The Medievals 1, page 10
part #1 of The Medievals Series
He grows closer.
Until he stops right in front of Wendolyn, his silver face reflecting the light that cascades through the giant trees.
He stands there in front of her for a long moment, until Wendolyn can no longer suffer in the tormenting silence of the steel.
“What do you want from me?!” Wendolyn yells at the cloaked figure.
But there is no response.
{Richard}
The harsh, crusted voices of the White Hairs carom off the stone walls of the Council Room. They are arguing as to what should be done about the missing girl.
Richard has never seen such urgency and concern among the King’s Council, tempers flaring like the torches that light the room at this late hour. They point fingers and yell, each seeming to believe that the loudest voice is the most sensible.
All the while, Richard stands at the back of the room, not wanting to add his voice to the din of disagreement.
“Enough!” Richard’s father shouts, presiding from his seat at the head of the ancient clawfoot table that spans the room, his voice booming over the dozen members of his council, silencing them.
Richard is reminded of his father’s roar that echoed over the Nine Territories and then beyond as they stood on that ledge near the top of Mount Saurian.
With the room silent, Richard’s father finds his measured tone and continues: “If this Descendant knows where the Sorcerer’s Staff is hidden, then there is no time to waste.”
The Sorcerer’s Staff.
In the final passages of the scroll that Richard read in the Scriptorium, the Sorcerer of Light revealed that he had buried his indestructible staff, fearing that it would fall into the wrong hands. For three hundred years the staff has remained hidden. And the only souls with the knowledge of where the staff now survives are his descendants.
As Richard stood in the fading light of the Scriptorium earlier that evening, his mind trying to make sense of the scroll, he asked his father why King Avedon had banished magic.
“Separating the Kingdom from its magical past was the only way to ensure that the people of the Realm could be safe," his father answered. "King Avedon believed that if magic survived inside the walls of the Realm, mankind would bring about its own destruction with access to such power. And so our ancestors erected the Northern Barrier. And only the most trusted few were given the knowledge of Merlin’s staff, with each ensuing King sharing that knowledge with his Council.”
Even after reading Merlin’s scroll and hearing his father’s words, Richard remains skeptical about this revised history. And he is uncertain about the truth. Fact and fiction seem to be intermingling in his thoughts, and Richard is unable to distinguish between the two.
How could it be real? That all this time, magic has lived in the shadows, allowing for pieces of Merlin’s history to be hidden.
But it is certainly real to his father and to the White Hairs in this room. Their heated debate and worried faces bespeak an existential threat.
Constable Clyburn clears his throat to speak: “Your Highness, I will assemble the knights of the King’s Lead Guard and we will leave before dawn breaks.”
The Constable is an imposing man, his jaw the shape of a lantern, his body not weakened by his growing years. In fact, the only indication of his age is his sweep of silver hair and his white bushy eyebrows that remind Richard of thick caterpillars.
Outside of Richard’s father, the Constable is considered the highest ranking official in the kingdom. And Richard has never seen him out of his uniform. He is a serious man who rightfully expects people to take him seriously.
“And go where? We do not know where her captors have taken her,” argues Borin, the eldest among the White Hairs, his dark skin like mud that has dried and cracked.
Constable Clyburn responds, a tinge of indignation in his voice after hearing his plan countered: “Then we will knock on every door in the Realm until we find someone who has.”
Borin shakes his head: “That will only spread fear. We are not even certain if there is fire in this flint.”
“The threat is real!” Out of the corner of his eye, Richard sees one of the robed White Hairs rise up out of his chair as he shouts.
It is Vladeen, a man whose eyes are pink, and whose skin does not hide blood and bone in the same manner as most men. As a young boy, Richard was scared of the man’s unusual appearance. Richard’s friends used to say that Vladeen is a member of the Pales, a group of albinos rumored to have migrated from the Cloudlands long ago.
Vladeen looks to the King, asking, “How much longer can we bury our heads in the earth? For years I have warned that evil grows beyond our borders and we act as though, if we close our eyes, it will not come for us. We built a wall pretending that it might protect us from the unspeakable monsters that live in the Beyond. But it was only a matter of time before those monsters awoke.”
Borin laughs. It is the laugh of an old man, one that mixes with a cough and then trails off into a growl. “Yes, but Merlin’s staff? I do not doubt the credibility of the scroll, but surely the staff was lost to the soil centuries ago. Merlin is now just a story we tell our children to fill their dreams. Besides, why is this our conflict? Leave it to the Caemon and the Shen if there are any left out there.”
“If the staff exists and falls into the wrong hands, those dreams you speak of fast become nightmares,” Vladeen warns. “We must find this girl before she reveals where the staff is hidden, or we may be facing an evil that will have the power to turn the entire Realm into an empty husk. My King, the cost of doing nothing is too great.”
A dark cloud settles over the room with Vladeen’s ominous warning. Vladeen’s use of the word husk makes Richard think of the delicate shell that the insect left behind on his windowsill, which he then kept. Within that shell, there was once a fluttering life. What would the shell of a lifeless Realm look like?
