Lady Knight (3 page)

“You’ve already found it.” Aveline used a ring-heavy hand to gesture to the cot.
“The sword. It’s for you. I should’ve known better than to have despaired of
finding a suitable person for this gift from the Goddess. She has provided you.”

Riannon frowned down at the weapon. A sword from the Goddess? That would have
raised her suspicions even had Aveline not mentioned Vahl. Riannon’s scars were
souvenirs from that bloody, prolonged siege of the northern Irulandi city by the
emperor’s army. She should not have been surprised that Aveline, naer of the
groves, knew exactly how Riannon had come by her wounds. Aveline could have
learned of it from the priestesses where Riannon had endured her protracted
healing and convalescence. Nor was it out of character that Aveline use the
knowledge to discomfit Riannon. Aveline’s reputation for cleverness and cunning
had been born in the nursery, and was not likely to have been blunted by the
passing years. But why a sword?

“Why do you frown?” Aveline asked.

“I trust you not.”

Aveline laughed. “You tatter my expectations of courtly gallantry from the sole
paladin of the Order of the Goddess.”

Riannon snapped her head around. Aveline smiled up at her.

“Your order is a womanly one,” Riannon said. “You have no sworn knights. What
need could the Lady of Mercy and Healing have for a paladin?”

“Ordinarily, we’d have no need. But sometimes we must recourse to less gentle
means of achieving our ends. Now is one of those times. I must find and invest a
holy warrior. That warrior is you.”

Despite her bone-deep misgivings, Riannon stared down at the sword.

“Pledge us your service and you’ll be a consecrated knight,” Aveline said.
“None of the other orders would have you, would they? The brothers of the
militant Order of Atuan, god of war, welcomed you until they discovered you were
female. Then they spurned you as a creature unnatural. At the basilicas of Kamet
and the chapels of Naith, you found no better welcome, did you? How many lords
have welcomed your service until they discovered what you are? As good as any
man, if not better, but always judged in the end as a woman, and found wanting.
Well, cousin, I offer you the purpose and place you always sought. As the
paladin of the Goddess.”

Could Aveline see inside her to read her past? A paladin? Aveline offered her
the chance to dedicate her sword, honour, and self to the glory of a deity, not
a flawed mortal. There could be no higher calling.

“Can you doubt that so singular a life as yours has been fashioned by our Wise
Mother, in her guise as the Lady of Destiny, for a special fate?” Aveline said.
“You are the sword I shall wield. Tempered by adversity. Hardened by war and
distrust.”

Though still clouded with doubt, and aware of Aveline intensely watching,
Riannon reached for the sword to satisfy her curiosity. What manner of blade
would the female religious order own?

The wire-bound grip of the hilt fit her hand comfortably. She drew the sword
out. The yard of steel glittered with oil from the wool lining the inside of the
scabbard. The blade tapered to a point with the narrow groove of the fuller
running down the centre of each side. The counter weighting from the round
pommel balanced it well. This sword would be easy to swing in a cut as well as
to thrust.

Riannon could not identify where it might have been forged. Hilt and pommel were
too simple for Marchandese tastes, and the blade too straight for a Themalian to
carry. Too long to have been smithed in Iruland, and more slender than those
swords normally made in Bralland. Beyond any doubt, though, this was no
ceremonial weapon fit only for priestesses to dip in blessed waters. The edges
looked razor sharp.

“Come,” Aveline said. “Oath-taking and blessing are best done beside the sacred
pool.”

“I’ve not accepted your offer.” Riannon slid the sword back into the scabbard.
“If I dedicate myself, what would you have me do?”

“Live.”

Riannon turned in surprise.

“The sword is keeping you alive,” Aveline said. “Are you not the least curious
to wonder how you can be standing there frowning so forbiddingly at me? Do you
not remember the pain before you were carried in here?”

Riannon lifted a hand to her chest. “How can a sword have healed me?”

“It’s specially blessed. The virtue in it is combating the insidious power left
in the wounds you received at Vahl. They were inflicted by no mortal metal.”

That last, Riannon had guessed years ago.

