by Paul Doherty
‘Brother Antony warned me against you.’
‘Of course he did.’ Clothilde threw her head back and laughed, a tinkling sound. ‘He is the guardian of the wastelands. It is his task to keep you in order.’ Clothilde pointed to the sentries on the parapet walk. ‘Just like they protect the castle.’
‘You promised to help me.’
‘And in time we will,’ Crispin replied languidly. ‘But we must have your trust, Beatrice. Everything in life, and in death, has a price; it must be earned, must be bought. Nothing is free.’
‘What is it you want?’
‘Your trust, Beatrice. Here we are,’ Crispin stretched out and stroked her hair, ‘willing to help and yet you stand like a wench in the marketplace studying us as if we are hucksters!’
‘What is happening in Midnight Tower?’ Beatrice asked, trying to distract herself from Crispin’s light-blue eyes.
‘The priest summed up the truth of it. Spiritual life is, as Brother Antony says, akin to water. In most people, and in most places, it lies sluggish like a lazy river at the height of summer, then something stirs its depths.’ Crispin’s face became excited. ‘It grows stronger and fuller. The currents beneath pull and tug and the surface is disturbed.’
Beatrice studied these silver-haired twins. She wanted to believe what they said. They looked so beautiful. Brother Antony was so plain. All he could give was good advice while horrors bubbled around the man she loved and threatened to engulf him.
‘Who is the killer?’ she demanded.
‘In time, Mistress Arrowner.’
She turned away in disgust and, before they could stop her, ran towards the wall, through it and out into the heathland. She reached Devil’s Spinney and walked among the great oak trees. She had been with Ralph on the parapet walk. She had heard his whispers. She knew what he had discovered. This was an ancient place. She had become accustomed to the shapes and shadows, those strange priests with their ivy garlands and bronze, sickle knives, the terrible sacrifices they made to their demons. Even now they were clustered, chanting in a tongue she could not understand. Other phantasms appeared: that terrible knight in armour, his band of robbers around him, hanging some unfortunate peasant, drowning others in the marsh. They sat on their horses and laughed as the unfortunates shrieked for mercy before disappearing into the green, dark slime. Such phantasms no longer troubled her. Brother Antony had explained that they were mere shadows of what had been. Now and again she encountered the occasional wandering soul. Never a child but sometimes a man or woman lost in their own world, disturbed, distracted, unwilling to go on. She was also conscious of those beings who met the souls of the dead, the seraphim, glowing orbs of light, and the wraiths clustered together like monks chanting their psalter, and the demons, mailed men, knights in armour, hunting for souls.
‘Mistress Arrowner!’
Two figures stepped out from the trees. Beatrice recognised Robin and Isabella, a young man and his wife. She had met them here before. They had explained how, many years ago, they had owned a tavern on the Maldon road, which had been burnt by French corsairs who brought their galleys up the Blackwater estuary before riding inland. They were merry souls, unable really to explain why they had not moved on.
‘Perhaps we loved this world,’ Isabella had laughed. ‘We had such a good life, Beatrice. Robin served ales and wines while I cooked in the kitchens. On one occasion we even served the King.’ She blinked. ‘I forget his name…’
Beatrice had come to accept them. They always appeared hand in hand, chattering incessantly about the petty things of their lives, what they had done, whom they had met.
‘What are you doing here?’ Robin came forward, thumb stuck in the belt round his green jerkin, his brown leggings pushed into strange-looking boots. He was clean shaven and had smiling brown eyes beneath his auburn hair. Isabella looked similar but thinner, more prone to laughter than her husband.
Beatrice told them everything she had learnt.
‘Then why don’t we help?’ Isabella suggested.
‘Is that possible?’ Beatrice asked.
‘If Brythnoth’s cross is here,’ said Robin, ‘at least we can look at it. There’s nothing wrong with that.’
Beatrice was distracted by shadows flitting across the skies like dark clouds. ‘I should go back to the castle,’ she murmured. ‘I really shouldn’t leave Ralph. He’s in danger, you know…’
‘Stay for a while,’ Isabella soothed. ‘Stay here, Beatrice. Let’s search for Brythnoth’s cross.’
