Tintauri's Squire - Part 8
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Getting to the keep was slow. Very slow. Tintauri was a tall man and hardly light, and Tal was known for her speed, not her strength. Descending the South Tower stairwell was a dangerous and slippery business, nerve-wrackingly slow. Most of the way she had to brace Tintauri against the outer wall and half-slide him down with her as she descended step by cautious step.
As she passed the third floor landing she cast a regretful look towards Madaire's door, but no more than that. Her mind was resolute.
Legs crawling again with the memory of spiders, Tal stepped onto the stone floor of the stairwell and hurried - inasmuch as was possible - out through the door, reemerging in the moonlight. Tintauri hung over her shoulder, almost a dead weight, his shallow breaths still not quite enough to keep all the coughing at bay.
"Which floor?" she asked him, staring up at the towering silhouette of the stone keep with fresh misgivings. He could easily betray her. One word to any guard on any floor. Still, nothing for it now.
Tintauri coughed fresh blood down her front, struggling for breath to speak. "Garden," he croaked.
"The garden? What ... you mean the rose garden?"
He nodded, still coughing. She ignored the dark, warm mess soaking through to her skin, the thin, metallic smell of the blood, and set off doggedly, her back muscles throbbing from all her exertions.
They made a very visible pair in the moonlight as they crossed the grounds from the South Tower. Perhaps someone did see them, but thought nothing of such a silhouette. Tal had no doubt that death in Ceorlkeep - particularly near the South Tower - was no uncommon thing at all.
She felt nervous all the same, and more so when they finally reached the small, creeping garden of roses on the keep's south face. It was deserted. Audible snores roared from the nearby groundsman's hut. The roses themselves were closed tight in the chilly darkness, their leaves shivering in a wash of whispers when the wind blew stronger.
"Where's your -" Tal began.
Tintauri gave a sharp, hacking cough, spilling more dark froth on the thin weave of her shirt, and then another, his arm starting to slip away from her shoulder. She tried to catch at him, but without even the tiny assistance he'd lent her before, he was now too heavy. All she could do was ease him down, swearing.
"My lady," he choked out, a plea; then he lay back bleeding, drowning in what rose in his lungs.
The delicate leaves in the garden whisper, whisper, whispered on the trellises. Tal's short-cropped hair stirred in a sharp, clean wind that made the blood on her shirt feel like ice, and suddenly the smells of most ancient winter - sharp-spice pine and rank wolf - came with it.
Snow fell in the garden. It fluttered in fairy-flakes to start, as if someone had cracked a door open on a winter's day, and then rushed down in swirling torrents, bleaching the world away. Tintauri's blood went from night-dark to livid crimson in the white.
And then the Queen came. She emerged like a shadow from the silent storm, her long, raven-black hair cutting dark comet-trails in the sky behind her, her black night-eyes cutting holes in her blanched white face. Tal remembered how she had looked on her throne, an unreal thing in a living world, and knew that this was the Queen's real place.
The Queen cried out, a crow-like mourning, and suddenly rushed forward like a snow-flurry, swooping and kneeling over the fallen knight. Tal stared unheeded at the warm blue fabric of the Queen's dress, at a loose thread trailing in the breeze from one sleeve, and smelled the stately but worldly perfume of lavender. It eroded Tal's frozen fear, the awe of the Divine. The Queen was the daughter of a goddess, but not a goddess herself.
Crooning gently over Tintauri's bloody face, the Queen slid both arms underneath him and lifted him as though he weighed no more than a child. Then she turned and began to stride away through the snow, trailing that very mortal perfume behind her.
Tal rose to her feet, conscious again of the knife now tucked into her sleeve. When she glanced to her right and left she could see the more subdued darkness of Ceorlhold night bleeding back in, and realised that the Queen was going somewhere she would soon be unable to follow.
Tal was Narraine. She glanced at the sky only a moment longer before readily giving it up and giving chase, rushing full into the world of white.
