Erik raised his eyes to heaven and shook his head. "When he doesn't have to be? Not likely."
Manfred nodded, and walked out and away up the passage. He could walk fast and quietly for such a big man.
A short while later he was back, with a bag and an oilcloth roll. He closed the door and bolted it before tossing the bag onto the bed. It clinked. Erik raised an eyebrow.
Manfred unrolled his oilcloth onto to the table and revealed a set of tools that would have done any torturer from Damascus to Vinland proud. "Get out of those clothes. If you've got a close-fitting quilted shirt, put it on. If you don't, we'll have to get you one. We'll need to fit this thing. It's too small for me these days, but likely it'll be still too big for you."
Erik looked doubtful. "What is it?"
Manfred stepped over to the bag on the bed. He hauled out a shirt of tiny chain links. They gleamed with an odd black pearly sheen. "Koboldwerk. My uncle had me wear it at court. Somebody must have washed it because it's shrunk."
Erik snorted. "Particularly across the belly."
It was an unfair observation. Manfred was as square as a foundation block, but he was also solid muscle. He'd been a great deal softer before Erik had started on him. He trained with Manfred from an hour before dawn until Lauds every single day. Then they'd put in at least an hour on the pells. Then they'd join the knights for morning drill.
To give the Breton squire his due, nowadays Manfred gave the training his heart and soul. At first, Erik used to have to haul him out of bed. But lately it was getting to be the other way around, despite the fact that Manfred had managed to explore the wilder aspects of Venice's nights quite successfully. Also, he'd noticed how the squire had put on inches, particularly across the shoulders, in the months they'd been together. The boy was finishing his growing, and it certainly wasn't around the waistline.
Erik suspected that Manfred had been genuinely shocked to discover how much more capable his Icelandic "keeper" was than he, when it came to any kind of extended fighting. Manfred's incredible strength and athletic ability had not been matched by endurance--leaving aside the fact that he had little of Erik's actual combat experience and the brutal skills the Icelander had learned in the island's savage clan feuds as well as frontier skirmishes in Vinland.
One thing Erik had come to realize about his charge. For all of Manfred's roustabout ways, the young scion of the imperial family was quite capable of learning something when he put his mind to it. And, if it accomplished nothing else, the incident in the church seemed to have finally brought a certain amount of seriousness to Manfred's outlook on things. The big young man had brooded for days afterward, obviously ashamed of his initial reaction to Erik's defiance of Sachs.
Erik suppressed a snort. Not that Manfred's new-found solemnity went all that deep. If Abbot Sachs kept the Knights here much longer, he didn't doubt that Manfred would even learn to speak the local dialect. Well enough, at least, to ask directions to any location in Venice. He'd already learned how to find the taverns and brothels.
Manfred slapped his stomach. "It's the wine," he said mournfully. "I need more."
Erik shook his head, and smiled ruefully. "That is the one thing you don't need."
"This is a matter of opinion. Now get out of that cotte and put on a quilted shirt."
Erik did as he was told. The chain-links were heavy and cold, despite the shirt. And while it was loose around the waist and a little tight around the chest, it fit across the shoulders.
Manfred grunted in satisfaction. "Too big I can fix. Too small would have been a problem. Stand still."
He reached for the tools, displaying a familiarity that surprised Erik. The Icelander watched in some amazement. "I thought you were a prince, not a blacksmith."
Manfred twitched a lockring loose with an evil-looking set of long-nosed pliers. "According to my father, the Breton chiefs were once both--blacksmiths as well as princes. This was his idea. I got to run tame in the castle smithy back in Carnac. Beat spending time with the tutors mother inflicted on me, that's for sure."
His thick fingers moved with expert skill. "That's the difference between Mainz and Carnac," he continued. "Too bookish in Mainz. The aristocracy either reads or fights. In Carnac, according to our old seneschal, my father used to do the winter slaughtering before mother got there and 'civilized' him. Now stand still. Old Sachs didn't say anything about that hatchet of yours, did he?"
"The subject never came up," said Erik, standing still as he had been told. Books were a treasure up in Iceland. Especially in winter. But he could see where sitting still with a tutor might aggravate a boy like Manfred.
Erik sighed. He was supposed to watch over him; guard him; teach him. But it seemed to Erik that Manfred's supreme skill was slipping off to have a good time. Taking his watchdog with him, if that was the only choice, but without him if he could manage it. It had been from one of those expeditions that Erik had retrieved him from the House of the Red Cat.
Manfred whistled tunelessly between his teeth. "Stretch your arms out." Erik complied. "Bring them round in front of your chest. Can you move easily?"
Erik nodded. "It's not very comfortable. But I can move."
Manfred snorted. "It's never comfortable. And be grateful. I even had to sleep in it."
Erik looked grimly at Manfred. Sooner or later the boy had to accept the fact that he was in close line of succession to the throne of the Holy Roman Empire, the largest and most powerful realm in Christendom.
"Your uncle wanted to make sure you stayed alive. And that is why I'm supposed to watch over you. No one but the High Abbot at Wurtemburg knows who you are. And that is your best defense. But somebody may just possibly recognize you. Even with that moustache."
Manfred's responding grimace was so like that of a boy denied a day's play that Erik almost laughed. He could sympathize with Manfred's plight, inwardly if not openly. By Manfred's description, life in rather ramshackle, relaxed Celtic Carnac had been a far cry from the stilted imperial court at Mainz. But there was no point in letting his charge see that sympathy. Manfred would only try to take advantage of it.
Chapter 21 ==========
Maria waited for them in the kitchen of the apartment. It was . . . homelike having them living here. The boys tried to keep quiet, but they were, in the manner of boys, not much good at it. Maria found the noises comforting. She hadn't been aware of Caesare's catlike quietness until she'd had the contrast. The occasional clatter and slip from whisper into a laugh or hastily stifled yell was pleasant, almost comforting. Maria had never had a real family, the way most people did. It had been just her and her mother, as she was growing up. Since then, her huge pack of cousins had offered to provide her with a home--well, until she took up with Caesare--but Maria had always declined the offers. She valued her independence too much. But the boys didn't really impinge on that independence. They just made her home . . . warmer.
Of course, she'd never tell them that. They obviously found the apartment pleasing too. They hadn't moved out although Caesare was getting up for part of each day now. There was not much wrong with him any more that Maria could see, except he tired quickly. She wanted a word with Marco about that. And she'd better sort Benito out before he got into real trouble. She felt a little awkward at the thought of trying to discipline Benito. He wasn't more than two years younger than she was, after all. But somebody had to do it. And Marco, for all that he was a good soul and gentle as a dove, wasn't up to dealing with his little brother.