by Tim Stretton
Lady Isola stood up and walked to the window of the carriage. ‘Your bearing is not that of a brigand. You appear not only educated, but to speak with the accents of Emmen – of Croad, even.’
‘We all follow our own Way, Lady Isola. My own circumstances, while perhaps of vulgar interest to you, are tedious to recount. You may know me as Beauceron. I am also known as the Dog of the North.’
Lady Cosetta shrieked. Lady Isola smiled quietly. ‘In Sey your existence is believed to be apocryphal. Any rogue could make the claim.’
‘Whether you believe me or not, my lady, I am your captor: call me Beauceron, the Dog or King Enguerran. Now, kindly gather up your effects. I will be setting light to the stout-coach before we move on. We have a long journey ahead.’
2
Croad
1
Arren’s earliest memories were of people shouting his name in the streets. ‘Long live Arren! Good health to Arren! Long live the King!’ He was sitting on his father Darrien’s shoulders in the sun, the market square thronged with folk cheering his name as a herald read out the King’s decrees.
From his vantage high above the crowd he could see the parade of gallumphers as they trotted across the market square, a haze of dust kicked up by their hoofs in the summer heat. The crisp blue and green surcoats of the riders delighted him and his ears thrilled to the high clear call of the clarion.
He was too young to realize that more than one person could have the same name, or indeed that a person could have several names. When he asked why they were shouting his name, his father laughed.
His mother Ierwen reached up and chucked his cheek. ‘It is not you they are calling for, my love. It is King Arren, away down in Emmen.’
Arren did not know what a king was. ‘Why does a man in Emmen have the same name as me, Mama?’
‘Why, we named you after good King Arren. It is good luck to name a son after the King.’
‘What is the King? Why is everyone cheering?’
The royal party, which to Arren had been little more than a parade of gallumphers, passed out of view. Darrien lifted his son down from his broad shoulders. ‘You know that I serve Lord Thaume in his Guards. Well, Lord Thaume, here in Croad, he serves King Arren in Emmen. The King rules all of us in Emmen.’
‘And who does King Arren serve?’
‘Why, the King serves nobody!’ said Ierwen, stepping over a discarded flag. ‘If he served anyone else, he would not be the King.’
‘Can I be the King when I grow up?’ asked Arren. ‘I would like it if I did not have to serve. No one could make me eat turnip, and I could play with Eilla and Clottie all day.’
Darrien laughed. ‘I am sure it is not all play being the King,’ he said. ‘Besides, you cannot be the King. Only his own family can do that. When good King Arren dies, his son Prince Jehan will be King after him. That is the way of kings.’
‘But I have the same name as the King,’ said Arren. ‘Should I not be King before Jehan, who has a different name?’
‘There are many boys called Arren,’ said Ierwen. ‘But the King has only one son, and it is he who will be King.’
2
The early years of Arren’s childhood were unburdened with trouble, or with learning. His father was the Captain of Lord Thaume’s Guard, and since raids from the North were frequent, he spent many of his nights and days on the city walls. Ierwen found Arren’s younger brother Matten more demanding of her time, and Arren grew into an active and independent lad. His favourite playmates were Eilla, a dark-haired imp of a girl a year his junior, and her sister Clotara – Clottie – a further year younger and of more malleable temper. Matten often joined in their amusements.
The children were forbidden to play outside the city walls, and the strongest prohibition of all was that they were never to cross the bridge and venture into the Voyne, the small irregular town south of the river.
Eilla in particular harboured a special desire to explore the Voyne, largely as a result of the ban her father Jandille, the city’s mason, had put on the area. The Voyne, outside of the city walls, housed those who did not have leave to enter the city, and those whose work kept them outside. This settlement had an air of impermanence, despite the inn which did a lively trade among visitors awaiting admittance to Croad.
