by Kate Forsyth
Again Iven stepped forward to speak with the soldiers. The one in charge nodded and beckoned to the grooms waiting nearby. They came forward respectfully and helped down the weary apprentices, then took the reins of their horses and led them into the stables. The caravans were deftly backed into the carriage-house, and the carthorses unharnessed, while the soldiers guarding the two black carriages dismounted and waited for their turn to report.
Within minutes, only Rhiannon was left mounted, with six hard-faced soldiers taking up positions all round her. She looked at them warily, not liking the way they stood with their hands on their sword hilts and their eyes fixed upon her. Blackthorn shied nervously, and Lewen moved quickly to put a calming hand on her bridle. He glanced up at Rhiannon reassuringly, but she hardly noticed, all her attention focused on the soldiers.
A sudden bustle of activity caused her to raise her head sharply. The gate swung open, and a tall, broad-shouldered man came through. At once all the soldiers jerked upright, saluting him. He acknowledged them curtly, his frowning gaze fixed on Rhiannon. She stared back at him, concealing her fear beneath a look of haughty defiance.
Dillon of the Joyous Sword, Captain of the Yeomen of the Guard, was a stern-faced man, his brown hair clipped back severely. At some point his nose had been broken so badly a chip of bone had been lost at the bridge. A thin white line slashed its way across his cheek under his left eye, and his mouth was set in a humourless line. He looked like a man who expected, and got, instant obedience.
He was immacutely dressed in a white shirt, a blue kilt crisscrossed with white and black, and a long blue cloak. His breastplate shone bright as a mirror, and his long black boots had been polished to a glossy sheen. A long, beautifully crafted sword hung at his waist. He caressed its hilt constantly, a nervy mannerism so out of keeping with his frowning face and stiff back that it made Rhiannon tense with trepidation. Blackthorn sensed her fear, and at once wheeled and reared, lashing out at one of the soldiers with her hind hooves. Lewen had trouble bringing her back under control and, bound as she was, it was all Rhiannon could do to keep her seat.
The thick, dark brows drew even closer together over that strong, crooked nose. He paid no attention to the soldiers from Linlithgorn and their aristocratic charge. All his focus was upon Rhiannon and her winged horse.
‘Clip the mare’s wings at once,’ the captain commanded. ‘And bring the prisoner here.’
‘No!’ Rhiannon cried in horror. ‘Ye canna clip her wings!’
The soldier ignored her. Rhiannon saw a groom come running with a large pair of shears, and rage welled up in her.
‘No, ye shallna clip her wings. How dare ye!’ she cried.
‘Subdue the prisoner,’ Captain Dillon ordered.
At once the soldiers converged upon her, drawing their weapons. Rhiannon leant her weight upon her bound hands, swinging her legs up and round and smashing her boots into the face of one of the soldiers. He fell back with a cry, blood spurting from his nose. Rhiannon brought one knee up to balance on the saddle-pad, using her other foot to kick away another soldier, then brought her knee back to balance herself. A mere nudge with her foot, and Blackthorn wheeled and kicked back her hind hooves, knocking the soldier behind her flying. Lewen was knocked off his feet, but he would not let go of the rein, bringing Blackthorn’s head round with a jerk. Rhiannon could hear him yelling at her to stop, and Nina and Iven too, but she was too busy lashing out with foot and elbow and fist to listen.
Then a soldier seized Blackthorn’s bridle, close to the bit. She reared, dragging him off his feet, then leapt into the air, her wings flashing out. After a moment he let go with a scream and crashed down onto the cobbles. Lewen tried to hold her down, but she was too strong for him and he was sent tumbling head over heels. As the winged mare rose into the air, a flushed and breathless Rhiannon clinging to her back, the captain strode forward and seized a rope from one of the grooms. A few quick gestures, and he had tied it into a lasso which he sent whizzing up around his head. To Rhiannon’s utter consternation, the loop rose high into the air and dropped over her head, jerking tight about her shoulders. As he yanked at the rope, she was half-dragged off Blackthorn’s back. Only the bonds tying her to the pommel kept her on, and they hurt her wrists cruelly.
‘Seize the bridle,’ the captain ordered one of his men. ‘Pull that horse down!’
