The rooftops on High Street stood close together. Shrike ran along them as swift and silent as a hunted hart darting through dense forest. Those few awoken by the incident in Cemetery Gate were too intent on discovering what had happened within to look without, and it never occurred to any of them to look up. Their lantern lights faded away like so many will-o’-th’-wisps as Shrike carried Wren across Rochester to the stable-yard. The horses slept on as he descended to the well, and Wren held tight as he plunged into the depths, eager to leave England behind forever.
~
Chapter Thirty-Eight
The Court of the Silver Wheel
The Fae Realms
Midsummer
An eerie silence descended over the gathered crowd as Wren and Shrike entered the Court of the Silver Wheel. It parted before them as they strode with purpose toward the hemlock bower standing tall on the opposing side.
In the corner of his eye Wren glimpsed some familiar figures beyond the denizens of the Court. Lady Aethelthryth, seated atop her grey steed, could hardly be missed. Nor could he fail to spot Tatterdemalion flitting about overhead in their dual-toned fur coat and trailing silver tresses. Several milk-maid huldra wandered through the throng, which Wren had come to expect, but he also recognized their queen, whose antlers outstripped Shrike’s, accompanied by the blue roan incubus who’d played the queer fiddle in the mead hall. He almost missed the silver glint of a spiderweb mask amongst strangers—for even the ambassador’s fearsome reputation couldn’t keep such a throng as this from crowding in at each other’s elbows. Fae had gathered from courts far and wide to stare at the Kings of Oak and Holly.
Well might they all stare at Shrike and Wren. Shrike, wearing the queen’s gyrdel fastened around his waist over his boiled leather armour, and Wren with Larkin’s scythe slung over his left shoulder. Whether the wide berth the crowd gave them was due to Shrike’s bloody reputation or the iron blade, Wren couldn’t say.
The knights encircling the hemlock bower’s base stepped aside to allow them entry. The sun shone bright above the tourney field and cast a green hue over everything beneath the needle-leaf roof. The courtiers’ low murmur of conversation died into a stunned hush at Shrike and Wren’s approach.
The queen sat alone on her throne at her balcony. Her delicate fingers held a crown. Not, as Wren had expected, braided holly leaves jewelled with crimson berries, but instead woven from evergreen thorns. He wondered if the fae understood the mortal symbolism of such a crown. He doubted it.
“Kneel, my Holly King,” she purred.
Wren bent on one knee as he’d seen Shrike do so many months ago.
The queen laid the crown on his brow with a gentle hand. It did not weigh upon him as heavily as he’d expected. Nonetheless, he felt it difficult to raise his head to meet her gaze again. He found her smiling. He didn’t return it.
Without a word, he and Shrike turned as one and descended to the duelling field.
Wren gave one last glance across the gathered crowd in search of friendly faces. Someone waved a scrap of white linen with a dark stain over their head. Belatedly Wren recognized his own bloodied cravat and the young man who wielded it, flanked by the statuesque woman and the crone. Further off, he espied a hint of blue amidst the green and found Nell perched in the fork of a tree at the edge of the field. With bow in hand and quiver slung over her shoulder she stood watching and waiting for the duel’s result.
Shrike and Wren took their places marked on either side of the three-ells-wide ring burned into the grass of the tourney field.
The queen’s herald held out a handkerchief embroidered with the symbol of the silver wheel. At a sign from her, they dropt it and leapt back from the combatants.
So began the duel.
The melodrama Wren had scripted commenced with he and Shrike circling each other around the marked edge of the duelling ring. Shrike had his sword unsheathed in an instant. Wren, with the scythe already in hand, had only to raise it in front of him as shield and weapon both.
Shrike attacked first, darting forward almost faster than Wren could perceive. He brought the scythe up just in time to ward off the sword.
Blade clanged against blade. Wren thrust the flat edge of the scythe at Shrike’s chest to force him back. Then, with a wild spin, he swept the scythe at his face.
Shrike ducked beneath the blade.
But not swift enough to prevent it striking an antler.
The iron blade did not slice clean through the bone but hacked halfway before ceasing, caught. This, Wren had not written. Nor had they rehearsed such a thing.
Shrike, however, improvised by seizing a prong in his own hand and breaking off the antler with a sickening crack.
Blood oozed from the jagged edge. Wren stared in horror. Antlers were supposed to fall off, he told himself, and when the rest of this one took its natural course, it would take the ever-bleeding wound with it. Shrike need not bear it over-long.
Still, the sight of the crimson gore beading along the craggy break did nothing to ease Wren’s conscience.
Shrike swung his sword just as Wren swung the scythe. The notch between iron blade and wooden handle caught the sword below the hilt. A twist of the scythe wrenched the sword from Shrike’s grip and flung it aside.
Nevermind that the hilt only dropt from Shrike’s fist because he chose to open his hand. The duel need not appear beyond convincing to the most discerning eye. After all, everyone watching the sword dance at Ostara knew it for mere play and rejoiced in it nonetheless. It need merely be a splendid spectacle.
