Scarlet Read online

  He spun me around some more, and then Siarles spun me the other way for good measure. “Mind your step,” said Siarles, his mouth close to my ear. “Keep your head low, or you’ll get a knock.” He pressed my head down until I was bent double, and then led me through a gap between two trees and, almost immediately, down a steep incline.

  “Cél Craidd,” said Iwan. “I pray it goes well with you here.”

  “You better pray so, too,” added Siarles in tone far less friendly. He had taken against me, I don’t know why—maybe it was that jibe about his name. Or maybe it was the cut of my cloth, but whatever it was, he gave me to know that he held me of small regard. “Play us false, and it will be the last place you ever see.”

  “Now, now,” I replied, “no need to be nasty. I’ve sworn to abide, and abide I will, come what may.”

  Siarles untied the binding cloth, and I opened my eyes on the strangest place I have ever seen: a village made of skins and bones, branches and stones. There were low hovels roofed with ferns and moss, and others properly thatched with rushes; some had wattle-and-daub walls, and some were made of woven willow withies so that the hut seemed to have been knitted whole out of twigs, and the chinks stuffed with dried grass, giving the place an odd, fuzzy appearance as if it wore a pelt in moulting. If a few of the hovels in the centre of the settlement were larger and constructed of more substantial stuff—split timber and the like—they also had roofs of grassy turf, and wore antlers or skull bones of deer or oxen at the corners and above their hide-covered doorways, which gave them the look of something grown up out of the forest floor.

  If a tribe of Greenmen had bodged together a settlement out of bark and brake and cast-off woodland ruck, it would look exactly like this, I thought. Indeed, it was a fit roost for King Raven—just the sort of place the Lord of the Forest might choose.

  Nested in a shallow bowl of a glade snugged about by the stout timbers of oak and lime and ash and elm, Cél Craidd was not only protected, but well hidden. The circling arm of the ridge formed a wall of sorts on three sides which rose above the low huts. A fella would have to be standing on the ridgetop and looking down into the bowl of the glade to see it. But this concealment came at a price, and the people there were paying the toll with their lives.

  Our arrival was noticed by a few of the small fry, who ran to fetch a welcome party. They were—beneath the soot and dirt and ragged clothes—ordinary children, and not the offspring of a Greenwife. They skittered away with the swift grace of creatures birthed and brought up in the wildwood. Chirping and whooping, they flew to an antler-decked hut in the centre of the settlement, and pounded on the doorpost. In a few moments, there emerged what is possibly the ugliest old woman I ever set eyes to. Mother Mary, but she was a sight, with her skin wrinkled like a dried plum and blackened by years of sitting in the smoke of a cooking fire, and a wiry, wayward grizzled fringe of dark hair—dark where it should have been bleached white by age, she was that old. She hobbled up to look me over, and though her step might have been shambling there was nothing wrong with the eyes in her head. People talk of eyes that pierce flesh and bone for brightness, and I always thought it mere fancy. Not so! She looked me over, and I felt my skin flayed back and my soul laid bare before a gaze keen as a fresh-stropped razor.

  “This is Angharad, Banfáith of Britain,” Iwan declared, pride swelling his voice.

  At this the old woman bent her head. “I give thee good greeting, friend. Peace and joy be thine this day,” she said in a voice that creaked like a dry bellows. “May thy sojourn here well become thee.”

  She spoke in an old-fashioned way that, oddly enough, suited her so well I soon forgot to remark on it at all.

  “Peace, Banfáith,” I replied. I’d heard and seen my mother’s folk greeting the old ones from time to time, using a gesture of respect. This I did for her, touching the back of my hand to my forehead and hoping the sight of an ungainly half-Saxon offering this honour would not offend overmuch.

  I was rewarded with a broad and cheerful smile that creased her wrinkled face anew, albeit pleasantly enough. “You have the learning, I ween,” she said. “How came you by it?”

  “My blesséd mother taught her son the manners of the Cymry,” I replied. “Though it is seldom enough I’ve had the chance to employ them these last many years. I fear my plough has grown rusty from neglect.”

