Kingmaker: Winter Pilgrims

by Toby Clements

  Afterwards they mount up and ride out in silence, following the path as it rises into the hills. Katherine cannot help but stare back over her shoulder, looking for that giant. Thomas does the same and their gazes meet and both nod in understanding.

  In a little while the rain starts again. They turn inland, following a valley where dark water froths over a series of rocky falls. Ahead are more hills, barren flanks rising into the clouds, and already the ponies are blowing hard. At one point the boy turns and studies the sky behind them. It is coming on to the evening, and the temperature is dropping.

  He says something.

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘Snow,’ Margaret translates. ‘He says it’ll snow on the high ground tonight.’

  ‘All we need,’ Walter mutters.

  Katherine is surprised Margaret understands the language. Hadn’t Dwnn said she had made no effort to do so?

  ‘We’ll have to find some shelter,’ Thomas says. It is all they ever seem to be doing, Katherine thinks, finding shelter from something or someone.

  ‘Let’s press on,’ Walter says. ‘More space between us and those bastards the better.’

  A while later they join a road with the grass grown high on the berm between the cart tracks. A little farther on, there is smoke in the air and they find a bridge over the river’s fast-running black waters and, beyond, a large village with an inn. They stable their horses and gather around the fire for thin rabbit soup and more baked cheese. There isn’t much straw in the mattresses but in any case Katherine would not have slept much. She lies listening out for Riven’s men, hearing nothing but Margaret coughing.

  It snows in the night just as the boy Dafydd said it would and in the morning the hills are capped white and there is ice on the water in the well. More cheese and they set off wrapped around in their travel cloaks, all except the boy, who has nothing, not even shoes.

  ‘Can’t even look at him, he makes me feel so cold,’ Walter admits.

  After a while Thomas can stand it no longer, and they stop and open Margaret’s bag to find the boy something warmer. There is a quantity of dresses, shirts, a coif, some documents, gold coins in a blue leather purse, rosary beads, a pair of oak pattens with leather points, as well as fine-spun wool hose, linen underthings, a woollen jacket, and underneath it all a Book of Hours, probably worth more than everything else put together. They give the woollen jacket to Little Dafydd, and Margaret says nothing but shrugs and ignores his thanks.

  They ride all day until in the afternoon when they come to a town dominated by its castle. The boy says something and Margaret translates.

  ‘Says this is Castell Nedd,’ she tells them. ‘He says it is best we stay here tonight, and in the morning take the road north.’

  The inn has a stock pond, and they eat fish soup and bread and yet more roasted cheese and despite the brackish ale no one says much. The innkeeper has heard of Tudor’s landing, but knows nothing of Riven’s party. Katherine sits by the fire watching the steam rise from her clothes and now she misses the solid presence of Owen, the constant jabber of Dafydd.

  That night Margaret sleeps on her back, breathing reedily and coughing in her sleep, and Katherine can’t sleep because of it. At length Thomas places an arm around her shoulders to calm her, and it is still there the next morning when they wake before dawn.

  ‘More bloody snow,’ Walter says.

  Outside the snow is a hard crust and as they move off a woman shouts something from the doorway of her house.

  ‘She says we’re wrong to be taking this road,’ Margaret tells them through her wheezing. ‘She says there’s bad weather on the way.’

  But there seems to be nothing they can do. They ride on out of the village, under the church where the doors are closed and the bell is silent and through the gatehouse beyond which the river flows swiftly under a wooden bridge. Plates of frosted ice spin on its surface.

  All that morning they ride north with the river at their side, the snow on their backs. The road gets worse the farther they go, rising into the hills. Bushes grow undisturbed in the middle of the track now, and sections seem to have slipped into the river below. The valley sides rise up around them. It gets steeper and they pass waterfalls where brown water churns in peat-coloured pools and mist rises into the air. Icicles hang from the rocks.

  ‘How much farther, Margaret?’ Katherine asks.

  ‘Why do you imagine that I should I know?’

  ‘Ask the boy.’

  She does so.

  ‘He says we ought to reach a place he calls Merthyr tonight,’ Margaret tells them. ‘He says he’s only been this way before, once, with my father when he was going to Ludlow, that last time.’

