The Dragon and the Fair Maid of Kent

by Gordon R. Dickson

Chapter Fourteen

  He's in the Great Hall," said Angie, "getting something to eat."

  "Eat," echoed Jim, his mouth beginning to water at the word.

  "And he wants to speak to you urgently," she said. "Urgently and privately. You'd better take him up to the Solar. It'll be cleaned and the bed made up by now."

  Jim thought of a High Table already laden with food.

  "That fast? Anyway, the Solar tempts him to talk too long," he said firmly. "I'll try and find out what he wants first. Pass the word to the staff—no listening in on pain of Magickal Penalty."

  "Don't eat too much yourself," said Angie. "Dinner's in three hours."

  He ignored the implications of that, already heading toward the Great Hall. Sure enough, he found young Edward there, stuffing himself on pastries and cold beef, and washing it all down, of course, with wine.

  "James!" he said with his mouth full, then swallowed. "They found you speedily. Good!"

  "I was on my way here for a bite," said Jim, helping himself to pastries, beef and wine.

  "Mph!" said Edward, his mouth too full for more extended conversation.

  "Mhrnph!" said Jim, nodding his head vigorously while in the same condition.

  Finally, Edward gave over eating, took a last swallow of wine, and sat back in his chair.

  "Hah!" he said. "No, no, James. I pray you, continue to break your fast."

  "I've had all I can hold, Your Grace," said Jim, also sitting back. "You must have been in the saddle a good three or four hours before daybreak to get here this early in the day."

  "And so I was. Time was of the essence—strike while the iron is hot, as they say. My father has always been of a less than good humor on waking—though later in the day he becomes merry enough—under ordinary circumstances. There was a chance, though only a slight one, that he might have rethought his invitation. But I was gone before his eyes could be open. Great success, James. All are summoned."

  "All?" said Jim. "Summoned?"

  "To Tiverton, to audience with your King—but I take you by surprise, James. You know nothing of this." The Prince laughed. "The Countess is a sly one, James, her wits forever at work, and this time she has come up with a ruse that has great possibilities for us all."

  "As a matter of fact, Your Grace, I do know about it. At least about the plan for you to speak to the King. So it went well, did it? I was only surprised to hear you say all were invited. You do mean—everyone?"

  "I do mean all, even that stiff fellow—though I understand he is a more than ordinary man of his hands, and like Brian a winner of tournaments and such. My father was in somewhat of more than ordinarily… cheerful… mood last eve when he spoke of whom he would care to see. All gentlemen and ladies presently beneath your roof—this, you see, includes Joan—that is, the Countess. I bear his command to you all to present yourself to him at Tiverton without further delay."

  "Remarkable!" Jim said automatically, his mind spinning with the possibilities that immediately presented themselves, now that the trip was to be certain.

  "Is it not?" said Edward, with well-fed self-satisfaction. "I can think of no one else who could have accomplished it. He is my father, and in my way I know him better than any other Christian soul—though it was only a matter of talking you all up and then choosing the right moment to ask which of you he wished most to see."

  "Not a small thing at all, Your Grace," said Jim, still automatically. "We will be overjoyed, all of us, I'm sure, to obey the King's command." But now his mind was beginning to work to some purpose. "We can come in a body in ten days or so, as soon as the wedding is over."

  "Ten days!" Edward suddenly sat rod-stiff upright in his chair. "No, no! Two days! Three at the outside! The King summons you, man! What is this nonsense of some wedding?"

  "I assumed Your Grace knew—that the Countess would have mentioned it. The Lady Geronde is to be wed to Sir Brian, and they've both overcome years of troubles since they were playmates as children and first fell in love—just as you and the Countess knew each other as children, and now the moment's come. It'd be cruel to delay them any longer."

  Jim had gambled on that last bit about Edward and Joan as children. Angie had not told him that part of their lives had gone exactly as it had gone in the history of the world they had come from—but his graduate studies as a medievalist had made him well acquainted with what the books had to tell him. Not to have it the same here as in the histories of his world would have skewed the present situation in this older England to the point where some fairly large mends would have had to be made—and there was no sign of any such.

