Nostrum (The Scourge, Book 2) (7 page)

“Such eloquence,” Tristan says. “I never stood a chance against you, did I?”

“I have studied the works of all the masters,” Gilbert says.

“Please, Gilbert,” Tristan says. “Use the cure for good. That is all I ask.”

Gilbert nods reassuringly. “Now, tell me, Sir Tristan, how do the phials work?”

“One drop will cure the afflicted. And one drop will protect the unafflicted for two weeks.” Tristan shakes his head. “Damn you and your reason, Gilbert.”

Gilbert stares at the phials and smiles broadly. “Alexander will be pleased when I show him what these phials do. Perhaps he will give me my own horse.”

“He may give you more than that,” I say.

Gilbert shrugs. “I will satisfy myself with a horse.”

“I wouldn’t.” Tristan shakes his head. “God frowns on that sort of thing.”

Chapter 8

We hear the first scream well after sunset.

There is a certain scream that only plaguers can elicit. A cry of unholy terror. After twenty years of war I thought I had heard every type of scream a man can make. But there is something biblical about a man’s cry when he is surprised by a plaguer. Something that taps into the fear of eternal torment. When a man shouts in battle, it is from the lungs and from the throat. But when a man sees a plaguer, the scream comes from his very soul.

The guard wakes and peers out of the tent.

“What in Christ’s name…” He squints, then dashes outside.

“Well, that’s sorted then,” Tristan says.

“What, exactly, is sorted?” I ask.

Tristan gestures vaguely with his chin. “That. Out there. Sorted.”

“Tristan, nothing is sorted.”

Tristan cocks an eyebrow, takes on Gilbert’s tone. “You obviously have not studied
reason
,
Sir Edward. All of our enemies will either be dead or plagued. If you had been to Cambridge, you would realize that we can now escape from our bonds and leave at our leisure. Here, let me put it in the simple terms of reason: only bandits can hold us captive. Plaguers are not bandits. Therefore we are not captives anymore. Breathtaking, isn’t it?”

“No, I did not study at Cambridge, Tristan. But let me make an attempt at reason: plaguers eat those who are not afflicted. We are not afflicted. Therefore—”

“The goal then is to not be here when the plaguers arrive,” Tristan says. “See the simplicity?”

I sigh. “Can we try to get these ropes untied?”

Another scream rings out somewhere in the churchyard.

“Please tell me that you fools did not infect this entire camp,” the nun says.

Tristan listens to the cries and winces. “Humans can run very quickly. We are human. Therefore…” He shrugs.

“Tristan.” I feel the heat of frustration rising in me. Elizabeth tells me I need to breathe deeply when this happens, so I do. I breathe deeply three times and smile. “Humans cannot run when they are
tied to tentpoles
.” I grit my teeth through the rest. “We are tied to thick tentpoles. Therefore…” I trail off, as Tristan did.

A man shrieks just outside, right next to us. Something falls against the tent behind Tristan. The tent shudders. More screams, including one from the nun. The light from the candles is just bright enough for me to see a dark stain spreading across the canvas.

“Knights are fools!” the nun says, and there is a touch of hysteria to her voice. “The two of you are knights!” She doesn’t finish. She drops her chin to her chest and sobs. “We’re going to die here because of your stupidity!”

“Edward and I may hold your life in our hands,” Tristan says. “You might consider being a little nicer to us.”

I dig my feet into the earth and shove with my legs. The tentpole shifts slightly, but not as much as I had hoped. They must have buried the oak shaft deep into the earth.

“Tristan, push against the pole with your back. Hard.”

The pole shifts a little toward me. I shove back. The pole tilts toward him, and he shoves again. We slip into a rhythm. Forward and back, forward and back. The entire tent rocks with us. Just a few inches at a time. Back and forth.

Tristan spouts poetry to the rhythm of our rocking.

“Here’s a riddle to leave you appalled…”

The cries echo all across the churchyard. A wild-eyed man with blood smeared across his cheek looks into the tent, then disappears again.

“I’m hairy beneath…” Tristan continues.

The pole shudders.

“…above I am bald…”

The canopy rattles over our heads as guy lines snap.

“I’m purple and red…”

A man enters the tent, almost falling as he does. It is Gilbert. Or was Gilbert. There is no
reason
left in the man that stares at us now. He stares at us with a vacant look of surprise.

