The Raven's Head (45 page)

I stared at the figure on the slab in horror, my eyes now seeing for the first time what my brain was struggling to accept. I was looking at a corpse. The tones of her skin were not painted, but real flesh. The eyelashes and brows were not stuck on but had once burrowed out of her body and been frozen there in that moment of her death.

‘This is my work, Master Laurent. To bring my daughter to life again, and I will.’ Sylvain’s voice reverberated in the small chamber, like a priest’s before an altar.

‘I have the bag that has been sewn with human hair to hide inside her belly. I have the ring your shadow transformed to place in her mouth. I have the blood of the boy to cleanse her. I need one thing more, Master Laurent, the most important object of them all. With that my daughter will rise again and live just as she was before. I will resurrect her. I will raise her from death to life, a new life. She will be reborn and this time she will never die.’

Kill the lion in his blood.

Father Arthmael is taking such broad strides across the grass towards the great tower that Regulus has to trot to keep pace with him. The boy cranes his head around, trying to snatch glimpses of the unfamiliar garden – the manor house with its many windows, the lavender bushes, the apple trees and the high wall. He is looking for a way out, an open gate that he could run to, but with a tightening in his throat he sees that this place is as firmly sealed as the abbey. Several times he stumbles in his haste, but the canon’s fingers burrow into his shoulder and he cannot fall.

As they reach the door of the tower, Regulus cranes his head back as far as he can to try to see the top, but they are so close it appears the tower is falling towards them. He tries to back away, but Father Arthmael only grips him harder. The boy can sense the priest’s excitement, but his fear too. Regulus has felt this tension before in adults, like the time his father was pacing outside the cottage while inside his mother screamed in labour.

A man comes lumbering across the grass towards them, a covered basket held in the crook of his arm. He is brawny and broad, like Regulus’s father. He is the first man the boy has seen since he was brought to the abbey who is not dressed in the white robes of the canons or the brown robes of the lay brothers. Though his expression is far from friendly, the sight of the green breeches and russet tunic eases Regulus’s anxiety. He resembles the people the boy used to see in the forest and marketplace, people who were once his whole world. He might have come to take him home.

Regulus offers him a shy smile, but the man barely glances at him. ‘Is this the boy the master sent for?’

‘It is. This is Regulus. Is your master inside, Odo?’

Odo grunts. ‘He’s not to be disturbed. Says you’re to settle the boy in the tower. He’ll come soon as it’s dark.’ He squints up at the afternoon sky, as if to judge exactly when that might be.

‘Here, you can carry this up,’ Odo says, thrusting the basket at Regulus.

The boy obediently grasps it in both hands, staggering slightly. It is heavier than it looks.

‘You’ll find what the boy is to wear in the basket. There’s a bite to eat and drink in it too. Master’s orders, case he gets fretful.’ Odo eyes Father Arthmael doubtfully. ‘Master said you’d not be eating yourself.’

‘I must prepare with fasting and prayer, as Lord Sylvain is also doing, is he not?’

Odo shrugs and, selecting the key from the great iron ring hanging at his belt, unlocks the door, standing aside for them to enter. Father Arthmael sweeps in. Regulus hesitates.

‘What are you waiting for, lad? Shift yourself.’ Odo’s hand shoots out, as if he means to shove the boy through the door. Then he jerks back as if Regulus is indeed a consecrated little king, who must not be touched by baser men.

Taking a deep breath, Regulus edges inside and is relieved to see nothing alarming, just kegs and piles of wood. He smells the familiar odour of animal dung. He watches Father Arthmael mounting the wooden steps that run up the side of the wall. The door slams behind him, making him jump. The small chamber is plunged into semi-darkness and the kegs and timber take on new and menacing shapes. Regulus scurries after Father Arthmael, but it is not easy mounting the steep steps dragging the heavy basket.

He passes through the first room, which he barely has time to notice, and finally staggers, sweating, through the second trapdoor into the chamber at the top of the tower. A ladder ascends to a closed trapdoor above him, but with profound relief he sees that Father Arthmael is not climbing that but is standing by one of the slit windows, staring out.

