Chapter 7
Ursyn knew all about sabres.
He could not hold one, but he went through the motions of sabre drill with the other Ulans. He also knew that picking up a sabre by the wrong end hurt.
He also knew about parrying, and he had picked up the movements.
Therefore, when Zabiełło slashed the sabre towards Ursyn, his claws were there to catch the blade between them, and twist away. Bear claws are remarkably hard and strong; Ursyn had no difficulty in smashing through light armour, if he could get purchase on it. He whimpered as the blade cut into his paw, and growled harder, and put up his other paw to push the sabre blade aside.
Ursyn’s parry was a great deal stronger than that of a human with a sabre, and the twisting motion he had learned pulled the sabre clear out of Zabiełło’s hand, dislocating his thumb as it went.
Ursyn was pleased.
The blade that burned was gone.
Now he could deal with the enemy.
By this time, Sylwia and Jaras had woken up, and Jaras fumbled with flint and tinder to light a candle. Ursyn needed no more light than he already had; and he was angry, in some pain, and aware that this was an enemy. Zabiełło dodged the cross-cutting blow which would have taken his head clean off if Ursyn’s claws had landed, and went for a knife.
Ursyn raked his arm, and Zabiełło’s suddenly limp hand dropped it. He cried out in fear.
Ursyn was starting to enjoy himself.
He knew the moves and this was plainly what he had practised for.
He feinted an overhand blow, and as Zabiełło ducked it, he turned his paw and raked up from below. Zabiełło started to scream, which turned into a bubbling groan as he collapsed.
Jaras, who had got the candle going, looked on with awe.
“I doubt anyone has ever seen a bear perform Hellish Polish Quarte,” he said.
His voice shook slightly.
“Is... is he dead?” asked Sylwia.
“I think it’s a fair bet,” said Jaras.
Ursyn looked inclined to investigate his kill.
“Ursyn, leave,” said Sylwia.
The bear grumbled slightly, but stepped away. Then he remembered that his paw was sore. He put it in his armpit like a schoolboy who has been caned on the palm.
“Show me, Ursyn,” said Sylwia.
Snuffling pathetically, the bear showed her his paw.
“Oooh nasty, between two claws,” said Sylwia. She bathed it with water from the ewer and tore up her shift laid out for the morning to bandage it.
Ursyn was satisfied.
He had noted that people with bandages got extra attention and treats. He put his head in Sylwia’s lap.
“You big hypochondriac,” laughed Sylwia, caressing all his favourite places. Ursyn sighed happily and subsided heavily on her.
The door opened and Eugeniusz came in, sabre in hand.
“Is everything all right? I heard dogs, and then a scream and... Good God! Is that Zabiełło?”
“Apparently?” said Jaras. “I think he came to attack us, and Ursyn defended us.”
“Is that poor bear hurt?” demanded Felicia, from behind her husband.
“Not as much as he’s pretending,” said Sylwia. “But he’ll milk it for all it’s worth.”
“We’d better get that....” Eugeniusz indicated the body, “... out of your bedroom. In fact you might want to... er, that bear won’t let you move, will he?”
“Not until he’s pacified,” said Sylwia. “Poor Ursyn, it’s just too bad of that fellow to go around upsetting him.”
“Quite so,” said Eugeniusz. “I think we’ll say that he fell foul of guard-dogs whilst on murderous mischief bent; no point giving outsiders any reason to want to do anything to your bear.”
“So long as he can boast to the other Ulans that he can do cross-cutting and hellish quarte as well as anyone,” said Jaras. “He wouldn’t want his towarzysze to think he hadn’t pulled his weight.”
“Uh... quite,” said Eugeniusz. He decided not to argue with the young people over the anthropomorphic qualities they assigned to their bear, who was undoubtedly smart for a bear, but....
Eugeniusz shook his head, patted the bear kindly on the shoulder, and with Jaras’s aid, carried the rather grisly body out into the back yard, and stowed it in what had once been mews.
The cleaning up would wait until it was light, if they could put up with the smell.
Jaras dealt with the smell by carrying in chaff from the stables to throw on the blood and body fluids, and opened the windows. Ursyn had climbed into his side of the bed where he had snuggled up to Sylwia and went to sleep.
Jaras went to sleep in the steward’s room and found where the faulty catch was, and jammed it with a page cutter from the steward’s desk.
Outside, Jakub waited to see if Zabiełło was going to come out again, and having heard people come out, observed his late master’s body being carried out.
He hastened home to collect his family and move back to their old homes before anyone else should be abroad.
oOoOo
Frydek sat up after the last ball-goer had been decanted into a conveyance, or poured into the street; no alcoholic beverages were served, but they always managed to get smuggled in, and Frydek had his eye on one of the constables for that error of judgement. He would watch the man narrowly during the next masque, next week, and see if he could not trace where the wódka came from.
