The Knight

“Hob would have been, if Hob had lived. Everyone in your castle is afraid of the warders, Your Grace, except me and you. I don’t know what’s behind all that, but it’s got to be more than ugly faces and black clothes. If I go down in your dungeon, Master Caspar and his men will do everything they can think of to see I never come out. I know that. But if you want me to—”

“Your Grace!” Caspar had jumped up. “I swear—he—Sir Able don’t—”

Marder shut him up by moving his hand about an inch.

I said, “I’ll go anyway, if you tell me to. And I’ll make it clear to Org that he shouldn’t kill anybody else, not even Master Caspar.”

Marder hid his mouth behind his hand, but I saw his mustache twitch.

“Only I’ve got a better plan, if I can just get you to agree to it. This will solve all the problems we’ve been talking about. It gets Org out of your dungeon. And it will be my punishment, too, one none of your knights can resent or argue about.”

Marder sighed. “It will get you killed, you mean. The more I see and hear of you, Sir Able, the more reluctant I am to lose you.”

“I hope not, Your Grace. You were going to send me out to make my stand. We talked about that outside my room.”

He nodded. “I recall it.”

“Then you remember you said you might send me to fight the Angrborn. Do it. Do it now. I don’t know exactly how they go when they come into your duchy—”

Agr said, “I’ll draw you a map of the War Way.” (He did that, too, afterward.)

I nodded to show I had heard Agr. “But there can’t be a lot of roads through the mountains. Let me take my stand someplace they have to go through. I’ll take Org along, and I’ll stay there until snow blocks the passes.”

We talked about that for a while, Marder saying that as long as I did not come back before there was ice in the bay he would take my word that I had not left until the passes were closed. Agr sent Caspar for a page, then sent the page to that armorer back in Forcetti to tell him he had to hurry up with all my work.

Then Marder said, “There is another difficulty whose solution I see in this, Sir Able.”

―――

That was Svon. I remember looking up from the fire that night to get a good look at him, and seeing he was asleep and that Gylf had laid a dead hare pretty close to his head. I got it and skinned it, and stuck one haunch on a long stick the way you do, and held it over the fire.

It was getting brown when Svon sat up. “Are you going to eat all of that, Sir Able?”

I held up the rest. “There’s more here. Take whatever you want.”

“Good of you. We’ve been on short commons, eh?”

I reminded him that he had bought extra food for himself when we had stopped at inns or in villages. It was easy—too easy, to tell you the truth—to get mad at Svon. Maybe it was even as easy for us to be mad at him as it was for him to be mad at us. When I thought about it, I understood him well enough. He was still a squire, when there were a lot of knights younger than he was.

I was one of those myself.

He went off to cut a stick. When he came back, he put the other haunch over the fire too. “I could eat it raw, like your monster, Sir Able. But I’m a man, so I’ll try to soften it up.”

I stayed quiet, knowing he was trying to get me mad.

“Your ogre, I ought to have said. I don’t like him.”

I had another look at my meat, and turned the stick.

“I had a nice nap until I smelled this rabbit. Have you slept at all?”

I said no.

“Because you’re afraid to sleep without your dog and your monster to guard you. Isn’t that right? You’re afraid I might stab you.”

“I’ve been stabbed before,” I told him. His lips tightened. “Not by me.”

“No.”

“Allow me to tell you something, Sir Able. I know you won’t credit it, but I’d like to say it whether you credit it or not. I won’t stab you, not while you sleep at any rate. But your pet ogre will turn on you someday, asleep or awake.”

“Would you defend me, if he did?”

“How am I to take that? Am I to say yes so you’ll have something good to say of me when we return?”

I shook my head. “You’re supposed to take it seriously, that’s all. And answer it honestly—even if it’s just to yourself.” I was trying to get the meat I had been cooking off the stick without burning my fingers; when I did, I took a bite. It was hot enough to burn my tongue, and tough too. It tasted wonderful.

“You always tell the truth. Correct?”

My mouth was full, but I shook my head.

“You know you try to give that impression.” He pointed his forefinger at me. “That impression itself is a lie.”

I chewed some more and swallowed. “Sure. Since you’re awake now, go see to the horses.”

He ignored it. “You told His Grace that you had guided Sir Ravd and me in the forests above Irringsmouth. Another lie.”

The scream of some animal made us both jump up.

Svon took a deep breath and grinned at me. “Your pet’s killed somebody else.”

I walked around the fire and knocked him sprawling.

He may have touched Pouk when he fell, because Pouk sat up. He stared at Svon, blinking and rubbing his eyes.