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Happy St Patrick's Day. Enjoy the one day of the year when the whole world is Irish.

Visionaries--Part One--Chapter Nine

Started by Evie, November 04, 2011, 09:36:39 AM

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Evie

   Chapter Nine

   Henslowe Hall inner bailey, late morning
   February 24, 1136


   Sister Helena, her face ashen, crumpled to a heap on the ground before them.   Bishop Duncan muttered a startled oath and bent to scoop her limp body up from the damp grass, casting a keen glance up at Father John as he stood.  "Let's get her inside, now!"

   John needed no urging.  He closed the distance between the tower foundation where the magistra had collapsed and the nearest castle entrance in a quick sprint.  A castle guard gave him entry and, upon seeing the swiftly approaching bishop and his unconscious burden, ushered the baron's guests into a nearby chamber where they might set her down.  "Has she taken injury?" the man asked, looking nervous.  "Shall I summon the baron's physician?"

   Duncan shook his head.  Physically, he sensed that the magistra was unharmed, although she had sustained some sort of extreme psychic shock.  "No need; I'm a Healer."  He glanced around the chamber, which appeared to be some sort of storage room.  A row of locked chests sat parallel to one wall, while wooden shelves holding various household items and containers stood against another.  Duncan's gaze fell on a stack of pallets piled up in a corner, doubtless those used by the household servants when they slept in the Great Hall at night.  "I'll need one of those, if you can lay it out for me."  He frowned slightly, taking note of the rough burlap and the bits of straw poking through the fabric in places.  "On second thought, she'll rest more comfortably in her own chamber, if you could send ahead and call for a tiring maid to assist her once she comes to.  A sensible sort with steady nerves, if one is available," he added, not knowing if all the baron's household would be as complacent as their lord seemed to be about Deryni adepts using their powers openly, even If those powers were used for an act of Healing.  And it was possible some form of Healing intervention might yet be required.

   "A tiring maid for m'lady?  Aye, of course, my lord bishop."  Henslowe's guard glanced at Helena.  "The guest wing is just upstairs and a wee bit down the corridor."

   The magistra began to stir in Duncan's arms, and as consciousness returned, she stiffened and began to struggle.  He exerted control swiftly, sending a tendril of comfort and assurance into her mind until she stilled, her eyes fluttering open.  She stared around the small storeroom, her panic slowly subsiding.  "Father Duncan?"  Her eyes met his, looking haunted.

   "You'll be all right, Sister," he told her, warning her with a glance to be mindful of the watching guard's barely restrained curiosity.  "But you need to get out of these damp robes.  Henslowe's man was about to send for a tiring maid."  Duncan shot the man a look full of meaning, and with a blush, he complied, scurrying off to do as he'd been bid.

   "I...think I could stand up now," Helena ventured, looking embarrassed.  "I'm so sorry; I hate to be such a bother."

   Duncan glanced at John, then back down at her with a wry smile.  "Perhaps, but let's get you into a room with softer furnishings in it first, just to be on the safe side."

   "Yes," John added.  "You probably ought to let Father Duncan have a good look at you first.  You were standing next to the castle tower when you fainted; you might have hit your head on your way down."

   Helena gave them both a sheepish smile.  "I'm sure he's had a good enough look at me already; he can hardly help it, carrying me around like some babe in arms!  Really, I'm fine.  I just wasn't expecting...that."  She closed her eyes in memory of what she'd experienced when she'd come into contact with the tower wall, beginning to tremble slightly.

   "I think he meant that I need a good look inside your head, not just at you, pleasant as that is," Duncan explained, his mouth twitching in an almost-smile, "It's the psychic shock you experienced that I'm more worried about rather than any physical hurt.  I haven't seen or sensed any signs of head injury.  What happened back there, Helena?"

   They heard the returning footfalls of the guard and the lighter steps of someone else, probably the requested maidservant.  "Maybe we should get Helena upstairs and she can tell us what happened once we've all changed into something dry," John interjected hastily.

   "Yes, that would be best, I think," Helena agreed.

