The Crowfield Curse (21 page)

C
HAPTER
TWENTY-THREE

 

 

S
oon after dinner, Brother Martin set off across the bridge with the handcart. He returned a short time later with the dead pig. It lay on the cart, head lolling over the side. The monk spotted William chopping the apple logs into smaller pieces outside the woodshed.

“Hoi! You! We have work to do. Get the trestle table and pig-frame set up in the yard.”

William set off across the yard to do as he was told. Cutting the pig into joints, ready for salting, would take the rest of the afternoon, but William did not mind; it would keep him busy and give him no time to worry about the dark fay world beyond the abbey gates.

Brother Martin sent William to fetch a pile of straw from the barn. They laid the pig on top of it and
the monk set light to the straw. When the pig's bristles
had burned away, Brother Martin heaved the carcass up and hung it from the lintel of the smokehouse doorway, from hooks through the hind leg hocks. William stood well back as the monk slit the animal from belly to throat and hauled out the innards.

“Hang 'em up to dry,” Brother Martin ordered, “and put the loose fat into that bucket.”

William did as he was told, working quickly to try to keep up with the swiping blade of Brother Martin's knife.

With worrying skill, the monk split the pig in half with a small axe. Off came the hocks, the head, and the hams. He slapped each joint down on the trestle table William had set up nearby, until the pig was no more than various-sized lumps of pink flesh. Its head lay at one end of the table, eyes half closed, mouth seemingly curved in a smile.

“Get them guts cleaned,” Brother Martin ordered, pointing to the knobbly ropes of intestines hanging from the wooden drying frame beside the table.

It was a smelly, horrible job, and William gagged several times as he squeezed the pig's last meal out onto the cobbles. He put the guts into a pail of water and swirled the slimy mess around with a stick to wash them. Brother Martin would pack lengths of the innards with chopped-up bits of fat and the scrapings from the bones, along with herbs and barley and oats, to make puddings. Normally he would have added the blood from the slaughtered animal to the mixture, but that had soaked away into the earth in Foxwist Wood.

“Bloody wasteful,” the monk snarled, glaring at William as if he were to blame for the loss of the blood. He flicked a contemptuous hand at the innards in the pail. “Puddings as pale as bloody maggots and mealy with it, this lot'll be. Should be stiff with good black blood.” He spat on the cobbles and wiped the blade of his knife on the front of his filthy apron. He turned on his heel and walked off to the kitchen.

William finished cleaning the intestines, rinsed them in the greasy water, and hung them to dry on the frame. As soon as Brother Martin prepared the salt water to soak the pork in, William would carry the meat into the kitchen and pack it into the pickle barrels. In a few days' time, when the meat was wrinkly-pale and salted to the monk's satisfaction, it would be hung in the smokehouse until it was as dark and hard as leather, or stored in small barrels of brine, to be used over the coming winter months.

William hauled up a bucket of water from the well and washed his hands, rubbing them together hard to try to get rid of the smell of the dead pig. The freezing water numbed his fingers. They would be painful later, when they warmed up and the feeling slowly returned.

At first, William did not take any notice of the raised voices coming from somewhere inside the abbey, but the voices became more insistent. He straightened up and dried his hands on his tunic.
What now?
he thought wearily.

The yard door of the kitchen opened and a frightened-looking Peter peered out.

“Will!” he called, his voice sharp with anguish. “Come quickly!”

For a moment, William thought Abbot Simon must have died.

“It's Brother Snail.” Peter twisted his fingers together against his chest. “I think he is dead.”

For several moments, William could not move. It felt as if the bones had been drawn from his legs. He began to shake.

“Brother Snail?” he whispered. Pain seared through his chest, making it difficult to breathe.

Then he was running across the yard. He pushed Peter aside and collided with Brother Martin in the kitchen. He ignored the monk's angry yell and ran out into the cloister alley. Peter followed close behind. William stopped by the archway leading into the cloister garth.

A small dark bundle lay across one of the newly dug herb beds. Brother Gabriel and Prior Ardo knelt beside it, stunned expressions on their faces.

William walked slowly forward. His whole body was numb with shock and disbelief. He sank to his knees on the path. Gravel bit into his knees, but he barely noticed.

Brother Gabriel rolled Snail onto his side, the plump hands gently cradling the stricken monk's head.

“Is he dead?” the prior asked, his voice sounding strained, his face gray with shock.

Brother Gabriel held a hand close to Brother Snail's mouth, and then lowered his head to listen to Snail's chest.

“I think so.”

“No,” William said desperately. “He can't be.” He touched the side of the monk's neck, as Snail had once shown him how to do. There seemed to be a faint pulse. William's hands were trembling so much he could not be sure if he had really felt it. Taking several deep, steadying breaths, he tried again.

“He's still alive,” he said, hope bursting into life inside him. “Feel here, on his neck.”

Frowning, Brother Gabriel did so. He glanced up at the prior. “The boy is right. There is a pulse, very weak, but it
is
there.”

The prior looked about. By now, all the monks were gathered around, watching anxiously.

“We need to get him off the cold ground. Brother Stephen, and you, Peter, lift him up and carry him to the infirmary. Be quick, now.”

