‘I think you’re all being too hard on him,’ Miller ventured. ‘Yes, he has been unpleasant in the past, but he needs us now, and as Christians we need to give him support … extend the hand of friendship.’
‘Shut up, Miller,’ they all chanted in unison.
They reached the walls and climbed the ladder to the walkway. The guard greeted them with a curt nod and continued his rounds. ‘Hallowe’en and all’s hell,’ Mallory called out. He couldn’t help a glance towards the pagan camp. A ruddy glow emanated from burning bonfires as they celebrated Samhain and the start of their New Year the following day.
‘I’m hungry,’ Gardener grumbled.
‘You’re always hungry,’ Daniels said. He dropped the large bag he had been carrying and squatted down to delve into its contents.
‘If they cut the servings any more, we’ll just be getting bowls of hot water,’ Gardener continued. ‘Bloody turnips and swedes. Give me a bloody big steak, that’s what I say.’
‘A curry,’ Mallory said. ‘Balti, preferably.’
‘Jerk pork.’ Daniels pulled out a crossbow and handed it to Miller. ‘Let’s see if all that training paid off.’ He handed other crossbows to Mallory and Gardener.
‘Won’t they be annoyed at us for wasting ammunition?’ Miller said.
‘Don’t worry, Miller. You can go out and reclaim them all when we’re finished.’ Mallory drew the crossbow and fitted the bolt before looking through the sight as he moved it in an arc over the rooftops. ‘When you really need street lighting …‘he sighed.
The guard wandered up. He had the worn features of someone who had worked too hard for too long. ‘It won’t do any good, you know. You can’t kill them. The best you can do is hurt them.’
‘Hurting is good,’ Mallory said.
‘I don’t know …‘the guard mused. ‘Maybe I should talk this over with the captain.’
Mallory clapped a comradely hand on his shoulder. ‘Look, we’re all under pressure here. This is just a bit of aimless sport … a bit of r’n’r and some way to show we’re not a waste of space … we’re not beaten.’
‘Thumbing our noses,’ Gardener said in support.
The guard thought about this for a second, then nodded. ‘Go on. Give ‘em hell.’ He wandered off whistling a Madonna song.
‘Right,’ Gardener said quietly, ‘let’s tear those bastards to pieces.’
They knelt down to rest their crossbows on the top of the wall, aiming at the empty road ahead where the supernatural creatures would sooner or later make their nightly appearance. After a while, Miller began to mutter under his breath.
‘For God’s sake, Miller, what is it?’ Mallory muttered.
‘I’m not happy with this.’
The other three all groaned together. ‘I’m having a post-traumatic stress disorder flashback,’ Daniels moaned. ‘Didn’t we go through all this in the refectory? Didn’t we talk at length before reaching a democratic agreement?’
‘Yes, didn’t we tell you you’re a stupid bastard and to shut up?’ Mallory added.
‘They’re living creatures,’ Miller protested.
‘Debatable,’ Gardener said.
‘They are. They move, they think—’
‘But they don’t have souls,’ Gardener said.
‘Neither do dogs,’ Miller said. ‘But would you advocate sitting up here shooting at a few pets running around out there?’
‘If they were the enemy,’ Mallory said.
‘We’re Christians,’ Miller said. ‘We shouldn’t be going out inflicting pain on any living creature. We turn the other cheek … that’s what we do.’
‘Eye for an eye,’ Gardener said. He cranked the bolt, ready to loose it. ‘They should be coming out any minute, right?’
‘Regular as clockwork, so the guards say.’ Daniels armed his crossbow, too.
‘I want to bag one of those little bastards,’ Gardener said. ‘Those black eyes they’ve got really give me the creeps. It’s as though they’re looking right into you.’
There was a movement as if a curtain of mist had been peeled back across the street. In an instant the road was filled with the army of tiny people with their pale skin and large, black eyes. The manifestation was so eerie in its silence and speed that they all felt a frisson. Gardener shuddered as though the beings had come in response to his comments. Though they had shown bravado when they climbed on to the walls, none of them could hide the primal fear evinced by the army of alien men, women and children in their odd clothes with their bizarre weapons of war.
