The Order of the White Boar

by Alex Marchant

  Roger was watching me closely.

  ‘Ah, your little trouble? I'm sorry for you. You will have missed a fine spectacle. I hear the men of York admire the Duke above all others, even more than the Earl of Northumberland. He says they treat him royally when he visits – and we all enjoy the gifts they send here. Rabbits from the town warren, loaves of fine wheaten bread, barrels of wine…’

  Was he mocking me – he the lad who belonged in this castle, me the lowly merchant’s son from the city? But his smile appeared genuine and he clapped me on the shoulder.

  ‘Come now, no more moping around. Let’s go to the kennels – I hear the Duke’s favourite hound has had her pups.’

  He set off across the court, weaving a way between horses, carts, hurrying servants. I trailed behind him. After a moment he stopped, waiting for me to catch up.

  ‘Come on. You do know where we’re going?’

  ‘I’ve never been there.’

  ‘Never? What about the mews?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘What on earth do you do with yourself all day? I don’t think I’ve seen you at the butts or out riding.’

  ‘I read, mostly. I —’

  ‘You read? You have books?’

  ‘My father is a merchant. He imports books with his other goods. He even has printed ones from Germany.’ Despite our recent differences, I was proud of my father. ‘He lets me choose one for myself from time to time.’

  ‘Really? Do you have any romances?’

  ‘One or two. Also poetry and histories.’

  ‘You must lend them to me – so long as they are not in French. But no reading today. In weather this fine we should be riding or at sport.’

  ‘But I have no horse.’

  ‘There are plenty in the stables for us to use. You know where that is? We’ll find the one for you.’

  I was not so sure. I had seen the other pages riding out from the castle on their beautiful mounts. My old pony, the one I had learned to ride on, would look no better than a mule alongside their shining flanks and dancing hooves – if my father had not taken her home with him. Would I be able to handle such a horse?

  To my relief Roger said, ‘But not today. We must be here when the Duchess arrives.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘To give her a proper welcome, of course. The whole household will turn out. But before that we have time to see the hounds. Hark, perhaps they sense something is happening. Or maybe it’s just their dinner time.’

  A great clamour of barking rang out from the building next to the stable as we approached. Outside, the great carthorses stood all in a row, their steaming coats being rubbed down by grooms and their noses buried deep in bags full of oats. We dodged past their stamping feet and into the open doorway beyond.

  Inside, in rows of wooden pens, scores of dogs were being fed. Several boys, barely older than me, were passing along the building, dropping meaty bones into each pen. A few hounds quarrelled for a moment, but all soon settled down to gnaw contentedly. A warm, musky smell hung everywhere, overlying even the sharp scent of the raw meat.

  Tossing a word of greeting to the kennel lads, Roger led me to the back of the building where several pens housed dogs on their own. In one at the very end lay a large lean white hound, a cluster of tiny puppies snuggled up to her side.

  Roger unbolted the gate to let us in and we crouched down on the straw beside the dog. She raised her head and licked the hand Roger held out.

  ‘Good girl,’ he said. ‘Six healthy pups. Well done, Florette.’

  The puppies were so small that their eyes were not yet open. Their mother nuzzled them, then rested her head back as though exhausted. Among the tumble of brown and white bodies one pup was a curious red colour. I stroked its soft fur with a finger and it mewled pitifully, nestling closer to its mother’s flank.

  Roger laughed.

  ‘That’s a strange one for a white hound to whelp. Small too. It looks like the runt of the litter.’

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with being small,’ I shot back, conscious that my new friend stood at least three fingers taller than me.

  ‘No, indeed,’ he said. ’Nor with being differently coloured to your fellows. And those who are small to begin with often grow greater than many others.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Yet again I regretted my words. ‘It’s just that…’

  ‘No matter.’ He straightened up. ‘Shall we go to the mews? It seems I have plenty still to show you.’

  He let us out of Florette’s pen and in a moment we were outside once more in the blazing afternoon sun. On the far side of the stables, snug against the mighty outer wall of the castle, crouched a long, low building, its windows all shuttered against the glare.

