Warlord oc-4

by Angus Donald

  ‘Hal’s daughter Sally is with child, or so they tell me,’ my lovely girl said, as if she were merely making idle conversation. But even then I knew her better than that. I merely grunted through a mouthful of half-chewed pork and waited for her next sortie.

  Sparks crackled and leapt from the bonfire, the music skirled through the darkness and the drums thumped on. We watched the ring of dancers break apart and reform as the spokes of a wheel, their left hands joined in the centre, their faces flushed and smiling.

  ‘And Aggie the Miller’s wife has just had twins — two beautiful boys.’

  ‘What happy news,’ I said, in a carefully neutral tone.

  The circle had formed again, but now a young man and a girl were dancing together, nimbly, in the centre of the ring. The love between the young couple was almost visible, and they moved like one creature, arms linked, toes pointed in perfect symmetry, eyes fixed on the other’s face.

  ‘And little Daisy Johnson is to be married next week,’ she said. ‘To William the Thatcher, of all people — he must be thirty years old if he’s a day! Twice her age!’

  ‘He’s a good man, a skilled craftsman, and a kind one. She will be well provided for in William’s house-’

  Goody snapped: ‘The Devil take you, Alan Dale — why are you being so difficult about all this?’

  ‘You know why, my darling,’ I said calmly.

  ‘One mad, unhappy woman utters a stream of pure moon-addled gibberish, nothing but hateful, hurtful ranting, and you take that as a reason not to fulfil your lawful promise to marry me and give me babies! You are scared of her, Alan, aren’t you? You’re frightened. Admit it. You — the big, tough, fighting man — are scared of her silly threats.’

  I was stung, and an angry retort sprang to my lips. But I managed to swallow it, something that I had failed to do on several occasions in the past few months. Besides, Goody was right: when I looked into my heart, I realized that a part of me was frightened of Nur’s curse. When she had burst into our betrothal feast the year before, she had uttered these words: ‘ I curse you, Alan Dale, I curse you and your milky whore! Your sour-cream bride will die a year and a day after you take her to your marriage bed — and her first-born child shall die, too, in screaming agony.’

  The words had burned themselves into my brain: and if Goody did not fear the curse, I knew, deep in my unreasoning heart, that I did.

  ‘We have not heard from that poor crazed woman for months now: there has been no sign of her at all since you returned,’ Goody continued. ‘She has likely gone away or curled up in a hole and died — she cannot hurt us, my love. Her words of hate have no power over us. Let us be married, and soon. And then in a while Miles shall have a playmate! And you will have an heir, a little Alan. Would that not please you, my love?’

  Goody spent most of her days at Westbury with Marie-Anne, and while a wet-nurse, a plump, plain village girl called Ada, tended to Miles’s basic needs, feeding him and changing his soiled napkins, the two gentlewomen, my betrothed and Robin’s wife, seemed to spend an inordinate amount of time clucking and fussing over the baby, playing with him, cuddling him. I could not understand it — he was a fairly pleasant infant, to be sure, with the correct number of fingers, toes and the like. But he did not seem to do anything except feed or cry or sleep. I was bewildered by Miles’s ability to enthral the household females. Occasionally I would lean over his basket and examine him, to see if I could discover the source of his fascination, always without the slightest success.

  Goody was staring at me expectantly: and I realized that I would have to come to some decision on this matter.

  I cleared my throat to give me time to think.

  While the threat of Goody’s death a year after the day of our marriage alarmed me, I realized that my girl might have a good point. We had neither seen nor heard anything from Nur in the three months that I had been at Westbury. As Goody said, it was entirely possible that the Hag of Hallamshire, as she was sometimes known in these parts, might well have abandoned her feud with us and gone away. I looked into Goody’s lovely pink-and-white face, and made my choice.

