The Widow and the King

by John Dickinson

  ‘I could have done it with my old one, in my father's house at Trant. I should have made this one better.’

  ‘Why didn't you?’

  In her father's house at Trant. And here he was, in the ruin of her father's house. He wished that he hadn't spoken to her like that.

  The moonbeams inched imperceptibly across the stones of the chapel. Where the light fell on the wall beside him there was a word all on its own. Ina. Ambrose thought it was a girl's name. He had no idea how long she had lived, or what kind of person she had been. He knew nothing about these people, or this place which must once have been his mother's home. She would have done. Now it was a shell: all dead, all gone like her.

  Ina, said the silent stone in the moonlight.

  At last he picked up one of his own white pebbles and drew it across the stonework. It left a faint white line. Then he began.

  Scratch. Scratch. Scratch. The sound of the stone scraping was loud in that quiet place. Stroke by stroke, forming the letters as she had taught him, he carved her name on the wall beside that of her dead sister.

  Phaedra.

  VII

  Crossing

  is fears followed him the next day, and grew as the hours passed. His eyes searched the flat, treeless land as they rode on under the grey sky. The wind blew at them, tugging at the knight's coat and throwing fine dust against Ambrose's cheek. His vision blurred with it, and still he stared and craned around him. He felt that he should be seeing something that was not there to be seen.

  He could picture it quite clearly in his mind's eye: the figure of a man in a grey robe – not at a poolside now, but as seen across the level grasslands with its cloak flapping like a scarecrow on a winter's afternoon. Maybe it was moving towards him. Maybe it was still. But it should be there; and it wasn't.

  Not seeing it was worst of all.

  Around noon the skies began to clear. The track led them past a living farm, and across a broad valley they could see first a hamlet and then a manor house, all with their roofs whole. In the mid-afternoon they came upon a large village, crouching within its stockade in the valley bottom. At its gates crowds of people were moving around a collection of animal pens. Carts and awnings were set about, with men and women selling things from them. Wastelands left Ambrose to hold Stefan and went into the fair looking for horse-meal and food for themselves.

  Ambrose watched the people buying food from the woman at the nearest cart. At another time he would have been curious. He had used coins only once, when he had thrust the whole of his mother's purse at the old man who lived by the lake, and had asked to be taken across the water. Here, he saw that each coin had a value, and that people counted them out carefully – so much for a plucked hen, and so much for a rabbit – and argued over what each purchase was worth. He even thought he saw the woman bite the coins she had been offered.

  But he did not want to go close enough to be sure. He kept looking about him, watching the people as they passed; and especially those who wore hoods, or whose faces he could not see.

  The wind blew up the valley, silvering the grasses. Ambrose stood with Stefan, big and reassuring beside him, and waited for Wastelands to return. He did not trust Wastelands – that angry, half-evil man – and after what the Wolf had said Ambrose felt more wary of him still. And yet he disliked Wastelands less than he disliked being alone. As time went on and Wastelands did not appear, he became nervous.

  His hand stole to the pouch at his belt. Through the cloth he felt the stones within it. Click, they went. It was a reassuring sound. He did it again. Click.

  Feet sounded, running through the crowd. It was Wastelands, hurrying up to him with his mail clinking as he came.

  ‘Mount up, quickly!’

  He was empty-handed and breathing hard. Something had alarmed him. He lifted Ambrose, who swarmed gratefully into his perch. The knight heaved himself up behind him. People had turned to stare at them.

  ‘Let's move!’

  Wastelands urged the horse into a trot, looking back as he rode.

  ‘What's the matter?’ asked Ambrose.

  ‘We've been seen. At least, I was.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘No friend of mine – or yours, for that matter.’

  There was a long, steady rise in the track. Wastelands checked his mount beneath the ridge, looking behind him again. Ambrose could see the road running back along the valley to the village and the cluster of dots that was the fair. It seemed to him that some of the dots had spilled down the road towards them. They were moving. They might have been men riding. At that distance, Ambrose could not tell how many they were.

