Gawain and Lady Green (20 page)

“To remember us by. Might come in handy, too. Silver.”

Silver it was. Well polished, it enlarged the candlelight. Gawain turned it over in his hands. He almost asked, “What is this engraved figure, my Lord?” but bit his tongue in time. It was obviously a pagan image. And if Lord Bright told him that, he could hardly hang it around his own stiffly Christian neck, as in common courtesy he must now do.

“I thank you, my Lord. I wish I had something—”

“Hrrumph. You’re sure you haven’t?” Knife raised again to venison shoulder, Lord Bright regarded him sharply.

Like a hidden serpent, Lady Green’s girdle drew itself tighter under Gawain’s tunic. “My Lord, remember your three kisses! If you are not content—”

“Content! Aye, guest.” Lord Bright laid knife to meat. “I’m content for now. Ale?”

“No ale, thank you. I need to be sober on the morrow.”

Lord Bright drank deeply, himself. “Me, in your boots I wouldna’ want to be sober tomorrow! But you’ll have meat, aye? Nothing looks so bad on a full stomach. Here, dig in, Sir Gawain of the Round Table!”

New Year’s morning.

Snow fell slowly from gray dawn skies. Gawain rode his prancing, rested chestnut cautiously, reins tight, among white tufts and hummocks. One-Eye rode ahead, slouched on a white pony that kept disappearing in the snowy mists.

Gawain’s innards seemed formed of ice. But mind and muscles worked calmly around the frozen innards. He rode well, watched the way, thought clearly.

Sword feels good at our side, Sir!

Magic girdle feels better.
This actually gave him hope.

You feel no remorse, Sir, for deceiving our host?

No time now for remorse. No time later, either.

Shield feels good on our back! Helmet on head.

Not allowed to use them. The Green Knight used no shield or helm in Uncle’s Dun.

Mary defend! I wish we had a bottle of Lady Green’s ale here!

We ride sober to our doom. Who can call us coward?

One-Eye has stopped.

Gawain rode up beside One-Eye and drew rein. At their horses’ feet a bank fell down away into a deep, white rift in the moor.
At the bottom wound a thin ribbon of ice. Gawain swallowed. “Down there?”

One-Eye nodded. “That’s it, Sir. Where you’ve been lookin’ for.”

“How do we get down?”

“How do
you
get down, Sir. I wouldn’t go down there for all the world’s gold. Lead your horse. There’s sort of a trail. But, Sir…”

One-Eye turned to look Gawain full in the face. “Let me tell you somethin’.”

“Tell!”

“That be no place to go. That’s a wicked man, down there. Bigger than anybody in the world. Meaner.”

“I’ve met him.”

“Everyone goes by there he kills. No matter high or low, knight, priest, shepherd…Sure as you sit in saddle, you go down there, you’re killed.”

Gawain swallowed again. “That’s as God wills.”

“Tell you what, Sir. You just ride away from here.”

“What!”

“What I’d do. Anyone with sense.”

Shocked, Gawain peered deeply into One-Eye’s eye. The man knew nothing of knighthood, of Honor. He was innocent.

“Me,” he went on innocently, “I’ll tell everyone I saw you go down there. Nobody’ll know.” The innocent brown eye blinked. The man hardly guessed his words were mortally insulting. He thought that what he suggested was merely reasonable.

The man…the brown eye…Gawain said, “I know you!” One-Eye shifted uneasily in saddle. Gawain said, “Your name is…Doon.”

“Aye, Sir.” One-Eye tightened rein as though to pull his pony away back. But there on the very edge of earth, he dared not change the pony’s balance, or confuse it. He faced Gawain as though cornered, at bay.

Gawain said slowly, “I knocked your eye out.”

Silent snow fell between them.

“I had nothing to give you. Gladly I would have given, but I had nothing. And now again…” He considered what he had with him. Gringolet, now champing at the bit, two sets of new clothes, one on him, one bundled. The lord would notice those on Servant One-Eye!

The lord’s medallion.

Quickly, he unlaced his helm, lifted it off, lifted the silver medallion on its silver chain over his head. He said gravely to the frightened, still face behind snow, “Take this medallion from me. Let not Lord Bright see it, for he gave it to me freely, a generous host’s gift. I give it to you now in Honor, because I did you bitter harm by no intent.”

The medallion swung, dangling, between them. Swinging, it displayed the horned head, swallowing leaf and thorn. “It is silver,” Gawain pointed out. “And it is wonderfully worked.”

Doon’s one eye glinted. He reached cautious, gloved fingers toward the medallion.

“Take it, Doon. So, you will lighten my soul of one sin.”

Slowly, Doon’s fingers pinched the dangling chain. Gawain let go. Doon said, “Thanks, Sir.”

Gawain nodded and laced his helm on again. “Take it with my good wishes. Now show me where this trail begins.”

Doon pulled the pony back from the edge. “I’ll tell them you went down there, Sir.”

“Ha! Man, you’ll tell them but the truth.”

“There, Sir.” Doon pointed to a milder, ridged edge a bit to the right. “Watch for rolled stones and such. The Gods—God bless you, Sir.”

Doon wheeled the pony and trotted away. Within a few steps he urged it to a slow canter.

Green chapel? no chapel here, Sir.

No building of any sort…

Gawain rode slowly along the narrow, iced stream, looking about at bank and bush, and great nobbled, horned rocks on both sides. Snow fell thinner, seldomer.

Unless that be a building, Sir. That…long mound under the cliff.

Gawain drew rein. That? That’s a hill. All frozen weeds and grass.

Our fathers used to build such mounds to bury their dead in.

