TCOTNK Season 3.7
The Castle Of The Naked Knights. The origins of the picture book that will change so many lives....
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TCOTNK Season 3.7
I spend the rest of the day in a haze of... I don't know any other word for it, in a haze. Some kind of enchantment. I walk from place to place. Listen to what flows into my ears. Make a note or a sketch every now and then, but I'm too flushed to get a handle on it. I meet people who are friendly and share food. Stand among singers who excite each other. Join the line in front of the circus tent without knowing what's coming. The performance is strange. Later I sit in the sun on the small village square watching a puppeteer. And gradually become wedged between the growing audience and the player dressed as a jester. I am incorporated into his performance. Finally, with stuffed black fabric birds on my hands and shoulders, I stand imitating a scarecrow on top of the cart that serves as a set piece and puppet stable.
It's starting to get dark. I'm hungry and go up to the castle to get something to eat. But I'm walking against the current. The better dressed guests are also on their way to the village. I steal an apple from a mighty fruit bowl because I can't find anything else edible. The white-covered tables in the glass cathedral are still empty. It's starting to get quiet at the castle. Curious, I go after the others. A group of several hundred spectators forms between the bollards and boulders above the encampment. Uphill at the base of the wall. It is too steep there for tents and vehicles. I arrive as one of the last.
The lord of the castle stands on the high platform with a group of chicly dressed ladies and gentlemen. Always with a glass of red wine in hand. He has exchanged the pajamas for a striped suit. Not subtle. Apricot and lime. A zebra salad. Quite striking.
I keep walking. Openings and ceremonies make me restless. Speeches in particular give me an allergic reaction. Besides, I'm cold. After my sweaty debut as a doll stand, I cooled down quickly. The sun has set. The royal blue sky promises a cold evening. I'm at my sleeping place.
One of the women is sitting on the steps of the gypsy car. She is gloomy. Looks like a thunderstorm. My vest and my sketchbook are in the caravan. I go get them and take a seat next to her. We are silent for a while. She leans against me a little. That's pleasant. The noise from above reaches us.
She picks up the sketchbook from my lap and starts leafing through it. It is fine by me. She seems a bit happier again. Right between two cars I see the moon rising. Things are going fast now with the disappearing light. The temperature also drops quickly. I slide nice and close to the young woman who is frantically leafing through the pages. She is also cold. I feel her shiver slightly. When I look at her I see that things are not going well at all. Her beautiful face is ghostly white and cramped. With shaking hands she continues to leaf wildly back and forth. As if she is devouring the drawings. As if she sees something in them that physically hurts her. The trembling in her leg has spread to her entire body. My sketchbook is shaking on her lap. She can no longer hold it and it falls to the floor. I quickly pick it up and put it back on the steps. Then I see her eyes have rolled back. Her mouth is open crookedly. She's having some kind of seizure. I don't know what to do. Just hold her. So she doesn't get hurt. The tremors go through her entire body. She feels like she's frozen stiff. Hard and rigid. It feels like she could just die. I start calling for help. My voice drowns out in a rising cheer. Apparently the opening has started. I keep shouting.
Suddenly she grabs me. Her fingers painfully squeeze whatever flesh she can get her hands on. She wants to say something but only noise comes. A kind of hissing with lots of saliva and sniffling and snot. I want to shout again but then she grabs my hair. Which really hurts. Now it is clear what she wants. I'm not allowed to shout. “Ssssshht”, she moans, struggling, “you have to get out of here.” Her voice is low and hoarse.
She has her normal face back and starts moving. Grabs my hand. Nearly pulls me over. She looks at me bewildered. But bright and clear too. She just stands there for a moment, breathing rapidly through her nose, thinking. Then she flies up the stairs to the caravan in two steps, disappears and reappears a minute later with a bundle of cloth under her arm. Immediately followed by a new outburst from the spectators at the foot of the castle. She jumps, lands next to me and starts taking my clothes off. The vest loses a few buttons. I feel anger welling up but I don't have time to express it because she opens my pants and pulls the whole thing down. She's not ready yet. Everything has to go. I push her pulling hands away from my bra. I can do that myself. And without the seams tearing. She's bouncing from one leg to the other. Looks between the cars. She bites her nails. Her knuckles. Blinks her big dark eyes a hundred times. I spread my arms. That's all I have, that's what it means. A cold gust of wind makes the awkward hairs on my soft parts stand up painfully.
She grabs the bundle and shakes out a white petticoat. It goes over my head and just barely fits. I'm scrambling to get it down. She ties the lace tight at the back. Pulls the elastic bands out of my braids and combs them apart with her fingers. I am forced to sit on the bottom step. She kicks off her chamois boots and at the same time struggles with the large red bundle. “Put them on!”, she says imperiously, pointing to the boots. The floppy trunks are long. I awkwardly slide them over my calves. They are still warm and a bit roomy. Not that I get the chance to admire the handmade straps, I immediately have the next layer put over my head. The sultry smell of perfume takes my breath away.
