A Friar's Bloodfeud: (Knights Templar 20) (40 page)

To his astonishment, Pagan appeared to ignore him. Instead he reached down and took hold of Sir Geoffrey’s short hair, pulling
his head up. ‘Shut up! You’ve done enough already.’

‘What?’ As the cold metal of the blade touched his throat, Sir Geoffrey was suddenly still.

‘Leave him, Pagan. Let me kill him!’

‘Adcock?’ Sir Geoffrey said, trying to look over his shoulder while not moving his head. He was pulled up so far that his
fingers could hardly touch the ground, and the pressure on his scalp was terrible, but he daren’t move his legs in case Pagan
thought he was readying himself to attack.

‘Leave him, Pagan. He nearly killed me, and all because I was doing our lord’s work, clearing unusable land. I say I kill
him now and we throw
him
into the mire.’

‘Adcock, don’t be foolish!’ Sir Geoffrey said. ‘You can’t kill me, I’m your master here. Steward to the …’

‘You are nothing now, Sir Geoffrey. You’re a fool who’s lost a manor, that’s all. And wandering about at this time of night
you are a suspected fugitive. Come, Pagan, let me kill him. God knows I have enough reason, the bastard!’

‘No.’ Pagan sighed deeply. ‘I can’t, Adcock.’

The fellow was brimming with enthusiasm, the blade gripped so tightly in his hand fairly shaking with desire. He wanted to
kill this man more than anything he’d ever wanted. And it was all Pagan’s fault.

‘I can’t let you, Adcock. We’ll take the knight back down to Iddesleigh, and hand him over to that Keeper and his friend.
They’ll know what to do.’

No, Pagan couldn’t let this fellow commit murder. When Adcock had arrived here, he’d been a cheerful enough lad, from the
look of him, and now he was ruined. He had been subjected to Sir Geoffrey’s cruelty, insulted, demeaned, and changed into
a brutal facsimile of the man he had been such a short time before. And all because of Pagan’s crime. It was all his fault
that Adcock was here in the first place.

Adcock protested, ‘I want to kill him, though. Look, it’ll take one stab and we throw him into that mire there. No one
will ever find him if we don’t clear it, and after being beaten for clearing the other one, I’m not going to do that in a
hurry.’

‘Don’t think you can kill me with impunity, boy!’ Sir Geoffrey grated.

‘Who,’ Pagan asked quietly, ‘is there up here who would stop us?’

And suddenly Sir Geoffrey felt panic. He tried to pull his sword free and then grabbed for the dagger at his belt, but there
were too many men, and he could only scream his defiance and abuse as they roughly turned him over, binding his wrists.

Baldwin and Simon watched the flames roar skywards. Edgar was helping a few others to keep the two sides apart, while men
ran about the place fetching and carrying buckets of water from the well to try to douse the flames. Hugh was standing morosely
staring at the blaze, remembering the fire at his own house.

‘There is little chance of putting that out,’ Baldwin said.

‘Old thatch that’s had a good chance to dry is never easy to put out,’ Simon said.

The clouds of smoke, thick, greasy, and greyish green even in the darkness, roiled about the area. Invariably when it sank
down and engulfed all the men, it made them choke and splutter, it was so thick and foul.

They had seen the fires as they hurried down the road, hoping to prevent bloodshed, and both had known that they were too
late before they had caught sight of the house. ‘At least there are few dead,’ Baldwin said.

‘So far,’ Simon replied. ‘There are some bad wounds in among that lot.’

They had brought all the men from the bar at Iddesleigh with them, in the hope that they might compose a force to thrust between
the warring factions, but by the time they
reached the hall most of the men were already separated. The fighting took second place to watching the manor burn for those
who had no direct investment in the building. When Baldwin and Simon arrived, Sir Odo’s men had more or less taken the place,
and he and a few others were impounding their prisoners against a fence, having taken their weapons from them.

‘Sir Odo, this is an outrageous abuse,’ Baldwin said as he met the knight.

‘It was an outrageous abuse when that man decided to invade my lands,’ Sir Odo said. ‘This was just an attempt to persuade
him to leave me alone. He sowed, and he has reaped the harvest. It’s the behaviour of the Despensers that makes the country
so dangerous today. If more men stood up to their bullying, the realm would be safer.’

‘You think this is safer?’ Baldwin demanded, waving at the fires and the bodies on the ground.

‘It’s better than giving up everything, every time the Despensers or their men decide they want to grab another piece of territory,’
Sir Odo said.

‘Is that all this was? An attempt to stop him taking your lands? Or was it to stop Despenser – or, for that matter, Lord Hugh
de Courtenay – ever learning that you’d kept back parts of the lands he had taken from the widow of Squire Robert?’ Simon
asked.

‘That is an unworthy thought,’ Sir Odo said.

‘It would be a deeply dishonourable act,’ Baldwin said.

Sir Odo glanced at him, then shrugged. ‘Well, I cannot help what you two think to yourselves, but bear this in mind, lordings.
My action here has protected Lord Hugh de Courtenay’s lands. While he is thought to be a bold and courageous defender of his
property, he is more likely to be
safe from the Despensers’ attempts to rob him as they have so many others.’

