The Table of Less Valued Knights Page 13

  The first test had come early on, when Humphrey had pulled up his horse and announced that it was time to shoot the yellow arrow, which turned out to have nothing to do with archery. Elaine headed for a bush. Martha nearly followed her before she realised that she was supposed to accompany Humphrey and Conrad to a nearby stand of trees.

  What do I do, what do I do, what do I do? thought Martha, as she skirted round Jemima – the creature made her nervous. She cursed that young Crone’s insistence that she couldn’t turn her into an anatomically correct boy; how hard could it be? It was sheer laziness on her part. Humphrey and Conrad, clearly accustomed to companionable pissing, headed for the same tree, chatting as they went. Martha chose one a few paces away.

  ‘Don’t go running off, now,’ said Humphrey.

  ‘Wouldn’t dream of it,’ said Martha, whose only thought was of running off. Oh, and of relieving herself, because her bladder was full to exploding. She stared at the tree trunk in front of her. Come on, think, think, THINK!

  ‘You’re taking your time,’ observed Humphrey.

  ‘My buttons are snarled up,’ said Martha.

  There must be an answer. Distract them and squat as quick as I can? Wet myself? What?

  The tree trunk, she noticed, was shedding bark. Some of the pieces flaking off it were quite big. As quietly and subtly as she could, and thanking the Lord that she’d picked a tree wide enough to hide what she was doing, she peeled a large slice of bark from the tree, pulled down her britches a few inches, put the bark in between her legs as a kind of sloping ledge and then pissed onto it, allowing the urine to slide down the bark and onto the ground in front of her. Success! Martha felt triumphant.

  These practical problems seemed the hardest to solve, but in many ways they turned out to be the easiest. People saw what they expected to see. So if a man was hesitating before taking a piss behind a tree, it was more likely that he had a shy bladder than that he was a woman and constructing a piss-slope from bark.

  Beyond these mechanical matters, though, Martha consistently said and did the wrong thing. On the first night they pitched their camp, Humphrey sent Martha and Conrad together to get firewood. Martha tried to snap the branches from trees while Conrad looked on in disbelief. At last he pointed out that green wood wouldn’t burn, and there were plenty of fallen boughs to choose from.

  ‘Do it yourself, then, if you’re so clever,’ said Martha.

  ‘Talk to me like that again and I’ll cuff you,’ said Conrad.

  Martha’s jaw dropped. Nobody had ever threatened to cuff her before, not even when she was a baby.

  She staggered back to camp bent double under the weight of the wood she was carrying, unable to see why Conrad, who was bigger and stronger and better suited intellectually to manual labour, couldn’t carry it all himself. Humphrey, meanwhile, had dug a pit for the fire, so Martha plonked down all of her wood in the middle of it. Humphrey stared at her.

  ‘Aren’t you going to light it?’ said Martha.

  ‘You don’t just pile the wood in a heap,’ said Humphrey.

  ‘Why not?’ said Martha. ‘It all burns, doesn’t it?’

  Humphrey knelt down and started painstakingly arranging the wood into a pyramid, which seemed completely pointless to Martha, as it would look exactly the same once it was ablaze.

  Once the fire was lit, Humphrey, Conrad and Elaine began pitching the tents. Martha took the opportunity to dig through her saddlebags looking for a book to read.

  ‘Aren’t you going to help?’ said Conrad.

  ‘No,’ said Martha.

  ‘That wasn’t a question,’ said Conrad.

  ‘Yes it was,’ said Martha.

  She sat down on a stump and opened her book. Seconds later, she found herself picked up by Conrad, tucked under his arm, and carried towards Elaine, who was laying out her tent. He dropped her, sprawling, to the ground.

  ‘She’s a lady,’ he said. ‘Help her.’

  Martha opened her mouth to protest, but she was in a bind. If she said that a lady was just as capable of pitching a tent as a man, then she had talked herself into helping, even if the others didn’t realise it. If not, then it was her role as man to do the tent-pitching, and, worse, she had lost the argument with Conrad. She decided that the best solution was to supervise Elaine, offering useful advice, even though she had never pitched a tent before. It didn’t look that hard. She could tell that Elaine was grateful for the input by the way she kept saying, ‘Thank you, Marcus,’ the strain in her voice no doubt due to the effort of hauling the canvas around.

