Adrienne Martine-Barnes - [Sword 01]

by The Fire Sword (v0. 9) (epub)

  Heal, always heal, my daughter. Eleanor could not mistake that voice. Content in Sal’s affection, she went off to find her bed.

  XXXIII

  The journey toward London was a nightmare of blowing snow, driving rain, and an increasing, icy wind from the north. In spite of this, they pressed ahead, their ragged army growing daily as word went out that Arthur had returned. Many who joined them had been babes in arms when the Heir had vanished, and they seemed to be of the mind that he was that previous Arthur, come to rescue Albion in its hour of need. Eleanor found herself in the company of legend and wondered if there was more truth in their belief than she knew.

  Despite her continued vigilance and that of the Marshall, there were two assassination attempts on the young king’s life. After the second, the Marshall put a guard of handpicked men, whom he trusted utterly, around Arthur at all times and kept everyone else at a distance. This led to some grumbling, since the newcomers wanted to meet Arthur personally, to kneel before him and offer fealty. One could hardly insult a member of the chivalry by demanding he disarm before coming into the presence of the king. They worked out a compromise of sorts, so Arthur sat on the back of a wagon with two armed men at his sides each day when they halted, unless the weather was too awful, which it often was. Eleanor considered this a mercy, for the young man was fearless and a bit too cocky for her peace of mind. William just shook his head and said the whole family was either feckless or heedless, and there was naught to choose betwixt them.

  Eleanor decided Arthur needed some sense shaken into him, and one evening she bearded the young lion in his den, going immediately on the offensive to be sure she had his attention. "I wish you had told me when you were dipped in the River Styx and made invincible, my lord.”

  The reference was lost on him, but he caught her meaning. "What do you mean?”

  "I mean you are behaving like a fool, rushing to embrace every Tom' Dick, or Harry who calls you king. If someone shoves a knife in your heart, I won’t be able to save you.”

  "No, I suppose not. If you could have healed such hurts, your dark Doyle would be living. Oh, forgive me.” He hugged her shoulders. "That was cruel, but I feel as if you and William would tie me up in a sheep’s fleece to save me from harm. I never knew him, yet he is my rival for your affection, and I think it makes me do stupid things. He was such a man as casts a great shadow. I have this hunk of metal by your grace and love, but I do not have you, and it is cold comfort. I know what demons drove golden Baird, for I feel their whips on me also.”

  Eleanor thought her heart would still in her chest, and she felt ashamed that she could not return his love. She knew she cared for him sincerely, but it was nothing like the emotions she still bore for her dead spouse. Doyle never had but one rival, and that was a goddess who wore the willows. The unfairness of it had the bittersweetness of mead on her tongue.

  She rubbed her head against his shoulder, forced tears away, and made herself chuckle. "He was a closemouthed, stubborn son of a snake. Don’t let his shade touch you. I wish I could love you the way you want, but it might be fatal. I don’t have a very good track record. Just be careful, please—for such love as I do bear you.” They left it at this unsatisfactory point, and Eleanor found herself weeping later: for Doyle; for Arthur; for poor, bright Baird; and for her unruly heart. And afterward Arthur kept his guard up, and she was relieved.

  They paused at various strongholds, some friendly, some filled with Shadow and needing a good cleaning. By the time they reached Oxford, their numbers were more than a thousand. The town welcomed them, and she was relieved to find it a bastion of light in the Darkness, uncorrupted by Shadow. They rested there two days, and she stood on Folly Bridge and watched the ice-floed river, glad that it had remained untouched. Then she laughed at herself for foolish notions about intellectual purity and went to warm her feet by a fire.

  It was while she was half-sprawled in a high-backed chair, toasting her toes and enjoying the feel of a seat that neither bounced nor jiggled, that the Marshall found her. Eleanor had requested—politely—that he speak to her, but it had been several days, and he had not come. She understood. The press of his duties was great, for not all who joined Arthur’s train did so out of love or loyalty. That was a trait of minor landholders and landless knights, afraid of the growing Shadow and looking to the young king with hope. Wealthy barons and earls wanted something more, and William had taken on the task of promising them the moon while, in fact, offering nothing.

