The Knight

“There is the target, my good knights,” Beel was saying. He pointed as he spoke. It was a round shield with an iron boss at the center. It hung from a scrubby tree at the end of the valley, at least two hundred yards away.

“You will shoot alternately, until each has shot five arrows. Sir Garvaon, Sir Able, and Sir Garvaon again until ten arrows have flown. Is that clear?”

Garvaon said, “Yes, Your Lordship.”

“Those arrows that fall short will count for nothing. Those that reach the target, but do not strike it, will count for one. Those which strike it, two.” Beel paused, looking from face to face. “And those which strike the iron center, if any do, will count as three. Do you both understand?”

We did.

“Master Papounce stands ready to ride.”

Looking around, I saw him at the fringe of the crowd, on foot but holding the reins of a nervous roan.

“If there is a question as to whether a shot reached the target, Master Papounce’s testimony will settle the matter.”

A murmur of excitement swept the crowd.

“Sir Garvaon! You are the senior. Step to the line.”

Garvaon did, taking from his quiver a shaft fletched with gray goose and tipped with a war point. When he drew, he drew and let fly in a single, smooth motion, the nock pulled back to his ear—the arrow disappearing like magic. His bowstring sang.

All of us tried to follow the high arc of the arrow as its faint whistle faded to silence. Down on the brown target it plunged, like a falcon on a rabbit.

We all gasped. Garvaon’s first arrow had hit the target midway between the edge and the iron boss. It stayed there, sticking in the target.

“Sir Garvaon has two,” Beel announced. “Sir Able? Will you shoot?”

As I stepped to the line, Idnn appeared with Mani on her shoulder; she held out a green silk scarf. “Will you wear my favor, Sir Able?”

It surprised me so much I could not say a word. I took her scarf and knotted it around my head the way I had seen scarves—red, blue, pink, yellow, and white—tied around the helms of knights at Sheerwall.

Someone raised a cheer for Lady Idnn, caps were thrown into the air, and for half a minute or more I thought about the way I would feel if my shot did not match Garvaon’s.

It’s up to me, I told myself. I direct the arrow, and it’s not a matter of chance.

There was a slight breeze, just enough to stir Idnn’s scarf. It was close to squarely at my back, but over so long a course it was bound to drift the arrow just a trifle to the left.

I chose a long, pale shaft of spiny orange, one I had shaped myself and knew to be as straight as my eye and hand could make it. Seeing it, I remembered the wild swan whose feathers had fletched it. How proud I had been of it! And how good it had tasted when Bold Berthold and I had roasted it over the fire that night!

The arrow was at the nock already, as if the string had gone looking for it.

Forget the people, forget the girl with the cat. Think only about the target.

They gasped, and I lowered my bow and took a good, deep breath. That flat-flying arrow could never reach so far. I shut my eyes, knowing that in a second or two I would have to smile and shrug, and get myself set for my next shot.

A faint noise, like the noise that a pebble might make if it were dropped into a tin cup, reached us from far away.

Chapter 52. To Pouk

“Missed!” somebody shouted.

“Hit!”

“Hit the center!”

That too was contradicted, and I opened my eyes.

Frowning, Beel had raised both hands for silence. “If Sir Able’s shot struck the iron boss of the target, his arrow will have rebounded, and there will be damage to the point. The iron may be scarred as well. Master Papounce? Will you investigate for us?”

Papounce was in the saddle already. At Beel’s nod he galloped away. Someone near me said, “If it hit the middle it would’ve bounced off and I’d have seen it.”

“The distance was only a hundred paces when my archers and I were shooting against each other,” Garvaon whispered. “His Lordship had it moved way back for you and me, but he wouldn’t hear of Papounce standing near it and signaling any more. Armor and a few steps away, and he’d have been safe enough.”

I did not think so, but I nodded out of politeness; I was watching Papounce, who had reined up at the target and dismounted, seemingly to look at its boss. While I watched him, he walked behind it, and seemed to look at the trunk of the tree from which the target hung. “Going to win that steel cap, Sir Able?” It was Crol, still carrying his trumpet.

I tried not to smile. “I doubt it. To tell the truth, I’ll be happy if I don’t disgrace myself.”

“The king had one like it made for King Gilling,” Crol explained. “Bigger than my washbasin. His Lordship liked it so much he had one made for himself.” Crol gestured toward the helmet on the pole. “That’s it up there. King Gilling’s is on one of the mules.”

“It will look good on you,” Garvaon told me, “but you’ll have to beat me first.”