Free The Leopard Sword by Michael Cadnum Page A

very accurate with his blows, is he?”
    Edmund turned, surprised.
    â€œI am not Lazarus,” I said, laughing weakly, “risen from a hole in the ground.”
    â€œYou are thin enough to be a corpse,” said Edmund with a smile. “But don’t worry—we’ll fatten you.”
    Osbert sidled up to me and said, “I never had any doubt of your recovery, good Hubert.”
    I eyed Osbert with the keenest interest.
    â€œI have wagered,” said the servant, “that we’ll be on the Rhône River by Saint Andrew’s day.”
    The feast day for that first of Christ’s apostles is at the end of November, which meant we had some weeks of sailing yet. The Rhône is a Frankish river, one of several possible routes north to England. Autumn was well in force here at sea, cold wind bellying the Santa Croce ’s sails. For a painful moment I ached for home, my father stamping his feet as he came in off Fisher Street with a song on his lips.
    I found myself taking heart at Osbert’s description of the fishing vessels we had passed, not one of them fast enough to keep up with the Santa Croce.
    â€œSlow as the last flies of summer, my lords,” Osbert was saying.
    â€œAnd no sign,” I asked hopefully, “of pirates?”
    â€œNo pirate would attempt a ship like ours, good Hubert,” said Osbert, “bristling with swords.”
    â€œLook here—Osbert mended your helmet,” said Edmund.
    I ran my fingers over the neat stitches.
    â€œI didn’t know you had so many skills,” I said.
    â€œI have many ways of serving two worthy squires,” said Osbert. “And I can mend my ways as well as I can stitch leather.”
    â€œCan you?” I asked.
    â€œBy my faith,” said Osbert, sounding like any reformed sinner.
    Because I thought that I was mistaken about Osbert—or because I believed that the crafty servant had changed his ways—I did not voice my fears.
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    All went well for days.
    The chilly wind drove us into swells, and soaked us if we lingered in the bow. But we dined on boiled goat and goat cheese, and drank pitchers of amber wine. My head no longer hurt. Sir Nigel responded to my question about sea thieves by saying that Osbert was right—any right-minded pirate would fly from us. “We’re the most fearsome ship on this sea.”
    The assortment of ailing and injured knights and squires became less like aggrieved Crusaders, forced by ill luck to leave the Holy Land, and more like travelers beginning to envision the cooking smoke and friendly smiles of far-off home.
    Sir Nigel was strong enough now to unsheathe his sword and make it ring against a practice shield, a battered, cut-up target. I held up the shield, dancing with the shifting of our vessel, until my own arms began to ache. Then Edmund braced his feet and gave Sir Nigel something of a contest, feinting with the target, dodging, making a rough game of it, Sir Nigel laughing with satisfaction.
    It was not the first time that I believed Edmund was destined to be a better fighter than I would ever be, once he learned to use footwork and timing, and to wield the sword like an artful weapon and not like a club. Sir Rannulf folded his arms and smiled with evident pleasure at the sight of Sir Nigel’s return to strength, and the other knights looked on indulgently and called out good-natured mockery. But some of the sailors went pale at the smash and bang of this sword practice, especially when Sir Nigel and Sir Rannulf let their naked steel swords ring against each other, brisk and dangerous sport on a coursing ship.
    Captain Giorgio showed his white teeth and coiled his knotted rope, but the sailors were tight-lipped, aware, I thought, that they were outnumbered if a crew of swordsmen decided to take the ship to some closer port than far-off Genoa. “We wouldn’t dream of such a thing,” said Edmund when I mentioned