The Owl Killers

by Karen Maitland

  Catching sight of me, little Catherine pushed her way through the crowd and almost fell headlong into me.

  “Look, Servant Martha, a miracle, a miracle!”

  She pointed to a silver plate that Tutor Martha held reverently in both hands. There was a slightly charred scrap of something lying in the centre of the plate. I couldn’t tell what it was. I peered closer. Then I felt an icy hand suddenly grip my stomach. The pattern on the little disc of bread was blackened, but it was unmistakably the same imprint as on the Host the Franciscan had brought.

  “Where did you get this?” I demanded.

  “When we raked out the fire in Andrew’s room, this was lying among the embers,” Catherine blurted out eagerly.

  “It was the Host that Andrew consumed this day,” Tutor Martha said in awed tones, still gripping the plate as if she feared it might wriggle from her hands. “She vomited it as she gave up her spirit and the vomit was thrown onto the fire, but God preserved the blessed fragment for us. Though all the corruption was burned away, the flames could not consume His blessed body.”

  “It is a miracle.” The words rippled softly as a breeze through the women.

  My bowels had turned to water. I searched the crowd for the face of Healing Martha. She must have told Tutor Martha what had happened. No one else was in that room; no one else could possibly have known about the Host. I could not believe that Healing Martha had betrayed me. She knew the danger. She was the one who had warned me of it in that very room. I’d believed that of all people on this earth I could trust Healing Martha. I had wagered my life on her loyalty.

  “Servant Martha.”

  I turned my head in the direction of the voice and found Healing Martha standing at my elbow.

  “What have you said to them?” I demanded. “How could you—”

  Healing Martha gripped my arm and spoke in a low voice. “Everyone who knew of the anchorite knew that she was sustained only by the Host. And there’s not a woman in the beguinage who hasn’t heard whispers of the Franciscan’s visits. They’re not stupid, Servant Martha. Did you honestly think they would not reason the connection? I had no need to tell them why he came. They suspected from the beginning that the friar was bringing the Host to Andrew.”

  Healing Martha fixed me with deep blue eyes as if she was determined to make me understand something. Then I realised that Tutor Martha had not mentioned me at all when she spoke of the miracle. She had told the story as if she thought I didn’t know that Andrew had vomited the Host. She had naturally assumed it was the friar, not me, who had administered the Last Rites to Andrew.

  “The beguines have kept the secret of the Franciscan’s visits,” Healing Martha continued. “But if they suspected why he came, then others may also have done so and therein lies the danger.” She jerked her head back in the direction of the infirmary.

  I drew a deep breath and tried to recover my wits. My hands were trembling and I clamped them firmly behind my back. I lifted my head, looking out over the crowd of beguines, now standing quite still, waiting for me to speak. I’d have to choose very carefully what I said next.

  “It is indeed a miracle that such a morsel falling from the pure lips of Andrew has been preserved. This is a sign that we have sheltered a saint within these walls. God blesses Andrew and we must pray for strength to follow her example. This is her relic and we shall have a fitting reliquary made to house it. But I charge you most earnestly not to discuss this except in private among yourselves, until God has made plain to us His will in this matter. You must take every care that this tale does not spread abroad. It would bring grave danger to the Franciscan for it’s forbidden for a friar to administer the sacraments. Besides, there are many who will be jealous of such a relic and wish to take it from us.”

  It was not the theft of the relic I feared, but I dared not alarm them with the real danger. I just hoped the threat of having the relic taken from them would be enough to silence them.

  “Now, about your business, all of you. I dare say you all have duties to perform. Tutor Martha, take the fragment to the chapel and see it is locked away safely. And after, bring me the key.”

  They hesitated for a moment, then slowly dispersed in whispering huddles of twos and threes, until Healing Martha and I were left alone. I could hardly bring myself to look at her. “You told them that Andrew received the Host. Are you sure you have not told them anything else?”

  Healing Martha sighed. “After all these years, do you need to ask me that question? Do you really think I would betray you? I have only confirmed what they already knew and they do not know about you, though I suspect Gate Martha may have reasoned it out. She knows the friar did not enter our gates.”

