The Grail of Sir Thomas

The rider devoured him with fiery eyes. All but fuming with grey smoke, he puffed up, grabbed his mace, but made a great effort to restrain himself, only barked out with fury. “Fool?! Don’t I remember that our holy Russian land has always kept the faith of Christ? Our forefathers prayed to Christ and Saint Nicholas! Filthy Pagan you are, the Hell’s fire will burn you!.. Take off your rags, now! And your basts too!”

Thomas bent forward in his saddle, cried at the top of his voice, “Sir wonderer! Make way!.. And you, churl, do fortify your spirit before I knock it out, to your foolish Orthodox Christ who’s not a patch on our Catholic one!”

Oleg turned to him, as though stung, thrust his hands over head. “Sir Thomas! Sir Thomas! Tame your righteous fury. We’ll have a dispute of religion some other time, and now we have a matter to settle!”

To the knight’s shock and indignation, Oleg stripped off quickly: took off the rags of his cloak, with burs and burdocks and frog spawn and green moss from the monsters’ backs stuck to them, then his pants, even his worn- out boots, which the nasty strongman had called basts.

Confused, Thomas twiddled his sword in hand, his cheeks high-colored by bitter shame. He could not bear to see his friend humiliated, so he resolved to ignore his insistent request not to intrude. Come what may. If we die, we die together. Not life matters but honor. But, suddenly, the strongman got off his beast- like horse, threw his helmet down on the road, undid and hurled down his heavy belt, gripped the hem of the mail coat that reached his knees, pulled it over head with effort, the entwined steel plates ringing.

The horse under Thomas danced nervously. The knight’s jaw dropped as low as the sixth rivet on his armor. The strongman had stripped off all his armor, even his red high boots with silver tips on their turned-up toes!

In silence, with not a glance at each other, Oleg and the strongman got into each other’s clothes. Thomas’s eyes popped out again: the strongman’s mail was a real fit on the wonderer, if not a bit tight in shoulders. High boots and helmet were just the right size. Oleg twirled the giant mace like a splinter of wood, hung it easily by strap on the saddle hook.

The strongman struggled into rags with open disgust, sighed. “How many versts from hence to Tsargrad?” he asked in a different voice.

“Fifty and over,” Oleg replied and jumped on the black stallion. The horse moved his fiery eye, bared his teeth, laid its ears back in a predatory way. Oleg clapped on his broad forehead. “Hey, wolfish food, won’t you fell on the way?” he said comfortingly, then turned to the strongman. “Hail to you, hero. I believe you will overthrow the Idol… but is it what you should be doing? Is that the Idol you must overthrow?”

“Thank you for your kind words,” the hero muttered. “I can’t fathom you, for the life of me! It was on your way! And I’m to do fifty versts and over, and ‘over’ can make a hundred…” He wheeled round and, wasting no more words, started his quick walk by the road to Constantinople. Thomas followed him with puzzled eyes.

Long after, the knight drove his horse up to Oleg who was waiting impatiently. Armored, he looked so strange for Thomas’s eyes. “Sir wonderer, I feel a great secret here!”

“Great? There’s no secret at all, Sir Thomas.” As Oleg rode side by side with Thomas, he towered over the knight all but for a head. Thomas’s stallion looked a foal near the giant black beast snorting in fury, looking at his neighbor asquint with bloodshot eye, about to bite him.

“He said you are twice as strong…”

“He is Ilya Muromets,[18] a great hero of the Russian land. Great not in strength, though his might has no equals even among heroes, but great in his sacrifice. He has no wife, no lover, no children, no parents — only Rus’! Since he came to Kiev, as a mature man already, he defends and protects only Rus’… as well as he can, surely. Rus’ is his love, his passion, his life.”

“Hmmm… Is Kiev the Wild Field of yours?”

“Why do you think so?”

“He has a face of a man who slept in the open air for many years, with his saddle as his pillow. Not the one used to sitting and talking at the festive table.”

