Winter Siege (20 page)

But some of the tunnels the badgers had built into their sett were of a size to accommodate a large human child so that Maud and William, both of them slim, were able to get through them by heavy scrabbling, heading for the dim light that now showed ahead.

Maud had been expecting the tunnel to end in a grille, something that could be raised or lowered, but if there had been one it had rusted away. Instead, bedraggled and scratched, they emerged out of a hole in a hedge. From here the ground sloped downwards through a copse of rowan trees, leafless now but so thickly planted that their bare branches formed a roof hiding the approach to the postern from eyes scouring the castle walls from the surrounding Chiltern hills. The snow was trackless except for a tiny path leading from the sett behind them to where the badgers, cleanly animals, kept their privy.

William began to follow it. Maud dragged him back. ‘We’re expecting visitors, boy. Unfriendly ones. Better that our footprints don’t show them how to get into the castle.’

‘Like that one?’

She followed his gaze. To the east, where the dawn was touching the hilltops, was a rider. His outline faced the castle and was perfectly still as if he were waiting for something. As she watched, another horseman joined him, then another and another, sprouting along the horizon like equine statues.

Taking William with her, Maud pushed her way back through to the main tunnel in order to alert her castle that it was once again under siege.

THAT MORNING, AS
every morning, Gwil had woken first, prodding Penda awake with his foot. ‘Got to get up, Pen. We been summoned.’ Alan had appeared beside them only moments before to warn them that they would be needed.

The small recumbent body at Gwil’s feet groaned and opened one eye, then closed it again quickly.

The truth was that Penda had slept badly if she’d slept at all; quite apart from the alien environment she now found herself in, and yet another strange bed, there was the matter of the un accustomed, debilitating ache in her belly, a peculiar cramping which had begun during their flight from the charcoal-burner’s hut and now spread to the top of her legs, making her feel sluggish and sick.

‘Ain’t even light yet, Gwil,’ she pleaded, turning away from him to curl into the foetal position which eased the pain.

‘Tell that to Stephen’s men, then,’ Gwil said, ‘’cause I don’t reckon as they know arse from elbow when it comes to timekeeping; an’ they’re right outside. You want to ask ’em to come back when you’re ready or shall I?’

Suddenly she was wide awake, the top half of her body launching itself upright from the waist like the arm of a mangonel.

‘We under siege then, Gwil?’ she asked, her voice squeaky with excitement, the pain all but forgotten.

‘More ’n likely,’ he said. ‘An’ if so we’ll need all the archers we got so you’d best rise sharpish.’

He turned away and stood with his back to her.

He’d become more mindful of her privacy lately and sometimes, she’d noticed, it was as if it offended him to look at her. She couldn’t blame him; it offended her to look at herself nowadays; her once neat and malleable body had become increasingly cumbersome, the fleshy mounds on her chest more resistant to their swaddling now, however tightly she bound them.

She gathered her blanket around her in defiance against both Gwil’s back and the morning chill and stood up but as she did so something warm and liquid seeped down her legs.

‘Gwil!’ The panic in her voice made him turn abruptly. She saw his face fall.

‘Oh Pen.’

She followed his gaze to the wetness at her feet and saw, for the first time, the tiny rivulet of blood dripping from her ankle bone on to the floor and suddenly the banks of an old memory burst like a dam flooding her head with a maelstrom of long-forgotten images, of unholy wounds and water and men on horseback, of pain and fear and blood.

Gwil caught her before she fell and laid her gently on the palliasse. When she came to the memories had gone again and Gwil was kneeling beside her gesturing at her awkwardly with a fist full of strips of cloth.

‘Here,’ he said. ‘For the blood.’

She grabbed his arm. ‘Am I dying, Gwil?’

He smiled then and stroked her forehead. ‘Not dying, Pen. Just means as how you’re a woman now. You’ll grow accustomed to it; all women do, or so they say.’ He was trying to reassure her, hoping his features had arranged themselves into what might pass for reassurance; judging by hers – the down-turned mouth, the large, anxious eyes – they had not.

‘How do
you
know I ain’t?’ she croaked querulously, peering suspiciously over the blanket at him. ‘Dying, I mean.’

