by Paul Doherty
Corbett withdrew and sat down by the well, his back against the wall. He gratefully accepted the beaker of water a castle woman thrust into his hands. The sounds of battle were now fading, though heart-rending screams and soul-chilling cries continued. The air reeked of spilt blood, the stink of bellies ripped open and the acrid smoke from fires. Soldiers hurried down from the walls to hunt those attackers trapped within the bailey. Some of these tried to hide, only to be dragged out and decapitated, their heads sent bouncing across the cobbles, their upright torsos spouting a rich red fountain until they toppled over and the blood continued to flow in streams across the cobbles.
The massacre in and around the Abbot’s Tower came to an abrupt end. Lord Henry bawled that he wanted prisoners, and about thirty of these were roughly assembled: fierce-looking fighters garbed in rags with scraps of armour protecting their backs, chests and groins. A few wore Darel’s livery; the rest were Scots dispatched, so one of them loudly confessed in a rough, grating accent, to bring Alnwick to its knees.
‘You were correct,’ Lord Henry declared, patting Corbett on the shoulder. ‘Darel had dealings with Bruce and these unfortunates will pay the price. Very well.’ He raised his voice. ‘Brother Adrian, shrive them. Constable Thurston!’ He turned and yelled at the pale-faced constable. ‘Take the prisoners up onto the walls.’
‘The cages, my lord?’
‘The cages be damned. Put a noose around the bastards’ necks and toss them over.’
‘Lord Henry,’ Corbett murmured, grasping Percy’s gauntleted wrist, ‘that would be stupid and wasteful. It is not necessary. There has been enough killing for one day and dawn has just broken.’ He stared up at the sombre clouds once again gathering over Alnwick. ‘We can use these men as bargaining counters, and there is one prisoner in particular who may be useful.’
Lord Henry looked as though he was about to refuse. His craggy face was splashed with dried blood, his chain-mail gauntlets had pieces of human flesh caught in their mesh. Corbett glanced around. The defenders were now moving amongst the fallen. Friends were being helped towards the inner barbican and the chapel beyond, where Arnulf had set up a makeshift infirmary. Any enemy injured had their throats cut, their bodies and clothes searched for valuables. One wounded Scot was trying to crawl away, but he was closely followed by a man-at-arms who kept prodding him with his mace, teasing and taunting, till he tired of the game and smashed his victim’s head with one blow of his war club.
The ground was littered with the debris of battle and widening puddles of blood. Bellies, bowels and skulls had been opened and gutted to exude a gruesome stench. Castle women who found their men dead or wounded began to keen, singing their shrill lamentations in high-pitched voices. Corbett closed his eyes. He just wanted to be away from all of this. He wanted to be back in his bedchamber at Leighton Manor. Maeve would be sleeping next to him, her head on his chest, his hand threading her thick glossy hair . . .
Sunlight pierced the oriel window on the far wall; the painted glass caught the rays and shimmered beautifully, catching the eye. Through an open window he could hear the bees buzzing over the flower boxes on the sills, whilst a thrush’s song echoed lucid and liquid. He should get up now. At the noonday Mass he and the manor choir would sing a three-voiced hymn. Afterwards he would go and tend to his beehives. In the meantime, he could revel in the fragrances in the air: perfume, polish, red wine and the savoury smells drifting in from the kitchens . . .
‘Sir Hugh?’
Corbett opened his eyes. Lord Henry pushed his face close.
‘Do you feel faint?’
‘No, Lord Henry, I feel sick. Now, I carry the king’s warrant. I wear his ring. No more killing. Issue the order.’
Percy grimaced but called to Thurston and rasped at the constable how quarter was to be shown except for those enemy wounded beyond human help.
‘Now,’ Corbett pointed at the Abbot’s Tower, ‘let us see where the attackers came in. Brother Adrian, those lying in the tower might also need anointing.’
The Benedictine was having a heated discussion with Ap Ythel about the tactics used to achieve ‘the miracle of Alnwick’.
