Bright Belovèd

by Non Bramley

  Lollis returned from the lazar house before dusk, asking for me. I was up on the walls so she sent David out to hunt for me. He found me in the northeast tower, muffled up against the cold of twilight. The towers were open to the elements and the hot drink he carried with him was a thoughtful touch.

  ‘It’s camomile with a little honey,’ he said, huffing after his long climb. ‘It’s probably stone cold by now though. Sorry.’

  I took it. ‘It’s warmer than I am. Thank you. You didn’t come all this way to bring me this, did you?’

  He leant over the parapet. ‘Christ save us, there’s more tonight. Look at them!’ He watched the thick shadows dart and flow.

  ‘It’s a terrible feeling,’ he said, ‘knowing that all that stands between us and them is a very old wall.’

  ‘I’ve tested these walls. They’re solid. To be frank we’d all be dead by now if there was a way in. Just keep your nerve.’

  He looked at me. ‘I nearly forgot – Lollis wants to see you. She said no rush but to come when your watch is over. She looked like she’d seen a ghost to be honest.’

  ‘There must be some putrefying cases in the lazar house. It’ll be the middle of the night when I’m done.’

  ‘She knows that. Wants you to come anyway. Says she’ll be up.’

  ‘Do you know what she wants?’ I said.

  ‘No. I think she’d had a few drinks, some of that stuff you found in the town.’

  ‘Let’s hope she’s left some for me then,’ I said, smiling at him.

  David took my cup and turned to leave. Then he stopped. ‘Reeve, has anyone told you about Brother Simon and Anne Mercer?’

  ‘Will mentioned Anne’s friend, a young Brother.’

  ‘That’s him, Simon. He worked in the infirmary with the sick and died of the red-water not long before she disappeared.’

  ‘Were they in love?’

  ‘I couldn’t say. They were definitely good friends. I always thought that Simon wasn’t interested in anyone in that way. Nasty way to die, poor man, bleeding to death out of both ends. Still, at least it’s quick, over in two or three hours once your urine turns red. Then you just bleed and bleed. Awful.’

  He shivered and I told him to go back and warm himself.

  David, with his strange face, had never had a love affair of his own and so took an interest in the romances of others. It was useful to me but made my heart ache for him.

  The stars above my head shone like wet sand at sunset, yellow, pink, blue and green - grains of light in such abundance. It was like living inside a geode, the sky above us an arc of glittering crystal.

  Sound carries far in the night. I sat and listened to the conversations of owls and tried to ignore the strangely familiar groans and growls of our murderous neighbours.

  When I heard it, a faint shriek of pure fear I had no idea where it had come from. I moved to the other side of the tower and it came again, the long almost sexual moan of a human being torn apart. It had come from inside the walls.

  I followed the sounds of rising panic to the infirmary. Inmates stood in front of the barred door, shaking and wailing.

  ‘Oh God,’ said a voice from behind it.

  Lollis.

  ‘Close the door behind me,’ I said as more pale faces appeared in the candlelight. ‘And check the gates, now!’

  I pulled up the wooden bar.

  She was on her back, juddering with the movement of the wolf’s jaws that were deep in her abdomen. It raised its head, shifted its weight and then bit delicately into the flesh of her cheek as Lollis spoke two words “selfless”, and “easier”.

  She rolled her eyes up and looked at me, trying to speak again but the beast tore away the flesh of her bottom lip.

  Then it went back to her belly and she hissed as it tugged at some hidden part in the cavity it had made.

  I stepped forward and hit it across the side of its face as it raised its bloody snout to snarl at me.

  —Why did you hesitate, Jude? Why did you let it hurt her more before you stepped into the fight?

  —Lollis was dying. There was nothing I could do. Always take a few seconds to think if you’re ever in a life-and-death fight. Use your brain before your muscles.

  Wolves are spider-like when they fight; they scuttle and jump, but I had caught this one a ferocious blow and stunned it a little. It backed away from Lollis and I stepped over her body, protecting it although I knew she was dying.

