Peter Tremayne - Chalice of Blood

Brother Donnán resumed his seat and folded his hands before him. He was shaking his head. His face was set, his mouthcompressed into a firm line.

‘You will not tell us who the instigator was in all this?’ Fidelma shrugged and turned towards Abbot Iarnla. ‘Who, more than most, wanted to protect the reputation of this abbey and make it, as I have said, renowned for its Faith and learning throughout Christendom? Who wanted this abbey to rise as a great monument to the Faith that would last forever?’

Many in the refectorium were now looking with open hostility at Brother Lugna, while a few were casting suspicious glances at Abbot Iarnla.

‘Who,’ declared Fidelma, speaking in a slow, deliberate tone, ‘has the ultimate power here?’

The eyes of all the brethren now focused on the abbot. Abbot Iarnla stared at her for a moment, and then his eyes suddenly widened. An expression of horror crossed his face and he turned to look at Lady Eithne. Everyone followed his gaze.

‘This is a scandalous accusation!’ she declared, immobile in her seat. ‘Am I being accused of killing my own son? I cannot and will not stand for it.’

‘Did you kill your son, Lady Eithne?’ asked Fidelma coldly.

‘I loved my son. Anyway, it would have been physically impossible for me to do what is claimed here. There was only one key to the cell, which was found by my son’s body in the locked cell after I had left him on that final visit when Brother Lugna called me to the abbey.’

‘You had another key made,’ Fidelma asserted flatly.

‘How could I have done that?’

‘Simple. I had overlooked that you made two visits to his cell. Brother Lugna told us about the day.’ She turned to Brehon Aillín. ‘Brother Donnchad disappeared for a day but came back in the evening and locked himself in his chamber. That was four days before his death. Brother Lugna told me that he sent for Lady Eithne the next day and she came and saw him. Thatwas three days before his death, and later that same day Donnchad went to the scriptorium . Brother Máel Eoin remembered that he was upset because he had mislaid his pólaire , the wax tablet for making notes. He had not mislaid it, Lady Eithne had taken it during her visit.’

‘Why would I take his notebook?’

‘You pressed the key into it so that the shape of it was made in the wax. Donnchad was too preoccupied to notice your actions, or maybe you distracted him somehow. You took the tablet out concealed in your robes. I saw that you had your own smith at your fortress. It was easy to get him to make a key from the impression. The original key never left the cell. When I handled it later, when Brother Gilla-na-Naomh showed it to me, it was still slippery with wax.’

‘That is true,’ declared Brother Gilla-na-Naomh.

Lady Eithne’s mouth thinned.

‘You returned to see Donnchad on the day of his death. You returned specifically to kill him. After you had killed him, thrown the papers and books through the window to your accomplice, Brother Donnán, you were able to exit his chamber, leaving his key by his body. You locked the door with your newly made key. It was realising that you made two visits that put everything in perspective for me.’

In the brief moment of silence that followed, Brother Lugna cried out, ‘I was not involved in any of this!’

‘In a way, you are the person mainly responsible for this,’ Fidelma replied harshly. ‘Oh, you will not be found guilty of the killing nor of conspiracy to kill, but you were the malign influence over that woman,’ she indicated Lady Eithne. Then she turned back to the Brehon. ‘She had developed a fierce pride in the Faith. That pride increased when she encountered Brother Lugna and she saw in him the means to build up this abbey as a shrine to her sons Donnchad and Cathal. But Cathalchose to remain in Tarentum as its Bishop. Only Brother Donnchad had returned here. So this was to be his shrine, a beacon for the Faith, as she called it. But, to her horror, her son was having doubts about the very fundamentals of the Faith. He was even researching and writing an essay on the matter. That could not be allowed.’

Fidelma addressed Lady Eithne again. ‘Who could you turn to to stop your son ruining your great plans for the abbey and, by association, your self-aggrandisement? Brother Lugna was actually too pious. I suspect he also thought he was making a shrine for himself. But you knew the scriptor was proud of the abbey, proud of the library that he had built up, and proud of its reputation. So you drew him into the plan, the plan to take the documents your son had gathered and to destroy them and any trace of writings that questioned the Faith.’

‘I was not told that she was going to kill Brother Donnchad,’ Brother Donnán suddenly said, loudly and clearly. ‘I would not have agreed to that.’

‘Shut up, you fool!’ cried Lady Eithne.

‘By the time Brother Donnán knew Donnchad had been killed, he was too involved and too frightened to do anything but continue as Lady Eithne’s accomplice.’ Fidelma looked at the librarian. ‘What did you do with the books and papers Lady Eithne threw from the chamber?’

‘As you said, I gathered them up and later took them to Lady Eithne’s fortress.’

‘You met Brother Gáeth along the way and said you were simply taking books from the library to her. But how were you able to alert her about the copy of Celsus’s book at Fhear Maighe just as we were setting off there?’

‘I was on the road outside the abbey, on my way to see Lady Eithne, when I saw Glassán riding off on some errand. Hepaused long enough to tell me that Brother Lugna had just seen Cumscrad and was in a rage, for he had learned that the library at Fhear Maighe held the Celsus book. I knew Lady Eithne would be interested.’

‘Interested to send her warriors to Fhear Maighe. So all Brother Donnchad’s papers are now destroyed?’

Brother Donnán shrugged.

‘One thing that Lady Eithne and Brother Donnán did not know,’ Fidelma said to Brehon Aillín, ‘was that her son had already written a brief account of his findings and his thoughts. Oh, not the great reference work that he was planning, citing those writers of centuries ago who presented their criticisms against the new Faith. This was only a short account of his ideas. He included the fact that he had tried to talk to you, Lady Eithne, his own mother, about his doubts. Instead of discussing them, you threatened him if he spoke out. He believed that you would attempt to steal his work and suppress it. He mistakenly believed that your accomplice was Brother Lugna. He even thought Brother Lugna might contemplate physical violence against him. That’s why he asked Abbot Iarnla for a key to his cell.’

There was a deathly silence as Fidelma paused, shaking her head.

‘There were other matters to be considered along the way. When Lady Eithne heard that Abbot Iarnla had sent for me, she sent two of her mercenary warriors to waylay us on the road here. They were to ambush and kill my companions and me. They did not succeed and one of them was killed by Gormán, and the other, a bánaí , fled. He was later to die in the attack on Fhear Maighe. It seemed he was the leader of a band of mercenaries from a kingdom called Kernow on the island of Britain. A band of mercenaries that you hired, Lady Eithne. I have since found that your clan, the Déisí, has a small settlementin that kingdom. The mercenaries were disguised as Uí Liatháin. Then, of course, there was the earlier attack on the barge by warriors dressed as Uí Liatháin. One of these attackers was wounded. And you felt you should send for the physician, Brother Seachlann, to attend to the man’s wound. That was part of your undoing, lady. You have more than once demonstrated to me your complete lack of concern for those you consider beneath your rank. That is why you did not attend the funeral of Glassán.