Swords v. Cthulhu

by Jesse Bullington

  So it was with surprise that she heard there was not only a messenger from Balan within the camp, but that he was drinking with Roland and Olivier as they spoke of their plans for the next night. Turpin was hesitant to bring her along when he was summoned, but she insisted, pressing the point that she needed all the intelligence she could gather before confronting her brother.

  It was stranger still when the messenger from Balan was not only a woman, but also his daughter, the princess Floripas. Aude imagined she would look much like the rest of the women she knew at court, but was shocked to see the tall, short-haired figure dressed fully in mail. The mail was narrower than a man’s armor, but it would have been difficult to deduce she was a woman by that alone. Only her face and the jewels at her ears gave her away.

  The twelve peers greeted Floripas as if she were one of their own, embracing her and kissing her cheeks, even though she wore the colors of her pagan father and her surcoat was embroidered with idolatrous symbols.

  “What news does Balan send us, then?” asked Roland, once they had all gathered in the king’s tent. Even though Charlemagne had not yet arrived — he was lagging two days behind his troops — it still felt a great sin to Aude to entertain a woman in his majesty’s quarters, and a pagan at that.

  For the moment, Roland held the highest place around the table, and Olivier sat to his right, with Turpin on his left. Beside Olivier was Floripas, and Aude sat back behind the bishop, given simple gruel to eat from a wooden bowl. The other knights who joined them had better seats and a better supper, but it was just as well, because Aude still had a good ear to the conversation at the head of the table.

  “My father, King Balan,” Floripas said, her voice tinged with only the slightest accent, “is well. But confident. He has a new regime around him, the one I wrote you about.”

  “The yellow monks, you said,” Olivier replied. “The ones from the East.”

  “I’m not convinced they are from the East,” Floripas said. “It seemed a little too convenient, especially considering father’s connection to Persia. But the more I’ve delved, the less I trust them. My father is enraptured by their words and promises, and Fierabras…”

  “The giant,” Olivier said.

  Aude felt her heart in her throat and she shoved down another mouthful of gruel. It had burned in the cauldron but the acrid taste distracted her from her fear.

  Floripas frowned and shook her head. “My brother was a fosterling. He was raised in the house of my uncle Monar, a duke of some wealth and standing in the Cordova. I haven’t seen him directly, but we exchange letters, and I have heard the tales.”

  “Olivier will best him, I have no doubt,” Turpin said, shoving a large chunk of venison into his mouth. It dribbled down one side of his face and into his bushy beard. “Giant or no.”

  “Some things can be worse than giants,” said Floripas. “I shouldn’t be saying as much, and really it is only because of my love and affection for Gui…” She gazed down the table to where Sir Gui of Bourgogne, her paramour, sat with eyes burning with adoration. Theirs was a star-crossed love, indeed. “But the last correspondence I had with my brother Fierabras, he was frightened. He is but a boy, really, but he is intelligent, logical. He spoke of the yellow monks, of their strange hold on him, their rituals. Like you Christians, we are a god-fearing people, and the way he sounded…”

  “Surely no monk could frighten a giant,” said Roland, his tone dismissive and unimpressed, as it so often was among those he deemed beneath him.

  “But that’s the thing of it,” Floripas said. “My brother was not born a giant. He is cursed, and it is a dark, strange magic. I know the yellow monks are somehow involved. I am ordered to come to you here and throw down our challenge. The danger is greater than you or I can even understand.”

  That night, Turpin was late again to the tent. Aude was waiting up for him, as she usually did, reading her psalter and doing her best to open herself to the Heavenly Mother’s understanding.

  “Do you believe the Queen of Heaven can abandon us?” Aude asked Turpin, as he ruffled around in his bedroll for something. A bottle, most likely.

  The bishop snorted. “That presumes that she gives a shit about us in the first place.”

  Aude stared at him, unable to form any cohesive response. “I mean… when I left court. When I bribed you. I felt as if the Queen of Heaven had given me a gift, for once. She had not done so when Charlemagne took Vienne, nor when Roland took my brother. I expected the way to be… clearer.”

