by David Penny
“Of course. But how did you know I would be here?”
Jorge shook his head. “Oh, Thomas, you are not near as mysterious as you believe. Lubna has the measure of you. She said you would come back because you had unfinished business. Not this, I admit, but you would want to see the location again.”
“There has been no more trouble?”
“None that has bothered us. The soldiers will be missed, though, no doubt about it. Mandana will expect them back and when they fail to appear he will know they have failed. You should have killed them all.”
“One more black mark against us, but he already wants us dead. What can he do, kill us twice?”
“Just the once would be bad enough.” Jorge gave a shiver, but it was for effect only.
“When–” Thomas cut off abruptly as a sound reached him. Boots on stone, coming this way. He held a finger to his lips and motioned Jorge to crouch down, went to join him behind the table. It offered little cover but there was nowhere else. The boots sounded on wooden boards now, approaching at a steady pace. Not a big man, Thomas thought, as they grew louder, but he saw he was wrong when a figure appeared in the entrance. A tall man, cadaverous, dressed in dirty robes that had once been grey, and a tall peaked hood. The clothing of those who disposed of plague bodies. No doubt a cart would be waiting outside.
As the man entered the room Thomas rose, immediately knowing it was too soon. The man closed the gap between him and the table and heaved, tipping the bodies on top of them.
Thomas pushed at the table, but only managed to move it off them when Jorge added his strength. By the time they we free the sound of the killer’s flight had faded.
Outside Thomas was surprised at how busy the cathedral square had become while he slept, knowing he was fortunate Jorge had woken him. Had the killer found him lying on the floor he would no doubt have never woken at all.
He climbed onto the lip of a buttress and shaded his eyes, looking over the heads of the crowd, but as he scanned the throng he knew they had lost him. He cursed and jumped down, about to suggest to Jorge they spread out and ask if anyone had seen a fleeing man, when Jorge raised a hand.
“There, Thomas.”
Thomas stretched, saw what Jorge was pointing at. The man would have been invisible if not for the robes he wore, which caused the crowd to move away from him so he walked in an empty space.
Jorge yelled, his voice loud. The man glanced back, started to run. He crashed into a seller of roast almonds on the far side of the square, sending man and hot coals crashing to the ground. Thomas began to run as fast as he could, knowing Jorge would be right behind. By the time they reached the cursing tradesman their quarry had fled, but Thomas had seen the alley he had disappeared into and skidded around the turn into it and slowed.
The alley was busy, which was to his advantage. By standing tall he could see over most heads. He caught sight of the man at the far end, his pointed cap discarded so he was less noticeable. Thomas started forward, using his strength and glare to make progress. At the corner he turned left, the same way he had seen the man take. He was no longer in sight, and bundled into a corner was the plague robe. Several narrower alleys led off to the right and there were fewer people now, the sun excluded by high buildings on either side. Thomas trotted along, glancing into each alley, but after two hundred paces he slowed. They had lost him again. He stood next to an open window where an old woman selling some kind of pie stared out at him, her chin on her hand. She raised a pie more in hope than expectation. Thomas ignored her, but Jorge came up beside him and took the pie in exchange for a small coin. He bit into it and made a noise of approval, reached for another and handed it to Thomas.
“Did a man run this way?” Thomas asked the woman.
“Other than you two?”
“Yes, other than us two.”
“Only Friar Ramon.”
“Who?”
“Friar Ramon Braso. He lives in a shack beyond the city wall east of here. Not a place for men such as yourselves.”
“He is a priest?”
The woman was warming to the conversation, barely acknowledging another customer who dropped a small coin on the ledge and took one of her pies. “A Friar. You know the difference, don’t you? Ramon prefers to spend his time with people rather than other monks. He is well respected, and many go to him when they are sick.”
“Why?” The pie was cooling in his hand and Thomas made to toss it aside.
“Don’t waste that if you don’t want it,” said Jorge, reaching out, seeming to ignore the conversation going on. Thomas handed the pie across.