  "Cruel be—" Edward caught himself. "Ten days is absolutely beyond all question, James—particularly that much of a delay for such a reason. If a wedding they must have, they can have it at Tiverton, with the honor of the King's blessing and presence. Tell them that—I vow they will leap at the chance! Then let us hear no more of it."

  "Much as I would like to ease your mind, Your Grace," said Jim cautiously. "The matter of Holy Church enters into the place of the wedding. You recall the Bishop of Bath and Wells from your previous visit I'm sure—"

  "The overweening prelate—" Once more the Prince checked himself in the nick of time. "What has he to do with this?"

  "Well, you see," said Jim, "the banns were read, as you know is customary, at Malvern Castle, the home of the bride-to-be. But a fire so damaged the chapel there that it was unsafe to hold the ceremony there, to say nothing of a following Mass which was planned. So it was decided to hold it here at Malencontri, instead."

  "Joan said something of this…" muttered Edward.

  "Unfortunately, though, the chapel here at Malencontri had been mistreated by a previous owner—not only in common ways but with certain unholy activities which made the chapel unclean for any Churchly use—"

  The Prince absently crossed himself.

  "—and would have been useless as a substitute if that same good Bishop of Bath and Wells had not come to Malencontri and not only cleaned and blessed the chapel but gave the Lady Geronde his permission to reread the banns for a marriage at a place not her home. So now the Church is somewhat concerned with the marriage."

  "Hah!"

  "You have met the Bishop," Jim went on, "and you'll be as capable as I am to judge of his reaction to the idea of a second removal of the wedding and Mass—let alone a third reading of the banns."

  "Only too well, James!" said Edward. "Only too well! And while I, myself, am not adverse to dealing with that Bishop on the matter, there is my father's attitude to Holy Church to be considered, he having some little argument on other points with Her at the moment…"

  Edward abruptly got up from his chair, turned and paced along the narrow foot-space on the the dais behind the side of the table.

  "Well, James," he said sharply, turning again and pacing back to look down on Jim. "What are we to do?"

  Jim got hastily to his feet. In the narrow space behind the chairs it was a little ridiculous, the two of them standing face-to-face to talk. But he could not in manners sit while the Prince stood.

  "It is indeed a problem, Your Grace," he said. "What complicates it is the matter of the wedding being put off twice already—otherwise I might suggest we all make our visit to Tiverton before the wedding. But since the banns have been read for the second time, and the wedding date itself is now hard set and less than a week away—"

  "James!" said the Prince sharply. "I did not ask you to rehearse for me the difficulties that seem to make obedience to a royal command a laggard matter, if not impossible. I looked to you to tell me what will make it possible. As a councilor, you leave much to be desired."

  "Of course," said Jim. "Pray forgive me, Your Grace. It is just the shortness of time between now and the wedding that preys on my mind. A visit to the King, of course, can hardly seem courteous if—counting the time to ride there and back with baggage—it could only make possible a stay for a mere three days and nights—"

  "Tr
ue," said Edward grimly. "A stay of only three days is unthinkably short. Impossible."

  "So I thought myself, Your Grace," said Jim. "Only to be considered if there was some powerful reason—or person, such as the Earl of Cumberland—who could convince the King the visit had to be that short."

  "Are you mad, James?" said Edward.

  His face had hardened at the moment of Jim's mention of Cumberland's name.

  "It may be true that Cumberland can, upon occasion, make black seem white to my father," the Prince went on. "But he is not the only one—nor the best at achieving that. You should understand that, James!"

  "I crave the gentleness of your forgiveness, Your Grace. Out in the country here as we are—"

  "Naturally. You have forgotten who I am and the fact that I am now gaining my father's ear in some respects. The problems of the Bishop, the banns and so forth—if I explain them to him, together with other perfectly reasonable reasons which may occur to me between now and when I talk to him—plus a promise of a quick return of his guests after the wedding—yes, I could arrange the visit for as short a time as that. Even better, when you and the others leave at the end of three days, the Countess could stay to console and amuse him, thus achieving at least one of our ends. My father has always had a strong liking for her."

