Nostrum (The Scourge, Book 2) (4 page)

Apparently the Virgin Mary has a sense of humor. A thousand pounds of Suffolk dairy peers over the stall at me and moos.

Chapter 3

I’m disappointed with Peter and Osbert. Rats must not have good vision. Dead rats even worse, I imagine.

The heifer is dun colored, with white around her nose and over her eyes. The sunken flesh of her flanks reveals the curve of her ribs. She looks like she has not eaten in days. She is alone. She is scared. And she is my only hope.

“There’s a girl,” I say softly. She shuffles away from me and bawls. “Shush. There’s a horde out there looking for you. And I don’t think they want milk.” A rope around her neck has been tied to a hook in the wall. I unfasten the rope and lead her out of the stall so that she faces toward the stable door. I set a milking stool beside her. “I don’t think either of us is going to enjoy this,” I say. “But we don’t have much choice, do we?”

I stroke her neck and her tail swishes. “What’s your name, girl?” She stares at me blankly, her wet nose glistening in the dying light. I step onto the stool beside her. “You look like an Abigail to me. How does Abigail sound?” I rest one hand on her side and she shuffles back a step and tosses her head to one side. “We’re going to take this easy at first. Slow movements. No panicking. We’re just going to get used to each other, isn’t that right, Abigail?” I put both hands on her, catch my breath, then hop forward, plopping my breastplate onto her broad back. I pivot and drop my legs to either side of her as she shuffles forward.

“Just nice and slow and gentle, you understand?”

She doesn’t.

Abigail bolts from the stable. I have never ridden a cow before. Apparently it is a learned skill. I topple from her rump and fall with a clatter to the stable floor. Cured meats and loaves of bread tumble from my shoulder sack. Tristan’s helmet, which I have tied to my belt, flops against my side. I pick up the food and hobble after her, terrified that she will run off into the countryside. But it is not Abigail that I have to worry about—she comes to a stop a few paces outside the stables and tears at the grass with her teeth.

No, my biggest concern is the army of plaguers staggering toward us from the manor house.

The fastest of the plaguers are no more than fifty paces from us. Growling demon-faced creatures with eyes that promise oblivion.

I run back into the stable and return with the milking stool. I set it beside Abigail and glance back toward the manor house. The plaguers are thirty paces away.

“Abigail, I don’t want to sound dramatic, but we are going to die here if we can’t work this out.” I hear the edge of panic in my voice. Her ear flutters. I think she hears it too. “I’m going to get on, and I need you to be a good girl. Can you do that for me? Can you be a good girl?”

The cow turns her head and I stare into one of her gentle eyes. I look back again. The mob of plaguers is fifteen paces away. The nearest is a man whose neck and lower jaw are riddled with weeping sores.

Mother Mary, I don’t care if you don’t save me, just save Elizabeth
.

I hop onto the cow as far forward as I can and straddle her, throwing my arms around her neck. It must be a lot of weight for her, but Abigail doesn’t flinch. She takes a few steps forward, then stops.

“Let’s go!” I glance back at the plaguers. They are close enough for me to see teeth. To see blood in their fingernails. “Move! Move! Move!”

Abigail lowers her head and picks at the lush grass.

“Oh, for God’s sake!” I smack her rump and am rewarded with a tail twitch.

I draw my knife.

“Sorry, girl, but this will hurt you a lot less than those demons will.” The first of the afflicted reaches her flank. It is the man with the sores. Tall and haggard, with a bloody piece of glass jutting from one of his eyes.

Abigail becomes aware of the plaguers. She lurches to one side and lashes out with one of her back legs, sending the man crashing backward. I lose my balance and drop my knife, and Abigail finds the strength to gallop. She hurtles forward, so I have to throw my arms around her neck and clutch the rope at her throat. The lurching of her broad back knocks me off again. My feet hit the ground but I do not let go of her neck. She staggers and tilts sideways, dragged downward by my weight, but she keeps moving toward an abandoned field of rotting rye. My legs drag along the clay and plaguers dive for them.

One of the afflicted, a woman, gets a hand on my boot and is dragged along as well. She is dark haired and the skin around her black eyes is peeling away in bloody strips. She opens her bloodstained mouth and hisses. Abigail struggles to move the two of us and more plaguers throw themselves upon me.

