Blaze of Silver Read online

  Amal cleared his throat and looked around as if to beg everybody’s pardon for being a nuisance. “I am of no interest,” he began in his scratchy voice, “but the silver mare, ah! It is said that her father is the wind and her mother the evening tide. You can believe that if you will.” He clasped his hands together. “I have seen her race across the desert, a blaze of silver in the sand, and nothing could come near her. She won many prizes. Some say she is Allah’s own horse but we know only that after your King Richard stole her, she fell into strange hands and ended up in the bazaar where I found her and was told she belonged here. I had nothing else to do, so I brought her. That’s all I can say.” He looked at Kamil for support.

  “If the mare’s so wonderful, why did you not ride her to Hartslove?” asked Marissa, hoping to have found somebody worse at riding than herself.

  “The horse is not easy to ride,” Amal said simply, “and if the fastest horse in the world takes off with you, who knows where you might end up.”

  Everybody laughed except Marissa. “She’s not the fastest horse in the world,” she said, annoyed. “Hosanna is.”

  Will shook his head as Elric’s treble piped through. “Hosanna may be the best horse in the world, Marissa, but I doubt that he’s the fastest.”

  Marissa turned on him at once. “Don’t be so disloyal,” she said loudly, looking to Will for approval and support. “Hosanna has never been beaten!”

  “Don’t be silly.” Elric’s voice was taunting. “Nobody races Hosanna. He’s a warhorse. That’s the trouble with girls, they can’t tell one type of horse from another.”

  Now there was more laughter. Marissa’s face flamed at the humiliation.

  When supper was over, she cornered the boy. “You think you know everything,” she said, “well, you don’t. You upset Will by what you said.”

  “I did not,” said Elric, cocky in his small triumph. “Will did not mind me pointing out the truth.”

  “It’s not the truth—and he’s Earl William or ‘sir’ to you.”

  Elric was unabashed. “Well, anyhow, you’re never going to find out who’s faster.”

  “Why not?” Marissa was trembling with fury now. “Are you too frightened that I’ll be proved right?”

  “No,” said Elric slowly, as if speaking to an idiot, “but, as I said, warhorses don’t race.”

  “They could.”

  “No, they couldn’t. Who would ride them? Neither the earl nor Kamil, because they would know it wasn’t right. You can only race with racing horses.” Elric tried to wriggle past.

  “You and I could ride them.”

  Elric stopped wriggling. “You and I?” His mouth was agape.

  “Yes,” said Marissa airily. “Why not?”

  “Well, for a start, they are not our horses, and then we’re all going off in the morning. All the men that is.” The taunt was deliberate.

  Marissa bristled. “We could do it as soon as it’s light.”

  Now Elric was alarmed. Marissa was serious. “Will—the earl—would be livid. I mean, Hosanna racing? Just before he is needed for important business? We couldn’t.”

  “Well,” Marissa was at her most supercilious, “if you’re too nervous—I didn’t mean race very far, obviously, because of the journey, just once around the jousting field, down to the river and back by the chestnut tree. If you don’t think you can do it, though, we’ll just take it that I’m right.”

  Elric hopped from foot to foot. “But you’re not right.”

  Marissa smiled contemptuously. “Well, we’ll never know, will we?” she said as she began to walk away, a victory swing in her limp.

  Moments later, just as she expected, Elric was at her heels. “All right then,” he said. “I’ll meet you at dawn in the stables. I’ll get the horses ready—I’ll have to find a saddle for the silver but I can probably use Dargent’s. Only, if Hal finds out, he’ll kill me.”

  “Why should he find out?” asked Marissa smoothly. “He sleeps in the bakehouse and surely you can find some excuse for keeping Dargent’s saddle with you tonight. Something on it must need mending. And by the way, I’ll be riding Hosanna of course.”

