Pip Vaughan-Hughes - The Vault of bones

I thought you had turned to stone. What do you make of it?' I could only shake my head in answer.

'The Inventarium has a powerful effect on most who read it’ he said, reaching for the vellum, which he refolded and tucked away in his bosom. 'The credulous, the pious, the merely curious, and of course those of us who have a professional involvement’ I was glad to listen to him, for I discovered – indeed, for a superstitious moment, actually feared – that I had been struck dumb. But the Captains eyes bored into me, and at last I found my tongue. 'All those things: all those holy things’

‘You are thinking like a Benedictine,' the Captain said, not unkindly.

'Forgive me, but… but I was a monk once: the things on this list were the pillars of my faith, and my faith was every moment of my day. And to see them itemised thus and thus, like stuff in a tithe-barn '… is shocking?' 'Yes. I am shocked. Truly.'

'Itemised like stock-in-trade. That is precisely what they are: to Gregory, to Baldwin de Courtenay, to me and, my dear Petroc, to you. And to a thousand others’

I sat in silence. He was right: I knew that. Had I not broken into a church to steal the body of a saint? Had I not seen a man butchered before my eyes so that another might possess the hand of Saint Euphemia, a saint with no importance outside one little English city? 'I cannot believe what I have read’ I whispered.

The Captain nodded. 'Two days ago, you heard me speak of the Philosophers Stone. Well, these things were what I meant. They have the power to convert the base metal of credulity – let us call it faith, if you prefer, my Benedictine – into the purest gold. Well’ he exclaimed, rising and clapping his hands together. 'This has been a fine mornings work. I feel as if I have dozed off beneath a tree and awoken to find a golden apple in my lap.' 'So you will accept this commission?'

'Accept? My dear boy, this is…' He threw back his head and laughed at the ceiling beams. 'There is no greater prize in all the world for a man in my trade. I believe I will indeed accept.'

'Gregory seems to think that it is a difficult proposition, though, sir.'

‘I do not share his anxiety. And’ he dropped his voice to a whisper, 'it will bring us a river of gold, all of it honest. I… to be frank with you, Patch, this is quite beyond belief, and I am not at all sure what it will mean for you, for me – any of us.'

The Captain's distant mood vanished after that, and we fell to the kind of plotting and scheming that is the fruit of an excited mind, but that is forgotten once calm returns. And our surroundings began to seem more pleasant. We were not prisoners, that was clear enough. But we were not free, if only because we had nowhere to go. In the event, we were summoned to dinner before our gentle captivity grew too onerous, and followed a major-domo through the outskirts of the palace and into a long refectory that would not have been out of place in a monastery back home in England. It did not seem to belong to the palace itself, although some attempt had been made to make it seem grand with hangings and gleaming fittings of silver and gold. An altar stood at one end, upon which a great and ancient-looking crucifix stood. But the golden candlesticks seemed out of place on the plain, monkish tables, and for the first time in two days I began to feel a little at home. We were evidently not to dine with His Holiness, for I guessed these were not the state dining halls. And indeed we filed in with the lowlier sort of cleric – that is, given the circumstances, for I had never in my life thought of bishops and abbots as lowly, but today I had seen cardinals swarm like sparrows. Many of these worthy souls knew their place and took their seats in groups of friends or compatriots, I supposed. I was casting around for a spare couple of places when the major-domo gravely nodded towards three empty settings towards the end of the table nearest the altar. I glanced at the Captain, who shrugged and followed the man.

No sooner were we seated than another man appeared at my shoulder. He was slim of build and he would have had a rather jolly face had his eyes not been hooded and shrewd. His black hair was tonsured. He wore robes of pure white, unadorned, which lent him a certain ghostly gravity, but this was dispelled when he tapped the Captain lightly upon the shoulder and smiled down at him.

'I believe we are ordained to be companions at dinner’ he said. 'Or at least this worthy fellow tells me so.' The major-domo bowed stiffly and turned back to the throng. The white-clad man sat down next to the Captain, reached for a nearby bread basket and offered it to us.

'I am Peter of Verona’ he said. 'Here, have some bread. It is a rarity for a mendicant to be offering food, though, is it not?'

I laughed politely, and the Captain did too, although his laughter was a little forced.

Well met, Brother Peter’ I said. 'My name is Peter too: Petrus Zennorius, late of Cornwall’ 'And I am Michel Corvus Marinus’ said the Captain.

'Cormorant! A mendicant and a cormorant at the same table – the kitchens will be in turmoil to keep this table stocked’ smiled Peter. I laughed again: it was rather a good jest, for a cleric. At that moment the food began to come out, and it was excellent. We fell to, and I had spilled much gravy down my chin before any of us were ready to converse again. Indeed I was so busy chewing an exceedingly tasty but stringy piece of roast kid that I did not even notice that we were being addressed. Well, that explains it’ Brother Peter was saying. 'Indeed it must’ agreed the Captain. 'Explains what?' I asked, no doubt rudely.

'The reason for our being thrust together at this worthy table’ said Brother Peter. 'The Lord has seen fit to provide me with a travelling companion – well, to be precise, the Lord's Vicar – for I am setting out tomorrow for the town of my birth, and your friend is turning his head towards France. His Holiness told me I would not be travelling alone, and now there will be two upon the road, for a day or two at least’

'An unlooked-for blessing’ said the Captain, with very uncharacteristic piety.

The finest blessings are always those that come unasked’ returned Peter.

'Amen’ I agreed. 'And what is the nature of your journey, if I may humbly ask, Brother?'

The friar threw up his hands. Something about the vigour of the gesture made me flinch. To preach, of course!' he said, as happy as a child. 'Three years past – we were speaking of unsought blessings, were we not? – when our beloved Gregory began his attack on the plague of heresy I was given, by His Holiness in person, the honour of being his Inquisitor General in the northerly part of the Italian lands, and alas! my official duties bring me south too often, for I love my homeland, flat and marshy though I will admit it is, and even more I love preaching the word of the Lord to my own people.'

We were dining with an inquisitor. No wonder the Captain seemed a trifle stiff. I tried to catch his eye, but his whole attention was upon the friar, who was tapping a goat bone upon the table top to make his point.

'And that is what I mean,' he was saying. 'These unhappy souls will gladly let their errors lead them to the fire if we do not save them! And if we cannot? Well, burn they must!'

To my enormous relief, the Captain soon turned the conversation aside from heretics and their ordained fate, and we fell to empty bantering before parting as bosom friends, Peter arranging to meet with Master Corvus after breakfast for a leisurely start upon the road. But as soon as we had gone our own way, the Captain's mouth froze in a grim line and we marched in stony silence back to our room. Once we had shut and latched the door, I was amazed to see my companion blow life into the embers that lay in the hearth, for the evening had grown warm and much of the dampness had left the chamber. But he fanned them into a blaze and laid on more wood, until he had made a pyre fit for a phoenix, that leaped, crackling and roaring, up the chimney. Then he leaned back in his seat. It was uncomfortably hot now, and sweat was beginning to bead on my temples.