At the Edge of the World

by Avi

  Was ever a family more wondrously made?

  19

  WE PRESSED ON in a southerly direction, Bear choosing not to travel by any road. It took us longer, but I suspected he picked a leisurely pace, the more to mend. In truth he was in grim humor, not given to much jesting or even speaking. While he did not say, I suppose he also thought Troth would be better off with just us. For her part, she remained mostly mute, but always close. I was pleased that there were just the three of us.

  The first night after our visit to the small village, we stopped in a clump of small trees near the top of a hill. For food, we ate some bread and cheese we had purchased.

  “What will we find in that place called Rye?” I asked.

  “I’ve never been,” he said. “I know it only as a port.”

  “Is it safe there?”

  He shrugged. “As always, we must watch, listen, and beyond all else, pray.”

  “To whom?”

  “Whoever hears you best.”

  “Bear,” I asked, “why are there so many saints?”

  “I suppose,” said Bear, “this wretched world has so many woes, even God almighty needs help.”

  Indeed, that night he chose to drill us—both Troth and me—in using a pike (a tree branch) and a dagger (a stick) to defend ourselves.

  “Do you think we’re being followed?” Troth asked.

  “Alas,” he said, “we all have our enemies. A soldier I once knew used to say, ‘He who thinks his enemies are fools is the bigger fool.’”

  Avoiding villages for a few days, we continued south. To pass the time I tried to get Bear to talk about some of the places he had visited.

  Once I said, “Tell us what your soldiering days were like.”

  He shook his great head. “I’d rather not talk of those things.”

  “Why?” I demanded.

  “Some things are too awful to want a second seeing.”

  “You’re only telling.”

  “A good telling is a good seeing,” he returned. “And it was war.”

  “What is war?” asked Troth.

  “Dear Troth, may God grant it never touches you,” said a grim-faced Bear.

  “Then tell us,” I said, “about that place you never saw—the one which has no kings, armies or wars—that land of ice.”

  “Iceland?” he said, with a broad grin. “I don’t even know if it exists.”

  “Then,” I suggested, “you can make it even better.”

  “I suppose—from its name—it’s all ice.” That said, he spun some marvelous tales—stories of giants, of trolls and dragons, of great deeds by ice-draped warriors.

  Troth and I listened, enthralled.

  To earn our necessary bread we performed three times, always heading south. Though these villages were pitiful places, we gathered enough thin coins to eat.

  The second time we performed, Troth joined in on her own. Taking Bear’s hat, she shook it rhythmically, adding to our sound. What pleased her most, I think, was that few paid her any mind. All eyes were set on Bear, his dancing and juggling.

  By night, Bear told us more fabulous tales, of holy saints and their miracles, of beasts and the great acts of the ancients. It was as if we traveled more by night—not moving, just listening—than we did all day by foot.

  Those were nights of joy: the cloaking darkness our guardian, the spread of stars above, each star a promise of God’s infinite grace, a blessed eye upon our little family. Oh, how I adored that feeling of us, the embrace of star-blessed love! If we could have been that way forever—a family below that overarching heaven which flowed on so gracefully—I would have been much content.

  But as we pressed on I began to notice something: when we were in the villages to perform, Bear made a point of going off to speak alone to some of the menfolk. It was as he’d done before in Great Wexly—though at the time I did not know it—when he was gathering information for John Ball’s brotherhood. Now, when he did this, he seemed glum, and as we moved farther south, increasingly so.

  “Is it news about the new king you’re seeking?” I asked when he came back one such time.

  “There is no news of him,” was his curt reply.

  “Are you hearing word of the brotherhood, then?”

  He made a face. “Let’s pray we never see their like again.”

  “But something is troubling you,” I persisted.

  “We shall have to see,” was all the answer he allowed.

  Avoiding common roads, and, for a time, even villages, we approached the port of Rye from the north. Thus we followed footpaths of which there were increasing numbers, often wending our way through grazing flocks of bleating sheep.

