During the autumn Will introduced other people to our practices, saying we needed to be sure we didn’t become too used to each other’s style. I would never normally meet these young men, save as silent escorts to functions; to me, guards were like armed furniture. Now, they had arms and legs and a strength that stunned. But not for long; Will and I were so proficient that by the end of winter we could hold off four of his fellow students.
Sergeant Ryngell attended these sessions, watching with interest from the sidelines. Will told me that our new techniques were introduced into the guard practices.
‘Fine lad, that Will,’ he said to N’tombe, one April morning.
‘See,’ I said. ‘You are appreciated.’ I felt good. Between us we’d left four young men in groaning heaps on the arena.
Sergeant Ryngell unwrapped himself from his cloak. ‘Let’s see how you go against a veteran.’
‘Me, sir?’ Will’s voice was confused.
‘Not you. Her.’ He nodded at me.
A burly man, Sergeant Ryngell was over six feet tall. His face was twisted from an old scar. He was, Will told me, ruthless in sparring.
‘Me?’ I tried to stop my voice quivering.
‘You need to fight someone who will fight properly,’ he said. ‘These young cockerels, all they see is a pretty girl.’
‘They’re holding back?’ I tried to keep the indignation out of my voice.
‘Of course.’
I gripped my staves tightly. ‘Alright,’ I said, trying to strengthen my voice. ‘Let’s fight.’
He grinned, stretching his scar. ‘Good girl.’
The injured boys stopped their moaning, standing up double-quick. Retreating to the edge of the practice arena, they called encouragement. ‘Come on, lady! Stop him!’
I stood alone on the sand as the wind whistled around my legs, and tried to empty my mind of fear.
‘Watch how he moves,’ Will had said, when we’d started sparring with his fellows. Does he lead with his left leg? Is there any stiffness from an old injury? Watch him walk, watch him turn. How heavy is he? Most importantly: where is my advantage?
The sergeant took two staves from the box, sizing them in his hands, swinging them to feel their weight and balance. Moving fast, he ran towards me.
I stopped thinking and worked on instinct. Everything slowed as I danced towards him, sidestepping at the last moment, setting my foot between his legs, but he’d seen that move and stepped around it, bringing his staves up and around to my face. I blocked with the right, bringing my left up and around and we exchanged blows that shuddered up my arm, into my chest.
But there. As I feinted backwards, stepping back on my left foot, he overreached. An opening! I reached forwards, up, under his guard, and hit him hard in the ribs. Jolted, he curled towards the pain and I thrust a knee up into his groin.
‘Ah!’ he groaned.
I threw a stave hold around his neck, holding his head tight in the vice, and threw him down onto one shoulder.
‘I could kick you in the head now,’ I said, ‘or thump you in the neck with the stave. Which would you prefer?’
He said nothing for a moment, looking up at me out of slits of eyes. Then, incredibly, he smiled, reaching up a hand for me to help him up.
‘Alright, Princess,’ he said, and put a heavy arm around my shoulder. ‘You can fight.’
The boys, who’d watched our performance in silence, now cheered, some throwing their caps high under the canvas roof. ‘Well done!’
Panting, I bowed.
Will flinched when the sergeant clapped him on the shoulder. ‘You need to teach her to use blades,’ he said. ‘That way she’ll be able to do some real damage.’
‘But not this week,’ said N’tombe. ‘It would not be suitable if the princess wore a black eye to the Maying.’
May Day: the first of May, the beginning of spring. As usual, the bells rang in celebration and there was singing and dancing in honour of the Queen of the May. I sat in a golden chair at the end of the hall, accepting gifts and listening to hymns of praise, wishing I could be on the sand arena with a metal blade in my hand. Mother must have rigged the elections this year; the winner of the May Queen crown was usually a blonde simperer, someone who curved as a woman was supposed to curve and clung to her admirers like a vine.
Wealthy young men swathed in gem-studded velvet invited me to dance. My skirt blew around me, a flaming band of colour. I could feel Mother’s eyes burning my back as I twirled about the floor. I felt like a butterfly. Was she proud that she’d squeezed me into satin and pushed me onto a dance floor?
