Damask & Deception (Spellbound #2)

Chapter 22: In Your Honor

Being back in the home of Lord and Lady Delen so soon again had not been on Baudwin's agenda, and he was finding himself rather frustrated that he was. He would rather have stayed in Ossol to oversee the enlistment of new soldiers and planning the guarding of the mountain range bordering the Dreadlands. Instead, he was stuck in a tedious meeting with Lord Delen and a handful of other lords from the western part of the kingdom, where Delen had the most influence.

They were not taking the news that Baudwin wouldn't allow them free rein to do as they wished particularly well, but he refused to back down. If he had to deal with both the potential threat of Son of Deva and an internal rebellion, then so be it. He would not yield to these old grouches who refused to accept the new laws where servants were no longer to be treated as sub-human beings, and they weren't allowed to set their own tithes.

"What is the point of having given you my daughter, if there are no benefits for me?" Lord Delen complained, his puffy face red below black, knitted brows.

Given? Baudwin had to hold back a scoff. If Rhiannon hadn't conceded, he doubted Lord Delen could have done anything to make her obey him.

"I would be willing to make some compromises," he said aloud. "But there are some things I will not negotiate. You cannot, and I repeat, you can not insist on the lord's night of first rights for your vassals. It's an old and outdated tradition that had been done away with for two centuries before you brought it back."

"It's a time-honoured tradition!" An old lord with spiky grey hair protested. "My family has done it for generations!"

Baudwin levelled a glare at the man, and he shrank back in his chair. "Well, your family shouldn't have. There was a reason they outlawed this despicable tradition. I cannot believe that you got away with it all this time."

"The western lords have always had a certain amount of self-rule," another lord said, his sweaty face looking oddly proud of this. "Being on the far side of the great forest, we've never spent much time in Ossol."

"That may be so, but this ends now. I will send a warden over here if I must, to keep you in line."

It didn't matter if the western lords were far away from the capital; they didn't get to make their own laws. Not having supervision for so long had gone to their heads, and with one of their own as the queen, they had completely lost the plot.

"Preposterous!" Lord Delen growled and leaned closer over the table to stare Baudwin in the face. "The king has always afforded us the trust to rule as we wish."

"And I would have too," Baudwin said, placing his hands on the table and standing up so he could look down on the seated lords, "had you not squandered the right by taking absurd liberties with it!"

"They are not!" Lord Spiky-hair howled. "All perfectly reasonable!"

Baudwin turned his gaze on him, his voice tempered, "You are asking for half of your vassal's incomes from trade or farming. Half!"

"We're allowed tithes!"

"A tithe is a tenth." He couldn't believe he had to explain this. "Sometimes we may ask for more tax, if it's needed. But that is something which will come from me. The king. You cannot ask this for yourself."

"What do you expect us to do?" Lord Delen asked angrily.

At his rope's end, Baudwin looked over to Aurelian, who had joined him on the trip for support, but the knight only rolled his eyes. With a sigh, he mulled over his options. He could try to compromise, somehow, or he could risk outright rebellion. What they wanted wasn't easy to negotiate, but he could not allow them to take such large taxes from their vassals. Which they then kept for themselves, as they certainly hadn't increased the amount sent to the capital. He also could not allow them to continue their mistreatment of the people living on their lands. Rebellion it was, then.