The Incorporated Knight Read Online Free PDF Page B

Velitchovo! Had ye asked me, I'd have warned you."
     
                  "Why has none of his victims slain him in revenge?" queried Eudoric.
     
                  "We are a law-abiding folk, sir. We do not permit private persons to indulge their feuds on their own, and we have some most ingenious penalties for homicide."
     
                  "Mean ye," said Jillo, "that amongst you Pathenians, a gentleman may not avenge an insult by the gage of battle?"
     
                  "Of course not! We are not bloodthirsty barbarians."
     
                  "Ye mean there are no true gentlemen amongst you," sniffed Jillo.
     
                  "Then, Master Tiolkhof," said Eudoric, calming himself by force of will, "am I stuck here for a year and more?"
     
                  "Aye, but ye may get time off for good behavior at the end—three or four days, belike."
     
                  When the jailer had gone, Jillo said: "When ye be free, Master, ye must needs uphold your honor by challenging this runagate to the trial of battle, to the death."
     
                  Eudoric shook his head. "Heard you not what Tiolkhof said? These folk deem duelling barbarous and boil the duellists in oil, or something equally entertaining. Anyway, Raspiudus could beg off on grounds of age. We must, instead, use what wits the Holy Couple gave us. I wish now that I'd sent you back to Liptai to fetch our belongings and never meddled with this roly-poly sorcerer."
     
                  "True, dear Master, but how could ye know? I should probably have bungled the task in any case, what of my ignorance of the tongue and all."
     
    -
     
                  After another fortnight, King Vladmor of Pathenia died. When his son Yogor ascended the throne, he declared a general amnesty for all offenses lesser than murder. Thus Eudoric found himself out in the street again, but without horse, armor, weapons, or money beyond a few marks.
     
                  That night in their mean little cubicle, Eudoric said: "Jillo, we must needs somehow get into Raspiudus' house. As we saw today, 'tis a big demesne with high, stout wall around it."
     
                  "An ye could get a store of that black powder, we could blast a breach in the wall."
     
                  "But we have no such stuff or means of getting it, unless we raid the royal armory, which is beyond our powers."
     
                  "Then how about climbing a tree near the wall and letting ourselves down by ropes inside from a convenient branch?"
     
                  "A promising plan, if there were such an overhanging tree. But there isn't, as you saw as well as I when we scouted the place. Let me think. Raspiudus must have supplies borne into his stronghold from time to time. I misdoubt his wizardry be potent enough to conjure foodstuffs out of the air."
     
                  "Mean ye that we should seek entrance as, say, a brace of chicken farmers with eggs to sell?"
     
                  "Just so. But nay, that won't do. Raspiudus is no fool. Knowing of this amnesty that enlarged me, he'll be on the watch for such a trick. At least, so should I be in his room, and I credit him with no less wit than mine own ... I have it! What visitor would be likely to call upon him now, one whom he would not have seen for many a year but whom he would hasten to welcome?"
     
                  "That I know not, sir."
     
                  Eudoric said: "Who would wonder what had become of us and, detecting our troubles in his magical scry-glass, would follow upon our track by uncanny means?"
     
                  "Oh, ye mean Doctor Baldonius!"
     
                  "Aye; my whiskers have grown nigh as long as his since last I shaved. And we're much of a size."