It seemed like a small concession in that moment - she had won the brawl against Sandsfern, won the argument against Tristan - but it felt agonizing nonetheless. Robena slumped into a chair and grasped a tankard so tight that her armoured fingers left dents in the metal handle. She had been an avalanche of willpower and intent, all driving relentlessly towards a single objective. And now she had to stop. And wait. And consider. Rather than crashing stone she was the poor devil holding the sheer weight of it back and drowning under thoughts like can I, should I, what if I.
No! The one thing that she cannot do is nothing! And yet that is where she is trapped.
"You," she said to Sandsfern - another thing that should have been buried under the avalanche. "look... well."
Bloodless Xristos, was she really going to have to deal with this impossibility now?
The ground laps up the beer you offered. It is dry and cracked, the soil greedy, and the beer sinks into it seemingly leaving it no better than before. The air is still and a feeling of pressure makes your ears feel as though stuffed with cotton. Something ought to happen here. You've never done this kind of augury and received no result before!
As you stare intently at the ground where your beer soaked through, it seems almost as though it was dryer than a moment before. In fact, you're sure that the dusty cracks in the soil are widening. An owl hoots, once and flies into the air, and as you turn suddenly, you feel your balance thrown. You look back down at the earth that has betrayed you and have no doubt that the cracks are widening. The ground before you is splintering and beginning to shake. A deep rumble like thunder from below rises to the surface and the cracks race outwards as the world beneath your feet rolls.
You are caught in the midst of an earthquake, as is all of Southhaven and the lands around! People rush from their homes and from the keep at this most dire portent. And there, visible to all as she takes stock of the situation and scans the horizon for her prey, is King Pellinor and her knights on the road between keep village.
What do you do as the ground tries to throw you from its back?
Robena
"I am as full of life as ever, Robena" Sandsfern says, beaming with confidence and turning upon you a stern look that chides you for notholding yourself up straight as a knight ought to behave. "And twice as skilled as when you last saw me, you boor. Don't think that because you're still a mountain in a wresting match that it gives you a leg up on me."
Sandsfern seems determined to fill the silence that you've left for her with the anger and the ache that hangs so heavily over you. But, before you can launch into anything further, her head snaps to the side, and it seems that fate has mercifully spared you the need for inaction as a loud rumbling sound leads to an earthquake that shakes the rafters and causes a fine layer of built up dirt and dust to rain down on everyone inside. The inhabitants of the Fox and Stag rush doors, and when you and Sandsfern do likewise, you see there upon the road between town and keep King Pellinor and a handful of knights from her household, arrayed in fine steel with tabards depicting the King's azure cross upon a field of or.
Tristan stands in the fields at a little distance, obviously interrupted in his offering. Could this, too, be Uther's doing somehow? The Lady Sandsfern stands ready to support you should you ride forth and declare a challenge.
What will you do?
Constance Merlin looks you in the eye set as you are and, for all his ageless wisdom, depth, and roguish mischief, he blinks first, and you see sorrow in those eyes. "You know her, the mistress of that fire-ruined keep that once you roamed in youth. Do not think this is the first I've seen of you or your family, Constance Nim, Daughter of the Bristol Avon. The dragon you seek is the lady of your knight Robena who you sent off with such haste. Sandsfern is no more human than I am, and wears the guise less well than I for her inexperience."
Merlin sighs and the way his face creases with worry, you'd think he'd just aged twenty years. Or two hundred. "She's hardly got any destiny. More of a curse, I've gathered, she traveled quite far away and I don't know all the details, but it's something demonic in nature. I doubt she's at all interested in stealing your sword or being slain by a heroic knight, nor do I think your oh so gallant knight is up to doing the slaying. Frankly, I'd be more impressed if you freed her and gained her aid in your quest than if you walked up to her with a sword and a request for a believable kidnapping only to get laughed out of whatever hole you find her in."
Merlin sighs again, this one in a sort of surrender, running a hand through his hair again and straightening up his hat back on his head and for a moment he looks again like a regular farmer just giving you directions. "Well, she's been see in the area at any rate, try Southaven and maybe from there..."
