Lucifer's Crown

by Lillian Stewart Carl

  A good Cathar, Esclarmonde de Perelha saw only a common Roman cup. “You are welcome to it.”

  “Don’t give yourself up to the Inquisitors. They are too frightened to be merciful.”

  “My kingdom is not of this world. Now take your relic and go, before your friends find you here with me.”

  So be it. Bowing, Thomas took his relic into the torch-gutted night, leaving her to her fate in the meadow below Montsegur, where even now, centuries later, the winds of the mistral stirred the bitter ashes of the burning…

  “Hello?” Maggie was holding a saucer toward him. “Flashback to the Albigensian Crusade?”

  “Yes. Sorry.” He took the dish.

  “No, I’m sorry that you have such terrible memories. But I suppose that’s why the broad horizons.” He handed her the towel and she dried her hands. “So I guess what I do now is my job. You’ll still lecture, won’t you?”

  “Of course. I shall follow the example of St. Dunstan and work and study. And pray for inspiration. ‘In Thy will, our peace.’”

  “Eliot?”

  “Dante.”

  “So how do you know what His will—no, don’t tell me. You base your decision on what’s inclusive, compassionate, and will serve others.”

  “Very good,” he told her.

  She clasped the necklace tightly, her eyes large, dark, and deep. He was certain she was going to throw herself into his arms, and he wondered how he’d respond. But with a rueful laugh she turned toward the door, saying, “You’ve got me between the Devil and the deep blue sea, you know that?”

  The door shut. Thomas gazed at its blank face. Was Maggie his last temptation? Not her body, pleasing as it was, but her wounded heart that called to his own? While Robin could never force him from his path, Maggie could lead him from it. Caught between the Devil and the deep blue sea…

  Mary’s cloak was the deep blue of the sea as well as of the sky. St. Andrew’s bones had been brought across the sea to Scotland. St. Andrew was the first apostle called by Our Lord. The Stone was the oldest relic. The deep blue color of the flag of Scotland was emblazoned with a white crux decussata, a St. Andrew’s cross. An X, which marks the spot.

  Bruce, who fled westward from Methven, called upon St Andrew, St. Fillan of Glendochart, and St. Cuthbert of Melrose. Melrose lay below the triple peaks of the Eildons. The triangular mountain Schiehallion rose above Glenlyon, which paralleled Glendochart. Fortingall guarded Glenlyon’s eastern end. The eastern end of a church was where the altar stood. The Stone was originally an altar.

  St. Bridget of Ireland was the Mary of the Gaels. The triad, the triplet, the trinity, was a metaphor bedded deep in the consciousness of men from Gaelic Ireland to Aryan India. Extending the edges of a triangle would make three St. Andrew’s crosses, one at each corner: St. Fillan’s shrine at Tyndrum in Glendochart, Bruce’s battle at Methven, and Fortingall, where grew the oldest tree in Europe save for the tree of the Cross itself.

  And in the center of this imaginary triangle? Inspired yet again by the quick tongue of Maggie Sinclair, Thomas reached for his Ordinance Survey map of central Scotland.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  No day was a grand one for a funeral, Mick thought, but he supposed Remembrance Day was good as any. It used to be Armistice Day, when the Great War ended, the eleventh day of the eleventh month. But there had been a greater war since the Great War. And now he was about the greatest of them all, it seemed, because no armistice was possible.

  Beyond the window the lights of the city smeared and ran in the mizzle. Traffic lights, Christmas lights, the windows of homes and pubs. Somewhere in the dark beyond the lights rose Arthur’s Seat and Salisbury Crags.

  This afternoon the sky had been gray, the buildings gray, the ground gray except for the black gash of the grave. After the funeral he’d put it about that Calum was robbed and murdered on his way home from a business trip. True, as far as it went. Dad had given his life for the Story. Now he and Mum were both cold in the clay, and the Story went on without them.

  Wiping his eyes, Mick turned away from the glittering darkness. Calum’s secretary Amy pushed through the kitchen door. “There you are, Mick, the food’s cleared away. I’ll bide a wee while if you like.”

  “No, no, Amy, get on home.” He took her coat from the rack and helped her on with it. “Thank you for helping me put the flat to rights.”

