A Month of Brambles: Opening Chapter - Rough Draft
A little insight into the nature of my next literary project, the working title of which is "A Month of Brambles".
This is a small extract from my latest writings. For any that read The Farmer and the Fald, some of the names might feel familiar to you. Greenjack supplies the foreword, and the mighty name of Good King Doryn is muttered often and with high esteem by Farmer Bundon and the locals of Dalkaford.
But kings are rarely the men they are heralded to be.
This story is one of duty and wisdom; of hardships and betrayals. It is ultimately the happenings that shape our dear Brother Greenjack into the pompous insightful soul who first penned The Farmer and the Fald.
And many more tales besides.
The King was dead
Good Doryn the Third, most prestigious in the clan of Blacktalon, had finally met his end. He was a year shy of eighty, and although he had never looked his age in life; in death, his long years seemed to catch up with him.
His eyes were sunken. His skin was sallow. His hands seemed skeletal and weak. He suddenly seemed no more than he was. A dead old man. Lying on a trestle table. His thin, spotted hands clutching an axe loosely to his chest.
Greenjack had placed the blade there himself, but the fingers would not shift to grip it properly. They were stiff, as though made of stone. And the young Brother feared they might break before they bent, such was the old man’s way. So he settled for placing the ebonsteel blade upon his cousin’s chest. With the fingers atop the haft, to act as a suggestion of being held.
“He loved his clothes, did our little King,” Sister Dresser fawned, examining the many garments the late King had brought with him on his third crusade. She had dressed him in a fine velvet doublet in a blue so dark it seemed almost black until the candlelight caught it. He wore silken black hose, and a black cloak of sable fur and raven’s feathers. His hands were adorned in long riding gloves of black leather and his boots were the same, sporting spurs cast in the shape of silver ravens.
“He loved this one, he never wore it enough if you ask me,” Sister Dresser continued, holding up a rather more flamboyant silken tabard in marbled blue and silver. The black raven of his kingly sigil painted across the chest.
“There’s a touch of the foreigner about it, Sister, he’d have favoured the doublet,” Sister Barber gave softly, running a fine toothed comb through the late king’s thinning hair. “He was handsome chap, wasn’t he?”
“Oh, he was, Sister. A fine man. Very fine.” Sister Dresser agreed, tears welling in her eyes. She busied herself quickly, laying her hands on another garment and holding it up to the dim light.
“Oh, I made this one after his return from Autreville. He was most taken with the raiment of the continent. Look here. I even ruffled the sleeves, just like those fanciful dukes over west.”
“Over north,” Greenjack corrected from the corner, where he sat in quiet vigil. He looked up and gave Sister Dresser a sad smile. “Autreville is due north from here.”
“By my fire, you’re right,” she paused a moment. “We’re a long way from home, aren’t we Greenjack?”
“A little closer now,” Greenjack mumbled inaudibly, looking to his dead king. And you’re closer still, cousin.
He had lit the three candles, the two black and the one green. He had lit the incense. The clay dragon breathed a steady fume. But it had done little to cover the lingering smell of the tent. Death and lavender.
But mostly death.
“He’s soaring with our Green Dragon now, Brother,” Sister Barber gave. “When He calls, one must answer. Some say it’s the most natural thing in this world.” The Brother gave a thin lipped smile and said nothing back, returning to his ledger. Where he had been charged with writing in detail the manner of the King’s death, how he was interred, what he was wearing and how gallant he looked.
In short, he had been charged to lie. For the late king looked not in the least bit gallant. He looked old, and fragile. And he would be interred the same as all souls who heed the Dragon’s Prayer. Burned, and turned to ash.
And ashes always look the same. Greenjack thought as he wrote. His urn will be chaste with gold and silver. With an obsidian raven to act as a handle. But inside the ashes will look as all ashes look. The rest is just pretend.
“You’ve done a splendid job, Sister,” Sister Dresser said courteously. “You can hardly see the scarring.”
