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caps were not made with a horse in mind, and had abraded vast areas of the only skin my mother had
given me.
I was sore of body, but I really didn't mind, for I was in love.
I pitched a small dome tent next to Lord Conrad's great one, at his bidding, and went gratefully to
my bed. The wiser heads, the captains and the lords, would be up for most of the night, conferring
about the military situation, but young fellows like me had nothing to do but obey orders when the
time came.
Maude stood behind Lord Conrad, to guard him, but from what little I heard through the walls of
the tents, I think that perhaps her nakedness bothered some of the local officials. Lord Conrad bid her
go to sleep. Having nowhere else to go, she came into my tent, and since it was too small for her to
even stand up in, she lay down at my side.
I had stripped off my armor and gambezon, and when she laid a hand on my back, she said that my
muscles were sore and tight. I had to admit that this was true, and she said that she had the cure for it.
I'd had my back rubbed before, but it was nothing like this! She started at my toes and fingertips,
and worked her way upward and inward, carefully loosening every muscle, every tendon, every
joint. Softly, she massaged back to life every square bit of skin on my entire body. She eliminated
pains I had not even known I had, and replaced them with the most sensual of all glowing pleasures. I
gloried in her golden touch.
I told her that I no longer had to wonder at what Heaven would be like, for now I knew!
I offered to return the favor on her body, but she said no. She had worked to relax me, and would
not see her work wasted. I thought of suggesting sex, and thought that if I asked politely, she
would oblige. But then I thought better of it. Best to put that off, for the time, for this was the woman I
would marry.
Chapter Twenty
From the Journal of Josip Sobieski
JANUARY 14,1250, CONCERNING JUNE 3, 1249
THE BUGLES got us up at dawn. Maude and I went to mass, and I said the Army Oath with the other
troops. Maude stood with us, listening but of course not joining in. We ate a quick breakfast, with little
Maude again eating three times as much as I did, and I was barely in my armor when Lord Conrad
came by.
"There isn't time to teach you how to operate a submachine gun, but you might as well take these,"
he said, handing me a pair of the six-shot pistols and holsters that his new company wore. "They
use the same ammunition as that single shot of yours, and their action is simple enough. Just point
it and pull the trigger. To load, they break open like your old gun. As for you, young lady, some of
the natives have complained about your choice of costume, so tie this around your waist."
He handed Maude a strip of cloth that I recognized as part of the tablecloth in his tent. With poor
grace, she took off her weapons belt and wrapped herself from waist to knees.
"This morning, we are going to conduct a raid on the Brandenburg vanguard. This company is a
prototype for what the entire army will be like in ten years, and I need to know just how effective it
is in actual combat. Josip, stay to my left no matter what happens. Your main job is to hold the Battle
Flag high so that anyone who needs me can find me. After you've done that, try to stop anyone who is
trying to kill me, or you, or Maude. Maude, your job is to stick close to us and stop anyone from the
other army from hurting us. Got that, you two? Your function is to be defensive only! No stupid
heroics allowed, and never leave my side!"
"Yes, sir, your grace."
"Good. Mount up."
While I saddled Margarete, Maude put her weapons belt back on. She carried a pistol like those I
now wore, a long, thin sword with the handguard removed, a small dagger and two small throwing
knives, all without hilts, and a small, one-handed shield of the sort called a buckler. I asked her why she
didn't like handguards or hilts.
"They waste weight and space," she said.
I asked if she wasn't afraid of getting her hand cut.
"No."
I gritted my teeth, said please, and asked why she would not get her hand cut by her opponent's
blade.
"Because I will not put my hand where my enemy puts his weapon."
I asked if a similar theory was working with regard to her lack of any sort of armor.
"Yes."
I said nothing, since there wasn't anything I could do to change the matter, even if I managed to
win the argument, which wasn't likely. With Maude again on my lap, we were at Lord Conrad's side
long before the rest of the company was ready. We could have taken longer with breakfast.
We rode out, as before, with Lord Conrad and his humble flag bearer in the lead. During the night,
thousands of army troops had come up and made camp surrounding the old castle town of Lubusz.
They cheered us on, but we rode out without them. Apparently, Lord Conrad's idea of a fair fight,
or at least an amusing one, was to attack with odds of six thousand to three hundred twenty to
one against us.
As before, a platoon soon passed us to take up the point. A bit later one of our aircraft, a
graceful machine with two engines, flew overhead and dropped a short spear with a long red
ribbon attached. One of our troops broke ranks, retrieved it, and brought it to Lord Conrad. He
unscrewed the head, removed a message, and read it. He nodded, put the paper in his pocket, and
discarded the spear. We rode on.
In perhaps a quarter hour we heard gunfire up ahead of us, gunfire like I had never heard before.
The submachine guns fired at an incredibly fast rate, each one of them spewing out hundreds of
bullets a minute!
We got to a rise where we could see what was going on up ahead, and Lord Conrad motioned
for me to stop there with him. Then, somehow, Maude was no longer on my lap. She was
standing on Silver's rump, behind Lord Conrad, and I had not seen her traverse the space
between the two points!
Lord Conrad turned and looked up at her, apparently as surprised by her action as I was.
"Are you going to be all right up there?" he asked.
"Yes, your grace."
He was about to object further, but then he just shook his head, lifted his binoculars, and
looked back at the battle.
I tried to put her strange actions out of my mind. My instincts told me to protect her, to keep
her from all danger, and yet Maude seemed completely relaxed and totally confident. There
wasn't anything I could do to change anything, so I didn't try. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]