City of Pearl

by Alys Clare

  I smiled. ‘Very good talk!’ I assured him.

  But he can barely have heard, for he had turned back to Gurdyman, shaking his head, his round black eyes full of wonder. ‘You are here!’ he whispered. ‘I do not believe, yet here you are, and I know you, I see it is you, for you have the bright blue eyes of your mama, who I loved.’ Then abruptly he burst into a storm of tears.

  The woman had come to stand close by, and comprehension had slowly cleared the puzzlement on her face. Now, a comforting hand on the old man’s thin shoulder, she looked at Gurdyman. ‘You are welcome here,’ she said cautiously. ‘My grandfather teach me your speech,’ she added. ‘Many peregrinos come who speak like you, and it is – it is—’

  ‘Good for business to be able to talk to them?’ I suggested, and she gave me a swift grin.

  ‘Yes.’ Her smile faded. She looked again at Gurdyman, her expression uneasy. ‘You do not – you cannot think to see your mama and papa?’

  ‘No,’ he said gravely, ‘for they were advanced into old age when last I saw them, and that is many years ago.’

  She nodded. ‘You know they are dead, then, but perhaps not how?’

  But he said – and his tone sent a chill of dread through me – ‘I do know how.’ He glanced at me, and I thought I saw an apology in his eyes. ‘And that is why I am here.’

  FIVE

  In Cambridge, winter was closing in.

  A cold wind blew off the fens in a blast that seemed to carry splinters of ice. Frost covered the ground in the mornings and at times snow flurries turned everything briefly to white. The townspeople stayed indoors, venturing out only when they couldn’t avoid it. A self-imposed curfew fell at dusk, as men and women trudged home from their day’s work and thankfully slammed their doors on the chill outside.

  And Jack, religiously performing his ritual pass by Gurdyman’s house each day, realized he had not seen either of the occupants for weeks. The house stood empty, it was now December and no weather for being abroad, and he had no idea where they were.

  He had wondered early on whether Lassair had returned to her village. It was possible, but it didn’t explain Gurdyman’s absence, for why would he go there with her? Why would he condemn himself to the dull routine of a small village out in the middle of nowhere and banish himself to life in a tiny and overcrowded cottage when he had a fine house and a good life here in town? He might go for a few days if there were a good enough reason, but for all this time? Apart from the lack of privacy and the stultifying boredom for a man such as he, what of his studies? For Gurdyman to abandon his life’s work for so long was about as likely as him abandoning breathing.

  Jack had resisted going to Aelf Fen. If she was there and saw that he had gone to look for her, it would make her think that he—

  That he what?

  He really didn’t know how to answer that question.

  He chose a morning of bright sunshine when, for once, the wind had dropped. The air was still and very cold. He called in at the castle to inform his deputies that he would be absent for a few hours – he wouldn’t be missed since they were hardly being kept busy just now – and stopped in the market square to buy food. There were few stalls open and they didn’t seem to be doing much business, the stallholders standing miserable and cross, bundled up in so many layers that they looked like fat sheep.

  Jack fetched his horse, and the animal looked at him out of wary eyes as if to say, ‘You plan to ride out? In this chill?’ Tacking him up, Jack muttered encouragingly to him, telling him they both needed exercise and a day out in the fens would do them good.

  He set out for Aelf Fen. It came as no surprise that he remembered the way so faithfully, for all that he had only been there a few times. The roads and the tracks were deserted. The land appeared to be deeply asleep.

  He neared the village, and saw trails of smoke from household hearths rising straight up into the blue sky. There was still no wind. Recalling the layout of the little settlement, he turned his horse to the right just before he passed the path to the lord’s dwelling, leaving the main track and climbing up to the higher ground behind the village. In the middle of an open space there stood an ancient and solitary oak tree, and he headed for it. It was bare of leaves now but its broad trunk offered concealment. He slipped off the gelding’s back, loosening the girths and looping the reins over a branch. They had stopped half a mile or so back for the horse to drink, and now he began to graze, pulling at the sparse grass with a rasping sound.

