Relics

by Pip Vaughan-Hughes

  I'm going home,' I said.

  I don't really remember the next few minutes. I know that I tried to leave the hand - I felt it might go better for me if I made some effort to return it, perhaps through Will. 'Terrible idea,' he said. 'There is a trade in such trinkets - there's a fortune in gold and gems here. And the relic . . . what price the hand of a martyr?' I was to keep the relic, to sell or to bargain with. It was priceless, after all, but its value as gold bullion alone would probably be enough to buy all of Dartmoor. He bound it to my chest with a linen scarf, which my mother had given to me when I became a novice. St Euphemia's touch was oddly comforting, but the metal dug into me in awkward places. It would be maddening, I knew, but there was no time to think of that now.

  Will's plan, if it could be called such, was simple. I would leave Balecester dressed as I was, a peasant to any curious eyes. Once I had put a day between the city and myself, I would put on my habit and be a monk once more. Monks were revered or reviled by country folk: in any event, they generally left us alone. It was the best protection I could hope for. My tonsure was a problem, however, and Will paced for a moment. Then he picked up my water jug and held the base over the candle's flame for a minute. The clay was soon coated with a layer of lampblack, and Will wiped this off with one hand and, before I could protest, began smearing it on my shaven pate.

  'Lucky you went to the barber last week, my boy,' he said. Tour hair is no more than black fuzz, and this will look like more of the same, I hope. Don't forget to wipe it off

  I was not about to put my habit back on, though. 'There's more blood in that thing than I have in my own body,' I told him.

  Well, you'd better have mine, brother,' Will replied, and he pulled off his robe and rolled it long-ways, binding the ends together to make a great, heavy ring. I hung it across my body. It was bulky and hot over my rough clothes, but I said nothing. Meanwhile my friend was standing in his tunic and breech-clout. 'If you could loan me a pair of britches, I'd be eternally grateful,' he said. I gestured at the trunk. He rummaged, and found a tattered thing that nonetheless proved to fit. It was strange to see Will dressed like a layman, and seeing my expression, he winked at me. 'I feel like a real person again, Patch,' he said. 'That sack may be good for the soul, but it lacks grace.'

  Then he blew out the candle and pushed me from the room. The stairs were still empty as we crept down them. Will stopped me at the door with a look, opened it and peered out. 'No one about,' he breathed. Then we were in the street and walking, arm in arm, two friends out for a stroll. We headed away from Bridge Street, towards the wall, beyond which a smear of tumble-down houses faded into hovels and then into the patchwork fields that stretched for miles out into the flat lands to the south and east. I would head south, skirting the city, and then turn west, into the wooded hills. It would mean crossing the river, but upstream where it was more narrow.

  The cathedral bell had ceased its tolling, and there was no sign of a manhunt in these poor streets. 'They've forgotten about me,' I muttered to Will. 'I expect they realised they were making a fuss about nothing.' The thin joke tasted like ashes in my mouth, and I wished I'd kept silent.

  Well, next time kill the Bishop,' said Will. I looked at him in surprise, and he grinned back. There was something alert and wolfish in his scarred face that I had not noticed before.

  "You're enjoying this, aren't you?' I said.

  The grin disappeared. 'I'm enjoying your company, brother, because I fear it will be the last time I shall do so,' he answered. 'And I have the feeling that we're spoiling someone's nasty plan, and I'm enjoying that as well. But if that hog of a Steward catches us, we're fucked. I'm not going back either, Patch. Christ knows I'm a sorry excuse for a cleric, but I won't serve a master who has knife-men and lunatics in its pay. I've seen things in this city. I've been up and about while you dreamed of Cicero.'

  What are you talking about? What things, Will?'

  'The Bishop's men running here and there, up to no good. Don't tell me you've noticed nothing.'

  I shook my head miserably. 'Not a thing,' I admitted.

  'Christ, Patch, you dreamer.' There was no rancour in his voice. You've been living inside your bloody books, man. Now you've bumbled right into the heart of something. Listen.' He paused, and lowered his voice even further.

