Not wanting to be reminded of those days, he muttered, ‘Stupid bitch, she probably deserves it,’ and watched as Hildeburg made a jerky, graceless curtsey and said, ‘Your children have come to say good night, my lord.’
‘Very well.’ Talvas had shown her no sign of affection or respect. ‘Now get out of here. They can find their own way to their bedchamber.’
‘Yes, my lord,’ Hildeburg whimpered.
Talvas reached out a hand towards her. He was only stretching for a flagon of wine that was standing on the table, but that single movement was enough to make his wife flinch. De Gacé wondered how many beatings it had taken to break her spirit so totally. By God, Talvas was a hard bastard, he thought admiringly, realising how much he still had to learn.
Then his host turned to him and said, ‘These are my children. Arnulf . . .’
A sullen, snot-nosed boy stepped forward, held out his hand and said, as if by rote, ‘Good evening, sir.’
De Gacé shook the lad’s limp hand.
‘And my daughter, Mabel . . .’
The girl who stepped confidently towards de Gacé was as pretty a vision of bouncing golden curls and sweet, smiling lips as anyone could wish to see. She was adorable, with a voice that was as clear and bright as a bell as she said, ‘Good evening, Lord de Gacé.’
But when Ralph looked into her eyes, Mabel of Bellême stared right back with a depth of pure, cold evil that pierced him to his very bones and frightened him more profoundly than any man, of any size, carrying any weapon, that he had ever met in his life.
He shuddered at the memory. That girl was surely possessed by demons, and it did him no good at all to think of her. He turned his mind instead to the Viper, and everything that was known about him.
Two days later, de Gacé rode at the head of a small column of armed men into the town of Vaudreuil. It stood at the fork of the rivers Seine and Eure. This position made it a natural trading centre, and its customs post and docks were always busy with boats and barges plying back and forth, cargoes being loaded and unloaded, and boatmen and dockers looking for a drink, a fight, a fuck or all three.
There were three taverns down by the waterfront catering to this rough-and-ready class of customer, and though it was barely an hour or two after breakfast time, there were already plenty of people seeking refreshment. De Gacé led half a dozen of his men into the first establishment and waited until the room had been cleared of drinkers and cheap dockside whores. Then he marched up to the wooden trestle table set up in front of a row of barrels that served as a counter and asked the scarred, shaven-headed bruiser standing behind it, ‘Where can I find the Viper?’
‘Who’s asking?’ the innkeeper replied.
‘The Duchy of Normandy,’ de Gacé replied.
‘Duchy my arse. I fought twenty years for old Duke Richard. Me and my mates did all our killing for the Little Cats. Don’t see no leopards on any colours here. So tell me who you really are or piss off.’
‘Wiger!’ de Gacé called out, not taking his eyes off the innkeeper.
One of his men stepped forward carrying a large battleaxe. ‘Yes, my lord?’
‘Smash that barrel.’
Wiger, who was just as large and almost as ugly as the innkeeper, stood in front of the first barrel, lifted his axe up high and then swung it down with all his strength.
The cooper who had made this particular cask had done a good job. The wood cracked and splintered but did not break. It was not until the fourth swing that Wiger finally smashed through it, sending a flood of mead streaming across the floor and filling the smoky air with the sickly-sweet smell of fermented honey.
Neither the innkeeper nor de Gacé budged as the liquid flowed around and even over their feet.
‘Where’s the Viper?’ de Gacé asked. ‘Or do you want my men to smash every single barrel in this stinking dump?’
The innkeeper was breathing heavily, struggling to control his temper. De Gacé decided he needed a little more help making up his mind. ‘Wiger!’
The soldier stood by the next barrel and raised his axe. He smashed it down once, twice . . . and then it was the innkeeper rather than the barrel that cracked.
‘All right, all right, I’ll tell you! Go down the other end of the docks. The place you want has a crescent moon on its sign. But you’re too late. The old man who ran the place, the one that knew the Viper, died. His son’s taken over, but he won’t know where the Viper’s hiding. That idiot can’t even find his own arse.’
