by Veras Alnar
It hurt that he could recall it so clearly. In the pig's barn he had raised his sword and swung it down. The light had been by a torch and candle held by Durgia and her friend, Ellie, the milkmaid Amis would come to so depend on. Where her body had landed in the town, he had never known.
“Hold it steady,” Durgia had directed him, “and swing it down in one stroke. It'll be easy, then.”
There was an infant on a great stone slab that Durgia's family used to slaughter the winter pig. It laid looking so young and wrinkled on white swaddling, only a few months old at most and totally dependent.
“I must kill him,” Durgia had tearfully confessed to him that morning, “if I can't get rid of him, then I'll never be free of this place.”
Stomach twisting Amis had felt more than a little uneasy, he hadn't wanted anything to do with the death of a child. And certainly, not a child that wasn't his own making.
“You've been kind to me these months,” Durgia said, “you've done all for me, even when you knew it wasn't yours, run my messages to my girls in the village when my Dad locked me up at home.”
“I'd do anything for you,” Amis said, “and I meant it.”
“But now you must let me help you,” Durgia said, “in exchange, I'll give you gold enough to escape this place just like I will, if you do this for me.”
What madness had overtaken him? He looked at her and the miserable countenance of her face and counted up what he had ever offered her in return for her blessed company and came up short. He'd owned nothing but shame and now she had her stain too, literally fallen from her loins because of the dubious company she'd kept. The world was so unfair and Amis felt this had been his one chance to even the odds and get back at the mysterious suitor for abandoning her.
“Will you be true to your husband,” Amis asked, “after I've done this? Will you try and be happy?”
Clutching him she had cried against his chest, her sadness a fair payment for her misery. And Amis felt though he knew no one in the village would ever forget, that she above them all deserved forgiveness. She deserved to escape from their meanness and their judging even more than him. In another town no one would have to know, the marriage would start her record clean.
“I promise,” Durgia said, “for you my closest friend, I'd promise anything.”
Happiness sailed in his heart, he may not have won her in a way an honest man could but he would do something for her. Something terrible, unspeakable that would mark his soul so hers could remain clean. Surely, in all the sacrifices of the saints something was said of it? Amis didn't know the scriptures well but he knew how he felt and he didn't want Durgia to face anything but a future made of more than Garstwrot's shabby river town.
In the barn he struck once and failed. Half cut neck and screaming child. He tried again and got the head off, his arms shaking and sweat covering his brow. The silence was as deafening as the sky above that emptied its stars into nothing but the most overwhelming blackness. From behind Durgia, her maid Ellie was holding her hand at her mouth and averting her gaze and Fulk, looming behind them held a tattered bag. He would do the second favour; bury the child in consecrated ground. Dump holy water on its remains and make sure its tiny soul would flutter to some other, happier realm.
That was what they should have done but they were caught at it by Otto who had come to check on the pigs who had become restless, and the first one to run was Fulk, the second Ellie and that left himself with blood on his hands and Durgia screaming, begging for his life.
There had been a moment when Amis thought he would have been free. When he had made a mad dash from the pig pens, he had a mind to stop home and get a horse before the rest of the men could be gathered. But late at night, there was someone up waiting for him. His father had always faltered in the face of Amis' anger, it was the only weapon he really had against the miserable man. He took two steps back and held the torch up as if it could be a shield.
“You've killed an infant, I heard them shout about it,” Martin said, “you stupid, stupid boy. You've no idea what you've done.”
The flames reflected red, they looked like blood for an instant. Like the blood that had rolled and spilled from the butchering table. But his father didn't run at him, though his hand shook while holding his well worn sword.
“I wish you wept for reasons other than yourself,” his father said, quietly, “I wish everything had been different. In you is such childish whims and compulsions I can barely call you a man but it wasn't your fault that your parents so abused you.”
“I am a man,” Amis said, “I knew what I was doing. Give me that, at least!”
