Divine Sacrifice, The (7 page)

And it was bright, shiny. Not worn at all. Sometimes we saw such coins in the far west of our lands, when merchants brought them in, but they were few, very few.

Too many questions. My stomach growled. I was hungry, but I knew that I had to see Elafius once more before he was buried. Besides, knowing Arthur and Coroticus, they were arguing over some
obscure element of the church.

I sent one of the young
monachi
to watch over Elafius’s cell and headed back to the building for the preparation of bodies. As I crossed the muddy ground, I noticed a very young,
very round
monachus,
obviously new to his service as his scalp gleamed whitely where his tonsure had been newly cut. Above pink, cherubic cheeks, his eyes followed me hawkishly, brazenly,
and I wondered who this fresh face could be.

“Ider!” I spotted the young
monachus
hurrying on some chore. He stopped and ran to my side.

“Yes, Malgwyn?”

I almost chuckled at his eagerness to please. “Who is that
monachus
there?”

Ider’s face screwed up into a frown. “That is Gildas. He is newly come to Ynys-witrin. Coroticus owed some debt to his father and took the boy in.”

So, this was Lord Celyn’s brother. “Why does he look as though he swallowed sour wine?”

“He has not learned the lesson of humility. Indeed”—and Ider shook his head sorrowfully—“I doubt that he shall ever learn it.”

I nodded in agreement. A lack of humility seemed to be a family trait. “Come with me. I must examine Elafius’s body once more.”

With Arthur and Bedevere busy elsewhere, Ider was visibly more relaxed. “Of course, Malgwyn. I would be honored.”

And so he fell into step with me as we trudged across the muddy ground. Ider had come to Ynys-witrin only in my last months there. He had been such a fresh-faced youngster, so devout and eager
to learn the ways of the
monachi
. I often wondered what drove these boys to so imprison themselves at such a young age. They had hardly sampled the world, and yet they entered into a life
of deprivation without giving themselves the chance to explore that world. I knew that many of them were second sons, unlikely to inherit more than their father’s reputation. So, service to
the Christ was a respectable calling.

“What think you of Elafius’s death, Malgwyn?” Ider shook me from my musings.

I paused before answering, sidestepping a heap of horse dung but landing my foot in a puddle the span of a hand deep. The splatter of water attacked Ider’s robe.

“I think little of it at present,” I finally answered, shaking the muddy water from my
caligae
. “Tell me of Lord Lauhiir. How long has he been here?”

“Just a fortnight. He sent some of his men and workmen to improve the Tor for his arrival. They eat much meat there, Malgwyn.” Ider shook his head, and I laughed a little. We all ate
meat, but not much. It was too rare a food, and the
monachi
kept their diet simple, mostly bread and vegetables. The amounts of meat that graced a lord’s table would have caused sour
stomach in any
monachus,
except Coroticus, that is. His table held as much meat as any lord’s. But such were the differences between abbots and those who served them.

“If that is the worst of his sins, then he is truly blessed,” I answered as we came to the door of the hut. “Please, Ider, attend me a moment. I will not be long.”

The young, pale-faced
monachus
nodded eagerly. “I would learn from you, Malgwyn.”

“Learn what? Learn writing? You are a
monachus;
’tis the brothers who will decide what work would suit you best.”

Ider’s face turned red. “No, Malgwyn. I would learn to solve puzzles as you do.”

“Then,” I said with a chuckle, “you yearn to spend your days in frustration.” With that, I entered the hut once more. Nothing else had been done with Elafius; he lay as
we left him. This time, though, I knew what to look for.

“Light that candle,” I instructed Ider.

“But ’tis still light,” he complained.

He spoke truly, but what little light filtered through the unchinked walls of the old hut and in through the door were hardly sufficient to read a holy text. I needed to read the holiest text of
all, a human body. “Just light it.”

Ider did as he was instructed, and quickly the small cell was filled with a yellow, hazy glow of light.

Once again, I faced the wrinkled white skin, shrunken now; he looked older and but a pale shade of himself. This time there were no shadows to hold secrets. His back from head to foot was dark
though. I had seen such in dead bodies on battle-fields before. I knew not its cause, but I knew it happened at some time after death.

