Fiction
Fantasy
On the sounding of the midnight bell, the horse returned to stand beneath the parapet.
We stood peering from the safety of the stones high above the sward, three soldiers newly commissioned to guard the night’s visitors; and the one visitor, which we now appraised, which left no courage in us but for the earthly things that we had seen in war. I held my lance against my shoulder, drawn back on my heels for seeing the apparition once again, and for knowing that great fear that shocks a man from wherein he finds his peace. The two men at my side, veterans of the most violent campaigns, stepped further back upon my shadow as they watched. I could not find fault in their trepidation, for surely the horse was not living, and shone as moonlight shines on the harvest fields, with inbred light. Our breaths obscured the clarity of that vision, as the ghostly visage stood stalwart in the cold, a tall stallion and white as the staring eyes of my companions, throwing off a braided mane that once had felt the touch of our old king.
“It is as I remembered,” I said, more to myself than to my companions. I moved the lance against the stone before me, rolling it quietly as I listened for a familiar sound, the grunt or whinny of a living beast. “And I was not more than an arm’s length away. But I swear it is the king’s best stallion.”
“How could it be?” Darrow Younger said from behind me. “It is another horse. It must be.”
Kepswitch moved slowly toward my shoulder, and silently laid a gloved hand upon my back.
“There was no other like it,” he said, and in his baritone I heard a trembling note. The frost of his breath moved gracefully into the night. “Sixteen hands tall, and white as bone. It even bears the king’s insignia on its flank.”
Perhaps his eyesight was more refined than my own, but I did see a marking, though whether it was the mark of our liege I could not say.
“But if it is the same horse,” I said, drawing back my lance and holding it firmly against my breast, “how could it have possibly survived?”
“It cannot be,” Darrow Younger said, and waved his arm briefly at the sight. “It is another horse.”
“Why does it stand before us so?” Kepswitch said earnestly. He drew his cloak about his leather tunic. “If it is dead?”
“It was our liege’s favorite horse,” I said. And then, when I remembered our mission, I turned to my companions. “Should we call on his chamber now?”
“And wake him for the sake of some stray stallion?” Darrow Younger said. He studied the vision below us. “Would we also wake his anger for the sake of our mistaken memories?”
“It is our duty,” I said, “to find the proof in it.”
“And I could not say that it was true without closer inspection,” Kepswitch said. “Can we really say that this horse is come from the country of the dead?”
“Then we must go down,” I said, “and certify the brand.”
We left the allure and moved in silence down the steps. And as we moved I thought of months ago, and that great battle in the rain, when half our garrison was killed, and our old king laid low on the grass. He had fallen as a soldier, still wielding his lance against the tide of arms, and suffered grievous wounds. I had been riding by his side, and formed a brace against the men who would have taken his last breath, but for the arms of several men devoted to the cause. My liege lay bloody in his armor, a jagged wound appearing through the violated plate, as his men fought their way toward honorable extinction. But then the enemy had fled, and we gathered up the king into our arms and carried him behind the hills. What we left on the battlefield was his beautiful horse, pure white and towering above the rest, but brought to earth by lances in its breast.
For this loss our liege most pitifully wept, even as we bound his wounds and prayed against the possibility of his death. The horse was dead, and no other of its girth and grace could take its place.
And now our warrior-king walked slowly in his binding, his beard now gray from war, and his body crippled from once surviving certain death. If not for his steward, I would not think that he could keep his duties to the crown. But it was he, five nights ago, who spied the apparition from the walls, as he paced the parapet in sleepless agitation. Of this he had confided in me, and I took his word for truth—that when he stood overlooking the sward, and the wilderness beyond, the stallion suddenly appeared, and moved its head aglow within the shadows of the keep. Was it madness, then, afflicting the man? But, no, it could not be, for it reappeared the following night on the sounding of the midnight bell. And so he brought me to the wall, and bade me study the nearby moor for its approach.
Alone I saw it move across the sward, and blind me with its light. That first evening, as the bell rang solemnly through the air, I was more afraid than at any time I faced the swords of my sworn enemy. Earthly things may only injure other earthly things, but that which comes from beyond death, and what evil we cannot know, is poison to the soul.
I reported my claim, and gathered my companions, and now waited with them for the woken gatekeeper to uplift the gate, so that we might leave the barbican. And as the man, dressed only in his tunic in the cold, addressed the chains with his assistants straining at the shoulder, I watched the comforting vision of the outer gate become the undying darkness of a moonless field—except for that ethereal glow cast by the persistent steed. My companions gazed at me expectantly, for I was the Sergeant-at-Arms, and held the closest trust of our liege. But the affairs of men do nothing to prepare the mind for any encounter with such entities, and I could only move at my body’s hesitating command, and they, in turn, followed.
