The Young Huntsman

1

The knight was saddle-sore and a healed chest wound ached and nagged at him as he rode through Calais at the head of his tired, bedraggled troupe of erstwhile Crusaders; men from his estate; houseguards, ostlers, smiths and cooks, men from the village in his fields and a few women; country girls who tended and cared for them, and laid down for them too. Survivors all and many left behind in the Holy Land, their bones bleached, by now, in the sun. God's work was done and Lord Arlen's thoughts sped across the Channel sea, before him at the dock, to England, to his castle in Somerset, to the harvest yet to be gathered in, to his cattle, tended, these several years, by old men and boys, and to his wife; the Lady Anne.2

They crossed the water in a fishing boat, under the moon, pushed on by a heavy swell, glad to land, at last, on a gravel beach, come together, roused from wine sleep, cursed and chided by Arlen's housecarl, Revell, and set off along the coast road, west toward their goal where, each dreamed, happy days lay waiting in reward for the trials and sickness, the blood and privation endured in Palestine.3

Anne woke and lay watching fingers of pale dawn light steal across the rush-strewn floor of her bedchamber. Beside her, sleeping like a child, and scarcely older, lay a youth of sixteen summers. She played with the ends of his tousled brown curls, gazing at his long-lashed eyelids, his red lips. He stirred, opened his eyes, blue as the sky under the now risen sun, and, seeing her, smiled. She moved to him, embraced him and kissed his brow, his eyes, his lips.4

He rose to her embrace and, turning, laid her back on the bed, to begin again to love her so that she was again lost, and found in his arms. They loved and dallied while the day wore on until, near noon, she sent the swain away. "Quietly!" she instructed him, fending off his kisses. He blew one last kiss from the casement and slipped off, dropping to the walk along the high wall. Lady Anne glanced quickly around knowing that none could see from within the castle, but anxious. She scanned the skyline, the track that ran from forest hill to castle gate. Naught but crows, seeking food in the grass. Then, suddenly, the black birds rose, calling, and flapped away over the trees. A man on a horse had breasted the hill. He paused, surveying the castle. Her mouth dried as she recognized her husband, Arlen.5

The people of the castle woke as from some long, dreamless sleep when Lord Arlen and his retinue rode and walked in through the gate. Revell roared for service to his lord and all was busyness and bustle while the travellers were received and preparations made for a banquet to celebrate their arrival. The Knight Crusader, told that his Lady awaited him in the great hall, dropped to his knee, so that all who were present in the castle yard followed suit, while he gave thanks for his return, that God had protected him and too, his property and serfs in his absence, then he stood and entered the hall.6

Lady Anne, dressed in blue silk, standing by the hearth, curtseyed as her lord strode across the stone flags to face her. He looked long into her eyes so that she blushed and lowered her gaze.7

"How fares my lord?" She asked.8

"Well, Anne, and not so well. Wounds will heal and grief abate, though. It is a long time."9

"Aye, my lord." 10

"Meredith is slain, and Revell's son, chief among my men."11

"I am sorry my lord. The abbot is sent for and a service will be given tomorrow, to pray for the dead and give thanks for your safe homecoming."12

She looked up at him once more and again, he searched her gaze, saying nothing. She reached out to him and moving close, kissed his face. He embraced her briefly.13

"I had forgotten, my lady, how beautiful you are." He said, and tossing his gauntlets onto the long table, turned and walked away from her. 14

"We shall talk later, Anne. I have orders for Revell and would rest before the banquet."15

The echo of his steps died away. Lady Anne stood, trembling slightly, shadowed in shafts of sunlight cast from the high west windows. Had he seen Robert on the castle wall, leaving her chamber? Had Arlen recognised her lover?16

Lady Anne's lover had heard a commotion as he descended the castle wall staircase. Rightly, Robert guessed it was Lord Arlen's return and waited, out of sight on the curve of the steps, until the sounds of servants, hurrying to the courtyard and the kitchens, had died away. He waited also for his nerves to calm and to still the apprehension in his mind. Then he slipped through to his quarters, donned his tabard, and went to fetch Lord Arlen's hounds. He was thankful to escape into his daily routine, and passed across the castle courtyard out into the green space beyond its walls, the hounds eager for their exercise, straining at the leash.17

