by Ron Miller
While the woman fetched Frontino, Leon replaced the saddle and helped his friend into it. It hardly seemed possible that it was the same man who only a few weeks earlier had overcome an entire army, and did what he did later disguised.
Following the woman, the two men rode for a few hours until she led them to an abbey, where Leon persuaded the monks to attend to Rashid. There they remained for the remainder of that night, the next day and the night after that. When Rashid awoke the following morning, he felt like a new man, leaping from his bed at first light, rousting a groggy Leon from the cot next to his.
“We can be in Marseilles by nightfall if we start now,” he said.
“Where’s the woman?” asked Leon.
“She’ll be around somewhere,” Rashid replied, but he was wrong. She was gone and none of the monks had noticed her leaving.
“Don’t you know where she’s gone?” asked Leon.
“How would I know?”
“She’s your friend, isn’t she?”
“No. I assumed she was yours. It was she who led me to you, after all.”
“I had no idea. I thought you’d come together.”
“Well, she’s gone now.”
“Yes, gone.”
“Without a word.”
“I’ve no idea what her name was, now that I think of it.”
“Never occurred to me to ask.”
“Well, there you are, then.”
They returned to Marseilles to discover that there had been developments. A delegation of Bulgars had arrived, expecting to find Rashid there so they could proclaim him before Charlemagne as their king. It’d taken all this time for them to have finally discovered the true identity of their savior. The astonished emperor was told how the Moor had single-handedly conquered Leon and Constantine, at the same time routing both of their armies. For this reason they had unanimously declared him their sovereign, even though he was not himself Bulgarian.
The ambassadors went on to explain how Rashid had been taken prisoner at Novigrad, had been tortured by Theodora and, after killing his keeper, had escaped. There had been neither word nor sign of him since, so the Bulgars had assumed their savior had returned to Frankland.
Their disappointment was bitter when Charlemagne told them that he had no more idea where their hero was than they did.
Hearing of all this from a peddler leaving the city, Leon and Rashid decided not to ride boldly into Marseilles as they had originally planned, but rather would instead make their entrance the following morning. There was no particularly good reason for doing this, other than perhaps their exuberant good humor.
Whatever their motives, Charlemagne—to say nothing of the remainder of his court—was astonished to see Leon Augustus suddenly appear before him. His inexplicable disappearance so soon after his triumphal answer to Bradamant’s challenge had been the subject of every conversation until it had been eclipsed by the arrival of the Bulgar delegation and its astonishing news about Rashid. He was dressed in the full regalia of the Greek empire, followed by his company, no less splendidly outfitted. As glorious as was this presentation, every eye was fixed on the prince’s companion. This was a giant of a man, clad from head to foot in armor decorated with Leon’s double-headed eagle emblem. What was most astonishing, and what caused a susurrant wave of conversation to sweep through the crowded hall, was that everyone immediately recognized that armor: battered, torn and dented, it was clearly that which had seen battle with Lady Bradamant two weeks before and the man in the armor was just as clearly the man who had then worn it.
Leon approached the emperor, kneeled and kissed the great man’s hand—the gesture was scarcely noticed. Like everyone else, Charlemagne’s attention was riveted on the armored stranger.
“It’s good to see you again, Leon,” he said, “but I don’t believe I recognize this gentleman.”
“My lord,” the prince replied, standing, “I have a confession to make. I shamefully deceived you and the good lady whose hand I’d so much desired. This man is that excellent knight who defended himself against Lady Bradamant from dawn to dusk. It was not I but this surrogate, who took my place. Since she was unsuccessful in killing, capturing or driving him from the lists, he has rightfully won her for his wife, if we properly understand the gist of your proclamation. He has come to claim his prize.”
“This man asserts that the hand of Lady Bradamant belongs to him?”
“Yes, Sire, he does. And what man deserves her more? If it’s the possession of valor alone, then he has no competition. If she belongs to whomever loves her the most, there’s no one to surpass him. And here he is now, prepared to defend his right.”
