Children of Clun

by Robert Nicholls

  The eyes of two horses, two scrawny boys, Brenton LeGros and half a dozen gnomish looking old men all turned on him, as expectantly as the eyes of a flock of chickens might turn on an approaching axe man. Had it not been for Brenton’s and Tom’s presences, Gwilym might have thought he’d stumbled onto a meeting of ghosts who’d been caught out, patiently waiting for All Hallows Eve nightfall. And in a sense, he had.

  When he left the clearing, half an hour later, however, all thoughts of ghosts had left his mind. He had, under his arm, a small stack of sticks, given him by Wild Jack Sorespot (“For the bonefire, Mister. Best not go back empty-handed.”). He also had a renewed sense of purpose in his walk. And best of all, he had a revived belief in his capacity to make a difference for his family.

  * * * *

  On the walls of the castle the all-seeing steward, Samuel Rowe, directed the soldiers to their places. The advice he’d received from Sir Roland Lenthall was that, against all odds, there might still be some formidable vigour in the Plant Owain. Not enough, one would guess, to besiege the castle, as Glyndwr had done in years past. But perhaps enough to slip up on an unready force. And it being All Hallows Eve, with most of the village in darkness and all attention focussed on the bonefire, no night would be better suited to such a devious attack.

  Rowe’s instructions to the defending soldiers were simple and, he was sure, equally devious. Stay low – make yourselves inconspicuous – keep your eyes open. The plan was for Clun Castle to be the most inviting target possible. The rebels would come in; but they would not leave.

  From concealed positions, his small contingent of knights, and new, young soldiers like Eustace and Rhodri, watched the industry in the village below. The boys thought back to the spine-tingling, childhood thrill of All Hallows Eve. The great roar and crackle of the fire, the heaving of bones into its midst, the leap of shadows – the terrible chilling awareness that ghosts might be hovering at one’s elbow. The old year and the new, summer and winter, the living and the dead – all bumping away at one another. Endings and beginnings.

  From their peepholes, many of the soldiers could see the commanding figure of Gwilym, the reeve, moving between groups. They saw him point to the woods and to the castle, place hands on shoulders and send people scurrying off at skedaddle pace. Eustace and Rhodri, who knew him, smiled with admiration for the man’s sense of authority and decisiveness. A strong reeve makes for a strong village. If the thought of demons, or even of Madeleine and Annie locked in the high tower, gave them any sense of unease, they managed to hide it very, very well.

  * * * *

  The sun stepped down the sky, peeping like a thief under carts and squinting through the narrowest cracks in walls. Perhaps it was hoping to winkle out a witch or surprise a hellish wraith wrenching itself between worlds. But just by looking, of course, the sun drives such shadows away. What it did find was secreted soldiers. Soldiers chatting softly in warmed corners of the stone work. Soldiers examining their swords. Soldiers oiling the workings of crossbows. And it caught glimpses of Samuel Rowe, moving about the castle. Had the clouds and the horizon not spoiled its view, it would surely have admired how methodical and assured his movements were, like those of a mouse checking for the hundredth time the many chambers of its burrow.

  He circled the wall, criss-crossed the bailey, peered out of windows and inspected latches. As castle steward, there was nothing about the structure that he didn’t know intimately and feel responsible for. In his most secret of hearts, he felt as though the castle was his own. Indeed, when no nobility was in residence – and there rarely was a need for anyone since Glyndwr had been scoured from the Marches – it was his own! Its care and maintenance were his obsession and his life.

  It was not, however, his first obsession. That honour went to the long dead Thomas FitzAlan, the 12th Earl of Arundel. In Rowe’s view, that man had been the best – and the last of any worth – in the great founding family. If allegiance could be equated to love, then Samuel Rowe loved the departed Earl. Like a very fine dog that would die in its master’s defence – like a son who would stand true at his father’s side – such was Samuel Rowe’s feeling for Thomas FitzAlan. It happened sometimes, in a reverie of loneliness and ale that Rowe would conjure up conversations with the Earl. And during those phantom visits, Rowe took the liberty – a liberty he would never have taken in real life – of addressing Thomas by his Christian name.

