THREE

 

 

They called him by this north-name of bersaka with good reason. Melanthe was accustomed to games of combat, the innumerable hastiludes and tournaments and spectacles she had attended, celebrating every occasion from weddings to foreign embassies. A plaisance—pleasantries, as Lancaster had promised. But with his blunted tournament weapons, her Green Knight fought as if he meant to kill.

Melanthe had led him last into the lists, holding back until two lines had formed: opposing ranks of destriers and knights, their banners waving gently over the fantastical crests of staghorns and griffons and outlandish beasts, as if each man vied to display a deeper nightmare than the next atop his helm. Down the open space between she led her Green Sire, halting at the center to the sound of scattered cool applause. The moment she had released his horse, a pair of pages in Lancaster’s livery hurried up to her, catching her by the hand and escorting her to a place upon the escafaut below Prince Edward on his red-draped couch and dais. She curtsied deeply to the prince and princess, then took her seat next to the duke’s empty chair.

There was to be no old-fashioned melee. At the stout gate into the tilting ground, a monument of red stone held the insignia of the defenders. As each knight had ridden past in the procession, he had struck the shield of his choice to issue his challenge—and the green shield emblazoned with a silver falcon bore so many sword and lance wounds of challenge that the wood showed through the paint. Not every knight had touched it; many had raised their weapons and brought them down as if they would hit the falcon, then at the last instant held back, bowing deliberately toward Lancaster, and struck some other arms.

But even so, there were no less than a score of rivals beyond the duke himself who had signaled a wish to fight for Melanthe’s favor. The trumpets sounded, clearing the lists of all but Lancaster’s swarm of attendants and her champion with his single man. As the Green Sire reined his destrier into position, the jeers began. They would not sneer openly at Melanthe, but her champion was fair game, it seemed.

The entire crowd burst into frenzied acclaim for Lancaster as the duke rode forward into place, surrounded by his squires and grooms. The Green Sire made no sign of noticing either applause or taunts; he rested his lance on the ground and slipped Gryngolet’s jesses from the tip. The marshal of the lists accepted responsibility for Melanthe’s prize, riding back to the escafaut. As he handed her the jesses, both combatants lifted their lances in salute.

Melanthe bowed to her champion, ignoring Lancaster.

The trumpets clarioned. The lances swung downward. Both horses roused; the Green Knight’s half reared and came down squarely as Lancaster’s was already trotting forward. The green destrier sprang off its haunches into a gallop. Lancaster’s bay mount hit its stride, rolling the sound of hoof-beats over the stands and the crowd.

An instant before impact, the Green Knight threw his shield away. The crowd roared, obscuring the sound as the lances hit. Lancaster’s bounced upward, flying free and solid into the air along with the shattered splinters of his opponent’s weapon. The Green Sire pulled up at the far end of the list, carrying half of a demolished tournament spear in one hand.

Tossing away his shield was the entire extent of his consideration for his prince. In five more courses he broke five lances on the duke, and took off Lancaster’s helm on the sixth—whereupon the marshal threw down his white arrow to end the match. To Melanthe’s displeasure, Lancaster accepted this without demur, not even demanding to go on to the foot combat.

Amid a murmur that spoke faintly of disfavor from the crowd, the duke saluted Melanthe and his brother and left the lists with his retinue.

She had not counted upon such a paltry showing. Not even the partisan onlookers could accuse her of withholding her favor from him without reason. But when he joined her upon the escafaut, he seemed unembarrassed—gay, rather, speaking favorably of his opponent’s skill to his brother Edward for a moment before he sat down beside Melanthe. The musicians behind them struck up warbling tunes.

"A fair fight, my lady," he said, "though your champion makes no fine distinction between battlefield and tourney. I only hope that he slays none of our guests."

She felt an irritated urge to rise to this bait. "He faced you without shield," she said shortly.

"Yea—so they told me, but indeed I did not know it until he took off my helm, or I should have done the same." He raised his hand for refreshment and took the cup his squire offered, drinking deeply. "Or mayhap not. Mary, I have no desire to be run through in a joust and buried in unconsecrated ground."