‘But where can we begin?’ Beatrice asked. The shadows were lengthening and, because she wanted to, she felt the growing coldness of the air. ‘Have you met Crispin and Clothilde?’
‘Oh yes, on many occasions,’ Robin smiled. ‘A precious pair, them!’
‘They said that one day I could learn how to intervene in the world of the living, make my presence felt.’
‘Oh, we can do that.’
Beatrice started in surprise.
‘We can,’ Isabella confirmed, grasping her hand. ‘Come, Beatrice, we’ll show you.’
‘What about Brythnoth’s cross?’
‘Oh, leave that,’ Robin laughed. ‘If, as you say, it is in Devil’s Spinney then it will stay there for a little while longer.’
‘But what about Ralph?’ Beatrice looked longingly towards the barbican.
‘Don’t you want to intervene?’ Isabella asked.
‘Come away, Mistress!’ Brother Antony was suddenly standing on the trackway glaring angily at her. ‘Come away, Beatrice!’ He lifted a hand, dark and threatening against the blue sky.
‘Oh, just ignore him!’ Isabella hissed mischievously. ‘Where would you like to go, Beatrice?’
Beatrice experienced a cold blast of air. Brother Antony appeared to have grown larger. He stood with his hands hanging by his sides, staring fixedly at her. Beatrice suddenly resented his lecturing, his vague promises, his constant watching of her.
‘The Pot of Thyme!’ she declared defiantly, shouting the words as if she wanted Brother Antony to hear. ‘Let’s go to the Pot of Thyme!’
She ran, Robin and Isabella clasping her hands. They hastened across the heathland like children playing some game. Robin and Isabella were laughing, squeezing Beatrice’s hands. They passed the churchyard and Beatrice paused. Usually God’s acre stretched out, a mixture of headstones and weather-beaten crosses among high-growing grass and old yew trees, gnarled and bent, their branches stretching out. A quiet, serene place. Beatrice stared in horror. It had all gone. Instead she was looking down an icy-white valley, high banks of snow on either side with a pathway stretching to the light-blue horizon. At the end of the valley a fiery sun glowed as it dipped into the west. On either side of the valley an army of shadows thronged. What really caught Beatrice’s attention was the figure coming along the pathway. Two great hounds bounded before him, barking loudly, their great ears flapping as they dived in and out of the snow. The figure drew nearer. He looked like a chapman with his sumpter pony. He was dressed in vari-coloured garments on which little bells jingled at every step. Beatrice glanced quickly at her companions. Robin and Isabella were kneeling, foreheads against the ground.
‘What is it?’ she gasped, feeling a fear she had never experienced since that dreadful fall from the parapet walk. ‘Robin, Isabella, what is it?’
She was aware of singing, the deep-throated voices of the shadows on either side of the valley chanting a paean of praise. Robin and Isabella still knelt, heads down. Beatrice again looked at the valley but it had gone, the snow, the trackway, the mysterious jingling figure and those fierce barking hounds.
‘What happened?’ Beatrice demanded. ‘I saw snow, a pedlar!’
Isabella was now on her feet, face glowing, eyes sparkling. ‘Oh, it’s only a friend of ours.’
Beatrice felt uneasy. ‘But why did you kneel?’ She looked again at the graveyard where grey shapes moved among the tombstones like tendrils of mist on a spring morning.
‘You’ll see,’ said Robin. ‘But forget the dead, Beatrice, the living await.’
Beatrice remained fixed to the spot. The graveyard was now full of those silver discs, shining and shimmering. They formed a path as a golden sphere left the church, rising up in the air and then back down again. Beatrice was sure the golden sphere, or whatever was in it, was staring directly at her. She had learnt how to experience, to feel, to stretch out her mind. She closed her eyes and experienced a deep warmth, a loving embrace, as when she and Ralph used to lie together in the grass and stare up at the sky. Then the sphere disappeared and Brother Antony was standing on a tombstone like some huge, forbidding black raven, gesturing at her to come closer.
‘No, come with us, Beatrice,’ Robin whispered. ‘And you’ll learn something. You’ll find the power that he denies you.’
Beatrice was about to refuse then she recalled her helplessness as Ralph struggled in the mire and, turning away, she joined the other two in their wild flight along the cobbled high street of Maldon.
