by Lucy Jago
The mumble of voices grew louder as they pushed the door and edged out into a dark corridor. Like the cell, it was of brick, vaulted, low and narrow. The only light came from an open doorway, much larger than their cell door, ten paces to their right. Between them and the doorway were two more cells, whose viewing windows revealed a faint red glow. To her left, Cess felt a wall of slimy rock. The corridor was a dead end, the only escape past the open door. Cess gripped her athame tightly.
They crept along the corridor, pressed against the wall. As they reached the first viewing window, Cess peered in. William was close by, she knew it. Jasper gripped her arm and pulled her head to his.
‘We take no one with us,’ he breathed. ‘If William’s here he’ll be dead or dying by now. We’ll only get away if we’re on our own.’ He gave her a hard look before turning and creeping closer to the open door. Cess could not help but look into the next cell. By the light of a single tallow candle she could make out the shape of a body. Unusually, it lay on a pallet. Her heart started to thump even harder. It was William, she was certain.
Fumbling in the dark, Cess raised the latch and slipped into the cell. As she neared the body she saw that the face was swollen and unrecognisable. She pulled at the oily covering sack and her hand flew to her mouth. One foot was curled.
‘William,’ she whispered, kneeling beside him and stroking back the hair plastered to his face with cold sweat. He was breathing, but his eyes were rolling about in their sockets and a trickle of blood from his nose had congealed on his cheek. Cess dropped her athame and put her arms around him.
‘William … it’s William,’ she whispered urgently to Jasper, who had followed her into the cell. He did not even glance at the pallet, but jerked his thumb angrily in the direction of the door.
‘We must help him,’ she whispered desperately.
Jasper stared at her, then stalked out of the cell without looking back.
Cess felt panic rising in her chest. She could not move William alone. She rested her head on his chest and tried to think clearly.
‘I will find help and come back for you.’ As she spoke William’s eyes stopped rolling and focused on her. He winced as a smile cracked his swollen lips. ‘Cess,’ he mouthed, his throat too dry for speech and his eyes still moving unnaturally. ‘I came to find you. On the hill after the fireworks …’
‘What have they done to you?’
‘They scraped me … They gave the illness to me,’ he whispered.
‘William … I am so sorry,’ she said. She meant for everything. For catching the coin, for arguing with him, for not coming sooner, for not being able to help him now she was here. His eyes reached her face and he struggled to speak, as if to reassure her that everything was forgiven, but the effort was too great and he sank back into oblivion.
A part of her wanted to stay wrapped around him. But a louder, more insistent voice was telling her she must get out while she still had a chance. She pushed the ribbon he had given her, still warm from her body, under his shirt. He might find it next time he came round and know that she had been there and would come back.
She picked up her knife, closed the cell door carefully and caught up with Jasper. The voices from inside the room were excited or angry in their foreign tongue. Jasper gave her a sharp look, as if to gauge her mood. Cess was miserable to leave William, but she could see they had no hope of rescuing him by themselves.
‘Latin …’ Jasper breathed into her ear. Despite the turmoil Cess felt inside, she could not help being a tiny bit impressed by Jasper’s skill in languages. ‘They are talking about you. They won’t touch girls because –’
Suddenly they heard footsteps coming in their direction and a man was speaking, in English. Cess and Jasper were hidden by the door that opened into the corridor.
‘… it has endangered everything for which we are working.’ Through the gap between the door and frame she saw two figures pass into the room. The first seemed to be wearing a fine coat and the second a plain grey cloak. He was tall with pale blond hair. With a shock, Cess realised it was the man she had seen in the woods.
Through the crack Cess could see into part of the room. It was well lit by torches and good quality tallow candles, although the walls and vaulted ceiling were in as poor repair as elsewhere. She could see one end of a wide trestle, around which sat or stood several men, all wearing long well-worn black robes and talking at once. The blond man let them speak as he removed his cloak. Underneath, he wore the simple hose and sleeveless jerkin of a labourer. Cess judged the clothes to be a disguise, for the man was clearly in a position of authority over the others. Eventually he raised a hand for silence.
