The Leopard Sword

by Michael Cadnum

  Sir Nigel held out his cup for more wine, and a servant filled it to the brim.“Since we are all men-at-arms together,” said Nigel, “and we all count ourselves loyal, squire and knight, I may explain Edmund’s expertise on the subject of debased coinage, with the permission of my lord.”

  Nigel gave a graceful, brisk account of Edmund’s employer and master, the late moneyer Otto, who had been killed by the Exchequer’s men. Edmund himself had faced brutal punishment, and Nigel recounted Edmund’s appointment as his squire by the lord sheriff of Nottingham. Sir Nigel offered, in conclusion, the opinion that Edmund had “proved himself equal to any squire on Crusade.”

  “More than equal,” said Rannulf.

  “I was blessed in my master,” said Edmund, with the earnest directness that marked so much of his speech, “and in my friend.” With this last remark he gave me a warm glance.

  “Heaven’s blessing on us all,” said Sir Maurice, evidently pleased. Every good-hearted Christian loves a story of a sinner earning God’s forgiveness, especially on the field of battle.

  “Which man of us,” Rannulf surprised me by saying, “does not have sins that require cleansing with enemy blood?”

  “Which indeed?” said Sir Maurice.The banneret frowned thoughtfully, and ran a finger over his lips.“But I hope you’ll not take offense if I have one suggestion for all of you.”

  “A suggestion from you, my lord,” said Nigel, taking another long drink of wine,“is worth more than any gizzard trove.”

  “Be wary,” said Sir Maurice, “of enemies on your return to England.”

  “Who would challenge the four of us, my lord?” inquired Nigel.

  “None of us is safe,” said Maurice.

  “I pray God I have no enemies,” said Edmund, sounding shaken.

  “Of course you don’t,” responded Sir Maurice good-naturedly. “But I myself fear Prince John is stealing into power in London.”

  I felt a chill in my belly, spreading out into my limbs. “What can the prince do there, my lord?” I asked.

  “Our own King Richard,” Maurice continued, “God’s chosen monarch, is afraid that his own brother might creep like a creature on many little legs onto the throne.”

  The banneret lowered his voice. “Edmund, if anyone spreads the slander that you did not acquit yourself bravely during battle, or that you continued the sin of thievery while you voyaged, then you will face punishment on your return—as though you had never joined these worthy knights on Crusade.”

  THIRTY-THREE

  That night rain pattered on the shuttered window. I could not sleep.

  I prayed to Saint Julian, the patron saint of wanderers in special need. I understood that only seamen and carters prayed to such a saint. My family kept faith a simple, correct matter, never dreaming of soiling our knees in sudden prayer, like the devout plowman frightened by thunder.

  But lying there in my bed, I felt the tug of Heaven.

  I had already made my decision, as soon as I heard Sir Maurice’s warning.

  Just before we left Nottingham—it seemed a lifetime ago—Nigel had received a warrant for Edmund’s further arrest. Nigel had ignored the warrant with a dry laugh, explaining that it lacked an official seal. I wondered now whether people in positions of power might continue to consider Edmund a felon.

  Especially if someone arrived there before us, to slander my friend.

  I rose from my bed in the predawn gray and scurried through the house, hurrying from hall to corridor, until I could follow the sound of voices.

  Sir Maurice and Sir Nigel were sharing their morning wine, dipping white bread into the beverage—the morning meal of noblemen.

  “I shall give you a letter of credence,” Sir Maurice was saying, indicating a sealed scroll at his elbow.“Unless you run afoul of Prince John’s men, you shall pass every sentry without any trouble.”

  I knelt before them and waited for them to realize I was there.

  “A squire joins us,” said Nigel.

  “Does he?” said Sir Maurice, and I realized, with some embarrassment, that I had been on his blind side.

  “Good morning to you both, my lords,” I said, still kneeling.

  “Ah,” said Sir Maurice, endowing the syllable with a dignified sorrow.“I can tell by the sword at your side what your decision turns out to be.”