The room was full of courtiers, young men from good families and young women with beautiful skin and fair complexions. This should be my world. Yet, even as I twirled until all I could see was brightness and gold, I kept feeling that it was wrong. This was not my place.
‘What’s wrong?’ said my dancing partner.
‘I feel dizzy,’ I said, putting my hand to my head.
‘It is very hot in here,’ he said, and helped me over to the side of the dance floor, found me a chair and departed in search of water. I sat and watched the other butterflies dancing, fighting a memory: a dream of another dance floor, a boy crossing it to watch his sister change.
The dancers were all young, for this was a young person’s dance; the girls graceful, dressed up like their mothers, the boys hesitant with stubble and awkward dignity. None moved with Will’s grace. Dancing with Will would be an interesting experience. Could we move in time to music instead of trying to kill each other?
Where was Will? He would not be at the dance, of course. He was probably in the kitchens, setting the baking for the next day.
‘Try this,’ said my partner, appearing at my elbow with a smile and a glass of something clear and sparkling.
‘Is it lemonade?’
‘Not quite,’ he said, his mouth twisting slightly. ‘But it’s good medicine for May Queens.’
It smelt of yeast. ‘I don’t think I like it.’
‘Drink it faster,’ he said. ‘It’s medicine, remember.’
So I drank the glass of bubbling, fizzing liquid. He handed me another and I drank that too. ‘You know,’ I said, squinting up at him, ‘I think you’re right. I do feel better.’ My voice sounded strange.
‘Of course you do,’ he said. ‘Come and dance.’
The May Queen receives presents from her subjects. Token gifts of jewellery, trinkets of glass, flowers; the usual rubbish. N’tombe gave me something different. A leather training vest and two jagged-edged knives. My charming partner edged backwards as I waved them unsteadily about my head.
The magic effects of the medicine had faded by the next day. I woke to a tight band of pain across my forehead, a churning in my stomach.
‘I can’t fight today.’ I had to whisper. Talking made my head hurt.
N’tombe had a hard heart. ‘You’ll feel better after breakfast.’
I winced and closed my eyes. How could she speak of food? ‘I think I ate something bad last night.’
She chuckled. ‘I don’t think it was the food, Princess. You seemed to have a good time, though,’ she added, in far too loud a voice. ‘We all enjoyed your singing.’
‘My singing?’ I never sing. Because my voice sounds like a croaking dog.
Apparently, that hadn’t stopped me trying. ‘Don’t tell me anything,’ I pleaded. ‘Please. I really don’t want to know.’
‘You want to be careful when you drink champagne.’
Champagne? How embarrassing. How stupid. So naïve. Drinking wine, thinking it was medicine. Hopefully, Will would never know.
‘I hear you’ve taken up singing,’ said Will, grinning.
‘I don’t think I can fight this morning,’ I said, groaning. ‘My head is so sore.’
‘I’m not surprised. From what I heard, you were roaring drunk.’
‘I wasn’t drunk,’ I said indignantly. ‘Was I, N’tombe?’
She nodded
and I groaned again. ‘I’m never drinking again, then,’ I said, as both my heartless tutors laughed.
‘Don’t make promises you can’t keep,’ said Will.
Couldn’t they see I was ill? ‘I’m not in the mood for this.’
‘There’s no such thing as a mood for fighting.’ Will’s voice was stern. I winced. He was too loud. ‘You fight when you have to. Otherwise you might get killed.’ He put one foot behind my leg and reached to grab my arms. Acting on reflex, I swayed sideways, ducking beneath his hold. ‘That’s better.’
To teach him a lesson, I tried to throw him. A stupid move, given my state of health. ‘Happy May Day, Princess,’ said Will.
I lay on my back and gazed up at his healthy, smiling face. ‘One day,’ I warned, ‘I will get you back.’
The little bathing chamber had no windows, just a slit high in the wall for the steam to escape. A lattice screen kept me private, even when the door was open. I turned on the hot tap. More heat! I needed to boil like a lobster; that way, maybe the bruising would go away.
‘I’m changing your lessons,’ said N’tombe.
‘Will they be any easier?’ I asked.
