Squire's Blood

by Peter Telep

  No, Woodward had not liked hearing that. But Orvin knew there were things he could get away with saying because of his age. Gray hair gave one a lot of free conversational ground. He could criticize the king if he wanted, but for the moment, he could find no fault in Arthur’s siege plans. The king would not start making mistakes until Merlin arrived. If Orvin could keep the druid away, under the pretense that someone must stay with Marigween, then Arthur just might win the castle back. Thus far, the plan was working.

  There was something Orvin had forgotten to do, and as he thought about it, he couldn’t believe he had made such an error. He knew that Arthur suspected Christopher was inside the castle trying to rescue his friend, but he wanted to confirm that notion to the king. Arthur needed to know for sure that Christopher was inside, so that when the squire escaped he would not be accidentally killed by the Celt archers. The Celts needed to be on the lookout for young Christopher.

  But Orvin could not tell Arthur he had physically . seen Christopher go into the castle; he knew it only from the sky. Whether Arthur believed him or not didn’t matter now. What mattered was that he should have told Arthur when he had first returned to Shores.

  Yet it had slipped his mind!

  Am I getting that old? Was I so preoccupied with getting a meal that I forgot all about the patron saint?

  No! It was unintentional . . . but I must mend my mistake. Now. Yes. Now.

  There, he had decided. He rose and stepped past a line of low-lying shrubs and started down the dirt road toward the king’s tent, erected five hundred yards south of the wood.

  Orvin was a mere fifty yards into the journey when he spotted her sitting idly in front of a dying cookfire, staring with distant eyes into the puffs of thin white smoke that rose like cold morning breath into the sky. “Brenna? Is it you? The young raven maid from Gore?”

  Her hair was the same, perhaps a few inches longer, but just as raven black as he remembered it. Her face was a little leaner, a bit gaunt, even, as if she had not eaten well for the past moon. The sun had browned her skin and there were new lines on her forehead and one near her right eye that Orvin felt made her look not older but strangely wiser. She was smart enough to get to Shores-and that must have been a feat. Had someone helped her? Had she come with her family? If so, for what purpose? To see Christopher? No, that was lunacy. She had come for some other reason and it was convenient for her to see Christopher. But for what other reason would she have ventured into the middle of a siege!

  Look at her, you old fool! She looks like she’s just been on a terribly rough and long journey. Use your eyes to see, Orvin. M y God, she’s come for the saint! Has she seen him already? Has he told her about M arigween and the child? Has he broken her heart?

  Or worse! Has Christopher lied to her? Would that fickle boy try to court Brenna while sharing a child with M arigween?

  Orvin. Orvin. Have more faith in your apprentice. Christopher is too smart to do that. If they have met, he has broken her heart. Look at her now. She looks lost. She looks as if she has learned the truth.

  Brenna stood, smoothed out her soiled kirtle, then raked the fingers of one hand through the right side of her hair, removing a pair of small twigs which had become tangled there. She was too aware of her appearance, and Orvin sensed that she was ashamed of it. The softness and timidity of her voice confirmed that: “Yes, Sir Orvin”-she let out a breath-“it’s me. I’ve forgotten how long it’s been. I thought you might visit Gore, but you never did.”

  Suddenly Orvin was on the defensive, staring into Brenna’s lovely eyes.

  Don’t lust after the young girl like you did M arigween!

  But I can’t help thinking that!

  It’s fine to think it. Do nothing about it, and don’t let it affect your conversation!

  “I wanted so much to visit Gore, to see you and your family again, to see so many old friends who went there after my son’s death. But my back”- Orvin placed a palm on his lower spine-‘Tm sure it would have bro­ ken on such a long journey.” It was not a lie, but a fear he had honestly had. Still, it was true he could have overcome the fear and gone to Gore. It wasn’t that much farther away from Shores than Merlin’s cave.

  Brenna’s smile was wan, but there. “We still have your mule.”

  “Cara?” Orvin asked, fervently wishing his old mount was still alive.

