Longbow Girl
Page 21
‘Don’t want to be there longer than you need. Not what anyone would call inconspicuous, are you?’ Mair asked, nervously twisting her bonnet in her bony hands.
Merry was all too aware of the bounty on her head, of the risk of the countess recognizing her, but she hated to wait. Nerves fraying, adrenalin pumping, she felt cooped up in the cottage. She wanted to walk out of the door and let it begin. She knew Mair was right, but as the sun rose to what she thought was eleven o’clock, Merry could stand it no longer.
‘We must go,’ she said. ‘I don’t want to miss the king’s challenge.’
‘The king’ll probably be sleeping off last night’s feast,’ said Mair with a pinched look. She paused, eyed Merry, looked out of her door again.
‘But you’re right. We don’t want to miss it.’
Merry took her bow and her arrow bag. She checked that all three strings were there, coiled safely. She slung the bag over her shoulder, took the bow in her left hand.
She picked up her waterproof backpack. If all went well, she’d be needing her head torch for the swim home. And she had her catapult in there too. She hoped she wouldn’t need it but it was a weapon and it was portable and it gave her comfort.
‘Can you keep this for me till after the tourney?’ she asked Mair. ‘I need it for my journey back.’
‘Of course.’ Mair took it. ‘I’ll hide it in my basket.’ She eyed the lime-green neon stripes. ‘It’s a bit … outlandish.’
Merry laughed, in spite of her nerves.
‘When it’s over we’ll have to find each other quickly. I must leave straight away.’
‘I’ll find you,’ said the healer. ‘You just do what you must, then go,’ she added softly. ‘Back to your time. Back to safety.’
Merry only prayed that she could.
Together they walked down the hill from Ty Gwyn.
‘D’you think he’s around, that man who attacked me?’ asked Mair.
Merry wanted to lie, to give Mair peace of mind, to suggest that Parks was long gone, but that would do the healer no favours. She needed to remain vigilant. ‘I suspect Parks is watching the tourney,’ she replied. ‘It’d be too great a spectacle for him to want to miss it. He might be hiding in the forest, watching from a distance, but it wouldn’t surprise me if he’d stolen some clothes to blend in. He’d be just another face in the crowd.’
Mair frowned. ‘I’ll tell everyone around that a stranger attacked me. After the tourney I’ll organize a hunt,’ she said, her voice low with fury.
Merry glanced at Mair. She was loved in the community, had friends who would hunt for Parks. It made her feel easier.
They walked down to Nanteos Farm. Rhiannon, Angharad and Gawain must have been watching and waiting, for they came straight out to join them. Angharad held out something in her palm.
‘It’s a four-leaf clover,’ she said. ‘For luck.’
Merry felt tears burn her eye. She blinked and knuckled them away, then stooped and kissed Angharad’s cheek. ‘Thank you, cariad. I’ll keep it safe.’ She pushed it down into the deep pocket of her tunic.
‘Spent hours looking this morning, she did,’ said Rhiannon. ‘Wouldn’t give up till she found one.’
Angharad smiled and Merry felt another surge of emotion. She seemed to go from being numb to being ambushed with emotions.
Soon they reached the earl’s lands. The smell of wood smoke and cooking meat filled the air. The crowds grew thicker as they approached the tourney ground.
If Merry felt self-conscious, she did not show it. She walked with her head high, ignoring the stares of those they passed: the farmers, the men-at-arms, the women and the children. There were mutterings, but Merry supposed they thought she was carrying the bow for her father or for her husband. Why else would she have a bow? Merry smiled. Let them wait, let them see …
There were so many people, so many animals. Both she and Mair scanned the faces, checking for Parks, but they saw no sign of him. That gave Merry no comfort. She felt sure he’d be here, somewhere, watching. And waiting …
A commotion broke out ahead. The crowds parted to reveal a line of grooms leading high-stepping, overexcited destriers towards them. Huge, powerful horses, they were bred to carry an armoured knight into battle. At a gallop, while wearing armour of their own. They were proud, fearsome-looking beasts with darting eyes and bunched muscles. Merry grasped Angharad’s hand, pulled her well clear of the horses’ snaking heads and stamping hooves.
