I stopped, my heart beating fast as I waited for a sound, though what I was expecting I did not know. A rush of feet towards the door, perhaps; the chaplain’s voice? I heard none of that, only silence.
There was the slightest crack between the door and the frame, and I peered into it, into the darkness. No candle or lantern was lit, and it took some time before I could make out any forms, but then I saw the windows on the far side, with the moonlight filtering through the shutters, the hangings upon the wall. And ?lfwold himself, a woollen blanket wrapped around him as he lay on the great bed, his paunch rising and falling in steady rhythm.
Again I pushed. The door met with some resistance as it grated against the floor, but I could not let it make a noise and so I had to move it slowly, all the time fearing that one of the others would come upon me and wonder what I was doing there.
Eventually the gap was wide enough that I was able to squeeze through sideways, pressing my back against the frame and ducking my head; the doorway had been built for men much shorter than I.
Then at last I was inside. Still the chaplain did not rouse, nor make any sound at all. I closed the door behind me; I didn’t want anyone to see it lying ajar and think that there was something amiss.
I glanced about, taking in the whole of the chamber. The bed itself took up a large part of it: about six feet wide and almost as long, it was made for lords, with posts of a dark-coloured wood, intricately carved in a plant-like design, with leaves and stems and flowers all interwoven. In one corner of the room lay a small hearth; grey ash filled the grate. Another door led from this chamber, no doubt through to a private garderobe. Beneath the shuttered windows on the far side of the room stood a writing-desk, and there I saw what it was I had come for.
It was as I remembered it: the same size, with the same rough edges and bound with the same piece of leather. Lightly I stepped across to it, avoiding the chaplain’s saddlebag, which he had left at the foot of the bed, looking about to make sure that I was not confusing it with any other scroll that he might have had with him. I could see none. A single white goose-quill protruded from a wooden stand, beside a small dish filled with ink. Otherwise there was nothing on the desk. This had to be it.
I heard a low grunt and cast a glance over my shoulder as the priest twisted in his blanket. For a moment I thought he was about to open his eyes, but he did not; he settled facing the opposite direction, towards the door.
My heartbeat seemed to resound through my whole body; I could feel it thumping in my hands, my feet, my ears. When was the last time I had done something so reckless? But I wasn’t going to leave until I had what I’d come for.
I picked the vellum up, holding its ends between my palms, feeling its lightness, its dry crispness. This was it.
I swallowed. I hadn’t planned this far. Did I dare take it with me and return it later, or should I read it now? There was enough light here – as long as the moon did not go behind another cloud, at least – but the longer I stayed, the more of a risk I was taking. But at the same time, if I took it away, I had to be sure that I could get it back before the chaplain noticed. Which meant I would have to do all of this again.
I gave another glance towards the chaplain, but he appeared soundly asleep. Breathing slowly, I started to untie the leather string. It was fastened with a simple knot, and once I had worked free one strand, the rest came easily. Then, holding my breath, I began to unroll it.
And felt a lurch of despair in my stomach. For where I was expecting to find line after line of delicately scripted black letters, there was nothing. At the bottom of the page was Malet’s seal in red wax – a delicately scripted initial ‘M’, with vines climbing and weaving between its legs – but above it, nothing.
Perhaps the chaplain had switched the scroll with another – but why would he have done that? Or else the one I was after was in this room somewhere. Yet it looked every bit the same; it had to be the one.
I squinted at the page, angling it into the faint slats of moonlight shining through the shutter, and as I unfurled the final few inches, a rush of excitement came over me. I saw two simple words, written in Latin, in a shaky hand: one that I presumed must have been Malet’s own, for no scribe could have prided himself on such work.
‘Tutus est.’
That was all it said. I read it again, to make sure that I had understood it all, even turning it over to see if there was anything on the other side that I had missed. There wasn’t. Those two words were all there were.