The Raven's Head

by Karen Maitland

  All the candles are extinguished. She must move. She must find her way to the stone coffin or Sylvain will drown. Maybe he is already dead. But she cannot leave him. She cannot get out of the tower without him. What if she cannot open the trapdoor? No one knows where she is. No one will hear her calling. No one came running when that woman screamed.

  She listens for the rasp of those wings. She hears only the beating of her own heart, the clawing of her own breath. She drops to her knees, one hand outstretched, feeling for the stone of the coffin. She crawls through darkness. She crawls for what seems like an eternity. And still she cannot touch it.

  Chapter 41

  It is the body which retains the soul and the soul can shew its power only when it is united to the body.

  Finding my beard had been shaved off without so much as a by-your-leave annoyed me. I’d been proud of that beard. It had taken long enough to sprout and there were times, when I was growing up, that I feared it never would come in, despite the copious amounts of bears’ grease I rubbed into my chin to encourage it. But I knew it was common for physicians to prescribe cutting off a patient’s hair to conserve their strength or stop their brain becoming fevered. Perhaps it was the same with beards, and at least they hadn’t shaved my head.

  But they had shaved something else! Something I only discovered when I eased myself out of bed to use the piss-pot. I hadn’t looked before. I’d had no reason to, so it wasn’t until I put my hands to my cock to point it in the direction of the pot that I felt a very short prickle of stubble where for several years there had been a bush of coarse hair. I stared down, but there was no mistaking it: I had been shaved all around my cods. The thought of which of them might have done it made me blush hot and shudder at the same time. Sylvain, Odo and Pipkin. I didn’t know whose hands I least wanted fumbling around that very delicate part of me with a sharp razor. Had Sylvain ordered it, not wanting to take the risk of me bringing lice or crabs into his bed? I must say I was more than a little affronted.

  I searched the room for the clothes I’d been wearing when I arrived, but there was no sign of them. Perhaps they’d been taken to be washed and mended, which was at least a courtesy of sorts, though after all those weeks I’d been lying in bed surely they’d been laundered by now. Unless, of course, Sylvain had had them burned, thinking they were lousy too.

  A long loose scarlet robe hung over the chair next to the bed, with linens and a pair of leather shoes. I could only assume they were intended for me to wear, and when I reluctantly dragged them on, I was forced to admit I’d never before worn woollen cloth that was so fine and soft. But I wasn’t accustomed to a long robe – at least, not since I’d disguised myself as a woman in Ricey-Bas – and I was sure I was going to trip over.

  I was barely dressed when I heard a fumbling at the door. I expected it to be Sylvain, but it was old Pipkin. I recognised his voice and the smell of the stale fat, blood and onion that wafted before him, like a page announcing his arrival even before he was fully in the room. I’d half a mind to ask him who’d shaved me so intimately, but I decided I really didn’t want to know.

  It was the first time I’d actually seen Pipkin, for he’d not come to the chamber since my eye bandages were removed. I discovered he was indeed as rotund as an ale-barrel, as he’d claimed, with at least three chins, though goodness knows how many more he might have secreted beneath the neck of that grimy tunic. What I hadn’t pictured was that he was as bald as a hardboiled egg, or that his eyes wandered, quite of their own accord, in different directions, as if they’d quarrelled bitterly and were determined to have nothing more to do with each other.

  ‘Good to see you on your feet,’ he said cheerfully. ‘At least I won’t be having to cook up any more of those broths, or feed you like an old gammer.’

  He set down half a loaf of bread, a jug of wine and a whole roasted pheasant. My head was clearer now. But how long had I been asleep this time?

  ‘Is this dinner or supper, Pipkin?’

  He shook his head, amazed at my stupidity. ‘Noon bell’s only just rung. Why would you be wanting your supper now?’

  He gazed hungrily at the roasted pheasant, which glistened under the lard, honey and spices with which it had been lavishly basted. A little stream of saliva trickled from the corner of his mouth.

  I pushed the platter towards him. ‘I won’t eat all of this.’

