Hastily, Errol shoved the book back into his bag and wondered if he dare pretend he had never seen it. The thought of such dishonesty was almost inconceivable to him. And yet there was no good reason why he should own up and get into trouble. It was very unlikely that Father Kewick would miss the book. He would only know it was damaged if Errol returned it. Not many in the village could read, let alone well enough to decipher the tiny old script in most of the ancient tomes. The subject matter of most was another deterrent to their being handled; treatises on man management and obscure theological tracts were hardly enticing, so they sat gathering dust and slowly mouldering away.
Only the histories and the tales of travels to far-off lands held interest to the youngsters trying to grapple with the intricacies of letters and words. These had been Errol’s favourites as he learnt to read with old Father Drebble. His replacement, Father Kewick was a different teacher altogether and, not long after he had taken over, the histories and journals had been removed from the library. As censorship went it had been quite counterproductive, since it had forced Errol to seek out something else to satisfy his burning inquisitiveness. As a predicant of the Order of the Candle, Kewick probably had no idea what fascinating things were written in Father Castlemilk’s introduction to the rival Order of the High Ffrydd.
Something rustled in the branches over his head, rousing Errol from his musing. Hurriedly he finished cramming the broken book back into his bag, shoving the whole thing behind his back.
Dead twigs and drying leaves tumbled down from above, shortly followed by a foot, a leg and then a slight figure. It seemed to drop like a stone, but then caught the lowest branch, falling lightly to the ground with the grace of a cat. A small girl, with an impish grin under an unkempt mop of dark black hair, brushed tree canopy detritus from her oft-mended tunic and stared at him with her slightly unsettling green eyes. Errol had seen her around the village but didn’t know her name. Most of the girls stayed at home with their mothers, helping with the household chores. They might be seen at Suldith prayers, all dressed up in their best clothes, staring at the boys and giggling, but Errol hadn’t been to prayers since old Father Drebble had died. In the main he was happy to ignore any girls he might meet, and they seemed happy to reciprocate.
This one was different, confident and bold. The few times he had seen her, she had been wandering around on her own but purposefully, as if on important business, not dashing nervously from house to house. And she wore clothing more appropriate for a boy, rough and ready cloth cut for hard wearing rather than style. She had never spoken to him, never even seemed to glance in his direction before. Now she fixed him with a curious smile.
‘Hello Errol Ramsbottom,’ she said, flopping down on the ground beside him. ‘Mind if I join you?’
Errol shrugged. ‘If I say yes, will you go away?’ He glanced nervously towards the field where battle was continuing. If Clun and the other boys saw her with him he would never hear the end of it. Shaded by the great leafy canopy he was fairly sure he couldn’t be seen.
‘Prob’ly not,’ the girl replied, leaning her back into the curve of the great trunk.
‘You might as well stay then,’ Errol said with a shrug.
‘What you been doing?’ The girl asked.
‘What do you mean?’ Errol said.
‘I been watching you Errol Ramsbottom,’ she said. ‘You been sitting here fer an hour now, just starin’ at nothin’. You looking for the Grym Lines or somethin’?’
‘The Grym Lines? How would you know about a thing like that?’ Errol looked at the girl. She was dressed in a pair of short trousers, loose tatters of frayed cloth showing eloquently where they had been hacked away from an earlier life. A stout rope held the spare folds of the garment around her middle. Her knees were dirty and flecked with small scabs, as were her bare forearms, clasped around her drawn-up legs.
‘The Grym Lines connect everythin’. They’re everywhere. My uncle Arlo says that if ye stare long enough and hard enough ye can see ‘em.’
‘And can you?’ Errol asked, his curiosity piqued. He had thought the secret all his own, yet here this strange little girl seemed to know all about it.
‘Oh aye,’ the girl said. ‘An’ it’s Martha, by the by.’
‘What?’
‘Martha,’ she said. ‘My name. Ye forgot ter ask.’
‘Why would I be interested?’ Errol asked, slightly irritated to be having a conversation with a girl.