   Duncan nodded his assent.  The three followed their host's household staff upstairs to the guest apartments.

#

   After changing into warm, dry clothing that didn't smell of wet sheep, Duncan and John spent a few minutes quietly discussing what had happened in the garden below.

   "It happened when Helena touched the tower base," John observed.  "Did you notice?  She was fine until she touched her hand to the stone.  Whatever it was she sensed, it had something to do with that tower.  I wonder what chambers it houses?"

   "Or which ones it housed during Baroness Ardith's time?" Duncan mused.  "Then again, we could be getting ahead of ourselves.  Helena never said that what she sensed from the tower wall had anything to do with that particular mystery.  She might well have stumbled upon something else entirely."  He glanced out their bedchamber window, studying the ground below, then pointed out the base of one of the keep's towers a few yards distant.  "That's where it happened, isn't it?"

   John followed Duncan's gaze, taking stock of the surrounding area...the location of that tower in relation to the door they'd entered afterwards, the proximity of the shade tree and bench where they'd gathered earlier for Helena to Read the items he'd brought....  "Yes, that was it."  He glanced back up at Duncan, realization dawning in his eyes.  "I know of at least two chambers housed within those walls."

   Duncan nodded, the same thought occurring to him as well.  "Yes.  The baron's bedchamber and library."

   "The library which used to be Baroness Ardith's bedchamber, according to Sister Helena's vision," John reminded the bishop.

   Their eyes met.  "Let's go check on Helena," Duncan said.

#

   They found the magistra in her guest chamber, kneeling at the prie-dieu.  She looked up as they were let in, not by the tiring maid they'd expected to find, but by the young Baroness Adela.

   Helena looked more composed now that she'd had a chance to seek the solace of prayer.  She stood, brushing absently at the skirts of the dry gown she now wore—the same lavender-blue bliaut she'd worn on the journey up, Duncan noted—and took a deep, steadying breath.

   "I think I know what happened to Baroness Ardith," she informed the two priests.  "At least if my guess is correct and that tower of the keep contains the Henslowe's oubliette."

   Baroness Adela looked startled.  "I don't think we have an oubliette!" she protested in a small voice, though as she stopped to consider the matter further, she added, "At least, my lord husband has never mentioned one, and I can't think of any room in that tower now that might have served as one.  I suppose it's possible that things might have been changed around quite a bit over the last century."

   "Yes, Henslowe Hall has been remodeled quite extensively since its origins, hasn't it?" Duncan noted.  "Perhaps your husband might know what that tower was used for in the past.  How is he this morning?  Would he feel up to a visit?"

   Henslowe young bride turned scarlet.  "He...ah...didn't get as much sleep last night as one might hope, but he might be awake by now," she murmured.  "Shall I go check?"

   "If you would, please, my lady," Duncan said.  Glancing at Helena, mindful now of the speculation that her presence had caused among other members of the Henslowe household, he stepped back out of the bedchamber.  "Shall we await word from you in the gallery, Baroness Adela?"  Father John, recognizing the bishop's silent prompt, likewise followed him out of the chamber, walking a few discreet steps further down the corridor in the direction of the gallery.

#

   Sister Helena joined them a few minutes later, self-consciously adjusting a veil borrowed from their hostess, as her customary linen veil and wimple were still drying by the fire.  The baroness had provided her with a rectangular veil which draped nicely around the magistra's face and neck in wimple-like folds, but it was of fine silk rather than linen, with tiny seed pearls edging the hem.  

   "I feel like a peacock," she muttered as she joined the two priests.  

   Duncan smiled.  "Well, thank God you don't sound like one!  Have you ever heard a peacock shriek?"

   "Maybe that's what we heard down in the garden," Father John joked, though his expression sobered almost immediately.  "What did you sense down there, by the tower?"   

   Glancing around to make sure there were no witnesses nearby, Helena took them both by the hand and shared her impressions of Baroness Ardith's final hours of life.

#

   "So, you're saying that she never left Henslowe Hall at all?" the baron asked, looking solemn.  "That she died locked away somewhere in this tower?"

