"I will sleep," Sir Tancred had said, shaking Ranulf's hand. "There is sure to be feasting and dancing at the castle later, and I would be fresh for that."
Ranulf, a trickle of sweat already dripping down his back, now ran his ungloved hand over the neck and back of Sir Tancred's grey charger, allowing the horse to smell and feel and become accustomed to him. The horse, which Sir Tancred said was called Hector, was rather better than the nags Ranulf had seen with the knight at previous tournaments. When he remarked on Hector's good looks, Sir Tancred had been quite open and unabashed about how he had acquired the beast.
"Yes, I know he is fine, and it is all down to my Lady of Lilies. She brought me Hector."
"And from where had she such a horse?" Ranulf had asked, but he was given no answer. Sir Tancred had been keen to praise the princess and nothing else.
"Easy, lad, easy great Hector." Ranulf coaxed the horse, stroking him over, lifting and checking each of the charger's huge hooves in turn. Hector had put his ears back once and then settled: in spirit he seemed as easy-going as his master.
"Which is why that princess can wind him like a ribbon round her finger," Ranulf grunted into the horse's chest. He was boiling in this wretched plate and mail suit, though the mail was a little loose on him. The plate armour was a new thing and he was surprised Tancred had some.
"No doubt due to our Lady of Lilies again, but how does a princess from beyond the land of Cathay know of these things?"
Hector whickered softly, as if in agreement.
"And that sword of his, my lad—it has a wicked point. I have not seen such a blade before today. 'T'will be most deadly earnest in combat: a sharp tip to stab through slits in armour. I wager that is our lady's influence, also."
Ranulf patted Hector's flank and began to groom his haunches, motioning to his squire to groom the horse's other side. Questions bit at him like fleas: Was she truly from China? Did women really dress that way there? How did she know of metal and swords? Why was she not at the court of the king?
Lady Blanche was a true and sprightly lady but the castle of Fitneyclare was, in brute terms, small and old. Lady Blanche and Lord Richard were not swimming in wealth: the joust was here because London was filled with pestilence and the nobility scattered. He himself would not have come had it not been that the tourney, any tourney, was his life these days. He knew that the prizes would be small.
Why then, would a princess of the east come here?
Deep in thought, he placed his own helm on his head—he would not ever fight in another knight's helmet—and covered it with the trinkets Sir Tancred had used in his costume. It gave him particular pleasure to thread and pin the princess' tokens to his chest where she would be certain to see them. Why not? Today he fought as an unknown knight and Olwen would have understood.
Even so, he tucked one of Olwen's seed pearls into his glove, feeling less disloyal as the smooth bead settled into the hollow of his palm. He was used to fighting with something of his wife's snug against his skin.
A memory of them cuddling scorched through him, twisting in his heart. Longing to blot out the pain he mounted Hector and straightened in the saddle, desperate to begin. Any challenge would do, and as proxy to Sir Tancred—no, Sir Dew of the Moon—he had plenty.
"Stay here: I will carry the spare lances," he told Edmund, knowing that otherwise he would recognized by his lanky squire. He wound a cloth about his helm, hiding his face, and spurred his borrowed horse to gallop to the place of battle.
Beneath him Hector caught his mood and snorted, racing smoothly now as Ranulf gave him his head.
Let it be that knight with the badge of white and red fist. Let me know him again, even if he fights in the costume of a nun. Let it be him.
Edith touched her gloves, ensuring that they were snug and covering her hands. She knew this was a nervous habit, but after months of artifice and pretence, she was still fretful in the company of ladies.
Men held no fear for her. She had made her costumes to distract men. The silks and rarer cottons she and those of her company wore were truly from the east, brought back by her sailor grandfather and hidden by his wife who had considered them too exotic. Edith, aware she had a gift for seeing shape and lines, the whole appearance and function of a thing, had imagined her princess costumes as she might have done a sword, or a mace; as a vital weapon. She had conceived them in the same deadly serious manner as she would have created a dagger.
"You have a knack for it," Teodwin had remarked once, "as I have for tents and garlands, it seems."