The Pot of Thyme’s taproom was filling with customers. Beatrice was acutely aware something was wrong. She had visited the tavern on a number of occasions. It was usually friendly, the meeting place of travelling people, chapmen, tinkers, pedlars, wandering scholars, itinerant friars. None of these was present now. Only peasants, villeins, cottagers, young men from the village and the surrounding hamlets. Taylis coldly turned away anyone else. The men were gathered round the overturned casks which served as tables. Beatrice noticed that the trap door to the cellars beneath had been opened; one of the pot boys was bringing out quivers of arrows, bows, helmets, pikes and hauberks. Martin the miller was there, his face wet with in tears. Others tried to comfort him.
‘Come on,’ Isabella urged. ‘Let’s see what mischief we can cause.’
‘No, no, let me stay here. What’s happening?’ Beatrice sensed the resentment, hatred and grudges curdling in these men’s hearts.
‘It’s only a cauldron,’ Robin whispered. ‘Coming to bubble – it will spill over soon enough.’
Beatrice would not be moved. She stood in the corner. The ugly mood of the gathering was apparent and audible in the muttered curses about the King’s taxmen, the castle, and Sir John Grasse. After Taylis closed and barred the door, he went and stood in the middle of the room, banging his staff against the wooden floorboards.
‘When Adam delved and Eve span, who was then the gentleman?’
The doggerel lines were taken up in a roar.
‘Worms of the earth, that’s what the great lords of the dunghill call us!’ shouted Taylis. ‘We are tied to the soil, we are heavily taxed and now our young men and women are killed. Fulk in the moat, Eleanora in some filthy dungeon.’
‘Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, life for life!’ an old man chanted, saliva dripping from his gumless mouth.
‘There’s trouble at the castle,’ someone else observed. ‘Fulk and Eleanora are not the only ones to die.’
The words created a moment of silence.
‘What are you saying, Piers?’ Martin the miller demanded.
Beatrice smiled as Piers clambered to his feet. He was a good, strong man, clear-eyed and honest-faced. When she was a child, Piers used to dangle her on his knee and tell her tales about wicked goblins and elves.
‘I think we should take good counsel,’ Piers declared vehemently. ‘Master Taylis is right, the lords of the dunghill oppress us so I do not speak for them. The royal tax collectors are nothing but jackdaws which hunt for anything that glitters. I do not speak for them either.’ His blunt eloquency brought murmurs of approval.
‘But I do think we should be careful and take prudent counsel.’
‘You haven’t lost a son,’ Martin the miller jibed.
‘No, but I loved Beatrice Arrowner. She was a comely, kindly lass. Master Ralph the castle clerk loved her as well. What I am saying is this: Goodman Winthrop’s murder was a mistake. The soldiers will come from London and they’ll not rest until they see two or three of us hang. Have you ever seen men throttled at the crossroads? Do you want to see your sons’ corpses picked and clawed at by the birds of the air?’ He paused, his cold words of warning dousing the anger in their hearts.
‘We will put our trust in our brethren from Essex and Kent!’ a farmer shouted.
‘Oh, aye,’ Piers taunted. ‘And when de Spencer, Bishop of Norwich, comes marching south with his mercenaries, burning our houses, pillaging our goods, raping our wives and daughters, will they come to our help then? This will end in blood and tears.’ He pointed a finger at Taylis. ‘You’re planning an attack on the castle, aren’t you?’
‘At night,’ the taverner replied, ‘we’ll take the place by force, burn it to the ground.’
Piers walked closer. ‘And what will you do with Sir John and Lady Anne? Hang them in Devil’s Spinney? What about Master Ralph? Adam? The soldiers and men-at-arms? They are lads like us. And do you think they’ll give up their lives lightly?’ Piers spread his hands. ‘Brothers, what wrong has Sir John Grasse done to us? He’s a kindly man.’
Beatrice felt relieved at the nods of agreement. Piers was much respected. He had served in the Black Prince’s retinue in France. He knew what he was talking about. Beatrice joined her hands in prayer. If these men attacked the castle, they would show no mercy, leave no witnesses. She joined her hands in prayer. If only she could warn Ralph. She felt so hopeless and frightened. She stared around. That strange bronze light also glowed in the taproom; she was aware of dark shadows, like plumes of smoke, rising, moving in and out among the men. She glanced at her companions.
