Blood of the South

TWO

The tavern was not far from the market square, on one of the main streets that run through the centre of the town and close to St Benet’s church. I had never been inside, but I understood it to be a well-run, clean and decent place where ruffians intent on theft and trouble-making were unlikely to gain admittance. In acknowledgement of the old ways, a bundle of brushwood hung above the wide entrance into the courtyard: the ancient symbol for an inn.

Chevestrier led the way inside, where a plump woman in a white apron, her hair covered in spotless white linen, was waiting. Our little procession was shown along the passage to a tiny, dark room, in which there was a bed, a three-legged stool, a table with a ewer of hot water set beside a basin and a worn but clean cloth for hand-wiping. ‘There’s the communal room, of course,’ the plump woman was saying nervously, ‘only I thought as how a lady would like a bit of privacy.’ The veiled woman looked around, gave a disdainful sniff, and then removed her cloak and flung it on the bed. Chevestrier thanked the plump woman and dismissed her.

I barely noticed. My eyes were on the veiled woman’s gown, revealed in full now that she had taken off her cloak. The gown was gorgeous: deep blue velvet with a purplish sheen, tight in the sleeves and over the hips, then spreading out in generous flares and gores that swirled around her ankles as she moved. It fitted her beautifully, except that it was a little loose in the bust: no doubt she had lost the fullness in her breasts that comes with pregnancy and childbirth, and had not yet had the chance of ordering a seamstress to take in the seams.

Breasts … That reminded me. I shifted the baby in my arms – he was winding up to cry, and already giving increasingly heart-rending little whimpers – and said, ‘My lady, your son needs to be fed.’

She looked at me as if I was simple. ‘He was fed before we left the boat.’

‘I’m sure he was.’ I held on to my temper. ‘But now he’s hungry again.’

She looked around, as if hoping that whoever it was that normally cared for her child might appear out of the wood panelling. ‘Oh,’ she said.

Chevestrier came to stand beside me. ‘I don’t suppose you know of a wet-nurse?’ he asked quietly. There was a note of desperate optimism in his voice.

I smiled at him. ‘I do.’

‘Thank the Lord,’ he muttered. ‘Do you think she’s likely to be available?’

I handed the baby over to him. After a moment’s hesitation – he had much more of an idea how to hold a child than the baby’s mother – he laid the increasingly noisy little bundle gently down on the bed.

‘I’ll go and find out,’ I said.

I located the wet-nurse – a lovely, strong, sensible girl called Mattie, with three strapping young boys of her own and a delicate little daughter at the breast – and she was happy to provide her services for the lady in the inn. Understanding that her new charge was probably extremely hungry by now, she came straight away. I introduced her to Chevestrier and the veiled woman, and instantly she bent down to the baby, already unlacing her gown. Then I turned and left.

Chevestrier, clearly not wishing to witness the intimacy of breastfeeding, hurried out after me. ‘Thank you for your help,’ he said.

I smiled. ‘It was more for the baby’s sake than hers.’

He smiled back. ‘Quite.’ Then he gave me a salute and strode away.

I had forgotten all about Gurdyman. When I got back to his wonderfully well-hidden house – you have to fiddle your way through the lanes behind the market square, doubling back on yourself, and when I first went to live there, it took me many attempts till I could do it without thinking – it was to find him already installed in his sunny little courtyard, waiting for me to tell him my side of the morning’s events. ‘I saw you go into the inn,’ he said, ‘and then hurry off to fetch Mattie.’

‘Yes, she’s just got herself another mouth to feed,’ I replied. ‘And her new mistress ought to be able to pay her well. You saw her, no doubt.’ It wasn’t even a question.

‘Yes, I did.’ Gurdyman paused. I thought he was going to say more, but he didn’t. Instead he asked why she had been attacked, and what had occurred up at the castle, and, once I had told him, he appeared to be satisfied and allowed the conversation to lapse, closing his eyes and enjoying the soft warmth of the sun.

‘She’s heading for the fens,’ I said.