  A man with a huge leather glove on his hand was coming out. He stood aside and held open the door for us, bowing slightly to Roger as we passed.

  Once inside, my eyes adjusted to the gloom. Ranged on all sides were perches of varying heights above the ground. On each stood a falcon, its strong-clawed feet fastened to its wooden rest by a short leash. As we walked between the rows, every bird’s head turned to watch us pass, their dark eyes glittering like cut flint.

  Roger stopped by a perch on which sat a small mottled-brown bird that bobbed up and down as he approached. Tiny bells sewn on leather straps on its legs tinkled at the movement. Roger clicked his tongue as he reached out a finger to smooth the glossy feathers on its back.

  ‘Hush now, Lady.’

  With his other hand he slipped from a pouch at his belt a small morsel of something and offered it up to the bird. Bending her head, she took it delicately with her cruelly curving beak.

  ‘She’s beautiful,’ I said. It was the first time I had seen a falcon so close.

  ‘So she is.’ In the half-darkness I heard rather than saw Roger smile. ‘And I hope one day she’ll be mine. I helped to catch her in the spring from a nest up on Pen Hill. The Duke has promised her to me if I help train her well. Most days now I come to see her flown, and sometimes the falconer lets me take her out. No, don’t touch her!’

  For I had raised my own hand towards the bird and too late did I hear his warning. Her head darted forward, the beak stabbing. The pain was needle sharp before I could recoil.

  Roger drew me away towards a shuttered window and held up my hand to the chink of light that crept through. Blood was oozing from a deep cut in my forefinger. I put it to my mouth, trying to stem the salty flow.

  ‘She doesn’t know you. Never approach a strange hawk. If she had been a large bird like a gerfalcon or peregrine, rather than a merlin, she’d have had your finger clean off. I should have warned you. Perhaps you can help me with her and she will become used to you.’

  I took the none-too-clean kerchief he offered me and tied it round my finger. Sore it might be, but I was grateful it was still attached.

  Roger gave another tidbit to the bird, who began her bouncing routine again, before leading me back to the door. I was careful this time to steer well clear of the perches, especially those holding the larger falcons.

  Back outside Roger’s head went up, as though a questing hound sniffing the air for a scent. From beyond the castle walls came the sound of many hooves and people were hastening towards the inner gatehouse.

  ‘I think they must be coming,’ he said. ‘Come on, we’ll have to hurry. We mustn’t be late for Master Guylford.’

  Together we joined the flow of people across the outer courtyard. Some stopped to make way for us. I wasn’t used to this. On the streets of York few would allow me to pass first. I was just one among many merchants’ sons in the town. But here, groomsmen, servants, men-at-arms all stepped aside. I guessed it was Roger, with his costly, bright-coloured doublet and hose. They recognized him as a page of the household, and while I was his companion, perhaps I was entitled to the same respect.

  Master Guylford was arranging crowds either side of the gateway and waved to us.

  ‘Pages to the inner court. H
urry now!’

  Roger and I passed through the dark tunnel and emerged into another throng of people, domestic servants and higher officials, surrounded by squires and our fellow pages. Master Fleete was barking orders while Sir William, the chaplain, just flapped his hands at the excitable boys milling around him, laughing and calling to each other. As we arrived, somehow the masters together managed to form everyone into lines, with the youngest pages at the front. I just about made it into the second row, to my relief. I had no wish to be lumped in with the seven and eight year olds. Roger stayed with me, though by rights he should have been with the taller boys behind us.

  Master Fleete hustled the final stragglers into place. Among them was Hugh Soulsby. He strolled to the back of the ranks, chatting with a friend, one hand resting casually on the pommel of the knife at his belt, refusing to be hurried. Then the trumpet sounded, a peal this time rather than the more usual single or double blast.

  Shouts began in the outer court and rippled towards us. Those nearby wearing hats of any sort took them off. Roger craned to see round the taller servants between him and the gateway, as everyone around us broke into raucous cheering.