For a while, Tal was able to follow the dark, dark trails of the Queen's hair and the blue flap of her skirts - the only shadows in these snows. But the storm was thick and eerie-silent, and soon Tal could not see even that.
The sound of the Queen's voice, still soothing and murmuring, led Tal on a little further then. She pursued it doggedly, and even drew close enough again to see the Queen in her shadows and colours again, kneeling on the ground to gently scoop snow over her half-buried knight's face.
Tal approached softly, ready to withdraw her knife and strike at the nearest chance. The Queen continued to scoop and pat down the snow over Tintauri until there was nothing but a mound of ice before her; then she trailed a long, white finger in an arc through the snow hiding his face, as if giving him back his smile.
By then Tal was only two yards away. The Queen rose, ice showering from her skirts, and then turned to look at Tal with her black, black winter-night eyes.
"Are you lost, child?" she whispered.
"Yes, your Majesty," said Tal. "Please, it's all white and I can't get home ..."
She folded her arms as if cold, taking hold of the dagger in her sleeve, and then lunged.
The world glared even more blindingly white, and hails of snowflakes blasted against Tal's skin, scouring like a sandstorm. Tal clenched her eyes shut, shielding her face and hunching down in the face of the screaming winds, half-expecting her hair to pull out at the roots and fly free.
Then the sudden wind died. Tal lifted her head and looked around, seeing nothing but snow - flat, featureless snow, and the colourless grey-white sky.
She wandered for a little while, but without much hope, and eventually stopped walking to settle down on her haunches, resting her tired muscles and coddling her empty belly. This had always been a possibility in the end. She had tried. The Divines would bear witness to that.
The cold was real, now; belatedly she realised that for some reason or another, she simply hadn’t felt it before. For a long time she sat in the snow and sheltered only in the comfort of her thoughts, feeling them burn lower and lower. Soon the courageous warriors of Narraine would lay siege to the Queen's castle of Ceorlhold. Her father would be there, and her brother, and whether the Divines granted them victory or defeat - let it be victory, roaring Brann! - the whole world would see that not every northern kingdom feared the winterknights. Perhaps another kingdom would see it too.
Her family would know, as well, that she had died bravely with them.
"I hope you're enjoying the Queen's mercy," said the voice of Sir Tintauri.
Tal opened her eyes with an effort, unaware of having closed them. The winterknight stood over her, watching her like a carrion crow, his wild hair even wilder in the cutting wind.
"She admires you," he said, crooked smile arching. "She feels it wouldn't be right to kill you. So here you are, happy and unharmed in the snow!"
"Do you demons never die?" asked Tal through numb lips.
"Not here," he replied.
He leaned in, grabbing a fistful of her collar, and hauled her to her feet.
"I knew you'd try to trick me," she said, staring unafraid into his face. "I only hoped you'd die as well."
"Did I trick you?" the knight replied, the crooked grin curling back for the first renewed laugh. "The Queen must have stepped into Ceorlhold to bring me here. It seems to me, not-quick-but-the-fastest, that you were just too slow."
"Do whatever you want," she threw back. "I'm the warrior daughter of a warrior. Nothing you do can take my honour from me - not you and not the worm Madaire. Divine Brann send my people victory!"
Tintauri laughed again, almost gaily, and linked his arm with hers, striding away across the endless snow. Tal blinked snowflakes from her lashes as she stumbled along, wondering if she still held the knife in her numb hand or not.
The blanched sky began to fade away, darkening to the real black of night, and Tal caught a whiff of soil and grass moments before the snow was simply gone. But the sights of Ceorlhold and the whispering rose garden brought her no relief.
"Here's what we're going to do," said Tintauri. "We're going to stop by the kitchen hearth until you can walk again. Then we're going to march down to the gates and say our tearful farewells. I'm afraid you just don't make a very good squire."
Tal turned her stiff neck so she could look at him, nothing but suspicion snarling in her gut. "I don't want to play with any of you any more. Just give me a knife and a moment with you - or Madaire."