  "Indeed, Your Grace," Jim said, making a real effort to have admiration sound in his voice. "You have solved the problem yourself—and with a solution only possible because of who you are."

  "I'm glad you see that, James," said Edward. "Never underestimate one such as myself. The skills of a war captain apply to much of human life. It is our duty and skill to take a shard of a thought and make a full battleplan of it."

  "Yes, Your Grace."

  "Well, then," said Edward, good humor completely restored to his face and voice. "I must take a small nap now, because of my early start from Tiverton, and meanwhile you can inform the others of my decision that they make a three-day visit before their wedding weekend. Then I will stay the night and start out fresh tomorrow morning to tell my father—or rather, on second thought, I may delay and make the trip with the rest of you tomorrow. He can hardly argue with their coming if they are already within gates where he is now staying."

  Cheerfully, the Prince turned, stepped down from the dais and went off in the direction of the tower stairs. Jim watched him around the corner and out of sight, and then raised his voice in the direction of the Serving Room.

  "Ho!" he shouted. "Servant here!"

  There was no immediate scurry of feet on the stone floor, no appearance of what he had called for. He took a moment to glance once more toward the corner that hid the tower stairs, and listened. But there was no sound in the silence of anyone going up or down. This whole area of the castle seemed to have become deserted.

  It was probably the best of signs—meaning everybody was busy as a beaver at something to do to get the castle into protective shape against the plague. But it gave him a sort of ghostly feeling, along with more than a slight touch of unreasonable suspicion. Dammit, when the lord of a castle shouted, things were supposed to happen.

  "May I be of service, m'lord?"

  They were the right words, but the wrong voice. He jerked his head back to see Angie standing by the dais, grinning up at him. He took a long step down from the stair and confronted her.

  "What's up?" he demanded. "I call for a servant and I get you."

  "Please, m'lord,' she said, still grinning, "but there was no other servant in the Serving Room, so I came. But if I displease m'lord—"

  "Come on now, Angie! Stop this! Where's everyone—working on plague preparations, I suppose—but what were you still doing there if there were no servants to direct?"

  Angie sobered up.

  "Of course they're all working—every one—and the reason I was standing in the Serving Room was to listen to what you and Edward had to say to each other."

  "The whole thing, from the minute you showed up!"

  "But after you told me the Prince was here, I thought you were off to oversee—something!"

  "True," she said. "I'd been out to look at how the pavilion was going up. Carpenter said he needed more men to handle the heavy work. So I went to the Nursing Room to send out some of the men working there, and then the Prince arrived—and I was heading up to tell you when we met."

  "Well, at least I don't have to tell you about what the Prince said. Now the question is getting everyone ready for this trip."

  "We'd better divide up the people we talk to—things are complicated enough around here right now without both of us talking to the same people and getting our wires crossed. I'll do the talking to Geronde—that's a full-time job by itself, right now—and you talk to Brian."

  "At least I got something to eat," Jim said.

  "You and the Prince," she said. "The way he was wolfing things down, I thought he'd be full in a matter of minutes, but he fooled me. The capacity of these people is unbelievable—"

  "So's ours. We live in fifty-degree temperatures and all kinds of weather. We miss meals and need to make them up—anyway, the point is you stayed and heard everything," Jim said.

  "As I told you in the beginning." Her voice softened. "You did a beautiful job of talking to him, Jim. That boy's got a swelled head. He's nowhere near being considered a war captain by any of the real ones. At Poitiers he had Chandos and others holding his hand."

  "Sure—but he was only sixteen years old, then. That swelled head is really an insistence on the kind of respect he should have as heir-apparent to the throne—and almost nobody who counts gives him that, what with Cumberland doing his best to destroy his reputation and the King not listening. Anyway, you heard it all, we leave for Tiverton day after tomorrow—that'll put us back on the Thursday before the wedding weekend."