  ‘Is the Duchess coming?’ I had to yell to Roger though he was so close beside me.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ he shouted in reply. ‘And so I hope, at last, is my best friend.’

  ‘Your best friend?’

  ‘Yes. She went away with the Duchess. And now, I trust, will return with her.’

  ‘She?’

  ‘Yes, she.’ His smile flashed again. ‘Is that so very strange?’

  I remembered my sisters, closer to me in age than my brothers. I had missed all of them so much these past days.

  ‘Perhaps not.’

  ‘You’ll see when you meet her.’

  A small procession of carriages flanked by horses and riders trotted through the gateway, the grating of wheels and clatter of hooves drowned out by the cheers of the crowd.

  ‘There she is! Riding of course.’

  My eyes followed his pointing finger.

  Among the foremost riders, the rest of whom were men, was a girl of about my own age, straight-backed upon a high-stepping chestnut pony. She spotted Roger at that moment and flung up her hand to wave. I caught a glimpse of light reddish curls and sharp green eyes, before the horses passed by us, further into the courtyard.

  The cheering grew louder and my gaze was drawn to the first carriage, eye-catching in red and gold, as it slowed to a halt in front of us.

  Seated in it, under a fringed, embroidered canopy, were three young women and a boy whom I guessed was about six, maybe seven years old. Pale despite the sunny weather of recent weeks, he gazed out upon the joyous crowd as if barely seeing it.

  The woman next to him leaned down and spoke a word in his ear. For a heartbeat a smile brightened his face and he raised his hand to greet the throng. Then he was hidden as Master Guylford stepped forward, bowing and offering his hand to help the occupants alight from the carriage.

  I nudged Roger.

  ‘Who’s that?’

  ‘Her Grace, the Duchess, of course.’

  A slender dark-haired woman clad in dove-grey silk stepped lightly down from the carriage. She stood talking to Master Guylford as the noise of the crowd began to quieten. The boy joined her, having been helped down by Sir William, who turned back to assist the other ladies.

  ‘Not her. The boy.’

  ‘That’s her son, Edward.’

  ‘Edward? The Duke’s son?’ I racked my memory. ‘But I thought he was eight or nine years old?’

  ‘So he is. He also is perhaps a little small for his age.’

  I shot a glance at Roger, but his face was expressionless.

  ‘Why is he here? Shouldn’t he be away in some other household by now?’

  ‘You mean in service as a page, like you and me?’

  ‘Well, like you. Isn’t that normal for the sons of lords? If he is to be a knight like his father.’

  ‘Look at him, Matt. Do you think he has the making of a knight?’

  I glanced again at the boy standing silent beside his mother. The light I had seen so briefly had vanished.

  ‘He is often ill, Matt, and the Duke and Duchess trust only their own physicians to keep him well. My father says that’s why he isn’t sent away as a page. They prefer to keep him close.’

  ‘Oh, yes – Old Dick’s soft like that.’

  I twisted round.

  The harsh voice belonged to Hugh Soulsby. It seemed he had elbowed aside the pages behind us – they were glaring at him as he swaggered to a halt among them. At his side was Lionel de Bruyn, one of the other pages I’d often seen him with.

  Hugh’s face showed some of that spite of our meeting on the weapons ground, but this time it was not directed at me.

  Roger rounded on him.

  ‘He’s not soft – not in battle, anyway. My father says ­—’

  ‘My father says —’ mimicked Hugh in a high-pitched voice. ‘My father the King’s man says…’

  He swung away, sniggering, before Roger could respond, and with Lionel at his heels like a dog, began to push his way out through the crowd. The cheering had died away now, and the pages and squires stopped chatting to each other, silently parting to let him through.

  I watched him go. Beyond the crowd, Master Guylford offered the Duchess his arm and was walking with her towards the steps of the keep. The boy and ladies and gentlemen from the carriages followed. Sir William, facing the crowd, dismissed us with a few words and a clap of his hands.

  Roger’s eyes were scouring the far side of the courtyard, where the riders had gone to dismount. Some of the horses, still wearing their rich trappings, were being led away towards the outer court.

