Gene Wolfe - The Knight

“I will.”

“Second, you need to know when he’s most likely to do it. Do you still have that shield you used last night?”

I shook my head. “I gave it back to Beaw.”

“Then take mine.” Garvaon got out the sticks that were our practice swords.

“Don’t we need more light?” I put Mani down.

“We’re not going to fight. I just want to show you a couple of things. You remember what I said about not coming at your man right leg first? Another reason is that if he knows much about foining, he can stick his sword in it.

“That’s right, square up. Now I’m not going to put my point in your face or your leg, which is what I might do in a real fight. I’m just going to foin your shield. I want you to stay squared up, but back away until I can’t foin your shield without taking three or four steps toward you.”

I took a couple of short steps backward, still on my guard.

“That it? Get set.” Before Garvaon finished the last word, the tip of his stick hit the shield.

He sprang back. “Did you see what I did? I was leading with my left leg a trifle. I took a long step with my right. Add the length of my arm to the length of my blade and it’s as tall as I am.”

“It was like magic,” I said.

“Maybe, but it wasn’t. You’ve got to practice that long step. It isn’t as easy as it looks. Also you’ve got to hold your shield up over your head when you take it. You’re wide open to an overhand cut, if your man’s fast enough.”

“I’d like to see that,” I said.

Garvaon glanced at the doorway. “It’s brighter out there. I’ll teach you how to make anybody back off, then we’d better call on His Lordship.”

With his shield on his arm, he demonstrated the thrust and had me do it. At the third, I felt Mani tugging my leg.

“Ready to go?” Garvaon asked.

“I should go back and dig out my helmet,” I told him. “Lord Beel will want to see me wearing it. Tell him I’ll be along in a minute or two.”

Back in the pavilion, I stooped to talk to Mani. “What is it?”

“I ran over to Idnn’s to watch the preparations,” Mani explained, “and he’s going to do it right there. He ought to go back to where the ashes were. Tell him to put some ashes in the bowl, too.”

The front of Beel’s pavilion was lit with a dozen candles. The stony ground had been smoothed, and a carpet laid over it. Beel sat cross-legged on the carpet with a wineskin, a gold bowl, and a gold cup before him. Idnn was in a folding chair in front of the silk curtain, with Garvaon standing beside her. “There you are,” Beel said. “Now we can begin.”

I bowed. “Would it be possible for me to speak in private with My Lord for a moment?”

Beel hesitated. “Is this important?”

“I think so, My Lord. I dare hope you’ll think so too.”

Idnn said, “Sir Garvaon and I will wait outside, Father. Call us when you’re ready.”

“I will not order my daughter out into the night.” Beel turned to me. “If we go a short distance from the camp, will that be sufficient?”

We walked a hundred yards up the valley. Beel stopped there, and turned to face me. “You might begin by explaining why you would not speak in the presence of my daughter and my trusted retainer.”

“Because I needed to advise you,” I explained. “As a mere knight—”

“I understand. What is it?”

“You called me a wizard. I’m not, but I’ve got a friend who knows a little about magic.”

“And he—or she—has taught you a few simple things, I suppose. Your modesty becomes you.”

“Thank you, My Lord. Thank you very much.” I looked around for Mani, but Mani was nowhere in sight.

“I’ve a question, Sir Able. In the past, you have not been entirely disingenuous in answering my questions.”

“Maybe not. I apologize.”

“If I listen to your advice—this friend’s advice, though I supposed that you came to me alone when you first sought the loan of a horse—will you answer one question fully and forthrightly? Upon your honor? Because I will not hear your advice otherwise.”

I shook my head. “This is very important to me, My Lord.”

“All the more reason for you to pledge yourself.”

“All right, I’ll promise. But only if you take my advice as well as listen to it.”

“You would command me?”

“Never, My Lord. But ... Well, I’ve got to find Pouk. Won’t you do as I advise? I’m begging.”

“The choice is mine? Save that you will not pledge yourself unless I do as you wish?”

“Yes, Your Lordship.”

“Then let me hear you.”

When we returned to Beel’s pavilion, he ordered horses brought for all of us. Another horse carried the carpet, the wineskin, and other things; and a sixth, his servingman.

“We are going back up to the pass,” Beel told Garvaon.

“You should ride before us, I think. Sir Able can bring up the rear, which may be the more dangerous post.”

What it really was, I thought as I rode rear guard, was the loneliest. If that were not bad enough, I had to rein in my stallion every minute to keep him behind the sumpter that carried the baggage.

The rocks, and the occasional tree and bush to either side of the War Way, concealed no enemies that I could see; and although I listened hard, I could hear only the cold, lonely song of the wind, and the clop-clop of hooves. The moon shone bright, and the cold stars kept their secrets.

When I rode out on a rocky spur far up the mountainside and looked down on the camp, its dark pavilions and dying fires seemed every bit as far away as those stars ....

Beel ordered the carpet spread between the ashes and asked everyone why there had been two fires. I shook my head; but Idnn said, “Sir Garvaon will know. Wilt tell us, sir knight?”

“They built their first fire here.” Garvaon pointed. “That was because it offered the best shelter from the wind, which is generally in the west. The next night, or it could have been the night after that, one of them saw it could be seen from the north.”

“And it was seen,” Beel muttered. “Now we will see what I will see myself, if I see anything. I must caution all of you again that this may not prove effectual.”

He glanced down at the bowl his servingman held. “Why that’s silver! Where’s my gold bowl, Swert?”

“I told him to bring this one, Father,” Idnn said. “You charm by moonlight, and not by day. This is my fruit bowl. I think it may bring you good fortune tonight.”

Beel smiled. “Have you become a witch?”

“No, Father. I know no magic, but I had the advice of a friend who does.”

“Sir Able?”

She shook her head. “I had to promise I wouldn’t tell you who it is.”

“One of your maids, I suppose.”

Idnn said nothing.

“Not that it matters.” Beel knelt upon the carpet. The servingman handed him a silver goblet and a skin of wine, and he filled both bowl and goblet.

Mani had crept up to, watch; to get a better view, he sprang onto my shoulder.

“I ask all of you to keep silent,” Beel said. Reaching into his coat, he produced a small leather bag from which he took a thick pinch of dried herbs. Half he dropped into the bowl, the rest into the goblet. Closing his eyes, he recited an invocation.

In the hush that followed, it seemed to me that the song of the wind had altered, humming with words in a tongue I did not know.

“Mongan!” Beel exclaimed. “Dirmaid! Sirona!” He drained the silver goblet at a single draught and bent to look into the silver bowl.

So did I, crouching beside him. After a moment I was joined by Idnn, and she by Garvaon.