Beyond the Gate (The Golden Queen) (Volume 2) Read online

  “And have you got one?”

  Gallen nodded.

  “Can I see it?” Thomas begged, making little grasping motions with one hand.

  Gallen checked to make certain that his mother wasn’t watching, then he went to his room, came back with the key—a glowing crystal globe with golden wiring inside.

  Thomas stared in awe, held it in both hands. “This is not of this world, that’s sure,” Thomas said. “But I don’t know if it’s a thing of God, or of the devil.”

  “Neither,” Gallen said. “It was made by the Tharrin, a race of good people who rule the heavens.”

  Thomas licked his lips, handed the key back to Gallen, who scooted it into his pocket. Thomas said, “So why haven’t you gone already? Is it those green-skinned devils?”

  “Something like that,” Gallen said. “Maggie and I have enemies who will begin hunting us soon, and this is a good place to hide. Maggie wants to get married here, before we leave. And to tell the truth, I wanted to say goodbye to my friends.”

  “So that’s why Maggie is so hot to marry you now,” Thomas said. “She doesn’t care about your political future, because your future lies elsewhere.”

  Gallen nodded.

  Thomas folded his hands, stared at them thoughtfully for a long time. “And if you don’t like it out there, you can always come back here, I suppose?”

  “Aye,” Gallen said. “We could.”

  Thomas leaned back in his chair, studied Gallen a moment, his gray eyes measuring the boy. His beard and moustache were impeccably trimmed. His body was leathery, but he had a gut growing on him. He was at that stage of life where he was still tough, but somewhat worn. And in his bright purple pants and a peach-colored shirt, he looked as if he should be out juggling or singing in the streets. “I want to go with you,” Thomas admitted at last.

  “Are you sure?” Gallen asked. “It’s a big place, stranger than I have time to tell.”

  “Hmmm …” Thomas eyed the boy thoughtfully, almost grudgingly. “I’ve never put much faith in God and heaven, or any rewards in the afterlife. But dammit, boy, I want to live forever!”

  “And if I were to take you with me,” Gallen mused, “what could you pay?” He said it as a joke, but Thomas didn’t see it as one.

  “How much do you want?” Thomas asked, licking his lips.

  And Gallen realized that there was only one answer. Nothing that Thomas took with him would be of any value out there. “Everything you own,” Gallen said. He watched the old man smile weakly, thinking he would balk at the price. “All of it. You’ll give it all to my mother, and go into the next world as broke as a babe.”

  Thomas watched him calculatingly. “I’ll need my lute and my mandolin and flutes.”

  “You can keep those,” Gallen said.

  “A fitting price,” Thomas agreed. “I’ll make out the papers this morning.”

  “And one more thing: I want consent to marry your niece.”

  “No, no,” Orick said. “You can’t barter for her like that, Gallen. It’s not proper.”

  Thomas smiled greedily, and he scratched his beard, thinking.

  “Maggie won’t care. We’ll all get what we want,” Gallen said. “What does it matter what price Thomas and I agree on?”

  “It’s a deal,” Thomas said, and he reached out his hand. The two men shook. “I’ll go tell her. She’s got her dress made, so you can marry as soon as the priest gets back.”

  Thomas got up, swaggered to the door, opened it and looked out at the sheriffs all gathered around out there. “Oh, it’s going to be the damnedest long day you ever saw,” Thomas bellowed, and he was out the door.

  After Thomas left, Gallen’s mother fixed a huge breakfast of ham and eggs with sweet rolls, and in the early morning dawn, Gallen, his mother, and Orick sat down to eat, watching the sheriffs outside through the windows, who all stared in at the banquet with envy.

  All through the morning, there was nothing to do but sit, and Gallen waited with a heavy heart, considered routes of escape. But escape was out of the question. Orick tried to go outside, for the sheriffs had one of his bear friends, a female named Grits, in custody, but the sheriffs would not let him past.

  And so they sat. In a couple of hours, Thomas came back and sang to the sheriffs a bit, sat with them and drank, laughing, as if they were all as thick as thieves. He came in for a minute, warned Gallen to lock all the doors and windows, and keep his weapons handy. “There’s some sentiment for a lynching out there among those boys. They’ve come a long way to get you, and they don’t want to go back empty-handed. But I think I can cool their heads,” Thomas whispered, then he was back out the door.

