Фрэнсис Хардинг - A Skinful of Shadows

‘What’s that?’ said James.

In the far distance, the two of them could see a tall whisker of brownish-grey smoke. It was too large to come from a chimney or campfire, and the wrong colour for woodsmoke. It was the wrong time of year for stubble fires.

Makepeace got out the diptych dial, and looked at the compass. She tried to remember the maps that she had so carefully pieced together, but she already knew in her heart where the smoke was coming from.

‘Grizehayes,’ said James in a whisper. He looked numb and shocked, and Makepeace knew that her face wore the same expression.

Grizehayes the invulnerable. Grizehayes the eternal, with centuries encrusted upon it like barnacles. Grizehayes the unchanging rock in the world’s river. Their prison, their enemy, their shelter, their home.

Grizehayes was burning.

‘Is the world ending?’ James asked huskily.

Makepeace moved over, wrapped her bruised arms around him and hugged him tightly.

‘Yes,’ she said.

‘What do we do?’

‘We walk,’ she said. ‘We find food, and a place to sleep. Tomorrow we do it again. We survive.’

Worlds ended sometimes. Makepeace had known that for a while. She had known it since the night of the riots and Mother’s death, when her own world had neatly and completely fallen to dust.

One of the dogs snarled at something in the spinney. Makepeace leaped to her feet, but then saw the small outline lumbering through the undergrowth, and the livid white streaks on its pointed face. It was a badger, going about its business as if there were no wars to be fought.

Makepeace watched it with fascination. She remembered all that she had learned about badgers in the bestiary book at Grizehayes. The badger, or brock, whose legs were longer on one side, to help it on sloping ground . . .

. . . but they weren’t. As it ambled through a patch of daylight, she could see it quite clearly, and all its short legs were the same humble, sturdy length.

Perhaps none of the old truths were true any more. This could be a new world entirely, with its own rules. A world where badgers were not lopsided, and pelicans did not feed their young with their own blood, and toads had no precious stones in their heads, and cubs were already bear-shaped at birth. A world where castles could burn, and kings could die, and no rule was unbreakable.

‘We survive,’ she said again, more firmly. ‘And we try to lick this new world into shape while it’s still soft. If we don’t, there’s others that will.’

It was only much later that a news-sheet told them the full story of the fall of Grizehayes.

The explosion in the dead of night was commonly blamed on powder stored too close to the walls. When dawn came, white cloths had hung from the battlements of Grizehayes, signalling a willingness to talk. A man called Crowe had emerged to negotiate the surrender.

The siege commander had let all the civilians leave, and even take some provisions and possessions with them. In peacetime he had not been an unkind man, and the siege had been relatively short. His fighting zeal had not had time to curdle into hatred.

The Parliamentarian force that had taken Grizehayes had barely had time to raid its stores before they received word that a large Royalist force, headed by Sir Marmaduke, was less than a day away.

The siege commander faced a hard decision, and made it quickly. Better to torch the house, so that it could never be used again, than risk the King’s forces using it as a stronghold, albeit a broken one.

The account said that when Sir Marmaduke saw his ancestral home in flames, it ‘killed his heart’. He refused to wear his protective buff coat, led the cavalry charge and fought like a madman. Afterwards both sides spoke highly of his bravery. But then again, the dead are often easier to praise than the living.

Not all battles were reported in the news-sheets, and not all of them involved full armies or neat battle lines under the gaze of eagle-eyed commanders. Months were passing, and there was still no peace. Sometimes there was a great battle that everyone said would decide things, one way or the other. But somehow it never did.

Humans are strange, adaptable animals, and eventually get used to anything, even the impossible or unbearable. In time, the unthinkable becomes normal.

The inhabitants of one forest hamlet were very glad to be visited by someone who could dress wounds. They had been attacked by an armed band wearing sashes. There had been shots fired and blows struck. In the end the villagers had hidden in the church, and dropped rocks on the strangers until they tired of trying to set fire to the building and left. Nobody was quite sure whether they had been paid troops, brigands or a group of marauding deserters.

The villagers could only pay Makepeace and James by offering shelter, meals, and bones for the dogs, but these were very welcome. James did most of the talking. He cut a good figure, even as a wanderer.

When I think of the fees my services might once have commanded, muttered Dr Quick, as Makepeace’s latest patient left through the door with a clean strip of linen around his head. Nonetheless, the doctor complained less about such things these days. Perhaps rich patrons were less grateful than struggling householders. You are sentimental, as ever.

It’s sense, not sentiment , Makepeace told him, as she cleaned her hands. We needed somewhere to stay for a few nights.

You had good solid reasons to help these people, said the doctor. You always do.

Did I ever tell you about another chirurgeon I knew before the war? He was a rising star, with better patrons than many physicians. But one day a child died under his knife — the little daughter of his closest friend. After that, he was hopeless. Suddenly he could deny nobody. He ran himself ragged, taking up every case, even where there was no hope of payment. And he could always give excellent, sensible reasons why it was in his interests to do so. He never admitted that he was trying to save everyone, to soothe the ache of failing to save that girl.

Did he ever find peace? asked Makepeace. She knew perfectly well what the doctor was suggesting.

Who can say? He still lives, as far as I know. Perhaps he will, some day. And in the meanwhile, the stupid man is saving a lot of lives.

Do you want to write some more today? asked Makepeace.

If we can spare the time and paper.

Whenever she had the chance, Makepeace bartered for paper. It was seldom cheap, and often used on one side, but it allowed the doctor to write up his discoveries and theories concerning battlefield surgery.

Makepeace had also written two letters, not long after the fall of Grizehayes. The first was sent to Charity Tyler in Norwich, sending back her brother’s prayer book, and breaking the news of his death. It told her that he had wished to be reconciled to his cousin, and for an end to bad blood between them, and that he had loved his sister with all his heart. The letter also told her that Livewell had helped breach the walls of a Royalist stronghold and end a siege that might have cost many lives. It did not mention that this had happened after his death.

Livewell would vanish soon, she was sure of it. There was something calmer about him now. Some day she would wake and find a hole in her mind like a missing tooth.

I have polished my soul as much as I can, he had said recently. If I stay much longer I will only scuff it again.

The second letter had been written with the help of Morgan. It was addressed to Helen, and was a very dull missive about children getting measles. On the back, however, a second encoded message was written invisibly in artichoke juice:

Helen,

By now you will have heard strange things of me. The truth is stranger still. I was not in the service of the Fellmottes when you met me, but nor was I working for your enemies. I am your friend and mean to prove myself so.