The Cup of the World

by John Dickinson

  ‘The wall bulges outward near the bottom,’ she said. ‘You don't see it, unless you are up here looking down.’

  At another time he might have explained about building techniques – about the need for a broad base to the wall for stability, or some such reason. Today he scowled.

  ‘I wonder at your workmanship here. The mortar is well enough at this level – no doubt because it is easy to come to. But are there not cracks between the stonework on the face of the wall?’

  ‘You may be right, sir.’

  ‘I should say so. Perhaps it will fall down one day, and then I shall be free.’

  ‘You have better hopes of being freed, Aun.’

  ‘Have I?’ he said sharply. ‘I suppose if you marry this prince of yours, you'll be a princess, and if you bear him the right number of sons, he'll listen to you. Then if His kind Majesty and Barius would only die without further issue, you'll be Queen Consort one day. Then you can persuade someone to let me out of here – if I haven't died or gone mad waiting.’

  Phaedra paused, fighting the sudden anger in herself that would make her walk away. It was knowing he would not care that stopped her. And he had good reason to be distressed – as much as she did, she thought.

  ‘I'm not supposed to know about that,’ she said quietly.

  ‘Neither am I. Neither is half the castle. Do you think anyone would tell me if it hadn't been rattling around the corridors since yesterday? These gabbling Tuscolo gaylords!’

  ‘I do not wish to—’

  ‘You're very young, my girl. May I give you some advice?’

  ‘Do.’

  ‘Don't think of making your father play your game. He can't, this time. And he won't try. What he has done for you has already been beyond all reason – another man would have birched the skin off his child for crossing him so. If the prince wants to marry you, he will – although if you ask me, he'll suffer for it in the Kingdom. But he can do it. Your father would not be warden for long if he interfered. I'm not telling you this because I like it. I'm telling you because that's the way things are.’

  It might be a sort of comfort, to a man like him, to know that someone else was being constrained against their will. Rain began to fall in individual drops upon the stonework around them. After a while she spoke again.

  ‘Sir, I would like to forget what you have said. For too many men are nothing but armoured bullies. And I think that when you have taken a man's arms and bullying away from him, and find there is nothing more, then he likewise is nothing more. And you and he and the Kingdom are the poorer for it.’

  He glared at her, and she met his look, as she always did. Then she left him. When she looked back she saw him leaning over the battlements again, with the rain beating heavily around him.

  So she spent the rest of the afternoon drifting round the castle, watching the men and women at their work and telling them absently what she thought would be needed when the King came. Then she went to the north-west tower to watch the evening. The rain had gone. So had Aun. The battlements below her were empty. The grey underbellies of clouds ranked one after the other, on and on towards the pale gleams of sunset. The weather was changing. The wind blew from the south. It was strangely warm. She looked down towards the olive trees that hid the fountain and thought: I must go. Even if he does not come tonight, I shall go. Perhaps I shall make the sail-folk take me down the lake to Jent, and ask the bishop to let me enter a convent there.

  At the sixth hour that evening she sat through her last supper at Trant, with the oil lamps flaring above her. Looking down from her place at the high table, where she sat between the King's huntsman and his butler, she could see the household at the long tables below her. They had seated Aun on the one to her right, among the knights at the head of it. She could see him watching her, but could not read his face. When she looked again midway through the meal he was gone.

  The tables clattered with fists and dishes, and Joliper the merryman came up with his lute and his banter to entertain the high table. The sights and the sounds touched her eyes and ears, but reached only to the edge of her mind. The King's butler was talking with Brother David, but she did not listen. The thought of the old court beneath the oak trees lay in her head like a dark, quiet pool. The supper went on in uproar along the banks, but the surface of the water was still.

  ‘… So Wulfram came from the sea,’ Joliper was saying in his sing-song story voice.

  ‘… In Three Ships he brought Four Angels, and with them our people to a strange shore.

  ‘There he bade his Seven Sons each take land for their own, and in their hands he placed One Thing.

  ‘And the Thing was Iron.