  She nodded. “I’m afraid I sold the saddle Christopher had made for her, but I don’t think she liked it anyway.”

  Orvin returned her nod. “You know Cara all right.” Orvin felt the weight on his feet seemingly multiply, and knew he had to relieve the pressure. “Do you mind if I sit?”

  “Here,” Brenna said, circling around the cookfire and taking his arm, “let me help you.”

  She guided him down, and Orvin made what had become his ritualistic groan as his weight finally set­tled onto his rump. “There. Much better. Don’t ever get old, Brenna. It is no fun at all.”

  Brenna sat quickly, her agility demonstrated before his immediately jealous gaze. “Do you know where Christopher is?”

  He should have known that she brimmed with questions. Deep down he did, but despite that he wanted very much to be with her at the moment, to share a bit of the past that conjured up a lot of good feelings, and, of course, a lot of bad ones. Yes, they would talk about Christopher; he would dominate their dialogue. But were there still secrets to be kept? Orvin had to find out.

  “Yes,” he answered, “but first let me ask you a question and then I’ll tell you.”

  “Please ask,” she said anxiously, rocking back and forth with a new, burnished light in her eyes.

  “What are you doing here? How did you get here?

  And have you spoken with Christopher recently?”

  “Sir Orvin, that’s three questions,” Brenna said in a teasing voice. She was, indeed, jovial. “But I’ll answer all of them just the same. I came here to see Christopher. I grew tired of waiting. I wanted to be here for him. I tried to bring my friend Wynne along, but she got hurt and I had to send her back home. I’ve come so far and so long to see him-and still we have not been reunited! Thank the Lord I was able to remind King Arthur who I am and explain why I’m here. After a lot of pleading, he finally granted me permission to stay, albeit far from the battle. And I told him I will help in any way I can, cooking, laundry, anything.”

  Orvin creased his brow in thought, analyzing the situation thus far. Christopher had not been able to tell her about Marigween and the child. Orvin could do it now and spare Christopher the anguish.

  No, that would be wrong. He would be meddling. That very act would make him no different than Merlin. Telling Brenna was Christopher’s duty. The boy would have to do it. A new question formed: “Did the king tell you where Christopher was?”

  “All he said was that he had an idea but he could not be sure. I think he’s very upset with Christopher, though. He said something under his breath that I didn’t quite hear, but made me think that.” Brenna sighed. “I hope Christopher is not in much trouble. Where do you think he is?”

  “He is inside the castle,” Orvin said, the matter-of­ fact tone in his voice intentional. There was some­ thing about knowing when others didn’t that always made him feel a little powerful, and always made him want to understate that power in the tone of his voice. Yes, the world’s coming to an end. He would deliver that statement as if commenting on the salt content of a particular fillet of fish.

  “Has he been taken prisoner?” Brenna asked, her eyes unable to widen any more with concern.

  Orvin continued to deliver the facts, knowing he had become the center of Brenna’s world. He liked that. When some thought him a mindless recluse, she saw him as a wise man, an esteemed knight who held the key to unlock her happiness. And her attention was undivided, her eyes so firmly glued to his that he could almost feel the connection. “Christopher went into the castle to rescue his friend, Doyle. There is a way in through the moat. If he’s had any luck, h
e should be coming out soon.”

  “God, Orvin, how can you be so sure! They must’ve caught him! There must be scores and scores of Saxons inside the keep alone. Do not tell me you saw it up there.” She pointed to the sky with an index finger, and as her gaze lifted, Orvin saw tears flood her eyes.

  She was much harder, much stronger than the raven maid he remembered. No longer was she the shy chamber girl infatuated with a young, handsome squire. She was, in many ways, now a woman, hard­ ened by the world and driven by her desires to a place of pain and death. The tears were of frustra­tion, of a love Orvin sensed was so deep, so meaning­ ful, that it scared him. It scared him because he knew Christopher would have to shatter it.

