Pilgrim of Death: The Janna Chronicles 4

by Felicity Pulman

  Ralph set Janna aside, and went to express his condolences to Juliana. She seemed hardly to hear him. Nor was she aware of anyone else, so deep was she in grief. Travelers to the site pushed forward, asking questions and exclaiming in hushed whispers. Morcar and Ulf tried to persuade them to move back, to go away. Bernard had been well-liked and highly regarded by the pilgrims, and deserved their respect now that he lay dead. Golde and Winifred stood close to Juliana, ready to support her if necessary. Janna hesitated, for she was sure Juliana would find something for which to blame her. She stayed back and watched.

  “We must inform the authorities of this foul deed, my lady; we must raise the hue and cry. We must also arrange transport for your son’s body. Where do you wish to take him for burial?” Ralph had to ask the question twice before Juliana paid attention to him.

  Juliana stared up at him with red, tear-filled eyes. “We…we must take him home to Oxeneford.”

  “In that case we’ll need a mount to carry him, or a cart. Some form of transport.” It seemed that, in the absence of Bernard, Ralph had become their leader.

  “I’ll ask around, see what I can find,” Ulf offered.

  Janna’s attention strayed from the problems of transporting Bernard home to an even more pressing question, a question no-one had yet asked. Who had killed Bernard – and why? She looked around the pilgrims, counting them off as she did so. Juliana, of course. Ulf and Ralph. Winifred, looking close to tears. Morcar now had his arm around Golde, protective and reassuring. And Adam was still missing. Was he responsible for this? Or had a common thief taken his chance and caught Bernard unawares?

  Janna stood still as something else occurred to her: The message! Bernard had taken it upon himself to deliver it to the empress, believing it had become a matter of urgency. Whoever had killed Bernard might well have stolen it along with everything else he carried. In which case it was probably gone forever. But she owed it to Bernard, and the secret they’d shared, to look for it. And if she found it, Janna resolved to deliver the message herself.

  As unobtrusively as possible, she sidled across to the altar stone. Ulf, Ralph and Morcar had gone into a huddle to argue over the best means of transporting Bernard home. They weren’t paying any attention to her, but Janna knew that other eyes would see what she was about to do. Nevertheless, she forced herself to inspect Bernard’s body.

  He lay on his back, his eyes open and staring. She thought his expression was accusing, but told herself not to be so fanciful. She felt his skin. It was cool, and his limbs were starting to become stiff. The body had lain here for some hours then. She glanced about for Bernard’s pack and staff, but there was no sign of them. She made a note to look for them later. Next, she patted down his blood-soaked garments, looking for telltale bulges, artifacts sewn into hems, perhaps. But they yielded no secrets. There was no sign of his scrip either.

  There was no doubt how Bernard had died – the gaping wound and quantity of blood that had spilled attested to that. Nevertheless, Janna cautiously rolled him onto his side to see what she could find. Her conscientious examination revealed a contusion on the back of his head, a slight swelling and broken skin, which indicated that he’d suffered a blow some time before he died.

  “You seem very interested in Bernard’s body,” Ralph commented, materializing at Janna’s elbow.

  Startled, she let go and swung around to confront him. “I – I am a healer by training,” she stammered, trying to cover her real interest in Bernard. “Of course I can see that he’s dead. No-one could survive a wound such as that. But I wondered how his body came to be here, resting on this particular stone. It seems he also suffered a blow to the head, so I suspect he was probably ambushed and rendered unconscious before the killer brought him here to cut his throat. I just – I can’t think why.” She turned to Juliana. “You have my deepest sympathy, mistress.”

  “’Tis just past midsummer,” Ralph said. “This is a sacred place for those who practice the dark arts, so I’ve heard. Could this be a killing to placate the old gods instead, think you?”

  “I knew we shouldn’t have come here!” Golde wailed. Morcar pulled her close and she pressed her face against his chest.

  Ulf brandished a crucifix in the air. “The travelers told us of a recent miracle – but in the past the only tales I ever heard about the henge were of the ancient and evil spirits who dwell here,” he said.

  “The henge has long been associated with death and sacrifice,” Ralph agreed thoughtfully.

