Pip Vaughan-Hughes - The Vault of bones

And then I understood, or rather surrendered myself to understanding, for it was not a path I wished to take. The discrepancies in the Inventaria: the sandals of Christ, the Robe of the Virgin Mary, and what had set Gilles and the Captain chattering: the Mandylion of Edessa. The spices, the Captain had called them: an added commission for us, priceless goods on top of the untold riches already guaranteed. They were to have disappeared into my luggage sometime during the leisurely negotiations and no one would have been the wiser. It was a plan almost banal in its simplicity. But now, suddenly, I had the means to offset disaster and the ruin of every one of our schemes. I still had the pope's decree, which perhaps was more valuable than everything else combined. But I would have to act fast. It should be easy to talk my way into the chapel, for the guards would not question the seal of Saint Peter. Nor would they question me, I hoped, if I removed certain things. For items were leaving already, and under the clear auspices of the Regent himself. It would be easy, if nerve-racking. I would do the thing now, at once, before I could change my mind. Then I would smuggle my loot out of the palace, make my way to a Genoese ska’a and buy my way on to the next ship back to Italy and the Cormaran.

I had reached my corridor, and all but ran the last steps to my chambers. I wanted nothing more than to lock the door behind me and curl up in a corner. But as I stepped inside I was grabbed from either side, pulled off my feet and dragged, at a run, over to the bed. I did not have time to. cry out before someone grasped a handful of my hair, and then my face was being pressed into the sheets. I felt my knife being snatched from my belt, then my arms were tugged back much farther than nature had ever intended them to go. I shouted something – a protest, an oath – but a fierce blow to the ear silenced me. Then I was hauled up again by my arms, all but out of their sockets and flaying me with molten pain, and forced down on to my knees on the stone floor. I had time to see that the little iron-bound chest where the pope's decree had lain was open, the lock gouged and splintered. So Querini had it after all. Here is the end of everything, I thought. Then my hair was seized again – did I have any left? I felt tonsured anew – and my head jerked back so that I was looking up into the face of a man who had stepped in front of me. It was Hughues, the chamberlain.

'So: the murderer continues to enjoy our emperor's hospitality. How practical of him. Now then. Boy.' He snapped his fingers under my nose. Seeing how I flinched, he did it again, and when the others sniggered he slapped me across the face, hard. His fingers were loaded with heavy rings and I felt as if I had been punched by a mailed fist. Blood started to run down the back of my throat, and I coughed.

'All right, get him up, get him up. Take him to the scriptorium.' I tried to drink the blood that was pouring from my nose: I had a foggy idea that I could stop it staining my tunic.

'For God's sake, Hughues, can't we just slit his throat and drop him in the harbour? We know he killed young Rolant – don't we, Aimery?'

I tried to turn, but whoever had a hold of my hair gave it a twist and I bit my lip to keep from crying out.

'I know. He as much as told me. These churchmen, d'you see, they are so fond of their words. Condemned himself out of his own mouth. Shocking – absolutely shocking.'

The voice of Aimery was as cold and dull as the fog that drifted on the Golden Horn. Rage flared in my chest, but not surprise, for no betrayal, I thought bitterly, would surprise me again. But all I could do was writhe uselessly as my arms and scalp blazed with agony. But now I was pulled to my feet and my arms were released for a moment. The sudden absence of pain almost made me faint, but then my wrists were being tied in front of me and I was being pushed from the room.

My eyes had been watering so much from the pain in my scalp that I had not been able to look about me. Now I did, and saw that the chamber was full of men: Hughues the chamberlain, the baron who had argued with Aimery yesterday and another I had seen in the Regent's company; Gervais was there, and another huntsman, and a crowd of others whom I did not recognise but who all had the sneering cast of Frankish brutality about them. And, leaning on the door jamb, eyes narrowed, was Aimery himself.

When you are preparing for a fight – if you are lucky enough to be able to prepare – you can at least force yourself to believe that you will survive. And when you are fighting you do not think at all. But now, bound as I was and surrounded by hating strangers, I was visited by the certainty that I was about to die. Perhaps not instantly, no, but I knew, as sure as I knew my own name, that what was happening to me now was not part of my life: it was the very beginning of my death.

I had seen men die. It is horrible, always. They whine, they piss and shit themselves like helpless babies. They call on their god and they beg for their mothers. This was going to happen to me very soon. Strangely, I was not frightened. I was in pain, for my sinews were ripped across my shoulders and my cheek felt as if it were shattered; and perhaps that allayed the fear somewhat. But I also loathed these people with all my heart – with mine, and with Anna's, maybe – and I was furious beyond measure that my death was to come at their hands. I thought of Captain de Montalhac, and how relieved he had seemed to once more be aboard a ship, and of what had happened after that. So I drew myself up, stuck my chin in the air and paced as steadily as I could out into the passage. The huntsman and another courtier took me by the elbows and the others formed up in a mocking escort around us. They marched along quickly so that I kept stumbling, and as we went down the stairs I almost fell three or four times. Indeed, if they had not held me so tight I might have thrown myself down in search of a cleanly broken neck. But I reached the hall below and they dragged me along, making me trip and dance between them for the amusement of the company. What a merry gallows-crowd we must have made! But alas, only the Greek servants, were there to see us, and they cast down their eyes.

The scriptorium turned out to be a room that gave on to the chamber where the Regent had received the Captain and me on that first day. It was small and lined with benches and tables, and felt a little like a study room in my abbey, far away in Devon. There were no monks here, however; just the Regent himself sitting in a high-backed chair. My escort took the other seats. I was left standing in the centre of the room. It took me a long instant to understand that my trial had begun. And at that moment my anger vanished and cold despair curled itself about me like smoke.

Young man’ said the Regent. I wondered how he was feeling after his ordeal with the reliquary: he seemed to have recovered rather well, and with the aid of the silver jug and goblet at his elbow, no doubt. Young man, you have abused, most horribly, the friendship extended to you by His Majesty the Emperor Baldwin through his Regent’ He paused and scratched his throat, and I saw that he had succeeded in getting quite drunk in the few minutes since I had last seen him.

I drew myself up, damaged ribs shrieking within my breast. 'I am no murderer’ I said loudly. Where is Captain… Captain de Sol? I call Nicholas Qu-' A fist landed in my guts and I doubled over, retching iron-sour bile. Then I was jerked upright, and as I gasped for breath a wad of greasy cloth was forced into my mouth. I yelled into it, uselessly. Through watering eyes I saw that my wish had been obeyed, for there, against the far wall, leaned a heavyset man in Venetian silk. The Regent turned to him, and Nicholas Querini gave a curt nod.