  After they had eaten their mediocre meal and it was time to sleep, Martha headed instinctively towards the women’s tent. It was only when she saw Elaine’s shocked expression that she realised she was supposed to sleep with Humphrey and Conrad. The tent wasn’t really big enough for three, especially if one of those three was Conrad, but at least she had her own bedroll. Inside the tent, the two men stripped to their underwear and climbed beneath their blankets. Martha searched through her belongings until she found the little wads of cotton she had brought with her from the castle, then began carefully wiping rosewater onto her cheeks and forehead. Then she applied lemon juice to her freckles to lighten them. It was only when she was pulling a silk pillowcase out of her bag that she realised both men were gawping at her.

  ‘What?’ she said. ‘It keeps your skin smooth. You should both get one.’

  She was making mistakes, she knew, each mistake compounding the mistake before and making her look increasingly suspicious. How do men behave? she asked herself, but she only knew how men behaved when they were with a princess, not how they behaved when they were with one another. She needed to learn, and fast, and resolved to watch Humphrey and Conrad, as covertly as she could.

  Thirty

  Or rather, increasingly, she covertly watched Humphrey. She didn’t know what to make of him. He was her captor. He could kill her at any time. Leila must have had her reasons for attacking him, even if Martha didn’t know what they were. Somehow Humphrey must be involved in Jasper’s disappearance, or be standing in the way of Martha finding him. Even if she hadn’t been in fear of death at his hand, she wouldn’t have been able to trust him.

  And yet there was something appealing about him. She was drawn to his rugged looks and manner, so different from the wan courtiers she was used to in Puddock. The dry way he teased Conrad and even Elaine. Martha hated being teased, and yet she found herself wishing Humphrey would tease her too. She was mesmerised by his effortless confidence, the way he assumed the lead and everyone else just fell into line. If she’d had that kind of natural authority, maybe she could have been queen after all.

  She felt a sort of agitation whenever he was near her. In their fight, when he had straddled her, forcing her arms down with his knees, he’d been close enough for her to smell his odour of salt and leather, and she’d felt a sudden, oddly pleasurable alertness. This feeling never went away so long as he was close by, and he was always close by. It gave her the same gnawing sense in her stomach as hunger, the same slight nausea. And even in that first moment, when she should have been concentrating on staying alive, she found that she wanted to impress him very much. It was a feeling that increased with the passing days.

  They always rode in the same formation, Martha up front with Humphrey, then Elaine and Conrad behind. Martha and Humphrey rode in silence, while Elaine and Conrad chattered away to each other like two canaries. From time to time Humphrey would glance back at Elaine with an expression that Martha found all too easy to interpret. Elaine was lovely, her face fresh as a new sweep of snow. Martha wanted to slap her. Weren’t queens the ones who were supposed to be effortlessly beautiful? She wondered if Humphrey would look at her that way if she still had the appearance of a woman. But no, even before her transformation, she’d looked like an underfed fourteen-year-old boy.

  Humphrey never looked at her at all, and only addressed her to bark instructions. Apparently he was still bearing a
grudge over Leila trying to kill him, even though Martha had made it clear that it had had nothing to do with her. He was obviously an unreasonable man. In her previous life as a princess, if anyone was displeased with her they knew to keep it to themselves, or at least to speak ill of her only when she was out of earshot. If there was sulking to be done, she was the one to do it. Her odd, heightened awareness of Humphrey made the way he was ignoring her all the more irritating. Why was it that the more objectionable he was, the more she craved his attention?

  She had been determined not to speak first, to make him come to her and apologise. But she needed to know why Leila had attacked him, what it was that linked him to her quest to find Jasper. That was what mattered; she must put her dignity aside. So one morning as they were riding through a broad pasture, the grass still wet with dew, she abruptly said, ‘Have you been at Camelot long?’

  Humphrey turned to her, a look of surprise and amusement on his face.

  ‘So you can speak,’ he said.

  She refused to reply.

  ‘I’m not in Camelot, I’m in a field,’ he said, infuriatingly.

  Conrad, who was within earshot, sniggered.