  The wolf had come in through the door that led to Lollis’s herb garden. The green stuff she was chopping when it attacked smelled pungent enough to cover the blood and shit she lay in.

  The wolf was female and young. Too young to be hunting alone. Its eyes darted towards the door.

  Then it jumped at me.

  I hit it again, didn’t feel the claws slash across my arm, parting the skin like a knife cut.

  My blow had dented its face, crushed its cheek. One eye looked deadened. I kicked a chair at it and it flinched. I had hurt it.

  Lollis made obscene urgent sounds with her ruined mouth but I couldn’t turn to her. The wolf tried to get behind me but I moved to face it and it leapt again. This time my hammer caught its ribs and I felt them cave in. It lay on the floor, thrashing and screaming, frothy blood spraying from its jaws as bones pierced its lungs. I took another swipe from its hind claws as I stepped in for the kill, pounding its ribcage until I crushed its heart and it lay dead.

  Looking back, it was too easy a kill.

  Lollis was still alive. The wolf had stripped the skin from her neck and the left side of her torso. There was just a hole where her intestines should have been that pulsed with bright blood. I could see her spine. The pain must have been unimaginable but she was silent as she died, holding my hand.

  It is the manner of her death …

  God help me, it’s the manner of her death that makes me so angry, even now. She was food. If you’re murdered by another human at least there’s some acknowledgement in it. They’ve been triggered by you – your actions, your sex, your shape – something even more nebulous maybe, but at least they have seen you. Being chosen as a victim suggests you’ve been considered.

  There was nothing about Lollis that the wolf saw apart from the poundage of meat she’d provide. Her lightning-quick brain didn’t matter, only how easy it would be to crack her skull to get at it. She was no different to the sheep and pigs and cattle we slaughter every day. We don’t consider anything about their existence. All we want is their flesh.

  All creatures die in the same way. Legs thrash, feet drum on the floor – they rage at it. In Lollis’s wordless squeals was the same message as that of a pig: Don’t hurt me! I’m afraid! No! If the animal’s young its lowing means only one thing – Mother!

  I’m a killer. You are too. Every day we breathe we take the lives of others. The flax and linen we weave for our clothing is born of the little deaths of plants. We eat and eat and eat and I think it’s the fact that Lollis fell from her point at the tip of this arrow of destruction that makes me so sick.

  The only creatures I kill now can speak my name.

  —That’s enough for today, Levi.

  —I shall pray for her soul, Jude.

  Lollis was buried beside the oak tree that shaded the east corner of the abbey church. I was heart-sore at her loss but grief is a luxury a Reeve cannot afford.

  How this wolf had got in at all was a vexed question. The most likely answer seemed to be that it had somehow broken down a young tree and laid it upright against the wall. It would be an easy job to scuttle up it and drop down into the herb garden. Once there it could have squeezed through the window bars – young ones are as lithe as a cat. I had never heard of any wolf using a tool, let alone being capable of the kind of planning that this suggested, but, there was the tree as evidence, still lying at the base of the west wall.

  Leaving the safety of the walls to drag it away or saw it in half would be a death sentence. I made do with dropping spirit-so
aked kindling onto the trunk and setting it alight so it couldn’t be used again. From now on those not on sentry duty would be locked in their rooms at night, just in case.

  David, that good soul, collected Lollis’s belongings. Anything useful he shared amongst the community. For the time being he would see to the abbey’s hurts, although he had little knowledge and only kindness to recommend him. He could read, and spent his evenings poring over Lollis’s handwritten notes as she described diseases, cures and observations.

  I spent my days fretting at the confinement and worrying at the mystery of our murderer. The thought that he was within these walls made me mistrust every word spoken to me.

  I watched them all.

  We still ate together, but all was silence now. David spent his meal times reading and seemed oblivious to the stifling atmosphere.