Between them, the lay brother and the monk carried Snail across the garth and into the cloister alley. Prior Ardo turned to face the remaining monks.

“Go about your work. There is nothing you can do for our brother now except pray for him.”

Reluctantly, the monks dispersed and went back to whatever tasks they were supposed to be doing.

“You, too, boy,” the prior said, glancing down at William. His expression softened for a moment. “He is in God's hands now.”

William watched the small procession make its way around to the passageway beside the chapter house. He thought of the small infirmary, set well away from the abbey buildings and as lonely as a boat on a pond, a short distance beyond the monks' graveyard. He decided to take a basket of firewood there straightaway, a little of the precious apple wood. The prior had told him to get on with his work, and that was one of his tasks. At least that way, he would be able to see for himself that Brother Snail had been made as comfortable as possible.

William took the basket from beside the fireplace in the kitchen and ran across the yard to the woodshed. He was piling logs and branches into it when a shadow fell across the woodpile. He looked over his shoulder and saw Shadlok standing in the hut doorway.

“The monk told us where to find the angel's grave.”

“I know,” William said impatiently. He did not care about the angel or Master Bone. The only person who mattered at that moment was Brother Snail.

“Master Bone and I will leave tomorrow,” Shadlok said, “soon after noon.”

William frowned. “Do what you want, it's none of my concern.”

“We will go to the Hollow,” the fay continued as if William had not spoken. “The angel must be taken from its grave before the Dark King's followers find us and try to stop us.”

So the hob was right
, William thought with a shiver; Shadlok and Master Bone wanted the angel's bones for a healing spell.

“Can't you just take one bone and leave the rest of the angel's remains in peace?” William asked, straightening up.

A flicker of surprise crossed the fay's sharp features. “That is not possible.”

“Why not?”

“You will see for yourself tomorrow.”

William frowned. “What do you mean?”

“You are coming with us to the Hollow.”

William stared at him in disbelief. “Me?”

Shadlok said nothing.

“No,” William said, shaking his head. “No, I won't. And you can't make me.”

“Oh, I think you will,” Shadlok said, his voice as soft as the whisper of a blade through the air, “if you want the monk to wake again.”

As the meaning of the fay's words slowly dawned on him, cold rage surged through William's body.

“What have you done to him?” His hands clenched into fists, and he took a step toward Shadlok. “If he dies, I will kill you.”

The fay smiled thinly. “You care deeply for your friend. It is your weakness, human, and it makes you vulnerable. You will help us tomorrow because if you do not, then the monk
will
die.”

“You bastard!” William spat, his face close to Shadlok's.

Shadlok's eyes narrowed. “Tomorrow at midday, be waiting for us by the gatehouse. Live or die, the monk's fate is in your hands.”

“Prior Ardo will never agree to let me go with you,” William said.

“He will.” Without another word, Shadlok turned and walked away across the yard.

Angry tears filled William's eyes. He grabbed the axe from the chopping block and swung it blindly at a pile of logs. Bits of wood flew up. One piece hit him on his injured cheek and the sting of pain made him angrier still. He hacked at the logs and let his rage and frustration spill out. He hated Shadlok for using Brother Snail as a weapon to force him to dig up the grave; he hated the fay for being prepared to harm one of the few truly good people William had ever known.

At last, his fury spent, William sat on the floor, his back against the shed wall. He folded his arms across his up-drawn knees and rested his head on the coarse wool of his sleeve. A great weariness settled over him. His broken nose throbbed painfully and he felt sick.

He had no choice but to go to the Whistling Hollow tomorrow. Brother Snail's life depended on it. And he knew, with a dreadful certitude, that creatures of the Dark King would be in the woods, waiting for them.

For a moment, self-pity weakened him and tears stung his eyes. To think he had felt sorry for Jacobus Bone! To think he and Snail had imagined they were doing the right thing in trying to help him find a cure for his leprosy. If they had kept the location of the grave secret, then the monk would not be lying close to death in the infirmary, and William would not be facing an uncertain and possibly very short future at the hands of the Dark King's fays. One small act of compassion could well have cost them both their lives.

C
HAPTER
TWENTY-FOUR

 

 

T
he infirmary stood between the monks' burial ground and the sheep pasture. Brother Snail had once told William that it was easier to stop sickness from spreading if patients could be kept isolated. It was built of timber and thatch, and if it had not been for the small shuttered windows set high up in the walls, it could easily have been mistaken for a barn.

William carried the basket of firewood into the modest building. Shafts of gray winter light streaked down through the stale and dusty air from the gaps around the edges of the shutters. There were four beds in the single room, plain wooden frames with straw mattresses. At the far end of the room there was a wooden altar, covered with a white linen cloth. A simple iron crucifix was nailed to the wall above it. There were brackets around the walls for rushlights. Two iron braziers were the only source of heating in the infirmary, as far as William could see.

Brother Gabriel was making up a bed for Snail from the bundle of blankets he had hurriedly grabbed from the bedding cupboard outside the monks' dormitory. William dragged one of the braziers closer to the monk's bed and got a fire going.