Chapter Nine: Feast

Evening, 25th June

After a minute or two of being escorted through the winding corridors and down the narrow and steep stairs of the castle, we reached a huge hallway. The ceiling towered way above us and was full of intricate carvings and details. Halfway down this hallway sat two sets of nearly identical huge wooden doors. One set seemed to lead to the outside – judging by the howl of the wind coming through the gaps around each door – and the other to a room simply known as the 'Hall'. The doors were made up of vertical planks held together with a few iron bars, flared at the ends for decoration. We could hear the sound of raucous laughter and the voices of men attempting in vain to be heard over each other.

The two guards pushed open the heavy doors and stood to attention at either side of the large archway. This revealed the expansive great hall of the castle. Half of the room was taken up by two simple long tables with wooden benches on the outside. Some of the castle's servants seemed to be eating here off wooden dishes. The other half was raised up a step and two long taller tables ran parallel to each other towards the far end of the room, the chairs on the outside facing in. This led to the perpendicularly placed long table at the far end of the room, with the chairs on the outside facing towards the entrance. In the centre of the room stood a proud stone hearth, the outside of which was covered in intricate detail, most of it revolving around sword, shield and amulet imagery. The two opposite sides of the hearth had large openings exposing the roaring fire within. The chimney attached to the hearth raised up through the arched ceiling, the wooden beams of which ran across the ceiling to the centre.

The far tables were full of nobles eating off silver plates with silver knives but no forks, which I thought was odd. The King, now donning an ostentatious golden crown, was sat in the middle of the slightly higher table at the very end of the room facing at the doorway. The eight religious crosses along the top of his crown glistened in the candle light, each adorned with various precious stones including garnets, amethysts and even some large (normal) diamonds. On the King's right was a very regal looking young woman and an empty seat. The two seats on his left were also empty. Those three empty seats at this table were the only empty seats in the room at all.

The King beckoned us over, so we awkwardly shuffled through the centre of the room. As we walked past the servants' area, we noticed their food consisted mostly of brown bread with small amounts of beef and pork. They, like everyone in the room, were eating mostly with their hands, only occasionally using their knives. The nobles further up the room had significantly more bountiful feasts, their silverware crammed full of chicken, beef, pork, chopped purple carrots and peas, each with a small loaf of white bread on the side. There was a ridiculous amount of food on each plate and the King had even more.

The two empty seats adjacent to each other had places laid out but no food and the third was completely empty altogether. We approached the King, unsure of how exactly to behave in this situation, and he instructed us to sit in the two laid out seats, I was to sit next to the King and Kate was to sit in the next seat over, which she reluctantly agreed to. We stayed as quiet as possible during all of this so as to not make a social faux pas and embarrass ourselves. The King motioned for servants to bring some food out for us, giving me significantly more than Kate. I could see Kate was irritated but I calmed her by quietly whispering to her that I'd try to give her some of mine, it was far too much for me anyway.

One by one, each servant carrying a different portion of the meal entered the room, stood in front of us and slowly placed the food on our plates and poured a form of ale into our metal cups, described to us as 'fresh ale'. It was cloudy and didn't taste as alcoholic as those at home, though I was never much of an ale drinker in the first place. It had allegedly been made that day for this feast, however.

We both sat still, watched this happen and, after everything was put down, waited for a cue to start, in case we were supposed to do something before eating. This was met with the stare of a very confused king to our right who, while shovelling food into his mouth, indicated to us that we should start my feast and Kate's snack. We both obliged and tentatively started to eat. Since we weren't used to using our hands in a relatively formal situation, we tried to be careful not to make a mess; Kate doubly so as she quickly realised she was meant to be more 'ladylike' to not cause a stir.

The King turned to me part way through the meal and said, "Harding, you've yet to meet my daughter, Mary." He leant back and spoke to the young woman sitting next to him, "Mary, this is Mark Harding. The one who can control the diamonds."

The princess' face lit up as she leant towards me, "It's a pleasure to meet you, Harding." She said excitedly, "I've been told a lot about you."

Trying to be charming and formal I replied with, "The pleasure is all mine, your highness."

With utmost composure, she smiled and said, "We simply must talk properly once we are done here. I would surely like to get to know the hero of Sarthe."

"Sarthe?" I replied. I knew that name from somewhere but I couldn't quite place where I'd heard it. A common theme for me it seemed.

The King interjected, "Surely you know the name of the city you are in?"

"It would have helped if I had actually been told it." As I was speaking, I subtly pushed my plate towards Kate and tried to put my body in Harold and Mary's lines of sight so that Kate could quietly nick some food off it.

