“Caius!Brother Caius!”
Caiturned in time to see Oslaf taking the steps from the main buildingat a run.Oslaf’s skirts were flying, his face a colourless blank.“Oslaf?What’s wrong?”
“Ben.Was he with you for drill practice?”
“No.He doesn’t come anymore.”Cai steadied Oslaf as the youngman halted in front of him.“Why?Can’t you find him?”
“He should be out in the fields, but the ox is still in herstable.I haven’t seen him this morning at all.”
“All right.”As soon as the words were out, Cai knew that itwasn’t.The ground seemed to shift beneath his feet, a shadow topass over the sun still struggling against the coppery easternclouds.“We’ll help you look.You run up to the infirmary, checkthat he’s not there.Fen, will you go and look in thebarns?”
Cai setoff downslope again.Oslaf disappeared across the courtyard.Barelyfive seconds later, Fen emerged from a gap between outbuildings andfell back into step at Cai’s side.“You don’t think Benedict’s inthe infirmary.”
“No.”
“Or in the barns either.”
“No.”
“Where, then?”
Caicouldn’t tell him.His mouth and throat were numb, as if he’d beenswimming in icy water.He could only keep walking.In the brightsweep of open ground below, the newly rebuilt church shoneinnocently under its thatch.A sanctuary, a place of rest andprayer.Or so it had been, until Aelfric had opened up beneath itthe burning pit.He broke into a run.
He wasblinded from the sunlight, and his vision flashed red and green ashe stared around him in the shadows.The church was cool andsilent, the lull in the canonical tide between terce andsext.
It wasalso empty.His eyes cleared enough for him to be certain of thatmuch.The doors banged behind him, admitting a wash of clean airand Fen, gasping for breath, one hand pressed to hisside.
“I couldn’t keep up with you.”
“Sorry.”Cai too was breathless, now he had time to think aboutit.He leaned his hands on his knees, dizzy with relief.“Ithought… I don’t know what I thought.But he isn’there.”
Fen cameto stand beside him.Through the thump and rush of his own pulse,Cai became aware of his stillness—his absolute, focussed rigidity.The tension of a wolf scenting blood…
“Cai.He is.”
Thedoors thudded open again, and this time stayed wide, each of themcaught and submissively held by one of the Canterbury clerics.Inthe middle stood Aelfric, cutting out a thin, mean shape from thebrilliance behind him.Aelfric too scanned the church.“BrotherBenedict is missing,” he said harshly.“I will not have suchabandonment of discipline.Where is he?”His attention fastened onCai and Fen like a grappling hook, and he gestured to Laban to takehold of Fen, who for once offered no resistance, falling backagainst the wall.“You, physician—I’ve turned a blind eye to yourharbouring of this monster.His brute strength has its uses.Butdon’t you dare bring it in here, with its heathen corruption.Thisis holy ground.”
Cai began to chuckle.He couldn’t help it.He was stillelated, and Aelfric was so vile, so rich a contradiction ofeverything Cai had been taught about his new faith.“Aren’twesupposedtobring them in here if we can?The corrupt heathens, so we canconvert them and…”
He fadedout.Aelfric wasn’t listening.Wasn’t looking at him either.Hisgaze was suddenly fixed where Fen’s had been.Where a faint, slightmovement was now catching at Cai too, forcing him to look up—up andup into the shadows of the roof space.
A humanshape was hanging from the rafters.Cai took this much in, and thenthe sight and all it stood for seemed to rush to the far distance.He whipped round, looking for a human face.Not Aelfric, not Laban.They wouldn’t do.The third of the clerics, a Roman called Marcus,had sometimes seemed less sombre than the rest.Cai seized hisshoulders.“Keep Oslaf out of here.”
“Which… Which one is Oslaf?”
There are so few of us, and you are our masters.How can younot know our names?Cai shook him.“Benedict’s friend.The young one.God, ask anyone—just keep himaway!”
Marcusstumbled out.Now that Cai had done that one vital thing, thedistance closed, sweeping his next duty in on him.With it camehope, stabbing and hot.Hangings didn’t always work.Knots slipped,men were incompetent.Drops were too short to crush the trachea andbreak the neck.For as long as Cai had known him, Ben had neverbeen the most deft or thoughtful of men.He was a ploughman.Astaunch-hearted warrior when forced, and by nature a lover.All theactions of his hands had tended to life, not death.“I have to gethim down!”
Ben hadused the pulpit, the makeshift stairs and platform where Theo hadnine times out of ten laid aside his sermon, folded his arms andaddressed them agreeably, man to fellow men.He’d kicked it asidewith great force.Cai dragged it upright from the place where ithad fallen and pushed it back into place.He clambered up itssteps, sick fear slowing him, filling his limbs with lead.Thepulpit wasn’t tall.Nor was Cai, especially—not by contrast withBen, who’d been able to stand here, string himself up,and…
“I can’t reach him.”He tried anyway, leaning far out over thepulpit’s edge, grabbing a handful of Ben’s cassock and pulling himinto his arms.He could only stretch as far as Ben’s hips.He tookhold, desperately trying to lift him, to relieve the pressure onhis neck.“I can’t reach him.I can’t get him down.”
“Caius.I can.”
Cailooked down.The church was filling now, men arriving, drawn by thechaos, taking a few steps and falling still.Aelfric remainedrooted where he was.White faces stared, thank God none of themOslaf’s.At the foot of the pulpit, Fenrir stood waiting.He hadrecovered from his fright.He was solid and strong, and he soughtCai’s gaze warmly.“Let me.I can bring him down.”
Caicouldn’t let go.He stood aside to make room when Fen climbed up tojoin him, but he kept his hold on Ben, lifting, lifting.Only whenFen produced a bronze-handled knife from somewhere within his robesand reached up did he relinquish some of his burden, easing it intoFen’s free arm.Fen cut the rope with one savage gesture, andtogether they caught the body as it fell.Fen eased the bulk of itover his shoulder.“I’ve got him.Go down now.”
