The Widow and the King

by John Dickinson

  She seemed to think about what he had said.

  ‘Very well … Although a man like Aun is not nothing,’ she added.

  ‘Are you going to wed him?’ Ambrose asked.

  She gave a surprised little laugh.

  ‘My darling – what put that into your head?’

  ‘I don't know.’

  It had come to him, just then, as he had looked at her watching the man toil up the slope towards them. There had been something in her eyes that he hadn't seen before.

  The knight climbed steadily towards them under the sun. Ambrose could hear the clink, clink of his mail as he moved.

  ‘A wolf may watch the moon,’ she said. ‘But neither can wed the other. I am something else now. He knows that.’

  Wolf ? Why had she said that?

  Oh, because of his badge. Of course. And that must have been why she called his son the ‘young wolf ‘ back home in the hills – because he came from the house with the wolf-badge. That was all. She hadn't been judging either of them.

  ‘He wants to kill his son,’ he said.

  After a moment she answered: ‘That must not happen.’

  Butterflies fled wavering before Wastelands's armoured knees as he picked his way up the meadow towards them.

  ‘It must not happen,’ she murmured.

  ‘You will find that he listens to you, as he did not before,’ she went on. ‘He knows that you know the enemy. You must decide how to fight, and he will help you.’

  ‘Won't you be with us?’

  ‘I will not be far away. But I told you that in some ways I am still a babe. I cannot go with you under the sun, and I must be wary how I travel within the Cup. No,’ she said, seeing the expression on his face. ‘The enemy moves in both worlds. Aun can see only this one. And I am forgetting this one, while still learning my way in the other. But you – you see both. I think you always have. Oh, I know. It's too soon for you. But there is no more time. And you have grown this winter, Amba. You have learned as well – perhaps more than you realize. You must find your own way now. And you must help the rest of us to find it, too.’

  ‘Why do you think I can?’

  ‘Because you already have done.’

  She looked down at something she was turning in her fingers.

  ‘In the darkest hours of my life, my darling, you sent this to me. You gave it to Martin to bring to me in Tarceny. “Give Mama,” you told him. No, you do not remember. You were less than two years old. But I have treasured this, and when I escaped from the pool and returned to the house, I remembered where I had laid it. I have carried it since, and with it I have managed to hide and to protect myself from the hunters. And now I have it to give back to you.’

  It was a white stone.

  ‘It is, as they all were, a fragment of the bone of Capuu, cut from the broken teeth that stood around the pool. It will not make you a ring to hide in. It will not be enough, I think, to ward off all attack from the creatures of the pit. Nor will it keep you safe from any man who serves the Prince Paigan. But the enemy does not know where you are, yet, and it may help to hide you. Carry it, and keep watch, and be ready with a weapon. For your enemies are men or creatures. They are not ghosts. They may be wounded by a sure hand. Take care of it, my darling, for it is the very last.’

  She looked up as the knight climbed the last few yards of slope to where they sat. He stood over them, breathing heavily.

  ‘A sure hand,’ he said.

  ‘And I have a little iron, too. Also I have some hooves, to save our feet, and bread for our bellies. Where are we headed from here?’

  Ambrose gripped the last white stone in his palm. He knew she had just given him everything she had to give.

  ‘We'll go home,’ he said. ‘We'll go back to the pool.’

  XX

  The March of Tarceny

  nce again he was travelling with Wastelands. He slept on lumpy earth and roots, and rose in grey dawns with his clothes all clammy from the dew. His days were straps and camp-meals and the hours of plod, plod, plod as the landscapes shifted slowly by. He remembered it all so well that Develin might never have happened.

  Some things were different, and better. The wooded hillsides changed more quickly than the dull, flat lands on the other side of the lake. He had his own mount – the solid, rough-hided mule, with its air of peaceful indifference to all that came. He had not found a name for it and did not think he would. It looked as if a name would be just another indignity for it to endure. Nevertheless he was grateful to it, because riding its broad, swaying back was easier than he had thought it might be.

