High in the mountains of a strange and foreign land, in the biting cold of a frigid winter, the young knight, Sieur Yvan, astride his courser, cut a lonely figure. The land was lush and green when the knight had departed from the illustrious court of Arles many months earlier, and so too was the knight himself green and untested. Now, snow blanketed the earth, and ice clung to the sheer slopes that rose all around him. The knight, for his part, had thus faced travails tenfold those of any knight known to him. He had scrapped with snarling wolves, bears, and boars and beaten back the brutish woodwos and ill-natured lutins that prowl the primeval terrain. Though fierce as those beasts and fiends were, winter was worse. Hunger ate away at his cheeks, and the cold stung his nose and burned the tips of his fingers. He had spent many nights curled up in the cracks of rocky crags to shield himself from the chilling wind. Hard stones were his mattress, and the deadly spears of ice that dangled above his head were his canopy. They dripped upon him as he slept and froze again under the joints of his armour. His fine tunic, edged with embroidered silk, was worn threadbare. His neatly cut cloak, closed at the neck, its lining finished with a layer of white fur, was all that spared him from the cold.

With no soul loved by man or God to be found in the wilds that might give him direction, Sieur Yvan wandered weeks in search of the mysterious and storied castle he had set out to find. There, he hoped to be reunited with Sieur Rothilde d’Arlandis. Sieur Yvan feared for her fate should be held in that accursed place, of course, but were she not there, he would have no other lead as to where the lady knight who was so dear to him might be. Still, he hoped for the best. His faith and diligence were all that kept death at bay and so he held fast to them.

The lady knight had been a beloved friend of the young Yvan de la Motte since boyhood, and though five years his senior, she was also his first love. The daughter of the auspicious Marquis d’Arlandis, who ruled the eastern Marche of Arelat, Sieur Rothilde had forsworn the title of Dame and instead sought to become a knight of the realm. Though rare, it was not unheard of for women to pursue knighthood, particularly among finer families of little wealth. For the fille of such a hallowed house to do so, however, was truly remarkable. Her choice had hardly surprised the young Yvan. Having grown up with her, as his father was a Baron, vassal, and close friend of the Marquis, Yvan had many fond memories of playing with Rothilde, who always preferred to play with the boys. He heard her state countless times how she wanted to be a knight when she reached womanhood, though the ladies of her house told her she would outgrow that childhood fancy. Their words had only led to the rebellious girl devoting more earnestly to her aim. When she reached adolescence, rather than allow herself to be groomed for marriage, she shorn her hair short and refused the hennins and bliauds that had first been forced upon her. The strong and stouthearted Rothilde swore that she would ne’er marry, a promulgation that had shaken princely Yvan. He had hoped, albeit foolishly because of their age, that she might have been given to him as bride when time came that he wed. Even now, Sieur Yvan believed himself to be the man who might make Rothilde renounce her pledge—though at present, the fate of the lady Sieur was wholly uncertain.

Knowing that a lady knight needed be twice the knight as any man to receive half the renown, Sieur Rothilde had taken on the most daunting of quests to prove her valiance. She traveled east, past the ancient wood which flanked the champain they called home, o’er the mountains which loomed on the horizon ever in view from their family estates, and across the land of the barbaric Teutons. There it was said that an ancient enchantress had cast the land in shadow. All those who lived in that country were said to fear the Countess Nefârtul, who withered crops, drove maidens to madness, and wrenched nursing babes from their mother’s teat, to use their blood for her foul purposes. Sieur Rothilde had sworn to slay the striga haunting that land, but a year had passed without her return, and in that time no messenger had even brought news of her travels. So Sieur Yvan had set out in search of her.

However, half-starved and three-quarters frozen, seeds of doubt that he should ever find his dear Rothilde began to sprout. His horse, Carbonel, a sweet and docile gelding, full black from hoof to mane, trudged through snow up to its hocks, the creature so tired that it barely could put one hoof before the next. Sieur Yvan and his horse would become carrion lest he soon found shelter. He signed himself three times and prayed to highest heaven that Mother Mary guide him towards some house or haven. No sooner had he done so when, spurring his steer o’er the steep, he spied Castle Nefârtul, crowning the mountain crests, piercing the clouds.

