'A cage?' said Holger. 'For you?' He shifted his feet and rearranged the fire's ember with the end of a stick. Birgitta pushed her knuckles into her mouth and sobbed quietly. Julian placed his hand over hers. There was no mistake. A pattern like the scales of a snake had formed on the back of his hand.
'Julian,' she said, lifting his hand up to her lips. 'You are our son.'
'Make me a cage. Soon I won't be able to ask. And find something. Some berries, leaves or root - some mixture to help me keep these impulses under control. The pictures in my head, the iron in my muscles and bones, the serpent in my heart.'
They trailed through the night across the red earth of the Luberon, and, in the little French town of Cucurun, Holger found a blacksmith. Curiosity accompanied every clang of his hammer. 'Do you have a dancing bear, Monsieur? This would contain a very strong animal. Yes? Or perhaps contain some valuable treasure? Lots of treasure. A prisoner perhaps?' Holger gave nothing away, though none of his questions were far from the truth.
In a different part of the town, Birgitta was directed to Mistress Rimbaud, who made her own medicines for women in childbirth, old men who couldn't sit comfortably on their backsides, and children whose cough foretold imminent death. She was paid well for her potions. Advice, on the other hand, was handed out freely in exchange for gossip. When Birgitta eventually found the bolted door down a dark, narrow alleyway, she was invited in by a suspicious old creature, bent almost double, shrouded in long, silver hair that touched the hardened-earth floor.
'You are one of the troop who arrived before dawn,' she said, removing from her mouth some vine leaves she had been chewing. She didn't spit them out; instead, she wrapped them in a fig leaf, added a drop of pale yellow liquid, tied it with grass, and placed the parcel carefully among the myriads of bottles, ramikins and packages on a round, marble table.
'Yes, Mistress, I've come...'
'I know why you've come, Birgitta of Durnstein.'
Wednesday 10 October 2012
Monday 8 October 2012
The Dragonboy of Regnaville - Page 10
The purse bulged with gold. Holger was mesmerised by the way the rim of one of the coins peeked out above the drawstring closure. As he imagined the weight of it in his hand, his heart pounded. Like a drumbeat so loud he wondered that no one was alerted to his intentions. No more thinking. The gentleman blinked and the purse was gone. A second later, Holger was standing in front of the entire assembly, rescuing the fair maiden from the terrifying monster to great applause, when the cry, 'Thief!' went up. 'I've been robbed! There is a thief amongst us!'
The confusion was useful. Not only was Holger's alibi secure, but there was something else. Karl, the gypsy, had shown Julian how to take a mouthful of plum brandy and spit it out while lighting it with a tallow candle to create a fire-breathing effect when challenged by the brave knight. It was only after they left the outskirts of the town that Holger remembered he had meant to replenish the supply of brandy. But he'd forgotten. The jar had been empty for the last fifty miles. Julian could charred the bark of a tree with his own breath. The cry of 'Thief!' had been a distraction. No one had thought to ask the obvious question. At least, almost no one.
This wasn't the only change in the young man. He was becoming quick to anger, so that Birgitta had to learn how to use great diplomacy when asking him to do things. Collect wood, mend the wheel of the caravan, water the horses. When he wasn't raging around their overnight campsites, he looked exhausted and frequently fell into deep, dark pits of depression.
One evening, an innocent remark - 'My darling, please light a fire' - caused him to grab his mother and bellow into her face.
'Julian, light a fire. Julian sweep out the caravan. Julian fetch a bucket of water. I am not your slave!' A soon as the words left his lips he felt distressed, so sorry for his actions. He ran off into the forest and didn't reappear until the following evening, his clothes ragged, his face, shoulders and arms a patchwork of scratches, the skin on his elbows peeling and the bones protruding. He sat down between his parents, the colours of the blazing fire reflected in their anxious faces. Birgitta and Holger glanced sideways at each other. At last, Julian began to mumble. 'Make me a cage, Father. Make it strong.'
The confusion was useful. Not only was Holger's alibi secure, but there was something else. Karl, the gypsy, had shown Julian how to take a mouthful of plum brandy and spit it out while lighting it with a tallow candle to create a fire-breathing effect when challenged by the brave knight. It was only after they left the outskirts of the town that Holger remembered he had meant to replenish the supply of brandy. But he'd forgotten. The jar had been empty for the last fifty miles. Julian could charred the bark of a tree with his own breath. The cry of 'Thief!' had been a distraction. No one had thought to ask the obvious question. At least, almost no one.
