The Incorporated Knight

III – The Count's Coronet

When King Valdhelm II of Locania died, his heir, King Valdhelm III, bade all his nobles to his coronation in the royal city of Kromnitch. This was also the county seat of the King's feudatory, Count Petz of Treveria. One of Petz's liege men was Baron Emmerhard of Zurgau, among whose vassals was Sir Dambert Eudoricson of Arduen.

After the royal command arrived, Sir Dambert and his family met before dinner to discuss their plans. Eudoric joined them late and dirty.

"Eudoric!" cried the Lady Aniset. " 'Tis the third time of late that thou hast tracked mud into the castle. What's got into thee?"

"Mother!" exclaimed the young man. "If you'd had my troubles—"

"Thy carriage-wagon?" asked Sir Dambert.

"Aye. The thing overset on a turn and spilt me into the mud. Lucky I wasn't slain, besides which, the vehicle has suffered scathes that'll take a fortnight to remedy. I fear the fabrication of such a device be beyond our local wainwrights. I should have thought on that ere I entered into this compact with Baron Emmerhard."

"Belike," observed Eudoric's middle brother Olf, "your coach be too high and narrow."

"Aye, but there's no easy remedy. If I make the tread wider, the cursed thing can't pass the narrow straits on the Zurgau-Kromnitch road, for which traffic the wain's especially designed. If I make the wheels smaller, they'll give the passengers a fine bouncing."

Eudoric's sister asked: "Why go you not back to Pathenia, where this art be better understood, and buy a carriage-wain already made?"

" Tis an arduous two-months' journey, and the road over the Asciburgis is a mere track, impassable to wheeled traffic."

"Then," said Eudoric's younger brother Sidmund, "why not hire a brace of Pathenian wainwrights to come hither and work for us?"

"They would not depart their own land unless compelled by force."

"Then compel them!" snorted Sir Dambert. "By the Divine Pair, are we of gentle blood or are we not? Where's thy knightly mettle? Eh?"

Eudoric smiled. "Father, you know not the Pathenians' persnickety ideas of the rights of their citizens. 'Twould but get me mewed up in prison again, with none to go bail for me."

"The Emperor hath an one," said Sir Dambert thoughtfully. "This carriage must needs have been made by local wainwrights."

"Aye, I've seen it," said Eudoric. " 'Tis but a farmer's wagon with a fancy gilded body on top. Gives the passengers a fearful shaking; can't turn sharply-angled corners. My coach, contrarywise, suspends the body from springs and leather straps, to soften the jouncing, and can turn in its own length. I marked these virtues of the Pathenian coach when I rode in it, when Jillo and I were on our way to Velitchovo."

Sir Dambert sighed. "A fantastical land, this Pathenia, where dragons have the law's protection and villeins assert their rights against their betters. But let's to this question of the coronation. Wilt thou come, Eudoric? 'Twould pleasure me to have thee by me, but the choice is thine."

"Your pardon, Father," replied Eudoric, "but I plan to tarry here. Not being knighted, I'm not included in the royal command. Someone should remain to keep an eye on our demesne, lest that caitiff Rainmar raid us. I must, moreover, ride my wainwrights with a needle-spined spur, lest Baron Emmerhard seize the pretext to flout our compact."

"Doth he cool towards thee, then?" asked Dambert, frowning.

"Aye. 'Twas all firmly fixed: he to pay for the building of the coach and, upon its completion, to knight me and give me Gerzilda in marriage, in requital for a partnership in my coach line. Now he holds back the money and sidles around his promises like a crab on the strand. Meanwhile, my wainwrights grow loud in demands for arrears in their pay—"

"Part of thy trouble," said Dambert, "lies at the door of Emmerhard's lord. Petz of Treveria is a man of antique fancies, who likes not the grant of golden spurs for aught but deeds of dought upon the battlefield. Quotha, there's been too much purchase of honors and titles by baseborn tradesmen—"

"My spurs will be for the dragonslaying, not for carriage building."

