Heritage of Fire Page 3

  Gerd's master said nothing, merely inclining his head. Gratton shook his.

  "Well. And one of the old ways we cling to is to rise before the sun, in winter. Else the day is too short for anything useful. So I'm for bed. Will we have the honour of your company for tomorrow?"

  "You are very good, my lord, but I shall trespass on your kindness only this one night. We must be away, my man and I, at sunrise."

  "I'll see you at breakfast, then. Good night. And to you, younker."

  He rose, pushing up from his armchair. Gerd, startled at being addressed directly, had just wit enough to turn his awkward, rustic bob into the courtly bow his master had taught him. Squire Gratton smiled a little crookedly, and stumped out of the rear door that a serving-man held open for him.

  A moment later the steward approached. "My lord directs that you be lodged in the upper chamber, sir." He shot a glance at Gerd. "Your man . . ."

  "Will sleep on my floor. We have our own blankets. Please do not trouble about bedding."

  "No trouble, sir. I'll have a palliasse put down. A plank floor can be draughty. Another cup of wine, sir?"

  Squire Penrose took the hint. "I think not, I thank you. It's been an active day. With the good leave of the company, we'll retire." The steward bowed and called for lights. Within minutes the hall had cleared, except for those who actually slept in it. Within a few more minutes Gerd was asleep, too, the clean straw palliasse a heaven of comfort after the hard ground and the harder floor of the inn.

  Morning brought snow, gently sifting down as they ate the large breakfast that the weather demanded. A comfort, to have a solid meal and a warm cloak between his ribs and the wind, thought Gerd, for their trail led higher into the mountains, up a sharp narrow valley, over a saddle, and then through thin snowfields and hard slopes. This would be mountain pasture in spring; now it was desolate, and the wind moaned as it crossed it, picking up little swirls of snow and whirling them like a partner in a dance. And still Squire Penrose had said nothing about the why or the way of their journey.

  He seemed to know where he was going, though. The day after leaving Hardrange Hall he reined in and nodded ahead through the swirling wind.

  It was as if the mountains before them were parted like people at an angry town meeting, one group leaning away from another, leaving a gap between. Squire Penrose pointed at the gap. "That's the Carrine Pass," he remarked equably, through the wind. "Beyond, at the further mouth of the pass, lies the village of Geet, then dry plains, and then the sea. The Cold Ocean, they call it. There's a little port there, the town of Lameth."

  The information was the most that the Squire had given. Gerd squinted to look, and saw nothing but bare peaks and flurries of snow. The wind hooted and howled.

  "Sir, we are running short of food for Hugo, and for ourselves. Is the village within a few days' march?"

  "Yes. Less, in fact. But the Pass lies between. There is stabling and lodging there, and there we meet the dragon."

  Gerd tried to cover his disquiet. At the village, and until Hardrange Hall, it had been enough that he was getting away. Away from Miller and away from the inn, and away from the village itself. Away from being hungry and cold and tired all the time. But as the miles piled up, a question began to worm its way into his unwilling mind: all very well to be getting away, but what was he going towards?

  For the first time he risked a question: "Sir, will you be slaying the dragon then?"

  Squire Penrose regarded him, eyes crinkling in the wind and the little flurries of snow. "Slay her? What a question. What else would a cavalier do with a dragon?"

  Gerd digested this. "And your harness, Sir, should I help you into it, now that the pass is in sight?"

  "No," said the squire. "That we do at the watchman's house. Armour is a little chilling for such a day." He looked about. "Come along. We can be there by dark, if we don't tarry."

  Gerd wondered if the squire thought it was going to get any warmer. He sighed and shouldered his pack.

  A grey afternoon later, he smelt smoke, and a little after that there was a gleam to be seen through the swirling snow. That fleck of light became a rough square, a warm yellow glow, and Gerd stumbled toward it gratefully.

  The house that loomed up out of the darkness was built into the hillside, on at least two levels. A man stood in the lower doorway, a closed lamp in his hand, peering out into the freezing dusk. He raised the lamp, and Gerd saw him nod to himself within the hood of his thick cloak, as if he had seen what he expected.

  "Aye," said the man. " 'Tis you. I thought it might be. Come in." He turned his back on them.

  The light led them on, into a stable and a byre. A door slammed behind them, cutting off the wail of the wind. Inside, it was warmer and scented of straw and clean animals. There was a cow, contentedly cropping hay, and a couple of stalls for horses. They unsaddled and groomed their beasts, the man with the lantern watching them.

  Gerd watched him in between strokes of the curry-comb on Rousset's flank. The watchman was small and sandy-bearded, with eyes that disappeared into deep folds and a nose like a lump of putty. Squire Penrose worked on Hugo as if there was no need to make any remark at all.

  When he finished he nodded. "Well, Master Hawken. I don't believe you know Gerd. Gerd, I present you to Master Hawken, watchman of the Carrine Pass."

  Gerd bowed, wondering. Squire Penrose had spoken as though the title were formal, like a lordship. Master Hawken grinned briefly, exposing uneven teeth.

  "Don't bother with the bowing and scraping, lad," he said. "I'm no gent. Come up then. Supper's ready."