  “It was at my insistence that we come here!” Juliana wailed.

  “If someone wanted a victim to sacrifice, why then steal the victim’s scrip?” Janna found she was fast running out of patience with the notion of ritual killings still taking place, even though she herself had imagined just such a vision from the past. “Surely it was Bernard’s goods they were after? See, his pack and staff are missing too.” She wouldn’t mention the bishop’s letter, nor her fear that it might be the real reason for the attack on Bernard.

  The pilgrims solemnly nodded their heads in agreement. Golde felt sufficiently recovered to remove her head from Morcar’s chest and look once more upon the corpse.

  “Was there anything in his scrip worth stealing?” Janna asked Juliana, already knowing the answer but interested to hear what the dame had to say.

  Juliana looked at her with eyes glazed and red with grief. “He carried coins to pay our passage, and some personal goods too. Worth stealing, especially if you have nothing in your own scrip.” She drew herself up and said fiercely: “Adam had nothing! But he had everything to gain by murdering my son and taking his goods. No mystery, then, that he has fled.”

  No mention of the message that Bernard had decided was so urgent he should leave immediately, even if it meant abandoning his mother and the pilgrims, Janna thought. “Trust no-one,” Bernard had said. If he’d followed his own advice, if he’d told no-one of what they’d found on the dead man by the river, then no-one would know about the message and therefore her fears were for nothing. Everything pointed to the probability that Bernard had been killed for the valuables he’d carried. And for some reason, everyone suspected Adam.

  “Why should Adam run away? Where’s he gone?” she asked.

  “He’s escaped us, and we must raise the hue and cry after him. He must be made to pay,” Juliana insisted.

  “What makes you so sure he’s behind this foul deed?” Ralph asked. Janna was pleased that Ralph seemed as curious about Adam as she was; perhaps Juliana would answer his question instead.

  “He’s murdered once before, and now he’s killed again so that he can escape his penance and start a new life. All this…” Juliana gestured at the lifeless body of her son. “I believe it’s to make us think that this was some sort of sacrificial killing, and nothing to do with him.” She began to sob once more, crooking her arm across her face to stifle the sound and blot her tears.

  “You already know that Adam is a murderer?” Ralph asked incredulously. “Why, then, is he traveling with you?”

  Juliana continued to weep. Eventually Morcar spoke for her. “My father-in-law – Bernard’s cousin –was found drowned in a pond early in the spring. He and Adam have long harbored a deep grudge toward each other. It was a matter of the pigs, you see.”

  Janna was about to ask what he meant, but Morcar continued with his explanation.

  “There was a bruise on the back of his head, perhaps a blow hard enough to kill him. For certes, the water was too shallow for him to have fallen in and drowned!”

  “My father was murdered, and all know who was responsible,” Golde cut in indignantly.

  “Adam.” Morcar took up the tale once more. “But no-one was willing to speak against him. It was known that my wife’s father had consumed a quantity of ale shortly before his death, and the story went about that he was just too drunk to save himself when he fell into the pond.”

  “He was never so drunk as that! Never, ever,” Golde protested fie
rcely.

  Morcar nodded. “The next thing we knew was that Adam suddenly announced he was going to make a pilgrimage to the shrine of St James at Compostela.”

  “Yes, because the priest made him go as part of his penance!” Golde’s voice was thick with rage. “He wouldn’t have thought of it else.”

  “True.” Juliana gave a mournful sniff. “We believe he confessed his crime to the priest before the death could be investigated by the shire reeve, and this was his penance: to make a pilgrimage. But Bernard – and Morcar too – insisted Adam be fully punished for his crime. They resolved to accompany Adam, and keep him always in their sight so that he was forced to make the journey and, more importantly, forced to return. Their intention was to bring him back to Oxeneford and insist that he be brought to trial.” She mopped her tears on the sleeve of her gown. “I told Bernard, I told him over and over, that he should look to his own soul and leave the dispensing of justice to God,” she said, and began to weep once more.

