The levriers were capable of running down and tackling a young, velvet-horned hart or a doe, the alaunts could tackle a good stag if it had been brought to bay, but only the deer-hounds could run a prime stag into the ground and still have the wind left to drag it down.
Douglas had no deerhounds, so it came as a shock to see this pair arriving with Sir Hal of Herdmanston and his riders. It had seemed to Dog Boy that there were a lot of riders for a simple hunting party, but he had been put right on that by Jamie and others Sir Hal had come in the guise of a hunting party, sent by his father to hold to the promise theyd made to the Douglas fortalice to defend it in time of threat. There was no larger a threat, it had seemed, than the Lord Bruce of Carrick and his men, come to punish the Lady and her sons for her husbands rebellion against the English King Edward.
It had come as a shock to Dog Boy to see all those men more folk than he had ever seen in his life before flowing round the castle like spilled oil. It was even more a shock to see how unruly the Herdmanston dogs were, so that the wolf-howls of them set every hound in Douglasdale off. Berner Philippe had been furious but, to everyones surprise, the sight and smell of Dog Boy had calmed the two great beasts almost at once.
This one is Mykel, Master Hal had told him, and the dog had looked at Dog Boy with great, limpid eyes. It means great, an old Lothian word. The other is called Veldi, which means power in the same tongue.
Dog Boy nodded, breathless with the attention of the towering, smiling Hal and his towering, smiling crew, with names like Bangtail Hob and Ill Made Jock. Veldi, pink tongue lolling from between the white reefs of its teeth, looked at Dog Boy, the blue-brown eyes unwinking, and he felt the sheer heartleap of surety that these dogs were angels in disguise.
He tried to say as much, but could only manage angels, which made the giants laugh. One clapped him on the shoulder, almost driving him into the ground with the strength of it.
Angels, is it? Wee lad of pairts you, are ye not? this one said Dog Boy had heard the others call him Tods Wattie. Yell chirrup different first time these hoonds of hell mak ye birl yer hocks in the glaur.
From his bitterness, Dog Boy knew the dogs had somersaulted Tods Wattie into mud at least once; he could have sworn Mykel winked at him and he laughed, which made Tods Wattie scowl and all the others slap their thighs at his expense.
Sir Hal, grinning, had told him to take good care of his pets and Dog Boy had looked up into the old-young face, bearded and with eyes like sea haar, and loved the man from that moment; Mykel nudged a rough muzzle under his arm and stared at him with huge blue-brown eyes.
Once, on the day he had arrived in Douglas, Dog Boy had seen a hound as big as Mykel. A wolfhound, he had learned, rough-coated and big as a pony it seemed but Dog Boy knew that he had been smaller then and had an idea that the deerhounds were even longer in the leg.
That animal had died when Dog Boy was eight, two years after his mother, walking proud and desperate, had shepherded him through the gatehouse of this place, which had been wooden then. On it had hung the Douglas shield, with its three silver stars mullets, Dog Boy had been told, though he could not see that they looked like fish. He now knew because Jamie Douglas had told him that it came from the French, molette, which was a six-arrayed star.
Jamie, despite their differences in rank, was his friend and could read and knew where France lay. Dog Boy could not read at all and had no idea even where England was and a vague idea that Scotland lay fairly close to Douglasdale.
He knew that the English of England had come to Douglasdale, all the same, for Jamie spoke of little else these days, bitter that his mother had given in without a fight; now the Carrick men swarmed inside and outside Douglas Castle and the Lord Bruce, young and certain of himself to the point of arrogance, had politely taken over, in the name of the English even though he was not one.
The one certainty in Dog Boys life, the thing that he hugged to himself when everything else seemed to whirl like russet leaves in a high wind, was his age eleven. He knew this because he heard his mother say it, knew her voice better than he did her face.
He could not remember his father, though he had a rag-edged memory of stumbling in the plough ruts behind a man making kissing sounds to two oxen which were not his own, watching the plough blade curve a wave out of the earth.
He could feel it yet between his naked toes, see the birds wheel and cry at the exposed beetles and worms. It had been his job to get to the worms first and tuck them safely back in the torn ground, for they were ploughers of the earth every bit as much as Man. He heard a voice say that and thought it might have been his father but all that was gone, save for the moment when the great slab face of his da came down to his level, the crack-thumbed hands on either of his thin shoulders.
It had come at the moment after he had run across the fields clutching the rough bag with a slab of day-old porridge and two bannocks in it. Run like a deer to where his da stood with the oxen he was so proud of owning. No-one else had such a prize.
