by Hana Cole
Soon after his arrival, the governor’s librarian approached him. An Italian holy man, Francis, had arrived, seeking to convert the Sultan by preaching poverty and peace. His curiosity aroused, Al Kamil asked his clerics to interrogate Gui on the beliefs of this mendicant to ensure that the Sultan gained no advantage of secret knowledge. Thus Gui’s duties have been to assist the librarian in the quest for all books on the matter, ferrying parchments back and forth between the palace and the libraries, church vaults and private residences of the great city.
Stooped by age, the librarian does not always accompany him, and the guards pay him little mind as he comes and goes, trailed by an entourage of servant boys with boxes stacked upon their heads. They have been nearly a week in this task already and he does not know when Al Kamil will decide this particular avenue does not contain the mystery of the Ages and tire of it. Is this his best chance?
The call of the muezzin rings out. It is the only time the servants’ entrance is unguarded. His head is still buzzing from his encounter with the slave master and the fog of sleeplessness. All at once, the scourge marks on his son’s back harry his sight. His body heats with fury. God so loved the world He gave His only son. Gui knows it is a lie. What father would sacrifice his own son? For what? For this greedy and reckless world? ‘Do you ask me to give mine?’ he hisses. Above his head hangs a mahogany crucifix that the governor has provided. He wants to throw it at the wall.
‘Enough,’ he mutters and stuffs his few possessions into his bag. Slinging it over his shoulder, with a couple of large prayer books under his arm, he winds his way down the narrow staircase of the servants’ wing. There are two men at the entrance and he recognises neither. Inwardly he curses. He should have waited a few moments longer for them to turn to prayer. He raises his eyes to the graver looking of the two and salutes with a nod. The man raises his chin in query. It is the toss of the dice.
‘Books to be returned to the Coptic monastery,’ Gui says, hoisting up his bag. The men exchange glances. His heartbeat surges.
‘Where is the librarian?’ the guard asks.
Gui rests his hand on his stomach and mimes sickness.
The other man returns a nod and it is done.
Outside the palace gates, Gui sheds his black robe and flees north, a fleeting shadow among those who must rise to prepare the day for those of greater means. Men are already gathered beneath the buttresses of the Citadel, seeking the labour that drives them to risk the disease and dangers of the city.
On the other side of the road, a group of tribesmen are packing away their belongings in the dawn light. Scarves flick into place for travel, their eyes fix on the path ahead. A cloud of dust rises up with their beasts as they depart. Gui feels a weight at his back; the weight of someone’s attention. His peripheral sight detects no one but still, he can feel someone watching. His nerves? Perhaps.
Gui knows he will not be missed until the boys’ lesson after their morning prayers - the governor’s children do not have to rise before the dawn. Once his absence is noted, the governor’s honour will require that he send an outrider to find him. Such a man will travel twice the speed of a coach. He has two hours advantage, three at most, and the journey is two days long. If Etienne is to remain free, he must get to him first. The penalty for failure he has no time to imagine.
Chapter Thirty-three
The place she does not recognise, but she does know it is not the ancestral home of Amaury de Maintenon. They have turned off the main road to Dreux, and Mainteon’s chateux is a league or two behind them now. The bailiff has seated her in front of him as make their way along a track, cut with deep furrows of mud, the sky a canopy of gold dust above them on this crystal clear night.
At first, she gripped the pommel’s horn tightly, barely daring to breathe, doing all she could to prevent her body from touching his. But the anticipated violence has not come, and now she does not think that it will. Her captor has taken her hand axe, but not the arming sword she resheathed beneath her tunic. It is possible that he simply hasn’t seen it she supposes, but that does not seem likely - not a feudal retainer of his rank and practise.
He rides at a steady pace, just enough to keep the worst of the chill at bay, and the easy rhythm gives awkward comfort to this unexplained journey. Although the enigmatic bailiff has not said a word, he has wrapped a blanket around her shoulders, and she fancies she can sense something troubling him. Remorse? Sharing a saddle is an act of such intimacy, it would require a person to toss away their soul before they could blot out their awareness of the other.
