Navarin, Thunder and Shade

by William Stafford

  “Nothing, I swear!” The youth looked honest enough and sounded in earnest - but eyes and ears may be deceived, the watchman knew from bitter experience. “Please!”

  “This!” said the stallholder, exhibiting the purse.

  “I retrieved it from the thief,” said Broad. “And I gave it straight back.”

  “Lies!” said the stallholder.

  “Hmm,” said the watchman. He stroked his beard and looked from the youth to the fat man and back again. “You have your money - it is all there, I take it?”

  “Seems to be,” admitted the trader.

  “Then there is no harm done. Back to your business - all of you!”

  “But-”

  “But nothing,” said the watchman. “You have left your stall unattended. You had best hurry back before it is stripped bare.”

  The crowd dispersed quickly - no doubt to return to the marketplace in advance of the fat man. The watchman remained in the alley, watching them all go, then he turned to the youth.

  “I haven’t seen you around here before.”

  “I haven’t been around here before,” said Broad. “You are going to let me go on my way, sir?”

  The watchman looked him up and down again. “You’re strong. And you went after the thief, you say?”

  “It’s true, sir!”

  The watchman seemed to come to a decision. He nodded to himself. “How would you like a job, young man? We could do with your sort in the watch.”

  “I don’t know,” said Broad.

  “It’s got to be better than roaming the streets,” said the watchman.

  “What would I have to do?”

  “Roam the streets.”

  “Oh.”

  “You’ll be paid, of course. And accommodated in a bunk above the lockup.”

  Broad’s empty stomach made the decision for him. “All right, then.”

  “Good lad. I’m Dugger.”

  “Broad Shoulders.”

  “Yes, lad, they certainly are.”

  ***

  The lockup overlooked the market square. Dugger’s guided tour did not take long at all. There were two cells, divided by floor-to-ceiling iron bars, with a man in each. There was a desk where a watchman was slouched, with his boots on a ledger and there was a rickety staircase leading to the upper floor where straw pallets were laid beneath the eaves. Broad counted four. For a town the size of Grimswyck, the watch was certainly understaffed.

  “This one’s yours,” Dugger kicked a mattress. “There’s a bucket in the corner for - you know.”

  Broad nodded in appreciation. It was certainly an upgrade from sleeping in a ditch.

  “You’ll get a coron per shift, plus extra on public holidays - which you have to work, of course - and well, there are tips.”

  “Like ‘Don’t stand too near the bars’?”

  “No, more like the crooks will offer you money for additional services.”

  Broad frowned; he didn’t like the sound of that.

  “Oh,” Dugger laughed, catching his expression, “I mean things like if they want an extra slice of bread, they will pay. Or if they have a visitor and they’d like a chair. Little things like that to make their stay more comfortable and our pockets a little heavier.”

  “And is that acceptable?”

  “Of course! Look, this is a dangerous job we do, and the Duke doesn’t pay us very well. It’s not dishonest, if that’s what’s worrying you.”

  Broad was unconvinced.

  “What are they in for?”

  “Who?”

  “The men downstairs. Who are they?”

  “Cutthroats, footpads... Bad men, lad. But they won’t be with us for long.”

  “Oh?”

  “Hangings are set for tomorrow. Another reason to make things as comfortable as we can. We don’t want any trouble. A man can kick up a storm when it’s his last night.”

  “Oh. And we have to attend the...”

  “Yes. Double pay.”

  “Oh.”

  Their attention was caught by the cries of a child, coming from the ground floor. High, piercing cries that would have made a nail pause in its progress across a slate and put its fingers in its ears.

  “What the-” Dugger winced. He hurried down the stairs to see what could be done to put a stop to the awful din. Broad followed and was greeted by the sight of a grizzled, middle-aged man with flecks of white in his moustache and a helpless, embarrassed expression, holding a small boy, the source of the abominable racket.

  The watchman who had been dozing at the desk was on his feet and wide awake, yelling at the man to quiet the child. In their cells, the condemned men were complaining about the interruption to their last night of sleep. It was outrageous, they protested, and displayed an utter lack of respect for their plight. They had an early start in the morning, don’t you know?

  Dugger joined the fray, adding his voice to the general hubbub. The child - a boy, Broad determined - outdid the rest of them put together in terms of volume and lung capacity, until the youth approached and said in a calm, even tone, “Hello.”

  Instantly, the boy was silent. He stared at Broad with interest as though confronted by a new toy he didn’t know how to play with. It took a good few seconds for the men to cease their shouting with Dugger being the last to cotton on. His voice trailed off.

  “It’s my daughter,” Glenward explained.

  “She looks like a boy,” said Broad.

  “No; the boy started shrieking when my daughter went missing. We were supposed to meet in the marketplace but that was over an hour ago.”

  Glenward gave the watchmen Gonda’s description. Broad perked up to think that a girl around his age was potentially in peril. It would be good to save somebody for a change.

  The boy held out his arms to Broad and clenched and unclenched his hands.

  “He wants you to take him,” said Glenward, handing over the boy before Broad could think. “He likes you.”

