by Susan Price
“I need a wife.” He tried to kiss her again, but she ducked her head. “I must have a wife, and tha’rt better than any! Tha’rt big and strong and clever and bonny. Tha’ll be my wedded wife, Entraya, whatever comes.”
By which he meant that, big and strong and clever as she was, he would always grant her the respect and status due to his wife, no matter how many mistresses and bastard children he later acquired. “Per—”
“Our first son shall be called Toorkild—but if first be a girl, I’ll no care. She’ll be my second Elf-May. And after first son, tha canst name others as tha wilt, with Elf-Names.”
Tracey, Sharon and Wayne Sterkarm.
“Not thou or our bairns shall ever be hungry, I swear. I’ll never let thee be hungry.”
No, he would ride instead, steal cattle, and leave someone else hungry behind him.
“There be nowt to fear. I’ll look after thee. I’ll kill anyone who hurts thee.”
“Per—” But it was useless trying to explain to him that she couldn’t stay with him precisely because, when he said he would kill anyone who hurt her, he meant exactly that. “Per, be so kind, wilt ask thy father to spare Elven?”
“Wilt stay?”
“Per—” She started to cry again. “This be no fair!”
He held her tighter and rocked her a little. “Ssh, ssh!” He knew it wasn’t fair, but many things weren’t fair, and if this was what he had to do to make her promise to stay, then he’d do it. Better to get her to give her promise than to steal her swanskin so she couldn’t leave.
She looked up at him and said, “Wouldst thee come and live in Elf-Land?”
In the faint light from the hall, she saw his aghast expression. Then she watched the pretty face that had earned him his nickname turn cold. He said, “They talk of hanging thine Elven from walls.”
She stared into his face, and he looked steadily back. Though his hand stroked her hair at the back of her head, his expression didn’t change. If she didn’t agree to stay with him, he would give her no help in saving the 21st men.
She ducked her head and pressed her face against his chest, hiding from him. She felt him kiss her head. He said, “It will be all right, little bird, all right …”
She was thinking: How had she got into this, and how could she get out of it? She couldn’t seem to untangle the events that had brought her to this moment. At what point could she have turned back, or done otherwise? She could hardly bear to look at what the future held. Was she to watch men, who were guilty of nothing much more than trying to earn a little money, strangling from the tower walls? Was the rest of her life going to be discomfort, squalor and drudgery, without even the consolation of having chosen it for herself?
These couldn’t be her Sterkarms, it couldn’t be her Per, forcing her into this. These must be those murderous, frightening Sterkarms whom she’d always sensed hiding behind the ones she loved.
“Birdie?” Per spoke with difficulty, through a narrowed, painful throat. He knew that what he was doing was wrong, and it made him afraid, but he had to do it. If he didn’t, then his whole life would be spoiled. Everyone at the tower knew he had his eye on the Elf-May, and if he didn’t wed her, then everyone would see him snubbed … He would wed some other may, but she wouldn’t be an Elf-May, she wouldn’t be as beautiful and glamorous, and their children wouldn’t be half Elves. He would spend all the rest of his life in regret, and he had no intention of wasting his energy in doing that. “All will be right, honey cake; I’ll make it right …” He would. If he hurt her now, then he would make it right later. He’d succeed, because he’d try so hard.
She thought: He is so naive. Lifting her head, she said, “If I stay … if I wed thee … dost promise tha’ll get thine father to free Elven?”
He drew a breath and held it. “Entraya, if tha’ll stay, I’ll do my all, but—Daddy might say, ‘Nay.’”
She slid her arms up and around his neck. “Not if thou asks him.”
“Mammy’ll be for killing ’em.”
Andrea knew that was true. For all Isobel’s charm and gentleness within the tower, she was fiercely in favor of killing enemies. And Toorkild, if asked for one thing by the son he doted on, and its opposite by the wife he dearly loved for all his infidelities … Andrea felt almost sorry for him.
She kissed Per’s cheek. “Promise to do thine best, to try thine hardest, and I’ll stay even if Toorkild says nay.”
