“Oh, go away,” shouted the king, dropping the whip to the ground and flopping down himself on the side of the metal-based rack. “There’s no fun being king anymore. I shall go and play with Laximan.” He stood with a sour look at the woman who was scurrying away as fast as she could. “I’ll have to find myself another idiot. There’s always Kallivan. Or Logon. Or maybe some long lost cousin I’ve never met. They’re all bound to be revolting.”
First, he kicked the door, which opened, then he kicked the rack, which remained unmoved, and then he kicked the whip which he had dropped himself. “Clean up,” the king roared to the two guards, who had been unsure as to whether they should follow the woman or not. They still hovered. There was nothing to clean.
The king stomped back upstairs and into his dining hall, where he was sure to find his wife waiting for him.
For dinner each midday, the huge silver chandeliers were brought down with their own music of tinkling disturbance as sweet and loud as church bells, carefully lit with a multitude of tiny flickering candles, and drawn up again on their chains. Then the platters would be carried in. If any guests were present, each would be seated and served in strict but jealous precedence, but this day there were none. Only his wife sat opposite. Frink made a satisfied entrance as festooned in ermine as his swelling frame would support, all praise was given to the gods for the food about to be served, and the first courses were carried steaming into the hall.
“Oh damnation,” Frink shouted. “Come up here next to me. I can’t shout at you with every word heard in the bloody kitchen. You only need sit down there when we have a hundred guests.”
With her napkin already folded over her shoulder, Denda obediently moved her place up to her husband’s right hand. “Have you secrets to divulge, my dear?” she asked him with a careful smile.
“Who’s the fucking father?” asked the king.
The perfumes from the kitchen rose through the floorboards and travelled up the stairs like running steps. “I can smell roast goose,” Symon told his pillow. “I doesn’t reckon I can believe it.” But whizzing back onto his feet, he left the bedchamber he adored, thumped as fast as possible down the grand staircase, and tried to find the dining room by following his nose. He eventually found a smaller annexe where Jak was already speaking to an elderly woman, half hidden in a white fleece shawl, white hair frizzing beneath a square white drape of linen.
Stomping in, Symon stopped abruptly and crept out as quietly as he knew how, which happened to be quite noisy since both feet and both boots made silence impossible.
Looking around, Jak nodded. “Symon, stay,” he said. “Listen to what answers your kind disclosure.” Never having the habit of comb or wash bowl, Symon stood, waited, and stared, looking a little like a gardener.
Now Agasha seemed surprisingly ready to remember what she had previously claimed to have forgotten, and what Jak now discovered was of considerable interest to him. He promptly asked her something else quite different and was further surprised at what he heard.
He frowned. “Aggie, are you sure?”
“Not in the least, Jak,” she told him. “To be sure would be to be in possession of papers, confessions, or items of proof. But one can know something without being sure.”
Now Symon stood hesitant. But Jak continued. The drifting colours at the back of his mind were Freya’s colours and they sang to him. He knew she needed him, yet the colours did not tell him where she was. Lydiard cringed beneath the gales even in the height of summer, and the fire was now smaller, but aromatic with dried logs, and the crackle of the coke beneath. Jak stood before the fire, his back to the flames, and his hands clasped behind his back as usual.
“I intend starting again from the beginning, since I am not satisfied with your answers so far, Agasha, and this time with my friend present, who knows a good deal of the true story, I will ask the questions I most definitely need answered. Now,” and he paused, looking to Symon and then back to the small woman in white. “As I now remember, I was friendly with a local girl when I was young. She was Freya, known as the witch’s daughter. But both the witch and her daughter saved my life when the Pestilence came to Lydiard. Then both disappeared. I discovered later that Hyr was murdered. Stoned to death by the people who blamed her for the plague.”
“My lord,” Agasha said softly, “Indeed. I know. Hyr was my friend. But the girl I did not know. Although I was your nurse when you were young, as was Hyr, I no longer worked for your family when you left Lydiard as a child. But I remained in the town and kept the friendship with Hyr.”
