The Medieval Murderers - The Tainted Relic

Joseph was woken from a light doze some little while after dawn. The gates were routinely opened as soon as it was daylight, and now he heard the door open, and yawned as he peered short-sightedly at the figure entering.

‘Who is that?’ he demanded.

‘I am this man’s brother,’ the man said. ‘Is he well?’

‘If he were, he’d scarcely be in here, would he?’ Joseph said drily. He was not ready for foolish questions such a short while after being woken, and his sympathy for a soon-to-be-bereaved man was at a low ebb. He had not slept properly since the man had been brought in here and his temper was not improved by the lack.

‘I’m sorry, Brother. I didn’t know he was here, though.’

‘We couldn’t tell anyone, could we? He couldn’t tell us who he was, after all,’ Joseph said with a more tolerant tone. His good humour was returning. ‘Who are you?’

The man licked his lips. ‘I’m Rob. He’s my brother Andrew. Will he live?’

‘Oh, yes, I think so.’ Joseph walked to the bed and stood over Andrew. He took a cold cloth from the dish on the table and cleaned Andrew’s face and brow. To his delight, he saw that the face appeared to relax slightly. When he put his hand to Andrew’s forehead, there was a significant diminution in temperature. ‘My God! Yes, I think he’s fast recovering now. With God’s good grace, he will recover!’

He turned and smiled at the sight of Rob’s face. ‘It must be a terrible shock. Please, friend, sit and collect yourself. I have a little wine in my chamber. I shall fetch you some.’

‘Tha…thanks.’

Rob watched as the man bustled about the place.

This was all wrong! He had thought Andrew was safely dead. He’d stabbed hard enough, feeling the hilt of his dagger slam into his brother’s back, he’d thrust so determinedly. Damn his soul, he wanted Andrew dead and out of the way. He’d wanted that ever since he’d first realized that Annie loved him.

She had been all he had ever wanted. To him, Annie represented love, comfort, ease, a home. She was beautiful. He’d thought that on the very first day he’d seen her walking here from Tiverton. All he’d done since then, he’d done to make a new home and life for her. And in return all he hoped for was her acceptance.

But Andrew had taken it instead. It was dreadful to have a rival for her affections, but how much worse was it to know that his rival was his own brother? It tore at his heart, and yet he could see no alternative. If he was to have his woman, he would have to remove his brother.

He rose as though in a trance, his feet drawing him towards the bed even as his hand reached to his dagger, and he had already drawn the steel as the door to Joseph’s chamber opened and the little man came out with a bowl of wine.

‘Here we are. I hope you are feeling a little more…What are you doing there?’

Rob turned for a split second, and his momentary hesitation was long enough. ‘I…I have to…’

‘No! You mustn’t hurt him,’ Joseph shouted.

On the next bed, the outlaw had woken a few moments before. Now he turned his head to see the scruffy felon with the dagger in his hand. He recognized the man from the attack at Bishop’s Clyst, and the sight was enough to stir him. His belly hurt abominably, but he had to protect the man whose life he was sworn to defend. He reached down to the pile of his clothes by the bed. There was his sword, and he pulled it free, then swung his legs to the floor.

‘Christ!’

His legs all but collapsed when he put his weight on them. As he spoke, the felon looked at him, and appeared to recognize him too, and stepped back as though terrified by the sight.

Naked, grunting with the effort, the outlaw clenched his teeth. ‘The relic: where is it?’

Rob saw him teeter as though about to collapse, and was about to lift his dagger to strike Andrew when the knight gritted his teeth with a supreme effort and stepped forward, the sword’s point unwavering.

‘Where is it?’ he demanded.

It was like watching a corpse come to life. The scene was enough to destroy Rob’s resolve. He stepped back, one step, then another, and turned to the door to flee.

Joseph understood nothing about their actions, but he knew that this man had been about to murder his own brother. He had no compunction, and brought the heavy dish down on Rob’s head as he passed. There was a veritable fountain of red wine, and it smothered Joseph, making him blink, feeling a sudden shock.

Rob howled with the pain of the blow, but continued out, dripping with wine. He lurched, then ran across the small green to the gate.

‘Porter! Stop that man! He tried to kill a patient!’ Joseph cried. He saw the porter turn slowly.

The man gaped. As he later said, he could see Joseph covered in red, as though his throat had been cut, and Joseph’s words made him act without a second thought. He had an old bill behind his door for defending the precinct, and now, as Rob ran towards him, a hand wiping the wine from his face, he grabbed it. An old warrior, he swung it once as Rob passed, and hamstrung him.

Rob collapsed like a poleaxed heifer. He couldn’t comprehend what had happened at first, only that there had been a thud at the back of his knees, and a leg had stopped supporting him. Now he rose on his hands and one knee, but his left leg wouldn’t do as he wanted. It flopped, useless. He stared at it, realizing that it was drenched in blood, and looked up in time to see the evil, spiked pole-arm approaching him.

Joseph was about to cry out when he saw the spike hit Rob. The body twitched for a few moments, one leg beating a percussive beat on the dirt of the roadway, but then it lay still as the porter struggled to free his pole-arm from the dead body’s eye socket.

‘He is very unwell,’ Joseph said. ‘I would not have him upset any further.’

Baldwin and Simon nodded as Jonathan set out his reeds and parchment on a trestle table.

It was Baldwin who walked to the outlaw’s bed. ‘I am Sir Baldwin de Furnshill. Who are you?’

‘I am called Sir John Mantravers, from South Witham. I was born there five-and-forty years ago, served Lord Hugh de Courtenay here in the west, and then joined the noblest Order.’ His voice was weak, but as he uttered the last words, it strengthened, and he looked at Baldwin defiantly. ‘I was a Knight Templar.’

Baldwin nodded. ‘What happened to you?’

‘After the destruction of my Order, I escaped the tortures and the flames. I returned to England at last, and went to my old preceptory at South Witham. There I met an ancient comrade, Johel. He told me that there was a secret kept there.

‘A relic, a piece of the True Cross, was stored in a small casket in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre during the first of the Crusades. It was in the care of an Arab named Barzac, but he was murdered by Sir Miles de Clermont during the slaughter following the fall of Jerusalem. Barzac cursed the relic and all who would hold it. A few days later it passed into the hands of Geoffrey Mappestone, who wrote a document attesting to its authenticity.

‘Eventually it was brought to our country, and it has remained here for many years. Then Guillaume de Beaujeu learned of it, and he took it with him to the Holy Land when he became Grand Master of our Order. It killed him.’

Baldwin felt the breath stop in his throat. ‘De Beaujeu was slain on the walls near the Accursed Tower in Acre.’

‘The night before, I am told, he prayed for the city’s deliverance, and he took out this relic and prayed with it. The next day he died. The relic killed him, just as it kills all who touch it.’

Baldwin saw Brother Joseph crossing himself, and pressed the wounded man. ‘What then?’