  'Surely you've heard that His Holiness is demanding one-fifth of the English Church's tithes?' I nodded. 'Good,' he continued. And you can probably guess that the bishops aren't too happy.' I shrugged: politics didn't interest me in the least, especially now that my neck was practically in the noose. 'But listen, Patch. Even that share of the tithes is an ocean of gold. You met the Bishop tonight. He's no priest, he's a lord, and a rich one. Interests, brother. They need to be protected. By people like the Steward.'

  He still had hold of my arm, and must have felt my flesh shrink at the mention of Sir Hugh.

  'Don't be afraid, now,' he said gently. You'll be safe. Once we're over the wall, we'll disappear.'

  Why are you telling me all this, about His Holiness and gold?'

  'Because I've heard the name of Deacon Jean de Nointot before. He was cosy with Legate Otto. It seems that Otto was cultivating allies within the diocese, and de Nointot's loyalties were to Rome.'

  'So what?'

  'So it's an open secret that Otto has been promising advancement to those who take the Pope's side against the bishops - not just here, but all over the kingdom. De Nointot is - was - young and ambitious. He was a viper in the Bishop's bosom.'

  The thought of the Bishop's bosom made me chuckle despite myself.

  You're laughing. Excellent. But what I'm telling you isn't so far-fetched. De Nointot is out of the palace's way, his blood is on the hands of a young nobody - sorry, Patch, but do you disagree? - and the Bishop has a witness, to wit, his own Steward. Quite a pretty story, with all its ends tied up tight.'

  'But the hand, Will - what about the hand?'

  'Motive, you thickhead. They catch you soaked in gore, with the hand on you. No need for questions.'

  'But why me?'

  You told me yourself - he was looking for greedy people last night.'

  'But I wasn't greedy.'

  'Absolutely. You were trustworthy. A lamb, not a wolf. No room for two wolves in Kervezey's plan.'

  We walked in silence after that. My feet felt like two stones, and my heart made a third. I could find no argument against Will's theory. I was a dupe, and a scapegoat. All the thoughts I'd had in the palace, about power and favour, and how I'd been singled out for advancement, came back to me, and I almost moaned aloud at the horror of it all, but most of all at my own stupidity. I had let pride blind me and make me ignore my instincts about Sir Hugh. And after all, how could I have put myself in the hands of such a man? I was in no manner worldly, but I was not a babe in arms. And now Will had been caught in the smoke of my damnation.

  He was by no means a perfect cleric, or a model student, but his wit was the sharpest I had ever encountered, and he soaked up learning without any effort at all. Granted, he was addicted to nocturnal escapades of one sort or another, and no stranger to the bawdy-houses I had so recently dashed past on Long Reach. He had precious few illusions about anything, but I had always thought he would find quick advancement in the Church - a bishop by thirty, as we would sometimes joke. Now he was slinking away from all that, at the side of someone the whole country would soon know of as the foulest murderer of the age. I paused and grabbed his sleeve.

  You've done nothing, brother,' I said. 'No one need ever find out you met me tonight. Let me give you back your habit - and then please leave me. I will not be responsible for your destruction as well as my own.'

  But Will only laughed again, a little hollowly. You haven't been listening, Patch. This is about popes and bishops, but mostly about money. We're gnats. We don't count at all. I'm your best friend: if Kervezey doesn't know it yet, which I'm sure he does, he'll know it by tomorrow. My life in the Church is over, and probab
ly my life on this earth if I stay here. It's not your fault. You just used the Crozier's back door when you should have used the front.'

  'But you would have been a bishop by thirty!' I burst out.

  'Haven't you noticed that I've been less than diligent of late, even by my standards? I have been fighting with myself. My faith never was very strong - I'm sure you knew that - and now I fear it has completely left me. I'm a sinner; it's in my bones. And I hate this bloodless life, brother - hate it. I was no more born to this than to lord it over bales of wool like my God-bothering dad.'

  You mean you'll break your vows?'

  Aye.'

  'And do what? Christ, Will, they'll cut your ears off just for that, let alone for helping me.'

  'I'm heading north. Perhaps I'll tap my dad for some money on the way - perhaps not. But I've been planning for a while, and the plan is to seek my fortune. I'll find a free company to join, and then away to France and the wars.'