‘What is this?’
She did not like the expression on their faces, eyes glittering, lips parted as if they were enjoying the spectacle, like people watching a bear being baited.
‘They spit out the slime of Hell,’ Robin declared.
Beatrice looked again but the taproom had disappeared. She stood on the edge of a great forest. She was aware of the trees around her as she stared across a plain whose burning sand could nourish no roots. It was ringed by red hills. Herds of naked men and women were being driven across it, eyes burning with their scalding tears. Some had fallen to the ground, others squatted with their arms about them. The air dinned with their hideous lamentations. Men-at-arms, wielding whips, whirled round this herd like hunters would frightened deer. The sky turned an orange colour then the image disappeared. It was replaced by that freezing snow-filled valley. The pedlar with his jingling bells was drawing nearer. The pack pony was like some giant hare with elongated ears and fiery eyes. The mastiffs loped ahead, their barking like the clanging of some deep bell. On the rim of the valley, the army was more distinct: legion after legion of garishly-garbed soldiers, their cry ringing up: ‘Power and glory! All praise!’ The vision disappeared. She was back in the tavern: Piers was holding forth and winning his comrades over. The taproom had become divided, the majority, particularly the older ones, accepting Piers’s words of caution. Taylis the taverner’s face was mottled with fury as he tried to regain the ground he had lost. A vote was taken: the castle would not be attacked. Martin the miller sprang to his feet.
‘And what about my son?’
‘Leave that to the royal justices,’ Piers snapped. ‘Better still, I’ll approach Sir John.’
And on such words the meeting broke up. Some of the younger men gathered round the taverner; their muttered curses and surly looks showed they had not accepted what had been decided.
‘Come with us, Beatrice.’
Her hands were grasped. Robin and Isabella sped with her across the taproom and up the stairs to a chamber. The room was dark and dingy. An unemptied chamber pot stood in the corner covered by a filthy cloth. A rickety table, two narrow stools and a broken coffer were the only items of furniture in the room. A man was sitting on the bed. A tavern wench, a slattern, was kneeling on the floor before him; it was obvious that the greasy-faced, pockmarked young man was attempting a clumsy se
duction. He was dressed in a scruffy brown jerkin with dark-blue sleeves unbuttoned to reveal a wine-stained shirt beneath. His fat legs were encased in blue kersey leggings. On the floor beside him were his scuffed boots and a rather battered war belt from which sword and dagger hung. Against the bolsters were two bulging leather panniers full of yellowing scrolls of parchment. The wench was pretty enough, narrow-faced, with long, black hair which reached to her shoulders. The bodice of her bottle-green dress had been undone, revealing swelling breasts beneath a white chemise.
‘Are you really what you say?’ the wench asked, smiling at the silver coin the man twirled between his fingers.
‘I have more power than you think,’ the fellow replied. ‘I am a summoner from the Archdeacon’s Court of Arches. I have powers both natural and supernatural.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘I could have you summoned to the Archdeacon’s Court for whoring and lechery.’
‘Don’t be impudent!’ the wench snapped. ‘Master Taylis sent me up because you wanted some company.’
The summoner scratched at a red spot on his cheek, taking away the pus-filled scab. ‘How would you like to travel to Colchester and appear before the Archdeacon, eh? He is a terrible man. So,’ he patted the bed beside him, ‘why not sit here and entertain me?’
The wench obeyed. The summoner knocked his saddlebags full of writs and proclamations on to the floor and grasped the girl, rolling her on to the bed. He plunged a hand up her skirts, pulling back both kirtle and petticoat beneath. The girl kicked out long, brown legs, oohing and aahing as she thrust away his probing hands. Robin and Isabella were laughing but Beatrice did not like being here. It wasn’t so much spying on these two as the atmosphere in the chamber. Those shapes she had seen in the taproom below moved about, the air was tinged with a rank smell like the stench from an unclean latrine. Beatrice could see the wench was repelled by the scabby-faced summoner but attracted by his silver. She sat up on the bed, her dress awry, her hair almost covering her face.
‘Give me the silver piece,’ she demanded.
