by Brian Daley
Oorda’s volume grew and she gained force, overpowering John’s feeble objections. Suddenly a stupendous groan and profuse sputtering and splashing made Crassmor scan the far bank. He saw the giant drag himself onto dry land, gasping hoarsely, shedding water in rivulets.
Crassmor, treading water, sank lower and speculated on how long he could hold his breath. But Oorda’s attention had been attracted as well; she paused in her tirade. Seeing the monster in the moonlight, she cupped hands to her mouth and called down, “As for you, you worthless lump, I want a word with you as well! Your terrorizing days are over, fat clot! From now on, you work for your keep just like everyone else! Now, then, get your big ass back up here this instant!”
She resumed speaking to John and his cowed band. “This wallow is going to see some changes, or there’s going to be real trouble! What kind of people go around looking like beggars and smelling like sheep dip? Well?”
The knight noticed that the giant was still gaping up at her raving silhouette. After a moment the giant of John’s Winch turned to slink away upstream into the night, one fearsome guardian yielding his post to another.
Crassmor, breast-stroking away downstream quietly, meditated, not without pity, on the rough-handed civilizing that was about to transform John and John’s Winch.
Alanna was as good as her word. A low whistle signaled him, not far downriver. The dugout rested on the bank. “Are you being chased, good Sir Crassmor?” her voice came as he waded tiredly ashore.
“No,” he replied. “Your sister has John’s heart and mind well in hand, I believe, and more vulnerable components of his anatomy as well.” He sneezed.
“Bless,” she said automatically. “Come, take a blanket.”
He sat on the dugout’s gunwale, rubbing his tired arms and a knot in his calf. Alanna lit a lanthorn; in its glow, Bint and Arananth could be seen wrapped in cloaks, gazing blissfully into each other’s eyes, fingers intertwined. The swim had, in removing grit and grease, revealed Bint’s blond good looks.
Crassmor snorted. Arananth noticed him then. She asked, “And Oorda remains with John?” Crassmor sneezed again. “Inseparably.”
“Good,” Arananth declared promptly. “I was beginning to think she would never confess her feelings. In truth, I wanted to see her happy, but I did not know how much longer I could bear to linger in that cave and put up with John’s fumbling courtship.”
“Linger?” Crassmor screamed, what little satisfaction he had evaporating.
But Arananth was going on kindly. “And though your actions were rather precipitous, I thank you, Sir Knight, for helping Bint save me. Wasn’t he splendid?”
Crassmor was composing his reply when Alanna broke in. “Best we were on our way, dears.”
Roode and Dimble had appeared, to drag the canoe into the water. When they’d all boarded and shoved off, Alanna, seated behind Crassmor, dropped a flask into his lap. He took a sip of the nectar wine of Luur; his mood improved only marginally.
Arananth was asking, “Alanna, dear, couldn’t father find something for Bint to do around the place? He’s ever so handy, and we owe him so much.”
Bint sighed. “I am a Knight of Onn, sweetest Arananth, and have other obligations.”
Crassmor, staring sourly at the stars and listening to the dip of paddles, heard amusement in Alanna’s voice. “There are… alternatives; we shall have time to explore those. After all, I have to stay on for a while with poor Sir Crassmor to insure that he gets proper attention.”
That satisfied Arananth and Bint. Crassmor whispered, “Attention?”
Alanna chuckled. “Taken a chill, have you not? And gone through tribulations without number?. You need to recuperate and, no doubt, your sword arm has been strained. A sling would be in order.”
Twisting around, he studied her in the moonlight. Her humor and kindness brought up an ache that was Willow.
Alanna promised, “And when some pest shows up with a mission for a knight-errant, there I shall be to vouch that you’ve already rendered good service.” There was mischief to it.
Crassmor, considering that, liked it more each moment. He allowed himself one more modest sip of the nectar wine as the river took him far from John’s Winch.
