The Bone Thief

by V. M. Whitworth

  ‘That would be welcome, master. Take your time. I’ve milk and to spare.’

  ‘Thank you, again,’ he said. And a candle owed to the Queen of Heaven.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  NOW THAT HE knew what he was looking for, he could see the shimmer of the procession in the distance, winding its way down through the city. The crowd was around the Old Minster. They were meeting now, making their joint way to the new church, whose freshly lime-washed walls glittered in the sun.

  Wulfgar caught up with the tail of the procession as the vanguard paused outside the southern porch, beside a wooden dais which looked as though it had been thrown up hastily for the occasion. The Lady rode a magnificent bay mare, her brother a matching gelding. Edward was escorted by a clutch of his own hearth-retainers, armed and anonymous in blue cloaks and burnished helmets. Then followed a litter with a woman and two young children; Wulfgar recognised the woman as Edward’s long-standing mistress. Could her presence possibly mean Edward had actually married her in church at last? Acknowledged his son as heir to Wessex? He was out of touch with the Winchester gossip, but even in Worcester, surely, he would have heard news of that magnitude.

  They were reining in, turning to the crowd, holding up their hands.

  Whispers in the crowd.

  Silence.

  Now? Wulfgar cleared his throat. He shook, and his heart thumped.

  Too late.

  ‘My beloved people.’ The Lady’s voice carried over the heads of the crowd. It was as though she spoke in Wulfgar’s ear. ‘My brother, the King of Wessex, has this day brought us the greatest gift.’ After each phrase, she paused, allowing the crowd to seize her words, pass them back. ‘He, through his wisdom and courage, has penetrated the dark heart of heathendom to free our beloved St Oswald from his captivity. And in his love for us, he has given the relics into our keeping, to enshrine in our new church.’ She waved one glittering hand and in response the bell began to toll. ‘Pray with us, my dear people. Pray for the health of your Lord, my husband, and pray that, under the leadership of St Oswald, Mercia, too, will be returned to health.’

  How much of that carefully crafted rhetoric did she believe?

  Edward was speaking now, standing in his stirrups for the extra advantage of height. ‘A strong kingdom has a strong faith! St Oswald will unite us – West Saxons and Mercians, brothers under his banner – yes, and the men of Northumbria, too! We will fight the heathen in his name, and he will lead us to victory, as he did when he was still in his body – this very body here!’ He threw his hand in the direction of the reliquary. ‘Victorious in the days of our forefathers, we will see him victorious again!’ A roaring cheer.

  The Lady and her brother dismounted and climbed the steps to the dais.

  Wulfgar tightened his lips. Something was trying to escape them, and he wasn’t sure whether it was a sob or a most untimely laugh. Edward is choosing to leave rather a lot out of St Oswald’s story, he thought.

  But, to give my old schoolmate his due, he must have been paying more attention than I thought in our rhetoric classes. The crowd is loving it. They’re loving everything today, even our overlord of Wessex.

  Now came the procession of churchmen on foot. Wulfgar, still on the verge of hysteria, clutched the parcel of bones in their sling under his cloak as if they might be snatched from him. From his saddle he could see over the heads of the crowd to the reliquary borne aloft by four deacons, all of whom he recognised. Four Winchester men. He frowned. Surely for diplomatic reasons two of them ought to be Mercians. That spiteful, sneaking Kenelm, for example …

  And Winchester choristers. Faces he recognised. To think he’d been praying to hear Winchester music again. What had Father Ronan said, among the ruins of Leicester Cathedral? Be careful what you ask for …

  He caught glimpses of carved and gilded wood beneath a gem-encrusted pall, which dazzled with sunlight, preciousness and sanctity. Every cleric in the city, with other faces he recognised from Worcester and the surrounding minsters, must have assembled in the courtyard in front of St Peter’s to escort the saint up and down and round the churches and huts and market gardens of Gloucester before coming here to the new church. The Bishop of Worcester was in the vanguard, in a cope which flashed fantastically in the sun, so stiff with gold that it would have stood up on its own. More flashes of light glanced from the processional cross onto the pink, freshly scrubbed, newly tonsured scalps of the priests and lesser clerics.

  The grubby bundle he held couldn’t possibly compete with all this.

