The Table of Less Valued Knights (11 page)

Deborah slept in a small chamber near Martha’s room in case she was needed in an emergency, which this most certainly was. Martha slipped inside, leaving the door slightly ajar to allow in light from the candles in the corridor. She shook Deborah awake,
explained in the briefest terms that she was leaving, and whispered a few hasty instructions. Deborah wasn’t the most discreet person in the world, but that couldn’t be helped.

‘And you’re never coming back?’ said Deborah.

‘Never,’ said Martha.

Deborah started to weep. She flung her arms around Martha and held her tight, sobbing into her hair. ‘You were always a good mistress. I’ll miss you, I really will.’

Martha was startled. She tried to remember the last time someone had hugged her, and came up with nothing.

‘Don’t cry,’ she said, awkwardly patting Deborah’s back. ‘I’ll send for you as soon as I get to –’

‘Don’t tell me where you’re going,’ interrupted Deborah. ‘You know I can’t keep a secret.’

That doesn’t bode well
, thought Martha.

‘Are you sure you’ll be all right on your own?’ asked Deborah.

‘I’m certain,’ said Martha, who wasn’t. ‘Don’t worry about me.’

‘I won’t,’ said Deborah, who would, and she wept a fresh slew of tears.

‘Goodbye, dearest Deborah,’ Martha said, feeling a surge of warmth for her loyal maid, and she kissed her on the forehead. Deborah appreciated the kiss, but she might also have liked one of the gold coins in Martha’s bags. Martha didn’t even think of it.

She returned to the stables, saddled her horse, Silver, and rode the sleepy and reluctant beast to the Crone’s cottage, a stone shack surrounded by pines on the edge of the castle estate. She knocked on the door, first gently with her knuckles, then, when that drew no response, thumping hard with her fists. Eventually, the door creaked open to reveal a small girl, around twelve years old, with huge brown eyes. She was wearing a nightgown and wrapped up against the cold in a rough woollen blanket.

‘Who are you?’ said Martha.

‘I’m the Acting Crone,’ said the girl.

‘I need to see the real Crone,’ said Martha. ‘It’s an emergency.’

‘She isn’t here.’ The girl looked terrified. ‘Aren’t you the Queen?’

‘Yes. Let me in.’

The girl stood to one side, and attempted a curtsey as Martha passed her. It didn’t really work with the blanket. Then she closed the door.

The cottage was tiny. Was this how all commoners lived? There was just the one room, smaller than Martha’s bedroom. At one end was what Martha supposed was the kitchen bit, a large fireplace with a spit and a heavy wooden table on which was some fruit and a knife. There was another, smaller fireplace at the other end of the room with a couple of settles pulled up to it. On either side of that fireplace were alcoves, curtained with heavily patched drapes. Sleeping areas, Martha supposed – she couldn’t see a bed. The window by the door had a good view of the castle. Martha peered out of it to make sure she hadn’t been followed, then closed the shutters and turned back to the girl.

‘Tell me where the real Crone is,’ she said.

‘I don’t know,’ said the girl. She was so frightened she was shaking. ‘She drank too much scrumpy last Christmas and made herself disappear. I haven’t seen her since. I didn’t tell anyone because I thought she might come back, and I didn’t want to get her into trouble, or me thrown out of the castle. I’ve been the Acting Crone since then, but I’m just an apprentice really. My name’s Nancy.’

‘Can you do magic?’ said Martha.

‘Some,’ said Nancy.

‘Good. I need you to turn me into a boy.’

Nancy’s eyes widened.

‘Or a man, I suppose,’ said Martha. ‘It’s up to you. But I’ve got to get away from here. I don’t want to be queen, and even if I did, I can’t stay here and be married to that, that … to that. I can’t let him – well, anyway. I can’t. But the whole country
will be looking for me so I need to be in disguise as somebody that no one will ever imagine is me. I need to be a man. Or a boy. Male. Can you do it?’

Nancy took a deep breath. ‘No, Your Majesty.’

‘
No
?’ This was not a word Martha was accustomed to hearing. ‘Why not?’

Nancy paused. ‘May I speak freely?’

‘Please,’ said Martha, thinking,
well, freely-ish
.

‘I’m only a beginner.’ Nancy’s voice didn’t sound free. If anything it was so constrained that she could barely get the words out. ‘Magic is quite hard,’ she added miserably.

‘Don’t you just think about it and it happens?’

Nancy hesitated, then cleared her throat. ‘May I show you something, Your Majesty?’

‘If you must. But be quick about it. I’m in a hurry.’

Nancy led Martha over to the kitchen area, where three apples were sitting on a chopping block.

‘I made those with magic,’ she said.

