The Gallows Curse

Day of the New Moon,

April 1211



Yew - Mortals do not sit in its shade, nor place their beehives near it, lest the bees make poisoned honey. Nor do they drink from a bowl of its wood.

For those who would use a yew sprig in magic, the sprig must be not owned, bought or begged, but stolen in secret from a graveyard. If a maid would dream of her future husband, she must sleep with the stolen sprig under her pillow. If a mortal loses anything which is dear to him, he must hold a branch of yew before him as he walks and the yew will lead him to that which he seeks. When it is close upon the thing that is lost, the yew branch will wriggle in his hand as if he held a serpent.

For in the wood of the yew the spirits of the earth, both malicious and benevolent, may be bound fast and imprisoned for a hundred years.

The Mandrake's Herbal





The Quickening



The tiny room is crowded with pots, baskets and dyed linen strips hanging from the rafters. She impatiently tears down the cloth and kicks the boxes aside. She is looking for a cradle, but there isn't one. She is determined to find the child. How dare they try to keep it hidden from her? The wail grows louder. The source is only inches away, but still she can't see it, nothing but a stack of baskets covered with cloths like those hanging all around. As she stares, one of the baskets trembles. Did they really think such a foolish hiding place would conceal the brat? She jerks the cloth from the basket.

The infant blinks up at her in the sudden light, but it hasn't got the sense to stay quiet. It's messed itself. It lies wallowing in its own stench and excrement. Its face screws up and it bawls. It doesn't even look human, an animal, vermin, a stinking demon from the foul filth of hell. She seizes its ankles and jerks it up out of the basket; for a moment the child dangles from her fist, wriggling and writhing like a fish dragged from the river, then, as if it is a fish, she swings it violently, dashing its head against the stone wall. The silence is instant.

She stands quite still, watching the great splash of scarlet blood running down the white wall. The baby hangs limply from her hands, its eyes and mouth wide open, frozen. Then she notices for the first time that the baby's eyes are blue, deep and lucent as the waters of the ocean. They are the eyes of an angel.





Elena arched her back, trying to ease the ache of it, but her belly was so heavy she almost toppled backwards off the keg on which she squatted and had to press her hand on the wall of the dairy to steady herself.

The land was too wet from a week of heavy rain for any good to come from working in the fields, so Marion had rounded up some of the women to help with the work in the dairy. For most of the year the three dairymaids could milk the cows, feed the calves and piglets, and make butter and cheese. But now, with all the calves being weaned and the cows in full milk, extra hands were sorely needed.

Elena's belly was too big even to allow her to grasp the paddle of the butter churn at the right angle, and her ankles were too swollen for her to stand on them all day, so she was left to sit and fill the stomach bag of a newly killed bull-calf with water infused with boiled blackthorn and herbs to produce the rennet needed for cheese-making. It was greasy, messy work and her skirts were already soaked, but she made no complaint.

There was an indignant wail in the doorway and Joan, Athan's mother, marched in, struggling to hold the black dairy cat in her arms. The cat knew from experience what was coming and was trying to claw his way to freedom, but Joan had a firm grip on the scruff of his neck. One of the dairymaids grabbed the poor creature's tail and, parting the fur, searched for white hairs beneath the black. She took hold of a pinchful of hairs and yanked them out. The cat screeched. With a frantic wriggle it leapt out of Joan's arms and raced out of the dairy as if the hounds of hell were in pursuit.

The dairymaid circled the room, dropping three white hairs from the black cat's tail in each of the shallow stone troughs in which the milk had been left to separate. As every woman knew, the cat's hairs would help the cream to rise and counter any mischief evil spirits might have wrought. And it was well they did, for Gastmere abounded in evil-wishers, both spirit and human, just waiting for a chance to cause trouble.

'Has the fire been salted yet?' the dairymaid asked Joan, winking at the other women. They exchanged sly grins. She already knew the answer and was only asking to tease Joan.

Joan's chin tilted up with evident pride. 'Of course, I always do it first thing, before any other work is begun, else nothing will go right. You needn't fret that anything'll go amiss while I'm here.'

According to Joan, no one, not even the dairymaids, knew better than her the charms which would keep witches from spoiling the cheese or preventing the butter coming. And no one was more diligent in ensuring that such precautions were taken. As Elena had discovered, living under the same roof as her mother-in-law for these past four months, Joan had every reason to fear the evil eye, for there wasn't a man, woman or child in Gastmere who hadn't smarted under the lash of her tongue and cursed her under their breath.

Elena saw her mother-in-law casting her sharp little eyes about the dairy, and tried to shrink back out of sight, but with a belly as great as hers it was impossible to make herself invisible. Joan spotted her and pushed through the women towards her. Her lips were pursed as tight as the cat's arse- hole before she even reached Elena.

Shrinking from whatever spiteful remark she knew was already in Joan's mouth, Elena's grip faltered and the greasy calf's stomach slipped out of her swollen fingers and plunged to the floor, where all the liquid gushed out over her shoes. Elena tried to struggle off the keg to retrieve it, but Joan snatched it up.

