by Alex Dylan
“I keep tasting the foulness in my mouth, Sorcha, again and again. Every time I think of it, it’s enough for me to recall the smell, that awful smell…” her stomach clenched involuntarily and she winced.
Sorcha paused from brushing the crumbs from her apron front to pass a cup of ale to Melisande. Melisande shook her head, narrowing her mouth into a thin, firm line and picked up her bulging satchel. “Come on, let’s get this over with.”
The old dungeons were rank with the fetid smell of compressed, desperate men. This was only the second visit Ross had permitted Melisande to minister to the prisoners. The first time, she had emptied the contents of her stomach all over the steps, much to the amusement of the guards. She was determined not to make a spectacle of herself a second time. Melisande carried a small pomander with her, yet even so the wretched stink of too much humanity tightly packed into too small a space made her gag reflexively.
It took a while for her eyes to adjust to the gloom; she stood watchfully on the bottommost step, listening to the phlegm-rattling coughs, interspersed with the subdued moaning of the hopeless and punctuated by the wild shrieks of the mad. Some of the men had been chained to the walls. Other prisoners were only manacled round the ankles, yet unable to move more than a shuffle from the lethal embrace of the damp walls. They had been forced to relieve themselves where they sat or lay. The Solway boosted the Eden tidally, flooding the dungeons and swirling the dirty straw, turds and detritus together in a slowly circulating cesspit. At least the rats had the opportunity to swim away.
Those men who were too weak to move with their injuries or gaol fever lay choking in their own filth. Ross had even wanted to leave the corpses in the dungeons to rot until Melisande had hinted that they might cause plague. He had ordered them shifted quickly enough after that, in a grim reaping each sun-up. Melisande had seen the Watch remove the previous night’s harvest as she made her way across the Outer Ward. They slung the bodies across a couple of pack horses, intending to take them to the crossroad at Harraby Hill and gibbet them. Melisande shuddered at Ross’s relentless drive for revenge. He intended the reivers to die many times over.
In her heart, Melisande knew that the only reason Ross let her tend the prisoners was to keep them alive long enough to die excruciating deaths. It might be kinder to hasten the end for some. One skinny boy’s ankles were a mass of ulcerating sores where the rusted iron manacles had bitten down to his thin bones. She gave him valerian mixed with a little wine to keep him numb.
She moved to the next person, doing what she could; offering respite from the pain, a smiled word of encouragement for the families she knew. Ross would not let her provide food or water though, so when gaunt, thin faces with their saucer eyes looked pleadingly at her, she felt shame for even the oatcake she had eaten that morning.
She worked her way around the over-crowded chamber until she reached Adam Routledge. He sat alone with his back propped against the corner wall on a small stone ledge, staring fiercely at the darkness. He was half mad with thirst but there was fight left in him yet. Melisande recognised the burning ball of anger all Borderers carried in the pit of their stomach. The other reivers avoided him as he muttered incessantly, railing against some imagined foe. He wanted his revenge and was prepared to die for it; not until he got it. She hoped it would be enough to sustain him until the hunger consumed him.
She stretched out a hand to touch him but he flinched his shattered face away from her cautious reach. “’T ain’t no use anyhow, the faeries must have their token,” croaked Adam, struggling to force the words. “Save it, m’lady, for them that needs your pity.”
Melisande offered some valerian-laced wine to his cracked lips, “Drink Adam, let me help you rest.”
“My boys, my bonny wee boys…” he let the liquid trickle away over his face. “Elaine? The bairn?”
“Got away safe, Adam.” She clasped his hand between both of hers and felt his calloused fingers curl around, gripping her as though she was the protective Irish basket of his sword handle. He was a proud man, she decided. Courageous too, his reiver heritage like grit in the bottom of the bucket that never goes away, no matter how many times you rinse it. Continuity, lineage, that’s what counted for the reivers.
“Why did they torture you, Adam?” she asked. “What is it about you?”
“Faeries,” he whispered. “And the secret of their gold.”
“What gold?”
“The gold I had in my cods, wherra allus keep it for Roddy on market day. That Scottish prick’s bum boy was verra keen to know about it. But he can’t have it ’cause it’s faerie gold…” he broke off with a wheezing laugh that became a cough.
