Putting a contemporary spin on her favorite themes of St. George, the dragon, knights and all things medieval, Ellen Ekstrom, author of The Legacy and Armor of Light, brings us A Knight on Horseback. Meet Violet Ellison - a working mother, faithful, supportive wife, aspiring author, history student and pretty much burned-out and fed up with life. Just when she thinks she can’t fit another thing on her plate, she’s put to the test where it concerns love and finding happiness. But one thing: Violet doesn’t need a knight in shining armor. Just some personal space. And maybe some sleep.
______________
Chapter 1
Once Upon a Time . . . the Computer Crashed
Richard of Gloucester stood behind a wall of household knights, waiting. Somewhere on the field, his brother the King had committed the reserves for a final stand. Off in the distance, in the fog, he could see shapes moving and the unmistakable silhouette of Edward astride a great warhorse, his banner of the Sunne in Splendour a beacon for the Yorkists, as he screamed orders.
To Richard’s right, the duke of Clarence’s men shifted and changed position. Why would it not surprise Richard if his brother of Clarence changed heart yet again? Of the Plantagenet brothers, one never knew where George stood. Today, Richard hoped it would be with Edward. George only claimed kinship when it suited his political ambitions, or as it recently happened, to save his own neck.
Every man waiting with Richard held their breath as the Black Bull banner of Clarence appeared through the fog and joined with the Sunne in Splendour. That was it! That was the signal!
“Now!” Richard shouted at his men. “For God, Edward and York!”
Slamming down the visor to his helmet Richard led the vanguard in a charge and would have clashed with the earl of Oxford’s men had the computer not suddenly frozen up and the Blue Screen of Death appeared with a message.
‘DISK ERROR 23 READING DRIVE A. ABORT? CANCEL RETRY?’
“Sonofabitch!”
Violet could see her reflection in the monitor screen gone dark -- glanced up at the Kit-Kat clock wagging tail and googly eyes from its position above the kitchen door. Twelve thirty-three. She drew in a ragged breath and puffed out a sigh, then tried a few DOS commands, offering a prayer to the God of Microprocessors. The hard drive vented an excruciating whine comparable to her ‘67 Mustang on cold mornings. She tried another command, then a few more.
Nothing.
Nothing at all.
“Noooo! No, no, no, no!”
Violet banged her head gently against the monitor screen. Four hours of work had crashed on the information highway, made an irreparable detour into Cyberspace.
Nothing like modern technology to shock one out of the sanctuary of imagination and back to the autumn of 1995 – well, that and remembering the garbage cans needed to be dragged out to the curb.
The September night was cold and clear, the air sweetly pungent. A platinum moon slid from behind a shroud of fog and came to fullness, as bright as a street lamp. Somewhere in the neighborhood a musician banged on a piano and a dog barked frantically.
Everything in Violet’s world was the same -- her comfortable, safe, predictable, world.
Except there was a man standing at the corner of Oxford and Cedar.
He didn’t belong in the neighborhood; that much Violet knew. The blanching light of the street lamp made his features distinct -- he was blond, attractive, wore expensive European clothing and carried a suitcase, looked hopelessly lost.
Quite by accident they made eye contact and he smiled, taking hesitant steps in her direction. She shoved the cans up against the driveway gate and then made a dash for the door, pausing only a moment to glance back.
He was walking up toward Rose Street, just passing the front gate. They made eye contact again, and again he stopped. Violet ducked behind the lace curtains, then peeked out one last time before she turned her attention to the laundry on the sofa.
Laundry seemed to grow there, like mushrooms on a forest floor. If you plucked up one dishtowel, another would replace it by next afternoon; another sock would sprout from the overstuffed cushions.
Violet dug under the towels and sheets in search of the remote control and found a cookie instead. She had second thoughts about eating the cookie -- even if it was double fudge; she didn’t know which of the children had left it there. A second hunt recovered the remote control and eighty-seven cents.
Towels were folded into neat stacks beside pillow cases and fitted sheets – though how one ever folded a fitted sheet into a neat square, Violet had still to figure – while Jay Leno interviewed an aging Sixties rock star about her comeback and past lovers. This made Violet laugh – pity the poor fool who had to try so hard to be in the spotlight again.
Socks were rolled into egg-shapes and clothes were sorted and laid out on the back of the sofa to be claimed by their owners in the morning.
