The Fell Sword (80 page)

As the sun began to set, Ser Gavin faced the Megas Ducas, who was riding stiffly. For the first time all afternoon, the Duke was mounted on his new warhorse. Despite his stiff seat, he was technically perfect – as was his brother. They rode the first course, and broke lances on each other. As they walked their horses back to their starting positions Gavin raised his hand and they halted their horses in the centre of the lists, separated by the barrier that kept horses from colliding – and kept them on course.

Ser Gavin leaned over the barrier. ‘Is that you?’ he asked.

The Red Knight’s eyes flashed. ‘It is now,’ he said.

‘Why don’t I get to fight someone incompetent wearing your armour?’ Gavin asked. He flipped a salute and rode on. ‘You’re too bloody good.’

On their second course they broke lances on each other. The crowd roared. The small white handkerchief fluttered on the Red Knight’s aventail. The knights who were already out pointed and laughed.

Ser Bescanon said to Ser Jehan, ‘That was as pretty a pass as I’ve ever seen. We need an Alban crowd – this is art wasted on swine.’

Ser Jehan handed him a cup of wine. ‘He’s a brilliant lance,’ he admitted. ‘Better than I ever was.’

On their third pass, Ser Gavin’s lance skidded off the Red Knight’s shield and slammed into his left pauldron and ripped it off his body.

The Red Knight kept his seat as if made of iron, but the circular pauldron rolled across the sand like an accusation. The Red Knight paused at his own pavilion to have his visor removed, and then cantered back down the list and embraced his brother, and the two men pounded each other on the back.

‘Sweet Jesu, brother!’ Ser Gavin said. ‘You’re bleeding.’

‘So I am. But that was spectacular,’ his brother said, and they rode together down the lists, saluted the princess, and rode to one of the heated pavilions.

‘Melee by torchlight?’ Ser George Brewes said, after exchanging a steel hug with his Captain. ‘People will die out there.’

Toby got the Red Knight’s maille off over his head and they could all see the bandages.

‘What the
fuck!
’ shouted Francis Atcourt.

‘Crossbow,’ the Red Knight said. ‘It’s out and healed. And now I’ll get it worked again. Relax.’ He waved to Morgon Mortirmir, who was in full armour. The young man looked as if his eyes had been glazed by a potter, but he was adept enough with his healing. ‘Poisoned and magicked. Somebody thought it would be a one-shot kill.’

‘We didn’t get the shooter,’ Ser Michael said.

The other knights in the pavilion looked shocked.

The Red Knight took a deep breath as a pair of Academy Scholae lifted his shirt. Blue fire played across his left shoulder. Mortirmir ran his hand over the wound and nodded.

Tancreda Comnena smiled at her Plague. ‘When did you learn to heal so neatly?’ she asked.

‘At the siege of Lissen Carrak,’ Mortirmir’s mouth said. ‘Damn – despoina, please forget I said that.’

She blinked once, slowly.

‘You are very beautiful, and I think I’m in love with you,’ Mortirmir said.

She flushed.

He knelt with the sort of grace usually acquired by older men. ‘My lady, if you would vouchsafe me a token, I would be proud to defend your beauty against all others, taking you and you alone as my lady fair.’

She put a hand on his head. ‘What a pretty speech,’ she said. ‘Does that work on girls in Alba?’

She had left her hand on his shoulder, and he took it, turned the hand over and kissed her palm. And then her wrist.

‘Ah!’ she said. ‘Now that would work on the girls of Alba, I’m sure.’ She leaned down. ‘Suddenly you are very sure of yourself.’ She leaned closer and brushed her lips against his – the lightest of butterfly pressures.

There you go, boy. That’s all there is to it. Really, you are lucky I’m giving you back this palace of meat and lust and power. I do this so much better than you do.

When Mortirmir rode out for his last exchange of blows, he wore a magnificent red and purple sleeve on his shoulder. And Despoina Comnena pulled her cloak tight against her and refused to let her cousin look to see if she had given the sleeve.

In the last courses – mostly retakes from earlier bouts where a run had been missed or a horse or man had been injured – Mortirmir broke a lance against Ser Antonio and rocked the Podesta in his saddle, to the delight of the crowd and young Mortirmir himself, who pumped his fist in the air in self-satisfied glee. But he mastered himself, and the two were seen to embrace. Ser Alcaeus hit Ser Alison hard but didn’t unhorse her, and the crowd roared. It was the last pass, between two favourites, and when it was over the two knights met in the middle of the barrier. Ser Alison said something and Ser Alcaeus put his hand on his heart and shook his head, and then the two embraced.

