by Non Bramley
I sighed and lay down. ‘In the morning. We’ll talk then.’
I was asleep in moments and less than happy when he woke me again.
‘You’re not going to ask me, are you?’
‘Ask you what?’
‘Do you not think I might have an opinion about you riding in to what may well be your death?’
I’d get no more sleep unless we had this out, so I sat up and rubbed my face. ‘I’m not planning to die in Banfield.’
‘But you might, and you don’t think that will affect me?’
‘Frankly, not much. I’m one of many. I’m sure you’d be sad.’
‘I’d be broken. You don’t think I love you.’
‘It’s too early for all of this. Just go to sleep.’
‘I’m not sleeping now and neither are you. You don’t think I love you?’
I could have thrown him out but instead I got out of bed. The sky was starting to lighten and I was now fully awake; might as well make an early start.
‘Do you?’ he said.
‘What difference does that make? You have lots of women, Philip. I think you like us all very much. You know how good a friend you are to me. I don’t need you to romance me.’
‘I’ve known you for two years and I’m still just your friend?’
I stepped on a boot and cursed, hopping about with my foot in my hand. It didn’t improve my mood. ‘Oh for the love of God! I’m a Reeve, I go where I’m sent. What’s changed? You knew all of this when you met me.’
‘You’re not natural. All this time we spend in bed and it’s like we’ve just shaken hands or something.’
I was tired, preoccupied and hungry, never a recipe for sweet temper. ‘You don’t love me, my dear. You’re annoyed because I don’t cry when you leave and die with jealousy when I see you with your hand on another woman’s arse. What you want is power, the fucking upper hand, not love. If you loved me you’d stop chasing every other quim that passed your nose. You don’t want to do that; I don’t want you to do that; it’s fine; it works, now stop acting like I’ve pissed in your porridge.’
‘I only sleep with other women because I can’t have you,’ he said.
‘You keep telling yourself that.’
He got out of bed and stood in my way. I pushed past him, pulling on my clothes. When I turned he was down on his knees.
‘Don’t,’ I said.
‘Will you marry me?’
God help me I actually laughed. ‘When, today?’
It was still too dark to see his expression.
‘Well, no. Just say you’ll marry me.’
I tugged at my boots and hauled the pack on to my shoulders, then opened the door, which threw more light into the room. He was still kneeling, naked, and I had a rush of affection for him.
‘If you need somewhere to stay while I’m away use this place if you like.’
As I closed the door he called me a bitch.
It was too early to set off, so I knocked on Sister Judith’s door. She’d become a good friend and I told her about Philip’s odd behaviour.
‘You don’t like whole things, you know,’ she said. ‘Everything you own is a little bit broken. He needs to carry on being a villain.’
‘He can be what he likes. Why is it always so bloody complicated?’
Judith shrugged. ‘Sex is always an exercise in power. The giver and taker. The weaker and the stronger. I think it’s built in, that element of aggression, in to the act itself. That can’t happen with you; it leaves some lovers feeling cheated.’
She fed me porridge and scrutinised my smile as she drizzled yellow honey into the bowl.
1 Simony – the buying and selling of relics and privileges.
Chapter Two
Thomas Tavener was waiting for me at the stables. He offered me an apple. It was golden green and russet, just like its giver. Thomas was beautiful, should your tastes run that way. He had the face of a medieval saint. Grey eyes and tawny hair. His newly shaven tonsure exposed a pale scalp, marked with flecks of blood where the knife had caught. Not many bothered with tonsures now; they were too cold.
My morning had started with an argument, and now I had that weary feeling that comes when you’re facing the prospect of a tricky job with an unfamiliar companion. Thomas held Meg, my mare, and a small pony that would carry both himself and our supplies. He seemed anxious to be off and delighted at the prospect of an adventure. I was less than delighted about two hundred miles spent on roads that would be increasingly perilous.
