V. O, Glory of the Tournament! (10)
V. O, Glory of the Tournament! (10)
"As I have said time and again, all you valiant knights gathered here today, and you noble—."
Keldric listened up to that point, then shut his ears.
The two knights who had entered the lists looked as if they had finished preparing to fight long ago, but the herald would simply not stop talking.
It felt like thirty minutes had already passed. And yet the mouth of the bald herald standing at the high seat above the stands showed no sign of closing.
"When does this end?"
"I've heard, Burggraf Kuno is famously eloquent."
"Ah, right."
In short, he meant the man was long-winded. Keldric nodded at Sir Henri's comment with a complicated look.
A Burggraf was an office responsible for managing and defending the County of Bogenberg's chief castles. He was therefore one of Count Bogenberg's most important vassals.
And a man of such high rank meant that even a hot-tempered knight had no choice but to listen respectfully.
"Do you know anything about Burggraf Kuno? I'm seeing him for the first time today."
"Hmm... I don't know much either. I've caught a few rumors here and there, but..."
"Rumors?"
Among nobles of this era, a rumor could be a fatal weakness—or an even more lethal dagger aimed at someone else.
The commonly used ploy was to deliberately spread rumors, then, as if waiting for it, single out the nobles who ran them down and crush those who had turned their backs on one's own faction.
If Sir Henri knew about it, it was probably not that sort of thing—likely a genuine rumor.
Keldric lent his ear to Sir Henri.
Setting aside the story's reliability, even a rumor was worth hearing, filtered though it might be.
"There's a rumor running rampant around here that Burggraf Kuno will be stepping down from his Advisory Council seat before long. Even I, who've been wandering the north for months, know of it, so it must be spread far and wide in these parts."
"Why would that happen? Did he commit some blunder?"
"Because there's no seat left on the Advisory Council. The details are a little complicated to explain... Anyway, it's a case of a rolling stone pulling out a set stone, I suppose."
Keldric nodded with a rather reluctant expression.
Come to think of it, Sir Henri, who had been roaming all over the north for months, could hardly be expected to know the full inside story.
But, put the other way, if even Sir Henri knew about it, it didn't seem to be a mere rumor.
"If I may be so bold, I believe I've also heard something of it in passing."
"Oh?"
"Yes. A rumor that Lord Bogenberg has had friction with the vassals on his Advisory Council..."
And if even Alisa knew of it, then it seemed plain enough that Keldric shouldn't simply brush it off as a rumor.
Most important of all was Burggraf Kuno's family name.
"...House Lombard, you said?"
"Yes. He holds the Viscounty of Lombard. The Lombard viscounty is a prestigious house that has served Lord Bogenberg for generations."
Keldric's eyes widened a little. House Lombard—that was a name he had heard before.
'House Lombard... that Sir Tolle?'
The very Sir Tolle of House Lombard with whom he had nearly come to blows just yesterday was the subject.
It was only then that Keldric understood why Sir Tolle had been staying at the castle.
Keldric carefully stored this information away in a corner of his mind for now.
It was information he didn't yet know when or how he might use.
While Keldric, Sir Henri, and Alisa were chewing over the gossip and rumors, Burggraf Kuno finally finished his long opening address and raised a cup of wine.
"I now herald the start of the games—and may God look favorably upon this glorious tournament!"
"May God look favorably upon it!"
A roar of cheers went up, and far away, the bands positioned on either side of the high seat where Count Bogenberg must have been sitting began to play instruments Keldric was seeing for the first time in his life.
The two knights who had entered the lists finally mounted their warhorses. Those who wore helms with visors lowered them, and they grasped their weapons tightly.
Keldric watched the scene with shining eyes. All around him, other equally excited knights and nobles shouted battle cries toward the knight each supported.
"It was Sir Alan's second match, wasn't it?"
"He said so himself. Let's just hope that Britas knight doesn't bolt away tail-first."
"Why must you be so persistently spiteful? A victory with honor is a fine thing."
"...Damn it! Insulting the wine of Candillon is a sin you must pay for even after death!"
While servants taking wagers on behalf of nobles and knights moved about here and there, Keldric, who had grasped his reins, stared fixedly at the two knights facing each other.
'I need to observe carefully.'
The joust was Keldric's first. Naturally, using a tournament lance was also a first.
In that case, it was better to learn beforehand rather than disgrace himself spectacularly in the lists.
"The Red Paulownia Team knight competing in the first match, the honorable Sir Rupert of House Lichtenbaum!"
