The Silence of Stones

by Jeri Westerson

  With blood bubbling over, Crispin lunged and with one smooth move, grabbed the man by the bunched shoulders of his cloak, unsheathed his dagger, and yanked him up so that they were eye to eye, dagger to throat. He heard the sound of blades being drawn all around him but didn’t care.

  ‘Listen, you brain-boiled, dull-witted Scottish boar of an imbecile. You will not play your games with me. I have had enough. Tell me NOW where the god-forsaken Stone is or—’

  To Crispin’s surprise, the man laughed. ‘Och, here’s a man for ye, lads. No pasty-faced English here.’

  But instead of the good-natured laughter of McGuffin’s men, they moved swiftly to Findlaich’s side and pulled Crispin off him. One shoved him back and another held his dagger to Crispin’s chest. Breathing hard and coiled to spring, Crispin steadied himself.

  ‘We’d like to tell you our tale, Master Guest,’ said Findlaich, ‘if you will listen.’

  Do I have that kind of face, Crispin wondered, that seems to like to listen to tales?

  The other men stepped back, allowing Crispin some space, but only so much. He knew he wouldn’t have time to lunge for Findlaich again before a beefy arm belayed him or a ham hock shoulder blocked his way.

  ‘I’m certain you know the tale of the Stone of Scone, eh, Master Guest?’

  ‘King Edward wrested it from the Scots … when he trounced them in 1296.’ He took great pleasure in Findlaich’s frown at the word ‘trounced.’

  ‘That may be so,’ said the Scot with a rumble. ‘But the Stone has a great history. It was once the stone that Jacob used for a pillow. And Jacob rose up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had put for his pillows, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it. So you see, it has a long history of its holy and consecrated stature. The ancient king Cináed mac Ailpín originally brought it to Scone Abbey and there it sat, anointing king after king. Even old King John Balliol … before your Edward could steal it away. So you see, it has a long history to my people.’

  ‘Vae victis,’ said Crispin with a sneer. ‘Woe to the conquered.’

  ‘Aye, the spoils of war cannot be denied to the king and his army when they come knocking on the door. So it is ever thus. D’ya know what is said of the Stone? Ni fallat fatum, Scoti, quocunque locatum, Invenient lapidem, regnare tenentur ibidem.’

  Crispin intoned, ‘If Fates go right, where’er this stone is found, the Scots shall monarchs of that realm be crowned. So?’

  ‘So? You dinna see? It’s no that English kings become the kings of Scotland, but that the kings of Scotland become the kings of England.’

  Crispin snorted. ‘Very pretty. Your own interpretation, no doubt. This is all very interesting but not getting us closer to a negotiation. I suggest you tell me where the Stone is and we shall see about your, er … reward for returning it.’

  ‘Oh aye. Reward.’ He scratched at his bearded chin. ‘I well remember how King Richard rewarded Wat Tyler with a parlay on London green … and laid him low with a blade. Much reward he received with his head paraded on a pike.’

  ‘And rightly so for rising against the crown.’

  Findlaich laughed. ‘So says you, Crispin Guest, the traitor who lived.’

  Crispin drew in a sharp breath. His face instantly heated. He longed to draw his sword, but more information was needed. He could not kill this man who had hidden the Stone, else it might never be recovered. He breathed, gaze steely against the sharp eyes looking back at him, measuring.

  ‘Is that all then?’ Crispin grit out. ‘History lesson over?’

  ‘All but the recent history. We were asked to do this thing, Master Guest. Oh, there is pleasure in the doing, but it wasn’t our idea, you see. Coin was exchanged.’

  ‘How much?’

  A furrowed brow rose.

  ‘How much do you want, dammit?’

  ‘Well, I wish we were in a position to bargain with ye, Master Guest. Nothing would give me greater pleasure, I assure you. But …’ He walked toward the brazier and stretched out his hands toward it. The light flickered over his features in golden flutters. The cold was deep inside the little chapel, with its stone walls, stone floors, stone roof. It held the cold to it like a mother holds its babe. But Crispin was used to cold. Used to ceaseless nights of it, and days, too. He didn’t move. But he gathered himself like a horse waiting to spring into a gallop.

  Nothing more seemed forthcoming. He looked around again. Where could the damned Stone be? Anywhere, he reckoned. Anywhere hidden in plain view in a stone building with its stone walls falling down around it. His gaze moved more critically over the debris on the floor, under the skewed arches, into the shadows.