Marfisa, who had been standing on the dias with the emperor, stepped forward, her black eyes throwing off sparks like flints.
“What a joke this is!” she sneered into Leon’s face. “Rashid isn’t here to defend himself and his rightful wife against this usurper! Well, as his sister I’m ready to take up my sword against any liar who says he has a claim to Bradamant or believes he’s in any way superior to Rashid!”
Leon, believing that the woman was prepared then and there to put her threat into effect, decided that it was a prudent time to reveal his deception. “All right, then,” he said to her, “here he is, ready to give a good account of himself.”
At those words, Rashid removed his helmet.
A thousand years earlier, in the golden age of Greece, Queen Medea had feared the loss of her influence over her new husband, King Aegeus, if he acknowledged Theseus as his son. Knowing by means of her magical arts that Theseus was truly the king’s child, she filled her husband’s mind with suspicions about the young man whom he knew only as a stranger. Convinced by Medea that Theseus was bent upon assassination, the king was persuaded to present him with a cup of poison. But just as the fatal cup was at the boy’s lips, the king recognized the sword Theseus was carrying as that which he had placed in the cradle of his long lost son and in the nick of time dashed the poison from his hands and tearfully embraced him.
Marfisa was no less pleased than King Aegeus had been, when she discovered that the man she thought she hated was in fact Rashid.
Pushing Leon aside, she rushed to her brother’s side in two enormous bounds, embracing him and covering his face with kisses. Embarrassed beyond all measure, Rashid could not detach her from his neck. Worse, he found himself pressed on all sides by Renaud, Roland, Oliver and half a dozen other related knights—to say nothing of the emperor himself, who likewise had dispensed with all ceremony. Beyond them was circle after circle of barons and paladins, including the delighted Bulgars, all cheering the return of their favored champion.
Only Haemon stubbornly hung back from the celebration. Seeing this, Leon tore himself away from the mob and went to him.
“My lord,” he said, “I hope you now see that Rashid is indeed worthy of the hand of your daughter. He’s met and overcome every challenge and obstacle and he’s made himself a king by his own hand and the proclamation of a people who love him. Too, he’s won by honest virtue what I sought to win by deceit. In every way he’s worthier and more deserving of Lady Bradamant than I.”
* * * * *
Deep within her apartment, where for this past fortnight she had wrapped its comforting darkness around her, as self-contained as a nautilus, Bradamant had no hint of the tumult that was taking place not three hundred yards away.
DÉNOUEMENT
The Bulgars, who had at first been disappointed at not finding their king at Charlemagne’s court, were delighted to discover him at last and begged Rashid to return with them to Adrianople where a crown and scepter waited. Constantine was preparing another invasion, they told him, with an even larger army, but with their hero’s aid they’d have no fear of being absorbed into the Greek empire.
Rashid accepted the throne, telling his new subjects that he’d be in Bulgaria—barring accident—within three months. His job was done before it started, however, for when Leon heard of this
he told Rashid that as soon as he returned to Greece he’d have his father abandon his plans for further aggression against the Bulgars. Indeed, he’d beg Constantine to return every Bulgarian city he’d conquered.
Now that Rashid was a king he had the uninhibited approval of Bradamant’s mother; who had been impervious to his virtue was conquered by his title.
Charlemagne himself took charge of the wedding arrangements, making them as splendid and regal as though he were giving away his own daughter—which, in truth, he felt he were doing. Such was his love for Bradamant and for her accomplishments and merit that he would not have thought it overgenerous to have spent half his kingdom on her.
A proclamation of amnesty made it safe for anyone—friend or enemy—to attend the event and the lists were open for nine days to anyone who had a quarrel to settle.
The emperor erected the wedding pavilion on the same field outside the city where Bradamant had unsuccessfully fought Rashid and had it decorated with banners, bunting, wreaths and flowers and with so much gold and silk that it rivaled his own palace.