'Such a wicked waste! The stomach can only be filled six times afore its juice is too weak to use. And you've already lost the first and strongest filling through your clumsiness.'

Marion took the stomach from Joan's hand and deftly poured more blackthorn water into it.

'Stop mithering the poor lass, Joan. There's no harm done, bag's not even been put to soak yet.' She winked at Elena, who smiled gratefully.

Joan's face flushed with indignation.

But Marion ignored her. 'How goes it, lass? You bearing up? Not long to go now, I'm thinking. Last weeks are always the worst, but it'll be worth it when you hold your own babe in your arms. You'll be cursing your Athan to Norwich and back when the pains are on you, but the moment they put that bairn to your breast you'll not remember a thing about sore backs or birth pains, isn't that so, girls?'

The other women smiled, murmuring their agreement.

'But you make the most of these last weeks, lass,' Marion said. 'Once the bairn comes, that'll be the end of a good night's sleep for years to come, 'cause even when they're weaned, they'll still keep you awake worrying about them.'

'My poor son hasn't had a good night's sleep since that girl moved in with us,' Joan snapped, still smarting from Marion's intervention.

Marion raised her eyebrows, grinning. 'Is that right? Keeping his pike well oiled are you, lass? Good for you.'

'No she is not!' Joan spluttered furiously. 'In her condition, I'd never allow it. I know my duty to protect my grandchild, even if its own mother doesn't. No, it's her dreams keeping us all awake. Night after night, moaning in her sleep. I've scarcely been able to close my eyes these past months. It's a miracle I've not been driven to my grave.'

'Bad dreams, is it, lass?' Marion asked sympathetically. 'Every woman gets those, 'specially with the first one.'

'Not like hers,' Joan said tardy. 'Same dream over and over she gets, or so she says. She hears her baby crying and goes to pick him up, only he won't stop so she dashes his brains out.'

Several women gasped and spat three times on their forefingers to ward off the evil that might follow such words, and even Marion looked troubled.

For a moment no one spoke, then Marion said with a forced cheerfulness, 'I used to dream I'd put the baby down in the field and when I came back he'd turned into a mushroom, with eyes and a mouth bawling fit to bust. Put me in mind of the lad's father, dead spit of him, now I think on it.'

Several of the women chuckled. Every one of Marion's brood had a different father, but none of them ever stayed around long enough to discover they had offspring.

'I dreamed I dropped mine in the wash pool,' one of the other women said. 'Sometimes I wish I had. Might have knocked some sense into the little brat.'

The women murmured their heartfelt agreement. Her son was the torment of the village. His mother wore herself out with scolding him, but if anyone ever went to her cottage to complain about him, she stood up for him more fiercely than any sow-badger defending her cubs.

Marion nudged Joan with her elbow. 'You had dreams too when you were carrying your Athan. I remember you telling me. Didn't you dream you baked your babe into a pie thinking it to be a hare?'

The women exchanged sly grins and Joan flushed. 'Maybe I did, but I've never harmed so much as a hair on my dear boy's head.'

That wasn't entirely true and the whole of Gastmere knew it. Athan could still painfully recall the sting of his mother's switch which she had wielded vigorously on numerous occasions, whenever she fancied he was in danger of turning out like his feckless father.

'There, you see,' Marion said, patting Elena's shoulder heartily, 'every woman has these strange fancies when they're with child, and nothing comes of it.'

Elena smiled wanly, and tried to look reassured, but she was grateful when one of the maids called out that the milk was ready for churning. At once all the women set about their tasks and soon the steady slap-slap of the churn paddles filled the small building.

When Elena had confided her fears to Athan, he too had agreed that the dream signified nothing, although later when they were alone he had whispered to Elena that perhaps his mother had been right after all and they should not have made love in her condition. No doubt that was what was causing the night terrors. But Elena was not convinced by any of the women's tales. She had never in her life dreamed anything that seemed so real to her.

Ever since the first night she had used the mandrake and seen the end of the dream, she had tried repeatedly to dream it again, praying each night that it would end differently this time. She had become obsessed by the dream. Even in daylight she could think of little else. Days began to drag by as she waited impatiently for the night to come again. She was terrified by the dream yet, like someone with a sore tooth who can't leave it alone, she convinced herself she had to try again, and again. This time, this night it would be different. Once more, just once more, and it would surely change, it had to.

Even if she had not been pregnant, Elena could never have brought herself to make love to Athan with his mother in the same room, but neither could she persuade Athan to make love to her in the barns or fields, after she revealed her nightmare. However, she quickly came to learn that no matter how faithful men are when they are awake, they are helpless in their sleep. That wanton temptress, the night-hag Lilith, came often to Athan and seduced him in his dreams, so that Elena would waken to find the milk seed she needed was already spilling from him. She had learned how to steal a few drops, gently catching them on her fingers so as not to wake him, and slipping out of bed whilst Athan and his mother were still snoring in unison.

