The Long Sword (22 page)

Kunka appeared at my side, and all the ladies bowed – she was, after all, the Queen of Love for the tourney. Her husband unfolded a stool and she sat.

‘Come, Sir William!’ she said, and her smile was as wanton as any of the girls about me. ‘Choose one of my handmaids to sit closest to you.’

I bowed. I was right willing to choose, and chose a young woman with jet-black hair and lips so red I wanted to see if they had paint on them. I didn’t think they did. She blushed to her hair and into her gown, but she sat by me.

Kunka smiled. The wantonness was gone, replaced by a harder edge, and I thought that perhaps she was also a mother; she knew how to give orders as well as take them.

‘Now, Sir William, welcome to the Court of Love.’ Kunka laughed, and squeezed her husband’s hand.

All the maids sighed. There were some poisonous looks for my raven-tressed choice. ‘Before we dance, Sir William will amuse us by telling us of his Lady. He loves a lady
par amour
, and wears her favour on his shoulder.’

The maids looked abashed. I confess I was abashed myself, so soon had I forgotten her challenge and my promise.

I thought of Emile, and in truth – oh, this cuts me like a Turk’s sword – I had trouble recalling her face. So many years. I could see her arrogant husband well enough in my mind’s eye, but her face swam in a haze of associations.

But Kunka had every right to ask, as Queen of Love. And she was setting me a penance as well as recognising me as the knight who had won the prize, and I was being challenged. Chivalry is more than hitting men with a sword. Chivalry is there in every dealing with a woman, from the bath girl to the Queen of Love.

I thought of Father Pierre’s strictures about the farm girl, and it made me blush, and the maids giggled.

‘The lady I love must remain locked in my heart,’ I said. ‘But I will say that she is beautiful as – as …’ Once started, I could not be seen to stop, and yet no fresh image leaped to my head. A summer’s day? A pox on that one. A flower? A rose?

I still had my longsword in both hands. I raised it so that it formed a cross. ‘As beautiful as this sword – as beautiful to see, and yet as beautiful in her soul, strong as the steel and—’

‘Your lady is as beautiful as a sword?’ Kunka asked.

They were laughing at me.

I looked at the Bohemian knight, who shook his head and left me to my fate. ‘Perhaps I must beg you to understand how beautiful I
find this sword,’ I said, hoping to win a smile, but the women all rolled their eyes and prodded one another with their elbows.

‘Is she red and gold, this lady?’ Kunka asked.

‘No, blue and white like snow and the sky,’ I answered, too quickly. Emile’s arms were blue and white. I thought of her that way – I had been too open.

Kunka smiled, though. ‘Now that was prettier, Sir Knight, and I think it possible that you are more than a boor. No more swords. Tell us what it is about her that won your heart, so that we poor women may strive to emulate that and rise in your opinion.’

‘Courage,’ I said.

‘
Ma foi
,’ Kunka said ‘That is a fine thing for a knight to love in a lady. And far better than comparing her beauty to a sword. Let me tell you, monsieur, when you compare me to a sword, all I hear is that I am sharp and pointy.’ She laughed, and all the maids laughed with her. ‘But when you offer me
courage
as a woman’s virtue, then I feel hope that a knight might see me as more than a leman and a mother. Can you tell us of her courage?’

I thought of her coming to my room in Normandy, during the siege, dealing with her husband …

I thought hard, wanting to avoid revealing anything, and yet caught up in the game that was courtly love. And the girls were watching me differently, now, and in the distance, I heard the music begin.

‘It is not that she fears nothing. It is that, when fearing, she acts despite her fears. Ask any man-at-arms where courage lies. It is not the fearless knight who wins our respect, but the one who, full of fear, carries on.’ I shrugged, to end my little sermon.

Sir Herman gave me a small nod of appreciation.

Kunka put her hand on mine. ‘As Queen of Love, I say to all that you are a true knight and worthy of your lady. Now I love her courage too.’ She rose, and I kissed her hand, and she made a motion to the maids to attend her. ‘It is my express command that none of you may dance with Sir William more than once. Or any other thing. Does anyone doubt my word?’

She swept away from me with a smile, having made sure that I would sleep alone.

