Gate of the Dead

by David Gilman

  ‘Your counsel has always been considered. I never treat it lightly.’

  ‘And your stubbornness is a defence that cannot be breached.’ Killbere wagged a finger. ‘Very well! You’re too trusting, Thomas. Fate places Torellini in your life. He once served you; he took your family to safety and commissions us all with money from a Florentine banker. A banker! They pay for war and profit from dying men’s misery. They would sell their mothers into slavery if it turned an extra florin. Who is to say they have not made agreements with the Visconti? Who is to say the King himself has not subscribed to a deal? Our good King, and I bless and honour his name, is tight with the Italians. As good a fit as sword and scabbard. The priest could be playing you at the behest of our King and his master.’

  Blackstone waited patiently but the knight only scowled in frustration.

  ‘He serves me still, Gilbert. Trust me. He did not betray me.’

  14

  Paolo the dwarf stared out of the window across the clay-tiled rooftops. He knew his master was with the scarred-face Englishman and that Father Torellini was probably being held as was he – not guarded as prisoners, but given quarters as reluctant guests until the Englishman decided what was to be done. There was little reason for them to try and escape, and if there were, how far would anyone get down those twisting streets? Dogs would soon alert the mercenaries in the houses. No, he decided, they were safe enough. There was no fear within him, only the stoic patience of a life-long servant. Father Torellini was a priest of enormous influence. And he knew of his master’s connections with the English court. There would be no question of harm coming to either of them.

  When he had first set eyes on Thomas Blackstone he saw a man as tall as a mountain, a giant who could smite an army as a thrashing storm destroyed fields of corn. That was his legend. And the diminutive man could well believe it. He had obeyed his master and ridden into Blackstone’s camp. No one killed a dwarf. Everyone knew that was bad luck. And Father Torellini had been correct. A mixture of superstition and respect for the Florentine priest secured him safe passage.

  The door to the room creaked open. One of the mercenaries from the village, a vicious-looking man whose foul breath made him recoil, held a plate – a grimy thumb pressed into the piece of bread as he brought him food and wine. There was wood for the fire and the skins and blankets provided adequate warmth on the straw mattress. He tore off the soiled piece of bread and hungrily mopped up the peasant food. He had taken the offer of a woman and instructed her to wait outside. There was no point in sharing his food with a whore. He swilled the wine and belched, letting the firelight hold his gaze until he felt ready to call her into the room. When she entered she kept her eyes averted, either through subservience or fear of being had by a dwarf. It was something she knew nothing of. The men who usually paid her were assorted; they had calloused hands, blemished bodies and often black stumps where teeth should be. But they were men. Hasty and quick to be done with her. None had ever harmed her, because word of that would reach their sworn lord. One of the Hungarians who had joined Blackstone’s company had punched her a year ago, drunk and feeble with lust. He was stripped and lashed. Afterwards, insulted by the whipping, he raised a knife in anger against the one that was called John Jacob, but a great bearded Frenchmen caught the man’s hand, broke his arm and slashed his throat. He was a throat-cutter, that one. Everyone knew that. Except the ignorant pig Hungarian. But the dwarf? Had he been told no harm should be inflicted on the whores? Best not to challenge him. She kept her eyes lowered.

  He pointed to the mattress and she obediently lay down and lifted her skirts, her face averted as he stripped naked, wanting her to see his muscled body. A dwarf was no different than any other man and, before Father Torellini had rescued him, he had wrestled other dwarfs for those whose tastes ran to such entertainment.

  He lifted her breasts free, and turned her face towards his own.

  ‘Do as I tell you,’ he instructed.

  She was well fed, and her belly and breasts wobbled with satisfying enticement as he exerted himself against her. She showed little interest in his efforts so he slapped her face hard to elicit anger and fear, and then she behaved and did everything he told her to do. A dwarf commanded little respect in the world but a village whore was barely worth her keep. When he finished with her she wiped her hand across her face, smearing her tears. As he buttoned his shirt he heard her mutter something beneath her breath. A curse, was it?

  ‘What did you say?’ he demanded.

  She shook her head. He grabbed her hair, twisting it so that she could not move.

