by Euan McAllen
‘I’m from the Castle.’
‘I know that. Tell me who you are, and if you lie I’ll push this knife slowly into your eye.’
Mozak was about to pass out. He only just managed to speak his name.
‘Mozak, Prince Mozak.’
Mozak hoped that this announcement - that he was a prince - might somehow this persuade this madman to show him a little courtesy, a little respect. It seemed to work: Iedazimus withdrew his knife to a safe distance and loosened his grip on the prince. The prince has a twin! he thought. Suddenly everything changed. Iedazimus wanted to sit down.
‘What are you doing here? Have you been expelled, like your father?’
‘No!’
‘Then why are you here in this God forsaken dump?’
‘Looking for someone, a friend. Came looking for a friend.’
‘Looking for a friend? Tell me more. Convince me you’re telling the truth.’
‘I’m making nothing up. He went missing, a few weeks ago, a month. I decided to come and find him, rescue him if he was in trouble.’
‘Who? Who is this man?’
‘Foccinni.’
So Gregory wasn’t lying then, thought Iedazimus. He’s here, somewhere. Why hasn’t Gregory produced him yet? Delay tactics? Is he dead? Iedazimus decided to say nothing: just watch, see what game Gregory was playing. He turned his thoughts back to his captive prince. He put away the knife.
‘You can go.’
‘What?’ Mozak was thrown by the sudden, almost nonchalant u-turn.
‘You can go. I said you can go. Now piss off.’
As if snapping out of a dream - a nightmare - Mozak did exactly that. He retreated in full flight back down the stairs, almost falling over himself in his haste; to stop halfway, confused. He wanted to head on back up, all the way up to the top, to claim his prize, but looking up at the fierce face glaring down at him he realized that was not an option. He continued back on down and out; to catch his breath; to watch for the mad man to leave. When he did - soon after - Mozak went back inside, now even more desperate to jump into bed with a girl - the girl he had just paid for: the youngest in the house, the brothel keeper had promised him.
***
Timothy, stretched out on his bed like a bruised and battered soldier, suddenly awoke from a bad dream. His body twitched, as if it had been tugged sharply back into life. Despite the period of deep sleep he still felt shattered. He looked up towards the bright daylight: the girl Esmeralda was standing in the doorway, half in, half out of the room; like she was stuck, unable to make her mind up. She looked like she really wanted to talk. She looked like she wanted his help. She looked like all sorts of things. Timothy sat up and made an offer.
‘Come in if you want.’
She did want, and in she came; to stand with her hands folded neatly behind her back, like a small child who was waiting for the lesson to start, or who had just been told off - or found out.
‘You don’t look good,’ she admitted out loud.
‘I don’t feel good.’
Without asking she plonked herself down on the adjacent bed, leaned back and stretched her legs out before her. Timothy watched her as she looked around the room as if searching for changes. He was happy to watch while the weight of his gloom spread across the room towards her. It was infectious and in no time she too was downcast. Sad boys were dull, dreary, no fun to be with. They gave her nothing. They just wanted to kiss.
As they sat in self-imposed, leaden silence, so the world outside drifted away, and their presumptions about how they should conduct themselves melted away: they became children again; children on the edge of irreversible, mind boggling transformation, the kind which would leave them in a state of dizziness for years. It was like they both wanted to take three steps back and start again - but second time round better informed. There was the acceptance that the world out there was there to crush them, eat them up and spit them out. They both wanted to talk themselves up, and out, out back into the sunlight, but the talking took time to take hold. It only started because Esmeralda noticed the smell.
‘You smell,’ she said. ‘We have a bath,’ she quickly added, wishing to be helpful - and realizing her mistake.
‘I’ve been outdoors for days, many days.’
The girl was right, Timothy admitted to himself. I must have a bath.
And when the talking finally took off the girl got him to talk when she wanted to listen. And she got to talk when she wanted him to listen. They had stories to swap; experiences, fears and fantasies to share - if not now then later. Timothy wanted to impress her, but not to be seen doing so. He wanted her to pity him, but not openly, not to his face. Esmeralda wanted to turn him inside out; see the inside, lay it bare. She wanted him to treat her as his equal even if she could not match him for words.
Curled up in her own arms she hugged every word Timothy spoke, as if to extract all its juice, its warmth, its context. He was new, so fresh. She saw no imperfections beneath the dirty clothes, the greasy hair, the smell. The buzzing of a fly could not distract them, nor the distant sound of cold metal thrashing hot metal to within an inch of its life.
They revealed experiences - some never shared before with anyone - in random fragments, like slices of fresh cream cake followed by nasty lumps of steamed cabbage; random swaps at first, until each found their momentum and spoke at length, having hooked the audience. They remained on their separate beds, never closing the gap. The space made it easier to be intimate, to lower their defences. She was a big girl. He was a big boy. There had to be a gap: both understood that.