I looked first at the place where his jaw connected with his skull. The finger impressions were obvious, on both sides. “Bring the flame closer,” I directed. Just as I thought, a
palm print could also clearly be seen on his forehead. In the dead, I had seen that bruises, marks, were more vivid than in the living.

Waving Ider back, I stared at the cold body and thought for a long while, matching images from his cell with the marks on his body. Books strewn about, as if someone searched there. A silver
denarius
where it should not have been. The marks on Elafius’s body. The yew needles on the floor of the cell.

Suddenly I jerked from my reverie, almost knocking Ider back into a wall. I grabbed the dagger from my waist and saw that its edge was not as sharp as I needed. I turned to Ider. “Bring me
a knife.”

His eyes widened like those of a frightened young deer. “A knife?”

“Ider! We cannot help Elafius now. But by desecrating his body, we may make some sense of his death.”

Still he hesitated.

“The blame will be mine. Now, fetch me a sharp knife from the abbot’s kitchen.”

The young
monachus
scampered away as I continued to ponder. Someone strong had held the
monachus,
forced his mouth open and poured yew extract down his throat. But for that to
have killed him, he would have had to swallow a goodly quantity. I knew enough of battle wounds to have seen men’s stomachs split open and their last meal come spilling out. Now, I would do
it to find the cause of a man’s death, not to kill him myself.

“What is this nonsense?” I turned to find Coroticus standing imperiously in the doorway, with Arthur looking amused behind him. “You will not cut this poor man’s body
open! It is being prepared for burial. I will not have you desecrate it further.”

I laughed at him and scratched my half-arm. “If I do not, good abbot, then you will never know what happened to Elafius.”

“I already know what happened to Elafius,” came a strangely familiar voice. I looked beyond Arthur and saw the chubby young
monachus
Gildas, his freshly shaven tonsure
shining in what little sun God provided on this miserable day.

Turning, I looked at him. His face wore a smile born of thinking himself too smart. “And how did he die?”

Gildas stepped forward. “He was killed by the woman

Rhiannon, from Gaul. I heard them argue about the divine sacrifice. Obviously, she killed him. She is a stout woman, unlike poor, ancient Elafius.”

“And how did she accomplish this feat?”

He shrugged. “She strangled him, I should think.”

I turned to Arthur with a look he knew too well. Turning to Coroticus, he ignored Gildas and entered the fray for the first time. “Give him the knife. I will place my faith in Malgwyn, not
this child.”

Coroticus wanted to argue. I could tell by how his lips stretched into a thin line. But he trusted me as well, and he dared not dispute Arthur. “Give him the knife,” he ordered Ider,
who looked pained at being caught between such powers.

I took the knife, not as sure of myself as I once was, and approached the old man with some fear. For a man with my reputation, it was an odd feeling. But I reminded myself that the old fellow
could feel nothing, and so I slit his belly, about where I reckoned his stomach was located.

I cut carefully, amazed that no blood spilled from the wounds. Fascinated with the things I found, the different creatures that inhabit our flesh, I saw the one I sought. With the greatest of
care, I sliced it open and found the remnants of his last meal. Vegetable pieces mostly. And a few yew needles. Perhaps a small handful of a black liquid that I took to be yew extract. We all knew
how yew needles rendered a man senseless. But there seemed hardly enough to do even that.

Motioning for Ider to rearrange the lamps, I checked the other organs, not knowing exactly what I was looking for. I worked my way up his torso, looking for anything, something, to account for
his death. Reaching behind his ears, I cradled his head and immediately felt something amiss.

I rolled it to the right and left and it moved too freely. Something caught inside his neck. His neck was broken. That was how old Elafius had died.

“Who is this Rhiannon?” I asked, still staring at the pulp from Elafius’s stomach.

“She is the new abbess. From Gaul,” Coroticus explained. “She has some uncommon views. Well”—he hesitated—“somewhat uncommon for our lands but common
enough in Gaul.”

I grunted. “Rhiannon” meant “holy” in our ancient language, an appropriate name for a woman in the Christ’s service. “And they would be?”

“Might we move outside?” Coroticus asked uneasily. His was not a path strewn with bodies. That much was obvious.

