For Camelot's Honor (15 page)

Then Urien hooded the hawk with careful hand, and she felt its impatience with the sudden darkness and its acceptance of it.

It is only for now. Just for now. It will end.
As these thoughts passed through her, Elen found she was not sure whether they were for herself or for the hawk.

Fortunately, Urien was engaged in transferring the hawk from her perch to his gauntleted hand and did not notice her staring. He wrapped the jesses around his wrist and grunted. “Follow me,” to Elen, and Elen did.

The morning was chill and grey with a heavy lid of clouds overhead. The wind brought the smell of rain. Elen shivered beneath her cloak as she followed Urien down through the encampment. Men cheered as he passed and he raised his free hand, playing the gracious leader. Elen's stomach curdled, and she tried to see nothing more than the ground in front of her, but she could not shut out the sound of the cheering men, nor the way they called his name. “Urien! Urien the Red Bull!”

The makeshift field for Urien's tourney lay by the river. It was a great stretch of mud cornered off by four stones set in the middle of the trampled grass and meadow flowers. It was a busy place already, ringed by a great crowd, talking, laughing, exchanging wagers.

She shivered again and wrapped her arms around herself. This was her home they were gaming for. This was so wrong it made her gorge rise. She saw memories like ghosts before her inner eye. There should have been flocks of sheep grazing here, and herds of kyne being led down to drink at the river. There should have been carts and travellers passing over the bridge. She saw Carys beside her, carrying the basket of offerings down to the bridge. This was a place of peaceful passage. This was her home and it was for the life and support of her people. It was not this, not this trampling and yelling and casual blood. It was as if they defiled something holy.

The bridge waited silently nearby, grim and grey beneath the unwelcoming sky. For a fleeting moment, Elen dreamed of snatching the hawk off Urien's wrist and fleeing across the bridge, calling for the fae to open their gates and take her in. Let Urien chase her down the twilight road if he dared.

The men who meant to try themselves this day ranged across the field. Most of them were half-naked, clad only in kilts or breeches, leather belts wrapped around their waists to hold their knives or swords, if they were lucky enough to have them. A few carried spears almost as tall as they were. Fewer yet had bucklers in their hands, or guards for their arms or shins. This battle was in earnest. A tiny war to see who was worthy to stand beside Urien and claim what he swore he had to give. Men had died yesterday in this contest. More would die today, and those around would cheer and curse and exchange their bets, and Urien would think on how he would throw the survivors against Arthur's legions, and he'd smile.

As a final insult, Urien had father's chair brought down from the hall and placed on the slope just above his field. Wyx, ever faithful, had even rigged up a perch for the hawk and Urien set her on it with great show of care. Elen was given a small plain stool beside him.

You'd think he'd want a better setting for his jewel,
she thought with a kind of resigned bitterness as she sat where she was bidden. She clasped her cold hands together and peered between the trunks of milling bodies, trying to see Sir Geraint.

It did not take long to spot him. His raven black hair stood out in the sea of red and brown thatch. The others swarmed about, greeting friends, jeering at enemies, brandishing their blades, strutting for their watching women. Sir Geraint did none of these things. He stood at the corner of the field, one sandaled foot planted on the marking stone, and he watched them all, his face set and still.

She remembered the night of the feast, when Urien had leapt to his feet. The others had risen to answer him, but Geraint had held still then too, watching then as now, watching Urien's hands, the way he held his body, measuring and judging the man who might become his attacker but wasting no motion himself and giving nothing away.

They'll know,
she thought, her hands gripping each other so hard she thought she might bruise her own flesh.
They'll know he isn't one of them. How could any not see it?

But it seemed that none did. Urien nodded to Wyx who blew a hard, harsh blast on his horn. A cheer went up, and the crowd on the field pulled back, leaving just the combatants in a ragged cluster in the middle of the mud.

The horn sounded again, and the men scattered, taking up positions at the edges of the field, each making sure he had his back to the crowd, not to the other combatants. Cheers, whistles and catcalls rose from the crowd.