Away from the castle, Robert loosed the hounds and they raced away at once, across and around the greensward to pause, at length, at the edge of the wood and look back to him, waiting for him to come up to them. He ran lightly along and, as he reached the dogs, looked back at the castle. It was not a great castle but it was tall and imposing. The keep looked out over the walls, in shadow now the afternoon was advanced. The young huntsman saw Arlen's flag flying, high on the keep; a mailed fist on a red and yellow ground. A man was pacing the battlements and now he stopped and seemed to be watching the wood and Robert with the hounds. Sun shone and lit up ash blonde hair which hung in locks to his shoulders. It was Lord Arlen. Robert switched attention to his charges and moved with them, away under the trees, into the wood.18

Arlen continued to walk along the castle wall brooding on his wife's nervousness at their reunion. Six years was a lengthy absence. The fair Anne had married him at fourteen years and the call to arms had come hard upon the hours of love in the marriage bed. He had loved her well, and would again, he reflected. No issue had come of that union, no child to occupy her while he fought the muslim horde. That must change. He looked back toward the trees. Robert had gone with his hounds into the woodland shades. Lord Arlen smiled, he loved that boy, though he was careful not to show it. Kindly and fun-loving, Robert was his favourite among the youths who lived and served under his rule. He had protested at being left behind when Arlen's company went to the Crusades but obeyed his liege's order; "The hounds, Robert, there your duty lies." His reverie was interrupted by the sight of a raven, perched upon a corner turret. The gaunt bird studied the knight awhile, angling its sharp-beaked head. Of a sudden, it let out a harsh cry and launched into the air, flapping away over the forest. Arlen resumed his thoughts of his wife, wondering why she had seemed so apprehensive.19

She need not have feared what she thought he might know; he had seen nothing of Robert's leave-taking that morning. There was another, however, who had.20

Nicknamed, Weasel long ago, so that he had almost forgotten his true name, a sallow, bony man dressed in a worn, woollen, shapeless habit and soft cap, had paused, ere sent on his errand, to suck mead from a leathern bottle slung over his shoulder. As he raised his mouth to the bottle, he saw a man slip from the Lady Anne's window and, stooping, run along the wall.21

As the man passed between the embrasures of the battlements, Weasel recognised him.22

"Crafty beggar," he murmured. The knowledge he had just gained grew in Weasel as he walked the path to the friary, some miles off. He had always been jealous of Robert's popularity, his comeliness. Aye, and he fancied Lord Arlen was fond of the sweet boy too. Infused with mead,23

Weasel began to conspire with himself and chuckled and sniggered as he went on his way to fetch the abbot. "Perchance", he giggled, "my star shall rise in his Lordship's heaven. But best confide, I think, in Thomas Revell. Dont pay to be too forward with the high and mighty."24

Fed and watered at the abbot's kitchen, Weasel set off in his wake. The corpulent abbot sat astride a donkey, flicking its ears with a switch when the animal paused to eat dandelions along the trackway. Each time, Weasel caught up to them, then fell behind as the donkey moved on. The castle came into view as dusk drew in. The donkey's hooves drummed across the drawbridge above a moat whose banks sparkled with golden kingcups. Weasel was close behind; the enticing smell of roasting ox had reached his nose.25

Pipes and tabors in the gallery, Lord Arlen and Lady Anne seated, with the abbot, at the dining table, flanked by men of rank, some with their wives. Children played and danced in and out of the shadows of the hall scolded by servants where they obstructed the bearing in of platters of food and flagons of ale. Having blessed the meal, the abbot set to to devour it, his face flushed with wine. Lady Anne listened, with the company, to her husband's account of their journey to Jerusalem. Now and then, she stole a glance at Robert who was leaning at the fireplace, talking and joking with some stable boys while feeding morsels of meat to a pair of hounds resting at the hearth. As he looked around the great hall at the assembled house of Arlen taking its ease in merriment and feasting, he noticed Revell, talking to a man whose face he could not see, his back to Robert, half-hidden by the arched and shadowed doorway.26

