Burning the Water

by Robert Low

  ‘Broomhouse Tower,’ he said, then paused. ‘Do you even recall it, Master Sabin?’

  Again the shrug. ‘Not more than another. Screams and smoke.’

  Aye, Musgrave thought. Just so. Smoke from the fire you set, screams from the auld woman who burned alive in it. No ordinary old woman but the much respected and noble Lady of Hume, matriarch of the entire Hume Name, on both sides of the divide.

  Sabin shook his head when Musgrave told him this.

  ‘So I have been told. Now I know this and I know less than before – one old rebel frau is hardly here nor there in such affairs.’

  ‘Aye, well, it may yet come to hag you,’ Musgrave answered curtly. ‘Yet – no matter. I need word from your Captain General on how matters progress. There are some two thousand men at Twa Corbies. Wallis, Charlton, Robson and others. If your Company is to survive, they will need rescued.’

  ‘You think the Sable Rose cannot beat a rabble of dog-riders?’

  Musgrave shot daggers back at Sabin’s wry, amused look.

  ‘You have never fought Border riders, Master Sabin. I would not underestimate them if I were you. Nor would I end up in their clutches if they know it was you burned Broomhouse. They will hand you to the Humes, who will deal harshly with you over it.’

  ‘There is little risk of that – your plan runs true, Lord Musgrave.’ Sabin replied with an acknowledging bow and Musgrave sipped his wine.

  Yes, it ran true enough and he thanked God for the arrival of Thomas Horner, pompous little tick with his writ from the Lord Chancellor. All but accused me of being in league with Catholic recanters and worse, he recalled, because he had found out that the nun leading the group he sought was my sister. Thought to find her at Bewcastle, all snug and at Compline.

  Well, he was put right on that, Musgrave thought. My sister, whom I had not seen since I was six and meant less to me than the horse I ride. My sister bringing her dangerous un-Reformed cant to my door, threatening everything I have built so far…

  Yet there had been opportunity in it for a man charged with bringing the Wallis to heel for daring to trample on the dignity of the Dacres.

  All it took was a message directing her and her runaway nuns through the Wallis country and the dispatching of Rutland to find Maramaldo, who sent his Chancellor, Sabin. When he arrived, a contract was signed and Horner sent off with it; Sabin, of course, remained as a ‘guest’, but he was an experienced Chancellor and it was not the first time he had been a hostage.

  In return for service against the Wallis, Maramaldo got what he desired most – back into the good graces of King Henry and out of the pestilential damp north. Back to France and plunder, with the addition of the two sakers they had been ordered to escort south.

  Musgrave did not know whether Maramaldo had taken himself into the Cheviot with two stolen guns and the intent to ignore his orders, but he had certainly thought better of it. And now Hertford and Henry both would welcome the previously-detested Maramaldo like the Prodigal if he came wrapped in the aura of having helped forestall another Catholic revolt in the north.

  Horner, for his part, would wait to get whatever the nuns were carrying, what the Lord Chancellor sought. The truth, Musgrave mused, was that the Lord Chancellor would get a good portion of the treasure, whatever it was, to sweeten the news of Thomas Horner’s untimely death. Battlefields were dangerous places, a great loss to the office of the Lord Chancellor, so sorry, my condolences…

  He had to go, to keep the secret of Musgrave’s sister. The nuns would die for the same reason, them and the bairns – Sabin had laughed aloud when Musgrave had put this to him, without revealing the why. Not that it mattered to Sabin, who was interested only in the ‘how much?’

  ‘Grussgott,’ he said mockingly, when a sum was agreed. ‘A commissioner of the Chancellory, two nuns and five kinder – yet you people declare the like of me too fell cruel for civilised folk.’

  Musgrave did not like the tone then and was no better disposed to it now. Yet he turned the bright coin of his plan over and over in his mind, noting the nick and shavings in the immaculate of it. Rutland was one and Musgrave was annoyed at that, not because of the loss of the wee papingo, whose talents had been limited, but because of the stupidity in it caused by Maramaldo’s mistrust of his own Captains.

