AD 1444, Leicestershire County, England
The door trembled under his fist as he slammed his hand into the heavy oak again. Still no answer. Squire Walter Forrester groaned aloud and turned to rest his back against the cold stone on either side of the castle door. Beating on the door was like trying to teach a fish to fly or a bird to burrow: futile effort.
From the other side of the door, a woman’s voice said sharply, “If you are quite done with your tantrum, Master Forrester, the mistress says I may send your Lady mother out with your things.”
Tantrum? He straightened. “’Tis no tantrum, Mrs. Brownne,” he snapped back. “I wish to come in and you have locked the door.”
“At the Lady of the keep’s command, Master Forrester. You must make up your mind to be disappointed for once in your life,” the housekeeper responded with prim decisiveness.
“’Tis not fair,” he growled.
“Of course it is. Now, you wait by the postern and I shall send your things out shortly.”
The little window at the top of the door slammed shut, effectively ending the conversation. He remained where he was for a moment, leaning his head against the stone, processing this turn of events. Cast out of his aunt’s home. It had been threatened before, but never carried out. He could hardly believe it was true now. It had to be some elaborate prank. If not . . . well, his mother would put in a good word for him, like usual, and everything would be back to normal.
A little boy, probably the son of one of the maids, stood nearby watching him. He lifted an eyebrow in the kid’s direction. “I don’t suppose you would let me in?”
The little fellow’s eyes widened, and he shook his head, then turned and scampered off, clearly more afraid of the housekeeper than of Walter. With a sigh, Walter pulled away from the door and made his way into the garden at the rear of the castle, where the postern gate was nestled into the hedge lining the outer wall. Only a few minutes passed before he was joined by his mother, but impatience stretched them into hours in his mind as paced.
“Walter,” Lady Forrester said with gentle firmness as she approached.
He paused his pacing and turned to her. “Mother, tell me you have spoken to my Aunt and cleared the whole mess up.”
One look at the downward turn to her mouth told him the answer, even without the accompanying shake of her head.
“Not this time, Walter. You have well and truly alienated yourself from her this time.”
“What!” He cried incredulously. “Is this madness not to end, then?”
“‘This madness,’ as you call it, has been brought on by you,” she replied with unwonted sharpness. “Countless times over you have been told to keep your temper in check and as oft have failed to do so. If you will not abide by the rules of the house, you can no longer abide in the house.”
“We have nowhere else! You must make her see reason, Mother,” he insisted. “She is your sister, surely she would not cast you out to live in poverty.”
“She is not.”
He relaxed. “’Tis not true then. I thought not, for how could it be? It scarce makes a good joke, you must admit.”
“There is no mistake, son,” Lady Forrester’s eyes met his gravely. “I am welcome here, you are not. Even now, your horse is being saddled, and if you are found within your aunt’s holdings by nightfall, her men have orders to throw you out. You leave freely only if you leave now.”
Walter stared at her as her words sank in.
“Surely you cannot mean that,” he said at last. “Where am I to go? I have ever ridden in my cousin’s train as a squire of his house, shall I no longer do so? Shall I be a wanderer instead, a free lance and a mercenary?”
“Take a turn about the garden with me, my son,” she said, placing a hand upon his arm and forcing him to fall into step with her. “You make it out to be bleak, when really this may be for the best.”
“How can it be for the best?” He cried. “I was not made to wander fen and field, Mother, nor to trade my sword for bread.”
“Your sentiment is mere drama, not truth.” Her flat tone silenced him. “You are twenty-four, Walter, past the age when a young lord is wont to win his spurs. Yet you have not. Through idleness, mayhap? Nay, rather through lack of opportunity. You will never make a name for yourself here, my son. Moreover, turn your mind to this: you have never been a squire of his house, but a lord of your own and here only as a guest.” She paused to let that sink in, then added with the weight of a hammer striking a knell, “Where the guest is no longer welcome, he must depart.”
He looked about at the green foliage of the garden trees, the spring flowers in full bloom, the small creek that gurgled over shallow steps, diverted in its way by some craftsman’s hand long years before. A tranquil place, where he had oft taken his tears in the heat of anger as a boy, and as oft been met by his mother’s cool hand and gentle reproof. This was what he was losing by the folly of his temper.
Yet she was right: it had never been his. Why had he thought to stay here, save that he found in it a safe haven from the battle which raged constantly in his mind?
He took a breath, forcing himself to speak with control. “’Tis true, what you say, that I am lord of another house. But those holdings are long since destroyed. Where ought I to go if not here?”
“You must find a place of rest, my son. Not here. Your own holdings, whether won or earned. And would you have ever looked beyond your present place if this day did not push you beyond the nest? I fear I have held you too close, coddled you even, and that this trouble with your temper, this stagnant ambition to move beyond these walls, is my own failing not yours.”
He stopped walking as they reached a turn in the stone path and fixed his eyes on her tear-filled ones. “Say not so. You strove while I was a child to cure me of it, to no avail. ’Tis—” he broke off and looked away from her, searching the sky above for the words. “’Tis like a fire within, and I must rage or burst, like a new wineskin when it is overfull. My besetting sin, you might say,” he added with forced levity.
Lady Forrester shook her head sorrowfully. “You must conquer it lest it conquer you.”
They turned together and walked back toward the gate. Ahead of them, a stable hand approached, leading Walter’s horse in one hand and carrying a laden pack in the other. Walter’s step slowed.
“Is that all I am to take, Mother?”