  “You could talk to your brother, Aude,” Turpin said. He found his bottle, and sampling its contents, belched. “Isn’t that what you came here for? To get time with him alone? To convince him to let Roland do it instead?”

  “I thought the Queen of Heaven would give me a sign. But being here, seeing all this… ”

  “I warned you, Aude, did I not?”

  “How is your lie worse than all these lies?” asked Aude.

  “Because God has cursed me beyond those stinking men out there. He has found it fit to burden me with a need for blood, just as He has cursed me with my desires,” Turpin spat. Then he buried his head in his hands. “I can no more stop fighting than I can stop loving him, Aude. And since I cannot, I am yoked to this. This! You and your skulking have put me here in a position subservient to a woman. A woman so ugly she can pass for a scrawny boy — a woman so meek and mild, she can’t formulate a damned plan to speak with her damned brother after being given nothing but time for a fortnight!”

  He had never shouted at her so, and Aude shrank back into the corner. When she had confronted Turpin about his affair with Maugris, the enchanter, he had been aloof and surprisingly even-tempered, only taking a little coaxing to allow her to accompany him to Balan’s lands. But now she could see what he had been hiding beneath all along.

  Either the bishop did not remember the harsh words he’d paid her the night before, or he pretended the same, for the next morning it was as if nothing had transpired between them. After they had washed and prepared for the day, Turpin indicated that they were expected to ride along the perimeter and survey the sparring ring for the next day, when Olivier would fight against Fierabras.

  Reluctantly, Aude saddled her donkey and took up behind Turpin. Roland was at the front, addressing everyone in his strong, high voice, while the rest of the peers took up their ranks. Floripas had left at some point in the night, and Aude tried not to think what might have caused Gui to smile so broadly in spite of the austere news and impending doom of their beloved Olivier. She blushed in spite of herself, though.

  The scarlet tents of Balan’s army were visible even without much in the way of travel. They had taken up on the opposite bank of the Deva River, their neat tents more square than the rounder sort favored by Charlemagne and his paladins. Aude thought they looked like blood streaking across the foothills.

  “You don’t speak much,” said a familiar voice behind her. It was her brother, Olivier, resplendent in his armor and smiling in the cool morning air.

  Aude glanced up at him, just out of the corner of her cowl. “No, sir.”

  “Well, for what it’s worth, I’m glad that Turpin has someone to watch out for him. Though I daresay you probably didn’t get what you signed up for,” Olivier said with a laugh.

  That laugh. It took her a great deal of resolve to focus on the task at hand and not reveal herself to him.

  “You’re not afraid?” she asked him, keeping her voice as low as possible. “About tomorrow?”

  Olivier glanced behind him, and then looked forward, his shoulders falling. Aude knew what that meant. He was indeed afraid, but he had no desire to admit such shameful thoughts.

  “I will do what my king requests of me,” he said at last. “Good day to you, Milo. And thank you again for your service to Turpin. I hope I see you back at court when we are all better rested and once again in the world of sense.”

  Turpin did not return the next night, and after two hours
of unanswered prayers Aude rose to leave the tent and look at the stars. She was cold and afraid, and the words of Floripas lingered with her. She envisioned little yellow monks hoisting bloody spears, goading forward a giant that was not always a giant.

  It was unusually still in the camp. Most nights the ribaldry was palpable in the air. But perhaps now that the paladins and warriors had reached their goal, they were simply preparing in ways she could not imagine. There would be a great battle of brawn on the morn, a champion on each side of the Deva River, and only one could be victorious.

  The thought of her brother dying made her cut short her muttering prayers. She rifled through Turpin’s things nervously, hoping he wouldn’t return drunk and irate, and then she finally came across what she was looking for: a small box filled with clay bottles. Poison. Turpin claimed it was a coward’s weapon, and that he only used it to coat the mace he fought with. But Aude knew if she was going to kill someone, she couldn’t do it with steel.

