King's man oc-3

by Angus Donald

The walls of my cell were cool, dry smooth sandstone, with no breaks or cracks or fissures that I could discern, and there were no tools or weapons in the room of any kind. By touch I found an empty bucket, and a jug of cool water. I drank deeply and relieved myself in the bucket. And that was it, apart from some sacks of barley and a couple filled with oats. I did not know the underground ways of the great tower well, having only been down here on two or three occasions — Hanno knew it far better than I, as there were innumerable cellars and kitchens and pantries down here under the big square keep and built into the thick walls surrounding the upper bailey, and he often spent time down here in the warren of corridors and disused rooms, engaging in illicit trysts with some of the castle’s serving girls. But I had a rough plan of the castle in my head and I reckoned that I was not far away from the closely guarded underground treasury where Prince John was keeping the silver from his summer’s tax gathering.

  I prayed a little more, this time for strength in my coming ordeal, and then settled back to think about Milo. I pondered the question of how a smaller, lighter man could defeat a much larger, heavier one, but my thoughts on the little I knew about wrestling kept being interrupted by disturbing images of Goody.

  In my mind’s eye I could see her sweet face, her soft golden hair and her thistle-blue eyes sparkling with happiness — or sudden, incandescent rage. I realized that more than anything in the world I wanted to see her again, one more time before I died. I would like to hold her tightly in my arms and tell her that everything was going to be all right. I wanted to apologize for deceiving her as to my true role among Prince John’s men. And, so badly, I wanted to touch her soft cheek, and kiss her on the lips…

  I had to use a deal of force on myself to stop these thoughts sliding into greater sinfulness. She was as a sister to me; she looked to me for the protection of an older brother. Who was I to start thinking about kissing her? Besides, she despised me: ‘You hateful man,’ she had said. ‘I never want to speak to you again.’ These harsh words were burnt into my heart. Yet, if she only knew…

  Stop, Alan, Just stop. Milo: Milo is the problem at hand; you must concentrate on defeating the ogre if you want to live…

  And at some point in this strange half-dreaming, half-anxious state, I fell truly asleep.

  I awoke just after dawn and drank some more water. And then I sat and waited, munching a handful of loose oats, sitting on the barley sacks, and I waited and waited. After what must have been several hours I started hammering on the elm door, and demanding proper food and more water. I heard footsteps and a harsh voice in English told me to hold my noise. And then the footsteps went away and I sat for hours in the darkness thinking about my fate and singing long, jolly cansos loudly to myself to keep my spirits up. I must have dozed again, for the next time I was awoken it was by the door of the cell crashing open and the dim light of the corridor outside spilling violently into the room. Four men-at-arms burst in and grabbed me by the arms and hustled me out into the passageway. I had no time to resist, and before I knew it I was being marched up the stone steps to the ground floor of the great tower, out of its iron gate, past the eastern side of the great hall and across the middle bailey with the afternoon sun slanting down. I was escorted roughly out of the barbican and north towards the new brewhouse, with the four men-at-arms close around me until we approached the wood-and-earth palisade at the east of the outer bailey that marked the limits of the castle.

  The whole outer bailey was buzzing with men-at-arms and servants and clergy; almost every one of Prince John’s dependants, it seemed, wanted to watch the afternoon’s ‘amusement’. And there in the centre of the roped-off area of the list, sixty foot by sixty foot, stood Milo.

  He was even bigger and uglier than I remembered. Dressed only in a loincloth and a pair of heavy leather boots, I could see that his entire body was covered in sweat-matted black hair. Thick slabs of muscle stood out on his chest, his belly was huge and round but did not look remotely soft, his arms were as big as my thighs and his short legs were like the crossbeams of a great hall. He smiled at me cruelly from across the list, his little piggy eyes buried deep in a doughy baby’s face. I scowled back at him: but the ice snake slithered in my belly once more and I knew he could break my spine as easily as a man snapping a stick of kindling. I realized, too, that I had been misled about his height, for without lanky Rix to make him seem short — and the tall swordsman was nowhere to be seen on that afternoon — I saw that he was almost as tall as me, and I am six foot high in my hose.

