Istanna was farther than Calisole from Ocrens but no harder to reach, much as when a man whose father is a wide-ruling king, after the funeral, lays claim to his country and to the loyalty of the people under him in the same manner as does the son of a manor lord who was over a few families and their farms, and both equally are obeyed. The end of the journey though was unlike that earlier, for Gray Mirror Castle was no village or port-embracing town, but a keep built for guarding the mines there on Istanna and had walls high and thick enough for it that any foe might be awed by them.
So stout was that place and firm in its defense that Sir Donn and Jocosa were challenged by men who deemed not even a boat unworthy of notice, thinking that the rower of it was as able to do mischief as someone who arrived by any means other, were he mighty enough and bent on it. Jocosa spoke words suited to calm them. “While you may be taken aback by the knightliness of this man and the daring of our crew of two only, be sure that are we sent here on an errand of a friendly sort by the lord of Sebeneuse, who has heard a witness is delayed by weather's whims.”
Those guards eager in their duty hurried them to the hall where Baron Istannius, a man lean and stern by the look of him, greeted the travelers. His dismay that he had from worry over the last witness was put aside at first for his duty as a host, and then was overcome wholly when he heard the knight before him was of widely-famed Caerffos, brother to its lord no less, and willing to be a witness at the knighting of Pietro.
As for the other witnesses, what knights had gathered, and how Sir Donn wondered at them even as he told Jocosa of their deeds. Sir Plascentius of Mondommo was there, and his limbs were nothing less in their strength than would be thought of a man who once rid the land of twin ogres that did passing sore harm till they met a knight too much for them. His daring and might won much of praise, but there were some who esteemed higher Sir Jacopo of Divara, whose age was such that he had knighted men for his grandsons, and was better still in the fight than they. Sir Germund of Varndon had such fame from the horse race, for no rider was better, that all knew him and the crowns won by men rich in horses who begged that he add to their honor by his skill. The baron had asked Sir Andrea of Blue Mirror there by reason of their being cousins, but warlike men knew him from the tournament he won with a staff borrowed from an elderly man as his weapon, which he wielded after he lent out his arms, fine ones too, for the cause that a poor knight asked for aid that he might not be shamed there at a bout where renown is earned. Above even those well-honored men was a fifth knight come there to be a witness, Sir Kuintos of Noston, who by his canny orders had rescued an army of King Diodore that was without its commander, for the greedy earth seized him in the way it does all brave men. Otherwise all those soldiers were lost to Sir Reiner of Boncot instead of what happened in fact, which was that the war fared longer than either king hoped, to the good of one and ill of the other, and ended in surrender without Noston ever taken, which then seemed sure before that knight changed the course of things.
Sir Donn told all that and said, “To see such a press of knighthood as this is uncommon. It causes an uncommon hardship as well, to choose which among them you like to praise the most. I doubt it even now.”
With winning words Jocosa answered, “A hardship such as that is no hardship at all, for those men must all be liked enough. Knowing that, any would be wise not to waste liking on them but make use of it elsewhere in hope of better gain.”
“I will always be sure to tell those I like how grateful they must be and wait, my hand out.” Sir Donn said that, and Jocosa asked that he be sure to report to her the results.
The knighting of Pietro of Gray Mirror had nothing unusual in it. Indeed, the witnesses save Sir Andrea had only this plaint over it, that too gentle was the thing overall. “He ought to be struck right well as an aid to recall to him his oaths and to us that we saw it, and when, and where,” Sir Jacopo said, and Sir Donn agreed, as did Sir Plascentius.
“We have here our own custom for that. You will hear of it while we eat.” The baron told them that and forthwith ordered that his servants ready the meal, which command they obeyed. Soon the hall of Gray Mirror Castle had feasting in it to match the fame of the knights there, so much that each had to him a pie of his own, a small thing served in a bowl. And when Sir Donn ate his to the bottom, that bowl surprised him by having a number drawn there. The other witnesses had numbers as well, though Jocosa had none such. They asked the lord what meaning there was in it, and he answered them gladly.
“A lone buffet, no matter the strength of it, is soon forgotten by any warlike men among the dozens others he is struck if ever he enters war or tournaments. Our custom on Istanna avoids that clear. We call on a poet to write a song easy to learn and recall, and you witnesses will sing one after the other, the order set by your number. Sing it well, for we all of us will choose the best and give to him the prize.”
Then the knights, the six of them, were led apart and made to hear the verses that told of Sir Pietro, his line, the day and the place, so that there would be no doubt in any of it. After that, they sang in the hall. Age had thinned Sir Jacopo's voice to such a fineness that there was no force in it, and he fared worst of all in the judgment. Sir Plascentius and Sir Andrea both did better in that, but failed in skill next to Sir Kuintos, who had a voice higher than the look of him gave all to think and knew the use of it enough not to shame himself. Sir Donn for his part sang as any son of Caerffos should, that city fond of the chorus, and was more practiced in it than the other knights, enough to be acclaimed the second. But Sir Germund was so pleasing in his voice that some deemed it unfair that he be best at two unlike sports, riding and singing, as if some crop there were that gave forth fruit and meat both so that all the fields were given over to it by the wise while the stubborn alone still thought cattle to have any worth. Even so did it seem when he sang, and each who heard it doubted the need for any other knight.
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That doubt yielded to merriment when all agreed to give Sir Germund the prize to take home to Varndon. The witnesses, every one of them, had the bowl with his number as a gift, and the baron placed gold in each, the more the higher its knight's place in the vote. After that all was festive, and Baron Istannius showed himself a right cheering host, however forbidding his looks.
