Relics (10 page)

I was as eager to believe this as the men of Vennor had been eager to believe in our new saint, but I still hesitated. Adric read my face.

'Have you ever been bitten by a viper?' he asked. I thought of the little adder that had nestled in the crook of my neck that afternoon on Black Tor. I shook my head.

'I have,' he went on. 'I was a little older than you, picking bilberries on the heath near my home. The snake bit my hand. I knew I was going to die, but my father sucked out the venom and told me not to despair. "Grown men should not die from snakebite," he said, "only young children and the very old. But men do die, because they believe that they must." So he said, and I trusted him, because he was my father. And indeed, I had a day's sickness, a week's stiffness of the arm and no more pain than from a hornet's sting.' 'I was taught to fear adders,' I said.

'As you were taught to fear the saints,' Adric said. 'But the saints cannot harm us. Their greatest gift is the good they allow us to bring to the credulous and ignorant. If the Church can use that good, then that is pleasing to the Lord. The people of Vennor would die if an adder bit them, because they believe it to be evil, and that is how the Devil works amongst men. What we have done is use the Devil's methods against him, nothing more.'

I admit that even then I was somewhat baffled by Adric's argument, but it had the ring of conviction to it, and besides, was not the librarian a good and learned man? I felt my doubt and my guilt lift and vanish in the summer air. As we tied up our saddlebags and climbed back on our ponies, however, I wished to know more.

'Father, what made you say those things? Was there any truth at all in what you said?' I finally asked.

Well, .Elfsige was a name in an old ledger that stayed in my mind. I have been reading Gildas on the English invasions -
De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae,
a fascinating work, Petroc, you should glance at it - but of course the poor old Britons were as Christian as you or I, and not given to killing bishops. I am afraid the desperation of the moment wrought a convenient alchemy and brought forth our saint.'

And why Frome?' I persisted.

Where I was born, my son!' And with that the cadaverous librarian spurred his pony on down the track, and I followed him down through the deep green lanes, a dead man's bones in my pack, a miracle behind me and a monk's laughter leading me home.

Chapter Six

I

had been awake for hours when the wain juddered to a halt, and it felt as if I had not slept at all. I heard the carter curse his stiff joints, and then he was pummelling me through the burlap.

Clambering down, I mumbled my thanks as he jumped back onto the wain with ungainly speed. He stirred the old nag on its way with a slap of the reins. I heard him spit and make devil's horns with his fingers. So now I was something to ward off. Feeling more like a sack of turnips than a demon, I tottered to the ditch for a piss, then took my bearings.

I was on the Exeter Road, and just ahead was the old bridge over the river Dart. It was as dark outside as it had been under the burlap, and there was no one about, so I crossed the bridge and started up the track to the abbey. Passing the mill and the outlying barns, I saw something white loom ahead of me. I jumped into the shadows, then saw what had scared me: a may tree in full bloom. I could smell its rank sweetness in the damp breeze.

The air was almost warm, and full of the scent of wet earth. I was home. Feeling more alive than I had for long days, I decided to find a place to spend the rest of the night. From my days as a mischievous young monk I knew all the hidden ways in and out of the abbey precinct, and now I followed the mill's north wall down to the river, climbed down the bank and splashed into the shallow water. It was cold, fresh from the high moor. As I sloshed upstream, hauling myself along the willow roots, a bell in the abbey sounded vespers. Here the riverbank was choked with old straw and reeked of wet dung. I pulled myself up onto a shelf of granite and scrambled up the bank and over a low wall. There before me was the door to the abbey stable. I lifted the latch and slipped inside.

The stable was filled with the warm fug of horses. Although I could not see a thing, I could hear the animals shift in their stalls. They did not sound very interested in me, and I was glad not to have roused them. I had a few hours of darkness left for sleep. A lighter patch in the darkness seemed to show a window, and I groped towards it. I did not want to be discovered by the stable-hands, and I hoped the dawn would wake me in time. I found the wall, kicked some straw into a rough pallet and lay down. Sleep descended like a blow.

