Grail Knight

Richard is dead and King John has outlawed Robin of Locksley once again.  Robin wants Alan Dale to help him steal some valuable items from the local abbot, who had commissioned them from a local Jewish artisan, and was now refusing to pay for them.  At the same time, Alan is informed that the Knights Templar are planning vengeance on him due to a forged note, which robbed them of five hundred pounds of silver.  Alan was not the forger, nor the thief.

The theft is carefully planned and carried out.  However, it is as if the abbot had foreknowledge of the theft, because he was prepared for it.  Robin and Alan escape by the skin of their teeth.

A short time after the robbery, a group of Knights Templar come to arrest Alan at his home.  Fortunately another knight bears witness to the fact that Alan could not have stolen money from them.  Happy news arrives soon, when Alan's wife, Goody, informs him that she is pregnant.

After a late night attack on his home that destroys it and endangers the health of Goody, Alan teams up with Robin to get retribution from the man who had ordered it, and at the same time retrieve the Holy Grail. Alan is shocked and angered when Robin includes Nur in the group going to get the Grail.  She is the one who put the curse on Goody, but she is also the one who knows where the Grail is.

And so the quest begins.  It will bring trials and tribulations, battles and new friends.  But will they find the Grail?  If they do, can they get back to Goody with it in time to save her life?

Author Angus Donald has written an excellent historical novel full of action.   The search for the Grail is an all consuming event that occupied many a knight, and Donald's novel is a real page turner as he leads the reader in the quest.  A very good read.