Oath and the Measure (8 page)

Boniface stretched back on the cot, linking his hands behind his head.

“Usually,” said Sturm.

“I remember those hunts,” Boniface continued. “The smell of woodsmoke on cold mornings like this, when we would ride after the boar. I remember best the winter of Lord Grim.”

“Lord Grim, sir?” Sturm asked. Despite his love for Solamnic history and lore, he remembered no Knight named Grim.

Boniface snorted. “A boar. Grim was a great-tusked boar who eluded the best of us in that winter of three seventeen, when your father and I were seventeen ourselves and ready for anything except that pig. Lord Grim lost us in the mountains, in the foothills, in the level, snow-covered plains where you could track for days.

“The Yuletide passed, and still we could not catch him. It was not until midwinter when we brought him to ground, not far from here, in the Wings of Habbakuk. I remember the day well. The hunt. The kill. But mostly what happened afterward.”

Sturm set down the greaves carefully, his gaze locked on his father’s old friend. Boniface closed his eyes and was silent so long that Sturm was afraid the Knight had fallen asleep. But then Lord Boniface spoke, and Sturm followed him into the story. It became twenty-five years ago and far south of the Tower.

“Lord Agion Pathwarden led us into the foothills. Your cousin. As burly a Pathwarden as ever arose from that now-vanished line. Named for a centaur friend of his eccentric
father, Agion was. Your grandfather’s best friend, and a great brawler, and many was the time that the two of them came to blows, scuffled cleanly, and parted friends. Like his namesake, Agion seemed half horse, a big man in the saddle, charging like the south wind over the slopes and inclines of the Wings.

“We had caught the trail right after dawn, the thick-necked alan dogs, our best hunting beasts, caterwauling at the mere smell of Grim and racing through the rocks like water rushing uphill, fanning wide and converging, pouring through a narrow pass into a stand of scrubby aeterna where the boar was waiting. It was all the huntsmen could do to restrain the pack. They bayed and bellowed and swirled around that narrow copse of evergreen. Grim was in there, everybody knew, but each of us was … reluctant to go in and greet him first.”

Sturm nodded and shuddered, having survived his first boar hunt back in the fall.

“Finally four of us dismounted and entered the copse on foot: Agion and Emelin and your father and I. Angriff and I were along as squires, more or less. We were supposed to hold the spears, stand our ground and be silent. But Angriff wasn’t the sort. When Agion crashed through the brush and chased the boar from cover, your father was on it like a panther, quick and menacing, striking the beast once, twice, a third time with spears. Grim was old and thick of hide, and your father’s casts were those of a youth—swift and accurate, but lacking the muscle to pierce through gristle and bone.”

“So it simply enraged the boar,” Sturm observed, and Boniface nodded.

“Grim charged at Agion, who turned, ran, and scrambled out of the way through a thick aeterna, the boar skidding and stirring gravel just a step behind him. Meanwhile, your grandfather circled about the creature and waited for the chance at the delivering cast.

“That chance did not come, because Angriff was impatient.
Through the brush he rousted old Grim, and time and again I lost him in the mist and the thicket. Finally I heard a shuffling, a cough, and I stumbled around a thick latticework of branches … and found myself face-to-face with old Grim himself.”

Boniface paused. He stood and began to pace the room as Sturm held his breath, listening.

“He was as shaggy as the bison of Kiri-Jolith, dripping with dew and mud and half-hidden in mist and evergreen. He looked like something from the legends, out of the Age of Dreams and the bardic tales. I remember thinking, right before he charged, that if Nature were to take on flesh and form, it would be this beast before me, in its unruliness and terror and its strange hideous indifference.”

Again the Knight paused, his hands clenching, grasping the air as though he were trying to clutch something or push something away.

“He … charged you, Lord Boniface?” Sturm asked finally. “The great boar charged you?”

Boniface nodded. “Had my sword out in a flash. But I never used it.”

A strange shadow passed over the Knight’s face. Sturm waited expectantly, sure that the man was remembering that moment, the horrible charge of the boar.