‘If you’re coming with me you’ll do as you’re told. If I say no fire, we shiver. If I say we stop and hide then that’s what we do,’ I said.
He smiled at me and offered Meg his own half-eaten apple. ‘I’ll do as I’m told. I’m used to that. I’ve never been east. Is it as wild as they say?’
‘We’ll find out,’ I said, and gave him our sacks of provisions to strap to the pony’s saddle. ‘Do you have a weapon?’
‘I’ve got a knife.’ He pulled a blunt looking thing from his belt.
‘That’s no good.’ I looked about me. ‘Bring me that rake.’
He fetched one that had been used to strain leaves from the water trough. I broke the handle and sharpened it to a point with my own blade.
He looked at me with amused incomprehension. ‘Do wolves fear rakes then?’
‘Look what I’m doing,’ I told him. ‘You keep it slipped through a saddle strap here. This end’s for pushing dammers away from you and your horse. The pointed end’s for jabbing anything you can’t keep away. Go for the eyes or the mouth, not the guts; blind it or break the jaw, they’re easy enough to break. If you see a wolf – and pray to God you don’t – just run. Get a stout door between you and it. Not much will stop them and stabbing them just gets them annoyed. A rake is what you need.’
—That hardly seems sufficient, Jude.
—Years ago a dammer caught me with my britches down. I carried a knife then and all it did was tangle in its guts. Anything pointed slides straight through, and if you get caught in a loop of skin you’ll be dragging the bugger around till doomsday. I smashed its head in with a rock but I very nearly died bare-arsed.
Tom pointed at the long-handled hammer hanging from my own belt. ‘What’s that for then?’
‘This is one of the few things that will slow a wolf down. If you break its legs or crack its skull, it’ll think twice and you can make a run for it, but it won’t stop. If you’re really lucky its mates will decide a wolf with a broken leg is an easier kill than you.’
My hammer is a heavy beast that takes power to swing. I still have it. Brother Levi says I should give it up but I tell him he can have it if he can take it from me. I still have my hammer.
It took us ten days to travel to Banfield, only moving in full daylight. I discovered that Thomas liked to talk, and what he talked about was God. He was a walking education in theology. He bored me, but seemed a good enough lad apart from that. He’d been born at the abbey at Berwyn, a former prison now converted.
‘You didn’t want to stay there, join the community?’ I asked.
‘My mother wanted me to, but when she died I thought I’d travel a bit. I got as far as Saint Ivo’s. That’s why I’m going to Banfield, to see the world.’
‘I’m not sure how much of the world you’ll see from a lazar house.’
‘It’ll still be more than if I’d stayed where I was. I’d like to found a house one day. Make it the greatest abbey in England, or Wales. I need to learn.’
‘There’s nothing wrong with that ambition, lad. Good luck to you.’
He started to see me as a friend, I think.
On the fifth night we were lucky to find a stone-built hut just away from the road. It was round and solid with a domed roof. It looked like a jail, the space within divided by floor-to-ceiling iron bars. I walked around it kicking the stonework, shaking the grille in the single small window. It was safe, so we finished that day’s travel early and squeezed our ponies throu
gh the barred cell door; they would have an uncomfortable but safe night.
Two curved stone benches built into the walls would be our beds, but Thomas chose to lay his blankets out on the brick floor. I decided to let him find out on his own why this was a bad idea.
He had been particularly talkative that day and I’d heard a word that I’d thought gone from the world. Thomas had talked about heresy.
At the time I’d simply slapped the back of his head and told him not to repeat it. Ever. He’d frowned and rubbed his perfect skull.
‘We have to keep to the straight path, Jude. We need to show the people the way to God. Heresy needs to be stamped out or all will be confusion.’
I stopped Meg and tried not to swear at his intent face. ‘For there to be heresy there has to be a doctrine … a set of rules, that all of us are prepared to die for, prepared to kill for. There’s no law, lad. Just a few scattered houses that are frankly making it up as they go along.’