  I tore my gaze away from his mountainous muscle-bound shape and studied Prince John, seated in his customary highbacked chair on the north side of the list. Sir Ralph was beside him, standing on his left, looking over at me with a placid, contented stare. A knight in a dark blue surcoat on the other side of Prince John was whispering urgently in his ear: he was a slight man of medium height, with cropped grey and black hair. And I saw, with a little leap of hope in my heart, that it was Sir Nicholas de Scras.

  At that moment, Prince John nodded and said something quietly to Sir Nicholas, and the former Hospitaller came striding across the open space of the list towards me. His face bore a warm, slightly sad smile of greeting and he started to speak when he was still more than ten paces from me.

  ‘Alan, Alan, we can stop all this unpleasantness. We can stop it right now. But I will need your help.’

  I spread my hands in a query. ‘What can I do for you, Nicholas?’ I said.

  ‘You can stop this barbaric display with just a few words, just a few well chosen words.’

  I frowned: ‘You want me to beg? You want me to plead for my life — to them?’ I gestured at Prince John and Sir Ralph Murdac, who were eyeing me from beyond the ropes. I put my shoulders back, and jutted my jaw. ‘I will not!’

  ‘No, no, Alan, nothing like that. I would not insult your honour in such a way. But you must tell them where the heretic outlaw Robert of Locksley is hiding.’

  I looked straight at him: his kindly green eyes were beseeching; I could sense him willing me to tell him.

  ‘I do not know where he is,’ I said.

  ‘Alan, I understand that you serve him, that you have always served him; that you tricked me when you said you wished to serve Prince John, and came here as a — as a ruse. I forgive you for all that. But this is your life we are talking about. You must tell me where Robin is, or how we might find him. You must! If you don’t, in a few moments that brute yonder will tear you apart.’

  Very slowly and clearly I said to him: ‘I do not know where the Earl of Locksley is and, even if I did know, I would not reveal to you or to anyone else in this castle his whereabouts.’

  ‘Alan, I beg you…’

  I remained silent. There was nothing more to say.

  Sir Nicholas shook his head sadly and looked at the ground. ‘Then may Holy Mary, the Mother of God, watch over you now at this the hour of your death,’ he said, and made to walk away.

  Suddenly he turned back, and stepped in close. He slanted his head towards Milo, who was stretching his giant muscles for the bout, hands clasped above his head, twisting and turning his huge body in the afternoon sun. In little more than a whisper, Sir Nicholas said: ‘His left knee is weak. He twisted it a few days ago while exercising. His left knee, understand? God be with you.’ And with that he went to rejoin his royal master on the far side of the ropes.

  Two men-at-arms stepped forward and roughly pushed me towards the centre of the list, towards Milo.

  Prince John stood. In a loud, carrying voice he said: ‘Alan Dale, you are guilty of high treason against my person, of disloyalty, of oath-breaking, of serving a demon-worshiping outlaw — and now you will face your just punishment. You will die today for your crimes — and here is your executioner.’

  He ended his little speech with a shout on the word ‘executioner’. And at this Milo lifted both his massive arms above his head and the crowd gave a roar of approval. It sounded like the howling of a pack
of hungry wolves. And I have heard that sound before.

  ‘Begin!’ said Prince John, and abruptly sat down.

  Milo walked over towards me slowly, his piggy-baby face smiling, his arms opened wide, massive paws open, fingers outstretched as if in a friendly greeting, as if inviting a cosy hug. He spoke then, his voice deep and grating, like the roots of a mountain being pulled out: ‘I’m going to crush you, little man. I’m going to pull your head off as I did your little friend in Germany!’

  I made no reply, but moved backwards, slowly, edging around to my left. I thought of honest, blue-eyed Adam and my redheaded friend Perkin, and the heat of rage at their senseless deaths flowed through my veins like hot wine. I was going to kill this man-beast, I told myself. I might die in the attempt, but as I had vowed to St Michael all those months ago on the banks of the River Main, I would have my vengeance this day.

  The sun was low in the sky to the west and I wanted, if possible, to have it shining into my grotesque opponent’s eyes, so I continued to circle to my left. I also watched the way that he walked as he followed me round, a bear’s shuffle — and I saw that Sir Nicholas was right. He was favouring his left leg and had just a trace of a limp. The ogre grinned at me. ‘Come here, little man, and I promise it will be very quick. Come to Milo.’