  But what was in there, behind the glitter?

  There must be something. No one would arrange this ceremony for an empty box.

  Wulfgar nodded, breathing deep and slow as realisation dawned. It had to be the bones of the nameless monk of Bardney, and the rune-carved fragments of the old wooden reliquary.

  So, Garmund had got safely back to Wessex.

  Wednesday, Garmund had taken the bones. Two days, maybe, hard riding on good horses from Bardney … Garmund had good horses.

  King Edward must know they’re not the real relics, Wulfgar thought savagely. Or must guess, at least. Denewulf of Winchester may look like a fussy old wether, but he’s not that big a fool, not where matters of the Church are concerned.

  So, Friday, he guessed, they must have received the bones in Winchester. And seen at once that they weren’t the real thing. Edward wouldn’t risk St Oswald’s wrath falling on Winchester. So he’s palming the false relics off on his sister. Trying to undermine Mercia, put something false, something rotten, at its core …

  Wulfgar felt the hairs on the back of his neck prickle. Edward must have sent word that he was bringing the relics straight away – two, three days ago, they heard, that’s what the woman at Kingsholm said. Saturday, probably. Queen of Heaven, they’ve been working hard. And I didn’t leave Wappenbury till Sunday.

  He closed his eyes.

  If I’d been quicker, more decisive, I’d be up on that dais now. With the true bones of my Lord and saint. I couldn’t manage the job in a week, but I might have done it in ten days …

  Lips stiff with righteous anger, he thought, I’ve got to get this over with. This is my moment. He shortened his reins and tensed his thighs, preparing to urge his horse ahead. Ride forward, throw back your cloak, bring out your bag, and proclaim the presence of the saint!

  There was a sudden commotion in the crowd at the entrance to the square.

  Clerics and lords and dairywomen and ploughboys all turned as one, voices stilled and necks craning. The Lord of the Mercians’ litter had arrived. Wulfgar sagged again. He couldn’t interrupt this, not now.

  The crowd parted, falling back, some spontaneously falling to their knees. Wulfgar sneaked another glance at King Edward, curious to see what he would make of this display of devotion to his rival. But as far as he could see Edward was serene and smiling. Now everyone could see the litter-bearers advancing – a litter, Wulfgar thought miserably, that looked more like a funerary bier. The Lady walked to meet it, resting one hand lightly on the embroidered cover that covered her husband’s motionless form. The Bishop gestured and the reliquary-bearers moved forward.

  A strange symmetry here: the laymen bearing the body of the ailing Lord of Mercia coming to meet the clerics carrying the bones – the putative bones – of the dead King and Martyr of Northumbria. The Lady had a set expression on her face, as though she were struggling to keep her feelings hidden, no matter what might happen.

  Does she know they’re not real, the relics? Surely not, Wulfgar thought. She’s got too much integrity to go through with this if she did.

  The Lady might be determined to keep herself under control but the crowd knew no such restraint. Tears were flowing freely. In the last few days the man they had known for so long as the Old Boar, the Lord of Mercia, had vanished. In his place was this stranger, a wasted figure apparently sitting up but all too clearly propped and held by cushions. Those blue-veined hands, mottled an
d claw-like, flopped loosely on the cover with every step the bearers took. Had his hair always been that ash-pit grey? His eyes were closed, his head lolling to one side, a sheen of spittle in the corner of his mouth. The bearers lifted him up onto the dais.

  Wulfgar glanced at Edward again. The contrast was agonising. He chewed at his lip and looked down at his hands gripping the pommel of his saddle. The knuckles stood out white.

  All the bells had stopped ringing now; the word must have got back to the minster and St Mary’s. The crowd was growing all the time.

  Everyone watched the two biers. The bishop nodded at the choir. It must have been a prearranged signal because they at once began singing an anthem, soft and haunting. O Oswald, builder of churches, champion of faith, a lion in battle … The priests set the reliquary down on the dais. The Bishop went over to it and removed the gold-tasselled pall to reveal the casket underneath, its paint and gilding looking barely dry. He lifted the lid and took out a purple silk bag. A sigh hushed through the crowd. The thurifers stepped forward and swung billowing clouds of incense over the bones.

