The Red Knight

That night, Diccon put an arm around him. ‘Sorry, lad. It should hae’ been me left with the baggage. I don’t even know why we’re here.’

The Prior came and offered each of them a cup of warm mead. He sat on his heels, still armed from head to toe in plate and chain.

‘You are here to take my news to the king – when I have news.’ He looked back and forth. ‘Tomorrow.’

Diccon drank his mead. ‘What did you learn today?’

‘The fortress still holds,’ the Prior said. ‘And holds the bridge, as well. The Abbess has done far better than I expected of her, and I owe her an apology.’ He smiled at Galahad. ‘The trouble with a vow of silence is that it leaves you vulnerable to talk,’ he said.

Diccon nodded. ‘I’ll ride at first light.’

The Prior shook his head. ‘The woods this side of the river are full of the enemy. Sossag, Abenacki, irks, boglins and worse.’ He shook his head. ‘Tomorrow night we’ll make a demonstration. A loud demonstration. We will draw every creature of darkness like-’ he smiled ‘-like moths to a flame.’ He nodded. ‘Then you’ll ride.’

Lissen Carak – The Red Knight

Just a few leagues north of the hillock where the Prior camped, the captain stood in the castle gateway with the Abbess. Behind him were most of the men-at-arms, led by Jehannes, and twenty squires and valets led by Jacques. Every man wore a nun’s habit over his harness.

He gathered them in a circle.

‘What a very scary passel of nuns we make,’ he said. ‘The order of Saint Thomas will need to be a little more careful in their selection process.’

The Abbess laughed. The men going on the sortie managed a sort of nervous titter.

‘This needs to be fast, so listen up. It’s like taking a town in Galle. Sneak to the wall. Ladders up on the whistle. That’s all there is. When you are in, head for the towers at the gate. We get the lads there and back we come. Don’t leave your wounded behind. You know all this.’ He grinned. Turned to Ser Michael, the sergeant of the original garrison. ‘You must keep the gate open until the sortie returns. But don’t leave it open for a few men. You hear me? When the sortie is in, close the gate.’ He turned to No Head. ‘When you see my blue fire pound the town. Everything you have.’

No Head nodded. ‘The Bridge Castle has the word, too.’

Beside him, Harmodius crossed his arms. And winked.

The captain nodded. ‘You all know Tom would come to get you. Let’s go get Tom.’

A murmur.

He jumped down from his barrel, and led the way – not to the gate, but to the dispensary stairs, and the Abbess walked with him.

She led them through the lower dispensary, and then down steep steps to a basement, and then down another set to a well – a spring in the deep hillside, a cleft off to the right with lights burning.

The captain could feel an immense welling of power. Raw power. Neither gold nor green.

He reached into the well and filled himself.

You are much stronger, Prudentia said. But not as strong as he is.

I know.

You don’t. You are arrogant. You are outmatched.

Fine. Yes, I know.

Fool! she spat.

He dropped back into the cleft and came to a long storage room, packed to the rafters with wagon sides and barrels of pork.

It took long minutes for men to shift the wagon beds.

There was a door behind them.

The Abbess drew a key from her girdle. Their eyes met.

‘Now you know all my secrets,’ she whispered.

‘I doubt it,’ he said, and kissed her hand.

‘I am quite sure I should not give you this,’ she said. She smiled bitterly and handed him a small scrap of curled parchment, hard as an old leaf in his hand. Smooth as a woman’s skin.

‘I could disapprove, as her spiritual mother,’ the Abbess went on. ‘I could just be a jealous woman.’ She shrugged. ‘Sister Miram brought this note to me and confessed that she had passed another.’ She met his eyes. ‘Amicia is not for you, Captain. She is greater – far greater – than we.’

He smiled. ‘That is not what I expected you to say.’ He bowed. ‘I beg your indulgence.’ He turned aside, and held the scrap up to a torch on the wall in a clamp. He read, and he couldn’t control the smile that crossed his face.

Your gate is closed.

Meet me.

He turned back to the Abbess.

She shook her head. ‘You are glowing.’

‘How is she greater?’ the captain asked.

The column had begun to move. The door was open, and the lower door, too.

He kissed her hand again. ‘Thank you,’ he said.

She smiled. ‘You have brought me no peace, young man.’ She waved her hand. ‘Go – kill our enemies. Triumph.’ She sounded tired.

He turned and all but leaped down the steps. On his way he stopped to touch the favour he wore on his shoulder.

Amicia felt him, like a touch on her cheek.

She smiled, and went back to tearing linen into strips.

I’m a fool, she thought.

The company went down through the Abbess’s passage and entered a maze of stone corridors.

To those who knew what to look for, it was obvious that men had not made these curving corridors.

But they were empty, although, to the captain, every yard of them reeked of the power that had been used in storming them. More than a hundred years ago. More than two hundred years.

And still the power lingered, like the smell of smoke after a fire.

Eventually, the Abbess’s will-o-wisp led them to a double door of oak, bound with iron, copper, and silver. To the captain’s eye, it was covered in sigils – powerful wards drawn Hermetically.

He’d never seen anything like it.

She’d given him the key.

He held it with renewed respect.

Some of the lads were very much on edge. An hour in silent, haunted corridors deep under the earth isn’t the best preparation for combat. The sounds behind him were of men on the edge of panic.

He turned, and cast a soft light.

‘Ready, friends?’ he asked softly.

More and more men stumbled into the antechamber in front of the great doors.

‘We’ll come out into the chapel of the Lower Town,’ he said. ‘The roof is collapsed. Don’t run. Out here a rolled ankle is a death sentence and we’re not coming back this way. So don’t linger.’ He couldn’t explain why.

He was about to open the fortress’s Hermetic defences, for a moment.

He imbued his voice with calm. Humour. Normalcy.

‘Let’s go get Tom,’ he said. He smiled at Jehannes, who, praise be, smiled back.

And he turned the key.

North of Lissen Carak – Thorn