He stared back, dumbstruck. What she needed now was a woman, some kindly female who could explain the peculiar mystery of her sex to her, because he was damn sure he could not. But who? They knew no one and, besides, this morning of all mornings there wasn’t time to find one either.

‘Damn!’ he said, recoiling from her and turning away as an unwelcome memory of his own began to play itself out: of a damaged child, a savage wound and a ruined church.

‘And what do I do now, Lord, eh? Can’t pretend she’s a boy for much longer, can I?’

Protect her, Gwil, like always. You’ll think of something.

But what? How could he protect her from herself, from the burgeoning femininity that would make her vulnerable once more? His confusion was making him irritable; besides, it wouldn’t do to go soft on her now, she needed to pull herself together.

‘Get up!’ he said, his voice suddenly harsh. ‘Ain’t got time for this now.’ He turned his back, was heading for the door when another unbidden memory thumped into his head, this time of his wife curled up like a baby, pale and suffering and bemoaning the lot of a woman. He’d felt just as powerless then as now but he also felt pity infused with an overweening sense of duty.

It was God’s fault.

He had made him take the girl on, which meant that, for better or worse, he had to see her right. He took a deep breath and turned back to her.

‘Look …’ he said, struggling to find words he wasn’t sure he possessed: ‘It’s … it’s what gives you power, Pen.’ He could feel the colour rising in his cheeks. ‘It’s … it’s how you get to have a baby, see?’ Judging by her blank expression she did not. ‘It’s … oh Godandallhissaints!’ He clenched and unclenched his fists. ‘It’s how your body gets itself ready to have a baby … And, Pen …’ He paused, but it was too late to stop now. ‘Well … thing is, see … There are them’ll tell you it ain’t clean and that it’s wicked but it ain’t, Pen, it’s a blessing, a blessing in disguise … Might not feel that way now but one day you’ll come to appreciate it … or so they say.’ His voice tailed off as Penda’s bottom lip began to quiver.

‘But I don’t want a baby,’ she wailed and a slow tear rolled down her cheek.

Gwil knelt beside her. ‘Don’t talk daft,’ he said tenderly. ‘Don’t mean you’re going to have a baby
now
, just means as how you could, one day, if you wanted.’ He stood up again. ‘Now you use them cloths to stop the bleeding, replace ’em when they’re wet. And hurry up about it – we been summoned, remember!’

She did as he said, stuffing the cloths between her legs, waddling uncomfortably behind him like a newly hatched duckling as he strode towards the door. She still felt sick and her belly ached like the devil but something of what he had said resonated with her: ‘the curse of all women’, she had heard that somewhere before and somehow knew that it would be all right.

They arrived at the hall as a trumpet blew from a point high up on the battlements and suddenly the bailey swarmed with a throng of men and women chivvying to their various posts in the blue dawn light.

Maud had cleared the hall of the servants who slept in its niches by night, leaving Sir Rollo, Sir Bernard and Father Nimbus, her advisers, to discuss the matter of the siege with Alan of Ghent and Sir Christopher. They sat clustered around one end of the great table, the flames of a large candelabrum shining on worried, tired faces.

The sharp eyes of the Empress spotted Gwil and Penda as they entered and, to their surprise, she gestured to them that they should join her.

A vicious chill engulfed them all. The coverfeus that blanked all fires at night had not been removed yet. Penda started to shiver, which exacerbated the pain in her belly and, while the others leaned earnestly over the table towards one another, deep in conversation, she shrank back into her cloak, grateful for the warmth of its fox-fur lining.

Outside the hall the castle bustled with activity. Somewhere below their feet, men with axes were enlarging the secret postern to take horses and were doing it as quietly as possible among disgruntled badgers while others were filling great vats of water set at intervals round the cellars. Sapping was the danger. More than one castle wall had been brought down from having its foundation dug out by hidden miners. A shiver on the surface of the water vats would mean the enemy was digging somewhere.

After much chiding from his stepmother to be very careful, William had been allowed on to the roof to keep an eye on the enemy; he re-emerged every so often to report that its circle around the castle was thickening like a ring of scum around a bath. So far it had not attacked.

‘What are they waiting for?’ It was Maud who spoke.

‘To parley,’ Sir Christopher said. ‘Stephen won’t relish the idea of another siege this winter and who can blame him. He’ll want to negotiate a surrender.’

