Our Lady of Darkness sf-10

by Peter Tremayne

  Fidelma felt the pinprick. She did not even glance at the warrior but remained with her gaze fixed on Forbassach.

  ‘Tell your bully who I am, Forbassach, and do you remember it also. If blood is drawn from the sister of the King of Colgú who is a dálaigh of the courts then blood will answer for blood. You know the law. There are some things that no allowances can be made for. You have passed beyond my patience.’

  Bishop Forbassach hesitated at the ice-cold rage in her voice. Yet he had difficulty in controlling his own temper and stood for what seemed a long time before he succeeded.

  ‘You may put your sword down,’ he said in clipped tones to the man. Then he turned back to Fidelma. ‘I ask you again, where is he?’

  Fidelma regarded the intimidating figure of the Brehon of Laigin with cold curiosity.

  ‘And I ask you again, who is it to whom you refer?’

  ‘You know well enough that I am referring to the Saxon.’

  Fidelma blinked rapidly in astonishment as she realised the implication of his question but forced herself not to show her feelings.

  Bishop Forbassach grimaced with irritability.

  ‘Don’t pretend that you have no knowledge of Brother Eadulf’s escape.’

  Fidelma’s eyes did not leave his.

  ‘I do not pretend. I have no idea what you are talking about.’

  The bishop turned to his little army.

  ‘You men remain,’ he gestured to those holding Fidelma’s companions. ‘Keep hold of those two. The rest of you will search this inn and search it thoroughly, outbuildings as well. Check to see if any horses are missing.’

  Fidelma was aware of Lassar appearing behind the men looking terrified. She wished that she could reassure the woman. However, her own heart was beating rapidly. She knew that she must not allow Forbassach to dominate the situation.

  Then a thin, whining masculine voice, slurred by alcohol, rose above the hubbub and confusion.

  ‘What’s this noise? This is an inn and I paid for a good bed and a night’s sleep.’

  Behind the crowd at the door a small man pushed his way forward. He had clearly been roused from an alcohol-induced sleep; his hair was dishevelled, a cloak wrapped around him for decency’s sake.

  Bishop Forbassach turned, vexed by the interruption.

  ‘What is happening is no concern of yours, Gabrán. Get back where you belong!’

  The little man moved forward a step, almost like a terrier squaring up to a hound. He squinted almost short-sightedly at the bishop and then recognised him. He started to mumble apologies and backed away in confusion. Forbassach turned to Fidelma once more.

  ‘So, you were claiming that the Saxon is not here?’

  Fidelma’s eyes were bright in anticipation.

  ‘I am not claiming anything: I am telling you that he is not. It seems that he has escaped?’

  Bishop Forbassach greeted her question with a sneer. ‘As if you do not know.’

  ‘I do not know.’

  ‘He is not in his cell in the abbey. He has escaped and Brother Cett here was knocked unconscious by those who aided him in that escape.’

  Fidelma took a sharp inward breath as he confirmed her deduction. A sudden breath of hope. She gave Forbassach a hard look.

  ‘You accuse me of helping him escape? I am a dálaigh and constrained by the laws of the courts of the five kingdoms. I knew nothing of this until you told me this moment. Why do you break intomy room in the middle of the night with a use of force and threaten me and my companions?’

  ‘For obvious reasons. The Saxon made no attempt to escape until you arrived and it was clear that he did not escape on his own account.’

  ‘On my dálaigh’s oath, Forbassach, I have had no hand in this matter. This much you could have learnt from me without your dramatic entrance and use of unnecessary force. Nor is it necessary for you to continue in your violence to my companions.’

  Bishop Forbassach turned to where Dego and Enda were still bent double in excruciating pain in the hands of his men.

  ‘Let them up,’ he reluctantly ordered.

  The men holding the two Cashel warriors loosed their holds. Forbassach gave them a moment to recover their breath.

  ‘Well, accepting your word that you had no hand in the matter, perhaps your men acted in your stead. Speak, you!’ He pointed abruptly to Dego.

  The warrior’s eyes narrowed and doubtless he would have attacked the arrogant Brehon had he not been aware of the muscular Brother Cett at his side.