  “Hubert, you understand that I could forbid you to depart with us,” said Nigel. “I could choose to command you, on pain of punishment, to serve the worthy envoy here in Rome, whether you wish it or not.”

  “My lords,” I began, Nigel’s remark causing me pain. “I pray your forgiveness if I’ve offended.”

  “Rise up, good Squire Hubert,” said Maurice with a laugh. “And save your strength for a long and bitter voyage to our unsettled home.”

  Edmund and I were in the cellar of the envoy’s house, meeting with Anselm Waybridge, the armorer. Rannulf had directed us to this craftsman’s attention, saying that our weapons would benefit from care before our travels.

  The armorer used a fylor, a rasping metal tool, to put an edge on our swords. The armorer was English, attached to Sir Maurice’s household, but came from a corner of the kingdom where some local dialect and a bristling accent made it very difficult for us to understand him.This occurrence was fairly common—one hundred miles from home the innkeepers spoke foreign-sounding words. But this man made every effort to speak as we did, even hazarding a little Frankish, and the result was a halting, confused—if friendly—conversation.

  “No one wants to go on a journey,” he seemed to say, “without a keen-edged sword.”

  “No, we certainly don’t,” I agreed.

  He made a motion of waves with his hands, and indicated that the sea—perhaps he meant the salt air—was not good for sword metal.

  Edmund and I agreed heartily.

  Anselm peered along the edge of my weapon, where the blade had struck the wall. He offered something critical about my luck, or the hardness of the wall, but smiled and said that a few licks of his tool would set it right.

  A step whispered, and I turned.

  “If the good Squire Hubert,” said Blanche in a stiff, haughty tone, “could spare only one moment of his very precious time.”

  Galena’s usually plaited hair had been brushed over her shoulders. Her silk gown whispered when she moved.When she passed before the light that spilled through a window, the morning sun illuminated the sea-blue folds of her garment.

  “I understand,” she said, “that you have decided to leave for England today.”

  “I follow my duty,” I said, hating the wooden sound of my own speech.

  Women did not usually appear before men with their hair down, preferring to have it plaited, veiled, or fully covered. These long, loose tresses betokened illness, or even bereavement. Her hair caught the light as she paced, and she spoke as though to Blanche, barely looking at me.

  “Duty,” she said, “is evidently both a complicated and powerful force—little understood by women.”

  There is an art of conversation known to courtly folk. A man seeking to discuss carnal affection might touch upon the subject of the loom, the bobbing of the loom weight, the passing in and out of scarlet thread among the beige. I had heard enough poetry to attempt such conversation—when my wits were not clouded by feeling.

  But now my mouth spoke words without my ability to choose or to stop them. “I will dream of this city,” I said. “And of you.”

  I had never made such a bold—and truthful—assertion to a woman in my life.

  Galena stopped pacing and looked at me. “I wish it were so,” she said.

  “My lady, I will come back to Rome,” I said. “If it is in my power.”

  Blanche stopped me on the stairs, just before the cellar door. “My lady means to extend her wishes for a safe journey,” she said, slightly out of breath.

  Heavyhearted, it was all I could do to murmur thanks.

  “And she wishes you might rememb
er her, good Hubert, if I may say so on her behalf.” I was surprised at the sudden sincerity in this proud servant’s voice. “She offers you this locket, if it please you.”

  I closed my hand around a small object on a slender chain.

  THIRTY-FOUR

  I did not see Galena when we left the envoy’s house, although I looked back several times to gaze up at the many shuttered windows.

  When we reached the gates of Rome and bid farewell, Fulke took off his cap and gave a bow to each of us as we passed. I brought up the rear, and my horse nearly took fright at the all-but-silent creak of the city gate. The nervous gelding pissed a great gush and trembled, wild-eyed, at the sight of a gate man smiling and scratching his face.

  Fulke made a flourish with his cap and an elaborate bow. His lips were scabbed from the street fight, and one eye was swollen.

  “God be with you, herald,” I said, keeping my voice steady.

