Mistress of mistresses

by E R Eddison

  'Be it so,' said Antiope. "There is no other way of wise choosing.'

  'Let me look at your face,' he said. She raised it to his under the stars.

  After a while, he spoke in a whisper. 'What mystery was this? Looking but now in your face, I have been my own love: seen myself: loved myself, being myself you for that instant, madonna: chosen for you, and for me, with your love as from withinwards. Been your love. Been—' he caught his breath: 'Was that the threshold? upon Ambremerine, with glow-worms in her hair?'

  ‘I do not know,' Antiope said, her face hidden now against his shoulder. 'But what you have seen I have seen too: I too have chosen: been you for that instant, loving me. For a pang, and away.'

  For a minute they abode so, as one, motionless: then stood back and joined hands as might two brothers before battle. 'Then, this being our choice,' he said, 'better it is, madonna, that you remain in Rialmar rather than come south with me. For all Rerek and Meszria are up in war now, and my going is to put all in hazard that must us save or spill. And well as I can answer for my cousin while I sit in the saddle, I would not, were I to fall, leave him executor of my trusts toward you; nor with the means to come at you. I leave you a great army here, and the lord knight marshal: a general expert and to trust. I take but my own eight hundred horse, and may be three hundred more. And Rialmar is by nature inexpugnable. By heavens, they shall see lightning out of Fingiswold, and the thunder of it shall shake Meszria and Rerek ere they shall have reckoned with me.'

  Antiope said, as he kissed her hand under starlight: 'We have chosen, my friend

  He raised his head again, her hand still in his. It was as if the stars and the huge darknesses without remembered again for their own that saying of the Lycian king to his loved kinsman, standing forth under windly Ilios:

  Ah, lad, and were't but so: and, from this war fleeing,

  We twain, thou and I, for ever ageless and deathless

  Might endure: not then would I in the van do battle.

  Neither send forth thee to battle which maketh glorious.

  —But now,—since thus serried the fates of death come nigh us:

  Thousands, nor is't in mortal to flee such, neither elude them,—

  On! be it praise we become for another, or, haply, reap it.

  Lessingham's nostrils were like a war-horse's that hears the trumpets. Then on the sudden, in that questionable garden under stars, he seemed to see how a change, as with eclipse or deep clouding of the moon, overcame the beautiful face of this Queen of his, as if night should suddenly have clothed her with the mantle, inexorable, stony, archaic, of Astarte or if there be any crueller dethroned divinity of ages outworn: Terror Antiquus, treading the dead mouldered faces and unfleshed skeletons of nameless forgotten men. Then, as the silver moon with the passing of that red shadow, her beauty shone fair.

  The awe of that sight darkened his voice as he spoke: 'Who are you?'

  Antiope trembled. 'Sometimes, in such places as this,' she said, ‘I scarcely know.'

  It was morning now in Doctor Vandermast's wayside house. Lessingham, booted and spurred ready for setting forth, stood beside her pillow, as debating whether to wake her or let this, awake and asleep, be the last before their returning again to action and that banquet-table. Antiope lay asleep on her side, back towards him where he stood, so that he saw, partly from behind, the line of her cheek and brow and the rose of sleep that warmed it. Lessingham said in himself: 'Forgetfulness. What does it matter? Belike the old man spoke aright: that it is a precious gift of Her lap, this forgetting; in order that She may give all again, morning-new. Every momentary glimpse: every half-heard overtone in her voice: the sheet drawn so, as it always is, nicely across that mouth of mine: eyelid, virginal quiet line and long drooped lashes, closed asleep: pale dawn-like gold of that hair of mine tied back with those ribbons: I have forgotten, and even these shall be forgotten. Well: so She give it anew. Well: so that She have said: "They are Mine: I keep them: I store them up. In time they are gone for ever, but they are Mine unto all eternity."'

  He tucked the sheet gently in behind her shoulders. She turned at the touch with a contented inarticulate little murmur and, between half-opened eyelids, as only half waking, looked up at him. 'Those two songs,' she said after a moment, her voice soft with the down of sleep.

