The Fairytale Keeper: Avenging the Queen

by Andrea Cefalo

  Father eyes them for a moment. And I know he is wondering if he can fight them both and we can escape. The large man grabs the hilt of his sword and looks from Father to me, sending us a clear warning. Father huffs and heads to the table. I am frozen with anger, so Father drags me back toward the table by the arm.

  “Come on. You’re all right,” the large man says trying to calm me down, and then I recognize him. His father was one of the old bakers in the city. His name is Aldo and he is the youngest of four. The old baker, who’s been dead a few years now, had only enough work for two of his sons. The other two were forced to find their own trades. Aldo’s younger brother, Adolph, found success as a tanner, but rumor was that Aldo had failed one apprenticeship after another, before he was accepted as a guard.

  I had seen Haimo many times at St. Laurentius, ogling girls in a most sinister way with his buggy eyes. His gaze doesn’t merely pierce; it lances deeply, and makes girls feel violated. I feel his eyes on me, looking me up and down. I look out the window to avoid his gaze, to avoid giving him any hint of interest. Father’s face is like stone. He is not going to give these guards the satisfaction of fear or worry.

  “I shall watch her,” Haimo says and reaches beneath the table to touch my leg, but I move it. “And you watch him,” he says to Aldo of my father.

  “No,” Aldo retorts, annoyed.

  “Why do you always tell me what to do?” Haimo hisses.

  “Cause I outrank you, bastard,” barks Aldo.

  “Well, my father—”

  “My father…my father,” Aldo mimics with a whine. “Do you see what I put up with, Lord?” Aldo calls raising his hands to God.

  Haimo mumbles something under his breath.

  “Now what do we do?” Haimo asks.

  “We sit here until we get orders.”

  Haimo sighs. My fear turns to boredom as time passes painfully slowly. The guards watch us in silence. Haimo sulks, but Aldo seems relatively content with the silence. The bells chime nine, ten, eleven, and it shall soon strike noon. I wonder what will happen then. I notice Aldo’s knee pulsing like he is nervous about something.

  “You have to piss, don’t you? I told you not drink so much ale,” Haimo scolds.

  Aldo growls at him.

  “So go. I can handle these two.”

  Aldo returns a doubtful glare. Haimo is about Ivo’s size but without the lean strength that comes with hard work. Aldo’s knee bounces harder and faster in his discomfort. His brow furrows and I can guess what he is thinking: I can’t leave her alone with Haimo and Ansel’s strong enough to take him alone. My father slithers a hand behind me and races his fingers up my back like they were two running legs. I know what this means: when I get the chance, run.

  “I’ll take the girl with me,” concludes Aldo. “I’ve got my dagger on her, Ansel. Behave yourself.”

  Father stares stone-faced straight into Haimo’s. Aldo yanks me up by my arm and I mimic Father’s emotionless face as best I can. He holds me in front of him by the point of his dagger as we descend the stairs and walk out to the front of the house. I am a yard away with my back turned to give him privacy. At the sound of the first trickle, I run. I am a block away before he even notices, and three blocks away before he can finish urinating and is ready to chase me. Father charges out the front door, barrels into Aldo, and knocks him to the ground. By the time I reach the corner, Father is beside me.

  “Where are we going?” I pant, trying to keep up my speed.

  “I don’t know.”

  “To church? Before it’s over?” I suggest.

  “Too late,” Father replies.

  “The Gopher?”

  “Not open. Everyone’s… at church…. Out Severin’s gate…. Then down to the cottages…. Someone shall hide us… for a few coins,” he huffs. He grabs me by the arm and we run toward the gate. It is within our sights, but it is closed. Will Gregor be there? Will he open it for us?

  “Stop them!” a voice yells. I look behind me and Haimo is running toward us cradling a bloody nose. The bells echo through the city and I know it is noon. Mass is over.

  Three provincial guards step from the gate house to the front of St. Severin’s gate. Father grabs my arm and we turn toward St. Pantaleon’s church. If we can just make it there and the crowds are let out, perhaps we can hide among them.

