The Last Knight (16 page)

“As if I’d do anything of the kind! I’d like to do something
to
the sadistic son of a—”

“Or you can throw them out—”

“Into the street? Without a fract between them, and one of them half dead of infection, and—”

“Or you can keep them here,” said the sheriff, “with no one in the house but you and old Maudie. I don’t recommend it, Kara.”

“I’ll make my own decision, thank you very much. I mean to—”

“Or you could lodge them with the herbalist until this one recovers. It mightn’t cost that much…. I’ll pay a bit of it myself, and if there’s any good in him Master Barton will cut his rates. How about it, Barton? Is there any good in you?”

“Why do people always expect healers to offer their services for free?” Master Barton turned from Sir Michael’s bed, wiping his hands. “Do you expect free bread from the baker? Or free carpentry? No, indeed. So why should I do it?”

I couldn’t fault his logic, but my guts knotted. I didn’t have any money. Mistress Kara noticed my expression.

“Stop it, you stingy man, you’re scaring Master Fisk. He doesn’t mean it,” she assured me.

Master Barton sighed. “I’ll offer my time for free, but this man needs magica to heal and I can’t give that away—it costs too high. I can’t board them, either. There are two boys with mumps in my sickroom.”

“Then they’ll stay here,” said Mistress Kara firmly. “I’ll hire Milly’s brother to help with the heavy nursing, and he can keep Master Fisk from murdering us in our beds and making off with the silver.”

“I wouldn’t count on it,” said the sheriff.

“But what about magica herbs?” Master Barton asked. “They’re going to cost—”

“Wait, they do have money!” Mistress Kara’s eyes snapped with excitement. “That was a very fine tapestry Sir Michael was lying on—at least, I’m sure it
will
be fine, when I have a chance to look at it. I’ll buy it from them, and probably make a profit on the resale! Besides, there’s a…Master Fisk, are you all right?”

“I am now.” I drew a shuddering breath and blinked hard. “Mistress Kara, I thank you. If you hadn’t—”

“Nonsense, anyone would do the same. Well, anyone as curious as I am. But you’re worried about your friend, and tired out too, so—”

“He’s not my friend.” I was wondering if there’d be any money left after we paid Master Barton and spoke without thinking. “He’s my…ah…”

They all stared at me. Mistress Kara’s face was bright with interest, and Sir Michael would tell them anyway as soon as he recovered. And he
would
recover, thanks to Mistress Kara.

“He’s a knight errant,” I said. “And I’m his squire.”

The sheriff frowned, the herbalist smiled, and Mistress Kara’s eyes lit with delight. “I knew it! This is a story I’ve got to hear.”

It all came together as Mistress Kara had decreed. Milly-the-maid’s brother—a groom by trade—was perfectly willing to nurse “a two-footer.” Especially at the fee Mistress Kara offered. Master Barton left, returned with his magica herbs, and chased old Maudie out of the kitchen to brew them. Then he chased me out of Sir Michael’s bedroom while he applied them, preferring Milly’s brother’s assistance.

I was so stupid with fatigue that I was standing in the hall staring at the bedroom door when Mistress Kara came by.

“Master Barton’s treating your friend? Don’t look so nervous. He’s a very good healer, and he never lets anyone in. I have a commission to finish—not that it looks like I’ll get much work done with all this fuss going on—but I have a hunch your story will make up for it. And the moment I finish, I’ll start looking for a buyer for your tapestry.”

“I hope you find a generous one,” I said, inserting the words into one of her brief pauses for breath. “You’ve been spending pretty freely, considering you haven’t examined the tapestry yet.”

“Then let’s have a look at it, for I must admit I’m curious. If it belongs to one of the big houses, I might be able to sell it back to them. A lot of family tapestries were seized as loot in the warring times. Sometimes you can…”

We went downstairs to Mistress Kara’s weaving room and unrolled the tapestry on the floor. It was big, roughly ten by fourteen feet, and unlike the spiral story I had seen on Mistress Kara’s tapestry at Seven Oaks, this was designed in the usual way. The big scene in the center showed a bloodstained knight lying with his head in the lap of a slender maiden. The knight’s blood covered her skirt and hands, and they both looked quite unhappy. It wasn’t something I’d want on my walls, though the weaving was good.

