Jeri Westerson - The Demon’s Parchment

Crispin turned. Jack lay in the snow beside him. He gathered the shirtless boy in an embrace, unable to speak for his gratitude. Below him, he was vaguely aware of fire licking into the starry sky. His ancestral home was engulfed in flames and smoke, and its sturdy walls were beginning to crumble.

His still hazy mind was filled with jumbled thoughts. Jack, alive and safe. Giles dead. How were they saved?

The sound of timbers falling stole his attention at last and though he knew he was far from safety, he couldn’t tear his eyes away from the sight below. As each wall fell, as each arch toppled, a bit of his heart was ripped away. So final. The home of his ancestors, the manor house given to them by a king so many centuries ago, nothing but blackened rubble. This was the end, then. No going back. No returning to better days. While the house still stood, there always seemed to be that one slim chance, that possibility that the world could be righted again and everything could be put back in its place.

But not now. Not ever again. A frost colder than the snow chilling his face and hands clutched at his vitals. His time had slipped away. He would never be master of Sheen again. Never.

A shadow swooped above them and a feeling of panic gripped him. A figure blocked the starry field. He swung his cloak over Jack’s bare shoulder before he slowly faced his savior.

“Holy God!” Jack screamed. “The Golem!”

Crispin curled his arm protectively about Jack.

The creature moved forward and the moonlight washed his face and chest in silver light. His head was small on wide shoulders, but perhaps it was only a trick of the eye, for his shoulders were unnaturally wide, piled as they were with pelts and hood. Crispin looked up at the face of the creature. . and saw clearly that he was only a man.

“My God. Who are you?”

The man shuffled, peeking at Jack burrowed deep into Crispin’s cloak. “Odo,” he said in his gravelly voice.

“ You’re Odo?”

The man nodded. He fumbled at his tattered cloak. His fingernails were crusted with dirt and something lighter, like white dust. No. Not dust or dirt. Clay.

“You’re one of the potters in London.”

The man nodded again.

“But. . what-?”

“Hugh was my friend,” he rasped. “I followed. Bad, bad men hurt Hugh.” His voice winced higher and a sob escaped.

“Hugh? Berthildus’s son, you mean?”

Odo nodded.

“You. . couldn’t protect him.”

He shook his head sorrowfully.

“So you took it upon yourself to protect other boys.”

He nodded.

“You followed me here.”

Odo nodded.

“Now you understand that I am not one of the bad men.”

He bowed. He reached a hand forward as if wanting to pet Jack, who cringed back, but then Odo let his large hand fall to his side. “Bad men not hurt boy?”

“No. We stopped the bad men once and for all. They won’t hurt anyone else ever again.”

Odo considered this and turned his face toward the burning house. Crispin looked, too. Watched flames lick at the stones and timbers that had once brought such joy to his young life. Home. But that such evil had occurred in his beloved manor. . He was glad to see it in ashes. Better that.

Odo turned back to Crispin. The man smiled. “You are friend.”

But before he could speak again, they heard shouts closing on them. Odo looked up and with a fearful face, quickly disappeared back into the woods.

“Wait!” Crispin stared into the darkness of tangled boughs and listened for his footfalls but could hear nothing. As big as the man was he was as silent as the night itself.

“Unbelievable,” he said to the icy air.

“Then. . he’s not a Golem?”

Crispin hugged the shivering boy tighter. “No. There is no Golem, Jack. Only that poor hulk of a man.”

“He. . he was only trying to help them boys, then?”

“Yes, it appears so.”

“Merciful Jesus. What a world is this!”

“Verily,” he murmured.

The sound of shouting and of many feet slogging through the snow reached them and suddenly, figures clambered up the hill and stopped, looking at Crispin and Jack in bewilderment. Crispin didn’t even try getting to his feet. In his best courtly manner, he said, “If you would be so kind as to take us to the king’s manor. I urgently need to speak with his grace the duke of Lancaster.”

During their brief journey, Crispin glanced back at what was left of the manor, his heart wrenching with the dying glow of it. The smell of smoke in his nose would not soon leave him.

When they reached the king’s manor, the king was mercifully abed. That meant Crispin would not have to face him. But facing Lancaster was no better. After much pleading, Crispin and Jack were ushered none too gently to the duke in his royal chambers. And when Lancaster’s eyes fastened on Crispin, his face darkened. He studied Crispin’s singed and bloody clothes and Jack’s nakedness. “What happened?” he asked of his guards.

“There was a fire, your grace. At the Guest. . I mean, the de Risley Manor.”

Lancaster glared. “Was it contained?”

“No, your grace. It looks as if. .” He flicked an awkward glance toward Crispin. “It. . it burned to the ground.”

“Is this your doing?” he growled at Crispin.

“No, your grace. But I was there.”

“And what of Lord de Risley?”

The guard shook his head. “Many died, your grace. We believe de Risley was amongst them. He was in the mews where the fire appears to have started.”

“In the mews?”

“No one knows why he was there, your grace. The servants said that he often. . entertains there.”

Lancaster’s sharp glare never left Crispin’s face. “Very well. Leave Guest here.”

“What of his servant, your grace?”

His eye fell on a cowering Jack who was wearing Crispin’s cloak. “Leave him here, but bring him some clothes. A shirt and a cloak, at least.”

The guard bowed and left. Lancaster himself closed the door to his apartments and walked slowly toward the fire. Crispin felt the heat melt the permanent chill but he would not take his encircling arm away from Jack.

Lancaster did not speak for several moments. The anger in his eyes told Crispin why and he waited for his lord to do the talking first.

“Not your doing but you were there.”

“It. . it is difficult to explain, your grace. De Risley was the murderer I sought. Now he is dead. He started the fire.”

“Is there proof of this?”

Crispin shook his head.

“Master Crispin saved my life!” cried Jack, startling both men.

Lancaster gave him a look of incomprehension. Crispin supposed it wasn’t often that the lowliest servant ever dared speak to him let alone shout. Though Jack always seemed of a mind to confront Lancaster.

Gaunt approached the quivering boy and bent at the knee to look him in the face. Crispin could feel Jack trembling where he clutched at his cotehardie. “He saved your life? Tell me.”

Jack did, starting with the body of the young boy Crispin found and how Jack decided to lay a trap but never expected to become trapped himself. With comical gestures using Crispin’s cloak like a costume, Jack made it sound as if Giles and Crispin had fought hand to hand, that it had been a chivalrous battle to the death. It sounded to Crispin like the most heroic tripe any minstrel had ever croaked.

When Jack was finished, Lancaster slowly straightened. He rubbed his beard like a carpenter sanding it smooth. “Giles de Risley toyed with boys, did he?”

“As did his cousin.”

“Did he kill that astrologer, Cornelius van der Brooghes?”

With an unpleasant smile of satisfaction, Crispin said, “Yes. I witnessed it.”