Meanwhile, however, and stone cold sober himself, Frydek had the hardest letter of his life to write.
My dear Lord Skrzetuski, and also your good lady,
I am attached to the Ulans of whom your son is captain and consider myself a friend of Jaracz Rzędzian. I am part of the detached duty undertaking the hiding of your daughter, Helena, from the man who threatened her, who, if I understand you to be at all like Captain Skrzetuski, is likely to come off worse from the encounter with yourself.
I am in love with Helena, and I want to seek your permission to pay my addresses.
This is where it becomes complex.
I was born a Cossack, and named Frol Vyschnevetsky. I learned to use a sabre at a young age, but when my father died, when I was seven, my mother came west, and the only person prepared to marry a Cossack woman with a couple of children – I have a younger sister – was a cartwright, one Jan Adamiak. I took the name Frydek Adamiak, and I met Jaracz Rzędzian when he was working under cover for Starosta Młocki as an ostler. He and his wife took me as pachołek, but Lady Kordula has offered me her maiden name to pretend to be her illegitimate half-brother, because it means I can act as a towarzysz and help Starosta Zabiełło-Wąż, to whom we are seconded, better. He is a friend of the White Raven banner.
I am quite well aware that you will probably be angered that someone raised as a peasant should have the temerity to aspire to your daughter’s hand, but Jaracz insists that I write in hopes too far-fetched to be believable.
And yet, I do hope. She is intelligent, lively, beautiful, and worth more than the wife of a shit-for-brains snot who plans to, as she told us he said to her, ‘school’ her. And the bastard hit her! To bruise her for punishing a poor guard and improving her swordplay is one thing, but what sort of man hits a woman? What sort of man strikes another person in the face, even, unless with the fist when engaged in fisticuffs.
I have nothing to offer save a quick brain, and luck. I have no property, though if the starosta ratifies my Cossack birth as being his lord-brother, I might hope to retain the post of substarosta, or perhaps to rise in the Ulans.
Please pardon my impudence in writing to you, even if you cannot pardon my aspirations to the hand of your lovely daughter.
Frydek.
I won’t sign a surname; I’m not sure who or what I am.
He showed it to Jaracz next morning.
“Simple and dignified,” said Jaracz. “Send it.”
Frydek addressed it to Jaracz’s direction and dropped it in the town hall mail bag, leaving his money for postage with Wilk.
oOoOo
Jeremi Skrzetuski had received a letter from Jaracz, over which he chuckled mightily at its earthiness, reminded himself to reprove his friend as the lady in question was his sister, and approved what he heard of the man his sister might be sweet on. Jeremi was wise to the concept that there were peasants far nobler than many szlachciura, and he wanted his sister to be happy. And if Jaracz was plotting, things would be sorted out.
He heard loud noises and sauntered out of his office in time to see a big man slap his page, who was also his wife, Anna-Maria.
Anna-Maria promptly floored the big man.
“Oh, nice straight right,” said Jeremi. “What on earth is this about?”
“The fellow’s name is Paweł Korwiński, and his language was intemperate, as, indeed, was the level of his malicious opprobrium with regards to Halszka,” said Anna-Maria.
“Oh, indeed,” said Jeremi, grimly, as Korwiński came to his feet.
“Did you see what that little shit did?” Korwiński roared.
“Yes, I did, a lovely right,” said Jeremi. “You can’t go around slapping girls on the face, you know; she might just demand satisfaction. You slapped my sister, too, and if you survive Anna-Maria, you can answer to me about that.”
“I am not giving satisfaction to some whore attached...” He went down again as Jeremi hit him. Jeremi hit him a great deal harder than Anna-Maria could. Korwiński sat on the ground and spat out a tooth.
“What the devil...” he spluttered.
“Don’t call my wife a whore,” said Jeremi. “Now get up and draw; you hit my sister for no good reason, and I want your blood for that.”
“Hah! It was for a very good reason! I wager she didn’t tell you she was wearing trousers like – like your hoyden of a wife! And riding astride! I was mistaken in her! I thought she was a lady!”
“She is a lady, you prudish peasant,” said Jeremi “You sound like a greengrocer! We are Sarmatians, a warrior caste, and our family has always bred women as strong as its men! I require my wife to wear suitable clothing to be my page of Ulans, and to do sabre drill, and I take a dim view of you informing my sister that you would ‘school’ her as if she was a naughty child. You insult my father in your disrespect of what he permits his daughters to do, as well as disrespecting Helena as a young woman able to make her own choices. Now get up and draw your blade if you aren’t about to beg my wife’s pardon abjectly, and write a letter of equally abject apology to my sister with the undertaking that you will never seek her out again.”
“Apology? I owe no apology to your sister or your whore!” yelled Korwiński, struggling to his feet. “And I’ll be damned if I fight a half-woman like you....” He broke off as Jeremi pulled his nose. And flicked his fingertips across one cheek. And slapped the other cheek hard.