They all rode around the lists in procession, and the princess awarded the prize of honour to Ser Gavin – very much against her will, the crowd could see, and they roared for the Red Knight nonetheless.

And then they trooped back to their pavilions.

‘I am so sorry,’ Ser Gavin said.

‘I’m not – that was magical,’ the Red Knight said. ‘I think you may be the best jouster I’ve ever faced.’

Francis Atcourt shook his head. ‘Someone stuck you with a crossbow bolt, and you are still jousting?’

The Red Knight winced. One of the two Scholae – young Mortirmir – raised a hand, and a third Academician stepped forward and a line of power connected them – the junior student passing raw
ops
to his classmate.

‘I hoped he might be stupid enough to try again,’ the Red Knight said. ‘Any luck, Morgan?’

The Alban student shrugged. ‘We’re seeking the weapon, but whoever did this knows enough to break the connection between bow and arrow,’ he said, his voice deeper and strangely confident for an adolescent.

Toby, head down and clearly ashamed, said, ‘I’m too used to having Ser Thomas. And Ser Ranald. I was lax.’

The Red Knight reached out and tweaked his squire’s cheek. ‘Horse shit, Toby, we’re all a little stretched right now. And this bastard is
good.
He chose his moment well. We covered it.’

‘Why do you have to go back out there?’ Ser Michael asked.

The Duke’s eyes rested on his – sardonic and dark and a little too glittery. And glinting red in their depths. ‘Michael – if I go down all hell will break loose. I promise you. If they don’t even see me hesitate
—
’ he smiled, ‘
—
then they’re going to have some fractures of their own.’

‘Who is this
they
?’ Ser George asked.

Ser Gavin pushed forward. ‘Fuck that!’ he said angrily. ‘This place can burn for all of me.’

The Red Knight shook his head. ‘Gentles all, we may have a busy Christmas night. We knew it was coming – Gelfred got a messenger, but there must have been a duplicate.’ He sat up. He was very pale. ‘However, if I survive the public dancing, we should be fine. If I don’t, let me take this moment to tell you all what a pleasure it has been to be your Captain.’

Atcourt turned to Ser Michael. ‘He’s insane. Make him go to bed. And shouldn’t we warn the princess?’

The Red Knight’s face closed.

‘Warn her?’ Ser Michael spat. He turned and looked at Ser Alcaeus, who stood with his arms folded.

The Morean knight shook his head, looking ten years older, but said nothing.

It was Ser Alison who took up the gauntlet. She laughed, and her raucous laugh rang out like a challenge to fate. ‘Warn the princess?
She’s probably paying the fucking assassin.
’

Harndon – The Queen

The Queen had tidied her apartments with Diota, and she’d busied herself, first meeting with Master Pye, who’d brought her gift for the King, and then wrapping it. Then she’d dressed carefully in brown velvet with bronze and gold beads and emeralds the size of nail-heads. Her belly showed, but Diota had worked a miracle of her own, recutting the brown velvet to match her latest expansion.

‘Where is Rebecca? And Emota? And my other ladies?’ she asked, as the winter darkness began to roll over the snow. She watched the shadows lengthen – the towers appearing to creep across the dirty snow in the main yard – and thought with a shudder of the other
darkness
in the corridors under the Old Palace.

‘Sweet, they’re late. Everyone’s late,’ Diota said, with her usual practicality. ‘Because it is Christmas, sweeting, and that’s what happens at Christmas.’

‘I’m fat,’ the Queen said. She glanced at her nurse. ‘Emota worries me. She looks ill.’

Diota rolled her eyes. ‘You are having a baby,
Your Grace.
’ She grinned. ‘It’s been known to add a few pounds.’ She looked thoughtfully at the mirror. ‘Emota – I’m a coarse old woman. I’d say she chose the wrong door at the stable.’

‘Emota? She is no light of love,’ the Queen said.

Her nurse shrugged. ‘Men are pigs. And they behave accordingly.’

‘What do you know?’ the Queen asked.

‘Know? Nothing. But I think that one of the Galles has turned her head, and the little bitch has been spying on us for them.’ Diota seized a hairbrush and yanked too hard at her mistress’s hair. ‘I heard one o’ they calling her a slut and a whore.’

The Queen shook her head. ‘Why are they so stupid? Blessed Virgin – my own husband thinks I was unfaithful,’ Desiderata said. Suddenly she sobbed. She hadn’t said the words aloud before.

‘He’s a fool,’ Diota said. ‘But he’s a man, and that’s the way of men.’

‘How can he even think it?’ the Queen shouted. She hadn’t meant to shout. The anger appeared, almost out of the air.

