X. Sir Richard’s Mistake
Sir Richard atte Lee removed his armor before he headed north in search of his comrades. In cotehardie and hose he could move much faster. He brought his sword along and his staff, but not the items that announced his relationship to the crusades. After all, the costume had failed to strike any fear into his most recent opponent.
His band ought to have crossed the River Maun in returning, but none of the five had. One or two delayed he could perhaps understand, but all five gone missing—that was too peculiar.
There were plenty of places they might have camped, places that he and others used, for instance the so-called bramble fort, a naturally cultivated barrier that had warded off many unswerving pursuers who didn’t know that the entrance was tiny and could only be used by someone crawling on their belly.
There were sinkholes and crevices of various depths hidden in the veins of surface rock amongst the heath of Sherwood, too. All the outlaws knew the same hideouts, the same hollow trees, the same meeting spots.
He was approaching Edwinstowe when he came upon the first body floating facedown in the water among the reeds. Hugo Eylmer was one of his band. Turned over, Hugo’s eyes were open but seeing nothing, his final expression that of pain or fear, somewhat relaxed in death. Yet nowhere was there a mark upon him, no obvious wound. More likely he’d been drowned, held under, which suggested more than one man had been involved.
Sir Richard hauled the body out of the water, seeing then that more reeds had been smashed ahead. Not far away, he found Hugo’s brother, also seemingly drowned in the shallows of the wetland.
The third, Fuckebegger, had at least made it to the nearest trees. He had a terrible wound right through the center of him. A sword thrust. It had to have been made by someone strong. Or else Fuckebegger had been unable to move.
A thorough search of the area turned up their camp, well-secluded though apparently not secluded enough. It had been ransacked, the lean-tos smashed, satchels and sacks torn apart, one small ale keg splintered, and every bow and every arrow broken. So Hugo and the others had been on their way back from the manor of Leeds with ale, with supplies, when these brigands had struck. Three good men of the woods had been surprised. He shook his head in dismay.
Thomas, the Lincoln-green outlaw, had said that knights—crusaders, in fact—had killed Hodde with a sword thrust. Had the same knights caught up with his men? But why? It made no sense. Were they after every outlaw in the forest or his men specifically? He felt as if someone from Avignon, or even Carcassonne, was hunting him. But that was absurd. He’d made no such enemies in battle and those battles were long over.
The latest Crusade, led by Louis IX, was ongoing, but what would such knights as the king’s be doing this far from Damietta? More like thugs in the employ of the abbot of St. Mary’s. After all, his true enemies were here.
Still puzzling it all out, Sir Richard walked out of the camp and straight into a trap. He was suddenly beset by a horde of tiny flying monstrosities—green and goggle-eyed, shrieking and snarling, baring their teeth. He turned in a circle, sword drawn, but the little things flitted and whirled around him, making him turn and turn as he tried to ward them off. He stumbled through the underbrush, his only thought to get away from the creatures.
And suddenly, they withdrew, leaving him standing alone among knights.
It was the stillness of the knights that struck him as odd: The several of them on horseback and their mounts did not so much as twitch. They stood like carvings of men and horses. Then others on foot, wielding spears, strode forward to close the circle around him. The little screeching things hovered overhead.
The knights all seemed to be of one army, but whose? Their surcoats displayed four panels, two of black and two of red, with no heraldic markings, dark gambesons beneath, and all wearing distinctive flat-topped heumes, so nearly identical in their total silence as to be unsettling.
Finally one of the mounted ones came to life, swung down and approached him, explaining, “We want the return of the precious gifts promised the abbot of Leicester.” The knight stopped then and waited.
“Forgive me,” Richard replied. “I know nothing of what you speak.”
The knight’s head tilted. “Yet, you are acquainted with the three men whose camp you just departed.”
“Why, no,” he quickly lied. “I chanced upon three bodies, which suggested there might be more, a larger party.”
“You have never heard of Hugo Eylmer, then?”
“I—um, no, I don’t know the name.”
“So, what is your name then, mortal?”
Mortal? What answer could he give to that question? He looked from the speaker to the other faceless knights. These were the killers of Robert Hodde. They knew Hugo’s name, and Sir Richard knew that Hugo, given the chance, would have fobbed them off with some made-up name of his own devising. Which meant that it hadn’t worked. These dark knights likely knew or sought his name, and if he gave it, he would join the other three in death. The only alternative he could think of was that of the young man he’d only just met, who he knew for certain was no longtime denizen of Sherwood Forest. It was a name out of ballads and poems and plays, but what harm could it do? If they knew it, he would laugh along with them just as he had with Thomas. How absurd!
“I’m, ah, Thomas Rimor.”
He was ready for the laughter to follow, but there came none. The knight stepped closer, eyes narrowed. “What did you say?”
This was the wrong reaction; all he could do now was repeat the name, invest it with the knowledge of its absurdity and with a touch of pride that it was his. He tried for that balance.
With both hands, the knight pushed at the helmet.
Sir Richard expected it to fall off, but instead it collapsed, becoming black and fluid. It slid back into the neck of the black gambeson the knight wore, revealing a fall of silvery white hair and a face that wasn’t entirely human. Its color was gray-green; the cheeks were full, the jaw long and sharp. The knight drew closer until he could clearly see the large eyes—as golden as two coins but with rings of black around the centers instead of pupils. And while nothing of the costume suggested one sex or another, there was something about the face that seemed to him vaguely female.
“My goodness, Thomas Rimor, after so many years. You have grown considerably taller since the Royal Hunt.” The lips parted, flashing a smile of sharp fang-like teeth. “My name,” the knight said, “is Zhanedd. The difference, nuncle, is that I haven’t borrowed mine.”
“Royal hunt?” Richard asked. He knew even as the question emerged that it was the wrong thing to say. But what was the right thing?
Zhanedd drew off a glove, revealing a hand with long tapering fingers that came almost to points, held it up in front of him and curled the fingers slowly. In some way the gesture caught hold of Sir Richard’s will and pulled at it. The hoarse voice rang in his head. “Listen to me. Sleep now. Sleep.”
Sir Richard’s eyes fluttered. He resisted, or thought he did.
The hand drew back, fingertips together, and then it struck like a snake. A sting in his throat. He experienced then a slow sensation of falling back and back and never touching the ground. This is death, he thought, and then thought no more.