. “Agreed.”

  “I want in on this,” James said from Patrick’s other side. Big, blond, and somewhat gentle, James was one of the kindest and most understanding men Troy had ever met. The man came across as quiet and reserved, but that was far from the truth – a fire raged somewhere in the man, a fire that saw him explode in the heat of battle. There was no one fiercer in a fight. “I will match your four silver marks with four of my own. Winner take all.”

  Troy agreed. “What is your bet?”

  “That Father moves against them before Kieran or Michael does.”

  “Bloodied or no?”

  “Bloodied, of course.”

  “Broken nose?”

  “I will bet against that.”

  Troy and Patrick thought that was a fair bet. “Agreed,” Troy said. “Let us see how well we know our father and the others.”

  With that, the three de Wolfe brothers stood back, watching with satisfaction as Kevin, Case, and Corbin pushed past the elder knights and headed straight to the tower. As the older knights looked on with some shock, the three younger knights came to within a few feet of the tower wall. It was close enough to have something dumped on them, or worse. It was far too close for comfort. But they didn’t seem to care, filled with a sense of self-importance as they were.

  “We have killed your men and stolen your horses!” Kevin bellowed up for all to hear. “If you do not surrender immediately, then you are bigger fools than I could ever imagine. Come out of there at once!”

  There wasn’t much of a response. Irritated, and perhaps embarrassed in the slightest that the Scots didn’t immediately surrender, Kevin looked at Case, who took up the cry.

  “Fools!” he roared. “You are defeated! Open the door this instant and throw yourselves upon our mercy!”

  Case planted his hands on his hips, waiting expectantly for the door of the tower to open and the Scots to come out with their heads hanging in defeat. What he received, instead, were several naked arses hanging over the side of the roof in defiant response, just enough to thoroughly irritate him and Kevin. While the elder knights stood well back and watched the spectacle, and Troy and his brothers stood even further back and tried not to burst out laughing, Corbin de Bocage took over the negotiations. He was certain he would succeed where the other two had failed.

  “I see you are showing us your brains,” he shouted up to them. “Certainly, men like you keep your brains in your arses! Do you know what I am going to do when I get into that tower? I am going to kick your brains in! And then I shall thrust my sword into your gullets and take great delight in watching you drown in your own blood! Well? What have you to say to that?”

  The reply wasn’t long in coming. Great buckets of piss were suddenly poured off the roof, right down onto the three English knights who had been lobbing insults and threats. Kevin managed to dodge most of it, but Case and Corbin were covered in it.

  Roaring with fury, the de Bocage brothers ripped off their tunics and pulled off their helms, covered in piss and absolutely furious for it. They were jumping up and down, shaking their fists at the Scots even as they dodged more streams of piss. As most of the English laughed uproariously, Michael went to his smelly, humiliated sons and pulled them away, making them go to the well and wash off, while William and Paris and Kieran laughed until they wept. In fact, they were wiping away the tears when Troy, Patrick, and James came up to them.

  “You had better do something quickly before Case and Corbin and Kevin scale those walls out of pure anger and get themselves killed,” Troy said to his snorting father. “The next time, we might not be laughing.”

  William couldn’t seem to stop chortling. “You are correct, I am certain,” he said, “but I have been waiting many a battle to see those three have their comeuppance. Mayhap, they will not be so eager to rush things from now on.”

  “That is doubtful.”

  William sobered. “Probably,” he said, taking a deep breath to regain his composure. “But, God, it was worth it to see that.”

  William’s satisfaction made Troy smile, glancing to his brothers, who started chuckling again. Soon, all of them were laughing again, but that quickly ended when William suddenly turned for the tower and called up to the Scots.

  “You had every right to curb my enthusiastic men,” he shouted. “In fact, I applaud you for it. My name is William de Wolfe and I ask to speak to your commander.”

  The mere mention of the man’s name had the Scots buzzing. Everyone could hear it, but Troy and Patrick didn’t think that had been such a good move on their father’s part. The Scot who killed William de Wolfe would be a hero to his people. With that in mind, Troy and his brothers rushed up to their father, essentially boxing the man in so that if anyone with an arrow decided to take aim, they would be the targets.

  William knew what his sons were doing and he wasn’t thrilled that they’d made themselves human shields. He tried to move but no one would let him. When he tried to push Patrick out of the way, Patrick pushed back. Resigned, William called up to the Scots once more.

  “Bring me your commander,” he said again.

  More buzzing and grumbling from the Scots. They could see that there was some shuffling going on; men moving about on the roof and more than one head popped from the windows on the top floor. As the English grew increasingly impatient, a shaggy, gray head appeared on the roof, looking down upon them.

  “De Wolfe?” the man said in a heavy Scottish brogue. “I canna see well, but I can see the mark on yer face. ’Tis the Wolfe in the flesh.”

  He meant the eyepatch. Every man on the border knew that William de Wolfe sported an eye patch over a missing left eye. It was part of his mystique, part of his power. It was a mark that earned respect.

  “Aye,” William replied steadily. “May I have your name?”

