The Rose Demon

by Paul Doherty

  ‘Don’t worry, boy,’ he said. ‘Just look in my eyes.’

  Matthias did, saw two dark pools. . felt a sensation similar to when he stared into the dark mere in the woods around Tenebral. His own eyes grew heavy. He was falling into darkness. .

  Matthias must have slept for hours. When he awoke he felt refreshed and very hungry.

  ‘It’s three hours past midday,’ Rahere declared, sitting on a stool next to the bed. ‘You’ve been snoring like a little pig. How do you feel now?’

  ‘Warm,’ Matthias replied.

  ‘Good. Then it’s time you ate.’

  He left. A few minutes later he returned, carrying a tray which had a pewter bowl of venison stew, cheese, soft-baked white loaves, a pot of butter and a dish of sugared pears. Matthias ate until he felt his stomach was going to burst. All the time the clerk watched him intently.

  ‘I’d best go home.’ Matthias pushed the tray away.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Rahere answered. ‘Not yet anyway. You can help me. I have letters to write: I will show you the secrets of the Chancery.’

  Matthias spent a fascinating afternoon helping the clerk draw up letters reporting to the Chancellor what had happened at Sutton Courteny. The clerk showed him how to take a fresh, virginal roll of parchment, brush it lightly with a pumice stone until it was silky to the touch, then how to cut it with a special knife, using a slat of wood to ensure the line ran straight. Then there was the ink: the proportion of water to powder, the mixing and heating over a candle. The quills, delicate to the touch, needed to be sharpened. Matthias broke at least three before he learnt how to prepare them. The clerk was very patient. Never once did he show any irritation, but praised Matthias.

  ‘You have a quick mind, lad. You’ll make a good clerk. Now, I’ll show you how to write.’

  The clerk sat at the small desk, dipped the quill into the ink and began to write. His pen fairly skimmed across the page.

  ‘Can you read it?’

  ‘I only know Church Latin.’ Matthias shook his head.

  ‘It’s not Latin,’ Rahere grinned. ‘It’s Norman French, the language of the court. That’s the tongue the great ones speak.’

  And, getting to his feet, the clerk spoke in French whilst imitating the affectations of the courtiers, both men and women. He was such a good mimic that Matthias laughed until his sides ached. Rahere sat back on his stool.

  ‘It’s marvellous to watch them, Matthias,’ he declared. ‘They carry their heads as if what was in them were sacred. Yet they are all noddle-pates.’ His face became grim. ‘Most of them have one strength and one strength only: they know how to kill — but the same could be said of any savage animal.’

  ‘Surely the clerks are different?’ Matthias asked.

  ‘They are no better nor worse,’ Rahere replied. ‘Time-servers; they carefully watch who is about to rise and who is about to fall. Well, the parchment has to be sealed.’

  He took a small copper spoon and a finger of wax out of his chancery bag, showing Matthias how the wax had to be melted, poured on the parchment to receive the imprint of the seal he carried.

  ‘Now,’ Rahere left the parchment on the desk, ‘we let it dry then I’ll roll it up, tie it with a piece of ribbon and we’ll hire some honest journeyman to take it down to Westminster. As for you, my boy,’ he went to the window, ‘it’s nearly evening. Your father will be home.’

  Matthias did not want to return to his house, but the clerk insisted on accompanying him. Widow Blanche opened the door, her face all concerned. In the kitchen Parson Osbert sat in a chair, head lolling. The cup he had been holding had rolled on the floor, the flagon of wine beside him was empty.

  ‘He only came back a short while ago,’ the widow woman whispered. ‘I’ve never seen him like that before: bad-tempered and cursing. He asked where his brat was.’ She glanced pityingly at Matthias. ‘He had a stick in his hand.’

  ‘And Christina, the boy’s mother?’ Rahere asked.

  ‘She’s upstairs. God save us! I’ve dressed her for burial. But this?’ She shook her head, mumbling under her breath.

  ‘We’ll see her,’ Rahere declared. ‘I’ll take the boy up. He should see his mother, at least once.’

  He led Matthias up the stairs. Christina was laid out on her bed. She had been dressed in her best gown, her hair was combed, falling down to her shoulders, her face was serene, hands placed across her chest. Matthias felt that if he stretched out, he could shake her awake yet he did not want to. He felt guilty. She looked younger, at peace with herself. Matthias caught a glimpse of the mother he wanted to remember. He stood, the tears streaming down his face.

