Darkburn Book 3: The Gates of Kelvha by Tayin Machrie - HTML preview

Chapter 27

Durba jumped in shock. Shebel and Boral looked alarmed.

However, Meya immediately recognised the banging of a gong, one of the many that could be found in every tower of the castle. Whenever one gong was set ringing, the footmen hurried to ring the others, spreading the alarm. While the ostensible reason for them was to warn of fires, the gongs were rung more often than not by outraged nobles – demanding the presence either of dilatory servants, or of the guards to haul away the same servants after they had caused annoyance.

Through the still-room window she heard a faint shout of “Guards! Here, to me!” That would seem to indicate the last: except that the voice was Nerogun’s. And Nerogun seldom called the guards for trivial misdemeanours – he usually dealt with any disobedience himself.

Meya put down the vial with assumed calmness. “Ah, some trouble with the servants, no doubt. You must excuse me, ladies. Boral will bring you refreshments if you care for them. I had better go and see which footman has just overstepped the limit,” she said, and left the room, taking care to conceal her sudden anxiety.

What could have caused Nerogun’s displeasure? It was always difficult to deal with. And if he found any fault with the servants, he liked, if possible, to lay it at her door. So she was apprehensive as she walked swiftly down the corridor.

The shuddering clangs of the gong had come from the west courtyard. When Meya hurried out into the open space she saw Nerogun standing at the entrance to the north-west tower. He was shouting at a troop of soldiers who were running towards him; then he turned and dived into the tower. It was the tower where her own quarters were – along with those of several other ladies of the castle – and her heart missed a beat.

What could Nerogun have found? Nothing that was to do with her, surely. She had no secrets; or rather, she had many, but they were only in her head. It was more likely to be an attempted theft from some lady’s apartments. So Meya told herself, but with misgivings that she could not dispel.

The soldiers had already run past the door to her own quarters on the ground floor and were disappearing clatteringly up the stone stairs by the time she entered the tower’s high chilly hallway. She gathered up her skirts to hasten after them as quickly as she could, for her mind was suddenly filled with unaccountable dread.

“Here! Troops, over here! Hold him! Guard the stairs! We’ll have him put in chains before we take him off,” cried Nerogun from the landing just above her.

So it must be a servant, then. Only servants could be chained. She arrived on the landing a few seconds behind the soldiers, panting hard, and saw a footman struggling to escape the grasp of the two foremost guards.

It was Lorolo. Once the guards had a secure hold of him, arms twisted round behind his back, the Post-Regent descended on him, face distorted in fury and contempt. Nerogun began to stab the captive footman with a forefinger in the chest, and shouted at him, his voice thick with anger. Lorolo was an upstart bastard of a southerner, a rag not fit to wipe the shoes of his superiors, a lecherous goat that deserved to be castrated before having its throat cut.

Lorolo did not shout back. Despite his continuing struggles he looked stunned. He was only half-dressed, his breeches loose; and with a sinking heart Meya guessed what must have happened even before she peered into the nearest chamber – a linen-room – and saw the Lady Janeya there, also partly disrobed, her petticoat untied. Janeya too was struggling to get free, not against soldiers but against the arms of three distraught ladies’ maids who restrained her from reaching out to Lorolo.

Meya went up to her and looked her in the face. She wanted to tell her what a foolish, blind and careless girl she was, but pity held her back.

“Who found you?” she said.

Janeya looked at Nerogun. She could not speak. She was shaking and crying silently, tears streaking down her face and onto the maids’ restraining hands.

“Take her downstairs to my quarters, to my bed-chamber,” said Meya to the maids, before turning to address the Post-Regent in her most regal manner. “I trust you will allow me to deal with the lady.” By her tone she hoped to give him no option.

“She deserves,” panted Nerogun, “she deserves to be whipped, stripped and whipped, alongside this gutter-drinker.” He slapped the captive Lorolo hard across the face.

“That will not happen,” said Meya, “not to Janeya.” She spoke with as much authority as she dared.

“Then put her in your room for now,” said the Post-Regent, his face twisted almost manically with disgust and fury. “I’ll see to that so-called lady later. But this one is mine.”

Meya shrugged and turned away. Although she felt sick with fear it was chiefly for Janeya. She could do nothing to save Lorolo and it would cause more harm than good to try.

Instead she ushered the maids and Janeya past the soldiers, who looked at them with ill-concealed curiosity. Nerogun had already let slip far too much. There would be no keeping this quiet.

