The Language of Stones

by Robert Carter

  ‘Argent a fess gules in chief three torteaux a molet azure for difference,’ Edward said in heraldic as he peered at the column. Will knew exactly what he meant: a red-and-white banner with three red discs and a blue star on it.

  ‘I hope they’re friendly,’ he said.

  ‘It’s Sir Walter Deveron – Lord Ferrers. He’s one of my father’s personal retainers.’

  And Will heard the disappointment in Edward’s voice, for the duke was not with them. They hurried down to the gate, then took the reins of the lead horseman, a knight accoutred for travel in time of war. Will guessed this must be Lord Ferrers. At his back were perhaps a couple of hundred riders, and behind them came a long line of covered waggons each with an outrider to act as escort.

  Once across the Neane Bridge, Lord Ferrers dismounted from his muddy horse and looked around, alert as a jerfalcon. He was big and headstrong, an iron-fisted man of war, and he was exhilarated. He and his men had been in an engagement, and they had come off best.

  ‘Booty,’ he called out, pleased with himself. ‘And what stuff it is! Sixteen waggons arrested on the road to Trinovant, packed to the ribs with the tools of war.’

  ‘You’ve captured all that?’ Edward marvelled.

  ‘Aye, Sir Edward, we sent their escort running like hares! The drovers said they were under orders not to let it be known where this train was headed, but they told us soon enough once we were masters of it!’ He laughed. ‘This is a burden of weapons that Lord Strange will no longer have to shoulder!’

  Will started at the mention of Lord Strange’s name. But Edward took Lord Ferrers’ helmet and together they headed for the gate of the inner bailey, to where Lady Cicely had appeared amid a gaggle of waiting women to bid the newcomers welcome.

  While Will watched from the outer bailey, the waggons were brought across the bridge and marshalled together nearby. By now, his blood had cooled and he was beginning to feel all the cuts and bruises he had taken. His lip felt puffy and fat, one of his eyes was almost closed, and there was a lump the size of a duck’s egg on the back of his head. He knew he ought to go down and ask Gort to tend him, but he did not relish Gort’s disappointment at the sight of him. Instead he made his way among the newlyarrived waggons when something made him look up, for there, sitting beside one of the drivers was a girl with fair hair and fear in her eyes.

  Will looked once and then again. The girl saw him but turned her gaze quickly away, as she would from any armoured man.

  ‘Willow?’ he called, his heart thumping loudly now. ‘Willow? Is that you?’

  She turned back, surprised to hear her own name, and when she looked at him again the fear turned to confusion.

  ‘Willow, it’s me. It’s me, Willand!’

  ‘Will?’ she said in disbelief. Then she put a hand to her mouth and whispered, ‘Whatever have they done to you?’

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  COLD COMFORT IN THE WEST

  When they met next day, Will was dressed more plainly in the blue and white of Ebor livery. He went down to the empty waggons that now served as a camp for the waggoners. They were drawn up close together in a field by the river and the oxen set to grazing nearby. He decided to say nothing about how his face had come to be so cut and bruised, nor did he explain why he had been wearing armour. He was already wise enough to know that to Willow’s way of thinking the study of war was not something to be admired.

  Willow shared her makeshift home with her father, Stenn, a capable-looking, bearded man of middle height, who was very careful about what he said. He greeted Will genuinely enough, but there followed an uncomfortable silence. At last, Will saw a reassuring look pass between daughter and father before Willow led Will away.

  ‘Does he mind me coming to see you?’ he asked once they were out of earshot.

  ‘He doesn’t know who you are,’ she said. ‘Only that we met once at Grendon Mill. He thinks you’ll have us sent back to Wychwoode and we’ll have to face Lord Strange’s wrath. I told him I’d ask you not to do that.’

  He looked out over the river where a pair of beautiful swans were dabbling at the grassy bank. ‘It’s not up to me to send anyone back. I’m—’

  ‘I know. You told me once before. You’re no lordling.’

  ‘Well…I know it looks…’

  His words petered out and she looked at him uncertainly. ‘Will, you’ve changed.’

  ‘Don’t be scared.’ He smiled, trying to reassure her.