“But didn’t save her from the cruelty and nonsense?”
“My lord,” she answered, lowering her head, “I didn’t know, until it was done. Then I was told. I found her body and made a pyre. Her little girl also. She was a good child. But I’ve never seen her since.”
“It’s not now I need to know about,” Jak interrupted her. “It’s her birth. You were still in my father’s employ, and so was Hyr when Freya was born. Hyr claimed the child was fathered by my own father. I do not believe this. Agasha, tell me the truth. Of all those still living, you will know it.”
Symon said nothing but attempted to look as though he knew every secret of the north. And Agasha nodded. “My lord, I swore never to tell you, nor to tell anyone. I swore it to Hyr, whom I loved.” She hung her head. “But the child was not your father’s. My dear Hyr knew if the lord would accept the child as his, it would receive better care. And since your father was infatuated with Hyr, she did not want him accusing her of accepting other men. When jealous, your father was – well, a difficult man, my lord.”
“I know it. I now know a good deal regarding Hyr and Freya, but I need both substantiation and greater detail. I believe you know what I need to hear. Go on.”
The fire spat, and the sparks scorched Jak’s hands, but he did not move. Finally his childhood nurse sighed, and began to say what she had sworn never to tell. “Hyr had other friends, my lord, whom you would never have known. They were good people. One was from Shamm, but he was no villain. A good man, he was, and I believe his parents, although they’d lived in Shamm when he was born, came from Eden. But it was the lady I knew well, for she came first. Chia. A beautiful woman and as kind as the sunshine. She came from the south, and had some royal connections, but sadly I don’t remember those stories now. They married here in the forest, and I stood witness. So did Hyr. They lived with her for some time, until dearest Chia had a baby. Yet before it was even born, with the loving husband waiting, excited, for his child to come into his arms, he was arrested. “
“A villain from Shamm?” Jak asked under his breath.
“That’s what they said. But I don’t believe he was, and Chia never believed it either. I think,” she looked briefly away once more, “it was your father who spoke against him to the king. He was jealous. Although it was Chia the man loved, and they were husband and wife, your father hated them living with the woman he loved himself. He wanted no man in the same house. A small house, I admit.”
“That pissing Island Prison,” mumbled Symon, “beggin’ yer pardon fer the language.”
“Yes indeed,” Agasha nodded. “The poor man was arrested and dragged away. Once Chia had her little girl, she wanted, above all else, to follow her beloved husband. I was there, when she sobbed her heart out, and gave that little newborn darling to Hyr. “You lost your baby once,’ she said, all those tears running in little rivers down her cheeks. “So take mine. And never tell a soul, or the wretched people will say she’s the daughter of a vile criminal, and she’ll never be accepted. Nor is she a bastard, but no one would accept that either. Please keep this a secret until I can free my husband and come to get my child.”
“Gods and demons,” said Symon. “But the lass don’t know neither, do she?”
“I do not believe Hyr ever told her,” Agasha admitted. “And I had sworn never to tell a soul. It’s wicked of me, my lord, to tell you now, but dearest Hyr is dead, and Freya
’s real parents have now been here twice to try to find their lost daughter.”
Speechless and barely muttering, Jak walked to the chair which had been pulled up close to the fire. He sat there and gazed for long minutes into the flames. Finally he spoke to the diminishing ashes. “I have never followed the royal connections, nor do I know this Lady Chia, but if she is truly Freya’s mother, and is looking for her as I am, then I will willingly meet them. You say you have met them? Where?”
Now standing at some distance, Agasha spoke as clearly as she dared. “My lord, here. They came a year past, but without any answers to their questions, they left soon afterwards. They then returned. But I cannot tell where they have gone now. Perhaps back to the city.”
“They live in Eden City?” Jak stood, straightening his back as though still and hunched, “Then I shall return there myself. I may travel quicker by train, since I need none of my men.” He turned to Symon. “We’ve a deal to talk about, my friend. And first, I believe I should escort you to the dining hall.” Finally he turned back to Agasha. “It would have been helpful had you told me this many years ago, but I appreciate you holding faith to your promise. If there is anything else, I hope you will inform me. But for now, thank you, Agasha. The stars are back in the sky.”