“…and stand up in the bed. What am I called?” Tristan sees Gilbert and smiles. “Shall I repeat the riddle for you, Gilbert? A Cambridge man should have no trouble…” He trails off. “Oh.”

A line of bloody spittle dribbles from Gilbert’s mouth. He staggers toward us, moaning. The nun shrieks and thrashes against the pole. Gilbert reaches a hand out toward her. She shrieks again.

“Keep rocking, Tristan!” I lean toward the nun and pound Gilbert in the face with my foot. He howls and falls back, then turns back to me with a snarl. My boot has gashed the skin of his forehead. The pole tilts toward me, shoving me forward so that I have to curl in on myself. I shove back with all my strength. Gilbert lunges toward me and I use both feet to keep him at bay. He bites at the toe of one of my boots, so I use the other to knock teeth from his mouth. The pole tilts back toward me. The nun will not stop shrieking. I set one foot down and shove back against the pole. The tent tilts in Tristan’s direction. Gilbert grabs at my leg. I lean to one side, gather all my strength, and swing my free leg in an arching kick that catches Gilbert in the temple and sends him tumbling to the ground.

Tristan groans and shoves at the pole. More guy lines creak and snap outside. The canvas loses its tautness. Folds of the tent sag toward us. The thick oaken pole pushes against my back, bending me almost double. Gilbert staggers to his feet. Tristan groans again and something at the base of the pole cracks. The full weight of the tent shaft falls upon me. I rotate my shoulders so that the pole is free to fall onto the ground. The candles flutter madly in the far corner.

Candles.

The broken tentpole creaks and falls slowly. The canvas drifts downward, fluttering the candles on the other side of the room. I have time for one more calculation of reason before the darkness descends.

Canvas burns. Tents are made of canvas…

Chapter 9

Gilbert growls in the darkness with what might be frustration. I empathize with him. The thick folds of canvas lie upon us and I can see nothing. I lie on my side, my hands still bound to the fallen tentpole. The nun has stopped screaming, but I can hear her weeping quietly and muttering prayers beside me. Tristan is silent, but I can feel his hands pulling against his ropes. My wrists are bound below his and just above the nun’s. I feel her hands moving too.

“Sister,” I say. “Can you slide your hands off the edge of the pole?”

“I am trying,” she shouts. “They are tied tightly.”

“Try harder,” Tristan says.

“My wrists are at the bottom of this pole,” she says, her fear momentarily forgotten. “You should be a little nicer to the woman who holds your life in her hands.”

The canvas ripples toward me. Gilbert.

“Fair maiden,” I say, trying to keep the panic from my voice. “Wouldst thou be a dear and please slide your fucking wrists off the miserable fucking post that we are attached to before Gilbert the demon uses his pox-addled
reason
to find me and
eat my bloody brains!
” I might have failed to keep the panic from my voice. I take three deep breaths and smile. “If you would, my lady.”

“I cannot!” the nun shouts. “The ropes are too tight!”

“Rock back and forth,” I say. “Use your weight to loosen the ropes.”

The nun rocks back and forth. Tristan and I rock too. The canvas rises and falls as we rock. I hear a wooshing sound at the far end of the tent and notice a faint glow through the tent cloth…

…therefore this tent will burn.

We rock harder and the glow brightens.

“Is it…is it getting warmer?” Tristan asks.

I smell smoke.

“I am free!” the nun shouts. She stands, and the fabric rises in a peak around her. The far side of the tent is blazing.

“Run!” Tristan says. “Flee!”

The nun flees.

I watch her tunnel through the canvas, stooping and prodding it upward with her hands until she is gone.

“Tristan, can you slide your hands free?”

“There’s a nail beneath my ropes,” he calls. “I’m caught.”

A hand slips toward me from beneath the canvas. It lifts the fabric, and Gilbert’s ebony eyes stare into mine. I scream. It is a girlish scream, I will admit it. But Gilbert’s sudden appearance startled me beyond words. I pivot on my hip to kick him again and the pole moves with me. Gilbert’s nose shatters. I have an idea.

The smoke makes me cough. I know we do not have much time in here.

“Lean to the right hard as you can, Tristan!” We both struggle as Gilbert crawls back to me, his fingers squeaking against my breastplate. I put everything I have into sitting up but something is pinning us to the floor. Sweat trickles through my hair. It is miserably hot in here.

Gilbert’s hands find my face. I open my mouth to bite his fingers, then think better of it. One of his nails gouges my cheek. I crane my neck away from him. His teeth crunch against the mail at my hip.