  “Shocking, yobs breaking and entering during a man’s funeral. Good job nothing was stolen save some loose coins.”

  Odd, Mick thought, that nothing was stolen save some loose coins, when every cupboard and drawer in the place had been turned over. But then, he knew what the yobs were after. He’d had the sgian dubh with him, humming gently in his sock as the hem of the kilt teased his cold knees.

  “The solicitor is calling round to sort the will the morn.” Amy’s eyes brimmed with tears. “I’m so sorry, Mick. Calum was right lonely after your mum died. I thought that Foundation lot would help. He was right chuffed when the red-haired chap called in. But then he went—nervy.”

  “I dinna think the Foundation was what he expected,” Mick told Amy, and saw her out. He’d see to repairing the broken lock tomorrow—just now, he dragged his mother’s heavy kist against the door. Then he went into his parents’ silent, empty bedroom.

  His opening Maddy’s jewelry box set “The Bluebells of Scotland” to jingling. She had preferred books to ornaments, but her engagement ring had a wee diamond … There it was. And below that lay a ceramic Celtic cross, glazed in a blue shading from royal to turquoise, like the sea about Iona.

  Mick remembered the cool, fresh wind rattling the door to the Abbey gift shop, and the sunlight reflecting from the white-painted walls as Calum searched out a cross blue as Maddy’s eyes. She’d worn it as her body wasted away and her eyes grew deep as the sea, her soul shining through the flesh. Mick thought she’d been buried wearing that cross, but here it was, a kiss in the palm of his hand. “Thank you, Mum,” he whispered, not quite sure which mother he was thanking.

  Mick changed into everyday clothes, fastened the necklace about his neck, and dropped it down inside his jumper to lie next his skin. When he settled the sgian dubh in the waistband of his jeans it plucked his skin the way the Lady had plucked his heart, part caress, part demand.

  Closing the drapes above Calum’s desk, Mick sat down and booted up the computer. The hard drive held only business spread sheets and genealogical charts. He inserted the diskette marked “Personal,” the one he’d found with the insurance forms, into the drive.

  Slowly he scrolled down through the entries he’d already read. Calum’s grief at Maddy’s death, and his loneliness after his son went off to university—none of that surprised Mick. His father’s deep affection for him had done. “…. years to build up the business, years I could have spent with Maddy and Mick … he’s a clever lad.”

  Mick scrolled down past Calum’s economic worries. “…Inland Revenue their pounds of flesh, I may have to make some of the shop assistants and warehouse men redundant. So many lazy sods won’t work, it’s not right to sack the ones who will do … immigrants take the jobs that should go to our own … government regulations, the taxes—businessmen aren’t criminals, a strong economy is to everyone’s good.”

  And the social ones. “They’ve women ministers now, they’re changing the old rites … parents are scared to discipline their weans. We took a firm hand with Mick and he’s one to make any father proud.” A firm but fair hand, Mick thought. Even when he saw his dad only at bedtime, their discussion of the day’s events and the night’s story had seen him into his own Dreamtime safe and secure.

  “…the first time since I joined up Fitzroy’s visited here. He’s a leader for troubled times … I never realized just what was going on in Whitehall and the EU, it’s frightening … Fitzroy’s taken a liking to me, says I can play an important role in the FFF. I’d like to make a difference.”

  “You did do,” said Mick.
>
  “…a woman named Vivian Morgan. She’s a New Age loony, joined up more out of curiosity than conviction, I reckon. We went to an Indian restaurant. It was like my face broke open, I’d forgotten how to laugh. She might like to be more than friends, but no, sex outside marriage is wrong, and I’ll not re-marry.”

  Mick grimaced, thinking of a couple of casual encounters at university. Rose now, Rose was another matter.

  “…Ellen Sparrow not like Vivian, all smiles and daft notions. Ellen’s scared. I offered her a job but she’s wanting to live in London … gave her some books, hoping she’ll make something of herself…

  “…Fitzroy is keen on genealogy, said my pedigree is impeccable, I’m just his sort of folk, gey respectable … going on at me about writing the Dewar family history. But beyond my grandfather it’s not history, it’s legend. Old Malise ran on for hours about fairies and magic stones and iron driving away evil spirits. When I told Vivian that last she took it dead serious. I gave her a knife from the shop and told her it was a valuable heirloom, taking the mickey out of her…”

  The phone went. Mick snatched it up. “Hello.”

