"I suppose that will make for some changes in your household, my lord, but I can assure you that children add a lot to a home. She'll doubtless be a great comfort to you as you grow older." Just smooth it all over with honeyed oatmeal, I thought. Sometimes that works.
"Well, there is that, but don't you see? She's not exactly a child anymore. She's a young woman! She's fourteen years old and it's my duty to find her a proper husband."
"That's certainly fine, Christian thinking, my lord, but why discuss it with an old, confirmed bachelor like me? Better you should go talk to all of your female relatives and have them be on the lookout for a suitable young man."
"You know that most of those old bitches don't like me, Conrad, and anyway, I know the man I'd want for my heir."
That was the first time in nine years that he had called me just "Conrad." I was beginning to get a very bad feeling about this conversation.
"What's this talk about an heir, my lord? You're barely over forty and you come from a long-lived family. Why, you'll probably live longer than your uncle the old duke did!"
"Lately, I have had a premonition of death. I feel it strongly, and I am worried." He shook his head.
"We're all concerned about the invasion, my lord. Any of us could fall in battle, but a knight doesn't worry about that sort of thing, does he? Anyway, if you've come for my advice about your daughter, it's to let the girl pick her own future husband. She'll be a lot happier that way, and it will vastly increase your domestic tranquility."
"But I didn't come for your advice, Conrad. I came for your consent!"
"My consent, my lord?"
"To marriage, of course!"
"To marriage!" I stood. For the first time in twenty years, my voice broke and it came out like a squeak.
"Of course! What do you think I'm talking about? I want you to be my son-in-law! I want you to marry my only child and be my heir."
"But, but I'm just not the marrying kind! The whole institution frightens me! No, no, my lord. I would never make a decent son-in-law! You'd learn to hate me. So would she!"
"Nonsense, my boy. Why, you and I have gotten along for years with never a cross word. All the women around seem to love you. Why should my daughter be any different?"
"What's this 'my boy' business? I'm only two years younger than you! I'm an old man! You shouldn't saddle your daughter with an old man! She'll end up being a young widow, and you know all the trouble they get into!"
"Again, nonsense! You're as healthy a man as I've ever met, and any woman with any brains about her prefers a mature man to a young stripling."
"They didn't when I was a stripling!"
"Well, that simply proves your prowess! None of your ladies are complaining, are they?"
"It's not a matter of my ladies, my lord. For years now, I've been satisfied with just one, Cilicia. She's heavy with our second child now. I couldn't possibly leave her."
"Well, you wouldn't have to leave her, just sort of get her out of the way for a while. Anyway, I know full well that you haven't been absolutely faithful to her. You manage to get to Countess Francine's, manor at least once a month."
"She's an old friend."
"And a close one, no doubt. But that's all one to me. Just keep up appearances, and you'll hear no complaints from your father-in-law."
"My lord, I've never even met your daughter."
"So? She's a normal, healthy girl. She has all the standard features. What more can be said? And she'll learn Polish soon enough, so that's no problem."
"She doesn't even speak Polish! Well, I don't speak any Hungarian! What do we do? Invite an interpreter to bed with us?"
"Mind your manners, Conrad. This is my own flesh and blood we're talking about."
"There are hundreds of girls that are your own flesh and blood! And all the rest of them can at least speak the language! Why don't you make me marry one of them?"
"Conrad! Control yourself! If this goes on, you shall anger me."
"See what a lousy son-in-law I'd make? We had an excellent relationship until it was torn asunder by the mere mention of marriage! Find another man, my lord. I don't want to get married!"
"That's your final word, then?"
"Yes, my lord, it is."
"Well then. It has certainly been a pleasure having you for a vassal, and the experience has been vastly profitable. Tell me, where were you planning to go next?"
"My lord, what are you talking about? You can't fire me like a bricklayer who's finished his job! We made an oath together, and that oath gives you no right to force me into marriage."
"True. We made an oath. Do you remember it? It was Christmas time, almost nine years ago. True, I don't have the fight to force marriage on you, but you made one strange addition to the standard oath, which at the time I thought inconsequential, but now it comes into the fore. You swore fealty to me for only nine years! Those nine years will be up in three weeks, at which time our agreement is off! So I wish you well. Be sure and fill your saddlebags before you leave. Take a few carts of gold with you if you wish. But I am not minded to renew my oath with one who would so crassly insult my own daughter as to refuse her hand in marriage."