Mistress Kara saw my expression and grinned. “It was probably commissioned to portray an old family story. It gives the owner an excuse to tell everyone about his heroic ancestor who did thus and such. Besides, look how the crest on the knight’s shield is displayed.”

The shield lay at the knight’s feet; the painted ship sailing into an outstretched hand was clearly visible.

“And the same device is woven into the corners. See, the ship sails around the border, encountering storms and monsters, but at each corner it sails into the hand. Family tapestry. But it may be hard to find out who originally owned it, since it’s not a liege’s crest.”

The older and more important a family, the simpler their crest—across the length of a dusty battlefield, it’s much harder to tell the difference between a ship sailing into a hand and a bull charging a tower than between a shield that’s half red, half black, and one that’s blue with a yellow circle in the middle.

Mistress Kara looked the tapestry over. “Yes, this was made for some petty baron who wanted to brag about his ancestors. I’ll give you thirty gold roundels for it.”

“Forty-five,” I answered before I could stop myself; after all, she could still kick us out.

She showed no sign of kicking us out, but her eyes began to glitter. “Thirty-three. And considering that I might not be able to track down the family, who might not want it back if I do, that’s a very good offer.”

“Forty.”

We settled on thirty-five, for Mistress Kara was a shrewd bargainer and she had the advantage.

Master Barton joined us for mid-meal. He said Sir Michael’s fever would break sometime tonight and, seeing my resolve to sit up with him, Mistress Kara persuaded me to take an afternoon nap.

It was late when I awakened, for full dark had fallen, and I swore as I poured water into a basin. The face that stared back at me from the mirror was still hollow-eyed with weariness, rough with stubble, and looked so disreputable that I was astonished Mistress Kara had agreed to let us stay.

I was even more surprised, when I went down the hall to Sir Michael’s room, to find Kara sitting with him.

I thanked her, implying as politely as I could that she could leave if she wished. In her shoes, I’d have been worried about being alone in the same room with me.

But she settled firmly into her chair and declared that she’d like to hear my story now. “For I consider that story your rent, Master Fisk. I collect good stories, you know. I use them as inspiration for my tapestries.”

The lamp was turned too low to read, so as not to disturb Michael, and I needed to do something to keep myself awake. Besides, “stories” are part of a con artist’s repertoire.

I began with breaking Lady Ceciel out of Sorrowston Tower, and I made a good tale of it, for I glossed over a few of the less glamorous aspects, like the mud, and went for a saga of true heroism…after a fashion.

Mistress Kara was an attentive listener. When she interrupted, her questions and comments were the kind that led the story on and on. After a time, my recitation became less heroic and more true. When I reached the point where she opened the barrel, and finally fell silent, I realized that I had revealed not only that Sir Michael and I were both indebted, but my own criminal past. Mind, it would have been hard to explain how I became Sir Michael’s squire without revealing both those things, but I could have lied. Either I must have been more tired than I thought or Mistress Kara was a
very
good listener. Getting people to talk is part of a con artist’s trade. She might have been a good one, if she wasn’t so talkative herself.

My revelations didn’t seem to disturb her. She was gazing at Michael’s flushed, stubbled face. “He’s quite heroic.”

I looked at the scabbed-over cuts that crisscrossed my employer’s back. “Vastly overrated,” I muttered.

“But do you think he’s entirely competent at it? I mean, most of his efforts don’t come off, do they?”

“He’s not incompetent!”

Her brows lifted at my vehemence, and heat rose in my face.

“I know how it sounds, but he isn’t. It’s just…” I stopped. A dog barked somewhere in the distance. Mistress Kara waited, her bright, curious eyes fixed on mine.

“It’s that…his reach exceeds his grasp. He tries to do things no one else would even dream of attempting—and he usually brings about three quarters of it off. The last quarter sometimes trips him up, but the parts he does manage are remarkable. And no one else would have tried.”

A thoughtful, distant look crept over Mistress Kara’s face. Was I looking at an artist being inspired?
I hoped not.

“I see,” she said. “Thank you, Fisk. Good night.”

She left without another word.

