Son of the Night

by Mark Alder

  The Hospitaller strode forward with Arondight raised, but the young man held up his hand to stop him.

  ‘I am Giovanni Doria, Prince of Centola,’ he said. ‘My grandmother was Maria, and I should know because I sat at her knee. Why should I listen to beggars, even when they come clad in shining cloaks ?’

  Montagu still could not stand.

  ‘I am William Montagu, Baron Montagu, right hand of Edward II, king of England and France. I am no beggar, sir.’

  ‘Then why do you dress in rags?’

  ‘In imitation of Christ.’ Montagu found his grim sense of humour had not been weakened by the travel.

  A great noise outside. The shouts and curses of many men. Giovanni, as he called himself, crossed himself.

  ‘The horde at the gate, sir, no more. They won’t attack in numbers at night,’ said the Hospitaller.

  Montagu had enough strength to move himself to sitting. The horde? The Golden Horde of fearsome Tartars? That meant they were in the east.

  ‘Where are we?’ he said.

  The Hospitaller and Giovanni exchanged glances.

  ‘You don’t know?’ said Giovanni.

  ‘We travelled here by God’s will,’ he said.

  ‘By Lucifer’s.’ Dow’s voice was a whisper.

  The Hospitaller lunged at the boy with Arondight, but Giovanni quickly and expertly tripped him as he advanced.

  ‘I have not finished questioning these men,’ he said.

  ‘They are devil worshippers,’ said the Hospitaller.

  More noise at the gate – huge cries.

  ‘I’ve told you to put down your sword,’ said Giovanni. ‘As prince and your God-appointed master, I command you.’

  It had to be Edward’s son. That temper, so quick to boil, the way he stepped forward to confront the Hospitaller as if he was on the verge of striking him.

  ‘Let me fetch more men. We moved you here to protect you from the likes of these, sir!’

  ‘And a fine job it’s done,’ he said. ‘Look at them. Neither of these men can stand, let alone threaten me. Get your “more men”. I will discourse with them in private. Allow none in until I say so.’

  ‘You’ll be on your own, sir.’

  ‘On my own with a good sword against two invalids. If I can fight off four Tartars, I can deal with these. You, too, devil, go!

  So it was a devil, a servant of God. Montagu had concluded it seemed too stupid to be a demon.

  They left the room as he commanded. Giovanni – Edward, as he should be known – went to the small window and gazed out.

  ‘You are really the right hand of the king?’

  ‘I was.’

  ‘You speak like a man of breeding. It’s good to talk to a near equal. These Templars are base men, low knights for the most part.’

  ‘A man is more comfortable with those of his own station,’ said Montagu.

  ‘Indeed.’ He peered harder out of the window. ‘If they get in they’ll kill me, which will be a pity.’

  ‘And all of us,’ said Montagu. ‘Isn’t that what Tartars do?’

  ‘They do. As, to be fair, so do we to them. They are heathens, knowing not God nor the salvation of Heaven.’

  He turned back to Montagu.

  ‘It’s because of me they are here.’

  ‘They invade a town to get to one man?’

  ‘I killed one of theirs.’

  ‘A prince.’

  ‘A holy man, or magician. He offended my honour.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘He said I would bring about the end of the world,’ said Giovanni, lightly.

  ‘They say that of many men.’

  ‘Not of me,’ said the prince. ‘Not and live.’

  ‘So you fled?’

  ‘We did. We were lucky to have met them outside of their city. They would not let me in.’

  ‘Why? You Genoese trade with the heathens.’

  ‘We do. Again, I think it was this magician’s insistence that I would cause their ruin.’

  ‘Why did they not just strike you down?’

  ‘At first they seemed afraid of me,’ he said. ‘Then the death of their holy fellow hardened them up. They demanded Caffa give me up. But this is my city – the Hospitallers who serve me have a garrison here. There was no chance of that.’

  The sound of the battle outside floated over his words. Montagu couldn’t help feeling that a prince should be at the front of his men, but he said nothing. He felt very ill still, the taste of vomit in his mouth. The youth Dow crouched, sweating. The blood was issuing from his mouth again.

  Giovanni saw him glance at Dow. ‘Why do two sick men invade my room by magic?’

