by Grace Ingram
As the woods closed about them Conan gave a grunt of disgust. ‘Did I not say it was folly? The most unprofitable night’s work I’ve shared for years. Four men dead for a few poor pots and a half-grown pig!’
‘The prisoners ? What will he do?’
‘Whatever the Devil puts in his mind. Don’t interfere! If you can’t stomach it, get drunk—more drunk!—and get out.’
The woman was sobbing hopelessly in the dark, and Guy could not close his ears. He was sober enough now, with a throbbing skull and a queasy belly, but her weeping was harder to endure than those. Then one of the men tripped and was dragged along wailing until he could gain his feet again, while his captors mocked him. Guy lagged more and more, and Conan, riding behind him, made no attempt to hurry him but lagged too.
‘You gave the warning,’ he said abruptly out of the dark.
Guy started. ‘I?’ he parried.
‘I was close behind you. Oh, no one else has guessed, and I shan’t betray you.’
‘Forbearing of you,’ Guy growled.
The older man was silent while they jogged on for a good half-mile.
‘God’s Blood!’ Conan snarled suddenly. ‘Why did it have to be you?’
‘What?’
‘An unlicked cub-a whelp in my training—and from what? A loose bull and a churl with a pitchfork!’
‘You’d rather I’d left you to them?’
‘Devil fry you! I don’t know why you did it—’
‘Nor I.’
‘But I had Hell’s brimstone in my nose. Yet it galls me to owe my life to an unschooled pup.’
‘Reckon it your teaching.’
He started to curse, his horse stumbled, and he caught his breath on a hiss.
‘Hurt?’
‘A rib cracked, I think. Yes, a vilely unprofitable night.’
They reached the lesser ford and crossed without incident. The woman had stopped crying and sat humped and wretched in the man’s saddle that must be galling her unaccustomed flesh raw. Guy pushed forward to reach her, but Conan seized his bridle while the guards hustled the prisoners across and re-formed the line.
‘Get it into your solid skull, you cannot do anything. Don’t you realize they’d turn on you like a wolf-pack if you spoiled their sport?’
‘Then why should you stop me?’
‘Because I’m your man.’
Guy gasped, the words hitting him like a blow in the wind. He stared at the dim figure beside him, barely seen in the faint light reflected from the water. The Slut jumped up to his saddle-bow as he had taught her when crossing water too deep for easy passage, and wiped her tongue across his cheek. He put his arm about her. The horse snorted, but he had learned to carry her without further fuss. Slowly Guy assimilated Conan’s statement. Across the ford he let the Slut down with the customary slap on her flank.
‘What did you say?’
‘Like it or not, I don’t deny a debt. I owe you my life twice over, so it’s yours.’
‘I don’t want your life!’
The mercenary uttered his sardonic chuckle. ‘However the yoke frets you, we’re bound together, you and I.’
‘Bound to a Hell-doomed excommunicate—’ Guy choked.
‘No doubt we’ll roast together.’ His voice changed to earnestness. ‘You’ve achieved your desire. You’re a knight. Now get out! Ride for Malmesbury and take service with the Angevin lad before the week’s out.’
‘I aim to,’ Guy admitted before he could check himself.
‘Put all this behind you, never tell who sired you, and never, never come back!’
‘And you?’
‘I am bought until Easter.’
Faithfulness to the paymaster was, Guy knew, the only point of honour a mercenary observed. ‘And then you’ll follow your own advice?'
‘You don’t imagine I’ll stay longer than I’m bound?’
At the deeper ford one of the prisoners attempted to drown himself, and came so near achieving his end that the guards had to throw him face-down across a saddle to drain the water out of him. The rain came hissing back, and they squelched on weary horses through the dark at walking-pace, so that it was well after midnight when they reached Warby gates and saw them swing open to admit the company. Spitting torches danced about them, grooms ran to take the horses, and the captives were hustled off to the guardroom.
Tending of hurts, dry clothes and hot fires were their first needs. Guy emerged from his chamber to find Lord Reynald and his knights assembled on the dais with cups and wine-jug, and the troopers who had ridden with them, divested of mail, drifting in to steam about the hearth while servants scurried with ale and mugs.