  Better still, Wastelands had brought food for two, whereas before (Ambrose now realized) he must have been sharing what he had planned for only one. And they were both ready to talk, from time to time.

  In a valley like any other, Wastelands pointed to a rock. It had been roughly shaped into a short, square column, and stood where the stream they had been following tumbled over a cataract.

  ‘The March-stone,’ he said. ‘In law we are now in the March of Tarceny, and therefore in the Kingdom. If we were ordinary travellers we would be under the protection of the King. As it is, I am an outlaw, and so I suspect are you. Therefore everyone we meet would now be our enemy, and the lords would be bound to pursue us, out of the duty they owe to the crown.’

  Ambrose slid down from the back of his mule to look at the stone.

  ‘However,’ Wastelands went on, ‘I do not think we shall meet many who have heard of this King, or will seek to apply his law. The March was ever a land of few people, and the wars and risings of the last years have made it more so.’

  ‘And who is the lord here?’

  ‘You, I suppose,’ said Wastelands, as though it had only just occurred to him. He frowned. ‘Tancrem of Baldwin was the last real strength in the March, although he only held the land in stewardship. When he was brought down, Septimus appointed others, but by then the March was war-riven and worth little. One of the stewards was killed by the Fifteen. I did not hear that the rest ever came to see what they had here. Now Septimus is gone. There is no lord. There are not even many manors or farmhouses.’

  On the face of the stone was carved a disc, which might have been a moon, with a shape upon it.

  ‘Who are the Fifteen?’

  Wastelands grinned, bitterly.

  ‘You have met them. It was they who hounded us to Develin – and pressed me close for three days after, until I won to Lackmere and could drop my own portcullis in front of their noses. They were knights of your father. They lost their lands here after your father's rising, but they have crept back to what was left and they wring from it what they can, riding like brigands out of the shell of Tarceny.’

  ‘Will we meet them here?’

  ‘I trust not. The March is a wide land. But if we stay in one place too long, then they may come looking for us.’

  ‘Why did they chase us?’

  ‘They do not love me. But they were on your trail before I found you. So I guess they thought you carried some treasure of Old Tarceny, or maybe news of where they might find your mother. Her, they would hunt to the death, for her part in Tarceny's fall. I do not know who told them where to look for us. It may have been this scarecrow-priest that is our enemy. It may even have been my devil of a son.’

  The mule stood patiently in the narrow track while Ambrose clambered back into his saddle.

  ‘Your son spared your life,’ he said slowly.

  The man shot him an angry glance.

  ‘Eh? What's that?’

  ‘He came to our camp last season, when we were sleeping in the old castle. He could have killed both of us, but he didn't.’

  Wastelands had half-turned in his saddle, staring at Ambrose.

  ‘How do you know this?’

  ‘I spoke with him. He came by under-craft and woke me. He had a knife, but he didn't do anything.’

  He realized that the man probably wouldn't believe him. In a moment he woul
d decide that Ambrose was either mad or a liar, and ride on. It would be difficult to talk to him about anything after that.

  Wastelands sat stock-still in his saddle.

  ‘You spoke with him? You talked prettily and let him go away?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Ambrose.

  ‘Why didn't you wake me?’

  ‘I was afraid,’ said Ambrose truthfully.

  ‘Afraid! Michael's teeth! I could have had my throat slit – would that have made you feel better?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘He killed his brother! For witchcraft – witchcraft, you hear? It's the same damned stuff that your father did. There's no other word for it. That's what you were dealing with!’

  ‘It isn't right to kill your son.’

  Now he had done it. Wastelands was staring at him, his eyes dark and his cheeks pale. What now? Was he going to start beating him again?

  The fighter leaned in his saddle until his face was nearly level with Ambrose's.

  ‘What business,’ said Wastelands, ‘is that of yours?’

  ‘My mother thinks so,’ said Ambrose defensively.

  ‘Does she? And what's it to do with her, either? Listen. What's between him and me is my concern and mine alone. What he did in my house. And to my men and my friends and my King last winter, too. What right do you think you have to tell me otherwise?’

