The Ill-Made Knight (33 page)

I couldn’t take my eyes off her. I don’t think I’d ever wanted a woman as much.

She had an embroidered riband in her hand, and she was, I think, a little put out that I wasn’t leaping to my feet. She leaned down.

I smiled at her. ‘My lady, I beg your pardon, but I’m not at my best,’ I said.

‘You could unlace his right shoulder,’ Perkin said.

‘Oh!’ said my beautiful visitor. She took the cup from my right hand and drew off the gauntlet. She smiled at me and draped my right arm over her shoulder as Perkin had my left.

‘There’s blood—’ I said.

‘Christ on the cross,’ Perkin muttered. ‘Why didn’t you say?’

But my chivalrous lady reached in and unlaced the right harness at the groin – her eyes flicked to mine – and then she unbuckled the straps inside the thigh – one, two – and brought her hand away covered in blood.

She smiled at me and licked at the blood on her fingers.

I swear to you.

‘I love a brave man,’ she said.

By our sweet and gentle saviour, I was ready to be transported to heaven in that instant – or to kill every Jacques in the town.

Or to have her on the straw.

She wiped her bloody hand on her fine gown and got to the buckles on the greaves. She and Perkin took the whole right leg off in one pull.

There was a
lot
of blood in my hose.

And then I was gone.

I awoke when the hot iron touched the back of my leg. I wanted to scream, but there was something nasty clenched between my teeth.

My first thought was, Sweet Christ, I’ve lost my leg. And it was my last.

I wasn’t out long. A barber was rubbing ointment over the whole wound, and it hurt as if all the demons of hell had decided to torment my right knee.

Then he pasted honey over the ointment. He looked at me. ‘It’s really nothing,’ he said. ‘Happens to horses all the time – get a wound right on a blood vessel. Easy physic, if I get to it in time.’ He held out his hand and Perkin handed him a length of fine white linen, which he began to wrap around the wound.

Perkin leaned me forward and looked into my eyes. ‘You in your right mind?’ he asked.

‘No,’ I said.

He smiled and handed me a cup of mint tisane with honey. ‘Drink this. Here, chew on these,’ he said. He handed me two wizened red things like dried flowers. They had a wonderful taste.

‘Chew. Chew more. Now spit,’ he said, holding out his hand.

I obeyed.

‘Now drink the rest of the cup,’ he said.

The surgeon tied off the cloth. ‘Change it twice a day. Tell me if the flesh gets proud.’ He smiled. ‘Horses don’t get gangrene,’ he said, then he bowed and withdrew.

‘What was that stuff?’ I asked.

‘Drink it
all
,’ he said.

I complied.

He took the cup. ‘Good night, m’lord.’

It always made me feel funny when men addressed me as ‘my lord’, as I was lord of nothing but a horse, a sword and some armour.

I lay back, wondering what the sharp-tasting drug had been.

There was a very quiet knock and my chivalrous friend opened the door. She smiled sweetly and slipped in, carrying a wax taper in a stick. ‘The Dauphine says one of us must sit with you all night,’ she said.

She had on a plain working woman’s kirtle with an apron.

‘I’m sorry that I bled on your lovely gown,’ I said.

She smiled. ‘I will wear it at court. My dear man, there is no better adornment. I will say, ‘Oh, that’s the blood of William Gold, who saved the Duke de Bourbon on the Bridge of Meaux. I was helping him with his armour.’

There was another knock, and she went to the door and took a covered cup.

‘Here,’ she said. ‘It’s honeyed milk with a little spice. My father used to take it when . . . he was hurt.’ She smiled.

I had seen rings on the fingers of the hand holding the cup.

‘Am I being served by all the Dauphine’s ladies?’ I asked.

‘Two at a time,’ she said.

‘Am I so dangerous?’ I asked.

‘I imagine that you are quite fearsome to your enemies, messire,’ she said. For the first time since the courtyard, she let her eyes meet mine. ‘But as I have a high heart of my own, I believe that I can meet you in an encounter – alone. I felt that two of us might put you . . . at a disadvantage.’

‘Ah, mademoiselle, I’m afraid I am no match for you, and you alone have me at a grave disadvantage,’ I said. I’d listened to a romance or two. The girls at the Three Foxes used to read them aloud, those as could read. And players would recite them. The Provençal ones and the Italians were the best.

She settled gracefully on the edge of my bed. ‘Drink from our cup,’ she said.