As they ran to obey him, Rhiannon reached down with numb, clumsy fingers and wrenched at the girth-strap’s buckle. Once, twice, three times, then at last the buckle slipped free. She fell to the ground with a crash, and Blackthorn soared away, the ropes and reins dangling.
Fly! Fly! Rhiannon willed her. Fly far from here, my love!
As she watched the black mare tilt her wings and obey, a sudden rush of tears confounded her. She had only time to raise her arm and wipe them away before hard, angry hands seized her and dragged her to her feet.
‘Take the prisoner to the cells,’ the captain ordered. ‘And make sure she does no’ try to escape again!’
She heard Lewen protesting desperately, but to no avail. Dazed and sick from her fall, Rhiannon was marched swiftly away. She glanced back over her shoulder and saw his agonised face, calling words to her that she could not hear. Then cold shadows fell over her, as she was forced under the portcullis and into the guardhouse.
Rhiannon’s head was ringing from the blow to her ear. She staggered and they jerked her upright again.
‘Take her to Sorrowgate,’ Captain Dillon ordered, without even a glance in Rhiannon’s direction. ‘Put her in thumbscrews, and toss her in the Murderers’ Gallery. That should keep her quiet enough.’
‘Aye, sir,’ one of the guards responded smartly. Then they snapped manacles on her wrists and ankles so quickly she did not even have time to protest. They weighed heavily on her limbs, clanking every time she moved. She was taken through the building and out to another small courtyard, where she was put in a cart, her guards climbing up beside her. Rhiannon strained her head, trying to see past them, looking for some chance to escape.
The cart jerked forward and Rhiannon was flung to her knees. No-one helped her, and she struggled up again, determined not to lie in the filthy straw at their feet.
The cart rattled through the narrow city streets, attracting a lot of attention from the crowd. A few young boys came running along beside it, hurling apple cores and laughing. Rhiannon evaded them easily, shooting the boys looks of fury. They only laughed and ran off.
They passed under the shadow of a huge gatehouse, and into another dank, grimy courtyard. Rhiannon tried to cover her nose. The smell that rose from the slimy cobblestones was truly awful. The soldiers jerked on her chain to keep her hands low. She kept her head raised proudly as she was hustled out of the cart and into the prison. Inside was a crowded antechamber where Rhiannon’s name was taken, the charges against her recorded, and where she had to make her mark on a scroll of paper. Rhiannon had been taught to write her name on her journey with Nina and the apprentice-witches, but her hand was trembling so much she barely managed to make the R. The rest was just a squiggle punctuated with blotches and smears.
As soon as Rhiannon laid down the quill, she was dragged out of the room, down a sweeping staircase and through a maze of long gloomy corridors and halls. Three more times they descended steps, and each time the staircase was narrower, darker and dirtier. The last flight was very steep, and her guards were so rough with her that Rhiannon slipped and fell. The soldiers hauled her up again, dragging painfully on the manacles about her wrists. She would like to have struck out at them in retaliation, but she resisted the temptation, remembering Lewen’s oft-repeated advice on controlling her more violent impulses.
At the bottom of the stairs was a small antechamber with a wall of iron bars, barred and padlocked on the inside with a thick rusty chain. The only furniture was a stool on which a burly guard sat, his back resting against the wall. He did not speak, just grunted, let the legs of his stool drop back to the
ground, and got up to unlock a small gate in the bars for Rhiannon and her escort. It shut behind them with a hollow groan, and the guard locked it again.
The turn of the key was like a fetter on her soul. Rhiannon had never been locked up before. Until she had fled her herd on the back of the black winged horse, she had never even spent a night within four walls. She hated the feel of being enclosed in stone. It felt as if she had been buried alive.
Beyond was a long, low corridor set with heavy iron doors. The walls wept with moisture, and every now and again were stained with green runnels of slime. The only sound was the tramp of their feet, and the harsh rhythm of their breath. The air was dead, and smelt unpleasantly, so that Rhiannon’s nostrils wrinkled in distaste. She tried to count the doors, but there were more than the fingers on both her hands and she soon lost count.
Every ten paces a lantern was bolted securely to the wall, its wick turned low so that it cast only a dim and fitful luminance. Between each circle of light was a well of darkness, as cold and numbing as black water. Rhiannon was not the only one to unconsciously quicken her pace as they plunged through these gaps in the light.