The rock star was waxing poetically about Fortinbras, a British invasion band that followed the Rolling Stones and Moody Blues to America.
“Geez, I thought they were all dead – or in vegetative states,” Violet murmured as she settled onto the sofa with that night’s writing and a bottle of beer. The drone of voices from the television became white noise as she worked and finally made her sleepy.
I’ll just close my eyes for a moment . . .
She woke just before dawn to a glaring, hissing, static, television.
The living room took on different perspectives in the blue-gray darkness -- it became a chamber imbued with gargoyles and dragons that sprang to life from tables, cupboards, bookshelves, and chairs.
Family ghosts sat in the chairs and watched, asked her how she was getting on, waited for answers, wondered why.
Why? Why, Violet?
“I don’t know; I wish I knew.”
This was her favorite time of day, the hour before dawn. The tenebrous light was strangely soothing; it was comforting to lie in a semi-conscious state while listening to the sounds of morning. Everything was clean and everything was new. It was God’s way of giving her another chance to get it right . . .
“There’s nothing for breakfast.”
Violet opened her eyes and found seven year-old Alex glaring at her. He pulled the stuffed rabbit she was using for a pillow out from under her so that Violet’s head thumped softly onto the sofa arm. She was awake now and sat up.
“What do you mean? I bought a box of cereal yesterday,” she yawned.
“No there isn’t!” Alex pointed behind him to Max, who was clutching the box of oat cereal and shoving handfuls into his mouth. The two year old was assessing the situation with large dark blue eyes and eating as fast as he can.
In one movement, Violet scooped up Max and handed off the cereal box to Alex. “Now there is.”
The day began in earnest with Max’s howls of protest and when Violet entered the kitchen and found the note on the refrigerator.
“Gone to save the Soda Company . . .” daughter Elisabet muttered into a bowl of Shredded Wheat.
***
The line at the French Hotel take out window was already down to the sidewalk and Violet quickened her pace. She was late and didn’t have time for coffee, but this morning she needed it – a bad day was in the offing, if one judged life by the notes left on the refrigerator. She shifted the Macy’s shopping bag full of manuscript pages and notebooks and hoped it wouldn’t break – that was another thing. He always took her briefcase.
“Want the usual?”
Violet smiled up at the barista waiting, tapping a finger on the Formica counter as Violet struggled with the bag and fished on the bottom of her purse for change.
“Want a loan?”
“No, I’ve got it. Yeah, hi . . . Tiffany! Uh . . . cappuccino, no cinnamon, whatever you make cappuccinos with, uh, large.”
“That’s tall.”
“Sorry. Just not into the coffee culture,” Violet groused, and then smiled at the barista as she handed over a fist full of coins, some of which spun and then reeled off the counter and on to the pavement.
“Wait a minute!” Violet called as she knelt down to catch the quarters traveling into the street. “I got it, I got it!”
“No. I do.”
A man’s voice, soft, sensual, British in lilt, made Violet look up and she found herself staring directly at a man with striking, classically handsome features.
He was over six feet tall and looked about forty-seven, forty-eight, though he might have been younger. His eyes were violet-blue.
The blond man under the street lamp.
He offered a knee-disintegrating smile. Violet managed a ‘thanks’ while she tried to balance her purse and the overstuffed Macy’s bag. Shifting the bag caused disaster – it split open, spilling the contents onto the sidewalk. As she reached down, the blond man did the same and their hands met briefly. Violet recoiled and her movements propelled a wire-bound sketchbook, box of number two pencils from his hands. She stammered an apology and reached for them.
He was fabulously backlit with sunlight burning through the fog; his hair -- tawny, gold-streaked and starting to thin -- was tousled and damp, yet casting gloriously light of its own, like a halo. No one had a right to look so damned gorgeous so early in the day.
Violet piled everything into a stack and would have tucked it in the crook her left arm if Tiffany hadn’t offered a shopping back with the cup of coffee shoved in her direction.
“So how’ve you been, Violet?” he asked exchanging notebooks.
“I’m sorry – do I know you? Geez, look at the time,” she stammered.
“I guess after so many years,” he was saying now. Violet was distracted by the Transbay bus rolling up to the stop halfway down the block. She offered a look of panic and a weak smile. “Another time, gotta run!”