  As it fell out, long before the town came into sight, I began to smell something I never had before. It was strong, and fairly reeked of I knew not what.

  “What is that?” I demanded of Bear, for it made my nose itch.

  “You’re smelling the sea,” he said.

  “What’s seal” asked Troth.

  Bear looked to me.

  “The sea, Troth,” I replied with much self-assurance, “is water—also called ocean—and it covers the earth more than land.” That said, both Troth and I looked to Bear: I to see if I’d spoken correctly; Troth, I suspect, in disbelief.

  “Crispin speaks true,” said a grinning Bear to both of us.

  Excited to see something so vast and strange as sea, I urged us on, and soon enough, as we came round a stand of trees, the town we had been seeking lay before us.

  And then I learned what was worrying Bear.

  20

  THE ANCIENT TOWN of Rye is situated on a high knob of land like a clenched fist. It is surrounded on three sides by low water channels, rivers, and a marshy mix of sand and sea. These waters flow directly into a bay, the bay opening to the sea, though coming from the north as we did, the sea was hidden by the rise of land.

  But Rye itself, being elevated, could be observed from a distance. There was a large cluster of houses and a tower that looked to be a castle. A church spire could also be seen. What we also saw was a large amount of hazy smoke.

  “The town. It’s on fire!” I said, proclaiming the obvious.

  “Then it’s true,” he said.

  “What’s true?” I demanded.

  “I was told French and Castilians attacked and laid waste to Rye. I didn’t wish to believe them.”

  “Why not?”

  He shook his great head. “You heard the priest: there’s supposed to be a truce in the war. An attack at this time seemed unlikely. But it’s true.”

  “Who told you about it?”

  “In the towns—some of the people shared the news.”

  “Why would Rye be attacked?” I asked.

  “When England claimed the French crown, we brought the war to them. They’ve now returned the compliment.”

  “Is that the meaning of the new king’s lost shoe? The omen that priest spoke of?”

  “Or,” said Bear, “the French wishing to test the young king.”

  “Bear … are they still here?”

  “I was told they struck hard and fast, and fled. It should be safe. Let’s hope so.”

  To reach the town we had to cross one of the rivers, which was so wide we had to pay a ferryman one of our well-worn pennies to pole us across.

  He was an old man, stooped and grizzled, whose skin was as dark and speckled as a brown egg, his boat a narrow hollowed-out log with a bottom as flat as any shoe. At first I feared we might tumble into the water, but the man showed his skill and kept us on even keel.

  “Tell us of the attack,” Bear said to this man as he carried us to the other shore.

  “It was a sweet, cloudless day when they came,” was the reply. “They came by sea, at dawn, swooping in, killing almost seventy. Four men were taken away for ransom. Looting was rampant. Many homes were burned. They burnt our church, stealing everything they could, even taking the bells.” He paused in his poling to lift a fist in an
ger. “May God strike them down, hard!” He marked his words with a shove upon his pole, punctuating them by spitting into the water.

  “And they claim Saint Dennis as their protector, he who is a defense against strife. May Jesus blast them all.”

  “Was there no resistance?” asked Bear.

  “We did resist. Fiercely. But were ill-prepared. Those who failed in their responsibility have paid the penalty.”

  “How so?” asked Bear.

  “Execution,” said the man. “God rot them.” He spat into the water.

  “That,” suggested Bear, “will surely make them better prepared next time.”

  The man went on: “Happily after two days, the abbot of St. Martins—his name is Hamo—led a force to drive them away.”

  “And all this took place—when?” asked Bear.

  “Seven days ago,” said the man. “And with news of the sacking, the traders have shied away. But perhaps some—not knowing of our plight—will yet arrive. Was there somewhere you wished to sail?”

  “Not us,” Bear said.

  “You’re strangers. Where do you come from?”

  “York,” said Bear, who had clearly been prepared for this question.

  “Did they attack elsewhere?”