“Are you pulling, Tristan?” I shout. “Lean, you miserable bastard, lean!”

“I am leaning!” He coughs. “What is the purpose of this?”

“To sit up!”

He falls silent and the realization comes to me. “To your left! My right, your left!”

Tristan and I groan. I can hear him coughing too. The ropes bite at my wrists but slowly the tent post rises until it is vertical again. The tent is still attached to the pole, so the canvas spreads, although it sags downward without the support of the guy lines. I can see the hellish blaze that engulfs the far side of the tent. The guard’s empty chair is on its side and on fire. Bits of smoldering cloth fall from the canopy. We can see the church through great flaming rents in the fabric on the other side of the tent. Figures lurch across the graveyard. The dead walk. And we burn.

The heat makes the skin of my face tighten. I can hear little over the roar of the fire. Gilbert bites the cuisse on my thigh as I kick at him. But he has room now. He stands, pushing the sagging canopy upward with his head. He snarls and approaches from the side, where my legs cannot get to him. I kick meekly and brace myself for his final leap. I feel shame that my death will come at the hands of this idiot. Crushing sorrow for failing Elizabeth.

But Gilbert does not leap. He jerks and grows rigid, sways on his feet. Then jerks again and falls lifeless onto me. The Virgin Mary? Saint Giles? A seizure of the heart? I don’t question it.

“Stand…up…” I can’t stop coughing. I feel dizzy with the smoke. “Stand up, Tristan!”

We struggle to our feet, lifting the tentpole with all our strength.

“Never…never seen…a two-man caber toss,” Tristan says.

And that is exactly what it is like. The Scottish barbarians have a sport where they hold twenty-foot poles by one end and flip them into the air. The pole Tristan and I hold is only half that length, and there is no possibility of us flipping it, but I feel, for the moment, like a savage Scot.

The pole tilts to my left, so that the burning wall of canvas rushes toward us. I lean to the right. The pain in my ankle is too great. I stand on one foot and the pole pitches to one side. Tristan stumbles and the two of us groan as we right the pole again. The canopy above is melting into flame.

“Edward?” Tristan says.

“Yes?”

He looks over his shoulder at me. “It’s good to see you.”

I smile in spite of everything. It is good to see him too.

“Edward?” he says.

“Yes?”

“Our situation has not improved.” Tristan coughs. The sweat on his grimy face glistens in the orange light of the flames.

No, it has not. My ankle throbs with pain. I do not think I can bear the weight of this tent much longer. The pole feels heavy as a ship’s mast. All of the canvas rests upon the shaft, and the shaft rests upon our wrists. The heat is unbearable. My chin touches the bevor above my breastplate and the metal is hot enough to cause pain.

“Lean…” I cannot talk. I am coughing too much. “Lean…right…” I cough, then shake my head. “No…your left…” We lean to my right, and the weight of the pole and burning canvas topples us. We tumble sideways to the ground and the burning canopy falls upon us.

I hear Tristan’s screams. The fires of hell have found us. I will not smile as the flames sear my flesh, because no one will heal Elizabeth.

Chapter 10

The heat fades as I die.

Purgatory is dark and smells of burnt flesh and canvas. An angel stands before me. Perhaps I have been reunited with Elizabeth in the afterlife. But Elizabeth holds a smoking shovel, which seems odd to me. And Elizabeth has dark hair. I look more closely. It is the nun.

Her habit dangles mostly off her head. Soot and dirt smudge her face. But seen in the moonlight, she is a handsome woman.

Thick lengths of black hair have come free of her habit and fall across her face and onto her shoulders. Sculpted cheekbones and clear skin speak of a well-bred woman, but it is the lips that truly define her. Healthy, soft lips, emolliated by lanolin and rosewater. They are the lips of a woman who
demands
, and whose demands are always met. She was never meant for a nunnery. She was broken with the nun’s habit as a wild horse is broken with saddle. I wonder which of this woman’s demands got her banished to the convent. And I thank all the saints that my Elizabeth is not like her.

Most of the tent cloth has been pulled away from us, so that we can see the night sky. We lie on one wall of the tent and the rest of the fabric lies to the side in flames. Gilbert’s body lies a few feet away. His legs are on fire and the smoke of it fills the air with the gagging scent of burning flesh. It won’t be long before the flames reach the fabric beneath us. Tristan coughs beside me. I remember his screams when the canvas fell.