  “Faith,” Orvin said, beating the word out into the air. “I see that is still something that eludes youth. You’ve changed a lot, Brenna. You are … almost a woman. Faith is still the one thing you lack.”

  Brenna stood and turned away, lowered her head, then put a palm to her face. Orvin was not sure if she wept or not; she made no sound.

  It was one of those moments in which, a countless number of moons ago, Orvin would have stood and gone to her side and held and comforted her. His physical inability to do so angered him. He had made no mistake, striking her with steely words, but at the same time he could, in a very small but significant way, relate to her pain. He had spent a lot of time separated from Donella and had many times been teased with the idea of them coming together, only to have it ordered away by another knightly duty. The strain on their relationship had often made him ques­tion whether knighthood was really what he wanted. But the course of his life had already been laid in heavy stones. And as he looked at Brenna, he imagined that long ago his own Donella had grieved the same.

  “Brenna, believe he’s alive and that you will see him again. Let that belief carry you now. But also remember, as I have seen a change in you, so will you see one in Christopher. He, like you, has become hardened by the world, or more precisely in his case, the battlefield.”

  It was important that he not lead her on. There must be some way to ease her into the events to come, but at the moment, a way to do that eluded Orvin. He could not even hint about Christopher’s situation, for she might reach her own conclusions, which might be wildly false, or bull’s-eye the truth. She would urge him for confirmation and they would drop into an argument. All he could do was say what he had, that the patron saint was changed. That would not prepare her for what Christopher would say. But all of the speculation on Orvin’s part. He could not even guess how Christopher would handle her. He went on the assumption of how he would deal with her. He would confront Brenna and tell her the truth, knowing at his age that honesty was the only path to take. Christopher was young and raged with unbridled emotions. What he would do would only be known in time. The sky would not reveal it to Orvin; he had tried to conjure up the information, meditating after Christopher’s departure from the cave. But his mind had remained blank.

  Slowly, she pivoted back to face him and lowered her hand from her face. She had not shed a tear, but color had flooded her cheeks. “You say that Christopher has changed. Do you mean he doesn’t love me anymore?”

  Damn the insight of women!

  Orvin conversationally leapt to correct her. “No, no, no!”

  She sighed. “Then he does love me, thank goodness.” Orvin closed his eyes and rolled them back in his head. He could not tell her no. He could not tell her yes. The ultimate dilemma. His silence would convey a yes, yet that might be the truth. Indeed, Christopher might still love her. That probably had nothing to do with the fact that they simply had no future together. Orvin steadily realized that the more involved he became with her, the more dangerous it would be for his relationship with Christopher. Their ties were already frayed. The young saint lately questioned his judgment- something he had never done before. And if Christopher found out he had spoken with Brenna,

  the act might be mistaken for meddling.

  Maybe he shouldn’t have stopped to see Brenna at all! But it was too late for that and all he could do was bail himself out of the conversation in any way he could. He discarded the notion of confirming or denying Christopher’s love for Brenna and let her believe what she would. “When you meet up with Christopher again, you will not only see the squire of the body, dear Brenna, but you may be surprised to see … a man.”

  “If he comes back,” she retorted coldly. “I will never be as certain as you. You’re right. I do lack faith, only because I have believed for so long that Christopher would return, and I grew tired of believ­ ing. I wanted to make that happen. I have faith, Orvin. Faith in myself right now. But as for Christopher. He may die. And to think I came all this way only to see his body bum on a pyre … ” She broke off into finally released tears.

  “Christopher has too many things left to do in his life. If you could see what I have seen, dear raven maid, you would know. He’s just like the king! Not meant to live an ordinary life, but to be a part of something extraordinary, something that will be remembered always.”

  Orvin’s own words shocked him. Yes, he had always known there was something special about Christopher. But as he had just spoken, things had become oddly clear in his mind. It was not as if he stared into visions, as the sky often blurred into mind pictures, but as if his own heart had released feelings that were transformed into knowledge. The knowl­ edge that the future, with Christopher as a vital part of it, would be something spectacularly grand! He was chilled by the thought.

