The Rope Dancer

by Roberta Gellis

  The dwarf looked down at his half-eaten meal as if he had no idea what it was. “You do not seem to care,” he said, his voice carefully flat and neutral.

  “I care,” Carys assured him, sounding more surprised than resentful. “I am not yet sure what to do about it.”

  “Nothing!” Deri burst out. “You will do nothing! You will stay here and rope dance for the cook until Telor and I return to fetch you. Telor and I have enough to worry about without worrying about you also.”

  “There is no need to worry about me,” Carys assured him mildly. “I am not such a fool as to think I can climb into Marston. The guards are all alert for someone trying to sneak into the keep, and to do so might betray whatever Telor is trying to do.”

  Deri heaved a huge sigh of relief. “That is true, Carys, so keep it in mind that in trying to help, you might mar all. In any case, you need not worry about Telor. He is cleverer than you think and…he cares for you. He does not wish to die. He will be careful of himself.”

  “Yes, but—”

  Only Deri did not stay to hear the rest. He left his meal and stalked off, calling to the cook from the front door to ask him to leave the back of the shop open. “My friends play noisy games all night,” he complained, “and do not let me sleep in peace. I will see that nothing is stolen. If you lack anything, I will pay for it.”

  Having received the cook’s agreement, he walked off onto the main street and up to Lord William’s house to wait for Telor. Had Deri stayed with Carys, she would have told him, innocently, what she thought about the Lady’s weaving, and he would have been alerted and watched her more closely. As it was, he allowed himself to be soothed by her assurance that she did not intend to climb into Marston, and to believe she understood that her presence there would do more harm than good. He talked to Telor about his plans that evening and, when he heard what they were, argued loud and long, only desisting when he realized how much pain he was causing.

  “I must do it,” the minstrel said, his eyes full of tears. “I must. I have passed my word to Lord William. But it is more than that, Deri. I would be less than a man if I did not pay my debt to Eurion.”

  “And what of Carys?” Deri asked.

  The blood drained out of Telor’s face, and his eyes burned, but he said, “She is very young. She will forget.” And after a moment he added, “I will do my best to come out of this alive. You must stay with her, Deri. If the worst befall, you can play together.”

  They had been sitting in the second alehouse, and Deri stared blindly at the smoking torch in the corner of the room. “My debt is to you, Telor,” he said.

  “I am calling it in, Deri,” Telor answered grimly. “Do not think I do not understand what this costs you. I know you wish to come with me, but the need I have is to know that Carys will have some protection. No man could help me in Marston.” He waited for a moment and then went on, “Come, we had better go. Carys will be frightened if we are both so late.”

  Telor did not press the issue, although he realized that Deri had not replied. He could not say openly that Deri would be more danger to him than help; he was sure the dwarf already knew that and counted on that fact to keep Deri with Carys. On the way he only added that he was still not sure when he would leave Lechlade. The man who had gone to Creklade had returned with strong promises of support for any action Lord William wished to take, but his other messengers, to several neighboring barons, had not all come back, and there was some matter to do with Lord William’s brother in Faringdon that was not yet settled.

  The next day was much the same, except that Deri’s prediction that the crowds would be larger for Carys’s rope dance proved true. But the third day, there were many fewer men-at-arms present—and Telor did not return after dinner, as he had both previous days. Frightened, Carys donned her fine tunic and braies and went to Lord William’s lodging to inquire about him. The clerk told her blandly that the minstrel was with his lord and would not be free that day, but that a message could be left at his lodging, and Carys was appeased. It was not until after she and Deri had finished their late-afternoon performance that she began to wonder why the clerk had not told her where Telor lodged. And then Deri discovered that Telor’s quarterstaff was gone.

  “Could he not even say us fare well?” Carys whispered, tears hanging in her lower lids and magnifying the splendor of her eyes.

  “Stay here!” Deri ordered as he tore off his old garments and dragged on the new. “Swear you will bide here until I return.”