  ‘But you’ve been a knight a long time,’ Martha persisted, feeling at once annoyed and superior for being the one making the effort. At least she was capable of behaving like an adult.

  ‘Twenty years a knight,’ conceded Humphrey. ‘Five years before that as a squire, and five years before that a page. I’ve been there since I was eight years old.’

  ‘So you were friends with Jasper?’

  ‘You mean Prince Jasper of Puddock? You seem to be on awfully familiar terms with the Puddock royal family.’

  ‘Sorry,’ said Martha, cursing herself for yet another misstep. ‘Yes, I mean Prince Jasper. I’m just asking because I remember him from when I was a little g- boy. Back at the castle. I was only …’ Had Martha chosen an age for herself? She couldn’t remember. ‘Eight, I think? When he died.’ She tried her best to keep her voice calm and natural, but she was wondering whether Humphrey, too, knew that Jasper wasn’t really dead.

  ‘I wouldn’t call us friends exactly, but I liked him,’ said Humphrey.

  ‘Why weren’t you friends?’ asked Martha.

  ‘Well,’ said Humphrey. ‘He was heir to a throne. I know that everyone thinks of Camelot as an egalitarian place, but there are still questions of status.’ Humphrey hadn’t mentioned to Martha that he was a Less Valued Knight and that Round Table knights didn’t tend to fraternise with him.

  ‘You were jealous of him?’ said Martha.

  ‘Watch it,’ said Conrad, behind her.

  ‘It’s all right, Conrad,’ said Humphrey. ‘I’d rather talk than die of boredom, no matter how rude my interlocutor.’ He turned his attention back to Martha. ‘No, I wasn’t jealous of him. I’d sooner eat my own arms than be king.’

  ‘Really?’ said Martha, thrilled at having found this common ground. ‘I don’t think that would help. They’d probably still make you do it, even without arms.’

  ‘I was joking,’ said Humphrey.

  ‘So was I,’ said Martha, ‘though I think I’m right about the arms.’ She allowed herself a smile. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d smiled. To her delight, Humphrey laughed.

  ‘And Jasper,’ she continued, ‘I mean Prince Jasper, do you think he wanted to be king?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Humphrey.

  ‘Do you think he would have been a good king?’

  Humphrey pondered this. ‘That’s a difficult question,’ he said at last.

  ‘Why?’ said Martha.

  ‘You ask a lot of questions,’ said Conrad.

  ‘Calm down, Conrad, it’s called a conversation,’ said Humphrey. ‘It’s complicated,’ he said to Martha. ‘What makes a good king?’

  ‘You’re asking me?’

  ‘Yes, I’m asking you.’

  ‘Um, I suppose …’ said Martha. ‘Being honourable? And valiant?’

  ‘Those are abstract terms,’ said Humphrey. ‘People don’t just walk around being honourable and valiant. In fact, if you meet anyone who walks around making a show of being honourable and valiant, they’re generally a prick. I mean, name someone who you think is honourable and valiant.’

  Martha thought for a bit. ‘Lancelot?’ she said.

  Humphrey burst out laughing and turned in his saddle. ‘You hear that, Conrad?’ he said. ‘Marcus thinks Lancelot is honourable and valiant.’

  Martha felt her face redden.

  ‘I don’t give a fuck what Marcus thinks,’ said Conrad.

  Humphrey rolled his eyes and turned back to Martha.

  ‘Surely you know that Lancelot is screwing Guinevere?’

  ‘What’s screwing?’ asked Martha.

  ‘What’s screwing?’ said Humphrey. He stared at her incredulously.

  ‘Leave him alone, he’s just a kid,’ said Elaine. She and Conrad had edged forward and were now riding close behind Humphrey and Martha, the better to join in the conversation.

  ‘You know – the thing men and women do to make babies?’ sneered Conrad.

  ‘Oh,’ said Martha. ‘Yes, I do know. I’ve seen pictures.’

  Conrad snorted so loudly that it might have been Jemima. Elaine had a fit of the giggles, while Humphrey just gazed at Martha with open-mouthed amazement.

  ‘So they’re doing that on purpose?’ Martha pressed on, through her embarrassment.

  ‘On …? Yes, they are doing it on purpose,’ said Humphrey. He turned to Conrad with a smirk, and Conrad couldn’t help but grin back.

