Siege Perilous

by E. D. Debirmingham

  Ocyrhoe did not mind the attention as long as Ferenc was beside her. When his attention was turned elsewhere—if somebody across the room asked him a question about arrow fletchings, say, and he rose to move close enough to hear—she suddenly felt horribly exposed and wanted to tail him, hide up against his back. She did not like to be singled out, but a catlike contentment settled over her as long as Ferenc was beside her.

  As the excitement was finally softening to sleepy pleasure, the door to the keep was suddenly thrown open. Matheus Bonnet—one of the brothers who had taken the treasure into hiding weeks earlier—stood blinking at them. “Milords,” he called out. There was a moment of silence and then a moment of boisterous greeting. “Milords! I bring assistance from Isarn de Fanjeaux!” He stepped aside to reveal two soldiers—extremely well-kempt compared to the Montségur garrison, their tunics striped red and blue and looking almost new. Each carried a crossbow, and behind each stood a young squire dressed in similar livery.

  The entire room erupted into applause; the newcomers looked almost sheepish to receive such an ovation.

  “Ah, we don’t need them,” called out Peire-Roger, laughing. “We whipped the French’s backsides all on our own tonight, with women and children doing some of the best work. But you’re welcome all the same, gentlemen!”

  Now the crossbowmen looked uncertainly at each other.

  “Come and welcome,” said Raphael above the din. “Never mind the clatter. We’ve had an eventful night. If you have news, his lordship is not quite too drunk to hear it, and the rest of us will take note well enough.”

  Ocyrhoe wriggled over to make room for the approaching figures. This meant that she was wriggling up against Ferenc. Ferenc did not wriggle. He stayed exactly where he was, so that she ended up almost on his lap. She wasn’t sure why that pleased her so much, but she forced her attention to stay on Matheus.

  “I bring four pieces of news,” he said to Peire-Roger, who grinned at him drunkenly. Matheus blinked a moment, then removed his hat and continued to speak, delivering his speech to old Raimon de Perelha instead. “First, my brother and I have safely hidden the treasure in the Sabarthes Mountains, with Credents who know what it’s intended for.”

  “Excellent,” said both old lord and young at the same moment, but in very different voices.

  “Second, my brother has made contact with the agents of Corbario, the Aragonese mercenary captain. He has agreed to a rendezvous in ten days’ time at Usson. I have tallied the whole of our hidden treasure and will offer him that amount.”

  “The whole thing?” said Peire-Roger.

  “Of course the whole thing,” said his father-in-law sternly. “What is the use in saving it if we are obliterated?”

  “All right, then, the whole thing,” said Peire-Roger with sudden, offhand gallantry.

  This led to some cheering at the table; the rest of the room grew quiet and everyone’s attention, especially the men’s, turned toward Matheus Bonnet. “Third, of course, these excellent crossbowmen from Isarn de Fanjeaux, who sends his regrets for not having more men available.” Again the new arrivals were cheered and welcomed.

  “Finally,” said Matheus, raising his voice slightly, and trying to get Peire-Roger’s gleefully inebriated attention. “I bring word from Count Raimondo of Toulouse.”

  This immediately focused Peire-Roger. “When is he sending men?” he demanded, bolting upright.

  “He asks you—urges you—to hold out until spring. He is trying to put together an army without the French king or the Catholic Church realizing that he is doing so, and he needs time.”

  “It is only January,” Peire-Roger fumed. “The equinox is two months distant.”

  “When he comes,” Matheus pressed on, “he will bring not only his own men, but troops from Emperor Frederick.”

  Raphael startled violently at that. “What?” he demanded, setting down his cup of wine.

  Matheus nodded. “Frederick has sent word to the Count that he will support him, and us.”

  “Oh for the love of all things holy,” Raphael muttered under his breath. And then quietly to Percival, who was standing beside him, “That’s it, we’re leaving.” Percival responded with a look of confusion. “I’ll explain later,” Raphael said in a longsuffering tone.