It prompts her to risk asking their destination. Twice she has tried to get an answer. Although he raised no impatient hand, he will not speak. Perhaps he knows the dangers of striking up conversation with a captive you are inclined to pity? She doesn’t believe the man who steers the horse is soulless - heaven knows she has met plenty of them. No, rather it seems to her that he is lost, as though he has hazarded his lot on a game that he has no way to cease playing, even though he has long since tired of it.
The eerie song of a wolf pack has been following them since they turned onto the track. Suddenly, a howl from the alpha sounds, just paces away. The stallion shies and takes a stumbling sidestep, forcing the bailiff up from his seat. As they both grip the horse, the corner of the saddle cover peels back. Agnes reads Michel de Plaissis bezeled into the leather. Her heart skips. Now she has a name.
‘Michel?’ she blurts out, before the courage of impulse deserts her. The bailiff draws an audible breath.
‘The saddle bears your name.’ She cranes round to face him. His eyes are a soft brown. Not as dark as Gui’s, and without their ardent spark, but there is a warmth to them that tells her he has a good heart.
‘Will you not tell me where we are going?’
‘What does it matter?’ Michel replies. ‘Besides, we are nearly there, look for yourself.’
The row of timber dwellings look as though a series of labourers’ cottages have been refashioned as one building. Opposite, Agnes makes out the frame of an empty stable; no one of means lives here, or visits often. Michel dismounts and draws his horse to a trough of rain water. There is a dim, yellow glow at one of the windows. They are expected.
Drawing the blanket around her more tightly, she shambles over to Michel.
‘Why are you doing this?’ she asks. ‘What of those children?’
His eyes dart to his boots. ‘This way.’
The old woman who answers the door is almost invisible. She doesn’t stoop, but her hair, scraped up into a cap, is completely white. There is a soft down on her wrinkled cheeks. Agnes imagines she is well into her eighth decade and has been in service all her life. The housekeeper gives a bob to the bailiff and says, ‘I’ve prepared a room for the lady as you asked. Will you take supper now?’
‘No, thank you,’ he says, and she shuffles off, a small bird of a woman dwarfed by the low beams of this modest place.
Michel stands before Agnes in silence. For a moment she thinks he isn’t going to say anything at all. Then, he lifts his hazel eyes to hers and says, ‘I’ll do my best to find the children.’
‘Who..?’ Agnes begins, but she does not need to finish the question.
‘Inquisitor de Nogent,’ he cuts in.
Agnes closes her eyes. Of course.
‘I will be here until he arrives.’
Michel reaches the door before he turns and says, ‘I’m sorry.’
Although he leaves without another word, Agnes is left with the impression there is more he wants to tell her. Much more.
Agnes thinks she must have dozed for a bit, but the sound of hooves on the courtyard do not wake her from any dream. Quickly, she rises to peek out the window, grateful that the lord has given her these moments to prepare as Bernard de Nogent steps down from his carriage. She was expecting to feel only fear, but to her surprise, she finds it mingles with the warm seduction of hatred. Her hardships have had their purpose, it seems. All her tears h
ave dried diamond hard.
Although she has had half the night to ponder it, she has no answer as to why he has brought her to this place and not the dungeons of the Inquisition. Was it at the behest of Maintenon? It seems unlikely that Maintenon would have her deposited in this secluded cottage instead of the comfort of his own manor. Rather she feels as though she is being hidden, and her instinct tells her that guessing why may be the difference between life and death.
The slam of the front door shakes the building’s timber frame. Agnes returns to her pallet, pulling the cover back up over her in the hope that a feigned sleep will give her a few more hours. But it does not. Bernard de Nogent is well versed enough in extracting confessions to know that interrogating the weary yields results more effectively.
