The Scourge (Kindle Serial)

by Roberto Calas

  Gregory the Wanderer tells us that he has “visited” cathedrals and priories all across the east of England in his search for relics. The difference between visiting and raiding is as murky to me as the difference between worship and veneration, but I don’t challenge him. I leave that to Morgan.

  “How dare you steal relics from the houses of God?” Morgan says.

  “I have stolen nothing,” Gregory says. “The churches and cathedrals of England have been abandoned. The holy relics would have been looted or vandalized long ago if not for me. I only regret that I cannot travel faster, so that I may save more of God’s treasures.”

  “And then sell them,” Tristan says.

  “Selling of relics is forbidden,” Morgan says. “The Code of Canon Law is very specific about that, and about the permanent transfer of relics in general.”

  “I am not transferring anything in a permanent way,” Gregory says.

  “No,” Tristan says. “Only for eternity.”

  “I will guard them for eternity if I must,” Gregory says. “But I hope to find others who would help me bear this temporary burden of guardianship. I would gladly give some of these holy relics to other worthy protectors.”

  “Would you give some to us?” Morgan asks.

  “If I deem you worthy.”

  “How do we prove ourselves worthy?”

  “That depends. Do you have anything valuable with you?”

  “We have nothing of value,” I say. The conversation is running in circles.

  “Can you show us some of the relics?” Morgan asks.

  “Course I can,” Gregory says. “Course I can.”

  The old man removes two of the stakes from the back of his wagon and opens a hatch. The hut is overflowing with his “relics.” He has a fingernail from St. George. A lock of St. Becket’s hair. One of St. Cuthbert’s ears. The head of St. Swithun. The shoulder bone of St. Alban. The hand of St. Audrey, and a tumor taken from her neck. He rummages through a score of sacks in the back of the wagon, drawing out withered body parts, sacred fabrics, cups, knives, jewelry, stones from the Holy Land, and all manner of sacred items.

  “Here’s a lovely one.” Gregory holds up a desiccated lower leg and foot. “The leg of St. Hermann.”

  “My mother prayed to St. Hermann,” Tristan says. “He was a cripple with bowed legs and club feet. I’m fairly certain that leg did not belong to him.”

  “Oh.” Gregory stares at the leg. “I didn’t mean St. Hermann. I meant St.…St. Harold.”

  Morgan frowns. “St. Harold was a child. That’s a man’s leg.”

  Gregory studies the leg and tosses it back into the wagon. “I’m not certain about that one.” He reaches into a sack and draws out a rotting head. “But this one is most certainly St. Eustace. You know it’s a saint’s head because of the honey odor that wafts from it. You smell it?” He thrusts it toward Tristan. “Smell it. You’ll see.”

  Tristan recoils and makes a face. “Get that syrup-covered leper’s head away from me.”

  “Thank you, Gregory,” I say. Relics have great value in this new England, but I’m not convinced that this old peddler has a single true relic among his collection. Elizabeth waits for me in Suffolk, and Gregory wastes our time. “It’s time we were off.”

  “Wait.” Morgan and Gregory say it together.

  “I don’t have anything to give you at this moment,” Morgan says. “But I will have much in trade when I return home. What would you like for St. Cuthbert’s ear?”

  “There is no promise of a tomorrow,” Gregory says. “How can I be certain you are worthy guardians if you don’t sacrifice anything now?”

  “Sorry to trouble you,” I say. “We have nothing.”

  Gregory runs his finger along the metal shaffron upon Sir Morgan’s destrier. The horse shakes its head and bares its teeth. “I wouldn’t say you have nothing. I’ve lost two horses to those wandering demons out there. This is a nice mount. And with such lovely armor.”

  “The horse? You want our horse?” I laugh and wave Tristan and Morgan onward.

  “Edward, when will we ever have a chance to own holy relics?” Morgan dismounts. “This is an extraordinary opportunity.”

  “Morgan, we need horses more than dead saints right now.”

  “What about St. Giles?” Morgan asks. “Doesn’t Elizabeth always pray to St. Giles?”