  Brenna stepped over to him and put her hand on his shoulder. “I pray you are right, Orvin. I pray you are right.”

  He lifted his gaze to hers. “I am,” he said in earnest. “And I am also terribly hungry. I only took a few scraps with me today. Is there anything-”

  “Let me help you up and I’ll fetch you a large bowl of a stew I started this morning. I wager there is a line of cart drivers already forming around the caul­ dron, so we’d better hurry.”

  Her tone had risen a notch, and as she helped him up, Orvin felt content over their meeting. Yet he also detected a heat of guilt on his back. The knowledge of Christopher’s family and what would come was a rising sun from which he sought shadow. The more things became illuminated, the more pain he knew Brenna would feel. He tried to ignore the heat and let her escort him to the food.

  3

  Christopher smiled weakly with recognition as he looked around the cell. It was the very cell he and Brenna had spent a brief time in during the first moon he had courted her. It had been an innocent midnight rendezvous that had almost landed him in a lot of trouble. The trouble he had experienced had come, thankfully, from Orvin, and though his master had been the last person in the world that he had wanted to let down at the time, at least Orvin had been the most understanding.

  Was there some kind of strange fate working that had put him back in the same cell?

  Neil seemed to think so. Upon voicing his memories of the place to the barbarian, the pudgy boy began a detailed inspection of the room, pressing his fingertips into every crack and groove of the cell, searching for another elusive secret exit. Christopher doubted Neil would find what he was looking for. Regan had been an expert jailer and had known the block better than anyone. The man had shown Christopher every way in and out of the place-save for one. Christopher wished he knew where that exit was, the one the Saxon guards had used to capture them. Christopher did know where it wasn’t-in their cell.

  “Forget it,” he told Neil, shooting the ferreting archer a cynical look.

  “I refuse to just stand here and wait to be chopped up!” Neil shot back.

  Though muffled by the thick walls of the cell and the encircling earth, Christopher thought he could hear the shouts of men. Something was going on out­ side. Perhaps Arthur had begun the siege. If that was the case, escape would be even harder. Escape. That word, that act, seemed a distant dream. Christopher tsked and sighed. As he absently rubbed the sore spots on his wrists left by t
he shackles, he attempted to open his mind to the other avenues of flight. But his mind was as locked up as his body. He felt his legs begin to shake and the tremor moved up into his torso, spilled into his arms, and rolled across his neck. And as the chills engulfed him, Christopher realized his confidence was gone. That fighting spirit he had been able to maintain even after being captured had finally left him. His hopelessness had become as thick and as sure as the iron bars in front of him. There was no escape now. He repeated that to himself. Seaver would come with his cohorts and they would hold down Neil and him and destroy their futures. His eyes grew heavy with tears as he considered what a fool he was.

  How many errors of judgment will I make in my life? I’ve made so many already that it seems I may lose my life! I don’t have any ideas on how to get out of this! There was always something, something that came to me right away. A plan. Sure, we can try to wrestle our way out of the guards’ grips when they enter the cell, but there will most likely be too many of them. That idea is about as good as my last one up in Doyle’s chamber. Here we are, behind these bars, and that is our fate. I have to accept that.

  No! No, I cannot accept that! Marigween and my son need me. King Arthur needs me as his squire. The other squires and varlets of the army need me. Even Sir Orvin and Merlin need me, if for nothing more than to have something to argue over.

  “I think I’ve found something,” Neil said.

  Christopher craned his head and saw that Neil knelt in front of a stone at the base of the floor, two stones away from the right rear comer of the cell. Christopher moved to Neil’s side and fell to his own knees, then he jammed his fingertips into the cracks around the stone where it met its neighbors. Christopher dug his nails in, and together they tried to pull the stone forward.

  It didn’t budge.

  “Let me try kicking it in,” Neil suggested. He fell back onto his rump, rested his palms on the floor for balance, drew back one of his booted feet, then kicked the stone. He repeated the action again, then again.