‘’cause I know things,’ Martha said, a slight smirk on her dirty face. ‘I’ve seen you around the place, always sneakin’ off ter be alone, never playin’ them rough games with the other boys. I saw you stand up ter Trell last week. He’s not happy about that but Clun’s da’s sweet on your ma so he’ll stand up fer ye now. I know ye’re old Hennas’ boy, but nobody knows who yer da was. I know ye’ve been studying for the Novitiate and your Ma don’t want you to go.’
‘You know a lot about me,’ Errol interrupted, his annoyance coming back. He knew that most of the villagers talked about him and his mother behind their backs, and Clun’s father had been visiting the cottage in the woods quite a lot since his wife had died, but he had thought the man was looking for some potion to help with the grieving, not eyeing up his mother as a replacement. ‘Who’s your father then, the village alderman?’
Martha laughed, ‘Old Ned Clusster?’ The idea seemed to cause her great mirth. ‘No, Tom Tydfil’s my da,’ she said, chest swelling with pride.
‘The Smith?’ Errol asked. ‘I didn’t even know he had a wife, let alone a daughter.’ He had never much mixed with village life, his mother’s cottage was a good half a mile away on the forest edge and he only ever came down for schooling. Some of the villagers he knew by name, but not well enough to do more than say hello. They didn’t exactly invite him in, nor his mother unless they were sick.
‘My ma died when I was little,’ Martha said, a cloud of sadness passing over her face.
‘I’m sorry,’ Errol said and was surprised to find he genuinely meant it. Martha smiled at his concern for her.
‘Anyway,’ she said, as if getting back to the topic of interest to her. ‘If ye want to see the Grym Lines, ye’re best tryin’ over by the river, at Jagged Leap.’
Errol knew the place well. It was another of his favoured haunts when he could get away from his schooling, or the never ending round of chores his mother would have him do. But he didn’t want to give this slight girl the satisfaction of knowing she was right about him.
‘And why would I be interested in these Grym Lines,’ he said with as much disdain in his voice as he could muster. Martha looked at him as if he were an idiot.
‘Ye’ve been readin’ that old book all summer. If ye want to be a priest, ye’ve got to know about the lines,’ she said as if explaining something to a baby. ‘Hain’t old Father Kewick taught ye nothin’?'
‘He teaches reading, writing and the importance of making sure you are never to blame,’ Errol said, reflecting his frustration at lessons these days. Most of the other boys still struggled with their reading and, beside himself, only Clun even knew how to hold a pen. Errol had mastered both before even starting to attend the village school. Most days now he sat at the back, copying dry texts about the importance of good organisational structure and a clear chain of command. Only when the old priest’s back was turned, or he was called away on urgent village business, could he turn to the few books remaining in the library that were worth reading.
‘He’s a Candle all right,’ Martha said. ‘Not like old Drebble. He was a Ram. Da says he went all over he world. Saw everythin’. Even went as far as the Sea of Tegid.’
‘I want to join the Order of the High Ffrydd,’ Errol said, wondering why he was telling this girl something he had not yet admitted to anyone else. ‘I’m going to master the ways of magic and become an Inquisitor.’
Martha laughed, but it wasn’t an unkind gesture, more an appreciation of enthusiasm. ‘Ye’ve gotta get thr
ough the choosin’ first, Errol Ramsbottom,’ she said. ‘Then ye’ve gotta survive the novitiate before ye can even be a warrior priest. It takes years to get to be even captain of one of the troops.’
‘How d’you know so much about these things?’ Errol asked, amazed that such a rich source of information was so close and he had never known.
‘Uncle Arlo told me,’ Martha said. ‘He’s a sergeant in the army. He’s always goin’ on about the warrior priests an’ how they all look down on the ordinary soldiers. Sometimes he comes to visit when he gets leave. Da says he drinks too much, but he tells the best stories when he’s drunk.’
‘He sounds interesting,’ Errol said. ‘I’d like to meet him sometime.’
Martha laughed again and he grinned at her infectious mirth. It was nice to be able to talk to someone who wasn’t trying to teach him something.