‘Oh, really?’ Gurdyman seemed only mildly interested.

‘She’s looking for kin there.’

‘Well, now!’

I knew him in this mood: he didn’t want to discuss it, and nothing I could say would make him. ‘Do you know of Chevestrier?’ I asked instead.

Gurdyman opened his eyes. ‘Jack Chevestrier is a better man by far than his master the sheriff,’ he pronounced.

I smiled. ‘Ah, but that could be said of virtually every man in Cambridge.’

Gurdyman acknowledged the truth of that. ‘He is decent, honest and, as far as I am aware, capable,’ he said after a moment. ‘Norman blood, but he can’t help that. Picot, of course, takes advantage of his man’s efficiency, leaving him to do twice as much work as he should while Picot busies himself acquiring wealth and possessions to which he is not entitled.’

‘You’d think Jack Chevestrier would notice, and do something to stop him,’ I said.

Gurdyman shot me a look. ‘No doubt he does, and, in time, he probably will.’

‘But-’

‘Enough, Lassair.’ Gurdyman quite often does that: brings a topic to an abrupt end because he wants to raise another one. ‘Now, go down to the crypt and bring me the little bundle wrapped in a piece of sacking that you will find on the end of my workbench.’

I did as he bade me, returning to put the parcel in his hands. He held it for a few moments – it seemed to me he was testing his reaction to it, which was, on the face of it, unlikely – then, to my surprise, he looked up and said, ‘It arrived this morning. I collected it on the quayside from my merchant friend. Open it. It’s for you.’

I unwrapped the sacking, revealing a lump of bright blue stone, about the size of the top joint of my thumb. I held it up to the light, and the sunshine caught golden glints among the blue. It was very beautiful: the colour was a distillation of summer skies in the late evening.

‘Do you know what it is?’ Gurdyman asked.

‘I believe it’s lapis lazuli.’

‘It is indeed. Do you recall where it comes from?’

I remembered a morning when we pored over his map, and he pointed out a land that seemed impossibly far away to the east; on the edge of a huge range of mountains which, according to Gurdyman, scraped against the sky. ‘It comes out of the east,’ I said dreamily. ‘Men hack it out of the ground, and they sell it to the traders who travel the vast distances of the Silk Road.’

‘And what do we use it for?’ Gurdyman prompted.

‘It is used by painters to make the costly shade known as ultramarine.’

‘Yes.’ He hesitated, looking at the blue stone that I still held in my hand. ‘There is another use to which it is put. Since you are not an artist, Lassair, it is this second use that I had in mind when I ordered your stone.’

I felt a shiver of apprehension. Gurdyman’s voice had altered subtly. I was afraid of what he was going to say.

He nodded, as if he had picked up my fear. ‘Do not worry,’ he said softly. ‘I will be beside you. We shall experiment together.’ There was a pause. ‘But not now,’ he said in his normal tone. ‘Put the lapis away, child, and fetch us something to eat.’

In the course of the next day, nothing more was said about the piece of lapis lazuli. Gurdyman keeps a sack stuffed with odd bits of fabric down in the crypt, and I selected a piece of silk and sewed a tiny bag to hang from my belt, in which to keep my stone. Gurdyman said I should keep it close, so that it picked up my essence.

Late that evening, after I had gone up to my little attic above the kitchen, I heard Gurdyman step softly along the passage to the door. I detected a faint rumble of voices, both of them male. Very few people know where Gurdyman lives; he likes it that way, being reclusive by nature and frequently engaged on tasks that are better unwitnessed. One man, however, comes quite often.

I slipped out of bed, grabbed the lovely shawl which my sister Elfritha made for me years ago and, wrapping myself in it, went down the ladder and into the kitchen. Following the faint sound of the voices, I padded down the passage, then turned to descend the steps that lead to Gurdyman’s crypt.

I would not have dreamt of spying on Gurdyman and his night visitor. Apart from such an action being ill-mannered towards the man who houses and teaches me, it would also have been extremely dangerous, especially if the guest was who I thought he was. So, without stopping to think, I jumped down the second flight of steps and burst into the crypt with a cheery, ‘It’s me, Lassair! I heard voices.’

