Hoodsman: Queens and Widows

by Smith, Skye

  "It's March, and I have never seen a cloud that black before. Let's get down off this ridge, though, in case there is lightening."

  "Forget lightening, let's get down off this ridge before we are blown off it."

  Black cross turned onto a sheep's track that went diagonally down the slope. He pointed down the east side of the ridge that they had been stumbling along since they had passed the Tor. "There, did you see it. That is the reflection of a fire."

  The other men stopped to look, but saw nothing. They shielded their eyes from the dust that was being blown off the edge of the ridge. They walked a little further down the sheep track to be out of the dust.

  "There it is again."

  "I saw it too. Make for it. If they can have a fire there must be shelter. These winds are getting worse.” and just then the wind stopped, and with it stopped the great farting noises.

  And then the mist swirled in. "Take a good look at where this track goes, cause we may not get another bearing until this mist lifts.” They walked single file down the sheep track. The mist got thicker, and the air colder, and then colder still. Eventually there was just the four of them and nothing else. They were alone and lost in a sea of mist.

  "For Christ’s sake, look at your arms.” The men all held their arms up and one whimpered. The mist was turning to ice on their sleeves. Their damp woolen cloaks were getting heavier and heavier.

  The man in front slipped and screamed as he fell, though he did not fall far, it was just that he could not stop himself from falling, and could not tell how far down was the ground. "The bloody grass is turning to ice.” he said trying to get to his feet, but his boots were now caking in ice.

  The man behind him tried to help him to his feet, but then he slipped too. The track was ice, and the slope was steep, and he could get no purchase. He fell over the first man and rolled down the slope and then felt himself falling in air, and then felt his back break as he hit the ragged floor of the sink hole. He screamed in agony and then passed out from the pain.

  * * * * *

  Only four of Alan's five groups were at the glade. Alan was watching the sky. They were all watching the sky except for the men in the trees digging a deep grave for the two Normans.

  "Fuckin' ice storm comin', says I,” said Tideswell's thatcher. He spent his life on roofs watching the clouds build. "Dem others better get 'ere fast else they'll be for it."

  "They can take care of themselves,” said Alan unconvincingly. No one that lived in the Peaks took chances with ice storms. "They took the western path past the old mines. It is the longest way to here. They would have seen it before we did. If they can't make it to here they will go to ground."

  "I'm more worried about the children,” said the carter, "They can't have much with them. They fled from a warm house out the back door."

  "Each of them knows the high country. They've helped their grandfather with the sheep for years now. Especially Marion. She runs wild up there in the summer."

  "Well it ain't summer, and she didn't 'ave Norman cocks after her then,” grimaced the thatcher. "Oye, they's come.” There was the clatter of hoofs as horses left the porterway and lurched into the glade.

  The lead man was off his horse before it had stopped. "Did you find the children?” He looked around at the grim faces. "Oh fuck. There's a big storm right on our heels. We raced it down the path. Could be one of them.” No one had to ask what one of them meant. Ice storm. "Get the horses out of the wind and under strong roofs and gather as much firewood as you can. Bloody hell, you lot been sittin' around pickin' yer noses."

  Alan led the man up to the house and told him about the death of the two guards. "They weren't the normal guards. The carter swears they were two of the men from Britta's house. Something is not as it seems. It has me worried.” There was a fire pit in the center of the house and a hole in the roof above it to let the smoke out. Men were in the rafters tying old oil cloths across it so that the freezing rain and wind would not blow in. Other men, under instructions from the thatcher, had dragged long poles in from the outside and were using them to prop up the longest rafter spans.

  "I hope that holds the roof,” the thatcher said looking up. "I've seen big ice clouds before, but this one is so tall that it has brought night two hours early. Those poor children."

  * * * * *

  An icy gust woke Marion from her daze. She looked around and for the first time realized where she was. Hugh's summer camp. "What are we doing sitting out here in the cold,” she yelled to the two men and a boy huddled in their cloaks trying to keep warm. She stood and walked to them and shook each one.