Day after day she fed the mandrake, and night after night she was rewarded with the same dream until she knew beyond any doubt or reasoning that she would murder the baby she was carrying in her belly, though how or why she did not understand. Perhaps she would do it in a moment of madness or hatred or revulsion, for she felt all those things in her dreams. But one thing she knew for certain, whatever Marion, Athan or Joan said, she would not be able to stop herself. There was nothing she could do. She would kill her own son, because she had already seen herself do it.





Raoul was feeling distinctly uneasy. Osborn had retired to the solar with Hugh and dismissed all his men, save Raoul, to talk, it seemed, about the manor. At least, that was how the conversation had started, but Raoul had spent enough time at court to know that just as a viper may lie hidden in a basket of roses, so the most innocent remark can conceal a deadly trap.

Osborn leaned back in the carved chair which creaked in protest at his weight.

'Do you really imagine I want to spend days kicking my heels in this midden? Why do you think John gave me Gastmere? It wasn't for my own amusement. He knows half the barons in the land are plotting rebellion against him and he wants the land in the hands of loyal men he can trust, strong men who can put down any sign of discontent.'

Raoul still couldn't see where this conversation was leading. To cover his confusion, he rose and refilled his goblet from the flagon on the side table. He glanced towards the casement of the solar where Hugh was standing gazing morosely out at the rain which was falling harder than ever. Even though he had his back to Raoul, it was plain from his hunched shoulders that he was sulking. Hugh considered a day without hunting or hawking was a day completely wasted. Raoul hadn't known either of the brothers long, but he'd spent enough time with Hugh to realize that hunting was the only thing that filled his head, whether he was awake or asleep.

Osborn's eyes narrowed. 'John gave me this land, because I am one of the few men he trusts, so the question is, Raoul, what does John think to gain by sending you here?'

Raoul flinched. So that was it. Osborn wasn't stupid, far from it, and he'd been long enough in the service of kings to know that when a monarch invites you to take one of his courtiers into your service, it isn't to teach him table manners.

There was little to be gained by lying to Osborn, not that Raoul wasn't a master of fabrication. You didn't claw your way up to becoming one of the king's favourites without learning a few useful skills. But he suspected Osborn had already half guessed the truth and he couldn't afford to alienate him by letting him think he was being treated as a fool.

Raoul wandered back to the long table and sat down on one of the benches opposite Osborn.

'You know that ever since the Interdict was pronounced the Pope has made no secret of the fact that he was backing the cause of Philip of France against John?'

'The Pope has no right to try to impose his cardinal on an English Church!' Osborn snapped. 'Now he thinks to plot with England's enemies.'

Yes, yes.' Raoul waved a long, elegant hand. 'But the Pope argues that John is Philip's vassal and John did wage war against Philip in Aquitaine.'

'Aquitaine belongs to John; it was his mother's land. We fought to take back what was stolen from England.' Osborn swung forward in his chair and glared at Raoul. But Raoul had faced worst tempers than Osborn's.

'No one doubts your loyalty, my lord,' he said calmly. 'But every day John is receiving reports that England is swarming with Philip's spies who are reporting back on where and how he might best land his army. Now John has learned Philip is planning to send agents provocateurs to stir up the population to fight for him when he does land, as well as envoys who will try to persuade the rebel English barons to side with France.'

'Does John think I would side with France, after all I did for him in Aquitaine?' Osborn burst out furiously. He leapt from his chair and paced up and down the room. 'It was my skill and experience that helped him capture the castle at Montauban. It was me who ordered the escaping rebels to be hunted down before they could join forces with Philip's men.'

'I can swear to that,' Hugh said, turning back from the window, having at last been distracted from the rain. 'I served with my brother and I can assure you there was not a rebel left alive when we were done. We even rooted out those who'd gone to ground in the monastery, and then burned the monastery to ashes as a lesson to teach all of Aquitaine what happens to men who rebel against their lord. It was my brother who gave the orders and taught John's subjects the duty they owed to their king. There's not a man more loyal to John than Osborn.'

'Which is exactly why John put this manor in his hands,' Raoul said, trying to keep the note of exasperation from his voice. Hugh praised his brother more often than a love-sick maid extols her swain, but then Hugh didn't have a thought in his head that Osborn hadn't put there.

Raoul turned back to Osborn. 'This is the part of England he fears for the most. The sea voyage from France to Norfolk is many days longer and more dangerous than the voyage across to the southern ports, and for that very reason most of John's advisers believe that Philip will try to land the bulk of his troops in the south. But there are some who believe that the spies are not being landed through the southern ports; they are too closely guarded. Anyone being put ashore in these parts could dissolve into the marshland mists in the blink of an eye, but they would have to have a contact here. No stranger could find their way through the marshes alone and they'd need someone who could help them find the people they want to meet. John believes . . .' Raoul hesitated, then decided he might as well tell all. 'John believes that there Is a traitor in these parts, perhaps even in this manor. He sent me to root him out.'