  Jack stood beneath the tree gazing down on the village.

  He stood watching for some time. He had no idea how long, but when he came back to himself he realized he was very cold. There had been comings and goings, but no sign of her.

  The day wore on. He ate his food, which, combined with pacing up and down the high ground for a spell, warmed him up a little. He didn’t think anybody had noticed him but concluded it didn’t matter much if they did.

  Presently he saw someone he recognized: the young pale-haired man who he knew to be Lassair’s friend, and whom he had once seen in conversation with her; beneath the same tree where he now stood, in fact. He hurried down the long slope and caught up with the man just as he reached the huddle of dwellings.

  ‘You know Lassair,’ he said, panting. He raked through his memory for the young man’s name, and after a moment said, ‘You’re Sibert.’

  The pale-haired man eyed him suspiciously but did not speak.

  ‘I’m a friend of hers. I live in Cambridge, and I know her and Gurdyman.’

  ‘Oh,’ said the young man.

  ‘I mean her no harm,’ Jack pressed on. ‘But she’s not at Gurdyman’s house, and neither is he, and they’ve been away for weeks. I wondered if she – they – had come here?’

  ‘No.’ Just the one word, without elaboration.

  ‘But this was her home,’ Jack persisted. He could hear the note of desperation in his voice. ‘Her parents and her kin live here, don’t they?’

  ‘Yes.’

  The young man’s eyes were fixed on him, and his unease was palpable. It was very plain that he was wary of strangers, especially those asking after people he cared about.

  ‘I want to know if you—’ Jack began.

  The young man straightened his shoulders, gathered his courage and said belligerently, ‘It’s no use pressing me or threatening me’ – Jack realized he was standing too close and that the young man was in fact afraid, and hastily he stepped back – ‘because for one thing she’s my friend, and I don’t go sharing her private affairs with outsiders, and for another, I don’t know where she is either, so I couldn’t tell you even if I wanted to!’

  ‘But you must have some idea!’

  The young man had already turned away, and was running fast towards the houses. As Jack watched, he reached one that stood a little apart, to the rear of the group, opened the door and banged it shut behind him.

  Jack wandered back to the oak tree, leaning against the warm flank of his gelding. The horse raised his head from his grazing and gave a soft whinny. ‘I know,’ Jack muttered, ‘what are we doing here? Why don’t I take us both home?’

  But something was stopping him.

  Presently he saw a figure approaching the village from the north. Tall, lean, wrapped in a thick cloak with a deep hood, the man – it was clearly a man – hurried up to the cottage which Jack knew belonged to Lassair’s aunt. He opened the door and a slim woman appeared from the gloom to stand beside him. They spoke for some moments, kissed, then the man strode off again.

  Jack drew back behind the vast trunk of the oak tree, nudging his horse sideways so that he too was hidden. Peering out, he watched to see which direction the man took.

  For he was almost certain the man was Hrype. Married to Lassair’s aunt, father of Lassair’s friend Sibert, who Jack had just frightened away. He was a friend of Gurdyman’s, and—

  A friend of Gurdyman’s.

  Jack smiled. Then swiftly he tightened the girths
, mounted up and, keeping back and out of sight, set off to follow Hrype.

  Who just might, he thought with a lift of the heart, lead him to Gurdyman.

  And to Lassair.

  It was no easy task to trail a man who knew the fens as well as Hrype did. Sometimes he walked through thin veils of marsh mist and his tall figure became indistinct. Sometimes Jack lost sight of him altogether. He knew he must avoid drawing too close, for undoubtedly Hrype would be far more aware of somebody following him than most men. Once or twice Jack was forced to dismount and try to make out footprints, which ought to have been easy since they had been freshly made but in fact proved impossible. Does the man fly? Jack wondered grimly. Does he hover above the ground like some fenland spirit?

  Just then, out in the wilds alone and anxious, he could almost have believed it.