  Elric didn’t answer. Suddenly, all his bravado disintegrated and, not wanting Marissa even to suspect any such thing, he fled into the courtyard. Once outside, his courage rose again. Hal said his riding was good. The silver horse was used to racing and they were not going very far. What was there to worry about? Without further ado he went to Hal and, mumbling something, took away Dargent’s saddle. Then he visited the stables. The silver horse looked placid enough, picking at her hay. Elric grinned as he saw her. He was sure this animal would not prove too much of a handful. He turned to Hosanna. If anything, Elric thought, it was the red horse who looked the more fearsome. Instead of standing steady in his stall, he was pacing around and around and had kicked his straw into lumps. Elric imagined Marissa on his back and her face when the wind began to burn her ears and all she could feel was the pounding of hooves. He smiled and he was still smiling when he curled up in the loft and went to sleep.

  4

  It was a glorious dawn, with the rising sun giving the summer-parched leaves another chance to shine. Elric soon shook the sleep from his eyes, climbed down, and went to the stables. Marissa was already there, her fair hair tightly plaited and her bad temper banished by determination. She was busy pulling straw from Hosanna’s tail. Elric slipped on the bridle and saddle as he had been taught and tightened the girth. Hosanna seemed surprised to be getting no breakfast but did not object.

  “Ready?” Elric said to Marissa, and handed her the reins. Hosanna looked around for Hal before following Marissa obediently into the courtyard. His anxiety was apparent and Marissa was alarmed but she could not back out now. Elric noticed nothing.

  The silver horse was displeased to find herself carrying Dargent’s saddle, even more so when this unfamiliar boy, who was too short to reach, had to climb up the wooden partition and drop the saddle onto her back from above. She struck out at the manger with a flashing front hoof and it took Elric some time to fix the bridle. However, when at last the straps were buckled, she stepped eagerly over the cobbles toward the gatehouse, taking no notice of the chickens whose early-morning peckings she rudely disturbed. Marissa caught up and when the horses passed the bakehouse door together, Elric was glad that it was shut, with Hal on the other side. The silver horse felt strange after Hosanna and Dargent. She seemed to stretch up rather than forward and Elric wondered if he would bump his nose on her crest, so high did she hold her neck. Nor did she swing along quite as easily as Hosanna but hung back, holding the bit in her mouth as if it tasted nasty. Nevertheless, when Elric asked the mare to stop so that he could tell the porter, with only a slight blush, that he had been ordered to take both animals to the river to bathe their legs, there was only a slight hesitation before she obeyed. When the porter let them out, a feeling of conspiratorial camaraderie made the two jockeys momentary allies. It gave Elric a pang for he had quite consciously left off the neckstrap that Will always attached to give Marissa extra confidence, and now he felt a little sorry. “Shall I go back and get it?” he offered.

  Marissa almost bit him.

  Once on the grass the silver mare smelled freedom and Elric felt her change. Now, although still holding her head high, she was almost too willing, surging forward rather faster than Elric wanted. He had thought the race should begin from a standing start but she had no interest in standing still, even for a second, and began to trot faster and faster. Hosanna kept up, one ear cocked back for Marissa’s command. But she gave him none, leaving it all to him. If she could just stay on, they would win.

  The trot turned into a canter and when he could control the mare no longer, Elric could do little else but shout “Go!” Now the two horses began to match stride for stride, their manes rising and falling. “Around the jousting field, down to the river passing one side of the tree, turn, and back past the other,” Elric yelled as his lea
d increased. “First back to the drawbridge is the winner.”

  Marissa buried her hands in Hosanna’s mane. “You can beat anybody, Hosanna,” she whispered. The red horse gathered himself together and in an instant they were flying, a red arrow and a silver, neck and neck around the jousting field, their hooves making glittering dents in the dew. The pace was fast, not wild, and as the mare began to lower her head and stretch out, Elric started to enjoy himself. This was real riding and he was managing just fine. He shifted in the saddle. Immediately the mare shortened her stride and Hosanna drew ahead. Elric cursed but he had learned his lesson. If the silver horse was to win, he must keep perfectly still. Gradually the mare caught up with Hosanna and they were side by side again. Now they were out of the jousting field and heading for the river. It was downhill and slippery but the horses galloped on. Elric could see Marissa’s face, her mouth a little open. He wanted to grin, to share the exhilaration, but was too intent on winning to do any such thing.