  The three guards are young men, not lanky boys with bloodied noses, nor fat men who have been knocked over and are covered in their own piss. These men aren’t tired from running; they don’t have skirts to carry. They are fast and they gain on us so quickly I am afraid to look back. People begin to fill the web of streets around St. Pantaleon. If we can just get there, I know we can lose them. I hear their feet pounding closer and I push myself harder. Someone grabs the train of my cloak and I scream. I pull the string that ties it and I am free again.

  One person points to us and then another, and soon most of the crowd around St. Pantaleon’s looks upon us. And then something horribly strange happens, Father stops. He just stops running. Two of the men plow him down.

  “Run!” I hear him yell as the men grapple with him.

  But I can’t run from him. What if I never see him again? I know it is not what he wants me to do, but I run to him. The third man grabs me. My feet fly through the air as I kick and cry for him to let me go, to let Father go.

  ***

  Haimo meets us as we get back to Severin’s gate. He whispers to one of the guards that holds Father and the men nod emphatically with wide eyes. The gate is opened and we are walked along the outside of the city which I find very strange. Why would they walk us along the outside of the city? I suppose they do not wish for anyone to see us. I am glad for it because I am quite embarrassed to be under arrest, especially as I have done nothing wrong.

  I scream when we stop before the North Tower, hoping someone I know shall hear me and come to our aid. My mouth is silenced by a thickly-gloved hand. I bite as hard as I can, but don’t manage to catch flesh. The North Tower is where men are locked away and forgotten about. This is where men are tortured for information or for false confessions. I am not worried for myself. I am a girl, a child, hopefully, in the eyes of the cruel men within these cold stone walls. But what of Father? What shall happen to him? We are rushed up spiraling stone steps and separated. I am thrown into a dark, damp cell where I scream until I have no voice left with which to scream.

  ***

  I do not know how long I am in the dark. Every scream I hear, I fear belongs to my Father as he is being tortured. It is the most horrid feeling, even worse than the last moments of my mother’s life for I cannot hold his hand, I can do nothing to help him except pray. And so I do, until my knees are raw from the damp stone floor.

  The cell opens and just outside the frame of the door stands the Archbishop. My mouth drops with shock. It is true. He is here. I had overheard rumors in the market that the Archbishop had only returned to Cologne to help search for a new man to oppose the rightful King Conrad. Since the death of Conrad’s last opposition, Henry Rapse, it has become an urgent matter to fill his shoes with someone just as successful on the battlefield. It is no surprise the Archbishop didn’t announce his arrival formally for his palace gates would have been packed with those requesting an audience with him. Finding an anti-king is a most pressing matter. The Archbishop hasn’t the time for petty squabbles and land disputes.

  He is a slight man with icy, scheming eyes and thin lips. I bow to him though I have no desire to. “I hear you make trouble in my city,” he says with the accent of a man who spends most of his time abroad, probably securing his own interests in Rome. “I am good at dealing with troublemakers, eh?”

  “Please, I beg you to have mercy.” I drop to my knees. “Father and I tried to go to your cathedral, but—”

  “I have not asked you to speak,” he interrupts. “Ignorant, indeed.”

  “And feisty, Your Excellency,” pipes the guard who caught me. “She kicks like a mule and bite
s like a dog.”

  The Archbishop turns on the guard whose face goes white. “Leave us,” he snaps. The guards bow and race from the room. The door to my cell closes behind them.

  “Do you know what happens in this tower?” he asks.

  “Yes, Your Excellency,” I reply thickly, feeling my tears well.

  “Do you love your father?” he asks coldly.

  “Yes, Your Excellency!” I cry desperately.

  “Then you would save him, if you could?”

  “Yes, Your Excellency!”

  “Does your Father urge rebellion upon the Church?”

  “Your Excellency, if I may explain—”

  “Yes or no,” he prompts.

  “No, Your Excellency, he tries to stop them.”

  “So you know of plots?” he replies with a raised eyebrow and I know I have said too much.

  “I have overheard a stranger’s whispers, but also overheard my Father tell this man that he shall go to church and has no desire to see a rebellion.”