‘Don’t seek to threaten me into supporting you,’ Sir Baldwin hissed. He stepped nearer Sir Odo. ‘I shall tell the truth about
this night, Sir Odo, and you will be named as guilty in this.’

‘Guilty of what, Sir Baldwin? Is there any proof that I have done something wrong? There is no one here who is likely to accuse
me, is there? Do you have any evidence that I am guilty of taking lands or anything else? No! So I should forget your sourness.
You have done what you came here to do: you have found the murderer of your man’s family. You have found the murderer of Ailward,
too, I expect, and of Lady Lucy. At the same time, you have helped me to thwart an attempt by a lackey of the Despensers to
steal lands from our lord. I should stick to that story. It’s believable, after all. Who knows? It might be true.’

‘Sir Baldwin? Get this oaf off me!’

Baldwin turned in time to see Sir Geoffrey being walked up the track towards him, gripped by Pagan.

‘Sir Baldwin, I found this man scurrying away up behind the hall. Thought I ought to bring him home again.’

‘Thank you, Pagan,’ Baldwin said, and as Sir Odo moved imperceptibly towards Sir Geoffrey, Baldwin drew his sword and put
it between Sir Odo and his prey. ‘There will be no more bloodshed, Sir Odo, unless you want to challenge me?’

Sir Odo shrugged, smiling broadly. ‘If you say so.’

Pagan was not finished, though. ‘Sir Baldwin, I brought this man to you because I want him to hear the truth. I murdered Ailward
on the day of the camp ball match. I confess my crime, but I also denounce Sir Odo and accuse
him of the murder of Lady Lucy of Meeth and the murderous attack on Hugh’s family.’

It was not practical to try to hold a court in the middle of the night, and Baldwin demanded that all returned with him and
Simon to the church. There, in the nave, in full view of as much of the Iddesleigh congregation as could be mustered at short
notice, Sir Odo swore that he would return to be tried the next day. He gripped the Gospels with a firm hand, and he stared
at Baldwin as he spoke, loudly and clearly, and then he passed the book back to Matthew with a small bow and spun on his heel.

The people parted as though miraculously. None remained barring his path, which was normal, and showed the correct reverence
for his position, he thought, but there was something in the air that grated on his nerves. It was less as though this was
a mark of respect for his status, than as though they loathed to share the same space with him. They would not touch him in
case he polluted them.

Idiots! They couldn’t understand. How could they? He’d been in the service of other men all his life, and he had wanted fortune.
If he’d been luckier, he could have won it, but as things were, it was impossible. He was always in the pay of his masters.
The first, the very first chance he’d had of winning his own rewards had been when he’d met Lady Lucy. And he would have been
honourable with her, if she’d let him. He would have married her, and allowed his son to take all the money when he died –
but she’d have none of it. That look of terror and horror had never left her face, not from the moment when he killed her
steward to the last moments when he’d left her in the smithy. She had loathed him.

Outside he stood a few seconds and stared about him at the men standing silently. Then he gave a dry chuckle and walked to
his horse. Peasants couldn’t understand because how can property comprehend how another piece of property might be fought
over? If you have never owned or desired, you cannot see how a man might be pushed to extraordinary lengths to protect his
possessions, or to acquire more.

He sprang on to his horse, whirled the beast’s head about, and rode off along the lane to his hall. There was not much time.
He had to collect all his movables, pack them, and clear off urgently. Probably best to head for Tiverton. He seemed to remember
someone saying that Lord de Courtenay was up there.

‘Can I tell you what happened?’ Pagan asked as Baldwin and Simon led the way back to the inn.

Baldwin glanced at Simon and Hugh. ‘I suppose so. You will have to explain yourself tomorrow anyway,’ he said.

Pagan walked into the inn and sat at the table with the others. Baldwin and Simon sat opposite him, Hugh and Edgar stood behind
him, and Sir Geoffrey perched himself on an upturned barrel nearby, arms folded while he glared at Pagan with loathing. Villagers
from Monkleigh and Iddesleigh filled the room, while Perkin and Beorn were up at the bar with a pale and shaken Adcock.

Poor lad. He’d hardly got over the shock of being savagely attacked and injured by that idiot Sir Geoffrey when he’d been
overwhelmed by the desire to kill. He’d lusted for Sir Geoffrey’s blood as a youth might lust for a wench. And now the reaction
was upon him. He was himself again, and the idea of what he had so nearly become was a terrible burden.

‘I killed Ailward, sir, because I saw what he had done. He and Sir Odo had captured Lady Lucy, and they took her up to my
father’s smithy, because they knew that no one ever went there any more. They could do all they wanted to her without fear
of discovery. Her screams would go unheeded.

‘I didn’t realise at first, of course. I only found out on the day of the camp ball game, when I saw Ailward. He was smothered
in black mud, up to his groin. I had no idea what had happened, and when I asked, he told me! He had murdered the child and
taken her to the mire and thrown her in. She was guilty of refusing to marry Sir Odo. For that they killed her.

