These Our Monsters Page 11

  They are too heavy. There are too many stones here, flecked and splashed and stained with too much blood. I can’t hold them all, even in my mind.

  It’s the walls that kill you, not the ghosts. Séan was right, the dead have no power to harm, and none to heal either.

  The

  Loathly

  Lady

  Fiona Mozley

  1

  LYTHE AND LISTENYTHE THE LIF OF A LORD RICHE (was there ever another kind?). While he was alive, there was no one else like him in the world. Royal and courteous, of all the kings, Arthur was the flower, and his knights were chivalrous and brave.

  King Arthur hunts in Inglewood with the knights of his court. It is a no-place: too far north for the English (though they have given it their name); too far south for the Scots (though they have been here once or twice). Huntsmen spot a hart in a thicket of bracken. Hounds bray, horses gallop. The deer hears the clamour and stands dead still.

  Clothed in green in a blinking wood, leaves like eyelids, fluttering, flickering. Green like sunshine, green like night. A wood, a hart, the once and future king. They have been here before, they will come here again. He will follow a beast and it will follow him. They will evince, they will evade, they will venture, they will vanquish, they will dance, they will court, they will wrestle, they will sing.

  Arthur, alone, sees the hart’s mind, and tells his companions he will stalk the deer, and catch it by stealth and not by chase. He creeps beneath branches, between trunks. He tip-toes on tree roots, and scuffs the woodland loam.

  Arthur is everything and nothing, has everything, has no one, wants (for) nothing, desires a world. He is boy-king, man-boy, woods-man. He is king of these woods; he is a king who would.

  And wodmanly he stowpyd lowe. He stalks the deer for half a mile. His retinue is now far off. Through green sunshine, he spots an eye, spots it once then once again, then a haunch, and a flash of a white tail. His bow is made from yew, taken from a tree older than this story. The arrow is willow with fletchings from a goose. The bowstring is gut; it snaps a reaction. The arrow takes flight. The iron points blood.

  An animal falls once and once again, and vanishes into a cloud of green fern. Arthur leaps to the spot, marked now by rising spores, and kneels by the deer, as if in reverence to a dying monarch. He will dress the animal with his own kingly hands, take its skin, cut its flesh. He will serve it well, and taste the fat.

  But as Arthur stalked the deer, he was stalked himself. There was another in Inglewood. The other stepped; the other crept. He came upon Arthur. An unknown knight places a blade at the nape of the kneeling king.

  If the man is a knight; the knight is a brute. Larger than is rightly right, with arms and legs like lumber, and a belly like a pregnant sow. His helmet bears antlers, and his armour – plate and mail – is twisted and knotted around his frame as if they are grafted and grown together. His face is covered by a visor. He lifts it and Arthur sees skin sunken with sores, a swollen nose, and blooded eyes.

  ‘King Arthur.’ The knight greets the king discourteously. ‘You have done me wrong more than once and once again. I have waited for you in these woods, and now I find you alone, without your knights, without your court.’

  ‘Who are you and what do you want?’

  ‘I am Sir Somer Gromer Joure. You took my lands and gave them to your nephew, Sir Gawain. Now I have no lands, and I walk in the wilderness like a wilder-man.’

  King Arthur has no memory of this knight, though Sir Gromer has a face and a shape that might be termed memorable. Still, Arthur has no weapon except his bow, and he wears no armour, only green cloth. His only defence in this wood is against sight, and he has been seen.

  ‘I am in your power. What can I give you so that you will let me live? I have a kingdom that depends on me. I have a future.’

  ‘There’s not much you can offer me. Now I am accustomed to my life in the woods I want neither land nor gold. But there is a certain thing, which you can do for me. If, of course, you agree.’

  ‘What is it?’ asks the king, impatient to be on his feet.

  ‘You must agree before I tell you what it is.’

  ‘But how can I do that? It might be an impossible thing.’

  ‘Then I will have to kill you,’ says Sir Gromer, gleefully, taking hold of the hilt of his sword with both his broad hands.

  ‘No, wait,’ pleads the king. ‘I agree, I agree.’

