He shook his head and laughed again. ‘If we get back to Harndon, come and ask me for a job,’ he said.
She looked at him. ‘You mean that?’ she asked.
He made a face. ‘Of course.’
She rolled her eyes. ‘Just when we’re all going to die.’
Lissen Carak – The Red Knight
The captain looked out through the hole in his wall and watched the fires burning in a swathe across the enemy’s camp. The enemy’s men, at least, cooked supper.
The rest of the camps were dark.
His back hurt. But then, his side hurt too, he now had cracked ribs on both sides of his ribcage – his shoulders were wrenched from the stress of being plucked off the ground by his knights, and his right hand had odd, numb spots in it and he had no idea why.
He was supposed to be in bed.
Toby stood uncertainly by the door.
‘You want to be in bed, I suppose,’ he said.
Toby shrugged. ‘I’m hungry.’
The Red Knight went to the table in the middle of the room and tossed his valet a biscuit.
Then he looked at the lute on the table. He hadn’t played it in-
He couldn’t remember when he played it last.
He picked it up, suddenly decisive, and walked out the door into the hallway. Toby tried to cut him off.
‘Oh, Toby,’ he said. ‘I don’t give a fuck.’ He knocked on the door to his Commandery.
In three heartbeats, Michael was there.
‘Grab your lute,’ he said. ‘Good evening, Miss Lanthorn. Michael, these people need some music. Not a grim silence. Let’s light a fire.’
Michael sometimes forgot that his master was only a few years older than he was. He grinned. ‘Give me – us – a moment.’
Lissen Carak – Mag the Seamstress
Mag looked out into the darkness because she’d heard music.
There it was again, the sound of a southern lute. A wild, joyous sound.
And then another, lower lute played back.
There was a bonfire burning on the cobbles.
An archer, Cuddy, came and peered out of the North Tower. He shouted something.
Amy Carter peered out of the stable door and saw Kaitlin Lanthorn dancing by firelight, her legs flashing.
She ran back inside and rubbed her sister’s cheek. ‘They’re dancing!’ she said.
Kitty sat up, fully awake.
Low Sym heard music playing below the windows at the end of the hospital room. He threw his feet over the end of the bed and walked softly across the floor and opened one casement, and the sound of the notes raced in like a spell. He leaned out, listening.
The nun appeared by his side. ‘What is it?’ she asked.
Sym giggled. ‘Capt’n likes to play. Fast.’ He shook his head. 'Leastways, he used to play. On the Continent. Ain’t heard him in an age.’
She smiled. Leaned out. ‘You like him,’ she said.
Sym thought about that for so long she thought he wouldn’t answer.
From their vantage point, they saw the music do its work. Men came out of the stable and down the steps from the towers and the stumps of the towers. Women emerged from the stables and from the nun’s dormitory.
Suddenly, there were as many people in the courtyard to dance as had been there for the priest.
The two instruments were joined by pipes and a drum.
The dancers began to move in a circle.
‘I don’t hate him.’ Sym admitted.
Amicia turned. ‘You are not lost, Sym,’ she said. ‘You are more hero than villain, even now.’
He stepped back as if she’d struck him. But then he grinned.
Then he stiffened. ‘Where you going?’
She smiled. ‘You can come guard me. I’m going to dance. Or at least to watch.’
In the courtyard, Sister Miram stretched her arms and smiled wearily at the Red Knight, who stood with his back to the fire playing his lute like a madman. She turned to Sister Anne and ordered a cask of ale opened.
Bad Tom put a man-at-arms on the door to the cellars and another on the barracks. He and Jehannes whispered for a moment in the darkness beyond the fire, and Jehannes doubled the watch and forced some unwilling soldiers onto the walls where the farmers could see them.
When Jehannes looked down, Tom was dancing with the seamstress’ daughter.
Mag, Lis, and Sister Mary Rose hauled a great cauldron of beef soup to the door of the dormitory. Cheering archers and farmers hauled it together into the firelight.
Long Paw appeared with a brace of wine jars, and handed them to the first men he saw. They toasted him, and the bottles passed around, soldier to farmer, and farmer to soldier, until they were empty.
A farmer went and burrowed in his belongings in the stable, and returned with a jug that proved to contain apple jack.
And the lutes played on.
Lissen Carak – Michael
At some point, Michael knew he had never played so well, and he also knew that his fingers were going to hurt all the next day. Kaitlin whirled by, leaped in the air and was caught by Daniel Favor; Bad Tom caught Mag’s Sukey around the waist and she, a widow of twenty-four hours, squealed like a girl; Low Sym turned with the eight-year- old daughter of the Wackets, and Sister Miram and Sister Mary turned a somewhat statelier pavane together when Long Paw bowed, very Continental, and took Sister Miram’s hand and led her around the yard. Francis Atcourt bowed over Sister Mary’s hand and she laughed, and curtsied. Amicia danced with Ser Jehannes, Harmodius whirled Lis like a much younger man, and her feet spun her skirts out around her like a king’s cloak. and then Amicia spun by again with Ser George Brewes, and the Red Knight drank off his fourth glass of the Abbess’s red wine and played on. Cuddy tilted the apple jack back and back . . . and rolled off the barrel on which he was perched, and landed flat on his back, and didn’t move, and the farmers laughed. Wilful Murder had an arm around Johne the Bailli and a leather flagon in the other hand, and was singing at the top of his voice, his face lit like a daemon’s in the firelight.
The Carter girls began to dance, a fast, flashy dance of their own creation, and the Lanthorn girls, not to be beaten, leaped into the circle, and the music ran away with them. More pipes joined in, and Ben Carter produced bagpipes, and his drunkenness seemed to fall away as he played for his sisters. Fran Lanthorn leaned out of the turning circle and kissed him hard on the cheek as she swept by, and he blushed furiously and his tune tumbled, but he caught it and launched it anew.
Lissen Carak – Michael
Michael and his master allowed their fingers to fall still. The lutes dropped out of the busy music, which swept on.
Michael felt his captain’s arms go around his shoulders. He was afraid he’d cry. The captain had never hugged him before. Or anyone else that he knew of. He’d never seen the man’s face so open. So – defenceless.
And then he was gone into the swirling darkness and firelight.
Lissen Carak – Thorn