His explanation was lost in the sudden blast of a police siren as she made for the bus. When she sank into one of the back seats, Violet glanced out the window and saw him wave. If she had looked back, she would have seen that was still at the corner near the French Hotel,
looking.
______________
Chapter 1
Once Upon a Time . . . the Computer Crashed
Richard of Gloucester stood behind a wall of household knights, waiting. Somewhere on the field, his brother the King had committed the reserves for a final stand. Off in the distance, in the fog, he could see shapes moving and the unmistakable silhouette of Edward astride a great warhorse, his banner of the Sunne in Splendour a beacon for the Yorkists, as he screamed orders.
To Richard’s right, the duke of Clarence’s men shifted and changed position. Why would it not surprise Richard if his brother of Clarence changed heart yet again? Of the Plantagenet brothers, one never knew where George stood. Today, Richard hoped it would be with Edward. George only claimed kinship when it suited his political ambitions, or as it recently happened, to save his own neck.
Every man waiting with Richard held their breath as the Black Bull banner of Clarence appeared through the fog and joined with the Sunne in Splendour. That was it! That was the signal!
“Now!” Richard shouted at his men. “For God, Edward and York!”
Slamming down the visor to his helmet Richard led the vanguard in a charge and would have clashed with the earl of Oxford’s men had the computer not suddenly frozen up and the Blue Screen of Death appeared with a message.
‘DISK ERROR 23 READING DRIVE A. ABORT? CANCEL RETRY?’
“Sonofabitch!”
Violet could see her reflection in the monitor screen gone dark -- glanced up at the Kit-Kat clock wagging tail and googly eyes from its position above the kitchen door. Twelve thirty-three. She drew in a ragged breath and puffed out a sigh, then tried a few DOS commands, offering a prayer to the God of Microprocessors. The hard drive vented an excruciating whine comparable to her ‘67 Mustang on cold mornings. She tried another command, then a few more.
Nothing.
Nothing at all.
“Noooo! No, no, no, no!”
Violet banged her head gently against the monitor screen. Four hours of work had crashed on the information highway, made an irreparable detour into Cyberspace.
Nothing like modern technology to shock one out of the sanctuary of imagination and back to the autumn of 1995 – well, that and remembering the garbage cans needed to be dragged out to the curb.
The September night was cold and clear, the air sweetly pungent. A platinum moon slid from behind a shroud of fog and came to fullness, as bright as a street lamp. Somewhere in the neighborhood a musician banged on a piano and a dog barked frantically.
Everything in Violet’s world was the same -- her comfortable, safe, predictable, world.
Except there was a man standing at the corner of Oxford and Cedar.
He didn’t belong in the neighborhood; that much Violet knew. The blanching light of the street lamp made his features distinct -- he was blond, attractive, wore expensive European clothing and carried a suitcase, looked hopelessly lost.
Quite by accident they made eye contact and he smiled, taking hesitant steps in her direction. She shoved the cans up against the driveway gate and then made a dash for the door, pausing only a moment to glance back.
He was walking up toward Rose Street, just passing the front gate. They made eye contact again, and again he stopped. Violet ducked behind the lace curtains, then peeked out one last time before she turned her attention to the laundry on the sofa.
Laundry seemed to grow there, like mushrooms on a forest floor. If you plucked up one dishtowel, another would replace it by next afternoon; another sock would sprout from the overstuffed cushions.
Violet dug under the towels and sheets in search of the remote control and found a cookie instead. She had second thoughts about eating the cookie -- even if it was double fudge; she didn’t know which of the children had left it there. A second hunt recovered the remote control and eighty-seven cents.
Towels were folded into neat stacks beside pillow cases and fitted sheets – though how one ever folded a fitted sheet into a neat square, Violet had still to figure – while Jay Leno interviewed an aging Sixties rock star about her comeback and past lovers. This made Violet laugh – pity the poor fool who had to try so hard to be in the spotlight again.
Socks were rolled into egg-shapes and clothes were sorted and laid out on the back of the sofa to be claimed by their owners in the morning.
The rock star was waxing poetically about Fortinbras, a British invasion band that followed the Rolling Stones and Moody Blues to America.
