Writing for Fun
November 2016
Tommen - Pete Norman
Tommen was dead and he was not very happy about it – not one bit.
He had not immediately realised that he was dead, because everything around him seemed so normal: the big house still loomed in its white stone splendour against the skyline; the meadow still rolled gently away from the house and then up to the absurdly ruined folly on the hilltop opposite; the lake still wound through the valley in between, disappearing beneath the vast stone bridge; the cows, black and white, dusty brown and white, still grazed, heads down, on the lush pasture. Everything looked exactly the way it had for as long as he could remember.
As an abandoned foundling he had been brought under the Duke’s care in a rare moment of benevolence, but if the truth be known he had repaid that debt many, many times over with his unending and unpaid labour. Initially cared for in a small room off the vast kitchen, as soon as he could stand and was able to use his hands he was put to useful work. He had enjoyed the cosy frenetic lifestyle of the kitchens where he was kept warm, mothered and pampered by the busy but affectionate kitchen staff, but as soon as he was deemed to be strong enough for more physical labour he was moved to the stables. In an instant the delicious aroma of baking bread, cakes and pastries was replaced by the ever pervasive stench of manure which, with a stiff brush, a shovel and a heavy wooden barrow, became his sole responsibility throughout the daylight hours.
He did not mind the job, in fact he had developed a deep affection for the horses and especially for the hunting dogs which shared the building. His bed was a rough wooden cot in the corner of a vacant stall which was comfortable enough and warm through the harshest of winters and he had quickly become accustomed to the musky stable odour. The simple routine of stable life suited him just fine, the work was not too hard and he took a genuine pride in his duties. Old Maester Luke treated him more like a son than a slave; he was not a hard task-master and would, on occasions, reward his hard work with a brief period of leisure time. Provided that the family was not in attendance he was permitted to exercise the dogs in the woodland, to climb the trees and to use a quiet corner of the lake where he taught himself to swim – of a fashion. He was most strictly forbidden to dive from the boathouse jetty . . . but it was that that he loved the most.
As he stood beside the main pathway everything before him seemed as it always was, it was just that somehow he did not appear to be a part of it any more. The sun still shone down, but he could feel no warmth on his body. The wind still ruffled the leaves on the trees which spread along both sides of the meadow in a kaleidoscope of green, but he could feel no breeze in his face. Not ten feet away a dappled black and white cow raised her head from the grass slowly and methodically chewing and for a moment her eyes appeared to settle upon his, but then, slowly they drifted away again. He was well accustomed to the vagaries of the herd but this was more than vacant disinterest, it was as if she had failed to register his presence at all.
Tommen was a dreamer and he had always been blessed with vivid dreams – some exotic and pleasurable and some bizarre and troubling – but there was something about his current situation that was so real that he was becoming ever more certain that he was not actually dreaming right now and he was terrified beyond measure.
He began to move further up the path, further towards the big house and the stable block which lay in its shadow but then he stopped dead in his tracks, his heart pounding with fear. He had thought himself to be walking quite normally on the hard gravelled surface but he suddenly realised that he could neither feel the stones through the soles of his boots nor hear the sounds of his own footfalls. He looked down. There was no shadow following his movements. His feet appeared to be floating a few inches above the path. Only with a supreme effort of will did his feet eventually drift downwards. When they began to sink below the gravel surface he screamed out in terror . . . but he could not hear the sound of his scream.
The low red-brick stable building lay in the shadow of the great pile, the huge wooden gates open and chained back as they would normally be during the daylight hours. Tommen could not detect the familiar musky odour on the breeze but still he quickened his step towards the welcome sanctuary of the only home he had ever known, to Old Maester Luke, to the horses and to the dogs. As he approached the front of the house the stateroom doors on the high front balcony swung open and to his horror the immense figure of the Duke appeared in the open doorway, his rich burnt oak overcoat gleaming in the sunlight.
It was expressly forbidden for the lesser staff to be on view in the grounds at any time when the family chose to take the air so Tommen desperately looked around him for some place to run to, some place to hide until they had passed but he was in open ground with no means of escape. He froze, his heart thumping, knowing that he would suffer later when Old Maester Luke was informed of his impertinent transgression.
The Duke stood aside while the Duchess and the two young Earls emerged. For a few moments they all waited on the balcony at the head of the winding staircases and Tommen could guess exactly why they were waiting. Across to his right a small figure dressed in a rough brown smock emerged from the great gates of the stable yard – it was Mikken, the other stable boy, some two years older than Tommen. He held a leash in each hand with which he led big, black Brutus and the smaller light tan bitch, Lady up towards the house. When the sun shone and there were no pressing duties the Duke enjoyed a stroll through the grounds with the family, with the prospect of rabbit for luncheon if the dogs were of a mood to hunt. On occasion he would take the boat out on the lake while the young Earls traced the cold water with their fingers and the Duchess shaded her pale face with a lacy parasol in the stern.
Tommen watched as the family slowly descended the winding staircase, as Mikken doffed his cap and handed over the leashes to the two young Earls and then followed at a discrete distance, cap in hand, while the family made their way down towards the lake and the distant woodland. Not one of the group, not the Lord, nor Mikken, had appeared to notice him at all, yet he had been standing in full view all of the time. He shook his head in disbelief and set off at a brisk pace to catch up with the party.
Suddenly big, black Brutus stopped and lifted his nose into the air, searching, sniffing. He turned around and appeared to stare directly at Tommen, his great head jerking upwards in surprise, his great mouth opening as if in a growl, but with a cruel irony – at the very moment that his favourite dog appeared to heed him, the boy was to be denied that most familiar of sounds in confirmation. A sharp tug on the lead pulled the dog into line and he never once looked back again.
Tommen slowed his step. The moment had shaken him to the core, had destroyed his confidence, had removed his will to continue but somehow his legs alone refused to surrender and he found himself moving irrevocably onwards to follow the party.
The path wound through the meadow, through the cultivated trees and on towards the dense chaos of the woodland and Tommen kept pace though his heart was not in tune with the venture and, though he could find no logical reason to continue, continue he did. Soon the grey waters of the lake came into view with the vast stone bridge over to his left and the low wooden boathouse almost hidden by the bulk of the grass covered ice-house to his right.
It was there that big, black Brutus stopped again sniffing the air, then his great nose dropped and he began to pull hard on his leash. The young Earl was almost unable to hold his brute strength and was forced to stumble along at a half run to keep up with the dog. When Brutus stopped at the lake edge his nose again appeared to search in vain for a scent, but when he turned towards the water he threw his great head to the sky and howled.
Tommen’s ears failed to catch the sound of the dog’s anguish but his eyes could follow the gaze of the family group which were fixed on a point out near the centre of the lake. The Lord issued a command but Mikken was already wading out into the lake, out into the deeper water. When he lifted the pale, limp body to his chest and began the slow walk back to dry land Tommen cried out in horror but he could not hear his cry; his eyesight began to evaporate and the scene dimmed into oblivion.