  But she would not smile back. Instead she looked away from him as if she was not able to cross the gulf that seemed to have opened between them.

  ‘Don’t be put off by these clothes. They make me wear them.’

  ‘I hardly know what to say to you,’ she said quietly. ‘After all…all you said back in Wychwoode about magic and…’

  ‘I think we’d better have a talk,’ he said. He sat himself down on a low wall and told her what had passed since they had parted. He told her everything, except about the finding of the Dragon Stone.

  Willow, in turn, told him what had happened to her. She had received a message from the Wise Woman to meet at Grendon Mill, but her duties had delayed her and as she had come along by the brook she had heard a great crack of thunder and what looked like a blue lightning stroke coming from the edge of the forest. A few moments later a great torrent of muddy water had gushed along the ditch. That had scared her so much that she had run all the way home. Later she had plucked up the courage to go to Lord Strange’s tower, but one of the guards had told her that the lad who had come with the wizard had gone away.

  ‘Until then I never believed in any Master Gwydion,’ she said.

  ‘You mean, you thought I’d made him up?’

  She nodded. ‘My father says boys often tell girls things that aren’t true, just to impress them.’

  Will reddened. ‘I suppose they do.’

  ‘But you do just the opposite, don’t you?’ She looked at the way his hair was cut now and at the richness of his clothes. ‘You told me you were no lordling. But it seems you’re going to be one, after all.’

  ‘No, these things are not mine. I’m just a page.’

  She touched his hair. ‘I liked it better long, when you had the two braids in it.’

  He scrubbed fingers through his hair, remembering how he had cut his braids off because she had said they made him look like a girl.

  ‘The truth is,’ he said, ‘I don’t really know what I’m supposed to be doing here. Master Gwydion dumped me on this lordly household like so much old baggage. He just wiped his hands and went off without even saying so much as goodbye.’

  ‘What did you do to annoy him?’

  ‘I don’t think that was it. He just said he had important work to do, work I couldn’t help him with.’

  ‘Why did you stay here?’ she asked, looking gloomily at the stone walls that rose up around the outer bailey.

  ‘It’s not so bad here once you get used to it.’

  ‘You could have run away.’

  ‘I made a promise to do whatever Master Gwydion wanted.’ He looked down, thinking of the magical cloak that covered the Vale and how much he should tell her about it. ‘In truth…I probably couldn’t go home.’

  She chose not to pry. Instead she said brightly, ‘Well, in the end, Master Gwydion’s thunderbolt made no difference at the mill, because every man who could be spared was set to rebuilding the dam. Even my father was sent to it. It wasn’t a month before the autumn rains started to fill the pool up as high as it was before. Then the wheel was set to moving again and the trip-hammers began thumping out again.’

  Will nodded, wondering if Gwydion might not have told the Duke Richard’s men to set a watch over Wychwoode and wait for a train of waggons to appear. ‘You must have been afraid when Lord Ferrers’ men came down on you like that.’

  ‘At first I thought we were all going to be killed. My father took out his bow, but I made him put it down.’

  He smiled. ‘I’m glad you
did.’

  She took his hand and squeezed it. ‘I was never so pleased to see anyone as you, Willand. A friendly face in such a place as this. You don’t know what it means. Thank you.’

  He blushed and could not think of anything else to say. His left eye was still bloodshot and there was the remains of a purple ring around it. ‘But I haven’t done anything.’

  She looked into his eyes. ‘You say that, but last night I lay awake thinking and it seemed to me it must have been magic that drew us here.’

  When he thought of her lying awake thinking of him, embarrassment overwhelmed him. ‘Willow, the truth is, I don’t know any magic. Not that kind anyway.’

  ‘If it wasn’t magic, then I’d like to know what to call it. Maybe a twist of fate.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said, wondering again what part Gwydion might have played in her arrival. ‘Maybe it was that.’

  But as they sat together, it all seemed a bit too good to be true, and Will could not wholly put out of his mind what Gwydion had said about the way the battlestones might work their harm by warping people’s destinies. Perhaps it was the Dragon Stone that was playing with them. Perhaps enough of its power had reached beyond Gwydion’s restraining spells to draw Willow and her father here. Perhaps all was not quite as fortunate as it seemed at first glance.