‘One of those I caught last night was a girl?’ The man spoke with the confidence and accent of a gentleman. Although he used English, it appeared that the men understood him, or whispered to their fellows if they did not.
‘She was wearing a boy’s boots and cloak, Father Garret,’ said one of the men, with a heavy accent, who had been in the cell.
‘You must proceed regardless,’ said Father Garret. ‘Although it is against the precepts of our order to touch women, the prohibition is lifted in this instance. The sooner she is scraped, the sooner she will fall ill and her presence no longer unsettle us. After all,’ he said, smiling with his mouth only, ‘we are interested to see the effects of our work on a woman.’
Several of the monks muttered angrily, others nodded, but Father Garret raised his hand again until they fell silent. ‘There are other matters to discuss,’ he said brusquely.
Cess moved so that she could see more of the room and bent down a little so that Jasper could look over her head. There were two long trestles and benches and at least eight or nine men including Father Garret. On the trestles were miniature braziers containing glowing coals, over which stood a variety of glass and ceramic dishes and flasks on tall metal trivets. In some simmered different coloured liquids, while others had boiled down to a powdery substance. Some had flasks with downward pointing spouts that dripped into small pots and dishes. There were jars containing metal skewers like the monks had carried in the cell and small vials of what looked like blood. It reminded her slightly of Edith’s medicine-making tools, though far more exotic and expensive.
‘I was disturbed while disposing of the last body,’ said Father Garret without a trace of remorse for the death or the discovery of it. The muttering that followed was silenced with a look. ‘The villagers found the corpse on Saturday morning,’ he said with a note of contempt. ‘Thus, we must be more cautious than before. No one is to leave the cellars until our task is complete. As our Holy Father in Rome has commanded, nothing must jeopardise our task to rid this country of its Queen and her heir and bring the true, Catholic faith back to these forsaken shores.’
Cess thought a firework had gone off in her head. She stared at Father Garret. Had she misheard? He had just spoken treasonous words, words that could see him hanged, his guts cut out of his body while he was still alive and his head spiked on a pole on London Bridge.
It took a few moments for her to realise that the other man was speaking, in a thin, nasal voice as if he had a runny nose. ‘My Lord sends thanks for your great work and prayers for your success.’
Cess shifted her position again, but could not see the speaker.
‘He wishes you to know that the Queen’s household has confirmed that she will arrive before the end of this month.’ Murmuring broke out again. The man shifted his position and Cess could at last see him properly. He was short and thin-boned, with patches of red skin around his nose and by his earlobes. He looked weedy, as if he had been poorly fed as a child and was sickly as an adult. His fine green coat, intended to disguise his poor physical presence, accentuated it. His eyes bulged as if someone held him by the throat. He moved and Cess saw that there were hanging sleeves attached to the shoulders of his coat. He was wearing the uniform of a page.
Suddenly Cess remembered where she had seen him before. I
t was he who had been shooing the villagers away from his fine livery outside the church on May Day. ‘That man,’ she whispered to Jasper. ‘He’s part of Lord Montacute’s retinue.’ Jasper looked shocked. ‘If we can see the crest on his sleeves we’ll know which lord he works for.’
‘Time is short, but we must achieve our aim,’ Father Garret said firmly.
‘But we have not yet perfected putting the illness into a person using food or drink,’ called someone out of Cess’s view, in broken English. ‘We need more –’
‘We are close,’ said Father Garret, cutting off the speaker.
‘What of the boy who resists?’ asked another. For the first time, Father Garret’s self-assurance appeared strained. Cess saw the page look at him, eyebrows raised.
‘The boy is an exception and has the Devil’s mark,’ said Father Garret, as if that explained everything.
‘One has not died?’ the page asked. The silence was thick with accusation.
‘All have died but him.’
‘Why does he live?’
Father Garret hesitated and one of the seated men interjected, ‘It is possible he has had the illness before and survived. This sometimes gives the body strength. Or he is protected by God.’
