But fighting, especially fighting with an audience, always does wonders to focus the mind. My opponent, Sir Richard, was already armed. And my lady came with Helen and sat with the prince’s lady, an Orsini of Rome, and her ladies. For an impromptu tilt in a castle tiltyard, it had all the trappings of a deed of arms, and I could see that Sir Richard was a serious jouster.
Well, you’ve all heard my experiences with jousting. I’ve never been as good a lance as Jean-François or Fiore. On the other hand, as soon as Gawain came out, we all knew that I had a better horse.
Sir Richard came over while I was arming, and pointed at Gawain.
‘When I’m lyin’ on my back,’ he said, ‘I guess I’ll see yer girth. What a horse!’
I probably beamed with pleasure. This is something I have often noted with men; that before a fight, they will often proclaim their weaknesses – a poor horse, a bad shoulder. I’ve done it myself. It’s not cowardice; you may, in fact, believe that you will triumph, but you admit to these problems in some sort of attempt to establish rapport with a man you’ll try to kill or maim.
Perhaps. Men are as complicated as nations and tribes. I can’t tell you why men are as they are, although I often lose sleep pondering it.
Marc-Antonio had me in my harness in record time, and I could see rust on my arms, and he shook his head.
‘No blame,’ I said. ‘We’ve been at sea for days.’
He shook his head. ‘I’ve tried tallow and I’ve tried olive oil,’ he said. ‘There was no pork fat to be had in Adalia. I’m out of whale oil.’
‘We’ll get it out,’ I said. ‘Edouard will help us.’
Edouard didn’t immediately agree. ‘Will you kill him?’ the boy asked, pointing at Sir Richard.
‘Avert!’ I said. ‘I hope not, young man. He seems a good knight and a worthy man.’
‘Then why will you fight him?’ Edouard asked. ‘Is he one of the bad men who insults maman?’
Oh, that hurt. That a mere boy should hear that men insulted his mother?
I knelt by him. ‘Nay, lad. Sir Richard is a good knight and serves this prince,’ I said. ‘We fight only for sport.’
Edouard sighed. ‘I want you to fight the men who insult maman,’ he said. ‘And kill them all.’
I suspect I was supposed to give him a lecture on Christian virtue and how many of his maman’s enemies were merely misguided, but instead I gave him a steel embrace and said, ‘I will, Edouard.’
And then Marc-Antonio got my aventail over my face and my cervelleur on my head and I mounted, and then I donned my great helm, which slipped into place with a satisfying click.
And then the world was the horse between my legs, the heat, and my eye-slit vision of the lists. The Gatelussi didn’t have a barricade in the middle of the lists, and so we were forced to make a lot more decisions about riding at the start of a pass. Sir Richard saluted me by waving his lance tip and I did the same, and then we were running, and my whole world became my lance tip. I got my lance down nicely, but my attempt to pick the pauldron off his shoulder failed, and he splintered his lance on my shield. I kept my seat well enough, but that was his pass all the way.
Then Miles rode a pass with one of the local knights, an Italian, Ser Giovanni, and they rocked each other, a brilliant pass, and now we had hundreds of people watching – most of the garrison, and all the castle servants, and many of the people from the town below the walls. Fiore rode against Nerio, and their lances seemed to explode at the same instant.
I remember that pass. It was one of the most perfect I have ever seen; it is emblematic of that summer. After it, they embraced each other, and the Orsini princess, Beatrice, threw flowers at them.
Then Sir Richard and I were ready again. This time, Gawain was on his mettle; he was smoother somehow – I find it difficult to describe, but he was himself. I seemed to float down the lists, and my strike took Sir Richard’s visor off his helmet even as his lance splintered on my shield.
Fiore took my unbroken lance. ‘You think you are a poor jouster,’ he said. ‘But in fact, I have made you a very good jouster. Your only foe is your own head. Look at this. Beautiful.’