But, like many of my other teachers, Fiore and Father Pierre and Sir Peter and Arnaud and more, she showed me something about myself.

Why is it that there is always so much to learn?

By our Lady! I danced three times, once with the Lady Kunka, and then, at last, I walked out under the stars, out the great gilded doors of the King of Poland’s great hall, and into the cool of a Polish August night. I thought I was alone, but Fiore was at my shoulder.

He grinned like a boy. ‘The sword?’ he asked.

He was as eager as I.

We walked off into a garden, the two of us like secret lovers, and stumbled in the dark until we found what we sought: a little light from a lantern, probably left by real lovers earlier in the evening. And then I drew the sword from her red leather-and-wood scabbard, and her blade shimmered like Arabian silk in the candlelight.

She was broader than any blade I’d ever owned, as broad as a lady’s wrist, and even broader. She had a different taper from most swords, and a flatter cross-section than the other longswords I’d owned, flatter and shorter. Had I seen her in a bladesmith’s stall, I would not even have asked her down to put her hilt in my hand.

Listen: once I took a lady – we were both the worse for wine – who was, let us say, less than beautiful. Dumpy, short, a little overweight, I thought in my pride and lust. But when I undressed her, I found her body as beautiful as Venus herself. As that lady, so with the sword.

In my hand, she was quick and light and yet strong as a branch of oak.

Somewhat jealously, I handed her to Fiore. He brought her smartly to his shoulder and cut once. There was nothing showy or spectacular about his cut, but I felt like a man who has just watched his lady give a chaste kiss to a friend. Of course it is allowed, and yet … why is she smiling so much?

‘Yes,’ Fiore said. ‘Yes!’

The next morning, my Frenchman’s squire – the courtier, not the Savoyards – was at the door of our inn. Two hours later, I sat on Jacques with my helmet laced, and Lady Kunka was there, as were a dozen of the Empress’s maids and ladies, and many of the Bohemian and Polish gentlemen, despite hard heads and the early hour. I had time to say my beads and to realise that if I had lain with one of the lilies of the court, I would be muzzy with lack of sleep and perhaps still little drunk. As it was, I was fresh.

The Frenchman said nothing to me, nor did his squire chat with Marc-Antonio. And Marc-Antonio was all but transformed by finding that I was the great man of the tourney, and I caught him, more than once, pointing me out and claiming me for his own.

You might think I anticipated a murder attempt or some such, but my Frenchman didn’t seem the type, and none of the Savoyards were to be seen. Despite which, I checked every element of my harness and my tack for damage and interference.

We were riding along the barriers, which I had never done before. It keeps the horses straight, but requires some surprisingly false manoeuvres of the lance – common enough now, but new to me in the year sixty-five.

The first encounter was almost my undoing. My man could joust. His lance swooped like a stooping hawk, the point coming down from the heavens, and had his horse not faltered by a heartbeat in its course, his lance point would have taken me in the throat or left shoulder, but luck – Fortuna – was with me, and his point at my shoulder. I felt the impact on my shoulder, and I broke my lance on his shield.

He saluted me.

That changed the tenor of the contest. As we swapped ends, I returned the salute, galloped back to my place, and set myself. The salute meant, to me, that we were behaving like gentlemen.

The second course was accounted pretty by the crowd. My lance tore his left pauldron off his shoulder, and his – a beautiful strike, by God’s grace – tore the visor off my bassinet. It did me no injury, but his point penetrated my visor almost a full inch. Yes, we were fighting
a l’outrance
, with weapons of war, unabated.

The heralds and marshals had to have a conference, as we had both scored.

Ser Nerio rather sportingly offered me his beautiful helm. I accepted gratefully; I didn’t own a spare, and my bassinet had just met its end. Weakened by the Bohemian the day before, it now had two gaping holes where the visor pivots ought to have been.

Nerio grinned at me. ‘That was a good course,’ he said.

‘Any advice?’ I asked.

‘Don’t flinch. And don’t miss. He’s a better jouster than you, but not by much.’ Nerio smiled wolfishly. ‘If he kills you, I’ll kill him.’

Fiore shook his head. ‘No, he is very good, but you can take him. Remember what we practiced at Avignon, the lance low?’

