The Unicorn Hunt: The Fifth Book of the House of Niccolo

by Dorothy Dunnett

  ‘That’s no answer. What’s the trouble?’ said Nicholas.

  ‘I should say that to you,’ Gregorio said.

  ‘Why?’

  Gregorio said, ‘I don’t know. I’m not afraid of the jousts. You won’t be so stupid as to damage Sersanders or Boyd, and I don’t think either would hurt you. I’d forgotten about Cyprus and – the rest of it.’

  Very few people knew about Cyprus – and the rest of it. Julius. Julius and Katelijne. Nicholas said, ‘So what else?’

  Gregorio said, ‘What about Ochoa de Marchena and the gold?’

  ‘Explain,’ said Nicholas. It used up time.

  Gregorio said, ‘You’ve bought land. You’re building a castle. You talk of farming. You’re in the middle of developing dozens of projects and have run up debts which may not be paid, as the projects will have to be nursed at least until the King attains his majority, if not later. You have announced, indeed, that you intend to stay some length of time, and when I objected, you said it wasn’t your job to polish door-knobs. Neither it is. But you can’t run a Venetian bank from a castle at Beltrees.’

  He looked warm. It was a warm day. Nicholas said, ‘I also said that if something needed attention, you could handle it. Are you asking me to send you home or not to send you home?’

  ‘Neither,’ said Gregorio, and then looked both angry and bothered. He said, ‘I’ve run the Bank for you before. I can do it again. But I can’t handle the gold. Maybe the whole thing is a hoax. Maybe we’re imagining things. But if that was a message from Ochoa, it deserves some very fast action. And it was directed to you, not to me.’

  ‘Why? You know Ochoa’s voice,’ Nicholas said. There was, as he expected, a silence. Who knew Greek? No, who would recognise the sound of Greek and be intrigued enough to listen? He went on easily, ‘But in fact you are right. I did question Crackbene. The cage was consigned to me: it was on the lading-note but with no indication of the sender. He had it taken ashore when the Ghost was unloaded, but didn’t bother to tell me when he realised he and I were both leaving. The Countess saw it, and got it.’

  Gregorio said, ‘You thought it was important enough to buy back.’

  ‘I still do. But you’ve just described, haven’t you, all the reasons why I can’t do much about it?’

  Gregorio looked at him. He said, ‘You are saying that to withdraw now from Scotland would do more damage than the gold itself could repair, if we found it?’

  Nicholas said, ‘I’d put it the other way round. I really think it’s worth losing the gold to stay on and develop all that I’ve started. If the gold exists. If the message is genuine. If the person who sent it isn’t dead by now.’

  ‘You offered Diniz half of it if he found it,’ Gregorio said. He had a legal mind, had Gregorio.

  Nicholas said, ‘But as you said, the message was personal. Are we going to go on talking about this for ever? You don’t give a damn for the gold. You are only, as always, trying to find ways to force me out of the country. I have said this already. If you want to go, go. I am not disturbing my plans in order to deliver you from temptation and your mistress from her self-imposed child-nursing. Solve that problem yourself.’

  Gregorio got up and walked back to the house. Bravo, Gregorio. Bravo, Palamedes, who invented this manner of living. Nicholas got up, too, after a moment, and went off to reduce the work of three days to three hours. Or however long it was between then and his joust, his jocundus adventus.

  Chapter 22

  IT BEGAN TWO hours before sunset, so that most of the courses were run before darkness fell, and there were only the single jousts left to take place. In case of wind, they had three hundred coloured lanterns, such as they had in Bruges and Venice in carnival-time. But, in fact, the warm, breathless weather persisted, and they were able to use the standing candelabra as well, mounted with candles so large that a single man could hardly carry a dozen.

  The stands this time were two-tiered, built to face one another across the width of the lists, so that the royal party gazed at the Rock and its lesser guests sat with their backs to it. The royal pavilion was hung with cloth of gold and lined with velvet and tassels; and the knights’ tents at one end were all stitched in silk with the banners crowded around them, catching the afterglow from the west. As the lamps were lit inside, you could see the shadows of combatants arming, with their pages and bodyservants about them.

