Temple Sword

Chapter 109 Parting
The wine was finished, the food was cold, the music stopped, and the huge banquet hall slowly emptied.

The servants returned to their country cottages, and the guards who had not been sent for the night slept within the walls.Charlie's soldiers dozed off in the yard, wrapping themselves in felt blankets and resting their heads on their saddles.

The court knights Janos Bornemisza and Felicien Zacher slept in a smaller bedroom, and of course the King himself, who had his own room to himself.While his arrival caught everyone by surprise, generally all the estates reserved a room for the king in case fate should place him with them.

As dawn approached, the Night's Watch wearily leaned on their spears, staggering on creaking planks.They blinked and struggled with sleep, dozing off now and then.

However, they weren't the only ones staying up all night.

The sky outside the window had begun to clear, and Antal and Agnes remained in bed, staring at the vaulted ceiling.The husband's mind was full of countless thoughts, his stomach was tightly clamped by iron tongs, and the wife was crying silently.

"I don't want you to leave," she broke the silence with a hoarse voice, her throat dry, "I don't want to..."

"I don't want to leave either." Antal said briefly.

"But you can't say no." Agnes finally admitted what she had been reluctant to accept during their long and heated argument.

"I can't say no," Antal sighed, "He asked me what I thought, but... I'm sure he wouldn't accept me shaking my head and rejecting. He kept saying we were still brothers, but didn't know what he said Is it true? Although... I knocked him down, he didn't punish me."

"What did you do to him?" the woman asked in disbelief, Antal hadn't mentioned it before.

"I punched him and knocked him to the ground."

"and then?"

"He smiled."

Agnes couldn't control her laughter, which quickly turned into a cry of pain.

"I can't say no," the man insisted repeatedly, "if I told the king that his trip was for nothing, how would he react? I'm sure he wouldn't be happy, let alone let it go." I punched him."

"I know," Agnes sniffed, "at least we still have time to say goodbye..."

"You know I have no say in this matter," Antar turned to her, sitting half-bent on the bed. "We set off early in the morning."

"But Erie, my boy! I have to tell him..." the woman said worriedly, while her husband looked at her in surprise.

"What are you thinking?" Antar shook his head lightly, "Do you think I will take Yile away with me?"

"Can't you?" Agnes blinked, "But you train him every day..."

"He's just a child." Antal was relieved and patted his wife's forehead with some disappointment. "He should stay with his mother. Sepke and Kerta will also stay here, including Of the other soldiers, only Simon was on the road with me."

Antal's words calmed Agnes a little, not only because her only child would stay, but also because Simon would take care of her husband.Simon was a soft-spoken, tall man who had been a novice at the Knights Templar monastery in Dubica.

He was nearly executed by the mob when the Templars were persecuted.Antal was in the right place at the right time and saved the young man's life.No one dared to trouble him, because they knew that the king and him were like brothers, and if he was hurt, Slavonia would be reduced to ashes.

Simon became a loyal attendant to Antal's succession, and he helped the knights with the same enthusiasm, whether it was training, farming or building new buildings.Agnes knew that if they were on the battlefield under the banner of the lily, the squire would protect her husband with his life.

"Mikolaj will help you in everything," Antar said, touching his wife's tear-stained face. "While I'm away, he'll be managing all the finances, as well as assigning jobs.

I have made him continue to send Uncle Stephen a stuffed purse every two full moons.Varos will be in charge of all the soldiers, and he will be their commander in my absence.If anyone has any complaints, go ahead and punish them, they will shut up, of course, with restraint..."

No matter how hard he tried to resist, Antar's eyes became foggy in the end.

"I don't know when I'll be back," he continued in a low voice. "Twenty-eight castles is too much... If we don't conquer the whole of the Highlands before the snow falls, I may not even be home for Christmas."

"What would we do without you?" Agnes' drooping mouth trembled, "This is your manor, the little castle you built..."

"I don't know, I really don't know."

Both of them had tears streaming down their faces, and they didn't say anything more, words had become superfluous.They hug each other tightly until the first cock crow separates them.

-

"We've gone the wrong way," Antal said from the saddle, the walls and towers of his domain reduced to a distant point behind him. "This is not the way to go north."

"Where do you think we're going?" Charlie, who was riding next to him, laughed when he heard this, "I don't intend to go north."

"but……"

"We still have a lot to do at our court in Timisoara, and it wouldn't be a bad idea to take the time to get to know your captains."

"But you said," Antar said in a low voice, as close to the king as possible, "you said that you are going to the Northern Expedition now, otherwise you will never have the chance."

"Miklós Gutkeled has been raging in the north with the bulk of his army for nearly a week," Charlie declared naturally, "and when he speaks to tell us that the road to the highlands is clear, We will go out to join him again."

Simon could see the knight's face flushed, his right hand gripping the reins tightly, his fingers turning white.Antal felt that he had been cheated, that the king had not told him the truth about the battle, and that he had been played for a fool, and left home.

The king himself noticed the change in Antar's expression, and to avoid further embarrassment he kicked his spurs and joined the cavalry ahead, kicking up a cloud of dust on the road to Timisoara.

(End of this chapter)