Merlin scowls and his eyes darken as he drops his farmer guise entirely to looks towards the horizon. Though he does not change his clothes or move his hat yet again, for a moment, you see him as he really is. Strong and old, at once gnarled as the great oak and ageless as the mountains. His face is dark and fae and his eyes are looking away, always looking away to times long past and times to come, to the storms always in the distance.
In the distance now, you hear a low rumbling, more vibration than sound, and the pebbles upon the ground near you shake and rattle like merry little dice. "Run to Southaven! Keep your friends alive, child, and stage your dragon trial if you think it wise. Take the cat with you, she might just keep you alive."
Tristan doesn't try to get to his feet, staying crouched to the ground and holding on to it for as much purchase as he can. Surely this can't last more than a few seconds more, and trying to run would be hell on his knees and ankles. It's best to wait it out, and not to injure himself before his promised fight at Robena's back and side.
The land is sick, he realizes, and angry. This is not just an offering gone poorly. For an insult to be met with this... it would be like coming home late, smelling of beer, and your spouse burning down the house for it.
Okay, so maybe Pellinore really does need to die then. It's not the answer he wanted, but it was one he needed.
He keeps one hand on the ground, and one on his bow, ready to draw. Let the other two call the melee. He has no fear of the frontlines, he can just do more damage from here. He now sees this as a job that needs doing, like plucking weeds, let whoever think of him what they may for doing it.
Let the knights who see the Earth rend itself apart before their lord know whose side they are on, by it, as Tristan has.
This lesson the Holy Land taught Robena above all others: When the earth quakes, the skies burn, and the end of the world is at hand, that is the time for knights to go to war.
Apricot alone of the stable's horses has not panicked and shrieked or fallen. He stands sure-footed and ready with the same grim resolve he learned on the fields outside Antioch. Her helmet falls into place, deafening her ears and constricting her sight - things that were far more advantageous than mere protection on a battlefield like this. She draws her lance and levels it straight as they emerge from the stables in their full panoply.
Upon burning sands and shaking earth there is no time for the confusion of hearts. Lady Sandsfern is beside her, that is enough when they may both be dead in minutes. It would be a cruel irony indeed for them to have survived the Holy Land to perish here in green and gentle England but perhaps that was the true lesson of the pilgrimage: that the devil's work extends beyond any single kingdom and any single conflict.
Her hand touched the chalice amulet of Exsanguinated Xristos and she spoke the words of Roman prayer. She touched her heels to the sides of her Roman stallion. She lowered her lance and faced the foe and prepared to unleash Roman war upon these forgetful and doomed daughters of England.
It’s all motion. The way you lower yourself down and scoop up Cath, who bounds into your arms as heavy as the bones of hills; the way thanks and farewells tumble out of your mouth, the kind of roll of syllable on syllable that simply means an acknowledgement of an elder for their service and a respect for their age; the running. It is not the first time you have run with a cat pressed close against you; it is the first time that you have carried one of the Beasts of Britain.
And you are not strong enough. Not you, Constance, a lesser child of greater powers. Your ancestors strode over hills and raised up the high stones; where their missiles fell, they became mountain-scree and river-bed. But you? You cannot run all the way to Southhaven. Not in time.
This is a judgment upon you, daughter of giants. That you are the twilight of your people.
[Constance attempts to perform Great Labor and makes a 6 of it.]
The ground betrays you. The dry, dusty soil cracks and great gouges lance through it. At the village, old, decrepit wood, already afflicted with dry rot and termites cannot hold itself together. Roofs without support cave on themselves in bursts of dust and thatch. The trees tremble. Horses scream and their hooves pound on dirt and stone above the thundering din.
At the Fox and Stag, the patrons scramble aside as one of the walls buckles outwards and the whole building lists dangerously. The proprietor shouts a curse and shakes her fist at the heavens in defiance.
