by Robert Low
The prioress smiled softly, gentle as falling snow and just as cold.
‘Your husband sent word of your coming,’ she said. ‘Now we have established that an unwanted child is not the reason for your arrival, we may thank God for His guiding you here. We are to care for you and instruct you in the ways of God’s love. Victoria veritatis est caritas – the victory of truth is love.’
Isabel followed her meekly, past where women, unveiled, shaved heads revealed, wore stained sacking overserks and worked with lime water and sinopia at marking out a fresh plastered wall for painting; the blood-red sinopia ran in sinister runnels, swiftly halted by squirrel-hair brushes before they could besmirch the glory of the Raising of Jairus’ Daughter.
Red lead and cups of gold dust for the halos lay nearby, showing the wealth of Elcho, and Isabel wondered at what Buchan had paid for this, her final instruction.
Her quarters were simple, but comfortable. The prioress pointed out where the wash place was, and the latrines, showed where meals would be served, and told Isabel how she would be called by the ringing of the bell.
There was no need to show where the chapel was, for the sound of chanting revealed it; the prioress offered another thin smile.
‘Qui cantat, bis ora,’ she said – who sings once, prays twice.
Alone, Isabel sank on the bedplace, feeling good springy heather and thick warm wool plaids. There was wood stacked beside the fireplace, but it was unlit and her breath smoked; a pair of panting nuns sweated in with her meagre baggage, all that had been garnered in the brief moments between her husband’s brusque instruction and her own departure from Balmullo.
There had been little time to do anything, but she had used it as wisely as she could. A quick press of coin and token into the hand of Ada, a whispered, urgent message and the swift secreting of a bundle in the depths of her cosmetics.
She hoped it would be enough, the first to bring rescue, the second to bring some succour and, after a moment, she hunted out the bundle, unwrapping it to reveal the contents, the remaining five bright berries of blood on the snowy linen.
Wallace had shoved them at her in the cold half-light of the hall on the morning he had limped away from Balmullo.
‘For yer love and care, ye mun have need o’ this, lady,’ he had said, ‘though sell them abroad and tell only those ye trust that ye have them. They are no use where I am bound, since no-one has the coin or the will to buy them in this country.’
The sixth ruby Apostle she had sent with Ada glowed brightly in her mind and she wondered who was there, clasped in the warmth of her tirewoman’s considerable cleavage. James the Greater? Matthew? Peter?
‘May the saints bless your sleep,’ the prioress had said portentously on taking her leave and had been puzzled at Isabel’s sharp reply.
‘I have no need of them – I have Apostles to bless me.’
The ruby nestled in the warm down of Ada’s bosom like a blood egg, shining with soft hope as she hurried through the night.
CHAPTER SIX
Holebourn Bridge, London
The Invention of John the Baptist’s Head, February, 1305
The rain came across the Fleet like a curtain, a thin, stinking mist of tar, salt, pickle and fish. It collided with the rich odour of meat and dung, pie shop and bakery, hissing on the smithy fire, rattling the flapping canopies of the stalls along the river.
Folk fled it, grey shapes scampering, looming out of it with faces soft as clay, baggy-cheeked and scowling, the women barrel-bottomed and harsh-voiced. Hal didn’t understand them, didn’t like the place, not even the comfort of the Earl of Lincoln’s Inn which they had just left, and thought the best of London lay back with the unseen St Andrew’s church where they had paused for word of Lamprecht.
Kirkpatrick, squinting from under a loop of cloak, grinned at Hal’s expression; the wee lord had never been in London before – Christ’s Blood, he had never been south of York – and the sights and sounds and stink of it were as stunning to his sense as a forge hammer on the temple.
Even to Kirkpatrick, who had been here twice before, it was hard to take. Tinkers, furriers, goldsmiths, hemp-sellers, all with the crudely-daubed bar over their stall to show what they were, bellowed against the calls of butcher and, above all, the horse copers, for this was the southern edge of Smoothfield, main market for livestock and the sale of prime horseflesh.
The frenetic throng was thinning as folk huddled in shelters from the rain, leaving the muddy, shit-clogged roadway to carts, barrows, litters. And the doggedly foolish like us, Hal thought bitterly as the rain wormed down his back.
