Read by Tony Bell - first story in podcast, here
There was a roaring fire. Bess, the innkeeper’s lovely wife, moved through the crowd pouring mugs of ale, one to each, except for Big Sam, who took two, and Little Nell, who also took two, one in each dainty hand.
Between them stood Will, a stout lad, who was leaving tomorrow to join the king’s service.
“To Will,” Big Sam boomed, and hoisted his mug.
“To Will!” Will wobbled on his feet, a victim of too many toasts in his honour.
“The ladies do too,” said the innkeeper. “Even the princesses.” They all laughed, Bess most of all.
“I want to be a squire, and then a knight.” Will looked longingly at the sword hung as display-piece over the mantel. “Not just a pikeman.”
“Them be sons of lords, Will, or of knights, mostly,” said Big Sam, gently.
Will’s face fell.
“But sometimes outstanding pikemen.”
“I will be!” Will’s eyes sparkled. “I’ll be the bravest pikeman they’ve ever seen. The king’s favourite.”
“Aye, lad. Then the bravest knight.” Big Sam slammed down his mug. “Innkeeper, a tale! To see Will off.”
The innkeeper’s tales had whiled away many evenings. He knew that the right tale is a path through a dark forest. Will was not yet sixteen, his cheeks still downy as a peach.
“I’ll tell a knight’s tale, one I heard when I was in king’s service, long ago, far away, and with another king. ‘Tis a true tale, and I cannot change it…”
***
An ombramorto was loose in the kingdom and had taken the head of a peasant girl.
The ombramorto are fearsome creatures whose strength is shadows: light and dark together. They are not seen in light, and in darkness they are only tricksters. But in shadows they grow fangs and claws and are strong as ogres. They are known by the headless bodies they leave behind, and the knights sent to slay them, who don’t return.
The girl was found in a field of moonflowers, where she’d been picking flowers under the stars. The fearful peasants petitioned the king for help.
“Bother,” said the king, who left his feasting and summoned Geraint. Geraint was young, recently knighted, brave and skilled with the sword.
“As you love me, rid me of this shadow-beast,” commanded the king impatiently, and Geraint knelt, overwhelmed by the honour of the king’s charge.
Ombramorto are never seen, but leave tracks like any creature. Geraint followed the tracks from the decapitated body of the peasant girl toward the golden glow of the Western Hills, until he came to the entrance of a cave.
Geraint considered; to meet the creature in light or darkness? With light, he thought, there would always be shadow, so he chose darkness. He inched into the cave, sword in one hand, flint in the other. With every step the light retreated, until it was pitch black; the ground crunched under his boots, and he reached down and picked up handfuls of stones and bones.
Geraint’s foot nudged something soft, and his hand felt fine hair and sticky wetness. It was the girl’s head. “Help me,” it whispered, still somehow alive.
Then the ombramorto’s voice, unctuous and thick as honey, echoed from the surrounding walls. “A wise hero, meeting me in darkness.”
“My King has sent me to slay you, monster,” said Geraint.
“Heroes don’t need kings.” The ombramorto’s voice was amused. “Why do you do his bidding?”
“My King loves me,” said Geraint.
“When you fall, he’ll forget you, and send another.”
“Not so!” said Geraint.
“Leave, hero. I won’t harm you.”
“You can’t harm me in the dark.” Geraint reached into the pitch-black with all his senses. Though he saw nothing, heard nothing, he smelled the delicate perfume of moonflowers, which bloom at night.
“You can’t stay forever,” said the ombramorto. “When I find you in shadow, I will take your head. You won’t die for a hundred years.” The girl’s head wailed, and was answered by a chorus of moans that echoed off the cavern walls. “Leave while you can, hero.”
The wailing set ice into his bones. Geraint shivered.
Then the moonflower scent was in front of him, and he struck the flint. Before him, a man-shaped grayness, soft and doughy, a garland of moonflowers around its neck. Geraint’s sword flicked out and the head of the ombramorto rolled off and fell to the floor.
The ombramorto spoke its last. “Kings need heroes. Heroes don’t need kings.”
Geraint lit a torch. “My flowers,” said the girl's head, and Geraint pulled the garland off the ombramorto’s neck and placed it gently in the girl’s blonde tresses. The head closed its eyes, content.
The ombramorto’s last words lingered. “Heroes don’t need kings.”
In the torchlight, the floor was scattered with heads, some fresh, some old, some only bone. Some had also been knights, helmed like he was.
***
The innkeeper quaffed a mug of his own ale and stood.
“Another?”
Bess moved again through the crowd, graceful as a crane in flight, refilling the mugs.
Will scowled. Little Nell threw her arm over Will’s shoulders. “That’s a terrible ending.”
“The king wouldn’t have forsaken him.” Will’s voice quavered. “The ombramorto was a liar.”
The innkeeper sighed. The right tale is a path through the woods. He said, “The ombramorto had seen and slain many a knight, but never a king. There’s more to tell, if you want to hear it.”
***
Geraint shook off the monster’s final words and left the Western Hills with a spring in his step and two heads in his sack. One, the peasant girl’s, returning for burial; the second, the head of the fearsome ombramorto that had slain her.
A lordship was not too much to dream about.