  One dark afternoon when winter rain thundered on the roof as we ate our sole meal of the day, he said: ‘Lollis was an amazing mind. We really need to get some of her writings copied. They could be important. See here.’ He pointed to a line in the text. ‘She writes that wolves go for the intestines because they have symptoms of scurvy – the mottled skin and trouble with daylight. Not enough fresh stuff so they eat what we eat.’

  ‘For the love of God, David,’ Johanna said weakly, pushing her watery stew away.

  ‘And she thought that being very sick might be some protection from attack … that she’d never known a leper to be taken.’

  ‘So has there ever been an attack on the leper house?’ I said, looking around the room.

  ‘Yes,’ said Johanna. ‘One was taken two years ago.’

  ‘Excuse me, Prior, but that was one of the brothers, not a leper. And it was outside the leper house walls,’ David said diffidently.

  ‘So it was,’ Johanna said. ‘God is good. At least that terrible affliction might be some protection from Lollis’s fate.’

  —Before the fall, there must have been people who knew about the stars, about the body, about the world. We still have books but there are so few of us now that it’ll be years until the kind of mind that can understand them is born. Even then, they’ll be starting from scratch, inching themselves up the ladder of learning. Lollis was that kind of mind. We should have made better use of her.

  Night after night I lay on my back in my chilly room, going over the greatest crime it had ever been my job to unravel: a child who somehow had been both present and absent before she had disappeared, and the grieving father of a saintly young woman who had fled these walls and likely met her bloody end in a rotting church. I had no body to prove Anne was dead but the volume of dried blood – the thyme leaves – made me think it likely that she was the third victim of the same killer, and that her remains had been moved to some other place as yet undiscovered. There was the single dark hair but I couldn’t prove it was Anne Mercer’s. Lying cold in the mortuary, two young women, dressed like brides and murdered in the dark with a knife cut to the throat had been players in some ritual. The rituals seemed identical, but Magdela’s murder had somehow also elicited a sexual element.

  The killer hid from me behind tangles of thread.

  Then, in the midst of this terrible time - an inevitable tragedy. Mother Cohen went to sleep one night and never woke again. It was no murderer this time, except the one that takes us all in the end.

  Her body was placed in the mortuary where the bitter winter would keep it fresh until the ground was soft enough to dig a grave.

  It was here that David came across Peter Piss Pot, who had slipped into the mortuary unseen, lifted the old woman’s skirts and parted her legs.

  If I had not reached them before Will Mercer, I believe Peter would have been beaten to death.

  We had our man.

  Chapter Eleven

  It’s an odd thing knowing that you’ve been living with a man who is not only suffering from a sexual perversion, but has allowed that perversion to blossom into murder.

  David had come across Peter in the middle of his ghastly pleasures and had been frightened to his core. Despite this he’d struggled with the man, gaining a cracked rib in the process. When you’re in the middle of a physical fight you don’t realise how much noise you make – smashing glass, falling tables and the cries of the two men had brought others running. David was not made for combat and was sitting on the floor when I arrived and pushed through the little crowd at the door, his face red and rubbery. Peter was curled up in the corner, hands over his head and silent.

  I sent Anice running for Johanna just as Will arrived. He was reasonable at first, simply standing over Peter and asking him if he had taken Anne. Peter said nothing so Will kicked him in the head and was ready, I think, to kick him to death. I dragged him off, and to my shame I had to hurt him, just a punch to the belly but it winded him enough to bring him to his senses.

  ‘We’ve got him,’ I said. ‘He’s going nowhere. Trust me, Will. This is my job. I know what I’m doing. I’ll get the truth for you.’

  I bundled everyone but the wretched accused, Johanna and David out of the door, bolted it then sat on a low stool, the only piece of furniture in the room left whole. The body of Eva Cohen was still on the table, still naked from the waist down.

  ‘Is that how you found her, David?’

  He nodded and I covered her. Peter didn’t move, but his silence vibrated with fear and shame.

  Johanna looked green and put her arm around David’s shoulders. I put my finger to my lips, signalling them both to be silent then sat wearily next to Peter, my back to the wall. My boots scraped against the floor as I stretched out my legs and he coiled himself tighter.