Further back, a whole house gives way at once, its walls giving up the ghost in unison, and the dust is so great that it cannot be seen who may be crawling from the wreckage.
Along the road, the keep trembles and at the edge of one of its rounded towers a half moon of stone crenellations crumbles and falls with a low scraping rumble that echoes all the way back to your ears.
Some of the knights scatter outwards from the keep entrance like ants from a crushed hill.
Pellinor, alone among the assembly, maintains full control of her mount. Her shout rings above the chaos. "Knights, to me!" and though their mounts are half mad and whinnying, a few obey her and form a powerful formation arrayed in a V behind two deep behind her. Taking the point, she begins a charge with her four knights towards Robena and Sandsfern.
Tristan
Battle is joined! Robena rides past you towards King Pellinor! Her horse, obviously trained to carry her even through this storm is unperturbed and its snout is steady and forwards. Behind her and to the side rides the lady Sandsfern on a white horse. Hers make no semblance of calm, but she rides astride the crazed beast with an expression on her face of utter bliss, as though nothing in all the world could offer her greater pleasure than this moment. She wears no helmet and her fiery hair blazes behind her as she hefts her own lance.
Pellinore's knights, for their part, are rapidly organizing. You see them form their V and begin their own charge. This is not good, a direct attack like this is liable to harm all involved. What do you do?
Robena
You are one with the thunder and lightning. In a world where all around you falls to ruin, your lance is steady, your armor strong, your horse sure. Your lady rides behind you, an emblem of fire streaming from her head and pure unabashed joy writ upon her face.
However, your foe is fell indeed. The world shattered around her and she stood strong, far stronger than the Azure Knight you faced before. Somehow, in rapid speed knights arrayed with her for the charge, though they quail as she does not. Her impatience even for gathering such a small group at this is thinly veiled. Once she turns her gaze to you, however, the sneer falls from her face and her gaze is the cold and sturdy stone heart that will yield to none.
Enchanted: Pellinore denies the right of any being to harm her save the questing beast until such time as the magic around her fate is completed or disrupted. She can be unhorsed or thrown, but never injured. This applies only to her personally, she will not protect knights she leads. Thundering Blows: Pellinore is incredibly powerful and her blows reel her opponents. She denies the right of anyone to spend more than 2 points in single combat against her. Hidden: there is, as yet, one aspect of her nature that she previously denied Tristan's right to reveal, though it does not affect her immediate combat prowess.
Roll to Leap into Action and tell us of your charge!
Constance
For you, the portents are laid bare. The king is in pain of a great wound, or perhaps merely of the failings of age. He thrashes and so the lands thrashes. You could soothe it, soothe him if given the time, but that is not your place. Yours is to run as fast as your legs can carry you.
So you run. Though Cath Palug is a warm anchor in your arms, you run. Though you heart thunders in your chest and pounds out through your ears, you run. Though the earth splits and shakes, still you run.
It is not enough and fate is not kind to you this day. You stumble as you near the entrance to Southaven, the weariness in your arms too much, and Cath mews with pity. As you stumble and fail to slip into the town, the panicked riders from the keep not gathered to King Pellinore exit the gate and find you gathering yourself, your hair askew, your dress torn and dirty, your breathing heavy and fast.
In this moment, they see before them a prize and, safe outside the town walls, they encircle you. It is only a few knights, just five. And one of them at least looks exceptionally hesitant to be here and not riding into town. Nevertheless, they close and one of the knights, a dark-bearded man beneath his blue and gold tabard, reaches as to scoop you onto his horse. "My lady" he says in what you imagine to be feigned politeness. "It's not safe here, you'll have to come with us."
Through the town gate, you see knights charging. Some grand general, and the great bearskin that is your Robena, and behind that a blazing flame that must be your dragon as well.
The problem right now is the horses. Actually, there are uncountable problems, but the problem that Tristan has the tool to deal with is the horses.
He lets loose arrows as hard and as fast as he can. The act of drawing the sword from its sheath must be the decisive killing blow. Four arrows fly at full strength, three horses necks are shredded beyond utility - two in Pellinore's, and one each in the immediate flanks of her V. Now they are out of formation, and their charge will not hit as one crashing wave, but in two staggered blows.