Then Nerio exchanged splinters with Ser Giovanni. Fiore unhorsed a knight in a fine harness, the newest Brescian style; a tall young man who was not as good as he thought, and sought to do something fancy – against Fiore. I was just having my helmet put on when it happened; I put my hand on Marc-Antonio’s arm and sent him running out into the lists because the young knight wasn’t moving.
Luckily for all of us, he was only stunned, and he rose after a moment and Marc-Antonio helped him off the course. He was none too pleased with the result and snarled at Marc-Antonio. I was proud of my squire, who was a Venetian among Genoese and nonetheless remained courteous.
Sir Richard’s squire appeared and asked if I might be willing to try an exchange of sword blows next, on foot. I bowed and changed helmets to my basinet, a new one just purchased on Rhodes, with a very fine aventail in very small links and a better visor. The eyes were barred but the brow heavily pierced; I had better vision in it than in any helmet I’d ever worn.
Sir Richard emerged in a basinet with no visor. It was still common enough back then; indeed, most of our men-at-arms never wore them.
Jean-François was dropped by Ser Bernard. I had never seen it happen; Jean-François was accounted our best lance, or perhaps Fiore, but one cannot win every day, and down he went. He was a big man, and slow to rise, and then I walked out across the dirt and the crowd roared.
Sir Richard and I were a fair match for size. He had a very long sword and mine was almost a handspan shorter, and we were otherwise a match for reach. We saluted and I put my sword behind me, so that he could not measure its length; Fiore called that garde ‘long tail’. I like it when I face a new man; it gives nothing away and allows the opponent no play on your weapon.
We circled for so long that a woman laughed and men called advice.
By that time, I knew that Sir Richard was canny, well-trained, and patient.
He had his sword half-on his right shoulder, almost like what Fiore calls the ‘posta di donna or the garde of the woman’. He moved smoothly, his weight was always centred, and he looked as capable as Fiore.
So I was very careful.
But I can be affected by crowds, and when people began to mock us, I lost my battle with impatience and moved. Still, I moved with purpose. I didn’t change gardes. Instead, I closed the distance to try to force him to strike.
And he struck.
He was fast, and strong.
Luckily, I am also fast and strong.
Our blades met, the edges bit into one another, and as fast as the strike of a falcon, he moved his hips, stepping off my line to my left and cutting for my arms. I felt he left the bind too early, and I thrust at his face …
And pulled it. Christ, that was close. His blow missed, and mine fell short, and then we were circling. My heart was pounding; I had almost killed him.
He didn’t seem to know what had happened.
I was in another low garde, this one called ‘gates of iron’. He cut again, from his high garde, and I snapped a rising cut into his cut; we met in a rare high-low bind, and we both counter-cut, snapping blows into each other’s helmets. I stepped in, reaching to take my sword at the mid-part of the blade for half-swording. He got a hand on my right arm and my pommel clipped the side of his helmet, and we were apart, both cutting back one-handed as if we’d ridden past one another.
Then he whirled and came at me with four blows. He was fast enough that all I could do was cover; I could tell that he was trying to rock me so that he could enter for a grapple. I got my weight down, and rose off his fourth blow with a thrust at his armpit, which he covered.
And then we were circling again, by this time breathing as if we were powered by a blacksmith’s
bellows.
I won’t say he was the best swordsman I ever faced. But he was fine; and he wasn’t easy, and nothing especial was coming to me, except that Emile was watching me. I wore her favour.
He did seem to favour cutting into a crossing of the blades and then whipping his sword to one side or another. I understood that; I just didn’t have an immediate answer.
But I had a guess. I can’t even tell you that I thought this, consciously. I just decided what I was going to do and how I would do it, and it all required him to throw another heavy descending blow.
Which, as if he could read my mind, he refused to do. There followed an excruciating passage where he tried thrusts and rising cuts, and I covered them. Perhaps better swordsmen will mock me, but I can rarely keep more than one strategy in my head while I fight. I wanted that hard downward cut as my set-up.
Meanwhile, I parried.
And then he pressed me, taking his own sword at the half and thrusting fast from up close. I matched him, and we ended up pressed together, weight low, jabbing at each other while our armoured forearms touched or slammed into each other. I was trying for his underarm, and he for my visor.
