The king is there. Resplendent in colour and furs, his hair as golden as his crown, he regards Bisclavret with an eager interest.
Bisclavret bows his head. ‘How would you have me, my lord?’ he asks. ‘Is there a particular knight against whom you’d have me test my skills?’ He tries not to glance across at the knight in green, halfway familiar and therefore halfway to an ally.
The king does look at him, however, and at the others gathered, and then back at Bisclavret, gaze steady. Then he raises his hands to the fastenings of his cloak and begins to undo them. ‘I think I would have you try yourself against me, if you would.’
Bisclavret takes a step back. ‘Against you?’ he says.
‘I can see already that you’re skilled enough. And I am . . . dusty and unpractised, and desire to brush away the cobwebs with a moment’s novelty.’
Is that all he is, a novelty? Bisclavret raises his eyebrow and smiles. ‘If you wish, sire,’ he says. ‘I’ll endeavour not to hurt you.’ He feels a faint glimmer of satisfaction when this prompts murmurs of outrage from the spectators, and a huff of laughter from the knight in green. He will never fit in this court if it has no space for humour, no tolerance for defiance. Better to know that now, before they think to let him through the door.
The king’s mouth curls into an answering smile. ‘Perhaps I would welcome a challenge,’ he says, and raises his hand to call for his sword. ‘I ammostinterested to see what you can do, Bisclavret.’
8
You
You’d planned to leave the fighting to one of your knights, but the sight of him dismantles your intentions.
He seems uncertain of his own skills, but there’s care in his movements as he runs through his drills, each angle studied and practised until it flows unthinkingly. Few men of your acquaintance have mastered such precision of technique, and even fewer have disarmed you with nothing but a smile and a handful of words.
When did you last have a fair fight? You can’t remember. You’ve rarely had the opportunity to spar against an equal these last few years – if you can be called Bisclavret’s equal. He has the body of a man who hasn’t rested a day in his life; despite his slender frame, he has broad, strong shoulders, and you see the muscles shift beneath his undertunic as he moves.
You avoid his gaze as you warm up, relearning the feel of the sword in your hand, but when, by accident, you catch his eye, you are all the more grateful for the blunted edges. His attention is totally, unwaveringly, on you, and for a moment you have a sense of how it feels to be a hapless deer in the forest, in the breath before an arrow is loosed.
Your knight in green – a man you knew well once, in your youth, and still trust implicitly – has appointed himself thebout’s herald and judge. He clears the spectators to the edges of the courtyard, giving you space, and then he steps back, calling for the fight to begin.
You regard Bisclavret. He regards you. For a moment neither of you moves.
And then—
He’s fast. Faster than you expected, almost too fast to block, but you meet his sword and twist away. There’s a thrill to being unarmoured and vulnerable to bruising, though the blunted swords would cause no real wound. You gather your strength and your speed and go on the offensive, forcing Bisclavret to match you blow for blow. His footwork’s a little clumsy; you exploit it, slipping inside his guard, but only once, and then he realises what you’ve done and corrects himself, learning as he goes.
The crowd fades away. Their jeers and heckles, their shouts of encouragement, may as well be the whistling of wind through the trees. You forget where you are, forget the duties of kingship that wait for you, seeing only the swords in your hands and Bisclavret’s face as he calculates his next attack. There is fierce joy in his dawning smile. It begins as surprise, the first time you parry one of his feints and nearly twist his sword from his hand; it transforms into delight when he manages the same, moments later, and you stumble to avoid being disarmed.
He feints, twists, catches you in the ribs with the flat of his blade. It will bruise. You stagger under the impact, the pain resounding through your torso and startling a gasp from between your lips. It’s a pure kind of pain, a clarity-bringing pain, and though the crowd sucks in a breath and Bisclavret hesitates, unsure whether he’s allowed to strike you like this, your grin only widens and your efforts redouble.
Before long you’re both panting, dripping in sweat.
Bisclavret’s hair falls over his eyes, overlong, and as he brushes it aside, you take advantage of his distraction to strike his wrist, hard enough that he almost drops his sword. With a sharpened blade, he could have lost the hand; as it is, he hisses in surprise and pain, before swapping his sword to his left hand. And that’s a trick you didn’t anticipate. He’s slower and clumsier on this side, but stronger than you’d be, trying to do the same – it’s never occurred to you to fight with your left, and it throws you off-guard, unable to properly counter his moves.
An oversight, surely. A kingdom should not be so easily brought down by a sinister opponent. You’ll have to make that good, when next you have the chance to seek out a sword master for your own education.
The fight continues, but it’s awkward now, slow, and neither of you has the skill to drag it out. Finally, you stab your sword down into the ground and hold up your hands. ‘I yield, Bisclavret.’
He lowers his own sword hesitantly, as though anticipating a trick, but you don’t move. You’re not sure that you can, leaden with exhaustion. The rest of the world begins to intrude on your reverie, the colours of your knights’ clothes bright and demanding attention at the edges of your vision. Bisclavret’s undershirt is soaked and clinging with sweat, and you know your own must look much the same, but you cannot keep the grin from your face.
‘You must tell me who trained you,’ you say, earnestly. ‘I haven’t had a fight like that since—’ Then you break off, unable to recall a bout that left you so exhilarated.
Bisclavret is flushed red with exertion, so it’s hard to tell if he blushes now, but certainly there’s something bashful in his expression as he says, ‘I am largely self-taught, sire.’
It makes sense, of course; he’s rustic, countrified, his fatherdead. And yet at the same time it doesn’t, because he’s sogood, so quick to learn, enough to put any warrior to shame. ‘You expect me to believe you’ve not sparred before?’
‘Of course not,’ he says, and inclines his head towards his cousin, among the crowd of spectators. ‘We played at knighthood often enough in our youth. Still, I had little formal training.’
‘But—’ You shake your head a few times, stunned. Beaten in a fight by a man with no formal training – you should be furious. Instead you’re delighted, and more than a little intrigued. What, you wonder, would he be capable of, if given the chance? ‘Most impressive.’
Servants approach with cloths to wipe your faces. You’ll need to bathe, next, and have a physician examine your bruises, though you think there’s little real harm done. You’ll need to rest, too, after all that.
