Galen Beknighted

Chapter IV

The servants had gathered at a distance outside my quarters. As I opened the window to let in the muffled light, I saw them down below in the courtyard, huddled together, murmuring, exchanging something.

It was later I found that Raphael had listened at my door for a good while, ear pressed against the wood, overhearing my claim of visions. Quite naturally, he had gone to his friends among the servants, bearing this new intelligence.

So the something exchanged was money. It seemed that a sizable wager had grown about the subject of my sanity. "Climbing the Cat Tower" was the servants' term for it, for those unsettling moments in family history when one di Caela or another would burst free of sanity and provoke castle gossip for the next generation or so.

The Cat Tower in question had to do with Sir Robert's Aunt Mariel, who had locked herself away in the tall southeast tower of Castle di Caela, holding everything at remove-responsibility, nourishment, hygiene, and as it turned out, the care of her pets.

She was stalked and eaten by her own cats after all of them had stayed a month together in the topmost room of the tower.

It was rumored in the servant quarters that the Lady Mariel's obvious madness was hereditary. That I was family by adoption made only little difference to the speculators, who, I understand, carried on a running wager as to which of us-Sir Robert, Bayard, Enid, Dannelle, or myself- would first stray from orbit.

To many of them that morning, it must have looked like a time to call in bets. I stood by the window as the milling and murmuring subsided, and looking down upon those assembled, I mustered all the solemnity of my newfound knighthood, crossed my eyes, stuck a finger in each side of my mouth, pulled my lips wide, and throttled my tongue at them.

I stepped back into my chambers, satisfied that behind and below me, more silver was no doubt flashing, more wagers being struck.

I stood on the battlements looking westward, the long shadows of the castle walls diminishing slowly as the sun rose behind me. Below, the farmlands of Solamnia shone green and gold.

There was noise and altercation somewhere in the courtyard. Apparently Sir Robert di Caela had chosen to discipline his niece Dannelle, who in return had chosen not to be disciplined. What had started as a mild disagreement, the nature of which I could not overhear, had risen in volume until it was ending in a series of elaborate southern curses involving poison and mothers and goblins and the entire Solamnic pantheon.

Where I had come from, family disputes generally ended in fisticuffs or breakage or glasses of Brithelm's lemonade. It had taken me a while to grow accustomed to the Solamnic bickering, though I had a talent for it myself.

For now, there was more serious business ahead of me. The image of Brithelm I had seen in the frieze, the knife-wielding hand at his throat, was a disturbing one. Indeed, the only good thing about such a vision was its plainness: The image of one's brother in mortal peril is hard to twist by interpreting into anything other than that one's brother is in mortal peril.

From as early as I could remember, Brithelm had a talent for rumbling into places where trouble had set up residence, yet he always managed to walk away without damages. Though the situation would collapse around him, he would be left standing, no more dazed and no more the worse for wear than when he had first found himself backed to the edge of disaster.

At first, some weeks back, when sentries reported that the foothills were glowing, it did not concern me at all. Even when refugee dwarves passed through Solamnia and, soon after, farmers around Castle di Caela began to complain of bears and panthers who had wandered out of the mountains and into their livestock… even then I did not worry all that much, resting assured that the wind would change or die down altogether, or that somehow before the fire touched a tangled hair of my brother's, rains or snow or something capable of extinguishing it would begin.

After all, when it came right down to it, refugee dwarves and complaining farmers were both common fare in this place and these times.

Still the fires persisted. My disquiet grew as the flames rose higher. Given the nature of my brother's encampment-the half-dozen wooden houses, the tents, and the lean-tos-fire was certainly a dire threat.

The omen that had invaded the ceremony of my knighthood resolved matters for me. As soon as possible, I was going to the Vingaard Mountains in search of my middle brother. Of course, it was something I had to discuss with Bayard.

Which was what had brought me to the battlements this morning. Bayard, dressed in the armor he had worn to last night's occasion, leaned against the crenellated wall as I approached him.

He looked westward, toward the foothills of the misty Vingaards. From a distance, he looked like the same Bayard who had hired me on as a squire three years ago-the mustache a little longer, perhaps, and the brown hair flecked with its first gray.

It took a closer look to see the difference. There are some Knights who are not fit for settled circumstances, and there had been something restless, something almost pent up about my old friend in recent months, as though he lay under house arrest in a castle of women and old men.

"Looking for omens?" I joked as I joined him at his post.

"Oh, awaiting visions," he teased gently in return. "Awaiting those Plainsmen, who, I am told, inhabit mountains as easily as they do stones in a brooch."

I leaned against the wall beside him.

"You don't believe me, do you, Bayard?"