  ‘My love,’ I said, ‘you know that it is my deepest desire to wed you, to take you into my bed and to fill your belly with a child. God knows, it is not a lack of regard for you that has restrained me thus far. You are entirely right, my angel, until now I have gone in fear of the curse — but no longer. I will make this pact with you: if we have heard nothing from Nur by Christmas Day, if she is truly gone from our lives, we shall make our plans to marry next Easter, with all the pomp we can muster: a lavish event, attended by every great person of our acquaintance, that will set the whole county a-twitter. I will take you as my bride the first Sunday after Easter, and to my bed that night. Would that please you, my darling?’

  Goody made no verbal reply, but she gave a secret smile, leaned into me, and kissed me deeply on the lips, her hot little pink tongue flickering into my mouth. Suddenly, it seemed to me that Easter was a lifetime away.

  Robin came to stay with us at Westbury late that summer, a week or so after Lammas. He arrived with his dunderheaded squire Gilbert and a hundred men — many of whom were old comrades of mine — in a cloud of dust and shouts and laughter. My lord was in high spirits, bronzed by the French sun, and very happy to be able to spend a day or so with his wife and children before resuming the fight. I had given orders to Baldwin to set up the guest hall the moment the message arrived about his visit, with a private solar at the eastern end that was to be entirely at their disposal for the length of his stay. And Robin’s men were housed in a scatter of huts and stables around the courtyard.

  My lord had been raising troops in Yorkshire and Wales following the resumption of hostilities in Normandy between King Richard and King Philip, and he came bearing an invitation to me to rejoin the struggle at his side.

  ‘You’re getting fat, Alan,’ was Robin’s impolite and quite inaccurate observation. ‘You’d better get back into the saddle and bring your soft, bloated body south with me. A sharp bit of action would do you the world of good!’

  It was then almost a year since I had been pierced by the lance-dagger, a year of very little activity on my part, and yet, perhaps strangely, I felt not the slightest urge to leave Westbury and take up arms again. In fact, I was still struggling unsuccessfully with my queer malaise at that time — I found it difficult to get out of bed in the morning and had to be chivvied into the daylight long after dawn by Goody or Marie-Anne. It was not helped by the fact that I was still unable to sleep well and, when I did, my dreams were filled with horror.

  Robin had a rendezvous in Portsmouth in a few days’ time with Little John, a company of his Sherwood archers, and the rest of King Richard’s newly raised troops, and this fresh contingent was planning to take ship and assemble in Barfleur by the end of August. ‘You really should come with me, Alan,’ Robin said in a more affectionate tone, as we sat over our wine in the main hall long after the rest of the household had gone to bed. ‘The King has been asking for you: he misses your music, apparently. And you can’t just mope here for the rest of your life. I take it that you are now fit enough for a campaign?’

  I nodded miserably, and it was true: my chest had completely healed, and on the rare occasions that I did my duty by Thomas and engaged him in a lesson in swordcraft or on horseback with the lance, I found that my old skills, so hard won, had not deserted me. It was not my body that was ailing, but my soul. I struggled to explain to Robin the terrors that my night-time mind threw up, the deep currents of rage and fear that washed through me every day; with the only respite an ever-increasing tide of wine in the evening and a few hours of drowned oblivion. It was hard to tell my friend and master of these things: we were men, and warriors, and I hated to admit my weakness to anyone and particularly to someone whom I admired so much. And when I had finally revealed my sorry state to him, I thought I saw pity in his eyes, and that made me feel even worse. I felt a flare of red rage, and
it was only with difficulty that I managed to keep a spew of angry insults behind my teeth.

  ‘I have known several brave men who have been plagued with this condition,’ said Robin softly, perhaps sensing my rage. ‘It is a soul-sickness of a kind that falls on a warrior who has seen too much of the raw face of battle. In each man, the illness and its cure is different. But you are not alone in this suffering, my friend, although I’m sure you must feel that you are. What does Tuck have to say about this matter?’

  I saw then that Robin’s pity was, in truth, compassion.

  ‘Tuck says that I must have sinned greatly, and that God is punishing me — and perhaps he is right, there is much blood on my conscience. The Lord knows I have harvested many souls and not all of them deserved death at my hands. But I have done penance, as Tuck suggested, and prayed until my knees were numb, yet still I cannot find peace.’