The knights at the edges have to steer their horses out of the way of the crashing, foaming heaps of their allies. Pellinore surfs her own mount down to the ground and dismounts it easily. Unharmed, but unable to lead the rest of her knights in their charge against the two living mountains and champion jousters between them and stopping Tristan.
The devestation of the earth itself tearing itself asunder surrounds them.
Tristan wishes he had the satisfaction of being exhausted, after such a sprint, but his arms just feel the swell of blood rush into them, he feels stronger and faster than he started. May Robena and Sandsfern find this sufficient gratitude for gifting him a chance to rest. He nocks another arrow.
"The land is sick!" He speaks like a bard to a deep crowd - not shouting, but projecting his voice from deep in his stomach, steady and unwavering. He never liked how soldiers shouted. Never liked the weak vibrato of startlement and anger. "You can see it. I have ridden with you, and you know me to be good and to be true. Pellinore is cause and symptom! I hope you will join us in its cure, but will accept that you not stand against us! You will run out of throats before I run out of arrows."
[Leap into action: 5, 5 +0 = 10 I inflict harm I startle or scatter]
No time for hearts, Robena? As though it was your choice to make.
When she took up arms and oaths she told herself that she was a creature of fire and passion, inheritor of Lady Sandsfern's righteous anger. She told herself that she was a knight without peer, forged on foreign battlefields and beneath foreign swordmasters. She told herself that her horse for all his grand gentleness still remembered the beat of battle and his role as an instrument of perfect death. She told herself that she could defeat all of England's devils with her lance alone.
She told herself these things so that when it came time to make this charge she would not doubt.
It is a terrible thing to ride towards death. It is worse to ride with duties unfulfilled - wishes unfulfilled. To ride without discovering if the soul of Sandsfern is in fact damned? To ride without the favour of Constance? To ride without telling either of them what they mean, without telling them good-bye? No surer way of ending as yet another miserable ghost haunting England's moors, suffocated by the weight of her own wishes.
No time for hearts? As though the heart was weakness rather than strength. As though you were not going to battle unarmed.
You take his hand, Constance. Or, at least, that’s what he assumes, until your pale fingers close vice-like about his wrist. Your eyes flash as you draw yourself up to your full height, and the horses strain against their bridles to be away from you. When you look at him, it is with the furious disdain of your ancestors, looking at his forefathers spread out across hill and dale. His bones groan beneath your fingers, sudden stone-strong.
“I am the most perilous of all,” you declare, with the grandeur of a storm. “Stand aside.” You release his hand, sparing it, and with the dignity of a queen you walk forward, and not one of them may bar you. One (the hesitant) dismounts and walks beside you as you stride into the chaos, ignoring the cries of the men behind you, disbelieving and fearful.
And for this the knight has your favor. Let the forces of Uther come; your dreadful beauty has caused at least two foolish heroes to draw sword against whatever may befall you.
[Constance leaps into action, though in a refined manner. This might seem like a weird use of the move, but I stand by it. With an 8, she scatters the knights who try to stop her and inspires the hesitant knight to follow her.]
Tristan fires and his arrows whistle through the air and strike sure and true like thunderbolts from the heavens. Horses reel, then stumble. The charge falters. The two knights to Pellinore's left were more shielded and their mounts are only lightly wounded. But seeing the barrage, they break and turn aside, galloping towards the town gate. The two on the right go down amidst their horses in a tangle of armor and bridle and a resounding clang that reaches above the rattling of the earth.
One arrow strikes King Pellinore's horse and she goes down, falling past the head of the beast with her momentum. It seems she may have learned to do something like this, though. She slips her feet from the stirrups and sets her feet forward and her weight back as the horse buckles. Rather than be thrown, she slides forward almost as though riding on air for an instant and then her feet touch ground and she skids, digging in her greaves.