He turned toward me, his gray eyes direct and penetrating.

"To be honest, Galen, I am not sure what I believe. I had my own night of reflections after the ceremony, in which I took serious stock of my conduct, wondering if I had made a mistake to strongarm you into knighthood."

"And what… what did you decide, sir?"

"I'm not sure," Bayard answered. "Except perhaps that your armor is beginning to work."

"I beg your pardon?"

Bayard smiled cryptically.

"I had a hand in putting that armor on you, lad. I have backed myself into a corner of goodwill. Now I must at least act as though I trust you with visions.

"So," he proclaimed simply, his gloved hand set upon the pommel of his sword, "together we must go to find your brother."

I started to speak, to thank him, but Bayard wasn't finished.

"Now, don't try to weasel out of this, Galen."

I shrank away from him, stung, my old name rising like a relentless pursuer. Bayard continued, his voice rising with eagerness.

"Vision or no vision, neither of us will rest until this

Brithelm matter is settled. I think we could use some adventuring-time away from Castle di Caela. I could see being rid of my father-in-law for a few days, and Sir Ramiro of the Maw has rendered himself impossible to endure once more.

"You, of course, might enjoy being free of your… softer entanglements. At least until you know which favor to wear on your helmet."

Bayard winked solemnly. I grimaced, knowing he spoke of the business with Marigold.

"That is the sum of it. What we are short of around here is adventure, which is why, two days from now, bright and early in that wonderfully quiet time before sunrise, our adventure will begin. We shall leave Castle di Caela-a handful of knights, accompanied only by horses and squires-on our way to the Vingaard Mountains, where we shall see to the safety of your brother Brithelm.

"It will be like old times, Galen," he exclaimed almost jubilantly as I thought of the winds and the distant fires and the road that was steep and rocky and untamed. Somewhere out there, at the end of a journey that was only now beginning to unfold, my brother and my courage awaited me.

"I shall have my squire by that morning hour, Bayard Brightblade," I promised, in a voice so ceremonial and dramatic that I could barely find myself in it.

I extended my hand, and Bayard nodded.

"And I, Sir Galen, will have chosen our companions, if there be any."

We parted company after a traditional Solamnic handclasp, each descending the battlements to his separate disaster.

"Never wed with a drunkard," my grandmother said, "if you wish to reform her. For instead of reform, there will be two drunkards."

She also told me that when I decided to get married, I should look to the ugliest one of my prospective in-laws, for that would be how my bride would look twenty years hence.

It was advice born of bitterness and the marshes of Coastlund, of a world in which dire straits became more dire the longer you waited for them to improve.

Grandmama would have smiled to recognize the world of recruitments that Bayard and I faced once we descended the battlements.

No doubt Bayard believed that the mission at hand was an easy venture. Despite my bodings, we would find Brithelm and bring him back home. What he wanted, then, was good company along the way-good conversation, and no doubt someone up for a little hunting and hard riding.

Bayard politely asked Sir Brandon Rus to join us. That would have been good, for the most part. The young Knight, brilliantly promising, unmatched by any his age in skills or in resources or in downright physical courage, would have assured our safety against anything short of an army of ogres. Out in the hinterlands, there might be a chance to get him talking on something besides protocols and history, and maybe find out what it was that ate at the lad-why in the early morning hours at Castle di Caela the servants had heard him pacing the floor, as if despite all of the things in the world that did not frighten Sir Brandon Rus, something in his dreams or memory did.

Unfortunately, the young man begged off. He'd a quest of his own, he said, far to the east of here, past Neraka and Kernen. It was whispered that his journey would lead him to the Blood Sea of Istar, but Bayard, who had asked politely for Sir Brandon's company, was now polite enough not to ask his alternative destination.

It was disappointing to Bayard, but it came with the knightly territory. The world was filled with quests at that time-with quests and with the prospects of adventure. What Solamnic Knight, with the option of an eastward journey into dangerous country, would choose instead a sensible little search-and-rescue party in the foothills?

Ramiro of the Maw, evidently.

For the big Knight belched, wiped the crumbs from his beard, and volunteered at once, setting his blunt sword at the feet of Bayard Brightblade, promising allegiance and insight and a strong right arm for the duration of the journey ahead. Bayard coughed and stammered and tried politely to deflect Ramiro's attentions elsewhere, but he was too late and too courteous. By the time Bayard came up with reasons, Ramiro was packed and ready for the road ahead of us.

Ramiro's hearty enjoyment of food and wine and women had made him good company in Sir Robert's time-the delight of holidays and festivals and tournaments. In recent years, though, the wine and the food had taken their toll, and heartiness had turned to clumsiness and stupor. Ramiro had almost drowned in a barrel of sweet port last spring, and had not Gileandos, sneaking to the cellars for a nip himself, uncovered the barrel and the thrashing feet of the big knight, we would have spent our spring in funeral.