Teodwin, the former grumbler and loud mouth, was right. Cutting a gaudy figure in purple silk, he was more active, agile and happy than Edith had ever seen him.
Even his weeping sores had cleared. But then, leaving the slavery of the fields had released something in each of the former villagers, and all her people had discovered new talents. The world of chivalry was an enchantment to them: "It is as if we are living in a story," as Maria had said.
But the damsels of these tournaments were dangerous. Even the "Brides of the Joust"—the women who followed the knights and squires from tourney to tourney—were a risk. They were more observant than men, more keen on the forms of manners, more likely to notice if she made a mistake in how she ate or drank or conversed. She always exaggerated her “eastern” accent amidst womenfolk, and spoke as little as possible.
"You are comfortable, Princess?" Lady Blanche asked at once, noticing her slight movement. "This English sun is not too strong for you?"
"It is not, Madam," Edith answered slowly.
"The colour of your veil today is very pretty," said Lady Blanche, screwing up her slight pop-eyes as if trying to look behind her veil.
"Thank you, Madam. Yellow is considered to be a lucky colour in my land." I should have complimented her on some part of her costume, Edith thought too late. Talking over trifles was a strange thing to her: in the village there had been no time for such matters.
"Yellow is my colour today," said another woman eagerly. She was standing close to the seats, sheltering from the afternoon sun beneath the awning, although Edith knew she was no maid or lady. She was not a trader, either, and by custom Edith knew she should not speak to her.
"The tunic looks very fine on you," she remarked, while beside her Lady Blanche was stiff and horse-faced with disapproval.
The young, red-headed woman—scarcely more than a girl—sniffed in surprise, grinned and then whirled off in a gaudy spiral of yellow, the pendants round her neck clashing as she sped away.
"You must not encourage the dagger-girls, princess," said Lady Blanche at once. "Women aping men are best not spoken to."
"In my land, all speak to all," Edith replied, wishing she might be braver. The girls who chose to follow the joust and come to tourneys dressed as young men, displaying their legs and figures in male tunics and sporting the daggers that gave such girls their nickname, were more akin to her than they knew. But even with dagger-girls, even with indulgent Sir Tancred, she dare say nothing of her true state.
The dagger-girl who thinks she has won some words of praise from a princess would be less pleased if she knew I am a peasant.
Arrogance was the way of the world, but since it gained her and her folk food, shelter, fine clothes, flowers, music, and the spectacle of men-at-arms who fought in play and not in lethal intent, Edith had chosen to be as proud as the rest. She nodded now, as if in thanks, to Lady Blanche, and, hearing the familiar rumble of hooves, turned her attention to the approaching knights.
She saw Sir Tancred, mounted on Hector, the war horse she and her people had discovered slowly starving in a barn where Hector's master had crawled away to die. She smiled at the pearls and billowing grey cloak: Sir Tancred always entered enthusiastically into the festive parts of the joust. It was his fighting skills that were less than lethal.
"Poor Sir T," she murmured softly, then suddenly, seeing the two lances he carried, she straightened, sitting stiff-backed on her cu
shion.
Sir Tancred never carried more than one lance!
So who was this knight fighting in his place?
A wave of heat flooded up her throat and she swallowed a mouthful of bitter bile. Sir Tancred had done this without her knowledge and any change she did not know of was alarming, because it could be a threat to her and her people.
"He sits well in the saddle, Sir Dew of the Moon," remarked Lady Blanche beside her. Her ladies agreed, whispering and pointing, some giggling behind their hands, and Edith nodded, swallowing a second time. She knew who it would be, and, seeing her own favours littered across his broad chest, she suspected why he had done this.
I refused him a favour and he has gained many, by way of deceit. He has lied! He is no true knight!
As you are no true princess, Gregory-in-her-memory reminded her. Edith thrust this disconcerting thought aside and leaned forward, squinting through the dazzling sun. She was glad his head was covered: she did not have to look at his smug, victorious face. Deep in her chest came an old ache, one of disappointment.