Esmeralda was delicate - a delicate child or a delicate girl or a delicious young woman, thought Timothy. He could not decide, but he would have, later if not now, and before the time came when he was desperate to fuck her. Right now, he just wanted her to be his friend, no strings attached. Instinctively, he knew he needed a friend in this place. Gregory - also Valadino - did not count: he was imposed, from above. Timothy wanted to make his own friends in life. And even at this early age, he could appreciate the benefits of a relationship with a member of the opposite sex which did not involve sex. They truly listened when you talked. ‘Sex means war’ he had been taught at the Monastery - and many times, too many times. God was always looking over his shoulder and God demanded the highest standards. He had no issue with that. He told her how, on the outside, he had trained to be a monk, but had thrown it all in, to come home, to the Village.
‘That’s why your hair is so short, you’re a monk?’
‘Yes. No, was. I was a monk.’
‘Your home is the Village?
‘Yes. This is where my parents lived. Dead now.’
Parents. Esmeralda did not want to talk about parents. She fingered the blanket upon which she sat and listened patiently to Timothy as he told her what little he knew about his. Try as she might she could add nothing to their story.
‘How did they die?’
‘Don’t know. He - Gregory - won’t tell me, says I don’t need to know, says it was just bad luck, a bad accident. Perhaps they got lost in the maze.’
‘My aunt might know. Or the Village Elders.’
‘Village Elders? They run things round here?’
‘Definitely. They know everything.’
‘How do I talk to them?’
‘You don’t. They talk to you, when they want to talk to you, when the time is right.’
‘How will I know when the time is right?’
‘They send for you. I can put a request in for you, for an audience?’
‘Yes please.’
‘You are here to stay then, forever?’
‘Possibly. Probably.’
Timothy told her of his daring escapades, his close calls, his brushes with the law, the monastic law, the secret police
. Esmeralda was invigorated. She squeezed herself into submission. Secret police, he said. What did that mean? If they were secret how did he know about them? Timothy explained how after much soul-searching he had decided to quit the Order. He wanted to be a warrior (for God he added as an afterthought), on the move; not a monk, stuck indoors, living life to a carefully laid out plan and timetable. That Esmeralda could understand. She had spent too much of her life stuck indoors. ‘Soul-searching’, he had said: she wished she knew how to search her own soul. It was buried deep within somewhere: she had to find it, let it out, let it see the light of day.
Esmeralda could not match him for content. She had led a simple, sheltered life in one place - this place - growing up under the protection and reluctance of the Breamstons. She revealed that she had been adopted; that the Breamstons were her foster parents; that her mother was dead, and that there was no father. She wanted those facts out the way without any fuss. But still Timothy had to ask her what happened to her mother. She didn’t know, she confessed. Just that she was dead and buried. Quoting her aunt Rosamund directly she said ‘her mother had abandoned her because she could not cope, didn’t have the strength’. With that outburst Timothy saw her visibly shrink. He left it at that. He didn’t want her to self-destruct - not on his watch. But in an instant she fought back and threw off her bad thoughts, insisting that Timothy tell her more about the strange place he called the ‘Monastery’.
‘The Monastery? It rules us out there. Between them the Monastery and God decide everything, dictate everything. I was raised inside its walls, within the sight of God. Do you have God here?’
‘Sometimes. Somewhere.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘We have the church.’
‘Just the one?’
Esmeralda looked surprised. ‘Of course. Why would we need two?’
‘Is it full?’
‘Full?’
‘Full of people, for worship.’
‘On every sixth day it is, sometimes.’ She jumped back to her original question. ‘What is a monastery like? Is it like a church?’
Timothy smiled at her innocence.
‘It’s nothing like a church. It’s massive, beyond comprehension. It’s a self-contained universe, all powerful. It answers to no one - except the Chief Monk - and he reports to his superior.’
‘God?’
‘God no! The Chief Monk of all the monasteries.’
Timothy could see he was making a big impression so carried on at full throttle.
‘It sits on a hill, watching over us, watching all of us, making sure we are living clean lives, close to God.’
‘And did you?’
‘Did I what?’
‘Did you live a clean life?’
‘Yes!’ he shouted and kicked out at her but she was beyond reach.
He wanted to say no.
‘How many are there?’
‘Monasteries? I’m not sure.’ Timothy tried to tick them off inside his head.
‘Six. Maybe more.’
‘What did you do in there?’
‘Study. Meditation. Prayer. Physical labour.’
‘What labour?’
‘Farming duties. Domestic chores. Gardening. Building works. Just about anything. Anything except play - and playing jokes. It wasn’t all just about exercising the brain - thank God.’
‘Did you enjoy it?’
For the first time there was an almighty pause. Timothy took a long time to answer.
‘No. Can’t say I did if I’m honest. But enjoyment was never the point.’
He turned the tables.
‘What’s it like in here? You’ve always lived here, in the Village right?’
She responded without hesitation. ‘Boring. Nothing happens.’
Timothy wanted to slap her on the knee. ‘Well I’m here now!’
She laughed. He laughed, until struck by a sudden question - a big question.
‘How come you know Gregory, my guardian?’