  “Where are you going? When will you come back?”

  “I am going to Lord William’s house,” Deri replied. “I promise I will tell you if I go elsewhere. Now do not add more grief to what I bear already. Swear you will stay here until I come back.”

  Carys felt inside herself, but there was nothing but fear and desolation. “I swear.” Her voice trembled. “But they lied to me. They will only lie to you too.”

  Deri did not answer, but he hoped Telor had asked the clerk to tell the truth to his dwarf, and he was partly right. When he came, the guards passed him and the clerk nodded recognition and sent a page up to the solar.

  “Lord William wishes to see you,” the clerk said, and when the page returned, rose, and gestured Deri to follow. “Lord William can speak our tongue, but sometimes prefers to have me change French into English.”

  There was a small fire burning in the hearth, the evening being damp and cool, and sweet-scented wax candles were set about in such numbers that the chamber seemed almost sunlit. Lord William’s chair stood beside the hearth, and he laid aside, on a small table, a book bound between gilded, gem-studded, stiffened leather covers. When they drew close, he gestured the clerk away with a flick of ring-covered fingers.

  Deri had never felt quite the awe for the lords that most common folk felt. His father had not been knighted, but he was rich, his manors worth a knight’s fee and more. Thus, his family mingled more with the lesser knights and minor barons of the neighborhood than with the common folk. Still, when William of Gloucester looked down at him, Deri had to stiffen his legs not to back away and fight with the desire to drop his eyes. He compromised by bowing low; that was only good manners.

  “You are dressed with a richness, my lord dwarf,” Lord William remarked.

  The words were accented and ordered differently from English, but Deri had no difficulty understanding him. “I play many roles, Lord William,” Deri replied, “but when I can be myself, I prefer to dress as well as I can. It is a protection for one of my kind. Perhaps you remember me at Castle Combe, but there I dressed as a decent servant. I wear motley in the town when I drum for a rope dancer—”

  “One very good?” Lord William interrupted, looking interested.

  “A great artist,” Deri confirmed, keeping his manner easy although he did not know whether to weep with relief at having diverted Lord William from himself or shiver with fear for having directed his attention to Carys. It never occurred to him that he could have lied about her artistry; one did not lie with those black eyes watching.

  “Alors, c’est dommage—ah—it is bad that I must be gone from here tomorrow morning early. But you, I think, have come to ask about your…ah…”

  “Friend,” Deri finished, finding that he was arranging the words in the proper order in his head. “But I will listen to news of Telor even if you call him master and me slave.”

  “Then you are a good friend indeed,” Lord William said, one brow rising in sardonic query. But when Deri only went on looking at him expectantly, he shrugged and laughed. “I will tell you, if you will tell me what happened at Marston.”

  “Did not Telor tell you, my lord?”

  “He told me what was important for my purposes—” Lord William laughed again. “And to be honest, for his. The rest was not important, and I was busy and did not ask. But now I have an idle hour, and I think the tale will amuse me.”

  Deri tried desperately to think of what parts, if any, he should expurgate from
their adventures and decided that the only thing he would not mention was the attack on the men-at-arms. Thus, he told all that had happened to them, except that incident, as exactly as he remembered it from their brush with the outlaws beyond Malmsbury to their settling in the cookshop. Here and there Lord William inserted a question, but mostly he just listened with an amused smile on his face.

  “Now that is an epic your Telor should put into song,” Lord William exclaimed. “All he need do is change himself to a knight and the rope dancer—I assume it is the same rope dancer you drum for in the town?—into a highborn, delicate demoiselle.”

  “I cannot see a highborn, delicate demoiselle climbing roofs and—”

  Lord William’s lips curled. “Not delicate, no, and about climbing I do not know, but as for cutting throats…Let that go. You want to hear about Telor. He came and told me of the taking of Marston by Orin. I made inquiries and discovered that Orin is not a renegade but was directed to take Creklade—and Lechlade too, except that I was settled here.”