When Geraint arrived, the king embraced him, and kissed him on both cheeks, and called forth the court to honour him. Princess Elizabeth was there, smiling and clapping along with the other ladies and lords.
Even Princess Elizabeth was something to dream about…
The king said, “Let’s see what you have.”
Geraint reached into the sack and removed the girl’s head, which still had moonflowers in her hair. Her features were lovely, her expression serene.
“A pity to lose that,” said the king, and kissed the head loudly on the mouth. Uncomfortable laughter rippled through the court. He winked and handed it back to Geraint.
Geraint pulled out the ombramorto’s head. In the light it was a lumpy rock, with black pools for eyes and a toothless hole for a mouth.
“Oh.” The king prodded it with a fat finger. “That’s not so frightening. Well, I suppose you know your business.”
Geraint flushed. He’d descended into the cave in pitch darkness, not knowing if he would see the light again. It was a shadow-beast: in shadow, it had teeth, and claws, and was a monstrous thing. Like most fears, it was small and comical in the light.
The king called for a toast; he raised his glass and the company grew silent.
“For your service…” the king said.
Geraint hoped – a lordship, a chance to woo Princess Elizabeth…
“… four barrels of my finest ale!” He belched.
Geraint choked back his anger. This was all?
The ale master brought the four barrels up on a cart and presented it to Geraint. The king waved him off in dismissal.
A scullery maid followed him out of the court.
“Sir Geraint? It was my sister who was taken by the ombramorto.”
“I’m so sorry,” said Geraint, and bowed deeply. He gently passed her the head. She left, weeping, and Geraint went to the guardroom, pulling the cart of ale behind him, thinking that he’d never needed a drink more.
***
The innkeeper drank and clapped his hands. Again Bess produced the pitcher and refilled the mugs.
Will looked sober now, aghast and shaken. “That can’t be.”
“ ‘Twas, lad. ‘Tis true. I can’t change it.” Will sagged against Little Nell as the innkeeper spoke to him directly. “Go. Learn. Serve the king well. But… don’t put your heart in his hand, is all.” Will’s face twisted.
Nell hugged Will and glared at the innkeeper. “Finish the story, you fool, with a happy ending, one good for a lad setting off for king’s service.”
A tale is a path through the forest, thought the innkeeper; but enough was enough. “Cheer up, lad,” he said briskly. “There’s a happy ending to all this. Most true stories end happily - if the hero lives.”
***
As Geraint dragged the cart through the damp corridors of the castle toward the guardroom, he felt a hand on his arm. It was Princess Elizabeth.
“We’re all grateful,” she said.
“Not all,” Geraint mumbled.
“What was it like?”
“I found the ombramorto in pitch darkness, following the scent of moonflowers. After I cut off its head, I lit a torch. All around were heads of its other victims, some fresh, some rotting, some only skulls.”
Princess Elizabeth shuddered.
The ombramorto had not touched him. It was powerless in pitch dark, and his only battle was against his own fear. But the last words the monster had spoken planted the seeds of doubt in his heart.
“In darkness, its only weapon was words,” said Geraint. “It said, heroes don’t need kings.”
“It was right,” the princess whispered.
“Come with me?” he asked, throwing caution aside.
And, to his astonishment – and her own – she agreed.
At midnight that very night, Princess Elizabeth and Sir Geraint rode from the castle, and left the kingdom, and travelled far away, where they no doubt now live humbly and happily together in some little village.
***
They all clapped. Will looked thoughtfully at the sword over the mantel.
“No more a knight, then?” Will asked.
The innkeeper smiled. “I’m sure he is happier now, wherever he is. Even if he is just – serving ale, instead of serving a king.”
“That’s a proper happy ending,” said Nell. “An evil king and a princess, and a true tale, too. That should set Will on his way tomorrow.”
“I’m … not sure,” said Will. “Mayhap I’ll sleep on it another night,”
“Aye,” said the innkeeper. “That’d be wise.”
Big Sam spoke up. “That’s not true,” he grumbled. “I was a guard for three years for our king, y’know. No one leaves after dark. Thieves on the road. A guard who let any king’s daughter pass at midnight in company of a common knight would find his head on a pike.” There was a murmur. “A princess couldn’t just walk out of the castle at midnight.”
“Suppose they were drunk?” said the innkeeper. “The guards?”
“The guards on duty?” Sam snorted.
“All the knights, and the guards.”
“All?” Big Sam drained one of his mugs to the dregs.
“Yes, all,” said the innkeeper. “Blind drunk. Drunk as lords. Then Geraint and Princess Elizabeth could leave at their pleasure, knowing no pursuit would even be possible for at least half a day.”
“That’s true,” said Bess. She poured her husband another cup, and rested her hand on his arm, and Will’s eyes widened as he realized Bess was pretty as any princess.
“Perhaps whatever pursuit was launched would be half-hearted at best,” the innkeeper continued. “Geraint was a brother-in-arms, and they’d seen him done poorly with their own eyes. And he was the best among them, and he still had his sword.” Now the innkeeper looked at the sword over the mantel.
“Drunk, though?” Big Sam drained his second mug, and belched, and laughed. “All drunk? Impossible. Do y’know how much ale it would take to get us lot drunk?”
“Yes,” said the innkeeper. “Four barrels. Three for the guards and pikemen, one for the knights.
“After all, it was the king’s finest ale.”
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