She saw Phaedra, mother of the King, dressed in a dull and shapeless gown with her bare feet peeping beneath its ragged hem. She saw them all. As in a dream, they turned to look at her – at her, and at Atti beside her. The faces ranged themselves in a close semi-circle around the pair of them. The room fell silent. Someone coughed, and a long low hiss came from the fire.
She saw the King.
He sat slumped in a plain wooden chair by the hearth. He was still in his armour but without either crown or helmet. His hair and beard were unkempt. His skin was pale. His gaze was unsteady, as if he were drunk or fevered. Slowly he lifted his head and stared at Atti before him.
Atti looked round, proud in her silks within that circle of eyes.
‘Well?’ she said.
A man in livery cleared his throat. A herald. ‘Lady, thou art charged before Our justice. Thou hast betrayed Us, thy husband. Thou hast committed adultery against Us, which is also treason. It is known to Us that thou hast done this many times.
‘Also, with the traitor Gueronius thou hast now raised rebellion against Us, to whom thou sworest fealty as well as marriage oaths. Thou hast complied in the wrongful seizure of Our house and the murder of Our servants. Thou hast aided and abetted the raising of an army against Us. Thou hast ordered—’
‘Enough,’ said Atti.
The man stopped.
‘Will the King not address me himself?’ Atti said.
The King looked at his Queen. He did not speak. His eyes travelled past her and away to where Melissa stood. Melissa saw the moment when he saw her, with a sudden clarity as if he, too, were living a dream. He looked at her and she looked back. His eyes said, Melissa. What will you say?
Me? thought Melissa.
‘Thou stand’st accused, lady,’ said the herald. ‘Wilt answer nothing?’
Atti bent slightly and peered at the man in the chair. She drew a long breath.
‘Wilt answer nothing, lady?’
‘I answer that your King is dying,’ she said.
Dying! The thought lurched into Melissa’s brain like a monstrous thing. She stared at Ambrose. The way he looked! The way he did not speak! She stepped forward, breathed deeply and – and … (No! Angels, please, no …)
‘He is dying,’ Atti repeated. ‘I can smell it. So can you. His flesh rots. He has a poisoned wound. Look – he is at the edge of delirium. What judgement can he give now?’
It was there, in the air. Among the woodsmoke and the sweat smells there was something else: a foul scent of dark pus that weeps from wounds. That was not a hurt he had had today. That must have been done many days ago. It must have been festering all the while the armies had been marching. Wounds like that did not mend. Melissa knew that. They got worse and worse, and the sufferer went into a fever. And then he would die.
‘Will you kill me, sirs?’ Atti said. ‘It will do you no good. You have already lost, because you are losing your King. Only Gueronius can claim the throne now. You will have to treat with him. Will he be the better pleased with you if my blood is on your hands?’
And the King was still looking at Melissa. Not at Atti, not at the lords and ladies and pages around him whose words seemed to be coming from so far away. He was looking at her as if there were no one else. His eyes were intent, fierce, gripping at her as if she were the last, the very last thing they could hold onto – as if he had been waiting for her a long time, and was still waiting even as his death sickened in his limbs.
‘Why should we send to him?’ a man grumbled. ‘We have the whip hand. Should he not send to us?’
‘Could we trust him to keep his word?’ another said.
‘What does it matter?’ urged Atti. ‘You are the stronger and he knows it. More deaths will achieve nothing.’
‘At Bay I counselled a division of the Kingdom,’ said Padry. ‘Perhaps something along the same lines—’
‘By my blood, no!’ That was the knight of Lackmere, pushing angrily into the middle of the circle. And still the eyes of the King held Melissa, and they said, What will you say?
What can I? she thought. In another time, another place, we could have been … If we had had our years again, and nothing like this had happened! But I’m what I am, you are what you are, and now it’s too late. Don’t you see? What can I say that would change that?
‘… I did not march my people here to see Gueronius crowned!’ The knight of Lackmere was jabbing his finger within inches of the Queen’s face. ‘Nor did I have them spill their blood to put you by his side! And how long would it be before Gueronius grew itchy on his throne, and thought it better to be rid of me?’
