AT the end of the second day’s journey their party took shelter with a minor lordling on a minor estate that barely had room for their entire company to sleep in the hall and stables. Lord Arno greeted them by name; the clerics had stopped this way traveling north toward Hersford. Although the road north and a rutted track leading west remained clear, a barricade made up of handcarts, a wagon, and felled logs had been thrown up across the road where it continued southward. The barrier was manned by a dozen field hands armed with staffs sharpened to a point, a single metal-tipped spear, shovels, and scythes.
Over a meager supper of tart cider, roasted chicken, and spring greens, the lady of the house took it upon herself to warn them.
“Go not down the southern road, Your Excellencies.” She looked exhausted, face pale, eyes dark with strain, and she rested trembling hands on her pregnant belly as she glanced at her husband, who was, it transpired, lame from a wound taken in the battle of the guivre, fought near Kassel.
“The western road will serve you better,” the lame man added. “You will not ride more than ten days out of your way. It is safer.” As he spoke, he gripped the arms of his chair so hard that his knuckles turned white.
“I must turn west, as I have already suffered unreasonable delay,” said Brother Severus, “but their road lies south to Darre.”
“I pray you, do not go that way, Your Excellency. All the farms are blighted with the murrain. We’ve heard that not one farm in ten has sheep, cattle, or pigs left to them. We turned back two families yesterday. They were trying to escape north with their flocks. We pray morning, noon, and night that our own herd has not caught the contagion.”
“Yet you let us pass these six days past. I saw no barricade then.”
“The blight had not come so far north, Your Excellency.” The lord called for more cider and apologized for the fourth time that there was no more wine to be had. The long hall in which they feasted was only scarcely longer and wider than Aunt Bel’s house in Osna village. Although the floor was swept clean, the tapestries on the wall had a shabby look about them and all the children, huddled under the eaves on straw mattresses, had runny noses. “We only blocked the road three days past. We’ve heard rumors that bandits have come into the countryside as well. We’ve heard dreadful stories—”
“Speak no more of it,” said Severus, turning back to his food. He examined the gamy chicken with a prim frown. “My companions will continue south. God protect the righteous.”
Husband and wife glanced at each other, but there was nothing they could do. Simple country lords could no more change the chosen path of the skopos’ own clerics than they could prevent the tide from coming in.
Brother Ildoin was the youngest of Severus’ clerics, a slight young man with a blemished face, an amiable if often inattentive expression, and two fingers on his left hand permanently twisted from a childhood accident. He had not yet had every last drop of compassion wrung out of his soul, although it certainly seemed to Alain that Severus had burned any such wasteful and inconvenient sentiments out of his own heart.
“We have no livestock with us,” Ildoin said to the lady, “only horses. Horses do not take up the contagion, so you are safe from us as will be those we seek shelter with in the days to come.”
With that their hosts had to be content.
In the morning Severus took a dozen men as attendants and rode west, leaving his factor, by name of Arcod, Brother Ildoin, and ten rough-looking clerics who seemed as much at ease with a spear as with a holy book to escort Alain on the southerly route.
“Where is Brother Severus going?” Alain asked Ildoin as they left the besieged manor house behind. “I thought he meant to return to Darre, too.”
Ildoin had a way of lifting his chin, like a man recoiling from a sharp blow, when he was surprised by any comment or unexpected sight. “Brother Severus is a great and holy man, one of the intimate counselors of the skopos herself, may she remain hale and hearty and live many long years under God’s protection. We do not question him! However, he is a powerful man in more ways than that of intrigue and wise counsel—”
“Brother Ildoin!” Arcod drew up beside them. “Idle chatter is a breeding ground for the Enemy’s maggots. We will ride in silence, or sing Godly hymns, if you please.”
Alain was content to ride in silence. They made a peaceable caravan with the pack mules ambling along in the middle of their group and the hounds padding alertly to either side of him. It was a lovely spring day, the sky strewn with broken clouds. At first, birdsong accompanied them and a skeane of geese honked past above. But as the morning passed, Alain noticed that the joyous noise gave way to an uneasy hush. Midmorning they passed an abandoned hamlet, where a scatter of huts lay empty beside the road. A thread of smoke drifted heavenward a short distance off the road; otherwise there was no sign of life.
“Should we investigate?” Alain asked.
“No,” said Arcod. “It’s none of our business. Our business is to take you to the skopos.”
They hadn’t gone much farther through open woodland before a second clearing opened before them. Judging by the well-thatched longhouse, fenced-in garden plot, rubbish pit, and three pit houses, a prosperous farming family had once lived here. Stakes lined the roadside, four posts staggered on either side of the track, set there as a warning. On each stake a sheep’s skull was affixed, glaringly white against the lush green eruption of spring growth all around. Some of the skulls had a bit of flesh left, but most had been picked clean by carrion crows still flocking among the buildings. Here, too, they saw no movement, heard no welcoming hails, but the porch of the longhouse was swept clean as though its occupants had only recently departed.
The clouds drew in darkly. A chill wind blew up from the south as a mist began to fall, trailing off at intervals only to spatter down once again, inconstant and irritating.
“Another one!” shouted the cleric riding at the front of their party. He’d been chosen for this duty because he could speak Wendish. “Ho! Well met! Are there any folk living here?”
As they rode into a new clearing, they saw a scattering of huts, an empty chicken coop, a small roofed paddock, a trough half full of water, and an abandoned plow sledge. Four stakes pounded into the ground at the four corners of the paddock bore animal skulls, one sheep, two horned cattle, and something that looked remarkably like a dog with a patch of skin and pale fur hanging from the muzzle. Dried plants had been woven into the eye sockets, and a tangle of tiny carved wooden figures dangled down from the gaping jaw on a leather strip.
Rage barked once. Sorrow whined.
“Some witch has sullied her hands with magic workings and amulets,” said Arcod. “No wonder they were struck down by God’s anger.”
“Do you think so?” asked Alain. “Perhaps they were only trying to protect themselves.”
o;Speak no more of it,” said Severus, turning back to his food. He examined the gamy chicken with a prim frown. “My companions will continue south. God protect the righteous.”
Husband and wife glanced at each other, but there was nothing they could do. Simple country lords could no more change the chosen path of the skopos’ own clerics than they could prevent the tide from coming in.
Brother Ildoin was the youngest of Severus’ clerics, a slight young man with a blemished face, an amiable if often inattentive expression, and two fingers on his left hand permanently twisted from a childhood accident. He had not yet had every last drop of compassion wrung out of his soul, although it certainly seemed to Alain that Severus had burned any such wasteful and inconvenient sentiments out of his own heart.