“You're a fool!” his father shouted, “A trusting, lonely, miserable soul who should be crying to God and begging the church to take you in and teach you decency!”
“They don't build churches in Garstwrot,” Amis said, “and certainly no monkish order would ever come here, nor would they have use for a hand that kills the way mine does.”
“Is that the way you'll carve your fortune,” his father said, “with a murdering arm and borrowed armor?”
“Yes,” Amis said through gritted teeth, “there are two Kings at war, Fulk told me. And he said we could get to them if he wanted and with my skill they would hire me on the spot.”
“After he took his cut and introduced you to their ranks, I suppose,” his father said.
“Yes,” Amis said, hesitant, it was exactly that.
“He'd take your longsword and pawn it and leave you dead or dying by the side of the road,” his father said, “but I'll let you go now with some money if you promise never to darken my door again. Or any other door in Garstwrot.”
“I promise,” Amis said.
For once in his life, his father gave him gold. Only in the service of ridding himself of Amis' presence true, but it was something.
“Keep it with you at all times,” his father said, “or you'll end up cleaning the town's bogs just as I have.”
“I'll not end up dead on a highway or cleaning a privy,” Amis said, “but dressed in silks and velvets in a palace.”
“As a landed knight?” his father said, “That wouldn't suit you. Better off in a nursery with a pretty maid to wipe the drool off your childish face.”
“I hate you,” Amis whispered.
“I know,” his father said, “and I never loved you as a son. Find your way and maybe in the end, the devil will take pity and drag you into hell for the joy of your companionship or the pleasure of that evil arm.”
“I will leave,” Amis said, “and I will succeed!”
“You will,” his father said, “and no doubt leave a trail of misery and blood behind you.”
Amis turned away and left on foot as desperation bade him. He had stopped at the town well to fill his water and then walked until the last barn, and it was then he began to feel deeply unwell. It was there he had been set upon by the villagers, crying witchcraft and all manner of crimes that he wasn't responsible for. And he had become more delirious, his world tilting and everything including his life and his love seemed to slip away. Until he woke barely able to speak because his throat was so dry and his skin so hot and Ellie was trying to encourage him to drink water she had gathered from the well.
“I'll have to get a priest,” she had said.
And Amis had glanced to the open door, flung open in a hurry and had seen a figure indistinct. His memory was vague but it was still present and he knew now, who it was and what they had been doing. The face looked at his and he looked at him and recognized it. It had been Lord Guain in a dark cloak and he could only tell because he had seen his shining, curled blonde hair peaking out while his eyes gleamed as he poured a jug into the well. And that was when with a terrible certainty, Amis knew who the murderer of the town had been.
He was the first victim of its effects because he had taken first from the town well so late at night just after it had been tainted. The man had unintentionally been following Amis' foot path on hors
e all the way to his collapse in the barn.
Amis blinked back tears, the sky was darkening as a riot of ash began to fall and speckle his hair with gray dark as the keeps' stones. Getting up from the stone bench, Amis made his way miserably to the great hall where Fulk was loading the fire.
Amis picked up some wood and began helping him, then whispered to him.
“Lord Guain poisoned the wells,” Amis said, “he caused the plague for certain. It was him, I saw his horse right before I got ill.”
Fulk's eyebrows rose but all explanation ceased as Lord Guain strode into the hall with an armful of buckets connected to some apparatus.
“I found this in the barn,” Lord Guain said, “it must have been how the castle was managed in Lord Castille's time, this should make things much safer don't you think, Amis? No more near misses with that desperate ledge.”
Fulk glanced at him and Amis managed a weak nod.
“What pray is the matter?” Lord Guain said.
“The locking up,” Fulk said, quickly, “it's put us all on edge. Too much like a siege my lord.”
“Oh,” Guain said, “that is a worry, yes. But this keep has stood for millennia. I dare say it would have to be some army to break its doors and with a crowd like that, we'd have far worse to worry about than defending the keep, running would be the only thing that would save our necks.”