This wasn't the only change in the young man. He was becoming quick to anger, so that Birgitta had to learn how to use great diplomacy when asking him to do things. Collect wood, mend the wheel of the caravan, water the horses. When he wasn't raging around their overnight campsites, he looked exhausted and frequently fell into deep, dark pits of depression.
One evening, an innocent remark - 'My darling, please light a fire' - caused him to grab his mother and bellow into her face.
'Julian, light a fire. Julian sweep out the caravan. Julian fetch a bucket of water. I am not your slave!' A soon as the words left his lips he felt distressed, so sorry for his actions. He ran off into the forest and didn't reappear until the following evening, his clothes ragged, his face, shoulders and arms a patchwork of scratches, the skin on his elbows peeling and the bones protruding. He sat down between his parents, the colours of the blazing fire reflected in their anxious faces. Birgitta and Holger glanced sideways at each other. At last, Julian began to mumble. 'Make me a cage, Father. Make it strong.'
Saturday 6 October 2012
The Dragonboy of Regnaville - Page 9
The misshapen story - as if the truth were not bad enough - got bigger and bigger, invited Satan in, introduced him to howling blood-lipped wolves, involved witches and all manner of hideous demons, as it lumbered along from village to village. Fortunately, the River Danube meanders through a varying landscape of dialects, and the three fugitives had been given a head start.
Passing through farms and villages, they exchanged their labour for food, doing anything and everything that was asked of them. On the road out of Linz, however, they met a band of travelling gypsies, who entertained the crowds with their sword-swallowing, juggling and fire-breathing. They made friends with Karl and Magdalena and spent a week with them learning the tricks of the trade. Holger perfected his knife-throwing skills. Birgitta saw how to dance with grace and charm, hailing the onlookers to come and watch and part with a few coins. But Julian was the one who could leave an audience with mouths hanging open. He could leap higher than anybody had seen before. Scale a tree in no time. Pluck a knife out of the air, even as it flew towards his heart. So by the time they waved goodbye to Karl and Magdalena and took to the roads of Bavaria, they had transformed themselves into performers, engaging the locals with singing, dancing and stories of brave knights and fiercesome monsters.
Things might have settled into a comfortable pattern, but for two events which changed their lives forever.
On the final day of their stay in a small, wealthy town on the border of Austria and Switzerland, Holger was walking behind the circle of onlookers attracted by Birgitta's sweet rhapsodies. Holger stopped. Fixed to the spot. A pouch of coins hung from a gentleman's belt. He looked at the owner up and down - a rich man, judging by the neatness of the periwig, the gold stitiching of his jacket, the fine cut of his breeches, the silk of his stockings and the shine on his shoes. A man such as this, thought Holger, with so many similar pouches of gold at home, could surely live without one of them. Birgitta's eyes darted around the audience. She wondered why her husband was not appearing. Black lines of paint exaggerating the shape of his eyes, and a long arrow-shaped tail trailing behind him, Julian was already drawing near, playing out the drama they had devised.
Holger couldn't take his eyes of the purse of gold.
Passing through farms and villages, they exchanged their labour for food, doing anything and everything that was asked of them. On the road out of Linz, however, they met a band of travelling gypsies, who entertained the crowds with their sword-swallowing, juggling and fire-breathing. They made friends with Karl and Magdalena and spent a week with them learning the tricks of the trade. Holger perfected his knife-throwing skills. Birgitta saw how to dance with grace and charm, hailing the onlookers to come and watch and part with a few coins. But Julian was the one who could leave an audience with mouths hanging open. He could leap higher than anybody had seen before. Scale a tree in no time. Pluck a knife out of the air, even as it flew towards his heart. So by the time they waved goodbye to Karl and Magdalena and took to the roads of Bavaria, they had transformed themselves into performers, engaging the locals with singing, dancing and stories of brave knights and fiercesome monsters.
Things might have settled into a comfortable pattern, but for two events which changed their lives forever.
On the final day of their stay in a small, wealthy town on the border of Austria and Switzerland, Holger was walking behind the circle of onlookers attracted by Birgitta's sweet rhapsodies. Holger stopped. Fixed to the spot. A pouch of coins hung from a gentleman's belt. He looked at the owner up and down - a rich man, judging by the neatness of the periwig, the gold stitiching of his jacket, the fine cut of his breeches, the silk of his stockings and the shine on his shoes. A man such as this, thought Holger, with so many similar pouches of gold at home, could surely live without one of them. Birgitta's eyes darted around the audience. She wondered why her husband was not appearing. Black lines of paint exaggerating the shape of his eyes, and a long arrow-shaped tail trailing behind him, Julian was already drawing near, playing out the drama they had devised.
Holger couldn't take his eyes of the purse of gold.
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