Defiant Unto Death

by David Gilman

  Raoul had made a mistake and he knew it. He had waited too long to report to the place where the Norman lord had instructed him to go when there was news of anyone asking about the scrap of cloth. He had expected him to be there, readying for prayers, his rich ermine-trimmed cloak pulled up against the night chill and a gloved hand prepared to untie his weighted purse in reward. Instead he found a group of rough-looking men in the outer rooms of the house – cold dank rooms that were used as their quarters – and when he was ushered into the presence of the sallow-faced man who gazed at him with eyes as black as river pebbles it put the fear of Christ into him despite the crucifix that hung from the man’s neck. In his few years of life the street urchin had known violence and threat, but cunning and feral caution had kept him alive. When this man spoke his words were weighted with an accent that came from further south. Raoul had heard it before, belonging to wagoners from outside the city, places he had never heard of, but whose descriptions were of another great river and a countryside rich in fruit and crops. It had been of no interest to him as he had watched them drink away their misery in the taverns while he waited to relieve them of their purses. This man was someone of authority. The sword and knife were expensive; the cloth he wore was of a fine weave that would keep all but the most wicked wind from penetrating it. And the black garments made him look as big and threatening as a winter storm cloud.

  He reported everything Isabeau had told him and without a question being asked the man suddenly leapt to his feet and shouted orders to his henchmen. Raoul protested that his reward was due, but they cuffed his head and grabbed his arm and hauled him to the Half Wheel. Payment would be his only when the man they hunted was found. He knew better than to argue. And prayed for Christ’s mother to protect him.

  The tavern owner’s protests were met with threats that his flea pit would be closed down by the city authorities if he dared to intervene. When questioned he confirmed that such a man as described had been in the tavern, but had left before dawn. It was not a satisfactory answer for the Savage Priest and the men inside the tavern were hauled to their feet; those who resisted were roughly handled by the henchmen. Raoul was held as de Marcy gazed into the men’s faces. One had a scar that splintered his face from hairline to ear, but he was not as tall as the man they sought. But a man’s legend could put a foot in height on him, so he was pushed outside for a closer examination.

  The cries of alarm and protest soon drew a crowd and hecklers began cursing the armed men for their violence. It made no difference that they formed a half-circle and drew knives and swords; a Paris mob could swarm quickly and Blackstone saw from where he hid that the raiders were being threatened by the increasing numbers in the street. The black-cloaked figure shouted above the crowd’s rising anger and Blackstone heard the words ‘King’s business’. And that enraged the crowd even more. The unpopular King was already resented and to have men raid a tavern as the city awoke and its citizens made their way to church or work was a stinging rebuke to the Provost of Merchants and the guilds of the city who were essential for King John to sustain taxes and authority. The Savage Priest, Blackstone realized, had just overplayed his hand.

  Raoul cowered in the corner as the tavern owner backed away from the figure who re-entered, momentarily blocking the light from the doorway, strode across the room, knife in hand, and tried to snatch the boy, who jigged behind upturned tables and benches. He screamed for his life, crying in terror as de Marcy lunged and caught him by the hair.

  The boy wriggled and screamed as the tavern owner stepped back further still in the empty room but he found the courage to yell at the top of his voice. ‘Murder! Murder! Foul murder here!’

  The alarm caught the Savage Priest by surprise; Raoul twisted, sacrificed a handful of hair and ducked, bleeding, into the street with the Savage Priest at his heels. Raoul was known to many of the crowd and they gave a collective gasp and cry when they saw the boy, bloodied and terrified, pursued from the tavern by the black-cloaked knifeman. There was sudden turmoil as the onlookers parted, allowing Raoul to escape, and then bodies jostled back and forth as another group of men pushed through from the back, shouting commands to give way. The Provost’s men had been alerted and twenty of them, led by a deputy with a cleric at his shoulder, quickly took control and demanded the armed men lower their weapons.

  For a moment the standoff looked to turn more violent, but the Savage Priest told his men to do as ordered. He faced the deputy and said something that Blackstone could not hear – only one word rose above the hubbub: Englishman. The deputy seemed uncertain for a moment, but then took a more decisive tone and commanded his men to clear a path and escort the raiders away.

  Insults flew from the crowd, and then Raoul suddenly re-appeared and hurled a handful of dung at the man who had tried to kill him. The crowd’s mood quickly turned to derision and laughter as the foul mess splattered his cloak and the boy ducked and weaved away, escaping into an alleyway.

  If the words the brigand’s leader had uttered about being on the King’s business were true then Blackstone knew there would be little time before they resumed their search – and with more authority – as the court officials would instruct the Provost’s men to help.

  To hunt an Englishman was a sport worth joining. To catch him was worth the King’s favour.

  18

  Christiana had the comfort of Joanne de Ruymont’s friendship, but the pious woman’s insistence of praying four times a day and once more before retiring was a trial she had to endure. However, she was in Joanne’s debt for telling her about the embroidered token that she had come across in Paris. The long-suffering Guy de Ruymont refused to join his wife for each session of her prayer. Belief in the Almighty strengthened every knight’s backbone, but to spend hours a day on his knees in a cold, dank chapel was not why Guy agreed to accompany them to Paris. Christiana suspected that the noblewoman had always thought that by marrying Thomas Blackstone she had sold her soul to the devil and that these sessions of prayer, though silent except for the clicking of her rosary beads, had much to do with asking the good Lord to forgive Christiana for it.