On the other side of the castle, perhaps four leagues away, there was a village. The young knight considered traveling to the town to rest and regain his strength, yet he could not justify resting while the fate of the dear companion remained known only to God and whatever manner wicked creature that resided in the decrepit structure with its crumbling turrets that now towered before him.

Though the aged citadel appeared long abandoned, the knight was not foolhardy enough to approach via the anfractuous pass that led to the castle gate. And with the bridge drawn, intrepid Yvan, though his limbs were weary from hunger and exertion, was left with no choice but to traverse the bramble-lined fosse and scale the high walls of the enceinte.

The courtyard was a mess of untamed underbrush in which fragments of the western tower were scattered. The lofty battlements were half demolished and, thickly enwreathed in ivy, had become the residence of birds of prey. The knight crossed the rude yard with caution and entered what appeared to be the chapel of the castle, “where the hymn of devotion had once been raised, and the tear of penitence had once been shed; sounds which could now only be recalled by imagination.”* The only sounds that filled the hall as the knight stood in awe of its vastness were the screeching of owls and the howl of icy winds. Though taken in by the immense scale of the ruin, Sieur Yvan almost failed to take notice that the floor of the gloomy hall was almost entirely caved in, opening up in a dark abyss. Sublimity turned to terror in an instant and reminded the knight that he had no time to dally in such an accursed place. The knight carefully skirted across the crumbling pavement but paused when he noticed that the image of the Almighty was absent from the apse. Investigating further, he found the cross was cracked and in splinters on the floor, and the figure of the blessed Redeemer severed in six pieces, limbs and head broken from its body. The sinister sight made gall rise in the gallant’s throat. If there had been any question whether this decrepit den quartered devils, it was definitively answered. He passed on from this profane display, out of the chapel and into the lightless passageways.

Sieur Yvan crept through the dim corridors with great trepidation. Fearing that the clatter of his armour should announce his presence to the fiend that haunted these halls, his hand remained clutched round the hilt of his sword, his arm tensed and ready to slash at whatever should meet him. Yet the only sounds he heard were of his own making; nothing living save the spiders in their webs. Until, all of a sudden, a rattle of heavy chains rang out in the distance. Yvan sprang with a start, drawing his sword and brandishing his shield of shining scarlet with its pentangle painted in pure gold.

The gallant knight pursued the noise into the great hall, where he was met with greater surprise. He found no foul witch or fiend but only his dearest Rothilde, dirty and destitute. She was dressed in the course clothes of a maidservant and barely took notice of the knight as she scrubbed away at the stone floors. Below the hem of her long woolen skirt, Yvan espied the shackles that bound her ankles, which had been the source of the clangor. Her feet bare on the cold flagstone.

Sieur Yvan vaunted praise upon the Virgin that the lady knight still lived and breathed, though, seeing her brought so low, he had little doubt that she must have suffered torments and travails beyond his comprehension. At the sound of his prayer, Rothilde gasped and at last took notice of the young knight come to her aid.

“Yvan!” she called to him, voice filled with panic and eyes a light with fear, "My young M’Sieur, why have you come to this place? What foolish purposes have moved you to follow my path?”

“For what other reason than for you?” replied Yvan.

“If that is all, then you must flee at once!” She rose and, rushing towards the knight, clutched him by his brassards, halting his headway into the hall.

Yvan shook off her trembling hands. “What has become of that red-blooded bravery which I have always admired in my Rothilde? No fiend on earth could be fearsome enough as to make you so feeble of will; surely, this witch has robbed you of your wits.”

Her eyes did not meet those of the knight’s, though the image of her before him put Yvan ill at ease. Though her garments were tattered and dirty, her face was ful clene.* Her skin was as silk and her complexion rosy and radiant. Beneath her scarf, her tawny hair was lush and now long, well befitting of the lionhearted lady.

“That which you say is impossible is true, Yvan. In both brain and brawn, this beldame would have you beat. She bested me with ease, and I was not in so ragged a state as you are now. Her nails are like iron and could make ribbons of your mail shirt. And she is crafty in the ways of conjuration. I fear no knight may match her.”

“So am I to abandon you as you are, serving a consort of Satan?” asked Yvan. “No, I will not leave without you.”

“And should you meet her, you shall never leave with your life,” Rothilde pleaded, “My fate is now fixed, but your freedom is still yours. Do not sacrifice it on my account.”