  ‘They will see us for sure as we cross the ridge,’ said Wastelands. ‘And we are two, on one tired horse. It only wants some of them to be well mounted. But there's nothing for it.’

  They surged forward over the skyline. The noise of Stefan's hooves, harness and clinking iron battered at Ambrose's ears, and he heard nothing of the distant pursuit.

  A furlong after crossing the ridge Wastelands turned off the road. The thorns and scrub were low, and gave little cover for a moving horse, but he found a coombe of dead ground, and they threaded their way along it, emerging cautiously and then cantering across open land to find more cover. They saw no one. They followed the low ground among pathless rises, almost doubling back on the line of their journey, because that was where the cover took them. An hour later they crossed another ridge, and Wastelands seemed to relax in the saddle. Still he rode as they had done that first day after leaving Chatterfall, staying off paths and watching the land for enemies. Ambrose watched, too, for a cluster of black dots on the move, but above all for a lonely figure in grey who might walk at his very elbow without being seen.

  Unless he knew how to look, the Wolf had said. He was not sure that he did know.

  The afternoon wore away. The enemy did not reappear. On a hilltop in the shelter of a stand of trees Wastelands abruptly stopped the horse.

  ‘Better rest him while we can,’ he said. ‘We may need everything he has before long.’ They dismounted, drank water, ate their last dried fruit and unrolled their blankets, but Wastelands did not start a fire and did not take the saddle off Stefan's back.

  Ambrose crouched in his ring of pebbles. There was no wind, and no sound at all but Stefan grazing what he could from the heathy ground. Wastelands sat wrapped in his blanket with his back to a tree and closed his eyes. Ambrose looked at him: this man who must be in part the enemy's man, and yet was the only help to be had. He thought it strange that someone like that could be tired.

  ‘What did you see?’ asked Ambrose suddenly.

  ‘A man called Caw,’ said Wastelands. ‘One of a band of outlaws. They were knights and fighters for your father: consorts of his witchcraft, and they still wear the Doubting Moon badge. They'll be the ones who attacked Chatterfall. That was three, four nights ago. So someone's made them want you badly, for them to have kept to our trail so from their own country. Good tracking. Ve-ery good tracking,’ he added, as if he thought there might be some more sinister explanation.

  ‘Are they men?’ Ambrose said.

  ‘Yes – what did you think they were?’ said Wastelands sharply. But at the same time his eyes searched Ambrose's face as if he thought Ambrose might indeed know more than he did.

  Ambrose had not known if they were men or worse. The memory of his old nightmare was as real to him as the shapes he had seen in the gateway at Chatterfall. But he knew the Wolf had found him, using what he had called ‘under-craft’ and Wastelands now said was witchcraft after all. The Wolf must have told these hunters where to look for them. Ambrose wondered if he should tell Wastelands about the Wolf.

  ‘I think they're getting help,’ he said tentatively.

  ‘Ugh,’ said Wastelands. His brows slanted sharply. His eyes, Ambrose saw, had fallen on the white pebbles. Perhaps he was already guessing about witchcraft. His face was hard, and ugly.

  Ambrose's courage deserted him. Speaki
ng to Wastelands of his son might only bring the Heron Man closer. He said nothing.

  ‘Let us say they know we are going to Develin,’ said Wastelands at last.

  ‘They'll have reached the bridge by now, and they'll know they're ahead of us. If I were them …’

  Ambrose watched his face as he explored the paths before him. He did not seem to like what he found there.

  ‘They'll know we've left the road, and are between it and the river. They can watch the bridge, the road, and the bend where the river reaches the road. And they can sweep the banks. If there are still fifteen of them, they can do all that. They may have allies, too …’

  At least one, Ambrose thought. Your son, the Wolf.

  ‘We cannot go to ground. We have not the provisions. We must reach Develin. We must cross the river.’

  ‘Can't you fight them?’ Ambrose asked.

  ‘We don't fight. We run.’

  Crop, crop, crop, went Stefan on the hill grasses. Clouds had hidden the low sun. All the land was dimming. Somewhere just beyond the reach of eyes and ears men were hunting them with drawn swords. Somewhere, very close maybe, the Heron Man paced in the evening. And Wastelands said nothing.