  She chuckled at this. “Then we will burnish it up bright as new soon enough,” she said. Turning to Iwan, she said, “How came you to find him?”

  “He dropped out of a tree not ten steps from us,” he answered. “Fell onto the road like an overgrown apple.”

  “Did he now?” she wondered. To me, she said, “Pray, why would you be hiding in the branches?”

  “I saw the sign of a wolf on the road the night before and thought better to sleep with the birds.”

  “Prudent,” she allowed. “Know you the wolves?”

  “Enough to know it is best to stay out of reach of those long-legged rascals.”

  “He says he is searching for our Bran,” put in Siarles. Impatient, he did not care to wait for the pleasant talk to come round to its destination as is the way with the Cymry. “He says he wants to offer his services.”

  “Does he now?” said Angharad. “Well, then, summon our lord and let us see how this cast falls out.”

  Siarles hurried away to one of the larger huts in the centre of the holding. By this time, the children had been spreading the word that a stranger had come, and folk were starting to gather. They were not, I observed, an altogether comely group: thin, frayed and worn, smudged around the edges as might be expected of people eking out a precarious life in deep forest. Few had shoes, and none had clothes that were not patched and patched again. At least two fellas in the crowd had lost a hand to Norman justice; one had lost his eyes.

  A more hungry, haunted lot I never saw, nor hope to see—like the beggars that clot the doorways of the churches in the towns. But where beggars are hopeless in their desperation, these folk exuded the grim defiance of a people who exist on determination alone. And all of them had the look I’d already noticed on the young ones: an aspect of wary, almost skittish curiosity, as if, drawn to the sight of the stranger in their midst, they nevertheless were ready to flee at a word. One quick move on my part, and they’d bolt like deer, or take wing like a flock of sparrows.

  “If your search be true,” the old woman told me, “you have naught to fear.”

  I thanked her for her reassurance and stood to my fate. Presently, Siarles returned from the house accompanied by a young man, tall and slender as a rod, but with a fair span of shoulders and good strong arms. He wore a simple tunic of dark cloth, trousers of the same stuff, and long black riding boots. His hair was so black the sun glinted blue in his wayward locks. A cruel scar puckered the skin on the left side of his face, lifting his lip in what first appeared to be a haughty sneer—an impression only, belied by the ready wit that darted from eyes black as the bottom of a well on a moonless night.

  There was no doubt that he was their leader, Bran—the man I had come to find. If the right and ready homage of the ragged forest folk failed to make that clear, you had only to take in the regal ease with which he surveyed all around him to know that here was a man well used to command. His very presence demanded attention, and he claimed mine without effort to the extent that at first I failed to see the young woman trailing behind him: a fine, dark-haired lady of such elegance and grace that, though she was dressed in the same humble drab as the starvelings around her, she held herself with such an imperious bearing that I took her to be the queen.

  “I present Rhi Bran, Lord of Elfael,” said Iwan, speaking loud enough for all gathered round to hear.

  “Pax vobiscum,” said the tall young man, looking me up and down with a sweep of a quick, intelligent eye.

  “God’s peace, my lord,” I replied in Cymric, offering him the courtesy of a bow. “I am William Scatlocke, former forester to Thane A
elred of Nottingham.”

  “He’s come to offer his services,” Siarles informed his lordship with a mocking tone to let his master know what he thought of the idea.

  Bran looked me over once again and finding no fault, I think, replied, “What kind of services do you propose, William Scatlocke?”

  “Anything you require,” I said. “From slaughtering hogs to thatching roofs, sawing timber to pollarding hazel, there’s not much I haven’t done.”

  “You said you were a forester,” mused Bran, and I saw the glint of interest in his glance.

  “Aye, I was—and a good one, if I say it myself.”

  “Why did you quit?”

  “Thane Aelred, God bless him, lost his lands in the succession dispute and was banished to Daneland. All his vassals were turned out by Red William to fend for themselves, most like to starve, it was that grim.”

  The dark-haired young woman, who had been peering from behind Bran’s shoulder, spoke up just then. “No wife, or children?”