"You're already holding a knife, my dear," he replied, confirming her hazy suspicion. "And no, that will come later, you see. We'll warm you up and send you back out to your family, and then at some point over the next few days there'll be a very large battle between our two forces. I expect you to be there."
"If you actually do as you're suggesting, then yes - there's no other place under the heavens I'll be."
"Good," he said. "I'll be looking for you. Don't get yourself killed before then."
She laughed a scornful laugh, glad it still came. "You really want to fight me again?"
"I do my best work without a knife in my chest," the winterknight smiled. "And to be honest, I rather prefer a sword anyway."
"What a happy coincidence," Tal replied. "So do I."
Tintauri laughed, definitely a delighted sound this time. He began to escort her to the keep on his arm, as if they were just knight and maid hastening to join the dance. "I've really become very fond of you these last few days, you know. I'm glad the Queen settled on her usual 'mercy'. Oh, and that reminds me - speaking of the Queen ..."
Suddenly pain blazed up in Tal's half-numb face, a hot, heavy pain, and when her senses returned she was on the ground again with blood still rushing from her broken nose.
The knight was kneeling next to her, fist still clenched on one knee, waiting for her to come to.
"I remember snow, night, no feeling, no thought - and then me," he said as her eyes opened, his light voice sinking deeper, and there was no trace of his laugh or his smile left even in his eyes: only winter, the endless white winter. "I won't kill you clean if you lift a hand to her again. I'll gut you and leave the crows and flies to eat you hollow. And then, when the maggots have swollen your belly, I'll raise your corpse and let you scrape them all out."
"Help me up and let me tell you what I'm going to do to you as we walk," croaked Tal, spitting some of the blood that had trickled into her mouth. "My idea's got more broken glass in it than flies."
It hung there for a moment.
"Do tell," Tintauri replied at last, crooked smile returning. He stood up again, bowing in courtly invitation, and then pulled her up as well, offering his arm once more for the last of the cold walk to Ceorlhold's keep.
Getting to the keep was slow. Very slow. Tintauri was a tall man and hardly light, and Tal was known for her speed, not her strength. Descending the South Tower stairwell was a dangerous and slippery business, nerve-wrackingly slow. Most of the way she had to brace Tintauri against the outer wall and half-slide him down with her as she descended step by cautious step.
As she passed the third floor landing she cast a regretful look towards Madaire's door, but no more than that. Her mind was resolute.
Legs crawling again with the memory of spiders, Tal stepped onto the stone floor of the stairwell and hurried - inasmuch as was possible - out through the door, reemerging in the moonlight. Tintauri hung over her shoulder, almost a dead weight, his shallow breaths still not quite enough to keep all the coughing at bay.
"Which floor?" she asked him, staring up at the towering silhouette of the stone keep with fresh misgivings. He could easily betray her. One word to any guard on any floor. Still, nothing for it now.
Tintauri coughed fresh blood down her front, struggling for breath to speak. "Garden," he croaked.
"The garden? What ... you mean the rose garden?"
He nodded, still coughing. She ignored the dark, warm mess soaking through to her skin, the thin, metallic smell of the blood, and set off doggedly, her back muscles throbbing from all her exertions.
They made a very visible pair in the moonlight as they crossed the grounds from the South Tower. Perhaps someone did see them, but thought nothing of such a silhouette. Tal had no doubt that death in Ceorlkeep - particularly near the South Tower - was no uncommon thing at all.
She felt nervous all the same, and more so when they finally reached the small, creeping garden of roses on the keep's south face. It was deserted. Audible snores roared from the nearby groundsman's hut. The roses themselves were closed tight in the chilly darkness, their leaves shivering in a wash of whispers when the wind blew stronger.
"Where's your -" Tal began.
Tintauri gave a sharp, hacking cough, spilling more dark froth on the thin weave of her shirt, and then another, his arm starting to slip away from her shoulder. She tried to catch at him, but without even the tiny assistance he'd lent her before, he was now too heavy. All she could do was ease him down, swearing.
