Faint Heart, Foul Lady: A Novelette: & Bonus Story: Night Life Read online

  Faint Heart, Foul Lady:

  A Novelette

  & Bonus Story: Night Life

  by Nina Kiriki Hoffman

  Faint Heart, Foul Lady:

  A Novelette

  & Bonus Story: Night Life

  by Nina Kiriki Hoffman

  Kiriki Press, P.O. Box 10858, Eugene, Oregon 97440 U.S.A.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in whole or in part, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

  This is a work of fiction. The characters have been created for the sake of this story and are products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright 2000-2014 by Nina Kiriki Hoffman

  "Faint Heart, Foul Lady" first appeared in Knight Fantastic, edited by Martin H. Greenberg and John Helfers, DAW, April, 2002.

  "Night Life" first appeared in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, August, 2000.

  Cover illustration "Legend of a Knight (end panel of a cassone), Anonymous 1450-1474"

  Courtesy Rijksmuseum

  eBook Design, Kiriki Press

  This eBook edition was produced by Kiriki Press

  Originally Printed in the United States of America

  Table of Contents

  Copyright

  Table of Contents

  Beginning

  Bonus Story: Night Life

  About the Author

  Connect with the Author

  Other Nina Kiriki Hoffman Titles

  Faint Heart, Foul Lady

  Of a surety, I received my knighthood. After years of rigorous training as a squire, at Pentecost I had a ritual bath in rose water to cleanse me of sin. Then I was dressed in a white robe to signify the cleanness of the body, a scarlet cloak to remind me to always be ready to shed my blood in defense of the Church, my king, all women, and the poor and oppressed, brown stockings to remind me of the grave where I would ultimately lie so that I would always be prepared for death, and a white belt signifying chastity. I spent my vigil night in the church, praying to God to purify me of earthly desires and to make me a fine and upstanding knight.

  The next morning I heard mass. Afterward, I knelt before my king, who gave me a blow on the shoulder. “Arise, Sir Bran, Knight of the Realm,” he said. Then the king with his own hands took a sword from the altar and girded it around me, and two knights fixed golden spurs to my boots to remind me to swiftly follow God’s commandments as a pricked charger follows the commands of his knight. I arose in my third self since my birth, second since my baptism.

  In the first days of my knighthood, I clove to God and honor.

  But in the months that followed, with no war, no prospect of war, no one to fight save each other, we knights at court were at loose ends. We jousted and tourneyed for the amusement of the court and to demonstrate our prowess. We told stories and sang songs and dallied with the court ladies; we listened to minstrels and watched jongleurs practice their arts, and attended raconteurs who spoke of glorious adventures to be found just over the next hill. We lost our fire.

  I discovered my own sins and weaknesses, of which sloth played a part, but looming larger (though not as mortal) was cowardice.

  I did not begin a coward. I went to all my knightly studies with a good will and a clean heart. But somehow I could not get my limbs and my weapons to act in concert.

  I knew I lacked jousting skill before I was knighted, but thought application would overcome shame. No matter how much I practiced against the quintain, I did not improve. A wooden dummy could unseat me, and left me with bruises to the head and dignity. Even the meanest of the other knights could unhorse me.

  I became a laughingstock in the court. If not for some little skill at hand-to-hand combat and sword fighting, and enough skill with flute and fiddle to keep others entertained, I would have been wholly humiliated.

  My father was slain when I was a child, and he did not leave me much more than a competence, a too-large suit of chain mail, and his horse; I could not afford to tourney, for I risked losing all my possessions to whoever beat me, and everyone could. It was due only to my skill with dice that I managed to pay for stabling and training while I was a squire, and after my dubbing, I was enjoined by my king in the interests of honor against playing games of chance.

  Of my secret dream to be a bard, I never spoke. In the resting hours between arms practice, sleep, and meals, it was not thought unseemly for knights to take up the arts of music; one could pursue anything that would entertain the ladies, and so I learned from the castle bard some basic fiddle techniques and tunes, though I kept most of my practices secret.