  "Geronde is going to love this!" said Angie.

  "Come down hard on the advantage of the King getting to know Brian personally."

  "That tune's getting a little old. By rights, both she and I should be spending all our time on getting her and the wedding ready—if it wasn't for the plague."

  "I know." Jim softened his own voice. "She's waited so many years for this—anyway, if you'll take care of telling her, I'll take care of telling everybody else about this trip. The guests who don't want to go can stay here or leave."

  "They'll all want to go."

  "I hope. Where is Geronde now? I haven't seen her this morning."

  "I was hoping she would have gone to the Solar—it's the only decent place with room enough to lay out clothes and things."

  "And here I thought a wedding in this time, on the steps of the church, was nothing more than a business transaction."

  "She'll be leaving right from here for Smythe Castle. It'll take at least three sumpter horses to carry what she'll need for the first three months or so."

  "She doesn't have to stay there for three months without a break."

  "Tell her that."

  "Well," said Jim, "that's not my territory. I'll leave it up to the two of you."

  "And Danielle and Joan—we can't shut them out of the process. You know, Jim, you've got to really talk to the Countess and get to know her, first chance you get. She's well worth it—and her influence over young Edward's critical. She'll be calming him down tonight, wait and see—but look, I've got to get going up to Geronde. Luck!"

  She kissed his cheek, turned and headed toward the tower stairs.

  "And to you, too!" he called after her. She waved a hand without turning her head and disappeared around the corner.

  Left alone, he mentally debated whether to go to the pavilion or the Nursing Room first—but his thoughts were interrupted by a small voice from the fireplace.

  "M'lord?"

  He turned to see Hob walking out of the flames there with a hobgoblin-sized sword held crosswise before him in both hands, as if he was about to offer it up for sacrifice. He brought it to Jim and held it out to him.

  "Something wron
g with it?" Jim asked.

  Hob shook his head.

  "Not it, m'lord," he said, in the saddest voice Jim had ever heard from him. "Me. The noble lords say I'll never make a fighter with it. No, never in this world."

  Chapter Fifteen

  "Sir Brian told you you'd never make a fighter with this sword we had made for you?" said Jim, unbelievingly—for Brian knew Hob well from all their journeys together and had seen proof of the little hobgoblin's real personal courage. Surely Brian would have found a kinder way of breaking that news to him.

  "Not Sir Brian, m'lord. The other noble lord knight—"

  "Just Sir Brian and Sir Harimore, Hob. Neither one is noble. But they're both knights, and that alone is nobleness enough for most people."

  "But you're noble, aren't you, m'lord?"

  "Just barely," said Jim. "But never mind me. It was Sir Harimore who told you, then?"

  "Yes, m'lord. The knight who tossed me his dagger—you remember, m'lord. He said I'd never make a fighter with this sword, never in this world. Sir Brian didn't say anything, but he looked sad and shook his head."

  "Well, this doesn't make sense," said Jim, more to himself than to Hob. "What had you been doing to make Sir Harimore say that?"

  "Just what they told me to. They called it exercises, and I thought they liked what I was doing. They said I was very quick to learn and clever. But then Sir Brian wanted me to try to hit him with my sword—and I couldn't do that. He didn't have any armor on, just a sword himself."

  "And did you?"

  "Oh, I couldn't, m'lord! What if I had hit him?"

  "Hob," said Jim. "Both Sir Brian and Sir Harimore are very expert swordsmen. You could try to hit either one of them all day long, and if either one had a sword himself, you'd never touch them with yours. His sword would always be in your way. Sir Brian was just trying to show you that."

  "Oh!"

  "Yes."

  "But what if some accident happened, or I slipped, or some thing like that. I couldn't bear to hurt either one of them."

  "Could you hurt a deep-earth goblin?"

  "Oh, yes. That would be different. Besides, a deep-earth goblin would be trying to kill me. I'd like to hit one of them—lots of them!"