Hugh Corbett 14 - The Magician's Death (5 page)

Horehound moved on. Now and again the trees gave way to some dripping glade or treacherous morass. As usual, he circled these and continued his journey. The trees thinned. Horehound was now out in the open, climbing the slight escarpment from which the castle reared up into the sky. This was a favourite place for rabbits. Corfe had its own warren and some of the rabbits bred there often escaped to begin colonies of their own. The previous night Horehound had set traps very near the moat. He hoped the bitter cold and darkness would blunt the sentries’ vigilance. As he approached, he could smell the rank stale water, and grateful for the mist now beginning to boil, he searched out where he had laid his traps and was delighted at the soft plump corpses waiting for him.

He’d almost filled his sack when he came across the corpse. The young woman lay sprawled on the edge of the moat, hidden beneath some gorse, opposite a narrow postern gate to the castle. Horehound almost screamed with fright. Edging closer, he felt the girl’s face and her long hair, and touching her neck, he felt the coldness of death as well as the feathered quarrel embedded deep in her chest. He glanced up at the pinpricks of light along the battlements. There was nothing he could do, and retreating into the night, he returned to the forest by a different route, skirting the nearby village.

He reached the cemetery of the church of St Peter’s in the Wood and stopped before the lych gate. Should he go in and seek Father Matthew, a kindly, honest-faced priest? Surely he too must be concerned about the stories. How many now? Two or three young women, and tonight’s victim made possibly four, all brutally murdered. Two of the corpses had been found in the castle itself, and the third, like tonight’s, on the approaches to it. Horehound was deeply troubled. He did not want to think of the other nightmare, which he called ‘the horror of the forest’, that lonely glade, the sombre oak tree and that corpse hanging like the victim of some barbaric sacrifice. The outlaw stared across the cemetery. He could glimpse no light from the priest’s house, whilst the church was a sombre mass of stone, black against the night. Such matters would have to wait. Horehound loped on.

Inside the church, Father Matthew knelt, enveloped by the darkness. He was crouching just within the sanctuary, his back against the communion rail, staring at the small lantern which hung next to the pyx above the high altar. He crossed himself once again and quietly murmured the Confiteor, the ‘I Confess’, reciting his sins and begging pardon and penance for them. It was the same every night. Whenever he could, Father Matthew doused the lights of his house and came to pray in the cold darkness, an act of reparation, allying himself with Christ’s agony in Gethsemane. He recalled the words of Psalm 50: ‘A pure heart create for me, oh God, put a steadfast spirit within me.’ His dry lips and tongue stumbled over the word ‘steadfast’.

Father Matthew laughed bitterly to himself; he could pray no more. The cold darkness also reminded him of that cell, and above all of that voice whispering its secrets through the darkness. Such memories provoked tears, reminding Father Matthew of his mysterious past. Putting his face in his hands, he wept bitterly for what he had done, as well as what he should have done but had failed to do.

Roger Bacon,
Opus Maius

Horehound, with his companion Milkwort, hid amongst brambles and undergrowth, quiet as dappled roe deer. They crouched as if carved out of stone, watching the trackway which wound out of the forest to climb the chalky downs to Corfe Castle. Six weeks had passed since Horehound had found the murdered girl out near the castle. Since then there had been another one, Gunhilda, her battered corpse discovered amongst the rubbish heaps on a piece of wasteland within the castle itself. Father Matthew had preached vehemently against these gruesome murders both in his pulpit and again at the market cross. Yet what good would that do? Killing was part of life. A reward had been posted on Horehound’s head because he and Milkwort had to hunt to live, poaching Lord Edmund’s deer and filching whatever they could. They had spent November hunting, trapping deer and rabbit, drying the flesh and salting it in vats of brine deep in the forest. The Ancient One, a member of their group, had advised them to fill their larder against the winter; he had prophesied how the snows would come and how life, once again, for Horehound and his band would balance on a knife edge.