“I never used it,” Boniface repeated. “Angriff’s spear passed neatly between Grim’s shoulder blades, and the boar staggered and rose and staggered again. Believe me, I was well out of the way by the second stagger, but I saw it all unfold—your grandfather and Agion burst into the clearing, and Lord Emelin’s sword flashed silver in the winter sunlight as the blade rose and came slashing home.

“For a while, we all stood there above the boar. The alans were baying somewhere outside the circle of trees, so distant in our thoughts that it sounded like we were only remembering them.

“Then Lord Agion spoke. ‘A fitting end to our adversary,’ he said. To Lord Grim, whose trophy shall grace the hall of
Lord Emelin Brightblade, his slayer.’

“Your grandfather smiled and nodded, but your father stood pale and too quiet, and at that moment, I knew that something between them was about to unravel, perhaps beyond repair. ‘But, Lord Agion,’ Angriff protested, stepping into the matter as brashly and foolishly as he stepped into each hunt, each tournament. ‘I expect that the history will show that I cast the first and telling spear.’

“ ‘Nonsense,’ Lord Emelin protested. ‘My sword struck the boar, and it died. There is no more to say in the matter.’

“Indeed there
was
no more to say. But I could see Angriff start to say it, nonetheless. He began to answer back and defend his honor. But Lord Emelin would have none of it.”

Lord Boniface paused and regarded the lad before him. Sturm gaped at him, his fists doubled. Imagine the injustice of Lord Emelin! Sturm thought angrily. Why, ’tis against the Code and Measure entirely!

“Not at all, Sturm Brightblade,” Lord Boniface corrected, as though he was reading the younger man’s thoughts. “The rules of the hunt are simple, as simple as Lord Emelin set them forth that morning in the Wings of Habbakuk. Angriff, though, was livid. There was something in this, he felt, that passed beyond rule and protocol, but rule and protocol said that the rest was silence. He withdrew his spear …”

Boniface paused and shook his head, a little sadly.

“And I sheathed my sword, and we mounted our horses. I watched my friend ride and fume,” he maintained, “from the Virkhus Hills back to Castle Brightblade. As mute as a sheep before the shearer, he was, and he spoke not a word that afternoon and into the evening. For you see, defiance of one’s father was more against the Code and Measure than anything Lord Emelin had done by the rules in the clearing.

“Agion teased young Angriff all the way back to Castle Brightblade, calling him ‘bush-beater’ and ‘lyam-hound’ and ‘alan,’ as though the lad’s part in the hunt were simply
locating the beast. Angriff stewed further, and still he was silent. But I knew we had not seen the end of the matter.

“It was at the banquet that night for Lord Emelin’s triumph. All the principal families were there—the MarKenins, the Jeoffreys, the Celestes—and the talk was of hunt and ceremony.

“When dinner had been served and the guests had settled into the lull of food and wine, Angriff approached his father’s seat. Agion, at the left of Lord Emelin, snorted as the lad approached and said, far too audibly, ‘here comes the boy to ask for the hound’s share.’ ”

Sturm gasped. At the hunt, when the beast was skinned and cleaned, the entrails, the hooves, and all indelicate parts were left for the hounds. Agion’s words had not only been insulting, but they were also downright cruel.

“Emelin turned to Agion and said something sharp but inaudible,” Boniface said, “but Angriff seemed to pay the big lout no mind. He stood silently before his father until Lord Emelin looked up from the exchange with his cousin. Then Angriff began, his speech soft and mild and overprepared, but as urgent as any words spoken in Castle Brightblade before or since.

“ ‘My Lord Father knows,’ he said, ‘that sometimes the Measure and true justice are at odds. He knows also that, regardless of sword and stroke of grace, my spear dealt Lord Grim the mortal blow.’

“It was stilted and awkward, but it made its point. A murmur spread through the room, and Lord Emelin stood up angrily.

“ ‘Are you saying, Angriff,’ he asked, ‘that your father … that
I
have … 
stolen
your kill?’

