The Song of the Nightingale

by Alys Clare

  He didn’t even try to get her to explain. Breaking into a run, he followed her across the vast floor, out of the door and down the steps, then across the square and off along one of the dim, narrow little alleyways that led to the artisans’ village.

  Outside a low, narrow dwelling, three men were held at bay by a fourth, wielding a great sword. His three opponents had lesser weapons, and their reach was shorter. The man with the sword kept sweeping it in broad strokes before him. Even from where he stood, Ninian could see the blueish edge of the steel; no wonder the attackers were keeping their distance.

  The man with the sword had deeply tanned skin, a short beard and a gold ring in his ear, and he wore a length of cloth wound around his head. He was dressed in a long robe of an indeterminate shade that was nearest to brown. His eyes, almost black, were narrowed in concentration. He was holding his opponents – the largest of whom was grunting in pain – against the wall of the dwelling. He turned to give a swift glance at Meggie, flashed her a grin and, with a nod in Ninian’s direction, said, ‘Was he the best you could find?’

  Ninian heard Meggie laugh softly. ‘Just wait,’ she said.

  Ninian drew his own sword, and the sharp metal seemed to whistle and hiss as it emerged from the scabbard. He went to take up his place beside the man in brown. ‘I’m called Ninian,’ he said to him. It seemed only right to identify himself, since he was about to fight shoulder to shoulder with this man. ‘I’m her brother.’

  ‘Jehan Leferronier,’ the man replied. He seemed on the point of adding something, but then changed his mind.

  ‘What do you want to do?’ Ninian muttered. ‘Disarm them and hand them to the constables?’

  ‘They will not lay down their weapons,’ Jehan said. ‘They work for a ruthless master who does not accept such failure.’

  ‘Very well.’ Ninian felt the hot uprush of blood. ‘Let’s take them.’

  For a moment the brown-skinned man met his eyes. A glance of understanding passed between them – he too is a fighter, Ninian thought – and then, moving as one, they advanced on the three men.

  The fight was ugly. The long swords that Ninian and Jehan wielded were less useful at close quarters, and soon both men dropped them in favour of their shorter, stabbing knives. It was quickly obvious which of the three men was the greatest threat: the biggest of the trio was a tough, wily brawler who, surmounting his evident pain, seemed to anticipate and counter every form of attack. Then Ninian, who had been trying to wrest the big man’s knife out of his hand, felt a sudden blow to the back of his head and, spinning round, saw another of the attackers swinging a club high in the air in preparation for a second blow.

  Ninian wriggled out of the way just in time, and the man, thrown off balance by the lack of resistance to his mighty swing, stumbled to his knees. Ninian fell on him, landing on his back and forcing him to the ground. He pushed the man’s face down into the dust, clinging on as he struggled, holding him down until the struggling stopped.

  As the red fury abated, he looked up.

  Jehan was engaged with the third of the opponents, pushing him back against the wall of the dwelling, one hard hand closing against the man’s throat, so that his fleshy face was gradually swelling and darkening. A fierce joy swept up through Ninian.

  Then he heard a cry of fear.

  Meggie.

  She was halfway up the alley, backing away towards the town. The big man was almost upon her, and he had a knife in his hand.

  He cannot kill her, Ninian thought wildly. It will not happen – it can’t.

  The man advanced. Meggie took another pace back.

  Ninian struggled to his feet, his head spinning and fizzing from the blow he had received. Swaying from side to side, he hurried off up the alley. He stooped to pick up his sword and all but fainted as he straightened up again.

  The big man made a lunge at Meggie: a killing blow, except that she ducked down to her right at the very last moment and, instead of piercing her heart, the knife went into her shoulder. She fell, blood spreading swiftly over the cloth of her robe as the big man withdrew his knife.

  Ninian had no idea what she had done to make the big man want to kill her; he did not care. She was his half-sister, his beloved Meggie. He would have given his life for her. The least he could do was take this bastard’s life before he gathered himself for another attempt to take hers.