‘It was a miracle,’ Lord Henry conceded roughly, clapping Corbett on the shoulder. ‘My apologies, clerk, I thought you were soft, but your advice probably saved my castle. We would have manned the parapet against the belfry and the trebuchets, but that was merely a show of force, bustling and noisy, a powerful distraction. We would only have become aware of the dire fight in the bailey below when it was too late. If those attackers had seized the gatehouse, raised the porticullis and lowered the drawbridge, the castle would have been lost. So yes, I am very grateful and I shall not forget it.’
They reached the tower. The dead sprawled all around the entrance, twisted and contorted by the agonies of their fatal wounds. Lord Henry’s men-at-arms had already moved amongst them, giving the mercy cut to any wounded and removing injured defenders. They were now busy combing that place of slaughter for anything valuable, be it weapons, coins or personal trinkets. Lord Henry, Corbett and the rest waited until the corpses were removed before going down into the dark, dank, blood-reeking cellar; a filthy room with cobwebs spread like nets on the rafters and in the corners. The wall plaster was peeling. Cracked casks and barrels lay about. It had once been used as a storage room, and a wooden floor had been laid out across the beaten earth to protect against the damp seeping through.
In the corner, where a barrel had been pulled away, was a cleverly contrived trapdoor, now lifted. A square yard of wood that would be difficult to detect when in place, whilst the barrel had provided even more concealment. Corbett could see the rough-hewn steps leading down into the darkness below. Lord Henry sent a torchbearer before him; he, Corbett and the rest followed. At the foot of the steps stretched a long passageway hollowed out of the rock on which the castle was built. Corbett noticed the damp against the ceiling and walls.
‘It must run beneath the moat,’ he murmured.
Another torchbearer squeezed by them and they continued on into the darkness. Corbett reckoned they must have walked half a mile before they saw shafts of lights ahead of them and a set of steps hewn out of the rock. They climbed up one at a time through a square gap at the top into a box-like stone chamber, once a dwelling place but now open to the elements; its thatched roof, window shutters and door had long gone. Outside there was a small courtyard now greatly overgrown and closely ringed by trees, which shrouded and darkened this sombre, lonely place.
Corbett, trying to shake off his unease, walked back inside and stared down at the hole in the floor they had just climbed through. The floor was of beaten earth; bushes, gorse and shrubs had broken through to conceal the entrance. There was no sign of the enemy. Only a few had reached that secret tunnel and would now be fleeing as fast as they could back to Blanchlands.
‘I know what this place is,’ Lord Henry declared. ‘It’s the old hermitage shown on plans and charts of the castle.’
‘The real question,’ Corbett declared, ‘is who knew that a hidden tunnel connected this place and the castle?’ He glanced at Brother Adrian, but the Benedictine, his face a mask of surprise, just shook his head.
‘I assure you,’ Lord Henry declared, ‘neither I nor any member of my household knew about this tunnel. In God’s name, Sir Hugh, if we had, we would have taken care of it, as I assuredly will now.’
Corbett walked back into the courtyard and stared up at the crows, black as night, floating above the trees. ‘This murderous mystery is deepening,’ he whispered to himself. ‘The assassin is a true cunning son of Cain, and I, God willing, must trap him.’
Lord Henry ordered a search of the trees and undergrowth beyond the dwelling. Corbett drew his sword and joined the line of men who moved into the surrounding copse. They entered the eerie green darkness created by a tangle of ancient trees that clustered so close their branches interlaced, the leaves forming a thick matting to block out the light and deaden s
ound, turning the copse into a place of sombre mystery. He was about to go back when he heard a shout to his right. He hurriedly pushed his way through the tangled undergrowth and almost stumbled into the small clearing and the horror displayed there.
A man’s torso, stripped naked, lay sprawled on the ground. Next to it, a pole had been driven into the soil, on which the cadaver’s severed head had been thrust. The blood from the torso was sparse and congealed, the face of the impaled head almost masked by gore-matted hair. Corbett peered closer and immediately recognised the dead features of Lord Alexander Seton.
Others joined him in the clearing. Corbett gently prised loose the severed head, trying to ignore the gruesome sucking sound, and placed it on the ground. Brother Adrian came and knelt, Ave beads out as he blessed the pathetic remains. Corbett inspected the jagged neck and dried blood. He plucked aside the hair and stared into the contorted, twisted face, a nightmare sight with its gagging mouth, thickened tongue and swollen lips. He heard the rest gather behind him, their curses and exclamations contrasting sharply with Brother Adrian’s whispered words.