   As he spoke the words, Helena realized with a start that he was right.  The foreboding feelings she had sensed upon her first visit to the baron's combined bedchamber and library hadn't simply been due to the Deryni items that Baroness Ardith had carefully concealed within it, nor were they so strong in this place because the current library had once been her own chamber.  No, there had been something more here all along, something not yet discovered, but because of those other factors, she'd not suspected the whole until now.

   "Yes, my lord.  I feel certain that her remains are still around here somewhere, quite close by.  Are you certain there was never an oubliette in this section of the keep, perhaps on the lowest level, at the foundation?  It was a dark, damp, enclosed space that I sensed.  And there was water flowing nearby.  She couldn't see anything, but she could feel...."  Helena took a deep cleansing breath, willing down the sense of panic that was welling up in her again at her recollection of Baroness Ardith's last memories.  "She knew there was no escape, that she would die there."

   "Yes, but where?"  Baron Henslowe frowned in thought.  "There was a moat around the keep at that time; the sounds of water flowing and the dark and damp would indicate some sort of cellar or undercroft space, mayhap, but this portion of the keep doesn't have one.  In my grandfather's time, I think there was just...."  He turned pale, glancing towards the gap in the remaining bit of wall separating his bedchamber from the library.  "Oh, Jesú, surely not!"   

   Duncan's gaze followed the baron's.  He turned queasy as he picked up on the old man's line of thought.  "The garderobe shaft.  Did it once empty into the moat?"

   The baron shook his head, looking ill.  "No, not directly.  The waste dropped into a cesspit, but that had a low opening with a grate across it.  When the water level in the moat rose after heavy rains, the overflow would enter the cesspit and wash the waste out when the waters receded, and then the foul water would be diverted into the nearby river and the moat refilled with fresher river water from upstream.  My grandfather thought the plan quite innovative, but my father couldn't stand the stench after every rain, so once he inherited Henslowe Hall, he had the moat filled in and the cesspits made accessible to regular emptying by gong farmers...all except for that one, I should say, since it was no longer in use.  Filling the moat in also allowed him to continue expanding the castle walls beyond the original keep."

   "A self-cleaning cesspit," John mused. "No need to hire a gong farmer to shovel it out, then, nor would there have been any risk of one discovering any human remains in there, especially if subsequent renovations ensured that the garderobe would never be used again for its original purpose.  I imagine the openings in the grate would have been quite sufficient to allow water and ordinary garderobe wastes to flow back out, but small enough to keep something larger within?"

   The baron nodded. "They were originally installed for the purpose of ensuring that no enemy could use the cesspit openings as a means of entry into the castle.  Not that it would be easy to scale a slippery garderobe shaft, though I suppose it would be theoretically possible."

   "Baroness Ardith didn't manage it," Helena said softly.  "And even if she'd tried, I suspect that's why her husband sealed the only possible exit with a stone."

#

   Henslowe Hall
   February 26, 1136


   Bishop Duncan said a prayer of blessing over the earthly remains of Lady Ardith, the second Baroness Henslowe and first wife of the current baron's grandfather.  Her bones, as well as a few fragmentary skeletal remains of her unborn son, were contained in a single coffin hastily built by the castle's carpenter for her interment in the family tomb.  There was no public ceremony for her passing, for the family wished to allow the scandal of their progenitor's deeds to be buried along with her, yet as Baron Henslowe told the bishop, the poor soul deserved to be laid to rest properly and not left in an old dungheap like the mere waste her husband had evidently considered her to be.

   "I'll find a place for her in the crypt that doesn't adjoin my grandfather's tomb," the old baron told them with a wry smile.  "Given their history, I can't imagine either would lie peacefully if I were to lay them side by side as husband and wife.  Wouldn't want my grandmother coming back to haunt me for that either, or for that matter, my grandfather's mother."  He chuckled.  "I think, based on some of the things Great-Grandmother said before her death, that she suspected what had happened to Grandfather's first wife, but everyone else in the family just assumed her mind was going and had taken on a morbid bent.  She never did like that library, though.  She said she felt like the walls were closing in on her.  I just assumed it was because the space is rather small."

