Ashes of Heaven

by C. Dale Brittain

  And then Tristan spotted two figures in the distance, tall and clad in white, walking toward him. He ducked behind a tree, not wanting to be seen before he knew who they were.

  As they grew closer he was relieved to see that they appeared to be pilgrims, bearded, dressed in bleached linen, with crosses and the emblem of the cockleshell sewn onto their robes. Although they carried long sticks, these were—he hoped—for walking, rather than for cudgeling handsome youths. He stepped out from behind the tree.

  “Greetings, good fathers, in God’s name!” he said. They jumped, startled, and one raised his stick. “I mean you no harm!” he continued, relieved to see that they were as frightened of him as he was of them. “But I became separated from my hunting party, was thrown by my horse, and now have totally lost my way! I have been wandering through these woods since yesterday.”

  They stepped closer, saw that his clothing, though now ripped, stained, and heavily wrinkled, had been of very fine quality, and lowered their sticks. “Are you from Tintagel?” one asked.

  “That’s right!” he said, wondering where Tintagel might be. He was fairly sure it was not in Bretagne. It was at any rate not the name of Gilan’s castle. “But I am so turned around and so hungry that I do not even know which way to go!”

  “We are heading toward Tintagel ourselves,” said one of the pilgrims. “Accompany us, and we will be there by evening.” He reached into the bag that hung by his belt. “Let me offer you a little of our food, if you will accept something of such low quality.”

  He brought out a crust of stale black bread and a rather wrinkled apple. Tristan ate them in three gulps. “God’s blessing on you,” he remembered to say then. “I wish I could repay you in some way.”

  “Well, we always receive a warm welcome at Tintagel,” the other pilgrim said. “We will have more food by evening.” And the three of them walked on together.

  Tristan started singing hymns to distract them from asking him questions. He felt a little uneasy about how he would explain to them, once they reached Tintagel, that he had never actually been there before. He was not even sure if it was a town or a castle.

  They seemed to be approaching the sea again; he could smell the salt tang, and several times, from the top of the rise, he could see the dark waves in the distance. Then they came around a bend and he spotted, a quarter mile off the road, a hunting party and a hart at bay.

  “There are my friends at last!” he said quickly. “Maybe I will see you later at Tintagel. May God speed your way!” And he hurried toward the hunters without giving the pilgrims a chance to answer.

  Now he just had to make the hunters find him interesting enough that they would take him home with them.

  By the time he reached them, the hart had been killed, and the hounds turned toward this new person, sniffing him and rubbing against his legs. The chief huntsman was laying out the hart preparatory to cutting it up. He laid it on its stomach, with its four legs spread out to either side, like a boar.

  “Excuse me, good sirs,” piped up Tristan, “but you cannot mean to dress a hart like that!”

  The chief huntsman looked up in surprise at the strange youth. A quick assessment showed him someone very handsome, with courtly bearing and ruined finery, his hair tangled and hands scratched, but very well spoken. “How would you recommend dressing it, then?” he asked, not unkindly.

  “Do you not know how to excoriate a hart?” Tristan asked. “It is the practice of all courtly huntsmen.”

  “Excoriate?” The chief huntsman turned the strange word over on his tongue. “We usually just slice all our game into quarters, to make the pieces easier to carry. But if you learned something different, wherever you come from, please show us!”

  Tristan had never excoriated a hart by himself; the chief huntsman at Parmenie had taught him the method, but he had had plenty of assistants who knew what they were doing. But excoriation looked like his best chance to prove that he belonged in courtly company. He rolled up his sleeves, took the knife he was offered as though he had no doubts, and set to work.

  “Roll the hart onto its back,” he ordered, and when that was done he made a slit in the skin, from the muzzle down onto the belly. He then began peeling back the hide, slicing it as he flayed the four legs. This was harder work than it had looked when he watched his father’s huntsmen. He wiped a sweaty forehead with his arm and kept going.