  The Bishop moved slowly towards the bier. Even standing downwind Wulfgar could hardly hear anything, just a mumble, which could have been prayer or the Bishop having a word with the Lady. She stepped away from the litter and made her way up to the dais to join her brother. The Bishop took her place. He bent over the corpse-like figure, concealing the Lord of the Mercians entirely for a couple of minutes in a shroud of gold. The crowd was tense and silent; not even a baby cried. Finally the Bishop stepped back, still holding the silk bag. But no one looked at him: every eye was on the sick man. He lay still as he had been before, his head slumped to the side, the fragile white-clad body swamped by cushions. The silence held.

  Wulfgar became aware of the shuddering of his own heart, counting out the moments as they waited. And waited. He looped his reins over his saddle-bow and, unseen beneath his cloak, folded his arms around the lumpy bundle of bones.

  King Edward might think otherwise, St Oswald, he thought, but you are really here.

  What was it Father Ronan said? A bell you can ring, to get the saint’s ear. And the saints plead for us to God, if they choose.

  St Oswald, St Oswald, please. I know I’m asking a lot, but look at what I’ve been going through for you. Do this for me if for no one else. Or do it for Thorvald, and Leoba, and their little girl. For Electus. For all the holy innocents of this world. I’ve compromised my own soul for you. Killed. Lied. Surely I deserve something in return. Please.

  And suddenly there was a change in the air, as though the wind had shifted its quarter. The Bishop, who had been standing quietly by, hands folded and eyes downcast, snapped to attention. The crowd began to murmur, and then fell still.

  The Lord of the Mercians turned his head, and lifted a hand.

  Two of his attendants came forward swiftly. He was plucking feebly at the coverlet. They pulled it aside from him.

  Beneath it he was fully dressed.

  That pale cloth, which had looked so like a winding sheet, was only the finest of lambswool cloaks. He even had shoes on. They arranged his arms over their shoulders and gently levered him to a standing position. His sword-bearer stepped forward and deftly buckled the sparkling harness around his waist and shoulder, and then buttoned the sword and scabbard in place. The Lord raised his right hand, his left arm draped around the shoulder of a retainer, and the crowd went wild.

  Now Wulfgar did look at King Edward. He was watching the scene with veiled eyes and set mouth. He looked down to his side and said something to his son. His wife bent and put her arms around the boy. Wulfgar couldn’t guess at any of what they were saying, as the air was too full of shouts for the Lord and Lady of the Mercians, and the Bishop, and St Oswald.

  The Lord of the Mercians turned to lift his hand to first one side of the crowd and then the other. His feet shuffled – he was utterly reliant on the men who were helping him – but there was no doubt that he was standing. He was opening and closing his mouth, too, but no one could hear what he was saying. He was surrounded by hundreds of people who’d served under him for over twenty years, people who had heard only rumours for the last weeks, people who half-believed that he was already dead, that Mercia was about to be plunged back into foreign invasion or worse: civil strife.

  Now they had their Lord restored to them. No wonder their happiness verged on hysteria. The man standing next to Wulfgar had tears pouring down his bluff, red face.

  But none of the shouts now was for King Edward.

  The south door of the church opened, and the glittering procession moving inside.

  I ought to be there, Wulfgar thought. But it’s impossible. I can’t get through the crowd in time. I’m filthy, unshaven – the guards here in Gloucester won’t know my face.

  And what will I do, anyway? Shout, That’s not St Oswald?

  I can’t do that – not now.

  They’ve had their miracle. They’d pull me from my saddle and tear me limb from limb.

  So, what? Wait here? Or ride to Kingsholm, and wait there until the Lady comes home?

  The crowd surged forward then, avid for a last glimpse of the saint, and Wulfgar found his horse going willy-nilly with their flow. He was less than a dozen yards from the south porch when a hand took hold of his bridle.

  ‘Wulfgar of Winchester!’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  HE LOOKED DOWN in surprise to see a smooth, narrow face, bland light-blue eyes, straw-fair hair with a newly shaven tonsure just visible under a pristine lambswool hood.

  Kenelm. The Bishop’s nephew. And, like everyone else in the square, he was smiling.

  Wulfgar returned his bow but found a smile harder. He was such a mixture of conflicting emotions – exhilaration, outrage, fear, exhaustion – that he couldn’t speak for a moment.