‘Gueronius is not caught yet, sir,’ said the Queen coldly. ‘Will you spill blood again tomorrow, for a cause that you know is lost?’
‘After your doings, lady, do you tell me to spare lives? My King is dying, you say. What of it? We have all been dying since the day we were born. My King lives yet. He will live longer than Gueronius, I swear to it!’
For a moment Atti looked back at him. Then she turned to the Lady of Develin. Her voice was still cold, but now it shook slightly. ‘Madam? Will you be counselled in policy thus? By – by a fratricide?’
‘The fratricide speaks well, it seems,’ murmured the Lady of Develin. ‘He may speak for me.’
‘There can be no peace with Gueronius,’ said Lackmere. ‘Nor can there be delay. We shall not send for a surrender! We shall not sit down and wait for Gueronius to starve! When it is light tomorrow we will climb the breach. And I claim the right to lead, since this is my counsel, and I would have Gueronius account for the blood of my father.’
‘Well enough,’ said another lord. ‘But if we offer no quarter it will be a stiff fight indeed.’
Lackmere shrugged. ‘We have a breach, and we have numbers. And tonight we will fashion ladders – as many as we can. I shall send my footmen to climb the wall. We shall come at him from every side.’
The footmen, Melissa, said the eyes of the King.
The footmen! Into her mind jumped the image of Puck, marching eagerly with his fellows in a leather cap and coat, and his silly face pursed up in a howl. And now she understood what they were talking about, even as their King died among them. Puck! Were they going to take him, too? Were they going to take everything? She tore her eyes from Ambrose and looked around her.
‘So tomorrow we begin again,’ said someone.
‘It will be bloody, in the breach,’ said another. ‘And worse still on the walls.’
‘The price must be paid,’ said Lackmere. ‘With the strength he has left, I do not think he can guard all points. We shall have the castle soon enough—’
‘Sir!’ said Melissa.
The word was forced from her by her lungs and heart. She dropped to her knees before the Knight of Lackmere. ‘Sir, please. There’s no call for more of this, is there? You’ve won, haven’t you? Why get more men killed?’
The man turned away as if he had not even heard her.
‘Please, sir! Don’t get them killed! Please!’
‘Angels’ Knees!’ she heard him mutter. ‘Get her off me!’
From behind, an armoured hand grasped at her shoulder. She shook it off and reached out again. She was following Lackmere on her knees, clutching at his armoured leg.
‘Sir, if you must fight, then – then don’t send the footmen! My lord – it isn’t right! What are they? Young boys – that’s all! They don’t know anything. Don’t send them to the wall! They’ll just…’
Eyes all around the room were staring at her. Lackmere had his back to her. Someone in mail was pulling at her arm. ‘Come,’ said a voice in her ear. ‘This is unseemly.’
Unseemly? Melissa did not care. She could see Puck – her Puck – in his leather jacket and little iron helmet, trying to climb a rickety ladder while men shot arrows and dropped stones on him from above, and the walls were painted in blood!
He mustn’t go!
And all the eyes, all the world was watching her. She
felt it. She felt almost as if she had broken into two people, one still Melissa, begging for what Melissa wanted, and one that was another woman, crying to another armoured man for a child Melissa did not know. Her words were coming with a force that startled her. As if they had started from somewhere far away, even before she had been born.
‘Sir, there is one … He is not yours, sir, but I saw him with your men. He brought your father’s message to you. Please, sir, don’t send him!’
The knight looked at her for the first time. And although he did not answer her, she saw a moment’s hesitation in his eye. She fought the arm that dragged her back, and her voice rose.
‘He isn’t yours. He’s … he’s mine. I sent him to you. Don’t make him go tomorrow!’
‘Quiet, damn you!’ said someone, and cuffed her. Her head sang with the blow.
Above her she heard the knight say, ‘I can spare none. I am bidden not to.’