  In the early afternoon, the scar-faced sheriff came back to Gallen’s door, offering him a bargain. “If you come with us now,” the sheriff said, droplets of nervous perspiration on his brow, “I’m prepared to set your fiancée free. No harm will come to her.”

  “And if I don’t come with you?” Gallen asked, wondering why the sheriff wanted a bargain, what had spooked him.

  “‘Who knows?” the sheriff said. “We’ll take her north for questioning. It’s a dangerous road. Prisoners have been known to get killed while trying to escape. And the interrogations can get brutal. Even if your girl does make it through all of this, she’ll have a long walk home, over lonely roads, where robbers sometimes would rather take a woman’s virtue than her purse.”

  “You wouldn’t dare,” Gallen said. There was some shouting outside, townsmen arguing with sheriffs, and Gallen suddenly knew why the sheriff was getting nervous. The crowd was growing, becoming unmanageable.

  “With fifty men to back me?” the sheriff said. “Oh, I’d dare.”

  Just then, Thomas came up to the door behind the sheriff. “Say, Gallen,” Thomas chortled. “It looks as if you’re getting pretty thick with Sheriff Sully here. He’s the leader of this band of merry lawmakers, you know.”

  He pushed past the sheriff, carrying his lute in its case of rosewood, leaving the door wide open. He sat on the couch, pulled out the lute.

  “‘Why don’t you invite Sheriff Sully in, Gallen?” Thomas said. “I’ve been working on ballads about this meeting—the meeting of Gallen O’Day and Sheriff Sully—and I’d like you to hear them. They may be sung all over the world for many years, so I’d like your opinion.”

  He began fingering his lute, then apologized. “This is an early draft of the song, as you’ll gather. It’s a bit simple, a bit crude, but I always think a song should reflect its subject matter, don’t you?”

  Gallen looked to Sully, and he shrugged.

  “Now, there is one point I want to be clear on,” Thomas said. “You’ve got a nasty scar on your face, Sheriff Sully, and with a man in your line of work, one might imagine that you got it fighting some notorious outlaw. But that’s not how you got the scar, is it?”

  “No,” Sully said.

  “As I understand from your townsmen out there, it came about through a whittling mishap?”

  Sully squinted and nodded.

  Thomas plucked a few notes on his lute, then sang sweetly,

  “Come near and listen girls and listen boys,

  Whether you be virtuous or bullies

  Learn good from bad while you’re still young

  Don’t let your name be Sullied.”

  Sheriff Sully stiffened, reached for the haft of his sword, a sneer spreading across his face.

  “Och, now!” Thomas stopped, looked up. “Do you know the penalty for drawing a blade against a minstrel?” Thomas said. “We carry a license for this work from the Lord Mayor, you know.”

  “You can’t sing songs about me, unless a judge approves them!” Sully cried.

  “I can’t sing songs in public,” Thomas said. “But I can compose them in private. I’m sure I can clear the song through the review process before going public. It contains nothing slanderous, only the facts. Here’s how it goes.…” His hands strummed, and he continued in a sweet voi
ce,

  “Now, when Sheriff Sully was a lad often,

  he slept in his own piddle.

  He drowned young rats in his grandma’s well

  And sliced his face up when he whittled.”

  When Thomas sang the word “whittled,” he hit a sour note on his lute, smiled up at the two of them. “That’s the first verse. Sheriff Sully was a bed wetter, Gallen. Did you know that?” Sully’s face had turned a bright red, and he stood there mortified. Several other sheriffs were standing outside the door, and Thomas had sung loud enough for them to hear. Their guffaws reverberated through the room, and they pressed closer. “Anyway,” Thomas said, “here’s my idea for the chorus!” His voice took on a gravelly note as he pounded the strings of his lute and snarled,

  “But who knew,

  that when his body grew,

  his mind would stay so damned little?

  Yes, he wounds himself when he whittles!

  And you never know where he’ll piddle!”