  There is silence and after a while they stop for bread in a village and buy warm cheese from a woman who’ll only part with it for two of Walter’s coins.

  ‘Daylight bloody robbery,’ Walter mutters, but he pays because they will collapse without it. They feed the horses and then mount up again. It is too cold to linger.

  As they are riding out, with the promise of only a few leagues before they stop for the night, Katherine looks back. Her gaze travels from the village where snow lies thick on the thatch, and all the way along the valley side, back along the dark thread of the road down which they’ve travelled.

  The horsemen, when she sees them, are obvious enough. They aren’t trying to hide. They are riding fast, flashing through the trees, racing to catch them.

  ‘Look!’ she cries. ‘Thomas!’

  Thomas whips around. Walter too.

  ‘Can you see him? Is he there?’ Thomas asks.

  They are still too far away to know.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘How many?’

  ‘Five? Ten?’

  The pollaxe is already in Thomas’s hands.

  ‘Not here,’ Walter says. ‘There’ll be a better place up there.’

  He points ahead to a couple of cottages on the side of the road. Behind them is the suggestion of a path cutting up into the wooded hills behind. They turn and ride hard. Even Margaret jabs her heels and her horse starts a trot. They ride until they reach the cottages and then find the cut through to the trees behind them. It is another drovers’ path, though this one is paved here and there with larger stones as if it might have been one of the old Roman roads. The boy burbles something.

  ‘This path leads up to something he is calling Sarn Helen,’ Margaret reports. ‘He says it takes you to Brecon, but it goes through the hills, which he fears on account of the weather.’

  ‘We’ll worry about the weather later. Is Brecon good?’

  Margaret talks to the boy and tells them that Brecon is one way to England.

  ‘Come on then,’ Walter says. He forces his horse through a ford. They all follow and ride up into the trees, tall, silver-barked, with pale leaf mould on the ground and snow whispering through the naked branches above. They follow the path as it cuts across the slope and then doubles back again.

  ‘Here,’ Walter says, getting off his horse where the path turns. It is narrow here, cinched by tall earth banks. Walter steps aside to let them pass.

  Thomas gets off his horse.

  ‘Give me your arrows, Walter,’ he says.

  Walter turns to him, his face oddly placid.

  ‘No,’ he says, in a voice to match. ‘You give me yours. I’ll stay. You two go. You take the girl, understand? It’s her he wants dead, isn’t it? You saw what they did to Dafydd’s Gwen – can you imagine what they’ll do to her? So whatever happens, she has to live. Understand? Otherwise, all this is a waste, isn’t it?’ He gestures vaguely to take in everything.

  ‘No, Walter,’ Thomas argues. ‘You always say it yourself. This isn’t your fight.’

  ‘And it’s yours? A couple of servants from Lincoln?’

  ‘We were never servants,’ Katherine tells him. She’s dismounted and walks up to where they are talking. She feels her lack of size now, standing downhill from th
em, but she knows the time has come. Both are looking at her. Walter frowns, curls his lip.

  ‘What were you then?’ he asks.

  ‘We were ecclesiastics,’ she says. ‘Thomas is a canon of the Order of St Gilbert.’

  Walter swings his doubting gaze on to Thomas. Thomas looks for a moment as if he might try to deny it.

  ‘And I’, she goes on, ‘was a sister of the same.’

  She hadn’t meant to tell Walter this way, on a hillside in the snow, with Riven’s men in the valley below, but once the words are out of her mouth she is glad. This is no time for dishonesty. Walter’s eyes are on her now.

  ‘You were a sister?’ he says. ‘A nun?’

  He cannot believe it. She can see Thomas squeezing his eyes shut.

  ‘I was,’ she says.

  She lets Walter look at her body.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she says. ‘It was . . . easier.’

  Walter takes a pace away and then returns. He’s pushed his hat back and twists a clump of his forelock in his fist.

  ‘Can’t bloody believe it,’ he says. ‘All this bloody time. Girly! Girly? Ha!’

  ‘I’m sorry, Walter. I didn’t want to lie to you, but once it started . . .’

  Walter nods, collecting himself, trying to make sense of it all.

