I spurred my horse gently and moved towards the dunes, pulling the cloak tighter around my shoulders. Tiny raindrops, too small to soak in, fell thick and fast on the cloth and on the horse’s mane, dulling the sheen of the metal parts of my outfit with a thin veil of steam. The horizon kept spitting heavy, swirling, grey-white clouds that rolled across the sky towards the land.
I rode up the hill covered with tufts of hard, grey grass. Then I saw her: black against the sky, motionless, as still as a statue. I moved closer. The horse stepped heavily on the sand, breaking the thin, wet crust with its hooves.
She sat on a grey horse the way ladies do, wrapped up in a long cloak, the hood thrown to her back. Her fair hair was wet; the rain twisted it into curls and made it stick to her forehead. Sitting still, she watched me calmly as if sunk in thought. She radiated peace. Her horse shook its head; the harness rattled.
“God be with you, sir knight,” she spoke first, before I could open my mouth. Her voice was calm, too; just as I had expected.
“And with you, my lady.”
She had a pleasant oval face, unusually cut full lips and above her right eyebrow, a birth mark, or a small scar, the shape of a crescent turned upside down. I looked around. Nothing but dunes. No sign of an entourage, servants or a cart. She was alone.
Just like me.
She followed my eyes and smiled.
“I am alone,” she confirmed the undeniable fact. “I’ve been waiting for you, sir knight.”
Hmm. She was waiting for me. Strange, for I didn’t have a clue who she was. And I didn’t expect anyone on this beach who might be waiting for me. Or so I’d thought.
“Well then,” she turned her calm face towards me, “let’s go, sir knight. I am Branwen of Cornwall.”
She was not from Cornwall. Or from Brittany.
There are reasons I sometimes fail to remember things, things which may have happened even in the recent past. There are black holes in my memory. And conversely, sometimes I remember things I’m sure have never taken place. Strange things happen inside my head. Sometimes I’m wrong. But the Irish accent, the accent of the people from Tara—this I would never get wrong. Ever.
I could have told her that. But I didn’t.
I bowed with my helmet on, and with a gloved fist I touched the coat of mail on my breast. I didn’t introduce myself. I had the right not to. The shield hanging by my side, turned back to front, was a clear sign that I wished to remain incognito. The knightly customs had by then assumed the character of the commonly accepted norm. I didn’t think it a healthy development but then the knights’ customs grew odder, not to say more idiotic, by the day.
“Let’s go,” she repeated.
She started her horse down the hill, amongst the mounds of dunes bristling with grass. I followed her, caught up with her, and we rode side by side. Sometimes I moved ahead and it looked as if it were me who was leading. It didn’t matter. The general direction seemed correct. As long as the sea was behind us.
We didn’t talk. Branwen, the Cornish impostor, turned her face towards me several times as if she wanted to ask me something. But she never did. I was grateful. I was not disposed to giving answers. So I, too, remained silent and got on with my thinking, if the laborious process of putting facts and images whirling inside my head into a semblance of order could be called thinking.
I felt rotten. Really awful.
My thinking was interrupted by Branwen’s stifled cry and the sight of a serrated blade pointed at my chest. I lifted my head. The blade belonged to a spear, which was held by a big brute wearing a horned fool’s hat and a torn coat of mail. His companion, with an ugly, gloomy face, held Branwen’s horse by the bridle, close to its mouth. The third, standing a few steps behind us, was aiming at me with a crossbow. I can’t stand it when someone is aiming at me with a crossbow. If I were a Pope, I would have banned crossbows with the threat of excommunication.
“Keep still, sir,” said the one with the crossbow, aiming straight at my throat. “I will not kill you. Unless I have to. And if you touch your sword, I’ll have to.”
“We need food, warm clothes and some money,” announced the gloomy one. “We don’t want your blood.”
“We are not barbarians,” said the one in the funny hat. “We are reliable, professional robbers. We have our principles.”
“You take from the rich and give to the poor, I suppose?” I asked.
Funny Hat smiled broadly, revealing his gums. He had black, shiny hair and the tawny face of a southerner, bristling with a few days’ stubble.
“Our principles don’t go that far,” he said. “We take from everybody, as they come. But because we are poor ourselves, it comes to the same thing. Count Orgellis disbanded us. Until we join up with someone else we’ve got to live, haven’t we?”
“Why are you telling him all this, Bec de Corbin?” spoke Gloomy Face. “Why are you explaining yourself? He is mocking us, wants to offend us.”
“I’m above it,” answered Bec de Corbin proudly. “I’m letting it pass. Well, Sir Knight, let’s not waste time. Unstrap your saddle bag and throw it here, on the road. Let your purse sit next to it. And your cloak. Mind, we are not asking for your horse or your armour. We know how far we can go.”
“Alas,” said Gloomy Face, squinting his eyes horribly, “we will have to ask you for this lady. But not for long.”
“Ah, yes, I almost forgot.” Bec de Corbin bared his teeth again. “Indeed, we need this lady. You understand, sir, all this wilderness, the solitude…I’ve forgotten what a naked woman looks like.”
“Me, I can’t forget that,” said the crossbow-man. “I see it every night, the moment I close my eyes.”
I must have smiled, for Bec de Corbin quickly raised the spear to my face, while the crossbow-man, in one move, put the crossbow to his cheek.
“No,” said Branwen. “No, there is no need.”
I looked at her. She was growing pale, gradually, from the mouth up. But her voice was still quiet, calm, cold.
“No need,” she repeated. “I don’t want you to die on my account, sir knight. I’m not that keen to have my clothes torn and my body bruised either. It’s nothing… After all, they are not asking much.”
I’m not sure who was more surprised—me or the robbers. But I should have guessed earlier: what I took to be her calm, her inner peace and immutable self-possession, was simply resignation. I knew the feeling.
“Throw them your saddle bag,” Branwen continued, growing paler still, “and ride on. I beg you. A few miles from here there is a cross where two roads meet. Wait for me there. It won’t take long.”
“It’s not everyday that we have such sensible customers,” said Bec de Corbin, lowering his spear.
“Don’t look at me that way,” whispered Branwen. No doubt, she must have seen something in my face, though I always thought myself good at self-control.
I reached behind me, pretending I was unstrapping the bag, and pulled out my foot from the stirrup. I spurred the horse and kicked Bec de Corbin in the face so that he reeled back, balancing with his spear as if he were running on a tightrope. Pulling out my sword I leant forwards and the bolt aimed at my throat banged on my helmet and slipped. I swung in one nice, classic sinister move at Gloomy Face; the leap of my horse helped in pulling the blade out of his skull. It’s not really that difficult if one knows how to do it.
Bec de Corbin, had he wanted to, could have run for the dunes. But he didn’t. He thought that before I could turn the horse he would run me through with his spear.
He thought wrong.
I slashed him broadly, right across his hands holding the spear-shaft, and then again, across his belly. I wanted to reach lower but failed. No-one is perfect.
The crossbow-man didn’t belong to the cowardly, either. Rather than run, he pulled the bowstring again and tried to take aim. I reined in the horse, caught the sword by the blade and threw it. It worked. He fell down so conveniently that I didn’t have to get off the horse to retrieve the weapon.