Authors: Karen Maitland
They had not taken Regulus down into the cellars, Felix was certain of that. No lights burned through the slits of the chamber that led to the staircase, and as they filed out of Compline, he’d seen Father Madron heading towards the main abbey gate. Felix was certain they’d given Regulus to the black-robed wizard who changed boys into birds. He’d wagered his dinner for a month on that.
In the dark, it had not been difficult for Felix to slip away from the others just before they reached the dorter. He’d scurried along beneath the walls, keeping to the pools of shadow, well away from the candlelight spilling from the casements. Father Madron was deep in conversation with the gatekeeper, as his horse was led snorting into the yard. The beast’s breath spurted in white plumes from its nostrils and its iron shoes struck blue sparks against the cobbles. Felix’s stomach gave an excited lurch. The gatekeeper would have to open the main wooden door to let Father Madron out. No one could ride or even lead a horse through the narrow wicket gate.
The gatekeeper began opening the heavy door before Father Madron had even walked across to his horse. Felix crept closer, sidling round behind the White Canon as he was occupied with mounting his beast. The boy ran for the shelter of a cart that stood in the corner of the yard, close to the gate. Two chickens roosting on the cart opened their blackcurrant eyes and watched him, fluffing their feathers in annoyance at being disturbed. He prayed they would not start squawking.
Felix waited, crouching low. The flaming torch on the wall flooded the whole archway with yellow light. If he ran through the gate now, he would be lit up like a heretic on a pyre. But if he didn’t move soon, the canon would have ridden through and the gates have been locked behind him.
Felix leaped up and, seizing one of the roosting chickens, tossed it into the middle of the courtyard. The indignant bird fluttered to the ground, screeching and flapping its wings. Startled and disoriented, it fled across the yard, directly in front of the horse, which reared and whinnied at the sudden appearance of this demented creature. Father Madron fought to bring his mount under control, swearing and cursing at the stupid bird, while the gatekeeper and groom rushed forward to help.
Felix didn’t hesitate. Keeping low to the ground, he dashed through the archway and threw himself into the shelter of some reeds beyond the moat bridge. Panting and sweating, he knelt there until Father Madron, having calmed his horse, finally passed through the archway and trotted past his hiding place. The great wooden gate closed behind him with a thud that echoed off the stones.
Two thoughts struck Felix at the same instant. The first was that any punishment he had thus far suffered at the hands of Father John was mere play compared to what he could expect when he returned after having sneaked out. The second was that he was free. He need never return and nor would he.
His absence would surely be discovered as soon as Father John came to lock them up for the night; probably it already had been. But they would search the abbey first, all the usual places a boy might go – the necessarium, where he might have gone to relieve himself, and the kitchens or store rooms he might have raided to steal food. Everyone knew it was impossible to leave the abbey save through the main gate and the gatekeeper knew better than to let any boy go out unescorted. So, if Felix was lucky it would be some hours before they thought the unthinkable and began to search for him outside the abbey grounds. By which time he would be long gone.
A thrill of excitement rippled through him. He could go anywhere in the world, do anything he pleased. But excitement turned swiftly to anxiety. Where could he go? He’d been brought to the abbey when he was even younger than Regulus. They’d told him his family was dead. He didn’t know if that was true, but even if they still lived, he’d no idea where they might be or what they were called. He couldn’t even remember what he’d been called before he became Felix. The name was there, submerged somewhere beneath his nightmares, but he couldn’t reach it.
And how would he live? Food, clothing and shelter might have been meagre, but they had appeared in his life day after day, as the sunlight and the rain fall on grass. He had little idea how to obtain such necessities for himself. A great chasm of fear and loneliness opened beneath him. He wanted to run back to the gate and pound on it, demand to be let back into the safety of those cloisters. He didn’t care that he’d be punished. Punishments always came to an end eventually. He wanted to be safe in there with the other boys.
