The Born Queen - J. Gregory Keyes [49]
But after about a bell, things went quiet—all the birds, even the jays—and a shadow passed. Aspar looked up and caught a glimpse of something big.
“Sceat,” he said.
They crouched beneath huckleberry bushes and waited for it to return, but instead, after a moment, Aspar heard a shriek. Without a thought, he suddenly found himself running and wondering why.
“Aspar!” Leshya snapped, but he ignored her.
He bounded down a series of old terraces and broke into a clearing, and there was the thing, gleaming black and green, its wings folding down as its claws came to earth. But in that terrible moment, that was not what held his attention. It was Winna, coming shakily to her feet next to a fallen horse, her eyes wide, a knife in her outstretched hand.
She was in profile, and so he could see the round bulge of her belly.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
A CHALLENGE
THE HANSAN KNIGHT stepped nearer, and Neil tried to keep his hand off Battlehound’s hilt. A hush settled over the room, more profound by far than the earlier pause in the revelry that had greeted his lady.
“Sir Alareik,” Neil acknowledged. “We’ve met before, it’s true. I can’t recall any unfinished business between us.”
“Don’t you? The Moonfish Inn at the docks in Eslen?”
“I remember,” Neil said. “I was Sir Fail’s squire, and he sent me to ask you to dine with us. You refused.”
“You insulted me. Since you were a squire, honor forbade me taking the field against you. That is no longer the case.”
It didn’t stop you sending three of your squires to ambush me in the stables, Neil remembered, but he didn’t think it best to bring that up.
In fact, before he could reply at all, Aradal broke in.
“Sir Alareik, this man is a member of an embassy and therefore a guest of our king. You will treat him with all the respect that comes with that position. Whatever grievance you have with him can be settled later.”
“I’ll not attack him out of hand,” the Wishilm knight replied. “But there’s nothing in the old code that says he can’t agree to meet me with honor. There’s no law in the world that forces a man to hide behind skirts and pretty words rather than step out and take arms like a knight. Well, maybe in Crotheny that’s how they do things, but I’d rather think that even there knights are knights.”
A general mutter went up at that, and a few shouts of agreement. Neil sighed.
“Sir Neil,” Muriele whispered in Lierish.
“It’s too late,” he replied in the same tongue. “I can’t refuse this.”
“You certainly can,” she said. “Your injuries—”
“Don’t matter, Majesty. Don’t you see? It’s not the insult to me that’s the problem; it’s the insult to you and to Crotheny. If we’re weak here, we’ll be weak before Marcomir. There’s no helping it.”
“Nonsense. We just show we won’t be distracted from our purpose. You’re not that wise in politics yet, Sir Neil.”
“Maybe not, but I know men of war, Majesty. I know knights, and I know Hansans.”
“What’s your mother say there, sir knight?” Sir Alareik shouted to general laughter.
Muriele lifted a glare at the man. “You’ve no manners, sir,” she replied. “You’re no better than a beast. You’ve interrupted a perfectly fine evening in the most boorish manner possible.”
“I’ve approached your knight in an honorable way, Your Majesty,” he replied. “Which is more than I can say about how he dealt with my poor squires, whom he set upon from hiding. What sort of satisfaction can I have if I can’t fight him?”
To Neil, Muriele seemed to pause for an instant.
“Oh, you can fight him,” she replied. “I was only pleading with him to spare your life when the moment comes.”
The Wishilm knight’s brow arched in surprise, and then he smiled. But Neil saw something in the man’s eyes. It looked like worry.
He thought I would refuse, Neil realized. He doesn’t want to fight me.
“Shall we wait for the sun?” Neil asked. “Or would you rather have it now?”
“The morning is fine,” Alareik replied. “On the green. Mounted or not?”
“Your choice,” Neil replied. “I don’t care.”
Alareik stood there for a moment.
“Was there something else?” Muriele asked.
“No, Majesty,