  She took a small vessel with a mushroom pressed into the clay and tucked it into the folds of her habit before stealing out into the night.

  Aude walked silently through the shadows, toward Olivier’s tent. She wanted one last look at him before she committed to this madness. She pressed her eye to the gap in the flap of his tent… and gasped.

  Her brother sprawled across the bare chest of a tall woman. It was a tableau she never could have imagined. But there Olivier was, naked to the skin, one hand still curled around the woman’s ample breast. His lashes were dark against his cheeks, and there was much more hair upon him than the last time Aude had seen him out of his armor. The dying embers of the brazier lit their skin every now and again, but they slept in the sated way of lovers… or so she supposed.

  Part of her was glad that her brother was not the saint she imagined him to be. It had been a year since Charlemagne’s invasion of Vienne, and a long while since the siblings had had time to speak to each other of their loves and desires. Roland always needed Olivier more than she did, it seemed.

  It was not without tears that Aude pulled herself away from her brother’s tent and began the slow progress in the dark toward the Saracen camp, knowing her only chance was to confront the giant. His tent would be easy to locate, since it was apparently the largest of all, and it would not take her long to ford the river and then blend in among their people. She kept as quiet as a ghost, and no sentry nor hound detected her presence as she approached.

  Men moved about between the tents, singing and talking in a strange language she could not recognize. But she couldn’t spend all her time dawdling and wondering after their speech. The sun would be rising soon enough, and her brother’s fate was still in her hands.

  Aude made steady progress, winding her way through the camp. Unlike the haphazard layout on the other side of the river, the Saracen camp had a precise grid plan, with each of their square structures placed in neat rows of nine. The result was long alleyways between the tents, which helped Aude considerably in navigating her way without drawing attention. Moving fast, she used the shadows to her advantage, crouching and glancing around corners before proceeding.

  Fierabras’s tent was taller than the rest, but it was guarded at the front by two yellow-robed monks, their heads down. Aude doubted she could get past them without causing a commotion.

  She felt around the side of the tent for any weaknesses in the canvas, and found a loose lace. Swallowing her fear, Aude pulled the fabric open just enough to see inside.

  The tent was dimly lit, but empty. No giant. Not even giant-sized furniture or clothing or armor. The room was decorated in a foreign fashion, to be certain, but there was nothing gargantuan about it.

  Relief flooded her body, and she almost collapsed in tears. It was all a ruse, and she would not have to endure the loss of her brother.

  That hope evaporated, though, when she felt a hand clamp over her mouth and the pressure of a knife at her back.

  “Be silent,” said a harsh whisper in her ear, in accented Latin, “and they won’t kill you.”

  Aude didn’t have time to realize just how curious that statement was until she was pulled into another tent, two rows over, and turned around. She found herself staring at a young man, perhaps no older than her thirteen years. He would be handsome someday, perhaps, but he was mostly teeth and tousled hair. There was a familiar look to his face though, especially about the cheeks.

  In the struggle, her hood had fallen off. She had cut her hair to her shoulders and tied it back, but not gone so far as to tonsure herself. While Turpin may have found her far from feminine, the look in the young boy’s eyes gave her reason to doubt she had convinced him.

  “You’re not a monk,” he said, and he sounded disappointed. Then he grimaced. “You’re… you’re a girl.”

  She got a better look at him and at last she could place his face. Floripas. This must be her brother, Fierabras. “Well, you’re no giant,” she said, summoning all her strength to get the words out. She was still shaking.

  “This doesn’t make sense,” Fierabras said, folding his arms across his chest like a petulant child.

  “Perhaps not,” said Aude. “Little does, these days.”

  “They told me you’d be skulking around. The yellow monks. But… you’re not what you’re supposed to be. What, the Franks are so starved for clergy they’re allowing women in?”

  “No, I came here disguised.”

  “It’s not a very good disguise.”

