Unicorn Ring - Here There Be Dragonnes Part 40

"Firstly, Summerhill, or whatever your name is-I should like to thank you on behalf of us all for the refreshments." Everyone murmured their approval.

"We have already agreed to attend to the burial of the-the lady, your mother, and to defray all costs." He cleared his throat again. "Now we come to the distribution of the a.s.sets. . . ."

"My hens," said the butcher.

"My goat," said the tailor.

"My bees," said the clerk.

"The clothes chest-"

"The hangings-"

And suddenly they were all shouting against each other, pointing at our belongings, even gesturing towards the padded quilt on which Mama lay and touching the gown she wore.

I was horrified, but as they quietened down it became obvious that everything I had thought we owned, Mama and I, belonged in some way or other to her clients. They were just loans. If I had ever thought about it at all, which I hadn't, I should have guessed that the finely carved bed, the elaborate hangings, some of the fine clothes, could not have been gifts, like the flour, meat and pulses.

Now the butcher was on his feet. He was the man I had always liked least of Mama's clients, not only because he sometimes tried to put his hands down my front.

"Comrades . . . Quiet! I know what we all have at stake here, but we cannot leave the new wh.o.r.e entirely without."

Surely they couldn't mean that I- But the mayor took over, with an uneasy glance in my direction.

"Normally, of course, we could have left all this for a day or two until everything settled down," he said. "But under the circ.u.mstances-"

"With her losing her job and all-" said the butcher.

"-we shall have to make a quick decision," continued the mayor.

My heart gave a sudden lurch of thankfulness. They hadn't been thinking of me as a replacement after all. But the mayor's next words hurt. "Normally we might have offered young Summer-Solstice here the job, as her mother's daughter, but under the circ.u.mstances I don't believe she would attract the same sort of custom. . . ."

"Oh, come on!" said the miller, always ready with a kind word. "She's not that bad! A nice smile, all her teeth, small hands and feet, a fine head of hair . . ."

Even he couldn't think of anything else.

"Mama wished me to become a wife, not a wh.o.r.e," I said stiffly. Wh.o.r.es were special, but wives came in all shapes and sizes, so I had a better chance as the latter, especially with my learning and dowry-come to that, where was it?

Mama had never said. And when I found the coins, how did I set about finding this elusive husband I had been promised? With winter coming on, it would be better to leave it until New Year. If what they had said about the furniture going to the next wh.o.r.e was true, the cottage would seem very bare. I had a few coins left of Mama's, and perhaps if they let me keep a couple of the hens and I could persuade the carpenter to knock me up a truckle bed, I could manage with what was laid aside. But I should have to buy some salted pork- " . . . so, if it is convenient, shall we say noon tomorrow?" asked the mayor.

"Although your brothers are not here now, they will attend the interment in the morning, and your eldest brother let it be known his wife would not be averse to the dresses. . . ."

I had lost something in his speechifying, but that pinched-nosed sister-in-law of mine was not going to wear my mother's dresses, and I told him so.

"Why not? They're of no use to you. Your ma was tall and thin."

"I still would not like to see another in her dresses-"

"Nonsense! Why waste them? The new wh.o.r.e, Agnes-from-the-Inn, would fit into them nicely, too. No point in wasting them."

So that sandy-haired, big-bosomed wench was to be the next village wh.o.r.e!

"No," I said.

"As she's getting everything else," said the butcher, "including this cottage, why not chuck the dresses in as well? Not yours to dispose of, anyway."

"This place? But it's ours-mine, surely?"

The mayor shook his head. "Goes with the job. So, as I said a moment or two back, I can expect you out by midday tomorrow?"

"I can't! I've nowhere to go!" This just couldn't be happening. All in one day to lose my mother, the shreds of my father's reputation and also find I possessed a ridiculous name, then to be turned out into an unknown world with nothing to my name and nowhere to go- I burst into tears; angry, snuffly, hurt, uncontrollable, ugly tears. Now Mama had always taught me that tears were a woman's finest weapon. She had also tried to teach me how to weep gently and affectingly, without reddening the eyes or s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up the face, but all my tears produced were embarra.s.sment, red faces and a rush for the door, just as if I had been found with plague spots.