  Actually, I was so hungry I could easily have devoured it all for I felt as if I’d had nothing solid in my belly for weeks, but I was willing to sacrifice a little meat in the hope of winkling some information from him.

  He didn’t wait to be asked twice but, drawing up the chair, lowered his great hams onto the groaning wood. He took out a sharp knife, sliced off a large chunk of pheasant, and began gnawing at it, like a bishop devouring the first meat after the Lenten fast.

  I pulled off a leg and sank my teeth into it. It tasted even better than it smelt. ‘I suppose the baron’s ancestors built this place,’ I said casually.

  I knew it was no use asking direct questions about Sylvain, but I reckoned Pipkin might just give something away if I crept round the subject.

  Pipkin waved a pheasant bone in the air while he swallowed the mouthful he was chewing. ‘Not his family, it weren’t. But the master’s been here a good long time, over thirty years or more, I reckon. It was afore the abbey were built anyway. I reckon Father Arthmael only came here ’cause of the master . . . seems they knew each other years before.

  ‘But the master was none too pleased to see his old friend here at first, that I can tell you. Tried every which way to get the building stopped, but the abbot was determined. Then, a few years after, something changed. I couldn’t fathom it. The master started paying calls on Father Arthmael, spending half the night at that abbey, like they was blood brothers. But I dunno,’ Pipkin wiped a rivulet of grease from his chin and frowned, ‘those two always put me in mind of two beggars I saw once. One of ’em blind, the other’d no hands. Fought like two cats in a sack, each convinced the other was cheating him, but stuck together ’cause they couldn’t do without each other.’

  ‘I can’t imagine Sylvain having much time for a saintly abbot,’ I said. I was about to add it was as likely a friendship as Lucifer and the Archangel Michael sharing a jug of ale, but I stopped myself. I didn’t want that remark getting back to my not-so-genial host.

  Pipkin chuckled. ‘I doubt you’ll find many in these parts who’d call Father Arthmael saint. He’s another who keeps his place locked up tighter than a castle under siege. The White Canons go out teaching and preaching, but no one ever goes in. They don’t let pilgrims or travellers stay there. I heard one time . . .’

  Pipkin paused and leaned forward as far as his great belly would allow. I thought at first he wanted to be sure we were not overheard, but it was to pour himself a good measure of wine.

  ‘You were saying about the White Canons,’ I prompted him, as he hacked yet more meat from the bird.

  ‘Queer lot.’ Pipkin shook his head dolefully. ‘All these different orders squabble like cocks on a dung heap, thinking their way’s right. I’ve known monks to draw swords on each other afore now, but generally if a friar or monk is passing through, no matter what his order, they’ll always offer him a place in their guest hall and a bite to eat. Leastways, that what’s my cousin says – he’s a Benedictine. Keep a good table, they do, unlike some.

  ‘But he told me two of his brothers were coming this way in the middle of winter. It came on to snow so hard that if there’d been a black dog standing not a hand’s length from them they’d not have seen him. So, finding themselves close to Langley Abbey, they ride up and ask for shelter for the night. The gatekeeper tells them they’ve no room. I ask you, how can there be no room in a place that size?

  ‘“We’ll sleep in the stables with the horses then,” the Benedictines say. “Any place to shelter out of the snow.”

  ‘Quick as a ferret down a rabbit warren, the gatekeeper comes ba
ck at him, “We’ve a fever among some of the brothers. The infirmarer says no one’s to be admitted for fear of the contagion.”

  ‘Well, you’d have thought he’d have told them that straight off, if it were true, wouldn’t you?’ Pipkin said, pausing to take another bite. ‘The Benedictines were too afeared of blundering into the marsh in the snow to try to make it to the town, so they ended up sleeping in some riverman’s cottage. And they were none too happy about that, I can tell you, for their own pigs are given better fare than the riverman could offer them. They don’t let a fellow monk in, yet my master’s round there day and night. Makes no sense, does it?’

  ‘You make no sense, you old fool.’

  The hunk of pheasant in Pipkin’s hand shot out of his greasy fingers with such force it hit the wall opposite. He lumbered to his feet, as Odo barged into the room, carrying a small sloped writing box under one arm and a narrow table to stand it on under the other. He set both down as Pipkin blundered towards the door.