“Oh, it was a frightful mess, Sister,” Sister Barber gave with a slow shake of her head. “What a cowardly weapon is the sling. A pauper’s weapon. And to use it against a king,” she tutted most ferociously. “Have they no shred of honour, these people? As I said. It was a frightful mess.”
“Well, you’d hardly notice, I’d say.” Sister Dresser gave Sister Barber’s shoulder a comforting squeeze.
“What will happen to us now, Greenjack?” Sister Barber asked, taking Sister Dresser’s hand in hers. “Young Eiric never knew us well. We were always your cousin’s. Is there any life waiting for us back at court with our beloved Doryn now dead?”
At least they have the courage to ask such a question. Greenjack thought. All those in the King’s favour wonder such. What is there for us now?
“You were much beloved by our King. His son will not forget that. You will not be forgotten, Sisters.” Greenjack said, though for all he knew, it could well have been a lie.
“His son might not,” Sister Dresser snapped. “But his mother will.”
“And make no mistake, it’ll be her counsel he heeds. And them sorry lot she surrounds
herself with,” Sister Barber added with an indignant wag of her chin. Sister Dresser gave her fellow Sister a stern stare and referenced towards Greenjack with her eyes.
“Meaning no disrespect, of course,” Sister Barber added abruptly. “I spoke out of turn, Brother. I’d brook no insult to my kin, not even if said in grief. They are your family.”
“The family,” Greenjack corrected, not lifting his eyes from his ledger. “Be sure that’s not forgotten.” A stony silence followed.
Why say that, Brother? They meant no harm. But he had not the will to amend it, so he let the silence sour.
Ferries will be slow. Greenjack mused sullenly. And a place aboard one will be to the envy of all. He looked mournfully over the two old women, now wordlessly seeing to their duties in an evermore uncomfortable silence. And I doubt the late king’s favourite dressers would hold a winning lot in that raffle.
A horrible thought struck him then. And the scratching of his quill against the parchment halted.
They would not leave me behind?
He could not bear that.
Not here. Not so far south. Staying amongst these people in their lands, not after all we’ve… His thoughts trailed off, as his mind caught up with his pen, and he continued writing his lie. A convenient distraction. For the measure of what they’d done still had not been fully realised by Greenjack. He knew of it, yes. He had seen it. First hand.
But he did not realise it. He simply hadn’t had the time. For there were always more lies to write.
His quill halted again.
Do not think on it, Brother. But think on it he did. For in the ten years he’d lost to his King’s crusade, he had seen much and more. Depravities and desperations so deplorable and delinquent, to behold them you’d be excused for thinking the hells had cracked open, scouring the land with dragon fire. He had watched, sometimes. Thinking it his duty. But, as the years tallied on, two to five to ten; most times, now, he favoured not.
Knowing is enough, he would think. I need not see it as well.
Oh, and the lies. The lies he would weave, the threads he would spin to help calm the wracked, weary conscience of a king gone senile.
“The Dragon wills this, cousin, you do well by Him,” he would say. Throwing blame after blame at the feet of the guiltless. The Dragon wills this not. The Dragon wills nothing and no one. He is. He simply is. But he had not heart to say such.
The heart? No. No, I had not the courage. The point of his quill snagged and bent over itself, splotching the ink work. You’re a coward, Greenjack.
The brother looked up suddenly, and the two Sisters were staring.
“I broke my quill,” he said simply.
“You look tired, Brother,” Sister Barber gave in an overly simpering tone. “Have you slept a wink since— since…” She trailed off, looking mournfully to the trestle table.
“Two or three,” Greenjack offered. “I will remain in vigil, until this uneasiness passes, at least.”
“These are uneasy times, Brother,” Sister Dresser whispered. “ We need wisemen, with their wits about them. Not half mad from grief. Begging yer pardons, Brother. Meaning no disrespect.”