   "You believe she knew what her son did, but just didn't report the crime?"

   The baron shrugged.  "Who knows?  She may have felt it was her duty both as a mother and as the dowager baroness to protect her son and the Henslowe name.  But even if she did tell someone what she knew or at least suspected, her missing first daughter-in-law was Deryni.   Perhaps justice simply chose to look the other way.  It was a different age, Bishop Duncan.  You're old enough to remember the old prejudices, I'm sure."

   The Deryni bishop nodded sadly.  "Yes, indeed it was."  He thought back on his own experiences with anti-Deryni hatred.  "And I certainly do remember."  His gaze met the baron's.  "I'm glad we've both lived to see the dawn of a more accepting era."

   "So am I, Father Duncan."  The old man sighed as he looked back down at the rough-hewn coffin.  "So am I."

#

   The Episcopal Barge, between Henslowe Hall and Rhemuth
   February 27, 1136

   
   The priests and Sister Helena stood on the deck of Archbishop Cardiel's episcopal barge, watching the towers of Henslowe Hall recede in the distance.  The journey back to Rhemuth was easier on the watermen, as the barge would be traveling with the river's current the entire way home rather than having to row against it, and the bargemaster assured them that their return to Rhemuth would be swifter than their trip upriver to Baron Henslowe's castle had been.

   The river took a bend, and as the barge went around the curve, they lost sight of the castle behind a hill.  "Well, that's done," Duncan commented to no one in particular.  "I'll be glad for the warmth of my study again and a nice mulled goblet of Fianna wine."

   "Warmth sounds particularly inviting right now," Helena agreed with a smile, tightening her cloak around herself.  "And I think I spotted a bottle of metheglin in the cabin earlier; it's not mulled wine exactly, but it's close enough.

   "Depends on the spices used to make it, but yes, I imagine if we warmed it, it would essentially be the same thing as mulled mead," Father John agreed.  "I'm all for finding out, myself."  He held open the cabin door for Helena.
    
   "I think I'll join you," Duncan said, entering behind them.  "And shall I set out the Glückshaus board?  I'm pretty sure there's a mansion in Pwyllheli that's calling my name."

#

   Duncan cleared the last of the tokens off the game board several hours later, glad they'd been betting for imaginary stakes.  He'd managed to offload the dancing girls from Nur Hallaj on Father John some time back, but instead of a mansion in Llannedd's capital, he'd somehow managed to end up with a seedy tavern in the Free Port of Concaradine, two assassins on retainer, and a harem.  Just what every respectable bishop needed, to be sure.  That was definitely the last time he planned to allow John and Helena to gang up on him.

   He smiled fondly at them both as he placed the pouches filled with game pieces back in their storage chest, adding the game board in with them.  Father John had fallen asleep, lulled into deep slumber by the barge's motion and the warm metheglin inside him, and he now lay on the cushioned platform at the rear of the cabin, snoring softly.  Helena, too, looked more relaxed than he'd seen her since their arrival at Henslowe Hall, though she hadn't quite succumbed to the urge to nap.  Instead, she leaned back against one wall of the cabin, eyes closed, a faint smile on her face.

   A glint of polished ivory in the storage chest caught his eye as he started to close the lid.  He lifted it again, pulled out the slender object.  It was a bone whistle, of the sort he'd once watched an old man carve from a hollow bone when he was a boy growing up in his father's castle in Cassan.  The man had given it to him afterwards, and he'd spent the summer learning how to blow a few tunes on it before it had gotten lost some months later while he and his older brother Kevin were engaged in some boyish escapade or another.

   He lifted the mouthpiece to his lips and blew into it softly, testing out the fingering.  The magistra's eyes opened, her smile growing as he managed a short tune.  "That's lovely," she whispered once he'd finished.  "What was that?"

   Duncan lowered the whistle, surprised his fingers had remembered how to play the brief melody.  "The Merry Maids of Ballymar," he told her.  "The chorus of the song, at least."  He chuckled at long forgotten memories.  "Probably not the sort of song my mother would have approved of me knowing at the tender age of eight, though it's an easy enough tune to learn."