  The lamps had been lit first of all in the upper stand containing the musicians, where lutes and recorders and viols had been attempting to make themselves heard over the clatter, the pounding, the roars of the early encounters. The conductor was Will Roger, with the wild demeanour of a man who has embarked, at last, on a voyage which will probably kill him, superimposed on the vainglorious smirk of the same man who has managed to beg, borrow or bribe sixty trumpets and fit them out to a man in pink taffeta.

  The faces of the children in the royal stand were eager and flushed: they enjoyed jousting. The children? Waiting his turn, Nicholas caught himself thinking like Adorne, like Gregorio, and was amused. James was seventeen, but a King. His bride was twelve, but would be his consort next month. Albany might be the King’s younger brother, but he had experience of the Burgundian court, the richest in Europe, and his brothers must envy him. Mar would be a force to be reckoned with, one day, and so would Bleezie Meg, today without her attendant Katelijne, who was here, of course, in her brother’s pavilion.

  In the gloom, he could not pick out the others, although he thought he saw Dr Andreas, and he did see the well-tailored dark robe of the Secretary. Archibald Whitelaw had studied law at Cologne. He had wondered if Gregorio knew that, but it seemed that he didn’t.

  It was nearly time for his first bout. To tilt against Thomas Boyd with a lance, he wore the armour he had brought with him, neither etched nor gilded but cut and jointed and pinned so that he could move almost as if he wore kidskin. Lined and polished, it clung like an animal’s skin to its flesh. He had had it made not because he intended to take up a career in the lists but because there were things he wanted to do, and he preferred to survive to do them. It made it all the more ironic that he had nearly lost his life in the lists to the knife of a child, in December.

  The child he had been given as his queen for the day was very young, but older than Henry. Blind with maternal solicitude, Betha had fitted her out with a cone hat with a veil, dangling oversleeves and a gown with a train. Grasping his horse-ribbon was going to be the least of it. He went to sit beside her on the bench and talked while they waited for his announcement. She had been amused by the fantastic helms in the procession – wolfheads and eagles, lyres and boars. He had told her of Marx Walther of Augsburg who wore three sausages on a spike.

  His own banner, motto, badge were simple: it was not the place, although he wished it were, for something more witty. He did belong to an order of knighthood, a Cypriot one, and it was the Order of the Sword which was proclaimed, silver on blue, by the cross-hilted blade on his flag, and its motto which was inscribed on his surcoat, and round the blue and white plumes of his helm. C’est pour loïauté maintenir, it said. You couldn’t really appreciate the joke, unless you knew both Zacco and his royal half-sister.

  The fight before his began to run its three courses: Liddell against a short Dane. The Dane was skilled, but his horse was either unfamiliar or still unsteady from the voyage. And Liddell was uncommonly good: he held the lance, all twelve feet of it, as if it grew out of his wrist. They didn’t even run the third course: Jamie struck the other each time full on the breastplate, and each time the lance splintered and flew.

  It did no harm when it struck, with the coronel set in its tip. And these were poplar lances, made to break. You could hardly unseat a man with one of these, not unless he was an extremely bad rider, or you were especially lucky.

  Cheers; applause; the Dane retiring glumly and Liddell riding forward to the stand to make his bow before the King. He was Albany’s steward, and the face of Albany shone. T
he girl leading the horse was obviously used to it. A sister, perhaps. Nicholas turned and smiled at his little lady, and made a joke that he thought a Sinclair might understand. There was a pause.

  His page had come, with his helmet and gloves. The lances stood, ready stacked, and his groom waited a little apart, holding one of his thoroughbreds. There was a spare horse, in case. He could afford it. He walked to the bay, which was fidgeting, and spoke to it.

  A fanfare deadened his hearing, overwhelming all other sound. Despite its training the horse jerked its head, shivering. Then it calmed and he mounted, settling into the deep jousting-saddle. He had had it covered with blue velvet and studded with silver. One of the sets of reins also was silver-studded in a pattern of azure enamel, and his horse wore a gem on its browband. After the black of the past year, it felt like a costume of masquerade. He closed his visor. The girl looked up, her headgear stabbing his arm, her veil catching his spurs. Her lip was trembling. His page, who was prettier than she was, smiled at her too, and helped pick off the veil. It had torn a little. He touched his horse forward.