  As Roger started forwards, I grasped his arm.

  ‘Who’s “Old Dick”?’

  He turned to me, frowning, as though he wasn’t sure what I meant. Then his eyes cleared.

  ‘Oh, he means Duke Richard.’

  ‘The Duke?’

  ‘Sometimes among the pages we call His Grace by his given name rather than his title. We mean no disrespect. But that —’

  To my surprise he spat on the dusty ground.

  ‘Why doesn’t Hugh like him?’

  ‘Hugh dislikes more easily than he likes. It’s his way. Give him the smallest of reasons… You, for instance. What have you done to offend him?’

  ‘I don’t know. Except maybe be who I am.’

  ‘Exactly. And he doesn’t like that. You’re not of his sort. Very few are, thank the Lord.’

  ‘But the Duke? Surely he’s of his sort? The nobility, I mean. Why doesn’t he like him?’

  We had started walking across the inner court towards a small group of people outside the chamberlain’s office. But now Roger halted and looked me full in the face.

  ‘Do you not know Hugh’s story? And didn’t you hear what I said about him at dinner?’

  ‘Only that he is the nephew of a lord, and that he is destined for great things. And that his uncle fought for…’

  My words trailed off. I realized what I was saying.

  ‘Yes, his uncle – he was a Lancastrian and he fought for the traitor Warwick against King Edward. Duke Richard’s brother.’

  ‘But that was so long ago. Almost before I was born. And if his uncle’s now at court, the King must have forgiven him.’

  ‘As he did so many nobles. Including some who are now most loyal.’

  ‘So what’s the problem now? Hugh can’t possibly remember that.’

  ‘But he does just about remember his father. And I don’t think Hugh has forgotten – or forgiven – what happened to him.’

  ‘His father?’

  ‘He not only fought for the Earl of Warwick. He also plotted to kill the King a year or two later and was executed for treason.’

  ‘Executed? For treason?’

  Roger laughed at the surprise that must have been scrawled across my face.

/>   ‘Him – and so many others. It was all the rage back then. At least among the Lancastrians. Thank goodness King Edward has brought us so many years of peace since.’

  ‘But – but why? What happened?’

  Roger screwed his face into a serious expression, like one of my old masters when he was about to teach a lesson.

  ‘Well, in the beginning there were the families of the Dukes of York and Dukes of Lancaster. And the Lancastrian duke, Henry Bolingbroke, stole the throne from the king, Richard the Second, and became Henry the Fourth.’

  ‘Don’t be daft, Roger. I know that. We learnt it all at school. It must be a hundred years ago now, in my grandfather’s grandfather’s time.’

  ‘Then where do you want me to start?’

  My mind went back to my lessons and what I had learnt from my father – about all the plots and battles, over so many years, between the rival claimants for the throne from the houses of York and Lancaster. About how the Yorkists believed they had a better claim than the Lancastrian kings.

  I knew our good King Edward of the house of York had now ruled over us for eleven years of peace – the longest such spell for a generation or more. Ten years before that he had won the throne from the third Lancastrian king in a bloody battle just a few miles from my home city, the city of which his father had been Duke. But the crown had rested uneasily on his head while the previous king, Henry, the sixth of that name, was still alive.

  Everything flared up again when Edward’s cousin and once loyal supporter, the Earl of Warwick, known as the Kingmaker, had decided he could wield greater power through Henry, who many people thought was a weak king. So Warwick had rebelled against Edward to put Henry back on the throne. Then the problem had seemed to be finally solved when King Edward and his loyal younger brother Richard had crushed the Earl and his Lancastrian allies in two battles at places called Barnet and Tewkesbury, somewhere in the south of the country. Poor King Henry had died shortly afterwards in the famous castle known as the Tower in London.

  It all seemed ancient history to me. I had barely been born when those battles had raged. And I had never dreamed that I would find myself living in the home of one of the victors – the King’s brother Richard, Duke of Gloucester. Or sharing a chamber with the son of one of the defeated.