Nerio was close enough to hear. I did the courteous thing and introduced him, at least in part to cover my confusion, and because the blows to my head had not made me wittier. I tugged his sleeve and gestured in the direction of the cluster of Frenchmen.
Duke Rudolf exchanged bows of near equality with Ser Nerio. ‘Ah – Accaioulo the Younger? We were allies at Florence; how do you come to the company of this English Lancelot?’
Nerio smiled at me. ‘I took a fancy to his red hair. In truth, Italy is better with Sir William in Poland.’
‘Oh, my lords!’ I protested, or something equally foolish. My head was not working well, and the room spun each time I drank wine, and I was thirsty.
King Peter came and we bowed again – knees to floor, hats off – and he paid us all sorts of compliments. I was still trying to work out who might do the King of Cyprus harm, or why, when the Emperor summoned the judges.
My enemy of the morning, for so I thought of him, opened a scroll and began to read, in courtly French, through a list of the achievements and encounters of the tournament and the jousts that had come before. I’ll give the judges this much: they had sharp eyes for the encounters. The King of Cyprus was adjudged the best lance, and he went forward humbly to receive his prize, a hawk with gold jesses and bells. The hawk was magnificent – a true Icelandic peregrine. The victor in the foot encounters was none other than my Bohemian friend, who was showered with applause and kisses from a great many beautiful women, and who bore away his prize, an axe inlaid in gold with verses from Luke. There were prizes for archery, which I had not seen; for riding and for courteous behaviour and even a prize for the man who had been unhorsed the most times, given by the King of Poland to a German knight who bore the good-natured laughter with a sanguine air and seemed pleased to go away with a pretty gold-clasped purse and a velvet cushion which he flourished amidst laughter.
And then the Frenchman began on the events of the mêlée, naming the participants. The room fell silent. The Emperor was referred to as the ‘Count of Luxembourg’, which was, I gathered, part of an elaborate fiction by which a great lord might fight under a lesser title so as not to discomfit his opponents – a very courteous act.
I feel I have to mention, for Monsieur Froissart’s delectation, that the King of Cyprus and the Count of Luxembourg bore the exact same arms – did you know that? What a herald’s nightmare that must have been. But for the duration of our time in Krakow, the king displayed only his arms as King of Jerusalem – white and gold – and never the arms of the house of Lusignan.
I have strayed from my point like a courser leaving the lists. As my Frenchman described the mêlée, he and the other judges had it dead to rights, and in fact, my own description here owes a great deal to their observations. Heh, messieurs, you know that when the visors closes, you see little but the man in front of you! But they had seen it all, and every man received his due.
Even me.
I was surprised to hear the man I’d loathed in the morning mention my role, and my name kept coming up – Chevalier d’Or – and I began to grow uncomfortable as men around me looked at me. Well, I had been the first to put my sword on the Count of Luxembourg, and I had captured two horses, these things were true …
And then they were cheering!
By God, messieurs, that was one of the proudest moments of my life. I was chosen as the best man of the mêlée. Me! I suppose I should have seen it coming, and Nerio and Fiore say they knew all evening, but in truth – in truth, I felt more than a pang of guilt, my friends. I think that either Nerio or Fiore was the better man – and certes, it was Fiore who taught me how to throw men to the ground from the saddle.
I blushed so hard that my skin felt as if it was on fire. Nerio told me later I was as red as an apple from head to toe when I went and knelt before the Emperor and the judges. Men cheered and applauded, and women curtsied and looked at me under their eyes.