Nottingham

by Nathan Makaryk

  * * *

  ONCE UPON A TIME, Arable was a young girl in Derbyshire and there was little in her life to call wretched. The Burels and the Wendenals were close families with neighboring estates, and Arable met William by accidentally throwing a rock at his head as he bathed in the river. They met frequently as children, but never spent any real time together until that golden age when all they could think of was to disappear and explore each other’s bodies. And so they invented reasons to visit, slinking off to dark rooms or the river on a summer night, enraptured. He invented names for every single mother’s mark on her arms. She’d bite at his shoulder as they lay beside each other, and he always pretended it didn’t hurt. They made promises, they spoke of love, they wondered at the stars and gave them ridiculous stories that she somehow still remembered. They thought their relationship was unique and precious, like a million people before them. Looking back she could recognize how silly it was. Still, their ending had been a bit more dramatic than most.

  War, as she would discover, had a particular grudge against the happy. Then, fifteen years ago, it was King Henry the Young against King Henry the Old. At the time, she knew nothing of either of them. Both the Burels and the Wendenals owed fealty to the Earl of Derbyshire, William de Ferrers, who called upon his lords to raise an army and march to Nottingham. He had chosen for the young Henry.

  Arable’s father, Lord Raymond de Burel, obeyed the call.

  William’s father, Lord Beneger de Wendenal, did not.

  It was a simple difference in opinion, but nobody could properly explain to Arable why their families were suddenly made enemies. She begged William to convince his father to change his mind, that he was being selfish, but he would not budge.

  The Earl couldn’t stand to be disobeyed, so demanded punishment for those that did not rally to his call. His order was for Lord Raymond to take prisoner the sons of any lord that did not ride to war. This included William and his older brothers, George and Hugo.

  Arable could still remember her father’s sleepless fits in the nights before he carried out the sentence. She curled by the door to his chambers at night while he was restless, whispering under the doorway for him to have strength. She never knew if he heard her. Her father swore he would take care of Lord Beneger’s sons, and treat them as though they were his own children. That they would not be harmed.

  As far as Arable was concerned, it was hardly a punishment at all. An onlooker in her estate would have thought the Wendenal brothers were guests rather than captives. They lived in private rooms that were not prison cells, and were given free roam of the manor so long as they were escorted. And it delightfully brought William even closer to her. For a week or so they invented delicious tricks to slip away from William’s escort and hide in her room, or the stable loft. When they couldn’t meet, she’d throw messages into his window from outside and wait for an hour, falling in love with the sound of his inkwell, until he tossed one out again. They made more plans, only half of which were fantasy. They dreamed of reuniting their houses once the war was over with their marriage. They decided to hold the ceremony on a bridge they’d build over the river, where she’d first thrown the rock that hit his head.

  But George and Hugo were not as docile captives as William.

  They were insulted by the constant escorts, and they festered an anger that Lord Raymond had obeyed the call to war. Neither Arable nor William saw it, but everyone’s account was that it happened so quickly. While she was innocently giggling in William’s arms in the stable loft, William’s clueless escort went searching for them and stumbled upon George and Hugo instead, attempting an escape.

  Apparently there was shouting, and pleading, and apologies. And most of all, confusion. Nobody could tell who made the first move. But by the end of it, George and Hugo were dead.

  Arable had never seen William cry before, and she would never see him happy again.

  The news from the war trickled in. The Earl’s siege of Nottingham ended in failure, as did King Henry the Young’s war against his father. Lord Ferrers remained the Earl of Derby but was ripped of his lands and other titles.

  The boy who brought news of her father’s death had a crooked nose and a dirty woolen cap.

  Every night for a week she fell asleep crying, curled up at the crack of her father’s door, whispering for him to change his mind, to come back.

  A panel of justiciars awarded the Burel estate to Lord Beneger de Wendenal as recompense for the loss of his sons. Roger de Lacy was on that panel, though he dissented. Lord Beneger had Arable’s family manor destroyed, every brick of it. Then every brick down to every pebble, then every pebble to dust.

  Unsatisfied, he gave her family one day of warning that they would be hunted and tried for the deaths of his children. Her family disappeared overnight. Her mother and brothers begged her to leave with them, while she begged them to stay. Back then, she believed in the impossible. She was still so certain, so very very certain, that everything would be better once she and William married. It had become the only truth she knew, she couldn’t understand how her family couldn’t see it as clearly as she.

  They would not tell her where they were headed, for fear she had turned traitor to side with the Wendenals.

  Arable spent that night with William, in the loft of the stable they had spent so many nights in before. He swore he would speak with his father, and make him understand that she was innocent. She had once been close to Lord Beneger, and he would understand. William promised Arable he’d return the next night with an answer.

  He didn’t.

  On the second night, he still didn’t.

  When Lord Beneger’s men came for her, she ran.

  * * *

  IT WAS YEARS BEFORE she even heard news of William again. She never reached out to him, for fear of being discovered. But now when they spoke it was like nothing had happened.

  The stable loft. I’ll be there. I promise.

