Paul Finch - Stronghold

Ranulf reasoned that one of the earl's men-at-arms would be inside there, working the drawbridge wheel. But the fellow who now stepped from the darkness behind Gurt, unnoticed by him, was no man-at-arms — it was Navarre. And he had drawn his trusty dagger. Without a word, he raised it over his head and drove it down hard, ramming it between Gurt's shoulder blades.

Ranulf slid to a stunned and breathless halt.

Gurt had gone rigid; his expression of relief had rapidly transformed to one of bemusement. He half-smiled and tried to speak — though no words came out. With a weak gesture towards Ranulf, he tottered slightly, his knees buckling. But it took a shove from Navarre to help him on his way, pitching him head first into the gulf.

" Guuurt!" Ranulf screamed, as his friend dropped from view.

Navarre glanced uninterestedly across the drawbridge towards Ranulf, before turning and walking casually back into the darkness of the Keep.

"Raise the bridge," he told someone.

Five seconds later, Ranulf arrived at the end of the timber gallery, but the bridge had already been drawn up out of his reach, marooning him there. With a heavy clunk, it came to rest against the facing wall — a good ten yards away.

Ranulf teetered on the terrifying brink. Far below, the tiny shape of Gurt lay still in the foot of the dry moat. Even from this distance, a crimson stain could be seen creeping out around his splayed green cloak. Ranulf might have gone cold at the thought that this shattered fragment was all that remained of the closest comrade he'd had during the fight for Grogen Castle. He might have gone colder still at the thought that, with all the other indebted knights slaughtered — in fact with all of those not bound in Earl Corotocus's personal mesnie dead, including his father — he didn't have a friend left in the world. But he was already cold, deeply cold. Not just clammy with sweat, but chilled to the marrow by the nightmares he'd witnessed and partaken in.

He was so numbed that it was tempting to simply remain here and await the inevitable. There was nowhere else to go anyway. Every ten yards along this timber gallery, a stout post connected with its roof, so it would not be difficult to climb up there. But the roof was of thatched straw, which could easily be penetrated by spears or eaten by flames, and beyond that there was nothing. The only solution it seemed was to kneel and offer contrition for his sins, praying that the end might come quickly.

But Ranulf did none of these things.

Instead, he turned and walked back along the gallery towards the State Rooms. He now understood what had motivated his father during his final years: that the antidote to a wasted life could only be a worthwhile death; that the price of living without honour could only be to die covered with it.

Yet Ranulf did not intend to die.

Not yet.

As he'd fought through the barrack house and the Great Hall, it had occurred to him several times that his demise was nigh and that perhaps he should welcome it as a just desert rather than fear it. But now he consciously and determinedly sought to avoid it — because there was something very important that he had to do first.

He entered the room where the legless monstrosity was pinned to the floor. It remained fixed down, but on seeing him became wildly animated, struggling, grunting, tearing handfuls of flesh from its own torso as it sort to dig the implement out. Meanwhile, the door connecting with the Great Hall had almost been battered through. One hinge had come loose, and great chunks of woodwork were missing. The parchment-faced figures beyond gave shrieks of glee when they saw that Ranulf had returned.

Ranulf ignored them. He righted the fallen divan — a luxurious piece of Italian furniture, with a carved wooden base and thick fleece for upholstery — and shoved it across the floor until it was beneath the first casement through which a grapple and a rope protruded. Climbing up, he was able to reach the grapple and pull it down. It would be typical of his luck, he thought, if another dead Welshman was on the end of it and now came through the aperture screaming and raving. But that did not happen. The rope was limp and he was able to reel in forty or fifty yards of it, before drawing his broken sword and chopping it through.

He coiled it over his arm as he headed back to the Keep gallery, though now, with a deafening crash, the door behind him fell and the dead surged through. Ranulf broke into a run, shedding his mail piece by piece as he did — first his coif, then his hauberk, then his leggings. Each time it was difficult, the straps and buckles caked with blood, vomit, excrement; all the glutinous residue of death. He was half way along the gallery, into the timbered section, when he cast off the last piece. His felt and woollen under-garb was so sodden with sweat and urine — he'd lost count of the number of times he'd voided his bladder during the last two days, having had no time to find a quiet corner — that it clung to him like a second skin, but at least it was light, enabling him to run much faster. However, undressing en route had slowed him down, and a quick glance over his shoulder showed that his enemies were as close as ten yards behind, their dirge of shrieks and moans deadening his ears. Knowing that he had one chance only, he unloaded the rope, took hold of the grapple — three iron hooks welded together — and flung it up towards the top of the gantry drawbridge, which was about a foot lower than the lintel of the portal beyond it.

The grapple caught and held.

Ranulf didn't bother looking round. The dead were right at his back — their stench engulfed him, their claws were reaching for him. With no time to rig a harness, he wound the rope around his hands and threw himself into open space. Their howls of rage turned to groans of despair as he swung down across the gulf.

The Keep wall rushed towards him. He'd intended to extend his legs and flatten his feet, to brace himself for impact, but the rope spiralled and he struck the sheer bricks with heavy force, his left hip and the left side of his ribs taking the full brunt.

Seconds passed as he hung there between Heaven and Earth, his vision blurred with tears and sweat, his wrists burning as they supported the entire weight of his body. Finally he was able to focus again; he peered upward. The flat cliff-face of the wall rose inexorably to a sky now tinged pink by dawn sunlight. The rope from which he hung was a taut sinew, which creaked and twisted. He glanced towards the lip of the gallery. The dead clustered there, watching him, even though some of them lacked eyes and some even lacked faces. So great was their press, that one or two fell, hurtling down. Several, he saw, had axes, spears and knives — all potential missiles. How long before they, or whatever controlled them, realised they could still reach him? How long before his strength gave out regardless?

Young as he was, Ranulf's military experience was already sufficient to guide him through extreme pain and exhaustion. The usual trick was simply to pretend that it wasn't happening, to imagine that your agony was just like any other sensation, something minor and tolerable, until you actually fooled your own brain. This always took an immense feat of concentration, though it was easier to do it when you were lying on a battlefield nursing a wound than when you were hanging by weakening arms over a ninety-foot chasm.

Grunting with effort, he turned himself around and planted his feet against the wall. With his mail leggings gone, he only wore light felt shoes. Their soles lacked grip, but he had no choice. The climb that faced him was thirty feet at least and he couldn't manage that by the strength of his arms alone. His injured ankle felt as if hot coals were being crushed into it as he began the long upward walk, step by unsteady step. His shoulders seemed as though they were being wrenched from his torso, as he pulled himself along the rope. The palms of his hands were scored, blistered, already slippery with blood.