Symon stood, hands clasped behind his back. Once the nurse had closed the door behind her, he turned to Jak. “Reckon ‘tis getting mighty interesting, m’lord.”
But Jak was gazing at the window. “I have searched the city and I have searched the north. Now I have searched the south – my first passage across the dunes. I had wondered – many times – whether such an interminable exploration was wise – even ludicrous. Now I know. And will continue, although pushed between other responsibilities. My life should include her, even though it also includes so many other matters.”
Symon looked up. “You was speaking o’ justice afore, and I were proper keen on that, m’lord. I ain’t followed justice fer none o’ me life. But ‘tis a matter wot now I wants to see. T’will change the world, I reckons.”
“But Freya also deserves justice,” Jak murmured. “And I must find her first.”
She curled in the gutters to sleep, but for one night a woman invited her to sleep in the warmth of her kitchen hearth, where the fire was now only dead ashes. Doria was grateful, but she stole bread and cheese in the morning since she had eaten not a scrap for almost two days. The woman did not invite her to stay again.
Never having seen the city before, and never having seen anything beyond two ragtaggle villages and one unkempt and unmanaged far before moving to the mill, Doria had imagined the great Eden City as a place of golden shop-fronts, huge buildings with velvet streaming from the shining glass windows, streets of silver cobbles and the river as an azure blessing, reflecting permanent sunshine.
Discovering that the city was as much a dirty mess as the mill had been was not only a considerable disappointment, but it angered her. This was where the rich lived. They should have washed and perfumed every street, and they should be building in jewelled marble. Having known nothing but poverty, she disliked the rich and now presumed them all arrogant and mean. The fact that she one day wanted to be rich herself did not count. She had an ambition to be arrogant and mean and hopefully look down on those now looking down on her.
The gutters where she slept were wet and noxious. She smelled urine and added to it. It was too cold by the Corn at night for the winds rushed upstream from the mighty Falls, but she walked down to the sweet green banks once dawn brought spring’s early warmth. She trailed the river, following Banks Road along the primroses and daisies. Now barefoot, she sometimes sat amongst the flowers, flattening the little wild white tulips, and stuck her feet in the water, wriggling her toes and loosening the worst of the grime.
Once she saw a woman, as dirty as herself, a crying baby in her lap. The woman’s hand was outstretched, begging, and rucked in her skirts beside the baby’s little bald head, were two pennies and another cut in half. Doria stopped and looked down.
“I tried that once,” she said, “but I didn’t make naught. Not even enough fer a hot pie. But then, I didn’t have no little brat. Wot do you make?”
The woman began to cry. “We are so poor this end of the city. I get very little, but with my child to care for, I cannot work. My husband died when the Bridge fell.”
Having seen the men working on the final dumps of rock and sludge, Doria had simply assumed more rubbish. “Weren’t well made, then.”
“It stood for hundreds of years.” The woman shook her head.
“How does you know, stupid bitch?” Doria demanded. “Surely you looks a couple o’ hundred years old, but I reckon you ain’t.”
The woman was puzzled. “We know our history. We have books –,”
“History don’t mean nothing,” Doria objected. “It gets changed all the bloody time. And if you can afford books, then you ain’t poor at all.” Abruptly she reached down, first snatching the coins from the woman’s lap, and then, as they woman shouted and reached up, Doria grabbed the baby. It screamed, kicking its little unswaddled legs in fear. The woman screamed louder. Doria started to run. The child was now held tight under her arm, head rolling, mouth wide in panic. The woman was close behind, shouting and shrieking. Still on Banks Road which followed the river upstream, Doria was approaching the Upper City.