Sure enough, the slack-jawed young man who played host at the Crescent Moon had no idea where the killer could be found. ‘I swear our dad didn’t tell us nothing!’ he pleaded, close to tears. ‘He didn’t dare, said the Viper would kill him.’
De Gacé was all too depressingly certain that he was telling the truth. But just as he was leading his men out, the landlord of the Crescent Moon suddenly called out, ‘Wait! I just remembered something! My old man, he told us, “The Viper’ll come slithering out of the forest and across the river and he’ll kill us all if he thinks I’ve crossed him.” So that means he must live in the forest but not on this bank of the river, the other one.’
‘Which river?’ de Gacé asked. ‘There are two.’
‘Oh, the Seine. When the old man talked about “the river”, he meant the big one. He used to say, “The Eure’s no more’n a streak of piss.”’
‘He was quite the orator, your father.’
The young taverner’s jaw slackened still further and his brow furrowed as he tried to work out what an orator was. De Gacé ignored him. He stalked from the tavern, calling out to his men, ‘Mount up and move out! We’re crossing the river, and we’re going to catch the Viper.’
11
Eudo the poacher’s son was eleven years old. He’d never had a day’s education in his life. He’d never even met anyone who could write their own name. But he knew these woods better than anyone, better even than his own father, who was set in his ways and always left his snares in the same old places, even though the animals were learning to avoid the spots where death waited to trap them. There was one place in particular where Eudo liked to go. It was right in the heart of the forest: a series of glades filled with brightly coloured flowers, arranged in a circle around another, bigger opening in the trees where the beautiful lady and the black monster lived in a house of broken-down stones.
This was what Eudo called the magic house, and he had to set out at first light if he wanted to get there and back before sunset, even on a summer’s day. But it was always worth the journey. He had never spoken to the beautiful woman, nor even caught her eye, and he’d always hidden as carefully as possible when he came near the house. But she must have known he was there, because he’d once or twice found little presents that she had left out for him: small bread rolls or even a piece of cake, still warm from the oven. It was as if she knew he was coming, even though he hadn’t told anyone. That was how he knew she was magic.
It happened that Eudo had visited the house on the same day that Ralph de Gacé had led his men into the taverns on Vaudreuil docks. Sadly for him, he had not found any little gift of food waiting for him when he reached his hiding place. So now, making his way down one of the forester’s paths that criss-crossed the woods, and trying to ignore the aching rumbles from his empty stomach, he was so wrapped up in his own hunger that he wasn’t paying attention to his surroundings.
Out of nowhere, he heard the sound of horses’ hooves beating on the earth, and suddenly half a dozen armed and mounted men appeared just a short way up ahead. If Eudo had been more alert, he would have disappeared into the trees long before the soldiers had spotted him. But his mind was leagues away, his reactions were slow, and already the horsemen were almost on him.
‘Hey, you, boy!’ one of the men called out.
That did it. Eudo turned and
fled. Behind him he heard a shout of ‘Stop!’ and the next thing he knew an arrow thudded into the trunk of a tree just as he was running past it.
He heard the horseman’s voice again. ‘The next one goes right through your back.’
Eudo stopped and turned back towards the armed men. As a poacher’s son, raised all his life to believe that those in power were a threat to his livelihood and very existence, he assumed that these men were out looking for anyone taking game from forests belonging to the Duke of Normandy himself.
‘Please, sir, I’ve not done anything wrong,’ he called out, holding up his hands to show that there was nothing in them.
‘I don’t care what you’ve done,’ said the horseman, who had one of the strangest faces Eudo had ever seen, with sticking-out teeth and goggly eyes and a nose that looked as long as his horse’s. On any other day he’d have looked funny, but not today. ‘There’s only one thing I want to know, and if you can help me . . .’ The horseman rummaged in a purse hanging from his belt, pulled out a small silver coin and held it up so that Eudo could see it. ‘. . . I’ll give you this shiny brand-new penny. But if you lie to me or deceive me, or try to hide what you know, then I’ll stick my sword so deep into your guts that you’ll feel like a pig on a spit.’