  “Thomas,” he would say to his ghostly visitor, “how are things progressing in Sussex? How is it with your great castle at Arundel?” And Thomas would say, “Well enough, Samuel. Though I’ve been meaning to ask your advice on . . . ” And they would discuss the proper methods of storing wine, new ideas for transporting water through the kitchens, the difficulty of finding honest labour amongst the artisans or any of a thousand other details of castle life.

  Rowe never felt the need, as he sat by his fire, toasting the shimmering figure opposite him, to speak of his own loyalty or of his unceasing attention to the care of Clun Castle. The work that he had done would be obvious to a man of Thomas’ intelligence. The Earl – Thomas – would be aware of Rowe’s struggle (not altogether successful) to minimise the castle’s decay. He would see that Rowe held firm against the indolence of stiff-necked peasants; that, despite the ravages of plague and famine and war and time, Clun Castle was surviving in the capable hands of its steward.

  Eleven years had passed in this manner. Eleven years since the earl, in the flesh, had visited the castle. And of course he would never come again, having fallen victim to King Henry’s French war. Rowe did his best to forget that Thomas’ sister, Lady Margaret was what the FitzAlan dynasty in Clun had come to. She and her ranting, arrogant little knight of a husband! What a mercy it was that they found visits to Clun so unendurable!

  Clun. Once it had been the sun around which men of planetary importance revolved! When, he asked himself, had it become such a dim little comet, receding in a pale sky? How had his own life, his work, his dedication, his loyalty . . . his love . . . become so . . . insignificant . . . so by-passed?

  In truth, Rowe was thrilled at the thought of Glyndwr rising again! The last time he’d raided into Shropshire, after all, in 1410, Thomas and Rowe had fought like father and son! Together, they’d beaten the Welsh ghost at his own game. Though, devil that he was, he’d escaped that one last time. And despite the huge rewards on his head, he’d never been seen again. Until now.

  On this All Hallows Eve, Rowe wrestled fiercely with all his pent-up fantasies and delusions. They battered at the inside of his mind, lifting him one moment, leaving him agitated, worn and spent the next! One moment, he was simply a clerk, taking care of business. The next, he was the last falcon, defending its eyrie; the sole undamaged fox, facing the hounds at the entrance to its den; the one wolf left unslaughtered, crying out in a forest that had turned against it; a boy with a last chance to please a diffident father.

  * * * *

  The night set in, cold and still. The darkness was thick as pudding. The moon would rise but, unless the cloud cover passed, its light would be wasted. In both village and castle, small meals were eaten, drinks were taken and hearth fires were knocked apart. Heat from stone and flesh began to bleed away. Owls glided down without a breath of sound, snatching up mice from the fields and the sedges. Bats soared overhead, rolling their black eyes, savouring the limitless choice of the sky.

  The soldiers on the wall groaned stiffly to their feet to peep out at the forest. Unseen, the watchers in the forest, yawned, stretched, popped their joints and sniffed the darkness. In between, the peasants shivered and wondered what the night would bring. Even the smallest sounds cracked through the darkness, sharp and quick as knives. The bonefire remained unlit.

  And yet, things were progressing! Inside the castle, at the lowest level, Jeremy and Jenny Talbot whispered their old reminiscences and he unfolded, like a chestnut from its husk, the shiny kernel of his plan.

  High above, Madele
ine and Anwen lay down on thin blankets and stared at the torchlight that shone steadily under their door, as mesmerising as a frozen lightning bolt! They knew that, when Maude had come earlier in the day, their door had been unguarded. Now, the occasional creak of leather and a croaking cough told them that their guard had returned. But Susan had not come to them with their supper. And the chamber pots were hazardously full. And the night was cold.

  In the chamber of Sir Roland and Lady Margaret, Susan lay on her mattress groaning more out of self-pity than out of misery for the looseness of her guts. She would have liked someone to pay her some attention – give her a chance to milk her discomfort. But Roland never paid her any mind at the best of times. And Lady Margaret was already distracted with the job of cinching her husband into his armour.

  He stood stiff and resolute, his eyes focussed beyond the walls, while she moved about him, clucking over the straps and buckles, chattering about the coming confrontation.