  ‘On your honour?’ asks the knight.

  ‘On my honour as a king,’ Arthur replies.

  ‘Then I shall accept your word, and let you live.’ Sir Somer Gromer sheaths his blade and stretches out his arm towards the kneeling king. Arthur takes the knight’s hand and rises to his feet. He stands only to his chest. The king is small against this man.

  Then Sir Gromer says: ‘Now that you are standing, I will tell you what it is you have sworn to. In twelve months, to the day, you must meet me by the cross that stands in this wood. You must come alone, without any of your lords or your knights. You must tell no one you are coming, and you must tell no one about this meeting. You must bring with you one thing, and one thing only – the answer to a question: what do women want? If you bring me no answer, you will lose your head.’

  Arthur is woo.

  It is an impossible task; an absurd question without an answer. It is a nothing, a nowhere, a never. But he swore on his honour, his honour as a king. And Arthur’s honour is worth his life, and Arthur’s life is worth a once and future kingdom.

  The knight smiles. He reveals blackened teeth sharpened to a point, like a lion or a wolf or a bear. Something bestial, something not-man. ‘Go, then,’ he says. ‘Your life is in my hands.’

  Arthur puts his bugle to his lips and blows, though his breath is less than it should have been. The unknown knight disappears into the thick of the wood, folding himself between trees like a sea-shell between waves. He’s there, then he’s gone, he’s there, he’s there, then he’s gone, then he’s there, then he’s gone, he’s gone, he’s gone.

  2

  Arthur’s retinue arrives to see only the king and the deer, and Arthur says nothing of his meeting. The court returns to Carlisle, to a stone castle standing perpendicular, straight and predictable against the ellipses and fractals of moors and trees. The stones are the colours of a Carlisle sky, fog and mist and cloud made solid and still. There are towers for seeing, and towers for being seen. There are dark corners for hiding and forgetting, and wide halls for the eating ritual, the public performance of devouring. There are walls to keep out the Scots. There are walls to keep out the English. There are walls to keep out the wild.

  That evening, Arthur holds the events of the day in his heart’s mind. He cannot enjoy the feast. The deer has become roast venison. Turned on a spit above a fire, the animal’s nature is forever changed, like a base metal in the hands of an alchemist. The cooks bring Arthur the richest cut, but it sits on his plate untouched, while his lords consume their own portions, and squires and pages gnaw on bones.

  One of the knights is the king’s nephew. Sir Gawain is a sensitive young man, handsome and brave, the most courteous of all the king’s knights. While everyone else is busy eating, he notices the demeanour of his uncle. He sees that he is not devouring the deer as he should, and he is alarmed. If a king does not eat his meat, he is not king at all.

  After the feast, Gawain goes to Arthur’s chamber. It is the highest room in the castle, placed there so Arthur can do the most seeing and be the most seen. Gawain climbs the many stairs, placing his feet on the grooves that have been made by feet before his own, or perhaps of future feet, stepping once and once again. He finds his uncle there alone (Arthur does have a wife, but who knows where she’s got to).

  Arthur tells Gawain about the meeting in the forest. He tells him of the deer, the knight, and the bargain. ‘No answer can possibly be found,’ Arthur moans. ‘In twelve months I must return to the place of our meeting, and I will lose either my head or my honour.�
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  Gawain has experience of bargains struck, of twelve-month promises, and the honest proffering of a neck for a woodsman’s axe. And Gawain is of the view that any unanswered question requires a quest.

  ‘You have been asked a question, so now you must go on a quest. The further we travel, the more we will learn. We will seek knowledge with swords out-stretched. If I come too, we will double our chances of finding an answer. You go in one direction and ask everyone you meet. I will go in another direction and ask everyone I meet. We will write our answers on paper, and when we return we shall compile the pages into a book.’

  Arthur agrees. Though he has little hope, there is nothing else he can think to do. The next morning, the two men set off on their journeys. Each follows his own road. They ask every person they meet what it is that women want.

  ‘What do they want what do they want what do they want?’