It is a heavy dress made of red velvet with a tight upper body and a very wide skirt that reaches the floor. Once again my dresser tugs at the laces on my back, turns me around for an admiring second and then pushes me away.
She is puffing with effort. Hands on her knees. I stand, not understanding what she wants from me.
She points. “To the tree,” she gasps, “the moon is up. Go now! Go after it!”
Apparently she's not coming with. I hesitate for a moment. Her excited certainty seems so real. I don't sense any doubt or inauthenticity in her actions. It's pure. Clean as hell...well cleaner than anything here in the encampment. I start walking. Feel the rough ground through the soft soles of my boots. I have to lift the heavy skirt with both hands to avoid tripping over it. I think of the woman under the bridge. I almost feel myself slipping back in time. I keep running. Resisting. Just stay in the now. I hear the audience and faintly the voice of a speaker. This is better, I think. Better than listening to talk. The feeling of haste has infected me. There are no campers around the tree. Its surroundings are empty. It is also very uneven. I don't know what I'm doing. That's why I do exactly what my gut tells me. To the tree. I touch the enormous trunk. Look up. Trying to remember what else she said. After it? You can't chase a tree. The wind moves the now completely bare crown. I look around.
The moon is red. Just above the high field hangs a pockmarked glass ball. Craters and mountains clearly visible. Thin veils of clouds chase past it. Chasing the moon? It's ridiculous and yet I do it.
The big round light seems like a magnet that attracts me. It's a hole that sucks. I stumble through the clumps of grass because I don't look where I'm putting my feet. Past tents and campers again halfway towards the gathered people. There is a light on the high platform in the distance. The crowd of spectators is a dark forest. A tangle. A sod of ground-cover growing up the hill. There are even more than before. I'm walking to the moon. I chuckle. I'm really fucking going to the moon. It takes me to the left. To the bare ridge well to the left of the castle. Despite the sharp shadowing light of the full moon, it is difficult to see where I can safely stand. This is also where the large debris and bollards lie. Remnants of a stone-throwing fight between giants. I climb and clamber. Get heated and exhausted. And by God I don't know what I'm doing. I pause for a moment almost at the top of the ridge.
There is clapping and cheering. The speech is over. I would also clap, always nice when they stop talking. Then it becomes quiet. The lights go out on the platform. A small fire burns in a basket. The striped little man, the lord of the castle, is still clearly present even in the darkness, standing next to the flames. It is far away. I can't see the details. He lights a torch. Beautiful, I think, very symbolic. I want to continue walking again. Just a little bit longer, I think, but when I look up again I see that the torch is not a torch.
Forty meters in front of me there is a figure flashing a flashlight. It takes me a long time to connect those two pieces of information. On the high platform I see the leaking flame sticking up diagonally. The lord of the castle shouts something. Half into the microphone. The wind blows away the words. I can't understand them. The movement makes me recognize what is happening there. He has a longbow, the string of which he stretches far out. The torch is an arrow.
The next moment. The projectile shoots up into the dark sky, almost disappears for a moment because the fire seems to go out and then comes straight towards me at a breakneck pace. It goes so fast that I don't get a chance to get out of the way. With an insect-like growl and a dull thud, the burning tip whizzes into my wide skirt. A fire hornet.
The point has dug into my seam. Half the arrow disappeared into it. Between my feet. Between my spread legs. I am both relieved and angry. This bolt of lightning could have turned out very differently. I lift the skirt away from the arrow and that causes the head to flare up again. The heat hits my legs, my crotch. I viciously pull the shaft out of the mossy surface. There is a black hole in the beautiful dress. I stand with a burning torch in my hand that signaled the opening two seconds ago a hundred meters away.
The flashlight shines again. Now on me. I suddenly understand. I walk forward, towards the light and find the low pile of firewood. The boy standing there looks at me in awe and points. I insert the sputtering flame into the deadwood in several places. It takes a few seconds, but then the oil on the fire sets things ablaze so quickly that I have to step back from the high flames. Then the cheering breaks out.
Come, come, the fire-boy beckons. I have to go to the crowd. Then I just think, ow bugger, wear the dress woman, and put my resistance aside. A horse comes trotting from the right. It is Gorgio, medium hair, on one of their long haired tinkers. He pulls me onto the saddleless horse with him. Because of the skirt my legs have to stay on one side. The excited young man's eyes shine. He encourages the animal with a clack and we dash away. The cheering and shouting grows to deafening as we get among the crowds. Over the shoulder of my eager rider I see the blazing fire and the moon hanging above the dark castle.
This was a special day.
