Connie Willis - Doomsday Book

The servants swarmed over the hall, serving supper. Kivrin had not known whether they would eat an evening meal at all, since Christmas Eve was a fast day, but as soon as the pale chaplain finished reading vespers, obviously on Lady Imeyne's orders, the herd of servants trooped in with a meal of bread, watered wine, and dried cod which had been soaked in lyewater and then roasted.

Agnes was so excited she didn't eat a bite, and after supper had been cleared away, she refused to come and sit quietly by the hearth, but ran round the hall, ringing her bell and pestering the dogs.

Sir Bloet's servants and the steward brought in the Yule log and dumped it on the hearth, scattering sparks everywhere. The women stepped back, laughing, and the children screamed with delight. Rosemund, as eldest child of the house, lit the log with a faggot saved from the Yule log the year before, touching it gingerly to the tip of one of the crooked roots. There was laughter and applause when it caught, and Agnes waved her arm wildly to make her bell ring.

Rosemund had said earlier that the children were allowed to stay up for the mass at midnight, but Kivrin had hoped she could at least coax Agnes to lie down on the bench beside her and take a nap. Instead, as the evening progressed, Agnes got wilder and wilder, shrieking and ringing her bell till Kivrin had to take it away from her.

The women sat down by the hearth, talking quietly. The men stood in little groups, their arms folded across their chests, and several times they all went outside, except for the chaplain, and came back in stamping the snow off their feet and laughing. It was obvious from their red faces and Imeyne's look of disapproval that they had been out in the brewhouse with a keg of ale, breaking their fast.

When they came in the third time, Bloet sat down across the hearth and stretched out his legs to the fire, watching the girls. The three gigglers and Rosemund were playing Blind Man's Bluff. When Rosemund, blindfolded, came close to the benches, Bloet reached out and pulled her onto his lap. Everyone laughed.

Imeyne spent the long evening sitting by the chaplain, reciting her grievances against Father Roche to him. He was ignorant, he was clumsy, he had said the Confiteor before the Adjutorum during the mass last Sunday. And he was out there in that ice-cold church on his knees, Kivrin thought, while the chaplain warmed his hands at the fire and nodded disapprovingly.

The fire died down to glowing embers. Rosemund slid off Bloet's lap and ran back to the game. Gawyn told the story of how he had killed six wolves, watching Eliwys the whole time. The chaplain told a story about a dying woman who made false confession. When the chaplain had touched her forehead with the holy oil, her skin had smoked and turned black before his eyes.

Halfway through the chaplain's story, Gawyn stood up, rubbed his hands over the fire and went over to the beggar's bench. He sat down and pulled off his boot.

After a minute, Eliwys stood up and went over to him. Kivrin couldn't hear what she said to him, but he stood up, the boot still in his hand.

"The trial is once more delayed," Kivrin heard Gawyn say. "The judge who was to hear it is taken ill."

She couldn't hear Eliwys's answer, but Gawyn nodded, and said, "It is good news. The new judge is from Swindone and less kindly disposed to King Edward," but neither of them looked like it was good news. Eliwys was nearly as white as she had been when Imeyne told her she'd sent Gawyn to Courcy.

She twisted her heavy ring. Gawyn sat down again, brushed the rushes from the bottom of his hose, and pulled the boot on, and then looked up again and said something. Eliwys turned her head aside and Kivrin couldn't see her expression for the shadows, but she could see Gawyn's.

And so could anyone else in the hall, Kivrin thought, and looked hastily around to see if the couple had been observed. Imeyne was deep in complaint with the chaplain, but Sir Bloet's sister was watching, her mouth tight with disapproval, and so, on the opposite side of the fire, were Bloet and the other men.

Kivrin had hoped she might have a chance to speak with Gawyn tonight, but she obviously could not among all these watchful people. A bell rang, and Eliwys started and looked toward the door.

"It is the devil's knell," the chaplain said quietly, and even the children stopped their games to listen.

In some villages the contemps had rung the bell once for each year since the birth of Christ. In most it had only been tolled for the hour before midnight, and Kivrin doubted whether Roche, or even the chaplain, could count high enough to toll the years, but she began keeping count anyway, thinking, Gilchrist told me to do a temporal check as soon as possible.

Three servants came in, bearing logs and kindling, and replenished the fire. It flared up brightly, throwing huge, distorted shadows on the walls. Agnes jumped up and pointed, and one of Sir Bloet's nephews made a rabbit with his hands.

Mr. Latimer had told her that the contemps had read the future in the Yule log's shadows. She wondered what the future held for them, Lord Guillaume in trouble and all of them in danger.

The king had forfeited the lands and property of convicted criminals. They might be forced to live in France or to accept charity from Sir Bloet and endure snubs from the steward's wife.

Or Lord Guillaume might come home tonight with good news and a falcon for Agnes, and they would all live happily ever after. Except Eliwys. And Rosemund. What would happen to her?

It's already happened, Kivrin thought wonderingly. The verdict is already in and Lord Guillaume's come home and found out about Gawyn and Eliwys. Rosemund's already been handed over to Sir Bloet. And Agnes has grown up and married and died in childbirth, or of blood poisoning, or cholera, or pneumonia.

They've all died, she thought, and couldn't make herself believe it. They've all been dead over seven hundred years.

"Look!" Agnes shrieked. "Rosemund has no head!" She pointed to the distorted shadows the fire cast on the walls as it flared up. Rosemund's, oddly elongated, ended at the shoulders.

One of the red-headed boys ran over to Agnes. "I have no head either!" he said, jumping on tiptoe to change the shadow's shape.

"You have no head, Rosemund," Agnes shouted happily. "You will die ere the year is out."

"Say not such things," Eliwys said, starting toward her. Everyone looked up.

"Kivrin has a head," Agnes said. "I have a head, but poor Rosemund has none."

Eliwys caught hold of Agnes by both arms. "Those are but foolish games," she said. "Say not such things."

"The shadow — " Agnes said, looking like she was going to cry.

"Sit you down by Lady Katherine and be still," Eliwys said. She brought her over to Kivrin and almost pushed her onto the bench. "You are grown too wild."

Agnes huddled next to Kivrin, trying to decide whether to cry or not. Kivrin had lost count, but she picked up where she had left off. Forty-six, forty-seven.

"I want my bell," Agnes said, climbing off the bench.

"Nay, we must sit quietly," Kivrin said. She took Agnes onto her lap.

"Tell me of Christmas."

"I can't, Agnes. I can't remember."

"Do you remember naught that you can tell me?"

I remember it all, Kivrin thought. The shops are full of ribbons, satin and mylar and velvet, red and gold and blue, brighter even than my woad-dyed cloak, and there's light everywhere and music. Great Tom and Magdalen's bells and Christmas carols.

She thought of the Carfax carillon, trying to play "It Came Upon the Midnight Clear," and the tired old piped in carols in the shops along the High. Those carols haven't even been written yet, Kivrin thought, and felt a sudden wash of homesickness.