The two men standing by the workbench turned to stare at me. Gurdyman’s face wore a mild smile, as if my uninvited presence was a bit of a nuisance but nothing worse. The other man, even now throwing back the deep hood of his heavy, dark cloak, glared at me out of silvery eyes narrowed in irritation.

‘Hello, Hrype,’ I said timidly.

If I had to make a judgement, I’d probably say that, although Hrype is the more scary-looking, it is undoubtedly Gurdyman who is the more dangerous. Both men are powerful magicians; capable, I’m sure, of feats far beyond anything I have yet experienced, but Gurdyman has the advantage of being many years older, and thus more deeply steeped in his art.

Hrype, anyway, is my lovely aunt Edild’s lover, although I’m one of the few people in on the secret. I wouldn’t say that fact makes him treat me with any special consideration, but I think he’d probably stop short of doing me harm.

His icy expression seemed to have softened very slightly. Capitalizing on this, I hurried forward, grasped his hand in mine and demanded news of my aunt, my village and the rest of my family.

‘Everyone is well,’ Hrype said impatiently, dropping my hand after the briefest of squeezes. ‘Nobody knows I’m here, so don’t expect any fond messages. And,’ he added with the hint of a smile, ‘don’t go imagining I’ll be taking any back.’

‘Of course not,’ I muttered meekly.

There was an awkward pause, during which I reflected that my presence really wasn’t welcome at this secret night-time meeting. Hrype glanced at Gurdyman, who gave a faint grimace and murmured, ‘Well, she’ll have to know, eventually.’

There was a brief, tense pause. Then Hrype sighed, turned to me and said, ‘There is news, Lassair, although not of your family at Aelf Fen.’ I opened my mouth to speak. ‘And, before you ask, it does not concern either of your sisters living elsewhere.’ That was a relief: I’m not that fond of my eldest sibling, Goda – although I wouldn’t wish her ill – but Elfritha, the one who’s a nun at Chatteris, I adore.

‘Who does it concern?’ I whispered.

Hrype said softly, ‘Skuli.’

Skuli.

For an instant, the crypt seemed to grow even colder, and I felt a shudder run through me. I had every reason to fear the very name, since only a few months ago Skuli had been all set to kill me. He was my distant kinsman: my grandfather and Skuli’s father were cousins.

The events of the spring still gave me bad dreams. They had also left me with an ache in my heart, for I had discovered a grandfather who I never suspected I had. Nobody but Hrype and Gurdyman knew about him; I had no idea how to reveal to my beloved father that his mother – my late and much-loved Granny Cordeilla – had had a brief and passionate liaison with a huge, bearded Norseman, and my father was the result. I was not at all sure how my father would receive the news that the mild, hard-working fisherman whom Cordeilla married, and with whom she conceived all her other children, had been temporarily usurped in her bed. Nor, indeed, how he’d feel on finding out his siblings were actually only half-siblings; neither are facts a daughter is usually called upon to explain to her father.

So there was news of Skuli. Well, Hrype could keep it to himself. I didn’t want to know. Skuli had sailed off towards the sunrise in his slim and elegant craft, and he had been heading for Miklagard. With brutal ruthlessness, he had done everything in his power to take a precious family heirloom with him, but, although he didn’t even stop short at murder, ultimately he’d failed.

That heirloom – the mystical, compelling shining stone – was now in my possession; put into my nervous hands by my grandfather.

I still missed him. I’d thought that the passage of time would ease the hurt. So far, it hadn’t.

With a shudder, I brought myself out of my reverie. I looked at Hrype, then at Gurdyman. My mouth felt dry, but I swallowed a couple of times, and then said, ‘I don’t know why, but I think this has to do with the shining stone.’

And, not really to my surprise, Hrype nodded.

‘Gurdyman and I believe that it is not in your best interests to postpone any further,’ he said.

