The Flower in the Stone

Fleur - Part 5

I opened my eyes, which was impossible. I had closed them, for what I presumed was the final time, not in battle but during something like a brawl. I had a faint memory of walking uphill through a winter forest, but it was like a dream.

I opened my eyes and there was a pretty, dirty faced woman. She seemed as surprised as I was. Then I ruined it by coughing blood all over her gown. I didn't get to apologize because it got dark and I died for real.

Then I opened my eyes again. This time I was leaning upright against the wall of a dank little cave. It was fairly dark but I could see the trail of my blood on the ground, from the entrance to where I now lay. Obviously this was witchery. Was the pretty girl a devil, who propped up my body to claim my soul? I coughed again, seemingly unable to break the new habit, and she popped back from the darkness of whatever hell-cave she held me captive in.

"Begone, devil-ess," I told her. "And don't touch my sword."

"You're looking much better," she said, politely setting the sword down. It was out of my reach, I didn't know if I had strength in my body to retrieve it, or if the devil-girl would allow it. I did still have my dagger, and I inched my fingers toward the hilt in my belt.

She yawned (do devils yawn?) and surprised me again by asking, "Pardon me, my lord, but might you know what year this is?"

"What need have demonic creatures with calendars?" I countered. Devils were notorious for tricking you into giving away your soul through crafty question and thoughtless answers. Although this one already had possession of mine, probably. "It's the year of Our Lord 1134." I tried to get a better look at her, but the cave was scare lit, doubtless due to its proximity to the nether realms.

She gave a short laugh. "That would mean more to me if I knew the year I came to this place. But I'm thinking near on one hundred solstices. Thank you, Sir Knight, for waking me up." She walked past me to the mouth of the hell-cave (carefully avoiding stepping in my blood) and looked down the hillside towards the coast. "No ships this time? You didn't come here by ship. That's why the town hasn't been put to the torch." She turned back to me, her face once more in darkness. "At least, not yet."

"Has your town been put to the torch often?" I presumed burning their homes and fields was a matter of recreation for these foul creatures. I knew I ought not to engage the devil-ess, but how often does one get to talk to a damned thing? A non-mortal one, I should add. Damned things are thick and fast even in my own home.

She looked to sea again. "The first time was when I came here. Men in stinking fur cloaks came in ships and fired the town. I...ran away. They did it again, those same men--or their children, I suppose, a few years later. Then the next time the people in the town got to the boats first and they got set on fire. The boats, not the people. The men in the furs had no choice but to stay, and their children live down there, now."

"You mean the Danes, I think," I said. "They mostly got put down in my gran-pere's day. They still come 'round every so often, when they get tired of raiding each other. That's why I came here. I heard they sailed this way."

In the dim light I could see a sad smile. "Then someone lied to you, Fleur."

"What? Did you call me Fleur?"

She nodded and pointed at the fleur-de-lys on my surcoat. I wasn't going to correct her. "What's your name?" To get the name of a devil, that had to be worth something when all this was over, even if it was only good for a round of drinks at the pub.

"Alinor," she told me. "What happened? Someone lied to you, and killed you, or tried to."

"I...it's a long story." I was about to add that she wouldn't understand, but she rose to her feet, my sword in her hand. With one hand she pushed the rat's nest on her head out of her eyes, and with the other hoisted my sword as easily as a loaf of bread.

"It's a story where you got jumped, I'll wager." She changed her grip and posed as if she were on a horse. Now I was certain she was a deviless, because my sword is heavy and she held it up with nary a tremor in her arm. "You rode through the dark wood, with one behind. Or more than one, and many ahead. But you weren't running away, because you would have been looking over your shoulder. You left yourself open and someone walloped you. Oh! That must be where you lost your helm and whacked your head when you landed. And also where you lost your horse. You have a patron somewhere, he wouldn't have gotten you a fine sword and no horse. Sorry you lost it, horses are worth a lot. My brother's cost nearly every penny we had. He lost his, too."

Either a witch or a devil-ess. Perhaps bound to Satan in exchange for superior strength? In any event I found myself afraid to interrupt her.

"So! After you get your wits back about you, you find your sword and stumble to your feet. Ah, but look! There's your enemy!" She staggered about the cave with the sword held properly for someone unhorsed and in battle. "You raise the sword--the villains are still mounted, so you have it held up--all the way up here. And someone--perhaps the scoundrel who knocked you down in the first place--comes in for the kill, and from the angle of the wound, they're still riding. I'm thinking broadsword, not an axe, or they would have taken your whole arm off."

"You're close. It was a spear. That's what saved me, I think. It broke off and sealed my air. It came out though, I guess when I got up the hillside, I fell and dislodged it."

She set the sword down and sat next to me, looking delighted.

"I was right!"

"You were nearly right. There was no battle. I rode out with my two stepbrothers, Idiot the Larger and Idiot the Lesser. The Larger knocked me down, the Lesser lured me into a ground attack. Larger did me with the spear. My question remains, though. Why am I not dead?"