My gauntleted hands are locked together so that Abigail cannot shed me. We will live or die together. The cow’s head tilts closer to the ground. Her back legs dig for purchase among the dewy clay. A man missing part of his scalp throws himself at me, his clawed fingers hooking onto the back edge of my breastplate. I roll to one side, but the afflicted man won’t let go. And the weight becomes too much for Abigail. She crashes sideways to the ground in a shower of flesh, plaguers, and armor.

I seize the opportunity to drive the steel cowter on my elbow into the face of the man holding my backplate. His nose splatters like a mouse beneath a millstone and he lets go. The other plaguers struggle to their feet, but Abigail and I are faster. I clasp my arms around her neck and throw one leg onto her back as she rises. The rest of the afflicted are upon us. Their hands clutch at Abigail. She pounds away from the horde, fear at last giving her strength and speed.

I dangle from her neck with one leg over the top of her. The plaguers are falling away. But if I cannot get back on Abigail, she and I will fall to the clay once more. And there will be no second escape from the afflicted. The steel greave on my leg slips against the cow’s smooth hide. Each stride sends me one inch closer to the ground. I gather every ounce of my strength and pull myself upward, reclaiming one inch at a time. Abigail slows and kicks at me.

“Not…nice…Abigail…” I groan. She tries kicking again, but it is too late. I shift onto her back. She puts her shoulders into her strides and pulls away from plaguers.

I am riding a cow.

But I am not riding quickly. Abigail slows after another few strides, then slows to a trot, and finally stops. She dips her head and tears at the grass.

“They’re still back there!” I slap her rump and she swishes her tail again. This is not going to work. I kick at her flanks and she glances back at me, her jaws working the grass. Her ears twitch forward.

I can hear the erratic thudding of the plaguers’ footsteps. They are once more within striking range. I point to them.

“Look! Look, you stupid cow!”

Abigail peers at the plaguers and then lurches sideways and shakes her head as if she had never seen them before.

“You’re no chicken!” I shout at her. She bellows and lurches forward again. “You’re no chicken!”

Her hooves kick up dirt as she gets started, but it is too late. The fastest of the plaguers have arrived. Abigail loses her bovine calm and begins spinning and kicking. It is all I can do to stay on. I wrap my arms around her neck and wind one hand in the ropes. Five of the fastest plaguers have reached us and try to get close, but Abigail’s kicks and wild spins keep knocking them down.

When I am sure of my balance, I let go of her neck with one hand and hack at the plaguers with my sword. They will reach Abigail’s flesh soon. She will go down, and I cannot outrun this tide of plaguers. The brunt of these wretched creatures is almost upon us. I bring the sword down harder than I have to and hurl curses at the afflicted as I send them to purgatory. And then something peculiar happens.

Six or seven of the approaching plaguers fall to the ground. They simply topple backward. A few scream as they fall. I jab my blade through a man’s throat and look back again. Another few plaguers lurch and fall backward. The marching hordes behind these stumble over their fallen comrades but continue their relentless approach. And then another five or six fall to the ground.

There are three of them around Abigail now. The others cannot get close enough to us. They simply fall to the ground whenever they get near. As if God were striking them dead. Perhaps Mary is making amends for the cow.

I kick an old woman and hear something in her chest crack. She howls and claws at her breasts and I cleave her head from crown to mouth.

Abigail is whirling dangerously. Riding a cow is not like riding a horse. A cow’s back is broad, so that your legs cannot rest comfortably around the animal’s flanks. And its skin is looser than a horse’s: it slips forward and backward and pulls you along. I think it is only the terror of falling and pure strength of will that keep me on her while she spins and kicks. She sends a plaguer twirling to the lush grass with a kick and sees an opening. She bolts forward again.

The old woman comes with us for a few paces, until I can free my sword from her skull. And when I look back at the rest of the plaguers, I see what is bringing them to the ground. And I consider leaping off of Abigail and letting the afflicted take me.

Chapter 4

Arrows. The plaguers are riddled with arrows.

I look ahead and spot the archers behind a low hedge. They are arranged in a row a hundred yards from the stable, not far from the stone church I noticed earlier. I count ten of them.