The frost on the grass cracked and whispered beneath my feet, and the wind swept up suddenly and burned my face. And when I stood some twenty feet away from the ghostly horse, I stopped and regarded it closely.
“It does not move,” I said. “Its instincts are unnatural.”
“The light comes from its hide,” Kepswitch said in a whisper. “Surely it is something of the dead.”
Darrow Younger said nothing, but held his short sword lower at his side, his eye intent on the animal, and his mouth open to the wind.
And then the pale horse turned its muzzle to us, and we could see the prison of its eyes, which held no light akin to its appearance, but only the deepest black of non-life kept on earth. It stepped away and turned again, and then I saw the mark on its flank, the once-burned sign of our old king, plain to all of us.
“I have walked it endless times across the fields,” I said. “If it is the same horse it will remember me.”
“Do not move toward it,” Darrow Younger now said, and he lifted up his sword against the sight of it. “It is evil.”
“You said before that it was but a horse,” Kepswitch said. “Why should we not walk it to the paddock?”
“I was wrong—it is a demon in our fields.”
“But once our liege’s mount,” I said. “Why would its ghost bring evil to the place that first bred it?”
I let my lance fall in the grass, and carefully addressed the horse, and moved my feet as if by time alone my motion would be known; and when I was but an arm’s length away, my body bathed within the self-same light that from the horse’s hide found issuance, it turned, kicked soundlessly into the grass, and moved away from my entreating. And no matter the gentleness of my approach, it would not let me near it, and I could not gain on it, and so stood wondering after its purpose.
But when I turned, I saw the young man holding up my lance, and in the sudden motion of his arm, beyond the stunned expression of our Kepswitch, he hurled the weapon strongly through the air. I turned again and fell on my knees as the shaft flew toward the ghostly horse—and through its shoulder fell into that light and vanished in the field beyond. Then we knew, because of his condemnable fear, that the vision was not a creature from the ranks of the living. The horse of light remained unscathed, and suddenly reared up before me, and cast a shroud of frost on my lowering body.
And then, uninjured, fled into the moor.
It was another hour before I could leave my companions in the barracks and send word for my liege’s counsel. I could not leave the fire in the small hearth there, nor abandon the natural light that it provided. Darrow Younger would not speak of it, and Kepswitch only prayed over the holy artifacts within his hands. I was told that the king was not in his quarters, but was still awake at this late hour within the sanctuary of the chapel.
I found King Samuel kneeling before the altar, his aged hands impressing marks from amber beads along his palms. The candlelight danced madly in the room. He was alone. The tallow left a rancid odor in the air as I stepped into the light. He turned on his knees then, the shining crown reflecting every flame from its place on his long gray hair, his eyes affronted by the drooping flesh of age, his beautiful scarlet robes sweeping over the dusty stones. And then he rose as I paid my graces, and he sat on the bench before the altar and sighed through the tangle of his beard. He placed the beads into the pocket of his robe and smiled wanly in the chapel’s stifling atmosphere.
“Did you see it again, my son?” he asked in a strangely afflicted voice. His eyes watched me heavily.
“Yes, my lord, in truth,” I said. I moved before him. “My companions and I saw it clearly, and approached it.”
“How did you mark its presence?” the old man said hopefully.
“By a lance thrown through its body,” I replied. “The weapon caused no injury, and it was perfectly delivered.”
“By who?”
“Darrow Younger. His throw was accurate.”
“Even in a fearful state?”
“Even so,” I said. “I saw it fall through the stallion as I was kneeling near it.”
The old king accepted this knowledge quietly, and lowered his gaze to the floor in thought. When his head rose, his eyes were filled with greater strength, perhaps enough to face the truth of our uninvited visitor.
“It will come again,” he said. “And why should it come at all?”
“It was your property, my liege.”
“Then you believe that it returns to me?”
“I cannot say. I only know that it appears, and seems to wait before the gates for some unearthly reason.”
“But by God, what could the reason be?”
I stared into the old king’s eyes, and in their faint perception of the world I thought I saw a fear that I had never known, a fear of something beyond the power of the sword, or knights at arms, or provincial wars. It was a fear of his mortality, and what the horse might represent. I did not voice this estimation, though, and waited for him to speak again.
“I should have died upon the field of battle,” he said finally. “I should have died beneath my horse, my good brave horse that died beneath my failure to attend to my enemies.”