Amis had a mind to agree but said nothing and gloomily looked at the ground to avoid looking at Lord Guain's handsome features. It was easier to accept his guilt if Amis pretended it was anyone but him.
That evening they had rescued as much water as they dare from the riverside and filled great buckets in the kitchen shelter that had functioned as a bath for the garden inhabitants. It was with great embarrassment that Lord Guain was the one to rescue Amis as he'd nearly gone over the cliff again from overloading his buckets.
“Take care,” Lord Guain gently chided, “the land below you isn't just fraught with stones but also the bones of those unfortunate enough to wage war in Garstwrot's ancient past. They're so old they've turned to stone and are jutting out all over. It would be a nasty cut that would be your undoing and no so much the fall.”
Amis looked at him in the late afternoon light instead of the river, while Lord Guain offered him a lovely, laconic smile that would have charmed the devils in hell, he was sure.
“There are other reasons I should like to keep you whole,” Lord Guain said, quietly, almost whisked away on the wind.
It was again such flattery that Amis had never heard or hoped to hear in all his days. Amis tried to do better with the water but it was difficult, his footing was at its best while riding on a horse and his lost weight had sent him all off kilter, the buckets around his neck had never felt so heavy and for some reason, he couldn't wait until the advent of night. He seemed to feel much better after the dark, the later air not so choked with ash a marked improvement.
The late supper they all shared had a particular kind of tension that Amis found difficult to endure. Lord Guain was very pensive swirling his glass of wine and Fulk strummed the lute lazily but without any real tune. It reminded Amis far too much of his suppers at his first home and so he went to get up until Lord Guain gently grabbed him by the wrist.
“I must speak to you,” Lord Guain said, “both of you, about the possibility of a siege by someone very cross with me.”
“The Baroness,” Fulk said, strumming, “the only Baroness I know that is so well respected to go by a single title is the Baroness of J'Andeux. Not a very nice woman but very, very rich.”
“That is the one, God help us,” Lord Guain said, “my brother escaped his duties for the King to be sure I knew what danger I might be in. But I haven't been entirely idle while the two of you have been struggling to manage the keep on your own, I made a bigger hole in the stones in the wall where the two of you have come in from before. Enough for the three of us to slip through one by one but not big enough so a group of men could squeeze in without trouble. And there is the grate in the dungeons, I bent it just enough so one of us can get through. If things should go badly, I suggest every man for himself. Are you all right with this, Amis?”
Amis nodded his head, unsure of what else he could have said.
“Honestly,” Lord Guain said, “despite being the smallest in frame out of all of us, you're probably the one most likely to survive without too much trouble should things go badly. That arm of yours is fantastic.”
“I'll defend myself if I have to,” Amis said.
“What manner of weapon are you trained in, grave master?” Lord Guain said.
“Only the crossbow,” Fulk said.
It was an utter lie; Fulk could use the bow and a short sword if he were pressed but he was best with the sort of dagger Amis would strap to his thigh when the men had gone out, just in case a person should get close enough to him on horseback so he could stab them. A wicked, small weapon better suited for cutting throats than the battlefield that resembled Fulk's fancy filleting knife in size.
“You'd better go down into the dungeons later and find one,” Lord Guain said, “to be sure you aren't unarmed if something should happen.”
“That's a fine idea,” Fulk said, with a grin, “they're expensive things to buy, aren't they Amis?”
“I suppose so,” Amis said, feeling uneasy.
That night as they were washing up in their rooms after their suppers, Amis had resolved himself to a miserable, pervasive gloom about his person.
“The Baroness is coming,” Fulk said, “he's all but assured it, just as the Bishop said. We've got to figure out a way to get out of here without him knowing. Why don't you distract him for an evening-”
Amis snapped, “I'm very far from a courtier, knave.”
