ALINE
In Pertine, we say, ‘Life is a deal you make with the Gods.’ If you want to be a soldier, then you swear to fight hard and true your whole life, and you make a deal with War and shed blood in his name. And War, in turn, grants you strong bones and thick blood. If you want to be a merchant, then you swear to travel the lands and cheat only a little, and you make a deal with Coin, and in return Coin grants you safe journeys and gullible customers. I made a deal with Love, and swore my heart to one woman for my whole life. And, in return, Love gave me sweet smiles and warm nights, for a very short time.
Aline was wonderful and beautiful to me, and I won’t waste your time describing her to you because you might not agree, at which point, I would have to teach you the first rule of the sword – or worse, you might fall in love with her yourself, and that would bring you only a small piece of the sorrow that fills my life.
We were seventeen when we met and twenty when she died. We married, loved, argued, talked, faced famine, fought neighbours, barely survived a curse placed on our home and, once, almost made a baby together. And in the end, she died for no better purpose than that the Duke who ruled our land wanted to bed her.
I loved King Paelis, but I hated all Kings before him and none more than his father, King Greggor.
I don’t know why it was that the King and the Duke and their men came down the road past our cottage. Perhaps they were looking for wild game as they began their trip to Castle Aramor, the King’s home in the south. Perhaps one of our neighbours who craved our land had played some trick on us. Perhaps Love, offended by my lack of prayers, decided to break our deal. But however it came about, the King’s party rode right past our cottage, and the Duke asked him to stop for refreshment.
It is the Lord’s Right that anyone in his duchy can be called upon to provide sustenance in times of war or civil unrest. The Duke had a loose interpretation of war, and so demanded that we provide what food and drink we had to him and the King. We brought everything we had, even our winter stores. I was as miserly as the next man and twice as belligerent, but I was not stupid and I didn’t play games with Kings.
Yered, Duke of Pertine, actually looked pleased with what we brought. King Greggor showed no interest and neither one included their men in the meal so I counted myself lucky that there might be something left for us after they were done. I was foolishly optimistic.
‘You are one of my subjects, are you not?’ the Duke asked.
The question wasn’t quite as stupid as it sounds; we lived on the border between Pertine and Luth and there was always some dispute with the neighbouring Duke, Holm, as to who we should pay our taxes to.
‘I am indeed your subject, my Lord, and have paid my taxes every year,’ I said with humility.
‘Indeed? Well, that makes you the exception, my good lad.’
He and his men had a good laugh at that, and I started to feel almost safe. I could handle this. I could keep my mouth shut and bow and curtsy and whatever else they wanted if it would get them off my land.
‘But who’s this now?’ asked Yered, and I turned and saw Aline closing the gate that one of the Duke’s men had left open in order to keep the goats from wandering out.
‘That is my wife, my Lord,’ I answered.
‘Damn fine woman you have there, boy. Come here now, girl, let your Duke have a look at you.’
‘It’s getting late, Yered, and I’m getting hungry for something that wasn’t picked up off the floor this morning.’ King Greggor sounded irritated and bored – a good sign, I prayed.
Yered laughed. ‘I too am hungry for something different, your Majesty. Pray, give me a moment to ensure my proper rights are observed.’
Greggor waved him away. ‘Please yourself.’
Yered stood up before me. He was slightly shorter than I was, so I tried hard to stoop and not let him be offended by my height.
‘Now, boy, you tell me you’ve paid all your taxes?’
‘Yes, my Lord.’
‘All? Are you quite sure?’
‘Yes, my Lord. We paid seven pieces last season, and eight this one. I have a note of receipt from the sheriff. I could go find it for you if you—’
‘Enough! Don’t bray at me like some sheep. Have a spine in you, boy.’
The Duke turned to his men. ‘You see this? This is the stock I have to go to war with. It’s a wonder the damned barbarians haven’t overrun us yet.’
He picked up his wine goblet and handed it to me. ‘Here, you drink this piss. Perhaps it’ll put some grit on your bones, eh?’
I drank it, seeing as it was my wine anyway.
‘Now, back to the issue of the taxes. You paid taxes on your land?’
‘Yes, Lord, four pieces to the sheriff, Lord.’
‘Good, good. And now, you also paid taxes on those goats?’
‘Yes, Lord, two pieces.’
‘And on your, ah, chickens?’
‘Yes, Lord, two for them.’
The Duke counted off on his fingers. ‘Well now, that’s eight pieces, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, Lord; eight pieces this season, as I said, Lord.’
The Duke’s men were chuckling. They had heard this joke before.
‘Well now, you’ve paid for your goats and for your chickens, but what about the rest of your livestock?’
I shook my head, pretending not to get the joke. ‘I’m sorry, Lord? I don’t under—’
‘Your cow, man!’ he said, pointing at Aline. ‘When are you going to pay the taxes on your cow?’
There was a great roar of laughter – or perhaps just a little laughter, but a great roaring in my ears.