‘Sty Lane,’ Kirkpatrick declared, pointing the fetid entrance to an alleyway. Hal wanted to know how he knew that, but did not bother to ask; Kirkpatrick’s skill at finding places and people had long since earned respect from Hal. Still, he did not like the look of the place, where the houses leaned in and blocked the sky, making it a dark and dangerous cave.
Two men came out of it, carrying the split carcass of a large pig, leaking rain-watered blood on to the sacking of their shoulders – which at least proves Kirkpatrick is right, Hal thought. Right, too, about Lamprecht making for here like a dog back to its own sick, though that had made no sense at first, even as they trailed him down to St Andrew’s and then the Purpure Lyon.
‘The little by-blow will offer this Mabs back the half-cross he has,’ Kirkpatrick had growled in answer. ‘In return, he will want passage to France, or Flanders or even Leon if he dares the crossing.’
‘Because that’s what you would do?’ Hal had queried, speaking in a soft hiss so as not to be heard by the muttering growlers and drinkers in the inn. They spoke French for the same reason and Kirkpatrick had laughed.
‘Because it is what I would not do. But I am clever and Lamprecht is not only afraid, he is as idiot as a moonstruck calf.’
‘He may have gone to Dover,’ Hal pointed out, not so convinced of Lamprecht’s stupidity. Kirkpatrick shrugged.
‘Without coin he can squat on the shingle and try to wish up a ship until we come on him, then.’
The more Hal looked at the rain-misted cleft of Sty Lane, the more the Lyon’s now-distant fug-warmth called to him. The Earl of Lincoln’s Inn had been the last haven for Lamprecht, two nights before; no-one called it anything other than the Purpure Lyon thanks to the sign, the arms of the Earl of Lincoln, nailed over the door. Lincoln owned it as he owned a deal of the land round it, but Hal doubted if the Earl had ever been in it. Which was a pity for him, since the roast goose had been a joy, with raisins, figs and pears in it. A barnacle goose, for it had been a fish day and that was aquatic, as any priest would tell you …
Kirkpatrick was on the move and Hal, flustered, shredded his dreams of food and followed on, hoping the rest of the plans made in the Lyon moved as smoothly.
The rain was flushing filth out of Sty Lane like a privy hole drain; Hal’s boots sloshed through a gurgling brown mess and the place stank, so that pushing into it made him open his mouth so as not to have to breathe through his nose.
Kirkpatrick stopped and Hal almost walked up his heels. There was silence save for the hiss and gurgle of rain and the squeal and honk of unseen pigs; sweat started to soak Hal from the inside at the sight of the grey shapes looming up in front of them.
Six he counted, their faces blurred by rain and beards and grease. Three wore broad-brimmed hats, turned up at the front and pinned so that the soaked droop of them would not blind them. Two wore coif hoods of rough wool, one a hat trimmed with ratty fur, all had the sacking tunics of slaughtermen, dark with old blood. Every one had a naked, long, knife.
‘Oo are ye and what d’yer wish in Sty Lane?’
Hal struggled with the thick accent, knowing it was English but unable to make it out without squinting. Kirkpatrick, seemingly easy, offered a smile and a spread of empty hands.
‘Looking fer Mabs,’ he declared. ‘Heard there was work for lads as was not afraid o’ blood.’
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bsp; Which could mean much or little to slaughtermen, Hal thought, half crouched and silent in his role in the mummery. The rat-furred hat swivelled to take them both in, while the others circled in a ring; used to herding pigs, Hal thought wildly, his mouth dry, his heart thundering in his throat.
‘Sojers,’ Rat-Fur declared and then spat sideways. Kirkpatrick shrugged.
‘Have been, will be again if the shine is right. We knows the way of it, certes.’
Warned, Rat-Fur held his distance while the rain plinked and splashed. Then he nodded at Hal.
‘Tongueless, is he?’
‘From the Italies,’ Kirkpatrick countered smoothly. ‘Knows little of a decent way of speaking.’
Which hid Hal’s Scots accent.
‘Where did you hear about Mabs?’
The question came sudden as a hip-throw, but Kirkpatrick was balanced for it.
‘Old friend,’ he replied and winked. ‘Lamprecht. Ugly bastard of a pardoner. Said there was work in Sty Lane, with Mabs. Izzat yourself?’
Rat-Fur chuckled, glanced swiftly to his left. Oho, Hal thought, there is someone unseen jerking this one’s strings.