  “The Emperor, eh?” said Peire-Roger. “What price does he exact for his help? We’re not his people, and we don’t want to be. We want to be our own people!”

  Everyone cheered and toasted their agreement.

  “I suspect it is a strategic move on his part,” said Raphael diplomatically. “He wants to show some muscle against the French throne, which has gained a dramatic amount of land and power in the campaign against the Cathars. I assure you, he has no ambition to claim the Occitaine. He simply wants allies against France, and Fate has given him a wonderful opportunity to cultivate some.” He smiled reassuringly, ignoring Percival’s continued confused look.

  “All right,” said Peire-Roger indulgently. “Then we’ll accept his help. To his Imperial Majesty’s health!” he cried out, and downed the rest of the wine in his wooden cup.

  Raphael glanced at Percival, then at Vera. With a nod of his head he gestured toward the hall door. They rose and followed him as he hobbled on his crutches. As Raphael passed by Ferenc, the young hunter tapped his arm with a questioning look. Raphael shook his head, glancing between Ocyrhoe and Ferenc and then almost—almost—smiling. Ocyrhoe was sure of it.

  Once Raphael and the others had left the table, the newcomers moved in to fill their places, meaning Ocyrhoe no longer had to shift over to give them room. In fact, she and Ferenc were now smack up against each other, closer than any two other people in the room, and there was a considerable gap between her rear (planted on the planks of the table) and Peire-Roger’s elbows (likewise). She supposed she should move away from Ferenc, but she did not want to.

  She glanced up at him. He seemed to be avoiding her gaze, which was awkward since he clearly could not avoid her presence: she was snuggled up against his torso, the top of her shoulder pressing into the back of his upper arm, his arm itself resting forward, his hand on his lap. It felt wonderful, as if they had been carved out of the same piece of wood. But his refusal to meet her gaze made her chest constrict nervously. He raised his hand above his head, and she grimaced slightly, certain he was about to use the moment to move entirely, to shift away from her.

  Instead he raised his arm completely, rocked slightly back, and then lowered it again—draping it around her shoulder. Without looking at her. As if it were something that happened all the time between them. She grinned hugely and despite herself, she giggled.

  In the hubbub of the room, he could not hear the sound, but he could feel the vibration in her shoulders. “Don’t do that,” he said quietly into her ear. “We are already drawing too much attention to ourselves.”

  “You’re the one who put your arm around me!” she retorted in a whisper, tilting her head toward him but keeping her eyes averted.

  “Only because you were burrowing into my side for no good reason,” he said.

  “Very well, I shall unburrow,” she said tartly, and began to shift away from him. He pulled her back, bumping her against himself, and smiled sheepishly.

  “Stop that.” He glanced around. “At least everyone here is fairly drunk. There is no privacy anywhere here, is there?”

  “We could go down to the Good Ones’ settlement,” Ocyrhoe said, suddenly thrilled with nervous excitement. “The French are nursing their wounds, they won’t be up to anything else tonight.”

  “The porter will not let us out.”

  “There is the chicken coop,” Ocyrhoe suggested. Eggs were not part of the Good Ones’ diet, but the cook always snuck them into the bread for the Credents. There were only about a dozen hens, and they hardly laid this time of year, but Peire-Roger had decided to maintain
them through the winter.

  Ferenc frowned thoughtfully. This keep was free from the stench he associated with a crowd of humans in an airless place, mostly because nobody living here ate meat. But it was still stuffy and unpleasant, while the coop had airholes. And privacy.

  But he still hesitated; the idea of sneaking off to be alone with Ocyrhoe made him wobbly.

  “I’ll bring a blanket for the floor, so we don’t have to sit on the chicken shit,” Ocyrhoe offered, misunderstanding his hesitation.

