Grailblazers

Tom Holt
was born in London in 1961. At Oxford he studied bar billiards, ancient Greek agriculture and the care and feeding of small, temperamental Japanese motorcycle engines; interests which led him, perhaps inevitably, to qualify as a solicitor and emigrate to Somerset, where he specialised in death and taxes for seven years before going straight in 1995. Now a full-time writer, he lives in Chard, Somerset, with his wife, one daughter and the unmistakable scent of blood, wafting in on the breeze from the local meat-packing plant. For more information about Tom Holt visit
www.tom-holt.com

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Copyright

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

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First US e-book edition: September 2012

ISBN: 978-0-316-23296-8

Also by Tom Holt

Expecting Someone Taller
Who's Afraid of Beowulf?
Flying Dutch
Ye Gods!
Overtime
Here Comes the Sun
Grailblazers
Faust Among Equals
Odds and Gods
Djinn Rummy
My Hero
Paint Your Dragon
Open Sesame
Wish You Were Here
Only Human
Snow White and the Seven Samurai
Valhalla
Nothing But Blue Skies
Falling Sideways
Little People
The Portable Door
In Your Dreams
Earth, Air, Fire and Custard
You Don't Have to be Evil to Work Here, But It Helps
Barking
The Better Mousetrap
May Contain Traces of Magic
Blonde Bombshell
Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Sausages
Doughnut

GRAILBLAZERS

For GLH
Thanks

It is quite some storm.

It had started out with a perfectly ordinary squall on the strings, but then the brass had joined in, followed shortly afterwards by the entire woodwind section, and now the tubas and the double-basses are in full cry, with the trombones in the background doing the lightning effects. It is also slashing down with rain.

A flash of brilliant electric whiteness cleaves the darkness and reflects, painfully bright, off a man in armour staggering up the steep escarpment of the fell. His visor is up, and his face is lined with agony. He is an idiot. You can tell, just by looking at him. It's not so much his tall, youthful, athletic build or the sopping wet golden hair plastered like seaweed down his forehead that gives him away; it's just that nobody with anything substantial between his ears would climb up a steep mountain in full armour in a thunderstorm.

True, there is supposed to be a sleeping princess at the top of this mountain, whom a kiss will awaken from a century of enchanted sleep. True, this princess is alleged to be beautiful, wise and extremely rich, and quite likely to be well-disposed towards the man who wakes her u
^p. But common sense, even if it can handle the concept of sleeping princesses on mountain-tops, must surely insist that if she's been up there for a hundred years she's probably still going to be there in the morning, when it'll have stopped raining and a chap can see where he's putting his feet.

The knight stumbles on, and something - fool's luck, probably - guides his footsteps clear of the anthills, tussocks of heather and other natural obstacles which would send him and his fifty pounds of sheet steel slithering back down the hillside like a heavy-duty toboggan. The lightning forks from the sky again, and instead of electrocuting him chooses to illuminate the mountain-top. In fact it goes further, setting a wind-twisted thorn tree nicely on fire, so that the knight can make out the figure of a sleeping human under the lee of a rocky outcrop. Short of providing an illuminated sign saying YOU ARE HERE, there's not much more anybody could do to make things easy.

âHa!' says the knight.

He lays down his shield and his spear and kneels for a moment, lost in wonder and awe. A sheep, huddling under a nearby gorse bush and chewing a ling root, gives him a look of utter contempt.

The sleeper remains motionless. The funny thing is that, for somebody who's been asleep on a mountain-top for a hundred years, she's in a pretty good state of preservation. When one thinks what happens to a perfectly ordinary pair of corduroy trousers when they inadvertently get left outside on the washing line overnight, one is amazed at how tidy she is. But of course, the idiot doesn't notice this. In fact, he's praying. He doesn't half choose some funny moments.

And now it has stopped raining, and the dawn pokes its rosy toe outside the duvet of the clouds and shudders. A single exquisite sunbeam picks out the scene. The knight's armour rusts quietly. Somebody is going to have to go over it later with a wire brush and a tin of metal polish, but you can guess, can't you, that it isn't going to be the knight.

