“Why?”
His face went red and he flung out his hand. “I don’t know! I had a child. My wife died. I don’t know. Just take the damn thing, will you?”
Griffyn swept up the key. Fulk slid his mug of ale across table to de Louth, who nodded and drank deeply.
“And why did you contact me?” Griffyn asked. He slid his thumb over the smooth, cool steel.
“I told you, I saw him take it from the countess. I knew where it belonged. From Everoot ’twas stolen, to Everoot ’tis returned.”
“But you didn’t send a messenger to the countess, you sent one to me.”
De Louth looked at him in confusion. “You are Everoot, my lord.”
“Call me Pagan,” he said shortly, although no one could or would be listening in. It was loud and tumultuous, getting more crowded, and the room was practically tilting sideways with all the drunken revelry. Soon the fights would break out. Time to go.
“I knew your father.”
Griffyn came out of his thoughts with a start. “What did you say?” he asked coldly.
“Your father,” de Louth said. “I knew him. He didn’t like Endshire much.”
“No. He did not. How much? For the key.”
De Louth set down the mug and wiped the back of his hand across his mouth. “I was going to name a price that would have beggared you. At least, one that would buy me a corody with the Templars for my old age. Since I’ll likely go lame before my time.” He patted his thigh, the one Griffyn had shot through with the arrow. “But I think I’ll leave it at this: Take my daughter when she’s of fostering age. As one of the countess’s ladies. Raise her up right, and safe. I surely cannot do it.” He smiled bitterly. “I cannot even choose a good master.”
“You could choose another one, now.”
De Louth got to his feet and shook his head. “No. I made a pledge.”
“You stole this from him,” Griffyn pointed out.
De Louth scowled at his incredulous tone. “Who’s to say getting this thing out of his hands is not a way of honouring him? I saw the way he wanted it. The way the tattooed man wanted it.” He glanced at the key. “’Twasn’t a restful thing. So, we’ve a deal?”
Griffyn nodded. “Safe haven for your daughter when she’s ready to be fostered.”
“Aye. In seven years.”
Griffyn looked up in surprise. “How old is she?”
De Louth pulled his cloak over his shoulders. Someone jostled him from behind, walking by with a fistful of mugs. He stepped closer to the table. “She was just born. Two weeks ago. I’ve got to go.”
He turned and disappeared into the throng, just another pair of cloaked shoulders, then not even that.
Fulk and he walked side by side back to their inn. Griffyn had lodged his men at the monastery’s guest hall just outside the town walls, but he and Fulk had needed to stay inside, to attend this meeting that occurred long after the gates were closed and locked for the night.
Their bootheels clacked loudly over the wet cobbles. The moonlight glistened on the streets and lit the alleyways in an eerie silver glow. The scent of wet hay mixed with damp leather and the faint odour of blood: Tanners Row was three blocks over, but its stench carried much further. A cat slunk out from a shadow.
Griffyn said quietly, “Where is yours, Fulk?”
The Scotsman nodded, as if he’d been waiting for the question. He stopped walking, reached up and unbuckled his gambeson. The corner of the heavy quilted doublet flapped down. Expressionless, he yanked on the collar of the tunic ben
eath and held the lantern in his left hand aloft. There, in the soft crevice where his collarbones met, just below this throat, was a small, brightly inked, soaring eagle.
Griffyn nodded. Fulk buckled up and they walked on. After a moment, Fulk said, “We get ruined every so often too, my lord, just like everyone else.”
“Do all Watchers have the tattoo?” Griffyn asked grimly.
“Aye. But not in the same place.”