  ‘The magic itself weakens us.’

  ‘These Hospitallers are attended by devils,’ he said. ‘That is something I hadn’t realised before my journey to the east.’

  ‘Why were you going there?’

  ‘To enjoy the hospitality of their leader. The Hospitallers’ oracles had predicted something was coming for me. Perhaps they meant you.’

  ‘We haven’t come to kill you.’

  ‘No, but you will.’

  Montagu was puzzled by that.

  ‘Then why don’t you have us killed?’

  ‘And defy the will of God?’ he said. ‘I know what I am. I know why I am here. I come from a corrupted line. I am a corruption – so much has been revealed to me in prayer and fasting. The holy man was right. I am the end of the world and, though for years I sought to avoid that fate, I now see it is impossible to do so. When fate appears in a flash of light in a high, fortified tower in the middle of a siege, you know there is no way of running from it. God has had enough of man, it is time to start again. But my angel has revealed that.’

  ‘If you have an angel, call it against this horde!’ said Montagu. ‘You are not of a corrupted line. You are the pure prince. The corruption takes your name and your honour.’

  Giovanni smiled. ‘I was six when the angel first appeared to me. It explained who I was. I have royal blood in me, true, or it would not have come. But the Plantagenets were founded on a union with a devil. This was not meant to be, for God says only men must rule over other men. Devils are servants and must not rise to greatness over his lower creations.’

  ‘Your line is corrupt?’

  ‘Geoffrey, who founded our line, lay with a devil. Every child since has carried the devil’s blood.’

  ‘That is against God’s holy will!’

  ‘Yes. But God does not control all those he commands.’

  Montagu found he was shaking. The whole line? King Edward too ? Well, he was the boy’s father. Yes.

  ‘Did your father know?’

  ‘I don’t know. The angel appeared to me. Perhaps it would appear to him.’

  ‘Angels never appeared to him, I know that.’

  ‘Then he may not have known.’

  ‘So why not go to the woods and be a hermit? Give up all this.’

  ‘I was afraid. Hard for a man to admit, but I was. But now I see that God has put me in an inescapable position. He thinks the time is right. I can flee him no longer.’

  ‘For what ?’

  ‘He is sick of the people of the earth, disgusted by them. The last time he did for them by flood. This time he will let their inner corruption eat them alive. It requires only the magic to do it. A drop of angel’s blood. Or rather, half-angel. Corruption will mix with corruption and multiply many times. “I heard a great voice out of the temple saying to the seven angels, Go your ways, and pour out the vials of the wrath of God upon the earth. And the first went, and poured out his vial upon the earth; and there fell a noisome and grievous sore upon the men.” I will bring the angel to pour the first vial.’

  ‘Is that God’s will or your will?’

  ‘I am but a vessel for the will of the Lord.’

  Montagu had seen too much magic to doubt its effect but he could not sit by and see this man conjure a spell to destroy creation. Could it be
done?

  Dow let out a great cough and the blood burst from his nose again.

  ‘The Lord has given us a sign,’ said Giovanni.

  He took a fine cloth from a table and wiped Dow’s nose.

  ‘He has done miraculous things?’ he said.

  ‘He has.’

  ‘Then this is him. My mirror. The king’s blood corrupted by angel and by devil. The angel told me he would come.’

  A great crash and a roar from the horde. Giovanni went back to the window.

  ‘The gates,’ said Giovanni. ‘They could not last for ever.’

  Montagu tried to get up but he was still too weak.

  ‘I will call the angel,’ said Giovanni. ‘And we will end this.’

  ‘Those cloaks,’ said Montagu, ‘are of angels’ feathers. Put one on and wish to be away. You will be there before you know.’

  Giovanni glanced towards the cloaks.

  ‘I wish to be in Heaven. And may get there if I serve the Lord.’

  He locked the door to the tower and brought down a heavy bar.

  ‘Can you stand?’ he said.

  ‘I am weak.’

  Giovanni proffered him Arondight, hilt first.

  ‘For yourself, then, if all goes wrong.’

  ‘I will not kill myself.’

  ‘You must have care for your soul.’