Something furry, with sharp little claws, scuttled across my face. I flinched and opened my eyes. A pale light was filtering into the stable. I muttered my thanks to the mouse that had woken me: the watery dawn would have let me sleep. Outside the window the abbey was still, although the mumble of early Mass came from the direction of the church. I thought I would give the brothers time to settle in to their daily tasks before seeking out Adric, whom I thought would be the best person to hear my woes. He would surely know what I should do next, and I devoutly hoped he would take my side. Meanwhile I picked the straw from my robe as I wandered around the stable. The horses and ponies snorted at me as I passed their stalls, and I patted their great long heads. Some of the beasts I knew: here was the little black pony that had carried me on many a trip over the moors. He nickered as I rubbed his velvet nose. In the next stall stood a great chestnut horse, more magnificent than any I had seen in my years at the abbey. I wondered if the Abbot had acquired a new mount as I held a bunch of hay for the creature to nibble. Then I noticed the tack hanging from the stall's door. It was rich, caparisoned with fine silver. It was too fancy for the Abbot, I thought absently, as I bent to take a closer look. There were symbols on the bridle, and in the growing daylight I saw what they were. One medallion carried a crozier and a hound; on another two long bones crossed between four blazing stars. The arms of the Bishop of Balecester and his seneschal. Sir Hugh de Kervezey's charger bit my hand.

I lurched backwards, tripped over a leather bucket and stumbled against the wall. The shock felt like Sir Hugh's knife twisting in my belly. So my escape, those days of lonely misery and terror, were for nothing. Kervezey still lived, and I had been outwitted, as if my wits would be a challenge to a man of Sir Hugh's nature. How could I have ever dreamed of escaping? My pursuer was a hunter of men. And I had walked blindly into his net. I sat on the floor, nursing my bitten hand. The horse had nipped the web between thumb and first finger, but not hard. The pain was enough, however, to prove that I was not dead yet. Until my throat was cut, I could still run. And so I did, bolting from the stable by the back door and darting behind the chicken coops. From there I crawled past the swine-fold and into the patch of long grass and nettles that spread down to the river, a little wasteland where old wagons, broken ploughs and other wreckage was allowed to crumble into the brambles. I found a heap of wheels and boards that had once been a hay-wain, and wormed underneath. Young-nettles, always nastier than grown-ups, stung my hands and face. But I was hidden. I had gone to ground, I thought grimly. But few people came this way. And I could just see a corner of the stable-yard. Perhaps Sir Hugh would lose patience and go home. I rubbed my bite and my stings and settled down to wait.

It was really quite pleasant under the hay-wain. Honeysuckle and a dog-rose had grown over the old boards, and the sweet pink flowers were so bright and innocent that I began to feel, if not safe, then at least protected in some way by the sheer force of nature around me. Green shoots were everywhere. Perhaps it is strange for a man who has seen many wonders to think this, but there are few sights more awe-inspiring than a stand of young nettles in the first flush of their growth. They are greener than emeralds, and strain towards the sun with such vigour that one can almost see the life-force working within them. And their stings are a reminder that the mystery of creation may be approached, but not grasped. Now, watching the green spears soak up the light, listening to the bees at work in the roses, my fears began to subside.

I found some dock-leaves to soothe the nettle rash and began to plan once more. If I could find Adric, I would at least have an ally. I wondered what day this was. If it were Sunday, I would wait all day. Monday he would spend in the library. Tuesday was the day he liked to saddle a pony and go in search of oddities in the countryside. I prayed it was a Tuesday. From my cave under the roses I could see, beyond the stable, part of the main abbey and the physic garden. Monks were beginning to show themselves, walking to their appointed tasks with the calm of a sheltered existence and an assured afterlife. Unfortunately I seemed to have abandoned both luxuries. But their presence meant that at least it could not be Sunday. I lay there, sucking the honey from the tiny funnels of the honeysuckle flowers, and reflected that I was looking at my life, as it had been, from outside. I had been one of those calm figures just two years ago. But the filthy outlaw lurking in the weeds was a lifetime removed from them now. I realised that I could not go back to that life, that I despised their calm now. I had an urge to reveal myself, to let them see that everything was illusion, that they could fall through the flimsy walls of their world in the wink of an eye, into the wasteland outside.

As I lay there thinking these gloomy and uncharitable thoughts, I noticed a commotion over by the stable. Some monks weeding the garden dropped their hoes and started running towards the stables. Voices were raised, in surprise or anger - it was hard to tell from my distance. Then there was an almighty crash and a clatter of hooves, and from the stable burst a huge horse. The rider was dressed in dark green, and I saw it was Sir Hugh. The knight held something in his right hand, a long black bundle which dangled a few inches from the ground. As I watched, Sir Hugh raised the bundle to his face, shook it and flung it from him. It tumbled away, and I saw it was another man, a very tall, thin man in black robes. Sir Hugh wheeled the horse and seemed to make it dance for the monks who were watching the scene from a safe distance. Then horse and rider grew calm and trotted serenely from my view.