A knight clad in chain mail, a surcoat, and leather pauldrons waved to the stands. A red cloth was tied around Sir Rupert's shoulder joint.
"His valiant opponent from the Blue Woodpecker Team, the honorable Sir Ortvin of House Riesenbrunn!"
The same went for the knight standing opposite, beyond the rope dividing the lists.
Sir Ortvin, a green cloth draped on his shoulder, waved toward the stands and drew his reins.
At that, the pure white warhorse Sir Ortvin rode turned one full circle on the spot, then reared up and gave a single bound.
"Oh..."
Seeing that, Keldric let out a low sound of admiration.
A warhorse of good bloodline was certainly clever and strong, but this was the first time he had seen one that understood its rider that well and put on a trick.
Keldric thought of Boreas, who would be in the stables behind the lists.
With its glossy ivory coat and golden mane, Boreas also looked to have a decent enough bloodline, so he had a feeling that if he taught it a trick like that, it would pick it up quickly.
"That is indeed worthy of Sir Ortvin, the White Horse Knight!"
"A warhorse ought to be that clever!"
"Sir Ortvin! Be victorious! Show them proudly that your love, your honor, and your courage do not fail you!"
The trick Sir Ortvin had performed with his warhorse revealed a remarkably strong bond, and the knights and nobles sitting in the stands each burst out with fierce admiration and cheers.
"White Horse Knight?"
"' White Horse Knight' Sir Ortvin. You don't know him?"
"This is the first I've heard."
"Hah... it's a little awkward to say this, but sometimes you look like a yokel knight who's been holed up in some backwater."
Stung, Keldric chose to shut his mouth entirely.
He couldn't even freely ask about what he was curious about, and it just made him sigh deeply.
Still, it was far too late to come out with something like 'I'm a drifter knight from the sticks,'—Keldric's dignity wouldn't allow it.
It kept pricking at him, the attitude Sir Henri had shown toward Sir Alan, just as you'd expect of a Frankish knight with his traditionally high nose.
"Let me explain."
"Thank you."
It was a fortunate thing that the quick-witted Alisa carefully stepped in; Keldric wore a sour expression at the fact that he had nearly been treated as something slightly less than an 'ignorant fool who knew nothing of the world.'
"Sir Ortvin is a man of superb skill. He is renowned for the outstanding bond he shares with his beloved horse, Mariabella."
"Mariabella?"
It was a remarkably unusual name for a horse. One would sooner take it for a human woman's name.
As Keldric tilted his head, Sir Henri, who had been listening quietly beside him, took over with a slightly moved expression.
"Mariabella of House Heirenbrunn. She was a lady quite famous in the southern Empire. Her beauty was so surpassing, it's said that even the heathens in distant lands grew anxious from the rumors of her."
"...To that extent?"
"It's a great pity, but I never met her in the flesh myself. She passed away six years ago."
The story Sir Henri told was a deeply tragic and romantic one.
Mariabella, famed for her outstanding beauty, had fallen in love at first sight with Sir Ortvin, whom she'd met by chance at a tournament, and with the blessings of both families, the two smoothly concluded their betrothal and were set to carry everything through to marriage without a single hitch.
But as a trick of fate, Mariabella had wasted away from a fever of unknown cause and passed from this world before Sir Ortvin's watching eyes.
"Yet the very next day, a white horse came galloping into the castle of the grief-stricken Sir Ortvin, so they say."
The white horse, with a bright orange mane evocative of persimmons and a glossy, snow-white coat, was beautiful of appearance and a fine steed with strength and stamina equal to any warhorse.
And, by curious coincidence, the departed Mariabella had also been a lovely young lady with snow-white skin and orange hair.
Believing Mariabella had returned to him as a white horse even after death, Sir Ortvin named the horse Mariabella that very day, left his family, and began to wander with it.
"Twenty-four tournament victories in total, and never once defeated in the joust—the undefeated White Horse Knight! If I told you all of this was accomplished in just six years, would you believe it?"
"...A bit too coincidental, but is that story actually true?"
"What does it matter if it isn't! It's a story so beautiful and so worthy of chivalry!"
Sir Henri already seemed wholly captivated by the chivalric and romantic tale.
Indeed, the narrative of Sir Ortvin the 'White Horse Knight' was a story composed of substance that knights would go mad for.
The helpless death of a beloved betrothed, and a mysterious, splendid horse that had burst into the stables within a single day.