  ‘What did you say!’ he asked again.

  More tears. Her hand trying to break his grip – gasping – begging for him not to hit her again.

  ‘The merchant...’ she said, stumbling to find the words through her pain.

  ‘The merchant? The one here?’

  She nodded.

  ‘What about him? Have you opened your legs for him as well?’

  ‘Pay me and I’ll tell you,’ she said defiantly.

  He slapped her again and reached for his knife. ‘You don’t bargain with me, you slut. What about him?’

  ‘All right, all right...’ she begged. ‘He says he has evidence. That he can prove you betrayed Sir Thomas.’

  He released her. His own fear suddenly tightening its grip.

  ‘Not so!’ he said.

  She cowered, easing her dress over her breasts, then pulling her hair back from her face. ‘I heard it from one of the men. The merchant is frightened. That’s all I know.’

  ‘Get out!’ Paolo said.

  Had he not taken the whore he would not have discovered the information that now threatened him. Had Dantini already spoken to Blackstone? He weighed the odds in his mind. It was late. The village slept, the darkness challenged only by the occasional fleeting glimpse of the moon behind shifting clouds.

  Dawn would bring its own reckoning.

  *

  The silk merchant’s room was no less spartan than the dwarf’s. Food and wine and wood for the fire had been provided, but fear had taken his appetite, and the warmth from the fire made little difference to the chill that crept into his bones. He pulled his cloak tighter about him. They had offered him a woman. Sweet merciful God, he was in the hands of barbarians. He, Oliviero Dantini, who had stood in the courts of kings, being offered a village whore.

  ‘Take your opportunity while you can,’ one of Blackstone’s English soldiers had suggested when he laid the plate of food down on the rough-hewn table. ‘There’s a chance you’ll swing tomorrow.’

  That which gripped the silk merchant’s throat was no physical hand squeezing the breath from him; it was a terror that struck from within.

  ‘I am the one who saved the messenger. I paid the physician, I sent for the good Father. It was I who took the risk!’ he blurted to the disinterested mercenary.

  ‘I don’t know anything about that. I just heard that the dwarf has proof it was you what laid the trap. He’s having a good time with a whore, he is. He’ll be all right. That’s all I know.’ And then, as if trying to bring cheer to the frightened merchant: ‘The food’s not bad if you’ve the stomach for it.’

  ‘I must speak to Sir Thomas!’

  ‘He won’t get you any better food. He eats the same as every other man.’ He grinned, knowing full well it was not the food the merchant wanted to contest. ‘The town is asleep. Tomorrow is soon enough,’ he said and closed the door on the man’s stricken face.

  Never had Dantini felt so alone. The thoughts he had entertained of benefiting from Blackstone being killed in Lucca had been only fleeting. Thoughts could not condemn a man. They were known only to him and God. The Almighty would not punish him for thoughts! Untrue. Every priest and monk told how evil thoughts were like a whip to Christ’s flesh. But, Dantini argued with his mind, he paid the Church! He paid the priests! He paid for his sins! He bought forgiveness! He fell to the floor in prayer, arms resting on t
he bench, his knees pressing into the wooden planks to feel the pain of contrition. He hid himself in prayer without any thought to time, and had no idea how long he spent muttering every benediction known to him since childhood. As a distant monastery bell woke its monks for vigils, there was a creak of a wooden floorboard outside his door.

  *

  Paolo had clambered across the rooftop to the next building. His physical strength and agility served him well as he swung down onto the external steps of the house where Dantini was lodged. The floorboards creaked as he stepped into the passageway, but he soon found the firmness of a beam beneath the planking and his lightness helped him move quickly towards the room where a faint glimmer of firelight and the soft whisper of prayer filtered beneath the door. With the palm of his hand he pressed the door gently, letting it ease away from him, its leather hinges making a barely audible protest. It went unnoticed by the man in the near darkness whose back was to him, hunched deep in prayer and whose whispers continued unbroken as he stepped closer, knife in hand.