  ‘Are you working with McGuffin?’ asked Crispin. ‘There’s no use in lying to me.’

  The man fiddled with the clasps of his cloak in studied insouciance. ‘What has he told you?’

  ‘Precious little. But I already surmised he was working for a great lord.’

  ‘The Mormaer,’ said one of the men in hushed tones.

  ‘Wheest!’ hissed Findlaich. The man shrunk back.

  Mormaer? What sort of thing was that? He’d have to ask Domhnall when next he saw him. Yet it was plainly something to strike fear in the faces of these Scotsmen.

  The men looked at one another anxiously, in fact, and they gestured to Findlaich, speaking in their strange twisted tongue.

  Findlaich questioned his compatriots, but they all shook their heads. With a conciliatory posture, he opened his hand to Crispin. ‘I may not speak to you of the Mormaer at this time, Master Guest.’

  The Mormaer? Crispin wracked his mind, trying to remember if he had ever heard the name before, but came up empty. He had spent his warrior years in France, not Scotland. He had been thrust from court long before the latest uprisings began.

  Findlaich raised his chin and looked down his bulbous nose. ‘What’s on your mind, Master Guest?’ It had the tone of, ‘What would it take to get rid of you?’

  ‘I have encountered others who claim … they have the Stone.’

  Findlaich made a growling sound and swept his glance over his fellows. ‘I’d be anxious to know who they are.’

  ‘Indeed. But what does it matter if they don’t have it?’

  ‘Well, that’s the thing, Master Guest. We have our orders. We were to take the Stone but no orders were given about what to do with it once gotten. And anyway, we don’t have it. It was gone before we could get to it. With a verra interesting item in its place.’

  ‘Somehow,’ said Crispin, ‘I knew you were going to say that.’ He approached the brazier and warmed his hands over it, relishing the warmth on his face.

  Tricked again. And the wrong choice made. Again. He should have gone on to the Boar’s Tusk as planned. Was that chance slipping away?

  He rubbed his hands for another moment and turned. His strides were long down the nave, but footsteps followed him, and then someone ran to head him off at the door. A burly bear of a man furrowed his brow at him, body blocking his exit.

  ‘We weren’t done talking, Master Guest,’ said Findlaich from behind him.

  ‘Yes we were. You don’t have the Stone so there is nothing else to say.’

  ‘But you are a finder of lost things, are you not? They call you the Tracker.’

  Crispin halted but did not turn around. He laughed instead, a harsh bark of a sound. ‘Don’t tell me you intended to hire me, too?’ He did turn then, eyes narrowing. ‘You whoreson. Don’t you know why I am already looking for it? The king has my apprentice as hostage. If I don’t find it and return it to the king, he will kill the boy! What the hell do I care about you?’

  ‘Such haste and impertinence,’ said Findlaich, shaking his head. ‘I care not for what schemes the king’s got brewing. I only know my own task. And that was to secure the Stone. But I no have it. And I shall be in peril if I do not do as my patron says. Yet, I might have an idea who does have that troublesome Stone.’

  ‘And why should I tru
st you?’

  ‘Well now …’ He rubbed his shaggy chin again. ‘There are things that I know that perhaps you do not …’ Sagging, he shrugged. ‘I wish no harm to your lad, Master Guest, but as you well know, men like us are at the mercy of our betters.’

  Betters? Who would lead such an expedition for the Stone, he wondered. Who could? A Scottish lord, no doubt. But who? This Mormaer? The Mormaer, he corrected. The tribal nuances of northerners were a puzzle to him.

  And anyway, how would the knowing of it help his situation? Well, all the pieces were necessary. Only a complete tapestry yielded an understandable picture.

  He faced Findlaich, whom, he realized, had been civil to him. ‘You will forgive me if I leave you now? For I have another appointment which might provide answers that we all seek. Pardon me if I do not invite you along.’

  ‘To the Boar’s Tusk?’

  Crispin nodded. ‘I realize I can’t prevent you from coming …’

  Findlaich raised a conciliatory hand. ‘We’ll no follow you, Master Guest. We can find out what transpires, at any rate. We will speak again. But be warned. You mustn’t trust the others. They are dangerous men, despite what they might have told you.’