  “Nay, my lady,” I replied. “As you see, I’m a young man yet, and hope burns bright. Still, young or old, a man needs a bit of wherewithal to keep even one small wife.” I smiled and gave her a wink to let her know I meant it lightly. Unamused, she pressed her lips together primly. “Ah, well, I was just scraping some of that wherewithal together when the troubles began. Most lost more than I did, to be sure, but I lost all the little I had.”

  “I am sorry to hear it,” said Bran. “But we are hard-pressed here, too, what with the care of ourselves and the folk of Elfael as well. Any man who would join us must earn his way and then some if he wants to stay.” Then, as if he’d just thought of it, he said, “A good forester would know how to use a longbow. Do you draw, William?”

  “I know which end of the arrow goes where,” I replied.

  “Splendid! We will draw against one another,” he declared. “Win and you stay.”

  “If I should lose?”

  His grin was sly and dark and full of mischief. “If you would stay, then I advise you not to lose,” he said. “Well? What is it to be? Will you draw against me?”

  There seemed to be no way around it, so I agreed. “That I will,” I said, and found myself carried along in the sudden rush—the people to the contest, and myself to my fate.

  CHAPTER 6

  Obviously, you won the contest,” says Odo, raising his sleepy head from his close-nipped pen.

  “You think so, do you?” I reply.

  “Of course,” he assures me smugly. “Otherwise, you would not be here in Count De Braose’s pit waiting to be hung for a traitor and an outlaw.”

  Brother Odo is feisty. He must have got up on the wrong side of his Hail Marys this morning. “Now, monk,” I tell him, “just you try to keep your eyes open a little while longer, and we’ll get to the end of this and then see how good you are at guessing.” I settle myself on my mat of mildewed rushes and push the candle a little closer to my scribe. “Read back the last thing I said. Quick now before I forget.”

  “Siarles? Iwan? Your bows,” says Odo, in rough imitation of my voice.

  “Oh, right.” And I resume . . .

  The two foresters, Iwan and Siarles, handed Rhi Bran their longbows and, taking one in either hand, he held them out to me. “Choose the one you will use.”

  “My thanks,” I said, trying first one and then the other, bending them with my weight. There was not a spit of difference between them, but I fancied winning with Siarles’s bow and chose that one.

  “This way, everyone!” called Bran, already striding off towards the far side of the settlement. We came to the head of a miserable patch of barley. They were about growing a few pecks of grain for themselves, but it was a poor, sad field, shadowed and soggy as it was. The people ranged themselves in a wide double rank behind us, and by now there were upwards of sixty folk—most all of the forest dwellers, I reckoned, saving a few of the women and smaller children. The grain had been harvested and only stubble remained, along with the straw man set up at the far edge of the clearing to keep the birds away. The figure was fixed to a pole some eighty or a hundred paces from where we stood—far enough to make the contest interesting.

  “Three arrows. The scarecrow will be our mark,” Bran explained as Iwan passed arrows to us both. “Hit it if you can.”

  “It’s been that long since I last drew—” I began.

  “No excuses,” said Siarles quickly. “Just do your best. No shame in that.”

  “I was not about making excuses,” I replied, nocking the arrow to the string. “I was going to say it’s been that long since I last drew, I almost forgot how good a yew bow feels in my hand.” This brought a chuckle or two from those gathered around. Turning to Rhi Bran, I said, “Where would you like this first arrow to go, my lord?”

  “Head or heart, either will do,” Bran replied.

  The arrow was on its way the instant the words left his mouth. My first shaft struck the bunched tuft of straw that formed the scarecrow’s head, with a satisfying swish! as it passed through on its way to the far end of the field.

  A murmur of polite approval rippled through the crowd.

  “I can see you’ve drawn a longbow before,” said Bran.

  “Once or twice.”

  Lord Bran drew and loosed, sending his first shaft after mine, and close enough to the same place that it made no matter. The people cheered their lord with loud and lusty cries.

  “My lord,” I said, “I think you have drawn a bow once or twice yourself.”

