Heretic. Bernard Cornwell

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СКАЧАТЬ he said, ‘am I not right in thinking that Moses struck a rock with his brother’s staff and brought water from the stone?’

      It had been a long time since Father Medous had studied the scriptures, but the story seemed familiar. ‘I remember something like it,’ he admitted.

      ‘Father!’ Galat Lorret said warningly.

      ‘Quiet!’ Thomas snarled at the consul. He raised his voice. ‘“Cumque elevasset Moses manum”,’ he was quoting from memory, but thought he had the words right, ‘“percutiens virga bis silicem egressae sunt aquae largissimae.”’ There were not many advantages to being the bastard son of a priest or to having spent some weeks at Oxford, but he had picked up enough learning to confound most churchmen. ‘You have not interpreted my words, father,’ he told the priest, ‘so tell the crowd how Moses struck the rock and brought forth a gush of water. And then tell me that if it pleases God to find water with a staff, how can it be wrong for this girl to do the same with a twig?’

      The crowd did not like it. Some shouted and it was only the sight of two archers appearing on the rampart above the two dangling corpses that quietened them. The priest hurried to translate their protests. ‘She cursed a woman,’ he said, ‘and prophesied the future.’

      ‘What future did she see?’ Thomas asked.

      ‘Death.’ It was Lorret who answered. ‘She said the town would fill with corpses and we would lie in the streets unburied.’

      Thomas looked impressed. ‘Did she foretell that the town would return to its proper allegiance? Did she say that the Earl of Northampton would send us here?’

      There was a pause and then Medous shook his head. ‘No,’ he said.

      ‘Then she does not see the future very clearly,’ Thomas said, ‘so the devil cannot have inspired her.’

      ‘The bishop’s court decided otherwise,’ Lorret insisted, ‘and it is not up to you to question the proper authorities.’

      The sword came from Thomas’s scabbard with surprising speed. The blade was oiled to keep it from rusting and it gleamed wetly as he prodded the fur-trimmed robe at Galat Lorret’s chest. ‘I am the proper authorities,’ Thomas said, pushing the consul backwards, ‘and you had best remember it. And I have never met your bishop, and if he thinks a girl is a heretic because cattle die then he is a fool, and if he condemns her because she does what God commanded Moses to do then he is a blasphemer.’ He thrust the sword a last time, making Lorret step hurriedly back. ‘What woman did she curse?’

      ‘My wife,’ Lorret said indignantly.

      ‘She died?’ Thomas asked.

      ‘No,’ Lorret admitted.

      ‘Then the curse did not work,’ Thomas said, returning the sword to its scabbard.

      ‘She is a beghard!’ Father Medous insisted.

      ‘What is a beghard?’ Thomas asked.

      ‘A heretic,’ Father Medous said rather helplessly.

      ‘You don’t know, do you?’ Thomas said. ‘It’s just a word for you, and for that one word you would burn her?’ He took the knife from his belt, then seemed to remember something. ‘I assume,’ he said, turning back to the consul, ‘that you are sending a message to the Count of Berat?’

      Lorret looked startled, then tried to appear ignorant of any such thing.

      ‘Don’t take me for a fool,’ Thomas said. ‘You are doubtless concocting such a message now. So write to your Count and write to your bishop as well, and tell them that I have captured Castillon d’Arbizon and tell them more …’ He paused. He had agonized in the night. He had prayed, for he tried hard to be a good Christian, but all his soul, all his instincts, told him the girl should not burn. And then an inner voice had told him he was being seduced by pity and by golden hair and bright eyes, and he had agonized even more, but at the end of his prayers he knew he could not put Genevieve to the fire. So now he cut the length of cord that tied her bonds and, when the crowd protested, he raised his voice. ‘Tell your bishop that I have freed the heretic.’ He put the knife back in its sheath and put his right arm around Genevieve’s thin shoulders and faced the crowd again. ‘Tell your bishop that she is under the protection of the Earl of Northampton. And if your bishop wishes to know who has done this thing, then give him the same name that you provide to the Count of Berat. Thomas of Hookton.’

      ‘Hook ton,’ Lorret repeated, stumbling over the unfamiliar name.

      ‘Hookton,’ Thomas corrected him, ‘and tell him that by the grace of God Thomas of Hookton is ruler of Castillon d’Arbizon.’

      ‘You? Ruler here?’ Lorret asked indignantly.

      ‘And as you have seen,’ Thomas said, ‘I have assumed the powers of life and death. And that, Lorret, includes your life.’ He turned away and led Genevieve back into the courtyard. The gates banged shut.

      And Castillon d’Arbizon, for lack of any other excitement, went back to work.

      For two days Genevieve did not speak or eat. She stayed close to Thomas, watching him, and when he spoke to her she just shook her head. Sometimes she cried silently. She made no noise when she wept, not even a sob, she just looked despairing as the tears ran down her face.

      Robbie tried to talk with her, but she shrank from him. Indeed she shuddered if he came too close and Robbie became offended. ‘A bloody goddamned heretic bitch,’ he cursed her in his Scottish accent and Genevieve, though she did not speak English, knew what he was saying and she just stared at Thomas with her big eyes.

      ‘She’s frightened,’ Thomas said.

      ‘Of me?’ Robbie asked indignantly, and the indignation seemed justified for Robbie Douglas was a frank-faced, snub-nosed young man with a friendly disposition.

      ‘She was tortured,’ Thomas explained. ‘Can’t you imagine what that does to a person?’ He involuntarily looked at the knuckles of his hands, still malformed from the screw-press that had cracked the bones. He had thought once he would never draw a bow again, but Robbie, his friend, had persevered with him. ‘She’ll recover,’ he added to Robbie.

      ‘I’m just trying to be friendly,’ Robbie protested. Thomas gazed at his friend and Robbie had the grace to blush. ‘But the bishop will send another warrant,’ Robbie went on. Thomas had burned the first, which had been discovered in the castellan’s iron-bound chest along with the rest of the castle’s papers. Most of those parchments were tax rolls, pay records, lists of stores, lists of men, the small change of everyday life. There had been some coins too, the tax yield, the first plunder of Thomas’s command. ‘What will you do?’ Robbie persisted. ‘When the bishop sends another warrant?’

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