  “Gate Martha knows!” I said, aghast. “Do you honestly think she will keep it to herself?”

  “She realises the danger. She may gossip about trifles, but not about this.” Healing Martha blew on her hands to warm them. “You have many virtues, old friend, but if you have a vice it is that you don’t credit others with the intelligence or convictions you have. You demand too much of yourself, but you expect too little from your sisters. You must learn to trust others; it is the only way to win their love and loyalty. Otherwise all you have is their duty. And that is a cold companion.”

  “You trust too much,” I snapped. “You said the rumour of the Franciscan may already have reached the infirmary. So how many days will it be before the whole village knows of our miracle?”

  She grimaced. “I’ve never known a miracle to remain a secret for long.”

  “And then?” I asked.

  “And then who can know? Maybe our miracle will bring fortune, maybe disaster. But this I do know: A miracle never brings peace.”

  october

  saint frideswide’s day

  a princess from wessex whose suitor, ælfgar, king of mercia, was struck blind when he pursued her. she prayed to saint margaret for a healing well whose waters restored the king’s sight.

  osmanna

  oSMANNA, FETCH MORE WATER. We’ll need some to scald the starlings for supper.” Beatrice tossed two hard leather pails at my feet, forcing me to jump back to avoid being hit.

  “Let me go,” Catherine said, jumping up from the stool in the kitchen. “Healing Martha said Osmanna wasn’t to carry anything because it might make her ill again.” Catherine knew I hated going near the well.

  “That was over a month ago. She’s perfectly capable of fetching a little water now,” Beatrice replied, as if I wasn’t even there. “If she could be trusted to pluck a few starlings without leaving half the feathers on, then I’d fetch the water myself, but she can’t.”

  Beatrice never talked to me now unless she was forced to and then it was only to order me to do some dirty or tedious task. I sometimes wondered if she lay awake at night trying to think up the worst jobs she could for me.

  As I picked up the pails, Catherine darted an anxious look at me and I tried to smile to reassure her. Beatrice pretended to be engrossed in plucking and drawing the sack of small birds. Ever since that night in the infirmary when I had forced that dead creature out of my belly, Beatrice had done nothing to disguise her hatred of me. Healing Martha said none of the other beguines knew what had happened, not even Servant Martha. She’d told them I had the bloody flux. But Beatrice knew what I’d done, I was sure of it.

  One night when I’d been sleeping in the infirmary I sensed someone leaning over me and a voice whispered, “They might have forgiven you, Osmanna, but God won’t. You can’t ever be forgiven for murdering your own child.”

  When I opened my eyes, there was no one near me, but I know it was Beatrice’s voice I heard.

  And if Beatrice knew, I was certain she would have told Pega. Beatrice told her everything. I had dreaded seeing Pega even more than Beatrice for though Beatrice is spiteful, she’s not clever with words. Pega can use her tongue like a dagger.

  But when I left the infirmary and finally ran into Pega outside, all she said w
as, “You feeling better now, Osmanna?”

  I nodded. It was almost true. The pains in my belly had gone now. During the day, I could forget it ever happened, but not at night. Sometimes I was too afraid to asleep, because every night in my dreams the creature returned. In my dreams it was still inside me. I’d feel it clawing its way out of me. I’d see old Gwenith’s red-rimmed eyes, feel the raw blinding pain as she pulled the rod out of me. Then I’d see something in her filthy hands, but it wasn’t the rod. She would hold the thing up in front of my face, a tiny black squirming demon with leathery wings and a hooked beak. The beak would snap closer and closer at my face, but I couldn’t move. I’d scream and wake myself screaming.

  Pega suddenly put out her hand and touched my shoulder. I jerked away, thinking she was going to grab me and make some cruel joke. But when I looked up there was a strange expression on her face, almost … I don’t know … almost sympathetic.

  “Take care of yourself,” Pega said and walked away. Maybe Beatrice had not told her after all.