  Keep still, he said to her silently. Stay right where you are, then he too will not move and I can line up my attack.

  He knew he had to get it right first time, for he could not guarantee there would be a second chance.

  But she was up, on her hands and knees, backing away from her assailant. The man gave a quiet chuckle. ‘Going to make a game of it, my pretty lass, eh?’ He chuckled again. ‘So much the better.’

  Slowly, deliberately, he wiped his blade on his tunic and advanced after her.

  Suddenly she was up, haring off up the alley. The big man, as taken aback as Ninian, recovered very quickly and ran after her, cursing. Ninian tried to follow, but his legs were heavy, and he felt as if he were trying to run through thick mud. One step – come on! – two steps. He found a little strength and managed a loping run for several paces. Then he fell.

  Twisting round, his eyes searched frantically for Jehan. But he was still fully occupied with his own opponent, and Ninian did not dare distract him by calling out.

  Get up, he ordered himself. He forced down the nausea, ignored the agonizing banging in his head and got to his feet. Grasping his sword, he ran after the big man.

  And saw, in a flash of understanding, that he was too late.

  She was only a few paces from the end of the alleyway; she had almost made it out into the square. But by sheer ill fortune, there was a kink in the track just there, and both she and the man about to kill her were out of sight of anyone but Ninian. The big man held her by her hair, which he had twisted round his left hand. He was holding her very tightly; Ninian could see tears of pain in her wide eyes.

  The big man’s knife was at her throat. He was about to end her life, as a farmer might dispatch a weakling lamb that was not going to survive.

  Ninian knew it was hopeless, for he was still too far away and the deadly slice that would take out his sister’s throat was even now beginning. He saw a bead of blood on the soft white skin of her neck.

  Praying for supernatural strength – for any kind of miracle – he launched himself forward.

  The impetus took what was left of his strength, and quickly his vision clouded, until all he saw was blackness. Out of it he thought he heard a voice: a powerful, deep voice. It shouted, Let her go!

  Ninian opened his eyes.

  Beyond Meggie was a man on a horse. The horse was golden-coloured, its luxuriant mane and tail dark. The man was broad-shouldered, and in his hand he held a sword. He was bareheaded, his dark hair thick. His eyes, full of anger, were brown, and in them there seemed to be bright highlights, like sunshine on water.

  The big man shouted a furious oath and, as the man on the horse swung down his sword, he let go of Meggie. The man turned, broke instantly into a wild, loping, stumbling run . . .

  . . . on to the point of Ninian’s sword.

  He crumpled and fell, a look of astonishment in his eyes. Then he gave a low moan, and his mouth filled with blood. His eyes lost their expression, and Ninian realized he was dead.

  He withdrew his sword.

  He looked up. The man on the horse had dismounted and was cradling Meggie to his deep chest, gently touching her wounded shoulder, murmuring gentle words. Meggie seemed incapable of speech, other than the one word, constantly repeated.

  Ninian stumbled up to the man, who put out his free arm and clutched him close.

  Jehan! Ninian struggled free and, turning, ran back down the alley. He met Jehan coming towards him. ‘Is she safe?’ he demanded.

  ‘Wounded but safe,’ Ninian replied. He raised his eyebrows in query.

  ‘Dead,’ Je
han said shortly.

  ‘Then that’s all three of them,’ Ninian muttered.

  He caught the swift smile of satisfaction on Jehan’s face.

  Another wave of nausea took him, and he bent over, hands on his knees. With the danger passed, he was beginning to recognize how hard he had been hit.

  Jehan put a concerned hand on his shoulder. ‘You are hurt?’

  ‘Not badly,’ he replied. ‘Hit on the head.’

  Jehan nodded gravely. ‘You must take care,’ he said, ‘for—’

  But there were far more important issues to discuss. Such as, how best to explain to this surprising stranger – with whom, from the look of both of them, his sister had intricately and possibly intimately involved herself – that Meggie’s father was standing at the far end of the alley.