"But, son, thy dragonslaying was done, not in the Empire before witnesses, but in a distant, heathen land. So Petz and Emmerhard have nought but thy word—"

"What ails my word?" began Eudoric angrily.

"Oh, I believe thee; so do we all. But these others know thee not as we do."

At an inn of Kromnitch, Baron Emmerhard admired his scarlet-and-ermine reflection in a pier glass. He ran a comb through his graying beard, slapped a sandstorm of dandruff from his robe, and said to his wife:

"Not bad for a man of mine age, my dear. Now, prithee, the coronet!"

The Baroness Trudwig turned to Emmerhard's body servant. "My lord's coronet, Sigric! 'Tis in the trunk with the scarlet stripes."

"Forgive me, Your Ladyship," said the valet, "but 'tis not there."

"How now?" said Emmerhard. "Let me see ... Thou are right, varlet! Then where is the accursed bauble?"

"I know not, my lord," said Sigric. "Mona and Albrechta and I have already searched the twenty-three trunks and coffers. I know not how to tell you, sir, but I fear me it hath been left behind in Castle Zurgau—"

"What!" roared Emmerhard, hopping and stamping. "Thou dolt! Ass! Noodlehead!" He aimed a punch at Sigric but was careful, even in his rage, to move slowly enough to give Sigric time to duck. Good valets were not easily come by.

A half-hour later, the contents of the twenty-three traveling chests of Baron Emmerhard and his family were spread around their suite, but there was no sign of Emmerhard's coronet. The baron sat in a chair with his face in his hands, while his wife and four daughters tried to comfort him.

"Nay, nay," he groaned. "By the God and Goddess, I cannot take my place in line without my regalia. 'Twere a slight to the fledgling King. I should never live it down. I'll send a message to young Valdhelm, that I'm taken with a sudden tisic and like to die o't."

"Could not a hard-riding courier gallop back to Zurgau to fetch the thing hither in time?" asked the Lady Trudwig.

"Nay, with the fleetest steeds in relays, he could not return ere the morrow, and the coronation's at high noon today."

Gerzilda, the tall, willowy, blond eldest daughter, spoke up: "Father! Don't you call to mind that my lord Petz be abed with the gout? He hath been excused from the ceremony."

"Well?"

"Why can ye not borrow Treveria's coronet?"

"Nay, 'tis a count's coronet. It hath more spikes and knobs than that of a mere baron."

"None would notice. If any do, ye can explain the circumstance and pass it off with a jest. And I shall die if I cannot attend in my new gown ..."

Baron Emmerhard grumbled some more, but at length his womenfolk brought him round.

"Well," he said at last, "let's forth, stopping at Count Petz's on the way. Since his house be on t'other side of the city, this divigation will force us to miss the burning of the heretics; but that can't be helped."

Because of the gathering of the nobility, the narrow, winding streets of Kromnitch were more crowded than usual, despite a persistent drizzle. The chairs bearing Baron Emmerhard and his family were stopped a score of times as the chairmen bearing them slipped and staggered over the muddy cobbles. It took the party over an hour to reach Count Petz's mansion.

Knowing his master's vassals by sight, the doorkeeper promptly opened the portal for the Zurgau family. He told Emmerhard: "My lord is with his physician, sir; but I'll send a message."

"A pox!" cried Emmerhard. "This brooks no delay. Petz knows me well enough. Stay here, ladies; I'll go up myself."

"But, my lord—" began the doorkeeper.

"My good man, take thine etiquette and stuff it. I'm in a very swivet of a hurry. Show me to your master's chambers or call me one who will."

When Baron Emmerhard, preceded by a frightened servant, burst into Count Petz's bedchamber, they found the huge old Count of Treveria sprawled on his bed, and a gray-bearded, bespectacled little man pottering around a tripod and muttering. A mixture of burning powders perfumed the air with a rainbow of aromatic smokes. The physician chanted: "Abrasaxa, Shenouth—"

"Petzi!" cried Emmerhard, heedless. "Pardon the intrusion, but I must have your help instanter!"

