Johann grins as Annie comes out with a sack. ‘This lady’s pies is why I offered to come back here. An’ her cider,’ he says with a wink.
Annie elbows him. ‘Got a full skin of the new batch in your bag. Go easy on it, it’s got a kick like a stung mule.’
They make small talk for a while, Harry’s eyes continually wandering over to the packages Peter is unloading from Numbles, and finally Johann gets the hint.
‘Baron Montagu asks about the boy?’ Johann says as he mounts back up on his palfrey.
Harry groans.
‘That good, eh?’ Johann commiserates.
Harry is so bloody tired of pretending everything is fine. He looks up at Johann and says, ‘Honestly, at this point if I could back out of my deal with Montagu and send the boy to Rabbie instead, I’d do it in a heartbeat. I don’t want him here.’
Johann frowns. ‘You really want me to tell his lordship that?’
Harry sags. ‘Yes, Johann. Let’s tell him the truth for once. Maybe he’ll forgive me out of its sheer novelty value.’
Johann laughs. ‘He just might, an’ all,’ the man says, as he touches his fingers to his cap and spurs his horse down the road.
They move the books up to the solar. Harry clears the table for them, placing his mother’s comb and mirror away in a chest, as Piers carries the volumes up one by one. Harry runs his finger reverently down their leather spines. There’s the Gospels, a psalter and the Historia caroli magni. The psalter and the Historia are older books that had come down to Sir Simon from his father, and their pages are faded and torn in parts. Harry has read them all at Sir Simon’s, but can barely wait to look through them again. He still can’t believe that he owns books, plural. Multiple books. Even one book, he would never be able to afford given the poor state of Dartington. But three. Three is unimaginable luxury.
Iain watches them, his eyes wide behind his ragged curtain of dark hair. But neither Piers nor Harry speak to him, and he remains as silent as ever.
Harry leaves soon after to open Sir Simon’s other gifts. Piers follows him, as curious as Harry about his new possessions. As they walk through the hall, Piers looks over it and says, ‘Room for one more down here, y’know.’
Harry nods. ‘Good point. Next time Ralf’s about, we’ll move Iain downstairs.’
They have dinner, then go out to examine Sir Simon’s armour and weaponry. The mail coat is small on Harry, but finely made, and it never hurts to have another set in case his first becomes damaged in battle. And, surprisingly, there’s plate too, simple and unadorned, to protect shins, knees and elbows.
There’s a pair of swords, and Harry unwraps them from the waxed cloth one at a time. The first is old and well notched, its blade almost concave from sharpening. Harry knows it well; it was Sir Simon’s favourite sword, the one that came with him to every battle England fought for a score of years. The other sword is longer and heavier, and brand new: blade, hilt, belt and scabbard in perfect condition. The sword doesn’t seem as if it’s ever been drawn.
Harry looks at it, and loss clutches at his heart as he realises what it is.
Sir Simon had a sword made.
For Harry.
For the day Harry would become a knight.
He sits down heavily on a stool, and covers his mouth. The sword is finely made, but plain – a weapon of war, not a courtier’s decoration. It’s beautiful, and it’s perfect for Harry.
The moment is interrupted by Annie running in. ‘Harry! I— it’s Iain,’ she says, her voice tremulous with worry.
‘What?’ Harry says, springing to his feet. ‘What’s he done now?’
‘Just … come with me. You need to see for yourself,’ she says.
Something in him eases at that. For one horrible moment, he was afraid the boy had killed himself. He chases at Annie’s heels as they cut through the yard, the hall, and then up the stairs to the solar.
Annie points and makes a what are we going to do with him gesture.
Because Iain has somehow moved the giant, heavy pyramid of iron over, so he can sit comfortably at Harry’s mother’s table.
Where he is calmly leafing through Sir Simon’s psalter.
‘Get away from those!’ Harry yells. ‘If you harm them in any way, so help me—’
Iain cowers, flinching in on himself, and it’s enough for Harry to leave his threat unfinished.
‘I was just … reading them,’ Iain says, his voice rough with disuse. ‘I miss them,’ he frowns. ‘We, we had my mother’s Book of Hours. It’s all she was able to bring with her when she fled to Scotland. Well,’ he snuffles. ‘That and me.’
Harry puts his hand on his forehead and exhales, tired. ‘Go to your pallet,’ he says.
Iain curls a lip and barks at Harry, apparently deciding that if he’s going to be ordered around like a dog, he’ll respond like a dog. Then he rolls his shoulders, grabs the weight and waddles it back to where it belongs.
Harry sleeps in Star’s stall that night, curled up against the horse’s neck, trying to soothe her, to let her know as she passes from this earth that she is loved, that she won’t die alone. She survives the night, but she’s in such distress the next morning that he and Peter take the decision to end her suffering.
The first thing Harry kills with his new sword is his own horse.
He spends the rest of the day getting good and drunk, and staying away from Iain. By evening Peter and Piers have to carry him up to the solar, not that either of them are much better off, and they all crash to sleep on Harry’s bed.
‘Tomorrow,’ Harry mumbles to Piers shortly before he passes out, ‘tomorrow when we’re sober, we’ll move Iain downstairs to