  ‘All right,’ he says, nodding. ‘All right. So you’re a girl. A nun. How did you come to be on a bloody boat dressed as a boy, then, surrounded by all those dead blokes?’

  ‘It is a long story,’ Thomas begins, meaning that he does not want to tell it. But Walter deserves more than that, and Katherine tells him how she came to leave the priory.

  Walter grunts.

  ‘I knew there was something about you. About you two. But bloody hell. A girl. All that time. Holy Christ.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Thomas says. ‘I’ll stay, if you like. If that makes a difference.’

  Walter looks at him blankly. He is thinking hard. Then he pats Thomas on the shoulder. Tears ring his eyes.

  ‘No. No. It doesn’t make a difference. Or, yes, it does. It makes a big difference. It means that I’ll stay. You go.’ He turns to Katherine. He drops his gaze. ‘Sorry,’ he says. ‘You know. For the things I said. All the times . . .?’

  ‘There’s nothing to be sorry about, Walter,’ she says, though her throat is tight and she can hardly speak. ‘It’s me. I should be sorry. I am sorry. All the things you’ve done for us.’

  Walter looks up sharply.

  ‘Us?’ he says. ‘So you’re—?’

  But before either can answer, the boy shouts something from up below.

  ‘They’re coming,’ Margaret translates. ‘They’re still on the road, but they’ve found the tracks.’

  Walter jumps back down into the path again.

  ‘All right,’ he says. ‘Go. Get on your horses and go.’

  ‘No,’ Thomas insists. ‘It isn’t your fight.’

  Walter shakes his head.

  ‘Course it’s my fight,’ he says. ‘You seen what they did to Dafydd? I’ll stay here, hold them as long as I can while you get ahead with the girl. The girls. And the boy. I’ll have surprise and the hillside on my side and, with a bit of luck, I’ll kill them all. Five arrows. Five men. Then we’ll see.’

  ‘And what if you don’t kill them all?’ Katherine asks.

  ‘You ever known me not to kill them all?’ he asks. It is an act. She knows this. He is being Walter the old soldier.

  Now she can feel the tears brim in her eyes.

  ‘Walter,’ she says, stepping towards him.

  ‘Stop there!’ Walter says, backing off. ‘Go on. Get away. A monk and a nun. Creeping bloody Christ.’

  The boy shouts again.

  ‘They’ve found the tracks,’ Margaret intones.

  ‘Right,’ Walter says. ‘Go as fast as you can. Find somewhere to shelter tonight and I’ll catch you up. Make some kind of signal. An owl. What about that? A couple of hoots, you know it’s me.’

  They all know he’ll never make those hoots.

  Thomas nods. There are tears in his eyes too.

  ‘Go on now. Go on. Fuck off,’ Walter says.

  ‘Wait,’ Thomas says. ‘Take this.’

  He hands Walter his pollaxe.

  Walter looks at it.

  ‘You sure?’

  ‘It’s a lend, isn’t it?’ Thomas says.

  Walter barks a laugh.

  ‘Might come in handy. Now, go! And good luck!’

  When they look back, Walter is kneeling, applying the sign of the cross and bending to kiss the ground.

  28

  LITTLE DAFYDD LEADS them straight up the track, one long scour through the forest, wider than the drovers’ path but cramped on both sides with blackthorn bushes and straying field maples. Thomas rides as fast as he dares – he owes that to Walter – but the sure-footed cob is nervy, sensing the atmosphere, and nearly goes down just as Thomas is turning to look over his shoulder. He hears the scrape and clash of weapons below. A scream perhaps. Or maybe just a crow.

  He puts his head down and they ride on.

  Later, he pulls his horse aside where the track bulges and he lets Katherine and Margaret pass. Margaret’s face is clenched and she is racked with another coughing fit. Her breathing makes the sound of a saw in oak. Katherine does not look at him. They ride up on up the hill for a league. They ride in silence and all the while he knows he should have stayed and fought the giant.

  Later Margaret stops them and has to take a draught of the medicament. She shudders. Thomas looks at Katherine.

  ‘What is it?’ he asks. ‘What is wrong with her?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she says, ‘but whatever it is, the horse urine does no good.’