The King thought for a moment about what else he hadn't told me during the past two days' events. "We appear to have overestimated your knowledge of the area. We will clearly need to have a discussion about where we are."

Possibly trying to change the topic, Mary spoke up before I could reply with a sarcastic comment. She looked past me and at Kate, who was fortunately done taking food from my plate. Struggling to be heard over the other boisterous dinner guests, she shouted, "Who are you then, Madam? It is very rare for women to eat in the Hall with everyone, especially at the high table."

Kate swallowed the food she was eating and hurriedly said, "Kate Thompson." She was about to take another bite from her own plate when she remembered to say, "Your Highness." The princess looked at Kate expectantly, wanting her to elaborate. She soon noticed this and continued. "I'm a friend of Mark's. I helped him live on this island before we were taken to this castle."

I interrupted Kate to say, "That's really a massive understatement. She's saved my life so many times and began to teach me how to survive here before we knew there was civilisation here." I looked back towards Kate and smiled, to which she gave a half-hearted smile back, before I looked back at Mary, "She's basically the entire reason I'm still here."

Mary looked surprised, "Well, Kate, you sound like quite an extraordinary woman."

Kate simply shrugged and said, "One of us has to be competent at least." Both the King and his daughter looked at me in mild shock, presumably thinking that I'd chastise Kate for such a comment. I just lightly chuckled.

The table went silent with that comment and we carried on with our food until the King turned to me to say, "I hear you two have been making use of the guards' training rooms. Were you teaching her to defend herself in combat?"

I was facing away from Kate so I couldn't see her reaction, but I could somehow feel that she was annoyed by that comment. I pulled back my sleeve to show him one of the bruises she'd given me during the training and said, "She was showing me a few things. She's got a lot more experience with swords after all." I assumed that the King wanted Kate to be bad at something 'manly', so I thought that I'd set him straight. "She's certainly the better fighter between us."

Harold looked away from me and into the rest of the room, sighed, and thought for a moment before turning back to me, "She will have to show me what she can do some day. I'm sure it would be quite a spectacle."

Kate held back from answering and just focused on eating her food so as to not cause a fuss.

We finished our meals but the evening continued on, our drinks being topped up throughout. As a result, the room became louder and louder as the blustering nobles got ever tipsier from the weak ale. The King and his daughter remained dignified throughout, however. Kate and I tended to talk with each other rather than to the King and Mary, as did they, only occasionally breaking the social barrier to have a very short conversation, usually about something mildly sexist or just frightfully dull. We decided not to get into asking about the island or the city here, we felt that it wasn't quite the right place to get into a properly serious conversation like that.

After a small silence, Kate leant over to me and whispered, "I think that that princess is into you, mate."

I glanced over to Mary, who was attempting to look like she was listening to her father's conversation. Her eyes briefly flicked over to me and she gave a small smile. Looking back at Kate I said, "You think so?"

"Oh yeah," she replied, grinning. "Every girl loves a man from the future who can bend ancient magic to their will." I let out a small laugh before she continued, "But seriously, I reckon she's definitely going to want to 'get to know you better' soon."

I thought for a moment about the whole encounter. "I don't see it," I concluded. "Even if she did, I wouldn't do anything about it; I'm still holding onto the vague hope that we get back home someday so that I can be with Lucy again." I regretted mentioning Lucy as I immediately became distracted as thoughts of her drifted through my mind.

I snapped out of these thoughts when Kate, oblivious to my mild distress, continued with her half-joke. "You'd deny a princess? You've got some balls, Mark. If I was a princess, I wouldn't accept a no for anything I asked. I wouldn't take any shit. It would be fucking great."

"And you would end up with the fastest fucking rebellion in history."

"It would be totally worth it." We both laughed and continued our ridiculous conversation to a point where we decided that if either one of us were to be born a prince or princess, we'd both probably only make it to 15 years old at the most before we were murdered for being really bloody demanding.

Despite the medieval setting, it actually ended up being quite a good night. It was certainly the best night I'd had since arriving on the island. It had to end at some point, however. As the various nobles trickled out of the room, the servants started to clear the tables of plates and cups. The nobles seemed to take their knives with them, which confused me until I was informed that guests usually brought their own.

All four of us moved outside the hall and were about to go to our respective chambers when Mary suddenly spoke up. "Harding! You simply must come with me. I want to hear all about you and your powers." She gave me a big smile and stared at me, keenly awaiting an answer.

I glanced over to Kate, who simply gave me a quick nod, indicating that I should go with Mary. "That sounds good to me, your Highness."