  “Of course you would defend your Father. I shall have to find ways to get the truth from him, if I cannot get it from you.” He turns to leave and I grab his robe.

  “I swear it on my mother’s soul, Your Excellency!” I cry. “He is innocent!”

  He turns and I can tell he almost believes me. “Perhaps you tell the truth about your father’s innocence, but I know you lie of something else. You know who incites the rebellion and yet you keep it from me. For this you and your father shall be punished. But I can be merciful. If you tell me who incites the rebellion, then your punishments shall be light.”

  I stall as long as I can, but the Archbishop grows impatient. I hope a brilliant lie shall come to me, a lie that he shan’t see through, a lie that can save us all. But nothing comes.

  “His name is Elias, Excellency,” I mumble quickly, looking away, wishing I had never mentioned this stranger at all, wishing I had never overheard his conversation, and hoping the Archbishop doesn’t ask for more. But more than anything, I hope I have saved Vatti.

  “You shall confess that your father ordered you to abandon the Church and tell no one of any other story or I shall have to change my mind about your father’s punishment.”

  I wonder if he is seeking a confession in order to punish us as heretics and that all of his other promises are lies.

  “But that is not the truth, Excellency. It was—”

  “Ah, but, stupid, stupid girl, I do not care. And those are the kinds of words that might make my men want to drive a hot poker up your Father’s rectum and then burn you both as heretics,” he smiles.

  “Then I shall say whatever pleases you, Excellency,” I say, swallowing hard. I feel powerless and that the best I can do to save Father from torture and us from death is to do what he wants.

  “Perhaps you aren’t so stupid after all,” he says.

  He turns and leaves without another word. I want to ask what our merciful punishment shall be, but I don’t want to try his patience and make things worse. I start to kneel again for prayer, but guards enter my cell and yank me up by the arms.

  “Where are you taking me?” I ask in terror.

  “If you are a good girl and stay silent, you are to go to the stocks for missing Mass,” a guard answers. I want to cry out that we didn’t miss Mass and that we didn’t get a hearing. That only one man decided our fate before the eyes of no one else, but I’m too afraid to say it. If the Archbishop can put us in the stocks without a hearing, what else can he do to us? I think back to the tormented screams from my cell in the North Tower and it makes me cringe.

  “And what of my father?” I ask.

  “How should I know?”

  ***

  I am marched through Hay Market, though it is empty. I notice the stocks hold a handful of villagers, one of them being Elias. I don’t even look him in the eyes for I am so ashamed of what I’ve done to him, but at least he is in the stocks and not dead. Two stocks are empty and I realize they are for Father and I. I sigh with relief. We shall both live through this.

  A guard unlocks my stock and flips it open. I am dragged over to the stock and I obediently place my head and hands in position. Father is brought out a few moments later and I haven’t felt such relief since the day I found him at the Gilded Gopher after he buried Mother. I told God, in my prayers, that if He delivered us from this that I would never mention Father’s affair again, that I would forgive him, that I would be a good girl. Father doesn’t fight the guards either and I am glad that besides a bloodied lip, he looks to be all right. The sun begins to descend and the air grows cool as the wind grows cold. My cloak has been left behind and I know I am in for a long, cold night.

  ***

  “What happened?” Ivo says as he kneels before me so he can look me in the face. “Who did this to you?” His eyes dart back and forth, looking into mine.

  “Do not ask,” I say through chattering teeth for it is now cold and dark. “If I say, we’ll be killed.” He looks at me with such pity for just a moment and then his jaw locks. His brow furrows and he punches the base of the stock with a thwap that echoes through the frigid air. He rises and shakes his hand muttering curses.

  “Was there a hearing?” he asks, but I don’t answer out of fear for all our well-being. “It’s Soren, isn’t it? He did this,” he says heatedly.

  “Ssssshhhh,” I plead. “Stop, Ivo. You’ll get us all killed,” I whisper through chattering teeth. “Ivo, I am so cold,” I say, shivering. He whips off his cloak and ties it around my neck and rubs his hands against mine to warm them.

