Stupefied, he cannot immediately process this change of direction. ‘I beg your pardon?’
‘It would be a poor knight to swear into the king’s service who did not act courteously towards a lady. Your hesitationdoes you credit and your polite tongue more. Now allow me to help ready you, for the servants will not be back for some time, and the ceremony awaits you.’
Bisclavret is momentarily weak with relief that he seems to have passed this trial. ‘I can manage perfectly well by myself,’ he says, although he is not at all certain that is true.
She clucks her tongue disapprovingly. ‘It is no shame to be dressed, and I am as capable as any squire or page.’
It isn’t that he is ashamed. But there’s a shocking intimacy to it, to her hands on his legs as she helps fasten his hose, new and bright with royal dye. No more for him the simple colours of undyed wool and linen, or the cheap blue of woad. The armour is less familiar, and the sensation of permitting her help ever more alien: she eases the padded gambeson over his head and then the mail hauberk; laces the mail chausses around his calves; reaches around his body to fasten his belt over the fine bright surcoat in the king’s colours. Her movements are quick and efficient; perhaps she once helped her father with his armour, that she knows so well the fastenings and the best way to arrange his tunic into comfortable pleats beneath the layers.
Her touch is feather-light and safe as a hearth, and the weight of the armour is grounding. Each piece is like a bandage, another skin, a shell encasing him and binding him together, all of his selves locked up tight. He thought perhaps it would feel like losing something. Instead it feels as though something is coming together.
She takes a step back and regards him, appraising her handiwork. ‘There,’ she says. ‘You are almost ready to be dubbed, Sir Knight.’
‘Almost?’ he echoes.
She reaches out and touches a strand of his hair hanging loose about his face. ‘Let me braid your hair for you,’ she says.
‘That will keep it from shadowing those eyes of yours.’
His head will be bare for the ceremony, no coif of mail or helmet to hide his expressions from the king and all who have come to watch. He might well wish for the slender defences of his loose hair to conceal his thoughts. But he is aware that the length of his hair is unfashionable, an echo of decades past; the men here at court wear theirs cropped far shorter, and their beards likewise neat. On that front, at least, he fits in; he keeps himself clean-shaven, a small act of reclaiming skin from the wolf and anything that might remind him of it.
‘Very well,’ he says at last, and sits. She is as efficient with the comb as with the rest of his armour, braiding his hair and twisting it away from his face.
When she’s done, she drops a kiss to his forehead. ‘For luck,’ she says, with another smile. ‘I must to the king and my place there. You know your part?’
If ever he knew his part he has lost the knowing of it; he feels as though he’s waking from a dream, only half-remembering who or where he is. How unafraid she was. Touching him as though he were any man, any knight, no care for the lurking wolf. How unfamiliar the press of her lips to his forehead, a blessing his mother ceased to offer him some years before she died. He’d forgotten the unique benediction of a woman’s care.
She sees his stupefaction in his face and laughs. ‘The servants will fetch you, and bring you to the hall,’ she says. ‘All will be well, and you will be a knight.’
Yes. A knight. Dressed in the armour in which she dressed him, made by her hands. He opens his mouth to thank her, but she is already gone, and he is alone again.
He stays there, unsteady, unravelling, until the promised servant comes to tell him that it’s time, and then he finds his feet again and goes forward to meet his future.
12
You
His hair has been tied back from his face in intricate braids, the curls and tangles oiled away. His skin is clean, pink-cheeked in the cool air of the throne room. They’ve made for him a surcoat of green and burnt gold, and mail so polished that it shines like moonlight. Your ward returned some moments ago with a smile and a nod that only you would understand, and you know then that he did not touch her, but her touch is everywhere on him, lingering like perfume: in his hair, teasing out the tangles; drawing tight the fastenings of his clothes; resting on his skin.
You permitted it. You wish, absurdly, that you had not.
He wears no cloak, no helmet, no armour around his head and neck. His throat is pale and exposed, and you see him swallow as he approaches.
The words of the oath are as familiar as a prayer. It has been much less than a month since you received it from the rest of your nobles, a seemingly endless stream of fealty, a flood of kisses pressed against your hands and mouth. But for a moment you cannot recall them. All you see are his clear eyes, looking up at you. The contrast between his dark hair and his pale skin. The harsh, straight lines of his eyebrows. You look at him and feel as if you are drowning in wanting for something you cannot have.
The chaplain prompts you and you stumble through thequestioning, the words of the promises he must make. His responses are softly spoken, as much breath as speech, and you strain towards him to hear the quiet words. His Latin is rough; it lacks a churchman’s polish, but he knows the shape of it, and the formal patterns of the oaths expected from him. He swears to serve: with taxes in peace, with his body and with men in war. To answer your call and to stand at your side. It is a friendship any king is owed and it is too much to ask. You want it desperately.
When the words are spoken, he kneels before you, waiting for the bestowal of his title, and all you can see is the graceful curve of his neck as he submits.
You knight him with shaking hands, and he kisses your feet, your hands, your lips, as is proper, each fleeting touch an impossible tenderness.
Sir Bisclavret.
He wears a small, secret smile, one he keeps biting back as though afraid to show his joy. But what you feel is wonder: wonder that he is here, that you have his oath, that you will not lose him again to exile.
You fasten the sword-belt around his waist, and then you take his hand and turn him to face the gathered crowd – your knights in their brightest livery, the ladies in their finest gowns, all the castle servants dressed for feasting. They cheer, the musicians striking up a tune, and it is time for ritual to give way to celebration: oaths to wine, prayers to song. You have hardly let go of Bisclavret’s hand before he is swept away by his cousin to take his place among the knights.
As you stare after him, momentarily bereft, you can still feel his lips against your skin, the trail of his fingertips along your hands where he took your help to stand.