One spring morning, Arren woke early and roused Eilla, Clottie and Matten. They ran down to the marketplace in the centre of the city, hooting and calling in their excitement. The sun was up and already the day promised heat to come. Arren loved market day, with its clamour of sights, smells and sounds. Traders came from far and wide, gallumphers pulling rattlejacks piled high with goods, and Arren always kept an eye out for the olive-skinned, almond-eyed men who made the journey north from Glount, and always brought the most exquisite goods to defray the cost of their journey. Jostling with them were the farmers from the nearby plains, filling the square with their livestock and produce. Booths cooked every kind of food, and Arren’s mouth was always watering by the time he arrived in the square.
Eilla, who would now have been about nine years old, was always voluble on such expeditions. She had big dark eyes and could often charm the traders at the fish stalls into frying them up some fillets for their breakfast. There was a new lad on the fish stall today: a pimply lad of thirteen or so.
‘Hello. Who are you?’ said Eilla, looking downwards with a demure gaze. Arren hung back with Clottie and Matten.
‘Haroust,’ said the boy with a flush. Two other lads perched on a fish-crate beside the stall observing the scene.
‘Where is Teppentile?’ asked Eilla with a shy smile.
‘Poorly,’ said Haroust.
‘Oh,’ said Eilla. ‘He had promised me breakfast if I came early this week. I am sure you will fry us some fish, good Haroust!’
Haroust’s companions sniggered, and his face crimsoned. His voice was a squeaky crackle as he shouted ‘Be off with you!’ Eilla sloped away with her shoulders drooping.
‘I know. We’ll play raiders today,’ she announced as they left Haroust’s shrill curses behind them. ‘You have to steal three things from three different booths. We’ll make a feast of what we steal.’
‘Eilla!’ cried Matten. ‘We’ll be whipped if we’re caught!’
‘Do you think the raiders escape punishment when they are captured?’ said Eilla with a curl of her lip. ‘If you don’t want to be whipped, don’t get caught!’
She ducked into the crowd, to reappear with an apple in her hand. Arren followed Matten more sedately: there was every chance his brother would be caught.
As Arren followed Matten he managed to slide a lemon, all the way from Paladria, into his pocket while the stallholder served a portly lady. A rare and precious find! As his attention moved towards a necklace on a nearby booth – not strictly suitable for lunch, but still – he was distracted by a yelp. ‘Eilla! Help! Help!’
He turned to see a green-robed apothecary holding Clot-tie by the ear. ‘Shut it, you little sneak! Steal my purge, would you! It’s no use howling now! We’ll see what the constable makes of this.’
Arren could not help thinking that Clottie, in attempting to steal a laxative, had not fully understood the point of the game. He looked around for Eilla. She looked back across at him, shrugged, and dipped something into her pocket. She had two items already, and slipped away from the apothecary and Clottie.
While the younger girl continued her wailing, Arren absent-mindedly slipped the necklace into his pocket. He heard a call of ‘Hoy there!’ and tried to shrink into the crowd. ‘Get away with you there, boy!’ called the constable, but it was a furtive and guilty-looking Matten who was the target of his suspicion. ‘Get off home, now, son. I know your father and I’ll be checking up tonight.’
Arren moved off at a tangent to the constable, pouching a loaf of bread as he went past. He had his three items – would Eilla be able to evade capture and get her third item? Arren made his way to their usual rendezvous, the entrance to the T
emple of the Wheel. Some five minutes later, Eilla arrived, grinning.
‘I’ve got my three!’ declared Arren. ‘What of you?’
‘Animaxia take it! I’ve only got two,’ said Eilla. ‘But it isn’t lunchtime yet. That fat old constable is driving all the children off the market. It looks like Clottie will get a whipping.’
‘Matten escaped,’ said Arren. ‘So I win. Only I have three things.’
‘Not so! I haven’t finished yet. But you’re scared to go back.’
‘I am not. You’re the one who’s scared. I’m the King of the Raiders.’
‘Are not! Prove it!’
‘How? And anyway, I don’t have to. I have my plunder already.’
Eilla clambered up onto the wall surrounding the temple gardens and sat kicking her legs against the stone. ‘If you’re really King of the Raiders, you have to take your booty back to your secret palace in the Voyne. You have to go over the bridge. We’ll eat our lunch in The Patient Suitor’s courtyard – if you dare!’
Arren squinted up at the wall into the sun. ‘We aren’t allowed across the bridge.’