It took a second or two for them to accept that the siege army was not making any attempt to advance as it had on previous days. Instead, they stood shoulder to shoulder, all hideous dark eyes turned towards the cathedral. An air of unsettling apprehension hung over the scene.
‘What are they waiting for?’ Daniels asked with irritation born of fear.
Gardener’s finger gently caressed the crossbow trigger. ‘Praying to the Devil,’ he said. ‘A Hallowe’en ritual. This is Evil’s night.’
Mallory felt growing unease. ‘I’m not sure …’
‘They’ll move soon enough,’ Gardener said. ‘Just wait till they get within range, then let rip. I’m going for that little shit on the horse. He looks as though he might be the leader.’
‘Something’s wrong,’ Mallory said. He let his crossbow slip, then leaned forwards so that he could get a better look. ‘They’re waiting for something. It’s as if they’re listening …’
The white faces were turned up slightly, the moon making them glow with a spectral light. Their complete lack of movement was as frightening as their appearance. Gardener couldn’t contain himself any longer. He loosed his bolt, but in his tense state his hand shook and it flew off course, embedding in a tiny wagon. The thud echoed across the silent street. Even then none of the creatures moved, nor even acknowledged they had been attacked.
‘What are they doing?’ Daniels said insistently.
‘I don’t like this,’ Miller whined.
‘Wait,’ Mallory snapped. He had heard a sound, lost beneath the wind, something that had disturbed him, but it had come from his back, not from the city ahead. He turned and looked across the darkness engulfing the compound. Nothing moved. The only light came from the candles within the cathedral.
‘What is it?’ Daniels asked.
Mallory strained to catch what lay beneath the wind. ‘I thought I heard …’
‘Look at that.’ Gardener’s voice was so filled with repressed terror that they all felt queasy to hear it.
He was pointing over the rooftops. In the distance, rising up like grey smoke against the night sky, was the outline of a horned figure. It was massive, insubstantial, suggestive of great power. It had barely reached its full height when it began to break up and drift away. Instantly lights began to flare across the Stygian landscape beyond the city boundaries.
‘Bonfires,’ Mallory said.
‘What does it mean?’ Miller whimpered.
‘The Devil.’ Dread had turned Gardener into a shadow of his real self. ‘The Devil’s here.’
The noise behind them was now unmistakable and growing louder as voices rose up in support. Mallory heard terror, and disbelief, and grief. It was like wildfire, jumping from one person to the next. It was hard to tell which had the greater impetus - a desire to escape from the terrible threat looming over Salisbury or to respond to the alarm behind them - but they were all instantly in motion, skidding down the ladder and running across the compound to the source of the cries.
They found a small group milling around the cathedral doors. They were throwing their heads back and their hands up, wailing to the heavens. Mallory and the others drove through them to find Julian slumped against the base of the wall. Blood gleamed on his hands and face, so much blood that they were sickened to look at it.
At first, Mallory thought Julian had been stabbed, but as the precentor slowly pulled himself upright, it was clear it wa
s his grief that had brought him to his knees. He didn’t appear to be injured at all.
‘What’s happened?’ Mallory yelled above the din. He grabbed Julian by the shoulders, shaking him a little too roughly to disperse the glaze of shock that covered his tear-stained face.
Along the walls, the guards called the midnight hour. Slowly, Julian raised his left hand. In the half-light it appeared unnaturally dark; a drip slowly fell from his index finger and splashed in a band of light on the floor where they could see its colour and consistency.
Eventually, Julian found his voice, a cracked, pathetic thing that sounded like winter. ‘Cornelius has been murdered,’ he said.
CHAPTER NINE
the way of the earth
‘There is a saying uttered in sacred rites that human beings are in a sort of prison, from which we should not attempt to escape’
- Plato
At first, it looked like a pile of abandoned laundry lying behind the altar. Only when Mallory closed on it did he see the white hand twisted upwards from the clothes. In the stillness, the drip-drip-drip of blood falling from the altar table was unbearably loud.
‘Oh, Lord!’ Daniels hissed as he examined the body over Mallory’s shoulders. It had been torn apart, was barely recognisable as a man.