“You are right, Sir Thomas. Don’t be angry with Ilya. He spends his life on a frontier post, as befits a hero. Rus’ is big, though you still have trouble finding it between the vast kingdoms of Poland and Bohemia. Muromets catches enemies and offenders on their way. He’s burnt by summer sun, stung by winter frosts, lashed by autumn rains. Everyone who crosses the border unbidden is a foe to him!”

Thomas bowed his head slowly, as though accepting the apologies for the rude man who simply could not behave in a different way. “I see… But all the same, I’d not endure such insults if I were you!”

Oleg, still strange and unusual to Thomas in his armor, waved aside with great negligence. “I don’t take insults, as I’ve told you. I felt ashamed to hide behind his back. I’m not twice that strong, though he thinks I am… Could I spend my life reading wise books in the silence of caves if no him enduring frost, heat, and attacks of fierce enemies?”

Thomas glanced back at the road. “Do you think he’ll pass for a wonderer?” he doubted. “Too burly. And less humble than nothing.”

“He only needs to get into the palace!” Oleg took the mace off the saddle hook, twirled it, flung up into the air deftly, not slowing the horse’s pace. The mace flew back with din and terrible roar, its strap clapped loudly in the wind. Thomas alerted and hunched up, trying to do it without being noticed. This barbarian play is too dangerous. He glanced at Oleg slantwise, with fright. The wonderer rode on, looking straight ahead. At some moment, his hand jerked forward — and the mace smacked right into his palm. He tossed it up easily, caught by handle, and hung on the saddle hook again. His stallion stepped evenly, glanced a bit asquint on his rider absorbed in brooding.

“Have you changed with Muromets to help him… or you feel a trouble ahead?” Thomas asked suddenly.

“Both,” Oleg replied sadly. “Both of it, Sir Thomas.” Without a stop, he trotted past the houses plastered to the foot of the hill. They could see no livestock there save goats and hens indeed.

Thomas nodded at the hamlet. “Will we turn here?”

Oleg clapped absent-mindedly on his stallion’s neck. “No, I’d rather go by shanks’ pony… by this one.”

Chapter 27

As the road was going north, well-groomed fields were replaced by neglected, abandoned ones. Tall stone towers were seen more and more often: lit by blazing torches at night and bright reflected sunlight at daytime, as their guards exchanged signals with the help of mirrors.

Soon they saw a plundered village and, beyond it, the blackened ruins of the city that the wonderer had called Zolochev. The city wall was destroyed in two places, tall stone houses gaped with black holes of windows. Instead of roofs, they had white fresh-squared beams. Joined with cross-beams, they resembled picked skeletons of those monsters Thomas would hardly be able to forget until his death hour. Men bustled about. They whipped the survived horses, dragged logs and bricks, in some ant-like hurry to build their hill again.

“They also at war,” Oleg said sadly. “Forays, mutinies… Well, we ride farther to Saltov and part there. I’ll turn northeast, and you? Will you go back by the same road you took for Jerusalem?”

“I don’t remember it,” Thomas confessed. “Would noble knights who went to free the Holy Sepulcher bother with maps? We asked peasants and passers-by, and they pointed in the side where Jerusalem lies. That was how we went.”

“Oh, I see! You went with no calculations, not for plunder, but at the call of your heart. That’s why you made such a mess of things!”

“Which things?”

“Er… bones. In two days, after we pass Saltov, I shall turn onto the road across Steppes. And now the only way is straight.”

“Sir wonderer… It’s amazing but I’ve never had such a noble and worthy companion in my journey before! I have no brother, but when I come back to Britain, I’ll say I have!”

“Thanks,” Oleg replied awkwardly. He knew what it cost a noble knight to make such a confession to a common man. “Thank you, Sir Thomas.”

The nights were warm and so starry that the travelers had no need to make fire. However, twice they did it