Seeing an opportunity, the Lady Sandsfern spurs her horse and races ahead of Robena. She tries to strike King Pellinore with her lance and...succeeds? She strikes the king square in the chest, but the king grabs hold of the lance and pulls, ripping Sandsfern from her saddle even as Pellinore flies backwards from the impact of the hit. The ensuing clench ruins your charge, Robena and you are forced to pull up short to avoid striking your lady. Sandsfern seems almost enthralled by King Pellinore. Her eyes glow a maddened red and her hair burns and flies, but she cannot best the King, who has gained her own footing again and is wrestling with Sandsfern with locked gauntlets, slowly gaining the stronger position.
Intervene, if you will.
Constance The Knights quail at your grandeur and the earth continues to shake. The bearded man who had taken your hand cringes and bows his head as though some great spirit had passed before him. Perhaps he is not wrong?
The assembled knights disperse save for the young man who dismounts and offers you his reins. Cath Palug nuzzles your arm and seems to like the suggestion, for what that may be worth. The young man says his name is Mort, and he frowns as you consider his offer. If you look behind you, two more knights are making a panicked gallop for the gate and in the distance in the town square, you can see a press and hear the clatter of armor from a fall. A woman who's fiery hair marks her out even at this distance is fighting with a strong and powerful woman in a golden tabard that too reaches your eyes at this distance. And...is that Robena, forced to pull up short?
You are too far from them to stop this fight yet, but tell us what you do and how you make your grand entrance on the scene.
Tristan harnesses his bow and makes for high ground. He's done what he can from this vantage point, at this time. None of the King's knights can get to him through this wall of muscle, but neither can he effectively shoot through it.
Not all the buildings are crumbling with the earth. The cracks just make them easier to climb, again something that Tristan has drilled relentlessly, again an edge he has over opponents wearing heavier armor. To get to a rooftop - this time - is trivial. A loose brick slipping in his hands, shaken loose, just reveals a better handhold, and then a stirrup.
Now he has height. Now he has sight.
He draws his bow again, fighting between the need to leap off the building at any moment and the urge to steady his aim. He opts for flight, for now, until he's more sure it can hold his weight, until the ground finally rests. Until he knows who to shoot.
He holds his bow, but he doesn't focus it yet - not like he did with the badger. Now is the time for forests, not trees - he can't allow himself to be distracted by the one that towers over the rest, all must be cut down in their turn. He doesn't focus on the King - that's Sandsfern's fight, right now.
He focuses on her knights that haven't fled, haven't hesitated. The unwaveringly loyal. The unfortunately mortal. He performs the grim calculus of the order in which they must be killed.
These knights are the ones willing to die in service to their lord, and he can't help but admire and respect that. It is unfortunate that good knights must die for bad lords and bad causes. He feels no malice towards them, no hatred or anger. He feels pride in his skills, remorse in their application. His pulse quickens. The calculus continues.
Tristan doesn't quiet his heart. He doesn't push down these feelings, or ignore them. Those feelings matter. They just don't change what needs to be done.
He nocks an arrow.
[4, 4 +2 = 10 on Wary • How might I best husband, preserve, or defend my strength? • Which of my enemies is the biggest threat to me? • Where am I strong, and where am I weak?]
Robena and Alitel have at time seems like they were friends, they were peers, that they were rivals, even that they were courting. But in the heat of combat they are neither of those things. Lady Sandsfern is the Countess and Robena Coilleghille is her sworn bodyguard. No matter what exists between them the oath of fealty is the only aspect without ambiguity.
She is the shield she carries. It is hers to place that steel-bound wood between the King's blade and her Lady's heart. And when the shield fails it is hers to use her sword, her wrists, her shoulders and if needed her body. Whatever mistakes Sansfern makes it is Robena who bleeds and she suffers this duty silent and resolute. Again and again she turns her strength and speed and plate to the task of preserving her lady. She is battered, she is struck to her knees, she is hurled and punished and broken and all the while her lady becomes more and more akin to the fire that dwells within her heart.