  They put oats before the horses and then followed the Watchman up the stone steps to the upper hall.

  "You spoke to Squire Gratton, at Hardrange?" asked Master Hawken, as he laid wooden platters and bowls on the board. There was hot bean soup with bacon and onions, and it bubbled and chuckled to itself on the hob, a sound to put new heart into a tired, chilled body.

  "I did, indeed," replied Squire Penrose. "He seems to be doing well."

  "Well enough. He had the wit to cull his flocks this autumn." Master Hawken lifted the cauldron from the hook over the fire, waving Gerd aside as he made to help. "Knew it would be a hard winter, I reckon. Sit down, lad. This is just to warm you up. There's meat pie and greens to follow." He ladled the soup into wooden bowls.

  "You think he's keeping them in bounds, then?" asked Squire Penrose, spooning up soup. An odd question, thought Gerd.

  But Master Hawken wasn't surprised by it. "Oh, in numbers, sure. Depends on the lambing, next season. But he's looking to improve the breed of the mountain sheep. He got some new rams in, last spring. Just as well. There's flocks up there as rangy as the wolves, half-wild, and with fleeces so coarse they’re hardly worth the shearing."

  Squire Penrose cocked an ear to the rising wail of the wind as it tugged at the shutter. "A hard breed for a high pasture," he said, mildly. It sounded like a quote, a proverb.

  "Hard is well enough," said Master Hawken. "But what use to him is a sheep with neither wool on its back nor meat on its bones?"

  The squire nodded, smiling a little, as if he had expected the remark, and sipped his soup. Master Hawken watched him narrowly, and when it was clear that the squire would say no more, went on: "What use to anyone?"

  The squire's smile grew broader. "None at all, of course. Mind you, mountaineers have tough hides themselves, and good teeth to chew with."

  Master Hawken grunted, as if the squire had scored a point off him. He rose, opened the door of the oven above the fire, and drew a large square dish out of it. The dish was roofed over with a golden crisp pie-crust, and Gerd's mouth watered again at the savoury smell of it. The Warden placed the dish on the table. He nodded at the knife and spoon that were laid there. "Dig in, lad," he said. "No need to stand on ceremony."

  He reached up to the top of the tall dresser and drew down a crock with a tarred cork. As Gerd cut into the pie, he pulled the cork and poured dark wine int
o wooden cups.

  "Your man could do with some meat on his bones, as well," he said to Squire Penrose, watching Gerd slice the pie. It was full of mutton and onions and mushrooms. "A little too lean, he is. He's known hungry times."

  Squire Penrose pushed out his plate. "It seems so. I found him in a starveling inn kept by a lickpenny crone called Withers. Never was a woman better named. She'd have squeezed the life out of him in another twelvemonth."

  The warden ladled out pot greens. Gerd scooped up pie and served his master. He didn't understand why, but he felt moved to protest the words. "Yes, sir, she was hard," he said. "But she took me in and fed me when no-one else would. I was dumped on her doorstep like a bundle of kindling." The words were respectful, yet he could not help a sort of resentment showing. If the tasks that Mistress Withers set him were hard and many, at least he knew what work he was doing.

  The squire started on his pie. For all his delicate table manners, the food disappeared quickly. It came to Gerd that Squire Penrose had been just as cold and hungry as himself, but had said nothing of it, as if such things could not matter to a gentleman. The squire swallowed the morsel he had taken, patted his lips with a napkin, and took a sip of his wine, staring at Gerd over the rim of his cup. His stare was assessing.

  Then he set the cup down and nodded. "Your loyalty commends you, Gerd. I spoke amiss. All the same, she got full value for her charity, I'll wager. So you were a foundling? Was your parentage never guessed at?"

  "No, sir."

  "No village gossip?"

  Gerd snorted, and began eating. The pie was very good. "No. Sir. In a village as small as ours, no family could keep such a secret. Not even the lord's." He shook his head. "We all mind each other's business, in a place like that. It must have been someone passing through, some stranger. Yet nobody saw anything. I asked."

  "So you might be the son of a gentleman; of a knight, perhaps."

  Gerd stopped just short of a bitter laugh. "More likely, sir, I am the unwanted offspring of a swineherd and a goosegirl, run from their master and desperate to get away to the big city. The last thing they'd need would be a baby. So I was left."

  Hawken grunted. "And it's rankled all your life, I see. Well, that's to be expected." He addressed the squire. "He'll have been joked about and teased ever since the folk could give him to understand how little he mattered; how he was hardly worth the food to keep him alive. They're close, those villages. Don't like strangers. Don't like foreigners, meaning anyone from outside the village. You can come there, live for twenty years, die, be buried there - and your grandchildren will still be called Newman." He shook his head. "How did you come by your name?" he asked.

  Gerd shrugged. "It was short and handy." A thought struck him. "I didn't have a bracelet, or a ring on a chain around my neck, or a note with writing, if that's what you mean. Wouldn't have done any good if I had. None of us can read."

  "You're beginning to," said Squire Penrose. "Already you know your letters." He plied his spoon again.