  Thomas got up and strolled the room as he sang through the next two verses. And Sully’s eyes became more and more wild, more desperate and full of rage.

  “Sully matured into a fearsome lad,

  He turned his knife on others.

  And as sheriffs go, he wasn’t bad,

  at poking the wife of his own brother!

  But who knew,

  that when his body grew,

  his soul would stay so damned little?

  Yes, he wounds himself when he whittles!

  And you never know where he’ll piddle!

  And with his sister-in-law he diddles!

  Now Sheriff Sully knew he was brave,

  And he vowed to stamp out sin!

  So he hunted that worthy Gallen O’Day

  backed by only a hundred well-armed men!

  But who knew

  that when his body grew

  his heart would stay so damned little?

  Yes, he wounds himself when he whittles!

  And you never know where he’ll piddle!

  And with his sister-in-law he diddles!

  And what he calls ‘valor’ is a riddle!”

  “Enough!” Sheriff Sully screamed, reaching for his sword. But one of his men, who had been inching in through the open door, grabbed his arm and wrestled it behind his back.

  “Oh, I don’t think it’s nearly enough.” Thomas grinned. “I’ve got several more verses.”

  “I challenge you to a duel … you,” Sully roared. “You knave!”

  “Oh, a duel, is it?” Thomas said. “Well, if you’re going to abuse me with language like that, then I accept.”

  Gallen looked back and forth between the men for a moment. Sully was younger, bigger, and stronger than Thomas, and in any match, the minstrel was sure to lose.

  “I accept your challenge,” Thomas said, “and since you’ve offered the duel, I shall choose the weapons!”

  He walked over to the sheriff, who suddenly was glancing about worriedly, wondering what trick the minstrel was playing. Thomas glanced meaningfully at Gallen’s knives, looked over the swords of a couple of Sully’s men. “It shall be a duel … of tongues,” Thomas said. “You and I shall stand and hurl insults at each other for an evening, and we’ll find out who wilts first under the weight of a good tongue-lashing.”

  “You … you bombastic, overdressed …” The sheriff could not think what next to say.

  “Ah, how right you are!” Thomas said, looking down at his own peach colored shirt and purple trousers. ‘‘You wound me with your foulmouthed invectives, sir—mortally!”

  Thomas plucked at his lute, a tune that was now becoming familiar, and Sully let out a scream of frustration. He shouted at his own men, herding them outside, and rushed from the house, slamming the door behind him. Gallen could hear Sully’s own men guffawing as he passed.

  “You shouldn’t have done that,” Gallen said. ‘‘You’ve only infuriated him.”

  “No,” Thomas said, putting the lute away. “I’ve done right. Every man who abuses power as he does will come under scrutiny in time. He wants to be your judge and executioner, but his deeds here will be judged by others for years to come. My song only reminds him of this fact.”

  “He might kill you for what you just did,” Gallen said.

  “Very likely,” Thomas agreed. “And if I died tonight, every minstrel in the land would come to sing of it, and Sully’s fate would be far worse than he fears. Mere mortals cannot withstand the muse.” Gallen stared at the door a moment. “I find it odd that this Mister Sully should hate me so much. As far as I know, I’ve never harmed him or his kin.”

  “You’re a great lawman, Gallen,” Thomas said. “And he’s not much of anything. You wound his pride just by being alive. You’ll find that he’s much like small men everywhere.”

  Gallen studied Thomas, and found that he felt a new respect for the man. He’d just sliced Sheriff Sully to the core as easily as Gallen would gut a highwayman. There was no remorse, no fear of recourse, and now Gallen saw why Thomas carried himself with a lordly demeanor.

  “I don’t mean to sound critical,” Gallen said. “But that wasn’t much of a song you sang. I mean, it was a nice ditty, a catchy tune, but I think it needs some work.”

  Thomas looked up at Gallen with disinterested eyes. “You’re a critic, eh? Don’t fear. That bit of bawdy wasn’t meant to immortalize Sully, only intimidate him. In the business we call it a ‘driver,’ for it is meant only to drive a man away from his hometown. The real ballad will have to be much longer, with entire stanzas devoted to Sully’s bed-wetting, and whole movements devoted to exposing his acts of incest. I feel sorry for the man. Few men’s lives can bear such close scrutiny.” Thomas sighed. “And now that my day’s work is done, I think I’ll take a nap.”