As she spoke, another sound, a new sound, suddenly drew near: pounding footsteps steadily approaching. The young knight wondered what manner of wretched woman could make such a din.

Sensing that time was of the essence, Rothilde resumed her pleas, desperate to make the knight understand that his final window to flee was fast closing. But Sieur Yvan, unmoved, stood valiant and proud, prepared to meet his promised foe. Sword and shield at the ready, he anxiously awaited her arrival, undaunted by the deed he had sworn to carry out.

Yet as soon as it was, those footsteps sounded like they had finally reached the great hall; they ceased. Yvan breathed heavy in the pregnant silence, while Rothilde returned to her pail and brush, perhaps fearing some punishment should her imprisoner find her slacking.

At last, a form emerged from the shadows, though hardly the one Yvan was expecting. Neither a withered crone nor hulking ogress, this form was well-proportioned and pleasurable to behold: the form of a beauteous young maiden, ripe for marriage. Unlike Rothilde, this girl was dressed in the finest vestments. She wore a gown of rich burgundy with gold brocade and trimmed with fine mink fur. Long sleeves trailed behind her as she gracefully strode into the room. The jewel-encrusted belt, which sat low on her hips, swayed with her every step. It was clear to the knight that beneath her robe she was possessed of a perfect bosom and a buttocks, most pleasingly plump. She wore a snood over her long, straight hair, a net of delicately spun gold strewn with pearls that glimmered in her hair like stars against the blackness of the heavens. The knight had never met a maiden so fair in face and flesh. Her skin was as milk, though her cheeks bloomed with blood, and her wide lips were red as carnations. Dark eyes of incomparable beauty and expressiveness stared softly, their lustre dimmed only by a slight languor. Her nose was narrow and aquiline and crowned by two ebony eyebrows. Stunned by this striking creature, Sieur Yvan strained to make his tongue move.

“M’Sieur Rothilde,” he eventually asked, “who is this delicate demoiselle, who appears now before us?”

Rothilde replied, “She is the Lady Kalina, my mistress, and the maiden to whom I play maidservant. It is to her, Yvan, that I owe my present state of ignominy.”

“Just a jest, I am certain.” Sieur Yvan scoffed back. “No doubt, she is a lady of the highest naissance noblesse, and a prisoner like yourself. There is no one way a creature so lovely could belong to so wretched a place. The lady of this land is a demon who brings death and disease, who bathes in the blood of newborn babies.”

“Yes, and it is she that now you see; do not be deceived.” She warned the young knight in desperation. “Yvan, I have known you since you yourself were a babe, boneless gums latched to your mother’s breast, I beg you not to forfeit your life, but sheath your arms and flee!”

But thinking her mad, the knight in his kit did not heed her words and hastened to meet the fetching maiden. As he drew nearer to her, the knight did mark one abnormality in her appearance, which was her impressive stature. She was nearly six pieds in height, only ever so slightly shorter than Yvan himself, though he was in his sabatons and she in slippers, but he put this fact aside.

“Mademoiselle,” he said, “we must get you away from here! Castle Nefârtul is an accursed place, naught but a crypt for the good Christian. Perhaps you can persuade my comrade-in-arms, Sieur Rothilde, to take leave of this place as well. I fear that her senses have abandoned her.”

The young lady gave the knight a curious look before answering in the sweetest voice, “Why should I want to leave this place? It is my home.“

“Alas,” the knight bemoaned, “then you too are bewitched by the crone of this castle.”

“No, you misunderstand, M’Sieur,” the lady replied, “I am the lady of this castle. I am the Countess Nefârtul.”

“Ha!” the incredulous Yvan shot back, “You, the nefarious Countess? Never! You are but a girl; your physiognomy bespeaks that you are ill-suited to such ungodly business. The Countess Nefârtul is said to be an ancient and evil enchantress, eighty and eighty years by estimation, not some maiden, innocent and fair.

“Then perhaps, hapless squire, what is said is wrong,” she said in her sonorous voice. “Though I fear for your sake, that my darling Tilda,” she stopped herself, “I am sorry, the brave Sieur Rothilde,” she mocked, “has spoken nothing untrue. You should have fled, for I shall not let you leave this place.

