Raider’s Tide. Maggie Prince

Mary to Elizabeth the tide has turned from burning Protestants to burning Catholics. Burning those who disagree with you is a hard habit to shake off. We heard news recently of the burnings of some Catholics just a few hours’ ride south of us in Lancaster, but up here no one cares much what faith you follow so long as you are discreet. Witchcraft, of course, is another matter.

      Now the old priest is dead, replaced by a younger man who declares that witchcraft does not exist, heresy scarcely matters and that we had all better damn well love each other or he’ll know the reason why. He took over Verity’s and my lessons from the old parson. Sadly, these have stopped now that I am sixteen.

      I light my second beacon of the day. The tar barrels ignite at once with a huff of sound, and snarl like animals as they burn. I step down hurriedly as the heat hits me. Verity is handing out swords, bows and clubs, as more henchmen and Germaine appear at the top of the stairway. A grim air of calm hangs over us.

      Germaine refuses the bow which Verity offers her, and goes to fetch her own. Germaine is our only other female servant besides Kate. She is tall and dark and very beautiful, and plays a variety of musical instruments with a variety of lack of talent. She is supposed to teach music and needlework to Verity and myself, and do the mending. Instead she spends most of her time entertaining Father.

      I go downstairs with William and Henry to watch them lug our heavy old hagbut out of its cupboard on the east stairs and across the passage into the men’s common room. At Barrowbeck we cannot afford many firearms in the way that some of the bigger fortresses can. Our hagbut is inaccurate, slow to load and terrifyingly loud. Its eccentric angle of fire is such that it is more effective aimed from the common room, half way down the tower. When he was a young man, my father used to carry it into battle on his shoulder.

      The men latch the weapon on to its stand and tip it awkwardly backwards, like a cannon, for me to load. I uncap a horn of gunpowder and ram shot and gunpowder down the barrel, wadding it into place. “Better oil the hinges,” I suggest, extracting the ramrod and propping it by the wall for next time. I filter some fine gunpowder into the priming pan. “I’ll get you some lard from the kitchen. You need it to swing up more easily than that for reloading.” The acrid smell of gunpowder is in my nose and on my hands as I hurry downstairs.

      Now I am beginning to worry about Mother. Where is she? Is she still safely with Aunt Juniper, or is she in the woods on her way home? If the latter, then surely she will have heard the horn and seen the beacon, and will either hurry home or find somewhere to hide. Back on the battlements I work my way through the crowd to where Germaine is flexing her longbow. Most of us just have ordinary bows, but Germaine insists on using this six-foot monstrosity with its silk and flaxen string. I have to say, though, that she does tend to hit things with it.

      “Germaine?” I take care to be polite. “Would you please take charge of closing all the shutters, and later when we’re all in, wind down the grille on the door and open the wolf-pit? Can I just leave all those things to you? Oh, and please don’t forget to call ‘Wolf-pit open’. We don’t want a repeat of what happened to poor old Edmund.”

      She carries on flexing her bow, and replies, “You have an excessive amount of responsibility for one so young, Beatrice, and it has had a most unfortunate effect on you.”

      I turn away in irritation. Henry, who has re-emerged on to the battlements, overhears, and suppresses a grin. His face is still bleeding in a row of gleaming droplets. I am regretting my outburst of temper. I should like to apologise, but the words won’t quite come.

      “Henry.” I approach him. He looks minded to ignore me, but I stand in front of him. “Come with me, Henry. Let’s go and help Leo round up the cattle and bring the pigs up the hill.” I look round the full sweep of horizon. Smoke now rises from the Pike, and distantly from the direction of my cousins’ pele tower at Mere Point, as well as behind us on Beacon Hill, but of the raiders there is no sign.

       Chapter 4

      It is very quiet in the woods. The birds are silent and the squirrels and deer are nowhere to be seen. It is as if everyone and everything were waiting for the marauders to arrive. Yet by now, mid-afternoon of the following day, it seems almost certain that the beacon fire across the bay was a false alarm, a bush fire perhaps. It would not be the first time.

      In previous raids we have scarcely had time to get our cattle into the tower, let alone the sheep up into the woods. Surrounding homesteaders have not stood a chance, and their houses have been ripped bare of everything, then burned to the ground. Many of them have lost their lives defending their homes. At Barrowbeck Tower we are in a stronger position. Our thick walls protect us and we are excellent shots. We do not fight hand-to-hand, but shoot down arrows on the invaders, gavlockes with forked metal heads, or shafts with flaming tar-soaked rags bound to their tips.

      This time it has been possible to gather all the homesteaders, with their cattle, ponies, pigs and goats, into the lower rooms. The crush is terrible. The smell is worse. The silence of these woods is a relief after the dreadful racket of the animals. All I can hear now are my own footsteps, and the tinkle of the belwether as sheep wander in dense woodland.

      Our beacon is dying down, though it still throws out a ferocious heat in the afternoon sun. I am on my way to damp down and make safe the fire on Beacon Hill. I also have some slight hope of meeting Mother. Mother looks after our dairy, and by now will be fretting about curds left to stand too long, and cream on the turn before it can be churned into butter, despite the coolness of its rock cave.

      I am too hot in my grey woollen gown. My byggen cap is sticking to my forehead. I rest for a moment, and from habit gather a few dry sticks to replenish the kindling on Beacon Hill. I have taken the less known path because it seems safer. Off to my left is an old hermit’s cottage in the hazel thicket. It is half overgrown with brambles since the hermit died of a quinsy last winter. I tell myself I could hide there, if the Scots came now.

      This way up Beacon Hill is hard going, overgrown through little use. When I reach the top the smoky air makes me cough. I rest a moment, then pile stones round the collapsed ashes of the fire, and shovel damp soil into the middle. We will prepare it ready for next time once the embers have cooled. A false twilight has spread across the valley and the bay, from the smoking fires, but the wind will soon clear it. On my way back down through the woods I feel a surge of cheerfulness. A distant brush-fire has taken a day from our lives, but no matter. Tonight all the beacons will die down, and tomorrow Mother will come home.

      As I emerge from the trees I do not notice, at first, the thin, dark line streaming down the far side of the valley. I am out into the open before I see them, careering between the windblown trees on the Pike, racing down the distant, pebble-strewn screes.

      It had seemed an impossible slope, almost vertical. They have never come that way before. I realise, all in a flash, that they must have been hiding up there on the Pike, waiting for us to relax, knowing they would not be expected from that direction because we thought the sheer screes protected us. How long have they been watching? Days, perhaps. The speed the steepness gives them is terrifying.

      I am out in the open, but they have not seen me yet. I start to run towards the tower. The Scots are spreading out in an arc. Now I can hear them shouting. I can see their saffron coats, goatskin jerkins and brown and green draperies flapping about their knees. They have bows over their shoulders; a few, horrifyingly, have crossbows. At their waists are axes, dorks and cutlasses. Some carry muskets, and others, most ominously of all, scaling ladders. They are coming faster than I am. It is like running into the gates of Hell. For a moment I consider hiding in the woods, but it is too late. The outer edges of their line are spreading into a circle that will join arms behind me. There is no way back. Suddenly they see me. A great shout goes up. Individual Scots break free of the line and run straight at me. The ground is shaking under their feet as I reach the tower door. Their hands stretch out for me. Their sweat suffocates me.

      I had been afraid that no one would hear me or let me in, but the grille goes up fast, the door opens and Verity and Martinus pull