The Ballad of Stagbold Keep Part 2

The curtain wall presented no obstacle to the attackers. Violetta ran for the water-gate where one boat still waited. She climbed on board and I followed her before anybody thought to stop me. The two men in the boat pushed off and started raising the sail. She asked, “My father?”

“Left with Zare an hour ago.”

“South then.”

She sat back on a seat. From the keep came shouts, cries and the clash of steel. It seems that the attackers were meeting resistance. She listened with apparent indifference. “Poet, how much time has passed since I lit the fuse?”

Before I spoke there was a dull explosion. The shouts stopped and I could hear the sound of stones falling. This built to a crescendo and as it grew silent I was aware we were sitting in a thick cloud of dust, carried by a rush of air which made our sail billow. The tower that had shadowed us was gone and we were starkly illuminated in the moonlight. The shouts restarted but I could see men on the water-gate pointing at us. We let the breeze carry us away.

We sailed for a couple of hours, rounded a headland and pulled in to a small bay. There was a fire burning on the beach and it was for that we steered. When the boat grounded on the shingle, the lady Violetta and I splashed our way up the beach to be met by a young man who kissed Violetta extravagantly. As he did so an older, broad shouldered man came out of the shadows. He had a neatly pointed beard, and a strong aquiline face. The young man turned to the older. “Father, may I present my intended bride.”

Violetta curtseyed low. “Baron Garagan, your humble servant.”
The Baron stepped forward and kissed her on the cheek. “Welcome to our family my child. Now we have a keep to sack.”

Violetta pointed to me, “Take him, he’ll be able to go in ahead of you and let you know how things are.”

With that I was led to a horse, helped onto it and rode with the Baron and his force of at least a hundred horsemen. When we got close to the keep I was given a dark lantern and the instruction to raise it on the wall if it was safe to attack.

It was with some trepidation I approached the wall. I skirted it, heading for the North Tower because there at least I could guarantee being able to get in. From inside I could hear shouts and drunken singing but there were no signs of fighting. I climbed over the wall and made my way through the keep. In the inhabited area there were men wandering about in high good humour, most were half drunk and those who noticed me merely nodded. What I didn’t see where any women. I made my way into the turret I had slept; it might be possible to salvage my own small pack of belongings. I didn’t really expect to find anything else worth taking. As it was my pack had been emptied, the contents picked through and discarded as not worth taking.

I was just about to return to the North Tower to show the light when a woman’s voice hissed, “Poet.”

I turned and there were Lady Violetta’s maids looking at me. Obviously I bowed and said, “Ladies.”

“Less of the blather poet, we’ve got to get out of here and fast. We need horses but we cannot get them ourselves or we’d be seen and raped.”

I could see their problem. “Didn’t your mistress make arrangements?”

The older maid merely spat onto the floor. Then one of the younger ones, with a more boyish figure said, “I’ll come with you, we can take horses to the small side door in the north wall. We can ride off from there.”

“I’m supposed to show a lantern from the top of the North Tower.”

One of the women pushed an elderly man towards us. I recognised him as the man responsible for polishing the boots. “Give him the lantern, he can do it. He’ll be safe enough.”

I handed the old man the lantern, and with the youngest maid made my way towards the stables. I was surprised to find that most of the horses were already saddled and bridled. It was as if all were planning to leave. The guard on the door was hopelessly drunk so we led half a dozen horses past him.

At the wall the other maids met us. The old man climbed the tower, showed the light, and an arrow came out of the darkness, hit him in the chest and he died.

We rode out.

& & & &

I feel that for maximum artistry the story should end with our flight north in the darkness. Already I can see the painters in my audience toying with their brushes. Foam flecked horses, riders with hard, tired faces, catching the first light of dawn. Given that all the other riders were women I have no doubt that these artists are already picturing heaving bosoms, dresses torn to reveal more than a respectable lady would, and all that sort of thing.

But actually we rode sensibly to spare the horses, picking our way over quiet paths avoiding the road and before noon we were on the outskirts of Prae Ducis, where my companions bid me farewell. They rode into the town and I rode on. It was only a couple of hours later I realised one of them had picked my pocket and had stolen my purse with the ten gold alars.

Needless to say I wasn’t going back. It did occur to me that I might well be the only person who knew the whole truth. Violetta and the Baron had undoubtedly thought something similar. Had it been me who had shown the light from the tower as instructed, it would have been me the arrow killed.  I made my way back to Port Naain, sold the horse and kept quiet. I had no wish to sit and gibber in a steel cage outside lady Violetta’s bedroom window.

But it’s funny how as you grow older you watch things develop. Violetta married the heir to Baron Garagan. Her husband is now the Baron. After a year or two a cadet branch of the Zare clan from Prae Ducis started squatting in Stagbold Keep. It had been comprehensively looted; the Baron had even removed the great roof timbers. So the Zares built low huts among the ruins.

From there they followed the family tradition by having some of the family practice law in Prae Ducis, whilst the rest practiced piracy. Indeed they even had a boatyard in the bay where ships were taken, altered, and then emerged to rejoin the world of commerce under new names and with new legal papers.

The old Lord of Stagbold Keep retired to Prae Ducis after the sack. He lived the life of a gentleman there. He was supported both by estates he owned in the area and by a small pension awarded him by the municipality as one who had led the fight against piracy and brigandage. Apparently his legal affairs in Prae Ducis were managed by lawyers of the Zare family.

The tale of the sack was allowed to grow. According to most accounts there were over a score of named dead, most of them men who I certainly never saw there.

Then a few years ago the piratical activities of the Zares in Stagbold Keep got to such a level that many merchants agreed something had to be done. Lord Garagan, being paid by Prae Ducis, Avitas and Port Naain to keep order in that area, was invited to a conference with representatives of the three cities. He pointed out that he could chase the pirates away, but unless the keep was rebuilt and garrisoned, the pirates would just come back. Sighing deeply the three cities put their hands deep into the pockets of their taxpayers. Baron Garagan drove out the Zares in a swift and bloodless campaign, and the cities paid to rebuild the Keep. They even purchased the roof timbers back from the Baron.

Huis Stagbold, a kinsman of Baron Garagan by marriage has taken up residence in the new, well build and gentrified keep. There is rumoured to be glass in the windows.

Apparently, during the construction work, they had to clear away a lot of rubble. They came across a cellar that had been sealed off by the sack. It seems that a tower had collapsed onto its entrance. In the cellar they found the legendary wine cellar which had survived the looting untouched. Apparently a young lawyer, one Zelkin Zare, has been hired to value the cellar and its contents.

And also scattered about the cellar, in steel cages hanging from the ceiling, were a score of men, long dead, their bodies mummified by passing years. These may have been the only real casualties of the sack of Stagbold Keep.

Should you wish to know more of the adventures of Tallis Steelyard and friends, then we dutifully advise you to purchase;

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Flotsam-Jetsam-Jim-Webster-ebook/dp/B011VHS21Y/ 

or

http://www.amazon.com/Flotsam-Jetsam-Jim-Webster-ebook/dp/B011VHS21Y/

Tallis is also too polite to mention his own published volume, ‘Lambent Dreams’

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Lambent-Dreams-Jim-Webster-ebook/dp/B01278WPWI/