“Let us pass,” she said commandingly. “Cannot you see how distressed the poor girl is? It’s not the first time this footman has had too much to drink and tried to assault an innocent maiden. But it’s the last time he will do it to a lady of the castle.” She stared hard and severely at the sergeant, whom she knew a little.

“Yes, ma’am,” he said soberly. “We see how it was.”

She nodded and led Janeya past them and down the stairs. Fortunately the girl was still incapable of speech. She shook with great, wrenching sobs, stumbling blindly in Meya’s implacable grip, while the maids scurried after them.

Not until they were safely inside Meya’s quarters did Janeya find her tongue. Then she turned on Meya, crying out in anguish,

“How could you say that? That Lorolo assaulted me?”

“Be quiet,” commanded Meya.

“You know that he – I – I swear he did not, I swear on all the stars that Lorolo is as innocent as–”

“Be quiet,” Meya said again. She looked at the three maids. Good girls, all of them, but terrified. “Did you see what happened?” she demanded of them sternly.

“I was tidying my lady’s room,” said Piril, Janeya’s maid, in a low voice, “when I heard the Lord Nerogun shouting. And then I heard my lady call out in distress, and the banging of the gong, so I fetched these two from the Lady Sina’s chambers because I thought – well, I thought three of us might protect her better from the guards, Ma’am.”

“You knew the guards were coming for Janeya?” Meya was immediately suspicious.

“No, but I was afraid – no, Ma’am, I mean I knew that – but I did not expect…” The girl’s voice trailed away.

Meya nodded. “I tell you now, you knew nothing of this unseemly desire of Lorolo’s at all, until today, any of you,” she said carefully to all three maids. “You knew of no attachment on either side. This has been as great a shock to you as it is to me.”

“Ma’am.” They bobbed.

“Piril, you will stay here with your mistress. You other two may go back to your duties. I expect Nerogun will want to speak to you. When he summons you, claim absolute ignorance. Let him call you stupid. Let him call you foolish half-wits. You were ignorant of the whole thing. Do you understand?”

“Ma’am.” More bobs.

She let two of the maids out. The third, Piril, she kept within the room.

“I will have to lock you both in when I leave in a few moments,” she said to the sobbing, distraught Janeya and the silent, downcast maid. “I will speak to Nerogun as soon as I am able. I shall request that Lady Janeya be permitted to return to her own quarters once she has recovered from the shock of being assaulted.”

“I wasn’t assaulted!” Janeya burst out. “You know that! How can you say such things about Lorolo? You know I love him!”

“I know nothing of the kind,” Meya said severely, “and neither do you. Piril, the footman Lorolo clearly pulled your mistress into the linen-room and there attempted acts of violation.”

“He didn’t!” cried Janeya, the sobs breaking up her voice. “He didn’t! I met him there! What will they do to him? You have to help him, Meya! You have to!”

“That is out of my power,” said Meya. “Piril. Make your mistress decent. Wash her face. Calm her if you can. Let her lie upon the bed and see if she can sleep.”

“Sleep? Sleep? How can I sleep?”

She ignored Janeya. “Keep her quiet, at least, if at all possible. I will return soon.”

Then she slipped out of the room and locked the door behind her. Once in the passage she leant against the door’s solid, ancient wood, trying to calm herself, to ease the rapid thudding of her heart.

I am my father’s daughter, Meya thought, and this is my campaign. My coming battle. But oh, why did I not speak to Greshal the steward about moving Lorolo? Why did I not arrange for the boy to be transferred as soon as I learnt of the liaison?

“Foolish, foolish woman,” she said aloud, and this time she did not mean Janeya.

As if summoned by her thoughts – though now too late – she saw Greshal enter the tower at the passage’s far end. He walked towards her, his face full of doubt.

“I heard the gong,” he said. “What was it, Lady Meya?”

“Lorolo. The footman. Has been caught attacking one of the High Ladies.” Her mouth felt numb as she said it.

She saw the unfeigned shock in Greshal’s face. “But that is so unlike him – he is such a willing boy,” he said.

“So I thought. We were deceived,” she answered shortly; but she thought, Good. Greshal had probably been in ignorance of Janeya’s attachment to Lorolo. She hoped that most of the castle had been ignorant likewise.

“I am about to go and see Nerogun about what should be done with Lorolo,” she said.

“He will have to leave the castle,” answered Greshal in a low voice.

Meya nodded. He undoubtedly would, one way or another. She did not attempt to excuse him even to the steward. Whether or not Janeya had been willing, he had overstepped his place in the worst possible way.

For she knew that there was nothing she could say or do to save Lorolo now. She had been too slow to act. Her fault. She would have to work hard, just to save Janeya.