Roger Taylor: Valderen

The only threat to his unexpected euphoria was the absence of Marna. It took him some time to turn the conversation so that he could ask, casually, where she was. Harlen smiled and shrugged. Gryss had a brief vision of the young woman crawling along ditches and hedgerows in order to avoid the guards who were now permanently on duty down the valley. He dismissed it as calmly as he could. ‘Bring her with you, Harlen,’ he said as they parted. ‘There’re things I want to talk about that she’ll be interested in.’ Then he turned on his heel and left quickly before Harlen could summon up any questions.

Thus, in the early evening, all his would-be allies were gathered in his cottage.

He made no preamble, but set out his ideas immedi-ately. There was a silence when he had finished. Yakob eventually broke it. His initial reaction was the same as had been Gryss’s own. ‘All very fine, Gryss,’ he said. ‘We’d all like to do something. But what can we do? We can’t throw them out of the castle. We can’t get out of the valley.’ He threw up his hands. ‘We don’t even know what it is that Rannick and these people are up to.’

‘And they are leaving us alone,’ Harlen added, reluc-tantly reciting the growing response of the villagers. ‘Who knows what they’ll do if we start to make trouble?’

Gryss nodded. He suspected that this careful treat-ment of the villagers was Nilsson’s tactic, and that it had been adopted quite specifically to disarm troublesome local opposition. Rannick, he was sure, would not have hesitated to wreak havoc on the village had the whim so taken him.

He submitted this to his friends. ‘Just discussing it like this, now, makes me think that perhaps Rannick’s fully occupied on some greater design of his own,’ he concluded. ‘I can’t see that he’s leaving us alone because he regrets…’ He hesitated. ‘What he did to Katrin and Garren.’

Yakob scowled and shrugged. ‘Maybe,’ he said. ‘But whoever’s idea it is, it’s a good one, and it’ll work. Everyone’s seen those other poor souls being hauled in, and everyone knows it could be them next if they make trouble.’ Anger and regret filled his face. ‘It’s horrible to talk like that, I know,’ he went on. ‘But it’s true. Those people are suffering on our behalf.’ He brought his hand down on the table. ‘If only we’d seen them off when they first arrived.’

Gryss was no more indulgent with Yakob than he had been with himself a few hours ago. ‘Well, we didn’t,’ he answered curtly. ‘And we can’t be wasting our time breast-beating and howling over what we should have done. We did what we did because it seemed right at the time. That could be anyone’s epitaph. Now the harm’s been done and what we have to do is make sure we don’t perpetuate that mistake by letting Rannick and Nilsson get away with whatever it is they’re doing without any hindrance.’

Yakob made to speak again but Gryss lifted a hand to stop him. ‘Do you agree or don’t you?’ he demanded. ‘It’s that simple.’ He paused briefly. ‘If you don’t, then fair enough. I’ll involve you no further. All I’ll ask of you is that you keep quiet about this meeting.’

There was a brief, injured silence, then Yakob said heatedly, ‘You’ve no call to speak like that. Of course we want to do something.’ Harlen and Jeorg both nodded in agreement. ‘But I presume we’ll be allowed the odd moment to speak about our regrets, won’t we? It’s not as if anything springs immediately to mind that we can do, does it?’

Gryss bridled a little at this rebuff but he fought back a scowl and managed to look appropriately contrite. ‘You’re right, Yakob. I’m sorry,’ he said, insincerely. ‘I’ve no doubt I can rely on you to guard against my impetuosity.’ This time it was Yakob who bridled at the sarcasm that Gryss had failed to keep out of his voice, but Gryss continued quickly. ‘As for what to do, I’m afraid we must succeed in what we failed to do before. We must get news of what’s happening to the capital.’

For the first time since she had sat down at the long wooden table, Marna looked up. She did not speak, but she leaned forward a little. Gryss noted the movement. ‘There’ll be plenty for you to do here, Marna,’ he said, partly to reassure Harlen, but mainly in an attempt to forestall any folly that she might be contemplating.

Unexpectedly she nodded understandingly and said, ‘Of course, Gryss.’

Gryss looked at her narrowly and made an immedi-ate resolution to watch her very carefully. When they were alone, he would speak to her a little more bluntly.

Yakob reverted to practicalities. ‘I suppose it’s all we can do,’ he said. ‘But how? There are far more guards downland than there were when Jeorg tried to leave, and if anyone’s lucky enough to get past them, there’s no saying how far over the hill these raiding parties of theirs are reaching now.’

‘I’ll go again,’ Jeorg said resolutely. ‘If Rannick’s in the castle, I’ll take my chance on dodging his men.’ He tapped his head. ‘I go through the route continually in my mind, and I’ve still got the maps and notes we prepared, wrapped up safe and sound at the bottom of my pack.’

Yakob and Harlen looked unhappy, but Gryss nod-ded. ‘You’re still the best choice for the job,’ he said. ‘But we’ve got to be far more careful this time. They’ll kill you without a doubt if they catch you again, and who knows what reprisals they might take against the rest of the village?’

‘I know,’ Jeorg replied, his voice untypically soft. He tapped his head again. ‘I go through that continually as well. And don’t think I relish the prospect of trying again. The whole idea frightens the breeches off me.’ He paused, and then almost spat out, ‘But doing nothing’s rotting me. And it’s no guarantee of safety for the village. Rannick’ll turn on us sooner or later, I’m sure. You all know what he’s like.’ He looked around the table. His pain was reflected in the faces of his listeners, but no one disagreed.

Despite the grimness of this assessment, Gryss was strangely heartened by the fact that they had all apparently reached the same conclusion as himself about Rannick’s probable future conduct.

Jeorg continued. ‘And talk around the matter as much as you like, it comes to the same in the end. We can’t fight them. That’s a job for soldiers. So someone has to tell the King what’s happened so that the army can be sent to get rid of them.’

A long silence followed this pronouncement. ‘We must work out when and how, then,’ Gryss said eventually, his voice a little hoarse.

‘I can watch the guards downland,’ Marna said.

‘No!’ Both Gryss and Harlen spoke together sharply. Gryss deferred to her father.

‘You keep away from them,’ Harlen said. ‘You don’t need to be told why they’re bringing women back from their raids, do you?’

Marna’s face coloured in a mixture of anger and embarrassment. Such directness from her father was unusual. ‘Just keep away from them,’ he said again, quietly but with powerful authority. The other men around the table nodded. Marna’s face became stony, but she did not speak.

‘I’ll keep an eye on the guards,’ Harlen went on, turning back to Gryss. ‘They’re used to me wandering about down there. It shouldn’t be too difficult to find out how many there are and how they come and go.’

Gryss nodded. ‘I suppose we’ll have to think like soldiers ourselves,’ he mused. ‘We must watch all of them all the time. Find out exactly how many there are, what they do, who’s in charge, and so on.’ He grimaced. ‘I suppose we’ll have to get to know them. Find out their names. Find out who likes to drink, who likes to gamble, who likes to gossip. As we learn about them, perhaps other ways of quietly causing them problems will come to light.’