  He yawned, made his way back outside. The sheriffs hooted and cheered as he passed.

  In the early evening, Father Brian rode back on a winded horse with a writ from Lord Sheriff Carnaghan deputizing every man in Clere to make sure that Gallen wasn’t taken from the city, and he forbade the prosecution from securing testimony by torture, and ordered Maggie Flynn to be freed. Because of the fear that open warfare might break out between the northern sheriffs and the locals, the city of Baille Sean was sending a judge in great haste.

  Gallen had hardly heard this news from one of the local fishermen, when Father Brian came banging on the door, calling, “Out with you, man. Get on your finest duds, and out of the house with you!”

  “What’s happening?” Gallen asked, opening the door enough to see the sheriffs all crowded about, with Father Brian standing there, looking a bit worn.

  “Today is to be your wedding day,” Father Brian said. “It seems that Thomas Flynn has taken a sudden fondness to you, and he says that if you so desire, he wants you to marry his niece before nightfall!”

  * * *

  Chapter 8

  Gallen and Maggie’s wedding was perhaps the strangest that ever took place in the village of Clere. By dusk, nearly everyone from as far as fifteen miles away was in the village, so that tents and wagons filled every field within half a mile of town. And over two hundred men came north from Baille Sean, driving hard, hoping to see what all of the hoopla was about.

  Between having a minstrel in town, along with a display of a demon from hell and an angel from heaven, and an occupying army of northern sheriffs who’d come down to hang the local hero, an impending trial on witchcraft, and the marriage of Gallen O’Day—it was all too much for anyone to miss. The poor old church couldn’t have held a tenth of the number of people who wanted to view the wedding; and, as Orick grumbled, there was a grand lot of speculation as to the cause of the sudden marriage.

  The most evil-minded folks figured that Maggie had come down with a child, and this was all an effort to make it right.

  But many a bedazzled maid believed that Maggie loved Gallen, and so she wanted to make him her husband all in one grand gesture before he got hun
g.

  But some old deacon remembered an obscure verse in the Tome of Law, where it pointed out that it was illegal to hang a man within a month of his wedding day, for to do so would not only deny him his life, it would deny him the chance of having posterity.

  This last bit of news thoroughly enraged some of the northern sheriffs, who saw this all as some grand scheme to keep Gallen alive for another month, even if they could convict him, ensuring him greater chances of escape.

  But the northern sheriffs didn’t cause much of an uproar, for to tell the truth, the majority of them began to join in the festive attitude. While the rest of the sheriffs, seeing how with every wagon that pulled into town they were more and more outnumbered, decided to remain quiet. So the sheriffs paid their shillings to go see Thomas’s angel and demon, and one sheriff, after seeing the demon, said, “Well, if Gallen O’Day fought those monsters, he’s a better man than I am.” And he rode off toward home to much applause.

  And so the wedding was held in an open field, just before sundown, Maggie in a white dress that made her look radiant, and Gallen dressed in his finest blue tunic with gray hose.

  Gallen’s cousin, Father Brian of An Cochan, wedded the two, administering the oaths.

  Orick the bear played the part of Gallen’s “best man,” and that caused many a stare. Thomas sang, with the church choir joining him, and never had so sweet a music been heard over the city.

  Folks from all over Counties Morgan, Obhiann, and Daugherty tried to outdo one another on wedding gifts—trying to show those northern sheriffs how much they admired Gallen. Seamus O’Connor gave Gallen a nice carriage, while a friend of Gallen’s father gave the couple a brace of white stallions. Silver teapots took all of one table, while blankets and coats and saddles and all other manner of finery filled up others.

  Someone brought out a whiskey keg, and those folks who had nothing else to give began filling it with money, and more than one gold coin was seen therein. Over the past years, Gallen had saved more than a dozen locals from highwaymen, and the roads around Clere were notoriously safe—all because of Gallen O’Day. So folks let their money flow freely in gratitude.