The Story of Silence

by Alex Myers

  No. It’s a crow. Carrying my voice.

  ‘You’re still stuck in the forest?’

  Funny you should mention that. Indeed I am. And that makes us alike. For we are both in prisons, not of our own devising, as so many men are. The wretched witch (though she is a beautiful wretched witch) has imprisoned me in this forest, and in this feral form. And you …

  ‘I am not a prisoner,’ Silence bristled.

  ‘Haw!’ The crow clicked its beak. Listen to me! You are your father’s prisoner. He made me promise that I would help his offspring. That’s you. And given what you are, what you have been made into, what you could be, I am most happy to offer that help. ‘Haw!’

  Silence puzzled on these words. The wind picked up, lifting the crow’s feathers, bringing the tang of seaweed. ‘You’ll help me?’ He knew from the stories that Merlin could be helpful. But he knew from the stories that Merlin could also cause great harm. The two sides of him were always present.

  The crow paused a moment to preen, running the feathers of its wings through its beak. I’m here because of the promise I made your father, that’s true. But also because I find you most interesting.

  Silence couldn’t quite imagine what about him was interesting, not least compared to a bird that talked. ‘What do you suggest I do, then?’

  Get away. That’s my advice. I know you want to be a knight. But I am here to tell you that not all roads run straight. That a longer journey might lead to a better end. That you must set off into the unknown in order to be known.

  ‘I can’t just run away … that’s … cowardly.’

  Listen to yourself. You’ll hear a voice – your own, not mine – that’ll tell you when it’s time to go. Listen to that and do it. That’ll take true courage. There’s more than one way to be a knight. And there was a time when being a knight meant being courageous, and being honest, and being noble … but those are just words, now, and they’ve been bent by kings and lords to mean something other than what is true.

  Questions flooded Silence’s mind, but before he could form words to express them, the crow hopped up to the top of the wall, spread its wings, and soared out towards the ocean. How he wished he could follow it … Get away! Those words rang in his ears, sending a shimmer through him. Merlin. Not here, not quite, but close.

  That spring saw Tintagel renewed. Flowers were planted along every pathway. Every stone of every wall was scrubbed clean of lichen and bird splatter. The pages toiled in the hearths, washing away the soot, until it seemed no fire had ever burned there. Cador ordered new tapestries to be hung, beautiful pieces worked with silver and gold thread that caught the firelight. They showed scenes of love: a knight and his lady sitting on the edge of a fountain in a garden. A procession of knights riding back to a castle, where a lady waited at the gate to greet them. But Silence didn’t have much time to study the weavings. The closer the date of the wedding drew, the busier the pages – everyone in Tintagel – became.

  Carpenters erected an even larger pavilion for tilting, with more benches and more tables, the better to accommodate all the guests who would come for the festival, the feasting, and the nuptials. Rumours swirled among the pages and squires that Jackin would return from Winchester and joust. Silence wanted to see that, but didn’t much care to see Wendell return as Jackin’s squire. And the crow’s words – or Merlin’s words, through the crow – pecked at him. Was this a prison? How was he captive? True, he could not ride away … but wasn’t this what he wanted? To train to become a knight … only Merlin had hinted that maybe this path, the straight one, the one that seemed the shortest, was not the best path. Why did he have to speak in such riddles?

  Lords and barons arrived for the festivities, filling up the chambers of the keep. One afternoon, a day before the wedding was to occur, Silence was practising in the yard, running through sword forms with the other pages, when the guard at the gate called out, ‘Minstrels Hob and Giles!’ The steward came hurrying out and though Master Waldron narrowed his one eye and adjured the pages, ‘Focus!’, Silence let his gaze wander over to the two men who crossed the yard.

  One was tall, taller even than Silence, and quite thin. He wore a gaudy peacock-blue jacket matched by an equally gaudy black hat festooned with actual peacock feathers. Clean-shaven, his face was as thin as the rest of him, thin and long, with pale lips and dark eyebrows. Quite in contrast, his partner was short and a little stout. He wore plain brown and looked a bit like a friar, with a thick beard of tangled red-brown hair and a bald pate half-obscured by a wool cap.

  ‘If you’re going to be so distracted, then off you go. Help the steward get them settled,’ Master Waldron said, startling Silence.

  ‘Sorry, sir.’

  But Master Waldron waved him away. ‘Go on, then.’