At last they came to a set of iron doors at the very end of the corridor. Two of the guards lifted the great bolt and hauled the doors open. Within was another small antechamber where a woman dressed in a grey uniform sat at a counter. She rose as the guards came in and fixed Rhiannon with a frowning glare. She was a massive mountain of a woman, at least as tall as Rhiannon, and weighing four times as much. Her fingers were like over-stuffed sausages, her hands like red cushions, her arms like bolsters. Her iron-grey dress was as large as a tent, and threatened to split along every seam. Her face was as round as a white cheese, and about as amiable as a bulldog’s. Her mouth was so thin-lipped it was almost invisible, while her jowls were huge and heavy, and wobbled when she moved. Around her waist was clasped a leather belt as wide as a horse’s surcingle, with a hoop laden with huge old keys dangling on one side, and a leather-wrapped cudgel on the other. She looked as if she would take great pleasure in using it.
‘So what do we have here?’ she demanded in a deep, slightly hoarse voice.
‘Prisoner for ye, Mistress Octavia,’ the guard said, in the same deferential tone that he had used for the captain.
‘I can see that, balls-for-brains. Who is she, and why isn’t she on my list?’
‘Just come in. Captain Dillon said to bring her to ye. She’s to be put in the thumbscrews, he said, for trying to escape.’ As the guard spoke, he was unfastening the manacles about Rhiannon’s wrists and ankles. She winced and rubbed her bruises, looking about her in apprehension.
Octavia looked displeased. ‘I don’t want her,’ she grumbled. ‘Gallery’s full. Cap’n kens that. Take her away.’
‘She’s a hanging case.’
The tiny eyes seemed to brighten. ‘Gallows-apples, is she? What for?’
‘Murder.’
Octavia looked Rhiannon up and down, then yawned. ‘Knifed her lover, did she? Fool. No man’s worth hanging for.’
‘Nay, she killed a Yeoman. Connor the Just.’
The puffy lids widened enough to show more than just a glint of eye. ‘Really?’ she drawled. ‘Now that’s something I haven’t had afore. Treason, isn’t it? Would she be hung, drawn and quartered for that?’
The guard shrugged. ‘Should be. Bitch.’ He spat at Rhiannon to show whom he was speaking of. Rhiannon ignored him, which was not as difficult as it had been earlier. All her energy was going into hiding just how apprehensive she was. She had never seen such a grossly obese woman before, nor anyone with such mean little eyes.
Octavia was rubbing her fat red hands together. ‘Goody. I love a hanging. Been a while, stupid soft-bellied judges. Should hang this one, if it’s true she killed a Blue Guard. She’ll draw a big crowd too.’
‘Aye, and if I ken ye, Mistress Octavia, ye’ll be conducting tours through the gallery, for a very nice personal profit,’ the guard said with a twist of his lips that was half-amused, half-disgusted. ‘No’ to mention selling her hands.’
‘Nowadays they give the hanged bodies to the Healers’ College, for them to cut up, Eà kens why. Bet ye the healers cut the hands off and sell them. Ye can get a pretty penny for a murderer’s hand, if ye ken where to flog them. But these stupid new laws o’ theirs have cut my profit in half, I reckon, if no’ more. Soft-bellied and soft-headed, those judges are. If ye don’t hang them, they just keep coming back, don’t they?’
She winked at one of the guards, who looked revolted, for the contrast between the coyness of her voice and the grotesquery of her body was truly macabre. ‘But if they hang, draw and quarter her, well, then I’ll get her hands, and any other bits I want, ’cause no-one’s going to notice, are they, once the city dogs have torn her to bits?’ Octavia endeavoured to push out the leaden weight of her jowls into a smile. Rhiannon felt the soldiers behind her shift uneasily.
‘So, welcome to Sorrowgate,’ she said then to Rhiannon. ‘Got any money?’
One of the guards lifted Rhiannon’s pack and dumped it on the table. ‘It’ll be in here if she does,’ he said. ‘We havena had time to look through, we’ve only just apprehended her.’