  'Jesus Christ!' My voice rose, and my companion cautioned me with a look. A soldier? You? You're a cleric, brother. What in hell's name do you know of soldiering?'

  'More than you.' That at least was true. Will loved to fight, had spent his childhood scrapping and brawling through the streets of Morpeth and was a well-known hellion here in the city.

  You won't be finding dozy drovers and fat watchmen over in France, you know,' I went on. 'They'll chop you to bits quicker than a lamb at Easter.'

  'Better than the death-in-life I've been leading.' He paused. 'I could never be a priest. I might have made a scholar. But the Cathedral School is finished anyway, Patch.'

  What do you mean, finished?'

  'The Masters are packing up. They're moving to Oxford. Have you really not heard any of this? Magister Jens, all of them. There's a real school starting up there.'

  'That's just gossip.' I knew about it, of course. Scholars were drifting together all over Christendom. Our teachers had told us of the new places of learning at Paris and Bologna, and the same thing was rumoured to be happening at Oxford. And we were just a school, constrained by the Church and firmly under the Bishop's thumb. He could make it comfortable for teachers and students as long as it suited him, but schools like ours came and went according to the whims of the mighty. I had dreamed of going on to Paris, or Bologna, or even Oxford. That dream was dead now. But if Will was right, perhaps our days in Balecester had been numbered anyway.

  'It feels as if it's all falling to pieces behind us,' I muttered.

  'Perhaps we were the only things holding it up,' Will agreed. After that, there didn't seem to be anything else to say.

  But now the city walls were in sight, rising up to block our way. Ox Lane ended just ahead, and there was no gate. Fortunately for us it had been years since Balecester had been threatened by war, and the walls were neglected. They were high, but sheds, lean-tos and the odd house had been built against them, they were crumbling in places, and there weren't enough Watch-men to patrol their whole length. I had often wandered this way, and I knew that it would be simple to get up to the parapet. The other side was more of a problem: a sheer drop four times the height of a man. But the shanty-town that spread out from the city on the south had crept up to the walls, and there were plenty of refuse piles and rotten roofs to break a fall.

  We ran the last few yards, more from bravado than anything else - there were still no signs of a hunt behind us. In the moonlight the wall's dilapidation was obvious: the Roman bricks that made up its lower courses were crumbling and the mortar was gone, the dressed stone from the Conqueror's time was no longer smooth and straight, and vertical cracks shot up every few feet where the foundations were sinking. I steered Will to the left.

  'There's a woodpile along here somewhere,' I told him, and sure enough, a big stack of split logs appeared around a curve, stacked against a buttress. We threw ourselves at the wood, scrambled up without much difficulty, and found that the slope of the buttress made a convenient ramp to the top of the wall. Up on the parapet, the crenellations stretched away toothily on each side. We crept along, keeping our heads down, peering over every few feet to find a soft landing place.

  'See anything?' said Will.

  'All I can see is the easy way to a broken neck,' I muttered in reply. Then I caught sight of something far off along the wall to the east.

  'Lights, man! On the wall!' Will had seen them too.

  And now there were sounds from behind us. Feet on cobblestones. Torches flickered at the distant end of Ox Lane. They seemed to drift slowly in our direction.

  We scuttled along the battlements like a pair of rats, bobbing up to look for a place to jump, ducking down and running. We both sensed that we could be seen against the moon-washed sky, and the mob in Ox Lane was near enough for us to hear voices. Or perhaps it was other hunters in other streets. There seemed to be nothing near the foot of the wall on the outside: maybe the city had been pulling down houses, or one of the fires that seethed through the squatters' shacks had cleared away the rotting shelters that usually huddled right up to the bricks. We would have to jump now, and take our chances. I hunkered down to let Will catch up with me, but as I leaned against the chilly stone my nose caught a whiff of something unpleasant. I peeped over, and there below me rose a dark mass, rising up to the height of a tall man against the wall and spreading out on all sides. Will appeared at my side.

  'Look there, man,' I croaked. 'Dunghill.'

