The Grail War Read Online Free PDF Page B

shouted orders and curses. As the horses went on out of the encampment, Broaditch could see Lohengrin finally levering himself onto the mount s back …
    Broaditch was thoughtful. Well, he reflected, he could catch him on a mule, which these days was as good as a horse, and shank’s mare was nearly as swift as that …
    The first knight still protruded from the mud, legs bent like a frog’s, a rain-stippled stain of blood spreading out from him. The second lay on his face, struggling faintly to crawl as he sank into the ooze. The third was sitting, dazed, bent shield still held protectively up. The sliced woman was being bound by a surgeon, though she clearly was nearly dead. Lancelot stood there, legs planted solidly, staring after his escaped quarry …
    Lohengrin and his squire were clacking along a paved road with excellent drainage. The rain was lighter; a dense, smoky fog flowed everywhere, as though the countryside were damply burning.
    Lohengrin was smiling sardonically at the pale youth.
    “But, sir,” the boy, Wista, was saying, “I have heard that even your father had broken his sword and vowed never to raise it again in any cause.”
    The supple, dark-faced knight, head in a tight leather cap, was amused.
    “My sire, Parsival,” he said, “speaks honey and gold. But I have seen him at closer range than others. The men he has dispatched to judgment would make a hill to climb with labor.” He laughed. “And that without the horses and serfs in the stack!”
    “But he has since broken his sword,” the squire insisted.
    “Yes. And in good time. Who was left living for him to overthrow?” He frowned. “Just Lancelot, and even he feared the old dragon.” He poked his finger at the boy. “Do you know how many families have sworn to have my head and my sister’s and mother’s, too, and any spare cousins thrown in for the sake of my father’s gentle deeds?” He was now staring hard ahead into the billowing fog.
    “Still, he’s come to renounce the life of a warrior and become a holy sage.”
    “Like a glutted man abjures food, and the pox-struck turns from women.” He chuckled. “Why, once I heard a man in the stews swear, with ten whores all about him, never to come in the bawdy house again in God’s true name, by Christ’s back teeth, by Herod’s arse, by Pilate’s hands, by the wangers of all the saints who’re men, and the boltholes of all the female …”
    “God’s mercy,” murmured the boy, crossing himself and looking around nervously.
    “Fear not blasphemy.” Lohengrin laughed. “Worse things than words go unpunished.” He resumed: “So, swearing by these potent potentiations, so to say, this poor fellow dared not ever leave the whores if he were to keep both vow and pleasures intact!” He grinned, easy, sardonic, relaxed, his eyes always watching into the folding and unfolding mists. “So even my father’s broken blade may be joined again.”
    “Why does Lancelot seek your life?”
    “It seems he loves me not,” Lohengrin allowed, grinning. “Thank my great father, I suppose.” He was thoughtful. “I should have asked him …”
    “Your father?”
    “Lancelot, wistful-Wista.” Grinning, watching into the fog. “That grunting dung-lump will answer to me in the end. I wait and watch, when need be, and strike at last …”
    “Have you seen your father since — ”
    “Peace, break off!” Lohengrin commanded in a whisper. He touched the other’s reins as he halted his own steed. The light drizzle trickled over their faces. There was a plip-plip-plop of oncoming hooves. “One rider only,” Lohengrin murmured. “And a weighted beast. Here comes my new headgear and chestplate.”
    A dim, mounted figure seemed to take form before them out of the coiling, insubstantial fog.
    “And lance, too,” Lohengrin completed the list, observing the long spear held straight up.
    The knight came closer, his smooth, gray-green armor blending into the leaden background.