The page narrowed his eyes. ‘Or by the Devil?’ he said. ‘Let us see this boy.’ Monks began rising, causing the glass and ceramic dishes, bottles and flasks to clink as the work benches were jostled.
‘Bring your instruments for the new arrivals,’ ordered Father Garret. ‘I will scrape the girl myself if your scruples are too great.’
Cess and Jasper realised at the same instant that if they did not cross the doorway immediately it would be too late. They leapt across the patch of light and did not wait to find out if they had been seen. Running as fast and quietly as they could they came to a junction with another passage. The only light came from the right so they ran that way, full tilt into a robed man. He cried out as he fell and Jasper and Cess leapt over him. Rounding a corner, they came to a dead end. Cess looked desperately for a way out. If they were caught, she knew they would not escape again.
‘Here!’ said Jasper. To one side bricks had been removed from the wall, and there was a faint suggestion of daylight coming through the cracks in a wooden panel above. She scrabbled up, knife held in her teeth, terror forcing her on, but the panel would not shift however hard she shoved against it.
‘Hurry,’ whispered Jasper. ‘They’re coming!’
‘It won’t open.’
Cess desperately ran her hands around the edge of the panel and felt a short length of cord. She pulled and heard the welcome sound of a click on the other side of the board. Pushing hard, she clambered out into a square stone building, whose upper walls were pierced with hundreds of small holes between which bristled wooden perches. The air was filled with the cooing of hundreds of pigeons and the floor was crusty with droppings and littered with broken perches.
‘Cess!’ Jasper was pulling himself up towards her, but someone stronger had him by the leg. The look of terror on his face made her fly to him as if her own life was at stake. She threw herself to the ground, reached through the hatch and stabbed wildly at the hand that held him. The robed man yelled in pain, releasing Jasper, who scrambled up as if the Devil himself was in pursuit. Cess caught a glimpse of another face staring up. It was the bulging-eyed page.
Before anyone else could climb through the trapdoor, Cess slammed it shut and jammed a broken perch above the latch to keep it closed. She could not fathom why the tunnel led to a dovecote, but there was no time to think about it. The feeble wedge would soon give way. They ran towards a small door and listened carefully before looking out.
‘It’s just a field,’ said Jasper, surprised, because dovecotes were usually close to large houses or farms. Cess was even more astonished than Jasper, but for different reasons.
‘The priory!’ she mumbled, more to herself than Jasper.
‘You know this place?’ asked Jasper. Cess nodded. They were standing in the ruins of Montacute’s priory, once a thriving monastery which owned hundreds of acres of land, farms and woodland. The ancient dovecote and massive gateway were all that remained intact, and even these were obscured by the bushes, ivy and trees that had grown in the fifty years since it had been closed down by Henry VIII, Queen Bess’s father. The land had been acquired by Lord Montacute’s father and some of it, including the ruins, was leased to Nicholas Joliffe. There had long been rumours about the monastery gold being buried in the fields and it was said that there were secret tunnels running from there to Saint Michael’s Hill and Montacute House. No one really believed the stories, but they were diverting for children.
‘Come, I know where to go,’ said Cess as she ran out of the dovecote, across the field and plunged into the trees. Without cap or scarf, she tried to push her long hair into the neck of her borrowed doublet.
‘Where are we going?’ asked Jasper as he struggled to keep up.
‘This is Montacute, my village,’ Cess replied. ‘There’s only one place I can think of that’s safe.’ She nodded her head towards Saint Michael’s Hill. ‘Up there.’ She could not take this unknown boy home. The man from Sir Edward’s retinue had seen her, and if he remembered her from outside the church they would soon search her cottage.
Cess glanced back at Jasper and saw that his face was white. She stopped and waited for him to catch up.
‘There is someone who can help us,’ said Cess, trying to sound reassuring. Jasper was only a little older than her and now he was a fugitive from a murderous sect who seemed intent on high treason, accompanied by a girl he barely knew, who carried a symbol of witchcraft on her.