"Back at dawn," called out the mayor. "We'll bring a hurdle for the body. . . ."

The priest was the last to leave. "Not even one coin for the Ma.s.ses?" I shook my head.

I heard their footsteps retreating, then one set returning. The miller poked his head round the door.

"Just wanted to say-will miss your Ma. She was a lady. Sorry I can't take you in like your brother, but the wife wouldn't stand for it." He turned to go, then stopped. "Thought you might like to know; years after your dad-died- someone else confessed to planting those stolen goods. Said he was jealous.

Dead and gone, now . . . Hey there: no more tears! Could never abide to see a la.s.s cry. Here, there's a couple of coins for your journey. And don't worry, you'll do fine. I'll see the grave's kept nice," He sidled out through the door.

"Sorry I can't do more, but you know how it is. . . ."

"Yes," I said. "I know how it is. . . ."

Alone, I sank to my knees beside the dying fire, my mind a muddle. Shock and grief had filled my mind to such an extent I was incapable of thinking clearly.

All I wanted was for Mama to be back to tell me what to do, for I felt an itching between my shoulder blades that told me I had forgotten something, and could not rest till it was seen to.

A log crashed in the hearth and I started up. Mustn't let the fire die down, tonight of all nights-But why? Of course: tonight was All Hallows' Eve, the eve of Samhain. Tonight was the night when the unshriven dead rode the skies with the witches and warlocks and the Court of Faery roamed the earth.

. . . Tonight was the night that, every year, Mama and I closed and locked the shutters and doors early, stoked up the fire and roasted chestnuts and melted cheese over toasted bread, thumbing our noses at those spirits who moaned and cursed outside, wanting to take our places and live again. But it was the fire that kept them away, so Mama said, that and the songs we sang: "There is a time for everything," or "After Winter cometh Spring," and "Curst be all who ride abroad this night."

I rushed outside and brought in all the wood I could gather. Why bother to save any for the new wh.o.r.e? Let her seek her own. And she had no daughter to fetch and carry as Mama had done: they would soon be sick of her. I even emptied the lean-to of our emergency supply, running back and forth under an uneasy moon, till the room was overflowing with f.a.ggots and logs. Tonight we would have the biggest blaze ever, Mama and I.

By the time I had finished I was quite light-headed, even addressing the still figure on the bed. "There you are, Mama! Enough to set the chimney alight!"

"And everything else . . ." came a voice in my head. "Everything must go with me. . . . Nothing left."

Was that what she wanted? Everything burned? But wasn't that what her people, the Travelers, did? Hadn't she told me once that when a chief died his van was piled with his belongings, his dogs and horses were sacrificed and all consumed in a great pyre? Then if that was what she wanted, that was what she should have.

I approached the bed again. "You shall have a bonfire fit for a queen," I told the silent figure. "They shall not have your bed, your dresses, your chair; I promise."

"Open . . . Fly . . ."

I frowned; what did that little voice mean: Fly? What was to fly? There was a moth doing a crazy dance round one of the guttering candles and I moved my hand to bat it away, upon which it swerved over my head and made for the shuttered window, beating frantically against the wood. Then I understood.

"Sorry, Mama . . ."

Ceremoniously I flung back the shutters onto the night, then wedged open the door. Coming back to the bed I blew out the candles, one by one, then knelt to pray. I prayed for a safe journey for my mother's soul, reminding G.o.d that her sins were all absolved. Then I leaned over for the last time and kissed her brow.

"All ready, Mama. Go with G.o.d." As I did so it seemed a little breeze stirred the hangings, and I distinctly felt a rap on my head-the sort Mama used to make with her knuckles when I had completed a task after a reminder. A moment later the door crashed shut. She had gone.

