‘French?’ Mary asked. ‘Oh of course, this is the Hundred Years’ War.’
I guess I might have heard about that once but I was almost as surprised as Posy.
‘The what?’ Posy looked at Mary as though she was stupid. ‘This war only started a few years ago, what do you mean by a hundred years?’
But Mary didn’t have time to explain because more soldiers were coming. Good thing, I thought, because I didn’t know how Mary would get out of that. Explaining where we actually came from would be difficult. They didn’t like strange things here. Mary said they killed strange people, called them witches.
‘I think they burn them alive,’ she’d said and added: ‘I might be wrong.’
I hoped she was wrong. But we tried not to talk about ourselves. And we weren’t going to explain about the pills either.
They didn’t take us back to the fields that day. Another wagon came to the village. We saw it pull onto the green space outside the barn. This one was loaded with tents and long poles.
‘Lances,’ said Jack, sounding as though he enjoyed living in a history lesson.
Then the tents went up. At first they were decorated with the same sort of banner that had been carried behind Sir Henry. Then one huge flag went up, covered in lions and some sort of pattern.
‘Get that down, fast,’ shouted one of Sir Henry’s personal guard. ‘That doesn’t go up until I say. Keep it hidden in the wagon.’ The soldier glanced towards the village and our barn. We ducked down from the window. Had he seen us?
‘What’s that mean?’ I asked Jack. ‘That big flag’s impressive.’
‘Could be the king,’ Mary answered for him.
Jack nodded. ‘Maybe that was his banner – all those lions.’
I wasn’t sure what would happen if the king arrived. But if everyone in the village was scared it would make things worse for us, nobody would want to be seen helping us.
Mary said she thought the king was Edward the something who ruled the country at the time of the Black Death. Somehow that had passed me by, something I shared with the Petas. Our knowledge was more about life on the street and avoiding being hurt. My dad was more about hurting anyone who failed to pay him for services provided. I didn’t miss him. Then thoughts of Mum crept into my mind.
I felt Jenna’s arm around me. Could she have guessed what I was thinking? Sometimes I blamed her for leaving Mum behind. I knew that wasn’t right but I didn’t know who else to blame, except myself.
Later that day Posy came to the window with a frightened face. The soldiers were still patrolling and there was at least one on guard at the front of the barn. ‘You need to watch out,’ she said, looking all around her. ‘I’ve heard that Smith and the bailiff are trying to get Sir Henry to …’ she stopped as if too frightened to say the words and she looked for Kan. ‘And it’s not going to be good.’
‘What you mean?’ Kan pushed us out of the way to get closer to her.
‘Nothing,’ she said. It didn’t sound like nothing, but she wouldn’t say anymore and had to leave quickly again. Some of the soldiers were setting up tents on the field in front of the barn.
That evening we heard drunken laughs and shouts from the men.
‘There’ll be trouble,’ Jen said as we were doing another rat search and cleaning up any traces of food that might attract the animals.
I saw Kan smack his fist into his palm. I guess he was thinking the same as me – flagons of drink meant a village full of drunken soldiers. Posy would be in trouble – all the women would be in trouble.
In the dark the shouts grew louder. Angry dangerous laughs. Then screams and those didn’t come from the soldiers.
The view through the barn window the next morning had a strangely familiar feel.
‘Like home,’ Van said. ‘Passed out snoring drunks all over the place.’
I laughed. Jack and Mary looked confused but I knew what he meant. Back home was a different part of town for us.
As the sun came up, there were more things going on outside the barn. A long wooden barrier had been set up in front of the tents. The soldiers started practising riding up and down the length of it.
‘Jousting,’ said Jack as a soldier picked up one of the long wooden poles that had been brought on the wagon. He wasn’t very good and kept dropping the lance.
I might not know everything but I did know what jousting was.
‘Do they kill each other?’ Mary seemed to be quite interested in watching the jousting. That was probably better than wondering if Sir Henry was going to put us to death.