  And now Ambrose wished, glumly, that they had not passed so much time in silence together; although he did not know what he could have said to earn himself any friendship from this man. Maybe someone else could have done. The shepherd boy who had spoken with Uncle Adam had known how to make men listen to him. Maybe it was only Ambrose that men like this despised.

  He wondered what it would have been like if it had been his own father there, resting his back against the tree; and whether his father would have helped him or handed him over to the Heron Man. And he wondered, too, what Wastelands would do now.

  Still he wished that the man would speak with him. After a while he asked: ‘What is Devling?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Dev … The place you said.’ It had been the first time Wastelands had said where they were going.

  ‘Develin.’ The knight rose and pointed into the evening. ‘Look where the river runs – you can see a stretch of it down below. Where it bends – there. They have lit the lights.’

  In the distance Ambrose could see a thin pale ribbon that must have been the river. On the far side of it was a shape that bulked like a small hill, with a star upon its crest.

  ‘It is a great house. Larger than Bay or Trant, although not so old. There are few left in the Kingdom that can match it for wealth, and none that match it for learning – if you share your mother's taste for books.’

  It was a castle – the third he had seen since leaving Chatterfall. And this one had lights, and life within it.

  ‘I have been thinking to ask them if they would take you as a page. They would be well able to teach what you need to know – and to bat away any raiders that come. They've no love for your name, mind you. But I have no friends in places like Bay or Velis or Tuscolo. Whereas I did once make common cause with the Widow Develin. I think she will remember. If we can get there …’

  Ambrose waited for him to say more, but he seemed to be thinking again.

  The darkness was growing. Ambrose moved the little white stones outwards to give himself room to lie down. One, two three, and so on up to eight. Eight stones. And the Wolf had felled eight stones by the pool. Suppose he could go to the pool now, and put one pebble where each of the stones had been – would that keep the Heron Man in? Ambrose could not imagine it. They would have to be very far apart. And how could he get there anyway? It was going to be hard enough to get to the castle across the river. The pool was a world away.

  He huddled within the ring, his head on a fold of his blanket.

  Still the knight was silent. Perhaps he was no longer thinking, but watching. Perhaps, with the enemy as close as this, he was going to watch all night.

  Hours later, Ambrose was woken by a hand on his arm.

  ‘Up,’ said Wastelands. ‘It is time to go.’

  Ambrose thought he must be dreaming, because Wastelands's head had changed shape. Then he realized that the knight was wearing his helmet. He shook himself, heavy with sleep. It was still dark. The old moon had risen – little more than a fingernail.

  ‘Dawn's not far away. If we go now, we'll reach the river under cover of darkness. Then we shall see.’

  Ambrose fumbled for his stones and his blanket. It seemed to take an age to bring them together. The horse was anxious. The knight tightened its girth and replaced its bit in the darkness. Then he strapped on Ambrose's roll and they climbed once more into their places. Ambrose was still struggling with sleep as they rode off into the night.

  They moved slowly, in a dream-like journey downhill. Ambrose swayed and nodded in the saddle, lurching in the fringes of a doze. He wondered when they would be able to lie down again. Stefan picked his way, following no path that he could see. The shape of the horse's head, the points of its ears, showed against the sombre land. Was it getting lighter? He thought perhaps it was. The air seemed very damp. The moon had disappeared, veiled by some cloud. The ground had levelled, and still he could see almost nothing at all. His world was sounds: the constant squeak and jingle of harness and arms; the plod-plod of the horse's feet, softening as the hooves bit into wet ground. There was water-noise; and now, and for some time, there had been the voices of birds: large water-fowl, quacking and hooting in the coming dawn. He could not remember when they had begun.

  The river was there, away to their right. Wastelands was following the line of it, steering his horse as close as he could to the bank and then edging away again when they stumbled into boggy ground. Something flew splattersplatter-splatter away across the surface of the water, quite close. The sky was much paler, and yet the air was still thick and impenetrable. He could see the head of the horse clearly, his own feet, and a few yards of ground. And then the world was a dull grey wall of river mist. All around them birds clamoured in the unseen dawn.