  King Arthur and Sir Gawain receive many answers: enough to fill two books. Some tell them that women want gold. Some tell them women want never to grow old. Some say women want a burly man to hold. The king and the knight quest for eleven months, but when they return and compare what they have learned, neither man is satisfied they have the answer to save the king.

  ‘I have only one month until I must return to the forest and offer myself up to be butchered. Nothing in these books will do. It’s all lost – my kingdom, my life. All because I was tracked through the forest. I was so intent on catching that hart, I was caught myself. Unarmed and unaware. I should have taken the blow, and never agreed to this challenge.’

  Arthur is fulle woo. Gawain remains hopeful. ‘You still have a month. Ride out again, this time into the forest, and see what you find.’

  With nothing to lose and nowhere else to go, Arthur returns to Inglewood. He follows the paths as he followed before, he followed the paths he will follow again. Past trees as tall as ships, green darkness and green light.

  He comes to the place the deer was slain and sees what looks at first like a woodsman on a horse, but as he gets closer, and closer again, he sees that it isn’t a woodsman but a woman. And as he gets closer and closer again, he sees the foulest, ugliest, most woody woman he has ever seen. She is the most repulsive creature in the knotted wood, the most repulsive creature in the known world. Her face is all red and raw. Her nose is snotty. Her mouth is wide and her teeth are yellow, hanging out of her mouth over her lips. Her cheeks are as wide as a woman’s hips, and her hips and breasts are as large as those of a horse.

  Her horse, Arthur observes, is, however, quite charming. It is a pretty beast draped in fine cloth, adorned with gold and precious stones. How strange, he reflects, for such an ugly woman to be riding such a dainty horse. He sees the woman and is repulsed. He sees the horse and is captivated.

  Arthur steadies his own stallion at the sight of this glorious mare (or is his a mare and hers a stallion?) and he asks the woman, ‘What do you want?’

  ‘My name is Dame Ragnelle, and I have come here to help, or at least to strike a bargain so that we might both be helped. I can give you the answer to the question you have been asked. If you agree to my demands I will tell you the answer. If you do not agree, you will leave this forest no wiser and you will return to it in one month and lose your head.’

  King Arthur, for the most past, kept his promise to Sir Gromer, and told no one of their meeting, except Gawain. He is therefore startled that this unknown woman knows of their deal.

  ‘What do you want in return?’

  ‘I wish to wed a knight at your court. I have heard about him. They say he is the most courteous knight that has ever lived, and I have fallen in love with him from afar.’

  There is only one knight she can mean. Arthur knows who it is before she tells him. He cringes at the thought of his beautiful and handsome nephew marrying this monster, though he knows that Gawain would not hesitate if it were to save the life of his king.

  ‘Is there no other way? Could you not just give me the answer and leave my nephew alone?’

  ‘There is no other way. If you promise to this demand, I shall tell you what it is that women want. And if that answer proves to be the one that saves your life, I shall come to your court and wed Sir Gawain in front of all your lords and ladies. Do you agree?’

  Reluctantly, Arthur agrees: his life is not his alone, but belongs to a kingdom. Dame Ragnelle leans forward, like lovers lean to kiss. Her breath is rancid. It sweeps over his face and neck like vinegar poured to pickle him whole. He shuts his eyes and she whispers in his ear.

  King Arthur stands back, amazed. He must not have heard correctly. He asks her to repeat herself, and she whispers the answer for a second time. Again, he is sure he has misheard. Either there has been mishearing or misunderstanding.

  It takes a third telling for Arthur to believe that he caught her words as she meant to speak them. He lets out a single, low laugh. Then he laughs again, and soon he cannot stop laughing, and the trees around him begin to shake in the wind as if they are laughing too. Ragnelle’s answer is absurd. It is ridiculous. There is no way that it is the answer he needs. Gawain is safe from this woman and her abominable proposal.

  King Arthur rides back to Carlisle Castle. At first, he is relieved. It would have been a horrible sight, to see his lovely nephew marry such a monster. Then he starts to worry. He is sure Ragnelle’s answer is not the right answer, but then which one is it?