Eilla sniffed. ‘Some raider you are. If raiders only did as they were allowed, they wouldn’t be raiders.’
‘Well then! You must meet me there at midday – with all three items. Otherwise you’re a coward and a sneak and no true knight.’
‘How could I be a true knight? I’m a raider,’ said Eilla, jumping back down from the wall. ‘I’ll see you in the courtyard at midday.’
And with that she scampered back off into the crowd.
It was easy to slip into the Voyne on market day. Arren walked out with some fishermen, always expecting the call of the Guards. But nobody noticed him as he slipped across the bridge. Soon he found himself in front of The Patient Suitor Inn.
The sign above the inn depicted a dejected-looking suitor staring into the middle distance at a fine lady on a fine horse. Arren thought he looked sullen rather than patient; he wouldn’t like to be the lady once she’d agreed to marry him. Arren set himself to be equally patient until Eilla should arrive – providing she wasn’t caught. Or did she intend to leave him there on his own to get into trouble sneaking back into the city? He wouldn’t put it past her. He sat down at a table in the corner of the bustling courtyard.
Precisely as The Patient Suitor’s bell chimed for midday, however, Eilla appeared on the cobbles. He could see that she had been successful in securing her third item of plunder; it would have been hard to miss: a live cow strolling at the end of a long rope. As the patrons thronging the courtyard eased aside, she led the cow over to the table.
‘Eilla! What have you got?’ said Arren, in mingled awe, bafflement and suspicion.
‘What does it look like to you? In my house we call this a cow. I have three items. I am Queen of the Raiders. My items are better than yours, because they’re bigger.’
‘Where did you get it?’ Arren nodded at the cow.
‘I thought the King of the Raiders had to be intelligent. It was in the cattle pen at the market. I opened the gate, took hold of the rope and walked out. No one stopped me. Now we can have our feast. Look, an apple, a nice cheese, and a cow.’
Arren folded his arms and sat back. ‘The cow doesn’t count. You can’t eat it.’
Eilla screwed her face up. ‘Of course you can eat a cow. It’s called beef.’
‘You can’t eat it now, stupid. It’s alive.’
‘Well then, what about milk? Find me a pail, and I’ll milk it. Anyway, what have you got?’
Arren brought his items out and laid them on the smooth heavy wood beside Eilla’s. ‘First, a lemon. Rare and very tasty! Next, a crisp fresh loaf. Feel, it’s still warm. Last, a necklace, with red and blue beads.’
‘Ha! If you can’t eat a cow, you surely can’t eat a necklace. Although I’ll have it anyway: it should go on the neck of the Raider Queen.’
Arren handed it over. At ten years old he had no sweetheart in mind to give it to. The only girls worth playing with were the ones who thought they were boys, like Eilla.
Eilla nonetheless displayed a feminine delicacy in arranging the trophy around her neck. ‘Have you ever eaten a lemon, Arren?’ she asked with a smile.
‘Of course! My father is always bringing home titbits from Lord Thaume’s castle. We’ve had oranges, lemons and limes, redders, all the fruits you could imagine.’
‘And how do lemons and oranges differ?’
‘You really are a stupid girl, Eilla. A lemon is yellow, an orange is orange. And redders are red.’
‘I don’t believe I’ve ever eaten a lemon. Will you show me how?’
‘Of course.’ Arren pulled out his pocket-knife and deftly removed the peel. A little knowledge could go a long way, and the lemon appeared identical in every respect except colour to the oranges Darrien often bought home. He carefully split the lemon into two equal portions, offering one to Eilla. ‘Here, you just eat it now.’
Eilla weighed the lemon in her hand and looked at Arren. ‘Do you eat it all in one? Or cut it into little pieces?’
‘Oh! Some Raider Queen you are! Look! One mouthful – like this! Uuurgh! Ohhhh! Pah!’
‘Arren! Dear me! Here, have mine too . . .’
By the time they returned to the city, with the cow in tow, and only partly fortified by a lunch of bread, cheese and apple, Arren suspected that trouble waited. Eilla had hidden the necklace away in her pocket: Arren wondered whether it was worth the whipping Jandille would give her.