“Because of what he used to be before he took the cloth, of course,” said the woman. “He was a physician. A surgeon. Some say the best in Spain until something happened. Some scandal, but I have not heard what it was.”
But you would love to know, wouldn’t you, Thomas thought. This Friar Ramon could be no other than the one he had spent weeks in pursuit of, but he had been looking in the wrong place, distracted by his hatred of Abbot Mandana when it was a religious man of another kind he sought.
He glanced along the alley. At the far end two men were arguing over some matter, their voices echoing from the buildings.
“Where is this shack you say he lives?”
“You don’t want to go there.”
“I am more able than I look,” Thomas said. “As is my friend.”
“Oh, he looks able enough, and ten years ago I might have invited him inside.” The woman cackled. “But San Bernardo is no place for the likes of you.”
“San Bernardo?” Thomas said. “Where the Jews bury their dead?”
“Close by, yes.” She narrowed eyes already narrow with age. “You are determined to go?”
“I am.”
She leaned across the narrow counter and looked at the crumbs from the pie crust Jorge had dropped as he ate. She held another out toward Thomas. “Take it, free. You look like you need feeding up.”
Thomas ignored the offered gift and, it seemed, even Jorge had decided he had eaten enough.
“Go straight for a quarter mile,” the woman said, putting the pie back on the counter, “then bear right until you reach the city wall and you will be close to the Santa Maria gate. And may God walk with you. It is no place for honest men such as yourselves.”
Thomas was already walking away with Jorge at his side when he heard her proposition another customer. The pie had smelled good and he regretted not eating it now. He passed the men still arguing and judged fists would soon fly. After a quarter mile they took an alley to the right and wound their way through increasingly poorer neighbourhoods until they reached the high stone city wall and followed it to an unguarded gate. Beyond it Thomas saw a cluster of houses and shacks. Had this Friar Ramon returned to his lair, or was he somewhere else? If he was not here they might have lost him altogether, and if the man had any sense he would flee Sevilla as fast as he could. It was not the result Thomas wanted, but if it meant an end to the killings it was one he would accept.
“Not much of a place to live,” said Jorge.
To the right a stretch of abandoned ground separated the ruinous district from the Jewish cemetery. There were a cluster of headstones like tangled teeth at its centre with large, more ornate mausoleums toward the edge. Money had been spent here, outside of the city boundary, sitting alongside what had to be one of the poorest of neighbourhoods. Thomas saw what the woman meant. This was not a place to offer a welcome to strangers, but they had to continue their search, and he had a name now. There would be a record of Friar Ramon Braso and it was only a matter of time before he was captured. Even if he tried to flee the name would spread throughout Spain, together with a litany of his crimes.
As they approached the first shacks a broad-shouldered man rose from where he had been sitting in the shade. He spread his legs and crossed his arms. He was tall, strong, but Thomas wished him no harm.
“Did Friar Ramon pass this way?” He tried to conjure a
friendly expression on his face but still the man’s eyes narrowed, watching only Thomas, seeing no threat in Jorge.
“Who’s asking?”
“I am a physician working at the royal palace. I was sent to ask his advice.”
The man twitched his head to one side and back. “The royal palace.”
“Yes. I heard he has knowledge known to nobody else.”
“Don’t they employ real physicians anymore?”
Thomas took a step closer and lowered his voice. “It is a matter of some delicacy. I cannot say more, but his services will be well rewarded.”
“Ramon cares not for reward. His reward lies not in this world.”
“Is your Queen also not head of the Church? Does she not deserve his attention?”
“Men, women, we are all sinners.” The man almost smiled. “Particularly here. But yes, Ramon passed not long since. He had been running, I could tell. And if you offer him money he will distribute it here. So go ask, but do not be surprised when he turns you down. You will find him… No, you won’t find him, but for a coin I will show you where he lives.”