‘Congratulations,’ said Martha, wondering why she was looking at apples.

‘Pick up the one on the far left. I mean, please. If it please Your Majesty.’

Martha tried to do so but she couldn’t get hold of it. It seemed to disappear in her hand.

‘What’s wrong with it?’ she said.

‘It’s only what an apple looks like. I didn’t realise I had to make it solid.’

Martha picked up the apple next to it.

‘This one seems fine,’ she said. She bit into it and immediately spat into her hand. ‘That’s … that’s …’ She took another tiny bite, and this time chewed and swallowed. She pulled a face. ‘There’s something about this that’s not right at all.’

‘I know. I forgot to give it any texture.’

Martha put the textureless apple down, and handed Nancy
the chewed-up morsel. Nancy discreetly dropped it in a composting bucket. Martha picked up the last apple on the board.

‘And this one?’ she said.

‘Try it, Your Majesty.’

Martha took a bite.

‘Nice crunch,’ she said. ‘Juicy. Sweet. Well done. This is a very good apple.’

‘Until you cut it in half,’ said Nancy.

Martha looked at her with surprise and then sliced the apple in two.

‘Oh, I see,’ she said. ‘No core. But you know, that’s actually an improvement. When they serve apples at the castle, I have one of the cooks cut the cores out for me. And the peel, and any bruises or worms.’

‘Even so, I forgot to put one in. So it’s not exactly like a real apple. I also don’t know if it is nourishing, or if you could eat a thousand of those and starve to death.’

Martha put the knife down.

‘So what you’re saying, if I understand correctly, is if you turn me into a boy, I might be like one of those apples. Not quite right.’

‘Yes, Your Majesty.’

‘I’ll take that risk,’ said Martha.

Nancy curtseyed again, but she still looked worried. ‘Your Majesty is always right, of course. But … but with your permission, I still think it’s best if I just make you look like a boy, rather than … trying to … make all the bits right. It’s just that … I haven’t … seen everything myself.’ The girl was blushing now. ‘So I’d have to guess.’

Martha thought of the book.

‘On consideration, perhaps that’s wise,’ she said.

‘And also, before I start, there’s something I should give you.’

Nancy delved into a cupboard and emerged with a tiny, corked opaque glass bottle, which she handed to Martha.

‘The Crone was working on a universal panacea before she made herself disappear,’ she said. ‘This is the only dose that’s left. It should restore you to your right form.’

Martha held the bottle up to the light. She could see something viscous inside.

‘Should?’ she said.

‘I haven’t tried it,’ admitted Nancy, ‘and the Crone was very secretive about it, so I don’t know if it works.’

‘So if it doesn’t work, I may never be able to change back?’

Nancy shrugged helplessly. ‘Hopefully, it works.’

Martha nodded and put the bottle in the pocket of her cloak. ‘All right,’ she said. ‘I’m ready.’

Nancy looked petrified, almost as scared as Martha felt. She went over to an alcove and came back with some socks, a pair of scissors, and a rather tarnished mirror, which she propped up against one of the settles. She was shaking so much she nearly dropped it.

‘Let’s start with your hair,’ she said. ‘No magic required.’

Martha wasn’t delighted at the thought of Nancy putting a pair of scissors to her head when her hand was trembling to such an extent, but all the same she positioned herself in front of the mirror. She unpinned her hair and let the thick tresses fall down her back. She’d always been vain about her hair. It was one of the few womanly things about her. She ran her hand through it for the last time, feeling the silk of it in her fingers. Then Nancy took hold of it all in a bunch and sliced it away at the neckline. Martha felt a surge of – what was it? Panic? No, not panic exactly …

‘Now for the beard,’ said Nancy. ‘I’m not sure how this will feel so I’m sorry if it hurts.’

She stood beside the mirror and stared intently at Martha. Martha kept her eyes on her reflection. After a few seconds, her chin started to itch, at first just a little, but it quickly became almost insufferable.

‘What are you –’

‘I need you to keep your face still. Sorry.’

Martha clenched her fists to stop herself from scratching. Then just as she was about to protest again, a huge red beard erupted from her face and spilled down the front of her tunic. She looked like a ginger waterfall. She gasped in astonishment and started to laugh. It wasn’t panic she was feeling. It was excitement.

‘I think there’s a little bit too much,’ she said. ‘Can you make it go back in?’

‘I don’t think that’s a good idea. It might sort of fill up your head. I’ll cut it with the scissors.’

After Nancy had snipped away for a while, she stood back so that they could admire her handiwork. In silence they contemplated the flowing moustache and beard Nancy had left her with.

‘It’s a bit … Viking,’ said Martha.

‘Oh,’ said Nancy, hurt.