Hugh's hand jerked so violently that it sent Raoul's goblet spinning down on to one of the silk rugs. Hugh ignored the dark red puddle of wine sinking into it.

'The gelding! I knew it. I never trusted him. Raffaele's a foreigner; he's bound to side with England's enemies. What else can you expect but cowardly treachery from a man who isn't even a real man at all? You should dismiss him at once, brother.'

Raoul shook his head. 'No, if it is him, we need to keep him close till we have proof. Dismiss no one, whatever your suspicions. Sooner or later they will show their hand, and when they do, God have mercy on their souls, for John will show no mercy to their miserable bodies.'

But heaven knows when that will be, Raoul thought bitterly, for the truth was that however confidently he had assured John he could discover the traitor, he had no more idea how to go about it than of how to bake a pie or wash a shirt. So far, he'd discovered precisely nothing. Even if the traitor was Master Raffaele, how on earth did one set about getting him, or anyone for that matter, to betray themselves? One could hardly walk up to the fellow and ask him outright. Raoul only hoped that now he knew, Osborn would do the job for him ... oh, and, of course, leave Raoul to claim the credit.





Day of the Full Moon,

May 1211



Beans - a distillation of the bean plant when drunk will make a plain woman beautiful. If a mortal has warts, he rubs the wart on the lining of a bean case then buries it. As it rots, so will the wart fall from his skin.

But the scent of a bean flower will cause evil dreams and if any should fall asleep in a bean field he will suffer terrifying visions and after go mad. And if one bean in a row should come up white, then there will be a death in the household of he who planted it.

Beans must be eaten at funerals to keep the ghosts of the dead from lingering about the living. And the dried pods are rattled to drive away evil spirits.

In ancient times, when a human sacrifice was chosen, lots were drawn and the one who drew the black bean from the pot of white beans, drew forth his own death. What think you then: does death lie in his own hand to choose, or do his fingers reach for it because it is ordained they must?



The Mandrake's Herbal





Birth and Death



'No, no, take it away. I don't want to hold it.' Elena turned her l ace away from the bundle Gytha was holding out to her, and stared at the rough wattle wall.

'Bless you, the bairn's not an it,' Gytha chuckled. 'You've a boy, a beautiful, healthy boy, just like I told you. He's a mite on the scrawny side, babies born at green mist time always are, but he'll fatten up nicely on your milk once you get some good fresh meat inside you.'

Elena's mother-in-law, Joan, sniffed disparagingly. 'It's well known May's the unluckiest month to birth a bairn. You'll never rear a May baby, that's what my mother always said; too sickly. If Athan had listened to me —'

'Hush! Don't be telling the poor lass that,' Marion muttered, but Elena could see from her anxious expression she agreed with every word.

Her mother-in-law's tiny cottage was heaving with women. Her own mother, together with Joan, Marion, Gytha and two clucking neighbours, all bustled over her where she lay in the single room. Elena felt as if she was a small child again, lost among the legs and wheels of the crowded market place.

She lay on the beaten earth floor, her arms and legs too heavy to move. Her mother still supported her against her chest as she dabbed away at Elena's sweaty forehead with a rag, making little crooning noises as if Elena was herself a newborn again. Elena's buttocks were sore and numb from pressing against the hard, cold floor.

When the pains had come hard upon her, the women had hauled her off the low bed, scraped back the rushes and, pulling her shift up to her breasts, laid her bare loins against the cold, damp earth, so that she could take strength from Mother Earth from whence all men spring. It was how Gastmere women had given birth for generations and even Elena knew better than to protest against it. Now she was desperate to return to the bed, to curl up with her pain and misery and shut them all out, but she was too exhausted to drag herself there.

'Come on, my sweeting,' Gytha coaxed. 'I know you're worn out, but just let the bairn suckle, then you can sleep. He needs his mam's first milk. I'll help you hold him if you're afeared of dropping the mite.'

Gytha tried to push the mewling infant towards Elena, but she lifted her arm, warding him off as if he was a stick raised to beat her.

'Get him away from me,' she sobbed. 'I don't want him. I don't want to look at him.'

The women gasped and spat on their fingers to ward off the evil that would surely follow her words.

'That's a wicked thing to say,' her mother scolded, pinching Elena hard on the arm, as she used to do when Elena was a child and shamed her mother by misbehaving in front of the neighbours. 'Do you want to tempt the faerie folk to take him and leave you a changeling?'

She glanced over at the empty cradle into which Gyth had already laid a mistletoe twig and sprinkled salt to prevent the faeries from abducting the child.

'I do, I do, I want them to take him,' Elena wailed.

Her mother gasped in horror, crossing herself and moaning, 'Mary the Holy Mother and all the saints defend us. She doesn't know what she's saying'

Gytha rapped Elena sharply three times on the mouth. 'Don't speak so, they'll hear you and take him.'