  Now, I could have picked him up and hit him till his nose splintered and his teeth loosened, but that’s rarely the way to get to the truth. Peter was not on his feet brazenly denying any wrongdoing. I didn’t need to force my authority on him. As far as I could see his fight with David was the result of his blind panic, not an intention to kill. He knew what he was.

  In this situation what you use is kindness. Monsters like to be understood.

  ‘I’m not going to hurt you,’ I said. ‘Everyone has gone. It’s just you and me. I know you’re frightened. I just want to understand.’

  All I got was a muffled wail. It was something to work with.

  ‘Look at me, Peter,’ I said. ‘Don’t be frightened. You know me. I’ve never hurt you. We’ve been friendly you and I, haven’t we?’

  The silence continued and what I needed was tears. He was as sealed as an egg. Tears signal our pain to the world, and that signal is at least a form of communication, so I put my hand on his shoulder and said: ‘You poor man. How have you come to this?’

  He broke. He opened out like a spring leaf and lay on his side, sobbing, fists balled and pressed to his neck. There was that strange scent in the air you always get when people fight, yeasty and salty, like bread dough. It was strong enough to cover his smell of piss.

  I let him cry for as long as he wished, saying nothing, just witnessing his shame. So it goes with most murderers. They don’t feel empathy for those they kill but they can certainly feel pity for themselves.

  Eventually the sobs lessened and he sat up wearily and put his back to the wall beside me.

  ‘We can take all the time you need, Peter,’ I said. Then I motioned Johanna and David to sit on the floor on the other side of the room. Now we were all of a level.

  ‘You came in here to look at Eva Cohen.’

  He was silent, eyes screwed up.

  ‘There’s no need to speak. I’m going to tell you what I think happened. Just listen. I think you’re very lonely, that you’ve never had a relationship with a woman, and that drove you to come here secretly and uncover her body. I think you’ve done this many times over the years. You like to look … and sometimes to touch. Am I right?’

  A gasp.

  ‘Jesus save us,’ David said.

  I shot a ferocious look at him. He needed to be quiet.

  �
�There’s no crime in that, Peter. It’s a sad, sad thing but that’s between you and God.’

  Peter opened his eyes and stared at the roof with its hanging cobwebs. I moved away from the wall and sat cross-legged in front of him.

  ‘It wasn’t enough. You wanted to be with a living woman, so you took Rebecca to a hidden place and tried to lie with her. Did you kill her because she rejected you?’

  ‘Oh God!’ he said, and his head jerked up to look at me, eyes wide. It was an odd reaction. One I pondered for many hours afterwards.

  ‘You lay with Magdela, paid her maybe, but your compulsion drove you to kill her and leave her uncovered. It had become a new compulsion.’

  ‘No!’ he said. ‘You can’t get me for that. I’m nothing, dirt, but I didn’t kill anyone!’ He got up, hesitated then ran for the door. ‘I didn’t kill anyone! Oh sweet Jesu, save me. I’m trapped!’

  It was a pathetic attempt. I caught him easily, trying to breathe through his stink that was now so strong I could taste it. He wailed and his legs went from under him. I had to carry him out of the room as Johanna locked the door and gave me the key. Peter I took down to the cells under the stables. I would get no more from him today.

  Let him stew.

  His gaoler would be Francis, the young brother who worked with Peter in the laundry. I told him to admit no one but myself, to make no conversation with the prisoner, but to note down anything he said. If Peter wanted to confess to a priest we would get him one of my choosing.

  I had a brief word with Will who was hanging around outside when I emerged. I told him that in my opinion, Anne was not a victim of this man but I would know more later. Perhaps I told him that to save his agonies? Or perhaps, even now, I wasn’t sure. Will looked mutinous but could do nothing more than walk away.

  I went home, warming water in my small fireplace and trying to wash myself in half a barrel lined with cloth. Peter had left traces of his stink on me and it was hard to get rid of.

  I was still scrubbing my skin when David came in, knocking only briefly and staring, wide-eyed.