He asked also, as an unstinting lord, if Sir Donn and Jocosa wished to depart rather in a stout and crest-mounting ship of his than the boat which the well-winded knight had rowed thither. The people there and the witnesses had surprise at learning they had traveled in that manner to Istanna. But Sir Donn refused the boon and said, “That boat served well enough to bring us and will fare no worse on a course back, which is well. For it is not our boat, either of ours, but is borrowed from a Silacchian and must be returned.” And his honesty was praised when he said that.
On the broad blue-gray plain, Jocosa asked Sir Donn this. “I worry now at the ill come to the owner of this boat from our taking it, since it seems we alone live through strangeness in the night. For him all is usual save that he has not the use of his tools.”
“He will find it less ill when he finds this gold in it, while I am glad enough to keep the bowl my singing earned,” said that knight in words that pleased her.
The lord of Ocrens was pleased as well to hear how matters fared at the Gray Mirror Castle. “Word came to me that on Istanna there was some custom of knighthood not followed elsewhere. Straightaway my desire waxed to learn more of it, and I like it now so much that I would have it done here. Or, sir knight, what think you of it?”
Sir Donn answered this. “Every journey on the sea that I take, I see manners and habits new to me, and they are all of three kinds. The first are good in themselves and ought to be taken up in every city and castle. The second are those that seem good for the people who made and like them, but will do nothing better that they must be taken up by others. The third were ill for any to do, for there are better ways. This knighting to me seems of the first sort, and something of that kind is a boon to all the world that it will be well done to spread. I agree also with what you have not yet said, that it is a duty of knights to carry them with us even as we travel about, safer than most by reason of our arms and the honor that we have till we lose it by unworthy deeds.”
“Well, you are right. Now I have asked quite much and enough. You both may leave with my will behind it, but first I warn you that your surety is changed.” Then the lord of that place loved by the moon drew forth a setting of silver that was rich with diamonds, small and glittering, and in it was an oval larger than a thumb that was a turquoise. “This is what I had done with it, and this is the reason for what I did. It happens that while you never learned the why behind Cornard's search for turquoise of the best sort, that far-sailing captain who came even here, I know it. Once he wooed a daughter of a family in Cannfold great in its wealth. Nor did he fail in that, but he wed her, his Jocatta, who brought to that marriage a turquoise that was called the Grand Roc's Egg from its size and color than which no stone of that kind was better. But some years afterward, on a sorrowful day, Jocatta and her dowry both were lost to the gluttonous sea by the coming of a dreadful storm too fierce for the gentle. All that was sadness and woe almost too much to Cornard, yet he hoped at the least one day to find some turquoise that might be made into a like stone, though smaller, that he might give it to his daughter who will bring it to her own marriage some happy day. Instead it was found by Sir Donn, his friend, and is larger. That aside, do you have back your surety.”
Sir Donn spoke as he took it, that Grand Roc's Egg, for Jocosa seemed overcome by thought and was quiet. “Now I worry to seem an ingrate to return you nothing for telling me what I long had desire to know but weened that never I would. But then also I have a plaint against you, that gladly I would have given this to Jocosa the daughter of Cornard, but the story as you told it makes it hard to do so, which was not by mischance I think. The best course may be, merchant-like, to say there is no debt either way, and take my leave with the common thanks men have at parting for ever having met, to each other and to the Lord.”
“That is well for merchants,” Sebeneuse's master said, “but I must be owed more than I owe or else I will have a name as a mean and greedy lord. I now think of the gift you must have. It is a ship light and swift enough that even one rower is able to move it well but withstands most weather, though I advise you not rely overmuch on that. Tow your borrowed boat with that and then travel in it whithersoever you will, seeing marvels and taking good customs and news aboard as your passengers.”
And from the roof of the palace they saw it, that rare ship promised the knight which had one row of oars and no deck, and he was grateful for it and did not refuse the gift. Jocosa also thanked the lord, and so the two left Ocrens, an island hid from most. That marvelous ship carved the blue-gray sea with crew of two only, though twenty more were needed to crew it whole. Sir Donn rowed again toward Silacchia and Jocosa was the pilot, and during that she said, “And yet you have not said what your plan is for that our turquoise.”
“As to that, I was told once a sure help to anyone in doubt, if there is time for it. The newest bells, they say, have fresh thoughts in them that fly forth bit by bit as the bell is tolled, and over time lose all the wit stored when they are founded. For that reason I will travel to Chrysasty to hear the bell that was to be brought to Mumport. A knight should be bold, and therefore I urge that you go with me, you and your servants we will relieve from their worry on Silacchia, and Father Gianumberto as well.”
“Yes, we must have a priest,” Jocosa said, and all was done as Sir Donn urged. When Mumport saw that ship of Sebeneuse the people there esteemed it little, but when they heard the tales Sir Donn told them, they were amazed. For they knew him as an honest man and trusted his word as to everything that happened far west, but the galley Sir Donn left at Cousdebourg had not arrived so that those stories were new. Then they knew the worth of that ship the lord of Ocrens made a gift and strove ever since to build the like themselves.
Sir Donn tarried in Mumport two weeks and two days till the Saphonian galley put in. Then he allowed Sir Poemen of Argetych and Sir Clovis of Salisville to guide him, as well as Jocosa and Gianumberto the priest with him, to Chrysasty where the people heard all those adventures that came about because of the bell. And for that it was called Gaspar's Bell because many had this thought, that it was the will of the ancient king that the coming of the bell should spur such adventures as freed his kingdom from more wickedness and grief than any ought to suffer.