The Iron Tempest (3 page)

The knight looked at her for a long moment without replying. She thought that perhaps he had relapsed into his brown study and was prepared to gladly abandon him to his depression which, after all, was no real concern of hers. However, the knight must have found the tall, white figure with the gentle voice reassuring, for he finally answered her question.

“I am, young sir,” he said—voicing a misconception about Bradamant’s sex he was neither the first nor the last to commit—, “Count Pinabel.” Bradamant listened quietly, the knight’s name meaning nothing to her. Neither did she correct his misconception—she was long used to being mistaken for a lad and had long since ceased to be annoyed. That there might be any humor inherent in such an error had always escaped her; perhaps Bradamant’s one great failing was that she did not possess a sense of humor—or, perhaps more fairly, whatever sense of humor she had been equipped with at birth had been as effectively and efficiently buried as a heretic in his lightless dungeon. She never understood the point of jokes, to the infinite annoyance of those who appreciated that life was not entirely—nor even desirably—a serious matter.

“I was leading a troop of infantry,” the count continued, “and calvary to join Karl the Great, who was waiting for my help to bar Emir Marsilius’ descent from the mountains. With me was the love of my life, the light of my soul, the incomparable Gravelotte. To spare her the discomfort and ignominy of traveling in the company of my army we kept apart from the main force, keeping to a parallel path some miles distant. A trusted lieutenant easily oversaw the discipline of my men. We did this thoughtlessly; I can see that now. All we had in mind was privacy and simply never noticed how bad the countryside was that we had gotten into. We were among rugged crags and boulder-strewn tracks barely wide enough to allow us to ride in tandem. Eventually, I had to take the lead, allowing Gravelotte to fall behind. We were approaching Rodonna when we came upon the most terrible thing I have ever seen.” The man shuddered so prodigiously that his armor rattled like a tambourine.

“What was it?”

“It was a horse of astounding proportions, black as molten pitch, but winged like a condor—huge pinions, beating the air like sails luffing in a roaring gale. And if all that weren’t bad enough, it had the head and talons of an eagle. Reining in this monster was a knight clad in armor no less black than his hellish steed. As soon as he caught sight of us, he wheeled the creature around and dropped down upon us like a falcon plummeting onto a rabbit. I was thrown from my mount by a blow from one of the wings. Meanwhile, the knight swept my beloved Gravelotte from her palfrey and, before I was aware of what was happening, he and his fair prisoner were a hundred feet above my head. I could hear her piteous screaming, but what could I do? She was as helpless as a chick in the grasp of a hawk.”

“Did you try to follow them?”

“How? I was surrounded by hills and cliffs. Besides, my horse was exhausted and could scarcely stagger over the rough ground.”

“What about your army? Surely they could have helped?”

“It would have taken more than a day, perhaps two, to have rejoined them. I left them to find their way to Karl without me.”

“So what
did
you do?”

“I did the best I could, of course, what do you think? For nearly a week, I pursued Gravelotte and her abductor. There were no paths through that weird landscape; it looked like it had been blasted by God Himself, like the ruins of Sodom and Gomorrah. Eventually I came to a high, curving ridge. It overlooked a circular valley—like a broad crater—that was as wild and desolate as anything I have ever seen. From the middle rose a rock, a towering crag, and on the summit of this was a castle made entirely of steel.”

“Steel?”

“Yes, or silver. Some metal, at any rate, that blazed like an open furnace in the light of the setting sun. I arrived just in time to see the black horse land atop one of the gleaming towers.

“For days I circled the base of the crag, without finding any way to climb it; it was as smooth as a whale’s tooth. Can you imagine my despair? I’d have prefered to see my heart ripped from my breast, than to see Gravelotte taken from me. You’re too young to know about such grief, such despair.”

“Perhaps I do,” she replied, “know something of such loss.” The knight ignored her comment and continued his story:

“I had only just resolved to die there, waiting hopelessly, when I saw a pair of knights clambering down the rubbly slope of the crater. They were led by a dwarf, a horrible-looking thing riding between them on a donkey. I recognized them immediately as pagans. One was Gradasso, King of Sericana. The other was Rashid, the most eminent of all the Saracen warriors.”