  A mistrust not misplaced, Musgrave noted, since Sabin had added his own codicil to the contract, a private arrangement that Maramaldo did not know of – Batty Coalhouse.

  Musgrave had heard the cracked bell of Sabin’s voice when he said the name. There was longing in it, the same as a wolf looking on a lone sheep, but there was also a tinge of fear.

  Musgrave foresaw a quarrel brewing between Sabin and his master, but that was no matter to him, provided it did not hinder his own ambitions – rid the Cheviot of the stain of Wallis, secure the Dacre of Lanercost rights and bask in the glory of that Border house.

  It had been easy enough to steer Batty Coalhouse towards Akeld and all the one-armed bastard-born had to do was wander into the trap and be caught; yet he had escaped – Sabin had had word of it that very morning. Still, if Coalhouse was with the Wallis, then he would be scooped up in the same net as the rest of those troublesome fishes, as Musgrave had pointed out to the scowling Sabin.

  So all was still well and he was cheered by it as he went over his little speech to the young Ogle, preening himself with the way he had put the youth in his place.

  Then it came to him, sudden as a gaff, that the term used for this way of fishing had a new and darker meaning these days, because it brought black blood to the eye and vengeance to the hand on both sides.

  Burning the water.

  Akeld

  At the same time…

  She saw them moving suddenly, with a fluid purpose not seen before. It took her notice because it seemed to transmute the clay she had seen into a tarnished glimmer of gold.

  The one called Holy Cross had been simply another beribboned ugly draped in geegaws and medallions, the face under the broadbrimmed cap ruined by a red scar from hairline to jaw, nicking the nose on the run down and another from cheek to cheek – the Holy Cross which gave him his by-name.

  Now he and the tall, lanky Spaniard they called Marillo, the blond Portuguese albino they called Nevar, the Fleming known as Witt – all the men who had growled and spat at each other round the fire – were transformed.

  Sister Faith saw them kissing their amulets and dressing for war, looking at one another and knocking helmets together, or slapping hands like some deal had been made and she realised that what she had taken for growling animosity round the fire had been the opposite – the affection of wolves.

  They were skilled, honed fighters who put their trust in one another and so, she saw, would not be easily defeated. And though they snarled slyly behind his back, they would follow the orders of the clanking, half-armoured likes of Juup, the Captain who ordered them into a huge square centred on the bastel house.

  In the middle of the brimming maggot movement of it all sat Maramaldo, armoured and helmeted, plumed and perched on a white horse, so that all could see him and, she saw, take comfort from that. Sister Faith’s heart fluttered then, for it seemed such a power that nothing could overturn.

  Save God.

  She saw Daniel, stick-thin and sitting with Holy Cross, watching while he buckled and strapped – helping him now and then and getting a friendly clap on one shoulder. The other children huddled round Sister Faith, who watched from the bastel’s thin, high window as the scarred man told Daniel how to keep blades and armour from rusting.

  ‘Cut of all the legs off a goat from the knee down,’ he explained in his thick accent, ‘soak them in smoke for a day and keep them for twenty after that. Crack the marrow from them and grease your blades and they will stay bright even when wet.’

  ‘He is lost to us, I think.’

  The voice came from Sister Charity and Sister Faith knew she spoke of Daniel, knew her colleague was right – the mercen
aries called him ‘Suckling’, in the same way they had given by-names to each other and that name, Sister Faith realised sadly, was more to him now than the one he had been baptised with in the sight of God.

  Daniel would not come away with them when they were freed and, if forced, would run back to be with these glorious folk who promised more than a lifetime of huddling servitude in the Church – the one, Sister Faith remembered, that Horner called, scathingly: ‘that foul republic of wooden sandals’.

  She and the others would be freed, Sister Faith knew, for Maramaldo had said as much the night before, coming to them out of the darkness like a wraith.

  ‘Tomorrow,’ he had announced, breathing slow and heavy in the flicking tallow, ‘there will be a fight here, though you should be safe inside the house, for these dog riders are no match for the likes of us.’

  ‘I have heard they beat a Scotch army only recently,’ Sister Faith responded, ‘with no help from anyone else.’