Gardener and Miller helped Julian between them; he was almost delirious with shock. ‘He … he said he wanted to pray,’ the precentor stuttered. ‘He often came here on his own …’ His voice ended in a small, strangled cry as his eyes fell on the body.
Miller dropped to his knees, eyes screwed tight so he couldn’t see the polluting sight; he looked like a small boy praying at the side of his bed.
‘Who’d do a thing like that?’ Daniels said, aghast.
To Mallory, that was a question with ramifications to shatter the community: who would have committed such a terrible crime? Not any of the supernatural creatures that waited beyond the walls; they couldn’t walk on the sacred ground. But could any of the brethren do such a thing? He couldn’t imagine that either. The image of the army of tiny people waiting for something to happen lay heavily on his mind, along with the ghostly impression of the Devil appearing over Salisbury at the moment the murder was discovered. They knew. Somehow, in some way.
‘Get back! Get back!’ Blaine’s harsh voice echoed into the far reaches of the cathedral roof. He arrived with Hipgrave dogging his steps, Blaine’s face torn by a cornered-animal expression, part fury, part fear; he assimilated the entire scene in an instant, and it didn’t seem to affect him at all. Mallory noted Blaine’s response carefully. Hipgrave looked as if he’d just woken from the deepest sleep. ‘Who found him?’ Blaine whirled, cold eyes flashing over each of them in turn.
Julian staggered forwards. ‘Me. I did. I … I came looking for him … thought he might need a hand getting back to his residence. He still wasn’t a hundred per cent.’
‘He was like this?’ Blaine snapped. ‘You didn’t touch anything?’
‘Well … I … I touched him. I tried to stop the blood. I tried to save him!’ His voice rose to a sob, and then he covered his eyes, smearing Cornelius’s blood across his face.
Blaine had no time for Julian’s grief. ‘Did you see anybody else?’
Julian gulped air. ‘No … no …’ he said, composing himself. ‘Look, we must do this later. We have to care for the body …’ He covered his eyes again.
Blaine shook his head contemptuously, cursing under his breath but loud enough for Julian to hear. There was more activity further down the nave. The crowd that was hanging back from the awful scene parted like the Red Sea to allow Stefan to sweep through, followed closely by Gibson, the Canon of the Pies, sweating and blowing as he attempted to keep up.
Stefan was ashen-faced when he arrived, but his eyes had a dark avarice about them. Stefan silenced Blaine with a curt wave before he could open his mouth. He went directly to Cornelius’s body and knelt beside it in prayer. There was a theatrical note to his action that irked Mallory, but no one else appeared to notice. After a long silence, Stefan dipped his hands in the blood and smeared it on his black robes. ‘We have lost something great and Godly this night,’ he said in a quiet, strained voice. Tears ran down his cheeks. ‘A devout man, the father of us all.’ He paused before booming angrily, ‘This crime shall be avenged!’
The act of pantomime was not lost on the crowd gathered further down the nave; cries of support echoed back. Stefan rose and addressed them directly. ‘This crime is not just against our beloved bishop, nor against us, but against Christianity itself. Someone … something … has aimed a blow at our very heart, hoping we will fall aside … that we shall turn our backs and flee to the shadows. That must not happen! The times ahead will be harder still, and we shall all be called on to stand firm. Trials and tribulations will be inflicted on all of us, but if we each fulfil our role, if we hold our heads high in the Glory of God, then we shall overcome. Go now, in the name of our Lord, Jesus Christ, and carry word of what has happened to all our brothers. Let the period of mourning begin. The time for action shall come.’
His words were perfectly chosen. They resonated in the hearts of those watching and as one they turned and hurried from the cathedral.
‘Good show,’ Gibson said when Stefan turned back to them. ‘Gravitas. Perfect. We need to steady the hand on the tiller in this dark time.’
Mallory looked to Julian, who had as much right to leadership as Stefan, but Cornelius’s advisor and friend sat hunched on a pew, broken by his grief. It was a time for the hard men, Mallory thought.
