Winter Siege (30 page)

All around she could hear the cries of men either wounded or dying as the Kenniford casualty toll rose. She herself had only narrowly avoided being hit when, having turned briefly away from her loophole, an enemy bolt came whistling through with such force that it embedded itself in the stone wall behind her.

‘I’ll get it for you, Penda.’ A child’s fluting voice, incongruous in the brutal noise of battle, wafted through to her.

It couldn’t be! Surely it couldn’t be!

She spun around but saw nothing, comforting herself that she had just imagined it; after all, fear and panic did strange things up here. Perhaps it was her memory stirring again? But it came again; only this time, when she turned round she saw him.

He was standing with his back to her, his small feet set firm and wide, his arms reaching high above his head as he struggled to tug the bolt which had so nearly killed her out of the wall.

William!

‘Get down, you idiot!’ she screamed, terrified by the storm of arrows whistling through the air around him. He was going to be killed and it would be all her fault. It was
she
who had encouraged him yesterday when she should have summarily booted him back down to safety; it was
her
pride, the very thing Gwil had warned her about, succumbing to the flattery of a child that had put his life in danger. My God! she had even praised him for his bravery and thanked him for collecting arrows for her; and now she would be punished for her sin with his blood on her hands.

‘GET DOWN, WILLIAM!’ another voice screamed in unison with hers and Penda watched as another woman rushed towards the child.

He had freed the bolt now and turned triumphantly towards her, grinning with delight, innocent of the chaos and panic around him as he held it aloft.

‘GET DOWN! GET DOWN!’

But he seemed not to hear.

Maud reached him almost before Penda had a chance to move. She grabbed him, clutching him to her, weeping into his neck and scolding him bitterly with relief that he was safely in her arms. She too was oblivious to everything except the boy for whom she was prepared to risk her life.

Another arrow shot past them, perilously close this time, shocking Penda into action; dropping her bow to the ground, she rushed out from behind the safety of the merlon towards the woman and child. Whatever the risk to herself, she must get them out of the line of fire and down into the bailey as quickly as possible.

Spreading her arms wide, she reached around the two crouching figures, mantling them in her cloak to shield them as best she could from the raging storm of arrows while she forced them back towards the stairs and safety.

‘GO BACK NOW, GO BACK,’ she repeated over and over again as they stumbled in a ragged phalanx towards the stairwell.

When, at last, they reached it she pushed them through the gap in the wall and watched, as if her gaze alone could provide sanctuary, as they stumbled down the steps. Only when they were safely beyond arrows’ reach did she allow herself to breathe again.

They were down. Thank God!

She stood up, settled her mantle straight across her breast, and prepared to return to the loophole when she felt something strike her just below her right shoulder.

At first she thought she had been punched and, shocked at the audacity of the assault, wheeled round, fists clenched ready to confront whoever it was, to hit back if necessary; but there was nobody there.

She shrugged and carried on walking towards the merlon, until suddenly her legs were too heavy to move and she stumbled as the pain in her back, little more than a dull ache at first, grew in intensity, surging through the right side of her body like a branding iron. She staggered towards the nearest wall, struggling to breathe, and then her knees betrayed her and she collapsed.

Maud reached her before she lost consciousness completely.

Having delivered William safely into the arms of Milburga, she turned around to look back up at the strange red-headed boy who had just risked his life for theirs. He was still standing on the battlements watching over them, oblivious to the danger behind him and therefore unable to see, as Maud could, the arrow which came winging its way over the castle wall to bury itself in his back. The moment she saw him fall, Maud picked up her skirts and raced back up the steps to the allure.

When she reached him he was lying face down, arms by his sides, eyes open but unseeing. Maud knelt down beside him and put her ear to his lips. He was still breathing, but only just, and judging by the crimson tide creeping over the stone beside him, the blood loss was already considerable.

Think, think!
She reached out tentatively, hands shaking, to the arrow protruding from his back; it had to come out, she knew that much, but to remove it would cause yet more bleeding and she dared not, could not, touch it; to inflict more pain and damage was somehow repulsive. She needed Milburga; she needed Father Nimbus. She raised her face to the heavens.
Oh help me, Mary, Mother of God!
But there was no time to invoke anybody’s help because when she looked back at the stricken creature, she saw that his eyes were closing and his breathing was becoming shallow. He was dying and she could only kneel beside him and watch.