Why must men be so petty? He looks like King Arthur returned, grand as a bear and moving with the horse as if he is a centaur. The sun gilds his armour, he carries his sword and lances as easily as if they were flowers. He stands in his stirrups, bowing his head in polite acknowledgement of the cheering crowd and damsels. And all the time he holds my things and clutches them in spiteful glee.
She had known other men like that. Men who would not accept "No" as an answer....
"Do not judge," she murmured, failing to suppress a shiver as other memories roosted in her mind like rooks in a tree. "Adam was, in the end, a good man, and Peter may have been, had he lived."
But was this nameless knight?
Who is he? She would have asked Sir Tancred, but he was no doubt taking in ease in the stranger's tent and, she hoped, avoiding the sellers of day-old herring pies: her middling knight was middling for several reasons, one being that he preferred song and poetry to fighting.
As do I, but this knight of the stream is different.
He rode with an intent that made her tremble, now without acknowledging others on the field, or the good wishes of the spectators but speeding by all, as if he was searching for someone. His intensity, the way he was locked within himself, made her tremble afresh, the more so when she realized he also had Sir Tancred's new sword; the one she had devised after many hours of careful tourney-watching, putting her smithying skills to use for a week in a deserted hamlet, where even the animals had fled.
He has not drawn it yet, but what if he uses it as intended, to drive between a knight's chain mail? I could give this sword to Tancred, for he is no killer, but this stranger knight is far harder.
"Princess? Pardon, I mean, my Lady Jade?" Lady Blanche touched her arm, but Edith, rising to her feet so swiftly that her stool and cushion both overturned, scarcely heard or felt anything. She kicked off her shoes, the better to run.
"He is making for someone," she breathed, as the knight stood up on his stirrups again and roared out an unintelligible challenge, flinging aside a lance and couching the other, spurring Hector to a speed the war-horse had never tried before.
"A doughty call to arms," remarked Lady Blanche, while her ladies burst into applause, but Edith was already hastening for the steps out of the wooden stand. At the far end of the jousting field, scrambling to be ready, she could see a knight dressed as a monk, with a brown cassock over his armour. He was hefting a white shield with a red fist blazoned upon it, raising it desperately to his face as the unknown knight thrust his own lance directly at his opponent's eyes. Edith was too far away to see but she could imagine the stark horror on Sir Henry's face—he carried a white shield with a red fist. Sir Henry who had been injured and was only now recovered -
She ran out onto the jousting ground, heedless of the shouts, deftly avoiding the squires who tried to stop her. "Murder!" The word and fear burst from her lips as, at the last moment, the unknown knight lowered his lance, smashing it against Sir Henry's middle, knocking him off his mount into the dust.
"Stop, stop!" Edith called, hearing Sir Henry's wild cries of "I yield, Sir! Mercy, I yield! God's bones, Sir Tancred —”
The rest of Sir Henry's complaint was stopped as the unknown knight launched himself off Hector and kicked Sir Henry savagely in the crotch. While he whimpered and writhed, the stranger knight tore the shield from his twitching arm and began to beat him with it.
"Like this, do you?" he was roaring, "Like to see how it feels?"
Edith, closing fast, and skidding aside from a second yelling squire, shouted, "No!" The knight was drawing the sword: she feared the worst. "No!"
Amazingly, he heard. Looming over the stricken, moaning Sir Henry, the knight stopped and turned his head.
"Get back, woman."
"Stop. Please, stop," Edith gasped, stopping herself within a long-sword‘s length of him. She had run so hard she could see lights swimming before her eyes but the stranger's face, half-hidden by the swathes of grey cloths and his helm, was altogether dark and his eyes were black with rage.
"One of yours, is he?"
Edith could hear the contempt in his voice, while at their feet, Sir Henry now coiled onto his side and was copiously sick on the grass. It was worse than a barney on the village green at Warren Hemlet, and as inglorious. She felt ashamed to have witnessed it. "Please," she said again, hating the way her voice was cracked and her throat as dry as a grave. "As a favour to me, Sir Jade."