Joan pursed her lips. 'I knew it! I knew she'd never make a good mother. I warned Athan, but did he listen? You should have heard some of the wicked things she was saying before the poor lamb was even born. It was enough to mark the babe in her belly for life. It's a wonder he hasn't come out with two heads and a tail.'

'She'll feel different when she feels the bairn pull on her teats,' a neighbour said soothingly. She patted Joan's shoulder as if to comfort her for the distress of having such an unnatural daughter-in-law.

Although the women had wiped the baby, Elena could still smell the stench of birth mucus and her own blood on him. They wouldn't wash him with water. Never wash a child's hands until he's a year old, else he'll not be able to gather any wealth. Joan had kept reminding her of that and a hundred more commandments besides in these past few months, as if that would somehow allay Elena's fears about the child she was carrying.

But nothing could do that. The mandrake had done all that Gytha promised. It had shown her the end of her dream, and she was certain now, as she had been for weeks, that she was destined to murder her own child.

Elena lay on the cold floor as Gytha scrubbed the blood and mucus from her thighs with a hank of straw.

Her mother-in-law came bustling back into the cottage carrying a small pestle. 'I've just been to tell my bees there's a new babe in the family. Now we must smear her paps with honey and butter. Should be the first thing the poor bairn tastes, so the bees'll lend him strength and sweeten his nature.'

Elena felt the front of her sodden shift being pulled open. She tried to push them away, but her mother firmly held her hands, as her mother-in-law roughly anointed her sore breasts with a sticky mess of honey and butter.

'Butter to bless him with good health. And honey to keep the poor mite from the faeries.' Joan shook her head grimly as she said it, as if the precaution would be quite unnecessary if Elena hadn't so wantonly tempted the evil ones.

They held Elena tightly so that she couldn't push the child away. She felt the tiny face held against her breast, the warmth of the cheek, the nuzzling, then the soft lips fastening on her nipple. The hot little mouth pulling at her sent waves first of pain then of pleasure through her, like Athan had done that very first night. She felt her body relaxing towards this tiny, warm little bundle pressing into her bare belly. She pulled her arms free and cradled her son in her arms, as her resolve not to touch him melted away like butter in the sun.

But even in that moment as she fell hopelessly in love with her precious baby, even then, she heard herself screaming, 'No, no, I mustn't. I mustn't hold him. I'll hurt him, I know I will. I will kill him. I will murder my own little son.'





Raffe squinted up at the cold grey sky through the newly leafed branches of the trees. Thick clouds were tumbling across the flattened land and the light was beginning to fade. From his vantage point on the small rise he could see the cog-ship rolling at its anchor in the haven of Breydon Water. Wriggling forward, he peered down into the marshes that fringed the edge of the solid land, but could see nothing moving among the tall rushes. He didn't really expect to, a dozen little boats could have been hidden in the deep marsh gullies and you'd never see them until they emerged into the' open waters of the bay.

'They'll not stir till it's good 'n' dark,' a voice growled behind him.

Raffe whipped round and was mortified to hear a deep chuckle. He hadn't heard Talbot creep up on him. The old soldier's legs were bowed as a barrel hoop, but he could still move as quietly as an assassin.

Talbot, his hood pulled low over his craggy face, shuffled his backside into the shelter of the trees next to where Raffe lay. By way of a greeting he punched Raffe on the arm with his great fist.

'I remember a time when you'd have had a knife across my throat afore I got within a lance's blow of you.'

'I knew you were there, you great ape,' Raffe lied. You make such a racket, they will have heard you coming out on the Santa Katarina.' He jerked his head towards the cog-ship out in the bay.

They'd known each other for twenty years, but the old rogue hadn't changed since they'd first met at Acre. Talbot had been a sapper, one of the worst jobs in the Crusaders' army. Sappers burrowed under the walls of the city and lit fires beneath the stones to weaken the walls to make them collapse, while the defenders in the city hurled down any weapon they could on to their heads. And the Saracens would tunnel towards them from inside the city. If they met, the two sides would fight each other in the pitch darkness of those narrow tunnels. You had to be as tough and fearless as a mountain lion to survive that, and Talbot was.

Raffe grinned affectionately at him. 'But I didn't think to see you here. Your lads impatient for their money, are they?'

Talbot bridled indignantly, 'I came to watch your back, Bullock. If the marsh-men catch you spying on them and their cargo, your miserable carcass'll be lying at the bottom of some bog pool afore you can utter a curse. Whereas I can tell them you're a just a poor simple clod who wouldn't know his own arse if I wasn't there to kick it. They've only got to look at you to see the truth of that.'

If any other man had said as much to Raffe he would have laid him out cold, but instead he merely grinned. What Talbot couldn't fight his way out of with his great fists he could talk his way out of, at least with ordinary men. He wasn't quite so skilled in talking his way out of trouble with the nobility. Back in the Holy Land, Talbot would have found himself swinging from the gallows, hanged by his own commander, If it hadn't been for Raffe. It was the kind of debt that forged an instant and eternal friendship between the most unlikely of strangers.