  He sank wearily into a chair beside her, looking older than he had a few weeks earlier, and she felt guilty for her comfort. "You wished to see me.”

  His abruptness stung, and she knew he was still suspicious of her. Eleanor sighed. She pulled herself more upright and gestured to the now nearly omnipresent Yorick, who had started off as her driver and somehow became her personal majordomo on the long trip toward London, to get the Marshall some refreshment. Yorick was dour and silent, a North Riding man of grunts and shrugs, but somehow he always made sure her clothes were dried, her bed warm, and her person respected. He reminded her of her Uncle Richard, her mother’s brother, lean of face and long of limb, and she found in him a comforting if untalkative companion.

  When the Marshall had a goblet of wine, she spoke. "I wish to know what manner of man John is. Does he serve the Shadow?”

  "No. At least, his light still gleams, as those under Darkness do not. A good question you ask me. I would say he is subtle and cunning... and a witch, like yourself.”

  "That, at least, is plain speaking.”

  "I am a simple man, milady and—”

  "Oh, stop! You are a brilliant strategist, as canny as your father, and there is nothing simple about you. Spare me a humility that fits you like hosen on a cat.” He chuckled. "My good wife always gets sharp-set as she comes to her time. But its been ten years, and I had forgot. I’ve rarely been to Striguil enough to bed her for more get these past three years, and if she gives me a lusty son, I will know she played me false. Hosen on a cat. Very well spoke.”

  "I’m sorry. Yes, I am irritable. My baby kicks and squirms and I feel like... a wallowing ship. Before York, you said something that struck me. About being under Shadow but not in it. And would it reassure you at all if I made you free of my name?”

  He leaned forward, piercing her with sharp gray eyes. "That has rankled, milady, more than I wish to admit. You have such power over Arthur that he lets you go nameless amongst us yet seeks your counsel. I have watched you. I have seen the fire in you. I have seen you give a man a quaff from your bowl, and lo, he is well and hale. He sings your praises, that fellow, and yet I smell sorcery about you and trust you not.” "Again, I am sorry. Of all the men in Albion, I should depend on you most, but the Shadow makes us both untrustful. And names have power in them. For instance, I do not know your wife’s name, though you speak often of her. Your instinct is to protect her from me, as if I could reach out to the marshes of Wales and touch her. I cannot, I assure you, and I would not, if I could. But any words are empty, and promises get broken.” She took as deep a breath as her advanced pregnancy permitted, and the baby flexed, pressing hands and feet to each side of her swollen abdomen. She put her hands on the child’s, pushing inward to make it go to sleep. In that instant, she knew its name and nature, as if he had spoken to her, and she smiled. Whatever the moment of his conception, he was Dylan, a wave of the sea, a mighty fish, and she rejoiced in his essence, that he had of his father the water and of her the earth, joined in a harmonious person. He would have her song and Doyle’s seriousness, and she would have cried but for her pleasure. Sal, will you be godmother to my baby ? The thought rose unbidden in her mind. Of course, belov^d, came the reply, a rustle of willows. But all she said was, "I am Eleanor.”

  "Is that your true name?”

  He was, in some ways, as simple a man as he claimed, and he needed more assurances. She remembered another Eleanor, a dramatic figure who ripped her sleeve and promised to write a
will on her arm in blood and wished she had the stomach for such hijinks. "I am Eleanor Darlington Hope, and my mother came from Yorkshire, my father from the land you call Hibernia, but not in this time or place. I am from another future, another world, and that you will have to take as a matter of faith.”

  "Hope. Then you are she whom I dreamt of, and not some evil phantasm as I have feared.” He made a wry face. "I should trust more in the Lady, but it is hard.” Eleanor cast a quick glance at dour Yorick, standing within earshot, and he gave her his shrug, which said "I don’t gossip,” as plain as houses. She gave him a nod and a smile and hoped she would never be tempted to do Hamlet over his bleached bones. "So, John is a magician. Tell me more.”