I spread my hands before him. “Sire, I have seen more horses die in war than ever died in the fields,” I said. “Surely it has nothing to do with your survival.”
“You are a soldier,” the old king said, “and I can never speak of war in ways you do not know. But I am an old man, and old men see the ways of death more clearly than the young. I believe the horse has come to take me with it to the fields of the dead. I have dishonored its allegiance by leaving it to die so far from home. Do you know how much I wept to leave my horse to waste? Such love can only follow into death, and so it has come upon me to repay that debt I failed to pay in war. We should have died together, and now it will not leave until I have rejoined the battle in the vapors of another world.”
I moved and kneeled before him, and laid my hands on his robe. “Do not speak so,” I said. “You surely live in this corporeal world. And if this ghost of your warhorse will not leave by earthly threat, then we shall send it from you with our prayers.”
“No, my son,” the old man said, and placed his aged hand on my shoulder. “When I first spied that vision, I ran from it in horror, and gave a commission to my Sergeant-at-Arms to stand between us. Is this the conduct of a king? Or of a frightened old man? But I will not bear that burden any longer. Tomorrow, when the midnight bell returns my horse to me, I will go to it in the fields and let it make me dead, for I believe that it will not go until this has been done, and I cannot allow my people to endure an impious spirit.”
The old king nodded then, and rose before the altar.
“I shall sleep tonight,” he said, “and kiss those that I love. And tomorrow you will walk me through the gate, and by your sword prevent any obstruction of my mission. We shall see this haunting done, for I have lived with the pain of much regret.”
And then he kissed my head, and left me kneeling in the candlelight.
In the barracks rooms, before the small hearth that warmed our sleepless faces, I spoke of our king’s notion of the vision, and what he knew as his obligation to the dead.
Kepswitch touched his yellow beard with deep concern, and met my gaze with wonder at the thought of our good king in league with that pale horse. “He is mistaken, surely,” Kepswitch said. “How could a man perceive the motives of a spirit?”
“I only speak of what he said.” I turned to stare on the fire, still fearful that I might see demonic shapes, or demons glaring from the flames. “He believes it is his mount come back to take him on.”
“This is work for holy men,” Darrow Younger whispered from the shadows. A heavy blanket hung around his head as if he wore a shroud. “It is madness to succumb to the will of ghosts.”
“And is our liege a madman now?” Kepswitch said.
“He is vexed by a vision,” Darrow Younger replied.
“Even so,” I said, returning my attention from the flames, “we know it is a vision of that horse, the same damned horse.”
“Yes,” Kepswitch said.
“What could its motive be, then,” I continued, “if not to prey on the conscience of our liege?”
“It is bedevilment,” Darrow Younger said emphatically, “cast by those who would deceive our king.”
“It is the same horse,” Kepswitch said sternly. “And whatever it demands of this living world must be answered in one man’s heart. He knows this, certainly, and has resolved to keep his contract with the dead.”
“And he will,” I said, “tomorrow. And we shall walk him to his fate, the soldiers who are pledged to his survival. It is a bitter root for healing this supernatural disease.”
“The horse will surely take him,” Darrow Younger said. “And we will see him consumed by its iniquity.”
I shivered by the fire, and rested my gaze on the flames again. In this light, the world was a small room for sleeping men. But beyond the walls of the keep the world was a larger vessel, containing every haunt of life, and the unkept promises of war.
When the morrow came the word had spread to every ear of the night’s intruder, and men and women waited in the ward to see their good king walk slowly with his guard from his chamber to the bridge, and onto the barbican. Their eyes glowed fearfully in the light of their few torches, as the hour grew late and the cold winds swept forcefully against the clothes they wore. Our liege had left his good queen weeping for her loss, if her dear husband was to perish in the gloam. His son remained in another country, and surely would have stopped his father’s action if he had known the circumstance. But being in another country was as good as being on another world, and so we climbed the steps onto the parapet and stood before the wall.
If there was hope that our delusion would have paid a coin to save our liege, it was not met, for as we stood on the parapet and listened to the pealing of the midnight bell, a light arose from off the moor, a pale glow growing with its advance across the sward. At this sight the old king breathed an anguished air, and moved his arm against the vision. I held him steady on the allure, and he pressed his hands to his beard and moaned. The horse returned to the sward, and stood as gallantly as before, and seemed to sense the presence of our liege; it raised its forelegs high into the air, and returned to earth without a sound. The old king put his hand on mine and nodded.
“See it calling for its master,” he said quietly. “How beautiful it stands, how gloriously stationed.”
“It is a phantom,” I replied. “Command it to be gone.”