  He saw the murder clearly in his mind’s eye. The kneeling man was the perfect target. The merchant’s cloak and clothing would be too thick and of too good a weave to penetrate without a struggle, so he would pierce the man’s throat and then his heart. He would steal the rings from his hands and let the killing be blamed on a godless mercenary. Keeping his eyes on the humbled figure he turned the knife, stepped forward and raised it. The figure before him seemed to shudder momentarily – four more paces and –

  ‘Oh Paolo, I prayed it was not you,’ said Father Torellini.

  The dwarf faltered, stunned by the suddenness of his master’s words. Father Torellini half turned, pulling the merchant’s cowl from his head and showing his features to his servant’s dumbfounded face. Paolo dropped the knife. He could not kill the man he had served these past thirty years. He had not even time to show remorse. Darkness behind the door came to life as Thomas Blackstone stepped forward and clubbed him to the ground.

  15

  Betrayal was worth a few hours of torture, insisted Blackstone’s captains. There might be a greater conspiracy to uncover.

  ‘Brand him and hang him over coals,’ said Will Longdon. ‘A slow roast to give him a taste of what awaits him in hell.’

  Gaillard shrugged. ‘For once I agree with him, lord,’ said the Norman to Blackstone and the gathered men. ‘He must suffer. Impale him and plant him at the crossroads.’

  There was a murmur of agreement among the half-dozen men who sat around Blackstone on the roof terrace of his quarters. Killbere poked a finger into Gaillard’s shoulder. There was no give in the muscle, but Killbere was concerned only with making his point.

  ‘You would have Sir Thomas behave like the Hungarian barbarians? You are a pious shit, Gaillard. You pray before the Virgin yet you would ram a spear up a man’s arse and have the world see what kind of men we are!’

  ‘Then burn him, Sir Gilbert,’ said Meulon in an attempt to save Gaillard’s distress at being picked on.

  ‘Aye, burn him and hang a crucifix around his neck,’ said Killbere, ‘and for what? Witchcraft?’

  ‘He’s a dwarf, he could be Satan’s imp,’ suggested Perinne, and made the sign of the cross.

  Killbere turned to Blackstone, who stood with his back to them all, gazing across the valleys and mountain peaks. Beyond the white mountain of marble in the distance lay his way home.

  ‘Thomas? These men would damn us all by their thirst for revenge. You mutilate the dwarf at your peril. It’s bad luck, for God’s sake,’ Killbere implored Blackstone. ‘Have the priest deal with him. Damnation will cast him out into his own wilderness.’

  Blackstone turned to face the same men who had warned him against going into Lucca. ‘Elfred? How far back does your memory go?’

  ‘Sir Thomas?’ queried his master of archers, uncertain what his lord meant.

  ‘I was a boy when we went into France. We young archers served each other well enough; you were the voice of reason for us. We soiled ourselves and retched blood because of our fear, but you and Sir Gilbert held us together. You forged us, my friend, but you raised no objection when Sir Gilbert hanged John Nightingale because he’d fallen asleep at his post. Remember?’

  ‘I do. Aye. He let the enemy burn the barn where we slept. We lost many a good man that night.’

  ‘And afterwards your rank gave you responsibilities that meant men died under your command.’

  ‘It did.’

  ‘Then you are the senior man here after Sir Gilbert. What would you have us do with the dwarf?’

  Elfred’s mouth dried. His uncertainty was plain to see as he looked to each of the men sheepishly. ‘It can be bad luck; Sir Gilbert’s right about that. God made these small men, full formed and no different than us, but He made ’em right enough, and His purpose is known only to himself... Perhaps it’d be better to give the small man a chance...’

  Unease crept through the men. ‘A chance?’ said John Jacob. ‘You mean mercy?’

  ‘Aye. Somehow. That’s what I do mean,’ Elfred answered.

  ‘And that would square us with God, you reckon?’ Will Longdon asked.

  ‘It might,’ Elfred told him.

  John Jacob rubbed a calloused hand across his stubbled head. ‘All right. Put him to the stake, and I’ll garrotte him before we light the kindling. That’s mercy enough.’ He looked to his sworn lord. ‘Sir Thomas?’