He shook himself angrily. Regulus wasn’t safe, not if he was with the man in the black robes. That was why he’d escaped, Felix reminded himself sternly, to save Regulus, and when he had rescued him, he’d take him back to his family. Regulus’s mother would be so glad to see him that she’d hug them both till they couldn’t breathe. Maybe she’d ask Felix to stay with them – for ever. He clutched at the thought. He and Regulus would be brothers. He’d have his own family then and they’d live in their own cottage deep in the forest. He’d help his new father cut wood and tend traps. He’d mind the little ones – he’d had plenty of practice at doing that – and in time . . . He shook himself again. Time was running out. Before he could return Regulus to his family, he first had to find him.
Felix had never visited the manor, but from what he’d overheard the lay brothers saying, it wasn’t far along this track. That was what they’d said, anyway. But when he was creeping along the ink-black path, tripping over unfamiliar ruts and holes, it had seemed a very long way to Felix and several times he almost turned back, fearing he was walking in the wrong direction. His heart had been thumping most of the way too, as he bolted past the rustling bushes, or started at the sudden screech of an owl. Once, he thought he heard the sound of sobbing coming from a ditch. Maybe it was the ghost of a drowned child. Felix ran.
But now that he is finally inside the manor walls, his escape and the journey seem a mere stroll across a sunny courtyard compared with the task of finding Regulus, never mind rescuing him. As the cloud slides away from the moon, Felix sees that he is standing in a garden, not unlike the cloisters at the abbey. To his left is an imposing house. All the stout wooden doors are firmly shut, probably locked too.
As the silver lake of moonlight spreads out across the grass it reveals another building to the right of him, a gaunt square tower. Candlelight flickers in the upper window slits, and the deep red glow of a burning fire in the topmost chamber. But where are they keeping Regulus? Is he in the great manor building or up in the tower? Maybe he’s somewhere underground, like the vaulted cellar beneath the abbey. Felix can hardly march up to one of the doors and demand to know where his friend is, and in truth, he suddenly loses all confidence that Regulus is here at all.
He’s a toadwit, a clodplate, a muttonhead! Regulus will be safely back in the dorter by now. He returned while they were all at Compline and right now he’s curled up under his blanket asleep. He hasn’t even troubled to imagine what’s happened to Felix, much less care. Why on earth has Felix risked everything to rescue a stupid little maggot who isn’t even in any danger?
Felix turns back, searching along the wall, trying to find a foothold or a thick stem of ivy he can use to scramble back over the top. He grows frantic, expecting at any moment to hear a pack of savage guard dogs running towards him or a watchman yelling. The man who lives here is a wizard. He turns boys into birds and keeps them prisoners for ever, caged in his dungeons. What will he do to a boy he finds prowling in his grounds at night? As he runs down the length of the wall, Felix tries desperately to think of any excuse he can for being here. He hears a cry above the gusting wind. Is that the scream of one of the enchanted boys? Is it the shout of a guard who’s spotted him?
Even as Felix turns his head, a flash of light catches his eye. A beacon has been set ablaze on top of the tower. It’s a warning that there is an intruder in the grounds. It will bring the guards running. Felix wills the blaze to die away, but the red and orange flames leap higher into the black sky as if they mean to set the stars ablaze. Thick smoke, hell-red in the glow of the fires, twists and turns in the wind, one moment spinning skywards, the next licking down over the side of the building.
Felix stares frantically around him for some hiding place, but before he can move, his gaze is arrested by something else on the roof of the tower. Two figures are silhouetted by the flames, a man in long billowing robes and another, much smaller. Even though they are at some distance, Felix’s young eyes are sharp. He cannot see the boy’s features, nor does he recognise the strange red costume, but he has seen his friend day and night these past months. He can recognise his shape, his movement, his stance. That is Regulus up there. Felix is certain of it.
Even as he watches, two more figures smash their way up through the floor of the tower, like demons rising from Hell. The white-robed Father Arthmael and Father Madron stand side by side in the light cast by the twisting flames. The man in black robes grabs Regulus, dragging him away from the two canons, pulling him towards the very edge of the battlements as if he means to hurl him from the top of the tower.
Felix does not hesitate, does not think, does not plan. He just runs, runs as if the devil himself is roaring at his back.
Et moriendo docebo – I will teach you how to die.