‘I was disgusted by what I heard. I went to my father’s old smithy, and found it reeking still of burned flesh. They had slaughtered
her in the most revolting way so that when her body was found, people would assume the Despenser family had committed this
evil act. I came across Ailward on my way back to the house where I lived with Lady Isabel, and my rage knew no bounds. I
knocked him down and left him for dead. I would do it again. He murdered that poor child, and he did it in my father’s chamber.
Yes, I would do it again.’

‘But he was your master’s son!’ Sir Geoffrey exclaimed. ‘I thought you were so loyal to him and his seed!’

‘I was. I am. I would lay down my life for his child.’

Baldwin nodded. ‘Tell me, Pagan, was it your mistress’s choice that you should move back to your old home when Ailward died,
or was it yours?’

Pagan allowed a half-smile to curl his lips. ‘How did you guess that?’

‘I was very slow,’ Baldwin admitted. ‘But then I started to think. It seemed curious that you should move back to
your home just when the women would ideally require a man in their house to guard them. Unless you thought that they would
be safe enough on their own. And then I heard Sir Odo had visited the women.’

‘He went there often enough after dark,’ Pagan said. ‘It was much as it had been before, when Squire William was fighting.
He often took his son with him when he was fighting, so he could teach him the way of war. As soon as they went, Sir Odo began
to pay court to Lady Isabel, and she was so lonely and scared, it’s no surprise she succumbed to his wit and perseverance.
But then, when Squire Robert was dead, I think she repented and felt guilt. It was eight and twenty years ago that Robert
first went north with his father William, and the two won renown and some fame, under good King Edward, the Hammer of the
Scots, although they were not lucky with the spoils of war. The Scottish never seemed to have much to steal. Although he didn’t
know it, Robert lost more than his money in fighting for the king. It cost him dearly, and he wore a cuckold’s horns from
then on.’

‘So Ailward was Sir Odo’s son?’ Simon asked.

‘Aye. Ailward was Sir Odo’s. He was always aware of it. Sir Odo would ever make conversation with him if he saw the lad out
and about, and I think that after Squire Robert died, my lady Isabel must have told him the truth, because his manner changed
after that. He grew more arrogant, more froward. It was hard to contain myself sometimes, with the way he spoke to me. And
then he told me what he had done with his father to Lady Lucy.’

‘What did he do?’ Baldwin asked.

‘It was his father who captured her. He had known this lady for some years, and I suppose he always desired her.
He was a bachelor, she was a young and beautiful woman … It is not hard to see what thoughts began to fill his mind. Lady
Isabel was still feeling the guilt that her behaviour had produced. She feels it every day, or used to until Ailward’s death.
Now she only hopes for Odo to visit her again.’

‘He did yesterday,’ Baldwin grunted.

‘I know. Now that one avenue is closed, he is prepared to consider the other again.’

‘So he desired Lady Lucy,’ Simon pressed.

‘Aye. And she did not reciprocate. She spat in his face once, I heard, because he pressed his suit too strongly. She was a
spirited woman. Then came a time when Sir Odo decided he would have her. He drew his sword, killed her guard, and captured
her, expecting her to wither in his arms and accept his hand, but she wouldn’t. She rejected him entirely, and I think that
was when his love turned to loathing. He knocked her cold, and carried her body to my house, tying her there and keeping her
out of the way of all others. It was easy enough. He knew what he would do with her, because the news of the Despensers’ treatment
of Lady Baret was being bruited abroad at the time, and he knew that Sir Geoffrey would take the blame for any act of cruelty
towards a widow. So he killed her.’

‘What then?’ Baldwin asked gently.

‘Then, he told his son and a man-at-arms, Walter, to go and take the body to Sir Geoffrey’s land. Ailward told me all this.
He thought it was a splendid idea: to put the blame firmly on to the Despensers’ man, and to quietly take over Lady Lucy’s
manor while everyone was disputing Sir Geoffrey’s role in her death.’

‘How would he take the land?’

‘There was no heir, and her husband was a knight of Lord
de Courtenay. It would take a little persuasion, but Sir Odo planned to have Lord Hugh de Courtenay take over the lands and
make him the master of them. Lord Hugh may well have agreed. In the meantime, the disputed land where Crokers died would be
made over to Ailward, because Lord Hugh and Despenser did not know of it. Ailward would have an inheritance, and if Sir Geoffrey
was accused, he might somehow regain his old territories.

‘That was what he told me, his old servant, knowing that I was devoted to his father and his grandsire, but he didn’t realise
how I would feel about him using a young widow and killing her in order to win so much. He told me gleefully how he and Walter
had carried her body to the mire, weighted her down, and thrown her into the foul waters. Later, he said, a man at Sir Geoffrey’s
manor would suggest that the mires were drained, hoping for advancement, and the body would be found. It could hardly be kept
secret; from that moment Sir Geoffrey would be in difficult waters.’

Baldwin felt sickened. This behaviour was anathema to a man raised to the concept of chivalry. That a knight could consider
such treatment of a widow was almost inconceivable, but there was no doubting Pagan’s words. ‘So you killed him?’