‘Up here?’ Jasper asked doubtfully, puffing uphill with difficulty.
‘She is my friend and I would trust her with my life,’ Cess explained. ‘She might have an idea what those men are doing.’
They had finally reached the clearing.
Cess stopped dead.
The scene before her was so unexpected that it took several moments before she could comprehend it. Where Edith’s hut had once stood was a heap of smashed wood. Her friend’s belongings were strewn across the clearing, broken or ripped. The damage was so great Cess thought at first some natural force was responsible, a freak wind or ground shake. As she walked closer she could see that Nature would have been less thorough. Even Edith’s few clothes had been torn to shreds, and stinking patches of yellow showed they had been pissed on. The villagers had done this. This sanctuary of peace and health had been violated beyond repair.
Cess sank to the ground, too shocked to cry or speak. Jasper sat heavily beside her.
‘I am sorry,’ said Cess, unable to look at him.
A noise close by made her stop.
Out of the corner of her eye, Cess caught a movement. At the edge of the clearing a cloaked figure stood half-hidden behind a tree, watching them.
.
.
12
‘She was not on the cart? Why not?’ Sir Nathaniel Davies interrogated the kitchen hand, who shrugged. The steward was taxed that morning; he had to list every improvement that needed doing in the House before the Queen arrived as well as inform Sir Edward of a worrying development that one of his agents had discovered. Coming down the main staircase to the great hall he had glimpsed the kitchen boy in the screens passage beyond. It jogged his memory that he had not received the market takings from the poultry girl.
‘So how did she get to market, boy?’ he continued.
‘We saw her arrive with drunken … Farmer Joliffe, sir,’ he stammered, regretting now that he had joined the crowd who refused to let Cess ride with them on the cart. He had even tried to take the hens from her. It had not occurred to any of them that the steward would care what happened to her.
‘Go to the cottage of Anne Perryn and ask after the girl’s whereabouts. Now, boy!’ Sir Nathaniel pressed his lips together, irritated by the boy’s evasive answers and the disappear
ance of the poultry girl. ‘The Queen will be here within the month,’ he proclaimed to the army of servants who were rushing about clearing ashes, sprinkling fresh herbs and cleaning the precious glass windows. ‘Is this how you wish to greet your sovereign? With dirt and sloth!’ he barked.
‘Trouble, Nathaniel?’ asked Sir Edward, who had been observing the scene from the top of the stairs.
‘Sir,’ said the steward with a smart bow, abashed that his bad temper had been witnessed, ‘I have some pressing matters to report. May we speak in private?’
‘Why have you sent after the poultry girl?’
‘Sir, she is late and has yet to give me her takings.’
‘Is that usual?’
‘I have had no previous complaints about tardiness, but she went to market yesterday for the first time and I fear the money may have turned her head. But I have urgent news of another matter –’
‘Turned her head?’
‘She will be flogged, My Lord. But I must speak of –’ Again the steward could not finish his sentence, for Sir Edward raised his hand for silence.
‘Walk with me.’
Nathaniel fell in step with his master as he turned and mounted the stairs that led to his private chamber. Sir Edward spoke quietly, but with a firmness that reminded Nathaniel of his place: great, but not so great as His Lordship.
‘If you receive no word of the poultry girl by sunset, I wish you to go in person to Yeovil to find her.’
Nathaniel was too astonished to reply. This girl, whom he had never once noticed before May Day, was becoming the bane of his life. ‘Yes, sir. May I also speak of an urgent matter?’
‘Nothing is more important than this,’ said Sir Edward as he retreated into his chamber and shut the door behind him, leaving Nathaniel wondering what it was about this poultry girl that nobody was telling him.
.
After banging on the door for several minutes Anne Perryn was answered by a bleary-eyed Joliffe. When at last he was able to focus on her, she saw a look of astonishment cross his face. A long, silent moment passed between them before Joliffe spoke, in a voice barely louder than a whisper.