Our little troop left the cell and poor Elafius behind. Once in the gray daylight, the abbot seemed to return to a proper mood. In the distance, I could see the
vallum,
the ditch and
fence that separated the abbey grounds from the surrounding lands.
Monachi,
brown-robed and ascetic, scurried about the grounds on some errand or other.

“Rhiannon was used to the practice of women serving at the church services, giving the holy bread to those who would take communion. This is not something that we or the church in Rome
accept, only in Gaul. And, yes,” Coroticus admitted, “Elafius argued with her over it, many times since her arrival.”

“They argued violently, most violently, but especially the very worst yesterday eve after the meal,” Gildas interrupted. I had seen such as this little scamp before. Secure in their
position by virtue of wealth or influence, they thought themselves above all. And their ambition knew no bounds.

Arthur turned toward the young
monachus
. “The next time you speak without my bidding, young man, you will do so from a pit in the earth, filled with rats. Now, leave Master
Malgwyn to his work.”

I suppressed a smile. Gildas had several brothers, all older than himself, one of whom Arthur had personally killed. The others all led factions that would not join the
consilium,
and
Arthur had no love for them. That Coroticus allowed Gildas into the abbey spoke more of his father’s purse than his politics.

With some reluctance, I turned to Arthur and the abbot. “Elafius’s neck was broken. Of that, there is no doubt. How it came about, through design or by accident, I cannot
say.”

“How do you accidentally break someone’s neck?”

“By trying to force his mouth open and pour yew extract down. His neck must have been broken as they poured the yew, for some of it made it down to his stomach. Dead men cannot swallow.
The yew was meant to poison him. Yew will do that to horses and cattle. We know this well. Either those who held him were too rough or the old man’s neck was easily snapped.”

“Are you certain of this?”

I thought of the silver
denarius
. But I knew from experience that this was not the time to reveal it. “I am certain this is how he died. I know that more than one was involved.
Perhaps the woman recruited others to hold him while she poured the poison down his throat. Perhaps it was an attempt to make her seem guilty. Either way, the woman bears questioning if nothing
else.”

“A-hem!” Coroticus cleared his throat. “She is the head of the women. She was sent here because of her great devotion to the Christ.”

“She was sent here because of her family’s influence,” Arthur snapped. “When the troop arrives, send them to arrest her. Otherwise, not a word from any of you.
Especially”—and he glared most effectively at Gildas—“you.”

Arthur turned to me. “You have seen all that you require?”he asked.

I nodded. “I have seen enough.”

“Then join us as we confer with Patrick at the abbot’s great hall.”

“And what of Lauhiir?”

“He can wait. It will do his ego good.”

With that we trudged across the muddy ground to Coroticus’s great hall, almost as large as Arthur’s seat at Castellum Arturius. The timber hall stood on a line with the old church to
the east, beyond the cemetery and the cells of the
monachi,
which ran to the north, into the edge of the slope. From where we stood, we could look down slightly on the row of timber shops
that marked the village.

Coroticus fell in step with me, leaning in close to my ear. “Malgwyn, Rhiannon could not have killed Elafius.”

“Why?”

“She is a stout woman, I grant you, but she is not the murdering kind. Yes, she is strong in her beliefs, but she is gentle as a lamb.”

“People, even gentle people, can be roused to violence if their beliefs are challenged strongly enough.”

“Not she.”

His strong support for the woman made me question his relationship with her. In those days, though abbots and
monachi
were forbidden the pleasures of the flesh, many ignored the
prohibition.

With that he fell into a silence as Arthur glanced back at us.

“Coroticus,” he bellowed. “What temper is Patrick in?”

“He is in a foul mood, my lord. Though ancient he may be, he is stout as a bull. And just as loud.”

I chuckled quietly. Obviously, Patrick’s visit was as welcome to Coroticus as to Arthur. Patrick did not like leaders such as Arthur, Christian though they might be. He considered them all
false believers. His hopes for bringing our peoples together lay not with kings or lords, but through the Christ. Yet even in that single purpose, the fathers of the church seemed to have no
consistency and much controversy. It was no wonder I regarded them with a skeptical eye.