Ironfoot

by Dave Duncan

  “It is prepared,” I said, still frantically wondering how far to trust this shrewd and unlikely ally, “from the roots or leaves of the monkshood plant, usually as a tincture, meaning that the deadly matter is extracted by steeping the ground-up roots in strong wine. It has several uses in medicine, despite its toxicity; most often it is applied to the skin to ease pain, and it will stimulate urination. It is also known as wolfsbane, because foresters use it to keep down wolves. I would expect that Sage Archibald kept some in his sanctum. . . . If I might be allowed to look there?”

  For a moment the old campaigner studied me in silence, as if trying to decide whether to encourage my insolence or just hang me out of hand. I bore his inspection while trying to seem like a learned, honest, and trustworthy sage, but aware that in the other man’s eyes I was more likely just a brash, callow, meddling peasant, an increasingly sweaty one as the ordeal continued.

  Then Hugh nodded. “You truly believe that your arts will lead you to the killer?”

  “Unless you or His Lordship have reason to accuse someone, then I truly believe I am more likely to unmask him than anyone else is, Sir Hugh. He is a cunning fiend, but I have been trained in the logic used by the ancients.” The learned Aristotle might not be much help here. More likely, there would be something in the grimoire Guy had given me, perhaps the incantation he had mentioned, Ubi malum.

  “He has killed twice already. It seems he either hates or fears sages.”

  “I am prepared to take that risk, sir.”

  “How long?”

  “At least a week.”

  Hugh glanced at William. “Well, lad? Should I trust this Saxon adept, or is he all mouth?”

  William looked at me.

  “He is very largely mouth, Sir Hugh, but if he says he can do it, then I believe he should be allowed to try.”

  “Angels preserve us! Very well, Saxon. You can have three days, counting this one. Talk with anyone. Wear your cape; if anyone questions your authority, refer them to me. You have the run of the castle. On Saturday we’ll talk again.”

  Blessed saints! This was more than I could have dreamed of. “The count, sir—”

  “Lord Richard was humoring his lady, who is understandably distraught. Do not pester him or his family, of course. But if you can prove to him who killed his brother he will cut out the scoundrel’s liver with a rusty knife and reward you famously. What are you going to do with that flask?”

  “Empty it into the pits, perhaps. It is too dangerous to leave around.”

  Hugh hesitated, then nodded. He turned to scan the hall and waved. The page who came sprinting to learn his bidding looked as if he’d been stamped with the same die as Varlet Eadig— freckles, peach face, and all, although his dress was fine enough to mark him as a Norman.

  “John, this is Adept Durwin. He and Squire William have the freedom of the castle. Show them the sage’s sanctum, so they can move in there. Then find the fool and tell him this, also tell him he’s to make himself useful by helping the adept with his work.”

  “You mean Scur, Sir Hugh?” the boy asked incredulously.

  “Unless you’d rather do the job yourself?” Chuckling, the marshal rose to his full height and nodded to me as I levered myself up also. “There you are, Saxon—a place to sleep and a guide who knows everyone and everywhere. Anything else?”

  If there was to be incantation, then I would need the help of someone who could read and write in both French and Latin: Father Randolf could, of course, but he would never cooperate. The count himself must have some education, since he had invoked Despero. And he would have a secretary, likely a cleric in minor orders.

  “That should be plenty for now, Sir Hugh. I am most grateful for your trust and—”

  “Get to work, then.”

  He gave me no chance to thank him for a half-witted guide and booby-trapped accommodation.

  chapter 15

  i managed to descend from the platform without falling flat on my face. As I headed for the exit stair, I was much aware of young John at my side, wide eyes scanning me from cape to boot.

  “I have met Scur,” I said. “I didn’t know he was the count’s fool. Tell me about him.”

  John hesitated, unsure how to address a Saxon adept attended by a Norman squire; our names gave away our respective races before we even opened our mouths.

  “I have been told, Adept, that he was a childhood friend of the count’s, and a doughty man-at-arms in his day. They say the count knighted him for his valor in the attack on the Isle of Ely, but the very next year, at the Battle of Lincoln, his face was smashed in with a mace. He hasn’t been right in the head since.”

  “I don’t think I would be, either, if anyone smashed my face in.”

  John flashed a cheeky grin, reassured that I would not eat him. “Nor me, Adept. Scur’s crazy. He talks sewage that nobody understands.”

  William, on my other side, would not be happy to hear that, but I, from our one brief conversation, suspected that Scur’s sewage might contain lumps of truth. A fool must learn to guard his tongue.

  Then came the very tricky process of descending a narrow spiral staircase. I managed it without disaster, and was relieved to find myself outside in a bright, breezy day at the top of the wooden steps leading down to the bailey. Sunshine, even!

  “That there’s the sanctum, Adept,” the page said, pointing over the roofs of the cottages. “The tall one.”

  Other than the keep we had just left, there seemed to be only two buildings of more than one story in the bailey, so I could see the one he meant, but between it and us was the maze.

  “You’d better lead us there. It wouldn’t look good for an adept to get lost.”

