Charles of France had been delighted with the idea of presiding over a chivalrous contest upon this field of war since the moment he heard of the scheme. As they took their places, Marguerite discovered that Charles was delighted with the duchess too: her dark eyes and ravishing mouth and the moon-white thread of the unicorn’s mane. Seated in his great chair, Charles said, to eager nods from the young men of his household, “No wonder the unicorn liked her. I think I will like her, when we are married. Such a bosom!”
“As you say,” said Marguerite. “All the more reason to wed her quickly.”
“Straightaway,” said Charles.
Marguerite was pleased, and had her mouth open to say so.
“As soon as we have come home with the unicorn’s horn,” added Charles, and Marguerite ground her teeth. She was frantic to get out of Brittany, to go home, to see her husband, her baby daughter. Even now, when she closed her eyes, she had visions of that red-walled chapel and Moreau’s eyes, hardly seeing her, snatching at her instead, full of desperate defiance, forgetting entirely who she was. Her body was bruised, her pride outraged, her heart afraid. She should have had him dragged off and killed.
But she had not. He was indispensable to this most vital scheme, and if she tried to have him killed and failed, what was to stop him coming to her again in secret, dragging her back into the wild unseen places of the world, to be lost to all her kin?
She had dreamed of power, of the glory she’d lost when Charles was crowned. But, dazzled, she had forgotten that this power was not really hers.
Forgotten how the chronicles said the Lost Lands drove men mad.
The crowd stretched upon the field in every direction, making a noise to fright the birds to silence. French infantry and washerwomen and camp-followers mingled with the street-sweepers and pasty-sellers of Rennes, with the rich tradesmen, the burghers, the diviners and prelates sweating in the stands. They trampled the green below to mud and called to their friends.
And why would they not revel, Marguerite thought. They thought that the king and the duchess had decided to replace the real war with this spectacle, and then the siege would be over.
Poor fools.
Banners bearing the golden hedgehogs of the duke of Orléans drooped in the hot sun beside Anne’s snowy ermines. The brother, Avaugour, was wearing his black ermines and sea-serpents; he had some lady’s scarf trailing from his lance, and his frog-head helmet was topped by a perfect explosion of dyed plumes. The Bretons cheered him. Marguerite rested indifferent eyes on the spectacle, wished fleetingly that this was to be an ordinary joust, with the usual sweaty, boastful feast to follow.
In the midst of all the hubbub was the great tilt, the barrier that kept the jousters apart, made of light wood wrapped in bright ribbons. The knights paraded, saluted their sovereigns, and then the first contestants took their places in the lists.
Henri broke a lance upon the Bastard of Foix, and Louis of Orléans unhorsed his kinsman Edmond of Amboise, to screams from all the watchers. The common people delighted in watching the men who governed them roll in the dust for their entertainment. Louis saluted Anne as he rode away, and Anne nodded back with dignity, telling herself she was merely flushed from the sun. She began to think that no disaster would attend this tourney at all.
Then a knight on the Breton side took his place in the lists.
A man she did not know.
And this time the herald was silent, for this man had no banner, no device. His destrier was spectacular. Big, hard bones under rolling muscle; deep chest, short back, straight legs that made light of their own caparison. A heroic sight.
Except that this knight rode in a different daylight.
The sky overhead was puffed with dry cloud, yet rainwater gathered in dimpled drops upon the etched surface of his breastplate and ran like tears down the metal, from helm to gorget to the barding of his horse. The crowd began to whisper.
The herald did not speak.
The knight’s visor was down. His destrier stamped once, and all saw the raindrops fly. There was a flash along his armor, as though reflecting unseen lightning.
Anaon,the Bretons had begun to murmur to each other.Anaon.There was fear on their faces. What purpose did this presence serve? On her side? What was Moreau’s game? To make her people afraid of their own knights?
Well, that could be remedied.
“I suppose you have come to joust for us, fair ghost,” said Anne to the stranger, hiding her own fear. “And to deliver us from enemies.”
The knight bowed in silence.
As Anne had hoped, a cheer, first tentative, then stronger, rose from the Breton side.Ours has always been a haunted land,the Bretons murmured to one another.Why shouldn’t the anaon come in a time of need?
The French knight at the other end of the lists hesitated. But finally he set spurs to his horse and so did the stranger and they ran at each other, lances braced tight to their armor, horses flying.
Just as they were about to collide, the light shifted, and the stranger-knight’s horse galloped into nothing and vanished.
The French horse recoiled, jibbed, sent his rider to the ground, rolling, as the horse bolted. The crowd was on their feet, the Bretons cheering, the French shouting foul.
Squires carried the dazed French knight off the field. A shadowcame over the sun. Chills raced over Anne’s arms. Suddenly the whole world felt like something that had been sliced in half and stitched together wrongly.
