Eifelheim

“I much regret the mea

Einhardt was the imperial knight by Stag’s Leap. “I suspect the old man has heard rumors by now,” Dietrich suggested, “but is too courteous to indulge his curiosity.”

“That pleases. My daughter dislikes bathing him because he smells so. He seldom uses soap, though he was taught since childhood proper bathing. ‘French vanities!’ he says. I suspect he triumphed on the battle field because his opponents ran from his stink.” Manfred threw his head back and laughed.

“Mine Herr,” said Dietrich, “I pray you not tilt your head… Among the Krenk it is a mark of submission — and an invitation to the superior to bite the neck in twain.”

Manfred’s eyebrows shot up. “Is’t so! I’d thought them laughing.”

“Each man sees what his own experience has taught him. You did not punish Grosswald for disturbing the peace. To us, forebearance is a virtue; but to them it signifies weakness.”

“Hah.” Manfred walked a few more steps with his hands clasped behind the small of his back. Then he turned and inclined his head. “Hans’ gesture at Falcon Rock, when he spared his enemy… Did that signify also weakness?”

“Mine Herr, I know not; but his ways are not ours.”

“They must learn our ways, if they are to stay on my manor.”

“If they stay. Their desperation to regain their own country is what drove Hans to his disobedience.”

Manfred considered him thoughtfully. “But why such desperation? A man might long for his homeland, for family or lovers or…, or wife, but longing eventually dies. Most longing.”

On the morrow, the junkers emerged from the chapel and were bathed to symbolize their cleanliness, after which they were dressed in linen undergarments, tunics brocaded with gold thread, silk stockings and embellished shoes. Crimson cloaks were hung about their shoulders, so that the assembly gasped with delight when they re-entered the chapel. The Krenken painted many pictures with their fotografia.

The chaplain celebrated the Mass, while Dietrich and brother Joachim sang Media vita in morte sumus in choir. The choice was meet; for while the words reminded the young men that death lurked always in their chosen life, the tonalities of the fourth mode lessened the choleric yellow bile, which a warrior must ever restrain.

After the Mass came the schwerleite. Eugen and Imein placed their swords upon the altar and promised their services to God. In his homily, Father Rudolf cautioned them to imitate the knights of olden days. “In these degenerate times, knights turn against the anointed of the Lord and lay waste the patrimony of the Cross, despoil the ‘paupers of Christ,’ oppress the wretched, and satisfy their own desires with the pain of others. They dishonor their calling and replace their duty to fight with lust for booty and i

Dietrich wondered whether the knights of olden times had been as pure and upstanding as they were now remembered. Perhaps Roland and Ruodlieb and Arthur had been men no better or worse than Manfred — or von Falkenstein. And yet, was it not a good thing to seek the ideal, regardless how poorly it may have been attained in practice; to imitate the ideal Roland and not the fallible man he may have been?

Father Rudolf blessed the two swords. Then Manfred dressed Eugen in a double-stitched shirt of linked mail, shoes of iron ringlets, a topfhelm with windows, and a shield bearing Eugen’s new device: a white rose crossed by a thistle. Once Imein was similarly accoutered by Thierry and both were kneeling before the altar, Manfred took up each man’s sword in turn and laid the accolade upon his shoulder. Formerly, this had been done with a hand-slap across the face, but this new French custom had lately become popular in the Germanies.

Afterward, a banquet was laid in the great hall. An ox roasted upon a spit outside the manor house, and serfs hurried in and out with great platters bearing haunches and sausages. Laid out were pepper cabbage, candied songbirds baked into pies, eggs pickled in red beets, baked ham in black vinegar sauce, grated sweet beets and carrots combined with raisins. The iced cream and sobets were also drizzled with the black vinegar sauce. Feasting was accompanied by juggling, mimes, and song. Peter Mi

The bohorts took place in the afternoon. The contenders and their ladies progressed about the field while the spectators admired their colorful surcoats and livery. Eugen was especially remarked, for he was well-liked. The villagers hooted Imein lustily when the two newly raised knights took their positions at opposite ends of the field.

Dietrich watched with Max and Hans from the stands, distant enough that the horses did not smell the Krenk. “We played a game much like this at Paris,” Dietrich remarked.

“What!” said Max. “You? At lances?”

“No, it was the game of obligations. One student was assigned to be the interlocutor and another to be the respondent. The interlocutor’s task in the debate was to trap the respondent into maintaining a contradiction. The respondent’s task was to avoid the traps. It helped us develop nimble wits.”

Max grunted. “Hah, hardly as fine a display as this!” He swept his arm around the curial grounds.

“Ach, but the church disapproves of such displays,” Dietrich said.

Hans clacked his mandibles. “Small wonder! To risk life for sport!”

“It’s not that,” Dietrich told him. “It’s the display of vanity and pride that is objectionable.”

“You will thank God for all the vanity and pride,” said Max, “when you must trust your lives and property to the skills they practice here.”

“It is to their skills that our lives and properties are usually forfeit,” Dietrich said. “I think folk may one day be thankful more for the skills that scholars of natural philosophy practice.”

Kunigund, who was queen of love and beauty for the contest, tossed her kerchief, and the two knights spurred their mounts with a shout, leveling their lances as they closed. Imein cleverly deflected Eugen’s point with a feat of his shield, and caught the other full on with his own. Eugen flew over his horse’s rump and lay stu

Kunigund rose to go to him, but Manfred restrained her with a hand on her shoulder.

“Bwa! We Krenken might enjoy this game,” said Hans, “if the blows were not pulled.”

“Times change,” Max said. “In the old days, the crowd would shout, ‘Be cheerful!’ and applaud any well-turned feat. Imein did good work with his shield in that passage. Very prettily done. But now, you hear them yell. ‘Stab and attack!’” Max suited gesture to his words. “’Poke out his eyes!’ ‘Chop off his foot!’”

Hans waved his arm across the stands. “They cried no such thing.”

Max leaned forward to watch Thierry and Ranaulf enter the lists. “No, but elsewhere. Here, chivalry is not yet forgotten.”

That evening, Dietrich ventured into the Lesser Woods behind Church Hill, gathering certain roots and cuttings, the moon and he being both in the proper frame for such a task. A few herbs also had answered to the spring warmth, although the butterheads would not bloom for several months. Some plants he left whole. Others, he sliced and boiled to make a paste. Still others, he ground to powder with a pestle and tied into muslin bags for infusions. He would make of these medicines a gift to Theresia. The unexpected offering would delight her and she would invite him inside to talk and they could restore the life they had had together.