King's Warrior (Renegade Lords)

“Dockmaster,” Didier murmured. “Everyone arriving has to pay a toll, and no one’s allowed in or out without cause these days. No traveling warrant required, but they’ll ask questions.”

“I shall endeavor to have answers,” Tadhg replied.

“The more money you have, the fewer questions they have,” Didier advised quietly.

“That may prove a problem.”

“They also search everything. Will that prove a problem?”

“For me or for them?”

Didier made a disgusted sound. “Well, you’re just a boatload of problems, aren’t you?”

“Give me the dagger,” Maggie said softly.

Tadhg had spent the last years of his life in constant war, witnessing Man at his worst, doing all the shocking things humans were capable of, but this startled him so much his jaw fell. He jerked his gaze down to Maggie.

“Are you mad?”

She shook her head. “Practical. Place it in my hand, here.” She’d turned slightly toward him, and he saw her hand slipping out between the slid in the mantle thrown over her shoulders.

Tadhg wrenched his attention back to the dock official, who was drawing nearer. “Never. If they find it, there will be questions, and they shall all be directed at you.”

“Then you shall have to divert their attention, will you not? But they will most certainly find it if it is on you. And then where will we be?”

Neither looked at the other as they spoke.

“Maggie.”

“Now.”

With a low curse, he slid his hand under his cloak and slipped the dagger out of its sheath, pressed it into Maggie’s cool palm two heartbeats before the dockmaster appeared before them, parchment roll in hand.

He nodded at Didier, made a little check on his papers, and turned to Tadhg, ignoring Maggie and her downturned, modest head.

“Name?” he asked, bored and officious.

“John son of John, Cambridgeshire. And my new wife.” Maggie stirred beside him but stayed quiet.

“Purpose of your visit?”

“Returning home,” he said, keeping his voice calm, speaking in the modulated tones of a man from the English Midlands.

Disinterested, the official nodded and thrust out a hand. “Half penny.” His gaze moved to Tadhg’s travel-worn cloak and boots, and the hilt of his extremely large sword poking out from beneath. He waved to an armed port guard a few paces back, drawing the man forward. “And to search everything, of course.”

“Of course,” Tadhg agreed and flung his cape wide, with the confidence of one who had nothing to hide.

The eyebrows of the dockmaster and guard shot up when they saw the arsenal of weapons covering his body.

“Lot of weapons you have there, John son of John,” said the official slowly.

He shrugged. “Father trained me well. Was in the wars—”

“Which?”

“All of them. Fighting for our lord king in the south or, in truth, anyone who needs me. Always ready to fight an infidel or a Frenchman.” Tadhg grinned a lopsided grin. It felt as if it floated on the surface of his face, flotsam in the sea, for all he could think of was Maggie, standing beside him like a hooded shadow, the ruby-hilted dagger in her hand.

The official hesitated, glanced uneasily at the soldiers wearing the livery of the French king, then said, “And you’ve no goods to be taxed?”