‘He’s my friend, watched me grow up. Got Breamston to take me in. He visits - sometimes on my birthday.’ She thought of the presents he had given her over the years. The Breamstons had never given her presents - nothing except an extra portion of pie or chicken breast.
Timothy interrupted her rapidly wandering thoughts. ‘Why?’
‘Why what?’
‘Why would he do that?’
‘He knew my mother.’
‘He’s a good man Gregory. He’s looked after me.’
‘And me,’ insisted Esmeralda, not wishing to be left out.
Suddenly, without warning, they had bonded. Timothy wanted to close the gap, but before he could they were interrupted by Mutz who wanted to know what was going on.
‘None of your business,’ snapped Timothy as Esmeralda rushed out of the room.
***
Mozak buttoned up his tunic and took one last, almost wistful look at the body he had just enjoyed before leaving the room. He crept slowly back down the stairs, on the lookout for the village crazy. He froze and held his breath: someone was lurking on the landing below, sitting on the stairs, blocking his escape route. He had a weapon in his hand. Mozak gripped the handle of his blade: this time he would fight back; he would not submit; he would not take shit. The man, on hearing his footsteps, struggled to his feet, using the banister to steady himself. He gripped a walking stick in the other hand. Mozak breathed easy. It was not the crazy. The man showed his face. He had a bruised eye.
‘Foccinni!’
‘Royal Highness.’
‘Where the hell have you been! And what happened to your face?’
‘Slight accident.’
‘Someone hit you?’
‘Yes. Argument. Difference of opinion.’
‘And the stick?’
‘Snapped my ankle. That’s why I couldn’t get back. Sorry.’
‘I came looking. I was worried. Thought you might be dead.’
Mozak couldn’t actually remember if he had been worried, but it sounded like the right thing to say. He looked down. Foccinni had his left ankle heavily strapped.
‘Come on, in here.’
Foccinni beckoned his prince to follow him into his room, explaining he was renting it while convalescing - lest there be any misunderstanding. Like an old, worn out man he lowered himself into his chair, holding on to his stick like it was a trophy, like they could never be separated. Mozak took the bed.
‘Why did you come here?’
‘To look for you, of course.’
‘Not a good idea. It’s dangerous - really dangerous if they find out who you are.’
‘They already have.’
‘Who!’
Foccinni’s face screwed up as he accidentally put too much pressure on his bad foot and his protesting ankle sent a shot of pain back up to his brain.
‘I don’t know. Some local crazy grabbed me earlier. He knew Timothy.’
‘Wait, what? Who’s Timothy?’
‘I think he’s my twin.’
There, he had finally admitted it to himself and he felt slightly better for it, even though if it were true, things would get a lot worse.
Foccinni went pale. ‘Oh no. No no no.’
Mozak suddenly perked up. ‘He’s not my twin then?’
‘He looked just like you? An exact copy?’
‘Yes, except for the hair - very short hair.’
Foccinni stared at the wall opposite, gripped by the most uncomfortable thoughts.
‘Well? Is he? Talk to me Foccinni. I’m your prince remember.’
‘How did you find this Timothy?’
‘He found me. I met his friend, an older man, your age.’ Suddenly Mozak s
aw the resemblance and nearly had a fit. ‘He’s your brother! Foccinni you have a brother, right? Don’t lie to me.’
‘Yes he’s my brother.’
‘He lives here in the village?’
‘No, outside.’
‘Inside?’
‘No Outside.’
Inside or Outside: for Mozak the labels ceased to make sense.
‘Outside.’ Mozak paused to reflect. ‘People actually live out there? He lives out there?’
‘Of course.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me this before? I would have kept it secret.’
Foccinni looked at Mozak, trying to think of an answer which would not hurt.
‘Some family secrets are best kept secret.’
‘What’s going on. Tell me. You have to tell me.’
Foccinni looked Mozak right in the eye, forcing him to calm down before he would say more. Mozak held his breath. Something bad was coming his way.
‘You did - do - have a twin brother. It was said he was killed at birth. But obviously not.’
Mozak collapsed back on to the bed, shell-shocked, yet again.
Bastard, thought Foccinni. Why didn’t he tell me? He kept it from me all these years. Bastard.
‘She said I had no twin. Ugly rumours she said, nothing more.’ Mozak sounded like he had been punctured.
‘She lied. Sorry.’
Foccinni wanted to reach out, and console his young friend, but he was incapable of moving right now. He too was suffering from sudden shock. (It was now a room full of wounded warriors nursing burning resentments - the kind which were too hot to touch.)
‘My mother, the queen, lied to her own son.’
‘They do that I’m sorry to say: kings and queens have to tell a lot of lies in their line of work.’
Foccinni wasn’t sure if that comment had helped or not.
‘Why not tell me?’ pleaded Mozak.
‘Believe me, there were all sorts of reasons for no one to know. The monarchy can be a brutal thing sometimes, even to its own family.’
‘And he’s been living here, in the village, all this time?’
‘Looks that way. Although-’
‘What?’
‘Short cut hair you say?’