‘No’ your job to go pawing through a prisoner’s belongings,’ Octavia said reprovingly. A sudden paroxysm seized her. Her jowls shook and her breath wheezed in her throat. Rhiannon stared at her in alarm. Octavia bent over, placed both fists on what must have been her knees, hidden under the voluminous dress, and wheezed heartily. After a moment or two, Rhiannon realised she was laughing. ‘No’ your job,’ she repeated. ‘Mine! Ha ha ha!’
The guards laughed politely.
Octavia dug through Rhiannon’s pack. Rhiannon must have made some small sound of protest, for she lifted her gargoyle face and said menacingly, ‘Ye say something?’
Rhiannon shook her head. The guards sniggered. Octavia drew out the thin leather pouch in which Rhiannon kept the few coins she had managed to win gambling on their journey. The woman felt it disapprovingly, then emptied them out into her palm. ‘Well, I can see ye willna be trying to bribe me to help ye escape,’ she said with no attempt to conceal her disappointment. ‘Ye’ve got enough to eat tonight, though, and I’ll let ye have a blanket.’ She tossed the empty purse back into the pack, and shoved the coins away into a pocket.
‘Ye canna just steal my money!’ Rhiannon blurted out furiously.
‘I havena stolen anything!’ Octavia yelled. She surged forward, thrusting her face into Rhiannon’s, so that it seemed to fill the entire universe. Her skin had turned a nasty mottled colour, and her eyes were completely lost in the slits of fat. Rhiannon fixed her attention on the tuft of hairs that stuck out of a wart on the woman’s chin, willing herself to stand her ground. ‘How dare ye accuse me, ye filthy murdering sow! I just told ye that ye had enough money for a meal tonight, and a blanket. How is that stealing?’
‘There was enough money there to pay for two weeks’ lodging!’ Rhiannon yelled back.
That terrible wheezing paroxysm overcame Octavia again. Rhiannon shrank back, unable to help herself. The soldiers shifted from foot to foot, their boots squeaking.
Octavia managed to catch her breath. ‘Two weeks’ lodging,’ she repeated, wiping her eyes. ‘Och, it’s a clown, this one. Two weeks’ lodging! No’ at the Sorrowgate Inn, my love. Finest inn in town, we are, and that handful o’ coppers only pays for supper and a bed for one night. Tomorrow ye’ll be sleeping on the ground and gnawing dead rats’ bones, if ye canna get me any more coins afore then.’
Rhiannon said nothing.
The pendulous jowls slowly stopped their wobbling, and all her flesh thickened and drew down until her mouth had once again disappeared. Octavia pushed her bulldog’s face very close to Rhiannon’s. Her breath was foul. ‘And if ye ever smart-mouth me again, my girl, I’ll smash your teeth in for ye, do ye understand? Or hang ye up for the rats to gnaw on.’
Rhiannon nodded, trying not to l
ean away.
‘Ye say, “Aye, ma’am”, and ye say it right quickly.’
‘Aye, ma’am,’ Rhiannon said, and Octavia at last stepped away. Rhiannon took a deep breath. To her dismay she realised she was trembling. She hoped no-one else had noticed.
Methodically Octavia went through the pack, noting all of Rhiannon’s belongings and laboriously writing them down in a thick ledger attached to her counter with a chain. When she wrote, she stuck her tongue out one corner of her mouth.
‘One longbow, one quiver, one dozen arrows, green fletched,’ she said. ‘One dagger, silver, one boot-knife, with black hilt. One blowpipe, one bag o’ barbs, standard Yeoman issue.’ Octavia looked up and stared at Rhiannon expressionlessly, then returned her attention to the ledger, her pale tongue once more protruding. ‘One water-pouch, one whetting-stone, one tinderbox, one large flint. One embroidered shawl. One gold brooch, running horse design.’
She took out a little painted box, lifted the lid and listened for a moment as it tinkled a pretty tune. ‘One music box,’ she intoned, the quill scratching against the paper. ‘One silver goblet, crystal in stem. Mmmm, very nice. One silver badge, charging stag design. One gold medal …’ She paused as she turned it in her hand, then raised her gimlet eyes to stare accusingly at Rhiannon. ‘… with haloed hand design.’
‘The League o’ the Healing Hand!’ one guard hissed.