It was to improve this breed that Henry VIII had ordered the destruction of the wild ponies he deemed undersized, thought Merry, with such fateful consequences for her ancestor, who had rushed to their defence. She remembered the pony hunt she’d seen … Longbowman Owen’s protests, his doomed attempts to reason with the earl and king. His brutal silencing. She flicked a glance at the castle, where he languished in the dungeons just a few hundred yards away,
A pack of eight wolfhounds straining on leads dragged their handlers in the destriers’ wake. Merry watched them pass, suppressing a shudder. It was no stretch of her imagination to picture these dogs chasing down and killing wolves.
Cheers and shouts erupted from a fenced-off arena where, in her time, the laurel bushes grew. Inside, raucous men in fine clothes were throwing an iron bar, competing to see who could lob it the furthest.
The five of them walked closer to the castle, weaving through the thickening crowds lining up by the food stalls that sheltered under the white pavilions. The Tudor version of fast food, thought Merry. Toffee apples, chicken legs, hot bread and what smelt like mulled wine. Her stomach turned. She thought she was going to be sick. She walked away from the stalls, breathing deeply, willing her stomach under control. It seemed to work. Just.
And then Merry saw a group of powerful-looking men striding towards an arena, marked off by ropes and poles. They were carrying unstrung bows. Some carried quivers of arrows that swung from loose belts. Most of them had arrow bags like hers.
Time to go. The crowds were gathering outside the arena. Rhiannon hugged her fiercely. Angharad stood on tiptoe and kissed Merry’s cheek.
‘Thank you,’ she said, eyes full of sweetness, ‘for all you have done for us. For all you will do.’
Merry pulled the girl close, hugged her and Gawain too.
Mair stepped forward. ‘Goodbye, longbow girl. Be safe.’
Merry hugged the old woman, breathed in her scent of herbs and wool.
Then she turned and she followed the archers. She gripped her bow, felt its power flood through her. She shut down her mind to all but the task ahead.
Shoot. Win. Escape.
Merry strode into the arena, grasping her longbow, her arrow bag slung over her back. She felt more alive than ever. There was more at stake than ever. Her life, the life and lands of those she loved. But she had one job, one focus. She could not think of what she might lose, just of what she needed to do. Of how she would do it. Nock. Mark. Draw. Loose. She’d trained for years. This was who she was.
She was aware of the wind blowing down from the mountains, carrying with it the scent of new-grown summer grass. She was aware of the voices rising in shock, in question, then falling away at a loud command. She was aware of a presence, huge and terrifying. The king in all his majesty.
Henry VIII sat on a carved, throne-like chair on a raised dais at the back of the arena. Merry looked up, eyed him full on. The small lips, pursed in judgement, the wide-set, piggy eyes, the square face padded by fat, the furs, velvets and jewels.
Monarch, murderer, torturer, tyrant … the words ran through her head, but she kept her face impassive. She bowed low till her hair draped on the muddy grass. Then she straightened, whipped back her head so that her hair swung in an arc of gold.
‘Who are you, girl?’ thundered the king. ‘What do you do here with all the men?’
‘I am Merry Owen, Your Majesty,’ she answered in a cool, clear voice that carried to the depths of the watching crowds. ‘I am the sister of Lon
gbowman Owen, separated at childhood, raised by a family who could afford to keep me. I heard about Your Majesty’s challenge and my brother’s imprisonment. I have come to honour the pledge of my ancestors.’
She felt the blood pounding in her veins.
‘I am the longbow girl.’
There was a roar. There were shouts and jeers. Then, as suddenly as they had started, the shouts stopped. The jeering men fell silent as King Henry stood, raised his hand high.
‘Come here,’ he ordered Merry.
As she approached, she could see that on either side of the king sat the countess and an angular, angry-looking man who had to be the earl. Both glowered at her. The countess was scrutinizing her, uncomfortably closely. But Merry felt sure the countess hadn’t seen her hair and now she had two eyes, not one.