The King considers Vladeen’s words before turning to Master Cheng, who has been sitting quietly beside him. “What judgement do you offer?”
As ever, Master Cheng is patient and thoughtful in his response, his words coming slowly as his hand runs through his topknot. “The Caemon gave his last breath to us as he appealed to this kingdom for help. I do not believe we can forsake him,” Master Cheng opines.
Richard’s father nods his head in agreement.
“Then it is settled. We will send a search party,” the King says to the White Hairs. “But we must do so discreetly. We do not want to give rise to questions from the people, nor alert the enemy that we are coming. We should consider a small yet highly skilled cohort to search for the girl.”
“And who will lead this search party?” asks Borin.
Borin’s question prompts an unexpected prickle of excitement on Richard’s flesh, the hair on his arms rising.
Leaders are not measured by rank, but by deeds.
Master Cheng’s earlier words suddenly ring with intense volume in Richard’s mind, and he envisions himself on a great quest for the girl, a quest that will become the story people will tell about him for years to come. This is where my story begins, he thinks.
Then, before Richard can confer with his own mouth, he calls out. “I will!"
The words seem to fly up out of Richard’s chest with a conviction he has never felt before this moment. It is as if the words are being pulled from his mouth by a force greater than him. The stars themselves are encouraging Richard.
All eyes turn toward him.
For a moment, there is silence. An unbearable silence.
Richard has never spoken at a meeting of the King’s Council. While he is permitted, and his father has even requested he do so on occasion, Richard has always chosen to be an observer.
“You?” Constable Clyburn asks, his doubt knifing into the silence. “A beardless boy with a stainless voice?”
The White Hairs nod or give voice to their agreement with Clyburn’s estimation of Richard. Judging by their faces, they are all of the same mind. Amid the incredulous grunts, Richard even thinks he hears “Poet Prince” uttered anonymously.
A boy of words, not actions.
Richard has always felt the White Hairs concluded long ago that the Prince is not a suitable heir to the throne. The White Hairs see his position in the kingdom as an accident of fortune, that Richard does not measure up to his father’s broad shoulders and leonine features. It is as if something was let slip between the King’s cup and the Prince’s lips.
But now, Richard could have the opportunity to prove his true worth by leading the search for the Descendant.
“Clyburn, you forget your place,” the King says, upbraiding the Constable. “Richard is your future King, and you will address him accordingly.”
Clyburn bows his head deferentially to the King, then turns to Richard: “My apologies, Your Grace. I meant no offense. It will not happen again.”
Richard nods to Clyburn and then makes a slight wave with the back of his hand, attempting to mimic a gesture of forgiveness that he has seen his father do in the past.
Richard’s confidence is buoyed by his father so quickly coming to his defense. And this small victory swells Richard’s chest.
But as quickly as his spirits are lifted, he is once again made to feel the weight of his self-doubt as his father turns to Richard and says, “A prolonged absence by the Prince will only inspire questions among the people. Richard, you will remain at my side as we assemble a team.”
Richard sinks, his opportunity to prove himself gone.
Borin addresses the King. “The question then remains: Who will lead the search?”
“I have a man in mind,” the King says.
“One of your knights, I dare say?” Clyburn surmises.
Richard’s father ponders a moment, seemingly deciding how much he wishes to reveal just yet. “Yes. But a knight of years past.”
◆◆◆
The Constable knocks on the bruised door to what Richard can only call a hovel, a place that appears abandoned to the fists and whims of the weather.
Richard and his father have traveled to Rodina, a half-day’s ride from the castle, along with Master Cheng, Constable Clyburn and several men from the Lead Guard. They traveled in disguise along their northeasterly course to reach this remote house, which looks tired and lonely to Richard, no other neighboring dwellings in sight.
Richard’s father believes that this is the home of the man he seeks -- the man that will lead the search for the Descendant. But Richard cannot imagine that anyone capable of leading such a mission would be found in this tumbledown shack on the outskirts of Rodina.
The knock on the door goes unanswered, and the Constable looks to the King.
“Knock again,” the King instructs. “He is in there.”
As the Constable lifts his clenched fist to knock again, a gruff voice shouts from inside the house: “Go away!”
“This is the King’s Constable, and you are hereby ordered to open this door!” the Constable shouts back.
A long moment of silence passes with no response from within. The Constable looks to his men.
“Break down the door,” he instructs.
The King shakes his head, and with a wave of his hand says, “That will not be necessary.”
Then, Richard’s father moves to the door and says, “This is the King. I am asking you to open this door so that I may speak to you about an urgent matter.”
Another moment of silence passes before Richard hears the clink of a lock being unlatched from within.
Then, the old, rotting door slowly opens to reveal a hirsute man standing in the half-light of the doorway. There is something familiar in the man’s face that hides behind a thick beard. But try as he might, Richard cannot find the name of this man in his memory.
His father referred to this man as a knight from years past, but Richard finds this hard to fathom. Granted, his body is built like a warrior, his arms and chest thick with strength; but he has the dress and appearance of a vagabond.
