Falconburg Divided (The Falconburg Series Book 1)

by Sarah Waldock

  Falk came forward and picked up the arrow, walking back to the siege line almost feeling the arrow he half expected in his back. He could not get over the fact that Lady Annis seemed quite cheery, despite being wed – so Gyrfalon said – to his brother. And she had chid Gyrfalon for not teaching her the longbow; that he had taken in amusement. It was an incomprehensible situation that went on behind the castle walls; and Falk was concerned for the Lady Annis and her brave front. He perused the note carefully, to see whether the Lady Annis had used this as some means of sending a message to him; but it was nothing but a list of herbs in order of efficacy, that might be used to temper the marsh fever. It was written in a feminine, but bold hand with confident flourishes and she had named the herbs in both Latin and by common name. Willow, Salix, was the only one he knew, and she specified a draught of the bark of that. Falk shook his head, perplexed. He took it to a novice monk attached to the church forces.

  “Copy this out twice” he instructed “Have those who recognise the herbs collect them from one of the copies; and take the other copy to the Abbey for verification. They are skilled in the healing arts there.”

  The young cleric nodded and rushed off to comply.

  Finding that the nuns declared the cure not only genuine but excellent, Falk consulted with the abbot whose Abbey was his base.

  “I do not understand it, Father” he declared, pacing up and down in frustration “What would make Gyrfalon permit such a thing?”

  The abbot put his head, birdlike, on one side.

  “You say that the Lady Annis bears a striking superficial resemblance to the girl you both loved?”

  Falk snorted.

  “I loved her; Gyrfalon desired her.”

  The abbot looked quizzical; for no man might say how another felt, and frustrated love was more like to cause a man to the extremes of behaviour that Gyrfalon had gone to; but he merely said softly,

  “Whatever his feelings, if this Annis is like Alys, could it not be merely that he is sufficiently besotted – loving her even – that she can do no wrong for him?” he suggested.

  “Heaven help her then when she touches a raw nerve by not being enough like Alys – or too like her,” retorted Falk. “It puzzles me that he has not taken her crucifix from her, or convinced her not to wear it. I do take your point, Father Abbot; but I reiterate that Gyrfalon does not love. He possesses.”

  The abbot suggested,

  “As she is a Christian, my son, might it not be that the Good Lord is offering Gyrfalon another chance through her? If they have been wed by Father Michael, I am sure he would have felt that there was good reason. He is a sound priest; and capable of being stubborn. He would die before he betrayed his conscience.”

  Falk snorted.

  “It would take a miracle to make Gyrfalon repent.”

  The abbot chuckled.

  “Our Lord has been known to perform them you know,” he said dryly. “Falk, my son, I can see in your face that you think it a miracle beyond the power of God – which if voiced would be perilously close to blasphemy. Is not the possibility worth considering?”

  Falk considered the abbot’s words.

  “It is difficult,” he admitted “I have not your degree of faith, I fear, father. Merely my belief in what I know of my brother.”

  “And did you always hate him so?” asked the clever priest.

  Falk shook his head.

  “No Father. As a child I hero worshipped him; and followed him around like a puppy.”

  “So he must have been worthy of some admiration then?”

  “I do not know.”

  He shook his head again.

  “I do not know, Father.”

  When Falk got back to the siege it was to a moment of drama; the men of the attacking armies were laughing at a small figure that capered atop the walls, shrieking shrill imprecations and loosing off ineffective arrows from a small toy longbow. There was a bellow of rage, and the small figure was whisked within, yanked off its precarious perch by a black gloved hand seizing the scruff of his neck.

  “Thou cub, thou whelp!” Gyrfalon’s voice roared “What would thy mother say an you fell off, thou froward brat? Think you that your foot is recovered enough for a secure footing on those wet slippery stones? It is not! And what if those below not realise you be a child and shoot at you? I should beat you black and blue!”

  “But I didn’t fall, Lord Gyrfalon!” Came the child’s shrill protest “I was keeping their heads down!”

