“Ah, I’m sorry. I must sound like a madman to you. But believe me, I’m not insane.”
“No,” she murmured. “But what you may be, my lord, I’m not sure.”
“Lady . . .”
“All right. Baroness Alianor bore her husband two fine children, fair-haired like their father, a son first, from whom my lord husband is descended, then a daughter, my great-grandmother. You didn’t know my husband and I are related? We’re cousins. Oh yes,” she added sourly, “we received proper dispensation for our marriage, you needn’t look at me like that.”
Hauberin, who hadn’t the vaguest idea what she meant, nodded politely. “Of course you did. Please, go on.”
“Baron Gautier, like so many other nobles, left for the Holy Land on crusade. He never returned.” The baroness hesitated. “Some months after news of her husband’s death reached her, Baroness Alianor was said to have been visited by a strange darkness. Some said it was a devil, some called it a pagan spirit the baron had roused in his travels. There was talk linking the baroness with witchcraft, but she was of high enough rank for it to come to naught.” Matilde swallowed. “And then, well over a year after the baron’s death, Baroness Alianor bore a child, a girl, small, dark and wild, they say, as any changeling.”
She paused again, so obviously unhappy that the rest of the tale could only be tragic. Yet Hauberin had to prod, “Please, continue.”
“There . . . isn’t much more. The baroness . . . died not long after. Her brother was a strict, stern man. He . . .”
“Slew her?”
“There . . . are always rumors. She died. Her daughter was raised as a noblewoman, of course, but must have had a harsh time of it, poor thing, always being reminded of her shameful birth, always . . . different, even before her—powers developed.”
Hauberin winced. No wonder his mother had refused to discuss her childhood! And no wonder she’d been so understanding of his.
“At any rate,” the baroness continued softly, “after her disappearance, outraged members of the family had the door to the chambers she’d inherited from her mother bolted fast, the window barred, lest the darkness that had sired her ever try to return. You may have noted that window when you arrived; it’s the topmost one in the western tower. But—”
“This ‘darkness,’ ” Hauberin cut in sharply. “Who—what—was he?”
“I told you, my lord, I don’t know. Baroness Alianor never spoke of him. Even under threat from her brother, even though he . . . beat her, she never, never named the father of her child.”
“Ah, no, I can’t accept that! Somebody must know.”
“I—I’m sorry. That’s all there is.” She hesitated, bewildered and torn by his distress. “I’m afraid even my lord husband couldn’t tell you more. If he would talk of it at all. He considers it a family shame—my lord? What is it?”
Hauberin had caught a sudden silent warning from Alliar. “I believe your husband is waiting, my lady,” he said in quiet resignation. “Shall we join him?”
XII
LESSONS
Baron Gilbert’s well-schooled face, as ever, revealed little outward emotion, but his stance as Hauberin and the baroness left the chapel together spoke worlds of disapproval. The fixed stare he gave the prince was decidedly icy.
Is it that he doesn’t want me in his chapel, Hauberin wondered. Or doesn’t he approve of me being alone with his wife?
The baroness seemed not to notice any coldness on her husband’s part. Greeting him with a charming smile, she took his arm and turned to go, without so much as a glance back at Hauberin. After a heartbeat’s resistance, Baron Gilbert yielded and let her lead him away. As they left, unaware of the keenness of Faerie hearing, Hauberin caught first the baron’s baritone grumble, then his wife’s indignant: “In a chapel? Credit me with better judgment than that! No, my lord husband, nothing untoward happened in there, I swear it by my faith. Our guest was curious about our ways, that’s all.”
“I noticed he wasn’t curious enough to attend Mass.”
“Ah. Well. I . . . don’t think he’s exactly of our beliefs.”
“A pagan?” the baron blurted.
“No, I don’t think so. What he is, though . . .”
Is a good deal stranger than pagan, the prince finished wryly.
He turned to rejoin the uneasy Alliar, who asked him volumes in one brief brush of mind against mind. Hauberin shook his head.
“Too many servants watching us,” he said in the Faerie tongue. “Come, let’s walk.”