  “The heart this time?” he suggested, as we accepted our second arrows from Iwan.

  “If straw men have hearts,” I said, drawing and taking good aim, “his has thumped its last.” This time I sent the shaft up at a slight arc so that it dropped neatly through the centre of the scarecrow and stuck in the dirt behind it.

  “Your luck is with you today,” sniffed Siarles as polite applause spattered among the onlookers.

  “Not a bit of it,” I told him, grinning. “That was so the lads wouldn’t have to run so far to retrieve my arrow.”

  “Then I shall do likewise,” said Bran, and again, drew and aimed and loosed so quickly that each separate motion flowed into the next and became one. His arrow struck the scarecrow in the upper middle and stuck in the ground right beside mine. Again, the people cheered heartily for their young king.

  “Head and heart,” I said. “We’ve done for your man out there. What else is left?”

  “The pole on which he hangs,” said Iwan, handing over the last arrow.

  “The pole then?” asked Bran, raising an eyebrow.

  “The pole,” I confirmed.

  Well, now. The day was misty and grey, as I say, and the little light we had was swiftly failing now. I had to squint a bit to even see the blasted pole, jutting up like a wee nubbin just over the peak of the scarecrow’s straw head. It showed maybe the size of a lady’s fist, and that gave me an idea. Turning to Bran’s dark-haired lady, I said, “My queen, will you bless this arrow with a kiss?”

  “Queen?” she said, recoiling. “I am not his queen, thank you very much.”

  This was said with considerable vehemence . . .

  Yes, vehemence, Odo.” My scribe has wrinkled his nose like he’s smelled a rotten egg, as he does whenever I say a word he doesn’t understand. “It means, well, it means fire, you know—passion, grit, and brimstone.”

  “I thought you said she was the queen?” objects Odo.

  “That is because I thought she was the queen.”

  “Well, was she or wasn’t she?” he complains, lifting his pen as if threatening to quit unless all is explained to his satisfaction forthwith. “And who is she anyway?”

  “Hold your water, monk, I’m coming to that,” I tell him. And we go on . . .

  This time we draw together,” said Bran. “On my count.”

  “Ready.” I press the bow forward and bring the string to my cheek, my eyes straining to the mark.

  �
��One . . . two . . . three . . .”

  I loosed the shaft on his “three” and felt the string lash my wrist with the sting of a wasp. The arrow sliced through the air and struck the pole a little to one side. My aim was off, and the point did nothing more than graze the side of the pole. The arrow glanced off to the left and careered into the brush beyond the tiny field.

  Bran, however, continued the count. “Four!” he said, and loosed just a beat after me—enough, I think, so that he saw where my shaft would strike. And then, believe it or not, he matched it. Just as my arrow had grazed the left side of the scarecrow’s pole, so Bran’s sheared the right. He saw me miss, and then missed himself by the same margin, mind. Proud bowman that I was, I could but stand humbled in the presence of an archer of unequalled skill.

  Turning to me with a cheery grin, he said, “Sorry, William, I should have told you it was four, not three.” He put a friendly hand on my shoulder. “Do you want to try again?”

  “Three or four, it makes no matter,” I told him. Indicating the straw man, I said, “It seems our weedy friend has survived the ordeal.”

  “Arrows, Gwion Bach!” called Bran, and an eager young fella leapt to his command; two other lads followed on his heels, and the three raced off to retrieve the shafts.

  Iwan walked out to examine the scarecrow pole. He pulled it up and brought it back to where we were waiting, and he and Angharad the banfáith scrutinized the top of the pole, with Siarles, not to be left out, pressing in between them.

  “Judging by the notches made by the passing arrows,” announced the old woman after her inspection, “Iwan and I say the one on the right has trimmed the most from the pole. Therefore, we declare Rhi Bran the winner.”

  The people cheered and clapped their hands for their king. And, suddenly disheartened as the meaning of their words broke upon me, I choked down my disappointment, fastened a smile to my face, and prepared to take my leave.

  “You know what this means,” said Bran, solemn as the grave.