Let her lady fight as she wills and use her as she must. She will carry this burden without complaint as she has for so many years. This blood, this pain, this is her reason for being made manifest upon her body.
[Undertaking great labour to open the path for Sandsfern: 8]
Yes, Constance. Make a grand entrance. Why does your heart quail at the thought? Why are you afraid, great and mighty woman that you are? You have seen battle before, surely; why, then, does your heart quail?
Can it be that you fear only Robena will heed you? That if you raise your voice, draw attention to yourself, that only she will turn her head and look in wonder, and then Pellinore will strike her down with a mortal blow? Yes, there it is: the thought that turns your blood to ice. And yet if you stand here, a mute statue, like the giants who became mountains standing guard over the sea and shore, then all it will take is an errant glance for someone to become transfixed on you, a furious thing of an earlier age.
No, there is only one path forward; you force the words from your lips. Please. Heed. “Pellinore!” For a moment, your voice resounds in that chaos, louder than the clash of steel and the roar of fire. “How dare you stand against Britain’s champions? Lower your arms and stand no longer against your homeland!”
Turn your head, you pray, silently. Do not let Robena alone listen to your words. Do not let them be an inscription on a moss-grown stone, faded into uselessness. Do not reject you yourself, mock you as some bygone relic, the lesser daughter of great kings who ruled before the days of man.
With horses too risky in the face of a wrestling match, you dismount and strike King Pellinore on a blind angle with a powerful slam of your shield that would cave the skull of a normal person. In Pellinore's case, there is considerably less damage than you would expect, but the momentum of the blow is still present and it ruins her stance, sending all three of you into a tumble. You and Pellinore arise ahead of Sandsfern and you position yourself in front of your lady.
You can perhaps count yourself lucky. Pellinore had been arrayed for hunting when you saw her. Her spear and bow are useless at such close quarters (nor had she tried to attack you with archery at all) and her carving dagger was not built to thrust in the manner needed to pierce a chain coat much less your magically enchanted hide. So she has settled on a brawl, relying on the tried and true tactic that a knight thrown off her feet is just as vulnerable to being bashed with a rock as anyone else.
This rush is the hardest moment. You don't have an effective method to harm Pellinore, and Pellinore has decided that her approach will be as direct as possible. She leaps at you, ramming you with an armored shoulder that meets your shield with a deafening crash of metal. You hold your feet, barely, skidding backwards across the dry earth, your boots sinking into the loose soil and throwing up a dust cloud. The Lady Sandsfern mercifully rolls behind you and regains her feet so you do not trip on your own liege. So pressed, you continue to hold even as Pellinore rams a gauntleted punch past your shield and into the armor against your chest and stomach. Yet you are as strong as the bear whose skin rests upon you and you find yourself steady and locked in your lady's stead: you have no means to harm your opponent, but neither has she surpassed you yet.
You can feel the magical strength empowering her though. That punch hurt even through your armor and more are coming. Time is not your ally. Fortunately, the lady Sandsfern is your ally and she is gathering herself. You can feel a heat build behind you and as the dust starts to clear, she appears ready to unleash some sort of magic of her own. However, the fight is interrupted by a clarion call of a voice you know well...
Tristan
From your vantage on the roof, you wince as the melee goes down in another tumble (the clang and clatter of it reaches you even this high up) and then they rise and Robena has taken Sandsfern's place in the wrestling match. There is a large dust cloud, but as it starts to clear, you can see from your vantage that Sandsfern was never entirely human (you pretty much knew that already) and that her hair is blazing as though it is actual fire. She is gathering some sort of magic, which will be fire, and will likely be overkill and might start a fire in light of the setting (dry grass and thatch rooves being well known for mixing predictably with fire).
You are internally debating whether Robena would be justified in murdering you for betrayal if you were to disrupt Sandsfern by shooting her and whether that would be a good idea for Robena's short-term health when a shout rings out across the field and your view is drawn to the town gates, where the Lady Constance, spiritual advisor to the Duchess Marianne, strides forth with a knight that looks like Mort in tow with her.