‘Maybe you could trim it a tiny bit more?’

Nancy had another go. This time, when she stood back, the moustache and beard had been replaced by patchy outcroppings of hair, not unlike the remaining traces of grass on a field after a vigorous joust. Martha looked like a young boy who had only recently started shaving and was a long way from getting the hang of it.

‘Perfect,’ she said. It was far from perfect, but there wasn’t much that could be done about it now, short of starting again from scratch, literally, which Martha was loath to do. ‘But I still have the form of a woman,’ she continued. ‘Can you change my shape a little, to resemble that of a man?’

Nancy winced. ‘I’m afraid it might be very painful.’

‘But necessary,’ said Martha. She removed her cloak. Underneath she was wearing men’s clothes, stolen from Edwin. She stripped down to her undershirt.

Nancy swallowed and nodded her head. ‘Hold still.’

The young crone reached out a hand and placed it on Martha’s sternum. After a few moments, Martha felt a terrible dragging in her shoulders as they pulled away from one another, getting broader. Then, with a sound like a cork popping, an Adam’s apple bulged out of her neck. Her breasts began to feel hot, then got hotter, to the point of burning.

‘That hurts. Quite a lot,’ she said.

‘Sorry. I’m being as quick as I can.’

Martha felt a tightening, as if she was holding her breath and couldn’t exhale. In the mirror, she watched as her breasts flattened and disappeared. Her stomach churned.

‘I’ve changed my mind!’ she yelled before she could stop herself.

But her breasts were already gone, and Nancy staggered back from the effort of it.

‘I hate it,’ said Martha, a sob entering her voice. But as she pulled her tunic over her head she caught sight of herself in the mirror again. She truly did look like a boy. She turned slowly, regarding herself from all angles. ‘My apologies,’ she said. ‘You have done an excellent job.’

‘The last part is the easiest,’ said Nancy.

She handed over the pair of socks. Martha looked at her quizzically.

‘For …’ But Nancy was too embarrassed to finish her sentence, and instead waved in the general vicinity of Martha’s britches.

Martha blushed. ‘I’ll … apply them later,’ she said.

‘One final thing,’ said Nancy. ‘I think I should make myself forget that this ever happened, so that I can’t tell anybody about your disguise, even if I’m tortured.’

‘Surely nobody would torture a child?’ said Martha.

Nancy looked at her oddly. ‘Your soldiers do it all the time,’ she said. ‘Anyway, I will cast a spell of forgetfulness on myself, so that your secret will be forever safe.’

‘Thank you, Nancy,’ said Martha. ‘I will always remember your help and generosity, and –’

Nancy closed her eyes and began to mutter to herself.

‘Wait, you’re doing it right now?’ said Martha. ‘I don’t think that’s a good …’

Nancy opened her eyes. When she caught sight of Martha, she screamed.

‘Man! Strange man! Strange-looking man in my house!’

She snatched up the scissors and waved them at Martha. Martha grabbed her cloak and ran.

It was a bloody boring funeral, even for a funeral. They shouldn’t call it a funeral, thought Edwin, but a dulleral. He laughed at his own joke and had to cover his mouth with a handkerchief to pretend that he was crying, though why he’d cry over the death of some senile old king he’d never met was beyond him. Next to him, Martha was stiff and silent, as she’d been all day, from the moment he’d woken up to find her sitting in the armchair in the corner of the room, already in her mourning clothes and the impenetrable black veil she’d worn for the wedding. Opening his eyes and seeing Martha in her weeds, his cock had given a twitch – he owned her now, and a man wanted to make his mark. But before he could do anything about it, there had been a knock at the door and in had come that man from the Regency Council to tell them that the funeral was about to begin, so he’d had to dress in a hurry and run. And actually perhaps it was more gentlemanly to wait until his wife’s father was buried before boffing her. More kingly.

Not that Edwin thought he’d be able to get it up after all this tedium. (That was just an exaggeration for comic effect, he reassured himself. Of course he could get it up, he could always get it up. No problems in that department. None at all.) But Sweet Lord, couldn’t they just dig a hole, bung the old King in the hole, fill up the hole? A prayer or two, yes, for decorum’s sake. But did there have to be all this endless talking? It wasn’t enough that the Archbishop appeared determined to read out
the entire Bible from cover to cover. But Jesus, Mary and all the Saints, was there a competition going on for the world’s longest sermon? At least Martha was wearing a veil and could fall asleep if she wanted to, nobody would notice. It wasn’t fair, being a man and having a face everybody could see. Maybe if his eyebrows got longer with age he could comb them down over his eyes and nobody would be able to tell if they were shut. If this funeral lasted much longer he’d be able to try it out.