Old Dark Things

CHAPTER THE TWENTIETH

  Chill draughts thrummed through the long stone corridors of the Toren Vaunt. The two men standing guard outside Rosa's door were wrapped up in their cloaks and breathing on their white knuckles, now and again shaking their shoulders against the cold.

  When, some time after entering, the chambermaid Margit scuffled out, carrying a reed-woven basket covered with a rag, and said, "It sure is cold this even." They smiled and nodded in sad agreement.

  "Ah yes," said Margit raising a finger as if in recollection, "M'lady Rosa is gone to bed and asked not to be disturbed on any account. "Not anything," she said. Poor lass, her nerves are getting to her. I'll be back later to bring up few things she asked for."

  "Couldn't bring up a bit of something hot could you, Margit?" asked one of the guards. "Some mulled wine or cider?"

  "I'll see what I can do for you," she called back as she limped off down the hall.

  Cracked plaster, stone stained with smoke and soot, timbers old and sagging: these all rolled by as Margit shambled, hampered by her rolling gait, along corridors, down stairs and deeper, deeper into the underhalls of the Toren Vaunt. Gradually, the stone became rougher to touch. Scents became danker and darker and colder. In time, the blocks of stone laid carefully one atop another gave way to raw bedrock, chiselled and hewn into squat, rounded tunnels. Storage mostly. Filled with casks, and barrels and sacks and scurrying rats. But it was past the last cellar, and down the most dirt-encrusted of the holes, from which emanated a smell of rank human filth, that Margit went.

  Until, at last, she came to the end of her errand: a rusted, but very solid iron grill, heavily riveted, and guarded by a miserable looking man who sat wrapped in a thick, fur cloak and hunched over a small charcoal burner.

  He looked up with sudden, bright, expectancy when Margit rounded the corner, but soon his shoulder's sagged and his jowls sunk again.

  "I thought it were the change of guards." He rubbed his nose and snuffed, drawing a loud rasp of air through blocked nostrils.

  "No, 'fraid its only me, Margit. Bringing down crust and rinds for the Eorl's guests."

  "Here, I thought they been fed today?"

  "Brought you a little somewhat, too."

  He smiled and his teeth shone bright in the faint glow of the burner. "In that case, by all means."

  Margit lifted back a corner of the stiffly woven fabric that covered the basket and drew out a small clay bottle sealed with a cork.

  "A bit of hot tea for you. Just been brewed up."

  Taking it in grateful fingers, he uncorked and sniffed at the mouth. "Phew, got a smell to it. What's in it?"

  She shrugged. "The usual scraps of poor-mans tea. Not my fault if it smells worse than usual."

  Taking a tentative sip he dried his lips on a sleeve and said, "Actually, it tastes alright. And it's good and blessed hot."

  "Mind if I goes in?"

  "Sure." Corking the bottle, he got to his feet and ran a finger over a set of heavy, clumsy looking keys that dangled just below a slight paunch. "Here we are." Choosing one nondescript key, he unlocked the iron grill with a heavy clunk, then heaved at the grinding, protesting rusty hinges. Slowly, almost painfully, the grill dragged open. After the tooth jarring shriek of iron, silence resonated as a powerful presence.

  Margit grinned a weak smile and limped through the portal, then up onto a wooden walkway. The air was so rank as to almost be unbreathable. To either side cowered forgotten, chained semblances of human beings: some curled into foetal positions, some rocking back and forth, others simply sitting and staring into space. Most lunged greedily at the crusts of mouldy bread she threw to them. Two did not respond, apparently divest of any further interest in living, they let the big, black rats steal off with bread that landed near them.

  There were no more than a dozen men imprisoned by the Eorl, and only this many because he had been taken ill and so was unable to pass judgements of execution or banishment. It was, after all, a small eorldom. Coming to the end of the rather pathetic row Margit shook her head, and in a disappointed voice said, "Well, beggars ne'er are choosers." She pointed at one thin, man whose eyes were beady and narrow. "What was your crime?" Her voice sounded suddenly peculiar, as if it belonged to another face, if not another world.

  He spat at her, then said, "I didn't do nuttin to no one."

  "Suit yourself. You then, what was your crime?"