  Kenelm’s own smile began to fade as he looked Wulfgar up and down.

  ‘One black eye, fading. Unshaven – untonsured, even. Filthy clothes. Filthier nails. And—’ he fingered the hem of Wulfgar’s tunic ‘—is that a bloodstain? Wulfgar, what in Heaven’s name have you been doing?’

  Wulfgar, still awash with new and unmanageable feelings, couldn’t find an appropriate answer.

  ‘Getting filthy, as you’ve so astutely observed.’ He tried to soften the waspish edge to his voice. It was good to see any familiar face, even this one. ‘Do you know where I could get washed? And find a bite to eat? I need to see the Lady, and I can’t come before her, or your uncle, looking like this.’

  Kenelm looked him up and down again.

  ‘You’re right about that.’ He thought for a moment. ‘I’m lodging at St Peter’s,’ he said. ‘Come back with me? It’s not far, and they –’ he jerked his head ‘– should be in the church for a couple of hours yet. We can drink to the Lord’s restored health. And you can tell me where you vanished to.’ His eyes were eager. ‘You wouldn’t believe the rumours.’

  Wulfgar nodded slowly.

  Oh, I probably would, he thought. How close are they to the truth?

  He dismounted and the two young men walked side by side, pushing their way through the festive crowd, Kenelm leading the way past the south side of the new church.

  ‘Why aren’t you inside?’ Wulfgar asked. ‘Bishop’s nephew, and all.’

  ‘Me?’ Kenelm pulled a face. ‘Oh, I’m not important enough, apparently. What with King Edward, and the Bishop of Winchester, and all the West Saxon hangers-on, it seems there’s not enough room.’ He shrugged. ‘Anyway,’ he said, looking sideways at Wulfgar, ‘I could ask the same of you. The Lady’s secretary, and all.’

  Wulfgar slid away from that question. ‘Bishop Denewulf is here, too? I didn’t see him.’

  ‘He was waiting inside the church.’

  Edward’s hearth-retainers had lined up their horses either side of the south door. Wulfgar eyed them without curiosity, until he found his gaze returning with a jump to one cloaked and helmeted figure.

&n
bsp; Garmund.

  He was sure of it.

  And, just as the thought passed through his mind, the man-at-arms spotted him. Their eyes locked. Almost against his will, Wulfgar found himself handing his own horse’s bridle to a startled Kenelm and walking towards the mounted man. The man glanced quickly at the door of the church. Still closed. He swung himself out of his saddle with a creak of leather and a whiff of sweat.

  ‘Brother,’ Wulfgar said, with more calm than he felt.

  ‘Litter-runt. What a surprise.’ Garmund’s voice was low, his eyes shadowed by the helmet. The sun shone on his red lips, his white teeth, his black beard, the massive gloved hand gripping his horse’s cheek-strap. ‘She didn’t have you killed, then.’

  ‘She?’ Gunnvor? The Lady? It took a moment for Wulfgar to understand. ‘No. No, she didn’t.’ The Spider’s wife. He felt light-headed for a moment. Garmund had no idea of how that story had ended, he realised. Indeed, how could he?

  ‘Are you listening to me, Litter-runt?’

  He blinked.

  ‘Sorry. What did you say?’

  ‘I said, good. Because it’s giving me great pleasure, beating you at your own game. I can do the saint-hunting as well as you. Better, even. And telling my Lord King and his stupid bitch of a sister how badly you failed them. And now I can tell you, too. And see what happens to you, which is an unexpected pleasure.’ He grinned. ‘King Edward’s asked for you back, to face trial in Winchester.’

  ‘What?’ Wulfgar felt the ground shift beneath him. ‘What lies have you been peddling?’

  Garmund glanced at the church door again.

  ‘That’s the beauty of it, Litter-runt. I don’t have to tell them anything but the truth. What a fool you are, to come back to Gloucester.’

  While Wulfgar was still groping for an answer, there was a stir in the crowd. One of the other hearth-retainers shouted a warning.

  Garmund looked round, swore, and vaulted back onto his startled horse.

  Wulfgar snatched his chance to turn away and vanish into the throng of people. The church door had swung open on its massive wrought-iron hinges, but it proved to be a false alarm. No one emerged.