"Excellent." She said excitedly, "Follow me." She smiled and walked down the hallway towards her room. I quickly followed, briefly glancing back at Kate who winked at me as she left for our chamber.

I caught up to Mary and her two-guard escort and walked alongside her as she started to make light conversation, mostly talking about the feast we had just had. When we reached her room, a servant unlocked the door and pushed it open. We both quickly walked inside and the servant was about to follow before Mary stopped him.

"We would be alone for now," she said with more composure than I'd ever seen in a person. "I will send for you when you are needed." He performed a small bow and obliged as Mary closed the door.

Where I thought that the room that I had been given was grand, this was on a whole other level. It was only slightly bigger than my room, but everything inside was much grander. The bed's headboard was even bigger with more intricate carvings all over it. The bed itself was much larger as well and there was an entire living room's worth of fancy chairs on the other side, with a small table in the centre of them and other chairs scattered seemingly randomly around the room. The fireplace was larger than ours too, and emblazoned with what I could only assume was the Plantagenet crest; the three familiar lions it comprised of staring down at me from across the room. I was in awe as I entered and Mary seemed to sense this as she tried to hurry me along to two chairs facing each other in the far corner of the room.

I sat down at the same time as she did. I was still staring around the room, trying to take in all of the detail, as she enthusiastically leant forward and asked me, "Harding, I apologise for my eagerness, but what are the diamonds like? How does it feel to control them?"

I snapped out of my awe-inspired trance and replied, "Do you want the honest answer or the one that makes me sound like more of a hero?"

She seemed confused, "The honest answer, I suppose."

"Bloody terrifying."

"It's bloody? In what way?"

I was a bit puzzled for a second, before realising she probably wouldn't have used the word 'bloody' to mean anything other than in reference to blood itself. "Sorry, your Highness. I didn't mean that. It's just terrifying."

She seemed a bit disappointed but asked me what I meant by it. I went on to explain about my visions, dreams, and injuries from the diamonds. She seemed shocked by all of this; she must have only really been told about the pleasant aspects of the diamonds, not to mention how she probably expected someone more heroic to be one of these 'special' people.

Eventually, I changed topics and began to ask her about the island and the city we were in.

"As you already know, this is the city of Sarthe," she began. "Originally founded in 1149 by members of our house, the House of Plantagenet, who supported Henry Plantagenet in his fight for the English throne."

"Henry Plantagenet," I interrupted thoughtfully. "As in Henry II?" I vaguely remembered David going on about this war of succession before. I barely listened to him at the time, but clearly something went in.

"What do you mean?"

"Henry II? King of England. If I remember correctly, which I probably don't, the Plantagenets ruled over England until the 1500s or something." I thought for a moment as I began to regret blanking out David's random history facts. "Or maybe it was the 15th century."

"That can't be right. My ancestors left England because they knew that he was going to lose." Mary replied in disbelief.

"I probably am wrong, just ignore me. I don't know nearly enough to dispute anything you say."

"Well, either way, the settlers dedicated the island and the city to Henry Plantagenet by naming the island 'Henersey' and the city 'Sarthe'; the city being named after the river that runs through Henry's birthplace of Le Mans." I knew the name Sarthe. I'd been to the Twenty-Four Hours of Le Mans the year before with some of my friends and we briefly visited the city of Le Mans where we'd discovered its river's name. David bored us half to death with random facts about the place during the entire thing, unfortunately. "The city has since grown hugely and smaller farms and villages have cropped up in the surrounding area."

"You certainly know your history. I'm impressed."

"History is an important part of our studies here. It is important to know your past. Henry was a great man whose throne was wrongfully taken from him." I still wasn't entirely sure about that, but listened obediently nevertheless. "No heir to the throne of Sarthe has ever been named Henry to preserve the name's eminence. We even have a statue of him in London Square. For that reason, we learn a lot about his struggle and everything around it."

She continued to tell me about her family's history. They began as an important branch of the House of Plantagenet who left England's shores in 1148. The intention was to sail to the Mediterranean and seek refuge somewhere there. Without much of a plan other than escape, they encountered this island, completely uninhabited unlike most of the islands in the area. According to accounts at the time, the sailors encountered an incredible storm but somehow managed to survive it and end up shipwrecked on the island. They created the city of Sarthe over the years and continued to live there. No one had left the island since.

I began to plead with Mary after she had told me this, "Do you have any idea which direction they would have come from?" I leant forward and continued, "Please, Mary. I need to know." I was trying to find out any way to get off this island possible.