- PART III –
* * *
AS FATE WOULD HAVE IT…
Chapter 13
UNEXPECTEDLY FORTUNATE
“He calls himself the Count di Cagliostro,” Bint said while Crassmor refilled his goblet for him. “When I left, he was about to take up residence in House Tarrant. He has shown great powers of healing, by force of his will and not by medication. He has charmed your father, as he has so many others in Dreambourn since he wandered in from the Beyonds. He’s made enemies as well.”
That troubled Crassmor. Few other wanderers-in had known the hospitality of House Tarrant and fewer still had won Combard’s favor, which was hard enough to win, as Crassmor could attest.
The subject of di Cagliostro wasn’t the only thing disturbing the knight’s peace of mind. There was also the original mission that had brought Bint into the Beyonds, a general summoning-home of all the Knights of the Order. The Grand Master had simply issued the command, directing Bint, among others, to carry it into the Beyonds.
Crassmor reclined once more on his plush lounging couch, which was carved from cedar in the form of a sphinx. Alanna, Bint, and Arananth occupied, respectively, couches shaped like a dragon, roc, and unicorn. All were positioned, head-inward, around a low table of some blond wood unknown to the knight, set with bands of agate-studded copper. They wore new clothes, the women in satin robes and the men in loose trousers and blouses of bright samite. The town was a fairly peaceful place, but Crassmor had Shhing beneath his couch, and Bint’s replacement blade was under his.
Dappled shade from an aged elm covered them, but the weather was mild and the breeze held no chill. Only a few paces away, the wide river bore all forms of traffic: a gilt pleasure barge with two banks of oars to a side, laughter and the music of many instruments drifting from it; intricately painted dories with good-fortune totems fastened to their bows; a keelboat being poled by straining men in buckskins and homespun; a graceful junk; and an old dahabeah.
The four had stopped in this river city not far from the borders of the Singularity to rest from their adventures in John’s Winch and arrange transport home. It should have been a pleasant interlude for Crassmor, what with the hospitality of the famous Kalleck Inn to enjoy and the company of Alanna. However, word of the general recall and news of this di Cagliostro had disquieted him. Thoughts of homecoming had put Willow’s face before him all his waking moments, and his dreams were troubled. He was beginning to suspect that the final curse flung at him by Fanarion, that he never know peace, had taken.
“It’s a thing that has worried many of us,” Bint continued, “for di Cagliostro’s reputation is that of a seer and sorcerer and a necromancer as well, though he claims as his purest interest the art of healing. He has engratiated himself with the Grand Master and won over friends in many of the Elder Houses. He is free-spending with gold and gems, though no one seems to know whence comes his wealth.”
Crassmor rubbed the heir’s ring. “Perhaps my father supplies him with those?”
Bint shook his head. “It’s rumored that di Cagliostro makes them, by his thaumaturgy. And his advice is sure profit to any gambler, though he gives it sparingly. The Lady Willow likes him not.”
At this, Alanna shot a quick glance at Crassmor, somewhat amused but a little arch as well. Crassmor, avoiding Alanna’s gaze, couldn’t resist asking Bint, “What of Willow?”
“Di Cagliostro showed interest in visiting her. But when he did, he seemed filled with a great unease. I think he was afraid of those rickety old guardsmen of hers.” Bint chuckled. “Can you imagine? And Willow was cold to him, unlike her usual self altogether, and he was stiff and unfriendly to her behind his veneer of smooth manners. The visit was short.”
Bint’s face had
taken on a look of sober earnestness, as it did for such subjects, but when Arananth smiled at him prettily and held up her goblet, his mouth turned up in a grin. He refilled it for her and she scrunched her nose at him. Bint blushed to the hairline.
Crassmor had just another sip of the wine himself and tried to thrust aside his misgivings, telling himself to enjoy life while he could. Alanna regarded him now with less affection and a certain acerbity. They both knew that the end of their interlude together was near. She had her father’s farmhold to administer and, as Alanna knew, Crassmor had his duty to the Order, and Willow.
Crassmor reared up on one elbow to signal with a lazy forefinger. Across the lawn, by the entrance to the Kalleck Inn, a servant in a blindingly white tunic caught the gesture and hurried to fetch another decanter from the cavernous, whitewashed stucco bin.