  A man who once must have been as powerful and dangerous as an ox looked at her from under shaggy black locks. Lice ran in his beard. "I got drunk one night and got in a ruckus with old Ewald Hobleg. Gave him a crack on the skull. Killed him dead."

  "Your name?"

  "Kail."

  "Good enough," said Margit and she drew from her basket a soft leather wineskin stitched with waxy red thread and tooled with a pattern of roses. The smell that came from the bottle, as it was uncorked, was both strong and unpleasant. Kail screwed up his face and tried to edge away. Bound and fettered as he was, he had, however, little choice in the matter. Margit was merely all the more forceful as she jammed the wooden mouthpiece between his teeth and forced him to take several gurgling swallows. Sticky green-brown ooze encrusted his beard when she was done.

  Standing fully upright again Margit looked about and found another man who pleased her. His name was Burchard and he struggled more than the last: kicking and clawing and crying out. The last one she choose was a tremulous, desperate looking man, with a face knitted by the scars of a hard life--he remained grimly silent when Margit questioned him. Kail sneered, and muttered that he was a sheep-thief named Anno. At first, the sheep-thief appeared to take the drink willingly, but then spat the fluid out. So Margit held is nose and mouth shut until his eyes bulged and he swallowed. Wiping her hands on her apron she strode, without a trace of a limp, to a place where all three could see and hear her.

  "Now," she said, "You have all drunk poison. A tincture of black crone's root, with a little scrimlock, and fewbane, and a few other favourite little leaves and berries. Before the dawn comes you will notice an icy tingling in your fingers and toes. Then you will break out in a cold sweat. At that point, you may begin to convulse and vomit." She shrugged, "By then, any antidote will come too late."

  "Cruel execution," hissed Kail, "and an odd choice of executioner."

  She smiled and her eyes shone with a brief, forceful light. Her eyes were not the eyes of the worn out, slack-lipped, dour woman who had walked into the under-dungeons. They were eyes that were full of life and anger. "No, there you are wrong. For I have an unpleasant task that must be done, and so I need some unpleasant help. The guard who watches this filthy pig-pit is, by now, quite dead. I know a little about swift poisons, too. I have in my basket a cloak and shirt for you each. I will leave them here. No weapons though. You may take the guard's or pilfer what you can, if you want."

  "I think I know where to get hold of some arms. Used to be on the guard, I did. And this task?" asked Burchard, his eyes barely visible under heavy brows.

  "Do you know of the creature Snoro? Where to find him?" There were some general nods. "Good, then go to his cave. Kill him and any you find with him. Bring me the head of Snoro and you will drink deep of the antidote, and find a hefty mark of gold ready for each of you. And your freedom too. Fail in this?" she purred, "Well, I am sure I do not need to belabour the point."

  "Are you not forgetting somewhat?" and Kail raised his shackled hands and let the rust-spotted chains clunk and clatter.

  "Do we have an agreement?"

  "What choice have we?"

  "Good. Then the bargain is struck."

  Margit turned and vanished from the small, black hole, soon to reappear with the heavy ring of keys. Letting them fall to the floor with a clink and splatter in the wet filth, she turned to go.

  Kail reached for the keys and picked them up clumsily with his bound hands. "How shall we find you?"

  At that she gave a loud humourless rill of laughter. "Dear, faithless Kail. Should you s
ucceed, be assured that I shall find you."

  With that, she turned and left.

  There was one task left now, and this was a simpler one. She hurried through the dark tunnels, through dim undercrofts, and then out into the upper lived-in chambers.

  Through the pale, flickering light of cresset-lit halls she walked, once again taking up her rolling limp and wearing a mask of waxen, staring simplicity upon her face. The air of the winter-shuttered chambers was hazed with wood-smoke, and thick with the heavy scent of pine and juniper, burnt to mask the odour of cramped, ill-washed humanity. Now and again the harsh air raised a cough from her chest, and as she struggled on faster she cursed the haste that forced her to rush and breathe so deeply from the stale air.

  At last, she stepped outside, into cool winds.

  The night air was pure relief after smoke and rank smells. Looking up at the black spires of the Toren, Margit paused for a moment to gaze beyond at the turbid clouds, churning, and ready to shed their full weight of rain. Drizzle fell in a constant patter, but there was a much worse storm coming. Somewhere very distant, thunder swayed the sky. Rain would soon be falling here in tattered curtains.