‘Sir!’ she begged. But the knight shook his head. The brief flicker in his face was gone. In agony she cast around for someone who knew her – someone who could speak for her in that room. Atti was looking down at her. Her eyes were very hard and bright. Melissa lifted her hand in appeal.
Then she realized what she had said.
He brought your father’s message. Atti had heard that. And I sent him to you. Atti would guess what that meant. She knew now who it was who had betrayed her; who it was who had been so close to her all the time, and yet had betrayed her in the end. She saw the knowledge settle in Atti’s dark eyes. She saw Atti draw a long breath.
But she did not speak to Melissa. She spoke to the knight, in a voice that was stony and small. ‘Sir? You have heard. Will you not spare even one?’
‘Each will have as good a chance as any. But I may spare none.’
‘Not one? Do you even know the man you condemn, sir?’ said Atti.
‘Lady, I know every face of every man who came with me from Lackmere. Aye, I mind the boy well enough. But if I hold back one, then another must fall in his place. And what shall I say to that one’s sweetheart?’
‘But he isn’t yours!’ Melissa cried again. ‘He’s not! He’s the King’s, if he’s anyone’s—’
The King!
On her knees, Melissa turned to him, arms outstretched. ‘Your Majesty!’
‘That’s enough!’ barked the knight. ‘Get her out of here!’
‘Your Majesty … Once you said you’d do something if I asked …’
The King was still watching her. And as she clutched at his armoured feet and looked up at him, she thought she saw him straining to hear, and that his head even bent towards her a little.
‘Please!’ she shrieked as the men seized her by the arms. ‘Please – let him go!’
She was being dragged, wrestling and thrashing, across the floor. Something hit her on the side of her head. Everything went red-dark for an instant and sparkled with tiny stars. She heard the King cry aloud. When her sight cleared she saw him again.
He had hauled himself forward in his seat, gripping the arms of his chair as if in spasm. Now he was looking at Lackmere. His mouth was open. The room stilled.
Painfully the King lifted his arm. His finger trembled as he held it up. His mouth worked but no sound came.
No one moved. They were holding their breath, all of them, listening to the air that gasped in the King’s throat.
‘One …’ he said to the Knight of Lackmere.
And again: ‘One.’
At last Lackmere bowed. ‘As you command.’
He straightened, and repeated: ‘As Your Majesty commands. The boy may go.’
The wind moaned in the trees. It was as if the whole world had breathed out together at the King’s word.
They carried the fainting man away. Guards clattered out into the night, calling for the surgeon. Others gathered around the Lady of Develin and talked urgently about councils and parliaments. The Knight of Lackmere was speaking of ladders again. Melissa looked up and found Atti standing over her. Her face looked suddenly older, as if the great pain inside her were speaking at last through her eyes.
‘It was you,’ she whispered.
‘Yes,’ said Melissa dully. ‘It was.’
Atti’s mouth was a black slit. She stared at Melissa a moment more and then, as if she could no longer bear to look at her, she turned away.
‘I knew it would be someone,’ she said. ‘It had to be. I never thought it would be you.’
Melissa did not answer.
‘Why?’ asked Atti.
(Why? thought Melissa.)
‘For the King,’ she said.
‘But why?’
‘Don’t you understand?’ cried Melissa. ‘I loved him! Look at me, Atti. Look at me! I loved him! Can’t you see that?’
Atti stood there for a moment, silent, with her back turned. Then she said, ‘I don’t know what you mean.’ And she pushed the rough door-curtain to one side and stepped out into the night. In the glare of the brazier Melissa watched her slowly crossing the courtyard. Men cried aloud. Startled guards tumbled after her, clattering with iron as they hurried to prevent her walking clean away. The last Melissa saw of her was the side of her face, looking over her shoulder as they surrounded her and steered her towards the confines of an animal shed. And the first drops of rain were beginning at last, flashing in the torchlight as they fell singly and hissed in the brazier like arrows shot from the sky.
Melissa crouched by the doorpost, alone and hugging her elbows. No one was paying attention to her. The armoured men had gathered around the Lady of Develin by the hearth. Runners were being sent out with orders – for the storming parties, for ladders to be made, and yes, that a certain hill boy was to be found among the footmen of Lackmere and brought to Manor Gowden before dawn. No one talked yet of what would be done when there was no king in the land.
