The Iron Castle (Outlaw Chronicles) (35 page)

His eyes twinkled at me and I confess I laughed out loud.

Apart from that moment of much-needed levity, I received no joy from my conversations with the men. I pondered hard about who the Sparrow might be, hour after hour, as I went about my duties on the castle walls, and at night alone in bed when sleep would not come, but I could get no further forward. The chinking of the miners distracted me by day – but another person, too, occupied my thoughts in the dark of night. Tilda.

Unless King John came soon, the castle would fall – this was certain – and I knew I did not want to leave this Earth until I had kissed her and held her in my arms, at least one time. So, as the French dug away at the thick foundations of the inner bailey, and our doom grew ever closer, I decided I must act.

I found Lady Matilda Giffard near dusk in the great hall behind the keep. She was sitting beside the hearth fire mending a rip in a knight’s chemise with great concentration, and she did not observe me approaching. For once she was alone – there was no sign of her father nor of that loathsome lardy-boy Benedict – but for a few pages and squires seated about her on stools, she might have been entirely unaccompanied. Her sharp pink tongue was poking from her mouth as she squinted at the needle and thread in the gloom of the hall. She was dressed in a black gown, nearly clean, with white lace trim, and she looked for all the world like a black-and-white cat. Looking at her white face, her pink mouth, the dark sweep of her lowered brows, the midnight wink of a loop of hair poking out below her headdress, I knew that I loved her and would always love her from the deepest part of my soul.

‘Come with me,’ I said, and it came out thick and clogged.

‘Good evening, Alan,’ she said, smiling up at me.

‘I must speak to you alone,’ I said. ‘Please put that down and come with me.’

Tilda frowned, then half-smiled and stood, leaving the half-mended chemise on the stool. She looked a little uncertain but followed me out of the hall into a tower on the north side. I said no more to her but indicated with a gesture that she should climb the spiral staircase. We went up and up, round and round, until we came to the chamber at the top. We went inside. There were two men-at-arms there: Wolves; men I liked and who liked me.

‘I will take the rest of this watch,’ I said to the men, ‘you are dismissed’, and I held the door for them to leave. With far too much grinning, nudging and winking, the two left that high lookout room, and I waited until the sound of their boots faded away as they clumped down the stairs, before I bolted the door from the inside, turned and looked at Tilda.

She looked a little nervous, her face slightly flushed, her wonderful bosom moving gently up and down with each short breath.

I stood before her and took her cool hand in mine.

‘Alan, what on earth is the matter?’ she said.

‘I love you, Matilda. I have loved you almost from the moment I saw you. You are an angel in human form and my heart will shatter into a thousand tiny pieces if you do not grant me a kiss, at the very least.’

Tilda only had time to say ‘Oh!’ before I had my hand at the back of her neck, supporting her head, and my lips gently pressed against hers.

At first touch her lips were hard, unyielding – and then, to my joy and delight, they melted under mine and her hot tongue flickered out to enter my mouth. We kissed like parched souls at a well of sweet water, my head swimming with intoxicated happiness, our bodies locked together, pressed deeply into each other. After a long time she gently pushed me away, her palm hard against my chest, and gazed sadly into my eyes. My heart sank into my boots.

She whispered, ‘Is the door locked?’

I nodded, then was rendered speechless as she grasped my head in both hands and kissed me again, harder, more urgently. Then her fingers were tugging at my belt and I was dragging her skirts up, up to her slim waist. All thoughts of honour and decency were washed away as I glimpsed the neat, dark, forbidden triangle between her milk-white thighs. The storm of love broke and howled about us. I could taste her beauty through her hot mouth: a sweet, spicy, intoxicating brew. I could clearly scent her lithe young body, roses and oysters, and her moist, pungent sex and, over the top, the odour of my own goatish urgency. We found ourselves on the floor and my body reared up between her spread white legs, my prick as hard as an oak branch. I plunged into her, a warm, slippery, driving union of our bodies and souls. I crushed her with my eager body and ploughed into her, my thrusts building in intensity and depth. She gripped the long, hard muscles of my back and called, ‘Yes, oh God, Alan, yes’, in my ear as I sank into her, withdrew and lunged again. I could feel my loins, my tight-bunched balls, seething and boiling like water in a pot, rising perilously close to the rim, as I bucked into her, again and again and again, lips mashing, fingers clawing, naked bellies slapping like some wild applause, until my seed erupted in a huge, joyous, pumping flood deep inside her.