  'Did the little water-swallow say hers for you?' said Lessingham.

  Antiope said, 'Say it for me again.'

  Lessingham said:

  I am love: Loving my lover, Love but his love:

  Love that arrayeth me, Beddeth me, wardeth me—

  Sunn'd in his noon, Safe under hand of him,

  Open my wild-rose Petals to him:

  Dance in his music. —Such-like is love.

  Antiope said, ‘I like it better than that other. Say you like it better too.' ‘I like it best.' 'Why?'

  His mustachios stirred with the flicker of a smile. He paused, thoughtful, stroking his black beard. 'As not my way,' he said, 'could I by some magic be turned to a— As not known from within. I am not Barganax.'

  'My brother,' she said. 'I have never seen him. Have you seen: that lady?'

  'So far as any but he may see,' answered Lessingham, ‘I have seen her.'

  'How far was that?'

  He said, as if searching for words, 'May be, so far as —but no: you have never seen him. What are brothers and sisters? In the main, so. But once, until I beheld nothing. Then once, until I beheld you.'

  'Say it again, that you like Campaspe's best.'

  Lessingham said again, 'I like it best.'

  ‘I am glad.' It was as if on her breath two shadows crossed, of laughter and tears. 'I cannot, that other way.'

  'Because it is your way, I like it,' he said. ‘I love you,' he said, 'beyond time and circumstance.'

  She put out an arm, and with that about his neck drew his face down to hers, warm with sleep, upon the pillow.

  XIX

  Lightning Out of Fingiswold

  the first flash quelling of the free towns lessingham between pincers battle before leveringay march of the lord jeronimy battle of ridinghead peace given to the admiral storm and tempest at rivershaws the second flash eclipse and darkness.

  Lessingham came south over the Wold by great journeys and on the fifth day of April passed by the land-march into Rerek. He had with him barely a thousand horse, but not a man of them that was not proven in war, headstrong, bloody, and violent, and of long custom bound to his obedience, not as water-spaniels but as the hand is stirred to obey the mind: of his own following, the most of them, six and seven years gone, when the great King warred down Akkama. Of like temper were his captains of troops: Brandremart, Gayllard, Hortensius, Bezardes: all, like as the Captain-General's self, in the lusty flower of their youth, and such as would set no more by the life of a man, nor have no more pity thereof, than of the lives of partridges or quails which be taken in season to eat. Amaury he left in Rialmar, to be eye, ear, and hand for him in those northern parts. Gabriel Flores had set forth alone (supposed for Laimak) in advance, the very morrow of that banquet. So now Lessingham halted in the fortress of Megra, and held counsel of war.

  And first because the free towns in these outlaid parts should learn to fear him, nor trust too securely in the princes of the north, Ercles and Aramond, that still cloaked them underneath their wings, and because he would secure his rear and left flank a little ere adventure far south with an army that was all head and very little body, he rode in a sudden foray south to Abaraima. Here had Ercles last summer put down the captal and other great men that held the city in the Vicar's interest, and in their rooms placed other his own creatures. But the more part of the townsfolk, who passed nothing on Prince Ercles and much less passed they on the Vicar, but desired nothing better than be let live at ease with their pleasant houses and gardens and fishponds and wives and children and delicate dogs and beasts tamed to the hand which they have in deliciis, beholding this army suddenly at their gates, and knowing th
eir defences weak, and hearing now the word of Lessingham that if they were taken by force they should all die and the town burnt and spoiled without mercy, upon that present terror threw open their gates to him. Lessingham, that was well served by intelligencers here as otherwhere these many months past, and judged, both from these and from his own seeing and hearing, the temper and inclination of the people, sternly withheld his soldiers from all cruelty against them so as not a man should suffer harm whether of body or goods. Only some few towers he flatted to the ground, and seized those principal persons, unquiet, busy, and high-climbing spirits, who had sided themselves and sworn to Ercles. These, to the number of seven, he caused to be brought before him in the great paven square before the courthouse, where he, armed from heel to throat in black armour and with all his soldiers arrayed under weapons about him, sat in state. Whereupon, after proclamation at large of their fault, these seven were by his command thrown down and unheaded with axes and so hanged along the wall in that place, for a warning to who would be warned. Which being done, and a baily and officers brought in and sworn in name of the Lord Horius Parry to the Queen's allegiance, Lessingham wore no more these dreadful looks but showed himself so cheerfully that' within a few days' time every man in that city was joyful to behold him. Well nigh a hundred horse were added to him now, gathered of their own free will from Abaraima and the townships thereabout.