"You claim me as your husband, do you, Lady Jade?"
Edith sank to her knees in exhaustion and shock. Scraps of what Sir Tancred had told her in the tent that morning came back to with the force of hammer blows. She knew who this knight was, now. Sir Ranulf of Fredenwyke, who fought in honour of his dead wife.
“Where is your black armour?” she whispered.
His scowled, flinging aside the cloth from his helmet, his handsome face revealed to be as dark as his armour.
“Mercy, for the sake of your wife?” she asked, her head feeling as if it would explode, her heart was beating so hard and fast. “Sir Ranulf?”
He glared at her as if she had struck him with dung.
“For that piece of cleverness, Madam, and to stop your lips from mentioning my dear wife ever again, I give you this noble knight.” He kicked the pallid Sir Henry on the knee, so harshly that Edith heard the bone beneath grind. The stricken, unfortunate Henry yelled out again.
“You should spare some of your eastern care on his page, also,” Sir Ranulf spat as he strode toward her, “that is, if you can spare the time between your own wanton amusements and sports.”
“What page is this?” Part of her was furious at the rest of his accusations but she kept that down, stamped on it and hammered it down in her mind, keen to learn about the child. She had not known Sir Henry had any pages in his retinue.
“One I will take now as my own. Some brutes are not fit to keep a dog, but then, what do you care? Clearly, you judge men by other means.”
His free hand was in a tight fist, as if he wanted to strike her, but now he straightened his fingers, jabbing toward her bare middle, dismissing her and her costume with that single gesture. He stalked by, passing so close that one of his borrowed ropes of pearls struck her across her face. She flinched at the shock but he kept going, keeping her favours and ignoring the gasps of the spectators as he moved to mount his borrowed horse and to take Sir Henry’s for his own, as a prize.
“She did not know about the page,” Offa said again. “And she sent her own healer to tend him. The one you sent away.”
“Leave it, man.” Ranulf had heard enough. Offa had been whining at his ungentle treatment of the princess for the rest of the day’s joust. “Get some rest in the wagon. You have an early start and a long journey ahead of you tomorrow.”
His steward instantly turned and marched out of his tent without any kind of bow and Ranulf cursed long and heartily. In one corne
r, Edmund his squire was teaching chess to the new page Gawain, who crouched over the pieces like a shivering little animal. No doubt the poor little lad was convinced that he had come to a worse master.
“Play well, you two, and do not sit up too late.” Ranulf nodded to the pair and left.
Knowing he was fit for no one's company, he did not leave the camp for the castle but took a cold bath in the stream. Once he thought he heard a gasp, issuing from the tree where the little brown maid had been, but only a cat stared back at him from the bushes and when he lay back in the river the evening was fine and still. He floated on his back, thinking of the cosmos and the wonder of God, of worlds, perhaps, beyond this one, of a time without pestilence, and told himself it was enough.
Edith draped the clean, dripping washing over the bushes beside her camp in order to dry it. Ranulf of Fredenwyke had almost caught her again by the river: she had thought he would be dancing with the damsels at the castle, not bathing. He had a splendid shape, a beautiful body, but watching him lolling in the water she told herself she had no more desire for him.
He is a dreamer, besides, and that is nonsense. The world is as is and we know of nothing else, nothing beyond it. There may be nothing beyond it. Only an idle knight and a simpering damsel can be dreamers; the rest of us must work.
She had pounded the washing on the stones farther up the river, away from him. It was the wrong time of day for such work but she had been compelled to do something; she was so annoyed with that man. Now her arms ached and her chest ached and her rough tunic—she had changed to do the washing—was as wet as a fish. She had not gone to the castle because of manners—she always dreaded being seated and trapped at a feast, where the women would see she did not know how to behave.
But I do not throw kindness in another’s face. He could have accepted my healer for the little lad, if little lad there is. She had not been able to ask Sir Henry and would not: she knew she would get no true answers.
Love and Chivalry: Four Medieval Historical Romances Page 88