"Oh, Emmeri!" growled Petz, heaving his great bulk up and rearranging his vast white beard atop the covers. "Why in the name of the Divine Pair did ye interrupt Calporio's spell against my gout? Now he must needs start over."

"A grievous thing indeed, my lords," clucked the little man. " 'Tis the second such interruption. I might as well go back to bleeding."

"Which will doubtless finish off my liege lord altogether," said Emmerhard. "Doctor Baldonius tells me that bleeding's a useless, discredited—"

"Baldonius!" snorted Doctor Calporio. "I will not try Your Lordship's patience with my opinion of his servants, but if that mountebank—"

"Hold thy tongue, sirrah; we've no time for disceptation. Petzi, my trouble is this ..." Emmerhard rattled off his tale of the forgotten coronet.

"Certes, ye shall have mine," said Petz. He spoke to the servant who had ushered Emmerhard in.

"Harmund! Give the baron my coronet to wear at the coronation. Yarely; he hath but little time."

"A thousand thanks, Petzi!" roared Emmerhard, turning with a wave to follow Harmund out. "Let me know when I can do aught for you."

Harmund led Emmerhard to Count Petz's strong room. After comings and goings with' key rings—for the door could be opened only by turning two keys in the lock at once—they entered the room. When a massive chest was unlocked and the lid thrown back, two coronets lay revealed, each in its padded, satin-lined box. Harmund hesitated, saying:

"My lord said not which to give you, sir. Shall I go back to ask—"

"Nay, nay, no time. Besides, 'twould grossly upset his little wizard, were his spell to be thrice interrupted. The crown on the left looks the worse for wear; let's try it! I would fain not expose my old friend's best headpiece to the risk of dent or downfall."

The old coronet proved a size too large. "Murrain!" said Emmerhard. "This thing rides upon mine ears."

"I'll fix it, my lord," said Harmund. A strip of parchment stuck with flour paste to the inside of the lining made the coronet fit passably well; and the baron, beaming with relief, rushed off to join his women.

As Emmerhard had anticipated, they were too late to view the burning of the heretics, three unrepentant monotheists from Pathenia. They reached the Great Temple of the Divine Pair just in time to take their places for the coronation. Emmerhard, torn between haste and the wish to move in a stately, dignified manner, was the last man to reach the barons' rank. He ventured a glance down the knights' rank, behind the barons, and nodded briefly as Sir Dambert greeted him with a small, discreet wave.

While Emmerhard was lining up with the other barons of the Empire, Doctor Calporio sought out the chest in Count Petz's strong room, wherein lay the remaining coronet. "Harmund!" shrieked Calporio.

"Aye, Doctor?" Rattling keys, the servant hastened into the storeroom.

"Why gavest thou the baron the old coronet?"

"He chose it himself, sir; none forbade—"

"Knowst not that I've been using the bauble for a mighty magical work? That it be charged with puissant sorcerous powers? Ah, demons of the Pit, with what ninnyhammers am I surrounded!"

Calporio dashed out with his purple robe flapping and, back in Count Petz's bedchamber, told his employer of this untoward development.

"Carry not on so, good my Doctor," said the count. "From what ye told me, the wearer must needs do certain things and make a wish, ere the demon imprisoned in the gem will act. Is't not so?"

"Aye, but—"

"Since Emmerhard knows not the formula, he cannot activate the demon. So let us calmly await his return of the object."

Calporio did not look convinced.

Baron Emmerhard stood in the Great Temple, in a row with his fellow barons, while the ceremony ground on. It had already lasted two hours, and ahead lay at least two hours more of hymns and sermons and speeches and ritual acts of allegiance to the King. Valdhelm HI, resplendent in blue and gold, had just made his appearance before the altar.

The new king was a nondescript young man, pleasant enough but not, it would seem, very bright. Rumor had it that at times he fancied himself a watering pot. The effective rule of the kingdom would doubtless devolve into the hands of a cabal of ruthless, power-hungry magnates like the Duke of Tencteria, who had been acting as adviser to the crown prince. Emmerhard looked upon the future with gloom.