Revell stiffened, his gestures sharp. Clearly, he was agitated by something his companion had said. Robert's attention was diverted by one of the hounds which had lifted a foreleg to paw gently at his master's leg, begging more meat. He failed to see the housecarl staring at him across the room, his face set hard. The Weasel had exited. Why should he lie, he had asked of Revell? His loyalty was unto Lord Arlen and it was his duty to reveal what he had seen. It was up to Revell to investigate the matter of Robert's presence in the bedchamber of Lady Anne.27

Revell turned his attention to Arlen's wife. This she noticed and was discomforted by his stare. The evening having worn on, she begged leave of her lord to excuse herself. Lord Arlen was reluctant to part with her and downing the last of his goblet of wine, took her arm and bade goodnight to the company. They protested his leavetaking and Revell sought to converse with his liege but Arlen was well fed and warm with the wine. "Leave it to the morrow, my friend. Speak to me after the Mass, I'm sure it will keep. Goodnight, gentles all!" Revell watched his master exit the great hall. When he glanced back at the fireplace, Robert and the hounds were gone.28

Autumn had arrived. Robert looked out from an arrow slit onto green pastures where a flurry of yellow leaves flittered by on the morning breeze. It had taken some effort to rouse the abbot, he had heard, but fortified by a draught of ale, he had risen to the occasion and uplifted the worshippers with visions of beatific saints welcoming the war-dead to heaven. In his peroration he became exalted, raising a casket containing a piece of the true cross above his head, blessing the Lord Arlen, whose donation it was, and all those present, promising to make a pilgrimage, in due course, to Jerusalem, and inviting all true believers to accompany him on that journey. For now, he reflected inwardly, conveying the relic to the sacristry at the friary29

would suffice. As the congregation filed out of the chapel, below the keep, into the yard, Robert hurried ahead to prepare for the hunt set for this morning. Thus, attired in his lord's coloured tabard, with black hose and feathered hat, he stood for a moment at the narrow   window, watching the scene below; the horses being led out, huntsmen assembling and mounting their steeds, a horn sounding. Excited, he ran down the spiral stairs,  his  knife sheath bouncing on his hip, and out through the yard. Picking up a spear from the rack, and his two eager hounds loosed by a kennel boy to join him at his heels, the young huntsman joined the throng, now impatient for the day's sport.30

Lord Arlen was not the least of them keen for the hunt. He loved the thrill of the chase and had31

sorely missed pitting his wits and daring against the wild boar of the forest. He bade his herald sound the horn to move off. They trotted down the slope until Arlen, his spirits rising to the renewed activity, began to canter, then gallop off under the trees along the trackway, his herald, Revell and others in hot pursuit. Robert, in the company of the other huntsmen on foot, ran behind, their spears held level, their pace even, conserving their energy for the hours ahead. They followed the hounds who, well trained to their duty, loped along on the trail of the  horsemen. 32

Thomas Revell had begun to doubt the testimony of Weasel. The man was a drunkard and a knave who, it was said, had abandoned his family afar and, wandering the country, had, some years ago, begged admittance to the castle. He had made himself useful after a fashion but was sometimes to be seen rambling drunkenly around outside. He had twice fallen into the moat while stewed with drink. "Better had he drowned," mused Revell. Perhaps the man had been motivated by envy; Robert was well liked, while he was often derided. So, Revell decided to do nothing for the present, until he had time to question Weasel more closely. Thus, when Arlen enquired after Revell's request for counsel, the housecarl referred to the late harvest and matters regarding the cattle and so discussion was deferred and the hunt entered into.33