He laughed, but there was a glitter of deeper emotion in him. Melanthe watched him as he drained the wine, tossed the cup down, and turned back to the lists with relish. This was some artificial show—she felt it, studying his unabashed countenance. It was not over yet, not at all. Lancaster had no intention of concluding with such a poor display.

She turned a look of better humor upon him. "I will not believe you stand in such peril, sir. Come, you will fight again, will you not?"

The flicker of hesitation told her all that she need know. "Why—nay, madam. I will take my ease at your side, if you will be kind. Here, now comes your champion into the lists again."

A challenger, emblazoned in gold and black and crested by the gilt head of a leopard, was being led into position by two squires, while Melanthe’s knight circled his courser and backed it into place. He had resumed his fighting shield. The lances dipped; a gold-and-black squire shouted and stabbed a stick into the rump of the other horse. The animal jumped forward under the goad, galloping wildly, half shying as her champion’s stallion bore down upon it.

The green lance caught its target full in the chest. With a jerk he sailed from the saddle as the horse went down. They somersaulted in opposite directions, the destrier hauling itself upright in a flail of hooves and caparisons to trot intemperately about the list, evading attempts to capture it.

"Poorly mounted," Lancaster murmured dryly.

The gold challenger struggled to his feet, pulling off his helmet and demanding his ax. The Green Sire dismounted, changing to a bascinet helm and sending the visor down with a clamp as the hunchback led his mount away. The challenger came at him, swinging a long-handled ax. It whirred past his shoulder as he stepped aside; he lifted his weapon and took a single cut behind his opponent’s knees. The other man fell—and one more murderous strike, blade-on to his helmet, slicing an edge through the metal, was enough to make him shout pax. He was bleeding at the temple when his squire pulled off his helmet.

They did not proceed to the sword combat.

While the musicians played harmonious melodies and Melanthe sat calmly beside Lancaster, her champion smashed the pretensions of three more challengers. Two lances were shattered on him, but no contender fought as far as the swords, and one left the first course of axes with a broken hand.

Outside the lists, where common men-at-arms mingled with the squires and pages, there was a small but growing band of onlookers who met the Green Sire’s victories with a ragged volley of cheers. Melanthe made no sign herself, but a feeling of pleasant awe began to steal over her, watching him fight. Berserker, indeed. It only remained to see that Lancaster be fired to face her champion again.

Melanthe already suspected the duke’s intention. To allow a goodly number of challengers, wearing his rival down and painting him invincible at the same time...then perhaps a private visitation by some secret "friend," warning him of his prince’s displeasure and designed to shake his nerve...and somehow Lancaster, fresh from hours of relaxation in the stands, would find a reason to meet the Green Sire at the end of the day.

She could appreciate Lancaster’s design. It required a fine judgment—Melanthe smiled inwardly as he lifted a finger to communicate with the marshal of the lists, who instantly caused the heralding of a new set of combatants, allowing the Green Sire his first rest. It would not do to have him appear too easy—and just as vital to properly exhaust him before the coup de grace.

Melanthe prepared to ensure that the duke misjudged his moment.

She toyed with the jeweled jesses, turning a disinterested look on the new jousters. "Tell me of my champion," she said. "He is nameless in truth?"

"Nameless, yea, my lady. A nobody. He gives homage and claims our service, but brings no men of his own beyond that malformed squire."

"No lands, then? But such rich gear, and a great war-horse. He has won many prizes in tournament, I expect?"

The duke laughed. "Few enough, for I’ve better use for him in real fighting, but it is true that when he enters the lists, he prevails. I have sometimes sent him on a dragon hunt, for sport, but he brings me no prize yet."

"And still he has not proved himself worthy of his name?"

Lancaster turned his palm up casually. "The fortunes of war and dragons, my lady. All must await their great chance at honor, if it ever comes." He shrugged. "Haps he has no name. God only must know where he thieved his gear. It’s my thought that he’s naught but a freeman."

"A freeman!" Melanthe turned in amazement.

"Else why hide his lineage? That falcon device is recorded on no roll of rightful arms, so say the heralds. But the Green Sire has a talent to lead common soldiers. What men he commands, they come to love him, and the French dread his name. No great chivalry in that, but it is a useful art." He leaned back in his chair and smiled. "So we tolerate his odds and his unlawful device and green horse, Princess—and if he likes to call you his liege lady for a fantasy, then we will enjoy the game."