  The amusement that had lingered in Lord William’s face disappeared suddenly. He turned his head a trifle and looked toward the south where Faringdon lay. Deri shivered inside, even though Lord William’s icy rage was not directed at him.

  “Our honorable king,” Lord William spat, “will claim that he had not the faintest notion that these curs were sent out to rape the land. Oh, no. That is why they play renegades, so our precious King Stephen’s good name will not be sullied.”

  “That is why I play a ‘fool’ in motley,” Deri muttered. “One of those overran my father’s land. There were nine of us, and only I lived because they wished to play with me. But I am strong, my lord, and I fought them until they left me for dead.”

  Lord William took a deep breath. “We will get this one at least. Would you like a part to play?”

  “Oh, my lord,” Deri breathed, going down on his knees. “Tell me what—” He stopped abruptly and tears filled his eyes. “I cannot,” he said dully. “Telor has called in the life debt I owe him and has demanded that I protect Carys—the rope dancer. She would be alone if both of us die, and for a woman alone…She is a good girl, my lord, a great artist, not a whore or a thief.” He gnawed on his lip. “But if I can think of a way to make her safe—may I come to you? My lord, I can climb and tumble and crush a man’s throat between my hands and kill a man as far as an arrow shot with my sling. I am not useless because I have short legs.”

  “If you can free yourself from your obligation and find me,” Lord William agreed, rather amused, “you may come, and I will use you.”

  “Thank you! Oh, thank you, my lord.”

  “Come, come, get up,” Lord William gestured, and Deri rose from his knees. “I promised to tell you about Telor, and it is growing late. Having, as I said, made inquiries about Orin, I arranged for Orin’s ‘master’ to send him more displaced men, among whom is Michael the woodcarver. He should have arrived in Marston village by now, but he will have to find his own way into the manor. It should not be difficult. Probably there are work parties that go up to the manor from the village.”

  “Did he have tools for woodcarving?” Deri asked.

  “How should I know?” Lord William frowned. “It is not important. He can say he lost his tools when his village was overrun. All he will need is a knife.”

  “Yes, my lord,” Deri agreed hastily. “I thank you for everything.” And he bowed low, thanking God as Lord William gestured him away.

  Deri realized he had been stupid to ask Lord William that question. He knew Telor’s woodcarving tools had been left in Marston. Deri knew that no knife could be used for the work Telor needed to do—to cut a thin line down a thick, hardened beam and conceal that cut—and Telor would know it much better than he, of course. What Deri feared was that Telor was counting on finding his tools in Marston. He kept telling himself as he walked down the stairs that Telor would not have been such a fool, but he still felt he must find tools and get them to Telor before the minstrel got into the manor. Deri was barely able to stop long enough to tell the clerk his name and that Lord William had given permission to approach to be given some duty with regard to taking Marston Manor at any time.

  Most of his mind was given to trying to remember a shop that might carry tools for woodworking, and he finally got what he thought might be needed. He paid far too much, but he did not care and hurried back to the cookshop. With the tools in hand, Deri was able to think, but after considering one excuse or lie after another, he realized that Carys would believe nothing but the truth.

  Deri cursed himself roundly for having promised to tell her if he went away; but the promise had been given, and he was sure that she would have rushed off to Marston or into some other trouble if he simply disappeared. All he could think of was that he would have to knock her unconscious and tie her up if she insisted on accompanying him.

  He found Carys in the yard of the cookshop on her knees with her arms raised, her eyes turned up to the moon, and tears streaming down her face. “What are you doing?” he asked.

  “The Lady will not speak to me,” Carys sobbed. “I was so sure, but now…Oh, where is he, Deri? Is he already in Marston?”

  “No, I think not.” Deri said, answering her last and most urgent question and scarcely aware of her strange first sentence because of his tearing need to be gone to get the tools to Telor. “Come, get up and help me saddle my horse,” he urged, “and try to be calm and believe that Telor is not in any immediate danger.”