   "Why would she have objected?"  Helena's blue eyes shone with her usual bright curiosity.

   He smiled, returning the whistle to its proper place.  "You may have heard my son sing before, but you've evidently not heard him sing that particular ballad, or I'm sure you'd have guessed readily enough.  It's rather bawdy.  Fortunately I only had the vaguest notion what it all meant at that young age."  He secured the storage chest, putting it back in its proper place before returning to his fauldstool.  "Do you play an instrument?" he asked her.

   She shrugged.  "I used to, as a young maid.  I took lessons three times a week, trying to learn how to master the telyn rawn, though even after several years of practice I never counted myself as more than a mere novice in the art.  I haven't had one to play one in years, though.  I'm not sure you even have the instrument here in Rhemuth."

   "It's a Llanneddan harp, isn't it?"

   Helena nodded.  "One variant, yes.  It's an older sort, strung with plaited horse hair rather than with wire or gut. The hair strings give the telyn rawn a unique sound."  

   "Is it anything like a clàrsach?"

   "I'm sure there are similarities."  She studied him quietly before continuing.  "The small lap harp in your study—that's a clàrsach, is it not?"

   He nodded.  "It's the Llyrian variant.  That one belonged to my anam...to my first daughter-in-law."

      Sister Helena leaned her head back against the wall, her eyes drifting shut again.  "Duchess Catriona?  Yes, I remember hearing her play it once, shortly after I first arrived at the Schola.  It has a lovely sound."

      "I...had nearly forgotten you've been at the Schola that long."

      She smiled.  "I'm not surprised.  I spent most of that first year either holed up in the women's dormitorium or hiding out in the Library annex, when I wasn't in classes.  I wasn't quite ready to rejoin the world just yet."  She reopened her eyes, her curious gaze now fixed on the bishop's face.  "What does anamchara mean?"

      Duncan felt his face warm slightly.  "It's a complicated word, anamchara.  Literally, it means soul-friend, though it conveys more of the meaning of a spiritual mentor.  Except that it was more of a reciprocal relationship, not like a magister's mentorship over a scholar."  He shrugged, feeling as helpless at conveying the word's full meaning to her as Cat had once felt when she'd tried to share the Llyrian concept with him all those years ago—how long had it been?  Now, it seemed like half a lifetime ago.  Perhaps it was, at that.  He'd been young—impossibly young, it seemed—in those early days when like-minded souls had first bonded, before he'd known he even had a son, much less that his soul-friend would someday marry him.

      "I see."  The eyes watching him were warm with empathy.  "Her clàrsach hasn't been played in a long time, has it?  Not since she died, I'm guessing.  I take it you don't play, or do you simply not wish to?"

      He shrugged, not knowing quite how to answer.  "I don't know how to play it," he finally answered, "though Dhugal plans on fostering Duncan Michael in his uncle's household in Llyr eventually, and I'm thinking the lad might want to have his mother's clàrsach as an heirloom someday.  He's likelier to learn how to play one there in Mihall's Court."

   Helena nodded.  "If I can work out how to play it, shall I teach you?"

   A flood of emotion swept through him at the question.  He waited for the pain to come, the familiar ache that had once filled him whenever he remembered Catriona, but it didn't.  Instead, there was simply a fond wistfulness, a hint of longing to reconnect with happier moments in his younger years, but no longer the wrenching agony of loss.

   "I...think I'd rather like that, actually."  It would be a link of sorts, a way to honor the memory of one who had been dear to him.  How had Helena known?  "Why did you ask about that word?  Anamchara, I mean?"

   "I heard the Duchess call you that once, that same evening when I heard her playing her harp for you and your son.  It was just a few months before the fever-flux epidemic swept through Rhemuth.  And after she died, you became a cloistered soul for a while, just as much closed off from the world as I ever was, despite your daily duties that kept you outwardly participating in it."  She smiled.  "We shut ourselves off from life for far different reasons I think, you and I, but I recognized the signs of grief.  Though you've healed a great deal since that time.  I think your grandson Jared's birth helped.  When you returned from your visit to your son's court in Cassan, the life had returned to your eyes.  I don't think that was simply because you had a restful two-week holiday."