‘Ye’d do well to keep away from him, Errol Ramsbottom,’ she said. ‘You look too much like the enemy.’
‘I what?’ Errol asked, brought up short by the statement. Martha merely shrugged and got to her feet.
‘Yer da, I guess. Must a been, ‘cause yer ma’s from the south.’
‘What do you mean, enemy?’ Errol asked, confused. He’d lived with taunts about his looks all his life, but always assumed they had to do with his mother’s profession. Witch-boy. That was what they called him.
‘Yer a Llanwennog, Errol,’ Martha said. ‘Least yer da was one. Anyway, yer friends are comin’ back, I’d better scram.’
Errol looked down at the field where Clun and the rest of the gang, bored of playing battle, were making their way up the slope towards the chestnut tree. And when he turned back, she was gone.
~~~~
Chapter Three
There is a common myth that has grown around King Divitie XXIII’s abolition of the timeless tradition of Aurddraig. It is said that in his time of greatest need the king was aided by a dragon. So grateful was he to the creature that he immediately granted it and all its kind the freedom of the Twin Kingdoms and his own personal guarantee of protection from persecution. The truth is rather more prosaic.
Few dragons still lived at the time of Divitie’s reign, and the Order of the High Ffrydd had developed sophisticated techniques for tracking them down. The warrior priests were only called into action once a dragon had been located. Then they could be dispatched to use their skill in magic to execute the creature and recover its precious jewels. The warrior priests were few in number, the most adept magicians in the Twin Kingdoms.
Divitie reigned during a time of heightened threat from the barbarian Llanwennogs to the north. He saw in the Order of the High Ffrydd, with its highly trained and skilled warrior priests, an army in the making. Along with Inquisitor Hardy he set about changing the focus of the order. The warrior priests were elevated in importance, their numbers increased tenfold. The quaisters, who had previously been the dominant rank within the order, were reduced to the position of teachers and administrators. The lifting of the Aurddraig was no more than a small part of the rewriting of the order’s charter to emphasise its new role as defender of the realm.
It is likely that Divitie himself ordered the story of his narrow escape to be circulated. A canny politician, he knew well how to manipulate his people, and in particular the noble houses who had always provided the king’s army in the past.
The House of Balwen – Barrod Sheepshead
The old king sat on the edge of his huge black throne like some shrivelled piece of pigmeat, left in the sun for the flies to lay their eggs in. He was dressed in ill-fitting robes of state, as if they had been made for a man twice his size. Even the slim golden crown slipped over his head, held in place only by his protuberant ears. His face was sallow: bloodshot eyes focussing on a point not far from the end of a pointed nose mottled red with broken veins; thin lips stained with endless wine and cracked open to reveal a few rotting yellow-brown teeth in the foetid hole behind; cheeks hollow, their skin blotched with liver spots and ragged with gristly white stubble; lank, greasy hair a shade less healthy than urine-stained in colour, hanging limply from his balding pate to his weedy drooping shoulders. One trembling hand held a tall golden goblet half-filled with dark claret, the other grasped the thick carved arm of the throne as if to stop the weight of his drink from toppling him over into the dark depths of the great chair. He sat like a little child, huddled up to one massive armrest. Approaching her father across the great expanse of the Neuadd, Princess Beulah of the House of Balwen could hardly suppress the total disgust and contempt the pathetic figure of King Diseverin IX roused in her.
Shuddering, she climbed the low stone steps up towards the throne, glancing from side to side at the expanse of bare stone and the odd, fragmented stained glass windows, broken long ago in the Brumal wars and repaired without any regard for the images they had once sported. Things would change once the old man died. Once it was her sitting on that great Obsidian Throne. Things would change, but not yet.
Kneeling at her father’s feet, Beulah took his free hand, seeing the crease of concern fly across Diseverin’s face as his balance was upset. She pulled the rank smelling thing towards her, gagging at the odour of rotting meat that hung around her father, and kissed the large ring of state that rattled around one bony finger. A spark of life leapt from her lips and into the polished ruby, flowing through the king’s hand and up into his body, rousing him from his stupor like a puppet master taking up his strings. Duty performed, Beulah back quickly away.