Head high, Merry walked towards the king. She felt the fear she had desperately been trying to suppress bloom and grow inside her. She thought of Anne Boleyn, the wife he had recently beheaded. The brave, feisty, politically involved Anne, a woman who would have excelled in the twenty-first century with her motto of Complain all you like, this is the way it’s going to be. She thought of Henry’s current wife, resting in some palace as she prepared to give birth in the autumn. Dutiful, dull Jane Seymour … her motto – Bound to serve and obey – self-consciously differentiating herself as much as possible from her murdered predecessor.
Perhaps she wasn’t that dull after all … Displease the king and die a horrible death? Well, don’t be Anne Boleyn. Be dull Jane. Do your job and get the hell out …
Merry paused, just feet from the dais. She curtsied, then lowered her eyes, as she imagined Jane Seymour would.
‘You can shoot a war bow?’ boomed the king.
Merry glanced up. ‘I can, Your Majesty.’
There was a hiss from the men-at-arms on the dais, from the earl, who got to his feet.
Another gaudily dressed, puppy-faced man jumped up. ‘You’re not an archer!’ he yelled, face red with outrage, grinning with the sport he thought he could make of her. ‘You’re a woman!’
Something fused in Merry’s head – the history lessons, her father’s tales, her own refusal to be bullied. She raised her arm high, palm inwards. She forked the two fingers of her right hand in a V sign, directing it at the man.
The roars increased tenfold. Merry felt the blood sing in her heart. This was the sign with which the Anglo-Welsh archers had taunted their French enemies from Crécy to Agincourt. I have my two fingers; I curse you; I can draw a bow; prepare to die … Crécy was two hundred years ago. But the gesture still meant war. Merry felt the heat of the crowd pumping back at her. She stood, head high, defiant. Finally, point made, she lowered her arm.
The king got to his feet, strode to the edge of the dais, turned to take in the whole crowd. He raised his arm again. The hissing and the jeering stopped. The puppy-faced man, murder in his eyes, stalked back to his seat. The earl eased back into his. The king looked at Merry, eyes creased with amusement now.
‘So you are an archer, you say. Very poetically …’
Merry grinned back. ‘I am, Your Majesty.’ He looked massive, up there on the dais, enlarged by his splendid cape, the exuberant ruffles.
Carefully, Merry raised her hand, palm to him, fingers spaced. She wriggled her first two fingers, heavily callused from drawing the bow. She’d never been so glad that she didn’t use a glove or a tab on her right hand. Her skin told its own story.
The king’s eyes widened. ‘Why? You would be a warrior? You would join my army? You would kill?’
Merry looked back at the king, and when she spoke, her words rang with truth.
‘Not through choice, Your Majesty.’ She thought of Professor Parks. ‘But if I had to, I would. I am ready. All I ask is that Your Majesty give me the chance to show what I can do. And then abide by the results.’
There was a low murmur of disbelief. ‘Impudent wench,’ Merry heard someone say.
The king looked at her speculatively. ‘Abide by the results?’ he asked slowly, the smile leeching from his eyes. His huge, jowly face turned hard.
Merry felt her breath catch in her throat. She kept her gaze fixed on his, feeling that to look away, to show weakness to the bully would be fatal. She’d taken the confrontational Anne Boleyn route after all. For her, there’d never really been any other way.
‘As I must, Your Majesty. As must the Owens. As must the generations to come. The longbowmen not yet born.’ She paused. ‘And the longbow girls.’
The king gave a quick, instinctive smile and Merry felt her breath ease.
He glanced back at the earl, at his other men-at-arms; then he turned to the crowds. He raised his head, bellowed out so that they all might hear.
‘Let the competition commence. One gold coin to the winner!’ The king paused and it seemed that the earl, leaning forward, was suggesting something to him. The king smiled. ‘Ten gold coins to the winner!’ There was a gasp from the competitors, and from the spectators. Ten gold coins was a fortune to most of them. Merry guessed that the earl wanted to make the men compete as ruthlessly as they could. To outcompete her … Something in the atmosphere in the arena changed, became gladiatorial. The men, seemingly friendly before, were eyeing each other narrowly. Merry felt another wave of fear.
