The Widow and the King

by John Dickinson

  ‘My lady …’

  ‘Outside, fool!’

  ‘My lady – the king's men. They've arrested Hervan.’

  ‘What!’

  ‘And Brother Martin, too. They took them into the courtyard.’

  ‘Arrested? What do you mean?’

  ‘They said it was for Treason!’

  More feet were coming up the stairs. Armoured feet – many of them. Mail jingled. The Widow listened for a moment, appalled.

  ‘Out of sight, both of you,’ she said. ‘Quickly!’

  Sophia hurried past her into the writing chamber. She looked back. Burne had not followed. He was gone somewhere – along the corridor, perhaps. The Widow was motioning her to close the door. She did so as softly as she could.

  Feet scraped and clattered in the council chamber doorway. Armoured men were in the room. Sophia could not tell how many.

  ‘Swords, you fellows?’ said Mother. ‘For one old widow?’

  ‘You will come with us, my lady.’

  It was the last time Sophia ever heard her voice.

  XVIII

  Sunset

  mbrose stood by the river, watching the sun dip towards the crown of an oak tree on the farther bank. He was waiting for Chawlin, but Chawlin was late. He would wait another few minutes, then he would go.

  The Widow had told him to stay with friends. Ambrose was not sure whether Chawlin was still a friend, but he was the nearest to a friend that he had. They still had practice bouts every week. Ambrose enjoyed them, because he knew his skill was improving and because they made him feel less helpless. So even after the terrible moments with the Heron Man in the hall, he had remembered that he was due to have a bout that afternoon, and had come to the riverbank as usual. But Chawlin was not there.

  Time passed slowly. Ambrose began to fret. It would be a pity to miss the bout, but he could not stay much longer. He had to be in the Widow's chamber when she spoke with the bald monk about the Heron Man. He wanted to tell them about the fears that he had been carrying ever since he had fled the mountains, and of the new fears that had been piling within him since the Wolf had come to him two nights before. He wanted to speak with people who had seen the Heron Man; and he wanted to hear what the bald monk had to say. For the man had said that he had heard Mother's voice, there in the hall.

  Ambrose remembered him now. He had been in the castle the day he arrived. He had said, then, that he had known her, and been her friend. So did the monk mean that he had looked at Ambrose in the hall and been reminded of her, so clearly that it might have been a voice speaking to him? Or had she really stepped up from under the Angels' Wings, by some miracle that only happened to priests, and spoken in his ear to point out the Heron Man where he stood by her son?

  The monk knew the Heron Man, too. He had seen him before.

  He was someone who knew! Someone who could help – at last.

  The sun had touched the top-most branches of the oak. He could see the glare flickering through the highest leaves. Chawlin was now late by over half an hour. There was no telling when the Widow might begin her conference. Ambrose turned to go.

  That was when Chawlin finally appeared. He was leading a donkey, laden with sacks, along the river path. Ambrose called to him. He looked up, surprised. Then he frowned.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘We had a bout,’ Ambrose said.

  It was obvious that Chawlin had forgotten. He did not seem pleased to be reminded.

  ‘Angels! I'm busy enough already.’

  ‘What are you doing?’ Ambrose could not imagine what mission for the castle or the school would bring a scholar to the riverbank laden with sacks; but there were still many things about Develin that he did not understand.

  ‘It's no business of yours,’ said Chawlin, shortly. He began to unfasten the sacks from the donkey's back. Ambrose watched him. For a while Chawlin ignored him, but when he had all the sacks in a row on the ground, he seemed to think again.

  ‘Ho, well. Since we are both here, and since we've promised it to one another, I suppose we should at least cross sticks once or twice before we go our ways. In fact’ – he began to undo the tie around one of the sacks at his feet – ‘I remember saying I would show you some iron. What do you think of this?’

  From the sack he drew a short sword. The blade was dull, the hilt unadorned, but he swung it and swished it in quick, smooth strokes as though he knew exactly what he was doing. The donkey sidled a little away from him.

  ‘Do you have one for me?’ asked Ambrose.