For the present, the baron's feelings were of suffocating boredom. Even the most glittering tableaux lose their glamor with time; and for Emmerhard, the coronation had long since passed that point. He was evidently not the only one so afflicted. Out of the comer of his eye he had seen Baron Randver of Sidinia sneak a quick gulp of water-of-life from a flask concealed in the sleeve of his robe.

Furthermore, the baron's feet hurt. The Emperor and his family were seated in the front pew, and behind them sat several kings of the Empire. Everyone else, however, had to stand. Moreover, the parchment strip inside the coronet began to cut painfully into Baron Emmerhard's forehead.

King Valdhelm was involved in a lengthy series of answers to questions from the Supreme Pontiff of the Holy Universal Dualistic Church, when Emmerhard's nose began to itch.

All eyes were fixed upon the King. Some, Emmerhard suspected, feared and some hoped that the young simpleton would get his responses mixed up, thus casting doubt upon the validity of the ceremony, or at least cause political embarrassment and get the reign off to an ill-omened start.

Making sure that no one was watching him, Baron Emmerhard gave his nose a furtive scratch. At the same time he thought, silently moving his lips: "I wish I were home!"

And floomp! he found himself alone in a forest.

The baron's first impulse was to flee shouting in mad terror, but he mastered himself. After all, he reflected, he was a mature man of worldly experience, who had survived riots, battles, and assassination attempts. Now he studied his surroundings.

Nothing but greenery could be seen in any direction. Judging by the fresh springtime foliage, he might well be somewhere in his own well-forested barony of Zurgau, although he could not say just where.

In youth, Emmerhard had often hunted in the woods of the county of Treveria; but during the last decade he had hardly hunted at all. At first an injury had discouraged this activity; later he had become too involved with the economic side of his barony to resume the sport. Now he had forgotten most of the topographic details of his forested demesne.

Still, he reasoned that if he walked downhill, he would surely come to a stream. This would lead him to the River Lupa, which flowed past the village of Zurgau. He thought of climbing a tree to get his bearings but decided against it, lest he ruin his coronation clothes. Besides, the pale-green leaves were too thick to enable him to see far, even from aloft.

He was plainly the victim of magic; some spell had whisked him from the coronation to this distant spot. He wondered whether any had noticed his disappearance and whether some foe had done this to shame him. If magic had brought him hither, magic was needed to take him back.

Before setting out on a hike, for which his coronation costume was ludicrously unsuited, Emmerhard raised his voice in a bellow:

"Hola! Hola, there! Help!"

On the third attempt, he heard a faint reply: "Who calls?"

"Help! Help!" repeated Emmerhard.

"I come," said the voice.

Emmerhard heard the sound of hooves, muffled by turf. Soon a horse came in sight, the rider swaying and ducking as he avoided branches.

"Eudoric!" cried Emmerhard. For the rider was indeed his stocky, square-jawed prospective son-in-law. Caring little for appearances, Eudoric wore rough, stained forester's garb. A pair of bulging canvas saddlebags hung from the horse's withers.

"By the guardians of Hell!" cried the baron. "How earnest thou here so timely?"

"I've been visiting with my former tutor, the learned Doctor Baldonius," said Eudoric. "By the God and Goddess, my lord, what do you here in your court regalia? A horse on a housetop were no more incongruous."

"I know! I know!" cried Emmerhard, kneading his knuckles. "Saidst thou we be nigh unto Baldonius' house? Pray lead me to him, forthwith! Magic brought me hither, in the blink of an eye but now; and magic shall take me back. Hasten Eudoric, so that I may return ere the coronation be over or my absence marked!"

Eudoric studied the baron with narrowed eyes. "A moment, good my lord. Meseems there be a question or two to be answered first."

"What questions, sirrah?"

"Imprimis, there's my oft-promised knighthood. You know of my dragonslaying in Pathenia, not to mention my serving a month in their stinking jail for the breach of their game laws. So now, where's my title?"