  ‘Say your prayers,’ Rahere whispered.

  Matthias tried to think of one but he couldn’t. All he could remember were the words his father had taught him to say every morning.

  ‘Remember this, my soul, and remember it well. The Lord thy God is One and He is holy. And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy mind, with all thy heart and with all thy strength.’ He looked up at Rahere. ‘That’s all I can say.’

  ‘Kiss your mother,’ Rahere said.

  Matthias climbed on the bed. He kissed Christina on her cheeks and brow. He clambered off and watched in surprise as Rahere also bent over the dead woman and kissed her gently on the lips. He ran his fingers gently down her face.

  ‘It’s finished, Matthias.’ He stared down at the boy. ‘Only the shell remains. The spirit has long gone.’ Rahere whispered something, staring up at the ceiling. ‘She has gone,’ he continued to the boy. ‘She suffered much, yet, despite her sins, she was good. No objection has been made: she has been allowed to pass into the light.’

  Matthias stared, puzzled: Rahere shrugged and took him downstairs. Widow Blanche was still clucking like a hen over the sleeping parson.

  ‘You can leave the boy with me,’ she said. ‘I’ll get him something to eat.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Rahere retorted. His eyes held those of Blanche. ‘I am sure you’ll agree it’s best the boy stay with me for a while.’ He held his hand out and pressed silver coins into Blanche’s.

  ‘I would agree, sir,’ she replied. ‘Parson Osbert’s mind is turned with grief.’

  Matthias did not object: he did not want to stay here.

  ‘Will he get better?’ he asked as they left.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Rahere replied. He looked up at the sky. ‘I don’t think so. Some sicknesses cannot be cured.’

  The clerk’s words proved to be prophetic. Parson Osbert was so incapacitated that Baron Sanguis had to bring a priest from Tredington for Christina’s funeral Mass. Matthias attended with the other villagers. He felt a pang of compassion for his father, who sat on a bench supported by old Blanche and Simon the reeve.

  The day of Christina’s burial was a dismal one. The sky was overclouded. Once the sheeted corpse had been lowered and the dirt piled in, the mourners ran for shelter from the fat drops of rain which began to fall. Matthias went back with Rahere to the Hungry Man. He felt comfortable there, either assisting the clerk or doing jobs round the tavern for Joscelyn.

  The villagers grew accustomed to the clerk’s presence and, as the days passed, they accepted him as their leader and counsellor. Parson Osbert, constantly in his cups, was dismissed as a madcap who, before long, would be relieved of his living. In his turn, the clerk seemed unwilling to leave and, when questioned by Sanguis and others, dismissed any notion of returning to Westminster just yet.

  ‘I need to be sure,’ he explained, ‘that there are no more deaths in the locality. The Preacher’s corpse might be rotting on the gallows but there may be more than one killer. He might have been a member of a coven.’

  He told the villagers this when they all crowded into the tavern late at night after the harvest had been stored. The villagers gathered round him.

  ‘It’s true what you say, sir,’ Fulcher declared. ‘So many corpses, yet no one has given the reason why.’

  ‘I b
eg your pardon?’ Rahere sat back in his seat, putting his arm round Matthias.

  ‘Well, my Edith,’ the blacksmith hastily explained. ‘Why was she killed? Why were these corpses drained of blood?’

  ‘Perhaps you should ask the Preacher?’ Rahere joked.

  The assembled men and women laughed self-consciously.

  ‘And what about the boy?’ Scrivener Mapp pointed at Matthias. ‘I mean, when you go, sir?’

  ‘Oh, he’ll come with me.’

  Matthias hid his surprise but he found it easy to do so. Over the last few weeks he’d grown more secretive: he had already decided that, if the clerk left, he would not stay, though where he would go was, until now, unresolved.

  ‘Will you stay long?’ Piers the ploughman asked.

  His voice was anxious though he forced a smile. He and the other men were becoming increasingly concerned by this handsome, elegant clerk’s attraction for their women. Rahere leant his elbows on the table, steepling his fingers over the lower half of his face.

  ‘I’ll tell you what,’ he declared. ‘I’ll stay until Samhain evening. Yes, to the Eve of the Feast of All Saints.’ He chuckled deep in his throat. ‘I promise you, it will be a Samhain that will be remembered for years!’