I refastened door and window, then bethought myself of my own arrangements. If I were to be away from here before they discovered what I had done, then I must pack up all I needed for my journey quickly. Clothes, food, utensils, blanket, money . . . Money. Where had Mama put my dowry?

Frantically I searched all the places it could be and came up with nothing. It must be somewhere; Mama wouldn't have made it up. I wished it was light again, for the cottage was full of shadows and every corner looked like a potential hiding place. I must find it, I must! I couldn't face the wide world with the few coins left in Mama's box and the couple the miller had left me.

Opening Mama's box, however, discovered her bracelets, necklet and brooches, and the horn ring my father had left behind. I took them over to the bed, fastened the brooch and necklet, and then tried to force the ring onto her fingers, one after the other, but it wouldn't go: her fingers were too fat.

Strange, she had long, slim fingers. I put on the bracelets, deciding I would take the ring with me, wearing it on a string round my neck. It might bring me luck, I thought, and without thinking slipped it onto the middle finger of my right hand, while I bent forward to adjust the bracelets on Mama's wrists to their best advantage.

As I placed her hands once more crossed upon her breast, I noticed something strange; although I was certain I had washed her thoroughly there was what looked like a sooty residue caught under the fingernails of her right hand-All at once I knew where the dowry would be. Rushing over to the fireplace I felt high up in the chimney, first to one side, then the other. At first all I got were scorched fingers and a fall of soot, but at last on the left-hand side my scrabblings found a ledge, and on the ledge a bag of sorts, which I s.n.a.t.c.hed out to drop on the floor with a clink and c.h.i.n.k of coin.

I fell to my knees on the hearth and gazed with excitement at the pile of coins that had burst from the split leather pouch that had contained them. I had never seen so much money in my life! And all the coins looked like either silver or gold. . . . All in all, a fortune. Hastily wiping my sooty fingers I began to examine them, one by one. All but two were strange to me, the inscriptions and symbols utterly alien. A sc.r.a.p of singed paper fluttered to the floor. It was so brittle with age and heat it crumbled to pieces in my fingers even as I read it: "Thomas Fletcher, Mercernairy, his monnaies." There followed a list I could not follow, then "Ayti coyns in all."

So my father had been named, and could write, after a fashion! That surely was where I had got my learning skills. But eighty coins? There were less than half, surely, for even with the confirmation of my tally sticks there were forty- seven missing. I glanced over to the bed where my mother lay in all her finery, extra dresses and shifts spread around her, and my eyes filled with tears, remembering the silver coins and a couple of gold that had purchased them.

At the time I had wondered where they had come from, and now I knew. But how was I to know that my father hadn't wished it so? After all, she had been his beloved, and I shouldn't grudge a single coin. Before me lay enough still for a fair dowry, even if the coins would have to be weighed for their metal content only, as they were foreign. But there were still a couple of our own coinage: I could manage for a while on those.

Before my eyes the piece of paper crumbled into ash, the pouch also, as if they had been just waiting for me to find them and were now dead like my mother.

Carefully I packed the coins inside my waistband purse, determined as soon as possible to make them a separate hiding place.

As I tucked them away I noticed for the first time the ring upon my finger. I couldn't remember putting it there, and absent-mindedly tried to pull it off to tie round my neck, as I had originally intended. But it wouldn't come. There it was, settled snug on my finger as if it was part of the very skin. . . . Suddenly I tingled all over and everything became brighter and sharper, as if a veil had been pulled away.

As if a stranger I saw all the cracks in the wall, the shabbiness of the room; I heard the crackle of the fire, the creak of furniture as if it were talking to me; for the first time smelled the sweetish-sickly odor of decay coming from the bed so strongly I had to pinch my nostrils and swallow hard. There was a taste of soot and ashes in my mouth where I had licked my fingers and the hearth beneath my hands was rough with grit and dust.