“
Rashid?
One of them was Rashid?”

“That’s what I said. Why? Do you know him?”

“Yes! No. Not exactly. We’ve only met once. But please, I’m sorry,” she added, trying to hide her excitement and the embarrassment that she had allowed it to show, “don’t let me interrupt you.”

“A little late, isn’t it? Where was I?”

“Gradasso and, ah, Rashid had just arrived.”

“Yes. I approached and asked what had brought two such reknowned knights to such a Godforsaken place. The dwarf answered for them, which I thought insolent.

“‘They have come,’” it said, “‘to challenge the lord of that castle, the one who commands the hippogryph.’”

“
Hippogryph
?”

“Yes, yes,” he replied truculently at her interruption. “That’s what the flying monster is called. Half horse, half gryphon. Hippo. Gryph. It’s Greek. Anyway, if I
may
continue, I begged them to take up my cause and, if they were to prove victorious, to return my love to me. I told them my story and they promised to do their best.

“As they descended to the plain that surrounds the tower, I retired to the slopes, where I could best watch the battle. I knew that I was too exhausted—physically, mentally and emotionally—to be of any use to them. My proximity would have only been a hindrance.”

“I can see that.”

“Gradasso generously offered to toss for the privilege of being first to approach the enemy, but Rashid waived it, saying it didn’t matter to him who went first.”

“That’d be just like him!” she agreed breathlessly.

“As soon as Gradasso reached the base of the crag, he took his horn and blew a long, resounding note on it. The steel castle seemed to resonate in sympathy and the whole crater rang with the unholy sound. My very armor quivered like the metal of a bell and I had to clap my hands to my ears. The last echo had not stopped reverberating when the black knight on his black, winged charger appeared atop the highest turret. With slow, deliberate beats the monster rose and was soon nearly lost to sight at an altitude that would have made an eagle dizzy. Then the creature folded its wings and plummeted toward the ground like a meteor, like a falcon that had just spotted a succulent rabbit or pigeon.

“Gradasso set his lance, but he was obviously unused to combating a foe who came from above. He had scarcely acted, when the black knight was upon him with his own lance aimed at Gradasso’s helmet. At the last second, Gradasso swung his shield between his helmet and the point of the lance, which shattered at the impact. Gradasso tossed his shield aside and pulled his sword free, but he only swung and swiped at empty air as the flying monster hovered over his head, raising a whirlwind of dust from the beating of its mighty wings. Suddenly, the black horse shot back into the air, swooped and dived at Rashid, catching him entirely by surprise.”

“No!” Bradamant gasped, involuntarily pressing her hands over her mouth. “He wasn’t . . .?”

“No. Although Rashid had been distracted by watching Gradasso, he was able to duck just in time and the black knight caught him only a glancing blow.”

“Thank God!”

“He was almost thrown from his horse, and by the time he recovered himself the flying horse was already high above his head.

“This one-sided battle went on like this for some time. The black knight would first strike at one of the paladins, then at the other, flying away each time before he could receive a return blow. The flying horse was so fast that it almost seemed invisible. Most of the time it was just a dark blur, like a whirlwind. The fray would have gone on for another hour had it not grown too dark to see.

“It’s almost too embarrassing to tell someone else about all of this. It all seems so impossible, sitting here by this placid pool, in the midst of these green trees.”

“I have no reason to disbelieve you,” replied Bradamant.

“You haven’t heard the most unbelievable part, yet.

“During all of this time, never had the aerial horseman used his shield. He had one hanging from his saddle, but it was covered with an envelope of black silk. I thought that he had done this to prevent anyone seeing his arms and thereby identifying him. I couldn’t have been more wrong. It had been covered because it was too dangerous to leave uncovered.

“As the flying horse hovered with thundering wings over the two hapless combatants, the black knight tore the cover from his shield. It was as though the sun had suddenly reappeared in the zenith. I can’t describe such a dazzling brilliance, except to say that whoever so much as glanced at it fell down stunned, as senseless as though he had been poleaxed. Even I, more than a mile away, lost consciousness for more than an hour.”