  And suddenly, as I neared the southern rope, still circling westwards, he broke into a lumbering run, closed with me and made a grab for my body. I dropped to a crouch, my left hand on the ground, and lashed out with my right boot, catching him a hard blow on the side of his left knee. He gave a howl of rage, and stumbled a half-step forward, arms swinging to envelop me. I dodged under his massive right arm and danced away behind his back. And I felt the first flickering of hope. He was slow, he was very slow — and that kick to the knee had hurt him.

  I moved backwards towards the western end of the list. I could hear booing from the crowd at my cowardly retreat, but I knew that if I wanted to live long enough to take my vengeance I had to stay away from his crushing embrace. Milo growled something unintelligible and charged at me. I feinted to the left and as he moved that way to grab me, I dived to the right under his arms once again, landing on the hard-packed earth of the list but immediately flipping my body over, swinging my leg and landing another hard kick on his left knee. He howled and went down on the injured joint, his broad, fur-matted back towards me.

  Then I made a mistake.

  I jumped to my feet, leapt on his back and locked my left forearm around his neck from behind, squeezing it tight with my right forearm in a choke-hold. By God, his neck was thick — it must have been a good foot wide. But though I squeezed with all my considerable strength, hoping to cut off his wind and prevent the blood getting to his massive head, it was like trying to strangle an oak tree. Milo rose to both feet, with me clinging tightly to his sweat-greased hairy back, lifting me off the ground as if I were a child and he were giving me a piga-back ride.

  I could dimly hear the roar of the crowd, sounding like the beating of the angry sea against a cliff. Milo shook his body in a series of enormous heaves, to the left and right, trying to dislodge me. My stranglehold seemed to be having no effect on him whatsoever. As he shook his great squat body, mine flew from side to side with each heave, but I clung on for dear life, trying to keep my purchase on his neck and exert as much pressure as possible. I could feel the rumbling of his ogre’s rage through the bones in my left forearm. Then he changed tactics. His huge right fist swept up and backwards over his own shoulder, smashing into the right side of my head. It was an awkward blow, and only delivered with half-force, but it slammed me to the left and I could feel my grip slipping; then he punched me with his left hand, catching me full on the left ear and sending me crashing to the ground, my head spinning. He turned and stamped at my chest and just in time I rolled, and rolled again on the hard earth as he came raging after me, stamping and roaring. If a blow from one of those huge feet had landed on me it would have crushed my chest like a rock dropped on an egg. But I kept rolling and rolling just ahead of his stamping boot. In desperation I swung my own boot at him laterally, and by God’s grace I caught the left knee again, from behind, kicked it right from under him, and he dropped to the floor with a bull-bellow of rage.

  As I scrambled to my feet I saw that he truly was hurt. But I found I was breathless and still dizzy from the punches I had taken to the head, my legs felt like water, and I had a strong urge to vomit. Milo struggled to rise, and could barely put any weight on the injured limb once upright. Yet for all his inhuman looks, he was no coward. He roared: ‘Now you die, you little worm.’ And he came charging at me once more, his feral anger giving him the strength to run on that injured knee.

  And I knew what I had to do. It was a move that little Thomas ap Lloyd had shown me many months ago in Kirkton, a wrestling trick that he had devised himself, he claimed, to use a bigger, stronger man’s weight and momentum against him. He had used it on me, and easily thrown me — and it was not only my pride that had been bruised that day. I offered up a very quick prayer to Michael, the warrior saint, and, as Milo charged at me once more, hobbling forward with a surprising turn of speed, I committed myself to little Thomas’s strange wrestling manoeuvre.

  As Milo’s enormous hands reached out to grab my body, I fell straight back before him, tucking my knees up into my stomach and rolling backwards on my spine, curled up like a new-born baby. When Milo stumbled over my prostrate body, his meaty hands groping the air, I grabbed his wrists, jerked him forward and shot my feet suddenly upwards into his stomach — and, using all the main strength in both my young legs, I heaved him up and over my body.

  He flew.