  The Marshall gave a great, gusty sigh and rearranged his extended legs toward the crackling fire. "More? Tis difficult. He consorts with ghosts on the White Tower, some say. I have, myself, seen him walk those ramparts, speaking to air. He is tall and fair and well proportioned, a handsome man, but he has never taken a wife who lived more than a year, and he has had three. Several bastards claim him for parent, but who can say? I would say he serves neither the Light nor the Darkness but some other master. Mischief, perhaps.”

  "Does he possess some object—a ring or wand— which he is never without?”

  "You mean, like your staff?”

  "You don’t miss much, do you?”

  "No.” It was a simple statement of fact with no arrogance in it. "Yes, he does. ’Tis an odd thing, but I have never seen him without it. It is a wide bracelet upon his right arm with a face of some rude beast repeated around it. Sort of lionlike but with the tongue lolled out. Ugly thing. I cannot swear it is what you seek, but I think it is. Now, tell me why you’re curious about this.”

  "One should always know one’s adversary.”

  "True.”

  "Also, I think you and Arthur have been thinking purely in military terms. All the hours I have spent in the wagon have given me a lot of time to think, and I realized that I did not know enough about John. William, I doubt he can be defeated by the sword.”

  He gave another gusty sigh, sipped his wine, and said, "I suspect you are right. Several have tried to murder him over the years and failed. He seems invulnerable to knife or poison. And you are right, too, that I think only of the sword, for I am a fighting man.” "I think enough people have died already. How great a force can John muster?”

  "Five thousand, perhaps six.”

  "And we are a mere thousand.”

  "Yes. Though I am the better general than John, we do not have the advantage of numbers. I had hoped we would be greater, but this winter has ruined that.”

  "It wouldn’t do any good if we were ten thousand, if we cannot topple John from his throne.”

  "I think I begin to be glad to have you for a friend, for I believe you would be a deadly foe, my lady. There is steel in your voice and in your eyes. Indeed, you put me in mind of good Queen Eleanor, who was a most redoubtable woman, even in the last years. Do you have some plan to defeat John?”

  "Not yet.”

  Eleanor turned the matter over in her mind a great deal in the following week as they crawled to London. She thought of invisibility, then realized there was no way to make her body’s light vanish. The very act of making the body disappear seemed to enhance the aura. She went over every lesson Doyle had taught her of magicks and found no answer.

  After a particularly filthy day of driving through near blizzard conditions, they stopped. There was no keep or castle nearby, so they camped out as best they could, and Eleanor opened up her clothes chest to get another tunic, though she already wore so many she looked like a bear.

  Something clunked as she pulled out the garment, hitting the wood with a thud. She felt down to see what it was and found it was the ugly collar Baird had used to neutralize her powers. Turning it over in her hands, she pursed her lips thoughtfully. I’ll just nip into his bedroom and put it on his scrawny throat.

  Eleanor chuckled at herself, but she puzzled over how the collar might be used to advantage. She thought of several daring but impractical plans, all of which she discarded with mild regret, and took to carrying the thing in her belt pouch. Something would occur to her, she was certain.

  It had not by the time they made camp across the Thames from the walls of London. Eleanor stared at the frozen waters of the river and the snow-clad ramparts of the city and felt exhausted. The cold seemed to sap her strength.

  William drew up his battle lines in the bleak wilderness of snow and waited. His face as he walked the pickets was grim, almost haggard, and Eleanor realized with growing horror that he was defeated before he even began. She could feel the despondency spread and knew that a subtle magic was at work.

  "Yorick, help me down. I must find Arthur instantly.”

  "Naw. You sit. I seek.” He clambered out, sank into snow to his kneecaps, and plowed away determinedly. About half an hour later, he returned with an anxious-looking Arthur and his grim attendants.

  "What is it, milady?” He sounded annoyed.

  "Come into the wagon.”

  He joined her with ill grace. "Can’t you see I’m busy?”

  "Yes, busy getting ready for your cousin to win.”

  "What?”

  "Can’t you feel that the heart is going out of the men? There will be desertions before morning if you don’t act now.”

  "Would you suggest I tie them down?”