Advent had arrived, and the church was preparing for the birth of the infant Christ. Father Matthew had already decked the nave of St Peter’s with evergreen, whilst his parishioners were collecting wood in the cemetery and common land to build a crib. All this had been swept aside by fresh news and busy rumour; everyone was agog with excitement. Strangers were moving into the area! Corfe Castle was to be the meeting place for a council between the clerks of France and England. Horehound did not know who the King of France was. The Ancient One had told him that the Kingdom of France lay across the Narrow Seas and had once been ruled by the kings of England. Horehound had listened to the gossip. He’d acted suitably impressed as he squatted amongst the trees at the rear of the Tavern in the Forest, sharing gossip with the pot boys from the tap room who could so easily be bribed for local news and information in return for a basket of succulent fresh rabbit meat. He depended on such news, ever vigilant lest the Sheriff of Dorset move into the area with his comitatus, ready to hunt the likes of Horehound down. He’d questioned the pot boys closely. At first they teased him as he sat between Milkwort and Angelica, Milkwort’s woman. The pot boys claimed royal justices were coming, their execution cart trundling behind them surmounted by stocks, gibbets and whips, to punish Horehound and his coven. One boy, more insolent than the rest, even hinted that Horehound was responsible for the death of the local maids. The outlaw had yelped his innocence until the others laughed and reassured him. ‘One-ear’, so called because a dog had bitten off the other one, claimed it was because of ‘Ham’, which provoked more laughter, until he correctly recalled the details he had learnt from a sottish man-at-arms: how the Council was to discuss a Franciscan called Roger Bacon, a local man, born at Ilchester, just over the Somerset border. Horehound listened round-eyed. Even he had heard stories about the magical friar who’d travelled far to the east to study in some great city.

‘Why would they want to talk about him?’ he had asked. The boys had simply shaken their heads and returned to discussing the gruesome murders.

The finger of suspicion for the deaths pointed directly at someone in the castle rather than anyone from the forest or one of the local villagers. After all, as One-ear pointed out, and he was regarded as wiser than the rest because he could count to ten and knew his letters, the corpses of the poor maidens had been found either in the grounds of the castle itself or near its gateway. Horehound wasn’t concerned about such murders, as long as he and his ilk weren’t blamed. Yet the presence of King’s men in the area alerted him to danger, whilst the ‘horror of the forest’ still cast a deep shadow over both himself and his group. Horehound wished he could be free of all that, as well as gossip about what might be glimpsed in the forest.

Last night rumour, like a mist, had swirled up the secret forest paths. The King’s men were on their way. So Horehound and Milkwort were ready. They had to make sure about these strangers, and what better opportunity than a mist-strewn morning at the beginning of December when the light was poor and the forest dripped with damp, whilst their bellies were warmed with viper broth and chunks of steaming rabbit meat?

Horehound tensed. The strangers were coming, the clip-clop of their horses echoing like a drumbeat. He peered down the track. The riders emerged out of the thinning mist, four in all, three riding abreast, the last bringing up the rear, trying to manage a vicious-looking sumpter pony. The rider in the centre was talking, gesturing before them at the castle. As the line of trees thinned, just opposite where Horehound and Milkwort crouched, the riders reined in to take a full view of Corfe Castle. They did not speak in Norman French but English, so that the fourth man, the moon-faced, blond-haired groom, with a clear cast in one eye, could understand what was being said. The leading man, whom Horehound immediately christened ‘the King’s henchman’, was describing the history of the castle. He had a strong, carrying voice as he informed his companions about how, in the ancient times, a king had been stabbed in its gateway whilst princes of the blood had been starved in its ancient dungeons.

Horehound watched most closely. The speaker was the first King’s man he had seen for years and he wondered about his title. Turning his head, he caught the name ‘Sir Hugh’. He was tall and slender, with dark skin and large oval eyes, a sharp nose above full lips and a clean-shaven chin. A peregrine falcon, Horehound reflected, and he felt his stomach curdle. Horehound lived on his wits, and he knew this man was dangerous, just by his calm manner, the authority with which he spoke. He was dressed simply enough, in a dark blood-red cotehardie above pale green leggings pushed into high boots on which glittering spurs jingled. A ring sparkled on his finger, and beneath the cloak he wore some collar of office around his neck. As the King’s Man turned, pushing back the cowl of his cloak, Horehound could see that his black hair was tinged with grey, swept back and tied at the nape of the neck.