But as she listened Melissa began to realize that something had changed. They did not sound quite so tired now. It was as if a weight had been lifted from them. As if they could feel at last the glow of the fire on their skin, which had been cold for too long.
‘… No, my lord,’ the lady was saying. ‘You have your tryst with Gueronius in the morning. Be content with that. But the Queen has done no bloody act herself. Surrender her to me, and I shall see that she is held in a convent in my lands where she may do no harm.’
The Knight of Lackmere was frowning. Watching, Melissa sensed again the struggle that had flickered in his eyes as she had pleaded with him for Puck. But his demons had lost their force now.
‘As you wish,’ he said tersely. ‘Who am I to condemn her, after all?’
‘And the Outlanders?’ asked someone else.
‘They shall have their lives, too,’ he said. ‘We will have need of what they know, I think.’
‘Very well.’
The council was breaking up. Men left the room. The Lady of Develin remained in her chair, conferring in low voices with the Knight of Lackmere and Lord Herryce. At the fireside two other men had begun to play a game of chess. Melissa did not know their names. She had not seen them before.
Phaedra emerged from the inner room where Ambrose lay. Her face was tired and drawn, as if she had lost all hope of anything being good again. She came and leaned on the doorpost beside Melissa, looking out into the night and rain. Padry the chancellor saw her. He crossed the room to stand at her elbow.
‘My lady …’ he said in a low voice.
Oh, leave her alone, thought Melissa wearily. Can’t you see how she’s hurting?
‘My lady, there is something I must ask you.’
Phaedra sighed. She looked down at her hands. ‘What is it, Thomas?’
‘You brought him the Tears, when we were at Bay.’
She seemed to think for a moment. Then she whispered, ‘I did.’
‘Why, my lady? For no sooner had you gone than he roused the camp! He had always been for peace. Yet he roused us and led us to a fight that we now know was useless
. Why did you bring them to him? Forgive me but … I must ask.’
She looked at him wearily. ‘You accuse me, Thomas? Of the deaths of thousands, and of my son?’
‘Forgive me. But is it not so?’
‘I brought him the Tears so that he might live, Thomas. I was on my knees to him. You heard me. He would have lived as I live, and as the princes have lived – it is a sort of life, and no sickness, no ageing … Yes, in his last fever I would have poured them down his throat. I would have done it whatever the price!
‘But…’ She drew a long, shaky breath. ‘But he would not drink. Instead he chose this. He led us all to his death, when he knew that the goddess would hear him. Because he guessed that here, in the great eating of sons, there would be the chance to say what he has said. And now the hill boy has been saved by the last command of the King – by the last of the line of Wulfram, who killed the hill prince hostage at the beginning of his reign. She will depart. She is departing now. Don’t you feel it? Already they have begun to spare lives they would have taken without thinking. Because he spoke the word she was waiting for.
‘And her tears will dry. They will dry in the hearts into which they have fallen. Their power is going. They cannot save him any more. Even the princes will grow old and die as men. And only I will remain – because I must take her place.’
‘I see,’ said Padry softly. ‘I see.’
He cleared his throat. ‘I must beg your pardon, my lady. I am – more sorry than I can say.’
‘Yes, be sorry for me,’ she muttered. ‘Be sorry for every mother whose son has died today, or will tomorrow! What right have they to do this to us? But Thomas, Ambrose was no hapless victim. He knew what he did. And I knew that he would. In my heart I think I have known it all his life. Yes, I shall weep. But my tears will not be poison to the world.’
‘Is there anything I can do?’
‘Do?’ she exclaimed. ‘There is nothing you can do!’
She was silent for a moment. Then in a slightly steadier voice she said, ‘Find me someone who can cut stone, if you can.’
‘Stone? Yes. Yes, I – I will try.’
Neither of them said anything more. After a moment the man bowed and stepped out into the rain. Phaedra remained where she was.
The Fatal Child Page 40