For a moment, the boy looks around, puzzled. He can hear the forest, but he is inside a room. The sound is coming from a dozen or so tiny cages hanging from the beams above. In each one a single bird flutters and chirrups. Linnets and blackbirds, skylarks and robins, thrushes and magpies, all regard him with their bright eyes. He remembers what Felix told him about a black wizard who turns boys into birds. Is one of the birds Mighel? Felix never found a grave, but he found Mighel’s amulet, the one he always wore, the one that slipped from his neck as feathers burrowed out through his skin and Mighel shrank down and down until he was no bigger than his own hand.

Father Arthmael called Regulus a wren. Will they turn him into one and lock him in a cage? Will boys batter him to death with sticks on St Stephen’s Day, breaking his tiny wings so that he cannot escape them, crushing his fragile skull until the blood drips from his beak?

A wail of misery and fear erupts from Regulus. He lets go of the basket and tries to scramble back down the stairs. But before his head has disappeared beneath the edge of the trapdoor, Father Arthmael has crossed the chamber, seized the back of his robe and is hauling him bodily up into the room. Regulus struggles, but his arms are pinned firmly by his sides. The abbot kneels before him, so that he can stare directly into the boy’s eyes.

‘You are Regulus, the little king. Kings are not afraid. They never show fear and you have nothing to be afraid of.’

‘Don’t . . . want to be . . . bird.’ His small chest heaves in sobs.

He has to repeat it several times before Father Arthmael catches the words. He laughs. It is a strange laugh, like the excited bark of a fox.

‘You are not to be a bird, Regulus. You are a lion. The young lion. The king-slayer.’

He reaches down and lifts the cover from the basket. Inside is a small flagon, a beaker and several small packages wrapped in sacking. Father Arthmael lifts them out, and sets them down beside an unlit brazier. Finally, from the bottom of the basket, he pulls out a length of woollen cloth, dyed to the colour of a poppy petal.

He smiles and, folding it carefully, returns it to the basket. Then he removes a small flask from a leather sheath that dangles from his belt. Ignoring the flagon, he pours liquid from his own flask into the beaker and hands it to the hiccuping boy. ‘Drink.’

Walking in the hot sun, struggling up those steps with the basket and crying have all conspired to make Regulus extremely thirsty. He takes a sip from the beaker before he has even sniffed it. The liquid is thick, like mead or cream. It is sweet, herby and bitter all at the same time. He doesn’t much like the taste, but he needs to drink. He gulps it down.

Father Arthmael unwraps a jar. The smell of honey rolls across the chamber. He holds out the jar, inviting the boy to dig his fist in and break off a piece of honeycomb. Regulus stuffs the comb into his mouth, chewing it happily. His father brought home honeycomb whenever he found a wild bees’ nest and Regulus and his brothers would chew it just like this, squabbling over who had the biggest piece. Except that he hadn’t been Regulus then. He had been another boy, with another name.

Father Arthmael, still kneeling, leans towards him. ‘Listen to me, Regulus. What you will be asked to do tonight will be far beyond your understanding, but you must trust me. Tonight, two great powers will come together in this tower – Albedo, the white ablution, the rebirth born of fire, and Nigredo, the black death of putrefaction. Black and white, do you understand, Regulus? Only one of them may emerge from the tower. The other must descend into the tomb. He must die so that from his death the elixir of eternal life may be created. And he must die at the hands of the young king. You must slay him. But the old king will not want to die. He will tell you that it is I who must be killed, but you must not listen to him. Remember what I told you in the orchard – he is a wicked man. He is all the foulness and corruption that is the Nigredo. He is the black death and it is he who must enter that dark tomb.’

Regulus is not listening. He’s sleepy and there are too many words, all jumbled together. All he can think about is whether he will be allowed to have more of the honeycomb.

‘Have you watched your father kill a deer or a goat by cutting its throat? Remember how he pulls the head back to expose the throat then makes one deep slash. It is so easy, isn’t it? So quick. Over in the single flash of a knife. That is what you will do, just like your father. I will bind the black king for you, so that he cannot resist. I will pull back his head and you will slice his throat, here.’

Father Arthmael seizes the boy’s hand and presses it to his own throat, so that he may feel and see exactly where he is to cut.