I watched Michael sleep for the rest of the night, and Master Barton was right: His fever diminished. When Milly’s brother took my place at dawn, I felt no more than normal warmth when I laid my hand on Sir Michael’s face. Even the red streaks were fading. I went to my own bed and fell asleep without worry for the first time in days.

I woke in the early afternoon and checked on Sir Michael. He was still sleeping, so I took the time to shave and wash before going in search of food.

I found Mistress Kara in her weaving room, up to her elbows in paper and charcoal. I was surprised to find her sketching instead of weaving, but it was no concern of mine. As politely as possible, I asked to be paid for my tapestry.

She first subtracted the money she’d paid out to Master Barton and Milly’s brother. The amount left was smaller than I’d hoped, but if she’d charged us more rent than a story, there would have been nothing left at all.

I spent the rest of that afternoon in town, buying some inexpensive but decent clothes for my employer and myself. Returning with my purchases, I took the time to change before going to Sir Michael’s room and was pleased to find him awake. Quite ridiculously pleased.

He took in my restored appearance and his first words were “Where did you get the money?”

I could have indignantly denied that I’d stolen it. Or told him I’d robbed half a dozen widows and orphans. But his eyes were laughing, and since the owners of the tapestry would no doubt consider that I
had
stolen it, I sat down beside the bed and told the truth.

To my surprise, Sir Michael made no protest. “When we get back to Cory Port, we’ll repay them” was all he said.

“With what? And how are we going to get back to Cory Port?” I laid the old purse Mistress Kara had given me on the bed. “This is all that’s left.”

Sir Michael rolled onto his side, wincing, to lift the limp purse. He shook it, sighed, and handed it back to me.

“Keep it. You’re better at handling money than I. And if you’ve got it, at least I’ll know where it is.”

I felt myself blush, and he grinned. “Don’t worry so much, Fisk. As long we pay for the tapestry, the owners won’t care—’twas on its way to be sold, after all. We simply have to find them.”

“Well, I can describe the tapestry,” I said absently, wondering why Sir Michael was changing the subject. Where was
he
planning to get the money to carry us home? He clearly had some idea—and he didn’t want to tell me about it. “And it had a crest on it, too, a ship sailing into a hand. Sir Michael, how, exactly, are you—”

“A what?” he interrupted sharply. “Fisk, say that again.”

“I want to know how you plan to—”

“No, forget that. About the ship and the hand.”

“It was on the tapestry,” I replied blankly. “The device on the knight’s shield, and in the border, was a ship sailing into an outstretched hand. Why, do you know it?”

“That’s the coat of arms of Craggan Keep. ’Twas embossed on Lady Ceciel’s belt—you didn’t notice?”

I hadn’t, but I also hadn’t tied the lady into a rope sling, or helped her on and off several horses.

“But that doesn’t make sense,” I protested. “With Sir Herbert dead, and no other heir until this mess with Lady Ceciel is settled, no one would have the authority to sell off the keep’s valuables except…”

Lady Ceciel herself. I saw my realization echoed in Sir Michael’s face.

“No,” he said.

“She went home. We’ve been scouring the countryside, from Crown City to the leeward shores, and she
just went home
.”

“No.”

“It explains how they were able to find us in Cory Port so quickly,” I went on. “Hackle’s brother probably sent word the instant we left him.”

“No!”

“And it explains how she was able to find a ship captain willing to kidnap for her—he was already selling her valuables. She just offered him extra to take us, too.”

I thought Sir Michael was going to protest again—instead he began to laugh, low, but quite hard.

I glared at him. “It’s not funny.”

“Yes, it is.” His voice shook with mirth. “And the joke’s on us. She went home. You’re right, Fisk. We’re amateurs.”

“But we thought about that! Why isn’t she afraid Lord Gerald will marry her off to some henchman, and then hand her over to justice? Why hasn’t he done that, if she’s been sitting in Craggan Keep all this time?”

“I don’t know. Mayhap someone is protecting her. Mayhap she has some hold over Lord Gerald or some way to prevent him from knowing where she is. But only the heir could sell family valuables. She is the heir. Therefore, she went home.” He began to laugh again.

“That’s a cheerful sound,” said Mistress Kara, poking her head through the door. Her face lit with pleasure, and I suddenly wondered if she had some interest in my employer that went beyond charity or artistic inspiration.