"My lady," he choked out, a plea; then he lay back bleeding, drowning in what rose in his lungs.
The delicate leaves in the garden whisper, whisper, whispered on the trellises. Tal's short-cropped hair stirred in a sharp, clean wind that made the blood on her shirt feel like ice, and suddenly the smells of most ancient winter - sharp-spice pine and rank wolf - came with it.
Snow fell in the garden. It fluttered in fairy-flakes to start, as if someone had cracked a door open on a winter's day, and then rushed down in swirling torrents, bleaching the world away. Tintauri's blood went from night-dark to livid crimson in the white.
And then the Queen came. She emerged like a shadow from the silent storm, her long, raven-black hair cutting dark comet-trails in the sky behind her, her black night-eyes cutting holes in her blanched white face. Tal remembered how she had looked on her throne, an unreal thing in a living world, and knew that this was the Queen's real place.
The Queen cried out, a crow-like mourning, and suddenly rushed forward like a snow-flurry, swooping and kneeling over the fallen knight. Tal stared unheeded at the warm blue fabric of the Queen's dress, at a loose thread trailing in the breeze from one sleeve, and smelled the stately but worldly perfume of lavender. It eroded Tal's frozen fear, the awe of the Divine. The Queen was the daughter of a goddess, but not a goddess herself.
Crooning gently over Tintauri's bloody face, the Queen slid both arms underneath him and lifted him as though he weighed no more than a child. Then she turned and began to stride away through the snow, trailing that very mortal perfume behind her.
Tal rose to her feet, conscious again of the knife now tucked into her sleeve. When she glanced to her right and left she could see the more subdued darkness of Ceorlhold night bleeding back in, and realised that the Queen was going somewhere she would soon be unable to follow.
Tal was Narraine. She glanced at the sky only a moment longer before readily giving it up and giving chase, rushing full into the world of white.
For a while, Tal was able to follow the dark, dark trails of the Queen's hair and the blue flap of her skirts - the only shadows in these snows. But the storm was thick and eerie-silent, and soon Tal could not see even that.
The sound of the Queen's voice, still soothing and murmuring, led Tal on a little further then. She pursued it doggedly, and even drew close enough again to see the Queen in her shadows and colours again, kneeling on the ground to gently scoop snow over her half-buried knight's face.
Tal approached softly, ready to withdraw her knife and strike at the nearest chance. The Queen continued to scoop and pat down the snow over Tintauri until there was nothing but a mound of ice before her; then she trailed a long, white finger in an arc through the snow hiding his face, as if giving him back his smile.
By then Tal was only two yards away. The Queen rose, ice showering from her skirts, and then turned to look at Tal with her black, black winter-night eyes.
"Are you lost, child?" she whispered.
"Yes, your Majesty," said Tal. "Please, it's all white and I can't get home ..."
She folded her arms as if cold, taking hold of the dagger in her sleeve, and then lunged.
The world glared even more blindingly white, and hails of snowflakes blasted against Tal's skin, scouring like a sandstorm. Tal clenched her eyes shut, shielding her face and hunching down in the face of the screaming winds, half-expecting her hair to pull out at the roots and fly free.
Then the sudden wind died. Tal lifted her head and looked around, seeing nothing but snow - flat, featureless snow, and the colourless grey-white sky.
She wandered for a little while, but without much hope, and eventually stopped walking to settle down on her haunches, resting her tired muscles and coddling her empty belly. This had always been a possibility in the end. She had tried. The Divines would bear witness to that.
The cold was real, now; belatedly she realised that for some reason or another, she simply hadn’t felt it before. For a long time she sat in the snow and sheltered only in the comfort of her thoughts, feeling them burn lower and lower. Soon the courageous warriors of Narraine would lay siege to the Queen's castle of Ceorlhold. Her father would be there, and her brother, and whether the Divines granted them victory or defeat - let it be victory, roaring Brann! - the whole world would see that not every northern kingdom feared the winterknights. Perhaps another kingdom would see it too.