Afterwards we kissed and held each other naked in a nest of our own sweaty clothing. For a while we were silent – and then both seemed to speak at once: of our wonder at the other and the pain of waiting so long. Of love and life, family and children. She was utterly perfect: our imaginations, our souls, matching as well as our bodies. We spoke about the siege and its likely doleful end, and I promised Tilda on my honour that I would let no harm come to her whatever might happen.

Then, to my joy, more slowly and tenderly this time, we made love once more.

It must have been near midnight when I took Tilda back to the great hall. We kissed in the darkness just outside, our bruised mouths gentle in the parting, and murmured all the usual foolishnesses of lovers. I wanted to go to her father to tell him of our union, but Tilda made me promise to keep our love a secret from the world.

‘My darling, let us enjoy this wonderful thing between ourselves for just a little while. I want you all to myself. And I do not want Daddy to be distracted when the fighting comes. Please, for my sake, let us keep this as our own special secret. Promise me you will tell no one, promise me, Alan.’

So I promised. It was a surprisingly difficult vow to keep, for I felt like shouting my love from the battlements; I wanted to stop every passing man-at-arms and tell him the good news about Tilda and myself and elicit their congratulations.

The next morning I came face to face with Sir Joscelyn Giffard in the courtyard of the inner bailey, his face a barely controlled mask of fury.

‘I have found your damn traitor,’ Sir Joscelyn said, the muscles of his face knotted with anger. ‘It seems the Sparrow is one of your own men, Sir Alan.’

I was completely wrong-footed. My thoughts had been so entirely consumed by the bright glow of his daughter that I had difficulty comprehending him.

I looked across the courtyard and saw two men-at-arms in Sir Joscelyn’s colours grasping the shoulders of a tiny, wretched figure who drooped between them.

It was Little Niels.

‘I had my men keep a close watch on the walls all last night,’ said Sir Joscelyn, ‘and in the small hours we caught this fellow, red-handed, on the north wall engaged in commerce with the French below.’

We were walking together to the trio and I saw Roger de Lacy and Robin crossing from the keep, converging on the prisoner. As I drew closer, I saw that Little Niels had been badly beaten, his cheery urchin face a mass of purpling bruises. All his fingers seemed to have been broken, too. They were crooked, misshapen and scabbed with dry blood.

‘He’s confessed, has he?’ said de Lacy.

‘Yes, my lord,’ said one of the men-at-arms. ‘He admitted this morning under our questioning that he gave information to the French in exchange for food. Several times.’

‘Right. Hang him from the walls, now.’ De Lacy started to turn away.

Little Niels gave a mewl of terror. The men-at-arms began to drag him away.

‘Wait,’ I said. ‘Wait just one moment. He is one of my own men. I am his captain. I insist on speaking to him.’

I glanced at Robin. His face was a stone.

I looked at my little comrade, his body sagging, his bruised eyes closed. All the fun in the man seemed to have drained away and all that was left was an empty shell of the happy young fellow I had known.

‘Niels, is it true? Tell me, did you do what these men say you did?’

At first I thought he would not answer me.

‘Niels,’ I said again, ‘is it true what they say?’

‘I was hungry,’ he mumbled, through bloody snapped-off teeth. ‘We are all so hungry, all the time.’ He straightened in his captors’ grip. ‘And there is some that eat like kings in secret while the men starve.’ He was glaring at de Lacy now. ‘So I told the Frenchies a few things – so what! – most of it was lies, or things they must know already.’ He looked back at me. ‘It was just a laugh, sir, I swear it; I told them a few silly things to get a little bread for me and my mates. I did no harm to our cause, sir.’

‘You admit that you had commerce with the French and gave them information about us?’ I did not want to believe it.

Little Niels said nothing for a few heartbeats. ‘I’ll never be an officer now, sir, will I?’ he said, and began to weep, the tears turning the scabs on his face to rubies.

‘Take him away,’ said de Lacy. ‘I want his corpse hanging from the outer walls as a message.’

