Michael Jecks: A Friar's bloodfeud

Breasting the ridge, he easily picked out the place where he had fallen, just as he could easily see where Walter had stood before launching himself at him.

Now he stood where he had been knocked down, staring about him. The rock was there, and there was a flat patch of heather beyond it, but that meant nothing. A deer could have lain here.

A deer which had bled.

Perkin had a strange empty feeling in his throat as he frowned at the ground, reaching down to touch the viscous liquid. It was definitely blood: the tinny odour, sickly and sweet, was clinging to his fingers when he brought them to his nose. It was possible that Walter and Ailward had killed a deer, he knew, but it was unlikely. Much more likely that Ailward had. . but why should Ailward harm anyone? Perkin had never seen anything to suggest that the sergeant would hurt another man. It was his way to swagger and bully, but surely not to kill for no reason. Perhaps it was something to do with money.

One thing was certain. Ailward had not been up here because of the game. He had been involved in some other activity when the game had approached him.

The moonlight caught something moving about some three feet from the rock, and Perkin saw a fluttering piece of material. He picked it up and looked at it. It wasn’t a working man’s cloth — this was a fine piece of wool from a rich man’s gown. Or a woman’s.

He’d seen enough. Walter and Ailward had killed someone up here, perhaps to rob him, or to rape her. Perkin had to return to the vill to call for help.

Turning on his heel, he hurried back to the ridge, and it was only when he was over the brow, taking a direct line to the vill, that he stumbled and fell.

‘Pig’s turds !’ he hissed through gritted teeth as his arm stung and flamed. He was surprised it wouldn’t light his way, it seemed to burn so hotly, but then his curses were stilled on his tongue as he saw what had tripped him.

The dead body of Ailward lying among the long grasses.

It was a chill morning in early March when Hugh’s family was so brutally torn apart.

Hugh rose, as was his wont, in the hour before light, leaving his woman in their bed, her child snuffling and mewling in his sleep beside her.

He and Constance his wife had lived here for two years now, since they had first met early in 1321, and the birth of her son, young Hugh, had set the cap on their happiness, even though he was not Hugh’s child. He was the illegitimate son of a priest, but Hugh cared nothing for that. He adored Constance, and loved her child as if it were his own. An experienced shepherd, Hugh felt he had had more to do with the babe than its real father. When little Hugh was born, he had been there to help; when the infant first turned to suckle, old Hugh had held his head and guided mother and child; when little Hugh was old enough, it was Hugh who first took him outside, Hugh who first made him laugh, Hugh who had introduced him to the mangy dog, Hugh who had cleaned him through the long night when he had an attack of vomiting … Hugh adored the lad.

The fire was dead now. Hugh would need to fetch a faggot of wood from the store at the back of the house. He glanced back at the bedding. There was a visible lump where Constance lay, her sweet body clearly outlined under the blankets and skins, the child’s smaller figure almost hidden in her shadow.

Outside there was a definite chill in the air. The frost had held off, which was a relief, because Hugh was anxious about some of the plants he’d already set out in the vegetable plot, but with luck they’d survive. It wasn’t as cold as some of the mornings he’d woken to when he’d been a lad on the moors.

A lean, dark-haired man with the narrow, sharp features of a ferret, Hugh had been raised in a small farm near Drewsteignton, and his early years had been spent on the hills protecting the sheep. He had loved mornings like this out there. Yes, it was freezing for a man, and when you sat wrapped up in a thick cloak as well as a warm sheepskin jack, you still felt the cold seeping into your marrow. A man could die up there and no one find him for days; men had died like that. Hugh could remember one from the next vill, an older shepherd whose huddled figure was found by the boy who’d been sent into the hills with some bread and cheese for him. He’d been stiff as an oak staff when Hugh saw him, frost over his beard and eyebrows, and they’d had to carry him down to the vill like that. There was no point leaving him to thaw on the hill.

It was his time up there on the moors which had shaped the man he had become. For most of his life he had been dour and morose, unbending to the wind and the rain. He was known as one who would protect his flocks from any danger, whether it be men, beasts or the elements. Anyone who grew up on the moors learned self-reliance above all else, and a man who survived the depredations of the wandering gangs of trail bastons, the ‘club-men’ who robbed and killed with impunity in the last years of King Edward I’s reign, was one who was strong in spirit. He could cope with the worst that God could throw.

From the logpile he had a clear view of the moors several leagues south — his moors. Usually a line of hulking shapes that loomed on the horizon, today they gleamed in the low sunlight, and he felt a strong affection for them. He loved them as any man loves his homelands.

Hugh stood still, staring, struck with a strange emotion. Not a man prone to sudden fancies, he was aware of an unsettled feeling, as though he might never see this again. A melancholy apprehension swept over him, leaving him with a curious desolation. He was filled with uneasiness, a presentiment of evil, and the worst of it was, he had no idea what lay behind it. It was almost as though the moors were calling to him to leave his home and return to them, but he had no idea why the sight of a winter’s chill morning sun on the hill should make him feel so.

He shivered, an uncontrollable spasm that racked his compact frame, and he muttered, ‘Someone walking over my grave. That’s all.’

Crossing himself against Dewer, the Devil, he bent to his task and began to collect logs and a faggot of old twigs. He cast one last glance at the moors, and surprised himself by realising that he had a poignant longing to see again the rough, scrubby grasses, the heather, furze and rock. Even the black, square keep of the castle at Lydford would be a welcome sight. Not that he could go there just now. His master, Simon Puttock, wasn’t there. He was down at Dartmouth, the port all those weary miles away on the southern coast. Perhaps Hugh could return to Simon’s house for a little. He was still Simon’s servant, after all. He could visit to see that all was well with Simon’s household. .

What was all this about? He wasn’t leaving Constance and young Hugh on their own just now. Maybe when the weather warmed and there was a little less to do. He’d wait until then. It was plain daft to think of going at this time of year. He was mazed.

He turned from the view and trudged back towards the house, a small figure, easily missed in the great landscape about him, many miles from any town, his lands enclosed by the woods on the north, west and eastern sides.

Hugh didn’t mind. He liked being far away from other people; he had no need of them most of the time. As he shoved the door open and dropped the logs on the hearth, the vague feelings of concern faded.

This was his home. He was safe here.

The way led him along the road from the inn where he had stayed the night, and all Adam of Rookford could think of was the itching.

They must have been fleas. That grotty little tavern was probably alive with the damned things. In all Adam’s years, he’d never stayed in a hovel that was more likely to breed them.