“It is the same with the queen,” Willard growled back, looking fierce in his dark robe. Horatio sat beside him, his face unveiled and frightening to those who opposed his blood brother. Montague was visibly shaken by the bear’s presence, though he soon recovered himself. In his lifetime he had encountered many terrible beasts, not least among them his own younger brother.
“An interesting mount, to be sure,” Montague said. “What are you called?”
“Willarinus of Saxony,” he watched for Montague’s reaction.
“I am Nicholas Montague,” he answered, remaining unmoved. “As I was saying,” and he looked at Horatio fearlessly, “You have a most unusual steed.”
Horatio growled lowly, as if sensing he was derided.
“Better an unusual steed,” Willard answered, “Than an unusable creed.”
“I use my creed quite well,” Montague laughed.
“That is the rumor in the countryside. Your infamous deeds inflame the hearts of many.”
“Perhaps,” Montague said politely, “But I am sure you are far more infamous than I.”
“Not nearly, for I could never aspire to that lofty ideal. But tell me, Montague, what comes first, the creed or the deed?”
“Does it matter? As long as there is rotten wood, to Hades with the fruits and the roots.”
“Eloquently put,” Willard answered, subduing his flaming heart. “Eloquently put, indeed.”
He would have said more, but he was interrupted. The doors of the Great Hall were flung open and a tall, beautiful woman stood in their stead. She was beautiful, but it was of a different source than Ivona’s, though equal. It was the beauty of power, rather than of gentleness; of fear, rather than of love; of demons, rather than of angels. Her hair hung down her back, perfectly white though she could have been no more than twenty. Her eyes were gray like the fogs that cover the forest coasts and glaring like the moon that comes down through them. Her features were similar to Celestine’s and Casandra’s, but written over with a different demeanor. She wore a black cape and an iron crown, plainly cast and adorned. To those with true power, its symbols are not necessary.
Behind her stood her entourage of two dozen soldiers, each armed with a double-sided battle ax. At her side, moreover, were seven men – to the left were the Fardy brothers and to the right was the Admiral, Osbert, Barnes, and one of his sailors.
“What is this?” the lady said through the silence that had come over the hall. “Another guest of honor?”
Gylain stood and called to her in his own commanding voice.
“Who are you, there, to enter this castle so brazenly?”
“The Queen of Saxony!”
Gylain stood silently, his face unmoved. He turned and glanced briefly at Ivona, then at Cybele, the queen. He reached his hand to his sword and opened his mouth to command his men.
Yet whatever his command was, it could not be heard, for it was preempted by a shout from the other side of the room. The brown Fardy – seeing the situation they were in – acted quickly.
“Charge!” he cried, “Gylain is upon us!” and he run straight toward Gylain, flourishing his sword wildly above his head.
Chapter 40
The moon shone down on the forest road, illuminating the shadows with its silvery garnish. It came down through the cracks in the canopy above, slicing its way through the darkness of the forest. Yet it was not silent in the dark – for the forest was a nocturnal beast. Owls and cicadas joined together in a lonely dirge, kept steady by the constant rut-tut tut-tut of galloping horses.
There were seven riders coming down the forest road in the greatest hurry. They rode two abreast, with the odd rider in front, leading the way. It was evident from his careful and dexterous riding that he was well acquainted with both the forest and the horses. He was dressed in a green frock – the clothes of a forest ranger – and his hair was cropped short. His face was that of an honest man: unlearned in letters, yet fully literate in the hearts of man. Behind Osbert rode the Admiral, the Fardys, Barnes, and the sailor, Forsmil.
“This world has never seen a more patient family than my own,” the brown Fardy said. “But I would venture to say that our patience is ill-shown with all this bustling hurry. Perhaps my kin would think of resting, that we may manifest our patience before the world?” He spoke in a slow and deliberate manner, as if he were out of breath.
