The Apex Book of World SF 2 (36 page)

I reached behind me,
pretending I was unstrapping the bag, and pulled out my foot from the stirrup.
I spurred the horse and kicked Bec de Corbin in the face so that he reeled
back, balancing with his spear as if he were running on a tightrope. Pulling
out my sword I leant forwards and the bolt aimed at my throat banged on my
helmet and slipped. I swung in one nice, classic sinister move at Gloomy Face;
the leap of my horse helped in pulling the blade out of his skull. It's not
really that difficult if one knows how to do it.

Bec de Corbin, had
he wanted to, could have run for the dunes. But he didn't. He thought that
before I could turn the horse he would run me through with his spear.

He thought wrong.

I slashed him
broadly, right across his hands holding the spear-shaft, and then again, across
his belly. I wanted to reach lower but failed. No-one is perfect.

The crossbow-man
didn't belong to the cowardly, either. Rather than run, he pulled the bowstring
again and tried to take aim. I reined in the horse, caught the sword by the
blade and threw it. It worked. He fell down so conveniently that I didn't have
to get off the horse to retrieve the weapon.

Branwen lowered her
head onto her horse's neck and cried, choked with sobs. I didn't say a word,
didn't make any gestures. I didn't do anything. I never know what to do when a
woman cries. One minstrel I met in Caer Aranhrod in Wales claimed that the best
way to deal with it is to burst out crying oneself. I don't know if he had been
serious or joking.

I carefully wiped
the sword-blade. For such emergencies I carry a rag under my saddle. Wiping a
sword-blade calms the hands.

Bec de Corbin was
wheezing, moaning, making a huge effort to die. I could have dismounted my
horse and helped him, but I didn't feel all that good myself. Besides, I didn't
pity him enough. Life is cruel. If I remember correctly, no-one's ever pitied
me. Or so it seemed to me.

I took off the
helmet, the ring-mail hood and the skull-cap. It was soaked through. I can tell
you; I sweated like a mouse in labour. I felt awful. My eyelids felt as heavy
as lead and my arms and elbows were slowly filling with a painful numbness. I
heard Branwen crying as if through a wall made of logs, tightly packed with
moss. My head rang with a dull, throbbing pain.

Why am I on these
dunes? How did I get here? Where from? Where am I going?
Branwen…I'd heard
this name somewhere. But I couldn't…couldn't remember where…

My fingers stiff, I
touched the swelling on my head: the old scar, the reminder of that terrible
cut that had cracked my skull open, hammering in the sharp edges of my broken
helmet.

No wonder,
I thought
, that
going around with a hole like this my head sometimes feels empty. Even when I'm
awake I feel as if I were still inside that black tunnel with a turbid glow at
the end, just as I see it in my dreams.

Sniffling and
coughing, Branwen let me know that she was ready. I swallowed a lump in my
throat.

"Ready?" I asked in
a deliberately hard, dry tone of voice to mask my weakness.

"Yes." Her voice was
equally hard. She wiped her tears with the top of her hand. "Sir?"

"Yes, my lady."

"You despise me, don't
you?"

"That's not true."

She turned away from
me violently, spurred her horse and rode off, down the road amongst the dunes,
towards the rocks. I followed her. I felt rotten.

I could smell the
scent of apples.

I hate giving my
name when I don't feel like it.

It was lucky, then,
that we found the gate open, the portcullis raised and the guards leaning on
their picks and halberds not too officious. Luckier still, a man dressed in
velvet robes who greeted us in the courtyard was satisfied with the few words
he had exchanged with Branwen and didn't ask me any questions. Holding the
stirrup, he offered Branwen his arm and politely turned his eyes away while she
dismounted, showing her calf and knee. Then, just as politely, he motioned us
to follow him.

The castle was
horribly empty. As if deserted. It was cold and the sight of cold hearths made
us feel even colder. We were waiting, Branwen and I, in an empty great hall,
amongst the diagonal shafts of light falling in through the arched windows. We
didn't wait long. A low door creaked.

Now,
I thought, and the
thought exploded in my head with a white, cold, dazzling flame, illuminating
for a moment the long, unending depth of the black tunnel.
Now,
I
thought.
Now she'll come in.