“And should I not now punish you? Did you not scale my ramparts and invade my home with intent to rob me of my favorite servant?”

“I am no squire, you wicked and false woman. I am Sieur Yvan de la Motte, a knight of—” Though the man could not complete his introduction. To his astonishment, one sharp glance from the Countess had stopped his tongue and stifled his speech.

“I know who you are, knavish boy,” the Countess interjected, keeping her cool, “That was not what I asked you.”

“I did not come to exchange words with a witch, that is, if you are indeed who you say you are.” Yvan barked, brandishing again his sword and shield. “I only meant to inform you of who shall be undoing, but if my personage somehow precedes me, all the better. I have come to slay that evil that envelops this land and rescue brave Rothilde. And with her unharmed, reckon that you have the two of us to contend with now.”

He locked eyes with the lady knight, though she knelt upon the floor, at present still defeated. He drew a dagger from his silk bauldrick and pitched it towards once-proud Rothilde. “My soeur d'armes take up that blade and with me prove to this witch your worth!”

But the lady knight let the knife clatter uselessly upon the floor, casting her eyes away from it.

The Countess Kalina merely laughed as she walked over towards the waiting woman. “My darling Tilda would sooner throw herself from my battlements than lay a finger upon me in malice.” While she spoke, Kalina laid her hand casually upon Rothilde’s head, raking slender fingers through her golden hair.

In a display that both horrified and scandalized young Yvan, his admired Rothilde, apple of his eye, gladly surrendered to her touch. Like a lady’s lapdog, she craned her neck to nuzzle deeper into the Countess’s hand.

Made unwilling voyeur to this vulgar display, rage roiled in Yvan’s stomach, and bile burned his gullet. He lifted his sword aloft and charged at the unnatural woman. Kalina faced him without concern, for it was with only a glance that the knight found himself frozen where he stood. Without effort, she held him ensnared in her stare as her hand continued to idly caress her servant’s head. Yvan had no choice but to watch helplessly as Rothilde—whom he was secure in his thinking was surely ensorcelled—assented to such humiliation. Her face, however, bore no recognition of her state of indignity, but purported only the purest bliss and the Countess’s indecent treatment.

“Oh my dearest Tilda,” Kalina cooed to the captured lady, “what should become of this foolish knight. I leave his fate for you to decide.”

Addressed by her lady, Rothilde’s eyes lit up.

“Break this boy for me, mistress,” she begged, “Punish his impudence and make him know your full might and majesty!”

Sieur Yvan was badly stung by his beloved’s blatant betrayal.

“Very well,” said Kalina, “I will do as you wish.”

The Counted bowed down to bestow a kiss on Rothilde’s lips. And it was no prim peck, but a deep and adoring kiss. Rothilde rose up from her knees, wrapped in her lady’s arms. As they embraced, utterly impassioned, Kalina allowed her attention to shift away from the aggrieved knight.

Feeling her hold on him weaken, Yvan burst free of her grasp and broke again into a charge. His headlong heroics amounted to near nothing, for one fierce look out the side of her eye had him frozen again. The wicked woman did not need to face him fully nor even break off her kiss to subdue him. Yvan's brief moment of free movement spoke not to his strength but to the Countess’s own feeling of security.

She addressed him again: “Yvan, your sword is much too heavy and your shield too. Your body is weary and you can heave them no longer.”

Before the knight could even comprehend her words, his raised right arm was suddenly dragged down, and his sword slipped from his hand. Similarly, the weight of his scarlet escutcheon tore at his shoulder until he surrendered it to the stone floor. Yvan reached down to retrieve his blade, but found he could not budge it from its resting place. Rothilde snickered, watching on as Yvan weakly struggled.

“Such witchery!” Yvan exclaimed, “What manner of enchantment have you enacted upon my trusted shield and sword that the mightiest of giants could not make use of them?”

“No change to your armes, but to your head, heedless swordsman,” Kalina swore, “The mind conquers matter and your mind is mine to mold to my megrims.”

Misconstruing the true cunning of her craft, Yvan declared to the Countess, “Just a cheap trick by a charlatan, then. I should have known that only the Almighty in his infinite mysteries may transmute matter. And my Lord shall protect me from your paltry powers.”