  “Sit your horse squarely, if you can, squire,” said Fulke, offering a touch of friendly insult to take the edge off my sorrow—and, perhaps, his.

  As we rode, I examined the tressour I had received from Blanche, a silver-framed locket holding a honey-bright slip of hair.

  Edmund studied it respectfully, and gave it back. “You won her favor,” he said simply.

  “Perhaps she gives out bits of her hair broadcast, like a sower spreading seed.” I did not mean this at all, but was trying to spare my friend’s feelings. I marveled at my own good fortune. Certainly Edmund was tall enough and well favored enough to have won Galena’s attention.

  He smiled. “I don’t think she does.”

  At first I paid no heed to the hunting party as it approached.

  Sir Luke put a hand on his sword and turned in his saddle. “Those are the Orsini and the Neri,” he said. “And other cousins and friends of our guest Tomasso.”

  The hunting party grew closer, with gleaming spurs, the hooded falcons cocking their blind heads, listening. The brush beaters flicked the air with their leather flails, and a few hares dangled from a huntsman’s knot, bloodied where the falcons had seized them. Other coneys had been shot down by an archer, scored through with holes. The hunters looked much like English barons out on a fine day, and yet the sheen of their horses, the cut of the plumes in the caps, all looked both foreign and handsome.

  Sir Luke was garbed in an indigo-blue mantle, with brass-studded leather shoes, a man of wealth dressed simply for a journey. The rest of us were unmistakably King Richard’s men, down to the leopard insignia on our breasts. None of us carried lances, but we all wore broadswords. There were six of us—Sir Luke had joined our usual foursome, and an ostler attended us, to take the horses back to Rome when we had embarked.

  “Proud-looking men, aren’t they?” said Nigel.There were a dozen of them, not counting the beaters.

  “There’s only one archer,” said Rannulf. “He must be very skilled.”

  Many of the hunters wore swords, too, heavily armed for a day running down rabbits. No doubt they had decided to try for a variety of quarries—hope for Englishmen, but settle for field hares if necessary. The archer, a slim, clean-shaven man, slipped an iron-tipped arrow from his quiver, testing the point with his thumb.

  The bowman made a fine sport of discussing with his companions which of us he would unhorse first, nodding and chuckling.

  Rannulf turned off the road and rose challengingly in his saddle. Edmund joined him—a squire always shadowed his master. I could tell by the defensive set of my friend’s shoulders that he did not like the odds.

  One of the hunters called out words I could make out only after a moment. “La donna Galena,” he cried mockingly, making rude, rutting gestures with his fist.

  I kicked my mount and would have bounded across the field toward these laughing hunters—but Nigel seized my bridle.

  THIRTY-FIVE

  The hunters mocked us, jeered, and made every variety of coarse gesture, but Nigel restored me to reason by his cheerful example, he and Rannulf guarding our retreat all the way to the shore.

  We boarded a weather-blackened cog, a stout, single-masted ship.The vessel smelled of manure and hay, but all the horses had disembarked weeks ago, in the Holy Land. The sailors were busy scrubbing the last traces of horse from the hold, and a carpet was put down in a cabin for Sir Luke, one of the wine-red tapestries taken in battle from the Saracens.

  The Saint Susanna was loaded now with drink, newly built casks seeping black wine. Sir Nigel said, with a laugh, that he might be able to ride out another storm if he turned his belly into a wineskin. Sir Rannulf strode about the deck, as though eyeing the various vantage points from which he would kill boarders. The ship was outfitted with oriflammes—long, tapered banners that danced and fluttered in the wind.And to my surprise and pleasure, our ship also flew a leopard banner, a blue field displaying the warlike cat.

  When the vessel was under sail, knifing through the rising mountains of water, Edmund and I climbed like veterans up and down the deck, trying to reassure ourselves that this ship was safe, that our return home was blessed, that it was only a matter of time before we set foot in the kingdom of our birth.