“I will not allow my brother to humble himself below me, and to claim that I am more patient than him. The first will be last and the last will be first: I would not dare let you be above me here!” answered the blond Fardy, who rode beside him.
“Silence! There will be no stopping, for we must ride through the night,” Admiral Stuart said. “Above all, there will be no displays of patience by the Fardy brothers – we are in far too much of a hurry!”
“Listen,” Osbert interrupted, “I can hear horses approaching.”
They brought their horses to a stop and turned about, to see who was coming. As they did, a party of horseman came around the corner, led by a beautiful, white-haired woman. They came on at a gallop and stopped in front of the rebel party. William Stuart was the first to act.
“Welcome to Atilta, your majesty,” and he lowered his head in respect.
“Then Gylain has not forgotten my arrival,” she answered. “Why did you not meet me at the harbor?”
“We did not know you were landing in Thunder Bay, madam.”
“Of course not. We left for the Floatings, yet the captain caught sight of The King’s Arm as we came and diverted course.”
“He did?” the Admiral asked. “I did not know the fearsome William Stuart was about.”
“William Stuart is not fearsome,” she snapped, “Though he is dead.”
“Your wisdom gives you courage,” the Admiral returned, his countenance an empty canvas. “Come, to the Castle Plantagenet – to our master Gylain.” William seemed to choke on these last words and the Queen of Saxony saw him. Yet she said nothing of it.
Instead, she said, “Let us go, then. You will ride at my side,” and she looked at the Admiral.
The rebels fell into the ranks of the queen’s entourage, with the Admiral at her side. Osbert gave him a raised eyebrow as the others looked away, asking what they would do.
“It is good,” William whispered in response, “For we gain entrance to the castle.”
Osbert returned to the ranks and the Admiral joined the queen.
“What is your rank?” the queen asked Admiral Stuart.
“I am a noble commoner – common by birth and noble by achievements. At present I am the Admiral of the Atiltian Navy, madam,” he replied.
“With a sailor’s pride,” she laughed, “But with plenty of reason. Atilta’s navy is renowned for its strength, both under the Kings and under Gylain.” She said this with a faint sparkle in her eyes, as if remembering the navy’s past was a pleasant exercise. Soon, she recovered her royal countenance.
“We do, and not only in the main squadron, madam. We have many – how will I say it – hidden vessels. I have but lately returned from abroad and there has been little time to reveal them,” the Admiral said, eying the queen affectionately, as a parent long separated but at last returned.
She was both quick witted and quick to emotion. It was a trait she had in common with the Admiral, though neither was quick to display that emotion.
“Always improving, but never getting better: the human condition. Perhaps your navy is the same?”
“No, my lady,” he answered, “I am finally returned, and things will soon be ship-shape. Indeed, I would venture to say that within the week we will be driving Gylain from this land.”
The queen looked at him closely – his tongue had betrayed him.
“What can you mean by that? A coup?” She raised her left eyebrow and tilted her head slightly in the same direction.
“A coup? Who would think of such a thing?” he looked about him in pretended wonder. “No, your highness,
I had something entirely different in mind. Gylain only needs a stronger fleet to invade France. We will have that power in a few week’s time. The navy will drive Gylain from this land: driving him before the wind toward the coast of the newest acquisition of his empire.” He gave the queen the wink of a sailing man.
“Lyndon – the King of Hibernia, and Emperor of the Three Kingdoms – is on his way as well. The attack will soon be made ready. But I thought we first destroyed the rebels which plague both Atilta and England?”
“I have been away, as I have said. I do not know why , only what , I must do.”
“Ah, a man of duty. Or should I say a thing of duty, for duty comes before manhood. How long have you been gone, then?”
“Fifteen years.”
“Why would he send the head of his Navy away?” she asked.
“Important missions, my lady, important missions,” he answered with an air of great significance. “I would tell you here, except that these forests are filled with bandits and spies. Gylain will surely inform you, himself.”