The man stared at Thomas, waiting. Thomas reached beneath his robe, fingers feeling through the coins in his purse, hoping to pull something appropriate out. He was unused to the coinage of Spain and did not want to over-reward the man for his services. He placed a small round of copper on the man’s palm, who lifted it to turn in his fingers.
“Aye, enough I expect. Do you have more where this comes from?”
“Not much, no.”
“Well, we’ll see. Follow me.” He turned and strode between the shacks. There were no streets or alleys, just a tumble of wooden walls and torn sailcloth stretched to provide shade. Here and there someone had built in stone, and Thomas saw where a rough garden had been carved from the dry soil. Behind them the city wall rose, excluding those who made their homes here. Beyond the shacks a tributary of the Guadalquivir wound through low hills devoid of grass or crops, only the occasional stunted bush showing that life could find a foothold almost anywhere. Dead on one side, near-desert on the other, it was a place where only the desperate ended up.
“Do you have plague here?” Thomas asked, and the man turned his head.
“Is that what you want of Ramon? Yes, we have plague. Doesn’t the entire world? But not as much as within the city. The air is less tainted here, less people to breath it. But if it is because of the plague you want Ramon you will be disappointed. He cannot offer a cure.”
“It is not pestilence,” Thomas said, “but another matter I would question him on. He is respected here?”
“More than any other. Not merely as a man of God, but because of what he does. He keeps nothing for himself, as you will see. Everything he obtains is shared equally. There are men, women and children here who would not be alive but for him.”
The shacks around them grew ever more makeshift until they came to a small clearing almost at the centre of the township.
“This is where we gather, where Ramon preaches each evening, without fail.” The man pointed. “He lives there.”
It was barely a house, barely even a collection of wooden planks leaning every way but upright. A torn strip of canvas was stretched over part of the interior to provide minimal cover, but the rest was open to the elements. There was no sign of anyone inside, but shade cast dark pools in the corners.
“Thank you, sir,” Thomas said and handed the man a second coin. He expected him to return to his observation post, but he remained where he was, once more with legs spread and arms crossed, and Thomas knew they would have a witness to whatever might occur here.
“It might be wise to return another day,” said Jorge, leaning close, “with a score of soldiers.”
“If we do he will have fled. We do this now or never. We are too close to abandon the chase.”
“I see nobody in there.”
“He came this way. If he is not in his shack he will be somewhere nearby.” Thomas started across the dusty clearing and ducked beneath the canvas. His hand went to the hilt of his sword, but the interior was empty. There was a blanket laid directly on the bare ground, nowhere to cook, nowhere to eat. No furniture at all other than a low shelf containing some papers and books. Thomas knelt to examine them, found religious tracts, a bible, a few medical texts, recognising one as the same he had in his own library. He picked it up and let it open of its own accord, nodding at what he saw.
“He’s learning how to dissect the human body,” Thomas said, glancing at Jorge, who remained outside, head uncovered to the sun. Beyond him he saw a few more inhabitants had gathered and were talking with the man who had brought them here.
“People are amused by strange things,” said Jorge. “I thought he was already meant to be a great surgeon?”
“So am I, but I still possess books and read them.” Thomas put the al-Zahrawi back and leafed through some of the pamphlets, but they were nothing but the wild ravings of zealots.
“Thomas, we are drawing a crowd,” said Jorge.
“I noticed. Turn and stare at them. You are big and ugly enough to keep them off for a while until I finish here. I would like to wait and see if Ramon returns.”
“How will you know? You have never seen his face. Should I draw my sword?”
“Best not, they might take it badly. And if he returns here we will know it is him.”
“You do bring me to some interesting places.”
“No thanks are necessary.” Thomas took one last look around and rose to his feet. There was nothing to identify the man they sought, no clue to why he was doing what he did. Unless he believed the bile the pamphlets spouted. “I think you are right,” he said, “we return with soldiers and tear this entire place apart until we find who is sheltering him.”