  “They are not fighting now?” she asked, jumping to her feet.

  “No, nor will be tomorrow,” Deri answered, “because Lord William is leaving tomorrow morning, I think to gather men from Marston’s neighbors. He does not expect Telor to get into Marston until tomorrow, and Telor will need that night and perhaps the next to weaken the gate bars so they will burst at the first touch of the ram.”

  Carys’s hand clutched Deri’s shoulder so hard that he drew in his breath and pulled her hand away. “Do not cripple me, girl,” he protested.

  “You mean that he will not try to kill Orin before he works on the bars?” she asked, not seeming to have heard his complaint.

  “I am sure he will try to keep his word to Lord William,” Deri told her.

  She slumped back down to the ground as if her legs had gone weak, looked back up at the moon again, and whispered something Deri could not make out—not that he cared, except to hope she was not becoming moon-kissed under the load of fear.

  “Carys!” he said sharply, pulling at her. “Help me saddle a horse.”

  Now when her eyes turned to his they were sensible and calm. “Why?” she asked as she got to her feet again.

  Deri repeated what Telor had promised to do for Lord William, and his own need—useless as he was sure it was—to carry tools to Telor. He then hurried on to assure her he would be back the next morning, hoping to stave off arguments about why she should carry the tools instead or go with him, but none came. Carys only cocked her head oddly, as if listening for a very faint sound, and then nodded.

  “Get the saddle,” she said, and when he brought it and flung it onto the back of the horse he used, she caught it and straightened the straps for him and said, “How can Lord William be sure Telor will be able to get into Marston?”

  So while he saddled the horse and went to change into the hauberk of the man-at-arms, he recounted his conversation with Lord William, forgetting in his hurry and anxiety to expunge the part that concerned his promise to Telor and his eagerness to be part of the taking of Marston until he heard Carys draw a sharp breath.

  “I did not mean that, Carys,” he said. “I was only caught up in my own memories. Orin is nothing to me. I hardly knew Eurion.”

  Carys shook her head. “No, no,” she said urgently, “you must be there. Listen, Deri, if you say that Telor will try to keep his word to Lord William and weaken the bars that hold the gate, there is a good chance that he will not try to kill Orin before the a
ttack takes place. That means that there is at least a chance that you will be able to get inside Marston to help him. One man alone can be surrounded by three, but two, back to back, can make a strong defense. You have armor and a sword. The men-at-arms, Lord William’s and whatever other lord’s men are sent, the men from the town, all have friends and companions who will do what they can for each other. No one will know Telor or care whether he lives or dies. You must be there if you can.”

  “But I promised Telor—”

  “I do not need you, Deri,” Carys said, “Telor does. Never mind what he told you about a woman alone. I am no longer a filthy girl in a torn and faded dancing dress who would be driven from any town she tried to enter as a thief or a whore. I have good clothes and horses and money. I can be a merchant’s apprentice or a burgher’s widow or anything else I like until I find people with whom I can work. Do not fear for me. Besides, if you are with Telor, very likely you will both be safe. I feel that.”

  Deri rubbed his forehead so hard the skin whitened under the pressure and then remained reddened. “I am torn apart,” he groaned. “Will you swear to me you will stay safe here?”

  “Do not make me promise that,” Carys pleaded. “I beg you to trust me not to make trouble. I will gladly swear that I will not try to force my way or sneak my way into Marston alone. Will that content you?”

  It did not content him, yet his fear that he was only looking for excuses to leave Telor to die was so strong that he could not speak. He snatched up the sword and belt and turned away. Carys ran after him.

  “Have a care for yourself, Deri,” she whispered, bending to kiss his cheek. “You are my friend, my only friend. I need you too.”

  Chapter 21

  The moon was full and gave sufficient light to ride at a decent pace, but Deri dared not drive the animal faster than a trot. He was not accustomed to riding so large a mount and feared that if it stumbled, he would be thrown.