Roselynde (50 page)

That evening Richard dined in state with his ladies and gentlemen
in Comnenus's palace. Lent being past, they made free with Comnenus's larder,
enjoying such delicacies as they had not seen since they left Sicily. Richard,
seated between Joanna and Berengaria, was in high good spirits, telling them
how he was having the horses landed and exercised that evening so that they would
really deal properly with Comnenus in the next few days. Since this was a
victory feast, the King had ordered that strict precedence by rank be
abrogated. Those who had a marked part in Comnenus's discomfiture sat with
Richard at the High Table. As a mark of Richard's special favour, Simon sat at
Joanna's left, Alinor just beyond him. Alinor had not taken her eyes from
Simon's face since he entered the Hall and now, under cover of Richard's talk,
she whispered urgently. "Where are you hurt?"

"Not at all," Simon replied, trying to smile. "Not
even the two scratches I thought might be dealt me."

"Simon, do not lie to me."

"I am not lying. There were so few blows struck altogether,
and those so ill-placed and feeble, that it would be almost a miracle if one
hurt me."

"I do not believe you," Alinor cried, her voice rising
in her distress. "You look like a man bled white."

Simon's hand fastened warningly on Alinor's wrist, but it was too
late. Every head in the immediate vicinity, including the King's, turned. Simon
did, indeed, look like a man who had lost too much blood, his face gray-white
and covered with a sheen of sweat, his breathing shallow and uneven. Although
his violent sickness had subsided when he cleared his breakfast from his
stomach, he had remained too nauseated to eat or drink anything since their
return. Even now his food and wine sat untouched before him on the table. The
King's eyes flicked from Simon's face to the full plate and goblet.

"Salt fish," he said.

All eyes turned toward Richard, most containing blank amazement,
but William du Bois and two other gentlemen from southern France nodded
energetically.

"Harry," Richard said to the young squire who stood
behind him to serve, "get me some raw salt fish at once." The boy ran
off and Richard turned to look at Simon again. "When came this weakness
upon you?" he asked.

Simon opened his mouth to deny anything was amiss, then cast a
furious glance at Alinor, and shrugged. "When I ran to catch a mount, my
lord."

"See," Richard said, "that comes of burying oneself
in a country where the sun never shines and it rains so much that a man feels
his toes and fingers will rot off or take root."

The squire returned with a limp herring on a salver. Richard waved
him toward Simon. "Eat," he ordered.

Simon swallowed convulsively and beads of sweat stood out on his
forehead.

Richard laughed uproariously. "I know in this moment you
would like to murder me," he chortled, "but by Christ's ten toes I
mean you only good. Eat, I say. Now! Before your gorge rises."

Terrified at what she had brought upon Simon, for Richard was well
known to love a practical joke, Alinor hurriedly cut the head and tail from the
fish and severed three small sections from which she tore the skin and bone.
Pulling Simon's eating knife from its sheath, she speared a piece and presented
it to him, begging wordlessly with tear-filled eyes. Simon accepted the knife
and ungritted his teeth just long enough to get the piece of fish into his
mouth. His eyes were fixed on the table, his lips grim, every fiber of his body
braced to resist the expected upheaval of his stomach.

The taste, to his amazement, was exceedingly pleasant. The
bitter-salt flavor cleared the coating of slime from his mouth like magic.
Simon chewed, swallowed, speared another piece and popped it into his mouth.
The queasy, quivering sensation in his middle diminished.

"Thank you, my lord," Simon exclaimed as the color began
to come back into his face.

Richard laughed again. "Do not eat the whole fish," he
warned. "As soon as the taste becomes less inviting, give over. And do
you, not being accustomed to fighting in the hot sun, be sure to carry salt
meat or fish with you, or you will be taken with the same disease again."

He turned back to Berengaria, who was praising his wisdom, and
explained how he had learned the trick from a vassal of his mother's who had
been on Crusade with her. Simon breathed a quivering sigh of relief and washed
down several more pieces of fish with the wine in his goblet. Then he really
smiled at Alinor and began on his dinner with restored appetite.