  Silence set his practice sword down and hurried up to the steward and the minstrels. ‘Can I be of help?’

  ‘Ah, excellent, show them to the chambers near the dovecote,’ the steward said, for just then the guard at the gate had called out, ‘A cart of mead!’, and he hurried away.

  ‘The dovecote!’ the tall minstrel said. ‘We’ll be kept awake with cooing.’

  ‘The doves sleep at night, good sir,’ Silence said. ‘Follow me. The chambers are quite pleasant.’ In truth, the chambers were typically used as storage for excess lumber, but the pages had cleaned them thoroughly just a few days before.

  ‘Where are you coming from, noble minstrels?’

  ‘We’re not noble,’ the shorter one said. ‘I’m Hob. And this is Giles. And we’re coming from somewhere and headed to somewhere else. Who are you?’

  ‘Just a page,’ Silence said. He had no desire to share his name, to have them figure out he was Earl Cador’s son. He was tired of being Earl Cador’s son.

  ‘And we are just minstrels.’ Hob’s voice was low and sonorous.

  ‘Here is your chamber.’ Silence ushered them inside. There were two fresh straw pallets, a low table with basin and ewer, and a brazier ready to warm the room, though given the summer day, that seemed unnecessary.

  ‘I hear cooing,’ Hob said, cocking his ear.

  ‘They go to sleep at dusk,’ Silence said. ‘Can I fetch you anything?’

  Giles leaned down and felt the pallet. ‘Smells fresh,’ he said. ‘What do you say, lad, does this Earl Cador run a good household?’

  ‘You’ll not find a finer keep than Tintagel,’ Silence replied.

  At that the two of them laughed. ‘And how many keeps have you seen, boy? For all you know Tintagel is a great pile of turds.’

  ‘I have seen no other,’ he said, for he knew he must be honest, ‘but I have heard guests speak of others. And they all say Tintagel is the finest.’

  ‘Whatever keep one is visiting is the finest in the world, that’s what you say if you want your supper,’ said Giles.

  Hob set down the load that he was carrying, and Silence could see the handle of a lute jutting out. The squat man poured some water from the ewer into the basin and then splashed it onto his face. ‘Has anyone harped “Marton Lei” here, boy?’ he asked.

  ‘No, sir,’ Silence replied. ‘That title isn’t known to me.’

  ‘We picked it up on our travels,’ Giles said. He, too, had set down his instruments and was now trimming his nails with his belt knife. ‘It’ll be nice to settle down for a few days, won’t it, Hob?’

  Hob grunted and, setting aside his cap, splashed some water across his bald pate. ‘I suppose.’

  ‘And where will you travel from here, Master Hob?’ Silence said.

  ‘Where else does one go from the end of the world?’

  Silence puzzled over this. From Tintagel, he supposed one could go anywhere. ‘I’m not certain, sir.’

  ‘Why, to Brittany. Over the channel. We’ll sail from Looe, straight south of here.’

  Giles rose and stretched out his long limbs. ‘If you go when the season is right, you bring them a fresh crop of songs and are welcomed at every keep. An
d not only do you sow those seeds, but you reap the harvest of their winter and return to this side of the channel with stories no one has heard before.’ He ended in a huge yawn. ‘Do you think you could fetch us some wine?’

  ‘And bread. With gravy?’ Hob added.

  ‘I will do my best.’

  When Silence returned with a pitcher of wine and a few meat pastries (he thought that was better than bread and gravy and so had wheedled them from the cook), he found both minstrels asleep, Hob’s belly rising up and falling down like a sea wave, and Giles’s long form sprawled on the pallet, mouth agape. He left the wine and pastries and shut the door behind him.

  Lady Elea arrived that evening, throwing the steward into a frenzy of welcome. The pages were busy hauling water to chambers, sweeping and strewing reeds in the hall, helping the grooms handle horses. Silence barely caught a glimpse of the woman who would be his father’s new wife: she wore a white veil over her face and a tan cloak for riding. Her father helped her down from her horse and took the cloak from her, shaking the dust off, and revealing a light blue gown, simple, but well fitted to show the graceful curve of her hips and swell of her bosom. She had a long neck, which made her seem all the more beautiful to Silence, who had paused in his sweeping of the yard to watch her enter. She took her father’s arm and so gliding was her step, she seemed to float up the stairs to the hall.

  ‘That’s all!’ Master Waldron called some time later. ‘Get in! Take your seats!’