   "You're a very perceptive woman, Elen Angharad ferch Ednyved."

   She chuckled.  "And you have an excellent memory, Father Duncan, to recall my full Llyneddan name after seeing me sign it only once."

   Father John gave a quiet snort in his sleep and rolled over, nearly rolling off the narrow platform.  Duncan leapt up to catch him while Helena stifled a giggle.  The younger priest sat up, looking around bleary-eyed.  "I dreamed you put her ghost to rest," John told Duncan apropos of nothing.  "Did you?"

   Duncan knew John was probably referring to the late Baroness Ardith, but it was Catriona's visage that sprang to his mind's eye.  He smiled at Helena.  "Yes, I believe I finally have."


Visionaries Part Two, Chapter One:  http://www.rhemuthcastle.com/index.php?topic=774.0
"In necessariis unitas, in non-necessariis libertas, in utrisque caritas."

--WARNING!!!--
I have a vocabulary in excess of 75,000 words, and I'm not afraid to use it!

Rahere

#1
I was reading up on the renovations of the old St Lukes' Old Street, for the London Symphony Orchestra. Now that neatly combined the lot, as the original site was filled up with gonk, to the depth of a foot, even while the church was being designed. They too have had the problems of dealing with the bodies - over a thousand of them.
Now you had better beware - I have one gut-strung, one nylon-strung, and one knee harp within easy reach. Be advised that when it comes to rapid fire, nobody has ever beaten a preloaded glissando!

Rahere

And in search of Ballymar, i discovered the Deryni genealogies have made it into one of the real-world genealogical databases, GedBrowser! Aie, aie, aie...

Evie

Rahere, I wasn't able to use your link as-is, so you might want to edit it.  Looks like you need to take out the quotation marks from the URL and also the extra "http" bit that somehow got added in.  If you do a "Copy Link Location" (or whatever it's called in your browser) and then copy the link's URL to something else like Notepad, you'll see what I mean.

You're planning on using your harps as catapults in KK chat now?  I stand (or sit, rather) forewarned.   ;D
"In necessariis unitas, in non-necessariis libertas, in utrisque caritas."

--WARNING!!!--
I have a vocabulary in excess of 75,000 words, and I'm not afraid to use it!

AnnieUK

And so the Henslowes are left to continue their dysfunctionality in private - or do you have further plans for the obnoxious bunch?

Like how you wound Cat into it at the end.  Another "platonic" relationship for Duncan...

Evie

Quote from: Rahere on November 04, 2011, 02:41:22 PM
And in search of Ballymar, i discovered the Deryni genealogies have made it into one of the real-world genealogical databases, GedBrowser! Aie, aie, aie...

ROFL!  You mean the Eleven Kingdoms aren't part of the real world?  Bummer.  I was so hoping for a nice summer holiday there next year to do some genealogical research on my McLain ancestors....   ;D
"In necessariis unitas, in non-necessariis libertas, in utrisque caritas."

--WARNING!!!--
I have a vocabulary in excess of 75,000 words, and I'm not afraid to use it!

Evie

Quote from: AnnieUK on November 04, 2011, 02:43:20 PM
And so the Henslowes are left to continue their dysfunctionality in private - or do you have further plans for the obnoxious bunch?

Like how you wound Cat into it at the end.  Another "platonic" relationship for Duncan...

I never want to see that dysfunctional lot again!  Which, of course, doesn't mean they won't ever turn up again somewhere if a story ends up requiring it....   ;D

And yes, for a dead woman, Catriona sure keeps popping back up a lot in my stories.  So to speak, that is.  No Zombie Deryni here, even if we have just got past Halloween.   ;)
"In necessariis unitas, in non-necessariis libertas, in utrisque caritas."

--WARNING!!!--
I have a vocabulary in excess of 75,000 words, and I'm not afraid to use it!