And Raffe had known he could rely on Talbot to get him word when the Santa Katarina was sighted off the coast. He had a network of street urchins and boatmen who knew every inch of the river from Norwich to Yarmouth. A dog couldn't fart in Yarmouth without Talbot getting wind of it in Norwich. Through this web of rogues, Talbot could obtain anything that a man could pay for, though it was wisest not to enquire as to the source, that is, if you wanted to keep your guts safely in your belly.

'Any sign of this man you're looking for?' Talbot asked.

'Not yet, but he'll be here. As soon as I discover who the traitor is, I'll swear on oath to the sheriff in Norwich about what I heard him say and he'll be in chains within the day. With luck this night's work will rid us of Osborn too. John is bound to take the manor back from him, once this traitor is arrested. After all, a lord who doesn't even possess the wit to discover that his own men are plotting treason is hardly- competent to have oversight of the king's lands. And John will take it very ill, that Osborn has allowed this rebellion to fester under his roof.'

Talbot squinted at him. 'Way I see it, you wanted rid of that bastard Osborn from the outset, so why didn't you tell what you knew straightway? If you heard this man so plainly, how is it you didn't recognize the voice? Even if you didn't; know it then, you've surely heard it since.'

Raffe hesitated. He wouldn't trust Talbot with a clipped farthing if money was involved, but he would wager his life on the man's ability to keep his own counsel.

'If you want the truth I didn't hear what was said. It was a girl in the manor, a villein, she reported it to me. But she thinks one of the men may have seen her, glimpsed her anyway. If he's still at liberty when he discovers that he was overheard, her life wouldn't be worth the dirt on his shoe. That's why I need proof before I can act. I'll tell the sheriff I heard what was said, and I won't need to mention her.'

'So you'd lie for this lass,' Talbot grinned. 'Pretty, is she?'

'I'd lie to save a life,' Raffe snapped. 'And we both know it wouldn't be the first time I've done that, don't we?'





Mortals are strange creatures; they cling to life even when that life is nothing but pain and misery, yet they will throw awaytheir lives for a word, an idea, even a flag. Wolves piss to mark their territory. Smell the stench of another pack and wolves will quietly slink away. Why risk a fight when it might maim or kill you? But humans will slash and slaughter in their thousands to plant their little piece of cloth on a hill or hang it from a battlement. We mandrakes can give them victory, but on whom shall we bestow it? For both sides will pronounce their own cause just. And which is the brave man and who is the traitor? You must choose; we mandrakes never do. We simply give them both what in their hearts they truly crave — the illusion of a glorious death, which the poor fools imagine is immortality.

You don't believe me. Let me show you. Two old soldiers lying side by side on the hill watch the little ship bobbing out in the bay. The sailors on the ship watch the shore. They all wait impatiently for the blessed cloak of darkness to cover their wretched little deeds, but the sun will not be hurried by the whims of men.





The cog-ship shuddered as the racing tide twisted her against her anchor ropes. Hunched under the castle of the ship, Faramond shivered miserably in the wet wind, which had grown sharper as the light began to fade across the Norfolk marshes. Although they were sheltered from the great ocean waves behind the sandy island of Yarmouth, the lurching of the ship seemed even worse now that they were at anchor. The three rivers raced into the basin of water and the sea tide pushed hard against them, creating a turbulence that felt more violent than any at sea.

Faramond tried to shuffle downwind of the breeze which blew charcoal smoke and the stench of pickled pork across his face, but he could not leave the safety of the shadows in the ship's stern and the best he could do to escape the nauseating stench was pull his cloak over his mouth and nose. As soon as the Santa Katarina had come within sight of the English coast, the five Frenchmen had been forced to spend the daylight hours squatting in the stern under the castle of the ship, well out of sight. Even had they dressed in the thin, patched clothes of the sailors, a casual observer would see from the way they staggered like newborn calves across the rolling deck that they were not accustomed to life at sea.

The captain cursed as he struggled to reach round the huddle of men to grab a coil of rope.

'How much longer must we sit here?' one of the men grumbled loudly.

The captain grabbed him by the shoulder. 'I told you, keep your mouth shut. Sound travels across water.' He squinted over to the horizon where the pale sun was sinking beneath the waves. 'Be a while yet before we get the sign, they'll not risk crossing open water till it's good and dark. So you'd best settle down and get some sleep. It'll be the last chance you'll have to close your eyes tonight. Once you're on the move, your head will think your eyelids have been hacked off.'

Another man grasped his shirt and whispered, 'They will come tonight, you're sure of this?'

'God's bollocks, those sons of bitches had better be here. I I'm not hanging around with you lot on board, that I can promise you.'