Her family would know, as well, that she had died bravely with them.
"I hope you're enjoying the Queen's mercy," said the voice of Sir Tintauri.
Tal opened her eyes with an effort, unaware of having closed them. The winterknight stood over her, watching her like a carrion crow, his wild hair even wilder in the cutting wind.
"She admires you," he said, crooked smile arching. "She feels it wouldn't be right to kill you. So here you are, happy and unharmed in the snow!"
"Do you demons never die?" asked Tal through numb lips.
"Not here," he replied.
He leaned in, grabbing a fistful of her collar, and hauled her to her feet.
"I knew you'd try to trick me," she said, staring unafraid into his face. "I only hoped you'd die as well."
"Did I trick you?" the knight replied, the crooked grin curling back for the first renewed laugh. "The Queen must have stepped into Ceorlhold to bring me here. It seems to me, not-quick-but-the-fastest, that you were just too slow."
"Do whatever you want," she threw back. "I'm the warrior daughter of a warrior. Nothing you do can take my honour from me - not you and not the worm Madaire. Divine Brann send my people victory!"
Tintauri laughed again, almost gaily, and linked his arm with hers, striding away across the endless snow. Tal blinked snowflakes from her lashes as she stumbled along, wondering if she still held the knife in her numb hand or not.
The blanched sky began to fade away, darkening to the real black of night, and Tal caught a whiff of soil and grass moments before the snow was simply gone. But the sights of Ceorlhold and the whispering rose garden brought her no relief.
"Here's what we're going to do," said Tintauri. "We're going to stop by the kitchen hearth until you can walk again. Then we're going to march down to the gates and say our tearful farewells. I'm afraid you just don't make a very good squire."
Tal turned her stiff neck so she could look at him, nothing but suspicion snarling in her gut. "I don't want to play with any of you any more. Just give me a knife and a moment with you - or Madaire."
"You're already holding a knife, my dear," he replied, confirming her hazy suspicion. "And no, that will come later, you see. We'll warm you up and send you back out to your family, and then at some point over the next few days there'll be a very large battle between our two forces. I expect you to be there."
"If you actually do as you're suggesting, then yes - there's no other place under the heavens I'll be."
"Good," he said. "I'll be looking for you. Don't get yourself killed before then."
She laughed a scornful laugh, glad it still came. "You really want to fight me again?"
"I do my best work without a knife in my chest," the winterknight smiled. "And to be honest, I rather prefer a sword anyway."
"What a happy coincidence," Tal replied. "So do I."
Tintauri laughed, definitely a delighted sound this time. He began to escort her to the keep on his arm, as if they were just knight and maid hastening to join the dance. "I've really become very fond of you these last few days, you know. I'm glad the Queen settled on her usual 'mercy'. Oh, and that reminds me - speaking of the Queen ..."
Suddenly pain blazed up in Tal's half-numb face, a hot, heavy pain, and when her senses returned she was on the ground again with blood still rushing from her broken nose.
The knight was kneeling next to her, fist still clenched on one knee, waiting for her to come to.
"I remember snow, night, no feeling, no thought - and then me," he said as her eyes opened, his light voice sinking deeper, and there was no trace of his laugh or his smile left even in his eyes: only winter, the endless white winter. "I won't kill you clean if you lift a hand to her again. I'll gut you and leave the crows and flies to eat you hollow. And then, when the maggots have swollen your belly, I'll raise your corpse and let you scrape them all out."
"Help me up and let me tell you what I'm going to do to you as we walk," croaked Tal, spitting some of the blood that had trickled into her mouth. "My idea's got more broken glass in it than flies."
It hung there for a moment.
"Do tell," Tintauri replied at last, crooked smile returning. He stood up again, bowing in courtly invitation, and then pulled her up as well, offering his arm once more for the last of the cold walk to Ceorlhold's keep.