The castle shook again, rocking her sideways, as another huge boulder ricocheted off the wall. She had to get him out of here.
Have to do something!
So, scrambling to her feet, she ran to the stairwell to scream for help.

IT WAS GWIL
who came.

Despite the ferocity of the fighting and his new responsibilities, he had managed to keep half an eye on Penda all day and wherever he was, whatever he was doing, would glance across every so often to check on her. When he saw Maud waving so desperately on the allure on the opposite side of the castle close to Penda’s position, his instinct was to drop everything and run.

As he rushed towards her, darting through the crowds in the bailey, weaving his way around the archers on the ramparts, he hoped against hope that his instinct was wrong and that the casualty, if there was one, was not her. But as he reached the small, still body lying on the ground his hopes were dashed.

Between them, they lifted her up and carried her down the steps through the bailey to the keep.

The journey seemed to take an age. It felt as if the very ground was conspiring against him, as he jostled his way through the crowds, carrying the unconscious Penda. Maud ran in front, screaming at anyone who stood in their way, pushing and shoving when necessary to clear their path.

When they eventually reached the solar, Milburga and Father Nimbus were summoned: Father Nimbus queasy at the sight of so much blood and suffering; Milburga bristling with efficiency.

‘What you all standing around for? That there needs to come out,’ she said, pointing at the arrow shaft protruding from Penda’s back. ‘No good lookin’ at it. Ain’t going to pull itself, is it?’ In times of crisis, as Maud knew only too well, Milburga’s default position was one of supreme bossiness.

‘But which way?’ The very idea of removing the arrow was appalling; any decision taken now would be crucial to the boy’s survival.

‘We’ll see.’ Milburga frowned as she peeled back the blood-sodden outer clothing from the wound. ‘Can’t see no barbs,’ she said, turning her head this way and that as she examined it. ‘But likely it’s too deep. Pull it backwards an’ it’ll rip more flesh and he’ll bleed out.’ She stopped the examination for a moment to wipe her bloodied fingers on a cloth, then sighed, stood up straight and, with an emphatic nod of her head, said: ‘I say for’ards.’

The decision was made.

Father Nimbus quailed and turned a peculiar shade of green; then stumbled towards the bed, laid a trembling hand on the mattress to steady himself and, for want of anything more constructive to do, began unpacking his chrismatory box.

Milburga stamped her foot. ‘Put that away, Girly, you old fool. He ain’t dead yet!’ And then spinning around to the rest of the room, hands on her hips, glaring at them fiercely, demanded: ‘Now is you lot just going to stand there flapping, or you going to help me? You!’ she said, pointing at Gwil. ‘Sit ’im upright, won’t lose so much blood that way.’ And to Maud: ‘Send to the kitchen. We’ll be needing a jug of wine, some yarrow leaves and some comfrey. And don’t be long about it neither.’

As Gwil lifted Penda into his arms she whimpered and half opened her eyes and he felt the warmth of her blood oozing in sticky rivulets over his hands.

‘I’m sorry, Pen, I’m so sorry,’ he murmured as her head flopped on to his shoulder and her eyes fluttered closed; the only sign that she was still alive was the shallow rise and fall of her chest against his. ‘Stay with me, Pen, stay with me,’ he pleaded. ‘Don’t go dying on me now. Not now.’

He dared not look at her, but stared fixedly instead beyond her, through the window, as though the injured girl in his arms was merely sleeping.

As a professional soldier he had seen arrows pulled from bodies many times before with varying degrees of success. His only comfort now, the fact he would cling to desperately, was that she had not been hit by a crossbow bolt, which would have driven deeper and would almost certainly have been fatal.

Milburga and Father Nimbus heard him muttering under his breath and assumed he was praying; in actual fact he was berating God.

‘Ain’t she suffered enough, Lord? How much more You going to heap on her? How much more, eh?’

But God was in a contrary mood.
Did I loose that arrow, Gwil? Did I rape her? That was man’s work, surely. So, my answer to you is itself a question: How much more will you heap on yourselves?