“Geez, I thought they were all dead – or in vegetative states,” Violet murmured as she settled onto the sofa with that night’s writing and a bottle of beer. The drone of voices from the television became white noise as she worked and finally made her sleepy.
I’ll just close my eyes for a moment . . .
She woke just before dawn to a glaring, hissing, static, television.
The living room took on different perspectives in the blue-gray darkness -- it became a chamber imbued with gargoyles and dragons that sprang to life from tables, cupboards, bookshelves, and chairs.
Family ghosts sat in the chairs and watched, asked her how she was getting on, waited for answers, wondered why.
Why? Why, Violet?
“I don’t know; I wish I knew.”
This was her favorite time of day, the hour before dawn. The tenebrous light was strangely soothing; it was comforting to lie in a semi-conscious state while listening to the sounds of morning. Everything was clean and everything was new. It was God’s way of giving her another chance to get it right . . .
“There’s nothing for breakfast.”
Violet opened her eyes and found seven year-old Alex glaring at her. He pulled the stuffed rabbit she was using for a pillow out from under her so that Violet’s head thumped softly onto the sofa arm. She was awake now and sat up.
“What do you mean? I bought a box of cereal yesterday,” she yawned.
“No there isn’t!” Alex pointed behind him to Max, who was clutching the box of oat cereal and shoving handfuls into his mouth. The two year old was assessing the situation with large dark blue eyes and eating as fast as he can.
In one movement, Violet scooped up Max and handed off the cereal box to Alex. “Now there is.”
The day began in earnest with Max’s howls of protest and when Violet entered the kitchen and found the note on the refrigerator.
“Gone to save the Soda Company . . .” daughter Elisabet muttered into a bowl of Shredded Wheat.
***
The line at the French Hotel take out window was already down to the sidewalk and Violet quickened her pace. She was late and didn’t have time for coffee, but this morning she needed it – a bad day was in the offing, if one judged life by the notes left on the refrigerator. She shifted the Macy’s shopping bag full of manuscript pages and notebooks and hoped it wouldn’t break – that was another thing. He always took her briefcase.
“Want the usual?”
Violet smiled up at the barista waiting, tapping a finger on the Formica counter as Violet struggled with the bag and fished on the bottom of her purse for change.
“Want a loan?”
“No, I’ve got it. Yeah, hi . . . Tiffany! Uh . . . cappuccino, no cinnamon, whatever you make cappuccinos with, uh, large.”
“That’s tall.”
“Sorry. Just not into the coffee culture,” Violet groused, and then smiled at the barista as she handed over a fist full of coins, some of which spun and then reeled off the counter and on to the pavement.
“Wait a minute!” Violet called as she knelt down to catch the quarters traveling into the street. “I got it, I got it!”
“No. I do.”
A man’s voice, soft, sensual, British in lilt, made Violet look up and she found herself staring directly at a man with striking, classically handsome features.
He was over six feet tall and looked about forty-seven, forty-eight, though he might have been younger. His eyes were violet-blue.
The blond man under the street lamp.
He offered a knee-disintegrating smile. Violet managed a ‘thanks’ while she tried to balance her purse and the overstuffed Macy’s bag. Shifting the bag caused disaster – it split open, spilling the contents onto the sidewalk. As she reached down, the blond man did the same and their hands met briefly. Violet recoiled and her movements propelled a wire-bound sketchbook, box of number two pencils from his hands. She stammered an apology and reached for them.
He was fabulously backlit with sunlight burning through the fog; his hair -- tawny, gold-streaked and starting to thin -- was tousled and damp, yet casting gloriously light of its own, like a halo. No one had a right to look so damned gorgeous so early in the day.
Violet piled everything into a stack and would have tucked it in the crook her left arm if Tiffany hadn’t offered a shopping back with the cup of coffee shoved in her direction.
“So how’ve you been, Violet?” he asked exchanging notebooks.
“I’m sorry – do I know you? Geez, look at the time,” she stammered.
“I guess after so many years,” he was saying now. Violet was distracted by the Transbay bus rolling up to the stop halfway down the block. She offered a look of panic and a weak smile. “Another time, gotta run!”
His explanation was lost in the sudden blast of a police siren as she made for the bus. When she sank into one of the back seats, Violet glanced out the window and saw him wave. If she had looked back, she would have seen that was still at the corner near the French Hotel,
looking.
