Ninety-three days

Ninety-Three Days

This year of our Lord - Twelve Hundred and Fifty-Eight- has aged badly. A dull and lifeless summer carried behind it a bleak autumn, and now the November evenings whisper with a deep and desperate malcontent.

Above the town a lonely mongrel howls at nothing whatsoever and a dozen dogs reply to that nothing, and the nothing transforms into something dark and foreboding. The town bridge creaks with despair as carts sluggishly bounce over its spine. Beneath the bridge the filthy grey river passes, oblivious to the pain inflicted just a breath away. From inside the town a bundle is slung over the wall and hits the stagnant water with the dullest thud. I do not want even want to imagine what the discarded mass might have been. Animal or human; the sheer contempt or lack of respect leaves me feeling emptier than ever.

Desolate. Barren. Empty. This serves no purpose I should turn and go. There is nothing here for me except my own certain death, and with my death, the end of reason and hope for so many.

Standing here on the edge of a spindly copse, I can see several raggedy groups of soldiers milling around; their fires dancing with languid bright flames that taunt those shivering within the town who are stupid enough to take in the sight. Seven or eight weeks ago, from inside the town walls, defiant youths would have leant over and shout obscenities at the waiting army. Those few weeks now seem an eternity ago.

Siege is such a meaningless word when you are here, on the outside, but I all too easily have little problem picturing the despair inside those walls. Suspended on either side of the town gates are the remains of two bodies, pecked and gobbled by ravens and rats. Their rancid odour will be choking the strength of the townsfolk. Once I knew the missing faces of those bodies better than my own.

After ninety-three days food stocks will be low, almost non-existent. There has been no sound of livestock from within the walls for more than two weeks and without this incessant rain, the lack of water would have ended matters long before now. Tragically, the men inside the walls need to preserve water for quelling the fires that are constantly lit under their town gates. Water to be consumed will be available only for the children and the thieves.

I can feel daylight creeping up behind me. Four carts stationed outside the gates are crammed full of livestock and over the next few hours, the animals’ plaintive sounds will be torture to those people trapped inside, just a few yards distant. Yards or miles; it makes no difference.

All this suffering in front of me was brought about by my mere existence. The malodorous hanging corpses owe their hideous deaths to their efforts to create a diversion, which enabled me to sneak away from the town under cover of darkness – a thief in the night who has stolen nothing that is worth keeping. Freedom? It means nothing now I understand the cost to others.

This will have to end today. I am defeated; I am waiting for a miracle that will never happen. There will be a victory for others, but that will provide justice for no one. These brave and honourable townsfolk have stood by me, and now I have little choice, no choice, but to abandon them. That there is nothing I can humanly do does not make matters better; it does not clear my conscience. All it does is tie a tighter knot for this cancer of regret that runs through my body. What have I done? Oh God, what have I done?

I squeeze my eyes shut and slowly reopen them, taking in every last detail before me. I whisper a prayer of apology, then turn and trudge the other way with a burden of guilt on my shoulders that I know will never leave me.

*****

I have barely covered a mile traipsing through a wood, ignoring well worn pathways, feeling more pathetic than ever. My conscience weighs heavily on me, and so it should. What will I have achieved by turning my back on these people? Am I prepared to reward their faith and loyalty with nothing more than the promise of a long, lingering death? If I keep walking away, disguised as I am as a street beggar, what can I achieve? This war is lost; my escape does no more than slightly cloud issues that I can no longer influence. I stop walking and rest my body against a weathered chestnut tree to consider.

Finally I rise, disrobe and throw my beggarly clothes to the floor. I retrieve the last remaining robe of office from my bundle; light stains and snagged threads are no longer a cause for concern. I have no plan; plans are for Kings not paupers. I find a cattle track that seems to head directly to the city gates and the walk back to the town is physically effortless. The decision I have made makes perfect sense, and what is pain but a fleeting sensation? By this time tomorrow the torment will have passed.

A few hundred paces from my enemy’s camp I am sighted and an excited buzz fills the air as I enter with my head held high. Men gather to get a closer look at me, and I am surprised I encounter little hatred in their eyes; merely despair. A pathway is created which leads me to a large tent, from within a small man with black eyes and a choleric face walks towards me. We have never met, but no doubt he has lived with a description of myself that my appearance satisfies. If he is happy, his expression does well to conceal the fact; with the slightest inclination of his head he directs my attention to the waiting gallows and the end of my resistance. He wants this over as much as I. Ninety-three days is much too long.