“What else would you have, my son? This is all you can carry on your own, and you know not where you will rest your head tonight or if you will stay there long. Be content, for this will sustain your needs if it meets with strong hands and a willing heart. Very little that we have here is truly ours. You must needs work to have your own things.”
“I would take Ronan. He is mine at least, for I caught and raised him from an eyas.”
“You shall have him if you must,” his mother acceded.
They were near the small gate now, and the stable hand approached and passed the destrier’s rein and the pack to Walter, averting his eyes. Familiar heat rose within at the deliberate slight, but mindful of the consequence of an outburst and of his mother’s presence, Walter held his tongue. He lifted the pack in his hand a moment, gauging its weight, before swinging it up on his back by the strap.
“My falcon,” he said to the hand. “Will someone bring him or shall I fetch him myself?”
“Roger is bringing him, Master Forrester,” the man said. “He thought that you would want him.”
“Blessed Roger!” Walter cried in sudden joy and looked up, half expecting the falconer to be in sight already. He was not, but the thought of the old man who had taught him so much put a cheery note back in his tone as the stable hand took his leave, and Walter turned again to his mother.
“I believe I could get used to the idea of going, Mother, if I dwell not overmuch on what I leave behind. But I haven’t the faintest clue where to go, yet. I can hardly ride to those holdings roundabout and beg their lords to let me ride with them.”
The smile that had nearly appeared on his mother’s face when he began vanished in an instant. “Certainly not,” she said almost sternly. “You must ride to London, but along the way, you must buy a second horse, methinks, for though yours is strong, he carries more than a fair weight as you ride out tonight. Better that you walk until another can carry your armor and pack than that you ruin a good steed for battle. A courser, I think, for while not a packhorse, a courser will serve you well for lighter work for years to come. Soren here can do the heavy lifting when he must and you will ride the other.”
She scratched Soren’s forelock affectionately as she spoke and Walter blinked and looked away, dread of the near parting pricking him at the sight.
“And what shall I do in London,” he asked.
“You will figure something out, I doubt not,” she said with assurance. “There are always nobles and peers crowded about there looking for someplace to unlade their full purses or otherwise advance their aspirations. A stuffy lot mostly, but with a few who are worth riding with. Some, even, who might grant a loyal squire a knighthood and a knight’s feu.”
“You would have me bow and scrape to others when I ought to be lord of my own keep,” he said with reproach. “Why not take back our own?”
She studied him a moment, then said softly, “I would not have you risk your life for mere things. Nonetheless,” she went on, forestalling protest. “In your pack you will find a small bundle. It has been opened only twice since we came: once to take out a certain sum of gold to sustain us, once to put something else within. Should you decide—and I caution you against it—to return to our ancestral home, you will find what you need, methinks, within it.”
They were interrupted by Roger, the aged falconer of his aunt’s estate, approaching with a light, sturdy cage, just large enough to hold the bird within comfortably. Ronan, a peregrine falcon almost two years old, watched his master intently through the bars as though trying to discover the purpose of this unusual circumstance.
Thanking him, Walter took the cage. Roger lifted a small bag with a trace of a smile, his pride in his work showing.
“Everything he will need is here, Master Walt,” he said and proceeded to fasten it so that it hung just below the pack on Walter’s back. The man stepped back, studying his protégé.
“I will miss you, young master. You were an apt pupil.”
“And I you.” Walter looked at his mother. “I suppose I have no reason now to linger.”
She shook her head and leaned close to hug him. “Go with God, my son.”
He bit his lip against telling her his thoughts on that, and pulled away, steeling himself against a sorrowful parting. Roger held the stirrup as he mounted his horse, doing so more slowly than usual, and taking care that his pack should not strike the bundles already tied behind the saddle, containing his armor and other things. A heavy weight for a horse to carry long, as his mother had said.
Roger didn’t move away immediately, rather waiting until Walter looked down at him. The falconer’s eyes were troubled when he spoke.
“I fear for you, Master Walt,” he said. “You will have much to learn alone upon the open road. Do not turn away a friend when you find him, for you will need his wisdom.”
Walter laughed. “I have had a good upbringing, Roger, if a bit sheltered. I can manage, I am sure.”
“If you will hear me,” the old man replied with characteristic patience, releasing the stirrup and stepping back. “You have the breeding and education of a lord but the wisdom of a bird.”
He bristled. “Birds are no dimwits, as you taught me.”
“No, but Walter,” his mother said and caught his bridle as he turned his horse to the gate. “Even a falcon is worthless if it cannot be tamed.”
“Farewell, Mother.” He tugged his bridle free without answering her further and rode forward through the gate, now standing open at the porter’s behest, but not before Roger added one last word, loud enough for all about to hear.
“’Tis not intelligence you lack, but wisdom and self-control. Have a care, lest you destroy yourself.”
The gate swung shut behind him and he was alone. Outcast from the only home he could remember.
A Note from the Author
Somehow this chapter grew somewhat beyond its intended length, but it was a blast to write. If you enjoyed it or know someone who would, leave a like and a comment and share it with your friends!
Keep a close eye out for the next installment, coming next Tuesday, and if you haven’t yet, check out the last! ⤵︎
Until next time,
Blessings!
~Lexi
Psst! Did you know I have two other publications? Check them out! When I’m not posting over here, I am usually posting over there!
Didn't manage to catch up either last week or this one... But at least I can still read it!
This was fantastic! The dialogue is masterful, and the descriptions, artful.
Writing something like this would have taken me forever 😅
Keep up the good work!
Ooh, I loved this! 😊