  Ambrose looked into his eyes, and saw no speaking with them.

  ‘Now ride on,’ said Wastelands, in a voice that was not quite true.

  Obediently Ambrose kicked at his mule, and kicked again until it ambled ahead along the path. Behind him, he heard Stefan follow. He did not look round. He thought the man behind him might be weeping.

  After a while Wastelands spoke again.

  ‘Could you sleep, thinking that I'd sit and chat with the scarecrow and his creatures if they came on us in the night?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Your enemies are my enemies. Mine are yours. That's the way it works. That's why we can ride together, you understand?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘From now on, neither of us sleeps at the same time. You'll watch, then I'll watch, the night through. And if either of us see anything, we both rouse up.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And I'll be sleeping more lightly in future.’

  Ambrose heard the choke in the man's voice. And he felt like weeping, too.

  You have to find your way, his mother had said.

  He had tried. And what had happened?

  It wasn't fair! He'd tried to do what he'd been told! And now he was left feeling ashamed – ashamed because he had tried to tell Wastelands not to kill his son.

  He had not thought of Wastelands as a man who grieved. He had thought Wastelands looked at the world with a hard face and made his way through its misery as a fish swam in water – ruined farms, ruined houses; even, perhaps, the loss of Develin, and the Widow whom he had called a friend. Ambrose had wondered how he could be so callous. Now he knew that Wastelands carried within him a rage and grief that was deeper than anything the man saw. That was what lay in the pit.

  My mother thinks so. What a thing to have said! He had said it because he had thought Wastelands would listen to her. But it had only made things worse.

  What right do you think you have?

  It was not right that a man should kill his son. That was true. And Wastelands knew it. He didn't want to do it – or why would he be weeping now? But he was still going to do it if he could.

  It was not right. And yet what right did Ambrose have? In Develin they had said that men followed their feuds only because they could find no other way. Wastelands could not find another way; and Ambrose had not found it for him. There was a part of the man's soul that was locked, beyond reach.

  The enemy had him.

  They jogged on along the path by the stream. The countryside had hardly changed with their arrival on the southern fringes of the Kingdom. The valleys were wooded and steep-sided, and outcrops of rock broke the tree-cover on the ridges. They passed no dwellings, ruined or otherwise. After some miles the path left the streamside and began to climb an easy slope. Ambrose followed it. His thoughts had abandoned Wastelands. Now, angrily, they pursued the Prince Under the Sky.

  He had barely glimpsed his enemy, in Develin, until the enemy had chosen to show himself at Develin's fall.

  That fleeting, despising figure: how could Ambrose find him now?

  He had already been too long about finding him. He wished that he had not been so afraid, back in Develin. He wished that he had looked harder. He should have used his hours to go walking through the courts and rooms looking for the Heron Man. Somewhere, behind some door, his enemy had waited. They should have met, at a time of Ambrose's choosing. And when they had spoken, their words should have been like the quick quarterstaffs to each other; and Ambrose would have answered like an equal.

  He still would – if he could find him.

  Where are you, Paigan, my enemy?

  And so his mind escaped into a daydream of the house at Develin. He saw himself passing through the house, perhaps with a weapon in hand, searching for the frail man in a grey robe. Door after door opened before him, and all the rooms were empty. The corridors echoed to his feet, and the silence closed in behind him. He searched and he searched. And here at last was the door to the scholars' hall. And when he put his hand upon the iron ring he knew that the Heron Man was waiting for him beyond it: waiting before rows of empty benches to begin his lesson.

  Ambrose blinked.

  The mule had stopped. It had stopped because his hands had been pulling at its reins. They were at the top of a ridge, looking north into another valley, with the same fleece of trees that darkened in the shadows of drifting clouds.

  Wastelands passed, high on Stefan's back. He said nothing to Ambrose. He headed on along the path that would lead down into the valley.

  ‘Wait,’ said Ambrose.

  His companion either did not hear him or chose to ignore him again.

  Ambrose cleared his throat, and found the man's name.