  It was late in the evening, and Josse had at last found a moment to slip away and go down into the cathedral crypt. He felt he had very good reason to, and he would have gone before had there not been so much to see to.

  Meggie seemed to have found herself a man; the Brown Man, in fact, who, on first impressions, did not seem too bad. Josse was cautiously prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt, at least, while he got to know him better. It was a definite mark in his favour that he was not the man who had assaulted and killed the Hawkenlye victims, even if his true purpose in coming to England had been to join in with those who were preparing to stand against the king as he forced his way into Wales. Sometimes, Josse reflected wryly as he strode across the square towards the cathedral, he felt he could understand all too well why a man might take up arms against the king. That, however, was a thought that would have to remain very firmly shut up inside his own head.

  And fancy finding both Meggie and Ninian like that! It was quite extraordinary, for Josse and Helewise had only just arrived in Chartres, and, indeed, Josse had been about to seek out stabling for Alfred and for Helewise’s mare when they’d heard the commotion. A young woman, people were saying, had affronted the clerics and the high-up officials within the cathedral by racing in and shouting out that she needed help, urgently, and before they could decide how best to deal with her bad behaviour, a young man had raced off with her and the two of them had disappeared down that alleyway over there.

  Josse, fear stabbing at his heart and turning his blood cold, had thrown the mare’s reins to Helewise, put spurs to Alfred and followed the pointing fingers. To find his daughter in the grip of a fat thug who held a knife to her throat and seemed to be about to kill her.

  Josse still could not bear to think about that moment. She had not died, thank the dear, good, merciful God. The man who had been about to kill her had died, however. He and his two companions now lay in the burial ground attached to the town’s gaol, borne there by the forces of law and order who, belatedly arriving on the scene, had been convinced by Josse that no crime had been committed other than that three unsavoury strangers – English strangers, to boot – had managed to put paid to each other in a bad-tempered fight.

  The town’s law enforcers had better things to do than waste time investigating the deaths of Englishmen. Their leader pocketed the generous donation that Josse gave him, and no more was said. Just in case anybody changed their mind and began asking difficult questions, Josse had ordered Ninian and Jehan to leave the town. He described to them the location of a suitable campsite that he remembered and promised to meet them there the next day.

  Meggie’s shoulder wound was deep and dirty. Helewise had made the very sensible suggestion that they take her to the convent where Helewise had stayed the previous time she had visited Chartres, and now Meggie was being cared for there. Helewise had stayed with her. Apart from some slight embarrassment over explaining to the mother superior that she was no longer an abbess, or even a nun, all had been accomplished smoothly. The convent’s healers had washed and stitched the cut, and already Meggie was sufficiently recovered to ask questions about her treatment and offer her own suggestions.

  Amid all that had been going on, Josse had kept a part of himself back; a part that, recognizing this busy, crowded town as the last place where Joanna had been in her earthly existence, was already communing with her spirit.

  So it was that, now, he was quietly letting himself into the soaring, silent cathedral and making for the steps down to the crypt.

  He had a very strong sense that he would never come here again. Before he left for ever, he wanted to take the opportunity of trying to say a last goodbye.

  Goodbye and thank you, he reflected as he made his way down the stone steps. Ninian had told him – tried to tell him, although indeed the lad’s explanation had been all but incomprehensible – that he’d detected Joanna’s hand in everything that had happened concerning his return from the Languedoc, from first promptings right up to the moment in the crypt, when for an instant he had thought himself in another realm. The realm, perhaps, that Joanna now inhabited.

  Ninian. Josse thought with love of the young man. They hadn’t yet told him exactly why it had been so imperative to summon him home. Ninian had asked about Little Helewise, of course he had, as soon as there had been a moment and they weren’t trying to save each other’s lives, and Josse had overheard Meggie say, ‘She’s very well. She sends her best love.’ Josse was content to leave it to Meggie to tell him, when the time was right. Women seemed to understand about such things better than men. Better than Josse, anyway.