  We had as much red Lombard wine as we could drink, and when the ship stopped to take on a fresh supply of ducks and suckling pigs, we dined as well as any lord. We supped each night with the captain, an Englishman from Whitby. John Hawkmoor knew the stories of the virgin martyrs by heart, and told us these tales during the long, cold evenings. Even Sir Rannulf took an interest in these legends of piteous martyrs.

  Throughout the winter there were days when the ship made no headway, the small rain drifting down.

  Sir Nigel began to bleed from his gums, and some nights he drank as much as he could hold, and more, until he spewed red wine and I had to help him to his berth. Sir Rannulf had sores on his lips, and paced the deck with a mood caused by what a surgeon would have recognized as melas-khole, an excess of black bile.

  Edmund and I kept our spirits, practicing sword work on sunny afternoons, one hand clinging to rigging to help our balance, pretending to be mortally wounded, falling, rising, time and again. Laughing, forgetting all the real agony we had seen.

  I believed that we were approaching safety, all danger done. Soon I would see my parents and my sister Mary, and wake to hear the familiar street songs of home.

  Later I would marvel at my folly.

  THIRTY-SIX

  I had seen a winking point of light in the darkness, but now that I had my friend’s attention, the light was gone.

  “I don’t see anything,” said Edmund, “but mouse-gray water and rat-gray sky.”

  Edmund and I had speculated that we were close to our homeland, but the last approach to the shore was reputed to be the most frustrating part of any voyage, the winds contrary and the seas rough. The sailors had ceased to estimate our position on the coast, but their manner was quicker than ever, their eyes alight.

  It was about the hour of sunset, although the actual sol himself had been a well-guarded secret, somewhere beyond the overcast for days.

  “There it is!” I cried.

  I had seen this furtive point of light fixed along the horizon—not bobbing or moving along like one of the shore craft we had seen all winter. Steady—not like a watchman’s beacon, wavering with his steps.

  Each sailor shook his head, or offered mysterious counsel: “Best wait and see, my lords,” or “I don’t think I see it, Squire Hubert.”

  I knew why.

  They were wisely afraid that now we had come this far, some great menace would lift up out of the waves. And drown us all.

  Sir Nigel said it could be a candle set on some old shipwreck, to keep sailors from running into it. Sir Rannulf, preferring a violent view of events, said a vessel must have caught fire.

  Edmund asked our captain when he appeared, stiff-legged with the cold.

  “It’s the Southampton Lamp,” said Captain Hawkmoor without looking to see for himself.

&nb
sp; We were unwilling to ask further, too excited.

  The captain leaned forward, as though confiding a secret in his flat, unemotional way. “The lamp is a big lantern.” A bigge lanthorn. “Set out each night to mark the harbor.”

  We were afraid to look at each other.

  “God help you, squires,” said John. “It’s England!”

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  We sailed up the brown river toward London the next afternoon, aided by the incoming tide.

  Edmund and I waved at field men carrying wooden shovels and shepherd’s crooks in the early spring afternoon.The men waved back, and children scurried along the riverbank, calling just as children everywhere at the passing of a ship. When I lifted my hand to salute a boy, he took a long moment before lifting his arm in return, and I wondered how we must all look to the very young.

  “I see a tree full of rooks!” cried Edmund.

  I saw it too, a great leafless oak crowded with a hundred black, squabbling, laughing birds. In no other land had I seen any fowl so eager to congregate as our common farmland rooks.The scent of mud and livestock, pigs and cattle, lightened our hearts. Sir Nigel clung to the salt-stiffened rigging to see out beyond the sedge and reeds.

  “I spy Englishwomen!” said Sir Nigel. Goose girls in white aprons, dairywomen chasing hens with butter paddles. I wondered what Galena was doing just then—perhaps listening to some new, golden-voiced traveler, being won over by his charms.

  When the wind was not sufficient, the captain ordered out two great sweeps, long spruce-wood oars, that sailors manned, two to an oar.The Saint Susanna proceeded up the river, and river men sculling along made way for us with open smiles, pleased, I thought, to see the faded leopard banner at our mast.

  In late afternoon three horsemen in black leather rode beside the river, less than a stone’s throw away.