  ‘I don’t care for my soul, I care for my reputation. Let me be eaten by devils but I will not take a coward’s way out.’

  ‘Is the sword holy?’

  ‘It was Lancelot’s.’

  ‘Then hold it close. You will need all the relics you can get.’

  ‘What of him?’ Montagu gestured to Dow.

  ‘He is safest of all.’

  A hammering at the door. A voice in Genoese. Montagu understood a little. ‘Sir. Now.’ – that was all.

  ‘The head Hospitaller,’ said Giovanni. ‘I think they know my destiny and were seeking to keep me from it. As I too sought. Now no more.’

  He bowed before the altar, crossed himself and sank to his knees.

  ‘Malakh ha-Mavet, who gave Moses the soot to throw before Pharaoh. Destroying angel, who took the firstborn but passed by at the sign of the blood of the paschal lamb. Sword of God, holy abomination, come to me now. There is brightness here for you to extinguish, beauty to be annulled. You are God’s vengeance who undoes all the works of man. Now undo man himself.’

  Montagu felt the air thicken. His head swam and his guts contracted. He gripped Arondight and prayed to St Anne, whose tooth was in the pommel of his sword.

  ‘Mother of the mother of God, be at my side now as you have been in my every battle.’ Guilt bubbled up inside him. Hadn’t he vowed to be damned? Here he was begging the saint for aid, like a child in the dark.

  The air became grey. A smell of burning filled up the chamber. At the door, the Hospitallers hammered and shouted. Other voices were now close, harsh and alien. The horde had entered the keep? How? Bribery or cowardice, doubtless. Much easier to get through the doors of a great tower by targeting human weakness rather than that of iron and wood. Men offered their life can quickly forget their vows to their masters.

  The boy Dow was on his knees. His front was covered in blood which still dripped from his nose and mouth.

  Giovanni went on, ‘Bearer of plagues, he who raised the flood the Ark floated upon, choking smoke, thing of night and the fogs, come now.’

  Above the altar a smudge of smoke formed – an almost perfect circle, dark and turbulent.

  ‘Ender of days, purifier, he who never knew Eden, come to me now. End the world!’

  Montagu got to his feet, fighting nausea, fighting dizziness. He had to kill this madman before he could go through with such a foul magic. If this was God’s will then Montagu was, as he had willed himself to be, God’s enemy. He grasped Arondight. The saint’s voice rang in his head, high and clear. She was still with him. Holy Mary’s mother stood at his side. He saw her before him, in a shimmer of blue light. Giovanni was on his knees; it would only take one blow to kill him.

  ‘Give me strength, Lady.’ He staggered towards his man.

  ‘Be healed,’ said the saint. The lady stretched out her hand but not towards Montagu – towards Dow.

  The boy got to his feet. The circle of smoke contracted to a black dot not bigger than a fist.

  Montagu raised the sword and Dow charged him, dragging him down.

  The circle exploded in an instant and all the gold and fine jewels were turned black, as if coated by a dark frost.

  ‘What are you doing?’ said Montagu.

  ‘Beginning again,’ said Dow.

  ‘He wants to destroy humanity,’ said Montagu.

  ‘I can save it – those that deserve it,’ said Dow.

  Giovanni stood up, his arms wide.

  ‘Purge the earth as you told me that you would. Destroy everything so God might deny Lucifer his second Eden!’

  ‘He opposes you!’ said Montagu. ‘He intends to see you fail! Listen to him.’

  ‘Intends,’ said Dow, as if spitting something from his mouth. ‘What did the mouse intend when it woke the cat?’ He stood up.

  ‘Bring your diseased angel!’

  ‘Where is the seed for such a calamitous weed? Where the spark to light a fire to burn the world?’ The voice was like the fall of earth on a coffin lid and it came from nowhere.

  ‘Corruption on corruption, bad blood on bad blood, the manangel and the devil man’s blood mixed!’ said Giovanni.

  He held up the cloth he had soaked in Dow’s blood and drew a knife.

  ‘No!’ Montagu summoned his last reserve of strength and leapt at Giovanni, swinging Arondight in a big circle. Giovanni’s head fell from his shoulders, a fountain of blood hitting the ceiling of the room, splattering over Montagu and over Dow.