In the Lower City, theft, rape and abduction was neither rare nor of great interest to those who either entered such games or were too busy protecting themselves to help others. Upriver, a hatred of crime, unless it was some secret conspiracy, brought retaliation. Two men leaving a small haberdashery with their new hats in bright pink boxes, stared at the grubby girl racing the streets with a screeching infant under one arm, and her tunic spattered with the infant’s vomit. At some distance echoed the wails of the older woman calling desperately for her baby.
The men grabbed Doria; she swung away and kicked. She dropped the child. Another older man, passing while staring with interest, grabbed the tiny head just an inch before it reached the cobbles. He stuck a fingertip in the squalling open mouth, and the noise stopped as the baby sucked hopefully. Doria was kicking, cursing and spitting.
“Get the Law-Maker,” called a woman from the door of the haberdashery. “He’s in the tavern down the road.”
The child’s mother bounced into the ground and reached out for her baby. It blinked, saw her, and relinquished the finger in order to cling to its mother. The elderly man smiled. “Had four of my own once,” he said, handing over the infant. “Looked after them all, and then my grandchildren too. Now I’m waiting for great-grandchildren. Here, you take this and hurry home to feed the little one.” And he passed the woman his purse, a tied leather bag from his belt, small but well stuffed. The woman took it, felt the weight, and nearly fainted.
“Oh, my gracious lord, may all the gods bless you in turn. What a wonderful gift.” She began to sink onto her knees, but the man grabbed her elbow and hauled her up.
“No, no, my dear. You go on home. There’s enough there to feed yourself and your baby for a couple of months, and pay your rent too, as long as it’s not too grand.”
“I live in a shed, lord,” muttered the woman, “No rent. Just a cow to milk.” She kissed the purse and then her baby. “First tis the greatest fear of me life as little Candy is taken, and then the greatest gift of me life meeting you. I thank you forever, m’lord, you done saved both our lives.” She turned and hobbled away, clutching her baby, and the purse even tighter.
Arriving with a roar of impatience, the Law-Maker pushed into the squabbling group and surveyed the young woman kicking and screaming in the centre.
“Quiet, woman,” the Law-Maker shouted into Doria’s furious eyes, and with a large open hand he swiped her across the face. Not a fist, but hard enough to make Doria fall. She was accustomed to worse, so scrambled up immediately, but already she was held by the two assistant Law-Makers who were dragging her up into one of t
he back streets. One had her arm forced high behind her back, the elbow bent against the joint. The other, grinning to himself, held her by one hand to her wrist, bent backwards, and the other hand tight on her breast, squeezing and pinching.
The small cell at the back of the Law-Maker’s office was a pigsty but Doria felt perfectly at home as she was shoved inside, and the door locked on her. She screeched that she was starving, but one guard simply kicked on the outside, rattling the hinge, and told her to fuck off. Doria wished she could.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Already she felt the little tap tap of increasing panic in her head, and the first inevitable grinding belly pains as her body called for the poppy. Dawn brought the glimmer of sweet gold, lighting the thin black ink sweep of the horizon into golden shimmer.
But for Freya it meant no breaking of fast, no Hawisa grumbling as she brought the cup, no rich smell of poppy seed and no reassurance that the day would bring her comfort and safety. The lack of the poppy was a threat. And the attack which threatened was already stabbing into her eyes.
Then the long thin arm, the muscles and sinews hard and protective, came slipping over her as she woke, pulling her close. Abruptly the threat of attack disappeared and the soft moist kiss against her ear was a promise of safety as the sun rose in sweet celebration.
“No wine,” my love,’ said the reassuring breath against her cheek, “but there’s plenty of ale left, and I’ve heated it to frighten away the midges.”
Freya smiled and drank. Her mind swam separately, adoring the promise of peace to come. Then the waves of doubt struck as Pod moved away, throwing two stale bread rolls into the little fire’s ashes to heat and toast them. Freya drank the ale, and now it was steam that sent her thoughts rolling. Silly thoughts. Silly stories. She sat, hugging her knees with one arm, her cup with the other. She had been smiling but now started silently to cry, imagining an endless slide of years ahead, each one sewed tight with misery, hopelessness and failure, finishing with the final slip into rivers of tears and squalor.
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