Darrien and Jandille waited by the gate. Jandille grabbed Eilla by the hair and hauled her off home for punishment. Darrien said nothing, indicating his wishes with a jerk of his head.
They walked back from the gate to Darrien’s cottage near the East Walls in silence. The crowds were gone. Once home, Ierwen was waiting. Matten sat on a chair, his eyes red. He fidgeted and shot Arren a reproachful glance.
‘Before I beat you, Arren, have you learned anything from today?’
‘Yes, Father.’
‘Good. Your wisdom has been earned with pain. I hope you consider it worthwhile. Do you care to share your learning?’
‘Oranges and lemons look alike but taste different. Eilla is cleverer than I. It is as easy to steal a cow as a loaf. You always get caught in the end.’
‘These points are all unarguable. Ierwen, I lack all appetite to beat the lad. You must do it.’
Ierwen gave a sigh and reached for the cane above the fireplace.
3
Croad
1
In the twilight Beauceron’s party made its way along the rough trail leading into the foothills of the Ferrant Mountains, concealed by the scrubby trees on the slope as they moved upwards. As night fell, he called a halt at a clearing of modest expanse with the mountains at their backs.
In the darkness, Beauceron looked down into the Casalle valley at the blazing stout-coach. The flames, set against the starry sky, would draw attention away from his band, should anyone think to look up into the woods. His rabbit stew, fresh from the earth-oven, was given savour by mountain herbs, and from the exhilaration of the afternoon’s raid. It was disappointing that Siedra had not been on the coach, but there were compensations.
He looked across to where Isola and Cosetta were picking at their stew.
‘Eat up, ladies. This is as good as food gets in the wilds. We have the open road ahead and many adventures to come.’
Cosetta looked at the stew with a grimace. Isola said: ‘Our appetites are understandably impaired. We are unclear as to your intentions, but it seems unlikely our wishes will be taken into account.’
‘I have assured you that your chastity is safe.’
‘You expect me to be grateful that your men have not violated me? I was on the way to my wedding! You have taken my future!’ said Lady Isola, with spots of colour at her cheek.
Beauceron leaned back against a rock. ‘It might be more accurate to say I have substituted one future for another. Your
wedding will no doubt proceed, but at a later date. We will take you back to Mettingloom and ransom you there.’
‘Mettingloom!’ cried Cosetta. ‘You cannot take us all the way into the Northern Reach!’
‘I am returning there myself, with the treasure we have abstracted this afternoon.’
‘Beauceron,’ said Isola with an approach to a smile. ‘Can you not simply take us to Croad? Lord Oricien will pay you a ransom on the spot, and you are spared the inconvenience of transporting us north, and then all the way back south.’
Beauceron laughed. ‘I prefer to avoid the inconvenience of a noose around my neck. Croad and Mettingloom might not be at war, but I can assure you that if I fell into Oricien’s power he would hang me. We will skirt Croad to the north, take the mountain pass and secure a ship from Hengis Port. In three weeks we will be in Mettingloom, ready to secure your release.’
Isola dropped her hunk of bread to the ground, her nostrils flaring. ‘Dog!’ she shouted, throwing her stew at Beauceron. ‘You will live to regret treating Lady Isola of Sey in this fashion.’
Beauceron did not even need to lean aside, so wild was Isola’s aim. He stood up, lifted the empty bowl from the ground, and passed it back to her. Before she could respond, he turned on his heel and walked away.
Early the next morning the party set off into the mountains. Lady Cosetta remained largely silent throughout the day; Lady Isola set up a steady stream of imprecations, until Monetto, riding as their escort, threatened to gag her for the remainder of the journey.
On the second day the group rested for lunch in the high mountain pass which led from Lynnoc to the Northern Reach. Down in the valley below them was the city of Croad, compact and secure behind its walls. The air was becoming chill as they rose from the valley, and both ladies were wrapped in rough cloaks from Beauceron’s store. Lady Cosetta’s cloak had clearly been pierced by a sword, but if she had misgivings as to the fate of its previous owner she said nothing.