Altogether the evening he had dreaded turned into a great
pleasure. When Alinor saw that sufficient weakness remained to make dancing
somewhat less of a joy than usual, she drew Simon away to see the glories of
luxury in the captured palace. At first Simon suspected her motives, but Alinor
was truly entranced with what she had found. Simon was suitably astonished at
the sunken marble baths bordered by mosaic tile terraces to which she led him.
It took him a couple of minutes to realize that the bits of stone formed
pictures when one stood at a sufficient distance; when he made out the pictures
he was even more astonished.

Partly because of the mischievous twinkle in Alinor's eyes and
partly because of his own curiosity, Simon curbed his first impulse, which was
to shepherd Alinor swiftly out of the room. The persons—if one could call them
that—depicted were most certainly the ancients who had lived before the advent
of Christ. They were a weird brood. The nearest was a woman of astonishing
ugliness with snakes all over her head. Beyond her was a man of equally
astonishing beauty, until one saw his nether limbs, which, hoofs and all,
belonged on a goat. Simon would have thought it a portrait of Satan, except that
he was playing musical pipes. To the other side was a child with tiny wings on
shoulders and heels, bearing a minuscule bow. Beyond the child was a maid whose
arms were turning into the branches of a tree while her feet became its roots.
There were dozens of others, which Simon could not see clearly, each different,
except in one thing. None of them, not one, wore even a stitch of clothing, not
even the few who seemed to be engaged in quite ordinary business, such as
weaving or wrestling.

Simon made some carefully indifferent comment and Alinor, stifling
her laughter, led him away. The next stop was the Emperor's bedchamber. Here
indifference gave way. Simon snorted in contempt at the gilded bed with its
cloth-of-gold hangings and spread, at the jeweled cups and pitchers, ewers,
basins. The golden urinal made him laugh aloud and comment coarsely that, no
doubt, the Emperor thought he pissed sweet wine.

"He reminds me of a creature they brought to show the King at
Rhodes. The shell was of a beauty hard to believe, traced and fluted, all pale
pink and gold and white, but the thing inside—ugh!—boneless and formless, slimy
gray, good for nothing except its outer covering."

"You are right enough about the creature inside being
foul," Alinor said, carrying the branch of candles she held closer to the
wall and holding it so that the light fell upon the scene that hung there,

Simon glanced at what she was exposing and then cast down his
affronted eyes. There was no need to reprimand Ali- nor. She was taking no
pleasure in these scenes. She was not even looking at the hanging upon which
couples, trios, quartets, and quintets cavorted in lewd images of sexual
abandon and torture.

"They are all the same, or worse," Alinor remarked
distastefully, gesturing around the room.

"Have them removed," Simon ordered. "I do not know
whether the King plans to use these chambers, but this will not be to his
taste. And if he wishes to set the Lady Berengaria here— See if they can be
replaced with something decent. If not, the bare walls will serve."

Other chambers were less offensive. They found sufficient hangings
to replace those presently on the walls of the Emperor's bedchamber. They came
last to the chapel where Simon stared and shrugged his shoulders. He found the
murals depicting a Christ bedecked with silks and jewels almost blasphemous. In
the end he shook his head and admitted he found the grandeur oppressive.

"I am too old," he sighed. "I cannot come to like
the blazing sun, the air that is so clear that each crack in the earth appears
a chasm, the silks and lush fruits, and the houses and palaces with their wide
doors and windows that make me feel I must be armed and girded so that I cannot
rest. I long for the soft air of England, for an honest half-sour apple, for a
warm woolen tunic and a cool wall chamber where I can sleep in peace. I am
tired of new sights, Alinor. I am sick for home."

"I, too," Alinor agreed softly.

There was nothing more she could say to comfort him. Far from
having any hope of turning homeward, there was some question as to when they
would ever reach the Holy Land. Simon knew and Alinor guessed that Richard had
no intention of leaving Cyprus until he owned it. The King could be, and often
was, generous to a worthy foe, but he never forgot what he considered an act of
deceit or dishonor. Moreover, Cyprus was a rich prize that would serve as a
granary for the Crusaders in the Holy Land.