His da had looked at him for a long time and then crouched down into his face.
Tha runs fast as a wee dug, he said sadly. Fast as any wee dug.
The day after that his ma had walked him into the castle and stood looking at Berner. Dog Boy was ashamed these days that he could not quite remember his own mas face now, but he remembered her voice and the feel of her hand on the top of his combed head.
I have brung him, she said. As Sire said I could, when he could run fast as the dugs. He is six.
Since then, there had only been those stones and the dogs.
Malk, the Berners assistant, reckoned up Dog Boys age and marked it in the Rolls along with the birthing dates of all the hounds and their pedigrees. It did not matter to Dog Boy, for he did not know, that Malk could trace a hounds lineage back through several generations and recorded Dog Boy only as a scion of bound tenants from a huddle of cruck houses twenty miles away.
It would have been a surprise to Dog Boy to know that he had a name, too Aleysandir, same as the king who fell off a Fife cliff and plunged the whole of Scotland into chaos in the year Dog Boy was born but Dog Boy did not know any of that and had been Dog Boy for so long that he knew no other name now.
Get aff me, ye dungbags!
The voice jerked Dog Boy guiltily back to the kennels; Gib was pushing dogs away and, beyond him, The Worm stretched and yawned noisily, straw sticking out from his unruly hair. Dog Boy scratched a fleabite and then half-crouched, his habitual pose at sudden noises and surprises, as the heavy door banged open, flooding in cold light and chill air.
Avaunt, whelps.
Silhouetted briefly in the pale square light of the doorway, the figure paused slightly, then stepped in, flicking his dogwhip; the hounds knew him well and circled away from him, yet kept coming back, tails down, fawning and whimpering.
Berner Philippe had to stoop to avoid the low roof, though he was not tall. He wore a battered leather jack to protect the plain, stained-wool robe, itself worn to keep the pale-grey tunic clean from the dogs. He also wore his habitual sour sneer, which bristled his trimmed black beard.
Come on, come on, stir yourselves, he growled. Theres work to be done where is Gib?
Come on, come on, stir yourselves, he growled. Theres work to be done where is Gib?
Gib stumbled forward, picking straw off himself and rubbing sleep from his eyes. He swept a bow, almost mocking, as he showed off his little command of French.
A votre service, Berner Philippe
The scowl deepened a little as Philippe looked at him. This one was becoming too familiar by half. It wouldnt do. He tongued the stump of a tooth, then forced a smile and patted the boy on the cheek.
Ah, lordling, he said lightly. Such manners, eh?
The others watched him caress Gib as he would do the dogs, chucking him under the chin, fondling behind one ear; it was as much part of the ritual of morning as waking, for Gib was the berners favourite.
There were six houndsmen under Berner Philippe. Together with the six piqueurs, the huntsmen, they considered themselves the true Disciples of Douglas, not the strutting men-at-arms, who numbered the same. If that were so, then Berner Philippe was St Peter, White Tam, the head piqueur was James, brother of Jesus, the Lady Eleanor was the Virgin Herself and The Hardy was Christ in Person.
Thus was life arranged by Law and Custom, which is to say, by God.
Take five lads and clean this cesspit, said Philippe and looked from Dog Boy to Gib and back again. Then he nodded to Gib and watched as the boy shambled off to obey. He was getting bigger too big, Gods Wounds. What had once been soft flesh was filling and hardening and, even to a nose used to stinks, Gib reeked more and more positively of dog every day.
Dog Boy stood, looking at the fetid straw as if there was a cunning picture in it, and Philippe wondered, as he had always done, why he had never taken to the lad. Too scrawny, probably. There was a new lad Philippes head swung this way and that like a questing hound on a scent. What was his name ? Hew, that was it. That was the name his parents had given him, but he was on the Rolls with an easily remembered nickname a dog name, Falo, which meant yellow, and Philippe picked him out from the others by his cap of golden hair.
Disappointment. Too young still, that blond hair, which spoke of decent ancestry implanted in the mongrel Scots, fell over the boys face as he gathered armfuls of stinking straw and Philippes groin tightened a little. Worth waiting for
He caught sight of Dog Boy, edging, as always, into the shadows. Dog Boy felt more than saw the eyes fall on him and stopped, dull with despair.
You, Philippe said shortly, eyeing the thin-limbed, dark-eyed boy with the distaste he gave to all runts. Mews. Gutterbluid wants you.