  “Michael Dewar?” asked a dry male voice. “D. C. I. Mountjoy here. We spoke on Monday.”

  Mick had taken himself to Edinburgh police headquarters and talked with several detectives. Mountjoy was the one who looked like he had a red hot poker up his arse. “Oh aye.”

  “D. S. Mackenzie tells me your flat was done over this afternoon.”

  That was fast. “Oh aye. They took a few pence is all.”

  “Do you have anything you’d like to add to your statement about your father’s death?”

  “I canna tell you any more today than I did do on Monday.”

  “Nothing more about Thomas London?”

  “I just met the man last week.”

  “Your father was in Glastonbury. London was at Housesteads. They knew each other, stands to reason.”

  “I’m the connection, Inspector. My dad never met the man at all.”

  “Are you sure? If you searched your father’s office…”

  “Mackenzie already has done.”

  “But he didn’t know what to look for, did he?” said Mountjoy. “I could call round with a warrant, if necessary.”

  Mick gritted his teeth. “You’d be wasting your time, Inspector. If I were you I’d be looking out Robert Prince.”

  “Would you now?” A voice murmured in the background. “Very good then, Mr. Dewar. You have my number if you’d like to be a bit more cooperative.”

  Pulling a face, Mick put the phone down. When Thomas phoned Sunday he’d said Mountjoy was a real policeman, not like Robin playing at Robert Prince—no worry there. But being a policeman often meant having a poor opinion of human nature, and suspecting lies in the midst of truth. “Not,” Thomas had added apologetically, “that we’re being entirely truthful just now.”

  Needs must when the Devil drives, Mick thought, and turned back to the screen. “…Robin called in at the office and I gave him a tour … told him about my dad and Alex’s dad and the old stone, the one they pretended was the Stone of Scone. I thought it was the sort of story Robin would dismiss as dangerous superstition but now he’s going on at me about it … Robin is stinking rich, but when I asked him to help Ellen out he said a stupid cow like her deserved her lot … he goes on about self-reliance but seems to have inherited his brass.”

  Shouting at the computer will not help, Mick told himself.

  “…he asked if I had any family heirlooms about, saying the old errors need correcting and such old things should be destroyed for the good of the faith. I remembered a mathom—old Malise’s sgian dubh…” Mathom, Mick repeated. When had Dad read Tolkien?

  “…but the way Robin went all over funny when I mentioned it put me off. In any event, I haven’t seen it for donkey’s years. I’d ask Mick’s advice but he has his own life now, he wouldn’t care. And Robin says we can’t trust our families unless they’re believers as well.”

  The sgian dubh pressed into Mick’s ribs. “I’d have cared,” he said. But he wondered if he would have done, with his classes, his friends, the pub crawls, and the girls. He swallowed what tasted like acid.

  “Robin’s always at me for reading, saying he’ll tell me what I need to know. He’s the power behind the scenes at the Foundation, I reckon … Vivian’s only staying with the ‘inner circle’ so she can expose him in her newspaper. She thinks he’s creaming off the donations even though he says giving money to the FFF is doing God’s work.” Mick’s brows went up. Now that was a motive for murder even Mountjoy could credit.

  The last entry was dated the day before Calum went away on his trip to the South. His last journey. “…Vivian’s off to a pagan ceremony that night. But I’m worried about Reg and the others, Robin’s been going on about witchcraft and the like … he’s been at me again, wanting to see the sgian dubh. I found it in Maddy’s kist amongst the blankets. They smelled of her. It was like she was standing at my back telling me there’s no harm in the knife. And it’s all I have of old Malise.”

  Thank God. Calum must have taken the knife, then decided when he stopped by the office not to give it to Robin after all.

  The journal ended, “…Robin’s flannel about FFF members being the only sort worth knowing. When I get back home I’ll look out some old chums. I’ve neglected Mick as well. Maybe I’ll break it off with the FFF, but Ellen is still there, and Vivian—if I stay, I can help them.”