The man's eyes narrowed with anxiety. 'But if something happens to prevent —'

'They'll be here,' the captain said firmly, as if he was trying to pacify a child. 'They'll have had watchers posted ever since we sighted land. They'll not risk leaving us here longer than they have to.'

He edged away and strode rapidly towards the bow, as if trying to put as much distance as possible between him and his unwelcome cargo.

The men made pretence at closing their eyes, but Faramond knew they could no more sleep than he could. It was not just the stiffness of their bodies, the hard boards and the cold keeping them awake; God knows they were used to worse than that. No, what would not let them rest was the fear of what might happen in the next few hours, days and weeks. They'd had plenty of time to think during the voyage, and imagine too — imagine just what could happen to a man trapped in a foreign land among his mortal enemies. Approach the wrong person or betray yourself by the wrong word and death would be the least of your troubles.

It was not for nothing that King John of Anjou was known far and wide as the worst of the Devil's brood. Rumour abounded in France that John had ordered Hubert de Burgh to castrate his sixteen-year-old nephew, Arthur, the rightful heir to Anjou, and to gouge out his eyes as the lad lay chained and starving to death in John's dungeon at Falaise. And when Hubert had refused, John had brought the boy to his castle at Rouen and kept him imprisoned there. One night at Easter, when John was drunk after dinner, he had slain his nephew with his own hand and, tying a weighty stone to the corpse, had cast it into the River Seine. If a man could so cruelly plot the murder of his own kin, the exquisite torture he might devise for a French spy, before death mercifully released the victim, was beyond any normal man's imagination.

And Faramond and his companions would be depending for their very lives on strangers whose loyalty was at best dubious, for hadn't they already betrayed their own king? A man who might have been on your side yesterday could just as easily betray you tomorrow. Some men change their allegiances swifter than birds in flight change direction.

Yet, as Faramond had tried so hard to convince his beloved wife, this was a just war, a noble cause to depose a wicked tyrant. Even the Pope had denounced him. Any man who rid the world of King John, an enemy of God and the Holy Mother Church, would be assured of the papal blessing. Of course, the Pontiff had not said as much in so many words, but his meaning was clear to all, and thus it followed that any man who helped to depose this tyrant would be blessed by God Himself.

Faramond had repeated these arguments to himself as he lay awake on the tossing ship, retching over and over again. God was on their side. And now, sick with fear at what the coming hours would hold, he tried to remind himself of that again, but he knew all the tricks of rhetoric and he could not convince himself this was God's work as easily as he could persuade others. All he could think of, as he sat shivering on that deck, was capture, humiliation, torture and then . . .

St Julian and all the saints, I beseech you protect me. He patted at the front of his tunic, feeling for the small silver reliquary containing a tiny fragment of the bone of St Julian of Brioude pinned beneath a piece of polished rock crystal. His wife had sold all the jewels she owned to buy the relic, so desperate was she to keep her husband safe.

One of the deckhands who had been keeping watch frantically beckoned to the captain, who was at his side in an instant, peering out towards the land. It was dark now and only the tiny red rubies of flame strung across the rise above the marshes marked out the village fires. The deckhand was pointing at something out on the marsh, and the captain nodded. He raised a lantern, allowing the light to shine out over the rail before lowering it hastily, repeating the signal several times in quick succession.

Then, sidling across to where Faramond and the other men sat, he shook the nearest man awake.

'Boats are on their way. So be ready to move quickly. And not a sound, not till they tell you it's safe. The marsh has many ears.'

As quietly as they could, Faramond and the others fastened their cloaks ready, and checked for the hundredth time that their scrips and bundles were securely fastened. They were travelling light, no papers, only a few spare clothes, and a bite or two to eat. They carried nothing which could slow them down if they had to run, except the round flat silver ingots strapped to their chests inside their shirts. Those were cumbersome, and already chafing the skin. But they were indispensable; men would have to be paid and paid well.

The captain, motioning them to keep low, beckoned them across to the gap in the rail, where a rope ladder was already being rolled out. Faramond was so stiff from the cold he could hardly stand up, never mind keep his balance on the rolling deck. In the end he dropped to his knees and crawled across it. Reaching the safety of the rail, he crouched, peering through the gap.

As his eyes accustomed themselves to the darkness, he saw three shapes below moving across the water towards the ship. He couldn't hear the oars of the little craft entering the water above the noise of wind singing through the rigging of the ship and the constant slapping of the waves against her hold. But the oarsmen were plainly skilled at their craft and that knowledge at least gave him comfort.

His stomach had tightened so much it hurt. He glanced over the rail. The rope ladder was flapping wildly against the boat each time she yawed. It seemed a very long way down. In the darkness, it looked as if the ship was riding upon a vast mass of writhing black maggots feeding on some gigantic beast that lay dead beneath. Faramond shivered, and not just from the cold.