  Janna remembered that Juliana had said something of the sort before. She hadn’t understood her words then, but she did now. No wonder Juliana had been fearful. Adam had killed once already, if the pilgrims were to be believed, and by a blow to the back of the head before drowning his victim. So, too, had Bernard received a blow to the head before his throat was cut. It seemed that Adam was careful to disable his victims before trying to disguise their deaths as something else. Which meant that he was wily and dangerous, as well as desperate.

  “I was against this from the start,” Juliana lamented. “I knew in my bones that no good would come from this journey, and so I decided to accompany my son, to keep him safe.”

  “We know Adam understood our need for revenge, and that he resented being watched all the time,” said Morcar. “He hasn’t tried before to elude us, but now it seems he has succeeded. He’s no stranger to murder, and everything points to his guilt. We must find him. He cannot be allowed to escape justice and punishment a second time.”

  “Then there’s no time to lose in going after him,” Ralph said quickly, eager to be of help. He turned to Juliana. “We’ll report the death at the next hamlet we come to; we’ll raise the hue and cry after Adam. Meantime, my lady, we must come up with a strategy to transport your son’s body home. I promise I shall do all in my power to help you in whatever way I can.”

  Knowing Juliana was in good hands now that Ralph had taken charge, and conscious of her own self-appointed task, Janna hurried back to the place where the pilgrims had lain for the night. Aside from a patch of trampled grass, there was little to see. Most of the pilgrims had shouldered their packs before setting out on their search for Bernard. Janna swiftly searched through those that remained, after first secreting her father’s ring safely in her purse once more. There was nothing to find. None of the packs belonged to Bernard, nor was there any sign of his staff.

  Frowning thoughtfully, she walked slowly back to the pilgrims. Juliana was seated on the grass, being comforted by Golde and Winifred. There was no sign of Morcar and Ulf or of Ralph. Janna continued her search as unobtrusively as possible, starting from the site of Bernard’s body, just in case he was felled where they’d found him. After examining his body, Janna thought it more likely he’d been taken unawares once he’d left the henge, and then dragged back and killed on the slab so as to imitate some ancient sacrificial practice.

  Two parallel grooves caught her attention, faint lines that tracked through sand, grass and mud. They led from the henge out to the avenue beyond, and she followed them. Occasionally the tracks faded into nothing, but she discovered she could pick up the telltale signs if she walked on. Sometimes only one line was visible, sometimes two, even if indistinct. To Janna, they looked like the drag marks of boots. Finally, they came to an end some way along the avenue. She cast about for other signs of foul play, but found only a smooth, shallow indentation in the dust – recently made, she thought, or it would have been trodden over and obscured by the passage of visitors to the henge. She closed her eyes, trying to picture what might have happened: Bernard, leaving under cover of darkness, hurrying along the avenue, anxious to reach his destination. Someone had followed him, had hit him on the head and knocked him unconscious. The shallow imprint of his body on the ground told where he had fallen. Janna looked about for signs of blood, but there were none. So her supposition was correct: Bernard had been dragged back to the altar before being killed. Why? To disguise theft as a symbolic sacrifice? Or was the sacrifice real, done to placate the gods, whoever they might be?

  Janna shuddered, and looked around her. There were more urgent matters to consider now. Bernard’s pack and scrip, and the letter from the bishop. Would the thief have taken everything with him? It seemed unlikely that he’d carry an extra burden of unnecessary goods, particularly if he was escaping on foot. No, not if he could as easily stuff anything of value into his own pack and hide the rest of Bernard’s property elsewhere. Janna’s gaze settled on a small copse of trees off to the side but no great distance from the causeway. The pilgrims were still searching the stone circles and the ditch for Adam. If there was anything of Bernard’s to be found there, she knew they would retrieve it. With a quick glance around to make sure she was unobserved, she hurried toward the grove.

  It was the perfect cover – trees and bushes grew in wild profusion, while waist-high weeds thickly covered the ground; they would shroud anything thrown into their depths. Or would they? Janna stopped pushing through the weedy growth and paused to reconnoiter. She noticed the signs that someone had been here before her, his passage marked by bruised and broken stems and bent grasses. In the darkness, whoever it was wouldn’t have realized that he was leaving a trail, but in daylight Janna could follow it easily.

