The Final Quest (The Parsival Saga Book 3) Read Online Free
Author: Richard Monaco
brightness before him passing steadily in dips and leaps, saw the banked, white and yellow flowers on the slopes; loosely sketched poplar trees; bright, vacant sky … shifting shadows … until finally the sun was at his back and his own angled, jerking shape gradually grew out before him as if his substance flowed into darkness and he thought nothing, merely watching out of calm yet hungry emptiness as he was seemingly dragged along by a force oblivious to bone and blood’s frailty, until his shadow and the night were one and he reeled a little, the stored, burning sunlight beating in his head, the stick jerking, gesticulating … then the rising moon spread new shadows and he staggered straight ahead as the road looped away. Then suddenly stepped over an edge and fell silently into a slash of darkness that might have been bottomless, and he still seemed to be walking as he dropped, the stick fanning vacancy …
III
The knight was young, fairly tall, wearing chipped, weathered red and black armor, lacking a helmet. His black, dusty, tightly curled hair resembled a Moor’s, the rawboned woman thought, watching him through the underbrush that clustered on the slope before the little wooden bridge. She gripped the pitchfork tightly. Beside her crouched a short, goatish man in his fifties holding a spear with a cracked tip. There were other women, a few older men and teenage boys and girls hiding in the brush and willows that overhung the stream and path. It was an ideal spot and when the stranger was well out on the narrow, railless span a dozen or so of the motley ambushers fired and heaved and lobbed a volley of stones and makeshift javelins that twisted in flight and went end over end. One old man, as he let fly, fell forward down the slope. The missiles were rattling and splashing down everywhere, one, then another ringing lightly off his armor. The wrong end of a pointed stick struck him in the throat, puffing out his cheeks as the people scrambled, cheering (for some reason), and by the time they were jammed shoulder-to-shoulder on the narrow span he’d recovered enough to draw his sword and fan a single cut that sheared away two out-thrust spears and sent the leaders piling back, screaming, skirts flapping, white beards flopping. A little girl tossed a rock and scurried off, and at the end of the bridge (as the others tripped and skidded, slipped and rolled for the undergrowth) the big woman with the pitchfork and a bent old crone with a carving knife stood their ground together, the old one snarling:
“Curse all thieving bastards! You put no fear in a good woman!”
The knight seemed puzzled. Let his point fall and rubbed his throat where he’d been hit. Swallowed experimentally.
“What means this?” he wondered. “What folk are you, to use me thus?”
Some of the bolder hesitated now on the slope and under the willows that dryly shook the burning sunlight.
“And who be you, then, sir?” the big woman asked. “If not a brigand or worse.”
“Ah, well put,” said the crone in a voice like coughing, brandishing her knife, a little wasp of a woman with steel-colored eyes, threatening him almost symbolically. The rest were waiting partly in peace, fear and menace … “Who be you?”
“I?” the armored man frowned. Knit his eyebrows. One hand unconsciously fingered a raw, uneven scar alongside his right eye. “Why I am …” Broke off. His bare fingers flicked sweat from his eyes. “Never mind that,” he said, staring, then starting forward and all but the two rippled back as if a wind blew them, even the old one giving a step or two, painfully stooping and, as he passed, flailing the blade in his wake. The long woman just stood there, watchfully.
“Cowards!” raged the crone. “You’re all cowards! God curse you all for cowards!”
The knight marched on, surrounded at an impotent distance by the ragged peasants, some raged, some pleaded … some children were already
III
The knight was young, fairly tall, wearing chipped, weathered red and black armor, lacking a helmet. His black, dusty, tightly curled hair resembled a Moor’s, the rawboned woman thought, watching him through the underbrush that clustered on the slope before the little wooden bridge. She gripped the pitchfork tightly. Beside her crouched a short, goatish man in his fifties holding a spear with a cracked tip. There were other women, a few older men and teenage boys and girls hiding in the brush and willows that overhung the stream and path. It was an ideal spot and when the stranger was well out on the narrow, railless span a dozen or so of the motley ambushers fired and heaved and lobbed a volley of stones and makeshift javelins that twisted in flight and went end over end. One old man, as he let fly, fell forward down the slope. The missiles were rattling and splashing down everywhere, one, then another ringing lightly off his armor. The wrong end of a pointed stick struck him in the throat, puffing out his cheeks as the people scrambled, cheering (for some reason), and by the time they were jammed shoulder-to-shoulder on the narrow span he’d recovered enough to draw his sword and fan a single cut that sheared away two out-thrust spears and sent the leaders piling back, screaming, skirts flapping, white beards flopping. A little girl tossed a rock and scurried off, and at the end of the bridge (as the others tripped and skidded, slipped and rolled for the undergrowth) the big woman with the pitchfork and a bent old crone with a carving knife stood their ground together, the old one snarling:
“Curse all thieving bastards! You put no fear in a good woman!”
The knight seemed puzzled. Let his point fall and rubbed his throat where he’d been hit. Swallowed experimentally.
“What means this?” he wondered. “What folk are you, to use me thus?”
Some of the bolder hesitated now on the slope and under the willows that dryly shook the burning sunlight.
“And who be you, then, sir?” the big woman asked. “If not a brigand or worse.”
“Ah, well put,” said the crone in a voice like coughing, brandishing her knife, a little wasp of a woman with steel-colored eyes, threatening him almost symbolically. The rest were waiting partly in peace, fear and menace … “Who be you?”
“I?” the armored man frowned. Knit his eyebrows. One hand unconsciously fingered a raw, uneven scar alongside his right eye. “Why I am …” Broke off. His bare fingers flicked sweat from his eyes. “Never mind that,” he said, staring, then starting forward and all but the two rippled back as if a wind blew them, even the old one giving a step or two, painfully stooping and, as he passed, flailing the blade in his wake. The long woman just stood there, watchfully.
“Cowards!” raged the crone. “You’re all cowards! God curse you all for cowards!”
The knight marched on, surrounded at an impotent distance by the ragged peasants, some raged, some pleaded … some children were already
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