‘Does the cup come with a kiss of friendship?’ I asked.

She leaned over, almost bored, and kissed me lightly on the lips. I caught her – my hand against her back – and kissed her harder.

I’m not sure what I expected from a high-born girl. But I didn’t expect her mouth to melt open under mine, and for her to lean into me and breathe into my mouth.

Later, she said, ‘Did you expect me, then?’

I denied it, and she jumped off the bed and hit me lightly. ‘Liar!’ she said. ‘I’m too predictable. A light of love.’

‘My sweet and beautiful friend, I had no expectation but of an uncomfortable night with a nasty wound.’ I smiled at her – winningly, I hope.

She frowned. ‘And yet you chewed a clove. I can taste it in your mouth.’

‘Medicine,’ I said.

‘Only for foul breath,’ she said, but she laughed. ‘Perhaps our horse doctor uses it.’

‘Please come back,’ I said, patting my narrow bedstead.

‘No, messire. Too many such kisses and a girl may find herself with an unwanted swelling about the waist.’ She smiled. ‘Do you think my blood is any less hot than yours?’

I knew the answer to that.

‘I do hope that you stay on watch all night,’ I said, ‘because I’m not sure my strength is up to two or three or four of you.’

‘Fie!’ she said, swatting me. ‘That was ungentle.’

‘Benidictee! You may tax me, and I may not tax you back.’ I was getting the pace of her conversation.

She smiled. ‘Precisely, messire. I am to be adored, not to be teased.’

‘I could, perhaps, adore you more effectively if I knew your name.’ I smiled.

She nodded. ‘I am Emile de Clermont.’

I put my hand on hers without thinking about it. ‘Your father was the Marshal of Normandy?’

She dropped her eyes. ‘Yes.’

‘I met him. At Paris. With the Dauphin.’

‘You did?

‘Last autumn. I was acting as courier for the Prince of Wales. Your father came to the gate of the Louvre, fully armed. We—’ I smiled. ‘We almost fought.
Par dieu
, we were so cold and wet.’ I smiled at her. ‘Clermonts must be destined to rescue me.’

I was prattling on in this manner when I realized that she was crying. Like my touch to her hand, her tears were not in the game. She was truly crying.

‘They killed him,’ she said. ‘By My lady the Virgin, the
canaille
killed him. And two days ago, I saw my mother’s castle burn. Christ – I want to be braver than this.’ She stood up. ‘I’m sorry, Master Gold, you are a better man than I thought. Let go my hand.’

Instead, I pulled. I didn’t pull hard.

In a fight, you can learn everything – everything – from an opponent at the moment when your swords meet. The contact of the two blades is so intimate that a more experienced swordsman can read intentions, skills and weaknesses in one quick beat of a man’s heart.

How much more, then, can a boy or girl learn from the touch of a hand?

She didn’t want to go.

She came into my arms and turned her head away.

I wiped her tears with my free hand and then licked my fingers.

‘That’s not funny!’ she said. ‘You are mocking me.’

‘Perhaps,’ I admitted. ‘You are afraid.’

‘So? I’m a weak woman. Women are afraid of everything. So I’m told.’ She was pulling away.

‘I was afraid today,’ I said. She relaxed.

‘You’d have been some sort of a monster if you hadn’t been, I think,’ she said.

‘So I can be afraid, and you cannot?’ I asked.

She began to relax against me. ‘If I just lie here,’ she said, ‘will you – not entice me to do as I would rather do?’

‘Depends,’ I said.

‘On what?’ she asked.

‘On whether you lie on my right knee or not,’ I said.

Much later, she said, ‘You were an
apprentice goldsmith?’

‘Why so shocked? I can kill your enemies
and
repair your jewels.’ She laughed and then burst into tears. ‘You are very much not what I expected an English knight to be.’

I had enough experience of women to know not to explore every comment.

She had a bad dream and gave a low scream.

I woke her up.

‘They’re going to kill us all,’ she said.

‘Not unless they get better armour and some siege machines,’ I said. Will, the bold, bluff English squire, that was me.

Suddenly she was kissing me.

I’d been the most honorable of men for long, dark, pain-filled hours, and suddenly, in heartbeats, her kirtle was gone and we were . . . far beyond what might have been agreed, if such a thing could be discussed.

She hoisted my shirt.

‘Sweet Emile,’ I said.

‘Psst,’ she said. ‘I will be dead in two days.’

