‘I not play no longer, not till you agree to be honest.’
‘I will be honest. From now on, I will be unflinchingly honest. If you win, it shall be upon your own merits and not because I allow it.’
There was a brief silence. At the corner, the child glanced back at the two men. Marcello Tutti was squinting up at the Chief of Horses, a shy anxiety clear in his face.
‘So . . . I may visit tonight?’ he asked. ‘After I have seen the Lady Mary home from mass?’
The Chief of Horses gazed down at the dark little man, and something in his expression made the child wait. He wanted to hear the man’s answer for some reason. For some reason, it felt very important that he know it.
The Chief of Horses reached and plucked something from Marcello Tutti’s shoulder. ‘You got a leaf there,’ he said gravely. Then he met Marcello’s eyes and grinned his rare and charming gap-toothed grin. ‘I see you tonight,’ he rasped. ‘After you finish with your religions. You be honest, and we soon see who wins the game.’
Marcello Tutti relaxed into a smile. ‘Tonight,’ he agreed, and the little boy ducked around the corner, satisfied that all was well between his two friends.
Down the flagstone path and into the shadow of the schoolhouse, all was still and quiet now that the Protector Lord had closed up for the day, and the little boy’s footsteps echoed from the whitewashed schoolhouse wall, its blue painted snakes and bears watching as he ran past.
Then around he went into the resinous smell and sawdust of the hospital site, and came to a halt.
The great timber frame of the building itself was almost complete and it soared above him, cutting the seamless blue sky into mathematical slices. All was colour – the red timber, the dusty golden sunshine, the purple shadows. All was stillness. The heady, living smell of fresh-sawn wood and shavings spiced the air.
The little boy gazed upwards, listening.
There was a light thud as something hit the ground behind him and a warm voice lilted in his ear. ‘How do, Isaac? Have you come to learn your ABCs?’
The child squealed with delight as he was swept up by strong arms. He was instantly engulfed in that familiar spicy scent as the Protector Lord swung him onto his slim back. ‘You want to go visit the lass?’ he asked, smiling sideways over his shoulder as Isaac knotted his little hands beneath his chin.
‘Yes, please.’
‘Don’t choke me on the way up, mind. And don’t let go! I’ll never hear the end of it if you plummet to your doom!’ Tucking his long hair into his collar so that it wouldn’t get into the little boy’s face, the Protector Lord grabbed a rung on the first ladder and began to clamber, hand over scarred hand, to the top of the scaffolding.
Secure in the absolute certainty that he wouldn’t fall, Isaac clenched his legs around the Protector Lord’s waist and rested his chin on his shoulder. The lord’s necklace tickled the little boy’s wrist as they climbed up and up, and Isaac shifted so that he could watch it glinting in the sun.
Isaac loved that necklace. Recently, he had succeeded in counting all the ornaments upon it. He had numbered them all – twenty-four warm, amber stones, sixteen fangs of silver, eight of gold. The Protector Lord had been delighted with him. He had proclaimed him ‘excellent good at the ’rithmatics’ and asked when he could hire him as a teacher at the school. The Protector Lady had beamed with pride, but she had not allowed Isaac to take a turn wearing the necklace. It was the Protector Lord’s, she had said. He had waited too long for it. No one else must ever wear it.
Up they went, and up, until they were high above the sleepy towers and cupolas of the sun-baked city. The Protector Lord was not even slightly breathless when they finally breasted the rough planking of the uppermost tier and he stooped to let the little boy slither from his shoulders.
‘Christopher Garron! You best not have brought that child up on your back!’ The Protector Lady poked her head out from the A-frame of the hospital roof and glared. Her crotchety old grey cat slipped carefully from her shoulder and slunk across the red timbers like smoke. He looked his human companions up and down with the usual