“Though your flesh fused again,” Aveline said, “seeds of pain were left buried
inside you. As the seasons have passed, they’ve grown. Left unchecked, you would
die. By rights, I should be conducting your funeral as we speak. And, I’m
afraid, you are not cured. Nor will you be. Healers of the greatest skill could
not purge them. You must keep the sword close for the rest of your life.”

“How close?”

Aveline shrugged. “I can give you no exact measure to the closest span. You’d be
well advised to keep it at your hip, and not let it farther from you than a
hundred yards on those occasions when you must remove it. Certainly you’d not
want to be miles apart. The blessing on it is powerful, but not infinite.
You’ll feel when you’re too far beyond it.”

Riannon read no deceit in Aveline’s voice or expression. That left one
conclusion. “I have no choice.”

“That’s not true. You could take the sword without pledging your service.”

“What would you gain from that?”

Aveline flashed her a grin. “Truly, cousin, if you assault fortresses and foes
in such a forthright manner, it’s small wonder that few withstand you. You do
not trust to our generosity? But, surely, you’ve felt it before. Your healing
after Vahl was long. You were tended at a grove for the better part of two
seasons, were you not?”

Riannon’s jaw tightened. Vahl. Aveline had been holding that knife at her throat
since she walked into the room. Riannon owed the order her life. Twice over,
now.

Riannon bent to scoop up the sword. “I acknowledge my debts. I’ll swear your
oaths. I’ll pledge my body and honour to the service of the Goddess.”

Aveline had far too much wit to gloat openly, then or at dawn when she joined
Riannon. After a night in vigil beside the sacred pond, Riannon still knew some
doubt. But she offered her oath solemnly and without reservation. After all, her
service was to the Goddess and her order, not to Aveline personally. Perhaps
Aveline was right – Riannon, the only lady knight, had been guided along her
unconventional path by the will of the Goddess for this purpose. During the
hours of solitary darkness Riannon acknowledged that becoming a consecrated
warrior, accepted and acknowledged for who and what she was, satisfied a deep
longing she had almost despaired of fulfilling. Now she could build up credit in
both this world and the next doing what she did best.

Riannon rose after Aveline’s blessing and slid her new sword into its scabbard
hanging at her side. She fell in step with Aveline as they strolled back through
the trees towards the grove house.

“How glad I am that we can leave this rat hole,” Aveline said. “We’ll be resting
in much better accommodation as we travel north. My men have already gone ahead
to arrange it. I do look forward to good white bread that isn’t full of grit,
and capons that aren’t half raw.”

Riannon halted. “North?”

“Yes, we go to Tirand.” Aveline stopped to smile back at Riannon. “Did I not
mention that? I cannot think how it slipped my mind. We go to a wedding. Your
brother’s.”

Riannon’s left hand dropped to the hilt of her sword. “You cannot expect me to
return?”

“Why ever not? Our fathers – may the gods not judge them too harshly – lie cold
in their graves. They were the reason for your selfimposed exile, were they not?
My sister rules as queen. To whom, incidentally, you must pay homage for that
rat-bite manor of yours at Gast. Surely the news that Tirand has its first woman
ruler must have reached you in whichever pigsty you were selling your sword.”

Riannon had heard of her cousin’s crowning at Count Berenger’s court, along with
many jests about that unnatural animal, the female king.

“Your bull-witted eldest brother stood behind Mathilda rather than claim the
throne himself,” Aveline said. “For which we are all profoundly grateful, if
somewhat mystified by his lack of ambition. Truly, I suspect Henry must be a
changeling. Or a moonling. But the least we can do is thank him with a rich
young wife, don’t you think? The poor creature who has been selected for him was
an aspirant of my order. So, it’s fitting that you and I escort the sacrificial
virgin to her earthly destiny. What affecting scenes of family reunions await
us. But first, I must break my fast. I loathe travelling and absolutely refuse
to attempt it on an empty stomach.”

Riannon did not follow when Aveline walked away. Her fingers gripped her sword
hilt. What else had Aveline not told her?

Eleanor of Barrowmere heard a shout and looked out the front flap of her
travelling carriage. At last. Not a quarter mile ahead, she saw the pale stone
walls, so unexpected around a grove of the Goddess.