Robert and the other huntsmen went on, under the trees, down sun dappled paths and over leaf strewn rise and down along hollows following the baying hounds, the bugle calls of unseen horsemen. They splashed through streams, ran along fern decked gullies and at last, caught sight of the chase, following loud halloos, horn blasts and shrill yelps of hounds. The horsemen and archers were gathered before a thicket below a rocky escarpment.34

Robert's group ran up to them, panting from their effort to join the hunt. 35

"There is a boar within the thicket," explained a horseman, "and a great beast he is too. Arrows bounce off his horny hide and he has torn two hounds and broken another's back."36

Robert looked around to see a wounded huntsman moaning while another dressed and bound his gored thigh. Lord Arlen wheeled his horse before the stream and spoke to his men.37

"The boar is mine, men!"38

He dismounted and, sword held firmly before him, entered the thicket. For a few moments, there was silence, save for birdsong and the quiet snap of twigs from within. Then, in a moment, the bushes exploded in violent commotion. There was the loud roaring bray of a boar and Lord Arlen hurtled backwards out from the thicket, the desperate, enraged beast locked into him. Arlen fell to the ground and the huge boar stood over him, froth bubbling from its jaws. It gored him savagely in the stomach but as it reared back, its wicked tusks dripping blood, the stricken knight raised his sword and plunged it straight to the heart. The boar staggered in its death throes, wailed piteously and, keeling over, fell to earth with a thud.39

At once, three long spears, one of them Robert's, skewered the dead animal. 40

Revell knelt by his lord, staunching the blood flowing from a gaping abdominal wound with the 41

shirt torn from his own back. Quickly, the men made a litter to bear Lord Arlen back to his castle. The wounded lord was raised shoulder high by six men and the whole party made off briskly through the forest. Robert having retrieved Lord Arlen's sword, the dead boar was left where it had fallen.42

Arlen was brought into the great hall and laid upon the table. He saw where he was and said to Revell; 43

"I had thought to see that beast's head on this board, with an apple in his mouth."44

"And you shall my lord, now lie still while your wound is made whole."45

The apothecary hurried in and gave instructions to the anxious women. Lady Anne sat holding her husbands hand, tears runnning on her face. They worked patiently, with hot irons to cauterize and poultices to calm the riven flesh. All this, Lord Arlen bore with fortitude, though he was in great pain, but they could not staunch the bleeding, which ran and dripped to the floor. Lamps were lit as darkness fell and the moon rose, shining in from on high, lending a more ghostly hue to Arlen's haggard, blood-drained face. It was clear he was dying, and the abbot came to his side. Arlen made his confession, then, his strength ebbing called Revell to him, that he might speak in his ear. Revell bent to hear his master's words.46

"Know this, my friend. The huntsman Robert is my son, born out of wedlock to a handmaiden to my mother. The poor wench died giving birth to him. I charge you to guard him and further his station. He knows not that his lord is his father, you must find ways to make him lord as, to my sorrow, Anne has borne me no son and there is none other might assume my lands and title. Look after her, Revell, she is a virtuous and faithful lady."47

Revell assented, kissing the hand of his lord. Then Arlen died and Lady Anne sobbed and wailed and was led from the hall as dawn broke over the castle.48

What had been a castle reborn by the return of its lord in glory from the Holy Crusades was now mourning in grief that he was no sooner back at its head than taken from them. Lady Anne shut herself away following the funeral and would not admit Revell in spite of entreaties from the abbot. Prayers were made daily for Arlen's soul and no joy was found within the place. At length, the abbot departed with a guard to give him and the casket safe passage to the friary. Anne bestowed on him also a chest of gold and silver pieces, that the monks might daily sing Masses for her husband. 49

And Robert, who wept for his lord when he died, watched Anne from afar and sorrowed for her. Yet he hoped she might remember her lover and that she might seek him and the tenderness they had shared. She had loved him, he knew but in the long absence of her husband. Now her love for Arlen was spoken to heaven in her matins and her night-long prayers. She was in turmoil within and never saw Robert as he watched her pass by high windows to her chamber.50

