Chapter Twelve The Finest Knave in All of Traum
CHAPTER TWELVE
THE FINEST KNAVE IN ALL OF TRAUM
When my chamber door opened I was lying precisely where I’d been when it closed. “Pith, Diviner.” Chainmail spilled onto the floor and armor dropped. “What’s wrong with you?”
Tory caught my arm. It was a labor, getting me to my feet. She called for Samuel.
“Help…” I said to them, my voice like paper tearing. “With my armor.”
Samuel was blinking down at the bloody spit on the floor. “A terrible portent. You can’t compete like this, Diviner. You don’t have the strength.”
I put a hand on his shoulder and shoved him to his knees that he might feel just how much strength I had yet. “Yes, I can.”
Slowly, Tory retrieved the chainmail. She lifted the hauberk and I lifted my arms, the mail shirt slipping over my shift.
I gasped. Then Tory fastened the coif. Next was the breastplate, which Samuel fastened.
When his hands fell away and I felt the full weight of the cuirass, I hunched over, hissing between my teeth, eyes screwed shut.
Tory shook her head. “Samuel’s right. You’re not strong enough to wear it.”
My voice ripped out of me. “If I can bear everything else, I—can—bear—this—”
But I couldn’t. The armor and chainmail pressed against my abdomen, and it hurt so completely that I lost my footing. I fell to my knees. Slapped the floor and screamed.
“You’ll only injure yourself further if you compete,” Samuel said.
I stayed on my knees, unmoving but for the hot, loathsome tears that fell from my cheeks.
Samuel took the breastplate off, and Tory removed the hauberk.
When she reached for the coif around my neck, I let out an ugly noise of reproach, staring at my boneless armor on the floor.
Rory had measured me for it. Maude had commissioned it.
Bartholomew had put it on my back. It had been made for my body and would not exist had they three not looked upon me and known me.
When Tory reached for my coif, I tangled my fingers in the chains and held it against my throat. “Leave it.” Leave me one thing that I might remember, once, I did something in the Stonewater Kingdom besides drown.
Samuel turned his back, and Tory helped me into new clothes. A long white dress and my Divining robe, then the coif above it. Next came my veil, and last my crown. Then Samuel took my left arm, and Tory my right, and we left the chamber.
It was only when we were on the stairs on our way to the arena that I realized they hadn’t bothered to bring me a hammer.
We were joined by ten guards of the Seacht. I heard the arena before I saw it. Felt, in my body, the energy, rising. The roaring sound of applause.
The drums began to beat.
Benji waited in the king’s box, feet propped on the wooden banister, chest out. Hamelin and Otto Lange were there as well, along with a handful of other noble scribes. Behind them, as always, were a dozen knights, hands on their swords.
Just like in Coulson Faire, the king held a giant bowl with hundreds, maybe thousands, of gold coins.
The stands were a storm. There were hundreds of scribes, all of them in their gray robes. Then, like flashes of lightning, the gray was punctuated by colors, spectators from Coulson Faire and other hamlets crowding in, every seat filled. Two dozen Seacht guards waited in the lists—
And then, there were the participants. At least forty of them—men and women at arms, gathered in the arena.
Just like at the joust, some wore full suits of armor while others had but leathers on.
They were sorted into two teams and painted as such—a streak of blue paint over the chests of one half, a black streak painted on the other.
Hands on my abdomen, brow slick with sweat, I couldn’t climb the stairs without Samuel’s or Tory’s stanchioning hands. “Oh dear,” Benji said when they handed me into the chair next to him. I could smell the wine on his breath. “Seems you won’t be taking up the mantle today, Six.”
The drums grew louder, the buzz of the crowd like a swarm of locusts. The blue team moved to the west side of the arena, then the black to the east. Helmets were donned—weapons grasped.
“As you know, sire,” Otto Lange said, leaning forward in his seat to address Benji, “even common folk were allowed to join, so long as they had ten gold coins.” He nodded at the two teams—blue and black. “Happily I was able to weed out the truly ignoble with certain qualifications.”
“And all of them moot with your nephew guaranteed to win and return your investment, plus a great deal of interest.” Benji patted the bowl of coins. “But please, regale me with your standards, Lange.”
“They had to provide their own weapon. Maces, flails, clubs, or any stave variation will do.”
“Hammers,” I murmured, my gaze blurry. “Some have hammers.”
“Three hand-to-hand rounds were conducted. Participants unable to follow instructions or those who didn’t know tip from hilt were immediately disqualified.” Otto stuck up his chin. “Nothing less than proficiency.”