‘It won’t always be like that.’
‘The world you’re talking about has gone, and thank Christ for it.’
He looked mutinous and deflated and had been quiet for the rest of the afternoon. It was unlike him and I thought, well, he’s young and the young want a crusade; they want something to believe in. What do I believe? Well, right now I believe that it’s a bad idea to sleep in horse piss, so I told him to move his bed roll off the floor.
He cheered up when we went foraging, looking for early berries to liven up our usual meal of hard bread and cheese. We found wild garlic and collected enough to enjoy but not enough to give us the shits. It was still full daylight, but we would need to get back to the safety of the jail soon. Wolves hunt at dusk. Thomas, predictably, had wandered off. I heard him yelp and headed towards his cries.
He stood over a dead wolf. It was female and young, the long snout curled back in a snarl. Between its legs was an infant, new-born and sluggishly moving in a pool of black blood.
‘Died giving birth,’ I said.
‘Should we kill it?’ Thomas asked. ‘Would it be kinder than leaving it to die?’
‘There’s no need,’ I said. ‘It’ll be dead within the hour, and then one of its uncles or aunts, or maybe its father will be along to dine off mother and baby. Very practical, wolves.’
I headed back, Thomas lagging behind.
That night we heard the shrieks of beasts all around us – dinner was served. I slept long and well but Thomas had a wakeful night. When I woke he was huddled in his blankets, arms around his knees.
‘They were out there … all night,’ he said.
We came to a river bubbling over boulders and ribboned with weed, and stopped to let the horses drink and rest. We’d have to cross but it was shallow here so it didn’t concern me.
Birds of prey called high above us, attracted by the trout that moved in the deeper stretches. I spent a happy half-hour watching the great birds stoop and dive into the dark water, flapping sodden wings and rising, airborne once more with their catch.
—Out of their element fish are such vulnerable things, Levi – no claws, no limbs. All they can do is throw their bulbous heads back and forth like a solemn refusal.
Thomas poked around the riverbank, getting his feet wet. ‘I’m hungry,’ he said, just as a great fish, as long as my forearm, fell at my feet, stone dead from the long drop. A bird from on high screamed in frustration.
‘God is great!’ Tom shouted, hurrying over to it. ‘Surely this has been sent from heaven!’
‘Surely,’ I said. ‘By way of a hungry bird.’
I cut it in two and threw half high up into the air where it was snatched by the eagle, or whatever it was. Thomas frowned at the loss of one half of his dinner, but cheered up once the other was sizzling away on a flat rock placed over the fire.
Like all young things Tom found it hard to sit and wait. He got up in search of more firewood, stopping near a stand of last year’s greenery at the water’s edge. He was searching for his blunt knife, so I got up and went over to help him. What he was about to do made my mouth run dry.
‘Don’t touch it! It’s poison,’ I told him, taking hold of his arm.
‘It’s cow parsley,’ he said, trying good naturedly to squirm out of my grip.
‘It’s water dropwort … hemlock. Touch it or burn it and you’re dead. Mother of God, you didn’t make the fire with this?’
He looked at me, and then the innocuous-looking weed. ‘I do it all the time. It burns well.’
Despite the seriousness of our position I grinned at him. I had a split lip, a legacy of my last arrest and it smarted, but the absurdity of this last moment of our lives made it impossible to keep a straight face. What a way to die in a world infested with monsters – suicide by fish! Water hemlock will kill you if you eat it, kill you if you break it and then touch your eyes or mouth and kill you if you burn it. Even its dust is fatal. The only warning of its deadly nature are faint purple spots on the stem.
‘Don’t joke, lad. Did you make the fire with it?’
‘Why are you smiling?’ he asked me. ‘No, I didn’t. I used pinecones.’
It was probably the best fish I have ever tasted.
—If I’m honest with myself, Levi, I was disappointed.
—You wanted to die, Jude?
—No, but it really was a beautiful place. So still.