  At the river, Hosanna slowed and turned in a wide arc for he could feel that his rider was not secure enough for anything sharp. The silver horse showed no such consideration. When Elric twitched the rein, she spun around, almost unseating him, and set off back up the hill. Elric began to crow. He could hear Hosanna’s hooves behind him but now he could see the drawbridge. The race was nearly over.

  The mare, however, had other ideas. For months she had scarcely been allowed out of a walk, for although Amal had ridden her occasionally, the pace was always slow. She was going to make the most of this and when Elric tried to check her, she began to give him a taste of the pace she had set in her glory days on the Cypriot sands. Ignoring every tug at the reins, clasp of the leg, or squeaky command, she swerved away from the drawbridge, flattened herself out, and bolted back down the road up which she had come the day before. Now Elric’s exhilaration turned into bald terror. Surely nothing on earth could gallop quite so fast? Nor did the mare gallop straight. Instead, she went where she would, twisting and turning, sometimes on the road, sometimes off, with Elric’s small body snapping helplessly this way and that like a stem in the wind. Every so often the mare’s silver neck would arch and Elric’s nose would meet it with a thwack. Then she would snake her head in the dirt and Elric would slip farther and farther forward until there was nothing but the unforgiving ground whistling past in front of him. He knew only one thing, that to fall at such a speed would be fatal, so he clung on as the sparkling mane scourged his face and his hands grew raw and numb.

  Marissa, halted by the drawbridge, at first watched with smug satisfaction as Elric was carted off. Since the silver horse had never actually reached the agreed finish line, technically speaking Hosanna was the winner. But her smugness died away as the mare rocketed about like a rogue star fizzing through the sky. She began to call out Elric’s name. It was quite useless. He could not even hear her. Then she shouted, louder and louder, until her voice carried into the courtyard where Will, Hal, and Constable Shortspur were standing by the water trough. They broke off and within seconds were running across the drawbridge. They saw Hosanna at once. “Ellie said Marissa and Elric had been arguing. I’ll bet this is something to do with that,” Will fumed as he ran. Then he followed Marissa’s pointing finger. “Oh Lord in Heaven!” he cried. “Elric! For God’s sake, ELRIC!” He grabbed Hosanna, pulled Marissa off, and vaulted on. The silver mare was now punctuating her galloping with high, bone-crunching bucks. “Sit up, Elric, sit up, try to push her uphill,” Will bellowed. It was a waste of breath. The mare stopped bucking and began to rush around in a circle at a speed that was scarcely credible. The gathering crowd gasped as Elric, now more damp rag than rider, finally lost his struggle to keep the reins. As he let go, he seemed to abandon himself to his fate, clutching at the air and attached to the saddle by only an invisible thread.

  Will set off. He did not dare aim straight at the mare for fear of making her even wilder but arced around, closing in very slowly. Hosanna and he were as one, just as they were on the battlefield, the red horse second-guessing which way to turn so that Will would have some hope of catching a piece of flapping leather and bringing the crazy flight to a halt. But even as Hosanna drew near, Elric began to tip over to one side. His arms flailed as he tried to right himself, but he did not have the strength to catch even a clump of mane. As the mare thundered on, he began to slide off. Then came something far worse. Elric’s left foot, too small for the large stirrup, slipped right through and when he fell, instead of rolling clear, he hung, upside down, his head directly behind a pair of unforgiving iron-shod hooves. “Oh God! No!” Will howled as Hosanna found a new pace, one he hardly knew he had. Slowly, slowly the red horse gained on the mare, until, Will, scrunching his legs into his saddle, let go of his own reins and leaned right over and down. After two unsuccessful attempts, with the iron shoes slicing off some of the hairs of his own head, he managed to seize the scruff of Elric’s jerkin with one hand and catch the trailing reins with the other. He could not pull Elric upright and they both hung an inch or so above the ground.