‘Eh? Is that you, Lleyn?’ The king asked, his cataract-clouded eyes flickering around even though there was scant hope of them ever again focussing on anything.
‘Lleyn is dead,’ Beulah said. ‘It’s me, Beulah.’
‘What? Beulah? My little girl? So like your mother.’ The king attempted a smile and a waft of foulest garbage rose up in the air. Beulah tried not to retch, putting a scented handkerchief over her mouth and nose to ward off the stench.
‘How are you feeling today, father?’ She asked from behind her mask.
‘Tired, my little one. Affairs of state weigh heavy on me,’ the king said. Then, as if only just remembering it was there, he lifted the goblet to his lips and took a long draft. Most of the wine went down his chin and soaked into the ermine ruff of his robes of state. They were pink with repeated soakings, the fur matted and claggy.
‘You should go, little one,’ the king said, holding out his now-empty goblet for a page to fill. ‘I have a busy schedule today. Same as every day. Sometimes I wonder that Padraig doesn’t go out of his way to make work for me.’
Beulah bowed. It was enough of a dismissal. It didn’t matter that her father’s day would be spent in a soft-drunken stupor as an endless stream of courtiers petitioned him for favours or simply tried to flatter him. Seneschal Padraig and his cronies in the Order of the Candle maintained the day to day running of the state. The king had long since been reduced to a ceremonial role. That too would change when she came to power, Beulah vowed. But she was not yet old enough to ascend the throne. If her father died now, Padraig would be made regent. Even if it was only for a year her power would be eroded. She could not claim the Obsidian Throne in her own right until she turned twenty-five. So the old man needed to stay alive. At least for now.
Beulah was no stranger to leaching the life force out of her enemies. Her tutor, Inquisitor Melyn, had taught her the magic of the lines well, and his knowledge of poisons had been indispensable in the removal of her elder sister. Even without her bizarre liaison with the Llanwennog hostage, Lleyn would have had to go. Her pregnancy had just been the perfect cover. Now Beulah found herself having to do a very different task, to keep her ailing father alive. Were it not for her frequent administrations, King Diseverin IX would surely have died years ago. Still, that which could be taken away could as easily be given, even if the old man was doing his best to kill himself all the while.
Bowing slightly, Beulah turned and left the great hall, heading fi
rst for the kitchens to add vital powders to the king’s wine and food, then straight to her personal quarters and the tub of hot, rose-scented water that she so desperately yearned.
*
Creeping silently through the undergrowth, Benfro tried to keep his focus on the camouflage white-speckled russet brown of the roe deer. It was grazing on the moss clinging to the side of an enormous oak tree that had fallen in some long-ago storm, leaving a scar in the canopy that leaked sunlight into the gloom. Somewhere out there Ynys Môn was working his way around behind their quarry, but for all the noise he was making he could have been miles away.
Benfro thought he was quite adept at stealthy hunting. He leapt at every opportunity to head out into the deep forest with the dour old dragon. Away from the other villagers, out there in the wild, Ynys Môn was a fount of information, a skilled hunter and far more indulgent of Benfro’s failures and shortcomings than his mother ever was. Sometimes their trips went on for several days, like this one, and in the evenings they would make camp around a small fire. Benfro would prepare whatever they had managed to catch during the day and Ynys Môn would tell tales of distant times when dragons had been great creatures, masters of the earth and sky. A time when men were no more than simple creatures raising flocks of sheep and scratching in the ground for food.
The roe deer looked up suddenly, its mouth working away still as its ears swivelled this way and that trying to determine what had changed. Benfro froze, his breath held. The birds were still twittering in the high branches and overhead a buzzard wheeled and screamed. There was nothing in the scene to suggest that two dragons were within pouncing distance. He willed the beast to relax, to put its head back down and resume feeding. Slowly, as if it could feel and react to his thoughts, the deer settled. Letting out his breath silently, Benfro stepped forward.
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