I felt sorry for the lad. What Thomas wanted most was order in a chaotic world. He still thought he could plan against death. Tom picked at his meal and offered me his plate after a few mouthfuls. I ate his too. I am always hungry.
Brightly coloured plastic fragments had caught in the sandy bank where we sat. One seemed to fascinate him, taking his mind off his recent scare. It was green and silver with the words Turkish Delight written in an odd script.
‘What do you think this is?’ he said, peering at it.
‘Middle-time things. No sense and no purpose.’
‘It’s very pretty though,’ he said quietly, and put it in a pocket.
Later, as we were riding, he said, ‘What do you mean, middle-time things?’
I was amazed it had taken him so long to ask. He’d truly been frightened.
‘Things from the old times I can see a purpose to, I can hold it in my hand and see what it is. Things from the middle times don’t have a use, or seem too flimsy to use, and things from now are useful and right. Middle-time things are just boxes you can’t mend or burn on the fire for warmth. Pretty but useless.’
‘Pretty but useless,’ he echoed.
I asked him if he’d ever been into one of the middle-time dwellings.
He shook his head. ‘They’re haunted by the spirits of the unshriven dead.’
—From such fierce faith does greatness grow, Jude. Think of him kindly.
I stopped my horse and made him turn and walk his pony back to me. ‘Tom, listen to me. Life is complicated and these old rules – confession, penance and all of it – they can’t work here. Let faith sit lightly on you. Don’t let it stop you from really seeing people and really knowing God.’
He didn’t understand.
The land around us changed the further west we travelled. We avoided settlements. Those we saw were long abandoned. All was brambles and weeds as high as Meg’s shoulders. I could see no sign of ploughing or sowing. If there were people living here, it wasn’t off the land.
We travelled ancient lanes that had grown into green tunnels. Sparrows moved in great bickering clouds as we approached and once I saw a stoat struggling to drag away a rabbit. Cowslips bloomed everywhere and the air was filled with the sound of early bees. I envied them their simplicity of purpose.
Those we met on the road I asked for directions to the next landmark. That’s how we travelled back then, navigating the few miles from one known place to another. Some were walking to Banfield to visit the shrine of Saint Credan, but couldn’t keep up with our horses’ pace.
We slept in empty churches. Sometimes other travellers
joined us for the night. Not one of them failed to be charmed by the bright beauty of Thomas. I saw them look from him to me, and read the question there.
Once we shivered a dangerous night in a stone barn with no roof. April can still strike cold. We heard wolves that night but although they scratched and whistled and stuck their long snouts under the door to sniff us out, they didn’t attack.
I was confused but relieved. On the last day, when we were just a few miles from Banfield we came across a middle-time dwelling that looked almost intact.
‘Come on,’ I told him, dismounting. ‘We’re going in.’
Thomas looked mutinous, we were close to the city - could see the abbey church spires clearly, and the winding green lane we were travelling down could easily yet take us a circuitous route. We could strike out across the overgrown fields but that kind of rough ground can break a horse’s leg. Still, we could spare a little time to explore.
The house was a single-storey building with gaping holes that I assumed must once have been filled with a great expanse of glass. Even the door must have been mostly glass. Some of it was still embedded in the frame, which we both stepped through.
‘What about wolves?’ Thomas said.
‘Too light for them now. They like dark places. Just stay in the light.’
This place was warm with sunlight. The floor was paved with a pleasing pattern in wood that was still intact. In one room we found rusted metal boxes big enough for a child to hide in.
Back-tracking across the beautiful floor, I was stopped by a familiar stink. In a small room of indeterminate purpose we found the remains of three people, probably. It looked like a man, women and child, or perhaps a large and small man and child; impossible to tell as the faces had been gnawed off and the torsos stripped of flesh. Their skins were a dark burnished copper. What remained of their intestines had been dragged out on to the floor.
‘They eat the intestines first,’ I said. ‘They like them best.’
He turned and fled.