  ‘And you? Am I to trust you?’

  Findlaich spread out his hands. ‘I have no harmed you or yours. I am a man doing my duty to his laird. But the others. They are only out for themselves. I would hire you, aye, but if you’ve no mind for it, then I wish you God’s speed. But tread carefully. Danger awaits.’

  Crispin bowed. He didn’t doubt it. The hulking man stepped aside from the door and Crispin was allowed to leave. He took several steps out to the street, stopped, and looked back. No one passed through the door to follow. A small mercy, he supposed.

  He retraced his steps back to Gutter Lane, and the sight of that ale stake jutting into the road made his heart leap with hope and the familiar. The wooden sign carved into the shape of a tusk, with its peeling paint, creaked back and forth with a gust. He pushed the door open and stood for a moment on the threshold, casting his gaze across the noisy tavern hall, looking for men who looked like they might be looking for him … when his eyes fell on Eleanor. A sudden squeeze to his heart propelled him in her direction. She was laughing with some men at a table, pouring their ale from a round-bellied jug, her sleeves rolled up to her chapped elbows. Her ash blonde hair escaped from her linen kerchief but she didn’t seem to notice it swaying before her flushed face. Her intent was on the men, and when one said something to her, she threw back her head and laughed.

  Crispin moved closer and stood above the table, simply looking at her.

  She pushed away that errant strand of hair at last, and then rested a hand on the shoulder of the man who had made her laugh, whispered something low to his ear, and was greeted with his laughter. A strange feeling, something like jealousy, rumbled in Crispin’s chest, but when her gaze lifted and beheld him, her genuine smile of affection dusted any other emotions away.

  ‘Crispin!’ she said, hurrying around the table. She enclosed him in a hug, and though he was not given to public displays of affection, he endured it without complaint. ‘You have an anxious look about you,’ she said, setting the jug on the table and pulling on his arm. She maneuvered him to his favorite spot before the fire, facing the door. ‘Wine?’

  He stopped her from shoving him to the bench and instead took both her hands to gaze at her critically. ‘Eleanor, are you all right?’

  ‘Eh? Why wouldn’t I be?’

  ‘Well, it was just …’ But it wasn’t her that had been abducted. They had gotten the wrong ‘Eleanor’ after all. He smiled. ‘All is well, then?’

  ‘Of course! Well, the price of wine is ruining us. That Flemish wine has flooded the market and I don’t know that we will recoup our own losses. We’ve had to lower our own prices accordingly, mind, which will no doubt cheer you, but other than that …’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it, Eleanor. About you and the wine.’ He lowered to the bench at last and clasped her hand. He couldn’t seem to let it go. Charmed, she sat beside him.

  ‘Crispin,’ she said quietly, ‘what vexes you?’ She looked pointedly at her hand in his. His face heated in embarrassment.

  ‘Sometimes, I worry over you. And Gilbert. You have rough clientele at times.’

  She laughed heartily at that and took back her hand. ‘Rough? These?’ Her gesture swept over the men and women who frequented the tavern. Perhaps they weren’t the best or richest merchants, and there were many who could barely pay for meat and drink – much like Crispin himself – but very few ever created trouble. And if in their drunken state they did, the other customers would soon set them to rights.

  He conceded it with a bow to his head. ‘At any rate, have a care.’

  ‘You must be involved in very sticky doings if you are warning us. And where is that young knave, Jack Tucker? I’ve seldom seen him out of your company.’

  The good feelings that warmed his chest turned suddenly cold. ‘Eleanor,’ he said quietly, confidentially. ‘He’s … he’s been seized by the king.’

  ‘What?’ she shrieked, earning Crispin’s cringing disapproval.

  ‘Eleanor!’ he hissed between clenched teeth.

  Heeding his warning, she leaned closer. Her voice dropped down in volume to match his. ‘By the saints! What mean you, Crispin?’

  Staring only at the scared wood of the table, he told the tale, punctuated now and then by Eleanor’s squeak of concern.

  ‘And there are men I am to meet here.’ His eyes flicked from table to table, looking for anyone who might be waiting for him to be alone.

  ‘Oh Crispin.’ She brought the hem of her napron to her wet eyes. ‘Poor Jack!’