  “They only shit around the edges where the perches are,” said Ferenc. “Let’s just go.” He leaned back, removed his arm, and then casually slid off the table to the floor. He began, unhurriedly, to walk through the sleepy, mumbling crowd toward the exit stairs. After a heartbeat or two, Ocyrhoe also slipped off the table and began to walk after him. Her heart was banging happily against her ribs. She knew why they were sneaking off, but she did not know what might happen when they got there. Both these facts delighted her.

  Outside, the air was very still but very cold. She did not notice. The courtyard was still lit from earlier in the evening, although the torches were starting to sputter out. There were very few people about—a skeleton crew of men atop the walls, a porter at the gate. The strange knights—Raphael, Percival, and Vera—argued quietly near the trebuchet, their breath billowing in vapors into the darkness, their voices tiny in the thin, still, weak air. She hoped Ferenc would not be called over there.

  The trio paused and watched them. Ferenc kept walking resolutely toward the chicken coop, near the gate. He did not look at them. Ocyrhoe pretended not to look at them, but in her excellent peripheral vision, she saw them glancing back and forth between her and the hunter, and then exchanging glances between themselves. It seemed to take forever before she had entered into the coop and shut it behind her. It was considerably warmer in here.

  “Sit here,” she heard Ferenc say from the level of her waist. He had already taken off his outer wrap and put it on the floor. The hens clucked a warning, sleepily, but sensed there was no danger here and ignored them.

  She sat so that she was facing him. “No,” he said. He moved around so that they were facing in the same direction, and put his arm around her again. “Let’s start with this.”

  She grinned again. “Now is it safe to giggle?” she asked.

  “As long as you do not disturb the chickens.”

  “You were a hero today,” she said adoringly. “That’s the second time in as many full moons that you’ve been a hero.”

  “You were a hero with me,” he said.

  “I wasn’t in the barbican shooting Frenchmen,” she said.

  “You saved Peire-Roger’s life.”

  “With you,” said Ocyrhoe. “I like that we worked together against that whoreson Hugue de Arcis. We’re a good team.” She closed her eyes in the dark and beamed contentment.

  “Yes,” said Ferenc after a moment, sounding pleased. “Yes, we are. From the first moment we met. Someday, I would like us to be a good team under less interesting circumstances.”

  “Me too,” Ocyrhoe said instantly. “Let’s run away together from all this and see what happens if we go out into the world alone.”

  He pulled her closer and rested his cheek on the top of her head. The feel of it made each of them secretly dizzy. “I would like nothing better,” he said. “But I cannot. I am in Frederick’s service and now I am Raphael’s squire. They deserve better than my sudden disappearance.”

  “Frederick doesn’t,” Ocyrhoe said, suddenly sharp. “He sent me out into the world alone—”

  “I know, I know,” Ferenc said soothingly, rocking her gently. “And you will never have to do that again. I give you my oath. You will never have to go anywhere alone.”

  “Because?” she prompted, hardly breathing.

  “Because I will stay with you. Or you will stay with me. And I’ll tell the emperor I said so. He’ll allow it. He owes you that at least.”

  “Then there is nothing in the world that I’m afraid of.”

  “Good,” he said, “That makes me happy. I want you to feel safe. With me.” A small, nervous chuckle escaped him. “Maybe I have always wanted that, without knowing it.”

  “It wasn’t time to know it before,” she said, smiling. She pulled her head away and looked up toward his face in the dark. “Now it is time.”

  “Now it is time,” he agreed, and gently brought his lips to hers.

  “Never mind what I said to Peire-Roger,” Raphael insisted with barely contained impatience. “I know why Frederick is sending men. Or claiming to send men. He wants us to leave. He knows I won’t leave if I think innocents are undefended. He wants me to think that help is coming so that I will be willing to leave here and come back to him. Let me tell you: I am willing to leave here.”

  “These people are under attack,” Percival protested. “Most of the effective defense tonight was us. Without Vera and Ferenc, the French would have taken the barbican and Montségur would be leaderless. We are hugely useful here. It would be absolutely wrong for us to leave now.”