The man has a dirty red beard that creeps up his face to just beneath his eyes, where a patch covers his right one. Meanwhile, his exposed eye is bloodshot, as if he has never known sleep. And his crimson hair is matted, run-through with streaks of gray, with much of it hiding beneath a bear pelt.
At his chest, there is a small bovid horn on a lanyard, capped off at the end. Richard has seen men from the villages use such horns to hold their mead or spirits.
“May we enter?” his father asks, gesturing beyond the man to the dark room behind him, a room that looks as if a storm was loosed upon it.
The man flares his nostrils, like a hunter trying to catch a scent.
“I will not invite you into my home, and this should be no surprise to you,” the man says, a coating of resentment around his words. Then, before the Constable can protest, the man adds: “But I will not stop you from entering, either.”
The King nods, and then moves past the man, whose shoulders are broader than those of Richard’s father. The man allows the King and the others to pass through the doorway.
“Master Cheng,” the man says with a slight bow, greeting the Prince’s tutor without the same hostility seemingly earned by Richard’s father. And in return, Master Cheng also offers a slight bow.
Richard continues to follow his father, entering into the unlighted home, which could only generously be described as humble. The only adornments to the walls are the heads of animals, presumably caught and stuffed by this man, with antlers and tusks protruding from the frozen beasts.
Richard’s father takes in the room, and then turns back to the man, still standing in the doorway.
“Shall we sit?” the King asks the man.
“I will stand.” The man’s voice is rough and low in pitch.
Richard is surprised by his lack of deference for the King. If his father registers the disrespect, he does not show it. However, Clyburn, still standing behind the man, addresses the impertinence.
“You will heed the request of your King,” the Constable says.
Clyburn places a hand on the man’s shoulder, prompting him to move further into the room. But the man simply flares his nostrils again and growls lowly. On instinct, Richard takes a subtle step backward, his back finding the wall.
“Constable, we are guests in this man’s home and he may stand if he wishes,” the King says to Clyburn, who nods to Richard’s father and then drops his hand from the man’s shoulder. Then, the King adds, “Now, kindly leave us.”
“Your Highness?” Clyburn is clearly reluctant to leave the King alone with this man. His look is telling: This is a mistake. But Clyburn will not voice this concern, especially after being chided by the King in the Council Room yesterday in the presence of the other White Hairs.
“Ivanhoe and I will be fine, Constable. A conversation between old friends, that is all,” the King assures Clyburn.
As the Constable bows and exits the darkened home, with Master Cheng and the guards also leaving, Richard wonders if he heard his father correctly.
Ivanhoe.
Richard’s memory snaps to the young knight fighting in the King’s Arena, his skills inspiring applause. He remembers the knight’s clean jaw; his reputation shaped by battle. To the younger Richard, virtue was shining from Sir Ivanhoe like sunlight.
It is not possible, Richard thinks. This could not be Ivanhoe. The man standing before him now in this hovel could not be the hero of his youth, and he is a far cry from the man whose face is rendered in marble and sits along the outer edge of the Throne Room with the other legends of the Realm.
This is not a man whose lips have ever borne a smile; or whose glistening sword has ever captured the favor of the King. And he is certainly not the same man that tousled Richard’s hair with a victorious wink.
If eyes reveal the soul, then Sir Ivanhoe had a soul filled with light. But this man’s wild eye -- the only one that Richard can see -- reveals something dark and curdled.
“Ivanhoe, it has been too long between conversations,” Richard’s father begins.
“Our last conversation did not leave me eager for the next,” Ivanhoe says, not making eye contact with the King.
Richard senses an anger churning beneath Ivanhoe’s voice. A dangerous anger. And Ivanhoe’s lips have the slight quiver of an animal that has been kept from its feed for too long.
“What happened back then…” his father stops at the edge of his thought. Then, he seems to pivot. “I did all that I could.”
Richard presses his mind, trying to remember what did happen. What broke the bond between these two men, once the closest of allies?
“The hell you did,” Ivanhoe says, the anger in his voice rising, his eyes still refusing to find his father’s regard.
“Be careful of your tone, old friend,” his father warns. “You were burned by your own match once before. Do not let it happen again.”
The man replies with a grunt of contempt for Richard’s father. “I kept the devils away for you. Where were you when the devils came for me?”
“Ivanhoe, you deserted my men. You deserted your men,” the King says. “You should be in prison.”
“Not every prison has walls,” Ivanhoe responds, sounding like a man that lives his life only in the darkest part of night.
“Whatever you have believed all these years, however you have tortured yourself, I showed you compassion,” the King tries to convince Ivanhoe.
“Is that why you have come here? So I could praise you for your mercy?”
“No,” the King says. “There is a girl. She has value beyond common understanding. She has been kidnapped, and I need you to find her. I need your help, Ivanhoe.”
“I needed your help!” Ivanhoe snarls, his eyes finally finding the King’s look. “Where were you when they called me stark raving mad!? When they called me a murderer!?”
A murderer? Richard was only a young boy the last time he saw Ivanhoe, but he cannot believe that the hero he knew was guilty of such a charge.