Blaine turned to Mallory and the knights. ‘You lot, find a sheet to wrap the … ah …’ He struggled for a word with decorum, but could only come back to body. ‘Take it up to the infirmary and see what Warwick can find out. Then report to the great hall.’ He turned to Stefan. ‘I’m getting all the knights together … arming up. This might be the first strike in a war. Those things could be attacking even as we speak. We’ve got to be ready to knock ‘em back.’
‘Well said, Mr Blaine,’ Stefan agreed. ‘I have every faith in you to oversee our defence. Go to it.’
Blaine marched away with Hipgrave scurrying and jumping behind him. Stefan and Gibson followed without a backward glance at Cornelius, as if he wasn’t there at all.
‘Hard men,’ Mallory said, echoing his earlier thought, ‘for hard times.’
Miller was crying quietly, still in prayer with his eyes shut. He looked as though the final supports of his life had been kicked away. Gardener, too, looked tattered, uncommonly emotional; he wouldn’t meet anyone’s gaze.
‘Better get to it, then.’ Daniels’ shoulders had sagged. He tried to make a hopeful face at Mallory, but it wouldn’t fix. ‘I suppose this isn’t the end of it,’ he sighed.
‘No,’ Mallory replied. ‘I’m betting it’s just the start.’
The infirmary was lit by several lanterns that gave an odd, too-bright distortion to all the white tiles. Warwick emerged from a back room wearing pristine white scrubs. He took one look at the leaking sheet slung between Mallory, Gardener and Daniels, then down at his clothes and gritted his teeth.
‘Get it on the table,’ he snapped.
The knights laid the body out carefully while Warwick stood in the background, muttering with irritation. But when the sopping shroud fell away revealing the face, the medic started, his eyes widening. He looked around at them as if someone was playing a particularly vicious prank on him.
‘Murder,’ Gardener said grimly. ‘No suspects. Yet.’
‘What’s it all coming to?’ Warwick said under his breath. He gingerly lifted the sheet to see the extent of Cornelius’s wounds, stared blankly for a moment, then dropped it.
‘I think they were hoping for an autopsy,’ Daniels ventured.
‘An autopsy?’ Warwick raged. ‘He’s dead. What more do they need to know?’
‘What weapon was used. How the attack was carried out,’ Mallory said. ‘Who did it.’
; ‘I’m a surgeon, not a coroner. That kind of examination requires specialist knowledge.’
Gardener snatched a towel from the side and threw it at him. ‘Do your best.’ There was so much repressed anger in his voice that Warwick’s annoyed reaction was frozen. ‘From now on, we’re all mucking in. Pulling together. We’ll do what’s expected of us. So get on with it.’
Brooding, he stalked out of the room. Miller shifted uncomfortably. ‘Go on,’ Mallory said to him. ‘You don’t have to hang around if you don’t want to.’
Miller forced a smile from his tear-streaked face and hurried after Gardener. Mallory and Daniels took up seats in the corner of the room while Warwick brought over a stainless-steel tray of instruments. After that, he called for his assistant, an old man with long white hair who, from his trembling hands, had overheard the news. He prepared to take notes with a precious Biro.
Warwick worked diligently, cutting and probing, occasionally cursing under his breath. His white gown quickly became stained.
‘The first patient he’s had who never complained,’ Daniels whispered behind his hand to Mallory.
As the time dragged on, Mallory’s attention wandered. ‘Heard any news on your radio?’ he said to Warwick.
Warwick’s lips tightened and his eyes flickered towards his assistant. ‘I haven’t got a radio.’
‘OK, heard any news from people passing through the infirmary,’ Mallory said pointedly.
‘I have.’ Warwick gingerly held a pair of spring-loaded shears before attacking Cornelius’s ribcage. ‘Still no news from abroad. But there has been … talk … of a Government being established in Oxford.’
Daniels grew alert. ‘The PM survived, then?’
‘I don’t know who’s in the Government, just that a Government is being set up,’ Warwick said irritably. ‘There’ll be some kind of order established within six months, so they say. The first aim is to get communications up and running, including food distribution, particularly to urban areas—’
‘I can’t believe anyone’s crazy enough to stay in the cities,’ Mallory said. ‘What are they going to eat? They must have looted everything they can get their hands on by now.’
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