‘The blade I have brought for you to use is new. It is sharpened so keenly that even a baby could kill with it. It will be all over in the beat of an angel’s wing. Then I will send you home, just like Mighel. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?’ Regulus can feel a buzzing in Father Arthmael’s throat as he speaks. It tickles his fingertips making him giggle.

But he can hardly stand now. The floorboards are undulating as if they have been turned to water. His legs have vanished. He crumples slowly into the abbot’s arms. Father Arthmael catches him and gently cradles him, staring down into the boy’s half-closed, unseeing eyes.

‘Sleep now, little king, and when you wake it will be night and you will obey my every command. You will listen to my voice, only to my voice, and do exactly as I tell you. You will kill the old king and you will both enter the fire together. In the flames, youth and age, the living and the dead will melt into one and the fire shall consume them.’

There are two fountains springing with great power. The one water is hot and belongs to the boy. The other water is cold and is called the virgin’s fountain. Unite the one with the other that the two waters may be one.

Odo is standing on the other side of the gate as she enters, his great fingers grasping the ring of keys. Today he seems more like a gaoler than ever, for Gisa knows that when the Vesper bells sound he will not be waiting to unlock it again. She will not be returning to the other world tonight. She will not be able to reach the child.

She can still feel the grasp of Peter’s tiny hot fingers as he clung to her hand through the hole. She tried to explain, warned him to make the food and ale last as long as he could, but thirst is driving him mad. As she walked away, the boy pleaded with her to come soon and the ache of his cries echo in her ears even in here.

She has to fight hard to stop herself trying to wrench the gate open again. But it is already too late. The gate is locked and barred. Odo usually looks somewhere over her head when he addresses her, but today his gaze flicks towards her face. There is an embarrassed curiosity in the glance, as if he is looking at someone for the last time. He grudgingly informs her that Sylvain is not in the tower, but Father Arthmael is up there in the laboratorium.

She is almost relieved. She fears both men, but she cannot face Sylvain today, knowing what she owes him, what
he
says she owes him. The knowledge has left her numb, dead. But once Father Arthmael has delivered his instructions, he will leave, as he did before. Then she will have the chance to search again for the book.

That book is the hope, the talisman she has used to ward off the despair that has been wrapping itself about her since the moment Sylvain revealed the vile truth. But she will not accept it is the truth. She will never believe it. She drives the knowledge from her mind with that one fragile hope – if she can read the book, if she can heal little Peter, release him from that stone prison, then somehow her own past will shatter too, like some evil spell.

She drags her feet up the two flights of stairs and finds Father Arthmael seated on a stool in the upper chamber in his immaculate white robes. Her heart thuds as she sees his fingers tracing symbols on a page of a book, his mouth working silently as he chants beneath his breath. She glimpses the gold leaf of the sun emblazoned on the cover, impressed into the human skin. She knows it is
the
book. But Sylvain would not have left it here by accident.

Sylvain’s laboratorium is transformed. The flasks and glass tubes, the griffin’s-egg vessels and the many bottles have been cleared away. In their place, cages of birds swing from the rafters. They flap their wings as she takes the final step up into the chamber, flinging themselves at the bars, screeching their calls of fear. They are wild creatures. They cannot comprehend doors and locks. They are breaking their wings in their desperation to be free.

She is so distracted by the piteous birds that it takes her a few moments to realise that Father Arthmael is not alone. A small boy lies asleep on the floor at his feet, naked save for a length of scarlet cloth draped over one bare shoulder, the other end twisted about his waist as a loincloth. A narrow band of gold cloth, like a coronet, circles his red curls. His face rests on his arm, and tiny beads of perspiration spangle his upper lip. He looks even younger than Peter. But this boy seems peaceful, unhurt. Will he be safe here? If what Sylvain told her is true, he would not allow a child to be harmed, but if that part is true then . . .

Gisa makes an uncertain curtsy towards Father Arthmael. But he continues to read as if she is of no more substance than the air, though she knows he’s seen her, for his gaze darted towards her as she emerged through the hole in the floor. She stares hungrily at the book, as if her will can dissect away the skin and reveal the words that lie like bones beneath.