Finally, having said quite a few paternosters and the odd Te Deum, the knight rises to his feet and approaches the sleeping figure. Dawn is now in full swing, and as he lifts the veil off her face - please note that some unseen force has protected the veil from mildew and mould for over a century - the sun lets fly with enormous quantities of atmospheric pink light. Creaking slightly, the knight bends down and plants a chaste, dry little kiss on the sleeper's cheek.

She stirs. Languidly, she opens her eyes. Consider how you feel first thing in the morning, and multiply that thirty-six thousand, five hundred times. Correct; you'd feel like death, wouldn't you? And the first thing you'd say would be, âNnnggrh,' surely. Not a bit of it.

âHail, oh sun,' she says, âhail, oh light, hail, oh daw...'

Then she checks herself. She blinks.

âHang on,' she says.

The knight remains kneeling. He has that utterly idiotic expression on his face that you only see in Pre-Raphaelite paintings.

âWho are you?' says the princess.

The knight clears his throat. âI,' he says, âam Prince Boamund, eldest son of King Ipsimar of Northgales, and I have comeâ'

âWho?'

The knight raises both eyebrows, like someone by Burne-Jones who's just trodden on something sharp. âI am Prince Boamund, eldest son of Kingâ'

âBoamund?'

âThat's right,' says the knight, âBoamund, eldest son ofâ'

âHow do you spell that?'

The knight looks worried. Where he comes from you can take advanced falconry, or you can take spelling; not both. Guess which one he opted for.

âBee,' he says, and hesitates. âOh. Ee...'

The princess has a curious expression on her face (which is, of course, divinely beautiful). âAre you being funny or something?' she says.

âFunny?'

âKidding about,' she replies. âPractical joke, that sort of thing.' She considers the situation for a moment. âYou're not, are you?'

âNo,' says Boamund. He thinks hard. âLook,' he says, âI am Boamund, eldest son of King Ipsimar of Northgales, and you are Kriemhild the Fair, and you have been sleeping an enchanted sleep on top of this mountain ever since the foul magician Dunthor cast a spell on you, and I've just woken you up with a kiss. Agreed?'

The princess nods.

âRight, then,' says Boamund.

âSo?'

âWhat do you mean, so?' says Boamund, flushing pink. âI mean, it's supposed to be... well...'

âWell what?'

âWell...'

Kriemhild gives him another peculiar look and reaches under a nearby stone for her cardy. It is, of course, pristinely clean.

âI mean,' she says, âyes, you qualify, yes, you're a prince and all that, but ... well, there seems to have been some mistake, that's all.'

âMistake?'

âMistake. Look,' she says, âwho told you? About me being here and everything?'

Boamund thinks hard. âWell,' he says, âthere was this man in a tavern, if you must know.'

âA knight?'

Boamund scratches his head. Imagine a knight by Alma-Tadema who's somehow managed to fall off the picture and is wondering how to get back in without breaking the glass. âI suppose he might have been a knight, yes. We were playing cards, and I won.'

Kriemhild's roseate lips have set in a firm line. âOh yes?' she says.

âYes,' replies Boamund, âand when I asked him to pay up he said he was terribly sorry but he didn't have any money. And I was just about to get pretty angry with him when he said that he could put me on to a pretty good thing instead, if I was interested. Well, I reckoned that I didn't have much choice, so...'

âI see,' says Kriemhild icily. âTell me, this knight, was he sort of dark, good-looking in a blah sort of way, long nose, hair fluffed up at the back...?'

âYes,' says Boamund, surprised. âDo you know him? I mean, how can you, you've been asleep...'

âJust wait till I get my hands on him, the treacherous little rat,' says Kriemhild, vigorously. âI should have guessed, I really should.'

âYou do know him, then?'

Kriemhild laughs bitterly. âOh yes,' she says, âI know Tancred de la Grange all right. The little weasel,' she adds. âI shall have a thing or two to say to Messire de la Grange when he finally condescends to get here.'

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