“I see,” she answered gravely, and she shifted the conversation. “You left your family for fifteen years; you must be very zealous in the service of Gylain. I am surprised that you are not with them now. How does your wife feel of this? You are married, are you not?”
“A widower, madam,” and he lowered his head in grief.
“Was your wife a person of importance? Perhaps I have heard of her.”
“A person of importance?” the brown Fardy broke in, “Why, she was the Queen of—”
“—my heart, the queen of my heart,” the Admiral finished his sentence.
The queen smiled slightly and coldly, although beyond that her countenance was concealed behind itself. All this time they had been trotting briskly through the forest. The road was lit by the moonlight coming down from above, through the slender opening in the canopy. The dust that was kicked up by the horses was thrown into the air around them, struck by the moonlight and refracted and broken from its original silver into several different colors. These colored lights were focused on them, like a lantern in the dark. It was no longer a steady light, but a varied one – like the quilted wildflowers of the forest floor. One piece of the air was blue while that directly adjacent was the purest green.
The trees were poignant in the colored darkness. They brooded in the shadows, their branches entangled, their leaves whispering. They were ancient and unchanging, but that was the source of their poignancy – they were at once fearsome and comforting; knowable and unknowable. Yet it was not contradictory, for these characteristics did not come from differences in themselves, but in those who passed through their ranks. In the night, the forest itself came alive, joining the creatures which infested it. To the passing human, it gave fear and calm. Fear, for it was more than the human and could defeat him. Calm, for it was more than the human and he could not command his own destiny. In the realization that nothing can be controlled, there is only fate. Gylain, in his despotism, was left calm at times, for even his own evils were beyond his control. This was the essence of the forest. This is why men live to destroy it.
“Who goes there?” called the guards as the party approached the western gate.
The queen sat stoically on her horse, her face invisible beneath its own features. They masked her demeanor and covered her countenance. Her voice was equally controlled, wielding its power without thought. It was the voice of strength, that did not need emotion for a fuel.
“The Queen of Saxony,” she said, and the sound of her voice conquered the silence. “Open, that I may enter.” It was done.
Around his waist the Admiral wore a leather belt with a sword hanging from it. As they approached the castle, he reached down and loosened the belt, so as to draw it more easily, should it be needed. The queen saw him and looked over with her graceful mouth drawn into a smile.
“In case your master is displeased with you?” she asked.
“I will not deceive you,” he answered gravely. “There is to be a great feast in your honor, with an abundance of luxurious foods. I would not have my lord see me loosen my belt, lest he think me a man of weak habits.”
She laughed and said to herself, “If he is not a fool, he is a traitor. Yet I will not protect Gylain, if he means him harm. He is a man of strength, and if he is overpowered it is his own fault.”
They came to the castle gate and the queen stopped her horse in front of the river.
“Open!” she cried. “For the Queen of Saxony!”
The guards hesitated, until they saw the Admiral at her side, and Osbert and the Fardy brothers behind. They were the rebels who had scaled the wall. After the castle guards were destroyed, and the aiming marks painted, they prepared to destroy the drawbridge. If the queen and her rebel escort had been a moment later they could not have entered. But as it was, the drawbridge was lowered, and they passed silently over it and into the courtyard. Behind them the last exit rumbled shut. Before them, underneath the windows of the Great Hall, were a group of catapults, with a group of men preparing to fire them. The queen turned to the Admiral and questioned him with her eyes.
“There is to be a display, for your amusement,” he said. “An exciting and unexpected display, I should think.”
“Of course,” she answered, and continued forward to the doors of the Great Hall.
They dismounted, giving their horses to a stable hand. He thought nothing amiss, since the impersonators had deposited their horses in the town. The queen led them up the steps to the hall, hurried on by the sound of merriment within. She was angered by this show of contempt – as she thought it to be – from Gylain, in starting the feast before her arrival. Yet her emotions did not show through her face as she grabbed onto the handles of the double door and flung it open. Silence entered the room at her side. Every face turned to the Queen of Anger, the Siren of Saxony, and she returned every look with an invincible facade of power.
