John Marco - The Forever Knight

“You got an eyeball under there?”

“Of course I do. It’s gone white, that’s all. Sometimes I get a grain of sand in there. Makes me crazy.”

“How’d that happen to you? You’re a handsome man, Lukien. Bet you were pretty to look at when you were younger.”

I smiled, because she was so good at changing subjects. “You’re dodging, Cricket. We’re not done talking about the cistern.”

“I’ll paint it back to normal,” she groaned. “So what happened?”

“A Norvan scimitar.”

“From when you were a mercenary?”

“That’s right.”

“Must make it hard to fight, having one eye.”

“Two would be better,” I admitted. “Doesn’t hurt any more, though. Malator sees to that. Nothing hurts me anymore. Not for long, anyway.”

We both got quiet, the horse hooves echoing around the canyon. The claws of the kreels clicked on the sandy road as their tongues flicked in and out. Cricket looked at me. She wanted a story.

“Norvor’s a lot like Akyre, I guess. Just a bunch of barons fighting for territory now. No real king or queen any more. There’s been fighting in that part of the world since I can remember.”

“Yup,” nodded Cricket. That much she already knew. Everyone figured it was the fighting that took her family away, but Cricket couldn’t remember.

“I had to be a freelance,” I continued. “Didn’t want to be, but I was exiled from Liiria then. Not much else to do but hire out my sword. The Diamond Queen was rich enough to pay, so I took it. Got a lot of cuts and scrapes working for her, but this was the worst of ’em.” I gestured to my blind eye.

“Norvor,” she echoed. “The people who brought me here talked about Norvor, thought I might have come from there. I told them I was sure Akyre was my home. Don’t know why, though.”

“You’ll remember one day,” I told her. “If you want to.”

“Of course I want to! It’s all in my head, waiting for me to discover it. Maybe it’ll come to me in a dream someday.”

“Or maybe a chicken will tell you where you came from.”

We laughed, which was good because neither of us liked the way the conversation had gone. The sun was warm and the sky was crystal clear, and all of a sudden I just started talking.

“Gilwyn thinks I should go away,” I told her. “He says Jador doesn’t really need me right now. Says it’s time for me to find out about myself, just like you.”

Cricket’s round face tightened. “Huh?”

“I’m thinking he’s right. I’ve been restless here. That’s the itch. I need to see what’s out there for me, maybe do some good in the world. Like a knight-errant. Try to find my mission.”

“You’ve got a mission, Lukien. You’re Shalafein!”

“Yeah, well, I’ll still be Shalafein. I’ll just be doing it somewhere else. Don’t you know how a knight-errant works? He rides around helping people. I’d be doing that in the name of Jador.”

Cricket looked puzzled. “Sounds like being a mercenary to me. You’re the Bronze Knight, Lukien. Why do you need to go around proving yourself all the time? Why can’t you just stay here?”

“Because I’m going mad here, Cricket.” I slowed down, letting the Jadori get further ahead. “You remember when you told me how you like to keep doing things, how sometimes you can’t control yourself because the stuff in your head drives you crazy, because you’re trying to remember so hard that you can’t stop your mind from buzzing? That’s what it’s like for me. You need to remember things. . but I need to forget.”

Cricket lifted her chin. “You mean Cassandra.”

“Yeah. Cassandra.” I touched my sword, thinking its power would make me feel better. “Maybe we’re the same, you and me. Always looking for trouble. Sometimes I have to fight just to feel something besides sorry for myself.” I looked at her. “You understand. I know you do.”

Cricket nodded. “I do. Just thinking about myself, I guess. With Minikin gone, and now you. . What’ll happen to me, Lukien?”

“Oh, you’ll be fine,” I said. It was all I could think to say, the kind of thing no one ever wants to hear. “If it wasn’t safe here I wouldn’t be going.”

“But what’ll I do ? I don’t even know who I am. And Gilwyn’s always too busy for me. He’ll just shovel me under with chores.”

She looked genuinely scared. Not about the chores, which was nonsense, but about being alone. And that’s when I had my idea. At first I just smiled as it came over me, then I chuckled. Cricket grimaced.

“It’s not funny.” Her face got gloomy. “I don’t want to stay here without you.”

“Well,” I said, taking a deep breath, “a knight should have a squire. What about that?”

“A squire?”

“Someone to look after my armor, my horse. You think you could do those things?”

“Me?” She looked as startled as I was by my idea. “But what about your mission?”

“You could be my mission, Cricket. You want to find out about yourself? So do I. We can go to Akyre together, try to find something to knock loose your memories.”

“Akyre.” Cricket’s gloominess returned even darker. “Isn’t that dangerous?”

Before I could answer, Malator screamed in my ear, Yes!

I patted my sword to show them both I wasn’t afraid. “There’s no safer place than at my side. I’ll have a squire, and you’ll have your own bodyguard-one that can’t get himself killed.”

That’s idiotic. You can be killed! You’re not immortal!

I said to Cricket, “Gilwyn’ll try to talk us out of it, but I’ll make him understand. It was his idea in the first place. Why should he begrudge me some friendly company?”

Because she’s just a kid!

Cricket thought about it, then gave me her little grin. “I want to do it,” she said. “It’s like I’m out there, wandering around somewhere. I want to go find myself.”

“It’s a long way,” I warned. “Hard travel.”

“I know it; I already did it once. I can make it,” she promised.

“Good,” I declared, pleased with her passion. For the first time in months I felt happy.

We rode on, Malator chattering at me the whole while. Out of spite I ignored him. Malator didn’t control me, I told myself. Let him rant and rave. I was a man, not a boy. I’d go wherever I damn well pleased.

When I get an itch, I scratch till it’s bloody.

I was right about Gilwyn not being happy, and I was right about him not trying to stop us. I had my arguments prepared and the determination to make them stick, and in the end he relented. Cricket couldn’t stay in Jador forever. She wasn’t an Inhuman either, so living in Grimhold was out of the question. She was, Gilwyn admitted, a mystery to everyone. It made sense that she should try to discover who she really was.

We didn’t leave Jador quickly, though. I had affairs to get in order and friends to say good-bye to, and crossing the Desert of Tears took planning. We needed water, mostly, and mules to carry it. Food would be a problem, too. I had made the passage several times and had a good map that I’d drawn of the resting spots along the way. I knew every hidden oasis, every cave, every stand of fruit trees. If we found a rass I would kill it, I promised Cricket, and make her a necklace of its teeth. I was excited about leaving but also swore to Gilwyn and White-Eye that I’d return before their baby was born. I figured that gave me at least six months.

Eventually, everyone got used to the idea of us leaving, except for Malator. For days he brooded, not even bothering to talk to me. I refused to care. He’d played that game before with me, and in truth I liked the quiet. Having an Akari constantly in your mind can drive you crazy, so I didn’t bother calling to him either, not even the night before our journey.