“It was Mark A’Court himself who questioned you?” Melisande asked quietly.
“Shhh. No. The Lord Warden said not to tell him,” spat Adam. “Said I could keep my tongue until I told him where to find the faeries…”
Adam resumed his muttering. Melisande, crouched on her haunches, made to stand to leave him. “I never liked faeries,” he said, tugging at her hand. “Will o’ the wisps, out on the Marsh at night. I hated ‘em. My old da’ used to laugh at me, made me stay out all night with the cattle ’cause he knew how much I was afeared. Round Longshank’s cairn they’d dance, like white lanterns bobbing about. That’s what gave me the idea, see. I could outsmart them. I tied a couple of lanterns to the cattle’s horns and drove them away up the Marsh. I reckoned the faeries would follow the cattle and leave me alone.”
“And did they?” asked Melisande, fascinated in spite of herself. She crouched back down beside him. “Until the ship came, aye. I never meant no harm, I just didn’t think…” he tailed off.
Melisande chewed her lip. If Adam has been just a boy, it would have been many years previous. Perhaps the year that threatened invasion. She could imagine a Spanish ship, blown off course after that April storm, creeping northwards up the coast, the crew thinking they were heading for Ireland and their allies. They didn’t know that the rest of the Armada had turned back. Sailors in unfamiliar waters, they would be unaware of the dangers of the Solway spring tides. How had they been lured into the shallows? Had the bobbing lanterns tied to the cattle give the impression of ships anchored in a deep bay and drawn them in?
"They didn’t realise until the ship ran aground. I tried to warn the crew not to jump, the quicksands…but they leapt anyway. I ran for help. As God is my witness, I ran so fast it set my chest on fire with the pain of breathing. I fetched my da’ and his men but by then there was nothing we could do. I just held the lantern and we all stood and watched them sucked down. At first light, we took what we could. When the tide turned, the bore took the rest.
“How many families were involved? Not just the Routledges, surely.”
Adam shook his head. “Nay, but it was just those who were with my da’ that night, Kerrs and Maxwells both, Hutcheon Graham and a few of the Armstrong boys. There was gold, a lot of gold. Chests with coins. The men were all slapping my back and laughing that the faeries had shown me where to find treasure. And as soon as they said it, I knew we would all regret it. There came an ill week then…”
Melisande nodded her understanding. "We expected to be overrun. Ill week was bad that year, yes, so bad that those who had lands elsewhere took themselves away; to Ireland, to Scotland, some even to the Debatable Lands, just to let the heat die down. Those of us who couldn’t leave made sensible preparations and toughed it out.
“Plenty of folks would think to bury their treasures for safety and security, fully meaning to return to them. They weren’t expecting the feuding to be so bloody or to last so long. Many died with their secrets tucked tight. Time passed and most was forgotten. But not by you.”
Her knees were beginning to hurt from crouching in the damp, and the awful smell was making her nauseous again. Her eyes darted sideways to Adam.
“No, I didn’t forget, but I couldn’t remember properly, neither. Everyone pestering us to find their gold again, Kerrs a
nd Maxwells thinking we were deliberately trying to keep it from them. They knew how the sands would shift every tide. The faeries hid it, not me! Not letting Routledges ride, Armstrongs taking everything we had, hoping we’d grow so desperate we’d reveal where the treasure was until they realised we didn’t know neither. Then they just laughed at us, thinking I was mad to stay out on the Marsh, scratching a living from the land. And as soon as they left us alone, I began to remember.”
“Whatever you found, you should have reported to the Land Sergeants, but then Ross would just claim it for his own. And I suppose you figured that if you told anyone else, they might just spread the word amongst the families and start a blood feud against you.”
Melisande lowered her voice to the merest whisper. “That’s what happened with Old Man Kerr, wasn’t it? He realised how you were finding the money to keep paying your protection. Did he demand the blackmail for his continued silence? Or was someone else demanding a share all along for his silence and just got too greedy, Adam. Was that it?”