  “I do hope this can be resolved tonight! Really, we’ve had quite enough of this Glyndwr chap in past years, without him – (raise your arm a little for me, dear) – without him showing up on our doorstep again – (take the weight of this for me, dear, I can’t seem to – oh, yes! There it is.) And what are we to do with these dreadful Scottish people now that we’ve discovered who they – (Oh dear! There’s a spot of rust here! Must take this straight back to the armourer when we get home!) What was I saying? Oh yes, the Scottish people. Send them off with a jolly unfriendly escort, I should think! Straight back over the border with them. And a note to the king in London! Or better yet, have them escorted to London. Make jolly fine prisoners. Might make her father . . . whatshisname, that Douglas fellow, think twice about his cheeky raiding parties in the north if his daughter was locked away in the tower! Yes indeedy! Do you really think they’ve managed to make contact with this Glyndwr chap, dear? I suppose that would explain his sudden re-appearance. After all these years. Hoping to stir up trouble in the Marches! Tsk! That’s certainly what they’re up to! Distract the king from his conquest of France. And very pleased with themselves, they’d be, I don’t doubt! I expect those awful peasant girls have been the go-betweens, just as you thought. Quite probably the whole of Clun village would like nothing better than to rid itself of proper authorities. What an awful place! Really! I can’t wait to get home. I assure you I shall never think about this wretched little village again! And imagine! All this trouble being stirred up just at the same time as the Lady Joan de Beaufort, of all people, decides to travel! Goodness! What an awful coincidence! Imagine if a young lady such as her was to fall into their hands! (Can you lift your foot a little for me, dear?) I mean, how would it look? The king’s niece, for Heaven’s sake! I mean, she’s only a niece by marriage, but still . . . ! I suppose that de Coucy fellow will claim the credit for keeping her safe! Once this is over with, I mean. I do imagine he’d fancy a place in the court in London as a reward. Be better than being master of some nasty little village in remotest France. Jolly handsome fellow that! Though I don’t really fancy French people. Altogether too . . . French, somehow.”

  She stepped back a little to assess the results of her labour. “Oh yes!” she smiled, knocking with her knuckles on Sir Roland’s iron chest. “Very nice! Very . . . imposing!”

  To Sir Roland, his wife’s chattering had sounded like this: “Resolve tonight . . . Scottish people . . . escort to London . . . prisoners . . . Tower . . . trouble in the Marches . . . proper authorities . . . Joan de Beaufort . . . king’s niece . . . keep her safe . . . place in London . . . reward . . . better than a nasty little remote village.”

  To that moment, he had not decided what to do about Mary Gordon (or Elizabeth Douglas or whoever she was) other than to mew her up. But somehow, an idea – an idea that might very possibly bring him some benefit – seemed to be lurking at the edge of his consciousness. He had clanked halfway out the door when he heard Margaret say, “Oops! Forgot your sword, dear.”

  Chapter 31 – The Night is Young

  Partly to distract her from her continuous sniffling and sobbing, and partly out of curiosity, Perceval de Coucy, Marie and Lady Joan, encouraged Maude to talk.

  “Tell us how the village will celebrate All Hallows Eve!” Marie suggested, All Hallows being a celebration that was peculiar to England, Scotland and Wales. “Is it true that we may see the dead walking amongst us?”

  Even Lady Joan, whose experience of the celebration was limited to castles in Somerset and in London, was eager to hear how things happened in the remote rural west. For instance, there was the huge pile of fuel assembled on the common.

  “Oh yes!” Maude’s spirits began to lift immediately. She’d been in the castle for a week now and had become thoroughly disoriented about time. “All Hallows Eve!” She wiped her nose on her sleeve. “The bonefire’s wonderful! It’s lit the minute the sun goes down!”

  She skipped to the darkened window. Maybe, in the light of the blaze, she’d be able to pick out people she knew – the very next best thing to actually being there! But the darkness in the village was as absolute as that of a raven’s wing.

  “That’s funny!” she said. “Usually it gets goin’ straight away! An’ the celebrations start! There’s dancin’ an’ singin’ an’ games an’ bobbin’ for apples! I wonder why it’s not goin’!”