  ‘Yes. So it is urgent I get on with it. Eleanor, your presence here might be a hindrance to that.’ His expression softened when he saw hers. ‘I’m sorry. I know you want to help …’

  She rose. ‘And I can best do that by staying out of your way.’ She reached down and squeezed his arm. ‘You’ll do it, Crispin. You shall. Never fear that. Jack’s fate is in good hands.’ With a stiff nod, she ambled away, but looked back worriedly over her shoulder.

  After sitting quietly, still surveying the room, Crispin saw Gilbert approach. He said nothing, but the concern in his eyes was easily readable. He set down a horn cup and alongside it a jug of wine. He nodded to Crispin and left him in peace. It had to have been the quietest exchange the two of them had ever made.

  Crispin shuffled closer to the table, grabbed the jug, and poured himself the dark Flemish wine. He took up the horn cup, gave the wine a sniff, and pleased with what he found, drank. He sat upright, not leaning his arms on the table as he was wont to do. In most instances at the Boar’s Tusk, his posture told all comers to leave him alone. But this time, he wanted to be approached. And yet, as open as he made himself, no one seemed inclined to do so.

  He poured more wine – relishing the sweetness of it against the Boar’s Tusk’s usual sharp fare – and watched the room under brooding brows. A half hour. An hour. Two. Plainly, no one was there who wanted to talk to him. Another false lead? Who was that man who had urged him to go to the Boar’s Tusk? Was that merely a misdirection?

  He mulled Findlaich’s words of warning. He had no doubt that these men were dangerous. They risked their necks under Richard’s eye to do this thing. If Richard even had an inkling Crispin was talking with them, he’d be thrown into a cell. McGuffin seemed genteel enough and claimed he wasn’t looking for the Stone, but could he be believed? And Findlaich had talked of others. These that had wanted to meet him at the Boar’s Tusk. Clearly, they were in competition with one another. But if Findlaich didn’t have the Stone, then it must be with this third group.

  ‘Fie on it,’ Crispin muttered and pushed away from the table. There was just the merest satisfying sottedness to his head from the wine when he rose that he left extra coins on the table. He left the alehouse without bidding his farewells to the Langtons. He w
as too tired for that. He felt as if he had run races in full armor. He’d start again tomorrow. He was in no mood or humor to think of any more solutions today.

  It wasn’t a long walk from the Boar’s Tusk to his lodgings on the Shambles. Martin Kemp, his tinker landlord was still at his work at the little table under the shelter of a propped-up shutter, even as the sun dipped toward the rooftops.

  He raised his face from his work with a smile. ‘Greetings, Crispin!’

  Crispin attempted a smile. ‘Martin.’

  ‘You’ve been quiet of late. You must be at another of your Tracker tasks, eh?’

  ‘Yes, I must be.’ He trudged toward the stairwell that hugged the side of the building.

  ‘While you were out, those men came by.’

  Crispin had just set his hand to the railing when he stopped. ‘“Those men”?’

  ‘Yes.’ He bent back to his work, delicately hammering nails flat against a tin patch on a pot. ‘They were naturally curious as to when you would return. I wanted to let them in to wait, as I am accustomed to doing, but Alice insisted they did not. Said that most trouble upstairs comes when I allow your clients in. I can’t say that she’s wrong.’

  ‘I think that was most prudent this time.’ And as much as I hate to say it, ‘Give my thanks to your … good wife.’

  Martin snapped his head up at that. ‘My … good wife? Dear me. Now I know trouble is afoot.’

  Crispin offered him a genuine smile. ‘Don’t worry, Martin. Only the usual amount, I should think.’

  As he trudged up the stairs, he noted silently that news of the Stone had yet to travel to the Shambles. Or at least Crispin and Jack’s involvement in it. But who were the men who had come to see him? It seemed that three factions were somehow involved, and none wanting anything to do with the other. Were these the errant ones that had not made an appearance at the Boar’s Tusk?

  Unlocking and pushing open the door revealed the cold, empty room, just as they had left it that morning. Crispin unbuckled his sword and hung it up on the peg by the door and likewise his dagger sheath. He stumped toward the hearth and knelt beside it. Poking the ashes aside, he searched for any amount of remaining kindling, found some sticks, and dragged them forward. He rose briefly to retrieve the tinder box, reached in, and got flint and steel to raise a spark on the tinder and bits of straw he had snatched from Jack’s straw pile. Soon a small fire was going.