The Robber Knight's Secret

33. Sir Reuben's Secret

Reuben's eyes wandered over to the window to gaze out into the valley. Yet he didn't really see it. He saw the glittering roofs of a distant city, shining almost painfully bright under the hot sun of the south. He saw the woods of cypress trees, stretching forever and ever. He saw the bay hugging the startlingly blue ocean in a warm and welcoming gesture.

So far away...

jSo long gone...

"How to best to begin..." he murmured. "I wonder... Do you know Sir Galahad?"

"The best of the knights of the round table," Ayla responded, rather hesitantly. Apparently, she wasn't all too sure where he was going with this. "Of course we know."

"Back then, all those years ago," Reuben told her, "I was a lot like Sir Galahad."

Ayla frowned. "You went on a search for the Holy Grail and threw your father off a horse?"

Reuben felt his lips twitch. "Actually, I meant that I was pious, virtuous, courteous and demure."

Ayla's cocked her head in one of the most delectable movements Reuben had ever seen her make. Out of the corner, he heard Burchard make a derisive snort.

"Um... really?" she asked. "I'd find it a lot easier to believe that you went on a search for the Holy Grail."

His lip quirked up a little farther.

"You wound me, Milady."

She jabbed at his blood-stained arm. "Someone else already did that for me! By the way... It wasn't all about piety and virtue. I seem to remember that Sir Galahad was the best warrior of his time, too."

Reuben shrugged. "Of course I was that, too. I could easily beat any other knight my age into a pulp. But the important thing is that I was a young fool. I had wild dreams in my head about adventure, and romance, and fighting dragons and giants and the Devil knows what else. It was in this state of juvenile insanity that I came to the city of Palermo, looking for adventure."

He gazed into the distance again, once more seeing the shimmering city on the coast in front of his inner eye.

"You have to have seen it to understand," he whispered, reverently. "The great azur sea hugged by the coast, like a beautiful child by its mother. It was a wonderland. And then, at the center of Palermo, there was the Royal Palace—the court of Emperor Friedrich. They don't call him the 'Wonder of the World' for nothing. His court is like something out of a fairytale: beautiful animals from distant lands, sparkling fountains, exotic fruits to taste, and even more exotic people. I was sucked into a wild dream and didn't want to wake up."

He paused, tracing the line of flight of a hawk outside in the sky with his eyes. The animal was plunging down, down, down towards its prey on the ground. It vanished from sight, and Reuben took a deep breath.

"It was at the court," he finally continued, his voice darkening and his eyes flashing up to meet Ayla's, "among all the splendor and might of innumerable realms, that I first met her."

*~*~**~*~*

Ayla felt the words pierce her heart like a poisoned arrow with thousands of tiny barbs. She stared at Reuben, moisture suddenly at the corners of her eyes. He didn't look back at her.

Never in a thousand years had she expected his story to include another girl—to be about another girl. She bit her lip, trying to hold back tears.

Stupid, stupid, stupid! Of course he has met other girls. He probably did a lot more than just meet them. How many? Dozens? No, probably hundreds! Maybe thousands...