  Gregory rummages in his wagon and brings out a sword in a gilded leather scabbard. “This weapon has a tooth from St. Giles in its hilt.” He draws the sword and it glimmers in the dull light of the rainy day. I hesitate.

  I can see the tooth embedded in the wood of the grip. And though I’m certain it does not belong to St. Giles, I can’t take my eyes off the sword. Gregory smells blood.

  “The sword, Cuthbert’s ear, St. Alban’s shoulder, and one of my draft horses,” he says. “For your warhorse and barding.”

  My moment of weakness passes. “You’re mad. That’s a prime destrier with full barding.” I reach out to stroke the horse and it snaps at me.

  “What if I sweeten the offer?” He climbs into the wagon so only his booted feet stick out, and rummages again.

  “What’s in those?” Morgan points to a wooden rack that holds a dozen ceramic phials. Gregory backs out holding a pungent-smelling wooden cross on a leather thong. He covers the phials with an empty sack.

  “Those aren’t for sale.” He holds up the cross. “But this, this is something truly magnificent. Whittled from the wood of the True Cross, upon which Jesus was crucified. St. Benedict used it to drive away demons.”

  Morgan covers his mouth and looks at me with eyes wide. I shake my head.

  “Very well.” Gregory holds up a finger. “You are a shrewd tradesman. I see that. But I have something I know you will want. The most holy of all the relics in my collection. If you give me the horse, then it is yours.” He reaches into a velvet pouch at his waist and removes a small wooden box. He uses his head to shield it from the rain and opens the little chest. A tiny piece of flesh with a crude pane of glass above it lies on a strip of silk. “Behold: the foreskin of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

  Tristan opens his mouth to say something, then closes it. There are, apparently, no jokes he can make. Or perhaps there are too many. He points to the foreskin and grins at me.

  Morgan raises his clasped hands to the sky and looks to me. “Christ’s foreskin! Please Edward. Please.”

  “What’s in the phials?” I ask.

  Gregory frowns and closes the box holding the product of Jesus’s circumcision. “I told you, they are not for sale.”

  “Then neither is our warhorse.”

  The old peddler licks his lips. He glances toward the wagon. “Those phials are very special. There were fifty of them shipped from Rome and I acquired a dozen of them.” He uncovers the phials, takes one from the rack and holds it up between his thumb and forefinger. “The blood of the Virgin Mary.”

  “Oh for heaven’s sake,” Tristan says. “You can’t be serious.”

  “One drop of this will…” Gregory hesitates and he glances at the wagon as if he wants to put the phial away. “One drop of this will cure anyone afflicted by plague. And if you are not afflicted, one drop will guard you against the sickness.”

  Morgan drops to one knee and crosses himself. “The blood of Mary! Oh, Heavenly Father! Gregory, do you mean to say that if you drink one drop of that, you will not get the plague?”

  “You will be protected…for one week,” Gregory says, licking his lips.

  “Done.” Morgan rises and holds his reins out. “Our Lord’s foreskin and six of those phials, and the horse is yours.”

  “Morgan!” Tristan vaults off his horse and snatches the destrier’s reins. The horse pulls and blows. I dismount gingerly, favoring my ankle, and take the destrier’s reins too.

  “Thank you, Gregory,” I say. “Perhaps some other time.”

  “Edward!” Morgan holds his hands out. “A cure for the plague! The blood of Ch
rist’s mother!”

  “I don’t think that horse likes to be crowded,” Gregory says.

  “Morgan,” I say, “do you really believe — ”

  The destrier kicks its front legs upward, high and fast, and one of its hooves comes down on my injured ankle. My vision blurs with the pain of it and I scream. I strike at the horse’s neck and hurt my hand on the scalloped metal plates.

  “Take the bloody horse!” I shout. “Take it!”

  My ankle won’t bear weight anymore. Tristan has to help me into my saddle. I glance at the warhorse. Letting the beast go is probably not wise, but I might kill the animal if we keep it for much longer.

  In the end we walk away with a foreskin, an ear, a shoulder, a hand, six phials of Mary’s blood, a draft horse, a smelly wooden crucifix carved from the True Cross, and a beautiful sword with St. Giles’s tooth embedded in the hilt.