  He would have been forced to give up the pursuit had it not been for the fact that, after quite a long time, Hrype began to follow a path. Not much of a path, more a vague animal track, and one of four leading out of a patch of open ground. Jack told himself that it was the most likely one for Hrype to have taken. The alternatives were a path that seemed to double back on itself, another that plunged right down to the water and a third that was even less distinct and meandered off among the brambles and hazel. Jack memorized the location in case he had to return and try these others, then set off along the animal track. Very soon it became too difficult to negotiate on horseback, particularly for a man trying not to advertise his presence, so Jack dismounted, tied his gelding’s reins to the branch of an alder beside the narrow path and proceeded on foot.

  The undergrowth became steadily more dense, and now Jack was bending double to creep beneath the tangle of bare branches above his head. Brambles had sent out long, thick shoots that twined themselves into the mass, and their sharp prickles, dry and brown now, slashed the skin of his hands and wrists and sometimes his face. He forged on, impatiently thrusting the encroaching branches aside and widening the path. Then all at once the light grew stronger, the vegetation began to thin and, some ten yards ahead, the path, all but undetectable now, emerged onto a sort of beach, beyond which was the dark, still water of a fenland pool. He crept right up to the edge of the undergrowth, crouched down and peered out.

  The figure in the dark cloak stood on the land’s edge, looking out at a small island out in the water. He had thrown back his hood. He was standing in profile, the late sun shining on light hair shot through with silver. There was a look of Sibert about him, and Jack no longer had any doubt that this was indeed Hrype.

  He watched, keeping very still.

  After some time Hrype was no longer there.

  Jack pressed his palms to his eyes and looked again. The little stretch of beach was empty. But he was there, Jack thought, I was staring right at him!

  He burst out of the undergrowth and ran over to the water. He saw now that there was a narrow causeway leading from the shore to the island, submerged a foot or so beneath the surface. But the water was glassily still: nobody had disturbed it recently. Besides, if Hrype had gone across to the island, surely Jack would have heard the splashing?

  He looked to his right, then to his left. No paths led off to the left except the animal track on which he had just been crouching, and besides, even Hrype couldn’t have gone back past him without his noticing. But a path led off in the other direction: Jack went to look.

  The ground was muddy here. Quite clearly he saw the marks of recent bootprints.

  ‘So he doesn’t fly,’ Jack said softly aloud.

  Memories had been stirring since he first saw this place and now the voice inside his head would not be hushed. He thrust his way back down the animal track, fetched his reluctant horse and urged him to follow, shoving back the encroaching undergrowth to clear the way. He tethered the gelding at the end of the beach and then went to stand looking out at the island, exactly where Hrype had stood.

  And he listened once more to Lassair’s distress as she told her terrible tale.

  I took Rollo out into the wilds of the fens, and we hid in the house that belonged to Gurdyman’s friend Mercure. Then Rollo said we should lure the man to us so that he could kill him. I led him back to where Rollo was waiting. The man sent a bolt into the roof, and this one was on fire. I had to get out and I couldn’t move Rollo so I left him there. Then I realized the man wanted to kill me too so I got away, along the hidden ways across the water.

  She seemed so close. He felt he could have put out his hand and touched her.

  A house in the wilds of the fens. Yes, there ahead of him were the stubby remains of walls. Away along the hidden ways across the water. Yes, this place was an island, so escape would have to be over water. This one was on fire. Yes, there was abundant evidence of a huge fire.

  This, then, was Mercure’s island, and the place that Lassair had chosen when she – and the man she was with – had desperate need of a safe hiding place. Only in the end it hadn’t been safe, for the plan had gone awry.

  Without really thinking whether there was any point – for it was very apparent there was nobody on the island – Jack walked out onto the submerged causeway and waded across it.

  He climbed up the low slope on the far side.

  Slowly he studied the pattern of the stubs of posts and the stumps of walls. The dwelling had consisted of a single room and a short passage of some sort leading to a second room; perhaps a workroom. He wandered through the ruins. He looked up at the thick canopy of alder and willow that grew overhead. The trunks and branches of the trees circling the site of the dwelling were badly damaged.

