"How was it supposed to operate, then?"
"Oh… I dunno… But somehow, she was supposed to realize that I was the one who really loved her, and wind up with me!"
"You will have her eternal gratitude, Rod. You will have a friend for life."
"A friend is not quite what I had in mind…"
Chapter 11
A low moan echoed through the hall.
The children were up in an instant, their hair standing on end. Gwen was sitting straight, glaring.
"Oh, no!" Rod groaned. "Not again!"
" T-'tis a spirit of another sort, Papa."
"I don't care what it is—we need our sleep!" Rod rolled over, sitting up to glare at Magnus. "Who did you wake this time?"
"I did not, Papa!" Magnus's voice broke. "Or if I did, 'twas unawares, from dreaming!"
"That's all we need." Rod held his head in his hands. "We're gonna be living in a haunted castle, with a son who calls up ghosts even in his sleep." He turned go the spectre. "Just who do you think you are, coming in here in the middle of the night and scaring my family half to death?"
The moan turned into words. "I cry thy pardon, gentle knight. I would not affright younglings an I had any other way to seek thee."
"How about catching me alone, when I'm on my way to the jakes?"
"I cannot, for 'tis thy son who doth give the power to bring me forth."
Rod glanced up at Magnus, eyebrow raised. "Settles that question, anyway." He turned back to the ghost, frowning, studying its appearance. The new apparition was a stocky suit of armor with a sword in its hand, clanking appropriately. "Have the courtesy to show your face, and tell us your name!" Rod growled.
"Thy pardon." The knight sheathed his sword and lifted not only his visor, but his whole helmet, too—and stopped looking frightening. He was balding, and had wrinkles in his kindly face, all in softly glowing outline. "I am Sir Donde L'Accord. I had not meant to affright, least of all little ones."
"We are no longer little!" Geoffrey snapped, but Gregory just stared.
"And I am Rod Gallowglass, Lord Warlock. This is my lady, and my children. What do you want with me?"
"A warlock!" The ghost's eyes lit with hope. "I cry thine aid, my lord! Have pity on a poor, troubled father, an thou wilt! Assistance, I prithee!"
"Father?" Rod was suddenly totally alert. "You wouldn't happen to have a daughter who roams this castle too, would you?"
"Aye." The ghost's expression darkened. "As will I, till I have found the means of my revenge!"
"Ah," Rod breathed. "Revenge on the man who wounded your daughter?"
"Aye, tortured her heart, then slew her! Would that he and I were flesh, that I might cast down my gauntlet and dash out his brains!"
"Not exactly a worthy thought, for one who presumably hopes to win to Heaven. How come you died so soon after your daughter's death?"
"I did not." The spirit stared. "Wherefore wouldst thou think I had?"
Well, so much for Holmes's methods; Rod wasn't scoring any higher than Watson had. "Had to be after, or you wouldn't have known how she died. Couldn't have been very long after, or you would have carved the villain's gizzard, and cheerfully gone to the block if you'd had to."
"Indeed I would have, an I could have." The ghost smiled sadly. "Yet I died ere she did, in battle. My spirit surged toward Heaven, yet slowed and tarried; my concern for her did bind me back to earth. Yet in all else I longed for the mede of the Blessed, and so I hung, poised between this earthly mansion and the one above, until at last her longing for me grew to terror, and drew me back to this castle—at the moment that her spirit stepped forth from her clay. Yet she could not see me, for her whole being was consumed with weeping, as it hath been ever since."
"The poor lass!" Cordelia cried, and Gwen said,
"Was her soul so filled with anguish, then, that she could not break free?"
"Aye, and ever hath been. I have slumbered by, for when death passed, her craving for my presence ceased; she was so filled with horror that there was room for naught else. Only now have I awaked—and I must needs find some way to ease my child's rest!"
Rod rolled out of his blanket and beckoned to his children. "Up. Everybody up. Now it's my mission, too."
"But their rest!" Gwen protested.
"I think we'll have better luck sleeping during the day, dear. Fewer interruptions, you know?" Rod turned back to the ghost. "Name the villain."
Fires licked at the backs of the spectre's eyes. "The Count."
"But I thought he whipped his son into line. Did he turn around and commit the same crimes himself?"
"Nay—he died. And the son became Count in his turn—the last Count Foxcourt, and the final scion of an evil line."
"Evil line?" Rod frowned. "It sounded as though his father had some morals."
"True, but only what was needful to bind his knights unto his service—and to be sure that none could have their will, save he."
"Oh." Rod translated. "So his son couldn't bundle the knights' daughters into bed, because that was Dad's prerogative—only Dad wouldn't do it, because he needed to have his knights stay loyal."
"Aye, but his son had not so much wisdom. Bad blood will tell—and in him, it fairly howled. All his grandfathers had preyed upon the folk within their demesne, in all ways that they could, without inciting rebellion; they seized upon each chance for cruelty, every means of exploitation. Thus were they named as they were."
"What—Foxcourt?" Rod said. "Doesn't sound all that evil."
"Nay—that was but the sound the peasants gave it, till only we, whose forebears had been knights to that first Count, did remember its first form; for his neighbors dubbed him with the name that he, in insolence, took up in pride: Faux Coeur.''
The French vowel and "r" made all the difference; Rod's eyes widened. "False heart!"
"Quite false, in truth, for he was a man who would, for profit, swear to any oath, then be forsworn upon the instant. He would speak bravely as he led his troops out; yet would hang back behind while they did fight. Oh, false he was in words and deed, speaking fair and smiling sweetly, then wreaking every cruelty he could—and all his heirs were like him. Yet this last Count swore to outdo them all. He did not even deign to marry—what cared he for the future of his House?—but set out to seduce all women. Harsh-faced he was, but bore himself with a swagger, and spoke in honeyed tones, and wenches swooned when he came near."
Rod nodded. "Combination of a certain animal attraction, and money. Works on naive serving-wenches, every time."
"Thou hast known the kind."
"Yes—but I've also noticed their blandishments don't very often work on ladies of their own station."
"Oh, he scrupled not to seek out other ways than wooing! By fair means or foul, he would seduce each lady that he could bring within his power, then spurn her from him, to dwell in shame—and several slew themselves. He only gloated."
"Why, what a thorough villain!" Cordelia said in indignation.
"And he used his tricks on your daughter."
"Aye, for she was young, and very beauteous—and he, though a youth no longer, had taken womanizing as his foremost pastime. I sought to keep her from his sight, yet he did make a progress through his lands anon—I think more to espy out wenches than to be sure his bailiffs dealt honestly—and called in turn at each knight's house. He knew the number of my children, and summoned all before him—and when he saw her beauty, there was no restraining him."
"You could have taken them and fled!" Cordelia protested.
"Aye, yet I was bound by mine oath of fealty—the more fool I, for this Count did not feel bound by any oath of his! Yet when his man did come bearing his command to go unto his castle to attend upon him, and with all my family, I did say, 'Nay.' Within a fortnight, he did declare a war on Count Moline, and bade me forth unto the fray."