The privy door opened, and Lady Rebecca entered. She curtsied, her face as pale as new milk.

‘Oh, Becca, what’s wrong?’ the Queen asked.

Almspend shook her head, pursed her lips and said nothing.

‘I command you,’ the Queen said.

‘It is Christmas, and like everyone else, I am late,’ her secretary said. ‘Men in the halls are saying endless foul things.’

‘You have been attacked by one of the Galles!’ Diota cried.

Almspend smiled. ‘Unlikely,’ she said quietly. ‘Or rather, unlikely to happen more than once.’

The Queen sighed. ‘If only Mary – bah. She’ll come back after Epiphany.’ She looked out the window. ‘I would give much to leave the poison of this court. To go to a nunnery and have some peace until my baby is delivered.’ The thought of her baby clearly cheered her. She allowed a small smile to penetrate her anger.

Almspend made an effort, drew herself together and picked up a brush and began to work on the Queen’s hair.

Diota looked at her. The two exchanged glances.

‘Where is Emota?’ asked the Queen.

Almspend shrugged. ‘Busy, I expect, Your Grace.’ She was careful, but the Queen’s head turned.

‘Lying down for her Gallish lover,’ Diota spat.

Almspend glared at her. ‘That’s not how I’ve heard it,’ she said.

‘Nurse, do not be crude. Emota is the youngest of my ladies and perhaps not the brightest.’ The Queen smiled. ‘But she has my love all the same.’

‘You should keep it,’ Lady Emota said from the doorway. ‘I am not bright. I am dull, and stupid, and foolish. And pregnant. Can we share that, Your Grace? Like you, I will bear a bastard child.’

The Queen turned so fast that Almspend’s brush tangled in her hair and stayed there. ‘Emota!’ she said.

Emota pointed a finger at the Queen. ‘I am ruined because
you
are a slut. I
believed you.
I believed all that instruction about protecting the protectors and guarding the guardians and all I will have for my idles is a swollen belly and the reputation of being a whore
just like my Queen.
’ She burst into tears and threw herself on the carpet.

‘What has happened?’ the Queen asked. She looked at the other women.

Almspend got hold of the hairbrush and began to work it loose from the Queen’s hair.

Diota rolled the prostrate girl over and slapped her – none too gently – on the cheek. ‘Get up, you silly woman,’ she said.

‘He
is
the best knight!’ Emota said. ‘And he treated me like – like—’

‘Are you leman to Jean de Vrailly?’ the Queen asked.

‘Among others,’ Diota spat. ‘She’s ridden a prize number of warhorses.’

‘Aaaghh!’ wept Emota. It was as if she’d taken a wound, she cried so hard.

‘The Galles will use her against you,’ Almspend said, brushing on. ‘Her lechery will make you look a wanton, Your Grace.’

The Queen knelt by her lady. ‘Emota – I need to know what has happened. But I will not desert you.’

Almspend’s eyes met Diota’s in agreement for once. ‘Your Grace, it would be better if you did desert her.’

The Queen gathered the sobbing girl in her arms. ‘Why – because she loved the wrong man? What does it matter?’ she asked. ‘It is all male vanity and foolishness. All of it.’

Almspend’s eyes met her Queen’s. ‘That’s not the argument to use to a court full of men at Christmas,’ she said. ‘The Galles have us under siege, my Queen. And they have put a sap in through poor Emota.’

‘More like a battering ram,’ Diota said.

‘Be kind. Both of you. What has this girl done that is so bad?’ She turned to Almspend. ‘I understand your argument, my dear. I am upset too.’ She pressed her hand against Almspend’s cheek. ‘You are angry.’

‘More afraid than angry,’ Almspend said cautiously.

‘What do you know?’ the Queen asked, gazing into her secretary’s eyes. Almspend’s eyes were pale blue and shone like ice on a clear winter day. The Queen’s were deep and dark, green and brown and gold, and they seemed to hold secrets – all the secrets of an ancient world.

‘What have you learned?’ the Queen asked.

Almspend pursed her lips and frowned, and her eyes darted away. ‘Not today – please, Your Grace.’ She looked at the young woman sobbing on the floor. ‘Your Grace – I apologise. Emota is guiltless of anything but having her head turned. I’m sure of it. But the vitriol we will reap—’

‘When you call me
Your Grace
this often, I know that something is very wrong.’ The Queen smiled. She looked down and put her hand on the girl. ‘But no girl who has been raped is guilty of anything, and we will not make her more a victim.’ She ran her hand down the girl’s back and golden light seemed to fill the room.