RUIN HOUSE

It is a bloodied heap of flesh and metal the pensive peasant examines. Greaves are ripped and bitten, there is torn mail and deeply dented plates of steel.

“A knight.” The peasant sags upon a damp hummock of withered sedge.

Low moans of delirium escape blackened lips exposed beneath the ruined helm.

The peasant thoughtfully weighs a rounded hunk of fieldstone. The pensive figure is thin and worn, clad in rough sewn rags and deep veins of grime.

The ruined knight presents a far more noisome aspect.

“A right crack upside the temple and a quick tumble into the bog. That’d be best, it seems to me.”

Blackened seepage has stained the varied straps and twisted buckles that still somehow manage to wrap about the battered knight. One bare-knuckled hand twitches feebly. A ruined blade lies just beyond its amnestic grasping.

The peasant rises slowly, muck-streaked face downcast as grey blobs of overcast lower ever more heavily upon the scoured plain of the vale. The rock is shifted from hand to hand, a discerning eye well-trained to the necessities of sustenance hunting and midden heap scavenging, considers how best to strike. The stone is settled into a single hand and is set to a certain rhythmic swinging.

All about lies a cold plain pock-marked with brackish pools and wind-blasted scrub. There is a faint scent of salt upon the air. Heavy in the distance, two vast massifs run to the north, defining the noisome vale.

A sigh escapes the peasant’s throat and the stone is drawn up, poised to deliver.

A mangled hand with broken, blackened nails grasps the peasant’s throat and begins to squeeze with fearsome strength.

The stone drops and sounds a dull clunk as it strikes a ruined plate.

They could be bands of iron as they sink into pale flash and quickly constrict the windpipe. The peasant is struck by the silence, panicked nails dig at the mighty forearm and a dull throbbing strains the peasant ears. Above all this, a short distance away, a bead of moisture gathers upon a low rounded rock and begins to swell. Protrudent eyes are transfixed. The bead drops and there is a distant plink

The questing armoured claw has grasped the muddied hilt and crashes the hilt into the peasant jaw, drawing roughly downward. A pale, once-rounded breast is momentarily exposed. A welt of crimson is raised and blossoms upon the filthy tunic.

The fingers relax and spasmodically cast the peasant into the cold muck.

“Mustn’t kill women, mustn’t dishonour the blade. Mustn’t kill women, mustn’t kill children…” The knight slowly rises, ruptured bits of metal and sodden clumps of bog peat falling from a bloodied, blackened body.

The peasant woman gasps and sputters among the brackish water and broken reeds. Tears sting the eyes and she spits and spits and spits, a gagging retch tearing from her throat. She is hard pressed to focus upon the fearsome monster that slowly erupts from the very land before her.

Blood and bone, metal and fire all dance before her. Wood and stone are borne, wrapped about the loins. A sudden bellow, like a maddened bull, is disgorged from the shadowed helm.

She is terrified and fascinated beyond the near instinct to fall prostrate upon the noisome muck.

The ruined knight falls to his knees, collapsing further to rest upon shredded fists. Massive jags escape the heaving torso, descending into a monotonous mutter.

“…thou shalt not slay the maiden, thou shalt not slay the child, thou shalt not take by force, thou shalt right all wrongs…”

Another drop of loosened dew and she crawls forward, hesitantly. The ruined brute has collapsed fully into the muck. She rolls him over and gathers cold bog water with cupped palms. She roughly laves the scarred brow of the supine knight.

She casts about the mist-choked landscape with frightened eyes. There is a decisive sense of withered fecundity. The slopes of the vale waver and dance, the bog lands constrict and ripple, a dull purple fire accentuating the edges of blasted shrubs and broken reeds. The mist is oddly luminescent, it recedes before her sight, piling mightily all about her.

She bathes the noble brow, a low fervent prayer hissing through pursed lips.

The dreary light of day slips into a night of pale shadows and darkened moons. She cannot raise a fire, so she wraps the ruins of her cloak about the knight and curls into a tight ball at his feet.

She is free from dreams.

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There is stone. Long ago, the stone was sought and chosen for shape and density, carefully stacked and set with moistened dust. Soon, the stones are dressed, set with cunning and wrapped with iron.

Strings sing above sheltered orchards, pollen-heavy bees droning deep among hedgerows and clear pools of crystal water. The water runs the very bones of the land, gathering in the black pools of hidden caves. The slow black water is gathered into stone basins, delicate seashells and hollowed bowls of carven wood. As ages pass, the vessel is wrapped with precious ore and vain stones. Ages more pass, leaving only a finely wrought and over-exercised goblet of platinum and gold thoroughly divorced from any hint of human crafting.