‘Join us, lad!’ called Lord Reynald. ‘Fill up, all, and we’ll drink to my son newly knighted!’
‘Good fortune be yours, Sir Guy!’ seconded the seneschal, and Sir Gerard grunted acknowledgement as he sat with his bandaged leg extended stiffly. Conan grinned over his cup with his usual mockery, as though he guessed what a travesty of his dreams Guy found this knighting, without a priest to bless it or a lady to grace it. As he reached the dais Lord Reynald tossed something that glittered. He caught it automatically, pricked his hand and gazed stupidly at a pair of gilt spurs.
‘There you are. Never thought when I took them off a dead man’s heels that they’d adorn my own son.’
Guy crammed the outward symbols of his new status into his pouch, sick at the sight of them. Even the gilded spurs that he had dreamed of achieving all his life came tainted, stolen from some murdered victim. He dropped on to a stool at the end of the dais and gulped the wine someone thrust into his hand. Hippocras appeared, wine mulled with honey and spices, very comforting to the belly and mazing to the wits. Two cups of it eased reality from him, so that when the curtain-rings clashed and a roar of brutal glee went up he did not at first understand what was happening.
Men dragged the prisoners to the dais steps. The woman screamed and struggled, the man who had tried to drown himself, half-dead already, had to be hauled bodily, but the fellow who had used the pitchfork walked on his two feet, grey-faced but steady. Guy’s entrails turned to ice, his heart jolted. He glanced quickly along the table. Sir James’s face of stone might hide sympathy, but the rest showed only the same horrible eagerness that filled Lord Reynald. Wulfrune and Rohese had joined the company, gloating like devils from a painted Judgement Day. And while he was swallowing hippocras a brazier had been brought in and kindled; a man was energetically working the bellows to set the charcoal glowing throughout. The weaker man roused to wail for mercy.
‘Churls shouldn’t interfere in their betters’ affairs,’ Lord Reynald pronounced.
‘We’re the King’s men, not yourn,’ the other man protested hoarsely in rough French.
‘The King has more urgent concerns than to trouble over a serf or two. What shall we do with them, for the best sport?’
The woman cried out and laid her hands over her belly. ‘But me lord, I’m with child! I’m with child! In the Name o’ God’s Holy Mother, m’ lord—’
‘We’ll have it out of you,’ Lord Reynald answered.
She sank to her knees, folding her arms across her womb. ‘No, no, not my baby! Me lord—Alfgar—’ She turned to the man who had used the pitchfork.
‘Your husband?’ Lord Reynald asked with interest.
‘Me brother—oh me lord—’
Guy stood up so abruptly that his stool clattered backward. Men jumped and turned to gape at him as he collected his feet and stepped down from the dais to the woman. ‘I’ll take the wench,’ he declared.
‘You’ll what ?’ exclaimed Lord Reynald.
‘I’m the man lost his girl, remember? She’ll do instead.’ He stood over her, his wits working with sharp clarity. The woman he could save, and there was one service he might do for one of the men.
‘I'll see what an unborn brat’s like—’
‘Then rip up your own bastard!’ Guy retorted, jerking his head at Rohese, who shriek
ed a foul name at him. ‘This wench is mine. Unless any chooses to challenge me for her?’ He gazed round the astonished assembly, but no one answered. The Slut’s growl rumbled in the hush. Conan’s sardonic chuckle was the only other sound until the woman roused from her trance to whimper. Guy turned on the braver man, desperately willing him to respond, to give him the excuse he needed for what came next. His hand was on his dagger-haft, and he glimpsed incredulous comprehension in the man’s eyes. ‘Think of the honour I’m doing your sister while you provide my lord’s entertainment! ’
‘You hell-spawned bastard!’
Guy lurched at him. He had his reward, the gratitude that filled the man’s last instant as he saw the blade and braced himself for the blow, up under the ribs’ arch to his heart. His eyes blinked shut and open, his body jerked and then slid through the hands holding him to thud on the rushes. Guy backed to the woman, his streaked steel lifted ready, as the silence of shock was followed by a howl of fury from a score of throats. ‘Lord God, take his soul in keeping and grant him salvation,’ Guy prayed in his heart as he stood with the Slut poised beside him.
‘You drunken fool, you’ve ruined our sport!’ screeched Lord Reynald, leaping up from his chair.