Eleanor shifted in her chair and put a hand to her belly. Padding and cushions
could not ease those rusty aches from the last days of her monthly flux. Had she
been able to travel directly to Sadiston, she could have delayed her journey and
ridden rather than be cooped up in the stuffy, swaying carriage. Still, a grove
house was the ideal place to find a remedy against a woman’s discomfort. And, in
truth, a few cramps that would pass soon enough were but a minor trouble
compared to what faced her niece.

The swaying carriage rolled to a halt in a wide courtyard. By the time Eleanor’s
men had brought a stool and helped her alight, the greenrobed high priestess
waited for her.

“Lady Barrowmere.” The priestess inclined her head and traced the
quartered-circle in the air between them. “Be welcome at our humble house.”

Eleanor smiled, returned the greeting affably, and accepted the privilege of
kissing the high priestess’s offered ring. Humble would not have been how
Eleanor would describe the sprawling complex.

The wall bounded at least five acres of buildings, most of which were themselves
constructed from expensive stone. Beyond that stretched hundreds of acres of
woods, containing the sacred groves and waters, and probably twice as much
fertile land accumulated through two hundred years of bequests and gifts.
Founded by a king for his daughter who desired the religious life, the Highford
Grove was where nobly born women like Eleanor’s niece came to take the robe – if
their families could afford a suitable endowment.

Eleanor knew how much her late brother-in-law had paid for his daughter’s place.
Money spent for nought, as it happened, now that the girl was to put aside her
robe and wed. Not that Eleanor believed her brother-in-law would have been
disappointed to see Cicely as wife of the Earl Marshal, cousin to the new queen
and now the most powerful man in the realm.

What Cicely thought of her abrupt change in destiny, Eleanor would shortly
discover. She had received a letter four months ago from her niece at the time
of the death of Cicely’s cousin, the Earl of Havelock. The conventionally polite
and pious expressions about the young man’s untimely death had revealed little
of Cicely’s feelings at so unexpectedly becoming one of the most eligible
heiresses in the kingdom. It would be gross impiety to pray that Cicely’s had
not been a true vocation, but all the same, Eleanor fervently hoped, for her
niece’s sake, that it had not been.

Eleanor accompanied the high priestess across the busy courtyard and into a
two-storey building with freshly swept wooden floors. These spacious guest
accommodations even had windows of glass. Definitely not humble. Eleanor smiled.

“Truly,” Eleanor said, “this was a house built to exalt the glory of the
Goddess.”

The high priestess beamed. “We are most fortunate in being the recipients of
many pious offerings.”

Eleanor had heard more subtle shakes of the begging bowl, but she let the hint
pass. “How fares my niece?”

“Lady Cicely has been praying much for the soul of her recently departed
cousin,” the high priestess said. “I’ve sent someone to inform her of your
arrival.”

The high priestess ushered Eleanor into her private chamber. Sweet herbs mingled
with fresh rushes on the floor. Eleanor would not have been surprised to see the
uncommon luxury of a piece of carpet. Servants had brought in platters of sweet
wafers and good wine by the time Cicely appeared. Eleanor’s heart sank. Cicely
looked pale and wore her drab aspirant’s robe of green and brown.

“Aunt Eleanor.” Cicely dropped a curtsy. “I hope your journey was free of
mishap.”

Eleanor suppressed the flippant reply that sprang to her lips. Neither the
priestess nor her downcast niece were a suitable audience for merrymaking.

Eleanor offered the priestess what court gossip she knew while she waited for
the healer-priestess to bring her the brew against flux pains. As soon after
that as she decently could, she took her leave of the high priestess and guided
Cicely towards the guest quarters. Eleanor’s servants still swarmed with
luggage, putting her linens on the bed, and carrying food through to the private
kitchens. No chance of any privacy there. Eleanor dismissed her waiting women
and asked Cicely to walk with her in the gardens.

The carefully tended physic garden blended with an orchard. Aromatic herbs had
released their fragrances under a hot sun for most of the day. Rather than
disperse the scents, the faintest of breezes merely wafted them all together
into a heady mélange of lavender, thyme, and mint.

Eleanor paused near a wooden bench and, under the guise of admiring the garden,
checked that they would not be overheard by a meditating priestess or servant
about her weeding.