  Tiggy nestled his nose against the youth’s neck and went to sleep. Dugger and the other watchman, a fellow by the name of Stran, went out to look for the girl, leaving their newest recruit to keep an eye on the condemned men.

  “We don’t need babysitting,” sneered one of the felons.

  “Be quiet!” Broad whispered urgently. “Or do you want to set this little one screaming again?”

  The condemned men decided this was the opposite of what they wanted for their final night in the land of the living and returned to their bunks.

  Glenward sat at the desk while Broad walked Tiggy around the room, gently patting his back.

  “He’s not mine,” said the gooseherd. “I think you should know that from the start. My daughter - Gonda-”

  Broad’s face fell.

  “Oh, no!” Glenward said quickly. “My Gonda’s a good girl. Well, she was, until she ran off with the lad.”

  “She kidnapped him?” Broad thought this was perhaps worse than being an unmarried mother.

  “Well, not exactly. She saved him from a house fire.”

  “Oh. That was brave of her. But then she kept him?”

  “There’s more to it than that,” said Glenward. “You wouldn’t understand.”

  “Oh? I’d give it a go.”

  “There were people chasing her. From our village. But they’re all dead now.”

  “Go on.”

  “But the thing is they all died at Tullen Spee.”

  “I’ve heard that name before,” puzzled Broad. “What of it?”

  “Some say the place is bewitched,” said Glenward with sideways glances. “When I was a boy there was this goose.”

  Broad listened to the tale of the goose out of politeness more
than anything else. When the older man had finished, the youth attempted to piece together a string of current events. “So, you think these men who died at Tullen Spee - have they come back? Have they taken your daughter?”

  Glenward looked shocked. “No, I’m not saying that. I hadn’t even thought - No; those men are gone. Our travelling companion put paid to them once and for all.”

  “Who?”

  “Big fellow,” Glenward’s hand measured the air. “One-eyed. Name of-”

  “Lughor!”

  “You know him?”

  “You could say that,” said Broad. “I pissed in his face once.”

  “And yet you’re alive!”

  “I know!” Broad laughed. “My arms are getting tired.” He lay Tiggy on the desk. The boy did not stir.

  “You have a way with him,” said Glenward. “Just like Gonda. You’d like her. If you ever meet her. She-” He stopped himself; it was too upsetting. The youth placed a hand on the gooseherd’s shoulder.

  “I’m sure she’ll be all right,” he smiled. Glenward nodded, as though to convince himself.

  “So,” said Broad, “where is Lughor now?”

  “I know not,” said Glenward. “He went in search of rooms for the night. When I told him Gonda was missing, he stormed off in a huff. Perhaps if we had all stuck together-”

  “Perhaps you’re better off without him,” Broad suggested.

  “Perhaps. Although I had rather a fellow like that was on my side.”

  “Perhaps.” Broad glanced at the ceiling. “Look, why don’t you go and rest upstairs. Take my bed - the one by the window. I’ll keep an eye on the boy.”

  “You’re a good lad.” Glenward got to his feet and shook the good lad’s hand. Wearily, he climbed the stairs. Broad waited until he heard the gooseherd snoring and then, checking the boy was still fast asleep, opened the ring.

  “You took your time,” said Shade. He peered around at their surroundings and found them wanting. “I thought we were going to the palace. Has the Duke fallen on hard times?”

  “This is not the palace.”

  Shade gave him a withering, ‘no kidding’ look. He floated over to the iron bars and peered through at the sleeping criminals. “Well now, what have we here?”

  “They’re to be hanged in the morning. Please don’t wake them.”

  Shade chuckled. “Wake them? Oh, my dear friend, that’s the opposite of what I shall do.”

  Fourteen

  Lughor was furious. Having secured a couple of rooms in a half-decent hostelry, he had returned to the appointed place in the market square at the appointed time, only to be informed by the gooseherd that the goose girl had gone astray. The child - the malgrim - had proceeded to shriek its head off like a banshee having a nightmare. It was more than the warrior could take.

  The gooseherd, through shouting over the boy’s cries and a series of gestures, had indicated he was going to enlist the help of the watch. Lughor had been unable to talk him out of it and gave up trying.

  And so they had parted company. Lughor returned to the inn where he now sat scowling behind a foaming flagon, daring someone - anyone! - to look at him the wrong way and he would slaughter everyone in the place.

  No.

  He must restrain himself and contain the murderous rage that too often took over his actions, shedding blood and ending lives left, right and centre, with no compunction, no control. It was like being possessed by an evil spirit. Or hypnotised by a wicked wizard. Lughor - the real Lughor - could only watch as though from a distance as his body swung sword, axe and anything else it could get its hands on in homicidal frenzy until everyone around him was dead, and he would snap out of it, sober and sickened by what he had done.

  Not me, he had to keep telling himself, lest the guilt hurl him into suicidal anguish. It’s not me who does these terrible things.

  It was the curse.

  And, while the one who cursed him still lived, he was doomed to massacre innocent souls.

