The Bone Thief (16 page)

And he sagged with relief. The creature was unfolding into something no more than human. Its shapelessness explained itself: a big, burly man, on his hands and knees, retreating bottom-first from where he had been crawling in the narrow gap on the south side of the altar.

He hauled himself to his feet now, turning, coming through the tall, narrow chancel arch.

The flickering light showed deep-set eyes and a badger-striped beard, and a friendly but filthy hand which the stranger rapidly pulled back, rubbed down the side of his tunic, squinted at, and offered again at last.

‘Were you looking for me?’ he said.

Wulfgar nodded, his heart still in his throat.

‘I was putting down a bit of poison for the mice. You wouldn’t think they could get up onto the altar but they do. Do they
fly
, think you? And it goes against the grain for me to be offering the holy blood and body of Our Lord on an altar that’s no better than a mouse’s privy, wouldn’t you agree? Today, of all days?’

Wulfgar would, and did, though just then he would have agreed to almost anything.

‘Are you the priest here, then?’ Wulfgar asked. He scanned the other man for clues. No tonsure, he thought, his lips tightening, and his leggings and short tunic those of a layman. But then, he thought belatedly, I’m in layman’s attire, too, and although I should have had my hair cut on Maundy Thursday it’s still a shaggy mess for the Resurrection of Our Lord. Who am I to carp?

‘I am, in faith,’ the big man agreed. ‘Father Ronan, at your service. And a Happy Resurrection to you.’

‘You too, Father. Oh, you too.’ Wulfgar felt a grin of sheer relief tugging at the corners of his mouth. ‘Wulfgar of Winchester, at yours.’

‘
Winchester
?’ The priest had been turning to pick up the lamp from the altar, but now he swung round. ‘You’re a long way from home.’ He stared, his eyes narrowing. ‘Forgive me, lad, but I pride myself on a fool-proof nose for a whiff of ordination. Is it a brother in the Church I’m talking to?’ He raised the lamp higher and squinted through its rays.

Fear and relief had driven all thought of their cover story from Wulfgar’s head.

‘Only a subdeacon, I’m afraid,’ he admitted.

‘A subdeacon, and of Winchester? Not from the
cathedral
?’

Wulfgar nodded.

‘But this is miraculous! You can help me celebrate Mass here this afternoon, can’t you?’

‘This afternoon? I’m not too late?’

Father Ronan grinned.

‘What with our late Jarl’s arval
and
the feast after midnight mass last night, I don’t think most folk will be crawling out of bed until it’s gone noon today. It’ll be a very humble affair compared to what you’ll be used to, but you would raise the tone immeasurably, on this day of days. It’s usually just me and my altar boy.’

‘Of course.’ Wulfgar felt his cheeks warm with pleasure. ‘I’d love to.’

‘Come with me. Where are you staying? Just arrived? Make the presbytery your home while you’re in Leicester. Come and have a bite of food.’

Wulfgar was wanting to ask his own questions, about the church, about its priest, about the Jarl who was dead, about the one who was still alive, but he had to surrender himself up to the spate of welcoming talk while the priest gathered together a few bits and pieces, handed him the poison jar to hold, snuffed the candle out, picked up the lamp, took back the jar and ushered him blinking out of the church and into the daylight.

Ednoth looked long-suffering.

‘I thought you said you wouldn’t be long?’

Wulfgar turned to the priest.

‘My travelling companion,’ he said. ‘Ednoth of Sodbury. Ednoth, this is Father Ronan.’

Ednoth dismounted and they clasped hands.

‘Never tell me you’re another subdeacon! I have to tell you, lad, you’ve not quite the look of one.’

Ednoth was visibly taken aback.

‘No.’ He sounded puzzled. ‘We’re merchants from the south. Pottery merchants.’ He turned to Wulfgar, frowning, a question forming on his lips.

Wulfgar, embarrassed, spoke very fast.

‘Yes, that’s quite right. Father, we’ve a name given us by Heremod of Wappenbury, to help with our trade enquiries. Go to an ale-house called the Wave-Serpent, he said, and ask for a man called Gunnar, Gunnar Cat’s-Eyes. Is that anyone you know?’