The following morning was given to establishing a firm hold on the
port and city of Limassol. In the afternoon, the King rode out with a troop of
about fifty knights on the soundest horses to examine the countryside. Within
two leagues they came upon a somewhat larger troop of Conmenus's men, but those
fled away before a challenge could be offered. Richard laughed and started out
in pursuit. Fortunately, because the Crusaders' horses were not yet fully
recovered from their incarceration aboard the ship, the chase did not last
long. Another half league brought them within sight of the Emperor's army.
Richard pulled up to look over the force.

Hugo de Mara, one of the King's clerks, rode hurriedly up beside
him. "Come away," he urged, "come away."

Richard looked at him with blank amazement.

"My lord King," he insisted, "it appears a wise
plan to decline to close with so large and powerful a multitude."

Simon cast his eyes up to heaven in exasperation, wondering how
the learned, who were supposedly wise, could be such idiots. If he had thought
about it for a week, de Mara could have said nothing more likely to induce
recklessness in Richard. That Simon had judged his master well was apparent
from the King's reply.

"Sir clerk," he remarked coldly, "as for our
various professions, you had better employ yourself in writing and leave war to
us."

That did it, Simon thought, loosening his sword in its scabbard
and adjusting the loop of his morningstar so that his hand would slip in
quickly. When the King began to speak in plural person in an informal situation
like this, his temper had been roused.

Richard looked around at his fifty knights. "You," he
said to de Mara, "take good care to keep out of the crowd. Any other of
you who feel the same way had better stay with him." He turned his
attention again to the Emperor's forces. A forest of banners was progressing
slowly up a nearby hill. "Look at them," Richard exclaimed. "If
I saw a troop of my enemy sitting so close, would I not send my army to drive
them away or destroy them instead of parading about?"

"No," Simon replied drily.

"What?" Richard thundered.

"I said you would not send your army," Simon repeated.
"Doubtless you would go yourself with as equal a number of knights as you
could judge. But Comnenus has no chivalry."

The sally drew a laugh, but the damage had been done. Richard
would not accept the warning bound up in the compliment beyond waiting a little
while longer to see whether the opposing force had heart enough to attack. Then
Richard grouped his knights. When even that aggressive activity did not spur
Comnenus, the King fewtered his lance and set spurs to his horse. Simon's lance
came down behind and to the left of Richard's. The whole troop thundered
forward.

It almost seemed as if the opposing army had been watching with
blind eyes. Their reactions were those of men taken by surprise. Perhaps they,
like de Mara, could not believe so few would attack so many. Richard's troops
burst through the center, decimating the men in that area and scattering
knights and foot soldiers like chaff. Having won through, the King set up a
shout to rally his forces, threw down what was left of his lance, and prepared
to fight his way out to safety. The Crusaders wheeled their horses and grouped
around the well-known voice.

Now, Simon thought. Now they have taken our measure, how few we
are, and they will fall upon us. He could feel his horse heaving under him.
Even Lord Rannulf's strain of destriers was not proof against a month's
immobility followed by overactivity. The mounts of some of the other men were
in worse case, trembling and staggering. Simon smiled grimly. It seemed as if
he would need the salt meat he had stowed in a cloth behind his saddle. They
would have heavy work to win safe away. Sword in hand, he scanned Comnenus's
army, watching for whence the attack would come. Instead, he watched that army
begin to ravel away. Those with the swiftest horses were already farthest.

"Advance!" Richard roared.

For one moment Simon's faith in the King's tactical genius was
shaken. Had Richard forgotten the state of their horses? But the King did not
set out in pursuit of the fleeing knights. He rode down to where Comnenus's
camp had been set. Here, indeed, they had some heavy work, for Comnenus's
footmen and servants were determined to loot their master's camp, and Richard
was equally determined to keep the goods and cattle for his own men. Simon struck
and thrust with growing disgust. There were some armed men, but most of the
frantic wretches that opposed them were ragged scarecrows. Each blow killed or
disabled, and Simon used his shield more often as a weapon than to protect
himself.