Eudo didn’t know what to say to that. He just stood stock still, hardly daring even to breathe.
‘So tell me this, boy,’ the horseman went on, ‘do you know these woods well?’
Eudo was still completely dumbstruck. He nodded frantically.
‘Very well then. I’m looking for a man who lives here, somewhere secret, somewhere only a sneaky, sharp-eyed lad like yourself would know. This man is called the Viper. You ever heard that name, boy?’
Eudo shook his head.
‘Speak up!’
‘No, sir,’ Eudo said. ‘I’ve never heard that name.’
‘The Viper has a servant who’s as big as a giant and as black as night. I bet you’d be able to spot someone like that if they were in the forest. So have you seen him, this black giant?’
Eudo didn’t know what to say. He didn’t want to die, but he didn’t want to betray the beautiful lady and her monster, either. He darted his head from side to side, looking for a possible escape route, but the horsemen had formed into a ring that almost entirely encircled him.
‘You know who I’m talking about, don’t you, boy? Don’t deny it. I can see it in your face. I bet you know just where to find him, too.’
‘No, I don’t, sir, honest I don’t!’ Eudo blurted out. ‘Promise!’
The horseman grinned. ‘Do you now? Well I don’t believe you. I think you’re telling lies. And you know what I do to little boys who tell me lies . . .’ He whipped his sword out of his scabbard and pointed it directly at Eudo.
Eudo swallowed hard. His eyes filled with tears and his nose began to run.
‘What’s your name, boy?’ the horseman asked, sounding a bit less frightening.
‘Eudo, sir,’ came the reply.
‘Well, Eudo, I made you a promise, and unlike you, I mean it. So I will give you that penny if you just tell me where I can find the giant. Will you tell me?’
‘Yes,’ said Eudo, and burst out crying. It wasn’t for him, or even for the giant. He was crying for the beautiful lady.
A wordless, guttural roar, like the distant sound of a lion at night, but overlaid with a higher pitch of pain and alarm, echoed through the forest to the kitchen where Jamila was working. In the very instant that she heard it, she knew that the sound had been made by Mahomet, and that if he were afraid then it would not be for himself, for she had never once known her man to be scared on his own account. He only felt fear for her.
She dropped the prayer mats, gathered up her skirts and raced across the reed-strewn stone floor to the chest where she kept her knife, a dagger whose needle blade, forged from Toledo steel, made any Norman weapon seem like nothing more than a crude bar of pig iron. It sat in a short scabbard that she belted like a girdle around her waist.
Beside the chest stood a tall wooden store cupboard that was empty save for a few small hessian sacks filled with flour, turnips, cabbages and dried beans. Jamila stepped into the cupboard, lifted her right hand and pressed against a point on the far wall. There was a soft click and a door swung open revealing nothing but darkness beyond. She slipped through into the gloom and closed the door after her, leaving behind an empty room.
12
‘Over here, my lord!’
Ralph de Gacé peered down the path that ran away from the building site where the Moor had been working and lost itself in the shadows between the trees. Up ahead, one of his foot soldiers was waving to catch his attention.
‘What is it?’ he shouted back.
‘Some kind of old house, all broken down,’ the soldier replied. ‘But I can see smoke. Someone’s got a fire going.’
De Gacé called out, ‘Stay there!’ then turned back to the men who were struggling to tie the Moor’s outstretched hands to the ends of the heavy wooden yoke that had been placed across his broad shoulders. The Moor was half crippled by the arrow in the front of his right thigh, just above the knee, and his face was slicked with sweat and almost grey with the pain, but he was not uttering a sound. And though two of de Gacé’s men were wrestling each of his hands, marvelling as they did so at the contrast between the jet-black skin on the backs of his fingers and the delicate pinky-brown skin on his palms, they could not keep their prisoner still for long enough to pass the ropes around his wrists and tie him to the yoke.
De Gacé gave a sharp, irritable sigh. He dismounted, walked across to the Moor and tilted his head up so that he could look him in the face and smile. Then he grabbed the shaft of the arrow, pushed it deeper into the flesh of the Moor’s leg and yanked it up and down.