Once the monk had finished, Corbett squatted down by the corpse, completely stripped even of its undergarments. A raven flew out of the trees, a black shadow floating across the glade. Another followed, as if these carrion birds were eager to continue poking at the cadaver with sharp claws and razor beaks. The cawing of other birds eager to feast echoed across that haunted glade. The morning mist was thinning, but here it still swirled as if a company of ghosts stood amongst the trees watching the affairs of men.
‘Sir Hugh?’
‘Lord Henry.’ Corbett pointed to the head. ‘A real mystery. Seton was long dead when his head was severed. The flesh is cold and bone hard, the blood from the sliced neck meagre and congealed. A living head, once hacked off, creates a vigorous fountain of blood. That did not happen here. Seton, God assoil him, had already been killed when his head was removed.’
‘How? By whom? Why?’
‘His face has been pecked by the carrion crows.’ Corbett knelt and gently turned the head over; one of the eyes, loosened by a crow, slid out. ‘Predators always gnaw at the softest parts first. I reckon Seton has been dead for two days. Lord Percy, you ask by whom. Of course I don’t know. As for how,’ he pointed to the head again, ‘notice that his face is the same liverish colour as the other victims.’
‘Poisoned?’
‘Poisoned,’ Corbett agreed. ‘And so the mystery deepens. Seton was a Scottish prisoner. He wanted to escape. He must have been alarmed by the death of Roskell. I would wager he was gone by the time Sterling and Mallet were murdered. This is only conjecture, but I suspect the assassin, the traitor, the spy in the castle, approached Seton and offered him this secret way out. Seton accepts. He leaves Alnwick, only to be poisoned here in this godforsaken glade and die in agony. Darel launches his attack; his marauders approach the old hermitage and a party of them come across Seton’s corpse. They believe he is an enemy, someone trying to flee Alnwick and somehow killed. They don’t really care; their blood is up, so they dishonour the corpse. They strip it, sever the head and pole it.’ He shrugged. ‘More than that, I cannot say. Lord Henry, you will give Seton’s remains honourable burial?’
‘Along with the rest, Sir Hugh, but now, we should return.’
They threaded their way back through the tunnel to the tower and into the castle. The outer bailey was still a hive of activity. Castle servants were removing all traces of the conflict, whilst Lord Henry’s household knights guarded the prisoners, a long line of squatting men, some nursing wounds, chafing at the chains that secured both hand and foot. Corbett glimpsed Cacoignes, that cunning man, as Ranulf now believed him to be. He looked safe and untouched by the attack and lounged on the steps of the Falconer’s Tower watching what was happening. Corbett whispered to Ap Ythel, using the agreed secret cipher. The master bowman hurried away and returned with the welcome news that Gaveston was safe, hale and hearty, breaking his fast in the garrison buttery.
‘Eating and drinking as if there is no tomorrow,’ the Welshman murmured. ‘We must now journey on to Tynemouth.’
‘Across that countryside?’ Corbett countered. ‘We would never reach the priory. Darel’s men – and God knows who else – will be prowling the roads and trackways. No, we have no choice but to tarry here for a while, to watch and wait and at the same time keep busy. Ap Ythel, Ranulf, let us inspect the prisoners.’
Corbett and his two companions walked the line of manacled men. The clerk ignored the hostile glances and muttered curses. He stopped before one of prisoners and squatted down, staring into the man’s face, noting the narrow eyes, the well-kept beard and moustache, the scar along the forehead, the right ear badly clipped, the squat nose broken and twisted.
‘I’d recognise that ugly face anywhere. You are Bavasour?’ Corbett edged even closer as the prisoner grinned and nodded his head. ‘Once a captain of hobelars in the old king’s levy till you stole a pyx from a church and deserted the royal army. Well, Master Bavasour, I am sure you have seen the days and are ready to meet God. Do you want to hang?’
‘If you would join me, yes.’ Bavasour lifted his manacled hands and scratched his face with a stubby forefinger. ‘What is it, Sir Hugh? I remember you as well; you are not the type of clerk to bait a man destined for the gallows.’
