Ellis Peters - Dead Man's Ransom

“I begin to think so, too,” said Cadfael and went in to see the wager laid.

They had not yet moved Elis and his cot into the neighbouring cell; Eliud still lay alone. Sometimes, marking the path the arrow had taken clean through his right shoulder, but a little low, Cadfael doubted if he would ever draw bow again, even if at some future time he could handle a sword. That was the least of his threatened harms now. Let him be offered as counter, balance the greatest promised good.

Cadfael sat down beside the bed, and told how Elis had asked leave to join him and been granted what he asked. That brought a strange, forlorn brightness to Eliud’s thin, vulnerable face. Cadfael refrained from saying a word about Elis’s imminent departure, however, and wondered briefly why he kept silent on that matter, only to realise hurriedly that it was better not even to wonder, much less question. Innocence is an infinitely fragile thing and thought can sometimes injure, even destroy it.

“And there is also a word I promised to bring you and have had no quiet occasion until now. From Cristina when I left Tregeiriog.” Her name caused all the lines of Eliud’s face to contract into a tight, wary pallor, and his eyes to dilate in sudden bright green like stormy sunlight through June leaves. “Cristina sends to tell you, by me, that she has spoken with her father and with yours and soon, by consent, she will be her own woman to give herself where she will. And she will give herself to none but you.” An abrupt and blinding flood drowned the green and sent the sunlight sparkling in sudden fountains, and Eliud’s good left hand groped lamely after anything human he might hold by for comfort, closed hungrily on the hand Cadfael offered, and drew it down against his quivering face, and lower into the bed, against his frantically beating heart. Cadfael let him alone thus for some moments, until the storm passed. When the boy was still again, he withdrew his hand gently.

“But she does not know,” whispered Eliud wretchedly, “what I am… what I have done…”

“What she knows of you is all she needs to know, that she loves you as you love her, and there is not nor ever could be any other. I do not believe that guilt or innocence, good or evil can change Cristina towards you. Child, by the common expectation of man you have some thirty years at least of your life to live, which is room for marriage, children, fame, atonement, sainthood. What is done matters, but what is yet to do matters far more. Cristina has that truth in her. When she does know all, she will be grieved, but she will not be changed.”

“My expectation,” said Eliud faintly through the covers that hid his ravaged face, “is in weeks, months at most, not thirty years.”

“It is God fixes the term,” said Cadfael, “not men, not kings, not judges. A man must be prepared to face life, as well as death, there’s no escape from either. Who knows the length of the penance, or the magnitude of the reparation, that may be required of you?” He rose from his place then, because John Miller and a couple of other neighbours, nursing the small scars of the late battle, carried in Elis, cot and all, from the next cell and set him down beside Eliud’s couch. It was a good time to break off, the boy had the spark of the future already alive in him, however strongly resignation prompted him to quench it, and now this reunion with the other half of his being came very aptly. Cadfael stood by to see them settled and watch John Miller strip down the covers from Eliud and lift and replace him bodily, as lightly as an infant and as deftly as if handled by a mother. John had been closeted with Elis and Melicent, and was grown fond of Elis as of a bold and promising small boy from among his kin. A useful man, with his huge and balanced strength, able to pick up a sick man from his sleep—provided he cared enough for the man!—and carry him hence without disturbing his rest. And devoted to Sister Magdalen, whose writ ran here firm as any king’s.

Yes, a useful ally.

Well…

The next day passed in a kind of deliberate hush, as if every man and every woman walked delicately, with bated breath, and kept the ritual of the house with particular awe and reverence, warding off all mischance. Never had the horarium of the order been more scrupulously observed at Godric’s Ford. Mother Mariana, small, wizened and old, presided over a sisterhood of such model devotion as to disarm fate. And her enforced guests in their twin cots in one cell were quiet and private together, and even Melicent, now a lay guest of the house and no postulant, went about the business of the day with a pure, still face, and left the two young men to their own measures.

Brother Cadfael observed the offices, made some fervent prayers of his own, and went out to help Sister Magdalen tend the few injuries still in need of supervision among the neighbours.

“You’re worn out,” said Sister Magdalen solicitously, when they returned for a late bite of supper and Compline. “Tomorrow you should sleep until Prime, you’ve had no real rest for three nights now. Say your farewell to Elis tonight, for they’ll be here at first light in the morning. And now I think of it,” she said, “I could do with another flask of that syrup you brew from poppies, for I’ve emptied my bottle, and I have one patient to see tomorrow who gets little sleep from pain. Will you refill the flask if I bring it?”

“Willingly,” said Cadfael, and went to fetch the jar he had had sent from Brother Oswin in Shrewsbury after the battle. She brought a large green glass flask, and he filled it to the brim without comment.

Nor did he rise early in the morning, though he was awake in good time; he was as good at interpreting a nudge in the ribs as the next man. He heard the horsemen when they came, and the voice of the portress and other voices, Welsh and English both, and among them, surely, the voice of John Miller. But he did not rise and go out to speed them on their way.

When he came forth for Prime, the travellers, he reckoned, must be two hours gone on their way into Wales, armed with Hugh’s safe-conduct to cover the near end of the journey, well mounted and provided. The portress had conducted them to the cell where their charge, Elis ap Cynan, would be found in the nearer bed, and John Miller had carried him out in his arms, warmly swathed, and bestowed him in the litter sent to bear him home. Mother Mariana herself had risen to witness and bless their going.

After Prime Cadfael went to tend his remaining patient. As well to continue just as in the previous days. Two clear hours should be ample start, and someone had to be the first to go in—no, not the first, for certainly Melicent was there before him, but the first of the others, the potential enemy, the uninitiated.

He opened the door of the cell, and halted just within the threshold. In the dim light two roused, pale faces confronted him, almost cheek to cheek. Melicent sat on the edge of the bed, supporting the occupant in her arm, for he had raised himself to sit upright, with a cloak draped round his naked shoulders, to meet this moment erect. The bandage swathing his cracked rib heaved to a quickened and apprehensive heartbeat, and the eyes that fixed steadily upon Cadfael were not greenish hazel, but almost as dark as the tangle of black curls.

“Will you let the lord Beringar know,” said Elis ap Cynan, “that I have sent away my foster-brother out of his hands, and am here to answer for all that may be held against him. He put his neck in a noose for me, so do I now for him. Whatever the law wills can be done to me in his place.” It was said. He drew a deep breath, and winced at the stab it cost him, but the sharp expectancy of his face eased and warmed now the first step was taken, and there was no more need of any concealment.