Now it was Father Ronan’s turn to frown.

‘Heremod Straddler, is it now? And
Gunnar
? Indeed? Sure, are you now, that that’s what Heremod said?’

‘Yes.’ Wulfgar was puzzled in the face of this rain of questions. ‘Why?’

‘Oh, no reason.’ The priest smiled now. ‘And aye, I think I can
help
you. The Wave-Serpent’s no more nor a step away down the ginnel. We can go there after Mass, if you can wait? Let’s just bring your horses round; if we tie them up in my garth none will meddle, not if you’re my guest-friends.’ He took Starlight’s bridle and led the way round the south side of the church and into a fenced yard as he spoke.

They unloaded their bags and lifted the saddles off the horses’ steaming backs.

Father Ronan filled a couple of leather buckets with water and looked Starlight and Fallow over with a critical eye.

‘You’ll be resting them today?’ he asked them.

Ednoth and Wulfgar glanced at each other. Ednoth nodded.

‘Because Sunday is given for beasts as well as men,’ Father Ronan said firmly, ‘and those two poor brutes look in dire need. The righteous man regards the life of his beast. My stable for them tonight, and my hearth for you. How about it?’

Wulfgar looked at Fallow. Mud-spattered, eyes dull, her head hanging wearily. He felt a creeping sense of guilt. ‘We’ll be resting.’

The priest nodded in approval.

‘Now, give me anything that needs putting away in safekeeping. Your sword, lad, for one. That’s a fine-looking piece of kit, but you don’t want to take it into an ale-house in Leicester’s Dench town. I’ll just clear a little space in here, so I will – I won’t keep you more than a moment,’ and, his arms full of their gear, he ducked under the low thatch above his door.

Ednoth rounded on Wulfgar.

‘You said—’

Wulfgar held up his hands to ward him off.

‘I
know
. I’m really sorry. He was so friendly – I spoke out of turn and I gave more away than I meant to. I’ve been a fool.’

‘
Been
a fool?
Are
a fool, more like.’ But Ednoth couldn’t quite hide his smile.

‘I’m sorry, I’m really sorry. But—’

‘The horses do need a rest.’ Ednoth said. ‘What kind of a name is
Father Ronan
, anyway?’

‘Irish, I would guess. Isn’t there a St Ronan? Why don’t you ask him?’

Just then the priest re-emerged.

‘Come in, boys, come on in.’

Ednoth waded straight in.

‘Are you from Ireland, Father?’

‘No, not myself, I’m not.’ The priest stirred a pot set on the hearth-stones. ‘Leicester born and bred. My mother was an Irishwoman, though. She always claimed kinship with the house of the O’Neill, so, who knows, if I talked to the right folk in Donegal I might find myself an atheling of their blood.’ He turned to take a flat loaf out of the crock. ‘But I’ve never found her kin, and the chances are she was only telling me tall stories to keep her spirits up. Come and eat, lads. I’ll keep my fast till after Mass, but you two are travelling.’ The priest went briskly on, ‘So, you say it was Heremod of Wappenbury who recommended the Wave-Serpent? We’ll head down there after Mass and drink a toast to our risen Lord.’

‘Father –’ Wulfgar fingered his chin ‘– if I’m to serve at the altar I must shave. I should really get a haircut as well—’

‘Winchester standards!’ The priest looked amused. ‘We’ve no time to trim your hair for you, but I’ll get you some water for your beard if it’s bothering you, lad. Can you heat it with hearth-stones? I’d do it myself, but I’ve an errand to run.’

Ednoth had curled up on a pile of rush pallets and fallen asleep
soon
after the priest had gone out; Wulfgar had a dark suspicion that the boy looked upon his excommunication as a welcome excuse for skipping Mass, but he found himself glad of the peace and quiet. The last three or four days had been so far outside his former experience, he needed time to catch up with himself, to think and to pray.

Tunic and linen discarded, smooth-chinned at last, Wulfgar was kneeling in the light that came from the low doorway and splashing his bare chest and arms with blissfully welcome warm water when the noonday sunlight darkened. He looked up, startled.