  “We don’t know,” said Bear. “We have been traveling.”

  “Then travel on to France or Castile and slay them all for me,” said the man, who, with a final shove, beached the little boat upon a shingle of gravel and sand.

  On the shore, heaps of burnt and half-burnt wood lay about at random, no doubt dragged there to rot. They stank mightily. Whatever docking or lifting machines had existed, were destroyed. It was also there that I first saw a cog, the sort of boat Bear told me about, that carried most goods to other ports.

  Above us stood the town of Rye, situated on a hill behind the town’s portal called the Landgate. The gate itself had escaped destruction.

  Once we entered Rye’s grid of streets, we lost the rich tang of sea, to be enveloped by the stench of the town, the normal stink of offal, ordure, and slops. There was also the reek of destruction. Many a house had been burnt, with a fair number still smoking. Most houses were without roofs, mullioned windows destroyed, shutters aslant. Indeed, no wood structure was left unharmed. Charred wood was so common that the acrid smell of burn and smoke stuffed our noses. Everywhere was the chaos of destruction: the litter of countless broken things, clay, cloth, and wood. Stone structures fared somewhat better.

  In two places we saw the charred and stinking bodies of fly-encrusted dogs, and even, to my horror, a foul human not yet claimed.

  Hardly a wonder, then, that the survivors paid scant attention to us. The people of Rye moved slowly, faces taut with bewilderment and suffering. Some must have been in great pain, for they were bandaged, or limped, showing hurt in many ways. For others, the grief must have been contained within. When children looked at us, they did so furtively, clinging to their elders’legs.

  “Why did the French do this?” asked Troth.

  “We did the same to them,” returned Bear quietly. He seemed much disturbed.

  The town being on a hill, we trudged upward along its narrow, winding streets, toward the top. No rumble and uproar of people as in Great Wexly. No flashes of joy as we had seen in even smaller towns. No chatter or light laughter such as one normally hears. Here, only destruction to see and terror to sense, broken now and again by the thud of what must have been hammers attempting to set things aright—or perhaps in making coffins.

  At the town’s crown we came to Rye’s church—or what had become of the church. Doors had been wrenched away. Windows were broken. Shards of colored glass lay about on the ground—as if a rainbow had fallen from the sky and shattered.

  When we looked within, all was smashed, much of it buried beneath the mangled remains of a collapsed and still-smoldering roof.

  “Was it the infidels who did this?” I asked, shocked by the desecration of such a holy place.

  “There are no infidels in France,” said a grim Bear, as he turned away. “Just Christians. Like me.”

  We went forward and there I had my first look upon the great sea.

  What I saw astounded me: a vast plain of flat and endlessly empty gray, which was overwhelming. The word forever was thus made real, the boundaries of my world turned infinite.

  Thus it was that in one brief time I saw the hand of God’s creation as thrice awesome—and the hand of man’s destruction, frightening three times more.

  21

  THAT NIGHT, Bear found us a place in an inn. At least what remained of one. Like the rest of Rye it was much despoiled, though the innkeeper—a woman named Benedicta—and her son Luke were laboring hard to rebuild. The inn bore the name of Michael the Archangel—the one who can protect mariners against storms. A charred sign displayed his symbol: a dragon with a sword.

  Half the inn’s roof was gone. Stone walls, by God’s mercy, were mostly intact though dressed in soot. Doors were broken. Most of the wine and ale pillaged. The same for victuals.

  Worst of all, Benedicta, a widow woman, had one of her two sons slain by the marauding troops. A tall, stately woman, with long black hair in a single braid and black garments, she was severe-looking in her sorrow. There being little custom since the attack, she was willing to have us and our paltry pennies. Despite her great grief, she welcomed us as ones who had no such loss as she, so she could open her sorrow to Bear, who always served as a broad funnel for people’s grief. With so many of her neighbors consumed by loss, the poor woman could find no pity, and she was in sore need of some.

