The Black and the White

by Alis Hawkins

  ‘No! It’s true. You won’t fight me because you’ve seen that, in a free fight, man to man, I’ll beat you. If you still say you won’t fight me, I’ll say it again. You — are — a — coward.’

  Seeing as he has taunted him into it, Will is ready for Hob’s rush and they meet head-on, weight thrown forward, in a grappling clinch. Hob throws Will but is kicked as he tries to make good on the fall and Will springs up to rush at Hob again.

  He begins throwing punches like a man possessed by a fit of rage. Or of stupidity. Hob ducks and dodges and Will’s fists mostly swing through empty air, but he lands one or two heavy blows that cause Hob to shake his head.

  Wriggling free of a leg-hold, Will loses a boot. In a friendly bout, Hob would laugh and catch his breath while his opponent put it on again. Now, he charges forward at Will’s uneven stance and knocks him off balance. But, going down, Will’s booted foot catches Hob on the kneecap and fells him, buying him time to get his boot back on.

  Punch for punch, kick for kick; their throws become heavier, their holds on each other accompanied by vicious grunts as they grip tighter and tighter. Both are breathing hard, neither looking anywhere but at the other. Good humour has gone. Now the aim is to hurt. To fell.

  Will — one eye blacked now and an ear swelling from a headlock — breaks from a taut circling to charge at Hob. As his shoulder hits Hob’s chest, his hand drops to grab Hob’s balls but Hob brings up a swift knee to prevent him. Feeling his opponent off-balance, Will pulls Hob’s other leg from under him and tries to get a knee in his stomach to make him yield but Hob rolls, taking Will with him and ending up on top, lying over Will’s head and chest.

  Will bucks to try and dislodge Hob. Once, twice, three times. But Hob lies fast across him. Again he bucks, this time Hob gets his arms under Will’s head and clasps him to his chest. Will wriggles in a frenzy, trying to throw him off. Now, there is a desperation to his movements that I do not like.

  ‘Hob!’ I yell. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Do you yield?’ Hob shouts.

  More bucking from Will.

  ‘If you yield stamp one foot!’

  For the space of four or five heartbeats nothing happens, then one of Will’s feet jerks. At the same time, a wet stain spreads over the front of his hose; in his fear he’s pissing himself.

  ‘Do you yield?’ Hob roars.

  This time there is no response. Will has gone still.

  I dart forward and grab one of Hob’s legs. Tom, catching my intention, takes hold of the other and we pull Hob away from Will, upending him and separating them. As Hob is forced to release his grip, I see Will’s face — his eyes wide and staring, his mouth wide open in a fruitless attempt to draw breath while pinned to the muscles of Hob’s belly.

  We dump Hob and turn to Will.

  He is not moving. Before I can do anything, Tom is at his side.

  ‘Will!’ He grabs him by the shoulders and shakes him. ‘Will! Will!’

  I kneel down next to him as he shakes and shakes. Will’s head lolls like a broken-necked rabbit’s. As I stare at his senseless face, I see that his nose is lined with white wrinkles where it was flattened against Hob and his lips are a faint blue.

  Abruptly, a rattling sound comes from Will’s throat. He gives a strange kind of cough and Tom quickly pushes him onto his side as he begins to spew up the contents of his stomach.

  I watch as he lies there, spewing and gasping and retching, his beard thick with vomit.

  Unwilling to watch, now I know that he will live, I turn away, only to see Hob gazing at Will, his face without expression.

  CHAPTER 14

  Will went back to the village yesterday without a word to me or Hob and, this morning, his cousin Stephen came out to the woods to take his place. Since Stephen has made no mention of the wrestling bout and shows neither fear of Hob nor particular deference to him, it seems reasonable to suppose that Will has made some excuse for leaving the hearth.

  Tom has not spoken about what happened. Is he turning it over and over in his mind as I am? Is he asking himself what would have happened if he and I had not pulled Hob off?

  Will’s face haunts me. The blueness of his lips, the whiteness around his nose, the wrinkle-lines where his nose had been turned back on itself as Hob gripped his head.