It was not, however, the first of the food-related mishaps. A year earlier, Ramiro had nearly choked to death when he swallowed a whole chicken at a banquet honoring the anniversary of Bayard Brightblade and Enid di Caela. I remember that one myself: Sir Robert and Sir Fernando staring warily at one another, each trying to gather the courage to place a hand down Ramiro's monstrous throat to retrieve the wedged bird. Finally, with the big Knight purpling on the floor of the Great Hall, Bayard rushed from his chair and gave Ramiro a well-placed kick in the stomach, dislodging the bird and sending it skittering into the elvish orchestra.

Those were the highlights, of course, of Ramiro's seasonal visits. But each time he came, the farmers complained all the more as their livestock dwindled, and the di Caela women, forewarned of his hefty arrival, packed up and moved to guarded guest quarters on the upper floors of the Cat Tower.

This time had been no different. Two nights before my ceremonies, Bayard had found the big Knight tangled in an enormous harness, suspended from the top of that same Cat Tower. Lowered by his laboring squire, Oliver, Ramiro had snagged himself in an ill-starred attempt to peek in on Dannelle di Caela at her bath. Bayard had been beside himself, but he fumed politely as Sir Robert explained away the conduct as "the energies of youth."

"There is a white-haired conspiracy about us," Bayard had whispered to me playfully, but one could tell that again he had begun to count the days until Ramiro's departure.

It was no wonder he was speechless when Ramiro decided to depart with us.

I, on the other hand, fared not much better.

Had efficient little Raphael been old enough, or even as big as he was efficient, my choice of squire would have been an easy one. Instead, he helped by introducing the candidates as I sat in my quarters granting audience to a dozen or so likely prospects culled from the Solamnic countryside.

You would be surprised how many unpromising younger sons of Knights will crawl from the woodwork when squire-hood is in the offing. I tried to be attentive, to be polite, but my options were almost unbearable.

I remember some of them well-occasionally the names, and even more occasionally the face that went with them. And yet they all blend together ultimately into one big teen-aged fool hell-bent on squirehood…

"Fabian, son of Sir Elazar!" Raphael announced.

The boy's enormous feet filled the room-each the size of my forearm. It was as though one of those bandits from down near the Ice Wall-those men who sailed from the mountains on long wooden skis to plunder wayfarers and caravans-had found himself, surprisingly and uncomfortably, indoors with the skis still on him. Clumsily he skirted the furniture, backing into chairs, once nearly capsizing my table with a sudden turn. All the while he pled his case, concluding with the rousing statement that he'd "do well for the Knight in question when it came to a tight spot, sir."

I looked up at Raphael, who snorted and rushed from the room.

"I shall keep these things in mind," I replied neutrally.

"Gismond, second son of Bantos of Kaolin," Raphael announced…

"No matter what the danger," the lad concluded, his good eye narrowed and twitching uncontrollably and his sword drawn, slashing menacingly near my hand upon the table, "I shall be quick with the sword and the dagger, gladly setting myself between you and the enemy warrior or the monster or the earthquake or fire or explosion."

"I find that reassuring, Gismond." I lied.

"Anatol of Lemish," Raphael announced.

"And you are the son of Sir Olvan?" I asked, fumbling through the papers in front of me.

"Yes, sir," the boy replied.

"Wait. It says here you're the son of Sir Katriel."

"Yes, sir."

"Well… which one, lad?"

"Yes, sir."

"Toland of Caergoth!" proclaimed Raphael.

"No matter what you have heard, sir," the boy began, striding into the room, "they were both dead when I found them."

Raphael and I stared at each other in alarm. I nodded, and he opened the door.

"Oliver of the Maw!"

"Why, Oliver! This is quite the surprise, seeing as-"

"Three years. I've been in Ramiro's service three years."

"And?"

"What with the lifting and lowering, the harnesses and pulleys, and draping him dead drunk over horseback and onto cots, I fear I've ruptured myself so many different times that…"

So it passed, until Raphael tired and the line of also-rans dwindled. I set down the papers, waved the page away, and lay on the cot. Pouring myself half a glass of wine, I took a short, relaxing sip and stared at the ceiling.

There was a knock at the door.

"Raphael, I haven't the time or the patience for another applicant. If you'd-"

"It's me, brother," a quite different voice replied.

"Alfric!" I said, sitting up on the bed. "Come in, please."