“Twenty on the Dunwalt!”

“Go on, Tag!”

“You can take ‘em, Deny!”

Elen found herself suddenly thinking of the two voices she had overheard last night. She wondered which of these half-naked, fierce warriors with their blue tattoos was that man, and which of the cheering, wild-eyed women was his. What was that woman watching for today, and what would she do when she saw it? Elen felt a stab of envy for that unknown female who sought to claim her home. She could act when and where she would.

Sir Geraint had claimed the field's northeast corner and stood with his back to the stone. Elen could not see his face, but she saw the way he held his arms loose at his sides. He had drawn neither sword nor knife yet. He was still waiting.

Urien nodded once more, and once more Wyx blew his horn. Now the cheers rose from every throat, and the men on the field began to move.

Some of them charged roaring at their neighbors, weapons held high, falling on their target and flailing at them, trying to take them down by sudden brute force, or run them off the field while they were still close to the edge. The clash of metal and the sound of flesh and bone slamming together sounded over the cacophony of the witnesses. Others walked warily into the fray, choosing their victims with care, stepping in, circling their man, judging him before making the first slash or stab, or raising the first parry.

And still, Sir Geraint had not moved.

“Yah! Gododdin!” bellowed Wyx. “Get your coward's ass in there!”

Geraint looked over his shoulder, right at Wyx, marking him. Then, slowly, almost casually, he drew his knife. For a moment, Elen thought he was going to barge up the hill. But he faced the field again, crouched low, and charged.

He fell on two men locked in their own fight, slashing his knife deep in the nearest man's arm, making him scream even as he shoved him to the ground. His opponent who gripped a spear in both hands, stared, stunned for a moment, and that moment was all Geraint needed. He kicked the man's leg, and caught the spear as its owner fell, stabbing down swiftly. Elen could not see where the blow fell, but it raised an enormous cheer from the crowd.

Sir Geraint was better armed now than he had been, but had also made the others take notice. They came to him now, and he fell back, retreating to the stone, where none could circle him without leaving the field. They came in twos and threes, those who dared. They came with knife and sword, and Sir Geraint knocked their weapons from their hands. He stabbed at arms and legs, ruining their balance, their grip, their chance. None could get inside his guard to close with him. The cheers grew louder, and the attacks grew fiercer, and Geraint held his place and let them come.

The fight wore on. The wind whipped up and the first rain began to spatter down. Urien showed no sign of calling a halt to his contest, and the crowd's frenzy did not abate. Elen bit her lip to keep herself silent. She wanted to be on her feet. She wanted to shout out Geraint's name and urge him on. He must tire soon. Someone would stab him — belly, heart, hand — it didn't matter. Wounded, he might not be able to ride, they would be trapped here another day, and another.

He might die. For her and her need, he might be killed by one of Urien's brutes. The thought cut through her, and tears of anger and helplessness pricked at her eyes.

You do not have to win. You have done enough to show you are no coward,
she thought toward him desperately. Someone would make him stumble. Someone would strike him a blow that would send him reeling out of bounds. Then he would be safe, and they could make their escape tonight. They could ride to Caerleon and return with Arthur's army at their backs.

But none did make him falter. Most of them turned their attention to easier targets on other parts of the field where they had room to dance their vicious dance, where they could close and grapple and throw their enemies down into the deepening mud. Rain dripped down Elen's face and the ends of her hair. It began to soak through her cloak and her sleeves. Cold raised goosepimples on her skin, but she did not look away. She could scare remember to blink. All of her attention was rivetted on Sir Geraint and his struggle. Time stretched out into an eternity, and still the fight went on.

At last, at long last, Urien raised his hand and Wyx sounded his horn. The men on the field fell back from each other, panting and wiping sweat and rain from their faces. Geraint staggered, falling back against the stone, doubling over, dropping his spear and putting his hands on his knees. It was all Elen could do to keep her seat. She imagined his breathing, harsh and ragged. She imagined his muscles shaking and twitching beneath his skin, and how his own heat burned him, despite the cold and the rain.