The first of the boats was drawing alongside. A man was standing up at the back of the craft, rowing with a single oar that he rocked from side to side, trying to bring the little boat level so that the man in the bow could catch the rope from the ship. Just as the deckhand was about to toss it down to him, there was a sudden sharp pip-pip-pip call like that of a plover from the boat behind. Then Faramond saw to his alarm that just as swiftly as they had drawn alongside, the boats were retreating back into the darkness.

'Wait, where are you going?' Faramond yelled, completely forgetting the captain's warning for silence, but the captain was standing transfixed, staring up the haven towards the channel between the island of Yarmouth and the mainland.

He began barking orders. Before he realized what was happening, Faramond felt himself in the grip of powerful hands, being forced towards an open hatch.

'Get in there, hide, hide!'

He was pushed down the rickety wooden ladder with such force that he lost his footing half-way down and fell, landing in thick, slimy water. It was only a foot or so deep, but the planks beneath were so slippery he couldn't get a footing to stand up. For a moment he thought the fall had blinded him for he had rarely known such complete darkness, but he could hear the curses of his companions as they splashed around him in the filth. A foul stench engulfed him, making him choke. It was as if he had been thrown into a lake of rotten eggs. The air was rasping in his chest as he struggled to breathe. Then he heard the grating over his head being pushed back into place.

A voice that he recognized as the captain's yelled down, 'If you want to live, keep as still and quiet as dead men. There's a ship, one of King John's, bearing straight for us. If they board us . . .'

If the captain said more, Faramond didn't hear him, for a wooden hatch was slammed down on top of the grate and they heard the bolts being shot home.

The men in the hold did as they were bid: despite the misery of sitting in the freezing water, they instantly ceased splashing about trying to stand. The water sloshed back and forth over their backs as the ship rolled, and the crashing of the waves breaking on the wooden hull outside reverberated through the darkness. Above them they could hear shouts and bellowed commands, but the thick wood of the deck muffled the sound. Faramond was aware of the noisy gulping of the others around him, their lungs aching from the struggle to breathe through the gas that rose from the stinking water.

Then something heavy grated against the timbers of the hull. Had the ship caught up with them? Were the king's soldiers leaping aboard, prepared to search every foot of the Santa Katarina? Despite the captain's warning, Faramond crawled through the stinking water, feeling his way cautiously towards the hull, where no light would fall on him if the hatch was opened. Around him he could hear the others doing the same, cursing under their breath as their hands and limbs were grazed on the rough beams of the ship.

They were listening hard for the sounds of feet above them, boxes being overturned or arguments breaking out, but they could hear nothing above the sound of the water, not even voices. Perhaps the captain had managed to persuade the king's men that the barrels of wine and other stores on the deck were all the cargo he carried. It was so dark that Faramond's eyeballs hurt as he strained to see into the blackness above, searching desperately for that first crack of light that might give them warning the hatch was being opened.

Then he saw it, a line of orange so bright and yet so thin he thought for a moment his eyes were playing tricks because he was staring too hard. He saw another line of light flickering. He shrank back, wondering if he should duck his head below the water and how long he could hold his breath if he did. But the light was not coming from where he thought the hatch was, though in the darkness it was hard to remember. Then he smelt it, just a whisper of it; the stench from the water was so overpowering that it was hard to be sure and yet there was a waft of something new . . .

'Smoke!' someone yelled from the darkness. 'They've set the ship afire.'

Every man tried to beat his way through the water to the ladder. They were groping around for it in the darkness, catching hold of beams and the bodies of the other men, until with a cry someone felt it. Faramond himself grabbed hold of it just moments later and found other hands as cold as the dead also grasping the ladder and trying to force themselves on to the rungs. But the first man was already at the top. They could hear him battering at the grill, shouting and yelling.

Another climbed up, pitching him off into the water; he fell heavily with a single scream, instantly followed by silence.

'It won't shift. They've locked it! They've locked us in!'

'Let me try,' others shouted, but Faramond wasn't one of them. He splashed and crawled his way back towards the side of the hull. Fumbling for his knife, he started hacking at the wood, trying beyond all reason to make a hole in the ship's timbers. As he did so, he knew it was useless. Even if he could chip his way through the wood with his small knife, what chance would he have of making a hole big enough to crawl through before the water poured in and dragged them all to the bottom? Yet still he slashed away, desperately trying to split the salt-hardened timber.

Around him he could hear men screaming or praying. Above them, louder by far now than the crash of the waves, was the roar of the flames as they raced through the oil- soaked and tar-coated timbers. Smoke was trickling down into the hold, mixing with the bilge gas. Faramond was choking. As the timber above their heads blazed, the heat rolled down as if they were trapped inside a vast oven.

Faramond clutched his reliquary through his shirt. 'Holy and blessed St Julian, save me, save me!'

There was a huge crash as the mast toppled into the sea, followed by another as the castle collapsed on to the deck, driving the timbers into the hold below. The last thing Faramond saw was the blinding orange flames licking over a great beam of wood as it hurtled towards his face. It struck him with a force that was almost merciful, sending the poor wretch instantly into the darkness from which there can be no return.