  Mick minded all the times he’d neglected his dad, and again the tears welled in his eyes. This time he let them flow, searing his cheeks. If only Calum had confided in Mick. If only Mick had asked him questions.

  If only. With a shaky exhalation Mick found Gupta’s business card and forwarded the entire file to his e-mail address. Tomorrow he’d take a copy of the diskette to Superintendent Mackenzie.

  He stared blankly at the window above the desk. In the slit between the drapes he saw a dagger-shaped reflection of his own face, dim and indistinct … Something slithered through his reflection, outside the window. A kite? Who’d be flying a kite on such a filthy night? A large bird, like the ravens at Housesteads? He switched off the lamp, pulled aside the curtain, and looked out. He saw nothing save the shapes of buildings and lights mirrored in the slick streets.

  From the bedroom behind him came the tinkling notes of “The Bluebells of Scotland.” He sprinted into the room. The box was closed.

  The sgian dubh in his hand, he searched the flat, but he was well and truly on his own. The back door was locked tight. The front door was blocked by the kist … Someone knocked. “Who is it?”

  He heard a soft laugh. Something slid across the outside of the door and shuddered gently against the hinges. Again, louder. And again, so that the thick wooden panels seemed to bow inward. From behind him came the crash of broken glass. Mick spun round. But the window above the computer wasn’t broken. Nor were any of the others.

  Again the front door rattled. A distinct tap-tap-tap came from the kitchen, like dripping water or bony fingers against the back door. The lights went out. Mick ripped the knife from its sheath and held it before him. It shone like a tiny flame, casting a rosy glow across the room. Shapes, distorted, twisted shapes, moved in the shadows. He smelled the stench of decaying flesh. In the distance a voice screamed and sobbed.

  “Leave it, Robin! Your tatty wee tricks will not be scaring me now.” Pulling his mother’s necklace from his jumper Mick clasped it in his left hand. “I gird myself today with the power of heaven! With the faith of my fathers in all its themes and variations!”

  The lights shone out. The shapes vanished. He heard the traffic passing below his window and the distant mutter of a telly. The air was scented with coffee and smoke. Well then. Catching his breath, he put Nevermas’s CD into the player. The guitar solo at the beginning of “First Rites” filled the room. He’d spare his neighbors the full set of pipes—the chanter would do nicely.

&n
bsp; Mick sat down and played along with the music, “…of one substance with the word, of one mind with the flesh, begotten not made by grace out of blood…” The music filled his head, overflowed his chest, trembled in his limbs. The last shall be first and the first shall be meek when I open my heart to you.

  The iron had entered into his soul, right enough, and it wasn’t the sort of iron tears could rust. No, he wasn’t frightened, not any more.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Maggie parked the van at the south end of the village, beside the sign pointing to Camelot. “Everybody out. This is going to be a quick visit—those clouds are fixing to cut loose.”

  Rose and Anna climbed out and looked dubiously up at the overcast sky, followed by Sean and Ellen, who looked dubiously up at the massive hill of Cadbury Castle. “Yeah,” Sean said. “And we’ll be a mile away from the car when they do.”

  “Then we’d best carry on.” Opening a gate, Thomas led the way onto a dirt track winding its way upward through stubbled fields.

  Maggie fell in beside him, going around the muddy patches he simply stepped over. “Thanks for coming. I know you wanted to get some more work done on the chapel, what with it being—whose day?”

  “November fourteenth is the feast of St. Dubricius. In his avatar as Merlin he’s associated with Caerleon, but he might have come here as well.”

  The air was thick and damp. Sudden puffs of wind shook the trees encircling the hill, sending leaves scudding away to the northeast. “We could’ve left earlier if you and Rose hadn’t gone to church,” Maggie said.

  “You went to St. John’s with Bess.”

  She’d meant that as a joke. “You had their car, so she asked me to drive her. No big deal.”

  “No, I suppose not,” Thomas said with studied neutrality.

  Ducking his scrutiny, she glanced back at the students. Rose was using Sean’s camcorder to videotape him and Ellen posing in front of several sheep. He was expounding, “Maybe Arthur was successful because he revived the old Roman cavalry—I mean, what did the Saxons have? Foot-soldiers. So today we think of Arthur and his knights. Ta da!”