Jerusha

What a horrible way for Baroness Ardith to die - I'm glad they recovered her bones and gave them proper rest.

A very nice ending to this chapter, though I know there are more twists and turns to come.  This is only Part One, after all... ;D
From ghoulies and ghosties and long-leggity beasties and things that go bump in the night...good Lord deliver us!

 -- Old English Litany

Evie

More twists and turns coming up, yes.  This is actually the final chapter of Part One, but Part Two picks up almost immediately after and picks up some of the loose threads left dangling in Part One.  I hadn't originally set out to write a two-parter, but as two separate mysteries emerged during the plotting and early writing stages, I decided to end the first section of story after the shorter Henslowe mystery was wrapped up, and then continue on with Part Two and pick up some of the other hints and bits laid down in Part One to develop those further into the main storyline of the second section.  That made it all a bit easier for me to mentally manage, since I feel like I'm juggling lots of balls at once here:  the Schola stuff, Duncan's relationship with Helena, the Henslowe mystery, Helena's past and its impact on her present (which crops up again in Part Two), the mystery story yet to come (well, not sure "mystery" is the right word as the readers might well see it coming early, but the characters will be clueless), etc.
"In necessariis unitas, in non-necessariis libertas, in utrisque caritas."

--WARNING!!!--
I have a vocabulary in excess of 75,000 words, and I'm not afraid to use it!

derynifanatic64

Glad to see that Ardith and her child are now resting in peace.  Her story is similar to the ghost in Oscar Wilde's short story "The Canterville Ghost".  The ghost had been chained up and starved to death for 400 years.  Once he had been redeemed, his curse ended and his remains were laid to rest and he was reunited with his wife.
We will never forget the events of 9-11!!  USA!! USA!!

Rahere

Playing with that tune name, you're well into the 18th Century, yet the instrumentation is that of a motet. Not necessarily impossible, perhaps the Bishop intends using it as the ground of a cantus firmus mass? Pucellae epullarae Ballymarae?
Braided horsehair as a harpstring must buzz appallingly, and keeping it in tune a nightmare. Sorry, bad joke, horsehair?

Rahere

They did release the fetch of the child as well, I hope? An interesting point whether an unborn psychic has sentience to that degree...twins seem to have a pre-birth relationship.

Evie

Quote from: derynifanatic64 on November 04, 2011, 06:54:14 PM
Glad to see that Ardith and her child are now resting in peace.  Her story is similar to the ghost in Oscar Wilde's short story "The Canterville Ghost".  The ghost had been chained up and starved to death for 400 years.  Once he had been redeemed, his curse ended and his remains were laid to rest and he was reunited with his wife.

I'm glad that ended happily, then!  Four hundred years is a long time to go without food....  ;)
"In necessariis unitas, in non-necessariis libertas, in utrisque caritas."

--WARNING!!!--
I have a vocabulary in excess of 75,000 words, and I'm not afraid to use it!

Evie

Quote from: Rahere on November 04, 2011, 07:09:52 PM
Playing with that tune name, you're well into the 18th Century, yet the instrumentation is that of a motet. Not necessarily impossible, perhaps the Bishop intends using it as the ground of a cantus firmus mass? Pucellae epullarae Ballymarae?
Braided horsehair as a harpstring must buzz appallingly, and keeping it in tune a nightmare. Sorry, bad joke, horsehair?