And somehow, intertwined or grafted, there runs the code, two ribbons entwined about the vessel, one golden, one red.

“Blood and glory…
…protect the poor…
…By might of arms…
…provide succour and justice…
…private law…
…Defend the land…
…thou shalt not slay the refugee…
…thou shalt not slay the maiden…
…thou shalt not slay the babe…
…thou shalt be loyal and true…
…thou shalt obey thine liege…
…thou shalt answer all charges…
…thou shalt honour the land…
…thou shalt…
…thou shalt not…”

There is a sudden scream as the morning sun slowly breaks the bleak expanse of the southern horizon. Diffuse mists rise from the bogs and the peasant woman is rudely awakened. She quickly scurries from the thrashing warrior.

“Blood, land, honour, smoke, ruin, blood.’

The words burble from blackened lips, forming an incantation.

The peasant woman draws into a lowly organic squat and regards the delirious knight.

Soon enough, she disappears into the ruined reeds and sets herself to the hunt. A heron is a worthy sacrifice. She can set no fire, so the blood is fed directly into the noisome pools of the bog.

The knight achieves a certain state of awakening. Voices whisper and jibber at the limits of his hearing. Wizened faces peer from bower and shrub. There are menacing giggles and threatening titters. The mist grows crimson and fades away.

The knight is awake.

A peasant woman cowers before him, a ruined bird clutched in one hard drawn hand. The knight coughs and spits, recent memories dance about the edge of remembrance.

“Good woman, I remember water.”

She falls prone into the dawn-chilled mud.

“And warmth.” He rises and stretches, bits of ruined armour finally falling into the muck. He is, at best, semi-clad.

“Rise from the bog, good woman,” and she warily raises her head.

“Rise, I said.”

The ruined knight fishes about a nearby pool and draws forth a ruined blade. Sudden memories return and the broken tip is focused upon the grimy throat of the peasant woman.

“You threatened me, woman, you considered violence upon one of the noble born.”

There is the slightest hint of rebellion set within her eyes.

“Considered, aye, my lord, and more beside, but your bruising fingers set my considerations elsewhere, my lord.”

The knight minutely regards the harridan crouching before him.

“And what is that slaughtered bird you grasp, woman?”

She regards the bloodied feathers, the memories of the night past dripping from her fingertips. She drops the bird.

“Nothing, my lord, just, just, nothing.”

He is no fool, he reaches down and draws the woman to her feet.

“The code is…confused, on this point. You threatened me, so death is assured. Ah, but you saved me, so my life is yours. And, of course, I mustn’t slay a, a maiden, I must honour…”

He quiets and draws into a sullen silence.

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The cold bog lies behind, chilled low hills rise before. The knight and the peasant woman score the dust and work a wearisome way towards the north.

She has grown worried. The village lies many days behind.

“My lord, please, my lord, where do we go?”

The knight regards the wreck that follows closer than decorum should allow. A dull burning is set upon the nape of his neck.

“We return to Ruin House, good woman.”

Flat miles pass.

Corncrakes cry.

“My lord?”

“Speak.”

“Ruin House, the Lord’s house, my lord.”

“Yes, my father’s house, or what remains.”

The hours stretch dismal day into damp and noisome evening.

“I’ve heard how the Ruin House is haunted, my lord.”

“Aye.”

Cold nights are passed, huddled for warmth.

“My lord?”

“Aye, woman.”

“Why do I live, sir?”

The moist hills are long past. They dine upon strangled rodents.

“My life is yours. Your life is mine.”

“My lord?”

“The Code. It is difficult.”

Soon enough, a ragged heap of stone resolves itself unto a ruined pile. A massive tower rises from the centre of the stone house. Two wings are spread, one east and one west. Ruined towers of masonry rise from the far-flung wings. The oak-beamed roof of the Great Hall rises behind the Grand Tower. There are vast spaces of cracked and weathered flagging. Ancient battlements and once ornate crenulations lie toppled and crumpled, exposing moss filled gaps far above. A rotted orchard bears blackened and be-slimed leaves. A few shrivelled fruits decorate the blackened ground. Damp rags of muted heraldry are strung about the massive heap, apparently at random and long neglected.

A pale, shrunken figure clad in a moth-ravaged tabard lurks about a small door set to one side of massive double gates. They are broad slabs of greyed oak, bound with iron and bronze. The grime and muck of centuries have conspired to set a seal upon the barred gates.

The knight catches the peasant woman’s worried gaze.

“The gates were closed, long, long ago. We may not open them. Do not ask why, for I cannot say.”

“It is a mighty house, my lord.”