  ‘Iron in the hands of the Seven Sons won the Kingdom, and Iron in the hearts of their children shall see that it never is at peace.’

  Joliper had ridden with Father in the long harrying of the Seabord when the last rebels had finally been put down. He would never stand up to Father, or indeed to any man that Phaedra could think of. But his hatred of what he had seen stirred in the lines of his ballads – even before the King's own men. (He also mentioned lice and dysentery whenever he thought Father would let him get away with it.)

  Some time after the seventh hour, when they came to fill the cups for the second time, Phaedra rose to leave. She kissed Father goodnight, as she had done every night since she was small, and let her lips linger just a fraction longer than usual on his hairy cheek. If he noticed, he did not show it. But he smiled at her and there was warmth in his hug, which had not always been there in the last few months. Then he turned to the royal clerk beside him, and began to test the water about his long dispute with Falco of Bowerbridge, who claimed to be a free knight rather than to hold his manor from the Warden. Perhaps not one for the King himself, but for a panel of right men appointed to judge?

  Father was not a bad man. He played the game as he must, like chess, and this was too good a chance for him to miss. A gift in the right place, even to this clerk, would bring a royal letter that would finish tiresome old Falco's claim to be a dog-knight as surely as if Father had burned him out of his home and killed anyone who tried to help him. It would be a manor to set against Sevel, if he lost that: a fair exchange for Trant, whatever came of the marriage. Phaedra walked from the hall without looking back.

  The corridors were dark to her eyes after the lights of the hall. Purple splashes drifted in her sight as she walked. Her feet knew the way. Up the stair, turning after a dozen steps, and up again to the gallery from which she had heard Father and the prince's man talking weeks before. An emptiness was growing within her as she walked.

  Now to the right. A torch hung above her door, shedding a pool of light in the passage. She went in and fumbled for the things she had placed below her bed: a light cloak, and the bundle small enough to hide under it. She was leaving almost everything behind. Even her cup-and-ball game lay in her chest alongside the dusty rag dolls that she had not played with for years. There would be nothing, as she hooked the cloak around her neck, to show that she was doing more than taking a short stroll within the castle before retiring.

  She was ready. It must be almost the eighth hour.

  She stood alone at the window a little while, looking westwards down to the lake. There was a moon out there, somewhere above thin clouds. The oaks about the fountain clustered in a mass of black below her, and the lake-face spread in deep blue-grey into the night beyond. She thought she could just – just? – make out a pale patch that might be the full-bellied curve of a sail, dipping silently above the water. She could not be sure.

  There was one more thing to do. She left her room and felt her way along the corridor to the north-west tower, where she took the spiral steps down to the ground. The corridor here was unlit, but she walked forward confidently, running her fingers along the right-hand wall past one, two, three doorways. When her fingers touched wood for the fourth time, she stopped and groped for the door ring. The hinges opened with a moan.


  The chapel was empty. The Flame of Heaven still fluttered on the altar, but the roof and the aisles were lost in darkness. She crossed slowly to the far aisle, bowing to the Flame as she had done every day for a dozen years, and walked down the chapel until she came to the stones in the wall.

  She could hardly see them in this light, but she did not have to. She stood before them. After a moment she opened her mouth to say something, but stopped herself. Instead she reached out and touched each stone lightly, feeling for the names cut in the cold surfaces. Goodbye, Guy. Goodbye, Ellen, Anfred, Ina. Goodbye, Mother. I must go.

  She thought, as she walked down the aisle to the main door, that families should weep at parting. But for seven years she had had only five stones and Father. Stones could not weep, and neither did she.

  Set in Trant's west wall, under the lee of the northwest tower, was the small postern door. It was unguarded. Huge bolts held it on the inside, but her hands drew them back. The hinges groaned as it opened. She stepped through and closed it as softly as she could behind her.

  Immediately she knew she was in the wrong place. She had never been this side of the walls after dark before. She scrambled quickly down into the ditch (ankle-deep in cold water) and up the far side. No one called to her from above. Lights burned up there, but Trant's custom in time of peace was to man the gatehouse and let the walls look to themselves.