‘I’m sorry, my Lord, I didn’t realise. I will pay whatever price is due.’
Now I noticed several of the men winking at each other. In my effort to placate the man and hide my anger, I had walked right into the meat of his joke.
‘Ah, pay the tax you will, boy,’ the Duke said amiably. ‘But keep your little silver pieces. In this case, it’s the cow that pays the tax!’
Another round of laughter, and now one of the Duke’s soldiers who obviously knew how this joke ended came forward and took Aline’s arm. That was strange. All of a sudden there was a stick in my hand, and it was pointed at the soldier’s eye.
But before even the Duke could act, Aline shook off the soldier’s grip and slapped me hard across the face. I dropped the stick in shock. ‘Stupid boy,’ she said. ‘Don’t ever stand in the way of my happiness!’
The Duke laughed and waved down his archers and I realised she had just saved my life. ‘Look there, the little harlot thinks she can be my wife!’
Everyone was laughing, even Aline. The Duke bellowed something about the wine and one of his men began digging through our meagre supply. Aline grabbed my head with both hands and spoke into my ear. ‘Don’t you dare, Falcio,’ she whispered fiercely. ‘I know you love me, and I know you would fight for me, but not here, not now. I will do this thing, and I will pay the price for both of us. I will not scratch or claw or scream, but I will instead make this tiny man feel like a giant. It’s well known the Duke only beds any woman once. And when he does, he will leave us and go with his filthy men and his filthy King, and you and I will grow old together and laugh at the day these silly birds came to rest in our fields.’
She pushed me away and walked towards our cottage, beckoning the Duke to follow her. At the front door she turned back and called to the Duke’s men, ‘Be gentle with him, will you? I hate it when he cries at night.’
The Duke’s men laughed, and even King Greggor chuckled as he spat out a piece of the lamb we had planned on eating for supper. And I waited and prayed and I hated myself even as I thanked Love for giving me a wife as wise and brave as the one who was even now being raped by a man I would kneel before and thank in a few minutes.
True to her word, she had him grunting and moaning, and in a few minutes, he gave out a great bellow and stopped. For a moment, I feared Aline had put a knife in his genitals, but the chuckling of his soldiers told me this was the Duke’s way.
Aline came out first, hair flying free and doing up her blouse. ‘Gods bless you, my Lord. I am a new woman!’
The Duke came out of the cottage. His clothes were carefully done, but his hair was dishevelled, and he was red-faced and still sweating like a pig.
‘Saints smile on you, boy. You’re a rich man indeed. I should up your taxes next year!’
I swallowed my pride and my honour and whatever other forms of dignity I had left to me and knelt down on one knee and said, ‘I am grateful to you, Lord, for your generosity and protection.’
‘And for finally satisfying that woman of yours, eh?’ The Duke laughed in the grunting way pigs do right before you cut their throats.
‘Yes, my Lord, and for doing what I myself have been quite unable to do.’
‘Hah!’ the Duke shouted. ‘You’re a toad, boy, a rank little toad. But you know your place, and that’s the best we can hope for in a peasant. Don’t worry; we’ll leave, and I’ll tell my men not to put your cottage to the torch.’
The thought hadn’t even occurred to me before then, but I bowed and scraped gratefully regardless. The King and Duke mounted their horses and their men followed suit – all except one, a tall man with a great scar running from his forehead down past his lips. He carried a war-axe on his back. ‘My Lord Duke,’ he said, looking straight at me, ‘should we not bring the woman, in case you happen to be hungry again later on? The fare is unlikely to be so sweet at the inn where we stay tonight.’
The Duke barely turned his head. ‘What’s that you’re blathering about, Fost? You know very well no woman satisfies the Duke twice.’
‘Yes, my Lord, but wouldn’t you say this one was different? She seems an especially fine cow to be left to a boy who can’t properly milk her.’
The Duke was about to wave him away, but King Greggor spoke up. ‘Hells, Yered, just bring the damned girl. Your men have had to listen to you grunt away enough times – perhaps they see something in her that you don’t.’
As much as I despised the Duke with all my being, I believe he would have left us, had it not been for the King’s rebuke. But he was stung by the comment. ‘I have no further use for her, Majesty – but Fost, since you seem so keen on her, you bring her. She can entertain the men while I’m “grunting” with finer fare.’
Fost never took his eyes from me, and he never stopped smiling, the scar on his face crinkling in response. He motioned to his men and two of them took Aline while two more aimed arrows at my chest. Then he mounted his horse and followed his men down the road while I stood and stared like a peasant. Like a toad. Like a boy who knew his place.
Aline was a good girl, and she was wise too, but even she had the limits the Gods place on our sanity, and so by the time I had walked to the next town and found her on the floor of the tavern, she was two days dead. She had fought, my brave girl, and there were bits of skin under her fingernails and bruises on her arms, and her beautiful face was cleaved in two, as if by a great war-axe.