As they ambled on at random down a castle corridor, discreetly trailed by servants who “just happened” to be going the same way, Hauberin quietly repeated the story the baroness had told him. “There’s just no help for it, Li. I must see whatever’s left of my mother’s chambers. If those rooms really haven’t been disturbed for . . . what? . . . some three human generations, there may still be traces of auras—”
“And you mean to tap them?” Alliar stopped short. “Do you have any idea how dangerous that is?”
“Temporal distortions, you mean?”
“Among other things! Such as—”
“I’ll risk it.” Hauberin started forward again. After a moment, Alliar followed, protesting: “But you can’t—besides, the baron isn’t going to just let you walk into rooms his family has kept bolted!”
“Ah, but that’s where you can help, my friend. If you can sufficiently distract the baron and his entourage, you’ll give me my chance.”
Alliar hesitated for a long while. “There’s no dissuading you, is there?”
“No.”
“Then . . . done,” the being agreed reluctantly. “But I still think you’re risking—”
“I know. But there’s no other choice.” At the sound of hurrying footsteps behind them, Hauberin glanced back over his shoulder. “Now, what?”
A nervous little wisp of a man-servant was scurrying up to them, stopping with a quick little birdlike dip of a bow.
“Yes?” the prince asked.
“My lords, my lord baron sends you word that he will be engaged in castle affairs this morning. He thought that rather than sitting with him in the Hall, you might wish to visit the tilting yard instead.”
Alliar grimaced. “Our good host was very right.”
And perhaps, while everyone else is occupied, Hauberin added to himself, I’ll have my chance at those locked chambers. He waved a regal hand at the servant. “Lead on.”
The servant brought them to the top of a stairway curving down the outside of a castle tower, bowed his avian bow once more, and scurried away.
“Probably off to hunt worms,” Alliar muttered, and Hauberin laughed.
Below them, the yard was already busy despite the still-early hour and the chill, damp air. On one side, some of the baron’s knights in full mail were working with sword and shield. On the other, a few of the common men-at-arms were practicing wrestling holds. And just at the foot of the stairs, the two squires, Denis and Bertran, were studiously dueling with blunted swords under the keen eye of the solid, scarred, sergeant-at-arms. Aimery, arm in sling, sat on the steps and watched glumly. Hauberin, descending lightly, chuckled.
“Don’t despair. You’ll be able to earn new bruises soon enough.”
“What—my lord!” The boy’s face brightened. “God give you a good morning.”
“And you. Eh, sit.”
“Oh, out my ankle’s much improved.”
“Good. Don’t abuse it.”
They watched the activities in silence for a time. Then Alliar, who had been studying the sword and shield combats, said, “Now, I think I’d like to try that.”
As Hauberin stared at his friend in astonishment, Aimery agreed cheerfully, “Oh, of course. As my lord baron’s guest you’d be welcome. And they’re always glad of new blood—” He winced. “I didn’t mean spilled.”
“I should hope not,” Hauberin muttered, watching the being swagger—there was no other word for it—over to
the knights, looking the very image of the world-weary human noble. “And I sincerely hope Li knows what’s what.”
“He’s donning iron!” whispered Aimery in horror.
“That is what composes mail in this Realm.”
“But—iron! I thought you couldn’t—”
“I can’t. Alliar can. Hush, now. Watch.”
Alliar had, over the years, learned to handle a sword with considerable expertise, having often been pushed by the boy-Hauberin into being his dueling companion. The pseudo-human shape was strong enough to bear the weight of the borrowed mail shirt with ease. But the being wasn’t at all familiar with the foreign idea of a shield. Hauberin watched Alliar make several experimental passes, evidently throwing off an occasional jest that made the watching men laugh aloud. There now, Li seemed to be ready. As ready as Li was likely to be.
It wasn’t too painful. The being was too inhumanly graceful and quick to be in any real danger. And Alliar actually managed to get in a few solid blows to the slower human opponent. But of course experience told in the end, as the human used his shield to hook Alliar’s and force it out of line. The being frantically tried to recover, but in Li’s haste, let the borrowed sword go out of line as well.
“Ae, look out,” Hauberin muttered, seeing what was coming.