  Alas, for a lad whose noble father was killed by a wicked knight and whose noble mother’s heart was full of vengeance, there was only one future; one must become a knight and avenge one’s father’s death. My mother told me that my father had been like me, gentle and not good at jousting. He was beloved of everyone, a raconteur around whom people gathered wherever he went. He could jest even the sourest knight out of ill humors, and his words lent brightness to many an ordinary day.

  Would that I had such skills; I was only a shadow of my father, save for my luck, which often ran strong, stronger than his, I hoped.

  Why did the Knight of the Pearl, a stranger to our court, arrive on a tourney day and insist that my father meet him in a joust? Why, after he had unhorsed my father, did the Knight leap to the ground and strike off my father’s head after my father had laughed and yielded to him? My mother said my father had no enemies but his creditors. Who was the Knight of the Pearl? No one recognized his devices, and he rode off directly following his base and cowardly act.

  My mother told me the story of my father's death many times as I grew up. She planted the goal of vengeance in my heart. I, in my clumsiness, planted my own fears almost as deep.

  No matter how many soothsayers I consulted, the fates always fell out the same way. Somewhere along my path, I would meet the man who had killed my father. I had the subsequent outcome told a dozen different ways, but that one point they all agreed on.

  Any road, I had to make shift to prove myself better than I knew I was, lest I be cast out of court by the king and sent to guard some fortress at the far end of the wind-whipped world, where perchance I might never see another human face.

  When I heard that Sir Wulfric, strong and brave and in all matters of arms and warfare knowledgeable, though known to be headstrong and fearless to the point of foolishness, was about to set off in search of adventure, I asked if I might accompany him. He granted me permission to join his quest, or to join mine with his. Sir Wulfric promised that if we heard rumors of the Knight of the Pearl we could pursue them.

  Before we left court, I talked to all the ladies, begging one of them to inspire in my heart the knightly virtues of prowess, loyalty, generosity, courtesy, and an open and honest noble bearing. Most of the ladies laughed, but one of the queen’s attendants, Amicia, kindly granted me permission to enshrine her in my heart, and gave me a red sleeve to bind around my sword arm to remind me of her regard.

  She was not the most lovely of those who waited on the queen, but her brown eyes were merry, her brown hair curled softly about her face, and her figure was plump and generous. Her lips were plump too, and red as berries; in all, a lady of whom one could dream fine dreams.

  It was o
nly later that night when I was having a farewell ale with the other knights that I learned Amicia was beloved of a number of us, mostly the lowest among us. The others’ favors were green, blue, white, and yellow; it warmed my heart that to me Amicia had given a red sleeve. Better an overgenerous love than none at all. I hid my favor and stayed out of the ensuing quarrels to see who ranked highest in her regard.

  The next morning Sir Wulfric and I set out. Sir Wulfric had a squire named Eudo, and I, impoverished, had none, nor was my gear in good shape, since I had to polish everything myself, and I was not handy with mending leather or reweaving chain. When I myself was a squire, my knight booted me for my shortcomings until I learned to pay one of the pages with my winnings at dice to do my work.

  My horse, however, was a good one, though elderly; he had been my father's destrier.

  Sir Wulfric’s squire Eudo was a kindly lad. He helped me with my armor after he had tended to his lord’s, and managed fire and food and pack animals and weapons for the three of us without complaint. In this wise I traveled in more comfort than that to which I had been accustomed.

  We had been three days on the road, beyond the edge of our best maps, and found ourselves in a deep, dark forest, with trees so dense they eclipsed the sky, when we met with our first adventure.

  Sir Wulfric had chosen the least-traveled path, for he feared that other knights who had gone ahead of us would dispose of any adventures on the well-trod ways. As a consequence, we often had to pick out traces of the path through the underbrush. We were searching through brush for our path that afternoon and did not notice we had arrived in a clearing until we heard the noise.