She did. It was her.
Iseult.

I felt a deep
shudder when she entered: the white brightness in the dark frame of the door.
Believe me or not, at first glance she was identical to that other, the Irish
Iseult, my cousin, the Iseult of the Golden Hair form Baile Atha Cliath. Only
the second glance revealed differences: her hair was slightly darker and
without the tendency to curl into locks; her eyes green, not blue, and more
oval without that unique almond shape. The line of her lips was different, too.
And her hands.

Her hands were
indeed beautiful. I think she must have become used to all the flattering
comparisons with alabaster and ebony but, to me, the whiteness and smoothness
of her hands brought back the image of the candles in the chapel of Ynis Witrin
in Glastonbury: burning bright in the semi-darkness, aglow to the point of
transparency.

Branwen made a deep
curtsy. I knelt on one knee, bowed my head and, both hands holding my sheathed
sword, I stretched it towards her. Thus, as custom required, I offered my sword
in her service. Whatever it might mean.

She answered with a
bow, came closer and touched the sword with the tips of her slender fingers.
Then the rules of the ceremony permitted me to rise to my feet. I gave the
sword to the man in velvet, as custom demanded.

"Welcome to the
castle Carhaing," said Iseult. "Lady…"

"My name is Branwen
of Cornwall. And this is my companion…"

Well?
I thought.

"…Sir Morholt of
Ulster."

By Lugh and Lir! Now
I remembered: Branwen of Tara, later Branwen of Tintagel. Of course. It was
her.

Iseult watched us in
silence. In the end, clasping her famous white hands, she cracked her fingers.

"Have you been sent
by her?" she asked quietly. "From Cornwall? How have you got here? I look out
for the ship every day and I know that it has not reached our shores yet."

Branwen was silent.
I, of course, didn't know what to say either.

"Do tell me," said
Iseult. "When will the ship we are waiting for arrive? Who will it bring? Under
what colour will it sail from Tintagel? White? Or black?"

Branwen didn't
answer. Iseult of the White Hands nodded, as if showing she understood. I
envied her that.

"Tristan of
Lionesse, my lord and husband," she spoke, "is gravely wounded. His thigh was
torn with a lance in a skirmish with Estult Orgellis and his mercenaries. The
wound is festering…and will not heal…"

Her voice broke and
her beautiful hands trembled.

"Fever has been
eating him for many days now. He is often delirious, loses consciousness, doesn't
recognise anybody. I stay by his bed day and night, tend to him, trying to ease
the pain. Nevertheless, perhaps due to my clumsiness and incompetence, Tristan
has sent my brother to Tintagel. Apparently, my husband thinks it is easier to
find a good medic in Cornwall."

We remained silent, Branwen and I.

"But I still have no
news from my brother, still no sign of his ship," continued Iseult of the White
Hands. "And now, instead of the one awaited by Tristan, you appear, Branwen.
What brings you here? You, the maid and friend of the golden-haired Queen of
Tintagel? Have you brought with you your love potion?"

Branwen turned pale.
I felt an unexpected pang of pity. For in comparison with Iseult—tall, slim and
slender, proud, mysterious and a ravishing beauty, Branwen looked like a simple
Irish peasant woman: chubby-cheeked, round-hipped, as coarse as homespun cloth,
with her hair still tangled from the rain. Believe it or not, I felt sorry for
her.

"Tristan has already
accepted the potion once from your hands, Branwen," continued Iseult. "The
potion that is still working and slowly killing him. Then, on the ship, Tristan
took death from your hands. Perhaps, you have arrived here now to give him
life? Verily, Branwen, if this is so, you had better hurry. There is little
time left. Very little."

Branwen didn't stir.
Her face was expressionless: the wax face of a doll. Their eyes, hers and
Iseult's, fiery and powerful, met and locked. I could sense the tension,
creaking like an overstretched rope. To my surprise, it was Iseult who turned
out to be stronger.

"Lady Iseult—"
Branwen fell down to her knees and bowed her head "—you have the right to feel
bitter towards me. But I do not ask you for forgiveness as it wasn't you whom I
offended. I beg you for grace. I want to see him, beautiful Iseult of the White
Hands. I want to see Tristan."