Within days the city swelled beyond its capacity with the crowds that poured in from even the remotest corners of the empire—and even from beyond: friends, strangers, family and foes; peasants and aristocrats; rich and poor of every rank; Greeks, Romans, Goths and Vandals; there seemed no end to the ambassadors sent from every region of the globe, even transarctic Iceland, who were eventually crammed uncomplainingly into every available inn, hut and tent.
Bradamant, who ought to have been as happy as any woman might have any right to be, was depressed. She was not so unintelligent that she didn’t realize how ridiculous this was, but at the same time she was apparently not so intelligent that she didn’t understand the causes of her black mood, or at least appreciate the complexity of her problem. She knew she was hurting Rashid by her not very subtle avoidance of him—she being unfortunately unblessed by any talent whatsoever for guile.
In the days preceding the wedding, she managed to escape as often as possible—and more often than was truly courteous—into the surrounding forest. She would leave her horse to graze at the verge while she wandered aimlessly among the trees. It was virgin forest, the trees unmolested since the beginning of time, and their vast boles soared overheard in Gothic perpendicularity. Bradamant sometimes felt as though she were lost in the abandoned streets of some cyclopean city: one of tall, fluted, terra cotta buildings, umber and sienna—both burnt and raw—their highest stones and most distant streets lost in an encompassing gloom. Scores of yards separate the giant trees; an army could advance through the forest with rank and file scarcely impeded. The ground between the trees is a soft cushion, fathoms deep, of a humus black, rich, fragrant and peaty. Feeble virgas of sunlight struggle through a hundred feet of thick foliage, so heavily filtered that the light becomes more like a fine luminous dust sifting down to coat the forest floor in a shadowless half-light; the air itself appears to be softly phosphorescent. No underbrush grows in the light-starved interstices so that the forest floor is curiously barren and tidy. The deep forest interior is like a subterranean world: a vast, cool, silent cavern whose dark vaults are supported by immense, patient columns. Scant hundreds of feet above, on the far side of the dense canopy, impenetrable as the crust of the earth, is an alien world of light, sound and color.
More often than not Bradamant found herself at a mirror-like pool she’d discovered snuggled into a hollow at the head of a small gorge. Its deep waters were perpetually shaded by the steep, semicircular, moss-covered cliff, from the overhanging lip of which sprung a little waterfall that arched gracefully fifty feet before falling into the pool with a musical splash. The cove was cool and damp and fragrant and entirely self-contained.
Sometimes she shed her clothing and sat on one of the spherical boulders that overhung the water, leaning back onto its cool mossy surface while her toes dangled in the water. Sometimes she would slip into the fragrant black waters, which even in the midst of summer were so cold she would gasp with the shock. She would allow herself to be carried in a gentle orbit by the swirling water; she would hold her body vertically, allowing it to sink like a plumb bob. The water was as clear as glass—though its limits vanished into shady blackness in every direction. She knew the pool was no more than a hundred feet across and probably no more than twenty deep—yet beneath its ruffled surface it seemed to expand infinitely, as though there were an entire universe beneath that silvery mirror, as though the pool were merely a porthole through a great wall separating her world from another, a primordial one, one still without form and void. She would hang motionless, suspended, weightless, in a transparent hemisphere, itself surrounded by an impenetrable gloom, like a butterfly imbedded in a decorative paperweight. She felt like the center of a new universe, as though she were the gravitational nucleus around which a whole new world might accrete. She hung like a pendant from a mirrored ceiling, her wan, green-tinted body looking like a new planet, the shifting, reticulated patterns of light swirling over her softly luminous landscape like the storms, cyclones, squalls and gales of a primeval world. She would wonder what creatures might evolve there, what empires and wars, kings and lovers.
Afterwards, Bradamant would climb onto a high rock and let the sun wash over her like warm butter, as amber embeds the hapless insect, as the mineral-laden waters replace the flesh of the future fossil with jasper and onyx.