You can also see that other knights from Pellinore's hunting party are gathering outside of the town gates. The two that fled from the initial charge seem to have met a party of four more, and a few that panicked in initial terror are visible further out and have gotten control of their horses.
As a lookout, you are probably best positioned to protect your friends by ensuring that nobody in the central party is surprised. Consider a shouted warning if the reformed knights try to return or a threat to them to approach the town commons only slowly so that none of the powerful, dangerous, jumpy people resume hostilities. Try to also be careful not to make yourself the source of surprise so that nobody thinks a sudden betrayal is in progress. It seems likely that either Sandsfern or Pellinore could cause significant destruction if they are spurred back into conflict.
Also, if you can find the time, Pellinore is more than a little distracted right now and is not presently denying your right to comprehend the supernatural. A focused examination of her (that is not interrupted by a cadre of knights) might offer you some insight.
Being the lookout sure is a busy job!
Constance
As you stride into the village commons of Southaven, past the crash of metal and the shaking of the earth, you appear, for a moment, as the great Lady of the Hunt, that fell dame who crosses the sky on howling winds and thunder leading the Wild Hunt ever onwards. You are awesome and terrible in your countenance, and before you all show due respect and the combat ceases. Pellinore releases her grip and goes down on one knee heedless of Robena, and the Lady Sandsfern, your dragon no doubt by the fire that suffuses her, relaxes and a look of severe disappointment crosses that bright countenance as the flames fade to merely the bright red of her hair.
Before you then is King Pellinore on one knee, head bowed, eyes not meeting your own. "Lady of judgment" she says quickly "pray forgive me. I know not who I am fighting. There was an earthquake and when I and my knights left the keep, these two set upon us in sudden charge. I have fought fiercely, I admit, but only in self-defense. I demand recompense for this unprovoked assault, and for the two of my men wounded and their horses killed by the third of their party, who has beat a hasty retreat!"
Constance, you have arrived in judgment, what say you to this?
Tristan makes a snap judgement. Stay hidden. The knights will take time to reform, and there are other obstacles. But he might not get another chance to observe Pellinore like this, and that information could be more vital.
And he knows the Lady Constance. He has always been eager to learn from everyone he can - long ago she gifted him with her time, and he's treasured the lessons and the memories always. Idly, he wonders if she remembers him.
She is an ally, and she is better suited to the task of dissuading the knights. Of resolving it peacefully.
"Chase two rabbits, catch none." Isn't that what he was always taught? He focuses on the task he's better suited for, and delegates the other - though he has no good way to tell who he's volunteered.
He draws the bowstring, no arrow in hand. Now he blinds himself to the forest to better see the tree.
His concentration isn't perfect. The lingering doubt this is the wrong decision stays with him. It's irrelevant. The decision was made.
Breathe.
He is standing right next to Pellinore. He is close enough to touch. She is all he sees.
Breathe.
Blind to everything else. Trust the rest is handled. Trust that he's right to trust.
Oh, Constance. Always you must bear under this authority, this mantle, this glory. Better to agonize over the choice than to not have one at all, isn't it? Better to be the speaker for the land than one of many who suffer without redress. Better to know that you hold Britain in your hand than to despair and refuse food until you do not wake.
"Pellinore," you say, stern. "King of the Isles. Right hand of the High King. Luckless huntress. The land screams her pain beneath our very feet, and still you brawl and squabble and neglect your hunt. Until you catch the Beast, there will be no peace in England." You are a mouthpiece; the doom flows through you. "Or did you forget the words of Merlin? It is your quarry, Pellinore-- but not to kill. That has not been given to you." And if she rises to strike at you, or savage you with words that sting like whips, well. Let that be your doom, then.
Then you turn to Robena, and your mouth dries. No. Please. "Robena, called the Bear Knight," you proclaim. "Though you fight for Britain admirably, you struck against a King in your anger, and without declaration of war. The Huntress is not your enemy, not yet. You and the Lady Sandsfern are to offer Pellinore penance and restitution. Such are the ways of Britain."