The tune name by itself needn't brand it as 18th C.; after all, Playford composed "Merry Merry Milkmaids," didn't he, and that was a century earlier (though admittedly that's not meant as a bawdy ballad unless there are lyrics I'm unaware of and/or that once existed and are no longer extant).  I'm fairly sure there were other "Merry" or "Merrie" sorts in popular music long before that, though I don't have a copy of the Child Ballads onhand to double check if any might turn up in there that come from the earlier end of the historical range.  Bawdy ballads in general are definitely documentable back to the Renaissance at least, if not earlier, because I know several that go back to Tudor/Elizabethan times.  "Blow Thy Horn, Hunter" and "The Keeper Did A-Hunting Go" aren't just catchy songs about hunting deer, you know, unless one is completely oblivious to double entendre as I was as a young and naive Girl Scout first learning them.   :D  I think the second song is from the 1600s, but "Blow Thy Horn, Hunter" is by William Cornysh, so that puts it no later than 1525 unless Cornysh remained a busy lad after his death.  We know from QFSC that in the border regions at least, ballads were part of the popular music of the day in Kelson's time, since young Jass MacArdry leads the young knights on the quest in singing a ballad about some ancient MacArdry chieftain shortly before the accident on the mountain trail.  And as to whether they'd have had bawdy ballads, well of course they would have.  Bawdy humor is documented back to ancient history, but for our purposes we need look no further back than the Anglo-Saxons and their riddle poetry.  I mean, really, did those dudes really have nothing better to do on those long, dark winter nights than sit around comparing common household objects to genitalia?  Onions?  Butter churns?  Really?

          Swings by his thigh / a thing most magical!
          Below the belt / beneath the folds
          Of his clothes it hangs / a hole in its front end,
          stiff-set and stout / it swivels about.
          Levelling the head / of this hanging tool,
          its wielder hoists his hem / above his knee;
          it is his will to fill / a well-known hole
          that it fits fully / when at full length
          He's oft filled it before. / Now he fills it again.

Why yes, of course the ancient poet is referring to a key!  What else could he possibly be talking about?  *innocent look*

Thing is, when it comes to documenting early period popular music, it's pretty darn difficult.  Church music and Court music are both better preserved (though even in those genres, the further back you go, the harder it becomes to document, in terms of notation at least) because they were more likely to be written down.  During the Renaissance, broadsheet ballads helped preserve some lyrics that might otherwise have become lost, not to mention the growing literacy among the middle class.  But in Medieval times and earlier, commoners were less likely to be literate, which meant that their popular music was less likely to be preserved except via oral transmission, so we can't simply assume that absence of evidence is the same thing as evidence of absence.  But there's historical evidence of common folk as well as churchmen and nobility making music (extant instruments, depictions in art), and human nature being essentially unchanged over the centuries, it's a fair bet that some of it would have been of the "Merry Maids of Ballymar" sort, which might not have sounded very 16-18th C. in terms of musical style, but in terms of theme, probably not the sort of thing a mother would hope to hear her little darlings singing when the Bishop comes into earshot.  ;)

And you're right, the horsehair strings of the telyn rawn do have a bit of a buzz to them.  I heard a sound file of one being played when I was researching Welsh harps.  Mind, aficionados of the instrument seem to think that distinctive sound is a feature, not a bug.   :D  http://www.telynrawn.org/
should bring you to the recording.  And yes, I will thwack you for that pun.  *loads mackerel launcher*   ;D

"In necessariis unitas, in non-necessariis libertas, in utrisque caritas."

--WARNING!!!--
I have a vocabulary in excess of 75,000 words, and I'm not afraid to use it!

Evie

Quote from: Rahere on November 04, 2011, 07:15:44 PM
They did release the fetch of the child as well, I hope? An interesting point whether an unborn psychic has sentience to that degree...twins seem to have a pre-birth relationship.

Oh dear, so that's what Duncan forgot!  I suppose that's my lead-in for Visionaries Part Three, in which Duncan gets a frantic plea from Baron Henslowe to pleeeease come back post-haste and finish the job, as they're all heartily sick of the (literally) ghastly infantile wails resounding from the Haunted Tower....

Or not.   ;D

In other words, yes, I'm sure Duncan did everything that was needful.  And even post-natal twin "rapport" would be an interesting avenue to explore in a Deryni fic.  So, when do you plan to get on that one?  ;)  (Hey, Annie's working on other stuff at the moment, Alkari's getting Real Life stuff sorted so she can hopefully return to Jehana's story--hint, hint!--and I'm dying to read someone else's Deryni stories for a nice change of pace!)
"In necessariis unitas, in non-necessariis libertas, in utrisque caritas."

--WARNING!!!--
I have a vocabulary in excess of 75,000 words, and I'm not afraid to use it!