Timeline

seemed to be enjoying their exertions.

As he watched their aggressiveness and speed, Marek realized that left to his own devices, this was exactly the way he himself would choose to fight - quickly, with the conditioning and reserves of stamina to wear down an opponent. He had only imagined a slower fighting style from an unconscious assumption that men in the past were weaker or slower or less imaginative than he was, as a modern man.

Marek knew this assumption of superiority was a difficulty faced by every historian. He just hadn't thought he was guilty of it.

But clearly, he was.

It took him a while to realize, through the shouting of the crowd, that the combatants were in such superb physical condition that they could expend breath shouting as they fought; they hurled a stream of taunts and insults at each other between blows.

And then he saw that their swords were not blunted, that they were swinging real battle swords, with razor- sharp edges. Yet they clearly intended each other no harm; this was just an amusing warm-up to the coming tournament. Their cheerful, casual approach to deadly hazard was almost as unnerving as the speed and intensity with which they fought.

The battle continued for another ten minutes, until one mighty swing unhorsed one knight. He fell to the ground but immediately jumped up laughing, as easily as if he were wearing no armor. Money changed hands. There were cries of 'Again! Again!' A fistfight broke out among the liveried boys. The two knights walked off, arm in arm, toward the inn.

Marek heard Kate say, 'Andrй…'

He turned slowly toward her.

'Andrй, is everything all right?'

'Everything is fine,' he said. 'But I have a lot to learn.'

They walked down the castle drawbridge, approaching the guards. He felt Kate tense alongside him. 'What do we do? What do we say?'

'Don't worry. I speak Occitan.'

But as they came closer, another fight broke out on the field beyond the moat, and the guards watched it. They were entirely preoccupied as Marek and Kate passed through the stone arch and entered the castle courtyard.

'We just walked in,' Kate said, surprised. She looked around the courtyard. 'Now what?'

It was freezing, Chris thought. He sat naked, except for his undershorts, on a stool in Sir Daniel's small apartment. Beside him was a basin of steaming water, and a hand cloth for washing. The boy had brought the basin of water up from the kitchen, carrying it as if it were gold; his manner indicated that it was a sign of favor to be treated to hot water.

Chris had dutifully scrubbed himself, refusing the boy's offers of assistance. The bowl was small, and the water soon black. But eventually he'd managed to scrape the mud from beneath his fingernails, off his body and even off his face, with the aid of a tiny metal mirror the boy handed him.

Finally, he pronounced himself satisfied. But the boy, with a look of distress, said, 'Master Christopher, you are not clean.' And he insisted on doing the rest.

So Chris sat shivering on his wooden stool while the boy scrubbed him for what seemed like an hour. Chris was perplexed; he'd always thought that medieval people were dirty and smelly, immersed in the filth of the age. Yet these people seemed to make a fetish of cleanliness. Everyone he saw in the castle was clean, and there were no odors.

Even the toilet, which the boy insisted he use before bathing, was not as awful as Chris had expected. Located behind a wooden door in the bedroom, it was a narrow closet, fitted with a stone seat above a basin that drained into a pipe. Apparently, waste flowed down to the ground floor of the castle, where it was removed daily. The boy explained that each morning a servant flushed the pipe with scented water, then placed a fresh bouquet of sweet-smelling herbs in a clip on the wall. So the odor was not objectionable. In fact, he thought ruefully, he'd smelled much worse in airplane toilets.

And to top it all, these people wiped themselves with strips of white linen! No, he thought, things were not as he had expected.

One advantage of being forced to sit there was that he was able to try speaking to the boy. The boy was tolerant, and replied slowly to Chris, as if to an idiot. But this enabled Chris to hear him before the earpiece translation, and he quickly discovered that imitation helped; if he overcame his embarrassment and employed the archaic phrases he had read in texts - many of which the young boy himself used - then the boy understood him much more easily. So Chris gradually fell to saying 'Methinks' instead of 'I think,' and 'an' instead of 'if,' and 'for sooth' instead of 'in truth.' And with each small change, the boy seemed to understand him better.

Chris was still sitting on the stool when Sir Daniel entered the room. He brought neatly folded clothes, rich and expensive-looking. He placed them on the bed.

'So, Christopher of Hewes. You have involved yourself with our clever beauty.'

'She hath saved mine life.' He pronounced it say-ved. And Sir Daniel seemed to understand.

'I hope it will not cause you trouble.'

'Trouble?'

Sir Daniel sighed. 'She tells me, friend Chris, that you are gentle, yet not a knight. You are a squire?'

'In sooth, yes.'

'A very old squire,' Sir Daniel said. 'What is your training at arms?'

'My training at arms.. .' Chris frowned. 'Well, I have, uh-'

'Have you any at all? Speak plain: What is your training?'

Chris decided he had better tell the truth. 'In sooth, I am - I mean, trained - in my studies - as a scholar.'

'A scholar?' The old man shook his head, incomprehending. 'Escolie? Esne discipulus? Studesne sub magistro?' You study under a master?

'Ita est.' Even so.

'Ubi?' Where?

'Uh… at, uh, Oxford.'

'Oxford?' Sir Daniel snorted. 'Then you have no business here, with such as my Lady. Believe me when I say this is no place for a scolere. Let me tell you how your circumstances now lie.'

'Lord Oliver needs money to pay his soldiers, and he has plundered all he can from the nearby towns. So now he presses Claire to marry, that he may gain his fee. Guy de Malegant has tendered a handsome offer, very pleasing to Lord Oliver. But Guy is not wealthy, and he cannot make good on his fee unless he mortgages part of my Lady's holdings. To this she will not accede. Many believe that Lord Oliver and Guy have long since made a private agreement - one to sell the Lady Claire, the other to sell her lands.'

Chris said nothing.

'There is a further impediment to the match. Claire despises Malegant, whom she suspects had a hand in her husband's death. Guy was in attendance of Geoffrey at the time of his death. Everyone was surprised by the suddenness of his departure from this world. Geoffrey was a young and vigorous knight. Although his wounds were serious, he made steady recovery. No one knows the truth of that day, yet there are rumors - many rumors - of poison.'

'I see,' Chris said.

'Do you? I doubt it. For consider: my Lady might as well be a prisoner of Lord Oliver in this castle. She may herself slip out, but she cannot secretly remove her entire retinue. If she secretly departs and returns to England - which is her wish - Lord Oliver will take his revenge against me, and others of her household. She knows this, and so she must stay.

'Lord Oliver wishes her to marry, and my Lady devises stratagems to postpone it. It is true she is clever. But Lord Oliver is not a patient man, and he will force the matter soon. Now, her only hope lies there.' Sir Daniel walked over and pointed out the window.

Chris came to the window and looked.

From this high window, he saw a view over the courtyard, and the battlements of the outer castle wall. Beyond he saw the roofs of the town, then the town wall, with guards walking the parapets. Then fields and countryside stretching off into the distance.