  A man barred his way. In the distance, someone was speaking. The trumpets blared again, and the girl squeaked with fright: he held the horse firmly. The man in front of him said, ‘Sir knight, your match has given way to another. Be so good as to wait.’

  ‘Why?’ said Nicholas. His horse, balked, tried to sidle and he held it hard. The man repeated, ‘Later,’ and walked away without answering. His groom came up and Nicholas dismounted with care, and allowed himself to be divested again of his gauntlets and helm. The girl gazed at him, her eyes large as eggs. He spoke to her, smiling. ‘I don’t know what it’s all about. Perhaps Govaerts can find out.’ Govaerts disappeared.

  The next courses were run, and then the next, in which Anselm Sersanders took part. His little sister strode out beside him, pony-tail swinging. She had seized hold of both ribbon and reins, and when the horse attempted to shy appeared to shove it bodily forward. You could hear her talking testily and her brother responding, booming inside his helm. They presented themselves, and the lady Margaret threw down a flower, which Katelijne picked up and gave him. He had a fox’s crest pinned with his sister’s favour. The favour looked like, but could not be, a salt-cellar. Then she retired, and the tilting began.

  The Dane he opposed was not a giant, but he was well trained and sturdy and bold. He flew from the far end as from a catapult, without diverting except to adjust his lance as he neared. They collided. He struck, and so did Sersanders. The Dane’s lance splintered, but that of Sersanders, a shade less direct, skidded and glanced off the other man’s armour and remained in his grasp, still unbroken. First mark to the Dane. They rode on and turned.

  The Sinclair girl said, ‘They’re very poor-grown, the Sersanders family. If I were her, I’d wear pattens.’

  ‘Or a tall hat,’ said her knight. He glanced down at the eggs. They looked soulful. Govaerts came back, shaking his head, and resumed his place with the rest of his household. Gregorio had left the tent at the beginning. To take up his stance, Nicholas guessed, with the minstrels.

  They had started the run. It was true, Sersanders was short. So was his sister. But he had the family temper, and seemed to have lost it. He swept up to the barrier this time in an explosion of rage, and the crash was such that the whole structure shuddered and the Dane rocked to one side. Then he recovered and they passed. This time Sersanders held the smashed lance, and the other had missed.

  One each. With or without pattens, Katelijne Sersanders had both fists on the barrier and was jumping. The royal stands seethed. The public, massed in the dark, roared without cease. The Sinclair girl said, ‘That’s not a good fight. Ours will be better than that.’

  ‘I’m glad you’re feeling up to it,’ Nicholas said. He didn’t quite know what he was saying. It was dark. No one had come to tell him when to fight. Sersanders and the Dane had turned and were racing again.

  This time the collision was so great that both stopped. Sersanders jerked backwards. The Dane, losing a stirrup, half fell and was saved by his saddle. In the fist of each was a lance broken in shards. Honours even. An extra course to decide.

  ‘I can’t look,’ said the girl. Katelijne was hanging over the barrier, her long tight sleeves dangling like lobster claws.

  ‘Excuse me,’ said a man. The same man.

  ‘Yes?’ said Nicholas. He brought his mind back. It came readily.

  ‘I fear,’ said the man, ‘that I must ask your indulgence. My lord of Arran has been further delayed. Rather than hold up the contests, it has been decided to proceed to the combats by sword. Your bout with the gentleman Anselm Sersanders will therefore precede your match with Thomas Boyd, Earl of Arran. Unless you object?’

  ‘It is not for me to say,’ Nicholas said. The last gallop had begun. Anselm Sersanders, whoever won, would be tired.

  The collision occurred. The stand rose to its feet. Sersanders flung back his visor, a shattered lance in his hand. The Dane had missed. Nicholas said, ‘You must ask Ser Anselm. I shall be fresh, and he will not.’

  ‘I am sure he will agree,’ said the man.

  And, of course, he did. Pride saw to that. When they faced one another ten minutes later, Anselm Sersanders sat, secure and firm in the saddle, sword in hand. His horse was fresh but biddable under the iron hand of its maiden and his face was flushed but composed. The horse of Nicholas, unaccustomed to the smell of fright and to veils, was less manageable. But Nicholas had not galloped four times into battle, or accepted four times, as Sersanders had, the full weight of man, horse and pole against his bruised neck, and shoulder, and chest. Nicholas hadn’t fought anyone yet.