‘But we won’t surrender, will we?’ All eyes turned to Maud. ‘Surely we can’t.’ She looked pale, Penda thought, less sure of herself suddenly, and Penda also noticed that her hands were fidgeting in her lap as she spoke. ‘Kenniford will not be slighted. It cannot.’ It was more of a plea than a statement of fact and the tremor in her voice betrayed it.

For a while nobody spoke and then Alan broke the silence. ‘There is no question of surrender at least until the Empress is safely out of Kenniford. But the question, madam, is how well you heeded my advice when last we met and how well provisioned you are for another siege.’

Maud turned automatically to the reassuringly calm figure of Sir Bernard sitting beside her and put her hand on his arm. He cleared his throat.

‘We are well prepared, sir.’ He looked steadfastly into the mercenary’s eyes as he spoke, filling Maud with a sudden desire to throw her arms around his grizzled old neck in gratitude. Unaware of the emotion he had provoked in his young mistress Sir Bernard continued stolidly: ‘We have a hundred good men, including the fifty you garrisoned here previously. A good harvest means that stocks are plentiful and as long, God willing, as there isn’t another freeze, our water supply is sufficient.’

Alan looked surprised but nodded. ‘Good,’ was all he said.

Hah! Maud was exultant. Hadn’t expected that, had he? Damn his eyes! She sat up a little taller on her stool.

Out of the corner of his eye Alan of Ghent, who noticed a good deal more about the chatelaine of Kenniford than she realized, also noted the change in her deportment and smiled to himself, then turned to the Empress. ‘Domina. Last night two men were dispatched to Bristol. As soon as I have news of the reinforcements they will ask for we will leave here, but first you must rest.’

The Empress acknowledged him with a slight inclination of her head and stood up.

She certainly was calm, Penda thought, you had to give her that; on the other hand, though, this was probably a normal day for her; her entire life a long litany of battles and sieges won and lost; today was just one more and she had the arrogance to assume that it wouldn’t be her last.

The meeting ended to the scraping of wood on stone as they rose from their stools and benches. Just as they were about to leave the hall William and one of the guardsmen came rushing in with the news that three men from the enemy camp were approaching the castle gate.

‘They’re here! They’re here!’ he shouted.

Alan turned to Maud. ‘Are you ready for the parley, madam?’

Maud nodded curtly. ‘Indeed I am,’ she said, pushing past him towards the exit.

Once outside Gwil grabbed Penda’s arm and spoke to her for the first time since they’d left the keep. ‘You stick close to me now,’ he said, swinging her round to face him, his hands gripping her so tightly that the metal links of her hauberk bit viciously into the flesh of her arms. She winced and tried to pull away but he maintained his pressure, glaring at her with an intensity that frightened her. ‘You don’t make a move until I say so and you keep your eyes peeled. Understand?’

Penda glared at him sullenly as she fought to free her arms.

‘DO YOU UNDERSTAND?’ He was shouting now. She felt tears burning her eyes but could not raise her hands to rub them away.

‘YES!’ she shouted back, hands clenched, cheeks livid with fury. ‘I understand! Now let go of me!’

‘Good,’ he said, smiling at last. ‘That’s better.’ Then he patted her roughly on the head and turned to follow the others towards the gate.

She followed him up the steps to the ramparts, muttering under her breath as she went, cursing him, which made him smile again.

He was glad she was angry. It was what he wanted her to be. She shot better when her blood was up and, today of all days, he needed her sharp.

They reached the top and stepped out on to the allure. Through the loophole in front of her Penda saw, for the first time, the reality of war.

The emissaries of death stood in rows on the far side of the river, the sun glinting blindingly off hundreds of metal helmets: in the front line the pike men and slingers, shifting from foot to foot behind an interminable row of wooden pavises, bracing themselves against the cold and the bitter thrill of battle; behind them the archers – at a rough glance she counted close to two hundred, including around fifty arbalists – and behind
them
the knights, their bodies swaying with the movement of their horses shifting restlessly beneath them; their hooves pawing testily at the ground. And then, beyond them all, like the background of a macabre tapestry, great plumes of smoke rose into the sky from the burning village. The King’s men had not been idle that morning.