Bint added, “This order to get us back to Gateshield comes directly by the command of the King, but Ironwicca has told no man his reason.” He gave Arananth a guilty look; the thought of parting came with difficulty to both young people.
Arananth pushed herself up so that she knelt with knees deep-sunk in the unicorn’s plush. “Fie! Are you so eager to be shut of me, then? Get you gone! Boor! Kitchen knave! If you care so little for me, then I care nothing for you!”
She sprang up and flounced away, to stand at the inn’s dock, watching the floating traffic, in a monumental pout. Bint spilled his wine in his haste to run after her, all apologies. Crassmor and Alanna both laughed softly as Arananth stamped a slender foot and kept her back to him. Bint’s voice cracked several times as he strove to make amends. Alanna came and sat at the foot of Crassmor’s couch. “He feels duty-bound to be on his way back to your Singularity,” she said.
“Let him learn to savor life while he can,” Crassmor returned. “He’d be duty-bound to the scullery in John’s Winch right now, or dead, if things had gone just a little differently.”
Her look was enigmatic. “All would be much different,” she said, “if that little lame fellow hadn’t found me and told me where I might enlist a Knight of Onn.”
He was sitting up in an instant, his tone taking her by surprise. “What fellow?”
She blinked, then shrugged. “Small, old, frail, balding. He walked with a limp. His clothes gave him no distinction, but he spoke well. He came to me in a way station as I waited with Roode and Dimble to resume our journey to Dreambourn, saying he’d heard of my plight from the coachman. He directed me to you in Toe Hold and cautioned that I would have to play a trick upon you, for you were feigning injury. I was not unwary of him, but the time left to me was very short; John wanted to marry Arananth as soon as he could. I decided to try it—”
“A limp, you said,” Crassmor interjected. “And what hair was left was white, over a well-freckled pate?”
She nodded. He slapped his forehead and sank back on the couch with eyes tight-shut, to groan, “Mooncollar!”
He reopened them to find her gazing at him oddly. “A Klybesian,” he elaborated. “And not in the vicinity by chance, or he wouldn’t have been in layman’s clothes.”
“Perhaps it wasn’t the same man,” Alanna suggested.
“It was, it was. Klybesians are bound not to take life themselves, and their powers and endeavors are tied up with that vow in some arcane way. But they are geniuses at finding themselves roundabout ways of doing people in. Oh, yes, it was Mooncollar who sent you after me. I’d wager that word of Arananth’s plight didn’t reach Bint by accident either. Mooncollar came upon an ideal opportunity: your sisters’ captivity. He lured Bint in, then used Bint to draw me. Chances were excellent that neither of us would come out.”
Alanna was puzzled. “But why a war against you two?”
“Not Bint; me. With me out of the way, a Klybesian would control House Tarrant. I find it hard to believe that Uncle Furd is involved in this, though. Perhaps it is the doing of Mooncollar alone. We may have eluded him when we left John’s Winch, but we shall have to be on our guard.”
“This is all the more reason for you to return home,” she said, a fact she’d accepted. She leaned down upon him, half-lying across his chest on the broad couch. The few diners at the other tables scattered over the broad lawn took little notice; public deportment was a personal matter in most of the Beyonds, as in the Singularity.
He smelled her perfume, and her eyes held his. “Last night in your sleep,” she told him, “you said Willow’s name.” She touched the inner pocket of his blouse, where he carried Willow’s red scarf. “And we both know what is here.” Her smile was fond and knowing and sad. “It just may be that you are needed back there.”
Bint was returning with Arananth, still pressing his apologies and explanations on her. Crassmor said, “And they must part too.”
“It is a misfortune,” she admitted softly. “This is Bint’s first affair of the heart, I think. I know it is Arananth’s.” Crassmor thought of the poems Bint had composed for the girl, the flowers picked and carefully arranged, the songs sung to her with such feeling.
Alanna spoke up as the younger couple returned. “Bint, I think the time has come for Knights of Onn to heed the command of their Grand Master.” Bint was no less taken off guard by that than Crassmor himself.
