Alys Clare - Fortune Like the Moon

‘Two deaths, yes.’ She glanced at him. ‘But we do not yet know if both victims died by the same hand.’

We do! he wanted to shout. He restrained the impulse. ‘Whether he killed them both or not, Abbess, I am determined on this,’ he said instead.

‘I know.’ She smiled faintly. ‘I can see. But, Sir Josse, will you at least let me send some of the lay brothers to wait with you?’

‘No.’ The reply was automatic: Josse liked to work alone. ‘Thoughtful of you, Abbess, but the paramount need will be for silence. Any warning that he is expected and he will take to his heels.’

She tutted briefly. ‘I do not propose a band of gossiping, fidgeting old monks complaining about their aching bones and moaning at having been dragged from their sleep, although it might do some of them good to make the sacrifice. No. I propose only that you enlist the aid of Brother Saul, and perhaps one other lay brother selected by him. He knows who is sound, have no doubt.’

‘I’m sure he does.’ Josse was impressed by Brother Saul. ‘But-’ He had been on the point of refusing when it occurred to him that the Abbess was talking sense. Milon, terrified at being exposed as the killer of Gunnora, hadn’t hesitated to kill again. Even though the person he’d had to dispose of to ensure his safety had been his own wife. Under the circumstances, would it hurt to have Saul at his side in his vigil?

No. In fact Josse welcomed the idea.

‘Thank you, Abbess,’ he said. ‘May we ask Brother Saul if he is willing?’

She was, he thought, about to make further mention of a second brother. But, as if knowing she had won from Josse all the concessions he was prepared to give, she merely nodded and said, ‘I will send word to Brother Saul. And now, Sir Josse, I have ordered food for you. At least I can ensure that you begin your night’s work on a full stomach.’

* * *

Milon d’Arcy, product of a comfortable home, indulged by his mother over her other, worthier sons, was living a nightmare.

It was not the fear of the great, sinister Wealden Forest where he had hidden away that threatened to unhinge him — or so he was managing to convince himself — nor the fugitive’s need to survive on his wits; a loaf of bread stolen here, a fat roast chicken off the spit there, an apple scrumped while nobody was looking that proved only to be half-bad, these were, for Milon, minor triumphs that it quite pleased him to think about.

He was, he had reassured himself not a few times, proving to be pretty good at looking after himself.

Sometimes he would forget. For a whole morning, once, he had been happy. Lying on his stomach over a stream on the fringe of the forest, staring down into the clear, cool water and trying to catch tiny, slippery, silver fish in his fingers, he had thought himself back in the life that used to be his. Had, when he stood up and brushed off the fine tunic — now damp, stained and showing distinct signs of wear — been on the point of thinking cheerfully ahead to what might be on the table for the midday meal.

To remember, at that particular moment, had been cruelly painful.

His mind increasingly shied away from the pain. He was, he knew, finding it easier and easier not to remember. To go on living in that pleasant land where it was always nearly dinner time and Elanor was waiting for him.

Elanor.

Red hair, strong, unruly, full of life. Just like her. Lusty and passionate, her ardour matching his own so that, when all the family and friends had said what a good match it was, how suited the young couple were one to another, he and she had turned their faces aside and sniggered.

That — their mutual physical hunger — they had discovered immediately. But there were other compatibilities, which had taken a little longer to surface. Such as their shared, strong sense of what was owing to them. Which, if not handed to them on a plate, they would stretch out their hands and grab.

What a clever brain she had, his Elanor! What an excellent accomplice! What fun they’d had together! Until-

No.

His mind closed down on that. Refused to let him go on.

When that happened, he would go back to his stream, and get down to something useful such as cleaning and sharpening his knife. Or he would creep into his hiding place. But there, very often, he would have to endure another attack of the terrors.

Because, one night, not long after he had first come there, a night of clear skies and brilliant moonlight, he had seen a man. Thought he’d seen a man, he kept having to correct himself. A man in a long white robe who bore a sickle-shaped knife in his hand. A man who spoke to the trees.

Cowering right at the back of his pitiful shelter, shaking, sick with fear, Milon had watched as the man, chanting in a soft, hypnotic monotone, circled the clearing.

As, at last, the man approached the huddle of huts, Milon had closed his eyes and, terror turning his bowels liquid, covered his head with his arms.

When, after what seemed like an eternity, he gathered what little remained of his courage and looked up, the man had gone.

It was a dream, he told himself, then and on many occasions since. Nothing but a dream.

But, sometimes when he was very tired and very low, when the moonlight came filtering down through the branches black against the night sky, he thought he saw the man again.

And, each time, the terrors took a little longer to overcome.

So far, he was winning. By concentrating his mind on the past, where it was sunny and people were kind to him, he could make the horror go away. And, after a while, the door to the pleasant land would open again.

Sometimes he would sit up with a start and ask himself what he was doing there. It was quite nice, yes, a bit of an adventure to be off on his own in his camp, but why not go home? Why not return to Elanor, waiting in their bed for him with her white breasts and her smooth rounded hips, as ready for lovemaking as he was, wetting her lips, legs languidly apart, arms out to …

But, of course, she wasn’t waiting. Not in bed, not anywhere.

And he couldn’t go home. There was something he had to do, something important.

By concentrating very hard, he could make himself remember what it was.

But it was getting more and more difficult each time. Today, lying by his stream, the few rays of sunshine that managed to penetrate the trees warm on his back, he could hardly concentrate at all. The water was so cool, so pretty, rushing along over the stream-bed and …

Think!

No.

Yes! THINK!

Reluctantly, moaning aloud, he thought. And, when he did manage to remember, wished that he had not.

But act he must, before the whispering darkness, and the magical, dream-like pleasant place that was his escape from it, became his only reality.

He must do it now.

Tonight.

Then he could go home, and Elanor would let him back into her bed.

* * *

Josse and Brother Saul had been hiding in the undergrowth for what seemed like most of the night when Milon came.

It was Josse’s turn on watch. Seeing the slight figure coming carefully along the path by the pond, at first Josse had thought he was seeing things. It wouldn’t have been the first time, in those long hours. But this was no trick of the light: it was Milon.

He moved well, Josse thought detachedly, smoothly, silently, using all available cover, keeping to the deepest shadows. And he had chosen a cloudy night. Josse was surprised by the young man’s skill; he looked such a shallow, feckless fool, with his pointed shoes and his fancy clothes. With a part of his mind, Josse wondered what sort of desperate need had led to the development of these survival skills. Skills that included the dreadful final resort of murder, when someone had got in his way.