  Her search was rewarded when she caught sight of a bulky object thrust deep into a thicket of brambles. She forced her hand through, getting mightily scratched in the process, and dragged out a pack. It was stuffed full, clothes and possessions crammed in anyhow as if packed in a hurry – or crammed back into the pack in the dark? Janna pulled everything out, recognizing Bernard’s traveling cloak as she did so. She eyed it covetously, and set it aside. Where was his scrip?

  She could find no sign of it, but his staff lay close by, almost hidden among a patch of nettles. Stifling a sigh, and this time using her other hand, she carefully extracted it from its stinging nest. That Bernard’s possessions had been searched and then hidden seemed beyond a doubt. A casual passer-by would never have noticed them, would not have come near the grove in the first place. Janna’s thoughts churned as she carefully searched again the contents of Bernard’s pack. She remembered that the guard from Wiltune Abbey had also looked through it, but had found nothing. Had Bernard secreted the message elsewhere, or was there a hidden flap or a pocket, somewhere safe to hide the bishop’s message from the guard’s eyes?

  She ran her hands over the pack, feeling for anything unusual such as an extra seam that might disguise a hiding place. Where could the letter be? Not in this pack, she decided finally, although she patted it down carefully all over again, just to make sure. She rocked back on her heels and thought about it. And came to the reluctant conclusion that the thief, whether Adam or someone else, had stolen something even more valuable than he’d realized when he’d taken the scrip. The question was: Could he read? Would he know the value of what he’d found? Or would he discard the message, leave it blowing in the wind or torn and muddy in a ditch, destined never to reach the eyes of the empress?

  How important was the letter anyway? Important enough to change the fortunes of the lady? Or the fortunes of a king?

  Chapter 7

  Janna was thoughtful as she hoisted Bernard’s pack onto her shoulder and picked up his staff. She couldn’t shake off a sense of unease as she walked back to join the pilgrim band. True, Adam had disappeared, and everything pointed to his guilt. Yet he’d left the pack behind when some of the things that Janna had noticed inside would surely have brought him
a few pence if sold in the marketplace. Perhaps there’d been enough in Bernard’s scrip to satisfy his greed? Perhaps he was afraid to take anything that might link him to Bernard?

  The missing message hung heavily on Janna’s conscience. She shrugged, impatient to free herself from the burden of care, for there was no more she could do to retrieve it. She told herself that her duty now was toward Juliana: she must do all in her power to comfort and bring ease to the grieving woman.

  Bernard’s staff fitted comfortably into her hand and she leaned on it, relishing its support; it was so much better than the rough stick she’d been using. As she approached the pilgrims, she realized everyone was staring at her. Feeling self-conscious, she held the staff out to Juliana, along with the pack.

  “I found these, my lady. I believe they belonged to Master Bernard. I thought you would want them.” No need to tell Juliana – or anyone else – where she’d found them. “I couldn’t find his scrip,” she added.

  Juliana accepted the pack, but waved the staff away. “You may keep it. I’ve said some harsh things, blamed you unfairly. I’ve misjudged you, and I am sorry for it.”

  “Thank you, my lady. I shall treasure it always,” Janna assured her.

  Juliana nodded, and turned to take Ulf’s arm. Evidently some heavy bartering had gone on, for a cart stood close by the group, with Ralph’s palfrey at its head. Bernard’s body had been loaded onto the cart. Juliana now climbed in beside it, helped up by the strong arm of Ulf.

  “We must make haste to Ambresberie to report this matter, and raise the hue and cry. There’s no time to lose,” Ulf explained, as he noted Janna’s questioning frown. He swung himself up onto the horse and looked down. “Morcar and Golde will escort you there, along with the lord Ralph and Winifred. We shall wait for you at Ambresberie.”

  It was good of Ralph to give up his horse, Janna thought; he was a good man, kind and decent. She remembered how she had turned to him for comfort, and how he had tried to shield her from the sight of Bernard’s body. A sudden thought sent a flush of heat to her cheeks. Ralph had said he was interested in her, and everything about her. Was that why he’d elected to stay behind rather than accompanying Juliana himself?