  ‘You know what the master says about gossiping,’ Odo growled. ‘If he heard you, he’d rip your tongue out and kick your fat arse out of the gate for good.’

  ‘And what do you think he’d say if he knew about the whore you sneak in here when he goes off to the abbey?’ Pipkin retorted.

  ‘I’ve never brought a whore in here, you dung-brained scullion!’ Odo’s great hands clenched into fists and he took a menacing step towards Pipkin who, I discovered, could vacate a room with a surprising turn of speed for such a stout man. ‘As if I’d keep company with a whore,’ Odo muttered furiously. ‘Anyway, he can talk. The goats get nervous whenever they see him, and I don’t mean just when he’s a knife in his hand.’

  But from the guilty flush that had turned his face an unbecoming puce, it was evident that, whore or not, Odo was smuggling some female or other into the manor when his master’s back was turned. I’d have to remember that. You never knew when these little secrets could be turned to good use.

  Evidently still seething, he gestured towards the writing box. ‘Master says all you need for your writing is in there.’

  He strode from the room, still muttering away to himself furiously. Cooks as talented as Pipkin were hard to come by, so I only hoped that he’d found some place to conceal himself out of sight until Odo’s temper had cooled.

  I opened the writing box to find rolls of new parchment, bundles of uncut quills, a quill knife, pots of dried gall-inks and small dishes on which to mix them. Sylvain did indeed know exactly what was required. I doubted that my former master, Philippe, would have had the faintest idea what a scribe needed, even after all his years of dictating his letters to Gaspard, any more than he would have known what ingredients went into the dishes he demanded from his cook.

  Still hungry, I picked over what little meat Pipkin had left on the bird and devoured the bread. Fortunately there was still a good measure of wine left, and I sipped it as I tried to think of a story. Sylvain was in the habit of going to the abbey. So . . . he might be a secret monk, a holy man . . . No, that wouldn’t do. If what Pipkin had said was true, then the townsfolk were as suspicious of the White Canons at the abbey as they were of Sylvain.

  It was no good. The air in the windowless chamber was stale and heavy with candle fumes. My eyes were already aching from peering through the dull light. The room smelt musty and little wonder: I could have sworn the small patch of black mould I’d noticed near the base of the wall when my bandages had been removed had more than doubled in size. Either I’d slept longer than I thought, or else my memory was still far from clear. I needed to see daylight, breathe some fresh air.

  I tried the door, convinced it would be locked, but as I lifted the latch it swung open without so much as a squeak or groan, which somewhat unnerved me. The hinges had been well oiled and the wood too. No wonder Sylvain had been able to enter my chamber without waking me. But that little jolt was nothing to the one I received when I saw what lay on the other side of my chamber.

  The room was bare, save for a painted landscape that ran right round the walls. Some of the figures were similar to those on the chalice I’d seen in the Great Hall, but as I wandered round I began to notice other creatures too, which were disquietingly familiar – a lion, a swan and a scorpion – the same symbols that were hidden in Lugh’s feathers. The very ones that had made the silversmith thrust the raven’s head back at me in such alarm. But I still couldn’t understand why. Such images were common on shields and crests. Even in churches it was not unusual for the painter to work animals and objects into the biblical scenes that made some punning reference to their patron’s ancestors or deeds.

  Now, there was a thought. Maybe I could get an idea for a story about Sylvain from these walls. I wandered around them several times, but soon thought better of it. If any bishop or townsman saw these images of two-headed people and dismembered corpses, they’d more than likely drag Sylvain out and hang him on the spot.

  I tried the door on the opposite side of the chamber and discovered that it, too, was unlocked. It opened onto a spiral staircase. Holding up the skirts of my robe, I descended gingerly, partly because I was still dizzy, but also because at any moment I expected to encounter Odo or Sylvain himself. But there was no sign of either. Perhaps Odo was too busy chasing Pipkin around the kitchen with a meat cleaver. I supposed there must be other servants – a place this size could hardly be maintained by two men – but as yet I’d neither seen nor heard any others.