  Down the hill, and the ground was soft beneath her feet. Her cloak was dark. She was beyond the reach of the torchlight now. There seemed to be no sound but the steady whisper of the wind and the slight scuff of her shoes on the grass. The first trunks of the grove loomed at her out of the night. She went more slowly, straining her eyes for the sign of anyone moving or standing beneath the trees.

  ‘I should have brought a lantern,’ she muttered to herself.

  But what for? Carrying a light would only give her away to anyone watching from the castle. She knew the way. At least, she knew it in daylight. And it was not wholly dark, even here beneath the trees.

  Her feet touched stone flags. Some of the trunks around her must be pillars. The old fountain stood before her. Her fingers reached to touch the dry rim. It was there. She felt her way down to crouch on its step, and slowly settled her back against the stone. She wondered how long she should wait. An hour, he had said. Could she judge the time?

  The wind stirred in the branches. Between them, to her left, she could see the lights of the castle. Faint sounds clicked and muttered among the trees. Now and again she was sure she heard a footstep, but though she turned her head and strained her eyes she saw nothing, and then a gust would come and all the leaves would shiver, and as it died she would listen and listen and try, from all the meaningless patter of a wood at night, to pick a sound she knew.

  It was cold. Her cloak was thin. Her feet and ankles were chilled. There were warmer things in her bundle, but she did not want to fumble and scatter her belongings in the darkness. She felt that if she did it would take her an age to be ready again.

  Then she thought that she might as well be warmer and have something to do to pass the time. As she reached for the bundle she again thought she heard someone moving in the trees. More than one person, for the sounds behind her seemed very quickly to be followed by others to her left. She rose and looked around. Nothing moved. No one stepped forward to greet her.

  So she waited. And the wind shivered and the grove clicked and rustled and dripped around her, and gradually the pounding in her heart eased, and she crouched and hugged her arms around her knees, and looked at the lights on the hill and wondered if she had strayed into a dream.

  The cloud thinned. The light grew. A few feet behind her a voice spoke.

  ‘Phaedra.’

  Her heart jumped, and jumped again when she saw him. He was standing by the fountain, dressed in a heavy cloak, with the moonlight in his hair. Some restraint gave within her when she saw him, and she was smiling. So was he.

  ‘You did come,’ she said.

  ‘I came. My ship is at the jetty on the lakeshore. Do you want to come with me?’

  There were other men behind him, watching from the shadows of the columns and the trees. She rose.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Ulfin.’

  ‘No!’

  A man stumbled forward from among the trees behind her. Metal scraped in a scabbard. A blade gleamed for a moment in the moonlight.

  ‘She's not for you!’ yelled Aun.

  Phaedra cried out to him, but the knight was pushing her back from the fountain, drawing with his other hand. Aun checked his rush, hesitated. Steel flickered in shadow between the two men. Other hands took Phaedra and pulled as she looked back. The knight said something and then struck, and struck again as quick as a snake. Aun staggered away.

  ‘Don't kill him!’ she cried.

  Distant voices called from the castle. The blades rang and the fighters stumbled. Aun beat desperately to keep the long blade away, and then swung at his enemy's head. The knight jumped back.

  ‘Ha!’

  ‘This is ridiculous,’ the knight said. ‘Get him off me.’

  Men surged forward around Phaedra. She heard Aun shouting. There were lights and movement from the castle.

  Her companion's hand fell on her shoulder.

  ‘We must go now. Follow me.’

  Blows and running feet sounded in the wood. From further off Aun was still shouting. ‘Ho, Trant! Raiders! Raiders!’

  A whistle blew by her right ear. The knight was leading her quickly downhill, out of the trees and along the lakeside. There were two others with him. More came running up.

  ‘Is anyone hurt?’ he asked the one nearest him.

  ‘How do I know?’ The man put a whistle to his lips and blew. Shapes moved on the slope – men running towards them.