“But Rashid! What happened to him?”

“I have no idea. When I came to, the battlefield was empty. There was not a sign of Rashid, Gradasso, the dwarf, the horses or the donkey.”

“The black knight must have taken them.”

“That was my conclusion, too, though for all I could tell the monster had eaten them. But there was nothing I could do. My last hope had been crushed. If two of the most valorous warriors in all of Europe and Afric proved powerless, what could I do?”

“Cheer up, sir,” she said. “My arrival may prove a Godsend to you and you’ll soon think this day your lucky one. We’ll depart immediately for this magical castle, in which is secreted treasures dearest to both of us. If Providence is on our side, our efforts won’t have been in vain.”

This stilted speech did not cheer Pinabel; he sneered contemptuously. “You’d have me go all the way back to that place, would you? Have you any idea of how difficult that’d be? Of course, it’d be little enough to
me
, since I’ve lost everything else that matters, but what about you? You’d only go to all that trouble just to end up a prisoner yourself.”

“That’s my worry.”

“So be it. Just don’t blame me; I tried to warn you.”

The Count rose from the grass and went to saddle his horse while Bradamant returned to her own mount. As they were doing so, the regular beat of hooves filled the still air of the glen. Bradamant pulled her sword free, but the interloper proved to be nothing more than a messenger on a pony. She recognized the city arms of Marseilles through the mud and grime on the boy’s tunic. As she resheathed her weapon, he pulled up beside her.

“My Lady Bradamant!” he cried breathlessly.

“Yes?” she replied and, unseen by her, Count Pinabel turned with a start and stared with an expression so blackly evil that it certainly would have had her drawing her weapon again. He had entertained not the slightest idea that the knight with whom he had been speaking was a woman, let alone the famous Bradamant. If it had crossed his mind at all, he had perhaps thought, from the sound of the voice, slimness of the figure and whiteness of the armor, that the knight was a very young man, perhaps a bit too effeminate for his taste; an eager if naïve novice. But
Bradamant
! He knew this Bradamant. . . or at least his family did and he was glad that he had not mentioned that his father was Anselm of Altaripa or that he was of that house of Maganza which had been waging a bitter, jealous, deadly and implacably hostile feud with the house of Clairmont for generations. (Bertolai, victim of the infamous chess dispute, had been a scion of the Maganza family and his death had certainly added little to their love for the Clairmonts.) And of that evil family of scoundrels, traitors and blackguards, Pinabel outmatched them all in the ugliness and foulness of of his achievements. He knew that Bradamant’s father’s heart beat for her sake. The Count wondered how he could take advantage of this situation to the detriment of the trusting Bradamant. A blow to her would strike to the heart of the Clairmonts. As he stood watching Bradamant and the messenger speak, his mind turned over a dozen plans, each more treacherous than the last, as he half listened to the conversation.

“I bring news,” the boy gasped, “that Montpelier and Narbonne have surrendered and that the flags of Saracen Cordova now fly above them. Indeed, the whole coast of Aiguesmortes is now under pagan domination. Marseilles is direly threatened and implores your aid. Because Karl the Great placed the city under your personal protection, my lady, the people have sent me to find you and to beg you to return.”

She did not know what to say. Charlemagne had not only given Bradamant the city of Marseilles, but all that great tract of coastal land from the Var to the Rhône. If he could not knight her, he had at least this way of expressing his admiration and appreciation.

Honor and duty, of course, demanded that she follow the messenger back to her protectorate. On the other hand, her heart dictated an entirely different course. Cold reason versus warm passion—old warriors clashing on a virgin battleground.

“I’ve just promised this good knight my aid,” she told the boy, “and I cannot go back on my word. I will complete this mission first and then return to Marseilles.”
And
, she thought,
if I’m made a prisoner in the steel castle, then, through no fault of my own, at least I’ll be in the company of Rashid.

The boy protested, finally bursting into tears, but she turned her back and ignored him, leaving him to wonder gloomily what excuses he was going to make to his disappointed superiors, wondering, indeed, if it might be best to just keep on riding and not return to Marseilles at all.

“Are you ready, Count Pinabel?” she asked.