Outside, the cold bit Dog Boy and he hugged himself, dragging himself to the mews across the expanse of Ward in a cold wind out of the charcoal sky. Dog Boy eyed the glowing coals where Winnie the smithwife was blowing life into the forge fire, sparks flying dangerously up to the stiffened thatch of the wagon shed and the great stretch of stables. Beyond was the palisade and ditch, the gatehouse, newly done in stone, and the wooden dovecote etched blackly against the slow, souring milk of a new dawn. Behind, the bulked towers and stone walls of the Keep humped up and lurked over him.
The forge flames flared and danced brief eldritch shadows up the wall of one tower, to the narrow cross-slit window of the chapel, where light glowed, the honey-yellow of tallow candles; Brother Benedictus, the Chaplain, was already at his devotions, murmuring so that Dog Boy was almost sure he heard the words he knew so well:
Domine labia mea aperies. Et os meum annunciabit laudem tuam. Deus in adiutorium meum intende.
Dog Boy, hurrying on past the bakehouse, already spewing stomach-gripping smells and smoke, muttered the expected response without thinking Ave Maria, gracia plena. The rest of it followed him, circling faintly like a chill wind off the river Gloria patri et filio et spiritui sancto. Sicut erat in principio et nunc et semper et in secula seculorum. Amen. Alleuya.
He went past the dovecote, with its steep little roof surmounted by a strange bird pecking its own chest, and saw Ferg the scullion fetching new loaves and grinning at him, for he knew the Latin words as well. Neither had a clear idea of what they meant and knew them by rote only.
Next to the bakehouse, the kitchen sheds were quiet and coldly pale, as were most of the buildings within the rough palisade separating the Ward from the Keep, where lay the Great Hall, the stables and barracks and some little gardens.
Somewhere, high up on the hourds, watchmen stamped and blew on their hands. Soon those wooden hoardings would be dismantled, for the need for them was gone now that the Lady had given in to the Carrick men.
There had been a moment of confusion a few days later when a new host appeared, smaller but no less fierce. Dog Boy had heard the leader of it hailed as the Earl of Buchan and Jamie had muttered that no-one was sure whether this Comyn lord was for or against King Edward.
Dog Boy had watched them arrive, with their banners and their shouting; it had been exciting for a while and he wondered if he would see fighting but then it had all ended, just like that. It was a puzzle that the Lady of Douglas now treated the Invaders as Friends and the castle was crowded with them, while more were huddled in makeshift shelters all over the Ward and beyond.
Dog Boy, called a voice, and he turned to see Jamie stepping from the shadows. Dog Boy bowed and Jamie accepted it as his due, since he was The Hardys eldest, with black braies and a dagged hood, a fine knife in a sheath on his belt, good leather boots and a warm surcote.
He was of ages with Dog Boy, yet bigger and stronger because he trained with weapons and would one day take the three vows and become a knight. One day, too, he would become Jesus Christ, Dog Boy thought, when his father, The Hardy, died and left him the lordship of Douglas. Even now he was able to fly a tiercel gentle, a male peregrine, if he chose the memory of where that bird roosted brought misery crashing back on Dog Boy.
Cold, Jamie offered with a grin. Cold as a witchs tit.
Dog Boy grinned back at him. They were friends of a sort even if Dog Boy wore worn, mud-coloured clothing and was of no consequence at all because Jamie liked the dogs and had no mother, like Dog Boy. Dog Boy had questioned this once, because he had thought the Lady Eleanor was Jamies mother, but Jamie had put him on the straight road of that one.
My real mother was sent away, he said bluntly. To a convent. This one is my fathers new woman and the sons he pupped on her are my stepbrothers.
He turned and looked at Dog Boy then, savage as his tiercel.
But I am the heir and one day this will be mine, he added and Dog Boy had no doubt of it. It was what they shared, what cut through their stations. The same age, the same colouring, the same abandonment by ma and da. The same loneliness. It had all brought them together from the moment they could toddle and they had rattled around like two stones in a pouch ever since.
Both of them knew that changes were happening, all the same, as much to their rank as their bodies, and that unseen pressures were forcing them further and further apart. Dog Boy would never be anything more than he was now Jamie would become a knight, like his father.
There had been no knights other than The Hardy in Douglas, though there had once been twenty men-at-arms, with stout jacks, swords and polearms. Now there were only six, for the rest were gone and Dog Boy felt the cold unease slide into him, the way it had done the year before when the four surviving men had carried a fifth in through the gate.