I deceived his weapon and thrust, but I missed over his shoulder and I backed away. I slipped my weapon up over my helmet, changing to the ‘woman’s’ garde.
I think he echoed me unconsciously, and seeing me retreat, he cut – a heavy, powerful descending blow.
I powered forward into his blow and met him, using the weight of my step to push his blade off line to my right, opening his centre. We were close, and I slammed my pommel forward into his unprotected face. I was now a heartbeat ahead of him; it sounds odd, but I knew I had him, and I had time to put my armoured arm under his chin, instead of putting my pommel in his teeth, and I dropped him with a little lift-and-push, stepped on his sword blade, and saluted the prince.
‘You bastard!’ spat my opponent. He was laughing, so there was no insult. I stepped off his blade and he rose smoothly. He threw his arms around me. ‘Well struck, Sir William!’
The crowd roared.
Emile leaned down from the stands and kissed me.
Really, the life of arms is very satisfying, at times.
Back at my pavilion, I told the herald I was done for the day. Marc-Antonio was just unlacing my arms when Fiore came in. I had heard the roar; I assumed he’d unhorsed another victim.
I was full of myself. I admit it. I grinned at him. ‘Did you see that?’ I said, or something equally braggy.
‘Yes,’ Fiore said. ‘Perfectly competent, although your weight was overcommitted.’ He picked up his sword and went back out into the sunlight.
Really, he could be a very difficult friend.
I went out in my arming clothes and was invited to sit with the prince. I met my recent adversary as I approached, and we bowed; I was glad to see no rancour.
He caught my arm. ‘See yon sprite in the white harness?’ he asked me. It was the young knight in the brilliant Brescian harness whom Fiore had dropped like a sack of grain. ‘Prince’s son. Well, wrong side o’ the blanket, mayhap. Apple of his eye.’ Sir Richard touched the side of his nose with his finger.
We approached the ivory chair together.
‘You are a brilliant fighter,’ the young knight said as we knelt.
Prince Francesco waved at the man in the Brescian harness. ‘This young devil is my son, Francesco.’
At the word ‘son’, the faces of both of the younger boys behind his chair grew very grave. Or rather, all expression left them. I gave the young man a good bow anyway before kneeling in a reverencia before the prince.
The prince either didn’t notice or didn’t care what his two legitimate sons thought. He nodded to me. ‘Nicely done, although perhaps on your next visit you could leave us all some shreds of our pride, eh?’
‘My Lord, if you mean my fight with Sir Richard, an Englishman would have won, any road.’ I was kneeling, so I bowed my head.
‘Fair enough,’ the prince said. ‘But your preux is well known here,’ he added.
What do you say to that?
‘Where did you learn all these tricks?’ the prince’s by-blow asked.
I might have bridled at the term ‘trick’ but princes are princes. I bowed. ‘Ser Fiore there is the best lance and the best sword I have ever met,’ I said. ‘I practise with him constantly.’
Prince Francesco nodded at his son. ‘Ah, my son. Sir William Gold, the best knight in this castle, says that he practises constantly. Does that say anything to you, my son?’
I winced.
The young man shrugged. ‘Pater, there are so many things that I ought to practise. Which one is paramount? Statecraft? Fencing? Hawking? Sailing? I understand that it takes much study to understand religion. How about shoemaking?’ He laughed. Several young men around us laughed as well.
The elder Prince Francesco’s nose had been broken several times, I could tell. He had a look; he’d seen many things. He had the skin of a man who’d spent a lot of time out in the weather.
His son’s skin was as smooth as Emile’s; his eyes were bright. He wanted to sound wicked and worldly.
I thought of Richard Musard. And of me, of course.
‘But if you fail in a real fight, you are killed or taken.’ His father steepled his hands, even as Ser Jason threw one of the castle men-at-arms in a wrestling match behind us.
‘I can pay people to fight for me,’ the boy said. ‘I can pay them to write my letters, I can pay them to train my hawks.’ He shrugged.