  9

  In the scriptorium of Tewkesbury Abbey, the Chronicler did not know how to describe the horrifying events which occurred at Sutton Courteny in the autumn of 1471. The old monk scratched the quill against his face. He had talked to his brothers. Baron Sanguis had arranged for the survivors to be brought into the abbey where he’d met them in the refectory. They were all white-faced, haggard-eyed. Some were uncertain, others too shocked. A few had lost their reason, wandering in their own black pit of madness. Those who could speak mentioned the meeting in the taproom on 14 September, the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. Rahere the clerk was there, laughing and courteous. He generously bought stoups of ale and goblets of wine for the villagers when they met to prepare for All-Hallows and the Feast of Samhain Eve.

  Samhain was the night when the door between this world and the other was thrown open and the spirits of the dead were allowed to wander the world. The villagers agreed to a great feast being held at the Hungry Man tavern. Work on the land would pause. Cattle would be sheltered in preparation for winter. They would deck their houses with the branches of rowan and elder. Of course, they would also light bonfires around the village, as was ancient custom, to keep the evil spirits away. The villagers were relaxed and happy. The evils which had oppressed them since the death of the hermit seemed to have been lifted. True, Parson Osbert wandered his churchyard like a madcap, keening over poor Christina’s grave, but his boy seemed in good spirits, now looked after by Rahere the clerk. The villagers had grown accustomed to seeing him around the Hungry Man.

  Matthias, however, kept his own counsel. His mind was confused. He still could not understand or accept his mother’s death, whilst his father had become a dishevelled, wild-eyed stranger, neglecting his duties, lost in mourning for his dead wife. Rahere, however, kept the boy busy. They’d go out into the woods where Matthias would show off his forest lore whilst Rahere introduced him to the secrets of the Chancery and filled his mind with vivid stories about the King’s gorgeous court. He even hinted that Matthias might become a clerk, attend the abbey school and, if he showed wit and sharp intelligence, enter the schools of Oxford and become a master of learning. Matthias nodded when he heard this. He felt oppressed by Sutton Courteny. The villagers were strangers and he did secretly worry what would happen to him if Rahere abruptly left.

  Autumn made itself felt. Cold winds blew along the Severn, stripping the trees of their leaves: these were cold, hard, bleak days under an iron-grey sky. If the villagers thought their troubles were over, they were mistaken. Simon the reeve’s was the first tragic death. He was out ploughing in the great open fields, his boy walking behind him, scattering the marauding crows with his slingshot. Simon leant on the great plough and watched the iron hook rip open the dark brown soil. Simon liked this part of the year, when the earth opened to receive new seed. Yet, today, he felt uneasy. The trees which bordered the field had now lost their leaves in a violent wind storm a week before. They stood like sombre grey sentinels. The reeve was sure someone was watching him. Simon paused and scratched his head. He had drunk too deeply the night before but that was because he was worried. His young wife, Elizabeth, she with her black hair and warm, brown skin, merry eyes and kissing mouth, seemed a little too fond of the arrogant young clerk Rahere. Simon had heard whispers: how Elizabeth was absenting herself from the home for this reason or that, going hither and thither, with no real explanation or excuse.

  ‘I really should question her,’ he muttered to himself.

  Elizabeth was his second wife, much younger than he, and Simon was cunning enough to realise that there was nothing more amusing to everyone than a man showing his cuckold’s horns. He grasped the handle of the plough and savagely whipped the ox. But, if it was true. .?

  Behind him, the boy was whistling. Simon wished to be alone.

  ‘Go back to the house!’ he shouted over his shoulder. ‘Go to Elizabeth and tell her to bring me some bread, cheese and a jug of ale. If she’s not there, find out where she is!’

  The boy ceased his whistling. He could see his father was angry. Moreover, Simon was free with his fists when he lost his temper, so the boy loped across the furrow like a hare, quietly planning that he would take as long as he could. Simon returned to his ploughing. He could not bear the thought of Elizabeth playing the wanton with that young fop from London. Elizabeth was a merry bed companion: her legs wrapped round him, Simon enjoyed her smooth, slim body writhing beneath his, her face twisted into pleasure, her mouth urging him on. What if the clerk had experienced these pleasures?