  I left the warmth of the kitchen and trailed reluctantly out across the courtyard. It was a grey cloudy afternoon, warmer than it had been when Andrew died, but the wind was sharp and damp.

  The well squatted in the corner of the yard. I lifted its wooden cover and peered down. Beads of water sweated from the sides, running down the fingers of green slime into the darkness below. Each heavy drop echoed like a heartbeat in a giant chest. The well was never silent.

  Sometimes, there was a glint of light, a sliver of silver shining on the black water below, a new moon hanging in the midnight sky of some world that lay far beneath me. At other times there was nothing but darkness at the bottom, a darkness that rose nearer and nearer, as I gazed down at it.

  Round as an apple, deep as a cup

  But all the king’s horses cannot draw it up.

  I shuddered. Where did the water in the well come from, surging and rushing unheard and unseen beneath my feet? Did those chill black rivers empty into vast lakes? Or seas with tides and waves crashing in the darkness? Were there plants and fish and birds and animals down there in the bowels of the earth? Who had power to command them? They said the place of the dead was a desert, but what if the realm of the dead and the damned was blessed with water lighter than angels’ song?

  “Are you well enough to lift those buckets, Osmanna?”

  I jumped at the sound of the voice and water slopped over my shoes.

  Servant Martha was striding across the yard. She looked tired and strained.

  “I’m much better, thank you, Servant Martha.”

  “Good, good,” Servant Martha said distractedly. “God be praised that you’re restored to health. Then we must resume your studies. I have been trying to catch up with my duties, but we must not neglect your education. Since Andrew left us, there—”

  “Was it a miracle, Servant Martha, Andrew’s Host being preserved like that? Some of the beguines say it has powers.”

  “I gave orders it was not to be discussed,” she said sharply, glancing around. But the courtyard was deserted except for the scratching chickens.

  “You said we might talk about it in private,” I reminded her.

  “But I expected better of you, Osmanna. That a simple piece of bread becomes the flesh of our Lord is a daily miracle and the greatest miracle of all is that by consuming that fragment we may obtain life everlasting. That, Osmanna, is the only power that should concern us.”

  “But, Servant Martha, I was thinking about that. If a man takes the Host just once in his life, when he is dying, he may still be saved?”

  Servant Martha nodded. “If he has made a true and contrite confession, yes, that is what the Church teaches. Many have been saved in their dying breath.”

  “Then why should we need to take the Host repeatedly, if consuming only once can save you? In a book I was reading it said …” I faltered, seeing the frown deepen on her brow.

  “Because we repeatedly sin. You surely know this. But I am curious that anyone should question it. What exactly did this book say?”

  “I can’t … remember,” I mumbled, though I knew she wouldn’t believe that. I could have kicked myself. I should never have mentioned the book.

  Servant Martha took a step closer and stared down at me. I sometimes forgot how very tall she was. “Where have you been reading about this, Osmanna? I do not recall it from the books I have given you.”

  I’d kept Ralph’s book hidden at the bottom of my chest, beneath my linens. I could not bring myself to share The Mirror with anyone. There were such thoughts inside that I had not known it was possible to think. Such questions I didn’t know you could even ask. To open its pages was like drinking stolen wine, a heady taste of excitement, fear, and guilt, which demanded I drink deeper, faster, but I couldn’t read it fast enough.

  He has freely given me my free will and he will not take my virtue from me. My virtue cannot from me be taken unless my spirit wills it.

  The words were so new to me, so hard to understand, I was compelled to read the same lines over again while wanting to race on. Yet I was afraid to read too quickly, in case when the book was finished I was still left wanting.

  The soul is transformed into God and so retains her true form, which is granted and given to her from before the beginning from the One who has always loved her.

  I felt as if my head would burst if I didn’t share it with someone and I knew Servant Martha was the only one who would understand the excitement of it. But what if she took the book from me? Would she do that? She couldn’t do that, not when I’d just found it. I wouldn’t give it up.

  I felt Servant Martha’s gaze boring into me, but I daren’t meet her eyes.

