by Pat Walsh
He hauled up a bucket of water and filled his pail, then began the ankle-jarring walk back to the kitchen, the sodden and muddy wool of his stockings chafing uncomfortably against his skin. He set the pail down by the door and went to fetch wood for the fire. When he returned to the kitchen, he saw a pair of boots standing by the hearth. For several moments, he stared at them in astonishment. He picked them up and turned them over to examine them. They couldn’t be his boots, surely? The holes in the soles and the toes were covered by neatly stitched patches, and he could smell the tallow that had been rubbed hard into the leather to keep the rainwater out. He gazed at them in amazement and realized they were his boots. Someone had mended them while he’d been sleeping.
“They will keep your feet dry now,” a small voice said behind him.
William grinned as he turned and looked down at the hob, sitting on the mattress, wrapped in William’s blanket. “Thank you! Where did you get the leather for the patches? And how did you mend them so quickly?”
The hob grinned back and looked very pleased with himself. “The snail brother gave me an old boot that had lost its fellow, and I cut the patches from that. Hob fingers work quickly.”
“Well, these look almost as good as new,” William said. “Hob fingers are clever as well as quick.”
The hob looked at the puddle forming around William’s feet. “The snail brother gave me some tallow. Perhaps you should rub it onto your feet to keep them dry, too.”
“That’s a very good idea, but people don’t put tallow on their feet.”
“Why not?”
William shrugged. “I don’t know. They just don’t.”
The hob made a face to show what he thought of this bit of folly.
William prepared the fire and filled the cauldron with water.
“You’ll have to move from there,” he said to the hob. “Brother Martin will be here at any moment, and he won’t be pleased to see my bedding all over the floor.”
The hob bundled up the blanket and pushed it under the small table in the corner of the kitchen. Then he walked to the yard door and reached up to lift the latch.
“How did you get into the kitchen last night to take off my boots?” William called after him. “The doors were still bolted when I woke up this morning.”
The hob pointed to the rafters.
“Through the roof?”
“There are holes up there, if you know where to look.”
“And you do, I suppose?”
The hob nodded. “I follow the rats and the spiders. They know all the hidden ways in this place.”
The sound of footsteps in the cloister outside the kitchen warned them that Brother Martin was approaching. In a heartbeat the hob had gone, and the yard door creaked slowly closed.
William was scrubbing the greasy pottage cauldron with water and ashes when Brother Snail came to find him later that morning.
“These are for you, Will.” The monk held out what looked like a bundle of rags. “I found them in a chest in a storeroom. They’re old and are more patches than clothing, but at least they’re still wearable.”
Smiling broadly, William wiped his hands on the front of his tunic and took the clothes. He was moving up in the world, it seemed. As well as nearly new boots, he now owned a second tunic, undershirt, and two pairs of stockings. “Thank you,” he said with genuine delight. He plucked at the front of his damp tunic. “I might get a chance to dry these things out at last.”
The monk nodded and smiled. He glanced at William’s feet. “The hob has mended your boots, I see.”
“He’s made a good job of it, too.”
“He has nimble fingers. If it was not for the fact it would be too hard to explain away, I’d ask him to mend all the monks’ boots.”
William put his new clothes under the table with his bedding. He was already looking forward to the wonderful moment when he would be fully clean and dry again. He could barely remember how that felt.
Brother Snail stood by the fire and stared down into the embers. He was quiet for several moments and seemed preoccupied. “It has been a strange day,” he said at last. “A disturbing one, in many ways. Some of the brethren have seen or heard things that have troubled them.”
“Oh? What kind of things?”
“Several people have seen shadows and heard whispering or rustling noises in odd corners of the abbey. Brother Gabriel swore he saw the shadow of a huge crow in the church, spreading its wings. It was gone in a moment, and he didn’t stop to search for it, he just took to his heels and ran — and wasn’t ashamed to admit it.” The monk held his thin hands out to the fire. “But that’s not the worst of it. Brother Stephen found a dead lamb in the graveyard. Its throat had been cut, and it wasn’t the work of an animal, Will.”
“No,” William said, “and I think I know who did it.”
Brother Snail’s eyes widened in surprise. “You do?”
William nodded. “I think it was Dame Alys.”
Brother Snail stared at him in thoughtful silence for several moments more, then pulled up a stool and sat down. “I see. Perhaps you would like to tell me why you believe she would do such a thing.”
William squatted by the fire and told Brother Snail about the sacrificed fox and the bloodied sack he’d seen Dame Alys carrying.
“But how can you be sure the two things were connected, Will? You didn’t actually see the woman kill the fox, did you?”
“No,” William agreed, “but I saw other things.” He took the holey stone from around his neck and held it up. It twirled slowly on the woollen cord. “The hob gave me this. Shadlok calls it a seeing stone.”
Brother Snail listened in silence as William told him what he’d seen through the stone, about the Hunter’s Oak and the sacred grove. The monk’s face paled when William told him about the crow-headed god and how Dame Alys’s family had been the guardians of its grove for longer than anyone could remember.