But there was something else as well. Not exactly hope, that was too strong a word, but a sort of energy I had not known I possessed. Something enforced the knowledge that I was alone for the first time in my life, but also that I would manage somehow or other, that I wasn't a complete idiot, that life held more than I had expected.

I rose to my feet. There were things to be done and, as my inside time clock told it was near midnight, the sooner the better. Outside, when I went to check that the goat and chickens would be safe, the moon was riding clear of cloud, the stars were bright and a crispness to the air confirmed frost.

I loaded up the sledge I used for wood with what I thought necessary, did a last check, then piled wood around the bed, sprinkling it with oil the better to burn. I opened the shutters for a draught and left the door open. That done I made a last check, then gazed around the cottage that had been my home, expecting nostalgia.

Nothing. Nothing at all.

It was just a place that two people had lived in, an empty sh.e.l.l with now no personality left. A room, nothing more, as empty of life as the still figure on the bed, the living and memory seeping from it as surely as the body became cold in death. No, there was nothing for me here now.

"Goodbye, Mama," I said, and threw a lighted brand from the fire towards the bed.

Part 2: Summer's Journey

Chapter Five.

Someone had opened both shutters and door, and pulled back the bed clothes; the light was shining in my eyes and I was freezing- I came to with a start. I was in a forest, so had I fallen asleep while collecting wood? Realization came as bitter as the early morning taste in my mouth, as I struggled out of the blanket I had wrapped myself in.

I was in the woods somewhere between the village and the High Road, I was alone, and I was hungry and needed to relieve myself. First things first, and as I squatted down I glanced around the little dell in which I had hidden myself the night before. Last night's frost still silvered the gra.s.ses and ferns, but the rising sun promised a warm day. Already a cloud of midges danced above my head and a breeze stirred the almost leafless trees. A pouch-cheeked squirrel darted across the glade ahead, and I could hear the warning c.h.i.n.k of a blackbird as I scrambled to my feet. Otherwise everything was quiet, except for the tinkle of a stream away to my right.

So, I hadn't been followed. So far . . .

I cringed when I remembered my escape of the night before. Once I had been sure the cottage was blazing merrily, the flames lighting up the night sky until I feared the conflagration would be spotted in the village, I had set off down the path, dragging the loaded wood sledge behind me. Sighting the way had been easy, with the fire behind and the moon above, so I had not needed my lantern. But where had my caution, my fear of the night, gone? As I remembered it I had strode through the village as if it were a midsummer day, singing some crazy song I couldn't now remember, almost asking those within doors to come out and discover the suddenly-gone-mad girl who had made the cottage a funeral pyre for both her mama and all those goods that now belonged to someone else, and who was now disregarding the terror of All Hallows' night and marching down the road with the demons at her heels and the witches swooping around her head.

But no one had appeared. Doors remained bolted and barred, shutters firmly closed. Those who had heard my wild pa.s.sage had probably hid beneath the bedclothes, crossed themselves and been convinced that at last all their fears walked abroad in ghastly form and that to look on such would s.n.a.t.c.h what little wits they had away forever. And in the morning, when they saw what remained of the cottage, with luck they might think it had all been a ghastly accident, and that I had been immolated with Mama. Of course, once the embers had cooled down and they could rake through the ashes they would probably realize what I had done and make some sort of search for me-but by that time I hoped to be well away beyond their reach.

My stomach gave a great growling lurch, reminding me it had had nothing since I couldn't remember when. I didn't remember eating a thing last night, so those cheese pasties must have been the last thing to comfort it. I scrabbled among the wreck of my belongings on the sledge-it had tipped over twice last night and scattered everything-and at last found twice-baked bread, cheese and a slice of cold bacon. Washing it down with water from my flask, I refilled the same from the stream nearby, determined next to sort out the things I had brought. But I was still hungry. I couldn't think straight without something else in my stomach. After all, to someone who was used to breaking her fast with gruel, goat's milk, bread and cheese, ham, an egg or two and honey cakes, this morning's sc.r.a.ps were more of an aggravation than a satisfaction.