  “No, I suppose not. But I had a good accomplice. Mostly,” Aude said. “I escaped Aachen in order to keep an eye on my brother. You might know his name.”

  Fierabras did not miss a mark. “You’re Aude of Vienne, then. Roland’s betrothed.”

  He even said her name correctly, switching for a moment to Frankish.

  She nodded.

  The recognition of her status changed him utterly, and he took a deep breath, shaking his shaggy head. The more Aude looked upon him, the more tired he appeared. The dim light of the tent cast even deeper shadows on his face, perhaps, but there was a weariness there far beyond his years.

  “And you’re Fierabras. The giant,” Aude said.

  “Not right now, I’m not,” Fierabras said.

  “What do you mean by that?”

  He produced a wooden stool and she sat.

  Fierabras sat on another stool and took her hands in his, and to her surprise Aude did not recoil. His fingers were warm, slightly callused. He wore two rings, both elegantly wrought and worked in gold. Tired though he was, he must be just as frightened as she.

  “They worship a god… a strange god. These yellow priests, the ones that guard my father Balan. Their deity has no name, or else they tell us his name cannot be spoken. My father has been utterly bewitched by them.”

  “But what has this got to do with you?” Aude asked. Her stomach felt slightly queasy, and she was having a hard time concentrating on his eyes without blushing.

  “The yellow priests, they make me change in here. The great tent is a decoy, so if assassins come in the night they find it empty of the monster,” he said. “They keep me in here and make me use that.” He pointed to a leaden box by the door. “Once the sun rises, I cannot exit the tent until I am changed. There is a scepter in there, topped with an ancient paw from some beast of old. I do not know. They say I am the right age. The child of a king, and… virgin. And when I take the scepter, I change, become the monster. I am lost to rage and a dark fury, as if I can see into the eye of all creation and it’s just a black, roiling void of chaos.”

  “And your father approves of this torture?”

  “I assume so, but I do not know. I haven’t seen him in months. Floripas thinks he may be ill, or ailing, but the priests keep him from us. Do you know how many men I’ve killed?” Fierabras’s eyes filled with tears.

  “I’m sorry. I want to help. I do not want my brother to number among your casualties.”

  “What could you possibly do?” asked
Fierabras.

  “The Queen of Heaven came to me in a dream,” Aude said, feeling the story spill out of her before she could stop it. “I was so afraid when I heard that Olivier was going to fight you, but She spoke to me so loudly and so clearly — She told me I was to find a way to convince Turpin to take me, and I did. She said I would find the heart of the poison, and I thought that was quite literal, but now I see it’s you. You are at the heart of this poison.”

  “I cannot abide by your gods,” Fierabras said.

  “But where have yours led you? To these priests who corrupt your body and turn you murderous?”

  The young man shook his head, letting go of Aude’s hands. “I want to be free of this.”

  “I think I know how I can help,” she said.

  “What do you mean?” he asked. “I am trapped here.”

  “Stand up.”

  Fierabras did as she asked, and they stood eye to eye. Aude untied the rough monk’s habit she had worn for weeks, and let it fall to the ground. She revealed to Fierabras her naked body, thin and weak as it was, and not yet made into that of a woman. Turpin was right. She looked like a boy.

  Outside, the sound of soldiers mustering could be heard. Aude noticed the light in the tent brightening ever so slightly. The sun would rise soon.

  “My father was Bertrand de Vienne, a king. I never met him, but was raised by my uncle Girart at court. Charlemagne fought for seven years against Girart, until they were reconciled and joined together,” Aude said in a clear voice. The heat of her blushing turned her skin red, but in the gloom of the tent it was unlikely Fierabras could see. “I am a child of a king, and I am pure. I can take the scepter in the morning, and you can escape to our camp in the confusion, dressed as a monk. Find Bishop Turpin, and give him this.” She took the ring of betrothal from her finger and gave it to Fierabras, who accepted it with trembling hands.

  “But what if they find you out?” asked Fierabras. “You don’t know what you’re asking.”