When she enters the room he is scratching his eyebrow like an impatient tithe collector awaiting payment. First, Agnes feels dread stir in her gut. Then, she remembers his signature, looped over documents that sold her son. The choler rises. He has come alone with his driver, a middle aged man already bowed down with the cares of too many mouths to feed. Apart from the old woman and the driver, it is just she and de Nogent in the house.
‘Admirable,’ de Nogent says, ‘your tenacity.’
‘What have you done with my son?’
The wiry eyebrows jolt up into his forehead. ‘Your son?’ He pauses, grimaces. Agnes feels cold fingers of uncertainty grip her insides.
‘You did well to evade us for so long, waiting for your idiot of a lover.’
He doesn’t know where I was, she thinks, and smiles inwardly at this small victory.
‘I’m not waiting for anyone,’ she says.
He laughs, a hoarse, mocking sound that grates in the back of his throat. It makes her want to spit at him. The inquisitor steps in front of the hearth and warms his hands behind his back. Silence. Refusing to give him the satisfaction of her confusion, she stares, mute, at the floor in front of her.
‘You want to play games with me?’ he says. ‘You don’t remember what it was like last time?’
‘What are you going to do?’Agnes says. ‘Try me again?’
‘You know I don’t need to try you again. No one knows you are here. I can dispatch you when I am ready. No one will notice.’ Now, standing erect, he steps forward, rubbing his warmed hands together.
‘You have kidnapped me just to dispatch me unnoticed?’
The inquisitor purses his lips. ‘That was a very daring rescue you were attempting, the bailiff tells me. What were you planning to do with a gang of heathen children. Or hadn’t you thought that far ahead?’
‘Anything would be better than the evil you have devised.’
‘I have devised?’ He tuts at her. ‘No, no. I was hoping that you were going to tell me who devised it.’
‘Why are you asking me when you must already know?’
‘I do know who,’ he concedes. ‘But I don’t know why. And that is what you are going to tell me.’
There is such awkwardness to his question, it strikes her that he is trying to extract information without revealing his purpose.
She feels certain that if de Nogent were planning to dispatch her tonight he would have made his move by now. As the acid brew of fear ebbs in her veins, there creeps the exhaustion of this sleepless, disorienting night, bringing its own menace. The flames of the fire are the forked tongues of dragons, strange shadows race up the walls, the room feels alive, as though they are not alone. She stretches open her eyes.
‘How should I know?’
De Nogent shakes his head. There is a viciousness to his smile and it starts her blood pumping again.
‘You’ve been such a busy bee haven’t you, Agnes de Coudray? You are going to tell me.’ Unexpectedly, he takes the poker from the fire grate and smashes it down on the tiles with such force that a chip of flint flies off. She flinches at the assault. Now she is wide awake.
‘You are going to tell me everything you know about Amaury de Maintenon.’
Finally she understands why she was brought here, out of sight of Maintenon and his retainers. Their partnership of convenience, it seems, is no longer so convenient.
‘You’ve had a tiff, haven’t you?’ she says.
The perfect way to dispossess people of their land: have the Inquisition condemn them as heretics. The Church must hand its victims over to a secular lord for blood punishment. Then, really, who is watching what becomes of their property? Lord knows how much stolen land Maintenon is sitting on by now, she thinks. He doesn’t need a dangerous zealot of an inquisitor to help him steal more.
‘He has tired of you, has he?’ she says. ‘Do you think I know something that you can use to condemn him?’
The stony stare tells her that is the case. It also tells her that once she has told him what he needs to know she will no longer be useful.
‘Do not test me,’ de Nogent spits. His black irises are a pinprick; no light of a soul behind them.
Agnes’s mind flits back to her arming sword, now secreted under her straw pallet. An admixture of hate combines with the fear swelling within her. Is it fierce enough to overcome this desiccated old vulture? Even if escape from the cottage were possible, with such zealous enemies and the isolation of this unknown terrain, would she last the night out in the open? Fleetingly, the bailiff’s last glance returns to her mind’s eye. It is an imagined promise, hardly a hope, but it is all she has. If she can keep de Nogent waiting, will that be enough? She has no choice, she has to keeping playing his game. The blood rushes in her ears.