  ‘The point,’ said Humphrey to Martha, ‘is that Lancelot may be the best knight in the world – truly, he actually may be – but he is far from perfect. Nobody’s perfect. Well, Galahad might be pretty much perfect, but you just want to smack him in his smug chops, so that makes him not perfect. Lancelot is honourable on his horse, not honourable between the Queen’s thighs. Valiant in battle, not valiant pretending to Arthur’s face that he’s his best friend. So would Lancelot be a good king?’

  ‘No,’ said Conrad, just as Elaine said, ‘Yes.’

  ‘The ladies love Lancelot,’ said Humphrey. ‘What do you think, Marcus?’

  Martha hesitated. ‘No?’ she said.

  ‘Why not?’

  Because I’m not a lady.

  ‘Because he’s a hypocrite?’

  ‘You see – that’s what I’m saying. Everyone’s a hypocrite. If you exclude all the hypocrites, nobody’s going to be king.’

  ‘Even Prince Jasper?’

  ‘Yes. Even him.’

  Martha felt herself wondering how much she really wanted to know about her brother. When she’d thought he was dead, the book was closed – he was perfect. But now that he was alive, she felt a vertiginous panic about what she might be about to learn.

  She took a deep breath. ‘In what way was he a hypocrite?’

  Humphrey scrutinised her anxious face. ‘You knew him at the castle?’ he said.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘When I was little.’

  ‘You hero-worshipped him a bit, maybe?’

  With all of my heart. ‘I barely remember him,’ she said.

  ‘All right,’ Humphrey said, ‘if you really want to know. He talked grand talk about the importance of brotherhood and knightly values, but he was a lazy sod. Never put himself forward for a quest he didn’t have to go on. I realised a long time ago that you don’t actually have to like going on quests, you just have to be willing to do what’s necessary. I started feeling a lot better about myself when I figured that one out. Anyway, some of the knights had a problem with Jasper over that, but I didn’t, not really. He did lord it over everyone a bit because he knew he was going to be King of Puddock one day. I already told you I wasn’t grand enough to be his friend. So that was annoying, but it was understandable. On the other hand, he was nice to his squire.’

  ‘That matters,’ said Conrad.

  ‘It really does,’ agreed
Humphrey. ‘He bought his fair share of drinks. And, most importantly, when it came right down to it, you could trust him. He’d have been as good a king as anyone. I mean, he was a decent bloke, and that’s all you can hope for, since who becomes king is essentially luck of the draw. Look at Arthur. He’s made a fair fist of it for someone who got the crown by pulling a sword out of a rock. Sure, he’s a sanctimonious bugger and a terrible bore if you’re stuck next to him at dinner, but I doubt anybody could have done a much better job.’

  ‘He’s better than King Leo of Tuft,’ said Elaine.

  ‘Better than Edwin,’ said Martha, with a twinge of guilt at having left him in charge of her nation.

  ‘Better than any of us,’ said Humphrey. ‘Do you think you’d be a good king?’

  ‘Me?’ said Martha, appalled. She had only just begun to relax at the thought that Jasper had no real skeletons in his closet, and now she was being invited to open her own.

  ‘Yes, you, if however many thousands of people died and it ended up as your turn. Could happen. Bad plague year.’

  ‘No,’ said Martha. ‘I’d be a terrible king. I don’t know how to do anything. You saw me with that magic sword, I didn’t know what I was doing, I was terrified, I couldn’t even keep my eyes open. I can’t fight. I can’t lead an army. I can’t lead, full stop. I’m hopeless. I can sit politely at a banquet and laugh at people’s bad jokes, and I can shake hands and admire people’s pigs. That’s it. Sum total of my qualifications. I would be a disaster as king.’

  The others were silenced by this surprisingly passionate outburst.

  ‘Pigs?’ said Humphrey eventually.

  ‘Yes,’ said Martha. ‘I was always accompanying Princess Martha to county fairs. Puddock is full of pigs. I am quite the expert.’

  Humphrey raised his eyebrows. ‘You’re a pig expert,’ he said. ‘That I would not have guessed.’

  Then Elaine spoke up. ‘I’d be an amazing queen,’ she announced.

  ‘You would, would you?’ said Humphrey.