  “I assume it is a book you have read here in the beguinage. Your father did not seem the kind of man who—”

  She broke off, wrinkling her nose. At that moment I smelt it too. Smoke, but it wasn’t wood smoke from the beguinage fires. It was coming from somewhere beyond the walls, gusted in by the wind, but getting stronger even as we stood there. The stench was acrid, like … like scorched hair and burning flesh. The ground began to tip sideways.

  “Osmanna, are you unwell?”

  I staggered, dropping the pails. The water flooded out across our shoes. I felt two strong hands grab me as I pitched forward. I thought I was going to be sick. A wave of cold fear broke over me. I wanted to run to my room and bolt the door behind me, but I was shaking so much that I couldn’t even stand. It was the same smell as in the forest that night, the smell of the burning saint. I could hear the scream in my head, see the flames leaping upwards. Somewhere people were shouting. The sound was coming from the direction of the gate.

  “Stay here,” Servant Martha ordered. She began to run towards the gate.

  But I was too afraid to be left on my own. I stumbled towards the voices. A group of beguines stood in the gateway staring out at the fields beyond. I squeezed between them. A dozen huge columns of black smoke rolled up from the meadows. Beyond them were other fires, small, but bright with flames as if great stacks of wood were burning. The stench carried on the wind made me shudder violently. Kitchen Martha, feeling me beside her, put her arm about me and hugged me so hard against her that she almost squeezed the breath out of me.

  “What is it? What are they doing?” I asked her.

  “God have mercy on us, child, they say the murrain has broken out. They’re slaughtering the cattle, pigs, sheep—every beast on Manor land.”

  “All of them?”

  “It’s the law, child; they must be destroyed and the carcasses and byres burned alike to stop it spreading. It’s an evil sickness. Can kill a beast in less than a week and there’s nothing except a miracle can save it. Even those animals that live suffer great sores which ruin their hides. And it’s the ruin of their masters too, for what use is a beast if it can be neither eaten nor sold.”

  “And ours, our cattle, are they also to be slaughtered? Oxen too?”

 
; Kitchen Martha gave me another squeeze. “Servant Martha has even now gone with Shepherd Martha to see if they have the marks. Pray they are not infected, child.”

  “Saint Beuno and all the saints aid us,” someone murmured.

  The amen came from every throat.

  pisspuddle

  kICK ME AGAIN, you little vixen, and it’ll be your throat that gets cut.”

  The bailiff lifted me off the ground, holding me around the waist so tight it hurt. I beat my heels against his legs. Then I saw his great fat hairy arm wrapped round me and sank my teeth into it. That made him drop me all right.

  “God’s fecking arse! I’ll have you for that, you little witch.”

  He tried to grab me again, but I ran to Mam and hid behind her.

  “See what your brat did to me, woman.” The bailiff waved his arm under Mam’s nose. “She wants a good thrashing, she does.”

  The two men who’d come with the bailiff stood there grinning as he rubbed the bite. Their faces and hands were smeared with soot and blood.

  Mam held me tight against her rough skirts. “You lay a finger on my bairn and I’ll give you more than a bite, you see if I don’t.”

  I gaped up at her. If anyone complained about me, she always took their side and I was the one that got the wallop. I wiped my mouth on her skirts, trying to get rid of the taste of the bailiff’s sweaty arm.

  He glared at me. “Then keep the brat out of my way, Mistress, or I’ll not be held responsible. Come on,” he grunted at the two men. “Let’s get these pigs slaughtered as fast as we can. Every hour we waste arguing, the more time it gives the rest of these fecking villagers to hide their beasts.” The bailiff took a step closer to Mam. “I know what your game is, woman. You think if you can delay us here, it’ll give your friends time to spirit their own animals away.” He pushed his face close to Mam’s. “But it’ll not work, you hear me? Your neighbours can’t keep their beasts hidden forever. Sooner or later we’ll find every single one of them. D’Acaster’s out even now in the forest with his pack of hounds, hunting down all the livestock the villagers have driven in there.