  He saw young Edmund limping near the gate, watched over by a servant. His hand was still bound up and he seemed dazed. Horse hooves clattered on the cobbles and Will recognized Edward’s powerful chestnut destrier. Edward was in the saddle. He had concocted an unchallengeable tale about his brother having fallen down in the hearth, having put his hand into the fire and cracked his head. But the effects of what had happened to Edmund half a week ago had still not gone away. Perhaps, Will thought, it was time to tell Gort the truth.

  Will’s thoughts were interrupted by Edward’s approach. The easy manner he had lately begun to adopt whenever he was in the presence of young women seemed to suit him. In his velvets and jauntily-set hat he looked manly and almost as glamorous as his father. His horse sweated and stamped.

  ‘What goes, Willywag?’ he asked, nodding a breezy greeting. ‘Ah, you’re busy, I see!’

  Willow bowed her head and looked demurely away.

  ‘Hello, Edward.’ Will jumped down from the wall and touched Willow’s hand in parting. ‘I must go.’

  As she made her way back towards camp, Will turned. ‘Edward, listen, I’ve been thinking about going to see the Wortmaster.’

  ‘You’re always with him.’

  ‘You know what I mean.’ He took the bridle and began to lead Edward’s horse into the inner bailey. ‘About Edmund.’

  Edward continued to watch Willow over his shoulder until she passed out of sight. ‘I think not.’

  ‘Look – Edmund was never like this before. There’s something wrong. He doesn’t even smile.’

  ‘He never did smile much. His hand is getting better. Leave him be.’

  ‘It’s not his hand I’m worried about. He’s losing himself. It’ll be best if I tell Gort—’

  Edward’s flinty smile fell away. ‘He’s my brother, Will, and I’ll say what’s best for him. It’ll pass.’

  Stenn turned out to be a more agreeable man than Will had at first feared. He was level-headed and calm and he had the strongest handshake Will had ever felt. The other men from the Wychwoode saw him as their spokesman, and Will promised to petition the Lady Cicely on their behalf. To everyone’s great surprise the duchess came herself to the gates of the inner bailey the next day to give her decision.

  ‘You are free to go home,’ she said, looking from bowed head to bowed head. ‘However, Willand tells me that some of you are reluctant to leave. He says you are honest verderers who were pressed into a service that was distasteful to you. Is this true?’

  No one moved. Then Stenn spoke up. ‘It’s true, your ladyship. Every word of it.’

  The duchess eyed them, deliberating for a moment, then she said, ‘Anyone fearing the retribution of Lord Strange has leave to remain here. I will not have churls unjustly blamed.’

  When she retired, Will stepped forward to recognize the waggoneers’ gratitude on her behalf, and after a moment Edward appeared and drew him aside.

  ‘Where’s the girl?’

  ‘Willow? What about her?’

  ‘I came to tell her she should attend my mother to receive her duties. She’s to serve the family.’

  Will felt a warning pang. ‘But she knows nothing of castle life. Surely her place is with her—’

  ‘Will, it’s an honour.’

  In the days that followed, trumpet blasts were blown several times upon the walls of Foderingham. For some time the garrison had been swelling with men who had come down from the northerly parts of the duke’s domains. Rumours circulated of armies seen marching along the Great North Road, and reports were heard of levies assembling in distant towns. But a curious false peace settled over the Realm as the cold hand of winter tightened. Whatever combination of magic and politics Gwydion and the duke might be working out in Trinovant, they seemed, for the moment, to be holding back the terrible tide.

  As it turned out, Willow was put to helping care for the two youngest sons of the duke. It was a task that brought with it much responsibility and she longed to be free of it, for the infants were wilful and given to tantrums. Will knew that she would have preferred to visit the butts to shoot arrows or walk the meadows with Gort to learn about herbs. But, as Edward had said, it was an honour to be taken into the duchess’s service, and in truth Willow had no choice.

  The days grew shorter, and the weather colder and greyer, but on a rare bright winter’s morning several days before the Ewletide, horns sounded from the walls of Foderingham, and this time there were three long notes.