“Shadlok believes it is a fallen angel,” William finished, “and that it’s still there, in the chapel, keeping close to its holy place.”
“One of the Fallen?” the monk breathed, horrified. “Oh, dear God, no! That is what the words on the bowl must have meant! ‘Hide the fallen one in eternal darkness.’ ”
They stared at each other in silence. Brother Snail crossed himself slowly. His thin fingers fumbled beneath his cowl for the cross he wore around his neck, and he held it tightly. “The bowl and the fallen angel must be bound together in some way, Will.”
“When I saw the sacrificed deer, I saw a bowl, too. It had been used to hold the deer’s heart.”
Brother Snail looked appalled. “Was it the bowl we found?”
“I didn’t see it clearly, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it was,” William said. “Where is the bowl now?”
“Prior Ardo is keeping it under lock and key in Abbot Simon’s old chamber until the sacristy door is repaired.” The monk held out his arm for William to help him to his feet. “There has been something . . . unclean in the side chapel for the last few months, Will, but I never imagined it could be something so terrible. But somebody knew about the angel. Someone carved the words of warning on the bowl and buried it beneath the chapel. I will search through the abbey’s books to see if I can find out who it was and what they knew. There might be something written about it somewhere.” Brother Snail closed his eyes. “And in the meantime, we must pray that we can find the way to banish this angel . . . this demon, back to hell. Where it belongs.”
CHAPTER
FOURTEEN
Tuesday dawned bright and windy. Doors and window shutters rattled, and drafts whistled through gaps. William crawled out of bed, tired after another bad night’s sleep. Fleeting images of beating wings had chased through his dreams, and the dark outline of a monstrous bird had perched on the broken rafters of the church, its harsh cries filling the air. Several times he had woken suddenly and had lain there, listening, heart pounding in cold terror, with no idea wha
t it was that had broken his sleep. He went about his work in heavy-eyed silence. Lack of rest made him clumsy, and he quickly fell foul of the equally tired cook when he dropped a water jug and it smashed into pieces on the kitchen floor.
“Clear that up,” Brother Martin growled, landing a stinging blow across the back of William’s head.
“Give me a chance, then,” William snapped.
The monk’s bloodshot eye widened and his lips curled in the snarl of a mad dog. His big hand bunched into a fist, and he drew back his arm. William ducked just in time, but the monk’s hand kept going until it hit the wall, and he let out a yell of rage and pain.
William was out the door and halfway across the yard before the monk knew he’d gone. He wasn’t looking where he was going and ran full tilt into Prior Ardo, sending the monk flying. Brother Gabriel was behind the prior and broke his fall, but there was nobody to stop Brother Gabriel from landing heavily on the cobbles. He lay there, winded and dazed.
Brother Martin, hot in pursuit of his kitchen boy, tripped over Brother Gabriel and grabbed the prior to stop himself from falling, only to bring the prior crashing to the ground with him. William stared in horror at the three monks floundering in a heap at his feet.
The commotion in the yard brought people running to see what had happened. Reynaud the stonemason and Brother Stephen helped the monks to their feet. William looked from the furious prior to the even angrier cook and felt an overwhelming urge to turn and run. Before he could do so, Brother Snail was there. The small monk stood between William and the others and tried to calm everyone down.
“The boy meant no mischief, Prior. I saw what happened, and it was a simple accident.”
“Get out of my way,” Brother Martin snarled. He made a grab for William, but Brother Snail stood his ground.
Shadlok, who had been working with the stonemasons, walked over to stand beside William. He said nothing, but simply folded his arms and stared at Brother Martin, his gaze chillier than the brisk March wind whipping across the yard. The cellarer took a step backward. An angry flush of color mottled his face, and he watched Shadlok warily.
“Enough,” the prior said loudly. He seemed to struggle with the impulse to take William by the scruff of the neck and shake him until his teeth rattled. Instead, with a visible effort, he said, “Brother Snail is right. It was an accident. The boy does not deserve to be beaten for that.”
Brother Martin scowled at the prior’s mild words, but held his tongue.
William was as surprised as Brother Martin by the prior’s leniency. Normally Prior Ardo was all in favor of the redeeming qualities of a sound beating, and he had never taken William’s side against one of his monks before.
The prior glanced around. “Well? Haven’t any of you got anything better to do than idle here in the yard?”
There were a few raised eyebrows as people went back to their work. With a last glare at William, the cellarer stumped back to the kitchen and slammed the door behind him.
“You are no longer needed in the kitchen,” the prior said, staring coldly at William. “From now on, you will work with the stonemasons or with Brother Snail or Brother Stephen.” As if he felt the point needed to be made, he added, “Stay away from Brother Martin.”
William nodded and tried to hide his delight.
Prior Ardo turned to Brother Snail. “It might be as well if the boy slept in your workshop for now.”
William opened his mouth to protest. He couldn’t sleep in the hut, away from the safety of the abbey walls. But then he thought, It isn’t any safer inside the walls.
“Yes, of course, Prior,” Brother Snail said.
