But this was Ranulf of Morency in full health, and his reputation was well earned. Without looking back, without interrupting his relentless attack on the man before him, he evaded the blow from behind. It was a dip of his shoulder, a twist and bend at the waist, and the man behind was thrown off balance by his own eager advance. Then Ranulf turned, lightning fast, his knee coming up to connect with the man’s chin as he stumbled forward.

“He does not let them yield.” Davydd leaned close to her, speaking quietly in Welsh. As she watched, Ranulf struck a blow to the bearded knight’s unprotected side that she thought probably broke a rib, and the man crumpled to the ground. The other man with the freshly bloodied face repositioned himself and began to defend himself in earnest. “I think he would have killed the others, had more not come forward to fight, and distract him from it.”

She saw it now, as Ranulf turned to his opponent. It was not simply anger, as she had first thought, or his arrogance demanding that he fight every man there. Whatever it was that had simmered in him since they came to Morency, that made the air around him hum with tension, had broken loose. On his face was a frantic kind of cruelty, a bloodlust, a madness.

She could not say if he wanted to kill these men, but she knew with a certainty that he hoped to fight to his death. He wished them to fight against him with lethal purpose, and they did as he commanded. But none would be able to overpower him. None was he equal. No man in England was his equal, as well he knew.

It was supposed to be merely a spar, a demonstration of skill. Not this deadly combat. The spectators saw it too. One man, who watched wide-eyed as Ranulf disarmed his opponent, crossed himself and muttered a prayer.

Though this last opponent had no weapon, Ranulf did not end the fight. He kicked the sword to him, a cloud of dust rising as it skidded to where the man kneeled.

“Up,” he demanded, his voice carrying clearly. “You will not yield.”

The man was not fit for combat, bloodied and heaving for air, his arm held close to his body as though it had been injured. She thought he might weep with weariness and the clear wish to cry mercy, but instead the good man reached for the sword to continue the fight his lord commanded. Ranulf immediately struck, pressing the offense while the other man desperately warded off blows meant to injure, to kill.