Tom Swan and the Head of St. George Part Five: Rhodes by Christian Cameron Page A

you the same, my lord.’ He wasn’t sure he’d ever actually been referred to as ‘Your Grace’ before, and he was prepared to like it.
    ‘My father was a great one for Saint George,’ the lord went on. ‘And Saint Andrew and Saint Patrick. He was not a Greek.’
    ‘English?’ Swan asked, because he was coming to believe that half the population of Lesvos was English.
    ‘Scots,’ the Lord of Eressos said. ‘He came out when the Company of Saint George took the condotta for the Gattelusi. He was constable,’ the young man said with pride. ‘By the way, I’m called Hector. Hector Zambale of Eressos.’
    Swan tried to parse Zambale and came up with nothing. ‘Is Zambale a local name?’ he asked.
    The young tow-headed Greek grinned. ‘In Scots, its Campbell. Zambale is what the Emperor made of Da’s name.’
    Swan grinned. The Lord of Eressos’s smile was infectious. ‘Enjoying our ships?’ he asked.
    ‘The prince ordered us to provide pitch this morning. Prince Dorino likes to see his orders carried out quickly. He wants you to sail away and leave us alone as soon as possible, so that if the Turks return he can claim he didn’t know you.’ Zambale watched two men with a red-hot iron sealing the patched seam on the bow of the Blessed Saint John. ‘We offered shipwrights, but apparently your knights don’t trust Greeks near their ships.’
    There didn’t seem to be a good answer to that.
    ‘Is it true you are a prince of England?’ Zambale asked. ‘I hope I don’t offend when I say you seem a lot more relaxed than the princes I know.’
    Swan laughed. ‘I’m the bastard of a bastard. Nonetheless, John of Gaunt really is my grandfather.’
    ‘A famous line, even if reached the wrong way,’ Zambale said. ‘Prince Dorino intends to make much of you tonight. Can you dance?’
    ‘I know all the Italian dances,’ Swan said, suddenly thankful for Violetta’s instruction and a month of home entertainment.
    Zambale nodded. ‘Well,’ he said. ‘It should be quite an evening.’ He looked around. ‘The oarsmen say you are quite the swordsman. That you killed ten Turks fighting in a mine under Rhodos.’ He grinned to take the sting out of his next remark. ‘You don’t look like such a firebrand.’
    Swan scratched his beard. ‘Swords fascinate me. I … practise. And the knights – they have very high standards for everything – wrestling, swordsmanship – even fighting with the dagger.’
    Zambale’s eyes fairly glowed with enthusiasm. ‘Would you care to teach me?’ he asked.
    ‘Teach you what?’ Swan asked.
    ‘Anything!’ Zambale said. ‘I’m a young pup in a backwater and nothing ever comes here. We don’t get good sword masters and we don’t get good dancing masters. I learned everything from Da’s friends.’ He said it with the air of a man who didn’t believe a word of his own modesty.
    Sweet Jesu , Swan thought. He thinks he’s a swordsman.
    The Lord of Eressos dismounted and threw his reins to an oarsman, who glared at him with the resentment of a free man for an aristocrat.
    ‘You don’t practise with sharp swords,’ Swan said as kindly as he could manage. ‘In Italy and Rhodos they have practice swords.’
    Hector Zambale was young and immortal. ‘Oh – we do. Nothing to it. I’ll be careful.’ The younger man was bouncing on his toes. He was a clear six feet tall and probably three fingers taller than Swan, and had shoulders as broad as an ox. He drew his heavy long sword with a flourish.
    Swan wasn’t wearing a long sword. ‘If you’d like me to show you some things, perhaps you’d like to use an arming sword?’ he asked.
    The other man nodded. ‘Sure, it would be a great shame to have a mismatch.’ He went to his horse and drew a smaller sword from the scabbard on his saddle.
    ‘The big sword was my da’s,’ he said. ‘Now we’ll have a proper tiff.’
    His arming sword was much more modern – with a finger ring and a complex ricasso, it was