“I thank you for coming to escort me, aunt.” Cicely broke off a sprig of
rosemary and absently plucked the green spiky leaves from it.

“We go to the queen’s own castle of Sadiston,” Eleanor said. “Where, though I
hear she keeps a menagerie containing fearsome beasts from the world over, it is
not precisely a lions’ den.”

Cicely glanced up from under her brows. Eleanor saw a hint of amusement amongst
the fear. Good enough.

“You’ve grown since last I looked on you,” Eleanor said. “Passing strange,
though, you put me in mind of Hawise more than your mother. You’ll not remember
your Aunt Hawise. She was my youngest sister. When we were girls together, ere I
was first wed, Hawise would steal my prettiest gowns whenever she could. I
wouldn’t have minded, save she was not pretty and did my clothes no credit. To
one as fair as you, I yield your choice right willingly.”

Aghost of a smile reluctantly surfaced again in Cicely’s expression. And,
Eleanor thought, a flicker of interest. With any skill, she should be able to
get Cicely willingly out of those dour robes and clothed as befitted a countess
ere they departed the grove.

“Being such a vain and frivolous creature, I’ve enough finery to weigh me down
to the deepest hell,” Eleanor said. “And would be in your debt if you relieved
me of some of it.”

Cicely looked both amused and scandalised.

“Though, not the scarlet overtunic shot with gold threads,” Eleanor said. “I’m
willing to endure a little torment in the afterlife for a garment that becomes
me so excessively well.”

Cicely bit her lip but couldn’t fully suppress a giggle. “Do you truly have so
many clothes, aunt?”

“My dear, when you reach my great age, you’ll realise that no penny spent on
cloth that draws the eye from the sagging, wrinkling skin beneath it is wasted.”

“You cannot be more than thirty years,” Cicely said. “Yet to hear you, you might
be as old as Sio Ela.”

“Is she much afflicted with years?”

Cicely giggled. “Mary says that Sio Ela might verily have been born from one of
the nuts that dropped from the First Tree.”

Eleanor smiled and linked her arm with Cicely. As she drew the girl in a
meandering stroll through the gardens, she coaxed her to talk. By the time they
went inside to sup, Eleanor felt well pleased with herself. Her flux cramps had
eased and Cicely had loosened up delightfully. But when Enid, one of Eleanor’s
waiting women, congratulated Cicely on the magnificence of her forthcoming
wedding, the girl paled and her haunted, hunted fawn look returned.

Eleanor would continue her work on Cicely on the morrow. Not that Eleanor could
truly fault her niece. She remembered too well being faced with the same
prospect of marriage to a man she had not met before they stood at the altar
together. Was there any young woman who felt no fears at being given to a
stranger – to be his to use as he pleased?

As a widow, Eleanor enjoyed the freedoms of controlling her own finances,
actions, and body in a manner that maidens and wives could only dream of. The
one drawback was that it could be a lonely course. She had more than once
discreetly indulged her need for intimate companionship, but the abandon of
sexual pleasure was not always easy to achieve with the spectres of illegitimate
children, diseases, and social censure clinging to the bed canopy. On balance,
she preferred to continue as her own mistress. While at these wedding
celebrations, Eleanor would seek an interview with her liege lady, the queen,
for the purpose of negotiating the amount of the fine Eleanor would pay to be
allowed to continue for another year as a widow.

When Eleanor returned from her morning ride, she used the dustiness of her tunic
as an excuse to change her clothes. She and her women drew Cicely into an
examination of the two crammed coffers of clothes that Eleanor had brought
largely for her niece’s benefit. Some had been hastily made for the girl. Once
the news of the betrothal had reached Eleanor, she had written for the girl’s
size and colouring from the high priestess.

To Eleanor’s relief, Cicely proved as susceptible to finery as any young woman.
She looked covetous as she ran her hands over the soft wool of a sleeveless
surcote dyed the most expensive and deepest of blues. She gasped with unfeigned
delight when Eleanor told her the garment had been made for her. Cicely softly
admitted that she was pleased with the effect of it worn over a new yellow tunic
with long, tight sleeves embroidered with small blue flowers. As well she might,
considering their cost.