She thought for a moment. "I'm afraid I do not know. You may be able to check our archives at a later date." I sat back in my chair, disappointed at that answer. She sensed my dissatisfaction and decided to quickly change the topic. "You intrigue me, Harding. You appear to have been here for some time, yet you know very little about where we are. What is your story?"

"I'm not from here at all. I just came from England, actually."

Mary suddenly spoke up quickly and excitedly, "Really? What is it like now? Is it similar to here still?"

I thought carefully about how to word my answer, before giving up and simply stating, "No. Not in the slightest." She raised an eyebrow in a mixture of confusion and intrigue. "For starters, we don't build castles like this one, and the ones that are left are simply there to visit out of interest."

"Wait for a moment." She stopped me to think over what I had just said, "How do you show power over the masses if not with a castle? What keeps them in check?"

"Generally, people don't feel the need to rebel even if things aren't going their way. There are more peaceful ways of changing things now. Although I really can't say that it's a perfect system."

I continued to tell her a few of the things that had changed, leaving out the really complicated things such as modern transportation or the internet. I tried to keep it relatively simple; although when I had to explain the modern Parliament, which I didn't completely understand myself, I deeply regretted ever getting into this conversation.

After an exhausting time explaining the intricacies of UK politics, not to mention the fact that the United Kingdom even existed, Mary asked me, "Where does Ms Thompson fit into your life then? Is she your wife?"

I gave Mary a big look of surprise and quickly replied, "No, nothing of the sort. I met her when I arrived on the island." I went on to explain the whole story of how I got to the island (a version with less immaturity than my drunken blackout at least) and how I met Kate, making sure to explain that it was a purely platonic relationship. "Does it really seem like we're married?" I asked afterwards, simply intrigued since I didn't think we gave that particular vibe.

"Not particularly, it is just very rare for a man and a woman to be so close. Although your England seems most strange so anything can happen, I suppose." She chuckled to herself as if she'd said something completely outlandish.

"Hang on!" I quickly blurted out, completely forgetting about decorum, "Is that why we were given the same bloody bed chamber?"

"I would assume so."

"Well, that's just complete bollocks," I said before I, perhaps foolishly, decided to follow the topic of women in our cultures. "Our societies do seem to have rather different attitudes to women, don't they?"

"From the way you have been treating Ms Thompson, I would certainly say so."

"How do you find it here? I know that Kate is hating being here, she's constantly being sidelined just because she's a woman."

This proved to be a hard question for the princess, she sat back and thought for quite a while. "It's sometimes frustrating, but it's normal." She went back into thought, wondering whether she should continue, "Can I tell you something? I don't think my father particularly wants you to know this right now but I think you will understand."

"Of course. I'm always up for a bit of gossip," I grinned but she remained straight-faced, likely not understanding what I had just said at all.

"I am actually the heir to the throne. If my father were to die tomorrow, God forbid, I would become queen. In fact, I would be the youngest ruler in Sarthe's history at eighteen years old."

"Wow. That's really bloody cool." I leant forward so that she could talk a bit quieter. "Why wouldn't Harold want me to know that?"

Mary sat forward as well, "No one actually wants me to become queen. Sarthe has never had a female ruler before and they don't know how it will turn out, especially after Empress Matilda's attempted reign over England went so poorly."

"Empress Matilda?" I asked, starting to feel out of my league in this conversation.

"Henry's mother. She was to succeed her father but was never officially crowned. Many people blame her for the civil war that our ancestors left this island because of. I understand their worries, but I don't know what to think of it. My father has even told me that he is worried about it."

"That's seriously heavy. I'm sure you'd do a great job though, surely you've been taught what to do?" I asked, clutching at straws. To my relief, she nodded unassuredly. With some renewed confidence, I continued, "You're not going to be inherently terrible just because you're female. That's ludicrous." I smiled at her as she smiled back, "And if anyone says otherwise, I'll mess them up with my weird powers."

She let out a small, high-pitched laugh and said, "Providing you know what you are doing, of course."

"Yes, that may be the problem with my plan." We both let out restrained laughs before I turned back to the topic and asked, "How does your mother deal with these attitudes?"

Her smile disappeared and her face whitened. Her expression turned incredibly serious as she thought deeply about her next few words. "My mother," she began, giving a long pause before she continued. "She passed three years ago."

"Oh shit," I instinctively replied, forgetting myself. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to cause you any grief." I silently cursed my apparent bad habit of stumbling into extremely sensitive topics.

"No," She said, wiping a tear from her eye. "It's not your fault, you had no way of knowing." She composed herself as I struggled to think of things to say. Before I came up with anything, she carried on. "It was three years ago last February. I do not even know what happened; father refuses to talk about it. You may have noticed the empty seat at the table; he keeps it empty as a way of mourning her."