  ‘I know nothing about this escape, Brehon of Laigin,’ he replied in a measured tone but there was no respect in his voice which the rank of the Brehon should have commanded.

  Bishop Forbassach’s face mirrored his anger.

  ‘And you?’ he demanded, turning to Enda.

  ‘I was in bed until your bullies disturbed my slumber by attacking the sister of my King,’ he said defiantly. ‘I came to defend her from your assault. You may have to answer to the consequences of that attack later.’

  ‘Perhaps we might persuade you to reflect on your memories,’ smiled the bishop unpleasantly.

  ‘This is an outrage, Forbassach!’ cried Fidelma, horrified by his insinuation. ‘You will not lay hands on my men. Remember, they are trusted warriors of my brother, the King of Cashel.’

  ‘Better we lay hands on them than we should lay hands on you, woman,’ broke in the surly Brother Cett.

  ‘There will be blood between Cashel and Fearna if you let this matter get out of hand, Bishop Forbassach!’ warned Fidelma harshly. ‘You know that even if your bullies do not.’

  ‘I can vouch that these two warriors have not been out of the inn this night, my lord bishop.’

  The interruption came from a man who was standing outside the room and now pushed his way in.

  Fidelma saw that it was Mel, the commander of the palace guard.

  Bishop Forbassach looked up at him in surprise.

  ‘What makes you so sure of this, Mel?’ he demanded.

  ‘Because this is my sister’s inn, as you know, and I have been staying here this night. My bed is in the room next to where these men sleep. I am a light sleeper and I can vouch for the fact that they have not stirred until your men burst in here.’

  ‘You have been a long time in coming to tell me,’ observed Forbassach. ‘If you are so light a sleeper, why have you taken all this time to come to see me?’

  ‘Because your men started to search my sister’s inn and I thought it wiser to go with them to ensure that they were not too enthusiastic in their search and damaged her property.’

  The bishop stood as if puzzled how next to proceed. It was clear that the unexpected support from the Laigin warrior had left him without room to manoeuvre. While he stood undecided, one of his men came hurrying back.

  ‘The inn and all the outhouses have been searched. There is no sign of the Saxon. No sign of anything at all.’

  ‘Are you sure? Have you searched everywhere thoroughly?’

  ‘Everywhere, Forbassach,’ replied the man. ‘Maybe the Saxon stole away on a boat towards Loch Garman to get a ship back to his own lands?’

  Bishop Forbassach turned back to Fidelma with lips compressed angrily. Fidelma decided to seize the advantage.

  ‘My companions and I will accept your apology for this unwarranted intrusion, Forbassach. However, you have stretched the laws of hospitality to their limits and beyond. I will accept your apology only because it is clear that you are under some stress.’

  Bishop Forbassach’s face clouded in anger for a moment and he seemed about to make a verbal attack again. Instead he hesitated and then motioned to his men to leave. His fiery eyes did not leave Fidelma’s ice-cold gaze.

  ‘Let me warn you, Fidelma of Cashel.’ He spoke slowly, as if he had trouble formulating his thoughts in words. ‘This matter of the Saxon’s escape is a serious one. It is known that you are a friend of his. You came here to defend him. The fact that he has escaped at thi
s momentis no coincidence. You and your companions may have outwitted us and been able to hide him from our search. Doubtless you knew that we would come here first. I warn you, Fidelma, this will be your undoing. By taking the law into your own hands you will never be able to practise the profession of law again.’ He laughed shortly. ‘And here is an amusing thought to ponder on, Fidelma. I was actually going to defer the execution of the Saxon for a week, to please the concerns of King Fianamail, so that we might find some answers to those clever questions which you put forward. The escape of the Saxon is now a clear confession of his guilt. As soon as he is recaptured, he will be hanged. We will have no more appeals.’

  Fidelma met Bishop Forbassach’s smouldering gaze evenly.

  ‘You are wrong to accuse me of aiding Brother Eadulf’s escape, Forbassach. I have, unlike some in this kingdom, maintained strict compliance to the laws of the five kingdoms and have not discarded my faith in them for any other law. Remember that, Forbassach. Nor would I interpret his escape as a confession of guilt. Every innocent person has the right to self-defence. The escape might just as easily be interpreted as a defence from a judicial murder.’