  There was a short silence, broken by the scraping of knives. "You're big enough to be called Gerd," said the Warden, consideringly. "That's what it means, you know: big. You have the inches, and will have more yet. But you need proper feeding to fill you out."

  The squire smiled. "Just as well I came by when I did."

  Gerd, chewing, thought how he had been actually resentful of being rescued, a moment before. He spoke, feeling awkward: "I don't believe, sir, that I ever properly thanked you for that. Another half minute, and I'd have had my throat cut."

  "I doubt it. In truth, I think it would take more than a crowd of village louts to do that." Gerd looked up, wondering. Squire Penrose had spoken lightly, but with tones that carried total conviction. "Never mind. Gramercy for your thanks, which do you further credit. Eat your supper - which is up to Master Hawken's usual fine standard, I might say - and after we've cleared away, I'm for bed. We've an important day ahead."

  3

  The storm slid away during the night. Gerd awoke to a cold that tingled the end of his nose and made rising from the nest of his blankets a trial of will. The sun was still below the peaks, but the sky was clear, dark blue, and there were shadows, sharp as blades. Ice crackled as he opened the shutters and stared out at a landscape made of whites and blacks, blinding snow and stark rock.

  But not for long. Squire Penrose was stirring, and Gerd made haste down the stairs to the kitchen, where the fire was lit and water was warming. He brought a basinful for the squire to shave and wash with, and then went to clean himself. He had learned that the squire abhorred a sloven.

  Breakfast was as hearty as supper had been. Apparently Warden Hawken did all the cooking and housekeeping, for all that Squire Penrose addressed him as an equal. If Hawken were a gentleman, the same as Squire Penrose, there should be other servants. But there seemed to be none.

  They ate in silence. Gerd had learned through hard experience at the inn not to speak unless he was spoken to, and the habit was hard to shake. Neither of the others seemed disposed to talk this morning.

  But at the end of the meal, the squire drew back his chair and nodded. "I thank you for your hospitality, Warden," he said. "Gerd, go you down and bring my harness up to the chamber. I have some business to discuss with the Warden, but I shall be with you directly."

  Gerd rose and descended the stair. Hal and Rousset, who had learned to like him, greeted him with whickers and friendly pushes of their noses. Hugo stamped and glared. Gerd circled around him to pick up the panniers from the rail they were hung over. They were heavy, and he had to hang them from their straps over his shoulders. He climbed the stairs again, into the warm kitchen.

  " . . . the letter inside." The squire's voice was brisk. "This will cover it." He put a purse down on the table. "Thank you, Gerd. Take it up to my chamber, and attend. You should learn the proper order of a cavalier's harness, and it's as good a time to teach you as any." He followed Gerd up the stairs.

  It took a long time, and Gerd had to learn the meanings of a great many new words. They were words with an odd power about them; words like "rembrace" and "pauldron", "tassets" and "cuisses". Nor was that all. There was the proper laying out of the armour in its order, to be put on in sequence, each piece fitted in its turn. When it was finished, Squire Penrose had been turned into a steel statue, featureless, grim.

  Gerd stood back from his work. The squire's face was different somehow, with his helmet clasping it - more square, less humorous. His eyes glittered now like the metal itself, and the lightness of his footfall had been transformed into something more ponderous, more menacing.

  Yet still, as he flexed and bounced on his toes to test the fit and clasp of every piece, he moved lightly enough. "Harness is heavy, but it must never be awkward, Gerd," he said, and shrugged his shoulders so that the plates slid easily over each other. "If you can't dance in it, you can't fight in it. You get used to the weight, in time. The baldric, if you please."

  Gerd looped the sword-belt over his master's head, and the squire adjusted the fit. He slid the blade in and out a few fingerwidths to check that it drew freely.

  "Very good." Squire Penrose glanced out of the window. "A hard frost, but clear. Good. Hugo looked fit?"

  "Yes, Messire."

  "Good. Master Hawken will have groomed him by now." The squire glanced at Gerd. "Hugo knows him well enough."

  How? thought Gerd. The squire must have been past many times before, but he had said nothing about it. Gerd felt the resentment of the last evening welling up again, and he stifled it. Yet still, still, there was something odd about this.

  Odd? Of course it was odd. They were going to fight a dragon. How odd could things get?

  The squire turned, walked out the door and down the steps, and Gerd followed in his wake. The armour tapped and scraped softly against itself, but neither rattled nor rang; it fitted too well for that. They passed through the kitchen and descended directly to the stable.

  Here, ju
st as the squire had said, Master Hawken was waiting with Hugo. The warhorse was saddled and groomed and was wearing a horse-mantle against the cold, heavily embroidered with the squire's arms, six red roses on a white ground. Hugo stamped and shook his head as Master Hawken held him. Squire Penrose slapped his neck in greeting, and then swung himself up into the saddle, a little more heavily but no less easily than as if he were mounting without armour to weigh on his limbs.

  He gestured. "My lance," he said, and Master Hawken nodded to where it stood propped up against the wall. Gerd ran to fetch it, a long ash spear with a glittering steel head. He handed it up, and Squire Penrose set it in the rest by his stirrup. "And the shield," he said.