  “It is not our fight,” Raphael said tightly between clenched teeth. “I agree with your sentiment but it is a specious argument. We are not meant to be here. Frederick sent me to get you, and then return to him. I am honor-bound to do that.”

  “Before anything, you are honor-bound to lend your sword to those in need of it,” Percival retorted. Raphael suppressed a wince of acknowledgement.

  “Quiet,” Vera whispered sharply, and gestured toward the entrance to the donjon.

  As they watched, the door opened and Ferenc, wrapped in an extra blanket, came out. He did not close the door behind him, and a moment later, petite Ocyrhoe exited as well. She closed the door and pulled the bolt, following him. All three of the older adults watched the two younger ones walk with nervous determination toward the chicken coop. Ferenc did a perfect job of not acknowledging their presence. Ocyrhoe pretended to, but Percival could see her eyes swerve toward them once.

  They waited until the two had disappeared inside the coop.

  “That’s another reason not to stay,” Percival said drily.

  “It’s not, really,” Raphael said, softening. “Neither of them are breaking any vows. And she is not a Cathar. We can bring her back with us.”

  “I don’t think she’ll come,” said Percival, and then pushed forward with his argument. “You know we cannot leave now. The three of us—perhaps the five of us—are vital to the survival of this place.”

  Raphael, clearly pained by the absence of a purely good choice, said, “I cannot travel for a few weeks, and I have put in a request for sulphur. Charcoal and hemp they have enough of. We make fire-arrows, or some improvised form of them, without the smithy to forge the proper heads. We burn the French trebuchet. When Matheus Bonnet heads out again to find Corbario the mercenary in Usson, we go with him.”

  “I won’t,” said Percival calmly. “I have already told you I’m staying here.”

  Raphael grimaced but did not argue; instead, he turned his attention to Vera. “We will hear for ourselves that an army is coming to help, and once we are satisfied with proof that the defenders have that security, we will leave Occitania behind us.” A pause. “Agreed?”

  A pause. “I think we should stay until the help actually arrives,” said Vera.

  “What?” Raphael said crossly.

  “Percival is right. Until tonight, there was no way to judge how useful our particular skills are. It turns out they are very useful. Including yours, Raphael—you’re the one that sent us ahead to the tower, and that gave us the advantage tonight. Peire-Roger is a strong fighter on the field, or at least brave, but the man has gotten blind drunk nearly every night we’ve been here, and his father-in-law is a gentle soul who has few days left before dementia sets in. They need us. I agree with Percival. We
stay until there are satisfactory reinforcements.”

  “I stay until I have the grail,” said Percival.

  “Don’t—” Raphael began warningly.

  “And then I’ll do what the grail tells me to do.”

  “The grail will tell you to sit down abruptly and cry out in pain, because I will take it and smash it over your head,” Raphael said fiercely. Vera barked a laugh despite herself.

  Percival was unperturbed. “That might be what it takes,” he said, agreeably. “Perhaps I will have to be in a somewhat twilit state to really hear the message it is trying to send me.”

  “This conversation is over,” Raphael growled, and used his crutches to lope in irritation back toward the keep entrance. He slipped once on icy ground, cursed under his breath, and slowed to a moderate pace. Vera, laughing without real malice, followed after him.

  Alone in the courtyard, Percival glanced toward the chicken coop. If only he could will Ocyrhoe to admit she had the grail. She had her reasons, and he wanted to respect them.

  But if she fell in love with Ferenc, maybe her priorities would shift a little.

  Ferenc. Maybe Ferenc could help him get the grail. When there was a free moment, he would talk to Ferenc.

  CHAPTER 29:

  THE REVELATION OF THE CUP

  Despite the French failure to take the barbican, the bombardment marked a dangerous turning point in the siege. The crusaders had developed a new fervor. Their collective identity had swung from failing besiegers to successful bombardiers. The mining and shaping of limestone projectiles happened even as the trebuchet was being loaded, sprung, and reloaded.