  “Barden.”

  William realized that his sons were moving him back, away from the tower, and he struggled not to trip on his feet – and theirs – as they pushed him back. He knew they were doing it for his own safety but it was still annoying. It made him look weak. Frustrated, he dug in his heels.

  “Barden,” William said, coming to a halt and refusing to move any further from the tower. “Who is your clan?”

  The Scotsman didn’t answer immediately. “Me own,” he finally said, to the titters of his men. “But I was born a Gordon.”

  “And they sent you here?”

  “No one sends me anywhere.”

  “Then you have been raiding my lands for your own benefit.”

  A pause. “I have been takin’ what I need.”

  It seemed to confirm to William and the others that these men were not sanctioned by their
clans. Knowing he was dealing with rogue Scots, men who cared not for honor or, more than likely, reason, William proceeded carefully.

  “Barden, we are at a crossroads,” he said. “My men have invaded your bailey and captured your tower. Your men are either subdued or dead. That only leaves the tower at this point, and we shall take it eventually. We can, therefore, do one of two things; you can surrender and I promise you and your men shall not be harmed, or I will order my men to begin bombarding the roof with flaming oil. You cannot combat it and it will eventually burn everyone in the tower. You know this. I will, therefore, give you the choice of how you wish to proceed.”

  Barden was seriously contemplating what he’d been told. De Wolfe was giving him the choice of what should be done, which saved his pride in a sense. Barden understood that, but he also understood that either choice would end in his surrender. He turned back to his men and snippets of angry conversation could be heard. It was several moments before he replied.

  “We’ll not yield tae ye,” he said, “and most of this tower is made of stone. If ye must burn us down, then get on with it.”

  That brought a bit of information William hadn’t known – most of this tower is made of stone. He could mean the walls and the stairs, but what of the floors? They could be wood or stone, or a combination of both. William wanted the tower intact, but maybe he could burn enough of it – whatever would burn – to smoke them out.

  “Then you would die with your men rather than surrender and go free?” William asked. “I do not intend to take you prisoner but, in order to go free, you must surrender your weapons and leave. I’ll not have bands of armed Scots roaming these lands.”

  Barden seemed to grow angry. “These are our lands, Sassenach,” he said. “Ye’re in our country and ye have no right tae be. If ye want a surrender, it ’twill not be from us. Ye’ll have tae kill us first.”

  William was coming to see that there was no way around it. He had suspected this would be their answer and he was prepared. He was about to reply when an arrow suddenly sailed out of the tower, from the roof area, and hit James on the upper arm, penetrating his mail. It wasn’t a bad strike, but bad enough. The message was clear. When William saw the arrow protruding out of his son’s arm, it was all he needed to give the command for the archers to launch.

  He would waste no more time.

  Men began scrambling to fulfill his command and, soon enough, the sky was full of flaming arrows, hitting the stone walls of the tower but also hitting the roof, igniting both men and wood. William had brought two smaller trebuchets with him, war machines that had managed to burn a great deal of the interior of the bailey. And now those same engines were hurling flaming bombs of oil that, when smashing on the roof of the tower house, sent flames flying everywhere.

  Very quickly, the siege turned into a raging inferno as the tower house began to burn. Screams could be heard from inside the stone structure as the English eased up on their bombardment. The flames were doing more than they ever could at this point. Troy stood with his father, watching heavy black smoke rise up into the afternoon sky and listening to the cries of the men inside. He shook his head sadly.

  “Rather than surrender, they will die,” he said. “I cannot fathom that kind of zealous behavior.”

  William watched the smoke pour from the windows. “Put men on chopping through the door,” he said. “Open it. At least if there are men who wish to escape, they can do so. It could be quite possible that they are being prevented from escaping.”

  Troy looked at his father. “Opening that door could increase the flames,” he said. “Are you sure that is what you want to do?”

  William cocked a dark eyebrow. “It does not matter,” he said. “Whether the flames grow stronger or weaker, they are burning inside. It is an ugly death. Mayhap if we cut down the entry door, some will be saved.”

  Troy moved away from his father, grabbing Patrick and Tobias and telling them what his father had ordered. Very quickly, there were two very big men with axes chopping through the heavy oak and iron entry door to the tower, making holes in it, enough for terrible black smoke to escape. They could hear the Scots on the other side, coughing and crying out in fear but then cursing the English who were trying to break through. Troy, who was standing right behind the big soldiers who were doing the axing, began to shout at the men inside.

  “Save yourselves!” he yelled, coughing as the smoke poured into his face. “Get out of there!”

  More cursing, more chopping, until a portion of the door broke down and half-unconscious Scots began to push through the opening, one at a time. The knights standing at the entry, and there were several of them, began to pull the men out and away from the fire, which was gaining intensity. Only ten or so Scots made it out, leaving the rest to die in the inferno that burned long into the night. The smell of smoke and human flesh hung heavy on the air for days after that.

  It was a smell not many of them would soon forget.