  Those wrinkle-lines bother me. They remind me of how Edgar’s nose was bent to one side.

  Though Will may have said nothing about his wrestling bout with Hob, it soon becomes clear that he has been talkative on other subjects. Subjects he should know nothing about. After explaining to Stephen the bare bones of what we are about on the hearth, I ask him if there is anything he wants to know.

  ‘Yes.’ He thrusts his chin in the direction of the hut. ‘Is it true you’ve got a saint hidden in there?’

  I glance at across the hearth. Whatever Will has told his family can only have come from Hob — I put them on night-watches together.

  Hob comes over.

  ‘You’re a bit previous there, friend,’ he tells Stephen. ‘Get to know the hearth and its ways first and then maybe Martin will tell you about the saint tonight when we’re all sitting by the fire.’

  ‘I won’t have time for tales — I need to be looking to the pit. One mistake now and everything could be ruined.’

  But Hob is not to be fobbed off. ‘I can take my turn. You said yourself that night-time is better for seeing holes and slips.’

  ‘Yes, but judgement goes with the light. It takes an experienced man to keep his head and do the right thing in the dark.’

  ‘But you’ll be there, Martin. I can call on you the moment anything happens if I need to.’

  Stephen takes Hob’s advice and, all day, he is as busy about the hearth as I could wish. And he asks sensible questions. I wonder why Geoffrey Levett did not send him in the first place instead of his braggart cousin. Perhaps he owed Will a favour.

  But Stephen’s doggedness at the tasks I give him makes me increasingly uneasy as the day goes on, for I know that behind all his keenness is a desire to shame me into satisfying his curiosity about the saint.

  If I could simply tell the story of her life, all would be well. But that would be to deny her miracle — the one she wrought in healing me of the pestilence. And, if I tell that story, the questions will come. If not from Hob, then from Stephen and Tom. So where does the statue come from? If you put the one your father made in his grave, where does this one come from?

  I may guess at a commission from a Gloucester carver but I do not know it for sure. What if the appearance of the White Maiden’s image at our well is another miracle and not a work of man? Without certain knowledge I must not presume to explain away her very existence, nor yet her sudden reappearance in the press when I was lost and despairing. For no Gloucester image-maker put her there, did he?

  Agonised, I weigh and weigh again which explanation might make me more guilty of the sin of pride and vain-glory — claiming a mortal origin for the saint’s image or a miraculous one? The decision is no trivial one for I must not offend Saint Cynryth. Both my safety on the road to Salster and the safety of my father’s eternal soul are in her hands.

  That evening, I can barely swallow the food put before me and I decide that the best course is simply to tell the story of Saint Cynryth’s life and let the saint guide my words thereafter.

  ‘Cynryth was the daughter of Halstan,’ I begin, ‘a king of the south.’

  My heart slows its galloping as I take up the familiar words and I could swear I feel the saint smiling at me. She is with me, guarding me, guiding me.

  ‘Born with flame-red hair and eyes the colour of speedwells, Cynryth grew from summer child to tall and fearless maiden. Her voice was as pure and clear as a blackbird’s song and her heart was full of courage.’

  How well I know this tale; how easily and sweetly my tongue settles to its rhythms. For the first time since the pestilence came, I feel that perhaps not everything from my old life is lost.
/>
  ‘Cynryth was as wilful as she was beautiful and, growing up without a mother, she coveted the freedom her brothers enjoyed. She was her father’s darling and, because it made her happy, he let her ride and hunt, carry a sword and shoot with a bow. “She will be married soon enough,” he told himself, “and that will end her wild ways”.’

  They have settled now, as I have, and they relax into my sureness with the tale.

  ‘One midsummer’s day, when Cynryth was out hunting in the greenwood with her brothers and the young men of the household, they came upon a strange youth. He wore outlandish dress of shimmering silver, his hair was as white as the moon and his eyes were the colour of dawn. The silken mane of his silver horse cloaked him as it galloped and its hooves were as big as bucklers.