  She set a broken table for us, and somehow secured trenchers and some small meat with not enough rot to keep us off. Then she and her surviving son—twice my age and a likeness of his mother—joined us, and talked of their heartache to Bear. In so doing, they struck a friendship. Bear told her that Troth and I were his children and he a widower.

  While they talked, Troth and I stayed in a quiet corner and listened. After much discussion of the attack, they spoke of the late King Edward, of Richard the new boy king, the Duke of Lancaster, and the war with France, which had gone so poorly for England of late.

  Much land—and many men—had been lost in the Aquitaine, which is where Benedicta’s husband had died two years previous. A truce had been made between England and France, but she said English soldiers had been abandoned in France and they fought on as brigands.

  The woman asked Bear to tell his story. Perhaps to gain her empathy, he revealed that he, too, had been a soldier and spoke of fighting in France with the Black Prince. “It was hard and terrible,” he told her.

  She asked Bear if he knew her husband, and named the knight with whom he fought.

  Bear shook his head. “There were too many.”

  “Now you must tell me why are you here,” said Benedicta. “Or do you mean to enlist again?”

  “Not I!” cried Bear with alacrity. “We’re only wandering minstrels, hoping to stay awhile.”

  “I fear you won’t earn much with your music and dancing here,” she said. “People will cling to what they have.”

  Seeing Bear downcast, the woman said, “What say you labor for me in return for food and lodging? I need the help.”

  “I’ve not my usual strength,” said Bear.

  “I’m sure it’s enough.”

  A bargain was quickly made.

  Thus commenced a pleasing, even restful time as we stayed on at the broken inn. With a loan from Benedicta, Bear was able to purchase new clothing—breeches, shift, hose—and, at last, some boots. Troth was also garbed, though she refused wimple on her head and shoes. It was appealing to see her mix of solemn pleasure and discomfort in new clothing, a bird with new plumage, though her plumage was but a simple wool kirtle.

  For work, Bear was called upon for lifting, hauling, and repairing. While he was not as strong as he had been, he was strong enough. I prayed he’d regain it all.

  Indeed, concerned for hi
s state, I kept a self-appointed task of being his—and Troth’s—protector. At times I thought we should go elsewhere, to one of the lands Bear had spoken of, so as to be free of all thoughts of pursuit.

  Of this, however, I said nothing, knowing my restlessness was stirred not just by fear, but also by seeing the ships and sea, feeling their allure. For I, who had lived so confined, so closed, saw the sea as boundary-free, a notion I found exciting.

  Meanwhile, Troth and I were asked to do smaller tasks—to clean or fetch. She was too shy to talk to others. Only with me would she chatter. Thus she and I, finding more time to be alone, learned more about one another’s lives.

  She was much taken by the story of my mother’s secret life, how I had fled my town, my meeting with Bear, and what happened in Great Wexly. For my part, I was held by her tales of life with Aude in the forest.

  In truth, just as I had come to think of myself as inseparable from Bear, I now felt much the same for Troth.

  Once she suddenly said to me: “Crispin, when you first saw me did you think me very strange?”

  I gazed at her, and realized that I considered her differently from how I had at first. Then I surely saw the disfigurement. Now I saw—Troth. Still, I wondered how she wanted me to answer, but quickly decided she would trust me only if I told her true.

  “Did I think you strange?” I echoed. “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “You were different. The way you lived.”

  “My mouth?”

  “That too.”

  “And now?” she asked, gazing at me with eyes that welled with tears.

  I reached out and placed my hand on her cheek. “Next to Bear …” I stammered, “I have no better friend.”

  She smeared the tears from her face then took from her kirtle the sprig of hawthorn she had carried from the forest.

  “Why did you take that?” I asked.

  “Aude would bless me beneath that tree. She told me a twig of it would bind me to the ones I love.”

  “Then the magic works,” I said.

  She threw herself at me, hugged me and wept while I stroked her tangled hair.

  Once she suddenly said to me, “Bear has a secret sorrow.”