  They ride on. The path flattens, dips into a hollow where there are traces of some workings, a mine perhaps, and a stand of fir trees. They ought to stop, he thinks. They might even risk a fire. Get the girl warm. Beyond the hollow, the track rises steadily. Katherine pauses in the copse, perhaps thinking the same thing. But it is too soon. They have not ridden far enough yet.

  ‘We go on?’ Thomas asks the boy, pointing up the hill.

  Little Dafydd looks anxious. His gaze strays to Margaret, whose cough has not caught, but goes round and round, a constant churn. Katherine looks at her too, then back down the hill.

  ‘What do you think?’ he asks.

  ‘We should go on,’ she says. ‘We have not gone far enough.’

  Thomas nods, and turns his horse and uses his heels to set it trudging up the hill. The others begin to follow. The wind strengthens, and the snow stings their eyes. It gathers and hardens in the folds of their cloaks. They lean into the wind and the slope and press on until night is about to overtake them and they can stand it no more.

  ‘We can’t go on!’ Katherine shouts over the wind. ‘It is too dark.’

  ‘But we can’t stay here! There’s nowhere to shelter. If we get over the top, there’ll be somewhere on the other side.’

  They carry on, heads buried against the wind. The road continues on up.

  ‘Thomas,’ Katherine is shouting again. ‘Thomas! What’s that?’

  She is pointing ahead, on the left where a dark shape looms out of the snow. Thomas reaches for his pollaxe but remembers it’s gone. Little Dafydd starts saying something and pointing. The shape doesn’t move and they ride on towards it, watching it grow larger through the snow.

  ‘A stone,’ Thomas says at last.

  ‘Is there shelter?’ Katherine calls.

  Margaret is really bad now, her breathing a constant haul. Its noise mixes with the wind.

  ‘We’ll have to,’ Thomas says.

  He dismounts and pulls his horse off the track and up towards the stone. It is a thick slab of grey rock, twice the size of a man and almost as wide as it is tall, placed on its end by who knew what forces? Instinctively the horses huddle behind it, sheltering from the wind, nose to tail.

  ‘We’ll have to get Margaret up against
it,’ Katherine shouts. ‘Where there is most shelter.’

  Thomas helps Margaret from her saddle. She is rigid and light in his arms, like a strung bow, he thinks, but too hot to the touch and her breathing is a jerking scrape that makes him want to cough himself. He carries her to the side of the rock where Little Dafydd is scraping away the snow with his bare feet. Thomas sits her down, her back to the gritty surface. Her head rocks back and she gasps for breath.

  ‘Dafydd,’ he says and points Little Dafydd to the spot next to her. Little Dafydd cautiously sits down next to her, but she is too far gone to care for station or manners and she slumps against him. For a moment the coughing stops and it seems she will be comfortable. Then it starts again.

  ‘We need a fire,’ Katherine says.

  He is doubtful.

  ‘Can we risk it? What if . . .?’

  Neither wants to think about what might have happened down in the woods. It is better to concentrate on getting away.

  Thomas rummages in his bag for his flint and steel and the little bag of baked linen for kindling. He looks around for anything he might get burning. There is nothing. Even in the shelter of the great stone the wind tugs at his clothes. Katherine pulls out her extra clothes from her own bag and lays them over Margaret and Little Dafydd. Dafydd looks over her shoulder at Thomas. His eyes are large, and Thomas suddenly wonders if any of them will live through this.

  They must have a fire.

  He has the ledger. He opens the bag and is about to rip out the pages, all those names, all those dates and moneys paid out, all up in smoke. Would it matter? But Katherine leans forward and takes his wrist. She shakes her head.

  ‘Not that,’ she says. ‘What about the book in Margaret’s bag?’

  He is relieved. He packs the ledger away and picks out Margaret’s Book of Hours instead. He knows that it is good by its binding and the quality of the paper, and he fears to burn what might be a work of some beauty. But what choice is there? He closes his eyes as he rips out the pages, one, two, three at a time, tearing them from their stitches and pressing them into balls. He strikes the steel and the flint and after a moment the linen catches. He lets the flame grow, and then builds it a shelter from the balls of paper.