  When he gets back, he tells Gawain about his meeting, and everything she said to him. Gawain does not laugh with his uncle, but simply nods, and tells him he will do his duty.

  3

  On the prescribed day, twelve months from the day of the fateful hunt, Arthur rides out to Inglewood Forest for the third time. He rides through a palisade of trees with thick branches packed in defence. He rides past herds of deer – does, harts, stags – that at other times, he has hunted, and which he hopes to hunt again.

  Arthur rides alone, with no armour and no sword, clothed only in green, his cloak no thicker than the hide of a hind. He meets Sir Gromer at the carved wooden cross, which stands at a crossroads in a clearing. Sir Gromer’s sword is drawn before him, held in both hands, tip rooted in the green earth. Arthur approaches him as if knight is king and king is knight. He is ready to bend his neck to the blade.

  Sir Gromer: ‘Come, Sir King. Tell me, what do women want?’

  Arthur pulls out the two volumes he and Gawain compiled. He passes them both to the monstrous knight. Sir Gromer devours the books as a hawk devours its prey, reading each page then ripping it from its binding and tossing it over his shoulder to be caught by the wind and returned to the wood. As he reads, he mutters: ‘No, no, no.’ As he finishes the last of the pages, he bellows: ‘No, no, no!’ He tosses the empty books away, and raises his sword. ‘Sir King, you are a dead man. I will cut off your head and hack you limb from limb and joint you and skin you and hang you in my larder and make mince from your heart and lungs and make strings for my bow from your guts.’

  ‘Wait,’ says King Arthur, realising he must use the answer given to him by Dame Ragnelle, and thus bind his friend to that awful woman forever. ‘I have one last possible answer that I did not write down.’

  ‘Tell it to me then. Why delay?’

  ‘I will tell you, then,’ he says, readying himself. ‘The thing that women want,’ he says. ‘The thing that women want,’ he says once again. ‘The thing that they desire. The thing that they would choose, choose above all the things written in those books, above wealth and health and love. That thing they would choose, it is choice itself.’

  Sir Gromer pulls up his sword again as if to strike the king, but instead he thrusts it into the wooden cross, where it gets stuck. He shouts and curses King Arthur, and kicks his boots against the dirt. ‘That woman who told you,’ he rages. ‘I would like to see that woman burn on a fire. And that woman, Dame Ragnelle, is my sister.’

  Sir Gromer continues to rail against his sister, but there is nothing he can do. He
wanted to trap King Arthur and kill him, but now he must let him go. The woodland knight returns to his woodland keep and King Arthur begins to ride back to the castle at Carlisle, with its high stone walls and perpetual feasting, but as he had feared, he has not gone far before he meets Dame Ragnelle, the hideous woman on her beautiful horse.

  ‘You used my answer and it saved your life,’ she says to him. ‘Now you must allow me to ride with you back to Carlisle, where I shall marry Sir Gawain. He is my choice.’

  And so, the famous king rides with this winsome woman, wishing she were further from him and not at his side. At Carlisle, Gawain meets his bride, and true to his nature, he greets her with respect. From his face alone, nobody can know what he sees. They marry right away (better it were done quickly) and afterwards there is a feast.

  Ragnelle eats all she is given, and she is given more. She eats all the more, and is given more and more again. She pulls at the bleeding meat with her hands, her long nails tearing like talons, her yellow teeth gnashing like fangs.

  The beautiful and courteous lords and ladies of the court stare. So fowlle a sowe sawe nevere man. Many of them weep at the thought of their beloved Gawain married to this hag. But Gawain sits next to his bride and talks and laughs with her between mouthfuls of meat, and nobody could know from his actions what it is that he sees.

  After the feasting, Dame Ragnelle and Sir Gawain go together to his bed chamber. Now, all the lords and ladies of the court weep (or do they laugh?) at the thought of Gawain in bed with this ugly witch. They throw back their heads in hysteria. Gawain and Ragnelle are born aloft by the bellowing and screaming. It carries them up the winding stairs.