  But barely seven days tarried Lessingham in Abaraima: then, for a knock of the iron gauntlet upon Aramond's door to let him know the Queen's Captain-General was afoot now and to be reckoned withal, he turned upon the sudden eastwards and in a day's hard riding came through the hills of the Mortelf down upon the rich open city of Bagort. This is the quiet heart of Aramond's country: a mediterrane or inland secret valley where not in twenty years till that day had an enemy's foot trodden; so that they listened secure to all rumours of unpeace without; and here had Prince Aramond his delicate lodge beside the salt lakes of Methmarsk. And here, in his unprepared idleness and with but a very small force at hand, the prince had but time to take boat and escape down the lake ere Lessingham's black riders were in the city. Lessingham took great store of minted money and precious stones and costly treasure besides, and took away too all weapons and armour he might come by, but theNown he spared, and seeing they made no defence against hirrr- there was no man lost his life there. In Bagort he stayed three nights and refreshed his army, and upon Wednesday the eighteenth of April departed again by the same way west to Abaraima.

  Upon Saturday night he stood with his army before Veiring gates. Here was Roquez nigh a twelvemonth set in power by Ercles after much strife and blood-letting: his wife a Meszrian, cousin german to the Lord Melates she was a cruel lady, and had of late so wrought with Roquez and, through him, with them of the prince's party as that they were in purpose shortly to do somewhat against such as they loved not, that the streets should run again with blood. Lessingham sent in a herald under safe conduct to speak with them at the barriers, straitly enjoining them, on pain of their lives and goods and to be reputed enemies of the Queen's highness, that they should deliver up the town to him as Captain-General, and that within the space of one hour after the morrow's sunrise. Which Roquez denying, and speaking great words against him, there beean to be a tumult in the town all ni^ht. and they of the Vicar's upholding rose up and made head against Roquez; in so much that a little before sunrise, while the issue stood yet in doubt, some suddenly surprising a gatehouse opened the gates to Lessingham. But when Lessingham and his were come in to help them, then almost nothing held against them. In that battle fell Roquez, and when they of his following knew this, in despair of speed they gave back till they were come to the keep and there shut themselves in and shot from the walls and loop-holes. Lessingham let fetch wood and firing to burn them up; so, when the fire began to take and they saw there was nought to do but surrender themselves, they came down and surrendered to his discretion.