  I emerged through a low, narrow doorway into some well-kept gardens, with trees and a herb plot, neatly bordered with low hedges of lavender and rosemary. A dead rabbit lay on a stone a few yards away, maggots swarming over its gaping belly. A cat or fox must have dragged it there.

  But I had taken no more than a step outside when the door to what I took to be the Great Hall opened. I drew back hastily. A man clad in a long white robe strode towards the tower that dominated the grounds. His head was down and he seemed deep in thought. I guessed this to be the infamous Father Arthmael. I hastily retreated behind the turret door, fearing that if Sylvain was looking out of his tower he would see right across the garden to where I stood. I wasn’t sure if I was permitted to wander outside and I didn’t want to give him any excuse for locking me in. I huddled just inside the door, leaving it open a crack so that I could watch the abbot enter the tower. With luck, Father Arthmael would keep Sylvain occupied, leaving me free to explore.

  Father Arthmael turned the great iron ring in the tower door, but it didn’t open. He tried again, this time setting his shoulder to it. He banged and called Sylvain’s name. Then he bent down to examine a basket that lay on the threshold. Picking up the skirts of his robe, he ran back across the grass towards the house. This time I could hear him calling for Odo, who came charging out of the house, like a bull stung by a bee.

  ‘The door is locked,’ Father Arthmael shouted to him. ‘And the basket of food has not been touched. Sylvain always comes down for it when the noon bell strikes and it is long past that. I fear there may have been an accident.’

  They hastened back to the door.

  Odo was fumbling with a bunch of keys that dangled on a great iron ring from his belt. As soon as the key had turned in the lock, Father Arthmael gestured to him to stand aside and rushed in. Odo hesitated, peering in through the open door and calling out several times, but not entering. It was quite some time before anyone emerged. Father Arthmael came out backside first, and bending low. It wasn’t until he swung round that I saw he had his hands under Sylvain’s armpits and was dragging him. Sylvain was naked except for a black robe that had been hastily tied around his hips. Blood-stained water dripped from his corpse-pale limbs.

  Odo crouched down and, with Father Arthmael’s help, managed to hoist Sylvain over his shoulder. The man’s head and arms dangled limp as a dead rabbit. Odo set off towards the house, staggering slightly under the weight, with Father Arthmael scurrying behind.

  I stood at the foot of the stairs, not know
ing what to do. Should I follow them or scuttle back up to my chamber and pretend I’d never left it? I was on the point of doing just that when I heard a cry and saw Gisa running from the tower. She managed to get as far as the nearest apple tree, when her legs crumpled beneath her and she collapsed to the ground.

  Chapter 42

  Nigredo: the Black Death – All flesh that is derived from the earth must be decomposed and reduced again to the earth which it formerly was.

  Gisa feels the hand touching her shoulder, then withdrawing just as suddenly, as if its owner doesn’t know whether to lift her up or not.

  ‘Did you faint?’

  ‘No,’ she snaps, indignant at the very idea.

  She’s seen her aunt swoon dramatically on numerous occasions and always swore she would never do something so silly. But she is more angry with herself than the questioner, because she knows she came close to it. She lifts her head and finds herself staring at the young man, who only that morning – was it only that morning? – she had seen lying on the bed in that hidden chamber. She can only stare at him. After such horror, her mind cannot seem to grasp what he is doing here.

  She pushes herself up until she is sitting, her knees drawn up. She is dismayed to find that she is so shaky she cannot trust herself to stand.

  Laurent crouches down, peering anxiously at her. ‘Sylvain, is he dead? . . . Was there an accident?’

  She rubs her eyes. The light is cruelly bright after the utter darkness. ‘Accident? No, there was no accident. It . . .’

  She cannot think of a word, a phrase, even a whole book, that would give a name to what she has just witnessed, that would begin to explain the terror of not being able to find the stone coffin, of not being able to open the lid, and when she did, hearing no sound, no splashing, no breathing. Having to grope in the darkness for the gap, plunge her hand into the icy water and feel for his cold face beneath. All that time not knowing if the creature from Hell was behind her, creeping towards her as she reached out to Sylvain.