The Widow and the King

by John Dickinson

  Sophia waited.

  ‘Why's it showing me this? It's not done this before.’

  ‘If it's at night, it can't be happening now,’ said Sophia. And if it wasn't happening now, she did not see what help it could be.

  ‘No … Maybe it was last night, or a few nights ago.’ He watched the water for a while in silence. Then he said: ‘I don't like this.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘He's got no one with him. He's … There's something coming. I can feel it. Why's it showing this?’

  ‘What's coming?’

  Chawlin was cursing, softly, to himself.

  ‘What's coming, Chawlin?’

  ‘I've seen this before … Is it this? In Tarceny. But I was there – I can't see me! What's this? Who is it?’

  ‘Chawlin …’

  ‘Wake up. Wake up, damn you!’ He put his hands on the rim of the cup and shook it slightly, in his attempt to make whoever it was hear him. ‘Come on!’

  They must have come then. Whoever they were. He was dumb, pale-cheeked, staring into the opaque water. For a moment Sophia saw him try to look away, gasping. Then his eyes dragged him back to the bowl. His hand came up, cupped to shield his sight, but it stopped. The water had him.

  ‘Chawlin, you're frightening me! What is it?’

  His mouth moved, wordless. Then his eyes narrowed and his face hardened. He was watching something obscene – for long seconds.

  ‘Chawlin!’

  ‘That's – that's his arm. And that's a hand …’

  She reached out and put her own hand over the bowl. He stared at it for a moment, as though it was something worse than anything he had seen in the cup. Then, painfully, he lifted his eyes.

  ‘They tore him,’ he said. ‘Like Tarceny.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘It was Velis. It was the King. And they tore him to pieces.’

  XXII

  Night on the Knoll

  ow let the Lord of Tarceny speak,’ said one of the townsmen.

  For the third time that afternoon Ambrose rose to face the ring of men on the hilltop. As he did so, Aun caught him by the arm.

  ‘This time remember, don't be clever,’ he murmured. ‘Just tell them what they've decided. Then it will stick when you've gone – or when I'm not here to back you up.’

  Ambrose picked up his ragged banner and held it in his left hand, like a king's sceptre. The ghost of Denke reminded him to take a breath before he spoke, and to touch his heart with his right hand.

  ‘Before the man Mar came to be ruler in Aclete,’ he began, as though reciting a lesson, ‘one of the boats in the bay belonged to Ham Graysson. Three boats belonged to Penn Cable.’ He nodded to the tall, sparse-haired villager who stood among the crowd to his left. He had to get the details right. In the last case they had put to him, about the goat-flock, he had muddled them, and then he had made things worse by trying to invent a way out. The judgement had been argued over three times until one of the older townsmen had managed to bring it to an agreement.

  ‘Mar seized all the boats for himself, unjustly.’ It helped if he described everything the Helm had done as wicked. Everyone else seemed ready to do so.

  ‘Then he leased the boats back to their owners, demanding a share of one fifth of their catch and trade in return.

  ‘When the boat of Ham Graysson was lost by mischance, Mar put him to work on one of the boats that had belonged to Penn Cable, increasing the share that he demanded to pay for the lost boat. Penn Cable received nothing from Mar for this. Yet Ham Graysson has now paid to Mar one third of the value of the boat that he had lost.’ Ambrose paused. Some had said one half, some one third, some a quarter. No one argued with him.

  ‘Ham Graysson must have a boat to win his living. Penn Cable must have some good for the injustice done to him. Therefore Ham Graysson shall keep the boat, and shall pay to Penn Cable one fifth of all his catch and trade for …’ He hesitated.

  ‘A year,’ said a grey-bearded townsman.

  ‘One year?’ muttered Cable, incredulously.

  ‘Ten, more like.’

  ‘Two …’

  ‘For two years,’ said Ambrose firmly. ‘After which no more shall be paid.’

  ‘That is the judgement,’ said Aun, because Ambrose had forgotten.

  The murmur of voices rose around the ring. Penn Cable was shaking his head, as if he could not believe it; but he was keeping silent and the crowd seemed to think the case was settled.

