The Squire, His Knight, and His Lady Read online

  "Yes, but I declined it."

  "Then I call you a coward."

  "All right. Have you heard of this knight or his chapel?"

  "Why should I tell a coward anything?"

  "Pity?" Gawain suggested innocently.

  "Cowards are fit only to be thrashed!" the knight declared, booting his horse to a gallop. "Prepare to battle!"

  "I don't have a lance," Gawain said calmly.

  The knight checked abruptly, almost falling from his saddle. When he had gotten his horse under control again, he said, "I crave your pardon, sir knight. I was almost guilty of a grave discourtesy. I shall use my sword." He dropped his lance, drew his sword, and charged again. Gawain looked away.

  "Milord," Terence said, "he's going to—" Gawain still made no move. Terence spurred his horse forward into the knight's path. The knight's horse, already skittish, reared, and the knight grabbed frantically at his saddle with his left hand, dropping his reins. With his cudgel, Terence landed a numbing blow on the fingers of the knight's right hand. The knight yelped and dropped his sword. Then Terence thumped the knight solidly on the side of the helm. The blow was hard enough to dent the iron, and with a groan the knight dropped his sword and fell slowly backwards from his saddle.

  "Terence, you idiot!" Gawain shouted, galloping up. "What are you doing?"

  Terence looked at the fallen knight and said meekly, "I thought you were just going to let him hit you."

  "Well, I wasn't! You ought to be confined, rushing an armed man like that without any armor!"

  "What were you going to do then?" Terence demanded.

  Gawain looked at the knight, who was starting to stir weakly. "About what you did," Gawain said with a slow grin. "Well done, lad." Terence blushed, and the knight groaned. "Here, you ride over there a bit, and I'll see if I can't patch things up."

  Gawain dismounted and knelt over the knight, saying, "Oh dear, I was afraid he would do something like that. Sir knight? Can you hear me?" The knight mumbled something that Terence couldn't hear, and Gawain said, "Oh good. The last knight he smote couldn't speak for weeks. Tell me, sir knight, how are you called?"

  "I am Sir Oneas of Mercia, called the Knight of the Crossroads," the knight said. Gawain unlaced Sir Oneas's helm and pulled it off. Terence sneaked a quick glance, and saw that Sir Oneas was little more than a youth, probably a year or two younger than he was himself.

  "Well, Sir Oneas, you are very fortunate that Sir Gawain chose not to kill you." Terence blinked but kept his face impassive.

  "Sir ... Sir Gawain? Of Arthur's court?" Sir Oneas asked dazedly. "You mean that's the great Sir Gawain?"

  "Himself," Gawain said, with reverence. "Few are the knights who can challenge that great warrior." Terence coughed modestly.

  "Sir Gawain! But ... he looks so young! And why does he wear no armor?"

  "Ssh! He does not choose to talk about it, but it's to fulfill a vow."

  "I see," said Sir Oneas, who clearly did not.

  "We had best leave you now," Gawain said. "But before we leave, perhaps you should tell Sir Gawain if you've heard of this Green Knight he seeks."

  "I ... no, not exactly. Unless he means the Huntsman of Anglesey."

  "The Huntsman of Anglesey?"

  "Due north, on the island of Anglesey. It is a fearsome adventure by all accounts." There was a pause, then Sir Oneas added, "Sir? If you think it would be all right, would you tell Sir Gawain that it was an honor to cross swords with him?"

  "I shall tell him, Sir Oneas," Gawain said as he mounted. He trotted to where Terence waited, and they rode away. Gawain chuckled. '"Cross swords' indeed. By the time he's finished with that story, I'll bet he will have fought the noble Sir Gawain for hours before he was narrowly defeated."

  "Unless he says he defeated Sir Gawain," Terence said wryly. "One lie is as believable as another."

  "So it is," Gawain said with a broad grin.

  Gawain had kept Sir Oneas's lance, and as they rode north he began to instruct Terence in the art of jousting. First they adjusted Gawain's armor to fit Terence's much slimmer build. Then Terence had to learn how to ride while wearing armor and carrying a heavy lance. He much preferred swordplay to jousting, but he stuck to it for Gawain's sake, and after a few days was at least able to stay in the saddle and hold the lance straight.