  ‘Well, give it time,’ Robin said. ‘And rest here until you feel strong enough to take up arms again. I will say to King Richard that your wounds are not completely healed, which is true, in a way, and while he will miss you — as will I — he will not wish to embarrass us by enquiring further.’

  And then he changed the subject and told me of the doings of our King in France since my return to England. ‘He’s a restless soul, is Richard,’ said Robin. ‘He cannot bear to be in one place for long: we’ve held court at Alencon, Tours, Poitiers, Chinon and Le Mans all in the past six months. Oh, and he has found time to buy a very pretty country estate for himself and his wife Berengaria at Sarthe, near Le Mans — though God knows when he will have the leisure to enjoy it. There is no end in sight for this war, as far as I can tell. The sides are equally matched and neither King will yield territory willingly. Still, it keeps our beloved sovereign happy — and out of mischief!’ Robin grinned wickedly at me, a sliver of silver in his eyes, and I made an effort to smile back.

  ‘Is there any news of Brother Michel?’ I asked. I seldom thought of the Master in the daytime, but he was a regular attendant to my half-dreams in the long hours of night, standing over my bound body and shouting curses.

  ‘None,’ said Robin, with a grimace. ‘I make enquiries, occasionally, but he seems to have completely disappeared. No one has seen hide nor hair of him, anywhere. Even in the far south, apparently.’

  He took a frugal sip of his wine, and looked at me out of the side of his eyes. ‘Your old friend Mercadier is in high royal favour, though.’ An image of that scarred and brutal figure flashed into my mind; the phantom mercenary seemed to be sneering at my weakness. ‘He’s flourishing, in fact, quite the hero of the moment. He and his men have just taken the castle of Issoudun in Berry for the King — and by the way Richard talks about him, you’d think that scar-faced brute was the risen Christ.’

  I shrugged. I did not care for Mercadier, but while I was fairly certain that he had killed Brother Dominic, I could not raise the proper amount of outrage in my heart that this crime warranted. I shrugged again.

  ‘And Prince John is back in favour, too,’ Robin continued. ‘Richard has restored to him the counties of Mortain and Gloucester, and there is talk of making him Richard’s heir. So far, he seems to be behaving himself. But then, after last time, Richard was not so foolish as to grant him possession of any actual castles.’ Robin chuckled. ‘But he can now strut about calling himself the Count of Mortain and the Earl of Gloucester. To be fair, he does seem to have learned his lesson, and there has been no hint yet of disloyalty. But my point is, Alan, we need you in France — our enemies are prospering and growing more powerful. So as soon as you feel able, come south and join us, I beg you.’

  And with that he went to bed. I did not. I sat up late, burning a precious candle and drinking the rest of the wine.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Robin left the next day, and with him went his men-at-arms, Marie-Anne, the two children and Father Tuck, her personal chaplain. I found myself feeling strangely resentful at their departure, and barely managed a civil farewell at the gate. Westbury seemed deserted without them, the courtyard quiet, the hall echoing and empty. Goody wept when her friends left and for some unfathomable reason I felt slightly awkward to be alone with my betrothed.

  After Robin’s departure, I descended into a great, dark melancholy, which did not recede for many long months. My spirits had been temporarily lifted by the presence of hard fighting men and true friends, but when they had gone, I felt their absence like a hole in my soul. I also felt the shame of a coward, a warrior who has heard the trumpet call and refuses it, a man who has, in effect, deserted his comrades in the hour of battle.

  Autumn came, and the ripe apples and pears from the orchard were gathered in, the hedgerows delivered up their purple bounty, and Goody made fools and puddings and crocks of preserves; and in November we slaughtered the pigs and salted the meat for the winter and made long loops of sausages and huge earthenware pots filled with brawn. But none of these normally joyous occasions could bring my soul back from the depths of despair. How Goody put up with me, I do not know: but she did — for a while.