  She wiped her eyes and tried to remember what it was like to believe in the impossible.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  WILLIAM DE WENDENAL

  NOTTINGHAM CASTLE

  FOR A WHILE HE thought she wouldn’t come. What began as a grand romantic gesture quickly became an hour of William curled in a ball, freezing in the stables loft, regretting not bringing a heavier cloak or some blankets. Of course he could have left to find something warmer, at the risk of missing Arable or bumping into her in a corridor and spoiling the entire thing. So instead he sat, second-guessing every inch of it, as well as his reasons for being in Nottingham at all.

  He had hoped to make short work of the business with the outlaws. It should have been no more difficult than organizing the peace talks already suggested by the Lady Marion Fitzwalter, and then he and Robin could finish their business by working to secure the existing supply routes. But Roger de Lacy had stopped him cold as soon as he made the first suggestion.

  “Peace talks? What are you talking about?”

  “Peace talks,” William had explained, thinking he had slurred his words. “They were willing to come to an agreement. If your captain had a better temper, they would have come to the castle and already—”

  “Who authorized this? Gisbourne wanted peace talks?”

  “You … you authorized this.”

  “I did no such thing.” De Lacy massaged his temples with his forefingers, then pushed the skin back in a crazed stare. “I asked you for a peaceful resolution, and you mistook that for a peace treaty?”

  William had simply stared and started over, as if explaining it to a child. “A peace treaty would be a peaceful resolution.”

  “Ever a soldier, aren’t you? Peace is defined by more than an absence of violence. A peace is also something private, something personal. You had an opportunity to make amends quietly, but you squandered it.”

  “What is the difference whether it’s here or—”

  “I thought you were your father’s son,” the Sheriff reeked of disappointm
ent, “but you don’t understand at all, do you? I wanted you to make this problem go away, not invite it to the dinner table.”

  Their conversation went no farther than that. The only concession William had won was a temporary advisory seat by de Lacy’s side, although the Sheriff clearly thought this was more likely to change William’s mind than his own. William even tried to leverage the authority of King Richard’s letters, which earned him nothing more than a grave laugh.

  “Ah, precisely what Nottingham needs. Instruction from someone who doesn’t live here.”

  William planned to return to the topic in a few days, after it had cooled. In the meanwhile he could massage a relationship with de Lacy, but that only took a few hours of each day. A few more were spent familiarizing himself with the castle, the city, and the major issues of each. The remainder of his time—to his own surprise—was consumed by thinking about Arable, searching for her, then pretending he wasn’t. He wondered how heavy a role her presence played in his decision to stay. The invitation he’d written for her to join him in the stables had started off as a fantastical seed too silly to even think on, until he found himself throwing caution to the wind and making the preparations.

  How much worse for Robin, he thought, stuck in the woods with the refugees. William had a warm bed and civilization, while he had—

  —the ladder creaked beside him, and suddenly Arable’s dark curls filled the space right next to his head.

  “William,” she said, pausing her ascent.

  “Hi,” he returned.

  He tried not to glance at the scars on her cheeks. The only light came from the waning moon and the open space above, which made the world safe and soft. Unbelievably cold, but safe and soft.

  “You know we have three stables in the castle.” She cocked an eyebrow.

  “I did not know that.” Well that was a miscalculation. “Huh.”

  “Yeah.” Her lips were tight, her face cold. “You’re lucky I found you.”

  “I am.” He gave the words every bit of importance they deserved, pleased with how easily she had set him up for it. He let it linger, and for just a moment her façade cracked into a smile. She scrunched her face, those adorable wrinkles on her nose, but instantly hissed in pain and pressed one wounded cheek to her shoulder.

  He instinctively reached out to her. “Oh God, I’m sorry!”

  “It’s not your fault.”

  “Don’t smile,” he said, unsure how to make it any better. “Don’t react, to anything I say. Just stare at me, blankly, I won’t be offended.”

  She tried to do this, but her wide-eyed attempt at a stare made him laugh, which forced her to look away. “Stop it!” she said, suppressing another smile.

  He watched her, taking in her face, so easily transported back over the years. It was embarrassing how young he felt, how unsure of himself, how childish for him to invite her here in the first place. She might have taken it the wrong way, or been offended. He had not seen much of her in his few days back at the castle, and certainly not enough to know what burdens she still carried from their lifetime ago. But his gut told him this was right. It was as if they could pick up from precisely where they left off, erasing the empty years that separated them.

  The last time they had been in a stable loft together, lying on their backs and asking questions to the stars, was the last time he would see her for fifteen years. He had promised he’d return to her, once he convinced his father to take pity. But William’s father was cold to the world. Lord Beneger swore and cursed that if William brought Arable home, she would wear shackles. He was blinded with grief, unable to bear the sight of a Burel—even the sound of the name drove him to hysteria. He threatened to have his men follow William, with orders to apprehend her if the two should meet at all. And so William did not return to the stables that night, nor send word. He had broken his promise. To protect her.

  Now he had the opportunity to make amends.

  “That room I was sent to clean … that’s yours, then?” she asked.