But her distress was unlike the torment which assailed Thomas Revell. The secret of Robert's lineage, though a bastard one, warred in him with the tale told by Weasel, of the young huntsman's clandestine liaison, were it to be believed, with Lady Anne. He sought the man out and found him at last, drunk on the steps of the wine cellar, a small cask of sherry, empty nearby. 51

"Weasel!" Revell shouted at the sot. Weasel opened bleary eyes and stared, puzzled, at the housecarl. Slowly he came to, then, having recognised Revell, Weasel raised himself to a sitting position. 52

"Thomas Revell, sir. Good day to you sir." He mumbled.53

"I would have words with you, sir." Said Revell, seating himself on the step.54

"I told you what I know." Weasel slurred.55

"Are you sure it was Robert?" Asked Revell.56

Weasel nodded heavily. "It was 'im." He insisted.57

"And you saw him climb from Lady Anne's window?"58

Again Weasel nodded ponderously. "I saw 'im." He repeated. Revell lost patience with the drunken oaf, cuffed him, arose and walked away.59

"'Course, now Lord Arlen's dead, Gawd bless 'im, it dont matter much, does it?" Said Weasel to himself. He stared into space while a thought formed in his addled brain. The thought grew into an idea and Weasel tended it. He gazed after the absent Revell and sniggered; he still had cards to play. Who stood to gain now Arlen was gone? Revell. Why, as Lady Anne's protector, he might well make suit and court and wed her in time. Then he'd be lord. But Robert was a problem. Robert had already bedded her and Revell knew it. Robert, the lovely boy, was a thorn in Revell's side, clearly. Weasel got up and hatching his new plan, ambled into the stables to fall on a heap of loose straw and sleep off the drink. As he drifted asleep he began to dream of 60

advancement, perhaps keeper of the castle cellars, a post bestowed by a grateful housecarl, for services rendered.61

Three days later, his chance came. Weasel had been watching Robert's movements. Lately he had taken to exercising the hounds soon after daybreak, so that he might return with them worked, ready for breakfast.62

Weasel hid in a niche hard by the kennels and as Robert walked by, he swung out behind him and thrust a dagger, under the shoulder blade, up into his heart. Robert fell without a murmur, rolling over on Weasel's arm, his blue eyes, now sightless, gazing skyward.63

Weasel glanced around, all was still. Stealthily, he hoisted the body and carried it up to the high castle wall. There he set it down, close to the bedchamber window of Lady Anne. So far, so good. Now all he had to do was summon Thomas Revell to the spot and recount how his concern over the lad's disregard for Lady Anne's grief had led him to lay in wait for Robert to attempt to climb in at her window, thence to resume his sinful seduction of her. He took Robert's blade from its scabbard and, gritting his teeth, sliced his forearm with its keen edge.64

There was a sudden scream. Weasel looked up, mouth agape, knife in hand, blood dripping from his arm. Lady Anne, rising from sleep for her matins, had seen him. 65

Weasel panicked, looked wildly all around and ran along the wall, dropping the knife, trailing blood. He shouldered the turret door, cursed, then lifted the  ring latch and ran up the spiral stairs, as though he might escape, somehow, into the clouds. Lady Anne continued to scream and call for guards. They came, with Thomas Revell at their head. 66

Weasel watched from an arrow slit, as Lady Anne told of what she had seen, pointing to the turret. There was no escape and presently, Thomas Revell, and his swordblade, found him.67

Another scream rent the morning stillness. It was the death-cry of Weasel.68

Winter spread its white cloak over the castle and its grounds. Revell and Lady Anne stood on the battlements watching a trio of young huntsmen following hounds over the snow to the woods. Her protector was now her friend, and she needed both; her belly was growing full with child.69

"Let us go in, my Lady. The chill air should be avoided." Said Revell.70

Lady Anne smiled at him and followed him back inside. 71

In late Spring Anne entered her confinement and gave birth to a healthy baby boy. He lay in her arms as she gazed into his blue eyes, cooed as she played her fingers through his curly brown hair.72