In this age, people thought plagues were divine punishment or the curse of a wicked witch—if one even considered all that, there was a moral here: not even fate decreed by God or the schemes of a wicked witch could sever love itself.
"Sir Ortvin is one of the few true knights I acknowledge. God, good Lord. The White Horse Knight will make his renown felt yet again at this tournament."
After casting a sour glance at Sir Henri, who was dabbing at tears, Keldric soon turned his head back toward the lists.
Just as Sir Ortvin had finished preparing, Sir Rupert, lance in hand and reins held, now entered Keldric's sight.
"What about Sir Rupert? Is he his match in ability?"
"He is a knight known as the Shield of Lichtenbaum. Sir Rupert's record is excellent as well."
Sir Rupert, too, was a knight at the peak of his success, with sixteen tournament victories to his name in total.
Among those, the fact that he had won six consecutively was something truly remarkable.
If one drifted constantly around the tournament circuit, one was bound to lose at least once; to win six times in a row and remain undefeated could hardly be anything but a tremendous achievement.
"Lord Bogenberg must have gone through considerable trouble. I expected as much from the first match, but to put together a bout this intriguing!"
A tournament was fundamentally an event from which enormous sums of money bled away. To recoup even a little of that spending, naturally one had to collect money from the spectators.
Which meant: more spectators meant recouping more spending.
To draw a crowd, it had to be exciting. For that reason, the first match of a tournament was invariably arranged so that famous knights would fight each other.
"How do you compare Sir Rupert and Sir Ortvin? Who would win?"
"I've never seen the two of them fight, so I wouldn't know. Sir Rupert is hardly to be taken lightly. But, personally, I'd like Sir Ortvin to win."
At last the two knights tucked their lances under their armpits. To anyone watching, it was the posture for a mounted charge.
Keldric watched the lists with total concentration, forgetting even to breathe.
Even the stands, which had been a clamor of every kind of shouting, grew abruptly still at the solemn sight of the two knights couching their lances at their sides.
In the silence that followed, Burggraf Kuno, having risen to his feet again, let his booming voice resound.
"Knights! It is time to prove your skill at arms and your courage! Fight for the honor of the houses you belong to and of your liege lords!"
While cheers burst once more from the stands, both honorable knights kicked at their horses' flanks.
Both warhorses understood their masters' commands and powerfully struck the earth at nearly the same instant.
"Oh, ohh!"
"As expected of Sir Ortvin! That horse is truly a fine steed!"
"Win! Glory in victory to the White Horse Knight!"
"Sir Rupert! Do not lose!"
The distance between the two was shrinking in an instant.
Like Sir Henri and Alisa and the rest of the spectators, Keldric, watching the match, sprang up from his seat before he knew it.
Mariabella, Sir Ortvin’s horse, cut through the air like the wind beside Sir Rupert’s striking black horse.
A duel between a white horse and a black horse. This was also an incredible showdown, one for the history books.
If you were a man, and if you were a knight with hot blood, you could not possibly look away from a match of such rare magnitude.
At the moment the distance between them shrank to a hair's-breadth, the lances, which had been angled toward the sky, were all leveled at each other at once.
And they closed in fast. The lance tips each aimed at the opponent's breast, and the two warhorses galloped like the wind, manes flying—a flash of time.
Crack!!
In that instant, a lance that had precisely aimed at a breastplate shattered.
The two splendid horses that had passed by each other ran a long way farther before stopping in place.
It was Sir Rupert who was rolling on the ground, struck in the chest by a lance.
"Woo, woahh—!"
An immense roar of cheering blanketed the lists.
Keldric, whose blood was equally fired up, watched the match with an excitement uncharacteristic of his usual self.
'Madness. There's no comparison.'
It was incomparably more entertaining than the petty mud-slinging duel between Sir Henri and Sir Alan.
Not something complex or subtly enjoyable, but pure, primal fun that made the blood boil in truth.
"The glorious victor of the first match is the honorable Sir Ortvin of House Riesenbrunn! May God comfort the fallen!"
"Sir Ortvin! Sir Ortvin!"
"The undefeated White Horse Knight!"
As a few noble ladies in the audience clutched their foreheads and fainted, Keldric stared, mesmerized, at Sir Ortvin, who raised his lance-bearing hand high.
'Perhaps I, too.'
Could stand on that field.
The glory of victory, the lofty fame, and the applause and cheers of this vast crowd.
He could claim all of it.
It was something a man couldn't refuse. All the more so if he was a knight.
Keldric's heart pounded fiercely.
The glory of the tournament was only now awaiting its turn.