Once more you turn to Pellinore, your eyes hot. "But if ever you loved Britain," you say, and your voice is as fragile as a spider's web spun between two beams, "then let the matter lie for a year and a day, and then you may have your satisfaction. If you will have your recompense now, then I offer you the blessing of the waters of Britain, and the invocation of the Lady of the Hunt who rides in chalk upon the downs, made in their stead. They, too, are Britain's champions; they have a part to play as much as you do. You shall not hinder them upon their quest. You may hunt the Beast, but they hunt the Land's Wound."
[With a roll of Good, an 8. I have the right to ask any question I may, and so I ask: what is the dearest desire of your heart, Pellinore of the Isles?]
Rage. Rage, rage, rage. The fight denied. The rebuke delivered. Who are you? Wise women and priests have tried to stop us before. Fools! They said their words into a hurricane! There were no duels we could not win, no armies we could not shatter, no brawls that stood beyond us when we fought together. Who are you!? Who are you to tell us what is demanded by chivalry!? We left this land with you and you allowed it to come to this! You allowed this to become a place that could break the heart of dearest Constance!
Robena's blade falls upon King Pellinor's unprotected back as she kneels.
Tristan is still focusing entirely on Pellinore when the blade goes in her back. He does not even see that it is Robena that has done it, yet.
More than just what he was trying to learn, he feels what Pellinore feels in the moment that the blade goes in. This is new to him. The ritual ends by the loosing of the arrow. He has not felt the target when the shot hits.
Although you focus, what you see is a broader perspective. Looking closely at Pellinore, you can see that she is not...made of herself. Those are the words your mind would give you, that Pellinore is not made of herself. It is like a vast string stretches from Uther's throne in Camelot to entwine her and from her stretches out to the Questing Beast, lurking in a dell not so far from the village as you might have thought. There may once have been humanity in Pellinore, but it is not what constitutes her. Instead she is wrapped all about with the destiny and the darkness that comes from Uther Pendragon and manifests in the sickness and chaos in the land. Whatever humanity there was in her has been pressed down and down, then wrapped up with a monstrous destiny so tightly that you cannot see it.
And then, a blade falls and, for a brief instant, everything goes dark before you disentangle your senses and find yourself back on your roof.
Everyone
The blade falls with the weight of a mountain, lodging itself in King Pellinore's neck and biting into her back. Her body crumples and collapses, carrying the sword with it.
The last of the earthquake subsides and there is stillness and the settling of dust. Mort, the young knight in Pellinore's retinue, stands with mouth agape behind Constance, stunned by the scene. The folk of Southaven were already cleared out far away and none dare approach now. The knights returning from their panic pull up short when they come upon the scene.
Then, unnaturally, a ghostly aura of sickly green surrounds the corpse of King Pellinore. It stirs and rises inhumanly, the skin fading and blurring with the dry dirt and grass. Her head and neck dangle at a forward angle, barely attached to her body at all. The motion tilts the sword upwards and half translucent blood gently flows down her back from the wound before she cradles her own head in her right arm.
The ghost turns first to Constance and makes just the slightest bow, an act of grotesquery as the head and arm dip almost upside down. Then it turns to Robena and a voice somehow croaks out from that cut throat.
"The judgment of the Lady Constance is accepted. As recompense in a year and a day, your blow will be answered in kind."
The doom pronounced, the ghost steps past Constance and Mort, mounting Mort's horse, which seems to fade and blur as the ghost claims it. It goes to ride from town, but as it moves away, body and horse alike fade and blur with the distant forest until there is nothing left to be seen of the dead King Pellinore.
On the other, Robena did nothing less than her duty. Not only was she true to her word, but her words were proved true. He has seen how true for himself, now. For Robena to stay her hand at the critical moment would have been to shirk a grave responsibility.
Tristan does not admire this, but he must respect it.
He scrabbles down from the rooftops as fast as is safe. Delegation of duties again; if Robena has no interest in diplomacy, then she is in immediate need of a diplomat. Best be quick about it.