I had an awful feeling that I knew only too well what he meant.

‘Er – you mean it’s time I began to – to get to know it?’ My voice wasn’t quite steady.

Hrype looked at me and there was compassion in his eyes. ‘The stone has come into your hands for a reason, Lassair,’ he said softly. ‘You know that.’ I nodded. ‘You will also know, I’m sure, that the intention was not simply for you to creep up to your attic room and unwrap the stone once in a while to gaze at it.’ How does he know I do that? I wondered wildly. Sometimes, my curiosity overcame my fear of the magical object that was currently in my possession …

‘We will be beside you, supporting you as best we can,’ Gurdyman said quietly. ‘It is an object of great power, and it is right that you are in awe of it, child.’

In awe was an understatement.

I looked at Hrype, then back at Gurdyman. They appeared to be waiting for something.

‘You don’t mean – surely you don’t want to begin now?’ I squeaked.

Gurdyman smiled encouragingly. ‘No time like the present.’

By the time I returned to the crypt, my heart hammering from the combined effects of just having raced up to my little attic room and my increasing apprehension, Gurdyman had made his preparations. A piece of clean white linen had been spread over one end of the workbench, and smooth beeswax candles had been lit at the four corners. The seriousness of the moment struck home: beeswax candles are fearfully costly, and Gurdyman had just lit four. Somewhere close by, incense was burning; sniffing, I detected the strong, heady smell of frankincense; another very expensive commodity. In addition, I smelt cumin, dill and garlic.

All four substances are used for protection.

Gurdyman and Hrype stood like guardians, either side of the white expanse of linen. Hrype beckoned, and I stepped forward.

When it had first been put into my hands, the shining stone had been wrapped in a coarse length of old sacking. But, feeling that such a covering was unworthy of the stone, I had fashioned a bag out of a piece of soft dark brown leather, decorating it with a pattern of tiny glass beads sewn into a spiral. I had stitched a narrow hem in the top of the bag, through which I threaded a drawstring. I had collected fluffy pieces of sheep’s wool from the hedgerows, and, once I had washed and dried them and combed out the burrs and the tangles, the resulting soft nest made a good protective lining to the leather bag.

Now, approaching the workbench, I loosened the drawstring and opened the bag. I drew the stone out of its wrappings. I can just hold it in one hand, and I usually find that it is my right hand that reaches for it.

‘Put it on the cloth,’ Hrype intoned.

I obeyed. The stone, a perfect sphere, made as if to roll to one side. Then it seemed to change its mind.

The three of us, Gurdyman, Hrype and I, stared down at the shining stone.

At first glance, it appears to be solid, unrelieved black, with a brilliant sheen that repels the attempts of an onlooker to peer into it. But there is more to it. It’s as if the stone has light inside it; light that seems to flow, as if in some strange way the centre is liquid. You see a flash of gold, then a brief ribbon of deep green, there and gone in an instant. I recalled what Gurdyman told me of the stone’s origin. He told me – and I still find it hard to believe – that once it had been solid rock within the heart of a volcano, heated to such a ferocious temperature that it turned molten and then, when it encountered water and cooled, turned once more into a solid, but of a very different kind. Its nature is for ever changed from what it was, Gurdyman said. Through the medium of fire and water, rock is turned into glass.

I had been sure when he told me, and I remain sure, that he had been describing some sort of alchemy, of a kind I could not even begin to imagine.

I took a breath, trying to steady my fast-beating heart.

‘Have you your piece of lapis lazuli?’ Gurdyman asked softly.

I started. ‘Yes.’ I took it from the pouch on my belt.

‘Hold it in your left hand,’ he said. ‘It will help.’

There was utter silence in the crypt. Then, his voice soft, hypnotic but also irresistible, Hrype said, ‘Lassair, look into the shining stone.’