  They stopped for a time at a broad meadow so that Terence could practice tilting. On the third day, Terence was practicing alone while Gawain hunted in the forest for an ash tree with which they could make another lance when a knight appeared at the edge of the woods. The stranger was dressed all in black armor, with his visor down, and he held a long lance.

  "Good day, Sir Knight," Terence said, wishing Gawain were near.

  "Good day," the stranger replied in a husky voice. "I see you practicing. Would you care to try a pass with me?"

  It was what Terence had feared, but the knight's tone was pleasant, and Terence grinned suddenly. "Why not?" he said and took his position across the meadow.

  It was over suddenly and ignominiously for Terence. He aimed his lance straight for the stranger knight's breastplate, but the knight seemed to catch Terence's lance with his own and to push the point forcefully down toward the ground. Terence was dimly aware that he had just witnessed a superlative bit of jousting, and then his lance hit the ground, and he was jolted back out of his horse's saddle. "Let go of the lance, boy," the knight shouted, but it was too late. Terence's lance shattered under his weight, and Terence landed on his face.

  He rolled over and sat up amid the splinters of his lance as the stranger rode up beside him. Terence began to laugh. "I've never seen anything like it!" Terence declared, removing Gawain's helmet.

  The stranger chuckled. "That's why it worked. The best fighter is not the one who does the expected most skillfully. The best fighter is the one who takes the rest by surprise. In a joust, no one expects to have his lance knocked away. It might even surprise your master, Terence."

  Terence blinked. "You know us, sir?" The knight raised his visor. It was King Arthur himself. "My liege!"

  "Don't give me away, will you?" Arthur said, smiling guiltily. "The court thinks I'm having one of my retreats at that monastery. The abbot there is a friend of mine and he lets me slip out incognito."

  "Is this what you always do during those weeks?"

  Arthur nodded. "As king, I cannot take part in tournaments. So I stage my own, anonymously. Perhaps it's childish, but I feel better after I've bashed a few knights off their horses."

  "Happy to be of service," Terence muttered. "But what if you were bashed off a horse yourself?"

  Arthur shook his head. "I've never seen a knight who could," he said simply. "But enough of me. How is your search coming?"

  "We've found no one who knows the Green Chapel. Right now we're off to Anglesey, where there's supposed to be some sort of supernatural huntsman."

  The king lowered his visor and said, "Go with God, then. And Terence? No one else knows where I am."

  "I won't tell," Terence assured him, and Arthur rode away.

  A few minutes later Gawain appeared. "I can't find a tree for another lance," he announced.

  "Pity," Terence said, standing amid the splinters. "I think this one's used up."

  At the fishing village of Caernarvon, built on the site of an old fortress, they found a squat, vile-smelling fisherman who was willing to ferry them and their horses across to the island of Anglesey. On the way, Gawain talked to the fisherman, and when they arrived, Gawain told Terence, "If half the stories about this Huntsman of Anglesey are true, then he's a terror all right. Maybe we've found him."

  "Wonderful," Terence said dully.

  "Anyway," Gawain continued, "the fisherman said that we should see the Earl of Anglesey, whose castle should be just over that rise."

  The Earl of Anglesey was just as squat and almost as vile-smelling as the fisherman, and his castle reeked of fish. As soon as he heard who his visitor was and that Gawain was l
ooking for the Huntsman of Anglesey, he welcomed them with open arms and ushered them into a long hall with several ragged chairs and a roaring fire. "Oy, a bane to all decent men and women in the land, this Huntsman is," he said. "He's a terrible fierce fighter and a very demon at archery."

  "Archery?" Gawain asked.

  The earl nodded expressively. "That's the worst of him. That's how he's killed the most of his victims. My own youngest son died by the Huntsman's bow, just over a year ago."

  "I'm sorry to hear it," Gawain said.

  The earl shrugged. "He was a wastrel, but there it is. That was what started it all. The fellow's been ravaging the countryside ever since."

  "If it's not too painful, could you tell me how it happened?" Gawain asked.