‘And if Merry Owen can draw a war bow, if she can loose her arrows with deadly aim,’ continued King Henry. ‘If she ranks with the best of these men here today, good enough to fight my wars and kill for me, then her family may keep their lands. Now and for as long as the Owens can fulfil the pledge of their ancestor.’
Merry bowed low. She heard the roar of the crowd. It was time.
There were twenty men in the arena. They all turned to face Merry as she walked to the stake where they gathered.
She saw many things in their eyes: outrage, mystification, disbelief, amusement, appraisal and, from a few, pity. She kept her head up, swept her gaze over them all, face impassive. She hoped her glass eye would fool them. The less animated she was, the better. No good having one eye darting all over the place and the other dead. Plus, it suited her just fine. She wasn’t there to engage with them. She was there to beat them.
She loosened her arrow bag, took out her string. The men watched her, eyebrows raised as she put her knee to her bow, flexed it, strung it. That in itself was a feat of strength that few other than trained archers could manage.
Ignoring their looks of surprise, she took out each arrow in turn from her arrow bag and eyed the flights, making sure each one was true. When she was satisfied, she looked up again. All the men were still watching her.
‘I am ready,’ she said, in a voice loud enough to carry to the king.
There was a chorus of laughter from the crowd, then a low, mocking voice said:
‘Ready now, is she?’
She turned to the speaker, the one man without a bow. The marshal, she guessed. She looked back at him and waited. Inside, her heart was beating wildly, but on the surface she was cool and controlled.
‘Right then,’ said the man when he got no answer from Merry. ‘Here are the rules. With this’ – he paused – ‘Merry Owen here, we have twenty-one competitors. We have ten targets set up, so we shall have three opening heats. The test is for skill and accuracy.‘
Behind her back, Merry crossed her fingers tight, dared to feel a flurry of hope.
‘The targets,’ continued the marshal, ‘are set eighty yards from the shooting line.’
This news was met with shouts and jeers from the crowd.
‘I know, I know, not the full distance by any measure but, believe it or not, we’re short of space on this hillside today. Blame the knights and their destriers needing so much ground for the jousting! Blame the sloping Welsh hills!’
Merry felt a surge of elation. Eighty yards. She could do this.
‘And as I said, accuracy is what His Majesty, the King Henry, is seeking today.’
That silenced the crowd.
There was murmured agreement from the men. Merry nodded, squared her shoulders, started up a rhythm of deep, slow breathing, working on getting her pulse to drop. A slower pulse aided accuracy. Not by much, but perhaps by enough to make all the difference.
‘Right, are we all ready?’ called the marshal.
‘Yes,’ roared the men, drowning Merry’s soft answer.
‘Glory and His Majesty’s gold to the winner!’ bellowed the man, to roars from the spectators.
Merry glanced around, caught a glimpse in the crowd of the faces she sought – Mair, Rhiannon, Angharad and Gawain. Then she went into a kind of cocoon where the noise dimmed and her focus sharpened. She felt like she could see individual blades of grass, sense the direction of the wind from its feel on her skin, smell the lands over which it had blown.
The marshal stalked down the column of men, separating them. ‘Heat one,’ he announced, pointing to one group. ‘And heat two,’ he declared, pointing to the other. Like an afterthought, he turned to Merry. ‘You will be in heat three – alone.’
Merry nodded, refused to acknowledge the implicit insult. It was fine. She’d have more time to watch, to sense the mood of the breeze, to adjust … let him think he was putting her off. Let them all underestimate her, until it was too late …
The contestants in heat one lined up. They stood with their backs to the king so there was no danger of a rogue arrow, or an assassin, felling His Majesty. The targets were round pieces of white-painted wood, with a central black circle and inside that a small white inner circle. They were attached to wooden stakes, just like the one she had practised on.