Melanthe swung the jesses lightly between her fingers, drawing them over the back of his hand. "A poor game to the present, my lord! Know you of no man strong enough to win my favor from this odd knight?"

Lancaster caught up the jesses and kissed them. The bells rang brightly. "I shall find one, Princess," he murmured. "Fear not for that."

Furious shouts drowned the music as a fistfight broke out between a foot soldier and a youth from the retinue of a defeated challenger. Lancaster watched until some of the guards had separated them, and then turned again to Melanthe. "Will you take wine, my lady? The dust rises."

At his words, Cara stood up from her stool behind, placing a tray between their chairs to offer the ewer and goblets. As the duke reached to pour, Melanthe sat back in her seat with a pert moue of impatience.

"Nay, sir, I shall not." She waved Cara away. "This sport is too tame. I vow by Saint John, my lord—nothing, food nor drink, shall pass my lips until a new champion wins my admiration."

He lifted his brows, his hand poised with the ewer. "So eager, my lady? The day is long, and the earth dry."

"So it is," she agreed. She trifled with the jesses, allowing the bells to tinkle. "But I am dauntless. Indeed, I challenge you to join me, and dedicate your comfort to this quest. Surely it is little enough to venture"—she glanced at him beneath her lashes—"as you do not bestir yourself to fight for my prize again."

Lancaster’s mouth showed a very faint tautening. She saw the struggle in him, pride against guile, but he smiled at last and nodded toward her. "As you will, my lady." He set down the ewer. "By Saint John, I vow it. No food or drink shall I take until you are satisfied with a new champion."

As the noon passed, Melanthe sat upon the escafaut, fanning herself conspicuously with a green plume. The day was clement enough that winter clothing weighed heavily; the duke in his blue-and-crimson houppelande was a little flushed at the neck, his crown resting on hair that curled damply, darkened against his temple. The Black Prince, fretful and complaining of his swollen joints, had retired with his wife, carried in his litter from the stands to the shade of a magnificent tent set a little back from the noise and dirt.

As each new course of jousting sent dust into the air, Melanthe covered her mouth with a scarf and coughed lightly to convey her discomfort. She looked with a great show of longing at a tray of lozenges and cream tarts that passed en route to some other guests. The duke made no such indication of interest, but she was pleased to note that he swallowed once after the wine had traversed their view.

The Green Sire was handily trouncing all comers. Melanthe sighed, watching a knight outfitted in a boar’s head helm pick himself up from a fall, the boar’s tusks smashed and drooping askew. "I weary of these trials," she said. "Has he some magic, or be your men all weak as willow wands?"

"No magic, my lady, but goodly strength and skill," Lancaster said. "He, too, is mine," he added in a cool reminder.

Melanthe returned a taunting smile to that and casually jingled her bells. The noise of the onlookers grew, a confusion of cheers and scorn, passions flourishing as support for the Green Sire seemed to increase, scattered widely now among the mixed crowd below. Around the stout fence that enclosed the lists, youths and attendants thronged beside men-at-arms, all pressing as close as they could while the next combatant and his retinue surged through the gate.

The Green Sire pulled off his great helm, bending awkwardly to wipe his eyes and forehead with the tail of his tunic. A man-at-arms shouted, ducking through the fence to hand him a clean cloth. His intrusion past the lawful barrier sparked a great roar.

In the stands noble ladies shrilled their disapproval, answered by impudent shouts from some of the common soldiers below. Another scuffle broke out and spread. Melanthe felt the duke tense beside her, but his guards moved quickly, laying about with clubs and staves and hauling the brawlers away.

Lancaster made another subtle signal to the marshal, and the next challenge heralded was without the Green Sire. Melanthe watched as her champion left the gate. He and his squire were surrounded instantly by soldiers and commoners, who made a phalanx about his horse and escorted him through the mob toward the tents.

"But if you allow him yet more rest, my lord," she complained petulantly, "what chance have these beardless children to defeat him?"

Lancaster swung a goaded look upon her. She swished the plume lightly.