‘Not me,’ Rat-Fur said, while the others laughed, though there was little mirth in it. ‘Come and meet the bold Mabs, then.’
Cautious, sweating, Hal followed Kirkpatrick, who followed Rat-Fur, with the others closing in so that the flesh from the nape of Hal’s neck to his heels crawled with the unseen presence of them at his back. They went sideways, into a place of unbelievable stink and squeals from pigs jostling each other, as if they sensed that these men were slaughterers. That or the smell of old porker blood from them, Hal thought …
They halted. Rat-Fur leaned on the enclosure fence, where slurry slopped under a fury of trotters, then turned and grinned his last few ambered teeth at Kirkpatrick.
‘Mabs,’ he said. For a moment Kirkpatrick was confused – then a huge hump of the stinking slurry moved and the biggest sow he had ever seen lumbered forward, making him recoil; the slaughtermen laughed.
‘Mabs,’ said a new voice, ‘smells new blood and wonders if it is tasty.’
Hal and Kirkpatrick whirled and saw a lump of a woman with the biggest set of paps either of them had seen – bigger even, Hal thought, than Alehouse Maggie’s. She had a face like unbaked bread, grey and doughy and shapeless, though the cheeks were red with windchafe and drink. Her eyes were buried raisins.
‘Mabs,’ she repeated, looking fondly at the huge sow, which had now rolled over and was luxuriating in slurry, her line of fat, dangling teats dripping.
‘Queen of the Faerie,’ the woman went on wistfully. ‘Her name and mine.’
‘Ah,’ said Kirkpatrick, struggling. ‘Indeed.’
‘Mistress Maeve,’ Hal interrupted smoothly, giving the woman her full queen’s name and forgetting himself entirely. ‘We come seeking one Lamprecht, whom you ken. D’ye have word for us on his whereaboots?’
Kirkpatrick closed his eyes with the horror of it. The woman’s currants turned from the pig to Hal.
‘Now that is the strangest Italies I have heard spoke,’ she declared. ‘Much similar to Scotch, if me ears are working.’
Her men growled and seemed to loom closer. Kirkpatrick put a hand on the hilt of his dagger.
‘Stand back,’ he warned. ‘My friend has the right of it – we seek only Lamprecht, nothing more.’
‘And the Rood,’ Hal added, so that Kirkpatrick cursed him to silence.
‘Wood?’ queried Mabs.
‘Rood,’ repeated Hal before Kirkpatrick could stop him. ‘That what was in the reliquary ye split between Jop and Lamprecht.’
Christ’s Bones, Kirkpatrick thought, feeling his palm slick on the knife, he has doomed us all.
‘Lamb Prick,’ Mabs said slowly, rolling the name like a gob of greasy spit round her mouth, ‘is not welcome here. Nor that big whoreson dolt Jop, Gog’s malison on him – though I am told he is dead.’
She spat and looked slyly at the pair of them.
‘King’s men took him, or so I was told. Put him to the rack and the iron, or me name is not Queen Maeve. An’’ere yer are,’ she added, gentle as a poisoned kiss, ‘come lookin’ fer me.’
She thinks Jop spilled his all and that we are King’s men, Hal realized and started to deny it. Kirkpatrick, seeing his mouth open and fearing the worst, leaped into the breach of it.
‘Well,’ he managed through clenched teeth. ‘An error. No harm done …’
‘No?’
Kirkpatrick knew, with sick certainty, that there had been a great error and he was the one who had made it. Lamprecht was nowhere near here and Mabs would not want folk walking out of Sty Lane who could chain Jop and Lamprecht, Mabs and Sty Lane and robbery of the King’s Treasury in one shackle.
She leaned against the fetid timbers of the sty and gazed fondly at the giant sow.
‘Yes, yes,’ she crooned. ‘You are a greedy girl …’
Her giggle, strangely young and girlish, was chopped short by a thin, high whistle from Kirkpatrick as he sprang forward and Mabs reeled back. Rat-Fur slithered to put her behind him – but Kirkpatrick’s blow was no slaughterman’s cut, it was the flick of a killer.