  ‘Aun,’ he called loudly.

  The knight checked, and looked back.

  ‘Wait,’ Ambrose said again.

  ‘What's the matter?’

  What was the matter? Ambrose was not sure. The feeling – the moment he had put his hand upon the door-ring in his dream – had been very strong.

  ‘Have you seen something?’ Aun asked him.

  ‘No.’

  It was nothing you could see. There was nothing moving in the valley ahead of him. He had not heard anything either. And yet he had felt it clearly for a moment; like a trick of memory: an ugly, familiar, sick feeling, as if he had been about to walk back into a room where something dreadful had happened before. There had been a scent in the air as if the trees had begun to drip water from their leaves, in droplets that smelled of the edge of pools. Perhaps he could still feel it; perhaps he was just imagining it. But his mind showed him shapes that might be moving in the woods ahead of him – or that might come there, and look there, or that were walking among the brown rocks in a place that was near to this valley.

  The Heron Man was close; the Heron Man, or something that came from him.

  ‘They're hunting us,’ he said.

  The man he had called Aun looked at him, and then at the trees again. Plainly he could see nothing.

  ‘Have they found us?’ he asked at length.

  ‘No. Maybe they've gone, but …’

  ‘But?’

  Ambrose thought. Go on?

  (Open the door? The door to the scholars' hall?)

  Yes, he wanted to. He wanted to meet the Heron Man again. He wanted to hear him, speak with him, and prove to him that …

  But not yet, surely. This was no daydream. Now that the moment was real, he felt the old fears slithering into his mind. He fought them. He knew he must not be so afraid. And yet at the same time he thought: Not yet. Not without more help.

 
; His throat was sticky.

  ‘Is there another way?’ he asked.

  ‘We could go back to the streamside and follow that. I think there was a footpath on the other bank. We could rejoin the road further on.’

  Still Ambrose looked at the valley ahead of them. A minute ago Aun must still have been nursing their quarrel. Now he was ready to turn aside at Ambrose's word; because he was an ally in another man's war.

  ‘Let's do that,’ he said.

  ‘Very well.’

  They backed off the ridge and Ambrose felt better at once. He felt better still under the cover of trees.

  The going along the stream was slow. The branches were low and they had to lead their mounts. They made only a few more miles that afternoon. Then, in a clearing by the bank, they came upon a hut. They saw the roof was whole, and that smoke rose from the chimney. Ambrose dismounted first, and Aun let him. The door was closed fast, and so were the shutters. But Ambrose guessed that there must be people inside, and called and banged hard upon the boards. At length a shutter opened.

  ‘Lodging for the night?’ he said brightly to the scared faces that peered out at him. It was a woman and her young daughter. They must have heard the riders coming and have been hoping that these two strangers would pass and leave them alone; but the woman unbolted the door and showed them where they might tether their mounts.

  ‘Have you coin to pay them?’ Ambrose muttered to Aun as they unharnessed the horses.

  Aun's brow lifted in surprise.

  ‘I have. Although they will give us food and bed for nothing.’

  ‘Why should they?’

  ‘It is the custom. Also they may fear that we would cut their throats.’

  Ambrose felt his face harden.

  ‘Better to pay them, while we can.’

  Aun grunted, but said only: ‘We should take watches through the night, still.’

  Ambrose nodded. After feeling the enemy that afternoon he would certainly watch. If the Heron Man came to him, he did not want to be sleeping.

  The hut was a single room with an earth floor strewn with belongings. The air within it was dark and smoky from the fire. The woman's husband arrived with fish that he had trapped in a pool. He was surly and suspicious, but did not argue when his wife took his catch for their evening meal. While the pan began to sizzle on the hearth, Ambrose asked them questions about the March. They answered shortly. They had no lord or manor knight nearby. There was another family, half a day's walk further down the stream, but travellers were very few. They had heard of the Fifteen, and feared them, but had never seen them in their valley. They shrugged when Ambrose told them of the happenings in the wider Kingdom. Such things might have been taking place upon the moon.