"There are other matches to be fought, Princess," he said. "We have a hundred knights who desire to joust."

"I suppose my champion has not time to fight them all," she murmured. "Though I vow, I had not truly supposed him the greatest of the lot. I believe my father or brother could have knocked him down several times over."

He managed a creditable smile. "Perhaps so, my lady. But the day is not yet gone."

"I despair of surprises at this late hour." She shook her head. "The great days of the tournaments are past. We have only boys’ games now. The king your father, God’s blessing upon him, would find this a pale image of the splendid spectacles he has hosted."

Lancaster had become quite red now about the neck, but still he only nodded, stiffly polite. "There is naught to surpass the tournaments of our beloved lord the king."

Melanthe gazed upon the pair now thundering toward each other. To her pleasure, and the crowd’s sneers, they missed each another entirely—a commonplace in any ordinary pas de arms, but the first time it had occurred today. She clucked ruefully. "I suppose the Italians care more for their honor in these matters," she commented. "They take their ease upon the hearth rug instead of in the lists, and joust like gallant men before the ladies."

Lancaster made a sudden move, sitting straighter in his chair. A page moved quickly to him—they bent their heads together for an instant, and then the duke rose. "You will forgive my discourtesy, Your Highness." He bowed deeply. "A summons from my brother the prince—I regret I must leave your companionship awhile."

Melanthe acknowledged him with good grace. "Be pleased to go at once," she said, "with my health and dear friendship, may God keep our esteemed Lord Edward the prince."

He turned, with a degree less than his usual elegance, and strode down the steps behind his page. The musicians continued to play their merry melody. Melanthe looked after him, fanning herself slowly and smiling.

 

* * *

 

The crowd had grown dangerously restless with the lesser jousts, and Lancaster was still missing from the escafaut by the time the heralds’ trumpets blew a great fanfare, silencing the musicians and the noise. The marshal of the lists held up his arms and strode to the center of the ground, his slashed sleeves showing blue under scarlet and his cape flying out behind him.

"Now comes the one who will take their measure!" he shouted. "The one who will take their measure has arrived!"

As he declared the ritual words, old as the legends of King Arthur and Lancelot, the throng burst into frenzy. The discharge of sound beat against Melanthe’s ears like the blare of the trumpets themselves.

From between the tents came a knight the color of blood-sunset, galloping with his black lance balanced on one hand above his head, his armor shining reddish gold. He rode a massive black destrier encased in the same shimmering metal. His shield was sable, as dark as his lance and horse, without device or color.

He dragged his mount to a halt at the stone monument. A hush fell over the onlookers, delicious expectation; a carnal pleasure in this drama. The black lance poised—and came down on the silver falcon, rocking it with force of the blow. The shield he had chosen rang with a wooden resonance as the cheers hit a new plane of passion.

A outrance.

The black lance had no safe coronal to blunt it, but a sharp tip. The shield it had struck was not the battered falcon with the hood, but the one that hung above it, with the silver bird of prey unhooded, offering combat à outrance—beyond all limits.

A joust of war, fought to the death with real weapons.

His attendants came behind him, a full score, masked, dressed as fools in rainbow colors, playing flutes and hunting horns. The curling toes of their shoes were so long and pointed that they were attached by belled chains at the knee. They made a grotesque fantasy behind the blood-gold knight, an uncanny contrast to his hostile silence.

Amid the cries and tumult, Melanthe’s green knight rode out to meet him, armed with a sharpened lance. She pressed her palms together and tasted the salt on her fingertips, then folded her hands and held Gryngolet’s jesses motionless in her lap.

The hunting horns mingled their clear notes with the trumpets, rising higher and higher into the air. They broke off one by one, leaving a single carol from the herald’s horn to ascend and echo back from the stands and the river and the city walls, dying away like an angel’s voice.

The knights saluted Melanthe, the golden one with an extra flourish.

As they faced their mounts toward each other, the Green Sire pulled his arm from within the leather straps and threw his shield away.

He knew it. Melanthe knew it. The crowd guessed it—and burst into a furor of scandalized exaltation as the man hidden inside the ruddy gold armor tossed down his blank shield in answer.