Rat-Fur staggered away, choking and holding his throat, a thin jetting of blood forcing itself between the clench of both his hands. Both Mabs were squealing as loudly as each other and men were shouting – one of the big-hatted ones ran at Hal and he slashed the air, forcing the man to a skidding halt. For a few steps Hal danced awkwardly with him, slithering in the clotted mud, then the man bored in, a great slack, foolish grin splitting the tangled hair of his face.
Hal was no knife fighter, but he knew a few tricks. He raised his arm as if to strike, then lashed out with his foot, feeling it collide high up on the man’s thigh. It missed his cods, but the pain jolted him, deadened the leg so that he fell and then lay, one hand raised like a knight demanding ransom for yielding.
‘Please,’ he said. ‘I have daughters …’
Hal stopped, the dagger poised. The man got on one knee, then lashed with his free hand, a sharp knuckle that slammed into Hal’s already damaged ribs. The pain whirled through him like fire, a blinding shriek that took him to his knees in the shite; he heard the man snarl, saw the long butcher knife winking.
Stupid, he thought. Should have just killed him.
Then there was a sudden spill of bodies, men with the lower part of their faces covered, wielding long swords and the wrists that knew how to use them. The man facing Hal half-turned, gave a short scream and tried to run; the better portion of a good blade flashed into his ribs, spraying gore as it came. As he fell away, the man holding the blade let it slide out with a soft suck and grinned with his eyes – even without the mask, Hal knew Edward Bruce.
The men brought by Kirkpatrick’s whistle came up fast and hard, muffled as much against the stink as recognition. There was a flurry of cuts and screaming, then Hal turned to see that Mabs, trembling and on her knees, was the only one left; only she and the pigs squealed in terror now.
‘God disposes,’ Kirkpatrick said to Mabs. ‘How fast the world turns, eh Mabs – one minute you are planning the diet of your pet. The next, you ARE the diet of your pet.’
‘Wait,’ said Mabs, looking from Kirkpatrick to Hal and then at the rest of the grim, masked men who had appeared. Armed like King’s men, she thought, but hidden against recognition, so not them. If not Longshanks, then there was a chance to deal …
‘Wait? For what? Friendship? Something deeper?’
‘Enough,’ growled the muffled voice of Edward. ‘This is no place to be toyin’ with your food, man. Eat the porker, or leave her on yer plate.’
Men laughed as Mabs whimpered and appealed to the one man who seemed detached and unconcerned.
‘The Rood. The Rood, lord,’ she said. Hal, nursing his ribs, was taken by surprise; he had been watching the giant sow, seeing her unconcerned and luxuriating. Sae cantie as a sou in glaur – ha
ppy as a pig in muck. It had been a phrase he thought he had understood until now, when he had seen a sow of this size luxuriating in her filth.
Mabs’ desperation jerked him from the reverie, stunned him with a shock like cold water as to how he had been standing in the midst of all this, daydreaming.
‘The Rood,’ he repeated and Mabs leaped on it, worried it with feverish hope.
‘Jop and Lamb Prick had it, sir,’ Mabs wheezed, nodding furiously in agreement with her own words. ‘I gave Lamb Prick the little bitty wood in the thing, sir, of being more account to him than me. Jop wanted more and persuaded Lamb Prick to steal the cross with the stones. A murrain on them both.’
Hal blinked as the words sank in like rain on a desert. He tried to straighten, felt something tear and gasped, so that Kirkpatrick turned to him, frowning.
‘Is that all of it?’ Hal managed.
Her head threatened to nod itself from her shoulders, her huge breasts shook.
‘Round his neck on a string. It is no more than finger-length, lord.’
Kirkpatrick and Hal exchanged glances. It was good to have matters confirmed, but no joy to be reminded that it had been under their noses at the start …
‘Faugh,’ said Edward Bruce. ‘This place stinks and is dangerous – time we were away.’
Mabs saw the look in Kirkpatrick’s eye.
‘Wait,’ she said. ‘Wai –uurgh.’
It was done before anyone could blink – a short thrust and a heave, enough to knock her off-balance. She rolled like a boulder through the flimsy sty fence right to the trotters of her surprised namesake, still squealing.
The fresh blood hit the sow’s nostrils, and all the others raised their snouts, while Mabs struggled with the mud, floundering on all fours like a new and even bigger sow.
They left, Hal trying to blot his ears to the sound of the pleading shrieks, then the grunts; he could not tell whether they came from an agonized Mabs or from the enthusiasm of chewing pigs.