  "Get moving, all of you, get moving. There is a big storm nearly upon us. Drag the fire into the inner cave, quickly, before the ice mist puts it out."

  "What mist?” asked John, but by poking his head out of his cloak he realized how cold the air was. Marion had jumped up and was dragging burning branches along this half cave and through a natural cleft in the rocks and into some kind of inner cave. He joined her in the doing. The other two grabbed packs and cloaks and armfuls of dried wood and followed them.

  The inner cave was just as cold now, but they could heat it with the fire. It had but a small entrance, which angled up to the peak of the roof and became an exit for the smoke. She ducked out of sight through a half door on the other side of the cave and came back rolling round boulders which she put around the fire. She kept repeating this until there were twenty small round boulders surrounding the fire. "Now throw more fuel on and heat those stones,” she ordered. "Don't stand up. There is too much smoke. Stay low else you will choke."

  The inner cave was warming now. John was busy fetching all the dry wood from outside and bringing it in. He had a coughing fit and then remembered to duck low as soon as he entered.

  She went to the end of the cave and shifted a flat rock that was lying on the floor. It slid aside with a crunching noise from the tiny round stones beneath it.. She reached in and pulled out a cooking cauldron, and then a few food sacks. Her cousin walked over and lifted the cauldron and took it outside to fill it with water in the drip pool.

  The cave was getting warm enough that their cloaks were making mist. Her cousin came back hauling the much heavier filled cauldron, and he stamped his feet and shook himself. "It's an ice storm all right.” Ducked down he could not move the cauldron, but John leaned across to him and lifted it onto a flat stone inside the fire ring.

  Marion put the lid on the cauldron to make the water boil more quickly. Then she spat on one of the small boulders. Her spittle hissed and hopped and sizzled. She went back to the storage hole and pulled out some sheep’s tallow candles. These she lit in the fire and then took them through the half door. When she returned she was rolling more round boulders, and then she used sticks to roll one of the boulders from the fire, now sizzling hot, back through the half door. Her cousin helped her. When they had exchanged all the hot boulders with cold ones she announced, "the sauna is ready".

  They all followed her through the half height entrance, though John was forced to crawl, not duck, to get through. The candle light reflected around the white stone of the curved walls of the sauna cave. Families for a hundred generations had carved out, improved, and used this small domed cave. The hot boulders were in the center, and woven mats carpeted the floor closer to the walls. Marion dropped the doorway skin that would seal out the chilling cold.

  No smoke was allowed in this cave other than clean burning candles for light, and even they were set on high shelves pegged in the walls. There was no way for smoke to escape this cave. Any smoke would be trapped and eventually would suffocate those inside. Just as any smoke would be trapped, so now was the dry hot air rising around the sizzling boulders. "Get naked,” she ordered, "get dry, and get warm."

  She was the first one naked, but she put her cloak back over her shoulders so she could take her clothes out to the fire cave and suspend them from the laundry lines that were there. The hot smoky air of the fire
cave would not only help to dry the wool, but kill all the vermin that wool attracted. She ducked and went back into the sauna. The still heat of the domed cave was delicious compared to the cold drafts of the fire cave. She hung her cloak on a peg by the door way and raised her arms to let the warm air kiss her skin.

  The three men were now also naked and picking up their clothes to take them out to the fire cave. She looked at them and laughed. "You are all as hard as posts.” John tried to cover his huge dong. She laughed again. "Oh John, I have seen it a hundred times since I was a little girl.

  "You mean since last year when you were a little girl,” snorted John.

  Raynar was now laughing. The warmth surrounding him in this cave was slowly making him feel better. "It is the battle surge that does it. During a fight the blood flows hard and fast, and when the fight is over, it is either spilled on the ground, or it fills your cock. It is normal."

  "If grandfather were here,” laughed the lad, "he would tell us to find some sheep.” He also was starting to feel better.