When the lances couched level, an instant of silent anticipation blanketed the onlookers. The black horse threw its head and charged. The Green Sire spurred his destrier. In the hush the thunderous roll of the animals’ hooves made the wood beneath Melanthe’s feet vibrate.

The lances impacted with the sound of fractured bone, of a hundred hammers against steel. Both knights fell backward and sideways, clinging to smashed lances; hanging half off their mounts against the weight of armor as the onlookers broke into an uproar.

The rainbow attendants rushed to propel their master back into place and supply him with a fresh lance. He was already at the charge before the Green Sire had hauled himself upright and grabbed his new lance from the hunchback. As the green spear swung up, tip to the sky, Melanthe realized that he had it in the wrong hand to meet his opponent,

A sound like a great moan rose from the crowd. His dancing mount froze in place. As the challenger realized his advantage, he aimed for the most vital target, leveling the black lance at his adversary’s head. The green knight didn’t even attempt to compel his horse forward, but faced the oncoming lance and rider as if he were entranced. The onlookers’ groan rose to voluptuous agony.

Then the Green Sire seemed to collapse; an instant before the black spear hit his faceplate, he and his lance both toppled sideways—a sheer perpendicular to his course. As the tip of the black spear grazed his helm, the green lance swung down across his opponent’s path.

The rod took the golden knight flat across his belly. In a crash of plated metal he seemed to fly, bent double for a suspended instant across the lance as the green destrier sat down on its haunches, scrambling against the force of the butt end jammed between the Green Sire’s thigh and the pommel.

Melanthe found herself on her feet with everyone else. She stared at the fallen knight stretched on his back on the ground. When he moved, rising drunkenly, his golden armor dimmed by dust, she sat down. The green destrier wheeled and galloped after the loose horse, scattering the attendants as if they were colorful leaves.

Leaning to catch the reins, her champion flipped them over the black’s head just as his mount danced away from a vicious kick. The horses trotted together to the little hunchback, who took the black as if it were a palfrey instead of a trained warhorse—and the animal lowered its head, submitting instantly, as if it recognized that a man without armor was no enemy. The squire led the captured horse out of the gate. Melanthe looked away from the dirty golden challenger as he swayed to his feet, shaking off his attendants’ aid.

The Green Sire sat fixed upon his horse, gazing toward her.

The nameless challenger drew his sword, shouting within his helm. Still her knight did not move, but stared toward Melanthe. The great helm showed only menace, its eyeslits black and empty, but she saw beyond, saw a man on his knees in the great hall, looking up at her with intense entreaty. She allowed herself no change of expression, gazing steadily back.

The red-gold challenger shouted again. Her knight turned and swung down from his horse, jerking his sword from its sheath. His squire ran up to him with his shield and bascinet helm, but the challenger was already running forward, aiming a great swing with a sword that took the sun to its tip, shining murderous steel.

The hunchback ducked away, dragging the destrier with him. Her knight met the blow with an upward cut; the weapons rang and the crowd cheered. Neither man gave way as the blows fell, denting helmets and armor. They fought as barbarians fought, without mercy.

The golden knight slashed over and over at her champion’s neck, killing blows, pivoting and swinging back again. He landed a strike that made the Green Sire stumble sideways, but her knight seemed better at mischance even than advantage, turning his swordhand down and slicing sideways, beneath his adversary’s arm, cutting through the vambrace strap. The challenger’s plate flapped loose, exposing vulnerable chain mail above his elbow.

He did not appear to realize it, whipping his sword again toward his opponent’s helmet. It struck, driving a deep dent in the steel—under the force of the blow, the green knight’s sword seemed to fly from his hand, but then it was in his left as if he’d snatched it from the air. He brought it overhead, striking an arc downward, the sharpened edge aimed for his adversary’s outstretched arm with a force that would slice through chain mail and bone alike.

Sunlight flashed on the broad side of the blade. Melanthe closed her eyes. She heard it hit—and the golden knight’s grunt of pain was audible an instant before the throng burst into noisy reaction.