I was dumbstruck. I had put that in my oath! At the time, I wasn't sure whether I could get technology going in this century or not, and if I couldn't I wanted to have the right to be somewhere else than in the middle of a Mongol massacre, where one more dead body wouldn't have done Poland much good. I had left myself a coward's way out and now I was paying for it!
"But-but the army, the boats, the aircraft! I'm needed here now more than ever! You can't do this! Not to me nor to Poland."
"Wrong, Baron. Or at least 'baron' for the next three weeks. I can do it and I intend to do it. Sir Vladimir can handle the army properly, I'm sure, and Sir Tadaos can do what's right with the steamboats. And the aircraft? Well, I'm already in charge there!"
"Well, I won't stand for it! I'll go talk to the duke about this!"
"Feel free, but I've already discussed the matter with him. You know that he has long been displeased with you concerning the way that you have consistently lived in sin since coming here. He thinks that you should get married and that my daughter would be an excellent match. He has already given his blessings on the union!"
"But my lifestyle is a good deal more moral than yours!"
"True, at least by any sensible standard. But I am a mere backwoods count, whereas you have made yourself into a hero. Heroes have to live upright lives! After all, the youth of Poland looks to you for guidance! Myself, I think where you went wrong was all the charity work. You should have left those wretches alone,"
"But this is filthy, rotten blackmail!"
"Yes, it is, isn't it. Shall we say the day after Christmas for the wedding? The Bishop of Wroclaw has already given dispensation for the posting of the banns."
"Damn you, Lambert! God damn you straight to hell and the devil!"
I stormed out of my office, pushing aside a startled secretary who was standing in the doorway. I went down to the stables, threw a saddle on Anna and charged back to Three Walls. I told the stable girl, Kotcha, to put Anna's best saddle and barding on her and went up to my room.
I put on my best armor, not my efficient Night-Fighter suit, but the fancy, engraved, gold-plated stuff they'd given me for Christmas a few years back. I threw my wolfskin cloak over my shoulders and went down to the strong room. I came back up with my saddlebags filled with gold. To hell with the silver, the gold would do. It was all that I could carry, anyhow.
Then I headed down the trail, or railroad track now, and at the first intersection I headed not east, toward the Mongols, but west, toward France! I'd heard a lot of nice things about France. Maybe I could even learn the language.
Nine years in a country that punishes a man for helping the poor! Well, to hell with them! To hell with them all.
We rode like thunder for hours and Anna never let up. She didn't know where we were going or why, but I wanted to go and that was enough for her. The one good friend I had.
Darkness was closing in as we rode by the trail to Countess Francine's manor. Well, it was a bit cold for camping out, and I hadn't brought my old camping gear along, anyway. Maybe Francine would like a lift back to France.
She was a countess while I was only a baron, despite the fact that her county was much smaller than my barony. She only had six knights subordinate to her, yet she was my superior in status. Because of this, she absolutely refused to use my title or her own when we were together, and got unhappy when I used them myself. I think she thought I really gave a damn about that sort of thing.
Her watchman must have called her, because the drawbridge was lowering as we approached, and she stood just behind it, waiting.
"You come gaily clad, my friend!" she said as she warmly embraced my cold armor.
"It seemed like a good idea, if I was going to France."
"France! But you must come inside and tell me ail about it!"
A marshal came up to take care of Anna, but I slung the heavy saddlebags over my own shoulder. I just wasn't very trusting anymore.
At supper, Francine got the whole story out of me.
"So you charged away like a hero in a fireside tale, without even a change of underwear." She giggled. "Oh, you poor little dumpling."
"Well, I don't think it's the least bit funny."
"Of course it is not, darling. It is horrible. You have been rudely treated by a man that you have done everything for. You have a perfect right to be angry, but if Lambert has made himself your enemy, then you must fight him! You have done great things here and you must not let them be stolen from you!"
"The truth is that I really don't give a damn anymore."
"You have just worked too hard for too long and have treated it all too seriously," she said.
"Call it a long vacation, then. Say, fifty years or so. France still seems like a great idea. Would you like me to give you a lift there?"
"To ride with my knight and hero back to my homeland? Oh, Conrad, what a romantic thought! But France is not Poland and if you did not marry me, people would call me a strumpet! Would you let them do that to your poor damsel?"
"And so I would have to do the very thing I was running away from. You're pretty good at popping balloons."