  The bishop made to reply, changed his mind and left the room without another word.

  Dego came forward with a look of concern on his face.

  ‘Are you all right, lady? They have not harmed you?’

  Fidelma shook her head. She put a hand up to her shoulder where the tip of the warrior’s blade had pricked it.

  ‘A scratch, no more. Pass me my robe, Enda,’ she instructed quietly and when the young man did so, she swung out of the bed. She regarded the two young warriors carefully.

  ‘Now we are alone, tell me, and speak the truth. Did either of you have any hand in Eadulf’s escape?’ She asked the question swiftly, breathlessly.

  Dego answered immediately with a negative gesture. ‘I swear it, lady.’ Then he smiled crookedly. ‘However, had such an idea occurred to us, I think we might well have considered participation in it.’

  Enda agreed solemnly. ‘That is about the size of it, lady. The idea did not occur to us and now that someone else has carried out the plan it puts shame on us.’

  Fidelma pursed her lips in rebuke. While her heart agreed with them, her rational thought did not.

  ‘It would put a shame on you to break the law,’ she admonished.

  ‘Not break the law, lady,’ insisted Enda, ‘just bend it a little to buy time for the Brehon Barrán to arrive.’

  She looked up as Lassar entered, followed by her brother Mel. They had apparently made sure that Bishop Forbassach and his men had left the inn.

  ‘This is a bad business, Sister,’ fussed Lassar. ‘It is difficult to run an inn these days but if I have offended the bishop who is a Brehon, the abbess and the King all at once, I shall have no hope in continuing to run the inn. No hope at all.’

  Mel put his arm around his sister’s shoulders to comfort her.

  ‘It is a bad business, lady,’ he echoed uncomfortably. ‘We have come to ask you, openly and honestly, whether you have a hand in this business.’

  ‘We have not,’ Fidelma assured them. ‘Do you want us to leave the inn?’

  ‘Forgive us, lady. This is naturally upsetting for my sister. It would be unjust to turn you from the inn when there are no grounds for doing so.’

  Lassar sniffed and dabbed at her eyes with an edge of her shawl.

  ‘You are welcome to stay here. I just meant …’

  ‘And you are right to point out your position,’ Fidelma interrupted firmly. ‘I can assure you that if our staying here becomes a matter of compromising your livelihood then we will depart. If you feel happy with our staying then we shall stay. We have done nothing wrong in the eyes of the law of this land, in spite of Bishop Forbassach’s suspicions. That I can assure you.’

  ‘We accept your word, Sister.’

  ‘Then the only thing we can do now is to try to get some sleep during whatever is left of the night.’

  Lassar and her brother left the room together but Fidelma motioned Dego and Enda to hold back.

  ‘Now that we are assured that none of us are involved, this does bring up a problem,’ she whispered softly.

  Dego inclined his head in agreement.

  ‘If we did not help Eadulf to escape, who did and for what purpose?’ he asked.

  ‘For what purpose?’ echoed Enda, puzzled.

  Fidelma smiled gently at the young warrior.

  ‘Dego has seen the point. I have observed that several people involved in these events have disappeared — key witnesses at the abbey. Is it at all possible that Eadulf has been induced to “disappear” also in the same manner?’

  The possibility made her feel uneasy but it was one which had to be faced, as far-fetched as it seemed, but then, on reflection, it was no more far-fetched than the other mysteries connected with this business. There was a silence while the three of them thought about the implication.

  ‘Well, there is little we can do now in the middle of the night,’ Fidelma admitted reluctantly. ‘What is clear, however, is that we must find Eadulf before Bishop Forbassach and his men do.’

  Once alone, Fidelma did not know whether to give way to the feeling of wild elation which had been her first response to the news that Eadulf had escaped the gibbet, or to allow the nagging depression to overtake her thoughts — the fear that he might have escaped into a worse fate. She could not regain her state of sleep. Surely things were not as bad? She had been certain that Eadulf was facing death that morning. Now he had escaped. Had Brehon Morann been too cynical when he had once advised her that any time things appeared to be going better, it meant that something had been overlooked? What had she overlooked?