  Don’t look bland. Don’t look awed. Don’t look half intoxicated.

  Don’t think.

  It was a salt-cellar Sersanders was wearing. The brat. Betha Sinclair had favoured Nicholas with a handkerchief. He didn’t think it was the child’s. (Don’t smile.) The trumpets blew, and he and Adorne’s nephew faced one another.

  Nicholas had jousted quite often before. Once as Guinevere in a wig, as he remembered. Although no, that was one tourney that didn’t take place. He could handle a lance, but the sword, by now, was much more his weapon, and sport on horseback had given him an Eastern brand of skill in the saddle which Westerners complained was unorthodox. At the same time, the sword was more demanding than courtesy tilting. That is, the weapons for this kind of fight were not only rebated, they were quite different, and longer than usual.

  Thirty-one blows had to be exchanged. The winner was the man adjudged to gain the most points, or the man who unhorsed his opponent. It was hard, skilful work. Nicholas always preferred to be fresh for a sword-fight. As now.

  He had taken some other precautions. For this fight only, he wore an open sallet, exposing his face. It could be dangerous. But the jousting-helmet, as still worn by Sersanders, gave limited vision and, bolted to the breastplate and back, was always heavy. And Sersanders was tired.

  Now the barricade had been dismantled. The trumpets blew. Sersanders and he rode to the King’s stand together and bowed. The Sinclair girl, stiffened by competition, managed her veil, her sleeves and, nearly, her train. Katelijne unobtrusively helped her. Katelijne said out of the side of her mouth, ‘The Sterner versus the Psitticher.’

  Stars and Parrots. She knew a lot about jousting. The ladies retired. Sersanders gazed at him for a moment, his eyes unusually wide, and then lowered his visor and, turning, trotted to one end of the field. Nicholas took the other, and spurred forward the moment the trumpets blew.

  Their horses looked the same. The rules said they had to be matched. There was no advantage, therefore, in ramming together and hoping to unsettle the other man so that a blow might unseat him. So they each took their time, cantering evenly, closing the gap. They had almost reached the space before the King’s stand when Sersanders suddenly drove his spurs in and came hard towards Nicholas, his sword ready to strike from the flank.

&nb
sp; Behind the visor, his eyes were unreadable, whereas Nicholas knew the glow from the stand lit his own face. He took measure, fast, with his eyes. Sersanders watched him and struck. In a dazzle of sparks, his blade met that of Nicholas, in a direct counter that nothing had signalled. Nicholas felt the other sword momentarily yield: with luck it might even have fallen. Then they were apart, and the dance could begin.

  It was a dance. Combat was the deployment of ruses. Sersanders knew some, Nicholas others. Tellingly, the bay he was riding knew most. It was an old way of gaining ascendancy: to use a horse trained on the sports field. Not in battle, of course, but for this kind of fight, which depended on speed and lightness and agility.

  Not that Sersanders was anyone’s dupe. After the first moments, circling, stretching, striking, he could see well enough how Nicholas was using his weight to guide and instruct the horse, and how sensitively the horse was responding. It meant he had to change his own strategy. That, or be made to look less than professional, here, before the cream of a nation.

  And that was not what Nicholas wanted. This was not merely an event in a tournament: it was an encounter of honour for Sersanders. Sersanders shamed would arouse the whole Adorne faction in Scotland. At the same time, Nicholas had his own plans. He was performing, as Sersanders was, for the King and for Albany. And he didn’t intend to get hurt.

  It made a good fight. He liked the feel of the sword, five feet of it, in his hand, and liked to open his shoulders, using his extra reach, his extra height. Sersanders had never fought, as Nicholas had, with mercenaries, or been trained by a mercenary leader, despite his years of careful teaching by Adorne and his father, and the perpetual practice offered by the societies.

  Simon was one of the few men Nicholas knew who had done both: practised the art of chivalric warfare and also fought in the field for his own country against foreign knights and their followers. He himself had not, of course, met Simon in formal combat with weapons of chivalry. Or not yet. Or not unless you counted a few moments in Venice.