  Dow put his fingers to his lips.

  ‘You cannot fight the will of God, Montagu.’

  ‘Though you do!’

  ‘Yes, I do.’

  Dow rubbed his fingers together, mixing his own blood with that of Giovanni.

  The sounds of battle faded to nothing. Montagu felt as if turned to stone. Even Dow seemed paralysed. The only thing that moved was the blood trickling across the stone floor from the stump of Giovanni’s neck. Something was wrong with the way the blood flowed, thought Montagu. His thoughts seemed unwieldy, slow to react, like an ill-trained horse. What was wrong with the blood? Oh no. It was flowing the wrong way, back into the body of Giovanni.

  The sounds crashed back in. The first time he’d seen a shambles at the market, where they slaughtered the cattle in the street, he had fainted. He’d been four years old. His nurse had taken him back there again and again until he was inured to it. A Montagu couldn’t quail at the sight of blood. It was that first feeling that seized him now – terror, incomprehension, pity even.

  ‘Are you here?’ shouted Dow. ‘Are you here?’

  A ram was at the door, battering and smashing, the wood splintering under the assault.

  Giovanni’s headless body got up to its hands and knees, searching for the head.

  ‘I like you better blind,’ said Dow.

  He took up the eyeless calf’s head and set it on the stump of the neck. The arms reached up to settle it, as if putting on a hat.

  ‘Come,’ said Dow. ‘Earth is yours.’

  The door went through and the horde were upon them, the little squat men with their sallow faces, their swords and their smiling eyes. A wild-haired man who bore a staff of skulls was at their front. He pointed to the monstrous thing Giovanni had become and said a word that could only mean ‘Kill!’

  They fell upon it. Its body fell apart under their blows, chopped to a carcass, limbs severed, torso split by seven or eight heavy blows. The men of the horde did not stop when it fell but carried on hacking, smashing and stamping. Dow dragged Montagu as far from the door as he could, picking up his falchion from where the Templar had left it.

  The man
with the staff pointed it at Dow and spoke, in Genoese, or what Montagu assumed was Genoese. One of the languages of the Holy Roman Empire. He bowed and put forward a big purse – the size of a small bag, though finely stitched in goatskin. Montagu opened it. It was full of gold. Montagu could not believe it. He was offering to pay for the damage that had been caused. My God, he had truly only wanted Giovanni and now he looked to restore normal trading relations with Genoa.

  ‘Give it to my friend,’ said Dow. ‘It will be too heavy for me to carry.’ He pointed at Montagu The man shook his head. He put his hand into the air, his gesture indicating ‘higher’. He was asking for the ruler of Caffa, or whoever was the ruler now that so much slaughter had been done.

  Dow shrugged. The room was becoming colder. The black frost deepened on the gold and the jewels. The men of the horde glanced at each other. Their breath pushed plumes of steam into the air of the room. The man with the staff and the bag of gold put his hand to his throat, his companions too. They choked and spluttered, fumbled for support on the walls but they were dying, Montagu could see, great boils sprouting from them, their skin breaking in corruption. They fell, writhing and crying out.

  From the floor, the ravaged remains of Giovanni’s body reassembled themselves, each finding its brother but not quite in the order they had been. The ribs were inside out, exposed, the lungs and heart visible within – at first still, now twitching and glistening. The exposed bone of an arm found the joint of a shoulder, a bloody leg reunited with a hip but a skinless shin joined the wrong way round. The thing reached out and set the calf’s head on its shoulders and stood uncertainly from the floor, as the calf that had given its head once had when born naturally from its mother.

  It lifted its bloody nostrils to the air and sniffed. The thing was blind !

  It craned its head, as if seeking advice.

  ‘I will guide you.’

  ‘Kill it!’ said Montagu. ‘Kill it! It’s an abomination.’ Again, the creature craned its head.

  Dow took his little pipe from his pocket and lifted it to his lips, playing a peasant’s tune. Montagu recalled the words.

  Fowles in the frith, The fishes in the flood, And I must go mad Much sorrow I walk with For beast of boon and blood.

  The creature turned to Dow and took a pace towards him.