  "Baaaa,” bleated Marion. She saw the shocked looks the men gave her and she said, almost angrily, "It is the same for women. After a fight they swell between their legs, and become lusty."

  "I know it well,” said Raynar softly, "I have seen women sexually attack men after a battle surge, but this fact is not well known because women rarely fight in blood battles."

  The men put on their cloaks and left to hang their damp clothing in the fire cave. When they returned they told her that the water was boiling. She put her cloak on and went with Raynar to make a meal. "This bag is dried oats, this dried fruit, and this dried meat. None are edible until they have been soaked in hot water. It is not just that they would break your teeth. There is some spoiling when they are dried, and they can make you very sick if they are not boiled first."

  "What kind of meat is it?"

  She looked at him like he had two heads and then spread her arms up and around and said "This is a shepherds cave,” in answer to a fools question. "There is aged cheese as well, but since we have the fire and the hot water, it would be shameful to use it up. The next person caught here by a storm may need it more than us.” She stirred in the dried food, and some dried herbs. "Help me take it inside. It needs to stay warm and steep for an hour. The boulders have enough heat to finish it."

  They had to put the cauldron down in front of the half doorway to push the heavy hanging skin out of the way. Marion shushed him and kept him from raising the skin and motioned him to listen. They could hear John's deep voice.

  "So which of the twin cousins are you?” asked John.

  "You have known me all your life and you do not know."

  "I have known both of you all your lives, and countless times you have fooled me in any of those years,” said John.

  "I must be both now. My mother and aunt will know, and Marion knows, but no one else. It must be our secret, for we were both heirs to different estates. It serves my family better if all others think that we both still live, so I must live for both."

  "Fair enough, and with good reason, but then what do I call you?” asked John.

  "What you always called me when you didn't know which I was.” he rubbed his red hair. "Robin of course."

  Marion swung the skin out of the way, and flashed Raynar a secret smile. "The food will take an hour, so in the meantime I suggest we have a cloak sauna before these boulders cool, and then swap them for hot boulders to last the night."

  They all stood and hung their cloaks from their shoulders, and formed a ring around the boulders. They entwined their arms from shoulder to shoulder and spread their legs so that their feet touched the feet of two others, and then leaned forward. And so they formed a standing ring where none could fall forward and yet all were leaned slightly and comfortably over the heat of the boulders. They flicked their shoulders and the cloaks billowed and enveloped the standing ring in wool to hold in the heat. It was like a tent, with them as the poles.

  Marion was the first to moan. She could feel the cold and the ache leave her joints and she breathed out long and slowly and let her voice hold the musical tone natural to her size. Then Robin, then John, then Raynar, each voiced the tone of their own bodies. The four moaning tones resonated together and another rhythm began, the rhythm of their heart beats within the tones.

  They were all now sweating heavily, dripping with sweat. "Ugh,” Marion took a breath. "Too hot.” As she broke away, the others moved closer to each other to fill in her space and keep the heat in.

  She went naked out to the cool of the fire room. As she suspected, the drip above the drip pool was now pouring with clean icy water. She knew that it was not possible to inch into icy water, so she stepped in fully and the water was so cold against her hot skin that it felt like it was burning her. Immediately and quickly she rubbed her skin hard all over and washed away the grimy sweat. When she could stand the iciness no longer she raced back into the sauna cave.

  As soon as she returned, another went to shower, and when he returned, another, until they all had fresh clean skin and were drying it by standing above the warm boulders. Now the boulders had lost much of their heat and it was time to exchange the used and cooling boulders for the hot ones still in the embers of the dying fire in the fire cave. They all worked together and gossiped happily about how their skin's tingled, and how they had not felt so clean since last summer.

  "I can never do the shower twice,” admitted Marion, "though tradition says that you should do it twice. I don't have the courage for the cold of the second."