I tried to console her as best as I could but couldn't do much. I was bad enough at consoling people back home, let alone when the language they speak is just different enough for them to barely understand what I mean. When it became clear that I wasn't helping, she simply changed the topic.

"So, you can control the Diamonds of Perdition. What exactly is your plan for saving this city?"

I hadn't considered this at this point at all. "I've got no idea. I don't even know what the city needs saving from, to be honest."

"Knowledge does not seem to be your strong point, does it?" She let out a mischievous smile as if she'd just said the biggest put-down of the century.

I gave her a small laugh, mostly to not make her feel as if she'd stepped over the line. "This conversation has literally been the most information I've been given while being here. Can you tell me what's happening with the city?"

"I am afraid that I cannot. I have not been told enough to pass information on. I would probably get something wrong and I would rather not give you false information."

"Fair enough. I suppose I'll be told about it as soon as I'm about to fight the killer death monster of hate and misery." My sarcasm was met with a small, half-understanding giggle from Mary.

She briefly glanced at the once roaring fire in the fireplace behind her, doing a double take when she realised it was starting to dim. "We appear to have been talking for an awfully long time. It is probably best if you retired to your chamber now. We would not wish for people to talk, would we?"

I didn't immediately understand what she meant by that, only realising when I got back to my chamber, but stood up regardless. I thanked her for her time and the information and made motions towards the door. She rushed over to the door before just before I got there to say goodbye. She brought me in for a quick hug and said, "It has been wonderful talking to you. We must do it again if you get a chance."

Trying to sound suave and sophisticated, I said, "I will make the time if I must." Before copying Mary's servant's bow from earlier and opening the door next to me. She quietly giggled, most likely because the suave act didn't fit me at all, and said goodbye. She instructed one of her guards to escort me to my chamber and the other to get her servant back so that he could stoke the fire.

The guard obliged and silently led me through the hallways to mine and Kate's chamber. Ordering the two guards outside to unlock the door, he ushered me in and the door was locked behind me as usual. Kate was already in bed, simply staring into space. The fire was going strong in the fireplace and the whole room was brightly lit by candlelight. On my arrival, Kate immediately snapped out of her trance, patted the bed next to her, and excitedly ordered, "Mark! Come here. Tell me all about your 'meeting' with the princess!"

I began to do as she asked. While moving over the bed, I said, "Ok, but I can't promise you'll find it very interesting."

She dismissed the comment and, while I was getting ready to get into bed, eagerly began her crass inquisition. "First things first. Did you fuck?"

"A bit forward isn't it?"

"There's no point in being coy. Answer the bloody question."

"No, we most certainly did not." I realised that some of the princess' manner of speaking might have rubbed off on me.

"She's too classy to fuck on the first date, huh?"

I nervously laughed. I genuinely didn't like the princess in that way and I didn't think the princess thought about me like that either. I was pretty sure Kate didn't even think so, she just enjoyed poking fun. "You really want this to be a thing, don't you?"

"I just think it would be adorable."

"However adorable it may be, nothing's happening." I asserted.

Kate looked slightly disappointed, "Did you at least find out what the bloody hell is going on with all of this diamond bollocks?"

"Not really, but she did tell me a lot about the island." I proceeded to tell her everything that the princess had told me about Henersey and Sarthe. Everything that I could remember anyway, I had been told an awful lot of information. When I started talking about how her ancestors had left England in 1148 because Henry Plantagenet's throne had been 'wrongfully taken from him', Kate gave me a look of mild confusion and pity.

"You know that Henry actually became king, right?" She began, clearly trying to draw on old knowledge she had been taught a long time ago. "He was Henry II, I think; the Plantagenets held the throne for ages. You know the Hundred Years War? That was them."

"I bloody thought so! I didn't feel right correcting her because I thought that my mind was just playing tricks on me." I sat back, feeling very smug that I had got something right in history. "So her family is on this godforsaken island for absolutely no reason?"

"Seems like it. Fucked if I'm going to be the one to tell them that though."

"Yeah, too right."

We didn't stay up for much longer past that, we were both exhausted from the long day we had just had. The medieval socialising was probably the most gruelling part for me as trying to act suave and sophisticated with the royalty was not easy. It was incredibly refreshing to speak very frankly to Kate afterwards.

I went to sleep that night feeling significantly calmer than I ever had since arriving on the island. I was still incredibly stressed but could see a light at the end of the tunnel. The only problem was that I had absolutely no idea what was in the tunnel itself.