‘How would you like to walk free?’ Corbett smiled at Bavasour’s swift change of expression. ‘Provided you tell me everything, I think you can. Well, do you want to tell me?’
‘Sir Hugh, is the Holy Father a Catholic?’
A short while later, Corbett, Ranulf and Ap Ythel, with Chanson guarding the door, grouped around Bavasour sitting on a stool before them in Corbett’s chamber. The mercenary put the empty wine goblet down on the well-cleared platter and rubbed his wrists where the manacles had been.
‘You have been well fed and watered, so let us begin.’ Corbett brought across a stool to sit opposite Bavasour. ‘You were a captain of hobelars under Edmund Darel?’
‘One amongst many. By the way, I noticed an old comrade, Cacoignes he now calls himself, skulking around the bailey outside.’
‘Yes, we shall return to him, but the attack that failed, the secret passageway? Bavasour, you were a captain. You must have sat high on Darel’s council when he described what was being plotted. Somebody must have told him about the passageway that runs from the derelict hermitage to the Abbot’s Tower. That somebody also betrayed us on our journey north. So, what can you tell us?’
‘As regards the journey north, Sir Hugh, all we knew was your strength, your destination and reports that you carried the precious Lily Crown. Darel maintained that the ambuscade he had contrived would be successful and we would literally seize a king’s ransom.’
‘How did he know that? You must have questioned him.’
‘We did. Darel replied that it was his business and that he had it on good authority. When he described the ambuscade, we all approved. However,’ Bavasour laughed drily, ‘we know what happened there. You were waiting for us. Afterwards, I advised Darel to be more careful. Sir Hugh, Ap Ythel, false flattery aside, you both fought alongside the old king and his generals in Wales, Gascony and Scotland. You are not a group of humble pilgrims wanting to visit some shrine.’
‘I thank you for the compliment.’
‘It’s a fact.’ Bavasour picked up his goblet and Ap Ythel refilled it.
‘And the attack on Alnwick?’
‘The Black Chesters insisted on that, as did Hockley’s kin. They wanted revenge.’
‘What do you know of the Black Chesters?’
‘They get their name from a local village. They are a powerful coven. Sir Hugh, the Black Chesters are not old beldams chomping on their gums or frail, ancient wise-women brewing potions in a cauldron. They truly are a midnight coven, men and women who practise the black arts and perform macabre rites. Rumour has it that their sacrifices are not cockerels or some other bird or animal. No,
it’s whispered that local peasants have disappeared and the Black Chesters are responsible.’
‘And Darel believes in them?’
‘They have promised him their full support. They certainly instil fear, and of course,’ Bavasour added sharply, ‘there’s Richolda and her twin sister. Oh yes,’ he held up a hand, ‘the two are almost identical, fair of face and form but wicked to the bone. Apparently they grew up in Berwick and witnessed all the horrors when the old king sacked that town. Gossips maintain they both entertained Darel, how he was like wax in their hands. He tried to satisfy their every whim. From the little I know, they swept into Blanchlands and turned the inner bailey of that castle into their own fief or kingdom.’ He fell silent.
‘What’s the matter, man?’ Corbett demanded.
‘Sir Hugh, I wonder if the Black Chesters can hear me now.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’
‘They have spies everywhere, they pride themselves on that.’
‘But not in this chamber.’
‘Sir Hugh, I have wandered the face of God’s earth and rubbed shoulders with all kinds of wickedness, every type of evil that crawls under the heavens.’ Bavasour sipped from his goblet. ‘Forest folk, satyrs, gargoyles, babeywns and the wild men of the woods don’t frighten me, but the Black Chesters certainly do. Beautiful women or not, I kept my distance, and so did the others. I remember one night at Blanchlands being entertained by one of those wandering minstrels, a troubadour full of tattling tales about what he had seen and learnt here, there and everywhere. He talked about warlocks and witches; the powers they claimed and the cruel deaths they experienced.’
He paused. Corbett suppressed his own clammy fears as Bavasour’s words provoked memories of his own childhood and the execution of a warlock in a nearby village. His parents had kept him at home, but for days people talked about the burning, the stench, the dreadful sight and hideous screams.