At Eleanor’s signal, Agnes, her senior waiting woman, lifted Cicely’s aspirant’s
gown. “I’ll take this away now, shall I, my lady?”

Cicely bit her lip. Eleanor put a reassuring hand on Cicely’s rigid back.

“I’m sure the garment will be useful for someone,” Eleanor said. “And should be
given to the house. Do you not think so, sweeting?”

Cicely’s pale lashes shaded her downcast eyes, but Eleanor needed no special
skill in divination to understand that her niece looked on this exchange of
clothes as symbolic of the change in her circumstances. Cicely gulped. Eleanor
waited. Finally, Cicely gave a curt nod. Eleanor gently squeezed her arm and
bestowed a smile of approval. Cicely watched Agnes carry the robe out until the
door shut behind her.

When they attended the services in the grove, Eleanor saw Cicely’s longing looks
to her friends amongst the aspirants and young priestesses. She resigned herself
to Cicely requesting they delay their departure for another day.

The congregation had knelt to begin singing the final hymn when a commotion of
“halloos” carried through the trees. At the end of the second verse, a
breathless servant bolted into the clearing. Eleanor watched the woman
unceremoniously push through the worshippers and priestesses to throw herself to
her knees before the high priestess. What she whispered caused the priestess’s
head to snap up in surprise.

Cicely shot Eleanor a sidelong glance. Eleanor shrugged.

To Eleanor’s amusement, the high priestess signalled to the officiating
priestess an unmistakeable gesture of impatience. The singing increased in tempo
and the hymn concluded with indecent, if not comical, haste. The high priestess
hurried from the head of the sacred pool and barely paused to incline her head
to Eleanor and Cicely as she passed.

“A naer has arrived, my lady,” one of the older priestesses explained to Eleanor
before scurrying away herself.

“Has the exalted lady come because of me?” Cicely asked.

“I know not, sweeting,” Eleanor said. “Perhaps she has business with the house.
Or she might merely be breaking her journey here.”

Eleanor wondered, though, at the priestesses’ reaction. A naer was virtually a
princess of the order, but so large and prestigious a grove house as Highford
would have seen more than its share of naers. Kings had lodged here for a night
of their travels.

The noisy shouts and donkey brays grew louder as Eleanor and Cicely approached
the courtyard bounded by the guest quarters. They stepped into the cool shade of
the long, arched walkway when Cicely put a hand on Eleanor’s sleeve. She looked
corpse pale.

“May… may we walk the gardens, aunt?” she asked.

Whatever Cicely thought she had to fear from a visiting naer was best asked in
private. Eleanor signalled to Agnes and her women to continue. She and Cicely
turned to follow the walkway towards the main herb garden. Eleanor noted with
approval that even the vines winding around the columns of the walkway were
heavy with fruit that the priestesses could eat and preserve. None of the gods’
bounty was wasted even in so splendid a house.

“You needn’t quail at the prospect of meeting a naer,” Eleanor said. “You must
remember that you are a countess now. One of the highest ranking ladies in the
realm.”

Cicely frowned. “I’m not in the habit of thinking so.”

“You’ll grow accustomed to it,” Eleanor said. “There’s little in this life that
we cannot adapt to, however difficult it might seem at first.” Cicely looked
sharply at her.

“Ah, sweeting,” Eleanor said. “You don’t think that you’re the first to feel as
you do?”

“What is he like? Lord Henry?”

Prepared for such questions, Eleanor had already mentally ransacked her
impressions of the brusque Earl Marshal to find something suitable.

“He’s a man of the highest honour,” Eleanor said. “There are few who, finding
themselves in his position, would not have tried to claim the throne. His
actions also bespeak his high regard for his sense of the dues of blood and
family. Like his father before him, Lord Henry enjoys the reputation of a man
who treats women with the greatest courtesy.”

Cicely nodded. “His first wife died many years ago, did she not? He has a son
older than me?”

Eleanor signalled for Cicely to precede her through the gate into the fragrant
garden. “His eldest son, Lord Richard, has just wed a daughter of the Count of
Vahl, one of the leading vassals of King Fulk of Iruland. She is of an age with
you. I doubt me not that you and she will – Oh.”