  Silence trotted with the rest of the pages towards the keep. For once, Griselle hadn’t come to drag him away and stuff him into a fancy jacket. A few small dogs yipped at their heels as they passed through the entryway and into the hall. Garlands of flowers and greenery looped around the walls. Lutes struck a merry tune, the notes bounding off the stone, as servants hurried between the tables.

  Beside a hearth, Hob and Giles played lutes and sang a hunting song that filled the hall with a lusty and hearty mood. The boy who usually helped Sticks tugged on Silence’s sleeve. ‘Master Sticks said I was to find you and you was to sing with the minstrels.’

  ‘Where is Sticks?’

  ‘Ill. In bed. I am to go back to him once I found you.’ The boy looked grumpy at this, and Silence could understand; to miss such a feast, and perhaps most of the wedding festivities, would be terrible. ‘Master said to sing “True Love’s Sweetness”.’

  Silence went over to the minstrels. Sweat ran down Hob’s bald head, pooling in the collar of his tunic, staining the tan a darker brown. Giles seemed more at ease, nodding at the passing crowd, smiling here and there at a lady. They finished the hunting song with a flourish. ‘Good sirs,’ Silence said.

  ‘Ah! Our page. You brought us fine pastries,’ Hob said.

  ‘And reasonable wine. At least, it wasn’t vinegar.’

  Silence gave a little bow. ‘If I may be of more service … our bard, Sticks, made a request. He has taken ill, and he asked that I sing with you, “True Love’s Sweetness”.’

  ‘That old thing,’ scoffed Giles.

  ‘It is a wedding.’ Hob took a long swallow from his mug. He leaned close to the lute, and tuned one of the strings. ‘Well, shall we?’

  Giles tapped his foot and then they began, Giles playing the notes of the melody and Hob strumming beneath that. They looked at Silence and he opened his mouth and sang. ‘How sweet, how sweet, is my one true love …’

  As he sang, the hall grew quiet. Far away, on the dais, Earl Cador stared down at him. The Baron of Glynn stood next to him with his daughter Lady Elea by his side. On the chorus, Hob sang with Silence. Hob’s voice was low and rich. Another verse, another chorus. Always, when he sang, Silence felt suspended, as if he were hovering above himself. And this night was no different. He felt as if he could float up and see the whole hall: the servants waiting in the shadows, the pages kicking each other under the table. The knights quaffing from their mugs. He loved this feeling, this weightlessness, as if he’d left his body behind.

  Then the song ended, and the spell broke, and Silence was back on his feet again, and there were some cheers and appreciative murmurs, and Hob said, ‘Well sung, page,’ and took another swallow from his mug.

  ‘Thank you,’ Silence said. He wove through benches and tables, dodging the servants who were busily delivering platters and pitchers. He spotted Griselle, but there was no seat next to her, and so he settled on the end of the bench at the pages’ table and began to eat.

  When the feast was over, he helped the pages push the benches and tables to the side of the hall. Knights and guardsmen flowed out into the summer night to continue their drinking and singing and boasting. Silence bid Master Waldron good night and crossed the hall towards the stairs, climbing up to his chamber. To his surprise, his father was waiting within, Griselle standing next to him.

  ‘My lord?’ Silence said and bowed.

  ‘Tomorrow morning, at first light, you will return to Ringmar.’

  ‘My lord, did I displ—’

  ‘I’ll hear nothing from you, Silence,’ the earl said. He turned and left the chamber.

  Mist still swirled in the yard as he mounted Clopper the next morning. It was Master Waldron himself who rode with them out of Tintagel’s gate, down the causeway, and across the rocky hills to where the roads crossed. There, he clapped a hand on Silence’s shoulder. ‘Obey your father. He’s a brave man and knows what is best for you.’ He leaned back and untied a cloth-wrapped parcel from behind his saddle. ‘You are unlikely to meet with any trouble between here and Ringmar. But keep your bow nearby and your quiver full. And here’s this. Don’t tell your father.’ Master Waldron held out a basilard to Silence. Longer than a dagger, but shorter than a sword, the basilard had a leather handle that Silence gripped. The scabbard was leather too and as Master Waldron passed it over, Silence was surprised at how light it was; far lighter than the waster he trained with. ‘Belt it on, now.’

  Silence did, letting it hang from his left hip. ‘Thank you, sir.’