He let out a long breath and gave his brightest smile, while tears spilled from his eyes, catching the faint light. “I give thee my word I’ll do my all to save Elven. By oak, ash and thorn, by my mother’s heart, I swear it.”
It was the nearest to a binding promise that anyone was ever going to get from a Sterkarm. Even so, would he keep it? “Then I’ll stay.” She didn’t know if she meant it. She didn’t know if she could go through with it.
His arms squeezed tight around her, pulling her up onto her toes, pressing breath out of her. He kissed her cheek, his scanty beard and mustache scratching her skin as he tried to find her mouth. She turned her head, and his tongue slipped between her lips.
It was a roar from the hall that made her jump and bang heads with him. He drew back, his hand to his nose, grinning wryly. She breathlessly clutched at her thumping heart and wondered, was that yell from a lynching party setting off for the lockup?
Per leaned close again, and she smacked her hand against his chest. “Nay!” She had to think of the frightened men in the lockup, and their families back in the 21st.
Oh, the 21st! Hot showers. Sliced white bread. A happy absence of fleas and lice, and a general use of deodorants. And, despite the tabloid headlines, a tendency not to hack strangers to death right outside your own front door. “Go and talk to thine father, be so kind.”
“Entraya—”
“We’ve plenty of time,” she said, and smiled.
His big, bright smile came back. He kissed her cheek. “I’ll talk him round!” He ran down the steps and back into the hall, looking back at her over his shoulder, smiling.
Andrea was left in the cool darkness of the stairway, her heart beating uncomfortably fast, her body shaking slightly. She believed that Per would now do his best to persuade his father to free the Elves, but she had far less faith that Toorkild would agree. So what was she to do? Simply wait until Per failed, and then stand by as the 21st men were murdered anyway, and bleat, “I did my best”? After all, she was in no danger of having a noose tied around her neck and being thrown over the tower’s wall.
While Per was trying to sweet-talk his father, he wouldn’t be wondering where she was, so she had a little time.
And there was Joe … So many complications!
She looked in at the door of the hall. Joe was sitting on the end of a table near the door, a cup in his hand. His face was flushed and he looked thoughtful. She went over to him. “Joe? Joe, if you could go back to the 21st, would you?” He raised his eyes from his cup and gave her a long look. “Would you, Joe? I haven’t time for a long discussion.”
But, for Joe, it was a hard question to answer. He thought of the men he’d seen murdered. He thought of Per knocking down the man who’d defied him. He also remembered the welcome he’d been given, the gifts, and Per’s promises. “What should I go back for? A cardboard box?”
“They’re going to kill the men in the lockup, Joe—our men.”
“‘Our’ men?” Joe said. “They’re bosses’ lackeys. I’m a Sterkarm. I’m staying.”
She looked at him. “Okay. I hope you know what you’re doing. I hope it works out for you. Listen: If Per should ask, you haven’t seen me and you don’t know where I am. Will you do that much for me?”
Joe looked at her doubtfully. “You be careful.”
“I will.” Looking around, she caught the arm of the nearest woman. “If Per looks for me, wilt tell him I be
tired and—I’ve a head-pain.” The old lines were always the best. “Tell him I’ve gan to my bower to sleep it off.”
The woman grinned and said she would be sure to tell him. On her way to the hall door, Andrea gave the same message to three other people. It would be common knowledge that she’d been in her bower, asleep, all the time.
She ran down the stairs in the dark and heaved aside the heavy yett at the bottom. The horses shifted and snorted in the dark, and she could smell their sweet animal smell. Pushing through them, she reached the tower’s heavy door and struggled with it, finally shoving it open to emerge in the fresh, damp, cold air of the yard.
Oh God! she thought. Do I want to do this? If it went wrong, she could end up hanging on the tower walls herself.
But she had Per to protect her, even if things did go wrong … If she didn’t try, it was almost a certainty that the 21st men would hang.
If she did this, would she dare to keep her promise to Per, and stay to face the anger of Toorkild and Gobby—and Isobel? The very thought made her cringe with fright. Far safer and easier to run back through the Tube.
But that would mean breaking her promise to Per, and he was keeping his promise to her …
Oh, did she have to throw her whole life away?