‘Even if I did know something useful about Maintenon, why should I tell you? Once you have what you want, you have no further need of me.’
‘Think of it more as a simple choice. You can tell me your tale here by the relative comfort of this hearth, or you can tell it harder, later. Much harder.’
Agnes fights the urge to swallow as saliva floods her mouth. The inquisitor gives his rictus grin; a menace that tells her he will torture her anyway. Her heart thumps in her stomach. There is only one way to delay this she can think of. He is just a man, she tells herself as she feels her insides shrink away. He has no way of knowing whether you are lying. Agnes speaks slowly, buying herself all the precious time she can to think.
‘What if I do give you information that condemns Amaury de Maintenon,’ she says. ‘But in condemning Maintenon, you will also condemn yourself?’
‘What?’ The top lip of the inquisitor peels back.
‘I will give you the information you require about Maintenon. But when, and only when, I am released unharmed, will I give you the proof I have that links you to his crimes.’
‘You dare to threat me, Agnes Le Coudray?’ The inquisitor’s eyes are on stalks, his sickly pallor mottled pink.
Now he is off centre. Agnes allows the possibilities to tumble through her mind. Lady de Coucy’s parchments. The sale of Saracen slaves is not a crime, and the
reference to the shepherd crusaders in de Nogent’s note is too oblique. At least without witnesses. Noble witnesses. Hastily she sifts through her memory; her meeting with Lady Yolande, the letter, the bailiff. There must be something she can use.
‘If you do not release me, those to whom I have entrusted the evidence will see you hanged.’
De Nogent shakes off the threat and approaches Agnes. He leans right into her face so she can smell his sour breath. He pokes his index finger into her jaw.
‘Enough stalling. You have nothing to barter for your own life.’
Agnes fights the urge to close her eyes. If she withdraws now she is dead. She stares ahead, seeing nothing. Think, she instructs herself. The bailiff’s reluctance, poor Sister Octavia taken with the children to be traded. The chest full of gold. Gold that was to be delivered to Maintenon along with the human chattel? The money he made selling her son? The urgency of it fogs her mind. Think! She has no more time, she must hazard her guess. Turning to de Nogent, she looks right into those reptilian pupil, still probing her
.
‘I have proof that is…solid gold,’ she says, and she sees the muscle around his eye socket contract involuntarily. It is the tinest quiver, but his reaction makes her bold enough to risk the number she does have. ‘Five thousand, six hundred livres worth.’ Now de Nogent backs away. It makes her want to roar in triumph.
‘The thing is, inquisitor, you have been in partnership with a murderer for decades. Despoiling the innocent and making enemies you don’t even know you have.’ She leans into the bluff. ‘Some of your victims escape, don’t they? And no matter how hard you look, you can’t find them.’
The inquisitor exhales a long, wheezing breath. ‘The truth is always mine in the end,’ he replies. ‘And there is no better truth than the rack.’
With that he reaches up and tugs the bell pull for the old serving woman, leaving Agnes standing alone in front of the last embers of the dying fire. Will her bluff be good enough? Has she unleashed the dogs on poor Octavia? She heard a man being tortured on the rack when she was in de Nogent’s dungeon ten year’s ago. It is not a sound you hear with your ears, it is a torment you feel in your innards. She knows there is no lie – or truth – good enough to withstand it. She crosses herself.
‘God help me,’ she whispers.
*
Someone is hammering at the door.
‘Quick!’ Yalda’s voice rises urgently from the boudoir. Etienne can tell from the heavy, insistent thuds, that it is not a client.
They have the routine well-rehearsed. Grabbing a flask of water, Etienne and Christophe race out into the courtyard and pull themselves up a trellis to the balcony above, where Yalda’s neighbour lets them hide under her canvas awning. It’s hot under there, and boring, but after one near miss when a local administrator nearly found them in the courtyard, Yalda insists on it.