She blinked her eyes open. The challenger was hauling himself up off the ground, but he could not seem to gain any purchase on his sword. The Green Sire stood over him, looking up again at Melanthe. She had full expected to see the blood-gold arm severed and covered in real gore. But it was still attached to its owner—only rendered useless. The golden knight was groping for his sword with his left hand, his other hanging ineffectually at his side.

The marshal had stepped forward, poised with his white arrow, but the fallen challenger shouted furiously at him. The official hesitated, his hand wavering, and then bowed and stepped back.

The red-gold knight rolled, pushing himself to his feet with his good arm. Melanthe’s champion took a step toward her, the black eyeslits in his helm still focused in her direction. She could see his heavy breathing at the edges of his hauberk.

He lifted his hand, palm up in petition.

Melanthe saw the red-gold opponent achieve his feet. He shouted, his words obscured and echoing within the helm, and raised his sword with his left arm.

She ignored her champion’s appeal, staring at him coldly.

The challenger ran forward. The Green Sire turned, met the sword, and threw it off. He thrust the tip of his weapon at the golden knight’s helm, catching the visor’s edge, shoving the whole helmet upward, half off. Blinded, the other man ducked away, flailing his wounded arm and his sword to reset the helm, but another blow took it completely off.

It rolled across the ground. A great roar swelled from the crowd. Lancaster stood swaying in the middle of the dusty list. One of his attendants grabbed the helmet and ran toward him.

Her green knight turned yet again to Melanthe. He lifted his sword and shoved his helmet off his head with both hands; throwing the armor away from him. He pushed back his mail coif. Sweat streaked his face, stained with rust from inside the helm, marking the edge of his curling, half-plastered black hair. He did not look toward Lancaster, but still to her, breathing in great deep gusts.

She watched the attendants re-helm their master, and then met her champion’s silent plea with calm indifference. He closed his eyes and turned his face upward, like a man under torture.

The duke rushed at him. Without helm, the Green Sire came on guard. He ducked his liege’s left-handed swing and pressed close inside the other man’s reach, nullifying the lack of a helmet. Lancaster tried to grapple him with both arms, but the injured one would not lift past his waist. The duke’s sword cut awkwardly across the back of the Green Sire’s head, spreading crimson on black curls and mail. The blades locked at their hilts, crossed, pointing at the sky, shaking with the force of each man’s strength.

Lancaster made a hard shove, turning his sword inward between them, trying to slash it into the green knight’s unprotected face. The tip sliced her champion’s cheek, but he used the sudden motion to thrust his elbow back and up in one vicious lunge, ramming the guard against Lancaster’s fist, breaking the duke’s hold on his weapon. The duke made a desperate recovery, trying to retain his blade. The sword dropped, the tip lodging for an instant against the earth just as Lancaster caught it. As he stumbled, the Green Knight’s blade came up broadside against his helmet.

He fell sideways over the lodged sword, his exclamation of agony audible above the noise as he hit the ground on his injured side. He rolled onto his back.

The Green Sire stood above his liege, sword point at his throat. Lancaster lay weaponless, injured, felled—and still made no surrender. The crowd held its breath so still that the panting of the two knights seemed the loudest sound.

Her champion looked up at her, holding the sword steady. The blood on his face and hair was darkening, gathering dust; he looked like a devil risen from some pit, imploring her to save him.

"My lady!" The words were an exhalation of despair.

Melanthe lifted her plume and fanned herself. She laughed aloud, in the silence, so they could all hear.

"Yes, thou mayest have pity upon him," she said, with a mocking bow of her head.

Her knight pulled his sword from the duke’s throat and flung it half across the list. As Lancaster sat up, the Green Sire fell on his knees before his prince, head bowed. He pressed his gauntleted hands over his eyes. Slowly, like a tree falling, he leaned lower and lower, until his hands and forehead touched the ground.

"Pax, my dread lord." His muffled voice was agonized. "Peace unto you."

Painfully Lancaster hauled himself to his feet, standing against the support of one of his attendants. Still in his helmet, he seemed to overlook the man in the dirt at his feet. He searched out Melanthe on the escafaut, and then turned his back to her, walking unsteadily out of the lists with his attendants clustering about him.