“Show me then, pious knight, how you pray in your pew,” she said unshaken, “It is good that you have the Lord’s protection because your helmet and hauberk help you not; they but bring you to your knees neath their bulk.”

The knight never knew what hit him. He collapsed to his knees; his grieves coming to the ground with a crash. The weakened Yvan felt an utter whelp, whining and moaning under the weight of his gear. Every last bit of strength had left his limbs. His head lolled from side to side; his brain in its bucket was baffled and bemused. All his wit and welly were banished in a few words.

Standing over him, the stunning Kalina smirked: “It is better to see you where you belong.”

Behind her, Rothilde appeared radiant with joy at Yvan’s apprehension.

Kalina reached down and effortlessly ripped the helmet from the young knight’s head. Regretfully and in spite of himself, Yvan felt almost grateful to the Countess as he reeled with relief from the removal of the crushing weight.

The sharp nails of the Countess traced his sparse-haired chin as she spoke again to Rothilde, “Perhaps it is only me, but I see some promise in this princely face. From a certain perspective, it is nearly pretty.”

“Make no mistake, my lady,” she answered, “There is some promise there. In this facet, we are favoured by fortune that of all the knights in Francia who should seek my rescue, it was Yvan, a fawn, fair and feckless, who found me.”

As the two of them teased, the young knight, teeming with indignation, tried to think through the terrible haze in his head for a way he might counter the Countess’s magics. Resolving to trust in the Lord, he reached for the lariat wreathed round his neck, fighting fiercely, for it was a fantastic struggle just to make his arms move. He managed, nevertheless, to clutch and bring forth his chain carrying Christ on the cross from beneath his surcoat, and showing it proudly, the holy symbol in silver drove back the sinister woman at the sight of it. Kalina leapt a spear's length at least. Her face flashed a most vile visage before she averted her eyes, hissing like a viper. In that moment, Yvan caught a minute glimpse of the maiden’s true monstrosity.

His advantage, however, was short-lived. Within no time at all, the wretched Rothilde was upon Yvan and wrenching that most effective weapon from his neck. Rothilde brought back her hand and made to belt the boyish knight, but seeing him shrink, stopped her strike midway.

“You call yourself a knight, Yvan? You, who flinches in fear at the foretaste of harm? You are entirely untouched, and yet, you are terror-struck,” she mocked, “Can you not, for a moment, make yourself a man before my mistress?”

She laughed cruelly at the cringing coward. When Yvan looked back, the Countess was again coolly composed and commending Rothilde with a kiss. She stooped down low, her enchanting eyes even with Yvan’s. “Maybe we shall see the measure of this man if we try a more tender touch.”

She slipped her hand between his chausses and unsheathed his short sword. Though the knight thought himself the embodiment of courtliness to the bones of his being, his body betrayed his baser urges, and soon his manhood had sprung to life, unable to resist the sinful softness of her hands as she stroked his shaft.

“I appreciate his eagerness,” she said to Rothilde, with a laugh, “although his length is rather lacking.”

Even with Kalina’s taunts, however, Yvan’s arousal failed to ebb. His phallus fully engorged, the knight felt faint and flush, submissive and feeble. His virtue and propriety vanished in the throes of passion. Yvan wanted to comfort himself that no man could last against Kalina’s charms, but those thoughts counted for close to nothing. Almost effortlessly, she had Yvan on the very edge of emission.

With him poised on that precipice, Kalina made as if to take him into her mouth. Ecstasy overwhelmed Yvan until he suddenly sobered as Kalina flashed a pair of ferocious looking fangs.

She squeezes hard on his swollen member, stiff with blood. The knight, forgetting himself no longer, tried to fight her off in fits, but she held him down fast. Her pointed teeth plunged into his cock and pierced with veins with an icy chill. The knight’s voice cracked when he cried out, and stripes of scarlet dripped down his shaft. The seductive creature slurped and sucked at the surging sanguis, draining him dry. As she drank, the knight grew dazed and dizzy, and darkness crept in at the sides of his vision. So too did he note a newfound numbness that gnawed at his loins. Where once he pulsed with both pleasure and pain, he felt precious little. And with that, Sieur Yvan slumped over and sank into dreamless slumber.

* Ann Radcliffe, The Romance of the Forest, p. 15.

* Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, I.146.