The Cunning Woman and the Knight-Captain
by silverr
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( 1 )
Oh, I recognize that sound all right, the distinctive clanky rattle of the clasp on the right side of the cuirass that she can't be bothered to get fixed… although, it's more that she never pauses long enough between battles for anyone to sneak the piece off to the armorsmith. I've told her countless times that if a sword happens to find its way into that gap, into that soft spot under the arm and into her heart, that she'll bleed out before she hits the turf. And then she always says, "You said I don't have a heart!" and then I always say, "Well no, you don't, but there's still blood aplenty sloshing around in the empty space," and then after that the discussion usually goes downhill.
So, yes, I recognize the sound. I don't turn around from my worktable when something blocks the late morning light coming in through the sod-house door. "What have you done now?" I ask.
"Shoulder," she says, and damn it all to brown, I still am not tired of hearing that gravelly contralto, despite the stubborn pain-in-the arse personality it's attached to.
There's a thud as the helm hits the ground, and jangles when a gauntlet does, but it's not until I hear an almost inaudible groan that I turn around and say, not entirely impatiently, "Oh, let me help you with that, you fool."
I refuse to look up at her face, because I can well imagine the smirk. She plays me, but then again I tolerate it. "As always, you stink of sweat and blood and horse," I tell her.
She flexes her leg just enough to push against my hip. "Then bathe me."
The image of scooping water over her breasts flashes into my head, but I chase it away and snort. "The river's just that way. Big wet gash in the land."
"How poetic. You missed your true calling." She brushes a strand of my hair off my face and behind my ear. "It makes we wonder, though, how long has it been since someone took a long drink from you?"
The combination of the unexpectedly gentle gesture and the idea of her tongue working between my legs is making me blush, and so I turn to the table and start an infusion of riotweed and itchroot. "None of your business. Go sit on the cot."
"The river is too cold to bathe in." There is a shiver in her voice.
I have seen the bulge of her displaced shoulder joint under her pauldron, but I want to see what she will say. Generally she never admits to being in pain. "Not as cold as you're going to be if you don't take better care of yourself. How do you know there's a problem with your shoulder?"
"Pinches up there when I move my arm," she says.
This tells me the injury must be excruciating, and so I add some oblivionflower to the infusion. "You're going to drink this, and then I'm going to take off some of your armor, and fix whatever it is you've done to yourself. And then you're going to lie down and be still and stay quiet until I tell you you can go."
"Bossy." But she takes the bowl, and drinks. Her dark eyes, usually dancing with mischief, are like dull stones.
The shirt under her underpadding is soaked with sweat, but thankfully there are no other injuries. "I'm going to support your arm," I say. "Straighten it, and then raise it slowly out to the side. Stop if it starts to hurt."
She closes her eyes and grimaces faintly as she obeys.
"None of that, now," I chide. "Breathe in, breathe out… now, slowly, bend your arm, and put your hand on the back of your neck." I lift her heavy braid out of the way, myriad shades of brown and red, shot through with silver. What would it be like to have it unbound and falling around me like a curtain? To comb it with my fingers, to see it fanned across my pillow? "Very good. Now slide your hand past the back of your neck as if you are reaching for your other shoulder."
"You're making this up as you go, aren't you?" she growls, but then the shoulder joint shifts back to its normal position, and I can feel her relax.
I support her as she lies down, carefully arranging the arm of the injured shoulder across her chest before using a minor rooting spell to hold it in place.
"I still want a bath," she whispers before she falls asleep, and I resist the urge to kiss her forehead.
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( 2 )
Less than a fortnight, and she is back. "What is it now?"
She groans as she sits on the table. "Spear to the thigh."
I snatch up a bundle of oxtail and burjar weed. "Again?"
She makes a face and removes her tasset, then tears a slightly larger hole in her leggings.
The wound is large, and ugly, but the blood is flowing sluggishly. "Well, it seems that the damage was to muscle and not an artery," I say. "You were lucky."
"No, they had piss-poor aim."
I close my eyes and reach down into the earth, asking Kasvisto, goddess of all green growing life, and Rohto, goddess of the healing arts, to bestow their gifts. The essence of the herbs flows out from the bundle, into my hand and up my arm, across my heart and then down the other side, through the palm of the hand I have pressed against the knight-captain's thigh.
After the bleeding stops I clean her wound, then take a clump of moonglow lichen in hand. But the fact that she has been injured yet again makes me so agitated I don't think I can do the mending spell properly. "Why do you do this?" I demand.
"Do what?" Her lids are half closed; her full lips are parted just enough to show the gleam of teeth. The late afternoon light coming in the door behind her ignites her hair into a nimbus.
"Throw yourself at the enemy so recklessly!" I have leaned in; our faces are a hand's-breadth apart.
"And what else should I do?" she says softly. "Love makes me bold."
"What?"
Her eyes go wide. She presses her lips together and leans back. "Love of combat, and of victory. Love of the people, and love of the Radiant Mother who has given us this beautiful land." She laughs, and then takes bandages from my table and binds her wound herself.
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( 3 )
The following week there is a graze on her temple from an arrow, and a few days later a hand charred by demon's breath, and then poison from a spider-rumilus. Each time she says nothing as I stop the bleeding, restore the skin, drain the poison. Each time she drinks or swallows what she is given, and leaves without a word, and afterwards I dream of falling, but not fast enough.
And now it is night. The open doorway is a panel of stars that lets in the sound of ice-crickets, and once again she is standing there.
I am surprised: I did not expect to see her, as I had not heard the army ride out that morning or heard them return. She is not wearing her armor. She has no visible wounds. "Well?" I ask, trying to be stern. "What do you want?"
She walks toward me. The small lantern on the work table phases her from full to waning to new, letting the shadows swallow her until only slices are left: the side of her face, the side of her breast. Her arm is a streak of light from a falling star.
"Where does it hurt?" I ask her.
She puts a hand over her heart. "Here."
"Was it truly necessary to take such risks, just to get my attention?"
"I wanted to make sure I would be victorious," she says, "before I surrendered."
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THE END
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first post 7 October 2017; rev 20 December 2017
© 2017