  "Nay, not so painful. I've got four other sons. Of course they're all wastrels, too, but there it is. Let me get you a tot of something to warm you, and I'll tell you how it was." He poured out a cup of some black liquid that Gawain sipped gingerly. "Now, where shall I begin? My son, Erkin, and his brother was out in the forests about a year ago when they come on a deer trail. Naturally they begin chasing it down, even though they doesn't even have a good deer hound along. Hunting boar, you see."

  "So they didn't even have longbows with them?" Gawain asked with surprise.

  "Nay, just boar spears." The earl chuckled. "I see what you're thinking. You're thinking they was all about in their heads if they thought they would bag them a deer with boar spears. Well, you're right. Proper sapskulls they are, all my sons. Blamed if I understand it. Anyway, they finally catch sight of the deer and go chasing it through the woods on their horses. So," the earl continued, "there they was, carousing through the woods after this buck when of a sudden Erkin flips right off his horse. Barzil, my other son, stops right there, thinking Erkin has run into a branch or something, which it's a wonder they hadn't, but when he looks closer he sees an arrow right through Erkin's heart. Then he hears this ferocious voice shout, 'Got you, lad! You'll make a month of dinners for me!' Well, Barzil got no more brains than a hedgehog, but he knows what's due his brother, so he remembers to pack Erkin on the back of his horse before he takes himself off."

  "You say that the voice said your son would make a month of dinners?"

  "Oy, that's what he said. Of course the story gets around, like they do, and people starts taking care they doesn't go too far into the deepest forest, but things still happens. A man from the east shore disappears and only his hands and feet is found, right in the middle of the forest. People sees the Huntsman himself stalking at night, and some says they've seen him, a-riding a stag the size of a horse, with antlers that reach to the sky."

  Gawain nodded encouragingly. When the earl seemed to have finished, he said, "I thank you. If you'll point my way to the deepest forest, I'll see how this Huntsman likes being hunted."

  In less than an hour they were in a forest so thick that only the occasional shaft of sunlight challenged the darkness. Terence had never been in a forest like it. He was not at all pleased with the prospect of sharing that darkness with a man-eating archer either, and he said so to Gawain.

  "I wouldn't worry about it," Gawain said. "I've heard tales of man-eaters before, but I never found one that was true. It's the kind of story that people tell. There are monsters in this world, to be sure, but there are a sight more storytellers. Besides, you're the best archer I've ever seen. I'm depending on you to protect me."

  "And who's going to protect me, then?" Terence muttered.

  They made camp in a tiny clearing surrounded by huge trees hung all over with vines. Terence made a small fire, and they stretched out in the shallow pool of light and warmth near it and went to sleep. Only a few hours later, a slight stirring from the brush woke him. His eyes flew open, and he looked at Gawain over the still glowing coals. Gawain too was awake. He nodded, and Terence slipped out of his blankets and into the thickest part of the undergrowth.

  Soon Terence heard the rustling again, and he crept closer. As his eyes grew accustomed to the darkness, he made out a patch of deeper darkness, roughly the size and shape of a small man. Terence breathed more easily; the Huntsman was supposed to be huge. The shape moved toward their camp, and Terence followed silently. When the shape reached the edge of the brush, it reached behind him in a move that Terence recognized at once as reaching for arrows. Terence's heart leaped, and he threw himself into the shape's back, just as the shape grunted and doubled over. Gawain stood up from his blankets, brandishing his cudgel.

  "Don't move if you want your skull in one piece," Gawain said. The figure gasped and tried vainly to speak. Gawain must have hit him in the stomach.

  "Are you the Huntsman of Anglesey?" Gawain asked him. The figure croaked again, something that sounded like, "Nose a king. Nose a parson." Whatever it was, it did not sound very complimentary, and Terence picked his own cudgel out of his gear. Gawain waited a second, then asked again, "Are you the one called the Huntsman of Anglesey?"

  The gasping figure took several shallow breaths, then said, "An't you a bit old to be believin' sich rot? Boggart tales for the kiddies!"

  Gawain grinned. "Are they? I heard these tales first from a knight, then from a fisherman, then from an earl. They didn't think they were telling ghost stories."

  "Passel of fools. There's nown who hunts these woods but I meself, an honest woodsman."

  Gawain nodded and said, "And what might you be called, honest woodsman?"

  "I'm Dirk. I live at the edge of the woods hard by Holyhead."