  The huntsmen of Tintagel watched with great interest. When the hide was separated from the flesh, Tristan cut the forelimbs away and laid them to the side. He then carefully cut the breast free from the backbone but did not split it, but rather lifted it out, along with the first three ribs on each side. The hindquarters and haunch he also separated from the backbone but left attached together. By now, in spite of his rolled-up sleeves, his tunic was heavily spotted with blood.

  Last of all he cut the flanks and ribs away, leaving only the head, backbone, and entrails on top of the hide. “There!” he said in satisfaction. “That is the only proper way to break up a hart. The two forelimbs, the backlimbs and haunch entire, the breast, and the sides may each be carried home separately. I shall leave it to you to do the fourchie.”

  He was in fact quite sure that they did not know the term fourchie anymore than they knew the technique of excoriation, but he waited for them to ask.

  The chief huntsman laughed. “All right, boy, you were taught a different method than any of us know. At this point we’d let the hounds at the remains, but by all means show us this fourchie.”

  Tristan found a green forked stick, detached the liver and pizzle from the hart’s entrails, and carefully tied them to the stick. “There,” he said. “This properly honors the beast. Now,” handing it to a groom, “you can carry it back to Tintagel when you go.” To the chief huntsman he said, “I assume I shall also need to show you how to prepare the quarry for the dogs?”

  When the huntsman just laughed again, Tristan, who was now extremely tired but didn’t dare show it, ordered some of the men to cut away the head and horns and put them with the forelimbs, to remove the heart from the breast, and to cut the heart into four pieces. He laid the four pieces on the four quarters of the hide and wrenched off the backbone. “Give this to some poor person,” he said, “or otherwise dispose of it according to your own custom.” He then had the huntsmen chop up the lungs and the gut and spread them on the hide, between the four pieces of the heart. “This is the quarry, as we call it,” he said, “the reward for the hounds.”

  The hounds had been growing more and more eager for the last half hour, and when loosed they eagerly rushed forward to eat what was spread out for them. Tristan watched enviously as they ate; the pilgrim’s crust and shriveled apple had made but little dent in his hunger.

  “Is that it at last?” the chief huntsman asked. “Can we carry the pieces home now, or is there some final courtly ceremony to perform?”

  “No, that is all,” said Tristan, with a sudden fear that they merely found him amusing.

  “Come with us,” said the chief huntsman. “King Mark will want to meet you.”

  They found a horse for Tristan, loaded up the pieces of the hart, and started off. Someone offered sausage and cheese which Tristan accepted with pleasure, not caring that he ate with hands still bloody. “Where are you from, that you know all about excoriation?” the chief huntsman asked genially.

  Tristan had been thinking about his answer for the last ten minutes and getting his story ready. He did not want to mention Parmenie in case this King Mark, whoever he was, might be an enemy of his father’s, and he certainly didn’t want to confess that he had let himself be abducted and nearly sold into slavery because he was too engrossed in a chess game.

  “My father is a merchant, based in Arromanches,” he answered, that being the name of a port he knew only as a far-off place—and hoped was not near Tintagel. “In his younger days, he sailed his own ship, but he has been so successful that he now owns a whole fleet. He has traveled an
d collected rare treasures from all over the Christian and infidel worlds—though he has never engaged in slave-trading. When he settled down to raise a family, he determined to give his only son, me, the finest courtly education. And now that I am grown, I have become eager to see the world as he has. I thus set off last week, but yesterday the storm overtook the small boat in which I sailed, and I was shipwrecked on this shore.”

  There, he thought, an excellent story, one that explained his ruined finery and his knowledge of the hunt, but did not suggest that his father was the lord of any castle with whom this King Mark might be at war.

  “Did you lose many companions?” one of the huntsmen asked, concerned. “That was a violent storm indeed!”

  Tristan realized that he should have seemed much sadder and less concerned about the details of excoriation if he had been mourning friends newly drowned. “No, I was sailing by myself,” he said. “My father taught me shipcraft since before I could walk.”