The knight casts an eye about the ruined heap.

“Once, perhaps, and that, too, was long, long ago. Now it is Ruin House, a dank and festering memento. Soon it shall be truly forgotten, noble no more. Soon.”

They inch up the martial way, drawing ever closer to the shrunken herald crouching by the sally-port.

“You must be silent, woman, no matter the provocation. I cannot protect you, if you dare to speak.”

She casts down her eyes, intently studying her bare and dirtied feet. She is torn. Peasant born, the great house and the ruined knight seem to demand obedience and obsequiousness. But the village is many days removed and she has seldom seen any noble born. Once, as a child, the old Duke had ridden out with a panicked force of horsemen. They had torn through the village, churning the road and trampling petty gardens. A few moments of terror and thunder and then the return of worried silence. That had been twenty years long gone by. The village survived, seemingly divorced from the great House that claimed it.

“You are sorely worn, my lord,” leers the sordid herald.

“You come close to speaking above your station, Marque. Now, open the sally-port. I would enter.”

Marque leans upon his pike, his leer growing by marked degrees.

“Aye, my lord, I would be eager, too, were I one such as you. But the Lady has set me certain instructions, my lord, none may enter until the morrow. We are in mourning, my lord, the old Duke has finally passed.”

Marque casts an insolent eye to the key stone above his ragged head. A dank length of black ribbon has been affixed above the portal.

The knight favours the guard with a passive scowl. He turns and roughly gestures the peasant woman to follow. They slowly approach the sodden orchard some distance away. The ruined tower of the East Wing lays a heavy shadow upon them. A battered shack lurks beneath a blasted apple tree.

“Come, woman, we’ll shelter here.”

They enter the shadowed hut. The peasant woman huddles against a wall as the knight rummages about, soon to set a charcoal fire burning within a rusted brazier. He slumps against the opposite wall and draws his heavily notched blade. For many long moments he stares blindly at the ragged edge, then fumbles in a pouch to draw forth a sliver of well-worn whetstone. He futilely sets stone to metal and settles into a numbing rhythm.

The peasant woman watches moisture bead upon the ceiling.

Plink.

“My lord?”

The stone pauses and blackened eyes regard the huddled wretch.

“Yes?”

“The old Duke was your father?”

“Aye?”

“Then, are you now the Duke, my lord?”

“Aye.”

“Then, why can you not enter your own home, my lord?”

“Protocol.”

She shivers as a drop of icy water catches the back of her neck.

“When my mother died we threw open the windows and unbarred the door. All were welcome.”

“Aye.”

She dares to study the wracked hulk that slumps opposite her. The armour was never gilt finery, proper for the parade. The ruined scraps bespeak serviceable wear, any hidden filigree or heraldic device has long since been corroded and battered away.

He shifts and catches her gaze.

“Sleep, good woman.”

She struggles but they are deep bands of softest plush and velvet. She is swathed and wrapped insensate.

He rises, shoulders pressed against the walls to aid his progress.

“Sleep, good woman,” he mutters and slips out the shack into the lowering gloom. The mist has thickened and icy beads coat every surface. The fetid stink of mouldering compost filters through the dusk.

He makes his way with familiar ease through the fog-choked orchard and slips up to the gnarled foundations of the East Tower. Foul slime and dull moss coats every stone.

He casts a weary eye up the towering pile of mouldering stone, its crumpled top near hidden by the lowering clouds. He draws a dagger as he draws his bulk wearily to a certain stone set in the foundations. He sheds the battered remnants of his armour, then draws the blade across his palm. A few drops of slow crimson dribble and splatter upon the stone. It fades to reveal a tight black tunnel.

The knight crawls upon his belly and worms his way down, following the spiral path before him.

An unmarked period of time passes as he crawls beslimed among the bones of the land.

He is eventually dropped into a low rude chamber bathed in flickering firelight and littered with coarse furnishings. A lank pile of bones shifts by the hearth. A sickly eye catches reflected flames.

“Ah, the new Duke, by all accounts, resplendent in his finery. I would rise and show honour but custom is strongly against me, I am afraid.”

The knight displays the dagger with familiar ease.

“Custom, yes, it is custom that brings me here, Gottard, the custom that places your dwelling outside the confines of Ruin House.”

Gottard shivers and shifts slightly upon the rough hewn stone.

“There’s room enough round the fire, my lord, and perhaps a cup of tea, if this old brownie is any judge.”

The knight settles before the warmth and draws his knees to his chest. There is much clanking and hissing and whispered goblin cursing. Soon enough, an exquisite mug is pressed into his blind hands. He draws the warm herb brew up to his mouth and breathes deeply. He recovers a certain edge to his senses and greedily gulps the pixie brew.

