“Roel, someday, you will have to tell me of this war.”
“Ah, me, cherie, I do not like to think about it, for many good men died. . on both sides, I am certain.”
“When you are ready, my love.”
They rode without speaking for a while, and then Roel said, “It’s not like single combat, where two knights agree upon the rules ere the fighting begins. Instead it is a charge of steeds and knights and footmen and a horrendous collision of armies crashing against one another, and confusion and chaos and a wild uproar filled with the clangor of weapons and belling of steeds and shouts of rage and cries of fear and the screams of the dying. All one can do is lay about and lay about and lay about, with hammers smashing and swords riving and spears stabbing and arrows piercing, with severed heads flying and entrails spilling forth like hideous blossoms blooming; hands and arms are lopped off in a dreadful pruning, and bones snap and skulls crunch beneath crushing blows. And then, finally it is over, and it seems a silence reigns, but the silence is only relative to what has gone before, for the field is littered with the dead and the dying, and men weep and cry out in an agony born of horrendous wounds, and horses scream of broken legs and ripped-open bellies; and the gorcrows and looters come to pick over the carrion, and-” Of a sudden, Roel became aware that Celeste had stopped the horses and had dismounted and now held him by the hand, and tears spilled down her cheeks as she looked up at him.
Her voice choked, yet she managed to say, “You need never tell me of this war you fought.” He nodded once, sharply, and whispered, “Let us ride on.”
She looked up at him for a moment more, and then kissed his fingers and released his hand and turned and mounted her mare.
The caravan continued to fare starwise across the grassy plains, and as Celeste and Roel drew closer, Celeste said, “It looks as if their road will join ours. See, it curves ’round and does not cross over; I think it becomes one with this way.” Roel nodded but said nothing, and on they went.
Ahead, the caravan followed the arc and soon it was plodding duskwise, ahead of Celeste and Roel. It moved at a more leisurely pace than they did, and slowly the horses atrot overtook the ambling camels.
“It is a merchant train,” said Roel, his first words in a while. “Not a military convoy. They have an escort of guards, though, so be wary.”
Celeste slipped the keeper from her long-knife, and she strung her bow, though she slipped it back into its saddle scabbard.
As they neared the tail end of the train, three camel-mounted guards-dusky-skinned and dressed in turbans and jodhpurs and boots and long riding coats under torso-covering bronze-plated armor, and armed with curved scimitars and lances and bows-slowed and waited for Celeste and Roel to reach them. One of the warders held out a hand palm forward and called out,
His meaning clear, both Roel and Celeste reined to a halt, and their mounts snorted as if to blow their nostrils free of the somewhat rank odor of camels, and it took a firm hand to keep the horses from sidling away.
“Do you speak the common tongue?” asked Celeste.
The warder frowned.
Celeste sighed and said,
She turned to Roel. “It seems he speaks neither Common nor the Old Tongue.”
“I have heard such language as his in my travels, though I do not speak it,” said Roel. “It sounds as if he is from Arabia.”
The man looked at Roel and said,
Roel shrugged and shook his head, saying, “I think he just asked if I speak Arabic.”
Another warder came riding back, this one with gold braid ’round his turban. He spoke to the guards, and they treated him with deference.
“It seems he’s the captain,” said Roel.
The man looked at Celeste and dismissed her with a gesture, at which she bristled but remained silent, but Roel he eyed with some respect. Yet he, too, did not understand either the Old Tongue or Common.
Roel clapped a hand to his own chest and said,
“Chevalier Roel.” He gestured toward Celeste and said,
“She is with me.”
Again Celeste bristled, but still she remained silent.
Once more Roel slapped his chest and then pointed duskward along the road and said, “We ride yon.” The captain slowly scanned the plain; the land was empty as far as the eye could see. He said something to the three other warders, and they reined their camels about, the animals turning at the tugs on their nose rings, and with the beasts groaning and
The captain once more scanned out to the horizon, and then said,
Quietly Roel said, “Cherie, if they are from Aegypt or
It would be best if you rode slightly back and to my left.”
Celeste hissed, and then muttered, “As you will, my master. Yet be aware, love, you will someday pay for this.” Then she grinned at Roel’s gape.
Roel then laughed and heeled his mare and together they rode onward, did the knight and his lagging princess.
And slowly they passed alongside the camel train, the beasts laden with trade goods. Dark-skinned men walked alongside, while others rode, trailing the pack animals on tethers running to nose rings.
“That must be painful,” said Celeste, “yet fear not, my love, I’ll not leash you that way.”
Roel burst into laughter, and on they fared.
For the rest of the day they rode, and that evening as dusk was falling, and even as they espied in the distance to the fore the twilight bound looming up into the sky, they heard water running somewhere to the starwise side of the road, and there they found a spring bubbling out from the ground and running through the grass and down a gentle slope.
“That’s odd,” said Roel, looking about. “There are no hills or mountains nearby, yet here we have a fountainhead.”
“ ’Tis Faery, love,” said Celeste. She glanced at the darkening sky and added, “Perhaps we should camp here.”
“Oui,” said Roel. “It is a good place. And on the morrow we can cross through the twilight and mayhap find the gray arrow.”
The next dawn, as they were breaking camp, a turbaned rider came to the spring and stopped to let his camel drink its fill.
“A scout, I think,” said Roel, “from the caravan.” As the beast sucked water, Celeste stepped to the man and offered him a cup of tea. The scout took it and smiled and nodded his thanks.
Roel saddled the mares while Celeste removed the nose bags and stowed them away. As she tied the bundles, the turbaned man rinsed out the tin cup and stepped to her side, and smiling and nodding, he handed the vessel to her. Then he helped Roel lade the gear onto the geldings. Finally, all was ready, and Celeste and Roel mounted up, and the scout strode to his now-grazing camel and commanded the beast to kneel; then he, too, mounted and got the animal to its feet.
They rode together in a comfortable quietness for a ways, still going duskwise. The horses snorted and were somewhat nervous in the presence of the camel, yet
Roel and Celeste held them firmly, and after a while they settled.
But within a league they came to a juncture, where a trail continued on toward the twilight bound, but the road began a slow arc starwise. Roel reined to a halt, Celeste stopping as well. The scout stayed his camel alongside them, a puzzled look on his face.
