Paul Doherty - Bloodstone

Ailward ignored him; the mysterious intruder would also do likewise. The anchorite’s doom-laden pronouncements were common enough. Ailward peered round the pillar. A shape moved near the Lady chapel. Ailward could make out the garb of a black monk, hood pulled forward. Something clattered to the ground. The figure pushed back his cowl as he stretched out to pick up the sword, its blade blinking in the dancing light of the tapers. Ailward recognized him — Richer, the sub-prior, the Frenchman! Why was he carrying a sword and creeping about so closely cloaked and cowled? Richer had once been a monk at St Calliste which formerly housed the Passio Christi. Hadn’t Henry Osborne, another of the Wyvern Company, also remarked about Richer’s strange recent comings and goings? The sub-prior, in charge of the library and the scriptorium, had shown little love for the Wyvern Company ever since his arrival. Hadn’t he, chattering in French, once dismissed Ailward and his companions as tail-bearing Englishmen worthy of hell fire? Although to be fair, Richer had proved to be most compassionate to that old reprobate Chalk. Had he done that to squirrel out secrets? Had he been successful? Wenlock claimed he had. Curious, Ailward now decided to follow the sub-prior. The monk had disappeared. Ailward followed swiftly, his soft-soled boots making little noise.

Outside in the freezing cold, Ailward glimpsed the black gowned sub-prior go around a corner and across the monk’s bowling yard where the good brothers played nine-pins. Ailward drew his dagger. He kept this low as he pursued his quarry across the frozen gardens, through the apple yard and into Mortival meadow which stretched down to the watergate, usually a desolate spot especially at the height of winter. Ailward followed using the bushes and small copses to hide himself. Richer strolled boldly on. Now and again the monk would turn and glance back but Ailward was skilled in subterfuge and concealment. Hadn’t he and his comrades done similar work against so many French camps and strongholds? Ailward was now absorbed, his former unease and fear dissipated. Mahant was correct. The prospect of battle and conflict solved all misery. Ailward felt he was young again, heading towards the enemy. He was aware of the gathering river mist, the sharp breeze and the oppressive silence which seemed to shroud this lonely abbey. There again he had experienced the same many times in France. Ailward gripped his dagger. Richer was now near the lychgate in the curtain wall. The Frenchman abruptly paused. He put down what he was carrying and called out, a strident cry like that of a bird. A reply echoed in from the river. Richer picked up what he was carrying and hurried towards the watergate. Ailward made to follow but paused at the sound of dry wood snapping behind him. He turned round, dagger out; nothing, only the thickening mist billowing and shifting. He glanced back. Richer was now through the watergate. Ailward followed. Ignoring the stench of fox and other vermin, he pushed the gate open and stared through the crack. Richer stood further along the narrow quayside. He was crouching down beneath the soaring three branched scaffold handing a package to a man hooded and visored standing in a ship’s boat alongside the quay. The conversation was hushed and swift but Ailward caught the occasional French word. The man on the boat took the oilskin pouch Richer handed him. Ailward tensed. Was Richer a spy? What could he be handing over to some foreign ship? Something for the French or some other power? Ailward fought to control his excitement. He calmed himself, drew his sword and peered again. The monk had disappeared. Nothing was there but the boat, the figure in it now squatting down. ‘God go with you.’

Ailward turned and almost fell on the sword of the cowled figure cloaked all in black. Ailward gagged as the sword dug deep, its razor-sharp blade slicing his innards. He screamed again, a long, harrowing cry choked off by the blood welling through both nose and mouth. .

Athelstan caught his breath as he and Sir John hurried along the byways and alleyways leading off Cheapside down to the river. The day was drawing on. Bells tolled for the Angelus and noon day Mass as well as the sign for traders to break their fast in the cook shops, pastry houses, inns and taverns. Athelstan roughly shouldered by a pedlar of old boots with an assortment of footwear hanging from a stick, swiftly dodged one of St Anthony’s pigs, bell tingling around its neck, as it charged across an alleyway pursued by a group of ragged urchins armed with sticks. He crossed himself as a funeral cortège went by with bell, cross and incense. A young boy carolled the Dirige psalms while a group of beggars, clothed as penitents and fortified with bread and strong ale, staggered behind the purple-clothed coffin, funeral candles drunkenly held. Cranston and Athelstan crossed Fish Street. They passed St Nicholas Coe Abbey where the Brotherhood of the Beggars was feeding lepers on mouldy bread, rancid pork, slimy veal, flat beer and stale fish. Athelstan glanced away in disgust at the loathsome platters set out on a tawdry stall. He also felt guilty. He and Sir John had left Kilverby’s mansion. They had braved the importunity of the two beggars who haunted Cheapside — Leif and his associate Rawbum who’d once had the misfortune when drunk to sit down on a pan of burning oil. After they had coaxed their way by this precious pair, Cranston and Athelstan went into the warmth of ‘The Holy Lamb of God’, Cranston’s favourite ‘chapel’ since the merry-mouthed, rosy-cheeked landlady had taken over from the old harridan who had once resided there. Minehost had been preparing Brouet de Capon. The tap room was enriched by the fragrance of almonds, cinnamon, clove, peppers and grains of paradise. They’d eaten and drunk well. Now, faced with all this desperation, Athelstan paused. He opened his purse and went back to distribute coins into the bandaged hands of the ever-desperate lepers.

‘Dangerous,’ Cranston observed when the friar returned, ‘the contagion could catch you.’

‘Nonsense,’ Athelstan retorted, ‘there’s no real harm to be had from that. A silly fable, Sir John. You have to live with these poor unfortunates perhaps months, years before the contagion takes you.’ Athelstan was about to continue but he noticed a well-known foist approaching so he gripped his leather satchel more tightly and urged Cranston on.

A short while later they reached Queenshithe Wharf and hired a covered barge to take them down to St Fulcher’s. The river was swollen and dark; a freezing fog had rolled in to cloak the Thames in a deep greyness. Shapes of other craft emerged then swiftly faded. Lantern horns placed in their prows glowed as beacons whilst along the banks similar warning lights flared from the steeples of St Nicholas, St Benet and other churches. Cranston had refilled his miraculous wineskin at ‘The Holy Lamb of God’. He took a generous swig from this, settled himself more comfortably against the cushions in the stern and offered Athelstan a drink. The friar shook his head and stared fearfully across the river, a forbidding thoroughfare he reflected, full of mystery and sudden terrors. He recalled the Fisher of Men who, with his little band of swimmers led by Icthus, combed the river for corpses which, at a price, could be collected from his chapel, the ‘Barque of St Peter’. Even at the height of summer this river reeked of danger and Athelstan recalled some of the ghoulish tales narrated by Moleskin the boatman.

‘Dangerous weather,’ Cranston murmured. ‘These sea banks of fog float in and the French war cogs use them. A fleet of privateers prowl the Narrow Seas; they could slip into the estuary to pillage and burn, but,’ he sighed, ‘such thoughts darken the mind. Now Athelstan, Kilverby, there’s a family of choice souls?’