Horehound shifted his attention to the others. The nearest to him sat astride a big-girthed horse with gleaming saddle and harness. This second King’s man was dressed like a raven in his black leather, a broad war belt slung diagonally across his chest, whilst the cross hilt of his sword was looped over the saddle horn so it could be drawn swiftly and easily. The black leather garb accentuated the narrow pale face under the fiery red hair. ‘The fighting man’ was how Horehound would describe him later, a clerk but also a killer, just from the way he sat, hands never far from his weapons. The rider on the far side was sandy-haired and looked like a clerk in his sober cloak, his hair shaven close to his ears.

Horehound turned to Milkwort and winked. His companion grinned; his leader was satisfied. The King’s men hadn’t brought soldiers, so they wouldn’t be hunting them.

‘Shall we go?’ Milkwort whispered. As he moved his foot, the bramble bush shook. Horehound, horror-struck, gazed back at the trackway. The King’s men had stopped talking and were staring directly at where they were hiding. Both outlaws stiffened. The red-haired one, the fighting man, following his master’s gaze, swung easily out of the saddle, drawing his sword as he did so. He edged across the path, his left hand going behind his back to find the dagger strapped there, drawing closer to the line of brambles and tangled weed which stretched like a net between the trees. Horehound nudged Milkwort.

‘Now,’ he whispered.

Both men turned and, at a half-crouch, raced back into the darkness of the mist-hung trees.

‘Let it be, Ranulf.’ Sir Hugh Corbett, Keeper of the Secret Seal, gathered up the reins of his horse. Ranulf resheathed his sword and returned to his own mount.

‘Are you sure, Master?’

‘As God is in Heaven, I thought someone was there.’ Corbett pulled a face. ‘Perhaps children from the village; their curiosity must be stirred.’

Ranulf of Newgate, Principal Clerk in the Chancery of the Green Wax, wondered how long Sir Hugh had known about the secret lurkers. He was convinced they weren’t children; he had glimpsed broad shoulders and a tangle of hair, and one of them had definitely been carrying a crossbow. But there had been no real danger.

‘Master Longface’, as Ranulf called Sir Hugh whenever he was discussing him with Chanson the groom, was only intent on letting their horses rest before the steep climb to the castle gates, hence the brief pause. Ranulf glared at Chanson, who was now grinning wickedly at him.

‘They may not have been children, Ranulf,’ whispered the groom, ‘but very big rabbits. They grow very large around here.’ Chanson was pleased to have the opportunity to tease Ranulf, whose one fear, as he had openly confessed himself, was the countryside, with its menacing woods, lonely open meadows and stretches of land with no sign of human habitation, the only sound being the screech of birds and the ominous crackling amongst the trees either side of the track. Ranulf was a child of the narrow lanes and runnels of London, and was quick to pine for what he termed ‘the comforting stink and close warmth of a town or city’. Ranulf slipped his boot into the stirrup and remounted.

‘If they had rabbits as big as a house,’ he retorted quickly, ‘you still wouldn’t be able to hit one.’

William Bolingbroke, Clerk of the Secret Seal and recently returned from Paris, heard the remark and joined in the teasing. Amongst the clerks of the Secret Chancery, Chanson’s lack of skill as an archer was notorious. Given any weapon, this Clerk of the Stable, with such a notable cast in his eye, was judged to be more of a danger to himself than any mailed opponent.

‘We must go on. Sir Edmund will be expecting us.’ Corbett leaned over and gripped Bolingbroke’s wrist. ‘William, I am content you are with us.’ He winked. ‘Though I am certain that the Seigneur de Craon will not be so easily pleased.’ Corbett pulled back his hood. ‘You are well, William?’

‘Curious, Sir Hugh.’

‘Of course, but remember, those things done in the dark will soon be brought into the light of day.’ Corbett urged his horse on. ‘Or so Scripture would have us believe.’

They left the shadow of the trees, spurring their horses over the grassy chalkland up towards the castle built on its successive mounds, one above the other, which provided it with its impregnable position. Corbett had visited Corfe years before. His parents had farmed land in Devon and they had taken their favourite son to see the glories of the King’s builders and stonemasons. He had worked in London and Paris, yet even the sights of those cities, not to mention the passing of years, had done little to diminish his awe at this formidable fortress, with its lofty crenellated walls, soaring towers, battlemented turrets and thick-set drum towers. From the keep, on the top of the hill, fluttered the royal banner of England, the golden leopards clear against their scarlet background, and next to it the personal standard of Sir Edmund Launge, the Royal Constable, silver lions couchant against a dark blue field.