"And someday you must tell me what a balloon is, but not right now. Think! If you do not care about your wealth or position, what of the people who are depending on you? What of the noble Sir Vladimir? What of earnest little Sir Piotr? And Lady Krystyana. I know you loved her once. Has that love turned to such hate that you would abandon her to the Tartars?"
"No. I guess not."
"Then you must stay in Poland and find a way to resolve your problem with Lambert. We must plan our strategy! We must confound your liege lord and defeat him!"
"Well, I can hardly go out and fight the man."
"Of course not. You have a hundred fifty thousand fighting men and he does not have a hundred fifty, yes? How could there be a fight? You could massacre him if you wished, but that would be immoral. No. You must use a woman's arts of persuasion and intrigue, and I am the woman to help you with this. First, you must realize that you have many friends in the very highest places. The Bishop of Cracow is your friend and confessor, yes? And the duke himself is a member of your order of Radiant Warriors. And you have me. I spent many years by the side of the old duke. I know where all the bodies were buried and was privy to all of the old duke's secrets. "
"All? You mean..."
"Yes, all. Even about you. An old man will always tell everything to an adoring young woman."
"Then ... tell me what you know about me."
She glanced around to see that the servants were out of the room, then said quietly, "I know that you have come to us from the far future in some way that even you do not understand. Is that enough?"
"It's way too much. You shouldn't have been told."
"But I was. Don't worry, darling, your secret is safe with me. I swear that you are the only person I have ever told it to, and ever will."
"And it doesn't bother you?"
"It is passing strange, but I love you still."
"Well. You mentioned strategy. What do you think we should do?" I asked.
"First we must speak to the duke. We must do this right away, before Count Lambert has a chance to see him again. We must find out where he stands on your marriage to Jadwiga, and-"
"Who?"
"Jadwiga. Oh, you dumpling! You do not even know the name of the girl they are trying to marry you to?"
"The count never mentioned it."
"Well, now you know. Knowing the young duke as I do, it is quite possible that he really does want you to get married. He is such a prude about some things! Has he ever mentioned it to you?"
"I'm afraid so. Quite a number of times, as a matter of fact. "
"Then you just might have to get married."
"What!"
"Hush, dear. It is not the end of the world. You have been living with Cilicia for many years now, yes? Nothing need change if you were married to her. It could be done quietly, a few minutes with a priest. Is that so bad?"
"I can't marry Cilicia. We couldn't have a Christian wedding because she refuses to become a Christian! Believe me, I've been trying to convert her since we first met. And even if I was willing to become her brand of Moslem, which I'm not, her father has some sort of complicated theological reason why I couldn't join their church, or whatever they call it. The whole thing is simply impossible!"
"Then marry me. You have been coming here every few weeks for years. That would satisfy me, if I could get no better. Nothing need change, darling."
"But..."
"Then think on it. Come love, we must be up before gray dawn to ride to Cracow and see the duke. Let us go to bed."
Even after a vigorous bout of lovemaking, I had a hard time getting to sleep that night. Francine was asleep with her head on my arm, her back to my stomach, spoon fashion. I was careful not to wake her, but I needed a good think.
Okay, I told myself. You've got this phobia. Nothing to be ashamed of. Lots of people have phobias.
You've got to stay in Poland and fight this invasion. That's a given. A lot of good people are counting on you, You can't let them down. You've made promises and you have to live with them.
Is that what really scares you about marriage? The fact that it's a lifetime promise, without any way out if you were wrong? But you've made so many other promises, and you can't get out of them, either. You didn't go into a cold funk when you swore to Lambert, did you' Oh, you let yourself have a coward's way out, but that's one of the things you're regretting now, isn't it?
But if you're going to stay, you've somehow got to placate Lambert and the duke. Lambert isn't going to let up, you know. Once he gets an idea into his head, he's like a bulldog clamped down on a bull's snout. As long as there is any chance that you will marry his daughter, he'll be in there conniving a way to force you to do it.
And the duke. He wants everybody to live a fine, conventional and Christian life, just like in all the stories the priests like to tell. He would have had Lambert back with his wife years ago if she hadn't been out of the country and the duke's jurisdiction, that's sure. If you were married, you'd have the duke solidly on your side against Lambert. What's more, once you were married, Lambert would give up on his plans for you and his daughter. He's a bulldog, but he's not stupid.
