The Knight's Tale Read Free

one moon,
which seemed like it would be altogether peculiar.) Ridmark strode
towards the tower’s door, preparing to knock.
    The narrow door swung open before Ridmark could reach
it, and a tall, forbidding old man in a white robe with a black
sash stepped out. He looked like the very image of a learned
Magistrius – stern, wise, and solemn.
    “Magistrius Sempronius,” said Father Linus. “I bring
before you Sir Ridmark, son of the Dux Leogrance Arban of Taliand,
and a Knight of the Order of the Soulblade.”
    “I have come seeking your counsel, Magistrius,”
Ridmark said.
    Sempronius gave him a grave nod, and opened his mouth
to speak.
    “Chickens!” bellowed the Magistrius.
    Ridmark blinked, and Ulacht and Linus shared a
look.
    “Pardon?” Ridmark said at last.
    “Chickens!” said Sempronius, deadly serious. “Do you
not see the purple chicken upon your shoulder, Swordbearer?”
    Ridmark looked at his shoulder, baffled. “I…fear I
cannot.”
    “The purple chickens!” shouted Sempronius, his eyes
growing wider. “There is a purple chicken standing upon your
shoulder, wearing a hat with feathered plumes and reciting the
uncouth poetry of Ovid while juggling flaming apples with its
beak!” He leaned forward, and the Magistrius’s breath smelled…sick.
When Ridmark was a squire, one of his father’s knights accidentally
ate some poisoned berries, and his breath smelled much the
same.
    “Yes,” said Ulacht, his voice heavy with disgust.
“The chickens.”
    “Do you not see them?” shrieked Sempronius. “The
purple chickens are everywhere! Plotting their conspiracies,
tunneling beneath my tower, and listening to my thoughts! They are
scheming against me! They make me hear colors! I know that they’re
planning to wage war against the sun and turn my shoes into
breadsticks!”
    “Has he…always been like this?” Ridmark said, utterly
at a loss.
    “Not this bad,” said Linus. “I feared he had been
growing senile, but he has taken quite a turn for the worse.”
    The old Magistrius was likely hallucinating, and
suddenly Ridmark wondered if the old man had been poisoned. If he
had, the power of Heartwarden might cure the poison.
    “Magistrius,” Ridmark said, stepping forward. “I can
see the purple chickens, too.”
    Both Ulacht and Linus gave him a startled look, but
Sempronius bobbed his head up and down.
    “You can see them?” said the old Magistrius, coming
closer. “Then you know their villainy! You know they cannot be
trusted! The purple chickens are building mansions beneath the
grass, and they are plotting against us! All of us!”
    “Yes,” Ridmark said. “And I can help you.”
    “How?” said Sempronius. “Will you raise the Order of
the Soulblade and the armies of the High King and march to war
against the sinister armies of the chickens?”
    “Something like that,” Ridmark said. “Please hold
still.”
    He stepped forward, drew upon the power of
Heartwarden, and clamped his free hand on the old man’s temples.
Sempronius’s eyes bulged, and he started to cast a spell, but he
was too slow. White light pulsed from Ridmark’s fingers and into
Sempronius’s head, and the Magistrius flinched and almost fell
over.
    And as he did, Ridmark felt…something flee from him.
Some taint, some corruption in his blood. The Magistrius had indeed
been poisoned. Sempronius stumbled back, blinking…and some lucidity
came back into his wild-eyed face.
    “What…what am I doing here?” he said, looking at
Ridmark and then at Linus. “Father? What is going on?”
    “You don’t see the chickens?” said Linus.
    “Chickens?” said Sempronius. “What the devil are you
talking about? I am a Magistrius. I do not keep chickens in my
tower.”
    “You were poisoned,” Ridmark said. “Some sort of drug
that made you see things that were not real.” Such as, apparently,
purple chickens.
    "Poisoned?” said Sempronius, shaking his head. “But
that…that is preposterous. I am a