“There will be trouble,” Jorge said.
“Nothing we cannot deal with.”
“No, I mean now. There is going to be trouble. Look.”
Thomas came out, squinting against the sun. The handful who had gathered earlier had grown to over forty, more drifting into the clearing as he watched. The tall guardian turned toward them, a smile on his lips.
“They are unarmed,” Thomas said.
“And we are only two,” said Jorge. He too watched the man who had brought them, some kind of leader here.
“Stick a few of them and they’ll soon lose interest.”
“There are times I fail to understand what Lubna sees in you.”
“I don’t mean kill them. A slice here, a puncture there. They might think they are dying but I know how to be careful.”
“And I do not,” said Jorge. “Here they come. I’m going to draw my sword now, if that is all right with you?”
“Not yet.”
The crowd formed a solid semi-circle in front of the shack. Thomas glanced behind, wondering if they could flee that way, but saw others had gathered behind as well. He drew his own sword and stood beside Jorge.
“How many times now is this you have tried to get me killed? I am starting to believe you do not love me after all.”
“Prick one or two and you’ll see them run,” Thomas said. “When they do go as fast as you can, straight out and head for the gate.”
“With you behind me.”
“Of course.”
Which is when the crowd parted and a tall man appeared, dressed in the darned and faded grey robes of a monk. The hood of his robe was thrown back to expose a face that would have been handsome had it not consisted almost entirely of sharp edged bones. A face Thomas had seen twice before. The first time as the man drew a cart of dead where one body had not suffered the plague. A second time in the Cathedral square when he had tried to abduct Theresa.
“I believe you are looking for me, Thomas Berrington.”
Chapter Thirty-Six
“You have the advantage of me, sir.” Thomas studied the crowd that had flowed together to close the gap Friar Ramon had passed through.
“Yes, I do appear to
have, do I not? But you know my name.” A smile came and went, and Thomas experienced the same unease he knew he could spark in others.
“If you accompany us there will be no need for violence,” Thomas said.
“I wish you none in return, certainly, for I am a man of God, but sometimes God demands vengeance and justice.”
“As do I. You must answer for your actions.”
“Not to you, nor your mistress. I answer only to the ultimate power, and I take no heed of the words of the infidel. For that is what you are, is it not? An infidel? One who is without a soul?”
Friar Ramon turned and faced the crowd. He threw his skeletal arms into the air, the sleeves of his robe falling back to display blue marks of self-inflicted tattoos, the sign of the cross repeated again and again, and Thomas wondered how much of the man’s body they covered, and what the cost in pain had been.
“I think we are in for some trouble,” said Jorge.
“It will come to nothing. These people will not commit murder at his whim. A touch of steel will soon dissuade them.”
“There is but one God,” Friar Ramon called out, his voice deep, and the gathered assembly, growing as the moment passed, responded to echo his words.
“One God. One leader.”
“All others are not to be tolerated. Not Jews, not Moriscos, not the teeming tribes beyond the great desert, not those of the east nor any other man who turns his back on the truth. I seek proof we are the truly anointed children of God, and no man can stop me. Certainly not these two.” Ramon turned back, his eyes tracking across Thomas and Jorge, apparently finding nothing to fear there. “What do we do to interlopers and unbelievers?”
“Kill them!” called the crowd.
The response was so instant Thomas knew this situation had been played out before. Whatever hold Ramon had over these people, be it religious zeal, his skill as a physician, or money, they were his, heart and soul. No wonder the man felt safe in his preserve. But Thomas would not submit without taking at least some of them with him, and some might be enough. He drew his sword, the blade scattering shards of sunlight into the eyes of the watchers, some of whom turned away. Beside him Thomas heard the whisper of steel as Jorge followed his example. Then the man who had brought them stepped forward. He carried an axe, the head dark with stains which spoke of its purpose. Thomas wished he had brought Olaf with him rather than Jorge. They might have stood a chance had he done so.