  The wizard who had given him the pendant must have sensed the curse he was under. But had the gift been a way to ameliorate his circumstances by making the wearer invulnerable? Or to compound his misery by keeping him alive so he would kill and kill again?

  If our paths ever cross, wizard, I shall ask you. Lughor glared at the froth on his ale. Right before I sever your spine, I mean.

  And what of the one who cursed me?

  I sense I am close and there will be a reckoning.

  He drained the flagon in one thirsty but unappreciative gulp. Wary eyes watched him from every direction. Slowly, Lughor got to his feet, returning the stares. He strode to the bar and slapped the counter.

  “Drinks all round!” he declared.

  Perhaps there was something to celebrate after all.

  ***

  In his youth, he had been a man of peace and had only joined the army for want of anything else to do. Encouraged by his widowed father who said it was a chance to escape the dead-end hamlet of Trysp in which he had been born, a chance to see something of the world and, above all, a chance to help people for, with no one to fight, the army was nothing but a task force, travelling from place to place, damming rivers, mending bridges, and clearing up after disasters.

  Lughor’s dragoon settled in the village of Bram, making their billets in the barn of a hospitable farmer’s widow. They were there to resurface the main (and only) thoroughfare running through the middle of the settlement and extend it to link with the Great Lane of the North. The project would bring fresh opportunity to the tiny village, new trade and new growth.

  Lughor fell in love at first sight of the farmer’s young widow, a comely wench with coal-black hair and eyes to match, but he was far too shy to make the first move. Eventually, out of sheer exasperation, she gave up dropping handkerchiefs in his path and threw a bucket of pig slops over his uniform.

  “Whoops! Oh, dear!” she laughed and it was like music. “You’ll have to come indoors so I can clean you up.”

  Within seconds she had his clothes off him and was scrubbing them in a wooden bucket while he sat shivering - more from nervousness than cold - listening to her sing.

  “Have a name, do you, soldier?” she looked at him through wayward tresses, which she attempted to blow away from her face.

  “Lu - Lughor,” he stammered, his face, neck and chest flushing red.

  “Hello, Lughor,” she dipped into a curtsey. “This is where you’re supposed to ask my name.”

  “Um - ah-” He found he was unable to string two syllables together, so flummoxed was he by her beauty.

  “You may call me Callie,” she beamed and it was like a bolt through his heart. She handed him back his tunic and mail shirt, and pretended to avert her eyes while he put them on.

  “Th - thank you, Callie.”

  Things became easier after that. She was always there to welcome him back after his backbreaking day of toil and, as the other men were quick to point out, always gave him larger portions of the meals the army paid her to prepare.

  Afterwards, he and Callie would stroll around the farm and talk of nothing more taxing than the weather, how it had been and how it looked likely to be, and the turning of the leaves.

  “My favourite time of year,” he said. “All the colours are so vibrant and alive.”

  “And yet everything is dying,” she observed. “I think it’s very sad.”

  “Not dying,” he countered. “Just preparing to be renewed, to live again.”

  “Oh,” she said. “I like that. That’s much better.”

  For weeks they walked side by side. He did not dare to take her hand or link her arm, and the sunsets became earlier and earlier each day, and the air grew chillier by degrees.

  “You are going to kiss me, I hope?” she
asked one night when they arrived back at the barn.

  “Would you like that?”

  “I should hate it more than anything!” she gasped. And then she laughed to see how crestfallen he was.

  “I shall,” he said. “Soon.”

  She reached up and touched his face. “Do not keep me waiting too long, my handsome soldier.”

  He stood transfixed, watching her slink back to the farmhouse, with the warmth of her touch increasing the more he thought of it.

  His entry to the barn gave rise to an outburst of cheers and jeers. The other soldiers made salacious comments and cast aspersions on Lughor’s manhood. What was he waiting for, they wanted to know? The girl was practically begging for it. She was offering herself on a platter. And everybody knows what these farmers’ widows are like. It’s the isolation; it gets to them, makes them randy.

  Lughor was appalled. He shoved his way through to his bunk, giving rise to more laughter, and pulled the rough blanket over his head.

  The new road was nearing completion. In a couple of days, the dragoon would pack up and move on to their next project in another district. And still the young soldier and the farmer’s widow had not kissed.

  Callie carried a lantern for their final walk around the farm. He spoke of the road and how pleased everyone was, how it would transform the lives of everyone in the village.

  “Change is not always for the better,” she pouted. “It is the last night of October and the autumn is at its end.”

  “I know,” he said. He didn’t know what else to say or how else to behave. It fell to her to take charge.

  “Come to the house,” she said. “I have something to share with you.”

  He made no answer so she took his hand - the heat, the luxurious heat! - and pulled him through the door.

  “A drink,” she offered. “One last drink before you go.”

  She set the lantern on the table. It replicated itself in her eyes as she set out a goblet and a knife on the tablecloth. Lughor sat stock still, rigid with fear and desire at the same time.

  “Tonight is the night.” Her voice was soft and low. “Please close your eyes.”

  He did as he was told, expecting at any second the press of her luscious lips against his own.