  Staying a step inside the shelter of the great doors Margit drew out her soft leathern wine-skin, now half-empty. Upending the skin she let some its black contents trickle down her left hand, let it flow over the swollen, work-callused fingers, and as it seeped she rhythmically rubbed her fingers against her palm to work the sticky liquid over all the whole surface.

  "There," she said, "done," before corking the wineskin and stuffing it in her satchel.

  Across the courtyard the blacksmith's workshop rung with the monotonous pound of a long hammer. An open door of bright fiery light showed the smithy in the night. No other life stirred in the courtyard, and so pausing just once to set straight in her mind what she must do, Margit limped out onto the mud and straw of the open court.

  The kennel stood against the east wall. Only a little way from the small door that had been so recently destroyed by an unknown thing. It was rebuilt twice as thick now, but even so a guard still stood miserably against it. Passing the guard and door without a second glance, Margit closed on the kennels from which arose the occasional muffled yap. Closer still she could smell the unmistakable and nose-turning scent of the cramped dogs. The door stood open and three men lounged within. One had a pipe buried in his thick beard and puffed at it with full, fat cheeks. The second, a freckle-faced younger man, stood wrapped in his cloak and spoke softly with thin frowning lips. A third man stood further back in the shadows, his face puffy from lack of sleep.

  "Good even', lads."

  "Evening," said the younger one, while the fellow with the pipe remained unmoving, silently puffing, and getting one sickly curl of thin smoke for his trouble.

  "What brings you out here then?"

  "Afraid I drew the short straw. Damned my poor luck, and on such a night as this." Margit hunched her shoulders and shivered a little. "Still you'll know about short straws, eh? Given the dog-watch, so to speak. In the kitchen everyone's all a-nattering, and we're right curious to know 'bout the dog. So I've been sent to wade through muck, and come and have a peeksy. Supposed to report back, I am."

  Chewing on his pipe with an expression that stood on the edge of turning thoughtful, the older man frowned, then nodded, then said, "It's all about the Toren already, then? Can't say as I am surprised, but here I hoped there would be a bit more time before the word spread." He shrugged. "In case it all comes to aught. Or maybe more importantly, in case it doesn't."

  Margit stepped out of the cold and into the warm, but musty, no doubt flea-ridden kennels. From somewhere down in the darkness she caught the snatches of dog-whines and tail-thumping upon dry, packed earth.

  "And is this the poor mongrel then?"

  Tied by a nicely braided but very old and stained leathern cord to an iron ring on the wall, sat an equally old, ribbed, and thin-gutted dog. It looked at Margit with rheumy eyes and became slightly excited at the sudden interest she showed, wagging its tail and licking its nose.

  "Here now, good dog." Going up to it, she felt very aware of the guard's keen eyes as she let it lick her outstretched hand. "He looks famished. Couldn't let him eat anything?"

  "He's already had a full, big bloody cut of mutton," replied the younger man with a sneer. "More than we got to sup on tonight. Blessed, toothless thing probably thinks it has died and gone to the host of the goddesses."

  "Well, not yet," said Margit with a smile as the patted the dog's thin, bony head.

  "Sorry?"

  "Hmmm? Oh just me mumbling to meself. Suppose I ought to totter back, and tell the folk in the kitchens that the dog is as right as rain. The head cook with be right angry at having given up that nice bit o' mutton to it." She smiled as she limped past the guards. "We'll hear soon enough should the worst happen, I suppose?"

  "I am sure you will," muttered the older man through clenched teeth, his pipe dipping with each word.

  And with that, she hobbled out into the cold night, soon vanishing among the thin wreaths of mist and mizzle.

  Walking as quickly as she dared while people might see, Margit stole through the servant's corridors to the kitchens, where she procured a jug of mulled cider. With the cider cradled under her arm, she did a quick mental check. There was nothing else she could think to do, except return to the upper chambers.

  -oOo-

  "Here you go me lads. With all this waiting about in the cold you must be chilled through and through." Margit held out an earthenware jug, glazed with mottled ochre, and steaming with a rich, powerful, wonderful smell. "Spiced cider, hot as hot. As you asked for it. Just fetched it from the kitchens meself, I did."