There was a pause. This was not encouraging.
‘They’ll be different. I’m getting someone to help me.’
‘Who?’ Please, not the sergeant. He’d dump me on my face in the sand, adding to my collection of bruises. Maybe he’d remark on my singing too.
‘You’ll find out,’ said N’tombe.
Tufts of white cloud blew across the deep blue sky, so the courtyard alternated between warm sunlight and shadowy gusts of winter. N’tombe led me across the cobbles, her steps long, so I hurried behind her to keep up. ‘Where are we going?’ I asked.
‘You’ll find out,’ she said again.
N’tombe insisted on cutting her skirts short, wearing them in jagged strips above her ankles. She’d just had her boots resoled and the new nails struck sparks with each step, an unsettling effect. She looked like a witch. Kitchen wenches with floury aprons, their hair tucked into puffed white caps, paused in their duties to watch her, ducking their heads as she walked by. Some of them crossed themselves.
We passed under the inner gate. Once, long ago, I had run along the ramparts above, my father chasing me. We had laughed, both of us loving these stupid games. Now that I was fourteen, I was too old for playing chasing. I missed the freedom of childhood; soon I’d have to start behaving like an adult.
We stepped into the shade of the tower that stretched grey and chill like a dead man’s finger. Here, in the innermost heart of the Castle, there was no sound save the tapping of N’tombe’s boots, the patter of my shoes and the clicking of her beads as her braids swayed with the motion of her walk. Crows called from the ramparts above. I puffed, trying to keep up with her, and my breathing echoed from the stone walls so it felt like ghosts paced behind me.
I didn’t recognize the guardsman who stood to attention at the base of the tower. Tall, he was dwarfed by the sheer walls that stretched, dark grey, above him. The tower was unlike the rest of the Castle, its grey stonework seemingly dressed without cracks or joins. How old was this tower? Why had it been built? And how queer; I’d lived all my life in its shadow and never noticed its strangeness.
There were no windows or decoration of any sort on the stonework, save the wooden door at the base. Bowing, the guard unlocked it with a heavy key, and pushed it open. It was hard to see his face behind his metal noseguard, but for a moment I thought he winked, as though he knew me. I could not recall seeing him before. I crowded close to N’tombe and, like a child, grabbed a fold of her dress.
The only light in the hallway was the daylight from the doorway, partially blocked by the bulk of that enormous guard. I was suddenly aware of my breathing and the weight of the stone about me. We walked forward into the darkness until, finally, N’tombe stopped and I, shuffling behind like a lost spirit, banged into her.
‘There are many stairs,’ she said. ‘I would like you to go first, please.’
‘Me?’ My voice wobbled in the darkness.
‘The stairwell is sparsely lit, the stairs old and crumbling. I would rather you were in front. If you stumble I can catch you.’
‘What about you? You could trip too.’
‘Dana. Don’t argue.’
There were four staircases, each spiralling up to a landing, where we paused to catch our breath before beginning on the next. Each staircase had one hundred steps. Four hundred steps in all. Silently, I counted them, as I puffed my way up. Torches set into the walls burnt in gusty flame that made it hard to judge distances and I stumbled often.
At the top was another door. N’tombe reached past me to open the iron latch. I stood on the threshold as it opened, dazzled by the bright sunlight that streamed in through four windows. They were open and the air was fresh. I would have been cold if not for the warmth from climbing all those stairs. But it wasn’t the temperature I noticed; it was the woman, sitting at the table.
Rosa, my aunt. The Guardian. The fairy godmother, the girl from the forest. ‘You.’
17
Dreams Are All You See
Welcome.’ Her hands, specked with brown spots, rested on the wooden table. When she smiled, her teeth were yellow. And yet, and yet … Looking at her, I saw warmth and charm and, was it happiness?
I curtsied. ‘Madam.’
Rosa glanced at N’tombe. ‘She sees already. You did the right thing. I wasn’t sure, she’s still so young.’
‘We were all young once, Rosa,’ said N’tombe.
Rosa looked at me. ‘Child, do you know why you are here?’
I twisted my hands in my skirts. ‘Am I supposed to be learning something?’