  Marissa could not watch, and even Kamil tightened his fists as the horses’ legs seemed certain to tangle, bringing them all crashing down. Will could only trust in Hosanna. “Slow her, Hosanna, slow her down.” The horse knew what to do. Curving around, he balanced Will’s weight against his own, just as he did when they were together in single combat. Now he leaned away, creating a space for Will while he edged his nose in front. The mare was suddenly deflated, as if somebody had turned off a tap. Her legs moved automatically, all pleasure gone. Sobbing with relief, she gradually hooked herself into Hosanna’s rhythm. The four-beat gallop became a three-beat canter. Now it was possible for Will to pull up Elric. When the canter became a trot, the boy gave one piercing cry at the jolting and the mare threw up her head as if to go off again. But Hosanna crowded into her, bringing her to a walk, and by the time she halted, she was utterly spent. When willing hands took Elric from Will, she was trembling all over, submissive even, and although her wall-eye gave nothing away, the demon that had possessed the other had subsided and vanished.

  Elric’s head was already beginning to swell and he was spitting blood. Will was beside himself. “Get a pallet!” he cried, but Ellie was already running toward him with two men carrying a pallet just behind her and Amal behind them. “You idiot, Elric! Oh, you silly idiot!” Will’s fury at the stupidity of it all was matched only by his dread, for Elric’s eyes were beginning to roll backward. “What can we do?” Will spun around. “Hurry! Hurry! He’s going to die, he’s going to die!”

  Then suddenly Amal was beside him, gesturing and waving a small bottle he produced from a skin bag at his waist. He unstopped it and the smell was bitter but he thrust a few drops down Elric’s throat. Immediately the boy jerked up. “Good, good!” Amal murmured.

  “What on earth are you doing?” Will hardly knew he was shouting. He wanted Ellie, Old Nurse, or Marie. He trusted them. Amal stepped back. At once, Ellie helped to pull Elric carefully onto the pallet and ran beside it as he was carried quickly to the castle. Amal put his bottle in his pocket, watched, and waited.

  Kamil leaped onto the silver horse. “There’s only one way to cure a bolter,” he said, and turned her once again down the road. Using his voice, his heels, and a hazel switch, he forced the weary animal back into a gallop. Every time she slowed he urged her on until, in the end, long after everybody else had disappeared and she was sweating and grunting, he slid off and looked straight into her dark eye. Her head sagged. When she found the strength to pick it up again, she accepted Kamil’s proffered caresses without enthusiasm but also without objection. “Come on,” Kamil spoke in his own language. “You are a good horse, but if you are faster than Hosanna, you are certainly not as clever.” The mare, weary almost to death, seemed to agree.

  As he led her across the drawbridge, Kamil saw that Amal was standing humbly outside as Old Nurse’s voice echoed from the great hall. She was denouncing “foreigners
and foreign horses.” Kamil saw the men turn their backs on Amal and he was ashamed. The old Saracen was not responsible for Elric and Marissa’s stupidity. Kamil did not hesitate further but handed the silver horse over to a groom and gestured to the old man to stay by his side.

  5

  There was no question of Will and Kamil leaving that day, or the next, for overnight Elric succumbed to a fever of such heat and ferocity that Ellie and Old Nurse despaired. “What can we try now?” whispered Marie as Elric’s face turned from red to mottled black. She had helped to apply leeches all over his arms and legs and even his cheeks to bleed out the poison, but the boy was burning up.

  “Well, deary”—Old Nurse was sweating herself as she wrung out cloths, cursing that the water was not colder despite Ellie’s running up and down from the icehouse—“there is only one thing left for us to do. The poor lamb.” She squeezed her large, lumpy frame around the bed and dropped herself down onto a stool.

  Marie went cold and Ellie found herself clutching the bed-hangings. “Oh no, Old Nurse,” both girls whispered, “not that.”

  Old Nurse took Elric’s hand and rocked to and fro. “Look at him, dearies,” she said in her most matter-of-fact voice. “There’s no real choice. We must get the poison out of his head or he’ll die.” Marie felt sick. “It will be just a small hole in his skull we have to make,” Old Nurse continued, carefully not looking up, “just big enough to let out some of the bad spirits. We can’t let Elric’s head swell any further, so we’ll all have to be brave. I’m going to give it an hour or two, then, if he’s no better, with Master Will’s permission, I’ll call the surgeon.”

  “Butcher, more like,” said Marie, surprising Old Nurse by sounding like Marissa, for Marie was normally so meek. “Trepanning should be outlawed. It’s murder—at least I have seen only one person survive. How can making a hole in somebody’s head really be an answer to anything? It’s monstrous.”