‘Don’t think they kill each other on purpose,’ Jack answered, but even he didn’t know.
We could see the poles and they were blunt ended. But if one of those hit you at full speed from a horse it would do serious damage. Maybe they weren’t intended to kill but it could easily happen. I had a bad feeling about this.
Posy ran past the window, chucking in two loaves of bread as she ran off. I saw her face, red and blotchy, she’d been crying. Kan called after her but one of the soldiers shouted something and she couldn’t stop. Kan walked away from the window with his fists clenched. I wondered what the soldiers had done in that drunken night.
A little later we heard voices outside the barn door. Smith was arguing with the soldier – Ralph.
‘Bailiff wants them dead, I tell you,’ shouted Smith and I knew he meant us.
‘Sir Henry has other things on his mind.’ Ralph sounded much more in control now. Perhaps with the knight here, he felt more certain of his authority.
‘But they have the pestilence, do you want the k …’
‘Shut it.’ Ralph grabbed his sword hilt. ‘Don’t use that name.’
‘But everyone knows,’ whined Smith.
‘Are you simple?’ Ralph said angrily. ‘If I say you don’t do something then you don’t do it, and if you do it again then you get stuck with my sword.’
‘But the runaways and the pestilence,’ Smith started again.
‘They don’t have the pestilence. You know that and I know that. Sir Henry doesn’t care what happens to this lot.’ Ralph banged his hand against the wooden door. ‘Sir Henry wants to keep the village quiet.’
‘What, like last night?’ said Smith.
‘The soldiers have to take their pleasure. Now get away,’ Ralph raised his voice again. ‘And make sure there’s enough food for tonight.’
‘In case HE comes?’
I heard Ralph knock Smith to the ground. ‘I told you. Last chance.’ Ralph strode off past our window and onto the jousting field, leaving Smith muttering.
‘So Zach isn’t going to stop. He wants us dead,’ Jenna said from behind me. ‘I know we didn’t get on but why is he so set on killing us?’
‘Didn’t get on? It was a bit more than that.’ I turned to her. ‘He and Demelza were crazy even before they set out on the moor hike.’
‘But not vicious murderers.’ I think Jen was going to say, ‘like your family’, but she stopped.
We’d never understand Zach. Did it have something to do with Miss Tregarthur – her revenge – that’s what she’d said in my dream.
Whether we died by the sword or from the disease I couldn’t see us being anything but dead, and pretty soon. Running for it made even less sense when there were horse-riding soldiers. They would catch us in minutes.
Smith had hung around the barn. He must have been waiting for Sir Henry to come down to the jousting area. The knight arrived on his horse, surrounded by soldiers.
‘Sir Henry, Sir Henry,’ I heard Smith shout. ‘Can you kill them?’
The knight and the troop of soldiers said nothing. Peering through a crack in the door I saw them sweep Smith aside. They obviously believed him to be of no importance. I guess Smith
didn’t like that. He wanted to be the boss of the village, even if it meant using the new bailiff to gain his authority. Neither he nor the bailiff probably counted in Sir Henry’s world. But Smith wasn’t giving up. He followed them onto the field. We watched from the barn window.
‘Good work Ralph,’ shouted Sir Henry. ‘Just what we need. Something to entertain the king.’ Not mentioning the king didn’t seem to apply to the knight. ‘He’ll bring his own men. We’ll have to let him win but we must give some him competition.’
‘That worries me, my lord,’ answered Ralph. ‘Our men have done some fighting …’
‘And chasing women,’ Sir Henry laughed. I felt Kan tense beside me.
‘But neither makes them good for jousting.’ Ralph sounded anxious. Perhaps he would get blamed if things weren’t perfect for the king.
‘Let me see.’ Sir Henry climbed down from his horse, walked to the main tent and was given a seat. I wondered if they’d have a throne if the king turned up.
Ralph tried organising some of the soldiers. They looked confused, but he put two of them on their horses with the jousting lances. Finally they lined up opposite each other and charged. It was hopeless; both missed wildly and hurtled past each other.