“It would certainly recognize your authority,” Kepswitch said from behind the king. “If you cannot vanquish it with a blessing then perhaps with a martial declaration.”
The old king nodded his assent, and stood nearer to the wall. He shouted to the vision to desist, and flee into the moor from whence it came. But even as his voice resounded on the sward, the horse of light remained unmoved, and waited patiently observing. The old king dropped his hand at once, and lowered his head, and muttered of his foolish qualities.
“You see?” he said, regarding his abashed soldiery. “Such a spirit recognizes no authority in the living. We must make our way to the field.”
At his command the bridge was raised before the moat, and the barbican was severed from the keep. He would not have his people see his soul condemned, he said, for only soldiers knew the consequences of an incomplete commission. And now the gate was raised as we passed through, and now the gate was lowered at our passing. The hoarfrost broke our silence as we walked. I walked beside the king resolutely, as Kepswitch and Darrow Younger stood sentry on our flanks.
And then he bade me wait at his advance, for he pulled the scarlet robe from his shoulders and left it in my arms. He stepped nearer to the solemn ghost, and if it were not made of ethereal luminescence I would have thought it waiting in the stables for its master’s hand. But then the old king paused before the horse, and raised his hands in question. The horse watched the old king silently, for if it spoke it was a silent question asked beyond the hearing of the living to ascertain.
“What is it then, old friend,” our liege spoke, “that brings you back from so far across the moor?”
I briefly stared into the faces of my companions, though in their expressions found only fear and sorrow. Kepswitch mouthed his rosary, and Darrow Younger fearfully stroked the hilt of his sheathed sword. I turned again to the vision of the horse, and to the old king standing bravely in its light.
“Are you righteously angry?” the old king said. He seemed to study the large, dark eyes enchantedly. “Or do you come to remind me of my cowardice?”
Then the horse stepped forward on the sward, and the old king started briefly, but held firm against the motion.
I waited with the robe pressed to my chest. What could I do against the dead? What could any living soldier do to stay a ghost? Such sorrow is inevitable when physical courage is tested against the scythe. I knew that my good liege must stand before the meaning of that vision, and lose his mortal authority to its desire.
“I know why you have come,” the old king said, and brought his hands into the air in welcoming. “I left you dead on the field when I should have traveled through that higher gate upon you. I should have died on the field and left with your undying gallantry. Perhaps I died, and simply failed to hear the knell. Is that what you are telling me?”
The horse stepped closer, and the old king kneeled before the vision, his hands accepting of his fate.
“Please tell me what you mean to do,” the old king wailed, his voice destroying every silence of the night. “If you wish me dead, then take me now, but know that for my love of you I left my heart in blood upon that field.”
The robe fell from my hands that moment. For at the utterance of these words the horse advanced and bowed its massive neck before its king, and placed its light into the outstretched hands, but did not strike our liege with mortal energy. As if he had awakened its lost corporeality, the old king touched his favorite horse’s neck, and stroked the braided mane, and lovingly accepted every gesture of the ghostly mount. Then, as if called sharply to another realm, the horse of light turned from our king, and galloped on with quickening speed into the shadows of the trees, and faded still, and was no more.
I gathered the robe from the grass and stepped across the field. When I touched the old king’s shoulder at his weeping, he raised his head and told me with his gaze that no other man could know his grief. I touched his wrinkled face, and he touched my hand again.
“What did it want of me if it has left me living?” he said. “I do not understand, I am a foolish old man and I do not know.”
I kneeled before him, and gave him back his robe.
“Such love need not follow into death,” I said. “But when it is left on the battlefield unfulfilled it must surely haunt a loyal spirit.”
“My son, how so?”
“It was for love of you that it returned,” I said. “On the field of war you could not part without your best farewell.”
“Farewell,” the old king said, staring out across the sward in search of that lost fealty. “Farewell, my horse. We shall ride again another day.”
Though it would be another day, I knew that day would not be long in coming. King Samuel’s crippled body labored to rise, and the tears he dropped upon the frost were filled with his soul’s grief. We helped our liege from off the sward and back into the barbican, even as the winds resumed their passage through the night, and, far away, perhaps unto another world, a horse of light continued on its way, having offered its farewell to one it loved so valiantly.
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Copyright 2008, Lawrence Buentello. All rights reserved. Lawrence Buentello lives in San Antonio, Texas. His short stories and poems have appeared in over thirty publications, including Zahir, Ray Gun Revival, Mindlights and Andromeda Spaceways In-Flight Magazine. He is also the co-author (along with his brother, John Buentello) of the short story collection Binary Tales and the science fiction novel Reproduction Rights.
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