"Dost mean that thou would abandon me in the trackless wildwood, an I comply not with thy demands?"

Eudoric grinned. "You grasp the import of my words, my lord, albeit I should have framed my request more tactfully. Secundus, you've promised me Gerzilda's hand; and when I've pressed you of late, you've put me off, as if you were minded to renege on our bargain."

"The final word shall be the lass's own. I'm no petty tyrant, to give my ewe lambs to husbands against their will."

Eudoric waved a hand. "That aspect frets me not. And lastly, there's the money I owe the wainwrights, which you've promised me and then withheld—"

"Thy damned coach-wagon hath been a-building for months, with no end in sight. Am I to pour my silver down a bottomless well?"

The argument raged for another quarter-hour, while Baron Emmerhard grew ever more agitated. At last he burst out:

"Oh, very well, thou scoundrel! I'll yield to thy extortionate demands because I must. Now show me the way to Baldonius' house!"

"Not that I mistrust your word," drawled Eudoric, "but I shall be able better to guide you when your undertakings are writ on parchment."

"Impudent knave!" shouted the baron, waving clenched fists. "What shall we write upon in this wilderness? Bark?"

Eudoric brought out of one saddlebag several sheets of parchment and a quill and stoppered inkhorn. "Here, by good hap, are the latest drawings of plans for our coach. The backs will serve nicely."

"Hast pen and ink, too, thou young devil?"

"Certes. A gentleman of business like me must ever be prepared. First we'll set down my patent of knighthood. I'll serve as scribe if you wish, my lord."

"Write clearly, then. Remember, I read not badly."

Another quarter-hour passed while Eudoric painstakingly composed three documents binding Baron Emmerhard to fulfill his promises. The documents signed, Eudoric seated the wrathful baron upon his horse's rump and clucked the beast to a trot.

Doctor Baldonius weighed the coronet, peered at it through a lens, and pressed an ear against the gold. Then he shook his head.

"Typical of Calporio's incompetency," he said. "The demon was entrapped in the great emerald for but a single usage. When my lord scratched his nose and murmured a wish to be back in his own demesne, the demon whisked him hither and then fled back to its own plane. Now the coronet bears no more magic than any other headpiece."

"Why didn't the sprite deposit me at Castle Zurgau instead of in the woods?" asked Emmerhard.

"The spell had been tailored to the needs of Count Petz. All the demon knew of you was that ye were the Lord of Zurgau; so it dropped you at random in the barony. Or else it was the simple inaccuracy that one expects of a pilot model. 'Twas a stroke of luck that ye encountered Sir Eudoric."

"Luck, say ye? Humph!"

Doctor Baldonius' smile showed briefly through his long gray beard. "I said not what kind of luck it was, my lord. Would ye enact the ritual of knighting now, ye twain?"

A moment later, Eudoric grinned wryly as he felt his sore shoulder. "My father-in-law-to-be has had his revenge. He dubbed me nigh hard enough to break my collar bone."

"No more than thou meritest, whelp," growled Emmerhard. "Now, Doctor, canst send me back to Kromnitch ere the damned ceremony be over?"

"There is a spell," mused the wizard, "but 'twill cost you a thousand marks—"

"Hoy! Art mad, old man?"

"Nay, my lord. This cantrip calls for my rarest ingredients and leaves me fordone for a sennight. Time presses; shall we begin?"

A puff of displaced air announced the return of Baron Emmerhard to the Great Temple of Kromnitch, just as the Supreme Pontiff lowered the royal crown, its great gems winking in the lamplight, on to the head of the kneeling Valdhelm. Since all eyes were fixed on the twinkling, many-hued gems, the only one to notice Emmerhard's materialization was the person standing directly behind him, in the front rank of the knights.

Sir Fredlin Yorgenson of Aviona, far to the north, blinked and stared in disbelief at the baron's suddenly visible back. When Emmerhard disappeared, over an hour before, Sir Fredlin assumed that he had dropped off to sleep on his feet and that he had only dreamed of a man who had stood before him. Now Fredlin was sure that he had not dozed; but he decided never to cast doubt upon his sanity by telling of this phenomenon.