There was silence then, “Who told yer?” Adam rumbled angrily. “That bastard Hamish. I told Elaine that just because he was Scots, that wasn’t reason enough to trust him. I’ll have both his eyes next time I see him, same as Old Man Kerr. And his lying tongue too, for good measure.”
Melisande hushed him quickly. Adam started to weave his head from side to side. Melisande had seen cattle do the same thing when they were about to be slaughtered. She spoke quietly. “Kerr’s dead, Adam.”
“It wasn’t me. I just took his eyes. I stuck him on his horse and turned him back to the city. He was found. Hamish said he was found.”
“Did you kill Hamish?”
“Killed him? No, I never. Hamish is dead?” He dropped his head and started moaning.
“That wasn’t me. Someone else. Someone betrayed me to the Lord Warden. I’ll not hang for murder. I haven’t killed no one. Aye, I took Kerr’s eyes. I didn’t mean to, not at the start. He kept laughing about how the Routledges are everyman’s prey. He just went on and on about how I wasn’t man enough for Elaine, how he’d take it all from me…I just wanted him to stop, so I hit him with the spade. Mebbe a bit too hard, because he was out of his wits then and just kept gabbling ’bout faeries and gold. That gave me the idea to take his eyes. I wish I could’ve kept the look he gave me. It took a long time to get his respect but I did at the end.”
“Adam, listen,” Melisande whispered urgently. “I dare not stay much longer with you. It will make the guards suspicious.” It was alarmingly true. The brutish Watchmen kept turning around to look at her with their beady-red rat eyes and she didn’t like what she read behind them. She was sure they would report to Ross eventually and was hoping that the distraction of festivities that were planned for the Whitsun Fair would buy her just enough time before Ross decided to take his interrogations further.
Adam stiffened and grasped her hand more tightly. “I can see their lights,” he whimpered, staring at the walls.
Melisande followed his gaze into the empty darkness.
“Keep them away from me. I can’t remember where their gold is. Tell them. Don’t let them take my tongue,” he moaned.
“Hush, Adam,” Melisande crooned. “Keep your tongue still in your mouth, and they won’t find it now, will they?”
“Yes. Yes,” he mumbled quietly, weaving his head. “I promised I wouldn’t tell,” he repeated it over and over until his voice was lost to a whisper.
Melisande swore grimly to herself, remounting the steps and nodding to the guards to let her out. Watching from the upper windows of his spacious chamber in the Keep, Mark A’Court was amused to see Lady Melisande striding across the Inner Ward and attempting to undress at the same time.
Struggling to shrug off her semi-undone clothes, she pulled up her kirtle, revealing her underskirts. She was the very picture of a demon temptress testing St Anthony’s chastity that he’d seen painted on Prior Gondibour’s wooden panels in Carlisle Cathedral. Sin shaped like a woman. He chuckled blackly to himself, thinking that if anyone could tempt a saint to fornication, it would definitely be the Lady Melisande.
Her fiery maidservant scurried after her, stopping every so often to bend and pick up discarded items of clothing. Melisande was angrier than he had ever seen a woman before; including the only time he had seen the old queen. He winced when he remembered how she had thrown her slippers at him, unerring in her aim as he tried to back away from her. “Burn them, burn them all,” he heard Melisande command. Yes, that reminded him of the old queen too; and her cousin. Fire was a good way to purge and clean.
As the Cathedral bells rang out cheerfully, crowds of people were already at the Sands or on their way there. The whole city was in its holiday finery, tricked out with ribbons and ruffles. The women were wearing their best bonnets and the wives of the richer men, the merchants and not a few of the heidsmen’s too, paraded rich velvet costumes of tawny, green and mulberry, trimmed with fine French and Irish lace, on the way to the tented stands. Some of the men sported fine slashed doublets, linen shirts and ruffs, but most wore their jack and carried both sword and dagger with them through the crowd.
The hawthorn was bright with clusters of sweetly-scented white blossoms. Pedlars circulated amongst the crowds with their trays slung around their necks, tempting the populace to buy ribbons, small pastries and a hundred other over-priced distractions.