‘Again,’ called Sir Henry.
It was even worse. One soldier fell off. The other dropped his lance. Sir Henry was on his feet with a snarling look on his face. Several of the villagers had gathered to watch. I heard giggles.
‘They’ve been fighting on foot,’ Ralph tried to explain.
‘What they need is someone to aim at on the ground, get some practice hitting a target. Best to use a real person, get the right sort of practice.’ I saw Sir Henry looking over the soldiers. They shifted uneasily. No one would like the idea of standing up and being smashed to the ground with a lance. Sir Henry didn’t seem to care too much about other people.
‘What about that man there?’ Sir Henry pointed at Smith. ‘Use him.’
Smith squealed and the soldiers laughed. Smith fell to the ground. ‘No, please your lordship, please have mercy on me, please don’t take me.’ Then he gave a sly look. ‘If you kill me then there’ll be no one to see to the king’s horses. He won’t be able to hunt on the moor.’
Ralph turned to Sir Henry. Smith’s excuse must have made sense.
‘Use the runaways, use the runaways.’ Smith stood up and pointed to our barn.
I saw Sir Henry nod and Ralph walked quickly towards us with a group of his soldiers. We had no time to think. The barn door soon swung open. Kan was the nearest.
‘No,’ I shouted, and pushed forward. ‘Take me.’ I couldn’t let Kan do this. The Petas had come to save me, I couldn’t let them die.
‘Don’t worry, you’ll all have a chance.’ Ralph gave a laugh. I was pushed aside and they dragged Kan out. The barn door swung closed with a bang. Kan was thrown down onto the jousting field.
I saw Posy run from the village group, trying to stop them taking Kan, but one of the soldiers stopped her. ‘Want some more?’ he shouted with his arm around her. ‘Didn’t you get enough last night?’ and he laughed.
Posy sobbed as she struggled to get away. Kan tried to go to her but there were too many soldiers around him.
‘Right, you stand there,’ ordered Ralph. ‘And if you try to run away we’ll chop you up.’ He pointed to Posy. ‘She won’t want you if you’re all chopped up.’ Sir Henry cheered at that.
Ralph seemed to enjoy trying to frighten Kan, but it didn’t work. Kan’s face was blank and he looked very calm. Kan being calm wasn’t always a good sign for other people.
They turned him to face down the jousting track. One of the soldiers mounted his horse and shouldered the lance.
‘Go,’ screamed Ralph.
The soldier dipped his lance and charged.
Kan stood with his hands on his hips. The horse thundered down towards him. Only a few feet away. Slowly Kan put his fingers to his mouth and let out a screaming whistle. The noise echoed round the field and against the hill behind. An ear piercing sound – the loudest whistle I’d ever heard.
Loud enough to make you want to cover your ears. Loud enough to frighten any animal. The horse shied away and bolted down the valley with the wild shouts of the rider disappearing into the distance.
I could see that both the soldiers and the villagers were all trying not to laugh. Sir Henry was back on his feet, roaring: ‘Next. Send the next one down.’
Kan turned to us in the barn, grinned and gave a wave. I thought that had to be a mistake. Surely Sir Henry couldn’t let his soldiers be humiliated by Kan.
With his shaven head and rather too calm approach, I guessed Kan had become a little scarier than these soldiers would have liked. Later I found out that most of them hadn’t actually done any fighting at all. Ralph had trouble finding men to make up the guard. Men were scarce with the Black Death. Most of the soldiers could scarcely ride. They looked good in all their fine gear, but they weren’t up to much.
Ralph lined up another man. A thick set man with a blotchy red face. Older that the others. He was probably one of the more experienced soldiers. This time Kan was in real danger. I couldn’t see how he would survive a full on blow from the wooden pole. I could see Smith rubbing his hands.
As the red faced man prepared, Posy broke free and ran up to Kan. She gave him a kiss and whispered something in his ear. I saw Kan roll his shoulders.