They angle their longbows upward, draw back the strings, and let loose the arrows. I can just see the shafts in the darkening sky, impossibly thin geese flying in a chaotic formation. But these geese have teeth. Some of the arrows bite only dirt, sinking almost to the feathers in the soft grass. But most bite deep into afflicted flesh. The plaguers shriek and fall to their knees or topple backward. Most rise again and continue their clumsy pursuit.

I think of Sir Gerald, the enemy I made on my journey to St. Edmund’s Bury. His men used crossbows, not longbows, but perhaps he has broadened his arsenal. Who else could it be? I have no doubts.

I yank the rope around Abigail’s neck hard to the right, but a rope is not a halter. She shakes her head and continues toward the archers.

The plaguers behind are undeterred by the ceaseless rain of arrows. They plod on fearlessly. Some have three of four arrows jutting from their bodies. And still they come.

The archers fire volley after volley. If they are Sir Gerald’s men, then I should let the plaguers have me; it would be a much more pleasant death.

I think about leaping to the ground and running away from both the archers and the plaguers, but I know I cannot. My ankle would not allow me to escape either of them. Abigail trots toward the longbowmen. I breathe a quick prayer and put my life in the hands of Mary, Giles, and God.

One of the three responds. Abigail becomes aware of the archers, and she does not like them any more than I do. She wheels and pounds away from them toward the field of rotting rye. A thickset man among the archers points toward me. He shouts something. I think they intend to pursue. But I see no horses. Abigail may not be a racer, but a cow can outrun a man when she makes up her mind to.

But she cannot outrun arrows. Several of the archers turn their bows on us and the arrows plunge silently into the earth around us.

“Run, girl! Run!”

But Abigail needs no encouragement. It may have taken her time to realize her danger, but now that she knows, there is no stopping her. We plunge into the withered rye, where the archers cannot see us. I smell fertile earth and rotting crops. An arrow clanks against the spaulder upon my shoulder, striking sparks and deflecting into the field. I duck low against the cow’s neck and concentrate on staying upon her. She stumbles on the ploughed ridges but forges onward. Arrow hiss into the dry stalks until we clear the field and move beyond the archers’ range.

And then we are free.

I rub Abigail’s ears and smile. “There’s a girl,” I say. “I’m sorry I spoke ill of you.”

She slows to a walk and peers behind us, then lowers her head and eats. I dismount and let her feast for a time. She has earned it. Abigail and my holy triumvirate have kept me alive. I say a brief prayer of thanks and allow myself another smile.

My coat of arms is a cross, engrailed, crested with a unicorn upon a helmet. The cross symbolizes that we Dallingridges are a God-fearing people of England under Saint George. The helmet, because we have always been warriors and knights. And the unicorn, because I like unicorns. Many people ask me about the unicorn. Must there be meaning to everything?

Perhaps I should add Mary and Giles to my coat of arms. Elizabeth would be pleased if I added Saint Giles. I can see her smile in my mind. The small hop she makes when she is truly happy. I can feel her sweet lips against mine. Her fingers curling around the hair that falls at my neck. The memory changes. Her fingers are in my hair, but we are at the monastery two days ago. She tears at my locks and howls, and I have to push at her face to keep those beautiful teeth away from my flesh.

I open my eyes and sigh. Abigail cranes her neck back and stares at me as she chews. Saint Giles would go well on my crest. He watches over the insane, so perhaps I could change our family motto from
Amor, honor, regnum
—“love, honor, kingdom”—to
In tempore insania, insania salvábit nos
: “In these times of madness, only madness will save us.”

I feel a sharp burning pain in my wrist. The wound and all it might imply had slipped from my mind. I snatch the gauntlet off. The wound throbs. It is red and swollen and angry. I close my eyes and take a breath, then look again. It looks terrible.

Maybe the gauntlet sleeve scraped the cut in that wild escape
.

 I slip the gauntlet back on and think of Elizabeth. I think of our coat of arms and the castle we are building at Bodiam. I think of anything except the throbbing gash that could end my journey. I have killed so many of these plaguers. Am I to become one? Will Tristan find me staggering toward him? I force myself to breathe normally. I don’t feel sick. I do not think I have the fever. It is simply a scratch.