  He was in the crypt. Slowly he walked forward, across the central area where everyone went, and on into the shadows further in its cavernous depths. There had been a sacred spring here years ago, thousands of years, perhaps, long before the building of the great edifices to Christianity had begun. Joanna had always said it was a very special spot . . .

  He knew he was no longer in the crypt beneath the new cathedral. He was in the same place, yet it was different. He heard chanting and smelt incense. It was a pungent smell, and it made him slightly dizzy. He seemed to see shapes, lights, floating before his eyes.

  He did not know if she was there. But she might be, so he said softly, ‘Thank you, Joanna. You brought him back to us, and I reckon you had a hand in today’s events too.’

  Silence.

  ‘You’re going to be a grandmother,’ he went on, smiling. ‘How do you feel about that?’

  He wondered how she would look now. Would the years have changed her, as they did ordinary mortals? Would the long, dark hair now be grey; the dark, shining eyes dimmed? Or did people in whatever spirit world she now inhabited remain as they were when they left their earthly existence? She might be—

  She was beside him.

  He sensed her; he thought he saw her, although it was hard to distinguish between his vivid memories and what was actually before his eyes.

  He certainly heard her. ‘Hello, Josse,’ she said quietly. ‘How do you feel, Grandad?’

  He grinned. ‘Not quite yet. The baby isn’t due until—’ But he had forgotten.

  ‘July,’ she supplied. ‘It’s a girl, and she’s going to be as bonny as her mother. Don’t tell them I told you,’ she added.

  ‘I won’t,’ he said.

  There was a silence; quite awkward, on his part, for there was so much that he wanted to ask her and he did not know how. But, as she had so often done in life, she picked up his thoughts.

  ‘I am fine, dear Josse,’ she said. ‘I would say I am very well, but such things aren’t really relevant in the place where I am.’

  ‘You’re not – alone, are you?’ Somehow it would have hurt very much, to think of her all by herself.

  She laughed softly. ‘Oh, no. There are many of us. We watch, you see; sometimes, at places such as here, we can get through to those we love. At other times, we can view you as from a far shore, where very often there is a sort of mist.’

  ‘Was it you who called Ninian home?’

  She laughed again. ‘Of course.’

  There was another, longer, silence. He had the sense that he was drinking
her in, this woman he had loved so much, taking in every last moment of her to store up and keep in his heart for ever.

  Again, she picked up what was in his mind. ‘It’s goodbye, my lovely Josse,’ she whispered. ‘I’ll still be with you – I’ll always be with you, even beyond death – but I don’t think this – us being together – will happen again.’

  He knew in his heart that she was right. He nodded, unable to speak.

  He felt a warm touch against the flesh of his cheek, as if she had leaned close to him and brushed him with her soft hair. ‘Do not waste the time that remains to you,’ she said.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Oh, dearest Josse, you know what I mean! There is another who loves you as much as I do. You love her too, as you have always done, and it’s high time you both acknowledged it.’

  ‘I thought we had a chance,’ he admitted. ‘But I don’t think she can ever leave the abbey behind her. She went back, you know, and she has been living in the little cell by the chapel.’

  ‘Yes,’ Joanna said softly. ‘She has been.’

  The emphasis was unmistakable. ‘Might she come back home?’ he asked. The moment the words were out, he understood how much he wanted the answer to be yes.

  Joanna laughed again. ‘If I were you, I’d ask her.’

  He knew she was going. There wasn’t very long. ‘Joanna?’

  ‘I’m still here.’ He thought her voice was fainter now.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘For your love; for the two children you bore me, and for your son, who feels equally my own.’

  ‘Thank you,’ she replied. ‘No children could have a finer father.’

  He stood there for some time. His left side – the side where she had stood; his heart side – felt cold. He knew she had gone.

  Eventually, he turned, crossed the crypt, slowly ascended the steps and emerged into the cathedral. It was all but deserted. He made his way to the great north door, ducking down under some falsework holding up the roof. As he stepped out into the night, someone came out of the shadows and fell into step beside him.