The monks rushed towards the man, who had been thrown into the weeds by the pigsty. Adric,' they were calling, Adric!' I could only lie in my hole and watch as they picked my friend from the ground and held him, tottering, between them. At least he was still alive and, it seemed, unhurt. But he allowed himself to be led to a sunny bench in the physic garden and waved the other monks away. There he sat, his head in his hands, like an old raven, while the smaller brown birds twittered around him. Finally they let him be and went back to their tasks, shaking their heads and, I guessed, chattering like old women.

This might be my one opportunity to talk to Adric. I eased myself out between the briars and slithered towards the pigsty. It was obvious that Sir Hugh had found out that I had been friends with the librarian, and that he had been trying to shake some information from him. I hoped he was satisfied that Adric knew nothing, and that he had left the abbey for good. But the horse had not been loaded for a journey, and Sir Hugh had worn no cloak. He would be back within the day. As I crept closer, I thought how terrified my friend must have been, and that it was all my fault. I flushed with shame. The news of my disgrace must be all over the abbey now, of course. It would be fatal to be seen by anyone else but Adric. I hoped with all my heart that he, of all people, would not betray me.

The monks were giving Adric a wide berth now. I suspected that was because they saw the librarian as a lightning-rod for the wrath of Sir Hugh. They clustered at the far end of the garden, over by the beehives, and busied themselves with pruning the rose-bushes and trimming the low box-hedges -all tasks that allowed them to keep their backs to Adric. Out of sight, out of mind, I thought bitterly. But it suited my purposes very well. Adric's bench sat alongside a hedge of pruned beeches, just beginning to leaf out, planted in front of a high stone wall. Between it and the pigsty was a further swath of waste-ground, a cobbled track and a stand of yew trees cut into broad, flat-topped skittles of green. Between the yews apothecary roses had been planted in a thick line, forming another hedge about three feet high that met the beeches at a right-angle. If I could reach the roses unseen, they would screen me until I slipped between the beech-trees and the wall. But from where I lay peering out round the angle of the piggery's fence, the low grass and track might as well be a mile. I would be in full view of gardeners and, God forbid, the mad knight who might gallop back at any moment.

Snorting and munching sounded through the thick wooden fence beside me. The pigs should be out foraging, so I guessed I could hear the old boar, who was far too cantankerous to roam free. Many a novice monk had been bitten by the huge old beast, and I had been charged by him once, coming too close with the slop-bucket. He was a gross, bristly brute with beady eyes and jagged yellow tusks, and I was glad of a wall between us. Then it struck me. Without stopping to think, 1 hauled myself up and over the fence and dropped into the stinking, churned-up mud inside the sty. The hog was over in a corner rooting away, and he raised his red-rimmed eyes and stared at me with undisguised malice. Not giving him time to act, or myself time to have second thoughts, I rushed to the gate and, with three hard kicks, had it open. Then I charged the boar.

The hideous old creature had never faced such insubordination, and he panicked, as I had desperately hoped he would. Instead of disembowelling me on the spot, he gave an undignified shriek and bolted away. Waving my arms, I chased him out of the sty, then climbed back over the wall. The monks in the garden had heard the door being kicked open, and the boar's surprised squeal. Now they watched in horror as the beast, free at last, hurried around in widening circles, squealing in rage or perhaps delight. One of the burlier monks began to walk gingerly towards him, carrying his hoe like a lance. The others began to follow, and I almost laughed out loud as the boar bolted off towards the stable. The monks, running and yelling now, set off in pursuit, and the jolly cavalcade was soon out of sight. Meanwhile, Adric had barely glanced at the cavorting beast and yelling fools before dropping his face into his hands once more. I leaped up and dashed towards the roses. If anyone had seen me, they would have assumed I was running to find reinforcements for the boar-hunt. Sprinting over the cobbles, I threw myself down behind the nearest yew-tree, and crawled fast along the line of rose-bushes. In another few seconds I had squeezed into the narrow, dank passageway between beech hedge and wall.