  Ambrose looked around.

  ‘Is there anything more?’

  They had done the foodstores and hides, the herd (which had taken hours), and now the boats. An air of exhaustion hung over the gathering. Yet the Helm must have made hundreds of judgements in his years at Aclete. Any might be disputed now; and Ambrose knew that he would have to go on and on listening to people as long as they brought their quarrels to him.

  ‘Enough for today, your lordship, I think,’ said the grey-bearded townsman.

  Ambrose sagged inwardly with relief. He hoped it did not show. He wondered what they all thought about how he had done.

  Voices rose. The circle began to dissolve. Someone laughed. Someone else was calling out about some butts of wine down in the storehouse that could be opened (now, they hadn't been mentioned in all that wrangling over the grain and the hides). They seemed happy, for the most part: happy at the end of a day in which they had lost their lord.

  ‘Will you be lodging with us in the town, sir?’ said the greybeard.

  Ambrose shook his head.

  ‘No?’ said Aun, surprised.

  ‘We'd be pleased to offer you our best, sir – food and bed and wine.’

  ‘No. We sleep here.’ It was the one decision he had taken by himself all afternoon, and he felt quite firm about it.

  Up here, on this big-shouldered hill, he stood in the light. It would last an hour more, maybe – a weak, liquid gold already welling with the cool of evening. Down below, and far out across the lake, the falling sun had left the land in shadow. And down there, by the huts, Mar had died, and the air had whispered of the enemy he could not reach. He did not want to go back down there. He wanted to remain on his island of light, as long as it lasted.

  The greybeard looked nonplussed; but he shrugged.

  ‘It's played its part for your family, this hill, sir. Your mother and father were married on it. And your first ancestor, sir. He waited for his bride here. That's why it's called Talifer's Knoll, after him.’

  ‘Is it?’ said Aun. ‘Well don't let your young maids get ideas about their lord tonight. I'll be waiting with the flat of my sword for any that do.’

  ‘No sir,’ said the man, laughing wickedly as he turned away. ‘We'll keep ‘em under lock and key, right enough.’

  ‘That's one mercy,’ murmured Aun, as the crowd broke up. ‘Useful man, that. Him and two or three others. With luck they'll be able to sort out the rest of it among themselves, now they know where their law is coming from.’

  It was true. There had been three or four voices around the circle, all of them older men, that again and again had suggested things the rest had listened to. Disputes that had been close to fights at noon had been settled by evening. Ambrose had found that the less he said the better. His part had been to wait for them to decide, and tell them what they had decided, because when the words came from his mouth they would be the law. With the Helm dead he was the only one who could give it.

  Whether he could protect them was another matter.

  ‘Why did you kill him?’ said Ambrose, watching the townspeople trail off the hilltop.

  Aun shot him an angry glance.

  ‘What do you think he'd have done if I hadn't? He'd have picked himself up, gone back into the town, shaken out his fighting strength – he must have some, to have kept the Fifteen off this place. That's what he'd have done right away, if he had realized you had a war-knight with you. And then he'd have been after us for our blood. It was us or him, the moment you set those men f
ree. He was stupid enough to let us make it him.’

  His name had been Mar. He had been a knight, or a soldier of fortune – no one quite knew which. But he had come out of the south some years ago with a small number of armed men and made himself the chief of Aclete. And he had settled the township's quarrels – not justly, they had kept saying to Ambrose: not justly at all, and they did not miss him. But not all his decisions had been bad ones – wouldn't Ham Graysson have starved if the Helm had not given him Cable's boat?

  And how would Aclete deal with the Fifteen, now? That was for Ambrose to answer. He was Lord of the March, and the one who had brought Mar to his death. He hadn't wanted this. He didn't want any of it.

  ‘Anyway,’ said Aun, ‘I don't like ordeals. I saw your mother face one just like that. They wanted to kill her. By good luck Septimus and I were there to put a stop to it.’

  ‘What did you do to them?’

  ‘Septimus forgave them,’ said Aun flatly.