Hamelin nodded down at the lists. “There are a few favorites. Dedrick, obviously, for the blue team.”
Benji nodded to himself and belched. “And for the black?”
The drums beat harder, thump, thump—then went startlingly quiet.
A hush fell over the crowd, and the king stood from his chair.
“It’s time, Lange.” He turned to Otto. Waited as, slowly, the scribe got to his knees.
“Thank you for your continued loyalty. Your guiding hand over the Seacht. But never forget, it is not you who brings greatness to the hamlets, but me, my Diviner, and my stone objects.”
Then Benji reached into his pocket and drew the Artful Brigand’s coin. Just like he had at Coulson Faire, Benji threw the coin, vanished, then reappeared in the arena, opening his arms to thunderous applause. “Noble families,” he called. “Knights. Folk of the Seacht—welcome to the melee.”
Otto struggled to get off his knees, stumbling and wincing.
In the arena, Benji was still speaking to the crowd.
“It heartens me,” he called, “that so many of you should come today in support of me and my Diviner after the tragedy of Aisling Cathedral’s destruction.
Indeed, the Harried Scribe himself would be gladdened to see you here today. And speaking of that beloved Omen—”
On cue, Dedrick Lange appeared on a tide of ink, flying from the lists into the heart of the arena. The blue team rallied around him, patting his armor and fawning over his inkwell. In the stands, scribes rose to their feet, gasps and cheers and echoes of wonderment abounding.
Dedrick turned in a full circle, presenting his inkwell like it was the key to the kingdom, then tucking it back into its pouch on his belt.
He withdrew his mace and nodded at the blue team, who cheered him anew, like it was some magnanimous deed that he should be using such a mortal weapon in lieu of the magical one on his belt.
Behind me, Otto Lange and his fellow scribes tutted contentedly.
Benji’s hair gleamed in the sunlight. “The rules of the melee are simple,” he called to both teams. “Blue team against black. Should your weapon be knocked from your hand, you are to leave the arena. The last team standing wins. Let the melee b—”
A commotion began in the stands. A word said over and over. I couldn’t it make out, only the gusto by which it grew. There was a stirring in the lists. The crowd parted, a single combatant entering the arena, wearing russeted armor so dark no one had bothered to paint it black.
In his hand was a stonemason’s hammer.
I heard it then. The word buzzing through the arena.
Knave.
“There he is,” Tory said. “Their favorite.”
“Late,” Samuel muttered. “A terrible portent.”
“Stuff it.” Hamelin leaned over the railing of the king’s box, squinting.
Benji, who seemed caught between intrigue and affront, nodded at Dedrick, who nodded back. The light flickered, and the king disappeared and reappeared again, catching the Artful Brigand’s coin right in front of me, then settling into his seat.
Hands on my stomach, I leaned forward, watching the man, the knave, settle among the black team, who swelled around him, smiling and thumping his armor. Finally, he turned, facing the king’s box with the rest of his combatants. He tilted his head upward and kept his visor low.
Slowly, he reached to his gorget. Pulled out a piece of fabric. Dragged it over the place on his helmet where his mouth ought to be, then held it up like a token. It caught the light and fluttered, as small and delicate as a pallid white moth.
The hem of my Divining robe, the number VI embroidered in the silk.
All eyes in the king’s box turned to me. “You know him?” Benji asked.
I was barely breathing. The invisible hand that had pressed against my chest on the tor was now hitting me, stirring something deep within. It wasn’t hope—I’d lost that weeks ago. But it felt a lot like it. “No.” My hands knotted. “He was a guard at Castle Luricht. I called him a knave.”
Hamelin’s lips thinned. “Clearly it stuck.”
“An interesting portent,” Samuel added.
“Knave.” Benji reached for his wine. “I like that. A villain for Dedrick to put down.” He waved at the men down in the lists, purple flags waving all around him. “Let the melee begin!”
The banner between the blue and black teams lifted, the two parts of the yard becoming one. There was a brief pause, the drums beginning again, softer, then louder, bang, bang, bang—
And all hell broke loose.
The teams collided and I lost sight of the knave, the arena now a mottled bruise of black and blue. Armor banged, shouts echoed, and the drums went on.
“A melee is a game of might, but also of cunning,” Benji said in my ear. “If one team is to prevail over the other, they must execute discernment. It’s an art, really; stratagem at the end of a mace—”
A member of the black team swung his flail, its iron ball crashing into his opponent’s head, blood and brain matter exploding onto the arena floor.
“You were saying?” I muttered.