The Slitherine Knight

“It was many years ago,”
He whispered back to me
As he grimaced at his hand
And its fist full of jewelry.

“I am scion of the longest line
Of the noblest knights that you could find,
And a bishop I’d known from my youth
Asked if to help I’d be inclined.

We were to exorcise a demon
From the body of a child;
But the thing we thought was weaker
Proved obstinate and wild.

It held my friend’s life in its hand,
Its alone to steal;
And to free an evil from the land,
I chose to make a deal.

It lives safe inside me now:
A beast of avarice and greed.
Good fortune they don’t speak in words;
Though some things are harder not to heed.”

He looked again to his handful,
And I said he was absurd:
Why not simply kill it now?
“A knight never breaks his word.”