Arananth, beginning to well over with tears, said, “So Sir Bint rides away and leaves broken the heart of Arananth, nor does he care! Why should he not forget her, there among the pleasures of Dreambourn?”
Alanna suggested, “Why not go with him, silly goose?”
They all turned to her, brows raised. Alanna went on. “Surely the guarantee of two knights is assurance enough for your well-being and safekeeping. You always wished to see the Singularity, sister; now do.”
Crassmor listened to Bint’s stuttered thanks and Arananth’s breathless agreement with amusement, but admired Alanna for her effort to make them happy. “She is welcome at House Tarrant,” he offered, adding dryly, “And no one will question the quality of my father’s chaperonage.” That put a moment’s doubt on the faces of the young couple and almost made Crassmor laugh out loud.
“Off with you, Bint,” he ordered, “and make preparations for travel. Buy us horses and supplies, but quietly, quietly. And ask about—Lonar, the tavernkeep, would be a good place to start—if anyone resembling Mooncollar has been seen in town. I’ll explain later.”
Bint set off with Arananth by his side. Alanna took Crassmor’s hand and drew him off the couch. “And for us, farewell,” she anticipated, “or at least until and unless you wish to see me again. But this I promise,” she finished, raising him up and leading him off by the hand toward the rooms they shared. “You will not forget Alanna easily.”
They’d come across a series of precipitous tors by means of a trail that switched back and forth on itself. Both knights now bore light lances with glittering, foot-long heads, their reddish, hardwood shafts wound with blue hemp cord. They also bore long oval shields covered with zebra skin. In addition, Bint had a cased bow and quiver hanging from his saddle. The two knights wore hip-length coats of mascled armor. Arananth had on sturdy boots and leggings, swathings of green cloak, and a deep-shadowed hood. Crassmor, having parted company with Alanna, now wore Willow’s red scarf attached to Shhing’s baldric for reasons he had trouble identifying; it made him feel wretched about the parting, but eager to be home. He wore another scarf, a white one, at his throat.
A forest of blue pines swallowed them up for half a day, the sun penetrating the canopy of needles only now and again with milky rays that seemed to pick out every dust mote in the air. Crassmor and Bint knew with a marrow-deep certainty that they were close to the Singularity.
Time and again Crassmor or Bint would turn to look behind or drop back, to try to see if they were being followed. No scout’s trick or wilderness tactic known to either of them gave any confirmation of it. That couldn’t dissuade Crassmor from the conviction that Mooncollar was somewhere behind, a scheming shadow. The monk, Crassmor knew, had a natu
ral gift for stealth, a talent for spying. Again, Mooncollar might have provided himself with some supernatural means of keeping track of the trio’s movements. Crassmor had spent enough time in the Beyonds not to discount his own instincts, whether they were borne out by immediate proof or not.
After a stop among the pines, he rode listening with only half an ear to the flirtations of Arananth and Bint as he worked on idea after idea. He could think of no reliable way to draw out Mooncollar without betraying the fact that he knew of the monk’s machinations; Crassmor hesitated to yield that slight advantage. He glanced sourly behind, before, to either side, and overhead from habit. He knew by now that the Klybesian would be a prudent distance away, beyond perception.
There had passed through the knight’s mind the idea of soliciting help from another Lost Boy, but any meeting with another member of the Order would be sheer luck, and the trio had encountered no one else whom Crassmor had felt he could trust. He’d thought of enlisting magical aid, but had been at a loss as to how to go about it. Robin Goodfellow might cooperate for a lark, or Puck, though the sprites were more inclined to play tricks. And getting in touch with any supernatural entity was an entirely different problem from meeting one at random. Methods of invocation or summoning varied, and the knight was no magician.
The three came out of the forest and through some low hills. They found themselves riding the shore of a broad, rolling sea of grass, which brushed above their horses’ fetlocks. They rode warily, keeping near the tree line. It was not the openness of the vast plain that made them cautious; it was what the plain held.
“By all that is worshipped,” Arananth breathed. Bint was wordless, and even Crassmor had nothing to add.