  She sought vainly for sleep in the art of the dercad but her thoughts were too clouded with her new fears for Eadulf. It was dawn before she fell into an exhausted slumber. It was a sleep from which she awoke with no dream memories but only foreboding that all was not well.

  Eadulf had not gone to bed that night. Knowing that it was likely to be his last night on earth had somehow made the idea of sleeping it away seem a senseless act. He sat on his bed, the only comfortable seat, gazing through the bars of his cell window at the little patch of night-blue sky. He tried to form his random, panic-stricken thoughts into one cohesive stream of thought, but try as he might those thoughts rebelled. It was not true, as the sages claimed, that a man faced with imminent death could concentrate more clearly. His thoughts kept leaping here and there. To his childhood, to his meeting with Fidelma at Whitby, to his further meeting in Rome and then his coming to the Kingdom of Muman. His mind kept rambling through memories, bittersweet memories.

  The sound was muffled. A grunt. Something falling. He was standing up, looking towards the door, when the bolts rasped open.

  A dark figure stood in the doorway. It wore a cowled robe.

  ‘It … it can’t be time already,’ Eadulf protested, horrified by the thought. ‘It is not yet daylight.’

  The figure beckoned in the gloom. ‘Come,’ it whispered urgently.

  ‘What is happening?’ Eadulf’s voice was a protest.

  ‘Come and do not speak,’ insisted the figure.

  Eadulf moved reluctantly across to the cell door.

  ‘It is imperative that you do not say anything. Just follow us,’ the cowled figure ordered. ‘We are here to help you.’

  He realised that there were two other men in the corridor. One held a candle. The other was dragging the recumbent form of Brother Cett into the cell that he was vacating. Eadulf’s heart began to beat faster as he saw what was happening.

  He stepped quickly after them; his reluctance had vanished. The cell door was shut and secured.

  ‘Raise your hood, Brother,’ whispered one of the cowled figures. ‘Head down now.’

  He obeyed immediately.

  The small group walked smartly along the corridor and down the stairs, Eadulf content to follow where they le
d, through a maze of corridors and suddenly, without meeting any impediment, they were outside the walls of the abbey, through the gates by the riverbank. Another figure was there holding the reins of several horses. Without a word, the leading figure helped Eadulf to mount while the others were already springing into the saddles of their horses. Then they were trotting rapidly away from the abbey gates, along by the moonlit silver waters of the river.

  They reached a clump of trees and the leader caused them to halt, raising his head as if in an attitude of listening.

  ‘No sounds of pursuit,’ the man muttered. ‘But we must be vigilant. We will ride hard from now on.’

  ‘Who are you?’ asked Eadulf. ‘Is Fidelma among you?’

  ‘Fidelma? The dálaigh from Cashel?’ The spokesman laughed softly. ‘Save your questions yet awhile, Saxon. Can you keep up if we maintain a gallop?’

  ‘I can ride,’ replied Eadulf stiffly, yet still bewildered at who these men might be if they had not been sent by Fidelma.

  ‘Let us ride!’

  The leader dug his heels into his horse’s flanks and the beast leapt forward. Within a second, the other horses were following. Eadulf felt the exhilarating breath of the cold night wind on his cheeks and in his hair, blowing the cowl from his head, his hair ruffling and tousling in its grip. For the first time in weeks he had a sense of levity, of excitement. He was free with only the elements to constrain and caress his body.

  He lost count of time as the body of horsemen thundered along the riverside road, turning into woods, up a narrow track that snaked in and out of shrubland and open spaces, across marshland and up small hills. It was a dizzy, whirling ride, and then they went through a cleared area of land to a peak on which an old earthwork fortress rose; its ditches and ramparts must have been dug in ancient times. On top of the ramparts rose walls of great wooden logs. The gates stood open and, without even pausing, the body of horsemen thundered in, across a wooden bridge stretching through the ramparts.

  They came to a halt so swiftly that some of the horses reared and kicked out in protest. Then the men were sliding from their mounts and figures with torches were rushing out to take charge of the lathered animals, leading them away to stables.