The House of the Red Slayer

meal, shuffling its food into a dirty untidy pile as if it suspected Fitzormonde would like to take it away. The knight stamped his feet to keep warm. Tomorrow, he thought, he would leave the Tower. He had already said as much to Mistress Philippa when he had met her and her rather effeminate betrothed.
    Fitzormonde gazed up at the cruel gargoyle faces on the Chapel of St Peter ad Vincula. Yes, he thought, tomorrow, he would pay the chaplain to sing one last Mass for his fallen comrades then go back into the city and request from his superiors some mission or task well away from this benighted fortress.
    He started as he heard a whirring noise in the air. He looked up. A raven? No, what was it? The hospitaller suddenly stepped back in panic as the bear sprang into life, towering above him, its great paws clawing the air. The bear roared at him with fury, its black muzzle and huge jaws covered in a thick white froth. Fitzormonde’s hand went to his dagger as the bear danced like a demon, pulling at the great chain clasped in the wall. What was wrong with the animal? What had happened?
    Fitzormonde made to run but, even as he turned, heard the great iron chain spring loose and saw the bear rush towards him. He tugged at his knife but had it only halfdrawn when the huge taloned paw of the bear smashed his head as if it was a rotten apple. Roaring with fury, the bear dug his claws into the dying knight’s unprotected back and dragged him across the cobbles, bellows of rage proclaiming its triumph.

CHAPTER 12

    Athelstan was furious. He felt the anger burn his innards until his heart pounded and the blood throbbed in his head. For a moment, the friar didn’t give a damn about anything - the teaching of his Order to be gentle or the precepts of the gospels about kindness. All that mattered was the anger raging within him as he stood in the cemetery outside St Erconwald’s church. The snow had now turned into an icy, grey slush which dripped off graves, trees, bushes and the low cemetery wall as the thaw continued under clear skies and a weak wintry sun. Athelstan cursed, using every filthy oath he had learnt from Cranston. He beat the staff he held against the loose brick, furious enough to grind the rock into sand.
    Oh, he had found everything in order on his return: Bonaventure, asleep and well, curled up in the church like some fat bishop as Cecily cleaned and swept the nave. Benedicta and Watkin had set up the crib in one of the aisles, using figures carved by Huddle. The painter had also finished a vivid picture of Christ in the manger, just above the baptismal font inside the church door. Even Ursula’s pig had resisted its usual forays into his garden, and Pike the ditcher had cleared the gravel-strewn path in front of the church.
    Athelstan had pronounced himself satisfied and chattered about parochial matters as he stabled, watered and fed Philomel. But even then he had sensed the anxiety in the faces of those who had come to welcome him: Benedicta, Pike, Watkin, Cecily, and Tab the tinker. They had followed him around the church, answering his questions whilst exchanging secretive, anxious glances.
    At first Athelstan dismissed their concern as some petty matter. Had Cecily been flirting again, or one of Pike the ditcher’s sons peed in the church? Perhaps Ranulf borrowed Bonaventure or Watkin’s children had been drinking from the holy water stoup? The members of his parish council had fussed round him like noisy chickens. At last, just before he locked the church, Athelstan tired of their secrecy.
    ‘Come on!’ he demanded, confronting them. ‘What has happened?’
    They shuffled their feet and looked away. Benedicta suddenly became concerned about an apparent spot on her gown.
    ‘It’s the cemetery, Father!’ Watkin blurted out. ‘Tosspot’s grave has been disturbed.’
    ‘When?’
    ‘The night you left.’
    Athelstan had been so angry he’d used language which made even Pike the ditcher’s face blanch.
    ‘Perhaps Sir John will do something now,’ Benedicta tactfully intervened. ‘Or maybe if we make an appeal to the Alderman of the Ward?’
    ‘Aye!’ Athelstan rasped. ‘And perhaps pigs will fly and we’ll find pork in the trees tomorrow morning. The people who do this terrible thing are bastards! They are wicked and fear neither God nor man. Even the pagans honour the corpse of a dead man. Not even a dog would do this!’
    His parishioners had withdrawn, more frightened of their