  ‘At first, Cynryth and her friends could not understand the stranger’s speech but, as he continued speaking, it seemed to them that his words fell more easily on their ears and they began to understand that he had been falsely accused of killing a man and sent into exile.

  ‘“And now,” he said, “I wander the land looking for a new king to swear fealty to.”

  ‘Cynryth, knowing that her father could refuse her nothing, said, “Ride home with us, and speak with my father who is king of this country.”

  ‘So they returned to Halstan’s court and the king welcomed the stranger as courtesy bade him. But, from their first meeting, he mistrusted the youth’s strange ways. The young man would tell nobody his name, shrugging his shoulders like one who could not understand human speech. Even when several weeks had passed, when people asked him his name, he said simply, “I am the Exile.”

  ‘Despite her father’s mistrust, Cynryth fell ever more under the young man’s spell. They would spend whole days together, hunting, making music and playing at merrills and, while they kept company, Cynryth tried in every way she could to trick the young man into telling her his name.

  ‘And every time she did so, he would smile and say, “No, no, my lady, you don’t trick me so easily.”

  ‘Eventually, when she had wept and raged and threatened to see him no more, the Exile told Cynryth that, if he was to stay at her father’s court, she must do two things. Firstly, she must agree to marry him and, secondly, she must promise never again to ask him his name.

  ‘“For in my country,” he said, “a name has great power and, if I give you mine, that power will be gone and I will no longer be able to stay here.”

  ‘Afraid that he would leave if she did not agree, Cynryth said that she would marry him if her father would give his consent. Accordingly, she went to Halstan and begged to be allowed to marry the white-haired Exile.

  ‘But the king was full of fury when he realised that his daughter had given her heart to this stranger. “Disobedient girl,” he thundered, “you must marry a man of my choosing, a man with vassals to command who can keep us safe against our enemies! If you marry this foreigner, this stranger with no name and no allegiances, our allies will be insulted and our people imperilled!”

  ‘Then, knowing his daughter’s wilfulness, Halstan put the matter beyond doubt. He called the young man to him and told him that he must leave at once. “If you are still under my roof when day breaks,” the king told him, “your life will be forfeit.”

  ‘Guards marched the Exile to the guest chamber and stood outside as he went in to gather his few possessions. But, after a short while, all sounds from the chamber ceased. The guards looked at each other in alarm. One called out, “What are you doing?” and, when there was no reply, they pushed the door open, their swords already drawn.

  ‘The chamber was empty.

  ‘The guards rushed to Halstan’s hall but, as they approached the door, the king’s priest ran past them, burst through the door, and threw himself before his lord. “Lord Halstan — while I was in my bed, dreaming, an angel appeared to me in a vision. He revealed to me that the stranger who calls himself the Exile is not a mortal man but a fairy! Your daughter is in deadly danger,” the priest panted. “For if she goes with him willingly, her soul will be his to command.”

  ‘Halstan made all haste to Cynryth’s chamber. “Daughter!” he bellowed at the barred door, “Open for the sake of your eternal soul!”

  ‘When nothing but silence came from beyond the door, the king ordered his guards to break it down. With great blows of their axes, the door splintered in time for them to see the Exile’s hand reaching through the window to pull Cynryth after him. In three strides the king was at the window, his sword in his fist. Without a word or a look to his daughter he raised his blade and hacked off the Exile’s arm. Blood poured out, blood as black as night, and a sound came from the mouth of the fairy, a sound that no human mouth has ever uttered. As the king and his daughter watched in horror, the young man with moon-white hair and eyes the colour of dawn vanished and there stood before them a figure who shone like starlight, wrapped in spun cloud. With a hiss, the figure jumped into the air, uttered a last cry and was gone.’

  I look around. They are silent, waiting. They know this is not the end, that Cynryth has simply been delivered from the first of the evils that will threaten her. I take a swallow of ale and continue.

  ‘Cynryth withdrew to her chamber for forty days and forty nights. She ate only bread and drank only water which her servant carried from a well in the woods nearby.

  ‘Then, when the forty days were done, she went to the king.