Melanthe rose and descended the steps. As she walked toward the gate, youths and men-at-arms and onlookers parted, gazing at her. She moved to the center of the dusty lists, where the green knight still knelt with his face to the ground, blood matting his hair and staining his neck.

"Green Sire," she said mildly.

He sat back, staring for a long moment at the hem of her gown. Then he wiped his gauntlet across his eyes, smearing blood with rust. He turned his face up to her.

All light of worship and chivalry was gone from his look. He was still breathing hard, his teeth pressed together to contain it.

She knelt and reached for his right arm, tying the jesses about the vambrace and mail. The heat of his body radiated from metal armor. Gryngolet’s varvels made a silvery plink against his arm, the precious stones casting tiny sprays of light that played over steel, coalescing green and white as the rings came to rest.

On a level with him, she looked up from her task into his eyes. She could not have said what she saw there—hatred or misery or bewilderment—but it was surely not love that stared back at her from under his begrimed black lashes.

From the persistent tickle of recollection, memory sprang sudden and full blown into her mind.

Once, long ago, for a whim, she had pulled a thorn from this lion’s paw. She remembered him, she remembered when and where, an image stirred more by his height and bearing and the baffled agony in his face than by his features. Just so he had submitted, disarmed of all defense, as they took away his wife and money from him.

He repaid her today, then, for that emerald on his helm. Whatever precarious place he had striven to gain in Lancaster’s heart, with his fighting skills and command of men and vow to find glory, was vanished now. He knelt before her like a man dazed.

Apology sprang to her lips, regret for his maimed honor, his lost prince. It hovered on her tongue.

"Thou art a fool," she murmured instead, "to think a man can serve two masters." She lifted a varvel and let it fall against his armor, smiling. "A splendid fool. Come into my service to stay, be it thy desire."

He stared at her. A sound like a sob escaped him, a deeper breath, harsh through his teeth.

Melanthe rose. She extended her hand, touching his shoulder to make a gesture for the crowd. "Rise."

His squire brought the destrier forward. Melanthe took the silver lead. They smelled of sweat and dust and hot steel, the knight and his mount, perfumed with blood and combat. When he had mounted, she looked up at him.

"If thou art vassal unto me," she said, "I shall love and value thee as Lancaster never could." And with that snare set, she turned before he answered, leaving his hunchbacked squire to lead him from the lists.

 

* * *

 

"Away, away!" Melanthe held Gryngolet on her wrist, urging the flustered falconers of Ombriere to haste. "I will away!"

She turned her palfrey in the castle’s empty courtyard, watched only by her own retinue and a few dumbstruck servants. Outside the walls the sound of the tournament was a distant rise and fall of temper, the tensions between soldiers and squires and townsmen flaring. Melanthe cared nothing for that—it was the duke’s difficulty if he could not control his people—she only wanted escape from the tumult, releasing her own tensions in a flying gallop over the countryside with Gryngolet aloft before her.

Allegreto stood sullenly under the arched entrance to the hall, waiting for a horse, one of his eyes turning black from his morning in the town stocks. He had not had a difficult time of it; no taunting of a foreign stranger could equal the excitement of a tournament, but he glared at Melanthe all the same.

Her greyhound strained against its leash as Melanthe felt her heart strain for the open country. She had seen herons and ducks by the river; yesterday Lancaster had given her his leave to take what she could—and if he regretted it now, she was beyond having to care. The falconers, two underlings left behind to mind the mews, finally secured their drum and swung up double onto a thin poorly horse, carrying a trussed chicken in a bag in case the hunt should have no success.

Melanthe reined her palfrey toward the gate. Across the bridge and through the barbican—and she could turn away from tournaments and courts and crowds and pretend she was alone with the open sky. Alone, as Gryngolet flew, but for the escort of hunters and falconers that chased the bird’s wild courses.

Melanthe, too, was followed. Allegreto and Cara and a Riata rode behind her; Lancaster and Gian Navona and the ghost of Ligurio hounded her; and another hunted her now—the image of a man in green armor, bending slowly to the ground with his hands covering his eyes.

All of them her constant companions, ever in pursuit, never lost to sight. Spur her horse as she might, she was only free as the falcon flew free—until she killed, or was called back again to the brilliant jewels and feathers of her lure.