There seemed to be horses everywhere. Nimble young lads, perched on the backs of sleek ponies, rode them down to the river to wash them. Barkers addressed the crowds from within each small cordoned area, vying to be heard above the hullabaloo. Horses stood patiently having their lips pulled back for teeth inspection and hooves lifted as buyers checked for signs of rot. Men haggled, spat into their hands and shook to seal the bargain. Clerks wrote out bills of sale, which were torn in half; one for the vendor, one for the buyer. The soldiery checked the bills, inspected goods and made sure there was no cheating.
Those who could afford it sat in the sap-fresh shade of the newly erected stand and watched the better horseflesh parading round the ring in front of them as they sipped wine with wafers. Mark A’Court had one eye on the ring and another on the exits, where every so often, a line of ponies strung together left the Sands, trotting away around the Castle to the Sorceries or beyond Caldewgate to the old Roman Road.
“Your men are checking vigilantly that no horse over thirty pounds in value leaves this sale?” he asked Ross lazily.
“As carefully as are your own,” replied Ross testily, resenting the implied criticism, “and, aye, checking for stolen and over-branded mounts too. It’s not the first time we’ve held the Whitsun Fair, my lord.”
“Hmm,” mused Jeffrie Nortbie thoughtfully. “Prices seem to be very low this year, judging by the quick turnover.”
“The cheap stuff always goes first,” answered Ross dismissively. “This is where the real action is,” he rubbed his hands gleefully, “and afterwards, with the horse races.”
Melisande sat in the back of the stands, trying hard to ignore the chattering magpies, which was how she thought of Phillice, Ruth and the other goodwives. They made too much screeching noise and blathered on endlessly and inconsequentially. They bored her with the twaddle of their conversation. She wanted to flap her arms and shoo them all away, so she could be free to worry about Heughan and more important things instead.
Strains of music drifted over from the other entertainments on offer. Melisande turned her head as a crowd cheered their support for two wrestlers grappling with one another, arms clasped firmly in a circle about the other’s chest and their chins on each other’s shoulders. For a moment they shuffled uncertainly and then one hooked his leg round the other’s ankles and hefted him onto the ground. From the roar of the crowd, it had to be a popular win.
Melisande looked up at the angle of the sun. She had been at the fair for hours and it was already late afternoon. She scanned the top of the crowd, looking for other fa
miliar faces. She spotted Sally tricked out in all her bright finery, including an outrageous bonnet with a curling plume. She hoped Ruth wouldn’t notice and start on another of her hegemonies designed to influence Phillice and Lettice.
She caught Phillice’s eye just as the tediously over-long conversation about fashions finally wound down. Phillice stroked one of her lapdogs, giggled mischievously and said out loud, “Whether green is flattering to the complexion or not, it seems to be a good colour to catch a beau, to judge by Melisande’s success.”
Melisande resisted an overwhelming urge to slap Phillice for thoughtlessly making her the centre of attention but instead simply smiled and looked awkwardly embarrassed. Unfortunately, Phillice was mid-prattle and in no mood to stop her teasing. “Melisande made quite the conquest of her recent gallant, didn’t you, Mele?” she ran on.
Mark A’Court pricked his ears, and Melisande saw him angle himself in his chair so he could keep a backwards ear on the turn the conversation had taken and yet still appear to give his attention to Ross. She felt the hairs on the back of her neck prick up in warning.
“Indeed, and when was this, Lady Middlemore?” he interjected.
Phillice looked confusedly from Mark to Melisande and back again, waiting for Melisande to answer. She said nothing and Mark appeared to content to wait.
Phillice coughed nervously and coloured a little as she said, “Which one of us are you addressing, my lord?”
Mark stood up and turned the full intensity of his gaze upon her before bowing briefly. “My apologies, Lady Middlemore; it had not occurred to me that there were two ladies claiming this title here today, for truthfully I think of you as the rightful lady of the Castle, as wife of the Lord Warden, for all your charming youthfulness.”
Phillice smiled delightedly, and Ruth gave Melisande a hard, smug look that said ‘I told you so.’ Mark turned to Melisande and sketched another courteous bow, “And I tend to think of Lady Melisande in a somewhat different frame of reference.”