  He flew over my extended legs, sailing into the blue sky, his huge body turning a full circle in the air and smashing down a full three yards away, landing with an earth-jarring crash — on his left leg.

  I jumped up and ran at him, my mind barely registering the broken left limb sticking out under his prone body at an unnatural right-angle. His screaming drowned out the roar of the crowd as I raced in and smashed my right boot as hard as I could, squarely into the side of his face as he lay on the ground, roaring with agony. His head jolted with the impact of my foot, but still he seemed hardly to notice it and continued groping madly at his twisted knee, and squealing like a halfbutchered pig. I shouted: ‘For Perkin!’ — and stamped with the full weight of my boot-heel on his broad cheekbone, and was rewarded with a loud and welcome crack. He was trying to move, to sit up, so I gave him another belting kick to the right eye, pulping it and knocking his giant head backwards with its impact, and another hard-swung scything boot to the temple, and yet another that must have dislocated his jaw, and another, smashing into his cheekbone. His head was now bloody and raw, and hanging loose on his bull neck, but I did not let up — thinking of the deaths of my friends, I carried on kicking and stamping, landing blow after blow with my booted feet into that huge bloody baby-giant poll. I was filled with a black and terrible rage that afternoon, fuelled by fear of this monster sprawled before me and a deep well of hatred for all those around me, and for longer than I like to recall I kicked and hacked, stamped and ground at his gory, pulpy head, until my stout leather boots were slick with his blood and skin and tissue, and he moved no more.

  I finally stopped, panting, shaking with emotion, and looked around the crowd of men-at-arms at the ropes. They were absolutely silent and none would meet my mad, glaring eye. I looked over at Prince John; his mouth was hanging wide open, showing little yellow teeth and a bright pink tongue. Sir Ralph Murdac beside him looked white and shocked.

  Prince John recovered first. He croaked, ‘Seize him!’ and suddenly I was surrounded by a dozen men-at-arms with drawn swords. I readied my soul for death. ‘Take him… away,’ the Prince managed to say.

  And as I was being dragged back towards the keep by rough hands, I heard Prince John shout after me, his voice shaking with emotion: ‘You are not free of this matter, you filthy cur. You will not
escape your crimes. You will hang for this, you will hang for this, you diabolical, blood-crazed… animal; before God, I swear you will hang at dawn tomorrow.’

  Back in the storeroom, I wept. I do not know why, but often after a fight I feel a terrible sadness, a soul-sickness, come over me. It is one that I can usually control, but in that dark, desperate place, still trembling with rage after beating Milo, I allowed myself the weakness and comfort of a woman’s tears. It did not last for long and I must admit that, afterwards, I felt a good deal better.

  Over the next few hours, I took stock of my situation: to the good, I had defeated a monster who had sought to tear me apart; my enemies had arranged a humiliating death for me and by great good fortune — and here I blessed little Thomas ap Lloyd and his oddly effective wrestling tricks — I had avoided my fate and taken a suitable revenge for Perkin and Adam. I still lived. More than a little bruised around the face and neck, I grant you — I had taken savage punches from both Little John and the monster Milo in less than two days — but for the most part hale and well.

  To the bad: I was to be hanged like a common criminal in the morning.

  I bathed my sore face in what was left of the water, and drank some of it too, tasting the metallic tang of my own blood in the jug. I prayed once more for salvation — either in this life or in the next. And then I lay down once again on the barley sacks and tried to sleep.

  I had barely closed my eyes when the door of the storeroom opened and two men entered. One of them fixed a burning torch to a becket in the wall and when my eyes had adjusted to the harsh light, I saw that it was Sir Nicholas de Scras. I had half-expected a visit from my friend, but his companion came as a complete surprise: it was Sir Aymeric de St Maur, the Templar knight.

  Sir Nicholas handed me a jug of ale, a loaf of rye bread and a small bowl of cold mutton stew. And I found that I was starving. The two knights watched me as I ate hungrily and slaked my thirst, saying nothing, only staring at me by the flickering light of the torch. When I had wiped the last of the gravy from the bowl with the remaining crust of bread, I broke the silence: ‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘And to what do I owe this unexpected courtesy?’