  In the middle of the floor of the larger room there were signs of an intense conflagration. There was a wide circle of black ground, and everything within it had been burned away to nothing. The devastating fire had gone on to destroy the covered way and the workroom; there was another area of total annihilation in the workroom, as if here some spectacularly inflammable materials had fuelled the blaze.

  Jack thought about the story Lassair had told him. How, on Rollo’s instructions, she had lured the man who was bent on killing him to the island where Rollo was concealed, well-armed and ready. But the killer had struck first, and Rollo had died in her arms. Then had come the second arrow, this one alight, and it had set fire to the building where Lassair sat with her dead lover. Had she tried to drag his body away from the flames? She had said she couldn’t move him, so it sounded as if she had tried. He had a sudden flash of insight into how it must have felt to realize she had to leave his body where it lay and flee.

  So then had she run along the covered way to the workroom? That had burned, too, although the fire had begun in the main room …

  And then he thought he understood.

  He could almost make her out. She was a faint shape, seen through smoke, and her eyes raced along the shelves and across the workbenches, searching, desperate to find what she was looking for before the flames spread and that room too had to be abandoned.

  Now the image was clear and bright and he could see her feeding the fire, sending her lover into the afterlife like a Viking on his burning longship.

  Did she weep? Did she howl out loud with the agony of loss?

  Yes, he thought. Of course she did.

  He walked slowly back to the main room. There on the floor, in the epicentre of the blaze, Rollo had died, his body consumed by the furious flames that Lassair had encouraged until they were white-hot.

  This great conflagration was Rollo’s funeral pyre.

  Jack circled the ruins one last time. He didn’t think anyone had been there since the fire, for there was a darkness about the place and a sense of dread. It was hardly surprising, he reflected, for before the isolated island had burned it had been a magician’s retreat. People tended to avoid places that were the haunts of wise men, especially when they had been destroyed in such spectacular fashion.

  He knew that his journey here had been for nothing, for both his sense and his heart told
him Lassair had not returned.

  Just before he headed back across the water he stopped for a last look at the site of the pyre, standing over it with his head bowed. And, staring down at the blackened earth, he saw some small splinters of charred bone.

  He shrank away in horror.

  But almost immediately he found his courage. He went outside, hunting for an implement, and the best he could find was a narrow length of wood, about the width of his hand. He went back to the pyre and, a pace or two away from its centre, began to scrape the black earth away. As he dug deeper and through the hard crust on the surface, the soil became less resilient and quite soon he had formed a small pit. Then, on hands and knees, he raked to and fro across the patch of burned earth with his fingertips until he had found every fragment of bone. He put them carefully and reverently in the pit, then backfilled the hole and patted the earth smooth.

  He went outside to the water’s edge and washed his hands. Then, standing over the grave, he said a prayer for Rollo’s soul.

  He hoped very much that somewhere, some day, he and Lassair would meet again. He thought she would like to know what he had done.

  Hrype watched from the shelter of a hazel grove as the big lawman paced repeatedly across the island. He observed him standing quite still from time to time, clearly deep in thought and probably trying to work out the sequence of events. He saw him spot something on the ground, then set about digging. Then, head bowed, he said some words aloud. Hrype was too far away to make them out but he knew what they were.

  He will leave now, Hrype thought. He would wait, he decided, until the man was on his way.

  He had realized that someone was on his trail about halfway between Aelf Fen and Mercure’s island. He had a fair idea who it was and, when he managed to have a proper look, knew he had guessed right.

  Jack Chevestrier.

  And he was looking for Lassair and Gurdyman.

  Good, Hrype thought as Jack came back across the submerged causeway, mounted up and set off along the narrow trail. He would not find them anywhere hereabouts, for they were far away. But the thought of someone else being concerned was heartening. The quiet voice deep inside Hrype told him that Jack was an ally worth having.