  The oxen suddenly stopped. Simon looked up. It was late in the afternoon and a mist was beginning to seep in through the trees. He brought his small whip down across the oxen’s rumps but the animals didn’t move. Simon sighed and undid the cords around his waist. Perhaps the great blade of the plough was stuck. He stepped between the plough and the oxen, crouching down to dig at the earth, then he heard the whistling. Simon remembered that tune. He’d heard it before, but where? The whistling grew clearer. The reeve remembered. It was the song the hermit had sung from the fire!

  Simon stood up and looked over the heads of the oxen. A figure was moving towards him out of the mist, a man hooded and cowled. Simon blinked. He could not understand it. The figure was not walking but gliding, its feet not touching the ground. The figure drew closer. The oxen grew restless. Simon’s heart began to beat faster as the figure pulled back the cavernous cowl. Simon moaned in fear.

  ‘It can’t be!’ he whispered, making the sign of the cross against the evil one. The figure was the hermit, the man he had seen burnt to death! Now he was coming to greet him, eyes staring, mouth open in a fixed smile. Simon crouched down behind the oxen like a child, believing it was all a figment of his imagination. The oxen moved back. Simon gave a terrible scream which grew to a groan of strangled terror as the oxen then lurched forward. They dragged the plough out of the soil. Simon was knocked flat. He tried to roll but, in his panic, exposed his neck and the sharp iron blade cut deep into his throat. When Elizabeth and the boy arrived an hour later, they found the oxen still terrified. They’d moved backwards and forwards in terror and, in doing so, had turned Simon’s corpse into a bloody, mangled heap.

  Three days later Joscelyn climbed up on to the roof of the Hungry Man tavern. He was angry. He could not believe that tiles, freshly laid the previous spring, had grown loose, allowing rainwater to seep into the garrets. Joscelyn was determined that he would not pay good silver for the tiler to make a second mistake: this time he would do it himself. He ignored his wife’s protests and climbed to the very top of the sloping roof. He edged along, looking for the loose tile. When he found it, he gave a shout of exclamation.

  ‘The bastard!’ he mu
ttered.

  The tiler had laid it wrongly and the slate had slipped, knocking others loose. Joscelyn stretched out, leaning precariously down. He heard a flutter of wings and looked up. A raven, black feathery wings extended, was gliding through the air towards him. Joscelyn raised his hand to fend off those cruel claws aiming straight for his face. He lost his balance, slid down the roof and fell from the tavern. He should have survived the fall but his head came down: it hit the sharp iron bar near the front door of his tavern where travellers scraped the mud off their boots. The iron sliced deep and Joscelyn died immediately.

  The same day, late in the evening, Walter Mapp the scrivener was plotting lechery. The scrivener had not yet recovered from his previous injury but he now felt in good fettle. He’d promised himself that, before the weather changed and the roads became clogged, he would travel to Gloucester. He’d spend a few nights in the Merry Hog tavern which lay under the shadow of the great cathedral. Mapp was not too well known in Gloucester and he could play whatever part he liked. He would take his carefully guarded pile of silver coins and live the life of a lord, feasting and drinking and hiring the services of the flaxen-haired chambermaid there. Mapp scratched his stomach in pleasure, thinking what he would do with her this time. In his mind, he carefully undid the laces of her bodice, stripping her roughly of her dress and shift and then, in that little chamber, made merry and warm by a glowing charcoal brazier, he would take his heart’s delight. Still engrossed in such thoughts Mapp took a taper to the fire. His chamber had grown dark and more candles had to be lit. He caught a flame and lit the three-branched candelabra on his desk under the window.

  At first Mapp did not know what was happening. He tried to blow the taper out but the flame grew stronger, eating away at the wax, racing towards his fingers. Mapp tried to drop it but found the wax was stuck to his fingers. For a while he just stood transfixed in terror, his wits numb. He could hear someone singing outside, close to the window, a song Mapp recalled, but now the flame of the taper was almost near his fingers. The scrivener remembered the small pitcher of water he kept in the buttery. He hastened across but his foot caught a saddlebag. He slipped, rolling on to the floor, screaming as the flames reached his fingers and caught at his woollen mittens. He tried to dash his hand against the floor but the flames caught the dried rushes and, before he even realised, the flames were dancing around him. His cloak was on fire and, within minutes, Mapp the scrivener, so intent on his pleasures, was turned into a blazing torch.