Pawn in Frankincense - Dorothy Dunnett [119]
With the rest of it lying coiled on the grass, it was now useless. He was beginning to unwind it when it tightened. ‘Well done, Brother Blyth,’ said Lymond’s voice, clear and carefree as he had heard it so many times, in action, at home with his company. ‘First round to God and St Andrew. May I play?’
Bare-headed and coatless, he stood on the sand, laughing at Jerott. Then, the other end of the muslin wound round his wrist, he turned and, running hard, laid his hand on a loose horse and vaulted into the saddle. With the reins in his hand: ‘All right,’ said Lymond. ‘Let’s go.’
‘He’s drunk. He’ll kill himself,’ said the Aga Morat, grumbling.
‘Let him go,’ said Kiaya Khátún, for the second time. ‘Horsemanship to these men is second nature. They will provide a spectacle and no doubt will receive a suitable drubbing. Humility is a virtue Scotsmen require to be taught.’
Jerott, well fed, well rested, fully recovered from his fever, was a natural horseman, with the horseman’s broad shoulders and strong, capable hands. The beautiful little Arabian mare between his knees answered him like a polo pony: horse and man might have been one as, his eyes on Lymond, he swerved and galloped as he sensed Lymond intended. They used the twisted turban between them as a trip-rope until it parted, slashed by a scimitar. Jerott, escaping from that, was knocked flying by a usurping body landing on the rump of his horse: twisting, he landed hard on the ground on his shoulder and, rolling over, staggered unhurt to his feet. In the middle of the next course a performer, standing elegantly on his head, saw Jerott racing towards him and tried, too late, to recover. As Jerott’s hard body hit him he heeled over with grace into the mark, and Jerott settled, happily, into his place.
That horse had a bow at the pommel. ‘An advance, my boy,’ said Jerott. ‘Now for some arrows.’
It was Lymond, with six men on his tail, who leaned down from his stirrups like an acrobat and scooped two from the piled heap of quivers. He threw one to Jerott, nocked, and raced belly to ground for the mark, sending a stream of arrows into the target: as he reached it a man with a staff rode straight at him, and struck. Before he got there, Lymond was out of the saddle. The pole struck empty air, pulling its owner out of the stirrups, and Lymond, dropped under the girth like a spider, swung himself in the same movement into the saddle again, laughing, his hair tangled and soaking with exertion.
It had been a boy’s trick, Jerott remembered. Standing bareback on your father’s horses; somersaulting, chariot-riding. Francis, buried in books, had never publicly attempted it. What private practice, Jerott wondered fleetingly, had gone into that? Then he was under attack himself, a racing horse on either side, and a hand grasping his reins.
Kicking his stirrups free, cautiously, Jerott got to his feet. A hand flashed to his ankles. In the same second, jumping sideways, he landed first on the back of the third horse, and then, neatly, on the back of its rider. He dug his hands and feet in.
It is remarkably difficult to dislodge a man sitting astride your shoulders when riding full out. Provided he clings, if he falls he cannot fail to fall with you too. Faced with that dilemma, the horseman between Jerott’s legs gritted his teeth and tried to feel for his scimitar. Jerott kicked it out of his reach and, closing his hands, gave him a friendly squeeze in the windpipe. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Lymond’s horse, too, was racing up.
In a moment’s dazzling revelation he saw, as well, what he intended to do. ‘You bloody fool!’ shrieked Jerott, and then hung on for grim death as Lymond, galloping neck and neck, loosed his reins, calculated and, standing, jumped first on to