  We nod our good-byes to Gregory the Wanderer as he whistles and secures the barded destrier to his wagon.

  “I wonder where he will go next,” Morgan says.

  “Depends,” Tristan says. “Where is the nearest graveyard? He’ll need more bones to dupe gullible fools.”

  “Of course,” Morgan says.

  “Of course what?”

  “Of course you don’t believe these are true relics.” Morgan shrugs. “You have no faith, so they won’t work for you anyway.”

  “Morgan, that man is a fraud. That shoulder bone looks like it came from a cat.”

  Morgan stares at the large wooden cross that hangs from his neck. “You will see the power of these relics. But you will not benefit from them, because you have no faith.”

  “You are mad if you think that cross or any of these ‘relics’ are going to help. You know what’s going to help? That sword Edward is wearing. We could have armed and armored all three of us for that warhorse.”

  Tristan is right. The lure of holy protection has made me soft. These relics are not the bones of saints, and even if they are, I doubt they will help. God has turned away.

  I draw the new sword from its gilded scabbard and stare along the blade. I can see the forging patterns in the metal. It is a fine weapon. Not worth a barded warhorse, but it might just keep us alive. The tooth in the grip glitters under multiple layers of pungent lacquer. If the molar truly belonged to St. Giles, then I hope he remembers the flowers Elizabeth laid at his shrine. I hope he will protect her. And Morgan and Tristan. And me.

  I gaze at the sword again and smile at the irony of seeking protection from the patron saint of insanity.

  In these times of madness only St. Giles will save us.

  Chapter 21

  We ride for another two hours, and it feels like my ankle throbs more with each milestone we pass. I rub at it as we travel.

  “Getting worse?” Tristan asks.

  “Not getting better,” I reply.

  “My mother used to say that eating a spider dulls pain.”

  “I’m not going to eat a spider, Tristan.”

  “I wouldn’t either. So when I was a boy she would put a spider in a wooden box and make me carry it with me in a pouch. She said my injury would get better as the spider died. And that when the life left the spider’s body, I would be completely healed.”

  “Did it work?”

  “Never. But she would always find a reason for why it didn’t work. Maybe I had taken the box out of the pouch too many times. Or maybe it was the wrong type of spider. Once she tried to convince me that the dried-out creature wasn’t dead yet.”

  The three of us laugh. It has stopped raining and the sun is threatening to spoil the endless damp.

  “My Margaret, God rest her soul, she had a mountain of superstitions,” Morgan says. “Sara was born with the birth caul around her head. Margaret saved the caul and made me carry it around with me everywhere I went. She said it would protect me. Especially from drowning. Lost the thing a few years ago in Brighton, though.”

  “Well, now you have a foreskin,” Tristan says.

  Morgan scoffs. “I tell you, Margaret didn’t speak to me for a month after I lost that caul.”

  “A month?” I ask.

  “Yes.” Morgan smiles. “Made me wish I had another caul to lose when she started talking again.”

  We laugh once more and Morgan wipes tears from his eyes. I can’t tell if they are from laughter or from his memories of Margaret. She and her second baby died during childbirth a year ago. Only he and his daughter, Sara, are left. Sara is at home with her nursemaid, and I know Morgan must miss her. I pray my actions don’t make an orphan of Sara

  “She did love to talk, Margaret did.”

  “Don’t they all,” Tristan says. “They say that Eve came from Adam’s rib, but I think she must have come from his jaw.”

  “Yes!” Morgan laughs so hard that his horse shakes its head at the sound. “But I must say, the talking was better than the silence. When she was angry with me, Margaret wouldn’t speak. And no matter how many times I asked her what was wrong, she would just say ‘Nothing.’ Just like that. ‘Nothing.’ But something was wrong. And if I didn’t figure it out quickly enough, something was going to be even more wrong.”

  “I know that silence,” Tristan says. “Lady Jayne was the same and we weren’t even married.”

  Lady Jayne was lost in the plague. I rarely hear Tristan speak of her.