Urien got to his feet. “Hail Urien's champions!” He lifted his arms as if to welcome to his embrace all the men standing up to their ankles in the field of mud.

The crowd cheered them yet again. Urien waited for the sound to die.

“Tomorrow, only one of you will be left standing here! Tomorrow we will know who wins himself this hawk and this bride!” His hand fell onto Elen's head, and she bowed under the weight of it. The cheer from the crowd rolled over her like thunder.

“But tonight, we celebrate their courage and their strength. Tonight, you men come to the house of Urien and learn what a feast should truly be!”

And there were more cheers and more noise, and the crowd began to part, slowly at first and then more quickly, as if they only noticed now it was raining. The men on the field fought through the muck to reach the waiting arms of friends and family, but not Geraint. He remained alone, straightening himself slowly, painfully, fighting to pull his feet from the mud as hard as he had fought any other foe that day.

Help him!
cried Elen in her mind
Will no one help him?

But no one did, and alone, leaning on his captured spear like a an old man's staff, Geraint limped from the field.

“Well now.” Urien chuckled in her ear. Startled Elen looked up to see him smiling broadly down on her. He had the hawk in his hand, and the waterlogged bird hunched there miserably.

“I see you watching my men,” Urien winked and jerked his head toward the emptying field. “Which of them do you hope for, eh? Which do you want for your new master?”

Just in time, Elen caught her tongue. Obedience was becoming a habit, and she cursed herself for it. “I want no one for my master,” she said. “I hope as many of them die as can, so you will have that many fewer men to take to your wars.”

Anger clouded Urien's face. “You'd better hope my humor toward you improves, girl, or I will tell your husband you said that when I give you to him. We will see what he thinks of it. Come with me.”

Elen followed as she must, but she risked a glance backward, hoping to see Geraint one last time, hoping to see that he had found his strength and stride.

But Sir Geraint was already gone.

The feast that night was much as the previous one had been. Two slaughtered pigs had been roasted, and their flesh was hacked off and shared out with strong beer. Elen found herself grudgingly impressed. Someone had kept fires going in the rain long enough to get the beasts cooked. She tried hard not to think that all the ale going down the greedy throats was from her house. Urien's men must have emptied the cellars.

Urien's champions crammed themselves at his trestle table and the loyal ones who'd come with him to take Pont Cymryd filled the benches on either side of the hall. They ate and they drank and they sang. The hall stank with unwashed men, seared pork and ale fumes until Elen thought she would choke. Her only consolation was that Sir Geraint was there as well. He sat at the high table straight and calm, eating and drinking his portion. A purple bruise spread out across the back of one hand, and he held one shoulder a little higher than the other, but otherwise he seemed whole, at least as far as she could see from the little glances she could steal when Urien wasn't making her run back and forth, and when the others weren't crowding her so close.

They were bolder tonight, these men. They patted her and poked at her as she passed between them. Several times he growled at them, and they fell back laughing.

“Patience!” he bellowed. “You want her, you wait until tomorrow!”

“If you're still upright, Tag!” shouted one of the others.

“He's upright now, that's for sure!” sneered another, and the laughter was deafening.

Elen clenched her teeth and kept silent. She'd be gone tonight. Tonight, she'd fly.

“And what of you, Gododdin?” A burly ox of a man elbowed Geraint in the ribs, sloshing the beer in his noggin. “You going to be upright tomorrow?”

In answer, Geraint smiled a smile Elen would not have guessed could be his. It was slow and it was cold and sharp as a sword's edge against naked skin. It was a promise, that smile, of regret, of violence and revenge, and it silenced the room until the ox dropped his gaze and drank deep from his cup.

During the rest of that raucous feast, no one else asked Geraint what he would be on the morrow.

At last, their day's work and the heavy drink overcame them, and Urien's champions began to stumble from the house to seek their own beds. Some men just slid unconscious to the floor and were left where they fell, or were dragged out by bleary-eyed companions.