The horseman charged. The only sound came from the horse’s hooves pounding across the field. Even from our window I could see the man’s face set in a wild grimace and his eyes blazed.
‘This is like Friday night in town,’ Van muttered behind me.
I frowned but remembered that Kan and his brother were often sent to sort someone out. It was a family thing and, like my family, the Petas used extreme violence. The charging man might have a big lance but Kan had probably faced more dangerous weapons.
That was until I saw that it wasn’t a jousting lance. The man had taken up a full pointed weapon of war.
‘Watch out for the point!’ I yelled uselessly from behind the bars of the window.
The man charged on, nearer and nearer, the metal point glinted in the sun as he built up speed. The small crowd of women gasped as they too saw the metal point. Posy screamed.
I guess a replay would have been the only way I could have seen exactly what happened, because it happened so fast. Kan went onto the balls of his feet. As the lance dipped to hit him in the chest he seemed to fly sideways. He grabbed the pole and pulled. The speed of the horse and the force of Kan’s pull wrenched the man from his saddle but the horse kept going. One of the man’s feet caught in a stirrup. He screamed as his whole leg twisted and it must have broken as he fell sideways. The horse galloped on with the man still screaming. The lance dropped from his grasp.
The soldier, held by one foot, was dragged across the ground. His head hit a rock and we heard the crunch. The horse charged on. The man’s head bounced against more rocks, again and again. Two other soldiers finally grabbed the reins and pulled the horse to a stop. The jousting man didn’t move.
Kan had hold of the lance. He turned it to point away from him, looked over at Sir Henry and roared, ‘NEXT,’ as he shook the pole.
‘Take him away,’ screamed Sir Henry, who got to his feet and stormed from the jousting field, smashing his gloved fist into the face of Smith as he passed.
Witchcraft
-12-
Posy ran to Kan. Several soldiers chased after her, pushed her to one side, dragged Kan to our barn and threw him through the door. He might have sounded brave out on the field, but now he lay on the ground shaking.
Van went to him. ‘What did you do that for? Idiot. Now we do need to run for it.’ That stopped his brother shaking and they both started laughing –
in a crazy way.
Then we were all laughing. I didn’t think any of us expected to see Kan alive again. What had happened on the jousting field had been too weird, as we stopped laughing the questions fired at him from all of us: ‘How did you do it?’ ‘Are you hurt?’ ‘Why didn’t Sir Henry attack you?’ We treated him like a hero.
At first Kan said nothing. Then he looked up, stared at me and said: ‘Don’t think we’ll get away with it.’
None of us laughed after that. Kan had killed one of the soldiers and Kan was still alive.
‘What did Posy say to you before you …’ Mary didn’t finish her question.
I knew what she meant and I thought I knew the answer.
‘He was one of the men who came to her house on that drunken night.’ Talking about Posy brought back the angry look on his face. ‘They were drunk and wanted to have their fun with her.’ No one spoke, no one asked him why he’d stopped using his strange accent. ‘I guess they did,’ Kan finished.
I turned to Van. ‘You’re right, we have to run, even if we don’t know where to.’
‘But we can’t.’ Jenna held up her hands as though to stop us. ‘If we run, they’ll just come after us. We can’t escape the horses. No point in going to the stones. There’s probably nothing there. No food in that village we found. Nothing …’ Jenna trailed off and I just hoped she would come up with another idea.
‘Better to die out there than be butchered in this barn, isn’t it?’ Van kicked the floor, bringing up a cloud of dust.
‘No.’ Jenna paused and then went on. ‘No it’s not. But why didn’t they do anything out there? Kan’s killed one of their own. Why didn’t they do anything? Just brought him back in here.’
‘Maybe they’re planning something awful. Perhaps it takes time to get the torture things ready.’ I didn’t know why I said that, not a good thing to say, it actually might happen.
Tregarthur's Revenge: Book 2 (The Tregarthur's Series) Page 11