‘In-shulted me,’ Guy declared thickly, though in fact he was now hideously sober, the wine rising in his throat as his stomach heaved.
‘He’s cheated us a-purpose!’ Wulfrune shrilled.
‘Take the woman from him!’ yelped Rohese.
The woman, still on her knees, scrambled forward to throw herself wailing upon her brother’s body. A trooper, bolder or more drunken than the rest, grabbed at Guy as he stooped to her. The Slut slashed, and he yelped and reeled back with his arm laid open to the bone. Guy hoisted her up bodily and slung her over his shoulder. His dagger still ready, he backed to the wall, the Slut backing alongside with bared teeth, and no one cared to dispute his way.
‘She’s mine,’ he declared. ‘I’ll gut the man who tries to rob me.’ He moved crabwise along the wall to the stairhead, and they let him go, turning to the one prisoner left them. Sick to the soul, Guy had to abandon him, but he could only kill once, and had chosen the strong man fit to endure rather than the weakling who would not last long. The first shrieks pierced his vitals as he shouldered past the curtain and down the stair.
The woman kicked his legs and pounded his back with clenched fists, but he held her fast, tightening his hold about her thighs, and went down the spiral steadying himself with his shoulder against the wall. She was a well-fleshed peasant and muscled with field-work; he would be bruised for a fortnight from her thumping. He heaved her up more securely, crossed the deserted guardroom, struggled one-handed with the bolt and won into the air. It made him reel as the wine took hold, his legs tangled and he almost fell. Recovering, he squelched across the muddy grass to the forage-shed and dumped his prize with a grunt of relief on the loose hay.
She rolled over and struck at him, sobbing. Guy caught at her in the dark and gripped her arms. ‘Gently, gently, or you’ll miscarry!’ he urged.
‘Butcher—murderer—oh Mother Mary, you killed Alfgar!’
‘What else could I do for him?’ She had not understood; she was in no state to understand now, but he had to try. ‘I promise not to harm you. I’ll get you out of here—’
She was on her knees, rocking back and forth and sobbing. ‘Oh Alfgar, Alfgar! God smite you into Hell! Alfgar!’ He dropped to one knee beside her, and she shrieked and struck at him. The Slut snarled, and she huddled away from them both, her arms about her belly.
‘Listen to me. I shall not touch you—’
She uncoiled herself and sprang for the doorway. Guy caught her back by the skirts of her gown and pushed her down on the hay. ‘God’s Grace, do you want to be ravished by every man in the garrison and ripped up after? I tell you, I don’t want you!’
She stiffened, and drew breath sharply. He stood up, frowning down at the dim shape of her in the hay. The loveliest, most willing of demoiselles would not have tempted him this night, and the peasant-woman was not only lumpish and coarse but unsavoury. The rank stink of her, dirt and sweat and fear, was in his nostrils, and doubtless she was alive with lice.
‘Wait here,’ he commanded. ‘My bitch will keep watch.’ He touched the Slut’s head as she followed him to the door. ‘Guard!’ She sank to her haunches, black menace in the dim light, and the woman whimpered.
He stopped at the horse-trough to wash sticky blood from his hands and dagger. From the hall window-slits above came a scream and a roar of laughter. He ran for the gatehouse, stumbled against its chilly stone and leaned there shaking through every muscle to his bones. Dry sobs wrenched him. The cries hunted him, sinking to whimpers and then rising, piercing his hands when he covered his ears.
He had known a crazy hope that the gate-guards had been swept to the hall with all the rest of the garrison, or become incapably drunk, but the whipping-post was a peril none would risk. Yellow lantern-light slashed the tunnel’s darkness, and from the guardroom came a rumble of men’s voices and a bray of laughter. He might order them to open the gate, but they would not obey him without referring to Lord Reynald for leave; from dusk to dawn no one might enter or depart without his permission. Dawn would be too late.
‘No way out of here,’ Conan’s quiet voice said in his ear.
Guy whirled, his hand leaping to his dagger. ‘What—?’
Conan jerked his head, and Guy, half-suspicious and half-bewildered, followed him out of earshot of the guardroom. Vague uproar drifted down from the lighted windows of the hall, but he was all at once aware that the screams had ceased.