  "Thank you kindly, Margit."

  "My pleasure."

  "Back to see to Rosa then?"

  "That I am."

  "What did she want anyway?"

  "Sorry?" said Margit.

  "You said you went to get her some things. What did she want?"

  "Oh, um, some lady's things. You know." She gave a sort of scrunched up wink, and pushed inside the room before he could ask anything more.

  She was back inside the long, luxuriant room, piled with the best velvets and tapestries that wealth could buy in such a remote and seldom visited place as the Eorldom of Veld. Among these draperies, resplendent with leafy wreaths and garlands, and thick rugs of every soft-furred winter beast, there were several plush chairs. And in one of the chairs, asleep with her head titled to one side, was a woman of middling years and sallow pock marked skin. Her one good leg was stretched out in front of her while her lame leg rested in a twisted shape beneath it.

  Margit paused for a moment to gaze at herself, so out of place in this soft, subtle and tasteful room. Without much more than a brief flicker of a smile, she walked swift across the rug-strewn floor, and tossed the leather wineskin onto the blazing fire. It began to smoke and crackle immediately, and soon erupted, boiling, hissing black fluid. It took some time to burn away utterly and the lingering smell was repulsive, but eventually even that blew up the chimney, leaving nothing but glowing embers.

  As soon as the air was clear of the foul vapours Margit leaned over the sleeping body in the chair and gently nudged her. "Time to wake up dear. You must have chores to get on with."

  In the first moments of bleary, blinking eyed waking confusion Margit might have thought she caught sight of herself looking back, as if from one of the finely framed mirrors that noble ladies adore so lavishly. But her vision would have wavered and settled, and she would have realised that she was mistaken of course.

  She yawned. "Deary me oh my. Must have dozed off, and just kept dozing. How long have I been asleep, m'lady? I can hardly remember a thing... I..." In her eyes, confusion danced a moment. "No, I barely remember even coming up here to see you. My head is going soft, I'm afraid."

  "Ermengarde really is working you too hard." Rosa's voice was melodious. Margit, you have already
been and gone, and done all sorts of chores, and then you came back again. I thought it was only right to let you catch a bit of sleep. Now that everything is done. Surely, you remember. When you have been so useful."

  "Oh," said Margit, "No... I mean I think its coming back to me I think. All a little hazy. Must have knocked my head or drunk too much of... erm... somewhat."

  Rosa's voice turned gracious and beautiful and a little teasing. "Well, we did enjoy a tiny tipple of wine togther too."

  "That must be it then. I should be on with the rounds. Too much to do. No rest for the wicked. That's what they say isn't it?"

  "It is what they say, and it is too true." Replied Rosa, "too true."

  Rosa waited impatiently as Margit eased herself out of the chair and, after picking up her things, she shuffled out of the room. The chambermaid took a tediously long time about doing everything, and once or twice Rosa imagined she caught the woman glancing about, trying to remember perhaps. Was there suspicion in the young woman's eyes? Did she think something wasn't quite right here? The potion should leave the woman foggy and confused for hours, willing to accept any story told to her, yet there was always a chance that some odd and stalwart memory would burn thought the fog. Was there an inkling of mistrust in those dim, dull eyes?

  Rosa grew steadily more anxious watching Margit dither and faff in aimless circles before finding her way to the door. Nodding, perhaps a tad over-enthusiastically, smiling, perhaps a inch too wide, Rosa ushered the befuddled maid out, gently and hastily, and then closed the door behind her. Throwing the bolt, she sunk against the hard, polished wood and breathed a heavy sigh. For a long moment she stood there, all but motionless and struggling with vague, yet troubling emotions. How had she come to this? Had all her life's dreams soured into nightmares without her even noticing?

  An ugly thought.

  No. It was more than that now. She had to be more than a creature of fear, or anger, or revenge, those simple, base emotions. Could she yet save herself from pride, passion and pain? She thought of Sigurd and wondered if he might be able to save her with little more than his simple love for her. His was a deep, good sort of love, she felt sure of that. He might have taken her away from here. Away from the Toren Vaunt. Away from father. Perhaps they ought have done that. Just eloped, months ago. But, even now, she felt she was slipping beyond Sigurd's reach. Lost to him. Lost to everyone, maybe.