  Will peered in his turn. When he turned back, he was grinning. 'Just look at that great big pile of shit,' he said. I stared at him for a second, and then we were both cramped with laughter, trying to stifle it with hands stuffed into mouths, pounding each other and the stone battlement. We laughed as only those who have a choice between the gallows and a long fall into ripe shit can laugh. Then we jumped.

  It felt like a long way down. I noticed air hissing past my ears, and a griping tingle of expectation in my feet. Then I landed, and sank to my knees in soft, warm, sucking matter. An instant later, Will arrived beside me. The stench was unbearable down here. We were imbedded in a monstrous heap of dung, kitchen rubbish, offal from butchered animals -the mound was like a towering carbuncle on the face of the shanty town, filled to bursting with all the poisons and fetor of that filthy place. From the miasma that rose around us, I gathered that human as well as pig, cow and horse-shit had a place here. My legs were becoming unpleasantly warm - hot, even - and I tried to drag myself out. It felt like quicksand below me, drawing me down into the pile, and I braced myself for another try. Will was cursing and struggling. I felt hot slime ooze between my toes. Something was trying to wiggle between my sandal and the sole of my foot. I yelped, and threw myself forward. My hand struck something sharp. Now I was hanging forward over the pile. For a second I thought I was still trapped, and then the weight of my body dragged me downwards and out, and the front of the mound gave away. Will and I tumbled head-first down the slope, clods of horror bouncing around us, until a thick wall of brambles and last year's nettle stalks caught us at the bottom. I found I was still clutching something: a pig's jaw. I flung it away. Will reared to his feet, and I followed.

  'Patch, oh Patch,' he rasped, and hawked mightily. 'I think I kissed a dead cat.'

  'That must be what Purgatory feels like,' I said. 'But the Devil himself would leave us alone in this state.'

  We were in a dark, stinking bower formed by the skeleton of a large apple tree which had fallen onto the roof of a dilapidated shanty. Years of live and dead briars, goose-grass, nettles and bindweed had grown up and died back, forming a dismal, snarled wall. We pushed our way through as best we could, squeezing ourselves along the crumbling side of the shanty where the thick lattice of dead apple boughs was thinnest. Will was through and I had almost fought clear when footfalls sounded high above us on the wall, and then the gabble of angry, frustrated men. I froze. A torch appeared between two battlements, then another and another, the guttering orange light skittering down the dunghill towards me. I pressed
myself into the rotten wood, and the light fluttered past me. I was in the deep shadow of the apple's trunk, just out of reach of the trembling, searching fingers of torchlight.

  'Move on, Jack. That's a neckbreaker, down there.'

  'Didn't I fucking tell you? He'll have got down onto one of them tannery roofs further along.'

  The light went out as suddenly as it had appeared. I waited until the hunters' voices were a faint snarl in the distance, then pushed through to join Will on the other side. His eyes were very wide and white in the gloom.

  That lot are off to the tanneries,' he said, pulling pieces of bramble from his arms. 'If we skirt along to the right for a bit, we'll get to the river upstream of town. That puts the whole city between us and them.'

  'They chased me down Silver Street,' I agreed. 'Maybe Sir Hugh believes I made for the water-meadows.'

  'So we'll follow the river upstream. It will lead us to the Fosse Way. Watling Street cuts across it and will take you to London. I'll go with you as far as the crossroads, then go north. Coming?'

  I shrugged. You'll be safer there, at least,' Will pointed out. 'Hide in the crowds. Then find a ship and go abroad: Flanders, perhaps. Yes, indeed, Flanders!' His voice held a little warmth now. 'My father has business partners there. They will help you. A plan, Patch, a plan! Trala!' And he slapped me lightly across the shoulders.

  'Save yourself, Will,' I told him. What would I do in Flanders?' At that moment, as the dunghill stench crept around me with the memory of how I had shrunk, like vermin, from the torchlight, I felt myself at the end. 'I'll give myself up. Perhaps the courts will believe my story - it is, after all, the truth. Anyway, they'll hang me quick, and Sir Hugh will be cheated of his fun.'

  You are no coward, Petroc,' he snapped back. 'So move yourself. Now!'

  There were shadows all around us, darkness that gave forth the stink of death and decay. Death was behind - death was surely all around. But ahead?