The Knight of Chivalry

Chapter 38

After a nice large breakfast with the lord, where they spent some time talking about the tournament and how the lord was very proud of Simon for winning it. They discussed some of the more epic fights in the last few rounds which the lord had witnessed as he had been allowed to watch them with Simon being in his retinue. Simon then left the lords’ estate and went back down to then tourney field and this time went to where the archery contest was taking place. There was a lot of people there today including royalty as it was the end of the competition and the final round. There were eight archers left in the competition at this point including longshot, who was ranking in third position. Simon’s other friends showed up as well a little worse for wear after all the drinking they had done the night before but they wanted to see how longshot would do in this competition. They cheered for him as he came out onto the field with the other archers and they lined up opposite the targets they would be shooting at the end of the range around a 150 yards away.

            The announcer shouted for them to begin and each archer strung their bows and took up their arrows and shot one at a time at the targets. The first arrows hit the targets and most of them got very close to the bulls eye. They did this again and again for the next few arrows each one hitting the target and scored them points. The archers were all good at what they did and not one arrow was off target even when the wind came blowing by them. It was clear though that longshot and the archers in first and second were a cut above the others as after their first arrow to warm themselves up they managed to hit the bulls eye every time. They soon went through all their arrows in their quivers, the organisers then went down to the targets and looked at where the arrows had landed and counted up each archers points. The archers who was in first and second and tied for points and longshot was just one behind them and the other archer closest to him lay ten points behind so they left it at that. But longshot and other two would have a shootout round and the person who scores the least points with three arrows will be eliminated. The first round of this they all scored the same with their arrows and so they moved the targets further back to 180 yards to make it more difficult. This time longshot managed to score the same as the archer in first but the archer in second stuffed up his first shot and missed the bulls eye by a small amount and so was out. They moved the target back to 200 yards and shot again, this time longshot wasn’t so lucky and one of his arrows caught the wind and just missed the bulls eye so he lost to the number one archer.

            The king reward this guy with the silver arrow trophy and he would be later paid the money for the competition but longshot would also be paid a good amount for coming second and he was happy with his position. The guys slapped him on his back when he came over and said that he made a good effort with it. They spent some time going around the tourney field after that visiting a few different tents and buying some food and drink. Once they grew bored of this they went back into to town and visited a couple of taverns where they got some more ale and drank in celebration of longshot. They talked about how well the tourney was going and how they looked forward to the grand melee tomorrow and wondered what team they would be put in. they hoped whatever team it was that they would be together as though they could fight against each other they didn’t like the prospect of it. They also talked about what was going to happen after the tourney, the wedding and the feast to come and then after that returning back home. During all this drinking and talking the silent knight waved at Simon to come over and so he did and they went outside.

            “I’m glad you won” the knight said.

            “Thank you, I’m glad I did to but it was not easy to fight you and Charles, should you be talking right now?” Simon asked.

            “For a short while yes but we shouldn’t be too long or the other guys will notice our absence, fighting you was tough for me as well you are a good fighter, I tried my best to beat you though I knew I didn’t really want to win this tourney as they would want me to remove my helmet and they would notice that I’m a woman” the knight replied.

            “Aye that they would and you would’ve been in big trouble then, pity though as you are a great fighter, will you be attending the feast as the knight or the daughter?” Simon asked.

            “The daughter most likely, I expect the guys will miss me and you as well but I would like to eat and drink at the thing and can hardly do that with this one” the knight said pointing to the helmet.

            “That’s the truth, we best be getting back, we’ll talk later” Simon replied and the knight nodded and they went back inside and re-joined the drinking. They didn’t too heavily that day but had a good celebration and ate later at a different tavern. When it grew later Simon went back to the lord’s estate so he could get a good sleep for tomorrow would see him fight again and he needed energy for that as grand melees lasted a good while and he wanted to be able to perform properly. He was looking forward to the more battle realistic event.