  “You know what drove me mad?” he continues. “When she used to ask me which dress she should wear. Dresses are a part of her world, not mine. If she can’t work it out, how in the nine hells does she expect me to? God’s blood! I should have fetched a mace and a battle ax and asked, ‘Darling, which one do you think I should use today? The mace can turn a man’s head to powder, but there’s something elegant about an ax blade ripping through flesh, don’t you think? I’m just so torn.’”

  Morgan hoots and wipes at his eyes again as Tristan chuckles. They notice my silence.

  “What about you, Ed?” Morgan asks. “What vexes you about Elizabeth?”

  I think about it for a time.

  “My Elizabeth runs my household. She feeds me, she never denies me our marital bed, and she is unwavering in her support. Each time I return home, she runs to me and makes me feel like I am the king of England.” The grief wells in my throat. “What fault can I find in someone who gives me everything I — ”

  A man screams somewhere to our left.

  We stop our horses and listen. Another scream rings out, flat and toneless across the rolling hills. Tristan points westward, past a field thick with turnips. I nod and we ride through the leafy plot and up a slope.

  When we reach the top, we look out across a vast landscape of low, rolling hills divided by hedges and ploughed fields. Upon one of these hills, perhaps four hundred yards away, sits a majestic willow. It would be a beautiful image of the English countryside if not for the twenty or thirty plaguers swarming the base of tree. They press against the willow like a writhing mantle and claw at the branches.

  A woman screams from somewhere in that tree. A moment later another scream echoes from the willow, and this one sounds like a child’s.

  All three of us break into a gallop without exchanging a word and charge down the slope toward a row of squat hedges. I vault the shrubs and hear Tristan’s howl of excitement as he and Morgan do the same. Our mounts grunt and blow as we goad them up the slope with the willow upon it. But fifty yards from the tree we draw up our horses so quickly that Tristan’s chestnut rears. The plaguers at the top of the hill haven’t noticed us yet, but it is not these that have checked our advance. It is the swarm that comes into view on the other side of the slope.

  There are hundreds of them. Easily hundreds. And they totter toward us in a grisly exodus. A vast migration of the dead, only a few hundred yards away.

  “Dear Lord,” Morgan says. “Look at them all!”

  “Oh my,” Tristan says. “Quick Morgan, there’s no time! Bring forth Jesus’s foreskin!”

  “This is se
rious, Tristan,” Morgan says.

  “I know it is! Hurry! Smite them with our Lord’s cock!”

  “Shut your mouth, you blasphemous bastard.”

  At least five people squirm upon the weeping branches of the willow. In another few minutes the endless flood of plaguers will crash around them.

  “I’m going to help them,” I say. “You two have no weapons. You are under no obligations to follow.” I draw St. Giles’s sword and snap the reins of my golden mare. She charges toward the willow, with Tristan and Morgan at her flanks.

  There is a mix of peasants and gentry among the small group of plaguers surrounding the tree. Rich and poor are united in bloodlust and lunacy. I am not certain if I am sending infirm people to their rest or banishing demons back to hell. I simply kill. I kill them with no thought to class or title or holy standing.

  St. Giles’s sword slices off the top half of a nobleman’s head. The man turns to face me as he dies — even though he has lost everything from his eyes upward — then tumbles, lifeless, to the ground. The plaguers on the far slope are getting closer, but I can’t let myself think about them yet.

  I take the head off a peasant with a noose around his neck. I wonder at his story as he falls backward, twitching. Hands reach for me, but I keep my mare cantering past them. I slash at the plaguers on one side of my horse’s head, then the other. I cut them down like autumn wheat and circle the willow, trying to get a look at the people trapped in the branches.

  Tristan and Morgan ride close to the afflicted, then veer away, trying to draw them from the tree. A few of the plaguers pull away from the tree to chase after them and I ride to the spot they have vacated. I position myself beneath a man in black riding boots clinging to a branch.

  “Come down!” I shout. The man looks at me but he doesn’t let go of the branch. “Move!”

  But it is too late. The hands of the dead reach for my mount and I spur her out of reach. The man in the tree finds his courage at that very moment and jumps from the tree. He thuds to the ground behind me and screams as the demons close in around him.