  ‘It's important to forgive.’

  ‘I don't think so. The leader's name was Baldwin.’

  Ambrose said nothing.

  ‘You're being damned prim about this!’ said Aun. ‘I could have got my head split this morning. If you'd been my – my squire I'd have had the hide off you for that. I promised your mother I'd let you do what you do and just make sure you stayed alive. And I will. And I'll lay my head on turf tonight if I have to. But next time I may do rather less letting and rather more making sure.’

  He was angry again. Ambrose found it hard to look at him when he was angry.

  ‘I was trying …’

  ‘I know what you were trying to do. They taught you prettily at that school, I'll allow. But it wasn't going to work. You can speak about rule or law as much as you like, but out here it comes damned quickly down to the iron. That man had too much to lose to let him listen. Six months ago I'd have been the same. And as for forgiving – it's not free, not even for a king. It's like taking on debt. And a king who forgives too much pays with his life. Remember that.’

  You think you're with me, thought Ambrose. And yet you kill without thinking.

  Aun had turned away as if the talk were over, and was beginning to take wood from the beacon-pile to build up a small fire.

  ‘How long until the Fifteen get here?’ said Ambrose. Aun looked up.

  ‘Eh? You're counting on them arriving?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You want to show them that banner and talk rule and law?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Aun swore.

  ‘Are you mad or am I?’

  ‘You think they won't come?’

  ‘Oh, they'll come all right.’ He frowned. ‘Ordinarily I would say a day and a half to Tarceny – if they are at Tarceny – and the same back. But it can be done more quickly than that. And news travels like the wind. Aclete's strongman dead – that's news. You and your banner are news. We should be safe … until the evening of the day after tomorrow, I guess. If they don't night-march. If they do, it could be the noon or mid-morning. Now tell me why we should wait for them to come and cut our throats for us.’

  ‘I don't think they will.’

  ‘You think they chased us the length of the Kingdom last season just to ask the price of plum-fruit?’

  ‘They were told lies about us. I know who did it. So do you.’

  Aun gazed at him. In the long light half of his face was shadow. His cheek muscles were fixed.

  You think you are with me, thought Ambrose. And yet you want to kill your son.

  The man swore again, and stared into the pile of firewood he was constructing.

  ‘What about diManey – your friend and your mother's friend?’ he said at last. ‘They killed him. Him and his wife. Do you remember?’

  (The long room at Chatterfall. The people hurrying to get ready. Aunt Evalia with her hand on Uncle Adam's arm. And both of them dead within an hour.)

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Do you care?’

  Ambrose knew what he meant. How could he forget that? How could he hope for good from the men who had done it?

  It was the Wolf who had killed Aunt Evalia. And yet the question was the same. And he had no answer to it.

  ‘They'll attack Aclete, if we don't do something,’ he said.

  ‘The best we can do for Aclete is to get as far away from it as possible,’ said Aun. ‘The town must look after itself. We'll move at dawn. And you can have first watch.’

  He bent to busy himself with the fire.

  She had put a blanket around him, but he would not be still. Dazed, and with his mind turned inwards, Chawlin wandered through the huts of Aclete and out of the gate. She followed as if he were a sleepwalker whom she was afraid to wake. He climbed a little way up the knoll, still hugging his blanket around him. Then he sat down.

  ‘It was a message. A warning,’ he said.

  ‘It wanted me to see them do it,’ he said, a few minutes later. ‘Those things – they're so misshapen …’

  ‘You shouldn't look, if it's going to do this to you,’ Sophia said.

  She thought he had not heard her. But then, to her surprise, he said: ‘I don't think I need to any more.’

  ‘Good,’ she said. And she thought: now that he's said that, I can hide the cup when he's not looking. Perhaps I could even throw it into the lake, so he can't change his mind. It would be better for him.

  ‘So. Velis is dead,’ she said. Anything to get him to talk.

  ‘Yes. It makes no sense.’

  ‘I can't think of anyone who deserved it more. What do you think will happen now?’