Gottard spits noisily into the fire.

“I would not be remiss, I surmise, to postulate the following, my lord; that prat, Marque, held the door against thee?”

“Yes, at the Lady’s bidding, as he would have it.”

“Well, and there’s no surprise there, my lord.”

“Aye.”

“Aye.”

Gottard slumps further forward upon the hearth, lanky limbs peering through rotted rags and tattered finery. He absent-mindedly draws upon his tea and sighs.

“And how can this poor goblin aid you, my lord?”

“She’s been here a long time, Gottard, longer, even, than you.”

“Aye, my father knew her as a youngling and my grandfather remembered her coming.”

“Does she seek to delay my coming or is this simple adherence to the covenant?”

“That is quite the question, my lord. You’d know the mind of the Lady? Simpler to know the heart of the land.”

“I know the thoughts of the land, Gottard, and I have perceived its heart.”

Gottard regards his lord with eyes agog.

“You have done such things?”

“My line has also passed many long years upon this land, darkling. And we were set here for a reason, it seems to me.”

“Then might I recommend a bath, sir, and don’t forget the coin.”

The knight rises and heads towards a familiar door.

“You needn’t remind me of my duties, Gottard.”

“Aye, my lord, but pride leads to folly, nonetheless. You must always consider your duties, my lord. You must always consider your duties.”

--------------------------------------------

She is slow to awaken. The cold mist of the evening has given way to boiled midday doldrums. The sun has burned a hole through the overcast. An oppressive heat has set her to sweat. Her rags are soaked. Salt burns her eyes and cracks where it has dried at the corner of her chapped lips.

She draws her self up and stretches with momentary forgetfulness.

“My Lord?”

Her call echoes flatly within the tin roofed shack. The rusted brazier is cool to the touch. She more closely examines her surroundings. A simple door and a shuttered window. A rough-planked, low set table and an uneven three-legged stool. A dull glint of cracked and clouded mirror rests upon the sooted mantle. Pigeon droppings, undefined grime and the occasional feather lurk among the corners. A few lank cobwebs, long abandoned, sag from the beams and studs.

So many days have passed and she has come so far, far beyond the tight confines of the Village. The miles have passed vaguely and she wonders if some knightly glamour has dulled her wits.

She fumbles for her rude purse and takes stock. A serviceable knife, a few worn coins of copper, a length of thread with its attendant needle, a few bundles of dried herbs and a packet of crumpled biscuits.

She is as wealthy as she has ever been.

She thoughtfully chews on a bit of stale biscuit. After some time, thirst drives her from the shack and into the boiling mist of the late afternoon. The orchard is heavy and dark, lengths of moss dripping from blight blackened boughs. There is no insect droning.

She stays close to the shack and casts her gaze about. No water barrel presents itself, no trough greets her eye. She grasps a length of trailing moss and squeezes a lengthy dribble of tepid dew into her gummed maw.

Her throat moistens and she swallows with some gratification.

A whisper among the grass or a scraping of boughs catches her ear and she quickly dives into the sheltering shadows round the shack and slips beneath the raised flooring.

“I can sense you, yoke of the land. I can
taste your sweat. I can hear your worries.”

The peasant woman silently worms backwards, seeking the deepest shadow of the crawl way.

A sudden icy chill wafts among the stone clad timbers. The humid air chills and condenses, frigid damp drifts above the soil. There is a rustling of raw silk and starched linen. She spies hem and slipper as a disturbingly graceful figure glides about the pilings.

“Come out, dear girl, come to me.”

The voice is smooth as polished stone, dry as the deserts’ whisper. Slight rime crawls along the turgid earth and crawls with unseemly haste beneath the rude hut. There is scant shelter. She worms ever back, away from the menacing silk hemmed with crystalline tassels.

“What is your name, sweetling?” calls the voice in dulcet tones, both matronly and youthful. Strange harmonics assault her ears and a stiff compulsion to speak, to reveal herself grips at the boundaries of her heart. One hand fumbles through her purse to grasp the pointless knife, the other is tightly clasped over her mouth as she struggles to not betray her self.

“Ah,” the voice whispers, now sibilant and dark, “has he warned you? Has he forbidden you to speak? A pity, my dear girl, I only desire concourse. Long have I watched this land and long have its people forgotten me. Will you not come out and we shall reason together?”

Now she begins to panic, now she knows something akin to horror. She cannot reason as one equal with this terrible Lady who calmly paces the perimeter of her shelter. Even to meet her gaze is a terror she can scarce grasp. She huddles low among the dust and does not even think to pray.