His father frowned in, I think, disgust. I knew perfectly well that the lad was speaking to annoy his father.
A servant handed me wine. Emile was shaking her head, ‘no’ from left to right and back, but I essayed the empris anyway.
‘Ah, but My Lord,’ I said to the young man, ‘if you fight well, the men you pay will fight better – they will love you better. If you know a little about how to make shoes, you will never be cheated by a shoemaker. If you know a little about God, you will be all the wiser, and the harder to deceive.’ I shrugged. ‘And I confess that I know nothing of hawking, and only wish I did, as my lady wife loves it.’
The young man was not offended. He turned his head a little to one side, like a dog; he wanted to listen. That was interesting for itself. ‘But why?’ he asked. ‘Why do you know nothing of hawking?’
I shrugged. ‘I have never put in the time,’ I admitted.
‘Sir William was too busy mastering the arts of war,’ Prince Francesco said.
Now it was my turn to shrug. ‘Eh bien, but perhaps not,’ I said. ‘I have wasted a great deal of time in garrison and elsewhere. Wine. Dalliance. I suppose I might, at some point, have learned to go hawking. I regret it now, but at the time, I thought it would never be part of my life.’
I thought of all the hawking that the Black Prince’s household did, and how I almost never went.
There was a moment’s silence.
The young man nodded. ‘I see what you are saying,’ he said. ‘But you did choose to master your … weapons.’
I shrugged. ‘And even that, although perhaps it is not the example your father would choose, is because I love this man Fiore, over there.’ I waved at Fiore, who was giving another Italian knight an education in fighting on foot with a long sword. ‘Because of my friendship for him …’ I shrugged. ‘I have to learn.’
Prince Francesco smiled. It was a thin smile of an old corsair, and yet held some warmth. ‘Now this is a true thing,’ he said. ‘Yes! What my son needs is to follow someone he admires.’
The young prince shrugged. ‘Perhaps,’ he said with disdain. ‘I don’t tend to admire much.’
Now Emile was smiling, so I knew I hadn’t done so badly. The wine was delicious, and I enjoyed the plaudits of the courtiers. I watched another hour of fighting – some
excellent wrestling. Fiore wrestled, and so did Nerio, which surprised me. He was thrown early, but rose to fight again, and he made a brilliant throw against a bigger man, with a hip feint and a tackle, putting his man down, rolling him over and forcing his surrender.
Fiore shook his hand. It was almost the best feat of arms of the day, although Miles’s fight on foot with a poleaxe rivalled it. He was against Sir Richard’s lieutenant, Ser Giovanni, and at the drop of the wand, Miles stepped forward, thrust with the head of his axe, pulled, and threw his opponent to the ground. It happened so fast I didn’t see the whole of it; I was just turning my head from whispering to my wife, who was just saying something about ‘the mild-mannered Miles’.
And he struck, and threw his man. Fiore pounded his back. I went down on the sand and did the same.
It was a fine day. A triumph for us.
Our Persian friend watched it all as the Prince’s guest. At the end, he said to Fiore, ‘Almost as good as watching my master’s ghulami. But of course, they are slaves.’
Prince Francesco had another feast for us that night, and although there had been nothing formal about the deed of arms, he did hand a crown of gold to Miles. Miles had never won anything in his life, and he was transported. Pretty women fawned on him, and he was unable to decide what to do about it.
I shook my head. I still do; this was a man who’d fought his way into Alexandria and stood his ground in a dozen actions, but the attention of three Italian maids flustered him so badly that he was speechless. One had on a sideless surcoat and under it her kirtle, which laced up her side. But the laces were very tight and she showed a fine stretch of flesh from hip to underarm – the very ‘gates of Hell’ referred to so often by priests in sermons. Even Miles took notice.
Nerio went and stood with him a moment, and made all three young maidens smile. One of them blushed. Nerio whispered in Miles’s ear and walked back to me.
He rolled his eyes.
‘He’s afraid of them,’ Nerio said.
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