Her voice was quiet, soft, calm. In Iseult's eyes there was only sorrow.

"Very well," she
said. "You shall see him, Branwen. Although I swore I wouldn't allow foreign
hands to touch him again. Especially Cornish hands, her hands."

"It's not certain
that she will come here from Tintagel," whispered Branwen, still on her knees.

"Rise, Branwen." Iseult of the White Hands lifted her head and her eyes glittered with moist
diamonds. "It is not certain, you say. Yet…I would run barefoot through the
snow, the thorns, the red-hot embers, if only…if only he called me. But he
does not call me, although he knows… He calls only her, on whom he cannot
depend. Our lives, Branwen, never cease to surprise us with ironies."

Branwen rose from
her knees. Her eyes, I saw, were also filled with diamonds. Eh, women…

"Go to him, then, good Branwen," said Iseult bitterly. "Go and take to him that which I see in
your eyes. But prepare yourself for the worst. For when you kneel by his bed,
he will throw in your face a name that belongs not to you. He will throw it
like a curse. Go, Branwen. The servants will show you the way."

Iseult, wringing the
fingers of her white hands, watched me carefully. I was looking for hatred and
enmity in her eyes. For she must have known. When one weds a living legend, one
gets to know that legend in its tiniest detail. And I, after all, was no
trifle, not to look at, anyway.

She was looking at
me and there was something strange in her gaze. Then, having gathered her long
dress, she sat in a carved chair, her white hands clasping the arm-rests.

"Sit here, Morholt
of Ulster," she said. "By my side."

I did.

There are many
stories, mostly improbable or untrue from beginning to end, circulating about
my duel with Tristan of Lionesse. In one of them, I was even turned into a
dragon whom Tristan slew, thereby winning the right to Iseult of the Golden
Hair. Not bad, eh? Romantic. And justified, to a point. I did in fact have a
black dragon on my shield, perhaps it all started with that. After all,
everyone knows that after Cuchulain, there are no dragons in Ireland.

Another story has it
that the duel took place in Cornwall before Tristan met Iseult. That's not
true. It's a minstrels' tale. King Diarmuid sent me to Mark, to Tintagel,
several times, it's true, where I haggled over the tribute Cornwall was due to
the King, gods only know on what grounds, I wasn't interested in politics. But
I didn't meet Tristan then.

Nor did I meet him
when he came to Ireland for the first time. I met him during his second visit,
when he came to ask Iseult of the Golden Hair for Cornwall. Diarmuid's court,
as usual in such situations, divided between those who supported the match and
those who were against it. I belonged to the latter faction, though, in all
honesty, I didn't know what all the fuss was about; as I said, I wasn't
interested in politics, or intrigues. But I liked and knew how to fight.

The plan, as far as
I could see, was simple. It didn't even merit the name of "intrigue". We wanted
to break up King Mark's match and prevent the marriage with Tintagel. Was there
a better way than to kill the envoy? The opportunity presented itself easily
enough. I offended Tristan and he challenged me. He challenged me, you
understand, not the other way round.

We fought in Dun
Laoghaire, on the shore of the Bay. I didn't think I would have much of a
problem with him. At first glance, I was twice his weight and had at least as
much experience. Or so it seemed to me.

How wrong I was, I
discovered soon after the first encounter, when we crushed our lances into
splinters. I almost broke my back, so hard did he push me against the back of
my saddle. A bit harder and he would have pushed me over together with my
horse. When he turned around and, without calling for another lance, he drew
his sword—I was pleased. The thing about lances is that with a little bit of
luck and a good mount, even a green horn can thrash an experienced knight. The
sword, in the long run, is a fairer weapon.

To start with, we felt
each other around the shields for a bit. He was as strong as a bull. Stronger
than I'd thought. He fought in the classical style: dexter, sinister,
sky-below, blow after blow, very fast; his speed didn't allow me to take
advantage of my experience, to impose my own, less classical style. He was
tiring me out, so at the first opportunity I dodged the rules and slashed him
across the thigh, just below the shield adorned by the rearing lion of
Lionesse.