  ‘No. It took me enough begging and wheedling to get this one. We must take turns. One with the staff, the other with the sword. It's uneven, but then most fights are uneven. You try the staff first, since you know a bit about that now. I'll show you how I block with the sword …’

  Ambrose picked his rough-cut staff out of the reeds where they left it after each bout. The sword was much shorter than a staff, but the way Chawlin held it made him look very dangerous. Ambrose did not like it. He understood the staff, and how it hurt if you were hit. This was different.

  He swallowed. He did not like the look settling on Chawlin's face, either. It seemed like the face of an enemy.

  ‘I can't be long,’ Ambrose said. ‘I have to be within the walls by sunset.’

  ‘We've time for a few passes. Be careful, now. The sword is slower than the staff, but not much. And you may be surprised what I can reach.’

  Ambrose advanced, holding his staff two-handed in the way he had been taught. Chawlin waited for him, balanced, with the sword held across his chest.

  Ambrose stopped. Chawlin was quick – so quick Ambrose almost never touched him in practice. He did not think he had yet found out how quick Chawlin could be. He did not want to attack. He was – yes – he was afraid of Chawlin, and the sword.

  He knew he was scaring himself. This was just a bout. That was all. Chawlin might have been angry with him at first, for asking for it. But he wouldn't do anything …

  A rising sound from the roadway distracted him. Relieved, he stepped back a pace or two with his eyes on his opponent as Chawlin had taught him. Then he turned to look. Chawlin turned, too.

  A small knot of horsemen were on the roadway, riding at full canter. A great banner danced over them. The long light of the evening showed the device clearly.

  ‘It's the King,’ exclaimed Chawlin.

  The King himself ? Not some messenger? ‘What's he doing?’

  ‘Riding from the castle. Why, I don't know. And he's left nine-tenths of his men behind him. Why this?’

  If you don't get it for me, I've another way.

  ‘He's going because he's already done what he came to do,’ said Ambrose slowly.

  ‘What is that?’

  ‘He's got his men inside the walls.’

  They stared at one another, and the shadow of the oak tree lay around them.

  ‘They're going to do what they did at Bay,’ Ambrose said.

  That was what the Wolf had meant. That was the ‘other way’ he had spoken of in the night of Ambrose's cell!

  Chawlin glanced at the road, and at the castle again. He hadn't accepted what Ambrose had said. He did not know what to do.

  ‘I don't like this,’ he said at last. ‘We should go back, perhaps.’

  ‘She'll be in the council chamber,’ said Ambrose.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The Widow. We can warn her.’

  ‘Oh … yes.’

  Chawlin hung where he was for a moment more. Then some thought, or conviction, came to him, and he swore. He started walking towards the castle, striding quickly. Ambrose had to jog to stay alongside him.

  Then Chawlin began to run.

  Ambrose hurried after him. He could not keep up. Chawlin was bigger, and far more powerful. He was getting further and further ahead. Ambrose's breath began to come in gasps, forcing itself out of his lungs as he tried to keep running. He had gone more than a hundred yards before he realized that
he had dropped his staff.

  He ran on, empty-handed, and the walls of Develin reddened with sunset.

  Chawlin was not making for the gate. He was keeping to the river side of the castle, rounding the great corner tower and heading for the postern that stood concealed in its shadow. As they passed under the walls Ambrose could hear only his own feet, his breath, gasping with the run, and the endless ripple of the river. The towers and the wall-tops were silent. No sound came from within.

  Chawlin had reached the postern, and was prising at it. He still had the sword.

  ‘It will be locked,’ panted Ambrose, as he came up.

  ‘It looks it,’ muttered Chawlin. ‘But it's not. I've fixed the bolts from inside, so I can come and go without using the gate.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It's none of your business.’

  The door cracked open. Inside, the passage was dark. They listened. Still there was no sound.

  Chawlin led, sword in hand. They groped their way in. Ambrose did not know where he was in the castle. Chawlin did, it seemed. There were dark openings on either side of him, which might have been cellars. There was a light ahead – filtering in down a flight of steps. Chawlin hurried up them – one flight, two. They met no one. They heard nothing. They reached the level of the living quarters.

