Pip Vaughan-Hughes - Relics

My eyes had somehow become locked with those of the angry pig. An appalling calm settled on me, a white-hot, almost joyful clarity. I reached out, carefully selected a bird from the dish, and pulled off a leg. Sucking off the meat, I laid the tiny bone on the table in front of me. Now the whole gathering was staring at me.

'My love, are you insulted by the stench of the pigsty? The pig cannot help the stink of his shit: it is his nature to live out his days with a muddy snout and a shitten arse. So with these creatures: the low-born Englishman is a creature whose ignorance clothes him like the pig is clothed in his own dung. Do not be insulted, dear one. One cannot be insulted by beasts.'

I took the other leg, dragged it between my teeth, and laid it cross-wise over its fellow. I took a long swallow of wine, draining my cup, and ran my thumb once across my lips.

'Give these thirsty hogs some water, and cry them on their way,' I said.

You were quite good, Patch,' said Gilles. 'Every inch a lord.' The three of us had wandered off from the shrine under the pretence of relieving ourselves. Now we sat on an outcrop of rock overlooking the sea. We could still hear the festivities behind us, and below us one of the mountain's many spurs swooped, a knife-edged ridge, down to the blue water a half-mile below. One of those miniature coves glimmered there, and a flock of goats was ambling across it, black dots against white stone. 'Kervezey is here, and that settles it, I suppose. We'll sail in the morning.'

'No, no,' said the Captain. He had been in an unusually good mood since the Franks had been sent packing up the mountain.

'But this is business,' said Gilles, surprised. We have no obligations, we have received no advances. Kervezey was using those oafs to scout for the prize. Now he has found it, and he will fight for it, the island will be raised against all Franks, and that will be the end. It is over.'

'It will be over tomorrow,' the Captain replied. We will take the saint tonight. No, dear friend…' and he raised a hand. We can. You know that we can.'

We could,' said Gilles. 'It is possible. I can see as well as you that the Cormaran could anchor down there and that a party could scramble up. But in the dark, over unfamiliar ground? We need preparation.' 'I could do it,' I said. ‘You?' ‘Why not I?'

‘What has got into you?' It was the Captain, and he was grinning. I was not.

'Death,' I muttered. You know what I have had festering inside me since…' The two men nodded. Well, then: if this is to be a chance to hurt Kervezey, even in his… his purse, then that will do for me.'

You are strong of heart, Patch – no one doubts it,' said the Captain, gently. 'But for such a task, there are a few more…' he pinched the bridge of his nose, as he did when searching for the right word, '… experienced men on the Cormaran. This time, perhaps-'

'Sir, with the greatest respect, there is no one aboard with more experience of Kervezey. My own… think, Captain, of that boy Tom. Kervezey is like a bot-fly, laying his eggs in innocent flesh and watching as the maggots hatch and feed, on the Toms, the Wills…' I fell silent. From the moment Tom had spoken, the horror of my last night in Balecester had wrapped itself around me like corpse-breath. I looked up. The Captain was studying me through narrowed eyes.

'How did it feel to face those swine, Kervezey's beasts?' he asked.

'I felt nothing,' I said. 'Save pity for Tom.' I stood up and walked to the edge of the cliff. 'I grew up scrambling,' I said. 'And I am not afraid any more. Do you think I can manage Tula on my own, though?'

'Tula will be light as a feather, my lad,' the Captain said. I turned and found the two of them on their feet, studying me. 'The job is yours if you wish.' They both reached out to me and laid hands on my shoulders. 'Now let us get back – your betrothed will be getting worried.'

Anna was not the least bit worried, though. She was learning a folk song from the headman's wife, and by the blush on that good woman's face it was clear that the noble lady had wheedled out something ribald.

'It's a good one,' she confirmed. About goats. I swapped for one I know about an old couple and a giant melon. They use it as a privy: brilliant song.'

So I listened to dirty Greek songs as the cicadas thrummed along, and sipped astringent retsina. As the cypress shadows lengthened and turned our walled circle into a giant sundial, as the village packed up and said farewell to their saint, and as I jogged back down the mountain on the fiendish donkey, all I could think about was the long, dark climb to come, and opening the old blue door on a blackness that would be deeper than any moonless night.

We made our excuses and weighed anchor as soon as we got back to Limonohori. I was happy to leave. My conscience was troubling me with a vengeance, and the warmth of our send-off felt like a knife twisting in my soul. The villagers seemed to want to keep us there forever, and when we finally tore ourselves away they loaded us with food and wine, gifts they certainly could not afford. And so I kept my back turned as we crossed the bay and swept out past the guardian windmills that were turning madly in the evening breeze which filled our own sails.

The plan was to sail north and west to a small rocky island we had seen from the mountainside. A casual question to the headman had revealed it to be deserted save for goats. We would hide until nightfall, and until the fishermen of Limonohori had put out. They fished at night in these parts, using flaming torches to lure the fish up from the deep and into their nets. Fortunately for us, the evening wind was sharp this time of year, and the men would use it to run south along the coast, rowing back in the early hours when the air would be still again. Meanwhile, we would make our way to the cove below the shrine. I would climb up, Tula's replacement strapped to my back, make the switch and scramble down again. It was nothing if not simple. The only thing I had to remember was not to break the relic. My own neck felt far less important.

Gilles called me down to the hold. A number of chests and bundles had been moved and a coffin of rough deal planks had been dug out from the bowels of the cargo. Gilles handed me the lamp he was carrying and pried off the lid with a claw hammer.

'The eighteenth woman,' he intoned as the contents were revealed. It was indeed a body, and I suddenly wondered how many other corpses I had been sailing with these past months. It was not a pleasant thought. I could see several more coffin-shaped chests now that the covers were disturbed, and although I had seen at least one of them before it had never occurred to me that they held anything like this. Eighteen women? How many more were there? I must have said something aloud, because Gilles seemed to guess what I was thinking.

'This is our stock-in-trade, Patch. Our inventory. We try to keep them from piling up down here, but…' He shrugged. 'And there is much else besides, all of which you will learn about soon. Now come and help me. Don't worry: they won't hurt you.'

The occupant of the open box was swaddled in soft white sheeting, which Gilles unwound from the head. A soft, dry scent crept into the air, not altogether unpleasant and somehow familiar.

Well, that's not going to work,' I muttered as a face came into the light.

The eighteenth woman looked nothing like Cordula. She had short, dark curls lying close about her scalp, through which yellow skull-bone showed where the skin had peeled back. Her eyes were half open, but the sockets were filled with what looked like pitch. The nose was perfect but the corpse had no lips. Black skin opened onto a hedge of snaggled brown teeth set in a piteous, hopeless snarl.