  Their rooms in the merchant house were spacious, with windows on both sides so that the light reached across the broad planks of dark chestnut floors. The servants saw to it that the stone fireplace was well stocked with wood and that a fire burned throughout the day. There were two rooms and a privy, and Christiana slept on the bed in the main room. The apartment on the top floor of the double-storey house gave them views of the distant countryside and large private gardens that reached out from the rear of the property – space that was becoming a rarity as the city grew and landowners sold them for development. Two of the city’s gates were less than half a mile to the north and west and Christiana was conscious of their encirclement. She was held in the embrace of the city ruled by her husband’s enemy.

  Each day she awoke her first thoughts were for her children and how long she could stay away from Castle de Harcourt. The slender evidence that her father was alive could be explored for only a few days, because by then Blackstone would return from his attack on those who held William de Fossat. She had to be home before then, having broken her vow to him. Her anxiety of being parted from her children and the fear of being in Paris was soothed by her sense of self-willed righteousness. Thomas had promised her there would be no more campaigns that year, that he would stay and do what he could to find her beloved father. If he could abandon a promise then she could use his absence to take matters into her own hands. The thought of her father, an old, frail man, lost in a fog of distorted memory, gave her the same wilful determination to act alone that had given her the strength to marry Blackstone.

  She was up before first light and took it upon herself to feed the fire and ensure she was washed and dressed before the de Ruymonts came through from their bedchamber for breakfast.

  ‘Today, perhaps,’ Joanne smiled. ‘We will pray and then we will search. God will guide us. You’ll see.
’ She made the same comment each morning with a calm confidence that Christiana could only envy. Guy fidgeted and casually went from window to window, his eyes searching out those below, both on the street and tending the vegetable garden, as if looking for anyone out of place. When Joanne left the room to prepare for the day and scold a servant Christiana waited until her friend’s voice told her she was far enough away not to step back into the room.

  ‘I am responsible for your anxiety, Guy. I’m sorry.’

  Guy de Ruymont was known for his charm and good manners, as well as for his occasional and unexpected ill-tempered outbursts to a wife who voiced her pinched-faced displeasures on an all-too-regular basis.

  ‘Many people visit the city, Christiana,’ he said, smiling to reassure her. ‘There’s little danger for us. And no need for you to worry as long as I am here.’

  She remembered the first time she had come across the Norman lord’s gentle reassurances, years ago when Blackstone had survived his wounds and been forced to attend a Christmas feast at Harcourt. It was Guy who had saved him from embarrassment when Joanne, bitter at losing members of her family at Crécy, had tried to expose the archer’s lack of social graces in front of the gathered nobility. Guy’s was an act of kindness that had extended over the years and brought the two families closer.

  ‘My presence here might jeopardize your own safety if it becomes known that Thomas Blackstone’s wife is in the capital.’

  ‘And among all the rich merchants and those at court, not to mention other knights, barons and estate owners, who come and go along the grand streets and swarm in the side alleys, you think a humble Norman lord will be noticed?’ he said self-mockingly.

  She smiled. ‘You think we women don’t know how the times are, Guy? You and Jean and the others talking to Navarre? It’s dangerous.’

  ‘Not yet,’ he said comfortingly. For a brief second she saw what she took to be fear in his eyes. ‘Now, if Joanne spent less time on her knees and more time helping you search for your father, then our time in the city might be halved,’ he told her.

  Today would be no different from any other when they left the comfort of the rooms. Guy would accompany them as they searched the area around the Church of the Innocents and the marketplace for any old beggar who might be Christiana’s father.

  ‘And when we pray, Guy, you are left to do what? Wander the streets?’

  ‘There’s some falconry to be had and a gossip or two about the price of winter wheat. The marketplace gives me snippets of information. I make no complaint of being abandoned while Joanne prays for all our souls. You forget, Christiana. Men enjoy their own company.’

  ‘I know that only too well,’ she answered – too quickly – immediately regretting her show of irritation yet unable to resist the impulse: ‘I am Thomas Blackstone’s wife.’

  Blackstone walked as quickly as he could, desperately wanting to run towards the church he sought but knowing that to do so would draw attention to him now that the city was awakening. It was still barely light enough to see doorways or those who slept in them, but he caught the smell of something sweet on the air and a pang of hunger mingled with the anxiety he felt for Christiana. By now those who wished to trap him would know he had slipped through their net. Would they risk arresting a Norman lord and his wife in order to snare Christiana, forcing him to surrender himself? The Normans had already lost d’Aubriet by the King’s hand, and de Fossat to torture and death by the Savage Priest. If they arrested Guy de Ruymont on any trumped-up charge, Normandy would surely declare openly for Navarre and the English. His thoughts moved as quickly as his feet across the pavement. Christiana’s father had fought against the English, but that would not save her now she was married to Blackstone. The protection afforded her by Guy de Ruymont and the King’s desire to secure Norman loyalty was a contest that would end in only one way: her capture and his surrender to save her.