The prior turned back to William. “Find Master Guillaume and ask him what you can do to help.”
William watched the prior walk away with Brother Gabriel limping along beside him.
Brother Snail gave William a reassuring smile, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes. William knew the monk was worried by the thought of him being alone in the hut at night. “It really is for the best if you stay away from Brother Martin for now, Will.”
Something in the monk’s voice hinted that there was more to William’s banishment from the kitchen than met the eye. “This is about more than a broken pot, isn’t it?” William asked with a frown.
Brother Snail hesitated, then sighed and said, “Brother Martin has been having nightmares these last few nights. About you.”
“Me?” William stared at him in astonishment.
“The prior knows about the bad dreams, and he most probably feels things will settle down if you are away from the kitchen for a while. Brother Martin is tired and his temper is short, so it’s probably for the best.” Brother Snail patted his arm. “You will be far more comfortable sleeping in my workshop, I am sure.” The monk turned to go, but looked back at him with a gleam in his eye. “But don’t break too many of my jugs or bowls, will you?”
William grinned. “I can’t make any promises.”
William waited until Brother Martin left the kitchen for vespers before fetching his mattress and blankets and his spare clothes. He felt as if a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. He hadn’t realized until that moment just how much he had come to loath working alongside Brother Martin. He hefted his bundled belongings more securely in his arms and, without a backward glance, set off for Brother Snail’s workshop. In an odd kind of way, it almost felt as if he was going home. Shadlok and the hob were sitting by the fire when William reached the hut. The hob had taken William’s flute from its hiding place and was trying to play a tune. Shadlok was watching him with a gleam of amusement in his eyes. William carried his bedding over to a corner of the room and dumped it on the floor.
“You are sleeping here now?” Shadlok asked.
William nodded. “Brother Martin doesn’t want me in the kitchen anymore.”
“You can share the floor by the fire with me,” the hob said, looking very pleased with this turn of events. He laid the flute across his knees and grinned up at William.
“Thank you.” William grinned back.
“What did you do to anger Brother Martin this morning?” Shadlok asked.
“I dropped a jug.”
Shadlok looked surprised. “He tried to kill you just for that?”
“He’ll use any excuse to beat me,” William said tightly. He was quickly coming to hate Brother Martin.
“I could put a curse on him,” Shadlok said. There was a glint in his eye, and William wasn’t sure if he was being serious.
“What kind of curse?”
“Whatever you want,” he said, shrugging. “I could turn him into a fish or make his hands shrivel to stumps. I could make him fall asleep and not wake again.”
William smiled uncertainly. “You could really turn him into a fish?”
Shadlok nodded. “Just say the word and it will be done.”
“Or a frog,” the hob suggested hopefully. “Or a worm.”
For a moment, William was sorely tempted to accept the fay’s offer. He could imagine Brother Martin as an ugly old carp, mouth opening to bite on a sharp hook . . .
It was a struggle, but reluctantly he shook his head. “No, it wouldn’t be right.”
“It is your choice,” Shadlok said with the hint of a smile. “Just tell me if you change your mind.”
Oh, don’t tempt me, William thought.
The hob stared up at William in concern. “The one-eyed brother man is full of anger, like a boil waiting to burst. One day he will go sploff.” He clapped his paws together with a sharp slap.
“Well, I really hope I’m not there when he does,” William said with feeling.
The hob picked up the flute again. His fingers were too small to cover the holes properly, so the tune he played consisted of just a couple of notes, but he played them with his usual enthusiasm. William sat down across the fire from Shadlok.
“Brother Martin has been having nightmares about me. The prior thinks it’ll be better if I keep out
of the kitchen for now.”
“The prior is right.”
“Do you dream?” William asked curiously. “Do you even sleep?”
Shadlok shook his head. “Not in the way humans do. When I sleep, it is more a stilling of the mind.”
“What about you?” William reached out a foot and nudged the hob.
“I dream about the forest,” the hob said, lowering the flute. There was a hint of sadness in his eyes as he stared into the fire, and a faraway look on his face.
“You miss it, don’t you?” William said gently.
The hob looked up at him. “Sometimes I do. But I would miss you and the snail brother and Shadlok just as much if I were back in the forest.” He held the flute out to William. “I would like you to play now.”
For a while, William played, and peace settled around the hearth. At last, Shadlok stirred himself and said, “It is time you learned a more challenging tune.”
He took the flute and began to play a tune William had never heard before. His long fingers moved gracefully over the holes in the instrument, and the song lilted and spun and glowed through the firelit room.
William listened, rapt. He had never heard such beautiful music before. Not even Robin’s playing was this good. Even the hob sat perfectly still for once, a look of awe on his face.
When the last few notes died away, William shook his head. “I will never be able to play like that.”
The fay handed the flute to William. “That does not mean you cannot try.”
And try William did. With Shadlok’s patient instruction, he caught a shadow of the song. Frustration welled up inside him as he strove to get closer to the beauty of Shadlok’s playing, but his fingers felt clumsy compared to the fay’s, and at last he lowered the flute and frowned at Shadlok.