Fulk snorted, “Everyone on earth knows that to look at you. Why not review your poem again, a little charm could go a long way.”
“That book is hardly anything to go by,” Amis said, “it was a horrible story, Albin was clearly mad and Gamwyd an idiot for following him to the edge of the earth for a pat on the head.”
Fulk grinned at him, “remind you of anybody you might know?”
“Of course not,” Amis said, “no one with any sense would follow a mad knight even if he is landed nobility and his interests were so perverse as to be laughable. It was utterly useless. There must be a kinder poem than that about men in love.”
“There's an old stanza from Ulsfr about his page,” Fulk said, “full of noble love between knight and peasant. Not near enough debauchery to keep it interesting.”
“Ulsfr was a hunchback king who was cursed by a wizard to give birth to his own sons because he raped his daughter,” Amis said, “that's more than enough debauchery for me. And how do you know so much about poems and lyrical tales? I don't remember ever in my life seeing you with a book.”
“The simple reason that a minstrel can be paid to both sing and spy at once, it's good money when barons are at odds and you don't have to read but only memorize the tones. Free food, fine drink and the attentions of the local ladies for good measure. See? I'm not so deep in mystery as you like to think. So?” Fulk said, “what of my idea? Sleep with him, figure out our escape while he's distracted. Barter his neck to get away from whoever is after his hide and make our way to King Hune's army on the hill and then barter our own necks to him, if we have to.”
“It's a fool one,” Amis said, as he snatched his pipe from the table, “and Lord Guain is not so stupid.”
“Well, he does like you, doesn't he? That's plenty fool enough to work with,” Fulk said.
“Shut up!” Amis said.
Through his irritation, Amis couldn't help but admit that Fulk made sense. To stay in a shut up tower was certain death and if Lord Guain wanted to wager his life against marauding armies for a lousy plot of land by a crumbling tower and an ugly crag full of peasants murdered by who knows what (if not the man's own hand), then that was his fancy and not one that Amis ever wanted to be
part of.
Puffing his smoke into the night sky Amis closed his eyes and recalled that it wasn't as difficult as he'd imagined sleeping with a man. He was convinced he wasn't actually drinking blood or doing what his mind had tried to convince him of but was instead overlaying sex with something stranger, possibly with the help of heavily drugged wine. If Lord Guain was in fact a murderer, who knew what else he was proficient in doing.
But what if the wine wasn't being drugged? That wasn't a very kind thought so Amis didn't stray on it but closed his eyes while smoking, wishing he were away from Garstwrot's craggy hills and silent halls.
That night Amis fell to sleep straight away in his own rooms from sheer exhaustion. But he was plunged instantaneously into such a dream, he wished he had never taken himself to bed.
Whispers assailed his ears, the strange sense of being on the water, moving. And a terrible feeling that he was being watched by something that was very far from human.
When his eyes became aware of where he was, he realized he was in the most opulent and enormous room he had ever seen. Great huge swathes of velvets covered the bed in near total blackness and shadowy, decorative objects could be seen just outside its curtains. The wooden faces above him carved on the bed posts were those of shrieking bats entwined with roses and on the headboard, beautiful cavorting women embracing one another. Despite its richness the room smelled stale and heavy and was very cold, Amis could see his breath as he rose onto his elbows. Beyond the heavy curtains there was a flicker of something, like a tiny flame that sputtered around the edges of the room giving off only the tiniest bit of light, until that too, vanished.
Amis closed his eyes, wishing that he would wake up but to no avail. He swallowed thickly and opened the curtains more to peer outside the massive bed. The room looked covered in heavy cloth and sheets and the shapes of furniture could be seen under them. But the walls were alarmingly scorched all around, as if some great fire had burned them years ago. There was a single, red tinged window very much like the one in the hall with its shutters askew letting in a dappling of reddish light. With nervous steps Amis managed to crawl out of the massive bed and take a few careful steps on the cold stone floor towards what he had a mind to think was the door.
