The Princess and the Constable: A Chivalrous Man's Tale of Honor
Title: The Princess and the Constable: A Chivalrous Man’s Tale of Honor
Rating: K
Pairing: Adama/Roslin
Word Count: 1,366
Author’s Note: Posted for the about_time Battleship Challenge: Team!Laura.
Disclaimer: It all belongs to Ronald D. Moore. He’s a very lucky man.
Previous stories in the Medieval Times ‘Verse:
A Night on the Road | A Standoff in the Stables | A Sisterly Interlude
“Are we ready to travel, Constable?”
“We are just waiting for Tigh, Your Highness.”
“Here you go, William.” Tigh walked up to the royal carriage, arms loaded with thick blankets.
“You are aware this is but a day-journey so I may pay visits to some of my father’s lands, are you not Sir Tigh?”
“I am aware, Your Highness,” Tigh looked dubiously at Adama for help.
“And the blankets, Sir Tigh? Are you planning on camping out in one of the far villages?”
“No Your…”
“Tigh has brought the blankets at my request,” Adama interjected. Laura raised an eyebrow, inviting an explanation. “The last time we traveled together, Your Highness, I noticed additional blankets were required and not available. I have ordered that your carriage now always be prepared…Just in case.”
“Just in case…” Laura mused on his words, fully aware of the implications of Adama’s foresight. “I see.”
“Wouldn’t want Your Highness to be caught unprepared. The King would not be pleased.” Without waiting for Laura’s response to his mocking comment, Adama turned his gray steed to the front of the line of knights that would be accompanying the royal carriage throughout the kingdom for the day.
Laura watched him trot away, her proud chin held high in the face of the Constable’s obvious dig.
Billy peeked his head out of the open carriage door, “Are we ready m’Lady?”
“Yes, Billy.” Laura turned to him with a smile. Then spoke to the rigid form of Sir Tigh who was still standing awkwardly beside her. “Well stow the blankets Sir Tigh and help me into the carriage,” Laura ordered.
“Of course Your Highness!” Tigh moved to the back of the carriage and placed the armload of blankets in the luggage compartment, stuffing them into the already overcrowded space filled with items the Princess intended to gift to her father’s subjects.
Moving back to the side, Tigh reached out an arm for Laura to grasp as she lifted the skirt of her tunic and stepped up into the carriage. Just as Tigh was about to swing the door shut, Laura placed a hand delicately upon his arm, stilling his movements.
“You have known the Constable a long time, have you not Sir Tigh?”
Saul looked more than a bit terrified as he stared at Laura’s hand on his arm but she refused to remove it.
“You trained as a knight with him, I believe?” Laura continued her questioning.
“Um yes, Your Highness. William…I mean, Constable Adama was a few years ahead of me. He was in charge of my unit in the War against the Kingdom of Cylon. I left knighthood after the war, got hitched, tried to make a go of land tending but it wasn’t for me. Missed the heft of a sword in my fist, you know?” Saul realized he’d began to babble and stopped suddenly, his eyes turned down from the Princess’ inquisitive gaze.
“It’s alright, please go on,” Laura encouraged. Her friendly tone was something Tigh had only heard her use with her family and when visiting with children in the kingdom, and it gave him the courage to continue.
“Well Adama, see he grew up in the castle, as you probably know. Never left the service of the King even though there wasn’t much fighting left to do after the war ended. So when my woman, Ellenore got bored being a farmers wife, Adama arranged for me to return to the castle. Gave me a place back in the King’s service. I owe that man a great deal.”
“I am sure you have earned his respect and admiration, Sir Tigh.” Tigh looked doubtful but kept his thoughts to himself. “Adama does not seem the type of man to support someone he does not trust and even less to make someone his second in command who he does not feel the man capable.”
Tigh seemed to brighten at Laura’s words, agreeing that this was an apt description of his friend and commander.
“Tell me Sir Tigh,” Laura continued. “Is the Constable so careful in selecting all his companions?” Laura hoped Tigh understood her question and was pleased to see the slight color rise in the man’s cheeks.
“You mean with Ladies, Your Highness?” It should have been too personal a question coming from a lady, but Tigh figured a future queen could ask anything she liked. Laura nodded.
“He certainly is careful in that. Knows a bit too much about a man taking advantage of women from his father.” Tigh looked up at Laura, “You know about Joseph Adama, brigand-turned-Sheriff for that war criminal, Zarek?”
“Yes, I am aware of the Constable’s parentage.”
“Yea, well Adama still takes care of his mother. Goes to see her whenever he gets time away from his duties. His old man sure doesn’t seem to care about the woman he knocked up.” Laura looked a bit scandalized. Indeed, this was not information she had been privy to. It was both upsetting, in terms of the senior Adama’s behavior, and comforting to discern even further that William Adama was a man of honor.
Tigh, now fully engaged in his story, seemed loath to stop talking. “But William, he’s a good man. Never seen him treat any woman with disrespect. Even that harlot he almost married a few years back!”
“A harlot?!” Laura exclaimed.
“Well, she wasn’t actually a harlot, m’Lady,” Tigh looked embarrassed at being caught using such language with the Princess. “But she sure weren’t no Lady! Adama was prepared to make her an offer before he got called away suddenly on King’s business. The minute he was gone, Carolanne was off in another man’s bed! Of course I told him about it. Man has a right to know if his intended is unfaithful.” Tigh spoke with an exuberance that made Laura questioned just how personal an issue this particularly subject was for the knight. She had heard more than a little gossip about his own wife.
“And so the Constable left this woman after the truth was made known?”
“Well, not exactly. See that’s the thing with William. He’s just too frakk’n chivalrous. He still came back and spoke with Carolanne’s father.”
“But the Constable is not yet wed?” Laura was confused by the dramatic tale.
“Yea, well William had been gone seven months. It was the trip the King took across the sea to the kingdom of Tauron, you remember?” Laura nodded, eager for Tigh to go on, though the knight seemed to be enjoying drawing out the suspense. He grinned as he made his next statement, “Turns out the woman was well with child when Adama returned.”
“And could it not have been his?” Laura hated even having to ask. The thought of the Constable, so honorable toward her own person, laying with a woman he was not wedded to was more disturbing than she would openly admit.
“No frakk’n way. Carolanne wasn’t more than four months into her laying in. Barely showing. Her father had the good sense to turn William away without forcing him to take his daughter as had been promised. I’m telling you, William Adama lucked out there. He deserves a woman who can love him, like my Ellenore does me.” Tigh looked immensely proud as he made this declaration.
Laura seemed immensely distressed.
She was thankful Adama had been spared a union with an unfit woman, yet she feared his experiences had turned the creditable man against all women. Certainly he had been avoiding her at all costs. His ‘precautionary blankets’ seemed to weigh heavy in the Princess’ carriage as proof. Perhaps he had take her advances as evidence of a looseness which had already burned him once. Laura would have to be more careful in the future. She had no desire to scare the brawny man away. Quite the opposite in fact.
“Tigh!” the subject of Laura’s musings bellowed from the front of the line, surprising both she and Tigh out of their silent reveries. “Get a move on.”
“Go,” Laura spoke softly.
She took her hand back and Tigh nodded to his Princess, an admiration for the man on the gray stallion in both their eyes.