  They were enduring a lesson, but as soon as Edward heard the warning trill he was up and out of his seat, hauling himself up to the iron-barred mullions to catch sight of the looked-for return.

  ‘He’s back!’ he shouted. ‘I knew it!’

  ‘Sir Edward!’ Tutor Aspall’s voice fluted. ‘You must not rise at every alarum. Sit down again if you please, you have not asked permiss—’

  But the helpless tutor could only look to where two brothers had been sitting and where now only Will stood alone. Edward had already dragged his brother from his seat and was leading him along the passageway.

  ‘He really has no discipline,’ Tutor Aspall muttered, then, ‘Now, Willand…Willand?’

  But Will had already eased past him into the passageway and was heading for the far door.

  He followed the brothers down the worn steps of spiral stone, out of the solar and down to the gatehouse. A body of mounted men, two or three hundred in number and flying the duke’s personal standard, were approaching the barbican. Horses were already clattering across the inner drawbridge and through the open gate. The whole castle was in uproar as the duke and his lead riders came in, gear jangling. Will saw the horses were lathered and that the duke wore a neck-piece of shining steel and leg armour. It seemed he had travelled quickly and in expectation of trouble. Following along behind him were thirty men also part-armoured, and others in mail-shirts and brigandines. All wore swords, several were men of significant rank, the rest their attendant knights. Will looked for Gwydion among them, but of the wizard there was no sign.

  Duke Richard dismounted and threw back a mud-spattered riding cloak, plainly delighted to be back among his family. Edward and Edmund were already close at their father’s side. The duke ruffled their hair and smiled at them and took them with him inside to be greeted by Elizabeth and Margaret and George. Then the Lady Cicely appeared with the duke’s two-year-old namesake in her arms. He exchanged a serious word with his wife as everyone went inside.

  Willow picked Will out of the crowd and beckoned to him. ‘So that’s the duke,’ she said.

  ‘That’s him,’ Will said. ‘Isn’t he a fine lord?’

  ‘I don’t know about that.
’ Her eyes drifted among the various members of the duke’s family. ‘But he certainly looks to be a fine man.’

  Will saw that Edward was standing close by the duke’s side, and for an uncomfortable moment he could not be certain if Willow had meant father or son.

  That night, after the excitement had died down, Will sat with Willow in the buttery and took a simple supper with her.

  ‘I was hoping to see Master Gwydion among the arrivals,’ he said glumly.

  ‘It must be that he hasn’t yet found a way to break the power of the Dragon Stone,’ she said.

  ‘How do you know about that?’ he asked, shocked to hear her mention it by name.

  ‘Sir Edward told me all about it.’

  ‘Did he now?’

  She looked at him blithely, her blue eyes unblinking. ‘Yes, he did. Anything wrong with that?’

  ‘No…’

  She inclined her head. ‘Why do you think he won’t take me to see it?’

  ‘Did you ask him to?’ he said, fearing the worst now. ‘I mean, do you want to see it?’

  She shrugged. ‘I was hoping he’d offer.’

  He tore off a hunk of bread and dunked it in his stew. ‘It’s best you don’t think about that stone.’

  ‘Why not? Maybe you’d like to show it to me. I want to see what all the fuss is about.’

  ‘Well, you can’t. It’s locked in a vault under the keep where it’s safe – or as safe as anything like that can be.’

  Willow bit her lip. ‘Is it very dangerous, then?’

  ‘Oh, yes. I don’t know much about it, but I do know that. And I’m beginning to think the harm inside it has found a way to get out. It’s already done something to Edmund.’

  ‘Edmund? You mean Sir Edmund? The son who limps? The one with the crippled arm?’

  ‘He wasn’t like that before. And it’s not just his arm and leg. He behaves as if he’s trapped in a maze and can’t find his way out. It’s hard to explain, but I met him feeling his way along a wall yesterday like a blind man. “What are you doing?” I asked him, and he looked at me all kind of hollow and replied, “Looking for the light.” I tell you, Willow, the fates of all of us are getting twisted up and ruined because of that old stone. I hope Master Gwydion comes back soon.’