  “Brat, they be more like to die laughing at one of my people falling off!” cried Gyrfalon “If you be so interested in being of real use to the castle shalt spend the next three days emptying all the nightsoil pots into the garderobes and seeing that they be scrubbed! Be off with you!”

  “I only wanted to be brave for you my lord!” said Lukat.

  “Aye, well, sometimes it be better to live to grow up to be brave then,” growled Gyrfalon “If thou canst not behave, I – I’ll send you to be my brother’s page without!”

  “I’ll be good my lord,” said Lukat earnestly “Only how do I know if I be being bad if something not be forbidden?”

  Gyrfalon gave a shout of laughter.

  “Try thinking first,” he admonished.

  Falk listened incredulously; though after the first exchange he had needs to strain his ears.

  That had passed in much the same way as many a conversation between himself at a similar age and his big brother, when Gyrfalon had extracted him – as he so often had – from the consequences of his own folly and a spirit greater than his ability.

  Hot tears spilled down Falk’s face at a bittersweet memory of his childhood.

  And even as Gyrfalon had threatened to beat Falk black and blue – and had only sometimes done so – so too he threatened this child – and then sent him on an unpleasant, menial and smelly task. And the boy answered back pertly as though he expected no great punishment for it.

  Falk did not know what to think; but he told himself firmly that even if Gyrfalon acted doucely to the boy for the time being because the Lady Annis took an interest in him, it would not be long ere he showed his true colours. It could not be otherwise.

  Lukat took the penalty imposed upon him with philosophical acceptance. He would have preferred a beating; that would soon have been over, and he had been used enough to incurring the violence of bigger boys in his previous village. A serious beating from his lord might well have been worse but it would have healed. Three days of messy smelly chores was much worse; which was why Lord Gyrfalon had imposed it. Grown ups were like that; they picked the worst of two punishments as a general rule if there were a choice of such.

  Lord Gyrfalon had asked him what he thought the crenellations were for; and explained carefully that they were for the safety of the defenders and not generally for standing on save rarely, to make a point.

  And suddenly Lukat had less free time; for Lord Gyrfalon decreed that a page who hoped to be a squire must acquire literacy, Latin and arithmetic, that he might understand machines of war.

  Whatever Gyrfalon ordered was wonderful so far as Lukat was concerned; but he could have wished that a warrior needed less tedious skills than those he was now learning from the priest.

  Father Michael had been glad to take a scholar at Gyrfalon’s behest; though he warned the warlord he was himself no very great scholar.

  “Teach him to read, write, figure and construe enough Latin to start him on the road to understanding how to unravel the rubbish written in diplomatic documents and I’ll take over when he’s a little older,” said Gyrfalon. “When I be less preoccupied than I am at the moment. It may have escaped your notice, priest, but we have a little bit of a war going on out there.”

  Father Michael smiled shyly; it seemed to him that Gyrfalon’s sharp tongue was worse than his bite.

  “Why, so I do believe!” he said.

  Gyrfalon grinned.

  “You aren’t so bad, priest” he said.

&nb
sp; The siege was not, of course the only thing that preoccupied Gyrfalon; for he was delighting in being married to Annis; to have her sit at his side above the salt acknowledged as his lady by all in the Hall; delighting in the thought that he was to be a father; and delighting in their time together in the private darkness of his chamber, that was chill even for the fire in the grate, and the heavy furs on the bed; that their bodies warmed each other in their loving, and by being together in each other’s arms afterwards. Gyrfalon silently vowed that however many children they might have he would do his utmost to show no favouritism; that he would not permit the same troubles to occur as had happened between him and Falk. He tried not to think of the reason why there were so many years between him and Falk; that his own mother had died. For what he would do if he lost Annis, the warlord could not contemplate.

  Annis had taken over the duties of lady of the castle with the smooth efficiency with which she undertook everything she understood. She knew about running the everyday needs of a great household; and must only apply common sense to the exigencies of being under siege.

  She discussed such aspects with Bullard the reeve, for much concerned the addition of the villagers and their livestock.