Searching among the debris I found a heap of honey cakes I had forgotten about. I gobbled down one, two, three. . . . That was enough; I should have to go easy. I couldn't be sure when I would come upon the next village. Well, perhaps just one more: that would leave an even number-easier to count.

Feeling much better, the stiffness of the night nearly gone, I spread out my belongings on the gra.s.s. The sledge looked the worse for wear; too late I remembered it was due to be renewed as soon as possible: the carpenter had promised to make new runners. I should just have to hope it would carry my belongings as far as the High Road, then I would have to think again. Even now, there must be at least something I could leave behind to lighten the load.

An axe for chopping wood: I couldn't do without that. Tinder, flint and kindling, also necessary. Lantern, candles, couldn't do without those either.

The smallest cooking pot, with a lid that would double as a griddle, a ladle, large knife and small one, spoon, two bowls and a mug. Essentials. Water flask, small jug, blanket, rope, couldn't do without those, either.

Clothes? I was wearing as much as I could, but surely I still needed the two spare shifts, ditto drawers and stockings? My father's comfortable green cloak, pattens for the wet, clothes for my monthly flow, comb, needles, thread and strips of leather for mending clothes and shoes. Packets of dried herbs and spices, seeds for planting when I finally reached my destination-onion, garlic, chive, rosemary, dill, bay, thyme, sage, turnip, marjoram-and a small pestle and mortar.

Which brought me to the food. A small sack of flour-bread to eat if nothing else-a crock of salt, bottle of oil, pot of honey, jar of fat, pack of oats. And for ready consumption two cheeses, a hunk of bacon, two slices of smoked ham, some dried fish, two loaves and twelve honey cakes.

Which left my writing materials, tally sticks and the Boke. Those came with me if nothing else did.

I surveyed the articles laid out on the gra.s.s with dismay. There was nothing, absolutely nothing, I could leave behind. Somehow or other I would have to pack them better, and trust the sledge would at least get me as far as the High Road. Then perhaps I could find a lift, or could repair the runners well enough to get me to a village.

The sun was already clear of the trees: I had better get moving. Setting to work I found the packing much easier and the result neater and better balanced, especially when I utilized one of the double panniers I had also dragged along for the eatables, salt and flour, and I reckoned I should get along much faster now.

Perhaps the pannier would be better balanced if I distributed the food more evenly: it must be ten o'clock, and I should travel better with a nibble of something in my stomach. That bread was already stale, so if I ate a crust and a slice of cheese-or two . . .

"Proper little piggy, ain't you?" said a voice.

I whirled around on my knees, sure I had been discovered. But there was no one in sight, the forest was in the same state of suspended alert and there was no sound of footsteps. I decided I must be light-headed and had imagined it. I took another bite of cheese, and- "Some of us ain't eaten for two days," said the same voice. "Chuck us a bit of rind, and I'll go away. . . ."

Dear G.o.d! It must be one of the Little People, of which I had heard from Mama. I crossed myself hastily. What had she said about Them? Mischievous, usually only out at night, not to be crossed lightly. With shaking fingers I cut a piece of rind and threw it as far as I could, then hid my eyes, remembering that They don't like to be looked at either.

"Mmm, not bad at all," said the voice again. A very uneducated voice, I thought, then wondered if They could read minds. "How's about a bite of crust, while we're at it?"

Obediently I threw the crust, and this time there were distinct crunching noises, then silence. I decided I could risk a peep. Surely It had gone. . . .

At first I thought It was an Imp, a black Imp, then I saw that Whatever-it-was had taken the form of a dog. At least I think it was meant to be a dog. I shut my eyes again.

"Gam! I ain't that bad-lookin', surely?"

"Of course not," I said, still with my eyes shut tight. Heaven knows what would happen if I looked at it straight in the eye. "If-if there is nothing else, may I please go my way?"

"I ain't stoppin' you," said the Thing. "Though I thought as how you might like a bit of company, like."