  ‘“Father,” she told him, “God has been gracious to me. For he granted a vision to your chaplain that saved me from a most unholy fate. But it has been revealed to me, during the days of my fast, that I have been saved for a greater cause than marriage.”

  ‘At this, Cynryth flung herself on the floor before her father and begged his permission to withdraw from his court to the woods; she would live next to the well which had provided her fasting-water and she would devote herself to God.

  ‘Halstan, believing that she would tire of such a lonely life after a month or two, agreed and ordered that a little dwelling be built there for his daughter’s comfort and protection.

  ‘When the day came and her sanctuary was ready, Cynryth said goodbye to her servants and her friends, her brothers and her father. Then, dressed in a simple kirtle and cloak, she went to take up her new life.

  ‘As the months went by and people brought food and other offerings to her in return for her prayers, they began to see their prayers answered. Babies were born to the barren and sick children made well. Wounds did not fester and those on pilgrimage came safely home. By and by, her fame spread and there was talk, far beyond her own realm, of the king’s daughter who had given up her royal life for prayer and the common people’s good.

  ‘And so, though Cynryth’s life was one of holiness and not of disobedient marriage, still, that which Halstan had feared came to pass. A prince, who had thought to ally himself to Halstan by marrying Cynryth and raising sons who would unite their two kingdoms, heard of her life in the woods and was enraged that the whim of a spoiled girl should thwart his ambitions.

  ‘This prince — Aethenoth by name — rode to Halstan’s court with his most trusted nobles and demanded the right to marry the king’s daughter.

  ‘Halstan, thinking that he had been understanding enough, agreed with Aethenoth that it was time Cynryth returned to court, so he sent his sons, Cynryth’s brothers, into the woods to bring her back.

  ‘But Cynryth would not come. She told her brothers that she would rather throw herself in the well and drown than break the vows she had made. She told them that God’s curse would be on any man who tried to force her to give up her celibate life. And, sick at heart for their sister, they went back to Halstan with her answer.

  ‘When Aethenoth heard of her refusal to marry him he was enraged, for the story of Cynryth and the fairy Exile who had stolen her heart had reached his ears.

  ‘“Your daughter insults me!” he shouted at Halstan. “She would willingly have married a man without family or name, w
ithout land or honour, but she will not marry me!”

  ‘And he determined to ride to the woods himself to marry Cynryth by force.

  ‘But, as Aethenoth was riding hard from her father’s court, an angel came to Cynryth and warned her of the prince’s plan. Calmly, she put off her clothes, dressed herself in a clean white shift and knelt on the floor beside her virgin’s bed to confess her sins and to pray for courage.

  ‘When she heard the battering hooves of Aethenoth’s horse Cynryth opened the door and stepped outside. Quickly, before Aethenoth could reach her, she ran and climbed up on to the well.

  ‘Aethenoth rode into the clearing and saw her there. She was pure and beautiful in her white shift, with her hair unbound and her feet bare.

  ‘“I will not marry you or any man,” Cynryth told him, her voice steady. “And if you try to take me I will throw myself in this well. It is deep and dark and I will drown before you can pull me out.”

  ‘Aethenoth smiled. He dismounted and walked towards her. “You will not, lady. For you are but a woman, and weak. Better to be married to me — to bear my sons and rule with me — than to cast yourself down into hell in mortal sin.”

  ‘“It is no mortal sin,” Cynryth told him, “for I am pledged to God and have vowed to marry no man, being married to Christ.”

  ‘“And I say that you shall be married to me!”

  ‘Aethenoth lunged towards her and would have caught her hand but Cynryth’s angel turned him aside as she slipped over the side of the well and down, down into the cold, dark water.

  ‘And Aethenoth — cursed for his evil deed — ran mad in the woods and threw himself to his death from a high rock.

  ‘When the prince did not return to Halstan’s court, Cynryth’s brothers went to the woods and, finding their sister’s little dwelling empty, knew that she had been true to her word.

  ‘With great sadness, they brought up her body — as white and as pure as if she had lain down to sleep — and bore her back to their father’s court to be buried.