  Maramaldo dismissed it with a wave and a grin.

  ‘A Scotch rabble,’ he corrected, ‘ill-led and straggled out on a march. Dog-riding prickers like these can do well under such circumstances.’

  He paused and encompassed the room, the Cheviots and possibly the world with another wave.

  ‘These people are secret fighters,’ he went on. ‘They use their wits, ride by moonlight for a little plunder and they are the finest secret fighters in the world, no doubt of it. But their weakness is the love of their own places. Who would want this land? It is cold, wet, with nothing on it at all and good only for grazing. Yet they will abandon their secret Riding and come out, all plumage and boasts, to be shot down by my archers at the hint that one of their mean towers is threatened.’

  Sister Faith had seen the archers, hump-shouldered and strong, chaffering with the pikemen, whom they considered a lesser breed. Already Daniel was testing his puny strength on Holy Cross’s powerful longbow and being congratulated for moving the string an eyebrow hair.

  ‘Besides,’ Maramaldo added, mistaking her thoughtful silence for fear, ‘plans are laid which makes their ruin assured.’

  ‘More slaughter – what is worth this affront to God?’ she asked and Maramaldo laughed, harsh as rooks.

  ‘Our Lord will forgive,’ he answered. ‘An eye for an eye, tooth for tooth saith the Scriptures – though I only came to read them recently, now that Holy Books are no longer solely in Latin.’

  Sister Faith crossed herself against such impiety and Maramaldo laughed.

  ‘You are a good woman,’ he said to her surprise, ‘but have been cloistered too long. The world is not as you have made it, Sister.’

  ‘I know what the world is made of,’ she replied, stung. ‘It is made of more folk seeking God’s redemption than it is of folk like you. God grant you peace, Captain General.’

  Maramaldo made the sign of the cross and laughed.

  ‘God grant you release from alms,’ he replied. ‘You see? I greet you as you greet me – both of us would starve if our prayers were answered.’

  ‘Do you believe that for true, Captain General?’ she answered and he frowned.

  ‘Of course. Listen – if Plato stood up and called: “follow me and discuss Forms which cannot be seen” at the same time as Caesar clapped a hand to his swordhilt and yelled: “follow me and conquer Gaul” who would have the biggest crowd?’

  He smiled – almost sadly, it seemed to Sister Faith and answered the question himself.

  ‘A man would be shamed to follow Plato.’

  ‘And if it was not Plato,’ Sister Faith replied, looking him in his pouched, ravaged face. ‘If it was Our Lord Jesus Himself, who called out: ‘follow me and find a place in Heaven’?’

  Maramaldo acknowledged the sally with a slight flap of one hand.

  ‘You may find it hard to believe, but there was a time, woman, when I hadn’t given a blow to anyone. And not just when I had bare legs and toddled. I was a peaceful youth – but the wolf goes after lambs and the marten chases chickens, so that state did not last for long, not in my small corner of God’s world. The only way to stop lawless trash is to become a Law. Yea, though I walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, I will fear no evil, Sister. For I am more fearful than anything in that valley.’

  She had no answer; beyond, she heard the men round the fires singing:

  Maramaldo takes good care of us

  Beer and spirits he shares with us

  Music for our leisure,

  Pretty girls for our pleasure

  With our beer and our wine,

  Sable Rose men, we’re so fine.

  ‘Tomorrow,’ Maramaldo repeated, ‘we shall fight and we shall win. Afterwards you and the children – those who wish it – will go free. I suspect my current employer will want you dead, so I would run hard and fast. Charity will remain with me.’

  Sister Faith had known it all, since the revelation that she was a piece in a larger plot and that Sister Benedict had been betrayed by her own brother. Still, the saying of it made her heart weep and her eyes turn to where Sister Charity sat in the dark. Just Charity. Not Sister Charity…

  ‘Once a nun, always a nun,’ Sister Charity had said later. ‘Even if I am not wearing a wimple.’

  Now she stood behind Sister Faith and the children wearing a hodden grey dress and a simple kerchief round her head and cheeks, though she had contrived a cloth veil across her face.