  “A lad of many talents!” said the chief huntsman. “Look ahead, young man, and you will see the towers of Tintagel. You will receive a warm welcome there, for King Mark always enjoys welcoming strangers and travelers.”

  “Wait, wait!” said Tristan, suddenly remembering. “We cannot ride up to the castle with the pieces of the hart just slung over the horses. We have to do this right!”

  “And I am sure, lad, you are about to tell us the right way. Go right ahead!”

  The horses stamped and shook their bridles, eager for the stables, as Tristan got the riders, the hounds, and the excoriated hart arranged in the right order. “Let someone carry the head and horns and go first,” he ordered them, “and next someone with the breast, then, the rest of you, line up two by two. We should preserve something like the shape of the hart itself, to honor the dead beast. One rider to each hand shall carry one of the forelimbs. Next bring the flanks with the ribs. Then the hindquarters, then the hide, then the fourchie. The rest of you should ride in a double column behind, with the master huntsman last of all, and I, if it please you, riding by your side as your groom.”

  “You certainly have us all well arranged,” said the chief huntsman with another laugh. Tristan thought that it was too late to worry whether they considered him a buffoon. At least the laugh was good-natured. “Would you like to blow my horn as well?”

  That Tristan did, winding the call that hunters wound in Bretagne when coming home successfully from the hunt. The horses trotted eagerly, and the whole company rattled across the drawbridge into the great castle courtyard.

  King Mark heard the horn playing a tune he did not know, and he and his household hurried down to see the return of the hunt. While the men saw to their horses and the hounds, the chief huntsman brought Tristan to meet the king.

  “God save the king and all his household!” said Tristan with a deep bow.

  “We found a hart and also this excellent young man,” the huntsman announced. “He was shipwrecked on Cornwall’s shore. He taught us to cut the hart up by a process he calls excoriation, an improvement on simple quartering. I think I shall try it myself next time. And did you notice that we preserved the hart’s shape as we brought it to the castle?”

  Mark was less interested in the hart than in the youth before him. “By God, you remind me of somebody!” he said. “But I cannot think who. Your eyes— But tell me your name, young man!”

  Tristan also thought Mark reminded him of someone. He struck him as young for a king—maybe only fifteen years older than Tristan himself. His step was vigorous and his eyes clear, but he wore a black armband. “My name is Tristan, your majesty. Tristan of Arromanches.”

  “Tristan?” said Mark. “No, I don’t believe I ever knew anyone of that name. But it means Sadness, whereas you strike me as a merry young man.”

  “My mother died when I was born, and thus my father named me,” Tristan answered, having had this answer all ready. In fact, he had often wondered about his name, for there was as far as he knew nothing sad about his birth. But his mother Florete had just said that he would know someday.

  “This young man says his father is a merchant,” said the chief huntsman, “but I think rather a noble lord.” Tristan looked toward him, startled, but saw only good humor. “What merchant would have the time to teach his son all the things this young man knows—riding, hunting, sailing—or would dress his son so richly? And look at that cameo ring on his littlest finger: clearly a love token from some noble maiden.”

  “Your ring does seem most familiar,” said Mark, noticing it for the first time. “Indeed, I would have thought it was one I would recognize anywhere.”

  “I have had it from boyhood,” said Tristan, entirely accurately. “My father gave it to me.”

  “Well,” said Mark slowly, “rings are often bought and sold.” He fingered his own black armband. “And two cameo rings may look very similar. But it is of no matter.”

  “He is a cautious youth,” put in the chief huntsman, “wishing to be sure of us before revealing too much of himself.”

  “My name really is Tristan, your majesty!”

  “Well, whoever you may be,” said Mark, “you are welcome to Cornwall! Come sit beside me at dinner, and you can tell me how you happened to be shipwrecked.”

  Dinner. That was the best word Tristan had heard all day.