  A sliding, slithery, scales-scraping-on-rock sound it was, and then the moaning of a maiden. We looked up and beheld a horrid sight: a giant silver-green serpent as thick through as a man’s chest had wrapped its noxious coils around a golden-haired damsel, encircling her in its cold embrace so completely that only her head could be seen. She appeared a high-born damsel, her skin pale as lilies, her forehead broad and high, her eyes a fine gray.

  The serpent’s hideous long-nosed head, which bore a red fanned frill and waving whiskers, lifted high above its prey. Golden eyes with narrow pupils regarded us.

  The creature hissed. Flame shot from its mouth. The scent of scorched grasses surrounded us.

  My heart quailed. I had never seen such a monster. Fear urged me to turn and ride back into the forest any which way, so long as it was away.

  “Eudo! My lance!” cried Sir Wulfric. His squire handed him his lance, and Sir Wulfric charged the creature.

  Eudo glanced enquiringly at me. He had all our extra arms on his pack mules.

  “Let us see how Sir Wulfric fares,” I muttered. Perhaps this caution could pass for wisdom rather than cowardice.

  The worm’s head lifted higher, then shot forth as Wulfric approached, and knocked him out of the saddle. His lance fell to the ground.

  Sir Wulfric struggled to his feet and drew his sword. The serpent’s head was so high Wulfric would never lay a blade on it. He should attack the body, I thought, but he waved his blade at the head.

  Meanwhile, the serpent watched me, ignoring the threat closer to it.

  “Now, sir?” Eudo asked me. The trapped damsel treated us to a wide array of screams.

  I marshaled my fears and nodded. I had made myself a vow ere I started this journey that I would no longer run from danger; henceforth I would be foolhardy and hope that somehow I could win regard, if not from my peers, at least from God, who saw into all hearts. If the dragon ate me, still the court would respect me more than they did at present. “The light lance.” I had no finesse with the heavy lance.

  Eudo frowned. He was not allowed to question my choices, but I could nearly hear his thoughts. The light lance, not tipped with iron like the heavy lance, would not even pierce the monster’s hide, should I be lucky enough to land a blow.

  I held out my hand, and he put the light lance into it.

  I thought fondly of my lady Amicia, in whose honor I had vowed to fight. I couched the lance and charged, my heart pounding faster than my horse’s hooves. I pointed the tip of my lance at the damsel’s head.

  “What ails you? Are you a lunatic?” she screamed.

  Sir Wulfric cried, “Thou hideous, stinking worm!” and thrust upward with his sword through the air, a blow so strong it nearly overturned him. “Engage!”

  Nearer and nearer the serpent’s coils I drew, my lance point unwaveringly aimed at the damsel. Truth to tell, I had no finesse with the light lance either, and I never hit what I aimed at, so I conjectured that if I aimed at the one thing I wanted not to hit, I would hit something else; if the fates smiled, something vital belonging to the serpent.

  At the last moment, while the damsel screamed and Sir Wulfric raged (he had never even turned to see what she was crying about), the monster shifted and I charged past without striking anything.

  A familiar feeling of futility washed through me, seasoned with a hearty dash of terror.

  “Curse you for a black-hearted knave!” the damsel cried. “May you never love until you love the one who overmasters you, and may you suffer from that love as long as you live!”

  Her words did not inspire me with courage and the will to save her, but nevertheless, I managed to wheel my destrier and gallop back in the general direction of the serpent.

  Then a startling apparition charged from the forest, a besmirched boy on a shaggy pony, yelling and brandishing a short sword. The beardless youth wore a soup pot on his head with the handle to the back, and a ragged dun surcoat under armor pieced together from mats of woven straw, the sort of figure of a knight one saw in comic plays.