  ‘He keeps us as surety against Lord Musgrave of Bewcastle,’ she said and her voice was bitter. ‘Aye, him who is brother to our departed Sister in Christ and his own sister in kin. He has used her and us for his own ends. Captain General Maramaldo does not care for that.’

  Sister Faith heard the tone and the terms and cocked her head a little.

  ‘You speak as if this Maramaldo cared for us,’ she said and felt ashamed at the prim in her voice. Sister Charity might have smiled or scowled; only she knew behind the veil.

  ‘His nights with me are not what you might think,’ she replied flatly. ‘He is as bad poxed as myself, for all he looks so fine. It will take him in a different way – with me it will show in my face, all the sins of God’s punishment for the world to see. On his, little at all – but his mind is rotted and will grow worse and worse. He will die, mad and screaming. Some of his men know it too – that Cornelius for one – and wait for the moment when he is clearly too mad to follow.’

  Sister Faith could only stare, mute as a swan.

  ‘He wakes at night,’ Sister Charity added and Sister Faith heard some sorrow in her voice now. ‘He calls out a name – Bella. Then he curses her. I fancy it was this one poxed him, though I cannot know any more surely than he can himself. Yet he believes it – and that she lay with him deliberately to do it.’

  Sister Faith bowed her head and turned her rosary ring. Outside, the banners snapped and cracked and men fought with horses made restive by a rising wind.

  It was morning and the Company of the Sable Rose dressed for war.

  Twa Corbies

  At the same time…

  The wind was rising, a freshing breeze that drove off the stink, save when it swirled it to Batty’s nose, a rank smell made up of too many horses and men in close proximity for too long. If they stay here another five-day, Batty thought, sickness will rake its way through Twa Corbies.

  The place reeked with life now, all the same – thousands of horses and men, all chaffering one another. Somewhere, a man cranked a rosined wheel and men danced to the hurdy-gurdy lilt; beyond them, more men milled in a brutal game of football.

  Above it all loomed Twa Corbies, four stories of solid stone topped with gable ends on which stood the weathered lumps that gave the place its name, blackened with old smoke and age. Once they had been carved eagles, but time and legend had turned them into a brace of ravens, giant versions of the ones which swooped and harshed round the tower.

  John Wallis reined his big stot to a halt in the middle of this foam of men and turned, beaming his
triumph at Batty.

  ‘What say you now, Master Coalhouse? Do the Cheviot men have the match for this Maramaldo?’

  It had been the recurring theme all the way here – and the reason I am not wearing a wee rope collar, Batty realised. John Wallis needs reassuring that he can take on hard mercenaries from the Germanies, Landsknechts as he has heard and with all the fear and trembling associated with that name. He needs someone who knows them well.

  ‘Aye, mayhap,’ Batty mused, stroking his raggled beard. ‘If you catch him on the march. If not – keep away from the front of his brace o’ sakers.’

  ‘You will advise me on it – we move out soon. Willie, leave off with that hound.’

  The last was directed at a boy struggling to put a collar on a big, shaggy wolfhound and having little luck, since the dog had its arse firmly planted on the turf and was trying to drag itself by the front paws.

  ‘I want him beside me when I ride, da.’

  The face was a sullen mirror of John Wallis, who was as unimpressed by it as he was by the dog.

  ‘To what end, Will? Your fierce wardog may kill one o’ those Germans if he dies laughing at it trying to scrape the worm-itch from its hinter-end, but that is the only way it will happen. Take the collar away and the beast down to Dog-Anthone to be physicked.’

  He watched briefly as the boy did as he was told, then turned and shrugged apology.

  ‘Bairns,’ he declared, then signalled Batty to dismount.

  ‘War is no place for them,’ Batty said and John Wallis scowled uneasily.

  ‘A truth his mother reminds me off daily. Divven you start also.’

  They shouldered through the greetings of the crowd of men, who saw that the Master of Twa Corbies had arrived and sensed the imminence of Ride; Batty heard them as he climbed up and into the hall of the place.