Paul Doherty: Assassin in the Greenwood

Clothilde looked over de Savigny's shoulder at the small roll of parchment he had tossed on the table. She didn't care a whit. Ranulf-atte-Newgate had been an attractive prospect, and even more so with the bag of coins he had offered her. Enough silver for Clothilde to leave Paris, go back to Provence and buy a small farm or even a tavern. Men were so stupid! They'd sell so much for a single night with her. Clothilde continued her pretended gasps and whispers of ecstasy. She saw the door open and momentarily froze. Ranulf-atte-Newgate slipped like a shadow into the room. He tiptoed across, took the parchment, winked at Clothilde and left, gently closing the door behind him.

'May we have that, Monsieur?'

Ranulf whirled round. Two of the relic-sellers stood at the top of the stairs. One lounged against the wall chewing on a piece of straw, the other leaned against the rail of the stairs. Ranulf cursed. Somebody had betrayed them. He heard Clothilde giggling in the room behind him. Ranulf smiled and nodded his head.

'Your sister?' he mocked. 'She sends her best regards!'

The straw-chewer shifted and, as he did so, Ranulf smashed his fist into the other relic-seller. Straw-chewer did not have time even to lift his dagger as Ranulf, light as a cat, struck out with his own, slicing a deep gash into the side of his neck. He thundered downstairs, crashing into the taproom.

'Run, Bardolph, run!' he yelled.

The perpetual student needed no second bidding. Both he and Ranulf fled from the tavern before the other relic-sellers recovered their wits. Their leader shoved two of his companions towards the stairs.

'See what's happened!' he rasped.

The two men kicked their tinker trays aside, brought out the arbalests they had concealed on hooks beneath their cloaks and raced across the taproom and up the stairs. One of their companions was unconscious, the other dying, blood bubbling from the wound at his neck. They ignored him. One sent his boot crashing against the chamber door which flew back on its leather hinges. Clothilde and de Savigny looked up in astonishment but neither the clerk nor the courtesan had time even to protest. Nogaret's men pointed their crossbows and sent a bolt deep into each lover's neck.

In the darkening streets below, the rest of Nogaret's men were pursuing Ranulf and Bardolph. The two English agents ran like the wind, slipping and scrabbling on the dirty cobbles.

'Who told them?' Bardolph hissed.

'Clothilde!' gasped Ranulf. 'Who else? She did not say who she was meeting or de Savigny would never have been allowed to enter the tavern alive. She must have told them merely that tonight we would act. She sold her favours to both camps.'

Bardolph stopped at a corner, leaned against the wall and gasped for breath.

'The lying bitch!' he breathed. 'I'll kill her!'

'No need,' Ranulf answered, pushing him on. 'She and de Savigny will already be dead – as will we be soon if you don't run!'

The two Englishmen fled deeper into the warren of alleyways. Ranulf had prepared for such an eventuality. As long as they reached the riverside they would be safe. He had the precious roll of manuscript. Others in 'Master Long Face's' service, as Ranulf secretly called Corbett, would provide safe passage to Boulogne and a ship to England.

At first they could hear the cries of their pursuers but gradually these faded. The streets were black, the cobbled alleyways running off them shrouded in darkness. The good citizens of Paris slept. No one was about except withered, hideous beggars whining fruitlessly for alms. Ranulf and Bardolph thought they were safe. They left a street of dark, high-gabled houses and were half-way across the open square when they heard a shout.

'There they are! In the King's name, stop!'

Ranulf and Bardolph fled. A crossbow bolt whirled past their heads. They had nearly reached the mouth of an alleyway when Bardolph suddenly groaned, flung his hands forward and crashed to the cobbles. Ranulf stopped and ran back.

'Don't leave me!' pleaded Bardolph. Ranulf let his hand run down the man's back and felt the cruel barb embedded at the base of his spine. 'The wound is grievous.' Ranulf looked despairingly across the square at the dark shapes hurrying towards him.

'Then don't leave me alive!' Bardolph wept. 'Please, Ranulf, do it! Do it now!'

He shook his sweat-soaked face and peered closer.

'Please!' Bardolph insisted. 'They'll keep me alive for weeks!'

Ranulf heard the slap of leather on the cobbles.

'Look!' he hissed. 'Look over there! We are safe!'

Bardolph painfully turned his head and Ranulf swiftly slit his throat, breathed a prayer and hurried into the shadows.

The forest had always stood there, the trees providing a canopy to shield the earth from the sky. Beneath this veil of greenness which stretched as far as the eye could see, the forest had witnessed murder as long as it had seen man himself. First the small dark people who burnt their victims in hanging cages to atone their angry war gods or placate the great Earth Mother whose name should never be mentioned. They were replaced by more warlike men who hung their victims from oak or elm in sacrifices to Thor and one-eyed Woden. These, too, had gone to dust, supplanted by men who, though worshipping the white Christ, built temples to their own captains of power.

The trees had seen it all: the gnarled oak, the elm with its branches stooped with age. The forest was a dangerous place, a living thing, and through its green-dappled shadows slunk masked men who knew the secret paths and where to avoid the treacherous morass. Only a fool would wander from the beaten track which wound through Sherwood Forest, either north to Barnsleydale or south to Newark and the great road down to London.

The tax-collectors thought of the legends about the forest as they slowly moved the King's money in iron-bound chests, chained and padlocked in covered wagons, to the Exchequer at Westminster. The two tax-collectors were following a secret route, going by little used pathways and tracks so not even the local sheriff, Sir Eustace Vechey, had knowledge of their whereabouts. The convoy was protected by a small column of dusty archers and a few outriders who anxiously scanned the trees on either side for signs of ambush. It was a hot day. The sun was now high in the sky like a disc of molten gold and the soldiers sweated and cursed under their chain-mail cotes and tight-fitting iron helms. If they could only reach Newark and the safety and the coolness of the castle!

The principal tax-collector, Matthew Willoughby, spurred his horse forward, his assistant John Spencer galloping close behind. The two men rode ahead of the column, searching the horizon for an end to this treacherous forest. All they could glimpse was a sea of green and the white dusty track.

'At least it's empty,' Willoughby grated.

Spencer looked back at the convoy. 'Do you think we are safe?'

'We have to be. The King needs this money. It's to be at the Exchequer within a week and at Dover by the end of the month.'

They stood stroking their sweat-covered horses, not waiting for the wagons to catch them up. Spencer rose high in the stirrups.

'We will pause…'

The rest of the sentence was lost. A long feather-tipped arrow sped out from the trees, caught him full in his soft throat and sent him retching on his own blood out of the saddle.

Willoughby looked round in horror. Three of the escort were already down and two of the cart drivers were now a bloody mess still sitting in their seats, heads flung back, barbed arrows sticking out of chests or stomachs. There was a second volley of arrows. Some of the horsemen panicked whilst archers fell like skittles before they could even string their bows.

'Stop!' a voice rang out from the darkness of the trees. 'Master Tax-collector,' it continued, 'tell your men to drop their weapons. Take the lead yourself.'