  She and Thomas and Baldwin worked ceaselessly to keep Westbury running smoothly, and myself diverted from my black moods. But sometimes I had had enough of their healthy company and their cheerfulness, even that of my lovely Goody — and I would retire into my chamber with my vielle and bar the door, saying that I wished to compose something special, only emerging after several days, unshaven, hungover, having come up with barely a line or so of bad poetry, to empty my piss-pot and seek more wine. In those dark months, I occasionally even wished that Sir Eustace had ended my life when he stabbed me with the lance-dagger; and one night in December I found myself sitting naked on the end of my bed, shivering with cold and holding my misericorde in both hands, the sharp point resting on the right-hand side, the heart side of my chest, opposite and level with the pink ridge of scar tissue on the left, summoning the courage for one hard final thrust. In the end, I was just too damned cold to kill myself, and merely buried myself under furs and blankets, weeping and swearing that I would do the fatal deed in the morning.

  At dawn, after another sleepless night, I knew that I could not end myself. I was not yet twenty-one years old, and I told myself that I had to hold on, I had to hope that this Devil-sent soul-sickness would lift. I prayed to God, on my knees in that cold, foetid bedchamber, stinking of old wine, ancient sweat and farts, that one day I would regain my joy, and afterwards, after beseeching God to save me from my own despair, I did feel a little better.

  Christmastide came and went; I drank my way through the entire season, sitting for hours alone by the fire in the centre of the hall, and sipping at mug after mug of warmed wine. In truth, I remember little of that time, although I do recall that, even fogged by wine, those short grey days and long tortured nights of late winter seemed to last an eternity. I was dimly aware of the other members of the household continuing with their daily tasks: Baldwin overseeing the demesne as if I were not there, which was true, in one sense, and Thomas exercising Shaitan and taking command of the dozen men-at-arms who now lived with us — once Robin’s men, but now, I dimly assumed, mine. I fed them, anyway, and housed them, and stabled their horses; and Thomas exercised with them and took them hunting on my lands to keep them fit for battle.

  One washed-out morning in March, Goody came to me. I was sitting in my favourite X-shaped chair outside the entrance to the hall, watching the chickens scratch about in the dirt of the courtyard and thinking about a young English servant boy I had murdered in the Holy Land — God forgive me, I had cut his soft, white throat while he was tied and helpless. And, although it was long past dawn, I was still dressed in an old sweat-stained chemise, one that I had been wearing for many days and nights, and I was wrapped in a tattered blanket against the chill and sipping my customary morning mug of wine.

  ‘I’ve had enough,’ Goody said, without preamble, and I blinked up at her like a newly awakened owl. ‘I have been waiting for you to say
something about the matter since before Christmas, and now I’ve had quite enough. I’ve had enough of your moping, your silences, your drunkenness, and your bottomless self-pity. And whether you like it or not we are going to end all that right now. I am holding you to your word: we shall be married at Eastertide. There has been no sign of Nur for nearly a year now, and I will not stand for any further delays. Baldwin and I will make all the arrangements: your job is to pull yourself together and turn up, clean, sober and cheerful, at the church. Do you think you can do that, my darling husband-to-be?’

  I was astounded by the change in my betrothed: her normally loving violet eyes were sparkling like cold blue gemstones, her mouth was a grim line. I knew that she had a fearsome temper, but she had never directed it at me before then. I merely gawped up at her, and then recovered myself enough to dumbly nod.

  Goody reached out and pulled the mug of wine from my unresisting grip. ‘For a start,’ she said, ‘no wine in the mornings. You may have a drop with dinner, if you must, but otherwise you will drink ale, well-watered, like the rest of us before noon. And get yourself to the bath-house, you smell like a month-dead polecat. You are embarrassing yourself, and me, in front of the servants, not to mention your tenants in the village. Go on now, and if you can’t cheer up at least wash up.’

  ‘How dare you-’ I began.

  Goody brought her head closer to mine; her brilliant eyes bored into mine, and she said quietly but in a voice trembling with passion: ‘Alan, my dear, I do love you, but you will do as you are told — do you hear me? I want a real man as a husband, not a sweat-stinking sot and, so help me, I will have one, even if I have to fetch Baldwin and Thomas and some of the men to hold you down while I scrub you sober myself.’