  Killbere spoke before Blackstone could answer. ‘I say again, kill this dwarf and bring down a lifetime of bad luck on us all.’

  ‘That’s superstition, Gilbert,’ said Blackstone.

  ‘And I believe it, as do you in that pagan Welsh goddess you wear around your neck.’

  Arianrhod. He swore by her protection. Blackstone met the great knight’s stare with his own. ‘He has to die, Gilbert. There’s no mercy here for a traitor. It will be by my hand. Any misfortune will be mine and mine alone.’

  *

  The threat of torture and Father Torellini’s imploring made Paolo confess more than his sins. He had sold the information of where Blackstone would be in Lucca to Englishmen who had stopped him on the road to Blackstone’s camp. They were men of rough trade but they did not seem to be mercenaries. Paolo swore they were English and not German, like the mercenaries who held ground further north. And they knew about the messenger, but not of his whereabouts or whether he still lived.

  It had been a simple bargain. His own life, and that of his master’s, for the prize that was Blackstone. Any word of the betrayal and Father Torellini would also die. He could not have known that his master had sought the help of a guardian Knight of the Tau to watch over Blackstone in the city.

  Paolo begged for his life. He had gone to kill the merchant in order to protect his master, so great was his love for the man who had cared for him for more than half his life. Had the silk merchant held proof against the dwarf then sooner or later Father Torellini would have died beneath an assassin’s blade. The dwarf’s entrapment had been a simple bait laid by Blackstone to see who would attempt to commit murder in order to save himself. His men had watched and waited and when Oliviero Dantini submitted himself to prayer and Paolo had gone to kill him, Blackstone had taken the Florentine priest into the room and snared his trusted servant.

  Paolo had been stripped to shirt and breeches and knelt, tied beneath the silver crucifix in the stone shelter. The mendicant monk stood beyond the crossroads, wild hair and beard like a biblical prophet, chanting a liturgy of garbled prayer as he gazed up at the Englishman who strode towards them. The villagers gathered behind him, but none ventured any further than where the houses ended.

  Superstition gathered them like a dog penning sheep.

  Only his captains followed, willing to share their sworn lord’s decision.

  Tears welled in Father Torellini’s eyes. He rested his hands on his servant’s head. ‘My trusted Paolo, you sold Thomas Blackstone’s life. You would have had a great man slain in order
to save me. I cannot save you, but I absolve you of the sin and will pray for your safekeeping in heaven.’

  The dwarf wept.

  ‘Courage,’ Torellini whispered, and gathered him in his arms as he would a child. ‘Courage,’ he said again and stepped back as he saw Blackstone approaching.

  Paolo nodded and tried to control his fear as Father Torellini wiped the tears from his servant’s face.

  Blackstone stepped inside the shrine, and without a word to either man seized the rope that bound the dwarf’s wrists and pulled him outside. Father Torellini crossed himself and muttered the benediction as Paolo scurried to keep up with Blackstone’s long, unfaltering strides towards the gibbet. Like a child being taken from its parent he kept looking back to Father Torellini, who stood outside the shelter, hands clasped in prayer.

  Paolo’s gibbering words were a mixture of regret and desperation, imploring Blackstone to look after his master, whose life might still be in danger, as might Blackstone’s. Paolo only ever wanted to serve his master. Nothing more. Nothing less.

  ‘Forgive me, Sir Thomas. What I did, I did for Father Torellini,’ he said as Blackstone put the noose around his neck.

  It was to be no easy death. No scaffold for a drop that would snap his neck, instead a choking, kicking strangulation awaited him.

  ‘You served him well,’ Blackstone told him. ‘I forgive you.’ His words seemed to have a calming effect on the condemned man.

  Blackstone hauled on the rope.

  16

  The cold wind had swung and now blew from the north, and the men gathered their cloaks around them as they looked down across the village rooftops. The mountain passes were secure but Blackstone had not yet told them of his plans. He had spoken to Torellini and shared his thoughts. It was plain to see that the Englishmen who had accosted the dwarf in Lucca were looking for the King’s messenger, knowing Blackstone would obey the command issued. Whoever had sent these men knew the connection between Father Torellini and Thomas Blackstone.