Ah. True. Mother showed me one such…

And did not Lord Bright tell us the Green Chapel was one such?

Let us see.

Gawain dismounted and tied nervous Gringolet to a strong-looking bare bush. He walked up to the mound, which stood only twice his own height. One end consisted simply of cliff. The mound reached out to the stream. Ice sealed a rotten wooden door.

“God save!” Gawain uttered aloud. “Can this be the Green Chapel? Here might the devil tell his matins, about midnight!”

He splashed into the stream and around the mound’s end. On this side the mound was badly eroded, and he could see through fallen, crumbled earth to great rocks underneath.

Those rocks are laid by man, one upon another. Truly, this mound was built, long ago.

Ice crept from Gawain’s innards through his muscles.
This place is Fey! Holy, or unholy. Mother would know. This is the ugliest, most desolate chapel I ever came to; and now I fear a fiend must have drawn me here. Truly, the Green Knight must be the devil himself if he dwells here!

Gawain startled. Had he long, leafy ears like the head on the medallion, they would have stretched and trembled open.
What is that sound?

Came from within, Sir.

What clatters there?

Sounds like ax on grindstone, Sir.

Angel Michael! It must be the Green Knight, summoning me.

Gawain gave himself no time more to think. He stiffened spine, breathed cold air deep into frozen lungs. He cried aloud, “I am Sir Gawain of the Round Table, King’s Companion, here to keep my given word. If any one awaits me here let him now come forth. With speed. Now or never.” The bold words burst from him in mists and coiled against the mound.

The ringing stopped, Sir. It must have heard you…

“Wait!” cried a great voice above. On the chapel roof, under sober gray sky, stood the giant Green Knight, green ax in hand. “Wait a moment, and you shall speedily get from me what I once got from you.”

Sir Green lashed his ax once about, turned and climbed down out of sight on the chapel’s far side.

He can’t run well with that heavy ax. We could reach Gringolet—

Sir Green splashed around the front end of the chapel where the ford lapped high. On land again, he used his ax as a walking stick. Stalking beside the swinging blade, he came up to Gawain.

“Now, good Sir,” he said abruptly, “you are welcome here at my place.” He waved the ax briefly around at green-grown chapel, cold-lapping water, gray sky. “You know well the covenant we keep here. A year ago you took from me, and now this New Year I take from you.

“Here we are alone together; here is none to help or hinder. Unhelm you, Sir, and take your pay! And say you no more than I said when you whipped off my head at one blow.”

A statue of ice, Gawain said calmly, “Take your stroke, Sir. I shall say nothing.”

Sir! Oh, Sir!

Gawain laid helm and shield aside on stony ground. He bowed down and stretched his neck as far as he could.

Sir, why stretch so very far…

He stretched farther.

Beside him he saw green boots take a striking stance. He saw the green ax swing up past his face. The boots shifted wide for better balance. Unlooked-for sunshine brightened the stones and Gawain’s helm and shield. Unlooked-for sunshine showed him the shadow of the ax poised on high, and swooping down.

Gawain flinched. Only a little he shrank neck back toward shoulders. The ax crashed to earth under his nose.

“Ha!” cried the great voice above. “You are not the Gawain of great valor I have heard sung! That knight would never flinch! Myself, I never flinched when you lifted the ax in Arthur’s house. That must make me the better man!”

Gawain gasped, “Make haste, Man. Strike your blow. I’ll stand still. Though when my head falls I cannot pick it up again.”

Once more he stretched out his neck.

Once more the green boots spread and planted themselves. Once more the ax-shadow rose, poised, and fell.

Halfway. The ax stopped in midair.

“So,” Sir Green remarked, “now you’ve really got your courage up, I pay you back.”

Eyes to ground, Gawain saw red. “Hurry it up, boaster! You talk too much.” Redly he saw the boots grip ground, ax shadow rise into gray shadow as brief sunlight faded.

Redly he saw the green ax blade plant itself under his nose.

Blood redder than anger spurted upon stone.

Sir! He grazed your neck!

Gawain leaped. A spear’s length away he straightened, whirled on Sir Green, whipped out his sword.

“Hit me again, Sir, I’ll hit you back! Be you mighty sure of that. The covenant is finished, complete, accomplished. You have had your free stroke.” Warm blood leaked down his neck.

Sir Green leaned on his ax. “Be you not so fierce,” he rumbled calmly. “No one has insulted or misused you. I but followed our covenant, which is now finished.”

Sir, we’re alive!

Gawain stood panting. Redness lifted slowly from his sight so that he saw the Green Knight green, the sky behind him gray and clearing.

“But we had another covenant,” said Sir Green.

“Eh? What mean you?”

“You promised to give me whatever you took in my house.”

“Your house…”

“You kissed my wife. You gave me the kisses, as promised. For those kisses I here feinted you two harmless blows. But the third night you failed, Sir. For I know you wear my wife’s magic girdle that she gave you, which you took in my house, and said nothing of it.”

Saint Michael!

“I tested you, Sir Gawain. I thought to myself, ‘Gawain is as much above other knights as a pearl is above peas.’ But I found you a little wanting. Because you loved your life, which the girdle might save, you broke covenant with me. Therefore, I gave you that little tap that now bleeds.”

Gawain grew hot. From his heart, wounded as by a sword thrust, heat flooded up neck and face.

Give the cursed thing back!

But how to get at it, under everything else? “Take the foul, evil thing back, Lord Bright!” Gloved hands strove to reach it under cuirass and tunic. “I wish I had never seen it! For love of life I forsook my calling, my knighthood, my Honor! I am faulty, treacherous, untrue…”