  ‘Come on!’

  Before them Phaedra saw the long line of the jetty with the Trant boats rocking at tether. At the far end lay a long ship with her mast stepped and sail furled. There were men moving aboard. The knight led Phaedra out to it and jumped lightly down onto the deck. He held out his hand to help her after him. Behind her his followers gathered on the jetty The man with the whistle was trying to count them.

  ‘They've sortied,’ said someone.

  There were lights – torches – moving down the slope towards them from Trant. The men on the jetty scrambled aboard. The Trant boards pounded under the feet of the intruders.

  ‘Push off

  ‘Stand by me, Phaedra,’ he said, from the stern of the vessel. She picked her way among the men and boards to join him. Oars swung and bit whitely on the dark water.

  ‘Together!’ urged someone near her. ‘After me!’

  There was a strip of water now between her and the jetty She could still jump, and struggle back to her shore if she chose. She would have to jump now, if she was going to. The moment was slipping away.

  He was standing beside her. They had touched, and she almost had not noticed. He was there, where she could touch him again. The deck lifted and made her decision for her. She reached to him to steady herself and hooked her hand into his belt. She allowed her fingers to stay where they could feel his warmth through the thin cloth.

  Men were moving about them, and some looked their way. She wondered if they could tell what she was thinking, and whether it showed on her face, even in this light. She thought he must be able to feel her pulse through her fingertips and the fabric of his shirt, and if he could it would be wonderful, because he would already know what it was she did not think she could ever say. They stood together, and the taste of dark water was in her mouth.

  On the hill above her was the mass of the castle, topped with torches, against the night sky. In that flat shadow lay Father, the knights, the dogs, and all the tattle-tale community of Trant. Collen, restless in his stable. The chapel, with the light on the altar. They looked down on her, and she departed.

  Suddenly the night hissed at her savagely. She jumped.

  ‘
Keep low,’ he said softly, and they kneeled together on the deck. There were torches and men moving on the jetty Someone yelled at them from the shore.

  The air hissed again, a hateful sound.

  ‘Crossbow,’ muttered a voice near her. ‘More than one, maybe.’

  ‘Hoist sail.’

  There was a hiss and thump and a yelp from someone forward. The sail surged up the mast, flapping and rumpling in the night breeze. Men scrambled around it. Then it shaped and filled, and the ship heeled under the palm of the wind. The oars rattled and came aboard. The thick ripple from the stem of the boat grew as their way increased. The jetty was well behind them now. Lights were moving there.

  ‘Did you see to the boats?’ he muttered to the helmsman.

  ‘Threw the oars into the water and cut every rope we could find.’

  ‘Thank you. In the bow, there! Anyone hurt?’

  There was a pause. Then someone called back. ‘Only splinters.’

  ‘I think we've done it, then,’ he said. Whether this was to himself or to her Phaedra was not quite sure. She was looking back at the torches on the jetty and in the castle, growing more distant with every minute, until the next headland hid the lower lights on the shoreline, and those in the castle fused into a single, high spark that seemed to follow them across the water. The shoreline dropped behind them and was hidden in the night, but she could see the castle light still.

  Men were moving about the deck, loosening bundles, spreading blankets in the prow and stern of the ship. They gave one to Phaedra. It was stiff, and felt as though it had been soaked in oil. Someone pushed past her to take over from the man at the helm.

  ‘Sleep now, rise early’ said the knight. ‘We'll be warmer anyway’

  Phaedra realized she was shivering. The light she had been watching had gone. The moon was high – nearly full, but not quite. A fringe of shadow blotted one edge of the disc. Her knight and four others lay down in a row in the stern. She wrapped herself in her blanket and lay down with them, a woman not quite seventeen among these strange warriors. There was no privacy but she was glad of the warmth. She did not feel at all sleepy. She looked up at the curve of the big sail above her, and at the moon, and tried to imagine what tomorrow would be like, but found that she did not know. She had walked off the jetty into the end of her world.