  “Martinmas is traditional to slaughter,” she said “and so too we must do, for we will not have any spare hay for winter feed; methinks we should slaughter all but the best breeding animals, more than normal, and smoke and salt them down for the winter. Fortunately we have plenty of salt; for I found several barrels of it, permitted to become damp for none having known that it had been stored badly under the previous lord; so we must use wet brine salting not dry. There is good store of firewood that will permit the smoking of the hams; and we shall eat liver and chitterlings for the day or two after the slaughtering.”

  Bullard nodded.

  “There be a pair of plough oxen as I think be worth keeping,” he said “Unless we get really low on food; chickens be worth keeping for eggs, methinks my lady, that need not much to keep them up, and the prize sow, who have never farrowed less than thirteen piglings.”

  Annis nodded.

  “I rely on you to segregate those animals we not slaughter, good Bullard,” she said. “And to make note of those people whose animals we kill who would normally keep back some, so we may compensate them come the spring….or whenever we get rid of those wretched idiots out there.”

  “Ar, I’ll be glad to get rid of them: why do they still be there if you be married to Lord Gyrfalon and all arranged by consent with your father, Lady?

  Annis gave a wry laugh.

  “Somewhere between dislike of my lord and a desire to loot,” she said.

  “We do have people – you might call them poachers if you were feeling uncharitable – who do know there way about who might slip out of the water-gate and slit a few throats,” suggested Bullard.

  Annis grinned.

  “I have a better idea,” she said.

  The next day a number of Gyrfalon’s enemies woke to the horror of finding a dagger planted in their bed roll beside them; that pinned a note to their pillow in Gyrfalon’s forceful hand; for Gyrfalon had laughed and approved Annis’ improvement on Bullard’s plan. The notes read,

  “If this had been a few inches over, you would not have woken to read it. Depart. The next time will not be a warning.”

  Bullard stood with Gyrfalon and Annis on the walls to watch the sudden departure of quite a number of those to whom Gyrfalon felt it worth sending the warning. This was some dozen as well as those whom he had named to Annis.

  “Three have not heeded warning,” said the warlord. “A purse of gold for each of them to your men if they manage a neat job of it.”

  Bullard grinned.

  “For a purse of gold they’ll make as neat a job as any man might,” he said.

  “Tell them, leave it a few days; even a week or more” said Gyrfalon “That these lords forget to take their precautions for feeling it were an idle threat.”

  Bullard nodded.

  “Ar; not next dark o’ the moon but a few days arter it,” he said.

  The defenders of the castle also decided to encourage the discomforts of the besiegers by throwing such offal as was not cooked and eaten over the walls when the animals were slaughtered.

  Annis muttered that it were like to cause disease; then pulled a rueful face and added,

  “I suppose that be the whole idea to keep them unhealthy.”

  “Quite so my dear” said Gyrfalon. “They could always take the trouble to bury the tripes we throw at them; if they do not they deserve their diseases.”

  Annis shrugged.

  “True enough” she said “And that ought to be obvious enough that I not need to issue instructions. Let the frying of the offal be done in the courtyard too; it needs a hot fire but not a long lasting one. Then the smell of good hot food will further demoralise the attackers; and we shall all feast with merrymaking and dancing that be a good way to exercise and keep warm too.”

  “What, you don’t expect me to dance do you?” Gyrfalon said, horrified.

  “Why, did you not learn?”

  “Of course I learned – not very enthusiastically, but I learned. My father convinced me it would help my footwork with swordplay.”

  “Why, he was right; and not too late to use it for even more nimbleness that shalt beat me even more black and blue at practice!” cried Annis brightly.

  “Minx,” said Gyrfalon.

  He deigned to dance a little, and with Annis, that his presence encouraged the villagers as they ate fried offal and laughed and sang.

  Annis slid away early; for she had something that she felt she must do; and she felt that tonight was the best night for her endeavour when the besiegers were preoccupied by the merriment within the castle.