  John laughed and proceeded to skip all the way down the long stairway much faster than I could follow, but he stopped to wait for me at the bottom.

  “You should clip his ear, Saxon,” William grumbled as we descended. “Impudent brat.”

  “He’s young,” I said. “In a few years he’ll learn quality manners, like yours.” My assistant did not answer that.

  Down on the flat the boy set a brisk pace, leading us through the tangle of buildings. Other pedestrians stepped aside for the man in the white cape, men touching forelocks, women bobbing curtseys. I acknowledged each with a nod and a smile, wondering how many hundred people lived within the bailey.

  “Count Richard fought for King Stephen in the troubles?”

  The page’s young face froze. “At the beginning . . . so I have heard, master. But he is a loyal subject of King Henry now.”

  “As are we all, of course.” The Anarchy had been twenty years of insanity. Much of it is long forgotten, except by sages, monkish chroniclers, or other learned persons, but it is burned into the memories of those who experienced it, few as we are now. I was only a child when it ended.

  After the first King Henry’s son drowned, the king made all the barons swear loyalty to his daughter, Maud, widow of the previous German Emperor, although neither England nor Normandy had ever been ruled by a queen. When he died, they were told that he had released them from their vows on his deathbed, so they switched their allegiance to a man, her cousin Stephen. That testimony was not exposed as perjury until after Stephen had been crowned, and an anointed king could not be un-anointed. Maud tried to take the throne by force, but neither she nor Stephen was an inspiring leader, and in the end it had been Maud’s twenty-year-old son, another Henry, who succeeded. In the last ten years he had done much better than either his uncle or his mother, establishing peace and order, ruling with a hand of steel.

  “Lady Matilda is the count’s daughter?” Matilda and Maud are the same name.

  “Aye, sir,” John said. “Was married to Baron Darcy, but after his passing she came back here, sir, with her brat.”

  William caught my eye then. If Richard had no son of his own, who had been heir to the earldom? Matilda’s son or his great-uncle Rolf? The rules would have leaned toward the child, likely, b
ut they were not written in stone, as the Anarchy had shown. In this case the decision would likely have been made by King Henry himself, their overlord. Now Rolf was dead, and Baroness Matilda had been one of the possible poisoners.

  Or did Richard also have sons, perhaps grown up and living elsewhere? While I was trying to frame a way to put that question to John without revealing the way my mind was working, the page halted and pointed along an alley even narrower and more noisome than most, a favorite garbage tip from the look of it.

  “The sanctum’s along there, Adept, sir.”

  “My thanks to you, page. Now, when you have found Scur and given him the marshal’s orders, pray ask him to come here to me.”

  The lad hesitated. “If he refuses?”

  “Then tell the marshal. But Hugh might assign you to be my guide instead, so you’d better sound as fierce as you can.”

  For a moment it seemed as if John would reply with some shrill Norman obscenity, but then he grinned. He ran off and I was left with my squire, who was looking very wary indeed.

  Together we plodded down the alley, which was in truth only a miry and narrow gap between two buildings, tapering toward the end. Indeed it might even be a dead end, for all we could see ahead was a blank wall. When we reached that, though, there was an even narrower way leading off to the right, although it was so restricted that I had trouble not scuffing the knuckles holding my staff.

  The wall on my left was a blank, the back of one of the wattle-and-cob cottages, but to my right two shuttered windows flanked a door marked with a sage’s pentacle. The building itself was of stone and two stories high as expected. Likely it was old, and the lesser structures had crowded in around it over time.

  By accident or design, the entrance was now very private, which is a common feature of sages’ sanctums, since both they and their clients often prefer to keep their dealings secret. The windows were guarded by stout iron bars and oak shutters. I went on past the first window and the door to examine the sill of the second window. The alley ended there, at a wicker screen which more or less concealed a privy.

  I glanced up to the window above the one that had caught my attention.

  “William?”

  “Saxon?” We were alone, so I was back among the swineherds and latrine cleaners.

  “There’s mud here. Could you scramble up and see what was going on upstairs, if there was anything going on upstairs?”

  “Why should I want to?”

  “Because I can’t. Show me what a runt I am.”

  William handed over the satchel and the wine flask, gripped the window bars, and walked up the wall until he could put his feet on the ground floor window sill. By clutching the top of one bar, and stretching his other arm as high as he could, he just managed to get a grip on an upper window bar. Then he could straighten up.

  “All I can see is another shutter. If you’ll go in and open it, I’ll tell you what’s in there.”

  “The shutters are closed because it was raining on Monday. You can come down now.”

  William pushed himself off backwards. His boots hit the mire—splat! He flailed his arms wildly and might have sat down in the muck had he not backed into the wall opposite. “So what does that prove?”

  I eyed him; we were much the same height. “It proves that only someone as tall as us could climb up to spy through that upstairs window.”

  “Seeing in isn’t the problem,” he said, “as long as the shutters are open. Getting up there is. But he could have used a hook. Even a kid could get a grip on the upstairs bars then, and pull himself to take a peek. The sill was lower than my collar bones, so a kid would be able to see over it.”

  “True. And spying must have been his purpose. I can’t think how or why else anyone would leave mud on the window sill. Even all the recent rain didn’t wash it off. It’s interesting.”