Whatever she did, she was going to have to hurt and betray someone. And however much her betrayal hurt Per, he would still be alive. The 21st men wouldn’t be.
She ran from the tower door into the muddy yard.
20
16th Side: Asking a Favor
The noise in the hall, the yelling that had startled Andrea, was the noise of a chanting game, with forfeits for those who couldn’t remember the ever-lengthening list of words. Per made his way through the crush of people to the family table, where Toorkild lay back in his chair, a little drunk, red-faced and cheerful. If Per had been about to ask him for a horse, or for fleeces to sell to buy himself a helmet, or for anything in that way, he would have been certain of getting it.
Isobel was among the tables, serving more drink. That was good. She wouldn’t overhear and make things more difficult. Gobby, though, was sitting in his place beside Toorkild.
Per leaned over the back of his father’s chair, stooping down and putting his head close to Toorkild’s. “Daddy?” He spoke quietly, but insistently, to be heard only by his father. Toorkild twisted in his chair and looked up. “Daddy, shalt thou hang Elven?”
Toorkild, who had thought this matter settled, pulled his son’s head down, doubling him over the back of the chair. “Why art asking, eh?” Gripping the back of Per’s jacket, he shook him. “What be it to thee?”
Per, struggling, slipped sideways and landed on his knees at Toorkild’s side. Leaning on the chair’s arm, he looked up, his face flushed and his hair on end. “Daddy, let them be.”
Toorkild threw himself back heavily in his seat and shouted, “It be kill no Elven! Then it be kill Elven! Now it be kill no Elven again!” Per raised his hands to hush him, but Gobby had already looked around. He saw Per and nodded to himself, as if everything were explained. “If I’d kenned how much cussed trouble Elven were,” Toorkild said, “I’d have burned Gate down meself at beginning!”
“What now?” Gobby asked.
Pulling Per’s head against his shoulder, Toorkild shouted, “Now he wants to spare Elven!” His voice vibrated through his chest and through Per’s skull.
Gobby, considering the matter already decided beyond question, turned away. “Pah!”
He never failed to irritate Per. Wrestling away from his father, and pitching his voice to carry, Per said, “It’s by cause I’m nesh, like any son of Bella Hob’s-daughter.”
Gobby turned and glared at him. Toorkild looked down at him, puzzled. From Isobel came a shout: “What?”
Per got to his feet. Now that he’d spoken, he wished he hadn’t. He never much minded vexing his uncle, but now he’d hurt his mother.
Isobel came close to the table and set both her fists, a jug grasped in one, on her hips. “What about Bella Hob’s-daughter?”
“Nothing, Mammy,” Per said, and Gobby looked grimly pleased, which only irritated Per again.
Toorkild pulled at his hand. “What?”
“It be only something Gobby Daddy’s-brother said.”
Isobel turned and looked hard at Gobby, hands still on her hips. Toorkild looked at him too. The hall fell silent.
“I never said any such—” Gobby began.
“Tha did, Daddy,” Wat said. “When we were riding, before Per was slashed.”
Gobby, exasperated, looking to Toorkild for understanding, saw Toorkild looking bitter, and shouted, “If I said he’s nesh, it be because he be nesh! Always arguing, will no be said! Always—”
“Oh!” Isobel said. “Oh! And I suppose thy sons—”
And they were away, Gobby and Isobel, both of them calling on Toorkild to support them. Gobby drew in Wat and Ingram, and Toorkild called in Sweet Milk. Every person in the hall packed closer around the family table to hear, and a few of the bolder spirits ventured to give their opinions. Within five minutes so much had been said that no one remembered the argument had started over the question of whether or not to kill the Elves.
Isobel, on hearing that she had given Toorkild only one nesh son while Gobby’s Bertha had given him three good ones, screeched and banged down the jug she held.
Toorkild demanded, “Be I nesh? Be I nesh?” for no clear reason. Wat infuriated his father by refusing to take his side. Neither would Ingram, who often wished Per had been his big brother, in place of the two he was stuck with.