I looked back and forth. ‘A parry with a lance? In a joust?’ I asked.

Nerio raised an eyebrow. ‘Too professional,’ he said with a little of his old disdain for Fiore. But he softened it with a smile. ‘For me, at any rate.’

Fiore shrugged. ‘It is not against any rule.’

Nerio put a hand on Fiore’s shoulder. ‘My friend, there are rules that are not written down.’

Fiore frowned. ‘If there is not a rule against it written down, it is not a rule,’ he said.

I got the new helmet seated and the chinstrap buckled, and rode down the lists, still undecided.

Word of our tilt had spread, and other knights and squires were coming for their scheduled bouts. The ‘great’ men had had five days, and now the lesser knights, men like me and Fiore, were to be allowed three days of jousting and foot combat, and their own mêlée.

And all along one side of the list stood a troop of horsemen. I had never seen anything like them, and they were distracting me. They wore long coats, buttoned at the shoulder and edged in fur, even the least of them. Two of them carried hawks, and all had lances and bows.

I had never seen men with such deep lines on their faces. They looked like killers, every one of them.

I took deep breaths and took them out of my head, and then I set my thoughts on the lists and my opponent. He flicked his lance head at me. I returned the compliment, if indeed it was such.

When the marshal’s white wand dropped, I put spurs to Jacques, and he blew forward with his usual explosive grace. Before his third stride, though, I had my lance in its rest – so different from my first years with the weapon – and I let the head fall low.

Lowering your lance head is bad practice. It is terrifying. A low blow, a blow to your opponent’s horse, forfeits not just the run but your own horse and armour. It is considered cheating. With my lance across my body, under my right arm and couched against my lance rest on the right of my breast plate, but pointing to the left side of my horse’s head and across the barrier, and now aimed down, almost at the ground, it looked as if I’d lost control of my lance. This happens sometimes in the joust.

My opponent still had his lance tip high in the air. He didn’t couch until the last possible moment, just the way, let me add, that Boucicault used his lance.

We had heartbeats to impact.

His lance tip stooped towards my face and I did as Fiore had taught me and flipped my lance up, using my saddle bow as a fulcrum and my lance as a lever. It came up very fast, and our lances crossed, still in the air. But weight and the power of his lance on mine slapped them down again.

He missed his lance rest. With all the pressure my lance was putting on his lance, torqueing it, he’d have had to be Lancelot himself to maintain control.

My hit was unspectacular, just barely clipping his shield. But my lance-staff snapped cleanly with the impact, and he lost control of his lance three strides later and it fell to the earth.

The foreigners with the hawks were laughing and slapping their long whips against their thighs. One waved to me.

The judges all clustered at the centre of the lists.

Fiore slapped my back. ‘That was nicely done,’ he said, rare praise indeed. Then, ‘We need to practice your seat and how it relates to your control of the lance, but otherwise – good.’ He looked at Nerio. ‘I wish some Frenchman would challenge
me.’

‘Find the man’s wife and sleep with her!’ Nerio said with a sneer.

‘Why?’ Fiore asked, genuinely puzzled.

Even Marc-Antonio laughed.

‘They are calling for you,’ Nerio said, and I rode down the lists to where my French adversary sat on his destrier. He had his helm off and looked as sweaty as I felt.

I had forgotten he
was
a judge. But he was smiling, not grinning, and his eyes met mine.

So, just by way of experiment, I returned his smile.

We were an arm’s length apart.

‘Is your honour served?’ he asked me.

Well. That was the question, wasn’t it?

I bowed, like one gentleman meeting another when mounted. ‘Very well, monsieur. My honour is served very well.’

He urged his horse forward one single step. ‘Sometimes, a gentleman is only doing what his liege bids him do.
Eh bien
?’ He gave me a casual wave, and turned his horse, and rode away, neither angry nor afraid.

The judges held that I had been the victor, but on balance, I think he gave me the lesson.

Later that day, Fiore ran some courses, unhorsing men to the right and left until the judges forbade the use of his spear-crossing parry. Then he unhorsed more men.

He was spectacular to watch, and yet, at the same time, dull. He made one Polish knight very angry by unhorsing him on the first pass, and the man raged, claimed that Fiore had cheated, and looked like a fool.