  “Do you have gloves at your house? Does your father? I’ll fetch his cloak and yours.”

  “We don’t have gloves. Besides, the guards would notice them. They probably won’t notice the cloaks though...but my cloak fell into the street during the chase.”

  “Where?”

  “Don’t bother looking for it. Someone has surely taken it by now.” I sigh.

  “You keep mine then.” He says. I want to argue. I know the mornings shall be cold for him without it, but I don’t know how I’ll make it through the night without a cloak.

  “Thank you,” I say.

  “I’ll fetch your father’s cloak and bring some mulled wine. Does your father have any coin?”

  “Yes, at the house. They are in a purse somewhere near his bed. Why?” I ask.

  “I’d use my own coins if I had them.”

  “No, I don’t care about the coins. What do you need them for?”

  “So I can stay at the Giggling Pig.” He points down the market to a tavern frequented by the butchers’ guild. “Just in case.” He shrugs and whips the hair from his eyes. I give him a worried look. “Don’t worry. My parents know. It was Father’s idea, but beside that, no one knows…. I’ll make sure no one knows. I’ll make sure nothing else happens to you.”

  “What about your apprenticeship? Does the armorer know? Will he let you take leave?”

  “He knows I need a leave, but he’s been told that it is best that he doesn’t know why.” He puts his hand against my face, knits his brow, and pouts pitifully at me. “Don’t let such things worry you.” I let my neck release and rest my head in his hands. He kisses me on the forehead and is gone.

  25 March, 1247

  I have never been so cold. My teeth chatter and I shake violently even though Ivo has placed a second cloak over me. I try to keep my feet moving to stay warm. This has been the longest night of my entire life.

  The Archbishop parades through Hay Market as the bells toll nine, when trade is at its busiest. A procession of provincial guards and clergymen from the many churches in Cologne follow him. The councilmen from the wealthiest patrician families of Cologne follow as well, whispering to each other and looking upon the Archbishop with suspicious eyes. I wonder if they are angered that the Archbishop has sentenced us without a hearing by them. I hope they see that their power is being taken for I don’t doubt the ambitions of Konrad von Hochstaden an
d nor should anyone else.

  The people in the market part for the parade like the Red Sea parted for Moses. The faces in the crowd show a mix of confusion, fear, contempt, and surprise. We have all wondered if the Archbishop was really here since his warnings were nailed to our doors only eight days ago. I, of course, had learned of his return last night in the North Tower, but it is news to them.

  A few of the provincial guards give alms to the poor and crippled as a few others hand out pfennigs. A woman crosses herself and gets two pfennigs for it. Suddenly, everyone is crossing himself, cheering, or kneeling to see if he can get three pfennigs too. It seems the price of adoration, the price of abandoning reason is low in Cologne; it only costs two pfennigs. Two pfennigs buys smiles, bows, hurrahs, and holy gestures for the Archbishop who abandoned us for Rome during the Great Fever, who is about as holy as Judas.

  Soren saunters at the right side of the Archbishop, which is just where he belongs, at the right hand of Judas. Soren’s nose is in the air haughtily. His lips squeeze into a pursed smirk which pushes his fat cheeks into his baggy eyelids, causing him to squint.

  The Archbishop raises his hand and the crowd grows silent. “These heretics confessed to me a grievous sin.”

  The crowd gasps collectively and a few shout curses at us. The Archbishop raises his hands again and they hush. Many stand on their toes and lean closer to listen. They are anxious to hear the details of our sin, the more horrendous the better. Great punishment for us means great entertainment for them.

  “They have abandoned the Church!” he proclaims. The market is silent. There are no gasps, no hisses, no curses. The Archbishop’s face sags in disappointment. Where are the cheers for punishment? I’m sure he wonders. Soren’s proud smirk falls away and he catches my stare as I smile impishly at him.

  Who cares if we have abandoned the Church? Not the people of the market, or so it appears, unless, of course, there are more coins in it for them. If I weren’t so miserable or scared of further punishment, I think I’d laugh out loud.