Clutching the lapis tightly, I bent over the stone. Again, the flash of gold, and the deep green ribbon, moving as if it was water … a great river, perhaps. My eyes narrowed, and it seemed as if a film of smoke was swirling inside the stone. I thought I could make out faint images in the smoke: dark figures, moving in a wide empty landscape; a long line of hunched men, engaged on some arduous task; water again, as a river became a sea, white-capped waves breaking on a far shore. Then, across those vague, everyday images, suddenly something else: something heard, or perhaps sensed, rather than seen, for it sounded like the heavy hoof-falls of a fast-pressed horse … no, two horses. I leaned closer to the shining stone, trying to make out the horses and their riders, but now the smoke was swirling faster, and the images I had seen – imagined – were gone. Then I saw a pair of birds, jet-black against the pearly grey smoke, and instinctively I drew back. In that swift instant before they disappeared, it had looked as if they were flying right at me.

I took a deep breath, then looked into the stone again.

There was nothing. It was black once more; dense, impenetrable black.

My left hand eased out of its tight fist – I hadn’t been aware of how hard I’d been clenching the piece of lapis, but now I realized it had dug painfully into the flesh of my palm. I opened and closed my fingers a few times to ease the discomfort, rolling my shoulders to get the tension out of my muscles.

As if he couldn’t bear to wait another moment, Hrype said sharply, ‘Well?’

I turned to him. ‘Well what?’

‘What did you see?’ he hissed.

What had I seen? ‘Smoke,’ I said. ‘Figures, moving about. Water.’ I shook my head. ‘It was very vague, and I’m pretty sure I was just imagining it.’

Hrype gave an impatient tut, turning away.

‘It is all but impossible to determine where the imagination ends and true sight begins,’ Gurdyman said quietly. ‘Indeed, it is a matter hotly debated among the wise, for there are no easy answers.’ He paused. ‘Was there anything else, Lassair?’

I shook my head. ‘No, nothing. I’m sorry, Gurdyman.’

He smiled, but I sensed it took some effort. I could feel his disappointment. ‘Well, never mind. It was but your first attempt, after all.’

‘Will I get better at it?’ I hated to let him down.

‘Of course you will!’ he said robustly. ‘And I shall help you.’ Now the smile was unforced, and I sensed the affection behind it. ‘I promised to do so, did I not?’

Indeed he had. I remembered vividly exactly what he’d said: I will teach you all that I know, and we shall hope that would be enough.

I’d found it distinctly alarming even then, all those months back. Now, when learning how to use the shining stone was no longer a distant prospect but right before me in the here and now, I was downright terrified.

But I wasn’t going to admit it. Gurdyman, by my side, appeared to be waiting for some response. I said – and I could hear the shake in my voice – ‘I’ll do my best.’

Hrype left, and I went back to my bed. I was exhausted, as if I had been on a long, wearisome journey, or had been beset with worries and problems that it was up to me to resolve.

But, once I was snug up in my little attic room, warm beneath the bedclothes, scenes from the day kept playing before my closed eyes. I saw Hrype, throwing back his hood to stare at me. I saw Gurdyman, his face creased with concern as he asked if I had the piece of lapis lazuli. Then Gurdyman again, his face reflecting his acute disappointment as I confessed I’d seen no more than a blur of smoke and a few nondescript figures.

The scenes played again, and then again. At last, however, fatigue overcame me, and I felt my body and mind relax towards sleep.

On the point of a dream, two things leapt up to the forefront of my mind, hurling me back to wakefulness. The first was an image of those two black birds, flying out of the stone straight for me. Without a doubt – and I had no idea where the awareness came from – I knew they were ravens.

I could not for the life of me think how, when Gurdyman asked if I’d seen anything else, I’d forgotten about them …

The second thing was to do with my piece of lapis, and its use other than as a pigment with which to make blue paint. As every apprentice wizard could have explained, lapis lazuli is used to heighten psychic ability. To hold a piece in the left hand is to invite the spirits to emerge from the shadow world and into our own.

Gurdyman hadn’t given me the lapis for protection. He’d given it purely and solely to heighten the chance that my first attempt to see inside the secrets of the shining stone would be successful.

And I hadn’t told him how well it had worked.