On the afternoon preceding the matrimonial ceremony, as she lay half-dozing in the sun, imbedded in the warm sunlight like an insect in amber, Bradamant passed into what she thought was only a curious dream. She had been wondering just what it was that had happened during these past two or three years, what strange sea-change had occurred in her. Once, life had been simple, it had had the razor-sharp clarity of a woodcut. Black had been black, white white; good was as distinct from evil as night from day . . . there were no greys, no twilight, no equivocation, no doubts. I’d known my place in the world as precisely as a navigator knows his position at sea, and I knew for whom I fought and why. Charlemagne and the cause of Christian Europe were Right, the forces of Moorish Afric were Wrong—no, worse, they were evil, possibly even satanic, certainly ungodly. And I still fight that enemy, I’ve destroyed whole armies single-handedly, I’ve brought great Saracen warriors to the True Faith. But for whose benefit have I done these things? For God and my emperor? Or for myself? Was it for the greater glory of the Empire, or for my own small, self-interested gain? But do my motives matter if the end is the same? Do my personal gains really matter if the greater gain would have been the same regardless? But . . . could the difference lie in that I once did what I did because it was my duty and for no other reason? I was as unconsciously thoughtless of what I did as a machine created for the purpose. What I’ve now done I’ve done because I cared, with passion and, and . . . love. Have I sinned because I’ve thought for and of myself?
A flame seemed to rise from the center of the pool, as though it were a lens concentrating the sunlight into an intolerably brilliant focus. Bradamant shaded her eyes against the glare and when she dared to again look she saw—as she had half expected—the sorceress Melissa hovering an inch or two above the dark water, as though it were a pool of oil and she the flame that burnt at its center.
“I have a wedding gift for you,” the sorceress said.
“I haven’t seen you in a while,” Bradamant said a little cooly.
“It’s not because I haven’t been around, or that I’ve forgotten you.”
“I had wondered.”
“You sound bitter.”
“No—I suppose I’m just tired. I don’t know. I sometimes wish I’d never met Rashid or—don’t take this the wrong way—you.”
“No offense taken.”
“It just seems as though I’ve been through too much—more than anyone ought to have been expected to endure just for the sake of love.”
“But it was for more than love, wasn’t it?”
“That’s wh
at I mean. Was it? You attached this historical imperative to it; I felt the weight of the entire future of Italia and Frankland on my shoulders, as though the lives of thousands of people depended upon whether or not I loved Rashid.”
“It was nothing but the truth.”
“But what about these people? They’re only abstractions; I’ll never know any of them. In fact, I have only your word that they’ll ever even exist. Is the future so immutable that there couldn’t be impediments to its birth? Aren’t there alternative paths it could take? Even the greatest river can be deflected from its course. Can the future depend so utterly on the actions of single man or woman?”
“Would you like to see my wedding gift to you?”
“I suppose so.”
The sorceress drifted toward the girl and passed her hand over her eyes. When Bradamant’s vision cleared, she saw she was no longer sitting beside the pool but was inside an enormous, brightly-lit tent (and much more modestly dressed as well, thanks to Melissa’s thoughtfulness). Its walls and roof glowed with the sunlight that penetrated the canvas; its floor was covered by thick layers of beautiful carpets. The supporting poles were polished brass braced by velvet ropes. In the center of the tent, reminding Bradamant uncomfortably of the center ring of a circus, was a vast bed. Its cushions were piled as high as her head, its canopy supported by elaborately carved ivory columns. The jeweled head and footboards were engraved with scenes of Bradamant’s and Rashid’s adventures. She looked at them briefly and turned away in embarassment and annoyance. Was nothing of her life her own? She turned instead to the translucent walls and ceiling and was startled to see that they were covered with hundreds of figures, all stitched with such astonishing lifelikeness and color that they might have put Apelles to shame.
“This tent was embroidered two thousand years ago,” Melissa said, “by Cassandra, a maiden of Ilium. In a kind of prophetic fury, she created this entirely by her own hand in I don’t know how many long days and sleepless nights. She made it for her brother, Hector.