  In the passage a woman was standing. It was one of the Widow's chamber-maids. She was doing nothing, going nowhere. She was holding her hand to her head, as if she was suffering a migraine.

  ‘They've killed them,’ she said. ‘They've killed them.’

  Somewhere, someone screamed.

  Chawlin pushed past the woman and flung into the council chamber with an oath. It was empty. He passed on into the Widow's rooms beyond it. From the way he called and banged the doors Ambrose knew that there was no one there.

  Ambrose stood in the council chamber, listening. He had not set foot here since the day he had come. The Widow's chair was empty. Someone had pulled a chest out from behind it and rifled it, leaving the lid open. The hearth by which he had crouched to warm himself was dead. The window that looked out over the hills was darkening with night.

  A clamour of voices rose from somewhere – dreadful sounds, full of rage and terror. Feet were running, people sobbing, crying out. From the inner chambers he heard Chawlin exclaim.

  ‘Michael's Knees! They're amok – the king's men!’

  He must be looking out of a window into the courtyard. Ambrose stepped to the door, swallowing hard. He did not want to see what Chawlin could see. And yet seeing could not be worse than not seeing.

  Another sound – the softest sigh of a robe – made him turn again. The Heron Man was sitting in the Widow's chair.

  A voice was screaming for pity. It screamed, and stopped amid a series of dull thuds that must have been blows. There were more cries from beyond.

  ‘It is because of you,’ said the Heron Man.

  He was plain to the eye. He was not hiding now.

  Feet running, and screaming. A bellow that must have ripped the throat that made it. Metal upon metal. Metal on flesh.

  ‘It is your doing,’ said the Heron Man.

  ‘That's a lie!' yelled Ambrose.

  ‘At their noon-tide halt the son of Lackmere went to his King. He said that the Widow kept the heir of Tarceny in her house in secret – the heir of Tarceny, and the bloodline of Wulfram. To this king it was very clear that the Widow was plotting against him. His plans were changed in less than an hour.’

  ‘Chawlin!’

  ‘He has done this because of you. His men hunt through every room and corridor for you. And they kill everyone in their path.’

  Chawlin was at the inner door, swearing and breathing hard. He started at the sight of the Heron Man, and swore again. The Heron Man ignored him. His eyes were bent upon Ambrose.

  ‘You could have warned the Widow, and you did not. Now they have cut the Widow's head from her body.

  ‘You could have spoken with the monk. With the man who helped you. Now they have marched him into the courtyard, and made him kneel, and cut his bald head from his body, too. He lies beside the Widow, and their blood thickens on the cobbles. And the house-people will be heaped around them. Because of you.’

  ‘You did it! You made him do it!’ cried Ambrose.

  ‘You could stop it,’ said Chawlin, behind him.

  The Heron Man seemed to shrug.

  ‘I did not like to be chased from this hut of a farmer's daughter, as if I were a stray dog.’

  Chawlin lifted his sword.

  ‘Would you join the Widow then – a head shorter?’

  ‘Do not wave your stick at me, oaf. Oh, I remember you. Did you think I did not? I remember everybody. You did not reach me in Tarceny. You cannot reach me now. Before you tried, I would be gone. And after that you would do well to walk with one eye over your shoulder. Do you remember what you saw, that day?’

  Chawlin drew a long breath. The silence was torn with another scream.

  Suddenly Ambrose could smell woodsmoke. There was a low, windy sound, that had not been there before.

  ‘They've fired the house,’ he said.

  ‘Every man. Every woman. Every girl. Every pig or dog,’ said the Heron Man.

  ‘You must stop it,’ said Chawlin.

  ‘You have nothing to offer me.’

  ‘For all the Angels – stop them!’

  ‘You have nothing to offer me.’

  There was another scream. It might have been a woman or a child.

  ‘There!’ cried Ambrose. He flung the pouch of white stones at the feet of the Heron Man.

  ‘That's what you wanted, wasn't it? Now stop them! Stop them!’

  The Heron Man did not even look at the pouch at his feet. He leaned forward.