I pulled her shift over her head. ‘You will not, on my honour.’

She laughed, the way I have learned women laugh when you utterly fail to understand them.

And there was no sleep after that.

She dressed, kissed me and went out just as the stars dimmed. The blonde girl in the blue wool dress came in directly and looked at me with a fiercely disapproving glare.

My knee hurt like fire. I was in a castle out of food, under siege by a sea of enemies who intended our destruction.

I couldn’t have been happier.

My disapproving blonde friend sat primly, as far across the solar as she could manage.

I chivalrously went to sleep.

The older knights returned at first light, and I was awakened by the clatter of their hooves on the bridge.

In the second hour after matins, Jean de Grailly came. He praised me, I praised his squire Tom, and he explained that they’d brought in very little food.

‘We think we’ll mount every man-at-arms in the castle and sortie,’ he said. ‘Perhaps cut our way through the canaille. The Count of Foix believes we can lift the siege. The Dauphin is just two days north of us, and the King of Navarre is a day’s march away.’ He paused. ‘The Dauphine says she would rather die than be rescued by the King of Navarre.’

‘My lord, I can understand that sentiment,’ I said.

De Grailly laughed. ‘And I, too! Can you ride?’

I tested the leg. ‘If I was helped onto my horse,’ I suggested.

‘Excellent. You are a man after my own heart. I might even mistake monsieur for a Gascon.’ He grinned. ‘I will send your squire to arm you in the second hour after midday.’

‘In that case, my lord, I’ll eat,’ I said.

‘I trust you slept well,’ he asked me, and I swear his eyes sparkled.

‘As much as I needed,’ I agreed.

He grinned. ‘Very like a Gascon.’

Perkin was my next visitor. ‘How was my lord’s night?’ he asked.

‘Are you mocking me, you rogue?’ I asked.

‘Mmm. On balance, yes, my lord, I think I
am
mocking you.’ He put a wet towel and a bowl of steaming water on a stool. ‘I believe you can wash yourself, messire? And may I mention that messire has a certain perfumed smell to him that, unless messire has been visited by angels, might have come from a certain lady?’

‘Perkin, did you give me cloves for my breath?’ I asked.

‘By our sweet saviour, m’lord, someone had to. You might have killed her, else.’ He didn’t smile. ‘I think that m’lord’s left leg harness is badly damaged and doesn’t fit worth spit anyway.’

I had to admit he was right. I’d worn it all over France, but not in a fight – and it didn’t fit. It was two inches too short – the greaves caught on the sabatons and I had bruises on both insteps. Fine for riding – hopeless for fighting on foot.

‘First, I think I prefer Master Gold to M’lord.’ I met his eye.

He frowned. ‘I’ll consider it. Do you have the ready silver to purchase leg armour?’

I shook my head. ‘You have our purse, Perkin. What’s in it?’

He took it off his belt and opened it. ‘A little more than forty livre tournois. Not enough to buy anything but food on the road.’

‘Can the armourer fix the strap on the cuisse?’ I asked.

‘Already fixed,’ he said. He really was the best squire and servant any knight ever had. He unrolled the bandage on my knee, sniffed the wound and then began to re-bandage it. It hurt like all the sins of all the sinners in hell, and I groaned. I might even have squeaked.

‘She’s married,’ he said.

I was too busy being in pain. This cut took several heartbeats to register.

‘Her husband had his arm broken in the fighting. Rumour has it they detest each other, but I thought you needed to know.’ He leaned close. ‘He knows where she spent the night. She made a point of making sure he knows.’

Par dieu, messieurs
. This was my introduction to the lives of the rich and titled. It didn’t matter. I’d already given her my heart. That brave, yet terrified girl.

Why didn’t you tell me? I thought. I was in a state of mortal sin. I was about to fight, and possibly die, in a state of mortal sin.

Just for a moment I thought of her, and her kirtle going over her head, and I thought . . . Oh well. An eternity in hell.

I smiled. Friends, I still do. Do you really think God sends you to hell for the disport of two willing friends? I think the priests clip us too close, and I am reckoned a pious man for a man-at-arms. But I was younger then, and the whole thing preyed on my mind.

About midday, Tom came and, with Perkin, he began to arm me. And when I had my cursed leg harnesses on – the bases of the greaves already cutting into yesterday’s bruises – Emile slipped in the door. She looked angry. Her chin was high, she was slightly flushed.