I don’t know which is worse, to be left in darkness so that you can’t see the horror that’s crawling towards you, or to be left with just enough light to see death edging ever closer as you lie, trussed up, awaiting it. But even if we hadn’t been able to see death coming, we would have smelt the wet, decayed reek of it and heard it scuttling towards us on spiders’ legs. Worse still were the whispers and shrieks of the phantasms echoing inside those walls. For I had little doubt that Gisa was right: the living could not have scaled that turret – only the dead could climb those stones.
The stench of decay was by then so strong it blistered my nostrils, as if the mould was already eating its way inside me, its slimy black threads burrowing into my heart, liver and brain. I could smell dead flesh. Was it my own? My shoes were encased in thick cushions of mould. It was creeping up my hose. I couldn’t feel my feet any more. Had they already rotted away?
I turned my head to look at the girl. Her jaw was clenched, as if she was trying to bite back a scream. Her breath was coming in sharp snorts. She was staring up at the spiders as they circled above us, weaving their webs, which turned black and glistening even as they were spun. The webs were spreading wider and wider above us, running into one another, as if we were giant flies to be wrapped. I could feel Gisa shrinking down on the pallet as if she was trying to push her way through the bottom of it.
‘Something’s touching me!’ she burst out. ‘It’s moving. I can feel it. My neck! What is it? What’s on my neck?’
I craned my head to look at her. A tendril of black mould had slithered up over the side of the bed and was twining itself about her throat.
‘Worm, just an ordinary worm,’ I lied.
Even if she hated the creatures, it was better she believe that than know the truth.
‘I . . . I can’t breathe. It’s choking me.’ Her breath was coming in dry sobs now.
I wriggled my shoulder, trying to reach her neck and rub it off, but though I strained against the ropes until I thought I would sever my own hands, I couldn’t reach her.
A stone crashed to the floor, narrowly missing the bed. I stared up to where it had fallen, expecting to see a glimpse of sky, but instead small clods of earth trickled down as if we were buried deep underground.
‘God’s arse! Where are we?’ I yelled. ‘It’s a turret! There can’t be anything above us. I know there can’t.’
There was another crash and more stones fell, handfuls of earth pattering down behind them. Was that a jaw bone? I could see it lying yellow in the rubble.
‘We have to get out. We’ll be buried alive.’
Something was crawling over my forehead, wet and slimy, yet my skin was stinging beneath it, as if it was slowly being peeled back from my bones. It was edging down my face towards my eye. It was a worm. I tried to convince myself it had to be a worm. Yet I knew from the horrified expression on Gisa’s face that it was not. Cringing, I screwed my eyes shut. I turned my face as far as I could into my shoulder, nearly snapping my neck in the effort to scrub the mould away. There was another rumble and crash. Gisa shrieked, or maybe it was me.
‘Here, hold still,’ a voice said.
Gingerly, I opened one eye. A dark figure was standing beside the bed, leaning over us. For a moment I thought the mould had gathered itself into the terrible aspect of a man, until I saw the whites of two eyes and the flash of steel in the candlelight.
I felt a blade sawing at the rope across my chest.
‘Lie still, you codwit. Got to get you out afore Odo comes back, or this bloody tower falls in on us.’
It was only when I heard his voice that I recognised Pipkin.
‘What happened to your face?’ I said, staring up at the blackened skin. God’s bones, had the mould infected him?
The rope gave way and Pipkin chuckled, jerking me up into a sitting position, so that he could reach the rope that tied my arms. ‘Blacked it, didn’t I? Learned that trick long ago. Only way to sneak in and out of this place of a night time without Odo sticking his great beak in. There was one time—’
He broke off as another piece of masonry crashed behind him and, with a frightened glance at the ceiling, he hastily resumed sawing at the rope binding my arms. With enormous relief, I felt my bonds burst open.
‘Leave me. Untie the girl – you must get her out!’
I surprised even myself. I hadn’t realised until that moment how badly I wanted her to live.
‘You make haste to free your feet, then,’ Pipkin urged, glancing nervously up at the roof again. ‘That’ll not hold long.’