In other circumstances he might have wept but desperation dried his tears; besides, Penda needed all his strength undiluted by any self-pity.

Maud returned from the kitchen breathless, having run there and back, and handed Milburga the supplies she had asked for.

‘We need to strip ’im, get ’im clean afore I do anything,’ Milburga said and before Gwil had time to consider the impli cations of removing Penda’s clothes they had lifted her out of his arms, stripped off her hauberk and peeled back the blood-soaked chemise and bandages which bound her breasts.

‘God and all His saints!’ Maud said, stumbling backwards as Penda’s body was revealed.

‘Well, bugger me!’ Milburga put her hand to her mouth.

‘Oh my goodness!’ said Father Nimbus. ‘That poor child!’

Then three pairs of eyes swivelled on Gwil.

‘So she’s a girl!’ he spat defiantly. ‘Still dying, ain’t she? In God’s name, help her!’

Milburga was the first to pull herself together and, with a shake of her head, began to tend the semi-naked body now lying face down on the bed. ‘This might hurt a bit, my lovely,’ she said tenderly. ‘But, forgive me, I got to do it.’

Penda lost consciousness completely at the first pressure from Milburga’s hand; and appeared to feel nothing as the arrow gnawed its way through flesh and sinew, scraping bone and piercing muscle, until, finally, its bloody head emerged through the skin just above her right breast.

When it was done Milburga cleaned the wound with a cloth soaked in wine and dressed it with yarrow leaves and comfrey while Father Nimbus poured some more wine on to a clean cloth and pressed it to Penda’s lips. All the time Gwil stroked her hair and cheek softly, willing her to survive.

He wanted to stay with her, as if by sheer proximity to him she might absorb his strength, but Milburga had other ideas.

‘You get on now, Sir Gwilherm,’ she said. ‘You got other responsibilities now. This here’s women’s work.’

She was right and he knew it. He rose reluctantly, took one last look at the insentient patient and left the room.

When he had gone, Milburga, Maud and Father Nimbus stood around the bed staring in amazement at the creature lying on it. Now that the arrow had been removed they had time to consider the implications of what they had just witnessed.

‘So he’s a girl.’ Father Nimbus shook his head. ‘Who would have thought it?’

‘Might make no difference what it is,’ said Milburga, ‘if it don’t live. A corpse is a corpse.’ She looked at Maud, who was still white with shock. ‘You’m quiet, my lady! Cat got your tongue?’

Maud was, indeed, dumbfounded and wrestling with her conscience for an appropriate reaction. The confusion of it all was making her head ache.

At one point, and only moments ago it seemed, she had felt gratitude to the peculiar red-headed boy whom she had never liked terribly but who, nevertheless, had risked his life for hers and William’s. Indeed, in that moment on the allure she had acknowledged an enormous debt to him; but now that this same boy had been unmasked as a girl with all the duplicity and unnaturalness such a revelation entailed, she was overcome by feelings of revulsion and anger. And yet, and yet, she was still in his or, damn it,
her
debt, and
still
grateful; yet the disorderliness of it all was appalling, especially to one who admired order above all things. What she wanted most was to close the curtains around the bed, hide the pathetic abomination lying on it from view and forget about it. She couldn’t, of course; so instead she turned away and started pacing the room; she had always done her best thinking on the move.

‘What do you suppose we do now?’ she said eventually, her feet crunching rhythmically over the rushes.

‘Pray that she recovers, of course,’ said Father Nimbus. His conversation with Gwil that night in the chapel, never far from his thoughts, was foremost now. ‘I have a feeling that this child’s physical injuries are perhaps the least of her suffering,’ he added.

Maud stopped pacing and glared at him. What did he know about her suffering? Did everybody keep secrets from her these days? ‘What on earth do you mean?’ she snapped.

‘Judge not, that you be not judged,’ Father Nimbus said vaguely, aware that he had gone too far and was in danger of revealing too much.

‘Well said, Girly!’ Milburga nodded approvingly. ‘After all, can’t blame ’er, travelling the length and breadth of the country like her and Gwil did. No female safe? Course she dressed as a boy. Who wouldn’t?’