  He shrugged, uncaring. ‘I don't know. Some strongman among his followers will try to take the throne. It'll be more fighting, anyway. Perhaps a lot more.’

  ‘Has any of them have a proper claim?’

  ‘By blood? No more than he had.’

  ‘I'll tell you one who has. Ambrose.’

  She meant it as a joke. There was nothing kingly about Ambrose (although over the past few days as she had imagined meeting with him, she had begun to think that if the Kingdom could humble itself before this child it would be a better place indeed). But now she wanted to see Chawlin laugh again. She didn't want him to shut his eyes like that, as though even this were more bad news, more horror, more sorrow.

  Chawlin! Do I have to shake you?

  ‘He'd never have held it,’ Chawlin said, looking into space.

  ‘Well, he's already put down one lordling and held a court in the March. He's carrying the flag of Tarceny – did I tell you?’

  ‘If he wants to reclaim … it's the right way. I wonder if he knows what he's doing.’

  ‘I doubt if he's got the slightest idea.’

  They sat in silence together. She put her hand on his. He did not move. Together they watched the lake greying in the dusk.

  I'm not going to get him up the hill this evening, Sophia thought. He doesn't want to go. And he's had too much of a shock. He needs to rest. But if I wake before he does I'll take that damned cup and toss it into the water.

  ‘Right,’ he said suddenly, in a dead voice. ‘Sophia, you should sleep in the town tonight.’

  ‘What about you?’

  ‘I'm going to stay here.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I've got to – I've got to think.’

  ‘You can think in the town, with me. Two heads are better than one.’

  He shook his head. ‘They'll shut the gate.’

  Sophia did not see what that had to do with it. She was sure he would be better off under a roof in the town, where someone could cook them a warm meal and maybe offer them wine. But if he wanted to sleep under the stars, very well. He just was not going to do it alone.

  ‘I'll get our things from the boat,’ she said.

  ‘No. I want you inside the stockade. I want you to stay where there are people – in the light …’

  ‘Chawlin!’

  The sound of his name stopped him.

  ‘Chaw
lin – what is it? What's frightening you?’

  ‘You didn't see …’

  ‘I don't see anything in that horrid cup. What is it?’

  ‘It's those creatures. I – I saw the cockerel again.’

  ‘But they're nothing to do with us!’

  He wanted to say something to her. There was something he knew. What was it?

  ‘Chawlin – what's the matter?’

  ‘They are – to do with the cup,’ he said slowly. ‘They killed Tarceny. I saw it. Now they've killed Velis. And – and they were in Develin. Yes, I think so. If I'd looked, I'd have seen them …’

  Sophia stared at him. For a moment it seemed to her that all the world was haunted except herself. She was an island in a sea of madness. And Ambrose, and now Chawlin, were drowning in it …

  Pictures rose in her mind.

  An eye, red in the lamplight on a stair in Develin.

  A voice, pleading by a stone fountain.

  Something that was not a fox, slipping among the grasses on a hillside.

  The cockerel!

  Shadows moved in her head, hunched, hooded. Claws groped – blindly, but knowing she was there. She felt herself shudder. Where had she seen them? It must have been in a dream. She must be remembering a dream, that was all. She thrust the images from her head.

  ‘We're scaring ourselves,’ she said.

  ‘They were in Develin,’ said Chawlin. ‘I'm sure of it now. If I don't do what … If we are not careful, they'll … We have to be careful. That's all.’

  Sophia looked around her at the grey lake, and the grey slope of the knoll shadowed with the evening. Suddenly it seemed all too likely that she was being watched by things with unseen eyes. It was a feeling that was almost familiar, as if she had borne it for days without knowing. Nothing moved among the grasses or the low reeds. There was a shape on the shore that was probably a tree stump. But when you looked away, in this light, it did seem to be a figure of a hooded man, watching them.

  ‘I'm staying with you,’ she said.

  He sobbed.

  She put her arms round him, because she did not know what else she could do. His shoulders shook in her embrace.

  ‘Soph … Soph …’

  He was trying to say her name. He could not. She held him, but she could not reach below his skin.