John instantly snatched up the bascinet helm. It glowed with the new burnish as he turned it over in his hands. Nothing showed on the surface. He lifted the aventail to examine the staples and then smoothed his hand over the outside curve.
With a sudden exclamation he seized his dagger, slashed through the padded lining, and scored the inner surface. "God's death." He held out the blade. "Look at this, my lord."
Dark bluish shavings lay curled on the shining surface. Ruck knocked them into his palm. "Lead."
John clouted the helm with the hilt of his sword. It cut a dent in steel too soft to withstand even a one-hand blow. He tore the leather out and explored the interior with his fingertips. "There." He pointed inside. "You can feel the place, my lord."
The patch had been made with masterly skill, sheathed on the outside by a thin skin of finer metal. The flaw was invisible, but rubbing his fingers over the inner and outer surfaces at once, Ruck could detect the faint difference in the finish at the edges of the place, and the slight hollow in the thickness.
It was too late to fit another bascinet. "I'll have to use the great helm and a mail coif," he said.
"My lord!" John stood up. "This is too much. Lay it before the marshal!"
"No," Ruck said softly. He looked to Allegreto. The youth tilted his head, a smile on his mouth that never reached his black eyes. "Why do you aid me?"
Allegreto put his fingers around the tent pole. He examined the ruby ring he wore. "You were kind to me once." He shrugged, with a short laugh. "I remember it."
"Who tries to kill me?"
"If you will make mischief—many people."
"Your mistress?" Ruck's voice was strained.
Allegreto lifted his brows. "Show a little wit, green man."
Ruck felt a tightness leave his muscles that he had not known was there. "Then it's she who sent you."
"Must someone send me?" Allegreto made a smirk. "I come for love of you, Green Sire. How else?" He swung about the pole and paused. "Be wary," he murmured, and vanished outside.
The sound shivered Ruck's head: pain first, a bright arc through his brain, and then his ears aching in the peal of metal. Each time he took a stroke, the clang stopped in his ear, building pressure, until the roar of the crowd and even the blows grew distant. He could only hear himself panting, sucking hot air through the helm; he could only see black and his opponent through the eyeslits and feel the violent swacks when he could not parry them.
In spite of the padding his great helm shifted whenever a blow caught it, obscuring his vision for an instant. The Fleming didn't take advantage; he flailed over and over at Ruck's head and only shifted a few times to any other assault. The strong onslaught left the man's body undefended on the side opposite his shield, but he rained blows so swiftly that Ruck was too occupied with deflecting them to attack.
If the helm hadn't blinded him, Ruck would already have cut under this crude beating and had the man on the ground. But he dared not leave his head unprotected long enough to strike, for fear the helm would be knocked askew too far to seat again and screen his sight entirely.
He defended with shield and sword, watching the Fleming's arm strokes. He squinted through the slit, blinking back the sting of sweat. Stepping backward, he let the champion have control of the rhythm, retreating slowly from the blows. Through the dint and clang, the dim shouts of the spectators rose to passion as he gave way.
The Fleming heard them, too: he renewed the vigor of his onset, faster and harder. Ruck parried in his attacker's cadence, falling back. Inside his brain, with the ringing clash, he sang a song of war that Bassinger had taught him, the swords tolling each note. The Fleming pealed the steady motet; Ruck answered in even time.
Then he took up the hocket—a hitch in the rhythm, counterpoint as he dropped the parry and swung his blade in attack.
Brilliant pain flashed in his ear, a tumble of light as the inevitable strike came. His sword bit, silence to him amid the belling in his head, but he felt the jolt and pause in his arm, swung through and past it, blind entirely. The Fleming missed his note, but Ruck sent the sword back in treble, up and up, a half breath off the beat, a full double-handed swing overhead and down.
He killed the man. He couldn't see it, but he knew it: an instant of impact as his sword cleaved steel—and the collapse, a dull chime of metal falling to the ground.
He stood in sweltering darkness, gasping with exertion, the skewed slash of eyeslit a white radiance above his line of sight, the cheek padding pressed painfully against his nose. It gave him a horrible moment of helplessness, his ears ringing and his eyes blind, without defense.
Then John was there, divesting him of the helm. It didn't come off easily, beaten and wedged as it was. Ruck could barely hear; he couldn't tell if the roar in his ears was the crowd or his head. As the helm fell, the warm summer air felt like a blessed rush of coolness on his face.
At his feet the Fleming champion lay in the trampled grass. His attendants and a physician clustered around him, but he was lifeless, his helm sundered through. Ruck stood straight. He lifted his bloodied sword and turned about to the stands. The constable and earl marshal sat beneath a canopy. A cross and Bible lay on the tapestry-covered table where Ruck and the Fleming had sworn their oaths. Beside them, on a slightly higher dais, sat King Edward himself, leaning forward, his face red with excitement, his long beard flowing down over his robes like a living and gleeful statue of Moses. The well-fed Lady Alice stood behind him, unashamed to have her hand on his shoulder.
Ruck barely found enough breath to speak. "I wish to know—if I have done my duty—to my honor," he asked of the justices. His own voice sounded strange to him, muffled and remote. When the marshal answered that he had, it seemed that the man spoke from very far away.
Ruck handed his sword to John and walked forward to the king. As he knelt, the block in his ear burst, and he could hear again.
All was silence, but for his own heart and heavy breath, and the rustle of the pages of the open Bible. The crowd in the stand waited.
"Rise, bold knight," the king declared in English. "You have defended your honor before our court of chivalry with skillful sword as proper." He chuckled. "A great dunt it was! A delight to see."
Ruck stood up. He lifted his eyes. The king was grinning, a little childish as they all said of him, but still a royal presence. He stroked his beard, his smile fading as he looked down into Ruck's face.
"But why do you wear those colors?" the king asked on an aggrieved note. "We don't like you to change, Ruck. Did we give you leave to change your arms?"
He spoke the name without hesitation or title, as if he knew Ruck like an old friend. A faint murmur passed over the crowd. In his amazement Ruck could not find his tongue to answer,
"Why does he wear green?" The king turned to Alice. "It should be azure ground, and the device a well huge werewolf painted in black. Where is our herald of arms?"
While Ruck stood with his limbs and his speech beyond command, the herald came forward to wait on the king. The ladies in the stands craned over the railings, staring. People whispered and leaned near one another.
"Lord Ruadrik of Wolfscar," the king said, waving at Ruck. "Tell his arms."
The herald bowed. "Sire, the lord of Wolfscar of the County Palatine of Lancaster may bear him a blazon of bright azure, the device a werewolf of sheer sable within."
"There, we are exact in our memory!" The king looked triumphantly at Ruck. "We command our subject Lord Ruadrik of Wolfscar to divest himself of these greens and bear his right device and colors."