It was mercifully quick. That is the best I can say of the affair. Father de la Motte gave him absolution for his sins and he was hurled off the battlements with a rough hempen noose around his neck. Death must have been near-instantaneous. Yet I was still sick with grief and horror. I hate a hanging at the best of times, but Little Niels had been a comrade, even if he had proven to be a treacherous one. At least, I consoled myself, as I looked down from the battlements at the small ragged corpse swinging at the end of the rope, Kit had been avenged.

The traitor had been exposed, I said to myself, and the Sparrow was dead.

In my misery I went to seek out Tilda. She and her father were in the great hall, sharing a bowl of steaming herb-water and a heel of old bread at a little before noon. Sir Joscelyn had recovered his composure after his fury at the discovery of the traitor and he went so far as to try and make me feel better about the outcome.

‘A bad business, Sir Alan. War brings out the best in some, and the worst in others. You cannot tell how any of us will be affected. You couldn’t have known what the fellow was up to – and truly no fault lies with you. We are rid of him now.’

The knight even offered me some of his meagre portion of bread, which I politely declined. I did not wish either of them to grow hungrier on my account. Tilda looked – perfect. Unwearied by our exertions the night before, clean, fresh, dewy and politely friendly. I wanted to take her into my arms and make love to her as eagerly as I had the night before – and it was on the tip of my tongue to blurt something out to her father there and then. But her steady blue-grey gaze and a tiny shake of her head stopped me from breaking my vow. I smiled at my darling and she smiled at me, and that for the time being was enough.

Then it all went wrong. That toad Benedict Malet came up and joined us. I could hardly believe his bare-faced gall. He just pulled up a stool and sat down right next to Tilda, helped himself to a corner of their bread, dipped it into their herb broth and started chewing. I glared at him – under the etiquette of the siege, one did not take another person’s food until invited, it was the height of rudeness – but to my surprise Tilda did not rebuke him. Instead, she was as cordial as if he were a member of her family, a favourite younger brother or some such. Sir Joscelyn was affable to the fellow, too. After a few moments I began to feel as if I were the interloper and, perhaps sensing my discomfort, Sir Joscelyn spoke to me about the siege and the operations of the cat.

‘You, Sir Alan, have experience of this devilish machine from your service in the outer bailey. Is there anything we can do to defeat it, or at least to slow the progress of those miners beneath our walls?’

‘Nothing we tried in the outer bailey had any effect at all,’ I said.

‘But surely we can do something,’ said Tilda.

I smiled at her fondly.

Sir Joscelyn was frowning. ‘This might be a very foolish idea, but could we not dig under the walls from our side and confront them at their workings?’

I stared at him. I felt as shocked as if a bucket of icy water had been poured over my head. This was not foolish. It was utterly inspired. I could not understand why I had not considered this before.

I left Tilda and her father with only the briefest of farewells (I ignored Benedict entirely), sprinted to the keep, leaped up the stairs to the second floor, and burst into the chamber where I found Robin in conference with de Lacy and Father de la Motte.

The men were poring over a scroll and all three stared at me in surprise, and some with more than a little hostility, as I struggled to catch my breath.

‘What is it now, Sir Alan?’ said de Lacy frostily.

‘The cat. Counter-mining,’ I panted. ‘They dig, we dig too.’

‘What is your man babbling about, Locksley?’ asked Father de la Motte, looking at Robin. ‘Does he think he has unearthed another traitor?’

‘I would guess that it has occurred to Sir Alan that we might combat the activities of the cat, and the French miners sheltered under it, by digging a tunnel under our own walls and using it as a route to attack them,’ said my lord.

‘We have already discussed that in council,’ said de Lacy. ‘And we all agreed – did we not? – that it was too dangerous. That our own mining activities might weaken the structure of the walls and achieve exactly what the enemy desired. That this counter-mining might, indeed, bring about our destruction even more swiftly.’

‘It was proposed, yes, but as I recall we did not come to a conclusion,’ said Father de la Motte. ‘Let the young fellow speak. Indeed, I doubt we could stop him.’

I had recovered myself by then. ‘My lords, pardon this unseemly intrusion, but I believe, as you say, that we should take action against the French miners by digging a counter-mine. We have a man among us who is expert in this kind of warfare – Christophe of Leuven – one of my lord of Locksley’s own men.’