‘Yes. Has N’tombe told you what you are to learn?’
I should be so lucky. ‘No, madam.’
‘I’m to teach you magic, child. Look at me.’ I stared at the fingers resting on the table. Rosa shook her head. ‘No. At my eyes.’
Standing frozen in the doorway, I felt like a mouse trapped by a cat. She passed like a breeze through my memories: my parents, the forest around the Castle, N’tombe, my lessons, the festivities, the dancing. My dreams. Will. She was like an inquisitive visitor, someone who meant no harm.
‘She’s not been far afield,’ said Rosa to N’tombe.
‘Had you, at her age?’
‘True.’ Rosa gestured to a brown leather case set on a shelf between two of the great windows. ‘Fetch me that case, child.’
Exposed to the sky and the sun, the four great windows gave a view across the island. Far, far below, the forest sighed, breathing in the wind, but it was the endless blue of the sky and sea that drew my eyes to the curved line of the horizon. I felt like a bird about to fly.
The wooden shelf held a glass globe, a brass candle stick and the brown leather case. Cracked with age, it must once have been valuable, for faint traces of gold were etched onto the leather. Gently, I picked it up. It rattled as something moved within. My fingers tingled as I touched it. Carefully, I set the case on the table in front of Rosa and she slipped the catch.
Light burst from the box, blazing like a beacon to the roof. The interior was lined with red velvet. A necklace lay inside, curled upon itself, a fantastic snake resting on a velvet bed. I heard a whisper of sound, a sigh of welcome. A shimmer of song.
‘I don’t wear it all the time,’ Rosa said to N’tombe.
‘It’s strong.’ N’tombe gazed at the glorious thing, her face still. I felt her fascination and repulsion. ‘Is that why?’
The old woman nodded. ‘It would overwhelm me very quickly. I want to be me for a little longer. Is that wrong, do you think?’
‘How can I tell you what is right and what is wrong?’ said N’tombe. ‘But it calls for you.’
‘I know,’ said Rosa. Her mouth twisted and her voice was hard. ‘My heart knows this thing; it wants it. It’s like a drug. When I wear this, I see far, know so much. The walls o
f the Castle don’t hold me in. Like flying on the wind, I travel far.’ She turned to me. ‘You know this necklace, child?’
‘Yes,’ I said. The light from this glorious thing blew cobwebs from my mind. A boy, a girl with brown hair, an old woman with her heart torn out. ‘I’ve seen it before. In a dream.’
‘Do you know what it does, Dana?’
I stared at the gleaming stones and remembered Daddy telling me long ago about a tower and a necklace. ‘It’s special. It keeps us safe.’
‘Aye,’ whispered Rosa, her face and voice calm. ‘Aye. That it does.’ She closed the box. The room seemed dimmer. ‘We’ll leave the necklace for another time.’
My body ached for it.
‘Plenty of time, child. Now. See, on the shelf? A glass globe? Pass it to me, will you?’
‘I’ll leave you,’ said N’tombe, turning to the door. ‘Dana, you will have two hours a week with Lady Rosa. You may make your own way back when the church bell chimes four. Do you understand?’
Distracted by the globe on the table, I didn’t hear her leaving. The glass contained an upside down reflection of the entire room. Behind me, the four windows hung upside down in the glass. If I looked closer I could see the world, reversed.
‘It’s got the whole Kingdom in it,’ I said, surprised.
Rosa smiled at me. ‘Put your hands on it, child. Tell me what you see.’
I cupped my hands over the top of the globe, staring into the glass. My reflected fingers blocked the light, dulling the image. I had the entire island cupped in my hands. Through the windows of the reflection, clouds raced across the sun, cutting out the light.
‘That’s enough,’ said Rosa. Blinking, I took my hands from the globe. ‘What did you see?’
It seemed strange to see Rosa, upright and normal-sized in this room of sunlight. The church bells struck a distant chime. ‘How long was I looking?’
‘Long enough.’
‘The sky turned dark. The wind changed. Papers blew across the room.’ I rubbed my hands across my face. It was like rousing from a dream. ‘But now, look! All is still. And outside it is sunny.’
A Necklace of Souls Page 14