  Monteviot Tower, or what was left of it, now belonged to William de Wolfe. As dawn broke over the following day, it was the green and black de Wolfe banners that flew proudly from the walls. But true to his word, William allowed those men who had escaped the tower to flee without taking them prisoner.

  Flee they did, and word of de Wolfe’s victory spread very quickly in Southern Scotland. In particular, it spread to the clans who had an uneasy peace with de Wolfe. Fearful of rousing the man’s anger, no one sent any men to counter him. De Wolfe’s anger could bring tens of thousands of English, and no one wanted that.

  But no one wanted him with another base in Scotland, either.

  For a lesser branch of the Clan Kerr, it was a particular issue because Monteviot Tower was on their land. It was an issue they needed to deal with. Their lands bordered de Wolfe lands all along the border from Coldstream to Carter Bar. They already had to tolerate Wolfe’s Lair in their lands, mighty English bastion that it was, but now there was a second fortress for de Wolfe to gain a foothold.

  Keith Kerr of Clan Kerr, chief of a smaller offshoot of the clan, was the one who mostly had to deal with de Wolfe. Known as Red Keith, he knew he couldn’t shake de Wolfe. It was better not to try. But he also didn’t like de Wolfe becoming greedy and taking a disputed outpost.

  Therefore, he would have to deal with de Wolfe in a way the man would understand.

  He would have to bargain with his very blood.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Sibbald’s Hold

  Home of Red Keith Kerr

  Thirteen miles west of Monteviot Tower

  “Pa, how can ye ignore what the Wolfe is doin’? Are ye blind to him, then?”

  A very angry young woman dressed in hose and layers of tunics stood in the low-ceilinged hall of her father’s home, smoke gathering near her head from the hearth that was spitting sparks and gray ribbons into the darkened room. But the man she spoke to, sitting near the fire in his long tunic and coat of heavy, dirty wool, gazed back at her with some displeasure.

  “De Wolfe was cleanin’ out the rebels from Monteviot Tower,” he muttered. “Those same men have been raidin’ his lands. We expected he would do this, so it is of no great surprise.”

  The woman let her hand slap against her thigh in frustration. “So ye let the Sassenach remain? Now Monteviot becomes his holdin’?”

  It was sunset over the land and, deep in the heart of the clan of the Red Keith Kerr, Keith Kerr eyed his passionate, strong, big-mouthed daughter with increasing disapproval. It wasn’t that anything she said was wrong in any fashion; the great Wolfe of the Border had, indeed, launched a siege on Scot lands and, technically, on one of his holdings.

  Monteviot Tower belonged to Keith but he didn’t have enough men to hold it, so reivers had confiscated the property and had been using it for their base to launch raids into English lands. Most of those lands belonged to de Wolfe, so Keith had been expecting, at some point, that de Wolfe would come after Monteviot. The exchange for purging the reivers wa
s that now de Wolfe had another holding in Kerr lands.

  But there wasn’t much he could do about it.

  “Lass,” Keith growled, perturbed that she was calling him out in front of his men, “ye know the situation. Ye know that I dunna have the men tae hold Monteviot much less take it back from de Wolfe. If ye can bring me a thousand Scots, I may be able tae reclaim the property, but for now… I canna do it by force.”

  “Ye mean ye willna.”

  “I mean I canna.”

  Rhoswyn Whitton Kerr faced off against her father, feeling an abundance of shame and frustration. He didn’t seem willing to fight the English off of his very land and, to Rhoswyn, that was a sign of weakness.

  She’d never known her father to be weak before.

  And his excuse… that he didn’t have enough men to do it. Her father was chief of a smaller clan, an offshoot of the larger Clan Kerr that held most of the lands in this area. Why, all her father had to do was to call upon his cousin, the Kerr of Clan Kerr, and he could have those thousand men he needed to chase off de Wolfe. Never mind that her father and his cousin were at odds, and had been ever since her father had married her mother those years ago. His cousin had wanted the woman for himself and it had been the cause of an estrangement between them. But that was old history as far as Rhoswyn was concerned.

  Couldn’t bygones be bygones?

  “Ye could if ye wanted tae,” she pointed out. “But ye willna ask the Kerr for his help. It is a silly grudge ye hold against him and…”

  “Silly?”

  “Aye,” Rhoswyn pointed a long finger at him. “It has gone on for nearly twenty years now, since before me birth. It is time tae make amends, Pa. It is time tae pull together tae fight de Wolfe from our lands.”

  Keith sighed heavily. It was his own fault that his daughter was the way she was. He’d only had one child – Rhoswyn – and for a man who had badly wanted a son, the girl bore the brunt of that longing. He’d raised her like a son, teaching her to fight, to track, to hunt, and any number of things that men did. She could drink most men under the table and she had been known to fight on occasion. It was something her mother, God rest her soul, had tried to balance out by teaching her daughter what she considered the finer points of being a lady – sewing, singing, and learning to both speak and read in three languages. Rhoswyn was a fine student, and very intelligent, but her natural personality had her thriving on the things her father taught her more than the ones her mother insisted upon. The result was a warrior all men feared, a woman who was as tough and strong as most men.