The Moor emitted an agonised, shuddering groan and sank to his knees, his head bent down upon his chest. Seeing him finally humbled, his captors set about their task with a burst of new energy and enthusiasm. As de Gacé remounted his horse, another man dropped a noose over the Moor’s neck and tightened it so that it prevented him breathing in anything other than shallow, desperate gasps.
‘Bring him,’ said de Gacé. He wheeled his chestnut stallion and set off down the path at a leisurely walk. Up ahead, the first soldier was waiting by a sharp left-hand turn in the path.
‘There, my lord,’ he said, pointing ahead of him. ‘What did I tell you? A fire!’
The ruins of the villa stretched across a considerable area of the forest floor in a maze of walls, passages, half-demolished rooms, fallen columns and the trees that had grown up through the old mosaic floors and burst through the last few remnants of the tiled roof. Anyone unfamiliar with the place would soon find themselves in a maze, littered with obstructions and dead ends. Jamila, on the other hand, knew every single step, whether in the quantum of sunshine that penetrated the forest canopy or the Stygian gloom of a cloudy winter night. She could race from the secret doorway to any one of half a dozen separate exits into the forest. It would be a few moments’ work to escape the crude approach of the knights who came stamping and shouting their way down the winding path she and Mahomet had cut from the ancient bathhouse to the main courtyard. Once free, she could hurry to the graveyard, where a substantial portion of their accumulated gold was cached in a buried coffin, remove enough to keep her for this lifetime and another beyond it, and be gone from Normandy for ever by the time the sun next rose.
But that would mean deserting Mahomet, which was something Jamila could never do. She crouched at one of the observation points littered throughout the ruins, and peered at the entrance to the courtyard. Out of the gloom, no more than twenty paces from where she hid, emerged a foot soldier and then a mounted man – an aristocrat, to judge by the quality and condition of his mount and the richness of his clothing. She kept w
atching as the man emerged into a patch of watery sunshine and then nodded to herself as she recognised de Gacé. Even with a hood of chain mail over his head and a helmet on top of that, he was unmistakable. Had he made the connection between Jarl the Viper and his own father’s death and come looking for revenge, or was the motive for his visit something else entirely?
Her speculation was cut short by the appearance of Mahomet, tethered to a yoke and with a rope around his neck, being led like an animal to slaughter. Jamila cursed the womanly lack of strength that prevented her from drawing back a bow powerful enough to send an arrow through chain mail. Had she been suitably armed, she could have picked off four or five of de Gacé’s men before the survivors had time to take their own bows off their shoulders, select their arrows and start looking around for a target. Had they been about to bivouac for the night, she could have slipped through the darkness into their camp and finished the lot of them off with any one of a myriad poisons, aided and abetted by silent stabs from her needle-sharp blade, gently applied to the most vulnerable parts of the human body.
For now, though, there was nothing she could do to save her man except hide and wait and hope.
And then Mahomet cried out. He spoke in Arabic, but not in any form of the language that a citizen of Damascus or Jeddah would have understood, for the words were as malformed as de Gacé’s face. But Jamila understood him perfectly and knew that he had said, ‘Flee, my beloved! I command you as your husband – run!’
The words were silenced by a grunt of pain as one of de Gacé’s men hit Mahomet in the kidneys with the butt of his lance. The other men started mocking him, imitating the garbled, incomprehensible words as if they were nothing more than animal noises.
‘Enough!’ shouted de Gacé. Then he turned his head towards the centre of the courtyard and called out, ‘I come looking for the one that people call Jarl the Viper. I have a proposition to put to him . . .’ He sniffed the air like a hunting dog. ‘No . . . to you. I know you’re here, Viper. I’m certain of it. You wouldn’t leave your pet ape here by itself. From what I hear, this creature matters to you; perhaps you even love it as I love my favourite dog. Very well then. I wish to talk business with you. I suspect you may not wish to talk to me, so . . . observe. Serlo!’
The Leopards of Normandy: Duke: Leopards of Normandy 2 Page 9