  ‘May you have no call to use it,’ Master Waldron replied. ‘But if you do, use it well and nobly, as I have trained you.’ And with that, he wheeled his horse about and trotted back towards Tintagel.

  The mist had dissipated by the time they reached the next crossroads. Here, they turned west, onto the track that would take them by Lord Wendell’s keep and from there on to Ringmar. A flock of sheep grazed in a field beside the road; seagulls still wheeled in the air, but already the scent of the sea had grown faint. The sun rose up and Silence thought, now the jousts will have started. Now the pages will be starting their wrestling contests.

  ‘Did I offend my father’s bride?’ Silence asked, unable to stand the quiet any longer.

  ‘I do not know,’ Griselle said, her voice sombre. The basket in her lap hissed and shuddered with Mooch’s displeasure. ‘Your father told me last night that he couldn’t bear to see you every day, for you remind him so of his first wife, your mother. It is out of love for her and for you that he wants you away from Tintagel. A new start for him.’

  ‘But what about for me?’ Silence said. ‘Why couldn’t I go to Winchester? Why do I have to go back to Ringmar?’

  Griselle levelled her gaze at him, her bulbous eyes boring into his. ‘Your father may have you serve as squire to an older retainer. Perhaps to Lord Wendell, for that is convenient to Ringmar. And in time, after he is settled in his marriage, he may have you serve as castellan. Perhaps not at Tintagel, but there are other castles in Cornwall …’

  ‘And I would never be a knight, and I would never see the world, and …’

  Griselle brought her palfrey to a halt and leaned close to him. ‘Think of someone beside yourself. Think of your family and your family’s honour. It is through you that your father holds Cornwall. For the sake of being a knight, do you want to risk your father’s land, your mother’s heritage?’ She flapped the reins and the palfrey started forward again. ‘For the sake of the greater good we must all compromise some of what we wa
nt.’

  Silence kicked Clopper to a faster walk. It seemed he had done nothing but compromise. And now he wasn’t even a lowly page, but was once again sequestered, locked away from the world. ‘I wish I wasn’t Earl Cador’s son,’ he said.

  ‘My child, you wouldn’t last long in this world if you weren’t,’ Griselle replied.

  He knew she didn’t mean to wound him, but those words cut deep. He sat straight in his saddle and didn’t speak for the rest of the ride. Past Lord Wendell’s keep. Past the turn in the road where he had killed the wolf. And then into the thick woods that guarded the approach to Ringmar. It was not even Nones when they arrived in the yard. The groom rushed out of the stable, calling hello, and then the seneschal, sweaty and dirt-streaked, came jogging around, trailed by a dozen hounds that yipped and howled and set Clopper stamping. And Cook, still red-faced, tramped out from the kitchen to wave her spoon in greeting. Silence slipped down from his saddle.

  ‘You’ve grown! My, you’ve grown!’ the seneschal said, catching him in an embrace. ‘And strong!’ He felt Silence’s arms and shoulders.

  ‘Still not a whisker on him,’ Cook said. ‘And all the prettier for it!’

  ‘Have you come to hunt, then? Will your father join you soon?’ the seneschal asked as the groom helped Griselle to the ground.

  She shook her skirts out and replied. ‘No, we’re back to stay for a while. A long while, I expect.’

  Ringmar was the same. Or, rather, it seemed to have shrunk. The one table in the hall. The hall, that barely seemed to merit its name. Right now, at this very moment, his father was marrying Lady Elea, and all of Cornwall was celebrating, except for Silence. They ate outside that night, the groom and Cook joining them, and shared stories of their time apart. Mostly, it was Griselle who spoke, and Silence who ate and now and then supplied a word when the conversation required it.

  That night, he and Griselle knelt as they usually did, and said their prayers, and Griselle added that she prayed that Earl Cador’s new marriage was a happy one. Then, as they stood in this all-too-familiar chamber, she turned to Silence and reached up to stroke his cheek. ‘You would make a fine knight,’ she said. ‘More noble than most. But you were born a woman, and women cannot be who they want to be in this world.’ She drew a long silver chain from under her gown. Suspended from the end was a little vial that contained (Silence had asked her long ago about its contents) a hair of St Agatha. ‘Be as you want to be, Silence,’ she whispered. ‘For me. Your father would have you be half, but I would have you be all. Will you vow to be true to who you are and what you want to be? For me, will you swear it?’