  The alleyways twisted left and right and as one joined another he lost his sense of direction. He cursed the confines of the city and by the time his instincts and good luck brought him to a main thoroughfare he realized he had missed the church and was forced to backtrack. Raucous shouts from across the way made him falter and he edged cautiously towards the broad street. It was not those who hunted him, but stallholders shouting to each other as they laid out their wares under the covered market. A breakfast of ale, bread and cheese was being shared by the men and women gathered around a brazier, warming the cold night’s stiffness from their aching bodies. Beggars, some crippled, others blind and led by children, began to seep from the darkened doorways like wraiths in tattered clothing, little better than rags bound by string. The church was a few hundred paces beyond the walled cemetery. Blackstone’s eyes searched the people on the street for any sign of recognition, fearful that the citizen volunteers from the Provost’s office had already been sent to search for him. The man he saw at the tavern was the Savage Priest, and by now he would have convinced the authorities of his status. It was unlikely they would issue a hue and cry, something that could soon get out of control and become a riot. There were enough men with battle scars to be suspect, but it would cause chaos to have volunteers on the rampage pulling aside every man with a scar. It was more likely the Savage Priest would control events and send the Provost’s men to do their own search for Blackstone. He and his men, once they were released from questioning, would change their tactics and seize Christiana now that they had failed to snatch their prize at the Half Wheel.

  Blackstone pushed through the church door and stepped into its cold darkness. A bird fluttered, high up, seeking its freedom; other than that there was little sound in the church, except for a whisper of prayer that came from a hunched figure whose black cowl covered his head. Had his enemy already discovered him? Perhaps Isabeau had been captured. Blackstone’s hand was already reaching for his knife when the figure rose, knelt before the altar and then turned so that the candlelight showed him to be a priest. The man was startled when he saw Blackstone standing beyond the benches.

  ‘You offer no humility to God, my son?’ he asked. ‘A bended knee is little to ask.’

  ‘I need answers that God cannot give me in prayer. I’m looking for a woman, probably with a companion, who might come here each day to pray.’

  The priest looked at the roughly dressed man whose demeanour seemed to challenge not only his own authority but that of the Church. There were many men like this in the city, some had been hanged for going into a place of worship and dragging out their victims to kill them in the street. A church’s sanctuary was inviolable to most, but those who chose to ignore the law of God would find their punishment could not be avoided.

  ‘Those who pray here have the protection of the Almighty,’ he said carefully, trusting that, by offering no direct challenge, he would be spared any injury.

  ‘If the Almighty wishes these women to come to no harm then you can see me as his instrument for their protection. There are those close by who would seize them. Tell me if you know where they may be.’

  No threat had been made against him and the priest knew that such a man who stood before him could easily have reached out and squeezed the life from him.

  ‘Two women pray here during the day. They are pious and generous with their alms. One is older than the other and seems to be her chaperone. I suspect they don’t travel far from the safety of this place, which means they stay in the nearby streets close to the cemetery and the marketplace. If I see them again today shall I give them a message?’

  ‘Yes. Tell them to stay here because of the danger that seeks them out.’

  Blackstone turned for the door, the light and noise from the street cutting into the silent gloom. The priest felt uncertainty grip his chest and prayed his instincts had been right to send the man to the nearby streets. The bird in the rafters found a broken tile and its freedom. Once again the silence settled.

  The Innocents was the city’s graveyard, its ten-foot walls enclosing trenc
hes a hundred paces long, dug for mass burials, there being no space for individual graves. Old skulls and thighbones, clean and dull white, were stacked in a few of the archways, a charnel house for those who had been buried over the years and whose place in the ground was needed by others. Handcarts carrying the dead, led by priests or monks, formed an almost constant flow of traffic, wheeling in through the crowds on the busy street. Beggars extended bowls and cupped hands, hoping the sight of the dead might remind the mourners that a small act of charity could help pave the way to heaven when their own time came.

  Standing in the entrance he loitered, as did others, watching the carnival of death unfold. Street urchins drank from the fountain as market workers drew water and then carried their buckets away, avoiding itinerant bric-a-brac sellers with their makeshift trays. There were men and women in the cloistered archways, some of the women selling themselves and some of the men buying. Surely he would be able to see Christiana as he scanned the beggars and those too drunk to raise themselves from the stupor of the previous night’s drinking. He picked his way around the high walls. They were well built; a craftsman’s hand had cut and laid the stone and it had been done many years ago. He silently acknowledged the mason’s skill and wished his own life had given him the chance to lay down a monument that had his name cut into the cornerstone. He bypassed the grave diggers shovelling dirt over linen-wrapped corpses, and avoided the tearful women who made their way back to the street. One of them screamed in torment. Perhaps a child had been laid to rest, he couldn’t tell, but a man, possibly her husband, tried to calm her and when that failed, slapped her hard, stunning her. Her knees sagged and she rested in the dirt, leaning on one arm until he bent down and dragged her to her feet.