  Meanwhile, outside on the ridge, the worst ice storm in years raged across the peaks and layered everything with freezing mist and freezing rain. Branches of trees and bushes double their thicknesses due to the layering of ice, and then snapped under the weight. Everything living thing without shelter, died.

  * * * * *

  Black cross, fell to his knees. He could not go on. The weight of ice coating his cloak was heavier than any armour he had ever worn. The pathway had become like an iced over river. Every stone was slick, every branch was frozen. Anything not under a roof was coated with ice. He was so cold he just wanted to sleep.

  It seemed like he had been walking for hours since the man slipped and fell into the sink, and yet he could still see the broken, dead, dwarf tree that marked the place in his memory. The other men had quit trying to get to the fire light, though they thought they could still see it. They had curled up behind some boulders as much out of the wind as they could and were using their cloaks as roofs.

  He curled up into a ball under his stiff cloak and he closed his eyes.

  * * * * *

  "It's passing now,” said the thatcher, "but there will be no warmth again on this land until we have sun.” He pointed at the closest trees. Branches were twice their normal thickness due to the heavy coating of ice.

  "Thank the widow Hawly from me,” said Alan, "if she had not decided to hold off rethatching until better weather, you would have had paid work in Tideswell, and so you wouldn't be with us now. This roof certainly would have collapsed without your knowledge."

  The house that usually housed at most a dozen had over forty crammed into it. Alan's men, and every porter and traveler from the porterway nearby had sought shelter here. The thatch roof was old, too old, and the rafters were worm eaten. By rights this should have been the last night that this roof stood, but the thatcher had braced it and strengthened it, so that even the tons of ice that now sheathed the thatch did not collapse it.

  "Well, lad, just don't let the men shift that upended bench. It serves as the main post, and without it we will all be crushed."

  It would be a cold night but at least they would survive it. Someone had begun a communal pot and it was bubbling away on coals, while anyone fearing frost bite was sticking their feet towards the same coals. Some of the porters had been in a bad way when they arrived, but the steaming broth was reviving them.

  One thing was almost c
ertain. They would not be moving from this house until the ground ice melted. That could take days, at least in the shadows. Alan sent a prayer to the storm cloud to keep John and Raynar and the children safe.

  * * * * *

  The second set of boulders had cooled so they could be used for other things that just heating the sauna cave. Marion spread out her damp cloak on the mats so that the damp side faced up, and then she used two sticks to roll a boulder up and down the cloak. The smell was pungent and the men begged her not to stink up the inner cave where they would be sleeping. She pushed the boulder back to the center of the cave, then borrowed Robins cloak to wear into the fire room so that she could keep working at her own cloak. She was not gone long and she returned with her own cloak not only almost dry, but almost vermin free.

  She warmed herself a little and then put her own cloak on and went to dry Robin's, and then Raynar's and finally John's. Now she was exhausted. Now she could sleep. Now hopefully she would not dream of her brother falling to his death simply because he was trying to make the Norman let her go. She took John's cloak back into the inner cave.

  The men were all asleep. The howls of the wind had abated but had been replaced by the snoring of men. The cave was starting to cool but she was too sleepy to roll small boulders around any more. John was sharing Raynar's cloak and it barely covered them. She prodded John so that he would roll away from Raynar, and then she draped the cleaned cloak over him. She curled into the warm space between them that he had left.

  Raynar whispered, "How is the storm doing,"

  "It is calming now,” she whispered back as she pulled her cloak about her and got comfortable. "but everything is covered in ice. We are stuck here until it melts. Was the storm keeping you awake?"

  "No, my mind is keeping me awake. Something is wrong and I can't put my finger on it. It worries me that there were seven men on the ridge, but only six trailed you from your house."

  "How is my mother?"

  That was the other thing that was wrong. Marion had just lost her uncle and her brother, and now how was he supposed to tell her that she had also lost her mother. "She sent us to protect you children. We've made a mess of it so far. I'm sorry."