  On they went. He could not see the water; he could not even make out the near bank, although he could hear reeds rustling close by. He wondered what they were looking for, and when things would change. Nothing did. His neck and limbs ached with weariness, and yet he was no longer sleepy.

  Sounds had a strange quality in this mist. A large waterbird exploded from under Stefan's feet in a shudder of brown feathers and vanished into the mist, trailed by honking cries. A moment afterwards, as Wastelands brought the startled horse back under control, they heard the same noise again. It seemed to come from fifty yards behind them. The soft plod, plod of hooves, the squeak of harness and the clink of mail surrounded Ambrose as the horse picked its way along the riverbank. He wondered if the mist was so thick in places that sounds bounced off it, as they might do from a wall of rock in the mountains. Now Wastelands was checking their mount. It stilled, waiting.

  The sounds of horse-noises continued. Behind them, to their left.

  A voice called, and Ambrose's heart bolted.

  There was a rider, at least one, in the mist some twenty yards away. The same horse-noise, the same squeak, the same clink of mail. The rider called again, a question. Ambrose could not catch the words. They were muffled by helmet or hood, and muffled again by the fog. The voice was unhurried, bored, even. Behind him, Wastelands grunted loudly in answer, and stirred his horse to move slowly forwards. His arm was a bar of iron across Ambrose's chest. He leaned forward and whispered.

  ‘Pick your feet up. Get beneath the cloak.’

  Ambrose's eyes were straining at the mist. He thought he could just – maybe – make out the shadow of a rider over there. His heart was hammering.

  Pick your feet up. In this mist, a horse and rider would be a shape and no more. The hunters had not yet realized that their prey was among them. But if they saw a second pair of legs, a second head, they would know at once. Stealthily Ambrose tried to draw up his feet and sit cross-legged in his perch. His seat was precarious. He swayed, and almost fell. Wastelands clut
ched him, cursing under his breath. Ambrose swallowed, and tried again. He eased his left leg over the horse's neck and onto its other shoulder, so that he sat sideways with both feet towards the river. He bowed his head into the knight's armoured chest, and felt the big cloak draw around him. Propped like that, with his back to the loitering enemy, he could see only from the corner of his eye, to the head of the horse and the whiteness beyond it. His ears told him that there were two riders close, one now drawing ahead of them, another coming level. There were others beyond – how many? We do not fight. We run. They were not running. They were moving in company with their enemies, who could loom out of the mist and discover them in the time it took to draw a breath. Ambrose wanted Wastelands to urge the horse into a gallop – to carry them fleeing like a wildfowl along the riverbank, aimlessly, with the cries of the men in pursuit behind him. Wastelands did not. He was watching, letting the enemy draw slowly ahead. He must be hoping that they would not guess that he had been among them. Then, maybe, they could turn Stefan and slip back the way they had come.

  How long? How long must they walk like this?

  A voice called from ahead. Ambrose clenched his teeth and hunched his shoulders, but all that happened was that somewhere in the mist a horse picked up pace and rambled forward at a heavy trot. Voices came to him, conferring. They were coming nearer. Wastelands was idling his horse up towards his enemies. There were close, close. Could he see them? The lightest pull on the reins, and Stefan stilled. Another horse lumbered past – very close, this one.

  Clutched under the cloak Ambrose could only see the mist over the water, and a single, thin black line curving away into it – a rope, suspended from two points somewhere out of sight, sagging under its own weight. A rope across the river.

  Up ahead, somebody was dismounting. There was a slow paddling of hooves as other riders moved on into the mist. Metal rasped in a scabbard. That was Wastelands drawing his sword. What was happening?

  After a moment Wastelands slid down from the saddle. Ambrose felt himself swaying as the man nudged the horse forward. Plod, plod. There was someone else moving in the mist. There was a tall structure of beams, from which the rope Ambrose had seen swept lazily off across the river. Down there, where the water must be, there was a darker shape, low and wide. A raft, or jetty.