Too late. In the next moment, Alliar was at sword’s edge and laughingly conceding defeat. Slithering out of the mail shirt, the being returned to Hauberin’s side with a rueful smile.
“That is not, by any means, as simple as it looked!”
The prince shrugged. “You’re not hurt?”
“Only . . . ah . . . winded a bit.”
Hauberin winced at the pun, then grinned at Aimery. “We don’t fight with shields in my land. As Alliar has just proven.”
“No shields?” The sergeant-at-arms had overheard, and waved Denis and Bertran to stillness. “Your pardon, m’lord, but—no shields?”
Damn. I had to go and draw attention to myself. There went any hope of slipping away unnoticed. “None,” Hauberin answered, a touch amused, in spite of his impatience, by the man’s blatant curiosity. “Our stances are different, too. We—ach, I can’t show you properly from up here.” He stepped down to the yard. “Let me have one of your practice swords.”
The prince could afford to be daring: The hilts weren’t iron, but mere wood wrapped with leather. He was as safe as a man carrying a hot poker by a cool handle.
“Too heavy. A lighter one . . . Yes, this will do. No, I don’t want armor!” He fought down a shudder at the thought of iron encasing him and added honestly enough, “I haven’t the height or breadth to carry all that weight.” Even if it wouldn’t fry me at a touch. Hauberin glanced at the human. “Put down your shield.”
“But, m’lord, this leaves a man’s whole front unprotected!”
“Not if you turn, so.”
“What, nearly sideways? Does present less of a target, but . . .”
“Come, try it. Skill’s the thing, not brute force.”
He demonstrated a few supple passes and saw the sergeant’s eyes widen. Eh, a mistake: he was moving too swiftly for a human, and a human’s slower reaction time. Before anyone could begin to wonder, Hauberin subtly slackened speed, aware that he was attracting a crowd. The sergeant was following his lead fairly well being, after all, a professional weapons-master. But the human was still awkward in this new pose and the fear of hurting his unarmored opponent, and after a few leery passes, he drew back with a nervous grin, scarred face red with the strain.
“Int’resting, m’lord. Most int’resting. But, begging your pardon, m’lord, this is all well and good in a courtyard. If a man’s in the middle of battle, he’s going to want all the shielding he can get.”
“My people do have other defenses,” Hauberin agreed, and heard a smothered little gasp of laughter from Aimery.
But then the boy was saying, “Oh, my lord,” and Hauberin glanced up to see Sir Raimond descending the stair, Aimery hastily crowding himself out of the way against the wall. Raimond was dressed for travel, a thick cloak over heavy riding clothes, and Hauberin, wondering where the young man might be going in such a rush, commented, “Better put a hood to that cloak.”
“My clothing is my own concern.”
“Tsk, just trying to spare you wetting your hair.” Now, what was in those troubled eyes? Fear? Guilt? Just what had that secret midnight meeting been about?
“Spare me your worry,” Raimond muttered as he swept by. But then he stopped short, almost as though a sudden voice had called to him, and turned to the prince with a thin smile. “That was an unusual style of handling a sword. But you seem to be teaching it easily enough.”
“What does that mean?”
“Perhaps your mysterious secret isn’t so mysterious at all.”
“My . . . secret?”
“Why, who and what you really are! Perhaps it’s all been a clever masquerade. Perhaps underneath it all, you are no more than you seemed just now: a dueling instructor.”
It was so clumsy an attempt at insult that Hauberin hesitated, torn between rage and an urge to laugh in the human’s face. “Sir Raimond,” he said at last, his voice soft and firm as though speaking to a not-quite-bright child. “You were clearly in a rush to be away from here. Don’t let me stop you.”
But Raimond had taken up one of the practice swords. He made a few tentative passes with it, then looked down its length at the prince, smiling. “I think I just might try my hand at this bizarre style of yours. Show me how it’s done.”
It was an order. Hauberin raised an eyebrow. “I am not, despite your jest, a teacher.”
“What’s this? Afraid, my lord?”
He seemed to be aching for a quarrel as surely—and as artlessly—as ever one child taunted another. Hauberin thought again of that secret meeting, and of that scornful, “I’ll see to him.” But I’ll not play your little game, my lord! He raked the human with one brief, contemptuous glance and turned away.