“ ‘
Stolen
is not my word for it,’ Angriff replied, his own anger bursting through the calm and politeness. ‘I prefer
seized
.’

“It was then that Lord Emelin reached over the table and slapped his son.”

“Slapped him?” Sturm asked, his voice rising in outrage.
“Among his fellows at a formal banquet? Why … there is no … no …”

“No answer to such indignity,” Boniface replied calmly. “It would seem not. Yet Emelin had overstepped all bounds, had crossed the Measure’s decree that ‘though honor takes all shapes and forms, the father must honor the son as the son the father.’ To strike his father back would be unthinkable, as would words harsh enough to answer the insult. Nor could he stand there and accept the blow and maintain his honor as a man.

“Emelin blushed in the aftermath. He knew he had overstepped, but he couldn’t take back the gesture. It would seem that Angriff had no recourse. But listen.

“He stood in front of his father in a smoldering rage, the imprint of old Emelin’s hand still pink and flushed on his smooth jaw. Then Angriff turned deliberately and crashed his fist straight into the bridge of Agion’s nose.

“It was like the sound of a large limb cracking in a high wind. Agion went over backward and heavily, crashing to the floor, where he lay unconscious, awakening after a good half-hour, babbling about stockings and rhubarb pie.”

“My father hit
Agion!
” Sturm exclaimed, shocked and delighted. “But why? And … and …”

“Listen,” Boniface said with a smile. “For what your father said was this: ‘Present this to my father the next time you wrangle. It will be as much my blow to him as his was to Lord Grim.’ ”

Sturm shook his head admiringly. “How did he think of it, Lord Boniface? How did he think of it?”

Boniface opened the bag at his feet and slowly, with some effort, drew forth the breastplate and shield. “It was his way to think of things, Sturm. He thought to leave these with me … to give you when the time arrived.”

Breathlessly Sturm reached out for the shield.

“I am bound by Oath to give you these,” Boniface announced cryptically. “But this sword is … 
my
gift.”

He offered the broadsword lying in his lap. “Your father,
it seems, took the Bright Blade with him or hid it somewhere beyond even the knowledge and eyes of his friends. But Angriff Brightblade’s son
deserves
a sword the likes of which I am giving you.”

He extended the weapon hilt first. It glowed obscurely in the lamplight of Sturm’s quarters.

“Make it your own,” Boniface announced mysteriously. “It is bright and double-edged.”

Boniface left Sturm with the sword resting on his knees. For an hour, or perhaps two, the lad polished the weapon. He could see himself in the gleaming blade, the reflection of his face distorted and foxlike on the angular edges of the armor. When Lord Gunthar Uth Wistan stepped into the room, Sturm scarcely heard him.

“You must be more alert in the Southern Darkwoods,” the High Justice observed as the startled lad leapt to his feet, the sword falling from his lap and clattering against the stone floor of the chamber.

“I was … I …”

Lord Gunthar ignored the lad’s stammer and seated himself with a rattle and clanking of mail. Carefully he set down the package he carried—a heavy, cumbersome thing wrapped in a blanket. Sturm marveled that the man was walking the halls of the Tower in full battle dress. One would think that the High Clerist’s Tower were under siege.

Now Gunthar extended his gauntleted hand, within which lay a fresh green cluster of leaves. “Do you know them?” he asked curtly.

Sturm shook his head.

“Calvian oak,” the Knight explained laconically. “You remember the old saying?”

Sturm nodded. He knew rhymes and lore far better than leaves and trees. “ ‘Last to green and last to fall,’ sir. Or so they say down in Solace.”

“They say the same up here,” Gunthar acknowledged. “Which is why it’s so odd that I carry these leaves in winter, don’t you think?”

He regarded Sturm with a calm, unreadable stare.

“I’m supposed to be going,” the lad stated, crouching and picking up the sword. “That’s what it means.” The room seemed warm about him, and faintly through the window, the smell of flowers reached him on the back of a southeasterly breeze.