  “Why?”

  “Sage’s hunch. Upper rooms contain beds and intriguing things can happen in beds.” Not many people had William’s strength, but there were plenty of nimble youngsters around. With some forethought and preparation they could have spied on the sage’s upstairs activities. I handed back the flask and satchel, then returned to the door.

  The door was a serious challenge, and I suspected I had been secretly delaying this confrontation. There was no keyhole. Seemingly, all I need do was press down on the latch and push the door open, but the pentacle was a warning that a sage had laid a hex upon it. This castle was not tolerant and trusting Helmdon, so the consequences for entering without an invitation could be dire. The pentacle was old and faded, but that did not mean the warding had not been renewed often. I spread my hand over the sign, not quite touching it, and yes, I could feel the spell, a faint chill.

  William was standing back expectantly, waiting to see the fun.

  Who, other than the murdered Sage Archibald, knew the antiphon? Probably no one. Hugh was testing to see if I was all thunder and no lightning. I beckoned William closer.

  “This door is definitely hexed. Feel it.”

  “No.”

  “It’s a trick you’ll have to learn.”

  “I’ll wait for a qualified teacher.”

  Ever since I was a child, my parents had taught me that I must never lose my temper with a Norman. “If I tell you how I think it can be opened safely, will you try it for me?”

  “Eat shit, Saxon.” He set his big jaw defiantly.

  “Your lack of trust is disappointing, William.”

  “Yes, but that spell was set by a sage, and you’re only an adept.”

  “Well, will you promise to do something for me if I die trying?”

  Aware now that he was being baited, the squire said, “What?”

  “Go back to Helmdon, clench one of those big fists of yours, and punch Sage Guy on the nose as hard as you can?”

  “I think that might be even more dangerous than what you are about to do.”

  “So do I. That’s why I asked. Will you?”

  William scowled and repeated, “Eat shit, Saxon.”

  When he would have backed away again, out of earshot, I said, “Stay and listen.” Then I drew a deep breath and began in a low voice, “Pater noster, qui es in caelis . . .” After the amen, I made the sign of the cross, opened the door, and went in. I closed it in the squire’s face when he would have followed.

  Fortunately enough light came through a ceiling hatch to show me where the furniture was, because my first task must be to open the shutters. The ground floor was a single room, larger than Guy’s sanctum at Helmdon, and boasting an imposing fieldstone fireplace and chimney. Otherwise it was quite similar, with a workbench, a table, stools, a couch under a window for examining patients, a couple of chests . . . but what caught my eye right away was a wall of shelves, laden with jars, bottles, and boxes. Now if the bottles were all clearly labeled and stacked neatly in alphabetical order, with a gap in the m’s, or even the a’s, I would have identified the source of the poison that had killed Rolf. They were a wild mixture of sizes, arrayed higgledy-piggledy, and none seemed to be labeled.

  The room was dusty, but remarkably tidy, much tidier than any sage’s cabin at Helmdon. A stuffed crocodile hung from the ceiling while one wall was decorated with a boar’s head and a wolf ’s head with silver eyes, and another was painted with ornate planet and constellation symbols to increase the mystique. Sage Guy’s sarcastic tongue would scourge such hocus-pocus, but he earned most of his income by teaching. Sage Archibald had been required to provide cures, charms, or horoscopes to layman clients from Count Richard on down. Probably he had not charged the servants anything, or very little, but part of his job had been to keep the castle staff happy, and first impressions are important. To be fair, the decorations were faded and shabby; they might date from long before his time.

  The table was bare except for two silver goblets, standing side by side. I sniffed at each of them and decided that they had held wine. There was no sign of a wine flask though. Nor were there
any books in sight, which was impossible. Any sage needed at least one grimoire.

  The door squealed open again and a taut voice said, “May I enter, Adept?”

  “Certainly. You spoke the password, so you can enter. That was lesson one.”

  William entered, slamming the door. “Listen, you yellow-haired dog, I’ll play your flunky in public, but I’m keeping score. So far you’ve just earned a moderate pounding, but push your luck any further and that crappy leg of yours will be the least of your numerous deformities, understand?”

  “No!” I snapped. “What I do understand is that you’re an ignorant young thug, which is not your fault, and determined to remain ignorant, which is. I was trying to teach you something. The Helmdon sages beat you and that just makes you worse. I was hoping you were smart enough to learn by example, and maybe even ask an intelligent question once in a while.”

  William gritted his teeth and said, “Then how did you know that the Lord’s prayer would deactivate that hex?”

  “I didn’t. But what I learned at Helmdon was that a ward on a door is a form of curse, and there is nothing in the lore to prevent an enchanter from making it a very terrible curse, invoking major powers. But to put such a ward on a door that might be opened by mistake—in the dark, say, or by a child, or even by the sage himself in a fit of distraction—would be a major sin, even a crime. So most sages are content to use minor spells for wards. They may make you itch, or stagger, or at worst go blind for a while. Such minor enchantment cannot stand against the Lord’s Prayer. Do you understand?”

  William nodded angrily.