“You talk fighting words, precious, but you can’t back them up because you are a coward,” said Jeremi, falling back on the insults of Mikołaj Krasiński. . “You are making me taunt you a second time.”
Korwinski did draw his sabre at this.
“Oh, good, all the tedious formalities out of the way,” said Jeremi, drawing his own sabre clear.
A circle had formed around the antagonists by now.
“Teach the dirty mouthed little greengrocer not to spout off at his betters!” yelled Aureliusz Stroyny, whose wife was also his page.
“I am not a greengrocer!” ground out Korwiński.
“You make it hard for me to believe that, precious,” said Jeremi.
“You wouldn’t meet me with a sword if you didn’t think me a szlachcic,” sneered Korwiński.
“Good point,” said Jeremi. “Arapnik, anyone?”
He tossed his sword to Anna-Maria, without even looking at her, and she caught it deftly.
An arapnik flew over the heads of several people, and Jeremi caught it in his left hand, transferring it to his right, as he ran the left along its bullhide length to make sure there were no tangles.
There was a snigger from the watchers.
“He done made our captain irritable now,” declared a voice from the crowd. Jeremi thought it was Tortonski. He grinned savagely, and set his whip whirling.
“You fool, I’ll cut you to ribbons,” snarled Korwiński.
“You try it, precious,” said Jeremi.
“Don’t call me that!” yelped Korwiński.
“Why, precious? Don’t you like it, sweetums? Is poor smoochywoochy upset to be called ‘precious?’” jeered Jeremi. “You’re free with name calling, can’t take it, eh, Sweetie?”
Korwiński charged in, hacking at the arapnik.
Jeremi curled a bight of the whip around the sabre and jerked it right out of his hands.
Several people leaped out of the way of the flying sword, and Colonel Dębski, who had come out to see what was going on, dodged hastily back into the doorway.
“Jeremi! What have I told you about playing with your food!” he bellowed.
“He insulted my sister and my wife,” said Jeremi.
“The hell he did! Carry on, then,” said Dębski. He moved to join the crowd to watch; his Ulans put on a good show when they thought it needed.
“Pick up your sword,” said Jeremi, to Korwiński.
The szlachcic circled round, his eyes on Jeremi all the time.
“I am not lost to honour, to attack an unarmed man,” said Jeremi, coldly. “You, however, struck my sister a blow which bruised her, when she was not expecting any such thing. You did the same to my wife, but she knew what to do to you. You are not a man, you are a cur. Now fight.”
Korwiński knew he had to get in close. He charged.
He found himself jerked off his feet, landing painfully on his back, as the arapnik wrapped his leg and jerked him off balance.
Someone had found a tin whistle and started to play some of the folk tunes Gypsy tumblers and jugglers used to accompany their antics; Korwiński was furious. He extricated himself, and ran again at the laughing devil with his foxy moustaches.
He found himself close enough, and Jeremi had to parry the sabre by knocking it down with a blow on the unsharpened part of the back edge of the sword, circling it and coming back up.
“If this had been a sabre, that would have been hellish quarte,” said Jeremi, pleasantly. “You’re too full of beans, precious; time to make you skip.”
Jeremi somehow, Korwiński had no idea how, moved out of range again. The arapnik sang its ugly song through the air as Jeremi systematically flogged the bigger man, cutting his clothes with the fine end of the plaited rawhide, the far end travelling faster than sound in Jeremi’s relentless punishment of the man.
“You’d know more about this if it had the usual iron ball on the end,” said Jeremi, conversationally. “In the meantime, precious, I don’t kill you as fast, so I get to drag out your punishment for being an egregiously contumelious and fatuous specimen of unmitigated foetid loathsomeness, with the characteristics a slug would consider too low and slimy, and the manners of a street rat fighting for bones and scraps. Pariahs abhor you and even cholera abjures you as being too revolting for it to infect. Your turds flee your body begging release from one so disgusting.”
“Oh, Jeremi, I adore you!” breathed Anna-Maria.
“Don’t hold back, Captain, tell us what you really think!” called Stroyny.
Korwiński collapsed on the ground, whimpering.
Jeremi went over to the tatterdemalion, bleeding figure.
“Get the hell out of here and never bother my family again,” he said. “Next time I will use my sabre, and you will know what Hellish Quarte does.”
Korwiński somehow managed to struggle to his feet and mount up, his horse on the hitching post near the trough.
“He may cause you trouble,” said Dębski.
“Then, so be it,” said Jeremi. “I could only kill him with a bare arapnik if I flogged all the flesh off him, and I can’t do that.”
“Just a friendly warning,” said the older man, touching his younger friend on the shoulder. Jeremi nodded.
“I’ll bear it in mind; and write to Papa,” he said.