  They gave him new clothes to wear and a chamber of his own, and the next day King Mark insisted on going hunting, wanting to see for himself everything he had heard about Tristan’s excoriation of the hart. This time the chief huntsman did the bloodiest work himself, under Tristan’s direction, and those that accompanied them were quick to line up with all the pieces of the hart in the proper order.

  In the evening a minstrel came into the great hall after dinner, and all the court listened attentively, for he knew songs that none of them had ever heard before. When he played one haunting tune on his harp, without singing, Tristan commented, “That is the lay of ‘Guirun and His Paramour,’ is it not?”

  “It is,” said the minstrel in surprise, “but I did not realize anyone in Cornwall had heard it.”

  “I heard it in Bretagne,” Tristan said. “Could you sing us the words? It is very beautiful and very sad.”

  The minstrel shook his head. “I learned the melody, but I know only half the verses. It is a new lay, and I like to know the words by heart before I sing it.”

  “If you would let me borrow your harp,” said Tristan, “I can teach you the words.” The minstrel was surprised but handed him the harp. Tristan ran a hand over the strings and began. The whole court sat spellbound, listening to the very sad story of Guirun, who had loved a beautiful young woman, and how her husband had spied upon them and sworn vengeance. The husband invited Guirun to dine with him, and it was not until dinner was over that he told him that the meat dish he had found so delicious was in fact his paramour’s heart.

  “Love is the most powerful force we know,” the minstrel commented when at last the lay was over and the court sat sober, a few of the ladies even wiping away a tear. “It is a force for joy and a force for torment. God gave us love, but the devil knows how to use it for his own ends. That lay shows how even love’s sweetest moments can destroy all happiness and send the lovers to hell. You both play and sing beautifully, young man.”

  “Did your merchant father teach you that as well?” asked Mark.

  “Yes, he wanted to make sure I had every courtly accomplishment,” said Tristan gravely, ignoring the slightly bantering tone in the king’s voice, which suggested he did not entirely believe in this “merchant father.” In fact, Tristan was thinking again about his father Rual, hoping he had not been shipwrecked and wondering how he could get word to Parmenie that he was safe.

  “I would very much like to meet this merchant,” said Mark. “Stay with me here in Tintagel for now, young Tristan, and then I would like, in a month or so, to sail to the port city of Arromanches to meet him. It may not be too late for me too to see more of the w
orld.”

  III

  When the storm came up on the channel, Rual was able to outrun it, getting his ship safely back into Parmenie’s harbor. But he and Florete, along with their son Curvenal, waited out the storm in sick horror, imagining that the merchant ship that had carried Tristan away was wrecked, with all on board drowned and their bodies eaten by fish.

  When the storm cleared he set out by himself on horseback, to scour the entire coast of Bretagne, to see if he could find the remains of a shipwreck. He had not ridden so much for years, and all his bones and muscles ached, but he would not let his own discomfort get in the way of his search for Tristan.

  When he had searched for over two weeks, he began to wonder if he would have to go up to the far north, where the merchants had come from, to find Tristan there, or if he might better head for Ispania, in case they planned to sell him there. Years, he thought, might pass before he saw Tristan again—if he was even still alive, if he would even recognize him after a passage of so much time. That was when he met the pilgrims.

  They were walking south, striding along briskly with their staffs, and stepped out of the road when they saw Rual riding toward them. He pulled up his horse to speak with them.

  “God’s blessing on you, good fathers,” he said. “I know that pilgrims like yourself sometimes see things that others do not see, or are asked to do the final rites for unfortunates who are washed ashore dead. Perhaps you can help me. I am searching for a young man with honey-colored curls and grey eyes, last seen wearing a green silk brocade tunic. Have you heard of anyone matching that description washed ashore?”

  They looked at each other. “We certainly have seen no bodies washed ashore,” said one, “but that description exactly matches a young man we met two weeks ago in Cornwall.”

  “In Cornwall!” To himself Rual thought, Had God’s mercy perhaps carried Tristan to the lands of his uncle? “Tell me more about this young man,” he said cautiously.