“Alliar, shall we—”
“Don’t you turn your back on me!”
A hand closed savagely on his arm, pulling him about. Hauberin cried out in sudden rage and tore free, eyes blazing. Just for a moment, his hand raised to strike—with Power. But then, regretfully, he remembered where he was. “Very well, my lord. If you wish a lesson, by the Powers, you’ve just earned the right to one.”
“No!” Alliar thrust between them with a quick, “Are you insane? Those swords are iron! You can’t fight him!”
“If there’s a lesson, I’ll gladly teach it.”
“Step aside, lackey!” the human snapped.
“Lackey!”
“Li, no! Stand aside.”
“But—iron! This won’t be a friendly demonstration with a cautious sergeant. The blades may be blunted, but if he so much as scratches you—”
“He won’t. He’ll be too handicapped by those bulky clothes—ha, and by the weight of that mail shirt under the tunic—and by an unfamiliar sword style. Don’t worry.”
“Don’t worry! I’d be mad not to—this is madness!”
Of course it was: the wild, proud, illogical Faerie madness. And just now, Hauberin was wholly of Faerie. “Step aside, Li. You wanted this, my lord Raimond. Come.”
The human threw off his cloak and attacked.
It was a jest almost from the start. Raimond was a good swordsman; the brother of a baron could scarcely be anything else. But he stood little chance against this slim, dark flame of an opponent who darted in and out, mocking, comfortable in what to Raimond was a stance against every rule of swordplay, teasing the young human’s blade a little more out of line with every taunting feint. In his desperate attempts to block that supple speed, Raimond slipped bit by bit back into the frontal attack that had been drilled into him since boyhood. Hauberin laughed aloud and lunged, stabbing the blunted point of his sword against his opponent’s mail-protected chest, then lightly springing back, blade at rest.
; “Lesson’s over, my lord. You’re dead.”
But it wasn’t over. Furious at having looked the fool in front of underlings, Raimond attacked again, and this time there was nothing of a jest about it. The horrified cries of the onlookers ringing in his ears, Hauberin found himself being driven back and back, too engaged in avoiding that perilous iron blade to counterattack. As Raimond swung at him, he parried, two-handed. The shock of impact as the two blades skreed together echoed through every nerve, nearly staggering him—Ae! The swords had locked at the hilt, and he hadn’t a chance in a battle of raw strength, any more than he’d had in the death-duel with Serein.
Serein? Why think of Serein now?
Hauberin did the only thing he could: he gave way suddenly, slipping under Raimond’s arm as though falling, freeing his snared sword with one quick, desperate twist of his wrist. The prince landed on one knee and one outflung hand, off-balance, but Raimond was just as much off-balance, stumbling forward, nearly going headlong. He recovered quickly, but Hauberin was already scrambling up, ready to—
Something tangled itself about his ankles, and before Hauberin could catch himself, he fell full length. And Serein was—no, no, not Serein; Raimond!—Raimond was raising his sword in both hands, high over his head, ready to stab savagely down, his eyes glinting green—
“No!” Alliar sprang forward, dragging the human away even as Hauberin fought free of the encumbrance—Raimond’s fallen cloak—and rolled aside, sword in hand.
“Let go of me!” Raimond gasped in fury. “Let go, damn you!” He tore free to face an equally furious Alliar, who was showing every sign of losing control and human shape, and Hauberin shot to his feet with a savage: “Enough!”
The sheer force of that cry made them both turn to stare. Hauberin saw nothing at all of Serein in Raimond’s eyes, nothing but very human rage, and thought with relief that the sea-green glint had been only a trick of the darkening sky or his own nerves. “Alliar, step back. And you, Sir Raimond, you wished to leave. The lesson is over. Leave!”
It wasn’t the voice of guest or servant. It was the voice of unquestioned royalty. Raimond, for all his fury, flinched. Without another word, he swept up his discarded cloak, flung it dramatically about himself, and stalked off, attendants hurrying frantically after him, leaving stunned silence behind.
A Strange and Ancient Name Page 17
