The Ill-Made Knight by Cameron Christian

Author:Cameron, Christian [Cameron, Christian]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, azw3
ISBN: 9781409142430
Publisher: ORION
Published: 2013-08-01T04:00:00+00:00

A day or two passed. I hadn’t read a book in years, but my host, the French King’s lieutenant of Reims, had a library of over twenty books, and all of them were about chivalry. I had never seen a book about chivalry – I used to read a little Aristotle, but mostly Aquinas, psalms and sermons. I read a poem by John Gower once, and enjoyed it, although I’m pretty sure he wrote it against men like me.

I knew there were books on chivalry. I knew that the great de Charny wrote a list of questions for the Order of the Star, and I knew that the stories of Sir Lancelot, for example, were written down. But I had never read anything like Master Llull’s book of chivalry, and I devoured it. I read it through, and then read it through again.

When du Guesclin came, I asked him about the book. He shrugged. ‘I was never much of a reader,’ he admitted. ‘But my father’s master-of-arms says he was some sort of Spaniard – that he was a knight, and fought the Moors, and then became a hermit, and then a priest.’

‘He thinks that knights are chosen, by God, to protect the people.’ I looked down the page. ‘He thinks there ought to be schools to train boys to be knights.’ I looked at du Guesclin and he smiled.

‘Anyone can be a knight,’ he said. ‘Surely we’ve seen that in the last ten years. Give a peasant a good horse and a harness and a few year’s of training, and if he has a good heart and a set of balls, he can fight. You and I both know this.’

I gnawed my lip. ‘But . . . isn’t there more to being a knight than having courage and a harness?’

Du Guesclin shrugged. ‘No.’ He smiled wryly at me. ‘Well, perhaps there is more. A good sword is a help.’

A voice from the doorway said, ‘Fie on you, Monsieur du Guesclin! I thought better of you, sir.’

Now, in France, as in England, when you are sick (if you are lucky and have rich friends) you are put in a closed bed, a bed with heavy hangings, many pillows and a pair of feather mattresses over a roped frame. You can’t see anyone beyond the hangings. This means that women may visit you so long as they don’t enter the hangings, so to speak.

That was Emile’s voice. I’d hoped, but how on earth could a noblewoman visit a routier without comment?

‘If any peasant with spirit can be a knight, why is this war so vicious?’ she asked. ‘Isn’t it true that when we let any lad be a knight, they murder and rob at will, drunk on the power of their arms, whereas true knights have discipline and restraint?’

Du Guesclin was inside the hangings with me. His eyes met mine and he shrugged. ‘Madame may have the right of it,’ he said, ‘but when I need to go up a hill

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