  In those days was Veiring a strong town as for walls, being by nature well postured too in a bend of the river, whereby it is from three sides hard to come at. But in length and breadth within the walls and in number of folk that dwell therein it is but as a platter to a table-top as beside Telia or Abaraima. Lessingham made but short work, after the taking of the keep, of quieting the town. With the late ruling party he had little trouble: ready enough were they to go each to his own house and fare with hidden head, not to draw eyes which might single him out for retribution. But they that had been for the Vicar, seeing good harvest now beyond hope or dreams, ^and the readier because of that to make haste to cut it down and in it, began like jack sauces to jet the Streets, quick to beat or kill any that should displease them or withsay anything that they would do. Even in the eye of the Captain-General's self or his own men-at-arms, as at great dogs little tykes should snar, would these flaunt their roynish fashions, their bawdry, and their insolences. To end it, Lessingham proclaimed upon trumpets through and about the town that whoso, save only soldiers of his, should after the third hour before noon be found in the streets with weapon upon him, were it but a hand-dagger, that should be his death. By noon had a score been hanged in the streets for this offence: 'twixt noon and mid-even, two more. That ended it. Of general turmoil indeed, there was none later than breakfast-time, when there gathered a band together before Roquez's house supposing to have had out his lady, who with some of her household there sought safety, and quite her for those things they thought she had devised against them. But Lessingham, riding to and about with a troop of horse, so that while yet any spark smouldered of disorder he might with his own eye see it to tread it out, came thither, as God would have it, in the nick of time when they had beat in the door and were upon dragging her forth. He, upon sight of such a beastish act against a lady, was as if taken in berserk-gang: with bloody rage suddenly surprised them as he had been a wolf or a lion, and in such good coin paid them, that seven men shortly lay dead or bleeding under his feet as with one arm he bore off that lady, harmless but swooning, while in his other hand the reddened sword boded ill to any man that would nigh him near. Next morning Lessingham sent her with a conduct over land to Megra, for safety until means should offer for her faring south to Meszria to her kith and kin. He set Meron in Roquez's stead, captain of Veiring, and, because of the fury of their factions there, left him fifty horse to his bodyguard and to cow them. Three-and-thirty citizens of Ercles' faction Lessingham condemned to exile perpetual with loss of all their belongings: two hundred more to like banishment, but with leave to carry away their goods and chattels. Five he sent to be hewn of their heads in the public market-place; two of whom suffered that punishment not as traitors to the Vicar, but for divers outrages and cruelties acted by them out of private malice upon Lessingham's entry into Veiring and under cover of their espousing of his cause. It was the talk of men that Lessingham had shown by his dealings in Veiring that he was a lord both just and fearless, and wise besides and merciful, and terrible besides in season. And now was good settled peace in Veiling as had not been for many a year.

  It being now near the fourth week ended since he came down from the Wold, and news of these doings flown before him about the countryside, he made haste to depart out of Veiring by the highway southward. The second of May he came to Lailma which opened gates to him: and here came word to him that Ercles himself was come down from Eldir and held the Swaleback passage by the shore of Arrowfirth. Next day Lessingham moved south, going gingerly with espials before him to feel the way, and pitched for the night a little beside Memmering, where steep and stony hills, covered all with thick-grown trackless forest, begin to close in westwards toward the sea shore. Here in the morning he had sure tidings that the prince was fallen back southwards. But while he waited to satisfy himself of this, came Daiman, ridden in huge haste from Telia upon word brought thither of Lessingham's march south, with this news now: that the lord Admiral was come round about by sea from Kessarey up to Kaima and was there disembarked the week before wit
h a great army of as some said three thousand, others four thousand, men. Lessingham upon these tidings resolved, now that the passages of Swaleback were opened to him, swiftly and at all hazards to come through; seeing that if with so great forces they should once be closed against him he were as good pack home again to Rialmar. Upon which resolution, he struck camp and came, without sight or rumour of an enemy, through the highway past the head of the firth and pitched in strong ground rising amid open fields apt to the use of horse-soldiers some five miles west of Eldir.

  JHe stood now in this case. Ercles, not with a handful of horse, as had at first been bruited, but with an army more than two thousand strong, was retired not to his hill fortress of Eldir but to Leveringay, seven leagues or more to the south, where, astride of the main high road southwards, he awaited Lessingham, and in the mean time burned and harried that countryside where folk yet held firm for the Vicar. Upon the other part, west-away, the Admiral was reported moving leisurely up the wide lowland vales of Fitheryside. Between these forces, each by much outnumbering his own, was Lessingham now in danger to be taken as the nut in the crackers; or if, eluding Ercles, he should escape away southwards, then to be shut in betwixt their united power and the Chancellor's that maintained siege before Laimak. All weighed, he chose to fight both; and Ercles first, the rather for two respects: the one, for that Ercles lay the nigher at hand, the other, because they that dwelt about Leveringay and Mornagay were of a tried loyalty, and, a victory once had there, they were like to take heart and flock to the Queen's banner. But now, going about to fight Ercles, he was resolved that the time and ground and manner of their fighting should be not Ercles's but his.