It was not the brother I remembered from my childhood in the moathouse or even from the early events of my squirehood-the blustering and bullying seemed to have gone right out of the fellow, and it was a quiet sort, bent and chastened, who seated himself in my chair and looked at me across the expanse of my chambers, disheveled and shy.

Once before, on battlements far from here in miles and in years, my brother and I had struck the terms of blackmail. At that time, it had been something silly: a simple boyish prank of mine, which Alfric's threats had magnified into the greatest disaster since the Cataclysm itself. I was only nine at the time, and gullible. I had believed my brother's dire bodings, and set myself at his beck and call for eight years- cleaning up after him, translating his Old Solamnic and Qualinesti, doing his mathematics, and taking blame for every enormity he managed at the moathouse or in the surrounding lands.

Eight years of such schooling had taught me caution.

My brother cleared his throat.

"Does this bring back memories, Galen?"

"I'm not sure what memories you have in mind, Brother dear," I dodged, alert to his most subtle movements through a long and sorry brotherhood. "Why is your hand on your dagger?"

Alfric uttered a surprised little laugh and raised his hands.

"I'm sorry, Weasel. I guess it's an old habit."

"Galen."

He frowned at me.

"From this day forth, I shall be known as Galen," I pronounced, then noticed how pompous and foolish and Solamnic the words sounded as they echoed sourly in the chamber.

Alfric nodded. "Whatever you like," he agreed. "I guess that's an old habit, too."

Alfric stared at his knees, then scowled at me.

"Father wants me to be a squire, no matter what it takes and who has to do it."

"And I appear to be what and who for the time being, since I'm expected to obey Father and gladly dangle a millstone around my neck for the next ten years or longer. I'm sorry, Alfric."

In a way, I was sorry, seeing as the Knight may not have been born yet who'd take my brother on as squire, and I might be a grandsire myself, gray and doddering, before he'd have another chance like this.

Slowly, his eyes fixed on his hands, my brother began to speak. Listening, I rose and walked toward the window.

"I expect I cannot blame you, Weas-Galen. No, I expect I cannot blame you at all, seeing as I have not been a good older brother and all."

It was hard to argue with him.

I opened the shutter. The thick air of the afternoon rolled into my quarters, bearing the smell of mud and of distant rain.

"So I cannot ask you as your brother, but for our father, Galen. On account of he sits up there in the moathouse and looks at my future, which he cannot figure out. He says it is a dark one, if there is any future at all.

"And I believe him."

My brother's head sank into his hands, and his shoulders heaved.

"But what's the real reason, Alfric?"

He looked up, expressionless and dry-eyed, a bit surprised that after a long absence I still knew his tricks.

"Why are you willing to be my squire and borrow trouble," I asked, "when you can inherit the old man's castle and spend the rest of your years squandering his patrimony?"

For the first time in years, my brother looked at me directly, with a gaze free of guile and meanness and malice and brutality. I almost failed to recognize him.

"Girls, Galen. I will become a squire to meet girls."

With a sinking feeling, I knew where the conversation was heading. Far better than his customary threats or blackmails, my brother had stumbled upon a ready way to squirehood-to appeal, simply and forthrightly, to my sense of the ridiculous.

"You see, the last of the serving girls left Coastlund a month before we came here. The peasants hid her… told me they'd rather die than tell me her whereabouts. The moathouse gets kind of lonely without women around. And I get to thinking… thinking, what would be more respectable than Knighthood, and all of them ladies like Enid and Dannelle and Marigold-"

With the last name, he shot me a sly look, then continued.

"With all of them flocking about you? So I think to myself, what is squirehood, anyway, but a time that you have to wait before the girls are a sure thing? And who would be easier on his own squire than my own brother?"

I looked out my window, over the wall into the bed of the huge moat Bayard had ordered dug around the castle to allay the pressure of the huge artesian well from which the castle drew its water. It was not yet completed, but the rain had half-filled it, and for a moment, I thought of jumping, of hitting the ground running and continuing to run to a country far away from ambitious fathers and philandering brothers and Marigolds of all sizes and stripes and appetites.

I suppose that land lies somewhere. Somewhere near the best of all worlds, no doubt.

The breeze picked up, warm from the west. There was the faintest hint of smoke upon it, like you might catch in the depth of winter from the chimneys in a town miles away, the whiff of dark evergreen and warmth taken up by the wind and passed your way by chance. But this was midsummer- terrible midsummer, with its morning heat and the dry days that promised to stay forever-and the smell of smoke at this time of year was the odor of unchecked fires.

To the west, the Vingaards rose out of a bed of dark smoke, as though they floated on the backs of thunderheads.

"Very well," I said, my words surprising me more than they did my brother. "Your squirehood begins this moment."