  "Stop being a sarcastic ass. Honestly, Arthur, sometimes I could box your ears, just to get some blood into that thick head of yours. Get off your Plantagenet high horse and listen to me. Use the Harp.”

  "This is hardly the time for a musicale.”

  "Shut up!” She was weary beyond endurance, short-tempered and at the edge of her control. Arthur saw her face waver toward flame for a moment and drew back.

  "I am sorry, Eleanor. I feel surrounded by enemies, silent, invisible enemies. I jump at shadows. A hare running through the snow nearly panicked me.”

  "Yes, and the knights and men-at-arms feel that way even more so, because they lack your strength.”

  "Or thickheadedness.” He gave her a weak grin. "I am afraid of... nothing.”

  "Yes, I know. I think your bastard cousin is putting the whammy on us and—”

  "Whammy?”

  "A wicked spell. Remember how your harping healed me of some of my grief for Doyle?”

  "Yes.”

  "I want you to heal this fear, or there won’t be any fight tomorrow or any other day. Bridget told me the Harp makes and the pipes unmake, which makes me real glad, because I was starting to think she made us get them out of sheer perversity.”

  "The pipes unmake. They would. All right, I’ll do what you say. I just wish I could make it be less cold.” "We can bear the cold a few more days. The fear we cannot.”

  He was still doubtful. "I suppose it will not hurt.” "Believe me, it will work like magic.” Then she started to laugh, an ugly, hysterical laughter that frayed the nerves. Her body trembled. Arthur shoved her rudely onto her bed, heaped blankets over her, and tromped off to his own wagon. Eleanor huddled, shivering under the blankets, swearing under her breath that she was going to freeze one side of John and boil the other in oil. She fought the nibbling despair with all her strength.

  It was gone as suddenly as it had come, dissipated. Eleanor could not hear the Harp, but she knew it was being played. She took a deep breath and discovered she was not quite so cold. Yorick sat on the wagon seat, and she could hear him sniffing loudly. "Roses, milady.”

  Eleanor realized he was right. She sat up and pushed the covers aside and felt almost dizzy from the heady scent of roses. She felt refreshed and energetic for the first time in days. Her mind cleared of a fog she had not even noticed, and she scrambled off the bed and up to the almost smiling Yorick. She had never seen him quite so cheerful-looking.

  Eleanor knew Arthur couldn’t play the Harp forever, so she set her mind to finding another solution to the p
roblem. His wicked cousin could continue to send despair or any other mischief he could design at their camp, and Eleanor needed to find some way to prevent it. "A mirror!” she said so loudly that Yorick started in surprise. "Come on. We are going to walk the pickets.”

  "Snow’s deep,” he grunted.

  "I don’t care if it comes to my belly button, we are going.”

  "Reet. Ya sure gotta spiky temper for a Yorkshire woman.”

  Since this statement was perhaps the longest he had ever made to her, she gave him a quick smile. Then she got her staff, and he helped her down, glad she had someone around who neither argued nor smothered her with solicitation, as Arthur had developed a tendency to do when he thought of her at all. It was cold, though the wind had faded a little, and for once the snow had stopped.

  They trudged around the perimeter, greeted by cheerful guards, seemingly unaware that an hour earlier they had been ready to jump at any sound. Yorick moved ahead of her, clearing a path with his legs, while Eleanor concentrated on making an utterly simple spell that did nothing but reflect. When they returned to their starting point, she paused to sense her handiwork and found it good. She turned toward the snow-cloaked walls of London and smiled. "I hope John chokes on his own filth.” Then she leaned on her servant’s arm wearily.

  "Tha Marshall’s reet. A bad foe.” He patted her hand on his arm affectionately. "A good friend.”

  Eleanor slept a deep, exhausted slumber, full of strange dreams. It was a beautiful spring day, and the grass was dappled with golden daffodils and blue iris. She moved around the stones of Avebury, hearing their song mingling with a faint murmur of bees. A shout made her turn, and Doyle strode across the grass toward her. He smiled. On one wide shoulder he carried a girl child, squealing with delight and clapping plump hands. She reached for him, and her hands met the rough wooden wall of the wagon.