  Chapter 13

  Cloaked against the night chills and to avoid recognition, Annis slipped out of the secret marsh gate and into the low skiff of Caleb the waterman. Caleb was a canny hunter but was also what the village folk described as ‘a little loight’ meaning that he was slightly simple, a big, gentle lad that mourned with genuine grief the ducks and other birds his arrows brought down for necessity’s sake. Caleb adored Annis for the curing of some painful boils on his back; and the way she made salves for the injured animals he was wont to nurse. She never made fun of his love of animals as some did and was always ready to show him too some of the simpler cures. Caleb and his brother had come to Gyrfalon’s band as preferable to being hanged or maimed by the lord on whose lands they had been caught poaching; and having escaped they had to go somewhere. An outlaw’s army seemed at the time as good an option as any; and if Gyrfalon had not been an ideal commander, Caleb’s brother had shrugged and said he were no worse than many a Lord sanctioned by the church and given the deference of high degree. Caleb’s brother had died fighting somewhere but though the other soldiers called Caleb ‘the dummy’ they were kind to him in an offhand way for his skills with hunting and his deadly accuracy with a bow. Annis liked Caleb’s direct ways and gentle respect for all his fellow creatures; and had asked him to take her secretly to a shore near Falk’s tent. She knew Caleb would obey without question; and would use his big fists to protect her if any offered insult.

  The skiff bumped gently against hard earth under the cover of a light mist; and Caleb scrambled ashore, tying up the painter to an overhanging blackthorn bush that sheltered it, as did the alder carr, from prying eyes.

  “’Tis that way, m’lady” Caleb whispered, displaying the countryman’s sureness of direction that lay innate within him. “Should I come with you?”

  Annis considered. His size and strength were comforting – but could draw unwanted attention to her. Besides, he might react before it were necessary for respect towards her.

  “I will whistle loudly for you if I need you,” she decided. “But I will go alone. I have my knives that Lord Gyrfalon has taught me to use so well.”

  “Take care, lady,” his tone was anxious
. She smiled at him, touched him briefly on the shoulder and was gone, light footed into the soft grey mist, swallowed as completely, thought Caleb shuddering, as if she were taken by marsh piskies!

  Annis was reflecting wryly on the last time she had slipped out of a castle. What profound changes that had wrought on her life! She hoped that this time would have less far-reaching consequences; though hopefully as profound in some respects – at least so far as her husband’s happiness and any child’s future were concerned. It was different too in many ways; for unlike her midnight flight from her father’s keep she had every intention of being back before she was missed; and in case her absence was noticed she had left a note for her husband with her intentions laid out in it. She slid through the mist, like a little shadow, distracting the guard around the tent by tossing a stone into the alder carr where she disturbed roosting marsh birds; and their disturbance distracted the attention of the church knight on guard long enough to slip easily past him.

  It was true that she might have asked him to take her to Lord Falk; but Annis preferred her visit to be known to no-one.

  Falk had been smelling fried liver and bacon, and listening to merriment in the full knowledge that it was to taunt him and his troops; what amazed him was that there were sounds of what sounded like genuine enough laughter and cheery song, and bucolic dance measures scraped and whistled on rustic instruments that he might have expected Gyrfalon to have banned, or had broken. Gyrfalon permitting merriment, even to lower the morale of his enemy was a new start. Falk returned from his patrol, shaking out the moisture from his cloak that he had picked up from the chill and sodden air and wished that the smell of liver and bacon were not so appetising. The ground under foot of the attackers was too sodden to get more than the most sullen of fires burning; and all the wood around was wet through and almost impossible to light. The besiegers must make do with cold rations; for though some wood had been kept dry, there had not been enough covered by limited canvas to last long. And that would have to be rectified, dry wood brought in, if the army were to survive the winter. It was something Falk contemplated that would have to be arranged; and enough dry wood to get large fires going could then dry out local wood culled from the forest; which was sufficiently depleted to show that Gyrfalon had already prepared well in advance for a siege and had a good store of wood that was unlikely to run low.