  He charged straight at the serpent and jabbed its hide. To my astonishment, he opened a wide slash in the serpent’s outermost coil. Green ichor boiled forth, and the monster poured out an ear-splitting cry of rage and pain. The lad sliced it again with the short sword. His blade gleamed with green fire. Again he opened a wound in the serpent’s side.

  Wailing and spitting flames, the worm relaxed its hold on the damsel and fled into the forest.

  “My savior!” the damsel cried to the lad.

  The boy slid off his pony’s back and wiped his blade on the grass, then took out a rag and cleaned the blade and sheathed it. His face suffused with crimson at the damsel’s words, and he ducked his head.

  I pulled up beside him just as Sir Wulfric, apoplectic with rage, charged forward, sword extended. Whether he intended to spit the boy I did not wait to determine. I grasped the boy by the scruff of the neck and dragged him onto my horse. My muscles, hampered by chain mail, protested such a maneuver. Fortunately the boy was agile and scrambled to safety behind me. My good horse bore us both a little ways off. “Well done, lad,” I said.

  Sir Wulfric ran after us until the weight of his mail and shield and sword slowed and stopped him. When at last he halted, puffing and huffing, I pulled my horse up.

  “Sir,” said the boy behind me, “thank you, sir. May I be your squire?”

  “Are you of noble birth?”

  His arms, which he had closed about my waist in our flight from the foot charge of Sir Wulfric, loosened their hold. “No,” he murmured.

  “One must have noble blood to be a squire,” I said. “Only the king can else appoint a candidate to knighthood. It is not in my power.”

  “I humbly beseech you,” he said.

  “Listen, lad. I would love to have you as my squire, you and your sword and your skill and luck, but there are rules. I can take you as my servant, but I cannot elevate you to squire. I am sorry.”

  For a moment we sat. I watched the berserker rage drain from Sir Wulfric’s face. He lowered his sword and reached under his helmet to scratch his head. “What happened?” he asked.

  The damsel, behind us a ways and beyond sight, cried, “Where are you, sirs? Where are my protectors? The beast might return at any moment!”

  “You drove off the serpent,”
I told Sir Wulfric. The boy’s arms tightened around me again, perhaps in protest. “You were magnificent. I shall sing your praises: Sir Wulfric, mighty in battle.”

  Sir Wulfric chewed his ginger mustache. “There was a boy,” he said. “I am certain there was a boy.”

  “Yes. He’s up behind me.”

  Sir Wulfric toddled closer and peered up at the boy. “Had a notion he interfered with my fight.”

  “You saved us all,” I said.

  Sir Wulfric smiled.

  “Help? Help? Help!” cried the damsel.

  Sir Wulfric shook his head, then trotted off toward the clearing.

  The boy poked me in the back. “Why did you tell such great lies?”

  “Didn’t you see he was ready to slice you lengthwise and spill your guts over the ground? He doesn’t remember what happened. What use have you for glory? You’ll never be a knight. This way praise will be heaped on Sir Wulfric, and he will be happy. Unless,” I muttered, sotto voce, “Eudo tells him a different story. We’d best go back so I can warn him.” I wheeled my horse and we cantered back to the clearing.

  We arrived a little in advance of Sir Wulfric. “Help!” cried the damsel. I glanced toward her, and saw that though her garments were somewhat crushed she seemed otherwise in good spirits. The monster was nowhere in evidence.

  I rode directly to Eudo. “I’ve told Sir Wulfric he routed the beast,” I murmured to him.

  “He believed you?”

  “The madness of battle overcame him. He remembers nothing.”

  “Does that stripling on the back of your horse have aught to say about this?”

  “Yes. He complains about my choice in tales. Convince him I am correct.”

  The lad’s arms loosed from about me, and he slid the ground. “Never mind who tells what tales. I’ll get myself gone from here now.”

  “Wait.” For some reason I didn’t want the boy to leave us, and it wasn’t just a matter of treasuring his skill with the sword. There was something about him I liked.