‘Where’s the wench?’ Guy hesitated, and he added impatiently, ‘Devil burn you, I don’t want her!’
Guy nodded to the Slut in the forage-shed doorway.
‘They reckon to let you finish the night with her and then take their sport,’ Conan told him, ‘being otherwise disappointed. Don’t fret yourself over the man. He’s dead.’ He sounded entirely sober.
‘God have mercy on his soul,’ Guy prayed, crossing himself. Sudden comprehension jerked the question from him. ‘You?’
‘Yes. They’d blinded him. He was screeching and blundering about, and I hamstrung him. But being drunk I bungled it and cut the spurting vein behind his knee. And who more regretful than I?’ His voice was emotionless.
‘Why?’
‘You wanted it.’ He turned towards the shed, a featureless shape in the night. ‘You’re an obstinate self-righteous pup and I’d rather anyone else had come between me and that bull, but you were the one and I owe you the debt.’ He started for the shed, and then swung back. ‘Moreover, when I’d witnessed the risk you ran snatching two from under the devil’s claws, I didn’t find it amusing. So I finished your work. Now we’ve to get you out of here.’
‘Over the wall it will have to be.’
‘And no way of getting a horse out. That means you’ll have to come back. You can’t go to Malmesbury afoot like a beggar and expect the Angevin to accept you.’
‘Afoot I’d most likely be dragged back at my lord’s saddlebow.’
‘What are we dawdling for? Fetch the wench before anyone takes it into his head to seek you.’
The woman still huddled where Guy had left her. Waiting had given her terror time to grow, and at sight of a second man she shrieked and cowered into the hay. He bent over her, pity mastering exasperation, and took her gently by the arm.
‘Don’t be afraid. We won’t harm you. Come now, we’re going to get you out of Warby.’
Sobbing, she tried to pull away. He dragged her to her feet, and she struggled in panic.
‘You silly slut!’ hissed Conan. ‘He’s trying to help you! Come!’
But Conan had no word of English, and she fought the harder for the menace in his incomprehensible words. The Slut growled, and with a whimper she suddenly gave way and obeyed Guy’s towing hand.
‘The garden wall is lowest,’ Conan murmure
d, ‘and not overlooked.’
They trotted the length of the bailey. The keep was built on the highest point, and beyond it the ground fell steeply towards the river, which circled round the hill’s foot and made a ditch unnecessary at the southern end of the curtain-wall. Between keep and wall, sheltered and sloping south, lay the garden, and they squelched over grass paths faintly visible between beds of dug earth. Conan stumbled over something in the grass under the fruit trees, swore and then stooped.
‘Your luck’s holding,’ he observed, heaving up a ladder some gardener had left lying after he pruned the trees.
Guy remembered his cracked rib and gave him a hand with it up the steps to the rampart-walk. They hoisted it over between two merlons and managed to find firm footing for it on the berm beneath the wall.
‘You could set the wench loose here and let her go,’ Conan suggested as though he reckoned Guy’s obligations ended at that.
Guy shook his head. ‘I must see her to safety.’ He could not abandon the wretched creature to find her own way to shelter after all that had befallen her. Likely enough she would run screaming into the river, or fall and miscarry by the wayside. She stood hunched against the parapet, sobbing in faint gulps. ‘I’ll go first,’ he said. ‘Then you help her over.’ The Slut whined. He lifted and slung her over his shoulder, slid backwards through a crenel, found the topmost rung with his foot and decended. He anticipated he would have to carry the woman likewise, but Conan bundled her over and he helped her down. He spared time to hoist the ladder up for the mercenary to return, caught the woman’s hand and led her down the hill, the Slut loping ahead.
They slanted along the slope to the thickets and rough ground at its foot, and he led along the river bank, leaving it only to skirt the village and the ploughed fields. ‘No use seeking help where Lord Reynald rules,’ he told her. ‘Your nearest safety is Thorgastone.’
The ford was high, and he had almost to carry her over, the icy water swirling about his thighs and her skirts tangling against his legs. The Slut was carried far downstream, but she joined him grinning and shaking herself. His boots sloshed full of water, and the wind bit through his clothes, but the rain had blown away, and the clouds shredded to let gleams of watery moonlight show them the path.