That eventide, Baron Emmerhard sat in his suite at the inn, fuming. "A pox on that young extortioner!" he barked. "I ought to have snatched the damned parchments out of his hands and destroyed them. But, by the time I bethought me of that, Baldonius had already witnessed them, and the whelp had returned them to his scrip. Besides, he's a well-thewed youth, and I'm not so young as whilom."

"Why not see our counselor-at-law, Doctor Rup-man?" asked Gerzilda. "Surely he could find a way out of these legal gyves that Dambert's son has tricked you into."

"Nay, nay, puss," said Emmerhard. "Rupman's legal fees would exceed all that I owe Eudoric under my bond. And, forsooth, when I look at the matter with the eye of reason, that's the only one of the three instruments that truly hurts. 'Tis nought to me if Eudoric Dambertson strut about with 'sir' before his name. And whether he wed thee or not is, in fine, a matter for thy choice."

"If Eudoric's coach enterprise succeed, we may recover our coin," added Baroness Trudwig.

"A big 'if,' my dear," grumped Emmerhard. "I've lost faith in the scheme, what of the long delays. Nor am I fully convinced that such a partnership be meet for a nobleman, despite Eudoric's argument that anything to do with horses be a gentlemanly pursuit ipso facto. Still, 'tis not impossible."

"What said Count Petz when thou didst return his coronet?"

"He thought it a splendid joke, albeit that little grasshopper of a wizard, Calporio, was vexed at the expenditure of his costly enchantment on such a sleeveless errand. But Petzi, between roars of laughter, said he was thankful that the spell had first been tested on his faithful vassal—me—'stead of on's fat and gouty self. A murrain on all magical mummeries! Now, my dears, ye'd best get on with your robing and primping, lest we be late for the royal feast and the coronation ball."

Feeling very tall and noble in his gilded spurs, Sir Eudoric handed the reins to Jillo and swung down from the driver's seat of his coach in the courtyard of Castle Zurgau. Baron Emmerhard sourly regarded the gleaming paint, as yet unmuddied and unmarred.

"Well, my lord?" said Eudoric.

Emmerhard jerked a thumb. "Thou shalt find her in the flower garden."

Eudoric left the coach in charge of Jillo. In the flower garden he came upon Gerzilda. "Darling!" he cried, spreading his arms.

"Darling me no darlings, sirrah!" she said, backing away.

"Why, what's the matter? Are you not my betrothed?"

"Nay, nor never shall be. Think you I'd wed a man who so entreated my poor father?"

"But, Gerzilda, it was the only way I could—"

"Talk all you please, but 'twill make no difference. Go! Your presence is hateful to me."

Eudoric went. In the courtyard, he and Baron Emmerhard traded looks. Eudoric said: "Knew you what she'd say?"

"Aye. Blame me not; 'twas her idea entirely."

Eudoric thought. "Has her head been turned by the attentions of the fops in Kromnitch?"

Emmerhard shrugged. "All I can say to that is, she cut a swath at the grand ball, with several young noblemen dancing attendance upon her. Some have requested permission to call upon her here.

"Now, if I may offer advice, Sir Eudoric, meseems a young fellow like thee, who cares little for distinctions of rank and hath the outlook of a tradesman, were happier with some tradesman's daughter."

"Oh? I'll think on't." Eudoric's melancholy visage brightened. He swung into the driver's seat, took the reins from Jillo, and waved cheerfully to Baron Emmerhard as he guided the vehicle out of the castle gates and towards the town of Zurgau, to pick up his first passengers for Kromnitch.

After all, he thought, while he was sorry to lose Gerzilda—a fine girl, whom he could have loved— that was not the only factor. For one thing, she was taller than he; for another, she had hinted at plans for making Eudoric over into her idea of a stylish, sophisticated young gentleman of leisure. And, while there were plenty of girls in the world, nothing could equal a good, trusty source of steady income.