  “I’ll be staying for a bit. Maybe as long as a month,” he explained. “I asked the Sheriff for whatever accommodations he could afford me in that time, so that’s … my room.”

  She nodded. “It’s a nice room.”

  “It’s a nice room. I also asked if he could spare me an attendant, since I don’t know my way around the castle, and am otherwise unattended.” His words felt sloppy—he had all the grace of adolescence again.

  “That’s good,” she said, emotionless. “Do you know who it’ll be?”

  He blinked, not realizing it was possible she could misinterpret what he had done.

  “Oh,” her eyes widened when she figured it out. “Oh.”

  “Only for a few hours a day. I couldn’t really justify any more than that.”

  “Ah.” She seemed confused, or perhaps she was just avoiding making any face large enough to hurt herself. “So I’m to … serve you?”

  “No!” He had messed it up, exactly like he feared. “Sorry, I didn’t explain that well. I don’t need an attendant at all. The hours you’re assigned to me, they’re yours. To do whatever you want. Rest, or read, or go out to the city, whatever you like. I thought … I thought you could use a break. There’s a servant’s quarters attached to the state room, it’s yours, for as long as I’m here, at least. When you’re not tending to your other duties, of course.”

  He didn’t need anything brighter than the moon to see the effect it had on her. It was as if she’d never been given a gift before.

  “Arable, I don’t know what your life has been, I don’t know how you ended up here, and I don’t know what else I can do to help you. But while I’m here … well, I’m here to help. I’m also going to chop Jon Bassett’s hand off and feed it to him, but I can only do that twice and you deserve more than two gifts.”

  She bit her lip, at last her tension melted. “Thank you, William.” And then, after several emotions fought across her face for victory, “I’ve missed you.”

  He kissed her.

  It was as thrilling as their first kiss, new and heart-stopping, and yet simultaneously comfortable, familiar. But it cut too short when she winced, pulled back, and brought a hand to her wounds.

  “I’m sorry!” he said again, covering her hands with his, hoping to protect her face from any more pain.

  “It’s alright,” she whispered, a perfect private smile that made everything alright. “Do it again. Gentle.”

  They both smiled through it, longer this time, and every problem in the world faded away. There was just her and this moment. He tried to remind himself to memorize it, to hold onto the details. She touched her nose to his, then her eyes flicked down. “You understand I’m still standing on a ladder.”

  “I do understand that. Do you want to climb up here?”

  “I do not,” she said smugly. “It’s cold up there, and you are an insane person. We could have done this in that very nice room you were just telling me about.”

  “Well I thought that would be presumptive, asking you to my room.”

  “It would have been warm, which is better than presumptive. This is all very cute, but it was summer when we used to do this at home, and also we’re adults now.”

  William ran flush with joy. She was still very much the girl he had fallen in love with, but also so much more. There were new layers to her, hidden within the ones he knew, and it was captivating. They would only have a few weeks together at most, but at the moment it didn’t matter, because time had stopped for as long as they needed.

  * * *

  THE NEXT MORNING, THE world and its troubles rudely insisted upon existing again.

  William was summoned to the Long Room, where a skinny banquet table only barely fit between the surrounding walls. The odd dimensions begged disbelief, as if the space were intended to be a hallway instead of a dining room, if not an architect’s joke. There was scarcely enough room behind each of the tall-back chairs to slip a body behind, but
Roger de Lacy enjoyed the awkward space and its tall ceiling, which let light pour in from gutted windows above.

  De Lacy was there already, mid-conversation with his castellan, Hamon Glover. Glover looked like a wine barrel that had decided to stand up one day and exercise a bit. After William’s night reuniting with Arable, it took a serious bit of work to remind himself why he was supposed to care about other things.

  “Bring them,” the Sheriff ordered, and the castellan wobbled from the room.

  “Company?” William asked. Robin had done it, he dared to hope. He’d convinced John Little to—

  “Have a morning bite with us.” De Lacy gestured loosely to an assortment of fruits and bread at the table. “I have guests that may interest you. The Earl of Warwick, an old friend of mine, arrived yesterday with what he claims is urgent news. He’s a sharp fellow, but he’s the sort that is like to believe the moon is conspiring to kill the sun each day.”

  “Oh dear.” William made a face. “The sun is always getting itself into trouble.”

  The sheriff answered with a stern glare, and William chastised himself for making a joke. Within a minute they were joined by the Earl of Warwick, a fidgety gentleman with greying hair that seemed mostly concentrated within his ears. Anything unexpected is an opportunity, William recited, scrutinizing the visitor.

  “Walerian,” de Lacy said warmly. He exchanged a meaningful embrace with the earl and cleared his throat. “William de Wendenal, I’d like you to meet an old friend of mine, Walerian de Newburg.”

  The earl smiled. “Nobody calls me that anymore but you.”

  “Or Waleran, Earl of Warwick, if you insist,” de Lacy rolled along, “I’m not going to ask you why you’re here, because it will undoubtedly spoil my happiness in seeing you. Please take a seat, we are just about to eat.”