  ‘The Widow gave space for One in her house. One. So you may take One from it, alive. Choose whom it will be.’

  Ambrose stared at him in horror. Names, faces, flooded into his mind: the sprawling, shouting, chaotic community of Develin; the Masters – Padry, Pantethon, Father Grismonde; the scholars – Rufin, Cullen; the scullions and serving girls whose hands had brought them food.

  Who was already dead and who was still alive?

  He was helpless.

  ‘One.’

  Suddenly, a name exploded from Chawlin.

  ‘Sophia! The Widow's daughter!’

  The Heron Man paused. His head turned slowly, as if he looked through the walls around him. For a moment Ambrose saw him, perched not on the Widow's chair but on a pinnacle of rock under a dull sky.

  Then he said: ‘Go to the hall. Be swift.’

  He reached down for the pouch of stones. His finger and thumb closed on the very tip of the cord. When he rose, the pouch dangled from his hand like a dead rat that a man holds in disgust for a moment, before flinging it on a heap.

  ‘There will be a price.’

  He was gone, and the stones with him.

  The room was misty with smoke. Ambrose coughed.

  ‘Come on,’ said Chawlin.

  They hurried out of the chamber. There were men at the far end of the corridor, armoured, battering on a door. But the stair was free. They plunged downwards, Chawlin leading, sword held before him.

  Ambrose followed. He had nothing else to do. He had lost the stones. He was as naked as a chick out of his shell. The air was full of smoke and the smoke was full of swords. He was going to be hunted. The only thought in his mind was to keep moving, keep moving. If he was moving they might not catch him. Perhaps he could go on running for ever.

  Someone – a king's man in helmet and mail – had seen them, and cried out. Chawlin ignored him. In the hurry and confusion it was impossible to know if they were pursued. Everywhere men were running – chasing, fleeing, stumbling upon a new enemy and chasing or fleeing again to the kill. Chawlin kept ahead, down to the level of the hall and through the doors.

  The smoke hung thinly in the great space. Ambrose's eyes were weeping, but he cou
ld see that the hall was empty. Chawlin groaned aloud.

  ‘There!’ cried Ambrose.

  There she was. Perhaps she had been trying to reach the river-door. Now she came running blindly out of the kitchen doorway. A man was after her, lumbering in mail. He had a one-handed axe. She was quicker, but was running with her arm across her eyes. They could hear her sobbing – a high, broken sound, as she ran and did not see.

  Chawlin lurched forward, bellowing. The pursuer turned on him, calling for help. The sword rang on the helm and the knee, and the man staggered. He did not go down.

  ‘Sophia!’ cried Chawlin. ‘The river-door – quickly!’

  The king's man was coming on again. Chawlin sprang back. He had no armour. Across the hall the Lynx had stopped and was looking at them.

  ‘The river-door – both of you!’

  The attacker roared, and swung clumsily with his axe. Chawlin dodged back again. Other men were crowding in at the hall entrance. There were swords and pole-arms, dark against the smoky light beyond.

  ‘Go! Michael's Knees – go!’

  The Lynx was moving – back the way she had come towards the kitchens. Ambrose ducked around the fighters and followed her. Behind him there was a crash and a cry. He looked back. The soldier was down on one knee, clutching his axe-hand. The axe lay on the floor. Chawlin stood over him. The short sword swept in to the neck-joint. The man dropped like a puppet with its strings cut.

  Beyond him men were swarming inwards, yelling. Chawlin turned and ran for the kitchen door. Ambrose bolted before him.

  He did not know the way. The rooms were unlit, and full of smoke. His ears rang with cries. He could not see. He had lost sight of the Lynx – of Sophia. Where was she?

  He turned right, and then left. The noises of pursuit were close. Maybe Chawlin was fighting again. Armourless, he had beaten that man with a speed and savagery he had never shown at practice. Ambrose felt feeble, useless. All he could do was run.

  Surely he must be close to the river-door now. It hadn't taken this long when they were coming – or had it? He remembered that he had to go down a flight of steps to some cellars. He began to look for them. Maybe he had passed them already. He couldn't go back. If he went back he would run into the swords. He could only go on.