A shadow, outlined in blazing red and gold, moved forward and resolved itself into Father Ronan, holding an armful of cloth that shivered and radiated fragments of sunlight. He held it out to Wulfgar, who scrambled to his feet, eyes widening.

‘Careful! It belonged to the cathedral in the old, old days, and it’s one of the great treasures of Leicester. I’ve sworn it’ll go back as good as it came. And that’s none too good, I should warn you.’

He passed the roll of fabric over to Wulfgar, who unrolled it carefully as he would an old parchment, assessing its length. He tried to hide his delight.

‘Well, technically, as a mere subdeacon I should wear the tunicle rather than the deacon’s dalmatic—’

‘But there’s no one but thee and me will know the difference.’ The priest winked.

‘It’s beautiful, Father. Thank you.’ He looked up. ‘Whose is it?’

‘It belonged to the last canon of the cathedral.’ He jerked his head back in the direction of the walled city just as a nearby bell started ringing. ‘His widow keeps it now. Come on, lad, time to busk ourselves.’

Wulfgar was still tying the last of the faded side-ribbons on his
borrowed
finery when Father Ronan said, ‘When are you going to pay your respects to Ketil Scar, our new Jarl? He doesn’t miss much, you know. He’ll be waiting for you to come.’

Wulfgar looked down at his travel-stained shoes, a lump in his throat.

‘Will you not trust me?’ Father Ronan asked. ‘Tell me why you’ve come to Leicester? If it really is the pottery trade, then Ketil’s your man, you know.’

Wulfgar was silent. Father Ronan waited a moment, then ‘Ach, come along then,’ he said.

The sweet-voiced bell was still being rung as they processed round to the west door of his little church with as much ceremony as the two of them could muster. The bell hung in the branches of a rowan growing by the door, and a lad of around ten yanked its rope back and forth with glee. He looked familiar.

‘Kevin,’ Father Ronan muttered sideways at Wulfgar, ‘my altar boy.’

‘We’ve met.’

When the boy saw them, he gave the bell one last clang, waved at Wulfgar with his free hand, and fell in behind.

Father Ronan had been too modest about his Latin. Rusty, he might be, but unlike Diddlebury there were no unintended heresies here. Wulfgar was shocked, though, by what the priest had dignified by calling his books: tattered and greasy pamphlets, with whole quires missing.

When I get home, Wulfgar vowed silently, I’ll raid my secret store of perfect vellum and find the time to make him a proper lectionary. I’ll get it to him somehow.

He was even more shocked by the old mead-horn substituting for the sacred chalice.

But the little church was packed to overflowing.

The west door had been left open so that the people crowded outside could hear the Easter Mass, and the sunlight came slantwise into the church in a long golden shaft full of dust. As Wulfgar moved around the cramped chancel, he was only dimly aware of the congregation, but as Father Ronan was giving the blessing he realised there was one figure who had repeatedly caught his eye: a fox-haired man in a russet tunic, ears and throat glinting with gold. He stood leaning against the wall just inside the doorway, arms folded, never kneeling – as far as Wulfgar could see – or bowing his head, never crossing himself, never parting his lips in prayer.

He meant to ask Father Ronan who the man was, but after Mass, Wulfgar found himself swept up by the priest’s energy: ‘Let me just wash
those
– and put
that
away – and get
that
bag – kick that boy of yours, would you? We’ll need something to eat.’ After broth and bread he wiped his hand over his beard and said, ‘Now, boys, the Wave-Serpent? Faith, it’s early yet but we’ll likely find it buzzing. Everyone wants to know what’s going to happen, now our new Jarl’s got his hands on the reins.’

Wulfgar’s heart was still back in the little church.

‘Where did you get that wonderful incense? Like roses.’

‘It’s good, isn’t it?’ The priest smiled wryly. ‘Danish traders bring it from Byzantium. It isn’t even that expensive, here.’

Wulfgar nodded, wide-eyed. Greek incense cost more than most English minsters could afford. Perhaps he could take some home.

Father Ronan chuckled at the look on his face.

‘It’s astonishing what you can get, if you don’t mind haggling with heathens. They say the Archbishop of York wipes his arse with silk.’

Wulfgar managed a smile.