“What is this?” she bellowed, and her voice rang out through the lofty hall. “Another guest of honor, to overshadow my arrival?”
Gylain stood and asked, in a tone that told he already knew the answer, “Who might you be?”
“The Queen of Saxony!” she returned, growing heated.
The brown Fardy – seeing that he and his companions had to reach the other side of the hall before Gylain’s men took up their arms – cried out, “Charge! Gylain has turned against us!”
He waved his sword above his head and charged across the room, followed closely by the others.
Chapter 41
When Nicholas Montague saw the brown Fardy’s charge, he knew they had been fooled.
“Quick, Gylain,” he cried, “To arms! These are impostors!”
They drew their swords and stood back-to-back in a defensive manner. Willard was on them in an instant, his golden armor still covered by the black cloak. He jumped over the table and came down beside Montague. Both were skillful swordsmen and neither afraid to die. They each held their two-edged sword in their right hand, while the left sat on their hips and their legs remained firmly on the ground. Willard and Montague were men of great strength – of both body and mind – and they parried back and forth as if they used mere foils.
Willard struck Montague’s blade, catching it along its broadside and pushing it downward. Yet Montague held his advance in check, and neither retreated from the fierce grapple. Then, as if by common agreement, they both pulled back. Montague lunged forward at Willard, knocking his sword to the left; Willard recovered it and pushed him back again. Then, Willard took the charge, and came down upon his opponent’s head with a powerful downward blow. Montague knelt and held his sword above him, holding it at both the handle and the blade. It absorbed Willard’s blow, sending the force of the swing running back to its creator’s arm. Willard fell back for a moment and Montague pressed forward with several scissor strikes back and forth. Willard skillfully parried them. He deflected the blade rather than stand against it,
to recover his strength.
As they fought, Montague said, “You fight well, sir. It is an honor to meet a man of such strength, of such skill in destruction. It will be a greater honor to strike you down.” His speech was broken into short segments and accompanied by the clangs of their clashing blades.
“I, too, have fought many lesser enemies – among them your brother,” Willard enticed him to anger.
“It is rare that both emerge alive, when my brother fights a man. I will see that it does not happen to you and I.”
“By your weak left side? I see you are wounded,” and he drove forward with a series of leftward plunges and thrusts. Montague dodged to the right each time.
“Honor will yet be mine.”
“That is not what I would call it,” Willard answered, “For it is but devilry.”
“Perhaps,” and Montague dodged Willard’s sword, dashed to the left, and brought his own sword down at Willard’s head with a momentous downswing.
But Willard was quicker. He tucked his sword under his left arm and rolled in the same direction. When he came to a halt, he sprang from the ground and fell upon Montague, who had not yet recovered from his heavy swing. Montague leaned sharply away from Willard’s blade, his own sword still going downwards. His leaning changed its course; it came for Willard. It was easily dodged, however, and the move cost Montague his footing. Willard fell upon him at once. His loss of balance kept Montague from parrying the blow. Instead, he blocked it with his arm, receiving a large gash between the shoulder and the elbow.
“Impressive, but it will take more to take this demon’s head,” Montague laughed, taking the recoil of Willard’s blow to better position himself.
His feet stable again, he went after Willard with a rage. He came forward with a diagonal blow, going from his upper right to lower left. Willard could not parry, but allowed his blade to take the hit, weakening his arm. Montague looped his sword in a circle behind him – catching its momentum – and brought it down again from left to right. Once more, Willard’s sword absorbed the shock – giving Montague the smallest opening. He plunged at Willard with a leap. Spinning to the left, Willard dodged it and gave a sharp blow to Montague’s blade. The latter was not recovered from his reckless plunge and went reeling backwards for a moment.
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