  "And you hunt these woods, Dirk? For your food?"

  "Oy, and fish, too, in the summer. I've a boat."

  "I take it, then, that you've never seen a huge black Huntsman who rides a stag with antlers that reach to the heavens?" Gawain asked solemnly.

  Dirk looked exasperated. "Didn't I say there was no sich thing and no sich person? It's a tale the villagers tell to keep the kiddies out of the woods."

  "Then why did you sneak up on our camp with an arrow notched?" Terence demanded.

  "I'll tell you why, lad. Because ever since the earl's started telling his boggart tales, there's been no end of idiot knights—boys, most of 'em—traipsing in here frightening away the game. Last time one of 'em saw me he tried to take my head off with his sword. It an't safe for an honest man to hunt, it an't."

  "How did you escape?" Gawain asked, interested.

  "Stupid boy missed me and stuck his sword in a tree. Last time I passed, it was still there."

  Gawain chuckled but said, "Why do you think the earl has started telling these tales, then?"

  Dirk looked at his feet and said, "How'm I supposed to know what goes on in an earl's head? They be smarter than us poor folks."

  "It won't go, Dirk. I've been with you only two minutes, and I already know that you're smarter than that earl. Remember, you called him a fool yourself earlier."

  Dirk grinned slightly for a second, then looked away again. "I still don't know," he said.

  "I think you do," Gawain said. Dirk looked at him sharply, and Gawain said, "Oh, don't worry. If it's as I think it is, I won't say anything to the earl." They were silent for a second, then Gawain said, "You killed his son, didn't you?" Dirk was glumly silent. "By mistake. You thought you had a deer, food for a good month. Then you saw what you had done, and you hid and waited until the earl's other son piled the body on his horse. Then you went home. Is that right?" Dirk looked searchingly into Gawain's eyes, then nodded.

  "So there is no Huntsman of Anglesey?" Terence asked.

  "Sure there is, Terence—just not the sort you were expecting. He's just a woodsman, like you."

  "So we've been wasting our time," Terence said, disgusted.

  "Maybe not," Gawain said. He turned back to Dirk and said, "So your life has been miserable ever since this Huntsman story got about?" Dirk nodded. "Maybe we can help."

  "How's that?"

  "What do you think would do to stop the story?"

  Dirk snorted. "Maybe if you
killed every man, woman, and child on the island, you could stop it, but I misdoubt it."

  "Nay, that would only make it worse. I've a better plan than that. I'll kill the Huntsman."

  Dirk stiffened and said, "Thank 'ee kindly, your worship, but I'd rather live with the story."

  Gawain ignored him and turned to Terence, "Now what do you think it would take to kill the dreadful Huntsman of Anglesey?"

  Terence caught on. "How about a charmed arrow, milord?"

  "That's good. How was it charmed? Should this be a religious arrow?"

  "Why not?" Terence said.

  "Why not indeed? Then let us say that it was charmed by the blood of St. Sebastian. Yes, that'll do. Probably the only thing in the world that would kill this ferocious beast."

  "And we carried it in a silken wrap," Terence contributed.

  "Good," Gawain said. He turned to Dirk. "Now, what did the Huntsman look like? You're the only witness, so it had best be your own description."

  "I'm the only witness?" Dirk began, brows knit.

  "That's right. You were hunting at the edge of the forest when you heard the sound of the battle and you saw me fighting the Huntsman. What did he look like?"

  "Oy, he was awful big," Dirk said, eyes wide. "An' he had hair all over his legs—I'm not so sure that he didn't have the legs of a goat, now I think on it—an' horns that looked sharp as a knife. Fearsome."

  Gawain laughed with delight and said, "You're right! I remember it clearly! The legs of a goat!"

  "And horns," Terence reminded him. "Sharp horns."

  "An' beside him was a stag, bigger than any horse, an' it had long an' twisty prongs—snakes! It had snakes growing out of its head!"

  "Don't you think it was breathing fire, too?" Gawain hinted.

  "Now I think on it, it was. An' smokin' from the ears."

  "Fearsome," Terence murmured.

  "And what happened after I shot it with the charmed arrow?" Gawain asked.

  Dirk look puzzled. "It fell down dead, of course."

  "Where's its body, then?"