Ecky and Sim, at the tops of their voices, gave accounts of Per’s courage and fortitude, to which no one listened. Sweet Milk stood by, pulling at his beard and looking unhappy.
Joe had come forward through the crowd to see what was happening, and now looked about bewildered, with no idea of what this quarrel was about, or what might come of it. He caught Per’s eyes and was comforted when Per’s nod seemed to tell him that there was nothing to worry about. Per was certainly at ease. He had seated himself in Toorkild’s vacated chair and, with one leg slung over the wooden arm, was stroking Cuddy’s head as the big dog leaned it against his shoulder.
Per was pleased to hear Toorkild declare that Gobby’s three gowks all put together weren’t worth his Per. In a little while more, when he asked again for the lives of the Elves, both his father and mother would take his side, to spite Gobby. He hadn’t planned it that way. His repeating of Gobby’s insult to himself and his mother had merely been in the ordinary way of Sterkarm quarrels. But once the row was started, he had suddenly seen how it would work out, and had decided to let it.
At some point well into the quarrel, Gobby shouted that “May” was a well-chosen nickname—“A may’s face, a may’s nature—runagate and flighty and not a gnat’s turd of sense!” That stung, but Per bent his head to kiss Cuddy’s nose instead of jumping up to join in the yelling. It would only go on longer if he did.
It was still going on when a woman crept up behind Per and whispered in his ear, under the noise of the shouting, that she was off to bed now, but first had to pass on a message from the Elf-May.
When he’d heard it, Per kissed the woman’s cheek, thanked her, and settled back in the chair to consider that Andrea wanted him to know that she was lying down in her bower.
He looked up at the waving arms, the toing and froing, the gaping red faces above him, and wondered if he could somehow intervene and bring the row to a quick end.
But no, he wasn’t much good as a peacemaker. If he stood up and spoke now, they would all turn on him and dress him down. Even his father was likely to ask him if he wasn’t happy now he’d started this, and tell him to sit down and shut up. Better to keep low and wait it out.
It was dark in the yard and, in the narrow alleys between the buildings, pi
tch-black. Andrea knew the tower well enough to find her way, but she blundered into rubbish heaps, and tripped on uneven ground, and had to catch herself on walls. It made her think again about the distance between the tower and the Elf-Gate. It wouldn’t be like walking down a city street at night, over smooth tarmac or paving stones, lit by streetlamps. This was wild, trackless country. By day, going by the shortest way, it was a walk of over ninety minutes. By night, what with the rocks and the tussocks, the harsh tangle of bilberries and heather underfoot, and the river to cross, it would take much longer. It was the kind of country that could break a leg. Or they might go astray in the dark, wander in the wrong direction and become completely lost, to be found and recaptured by the Sterkarms.
But what was the point of worrying? They had a simple choice. They could make the attempt to reach the Elf-Gate, or they could stay and rely on the Sterkarms’ goodwill.
A lantern hung from a hook outside the lockup, casting a little faint candlelight into the dark alley. It showed her the ladder leaning in place, and she climbed it, calling out, “Halloo! You, up there!”
One of the men on guard came to the door and gave her a hand into the upper room. The two guards were using a chest as a bench and had set a couple of candles on the top of another. The candlelight showed the strings of vegetables and hard flatbread strung from the roof, and cast deep shadows among the rafters and the jumble of sacks and storage chests on the floor.
“Oh, my head aches,” Andrea said, as soon as she was in. She put a hand to her forehead. “I’m off to bed to try and get rid of it, but I just stopped by—Toorkild asked me to tell you to come on back to feast.”
The men looked at each other and then at her again. She could see them thinking that, nice may though she was, she was still an Elf.
“Isobel’s idea,” she said. “She said it was a shame you were stuck out here on your own. ‘What will happen?’ she said. ‘They be in lockup, gate be barred, there be a watchman on tower—why can they no come in and have a drink?’” She saw them glance at each other again as they relaxed. She might be an Elf, but didn’t Toorkild trust her enough to let her run around loose? Wasn’t she the May’s may? “So go on and enjoy yourselves,” she said. “Me, I’m off to bed.” She turned back to the ladder, as if she had nothing in her mind except her pillow.