  The three aristocrats crowded around her to look out. Perceval knew that a few torches continued to burn within the castle – in the bailey, in halls and in rooms such as their own. But no light – not even the light of stars – gave a hint of the village’s presence. It might as well have been at the bottom of a fathomless sea.

  Perceval rubbed his jaw thoughtfully while the three girls gazed in wonder. Then, “Gather your cloaks, mes petites!” he said. “We will go out on the curtain wall. Perhaps some explanation can be heard.”

  * * * *

  Down in the village, the stillness, the darkness and the silence all deepened. A deathwatch beetle, boring into the heart of a tree could not have seemed more cut off from the world.

  The villagers left their tallow and rush candles unlit and they damped down their hearth fires until only embers remained, smouldering like resentment beneath a coating of ash. At a point, Silent Richard of Wrexham and the other wizened members of the Plant Owain emerged from the forest, nodding grimly as they joined the villagers.

  Amongst the people of Clun, there was no love for the followers of Glyndwr. But, curiously, neither was there any antagonism. For them, the years of struggle, though costly at the time, were already a matter of history. And if the outcome had been different – if Glyndwr rather than King Henry had prevailed – they knew that little would be different in their lives. English – Welsh; the people of the Marches were as much one as the other. The victor got the spoils and, either way, Clun and its people would be part of the spoils.

  In the alehouse one tallow candle burned, hung high and masked with a linen shroud. Beneath its faint light, Silent Richard and a dozen men of the village had gathered, joined by, as the door swung closed, Jack Sorespot and Roger Ringworm who were determined to play their parts in whatever was to come.

  Quieter than a whisper, Jack slid to the front of the group to stand, his weight centred on his undamaged leg, at Richard’s elbow. Gently, Richard drew him around in front, making him a prop to lean on. Perhaps it was that gesture, coupled with the imposing presence of the reeve, that made Jack realise for the first time how old and enfeebled the Children of Owain had become.

  Owain himself had stayed behind at the monastery, desperate but unable to rise for one more confrontation in his beloved Marches. The potion sent by Myfanwy had somewhat relieved the agony that haunted his insides and he had slept long. But they’d all known that a day’s journey through the forest to Clun, even if made on horseback, would be the end of him. Tom/Maredydd had stayed in the valley with Owain, as had most of the others whose agues, swollen joints or croups made the journey too onerous.

 
; Richard had quietly attached himself to the end of the line of walkers. In part, it was his way of atoning for his impulsive declaration to Sirs Cyril and Angus, without which Annie and Madeleine would likely be free in their village and the priory would still be a safe refuge. Also he knew that Jeremy’s plan – to single-handedly invade Clun Castle – could not have been any loonier, more unlikely or more dangerous. It had occurred to Richard that his old friend might be seeking an escape for himself rather than for the girls – escape from a slow decline like the one that had held Brother Bones so long in his pew – and Richard was resolute. If Jeremy was to fall, Richard of Wrexham would fall beside him.

  Richard, a man unknown to the villagers, cleared his throat to address them. In the year that Jack had known Richard, he’d seen only the quiet, unobtrusive man whose deepest thoughts were mumbled to fish jigged out of forest streams. The assurance and authority of the soldier who spoke now was completely unfamiliar.

  “All of us men,” Richard said, “villagers and forest dwellers alike – the women folk, too – we’ve lived through hard times. We seen war an’ plague an’ famine aplenty. Some folk’ud say our lives was too little an’ unimportant to’ve mattered in such times. Some’ud not even’ve noticed we was ‘ere, botherin’ ‘round the feet o’the great ones with their great causes. But we are here, us! The wind don’ blow us away! The great ones don’ sweep us away. Ye know? There’s great trees in the forest, but it ain’ a forest at all wi’out the rest o’ the trees ‘n’ bushes ‘n’ saplin’s ‘n’ all! That’s all of us! All the little folk that everythin’ depends on. We’re the true forest!”

  A low growl seemed to emanate from the crowd; a growl whose tone Jack couldn’t properly assess.