Nostrum (The Scourge, Book 2) (33 page)

“And you can’t make more of it?” I ask. “You can’t determine what was in them?”

“Oh I know what was in them. Each ampoule has a strip of parchment attached with the ingredients written in Arabic.”

It takes me a moment to respond to this. “You…you have the ingredients?”

He nods.

“So why can’t you make more?”

“Because it isn’t like making stew,” he snaps. “You do not simply pour ingredients into a bowl and stir. It is complicated work. And I do not expect men who fight for a living to understand it.” His chair grates across the floor as he rises. “I have work to do. I hope you will pardon me.” He stands, sets his knife down carefully on the table, and leaves the room.

I look to Tristan, but he and Belisencia are engrossed in conversation. My eyes fall upon the tapestry of the Virgin Mary.

“He is torn apart by guilt.” It is the blond guard, Daniel, sitting at my side. I note once again the deep, mottled scars along his jaw and above his eye. And realization nearly knocks me to the floor.

“You…you were his subject.”

He takes a long breath and nods. “He cured me.”

My breath quickens. I study him closely. There is no trace of black in his eyes. The only evidence of his affliction is the scarring on his face. “Dear God.” I look closely at his skin, at his hair and fingers. I know it is unseemly to stare at him in this way, but I cannot look away. He had the plague and he is cured. “The alchemist must have caught your affliction early,” I say. “I can scarcely tell you were afflicted.”

He shakes his head. “I was far gone. They tell me that my skin was splitting and turning black. Boils all over me.” He strips his sleeve back and I see scars along his forearm. “The cure removed my affliction. And my body did the rest. It just healed.”

I close my eyes. Think of the black bands on the skin of Elizabeth’s wrists. I think of Morgan’s peeling, blackened skin. I can save them both.

“Has…has he come close?” I run a hand along the skin of Daniel’s forearm, feeling the scars. “Is he close to copying the Syrian cure?”

Daniel shrugs. “He’s trying. But whoever made the Syrian cure wrote the names of the ingredients in a mysterious way. Made them into riddles. One of the elements was called ‘the juice of hadeed.’ Dominic…the alchemist…he told me that hadeed means metal or iron, and he had to work out that ‘the juice of metal’ was quicksilver. They were all like that. Each of the elements. He’s very clever, Dominic. But there’s one element that he can’t work out.”

I’m terrible with riddles, but if Elizabeth’s life depends on the answer, I will read an entire library to find it. “What riddle is giving him trouble?”

“One of the element calls for blood from the ah-teen,” Daniel replies. “Ah-teen means...”

I stand, gasping. Daniel trails off, his eyes wide. “Are you not well? I can call the—”

“I’m fine,” I say. But I am not. The room is spinning. I can hear the wash of blood through my ears. I think of Sir Ethelbert, the old knight whose grandfather used to tell stories about the crusades.

They didn’t call them dragons. They called them aw-teen
.

“I know what ah-teen is,” I say. “It’s not a riddle. I need to speak with the alchemist at once.”

Chapter 51

“Ludicrous.” The alchemist shakes his head again and again. We are in his tower once more. “I have no doubt that the cure requires blood, but it is preposterous to think that he meant the blood of an actual dragon.”

“Why?” I reply. “Why couldn’t it be the blood of a dragon?”

“First and foremost, because dragons
do not exist
!” he snaps. “Alchemy is not sorcery. We do not use pieces of mythical beasts to make medicine. We use books and learning and experiments. The person who made that cure was cryptic about each of the ingredients. Why would he then be straightforward about the last one? I appreciate that you want to help, but you are knights. These things are beyond your comprehension. No offense meant. Such things are simply not in the realm of your understanding.”

“But what if I could bring you dragon blood,” I say. “Would you try using it?”

“Why not bring me fairy dust?” the alchemist replies. “Or a feather from the tail of the phoenix?”

“Because I don’t know where to find those things,” I say. “But I can bring you dragon blood. How much do you need?”

“We might as well bring him the entire dragon,” Tristan says.

“Too right, Tristan. We’ll bring you the entire dragon.”

The alchemist shakes his head, his lip drawn into a snarl. “You are fools. Where do you intend to find a dragon?”

I smile at him and cross my arms. “You are a simple scholar. It is beyond your comprehension.”

“No offense meant,” Tristan adds. “Such things are simply not in your realm of understanding.”

We sleep that night in one of the dorters on straw-filled mattresses meant for monks. There are twenty-six beds arranged in two rows in the long chamber. I wonder what happened to the monks.

I think for a time about the dragon blood. It sounds foolish now that I consider it carefully. The alchemist, Dominic, is right of course. He is not making a witch’s spell. He is making a medical tincture. And medical tinctures do not rely upon dragon blood or bat wings or bear bollocks. But I have to believe it can work. If it does not, my only hope lies in tracking down Gregory the Wanderer and obtaining the cure from him. And Gregory the Wanderer is not an easy man to find.

Tristan creeps out of bed sometime in the night. I know where he is going. I feel an urge to stop him, to protect Belisencia’s honor, but I do not think she wants her honor protected. And in this time of darkness and misery, how can I disapprove of two people seeking happiness in one another?

I think of Elizabeth again and feel the wash of hot tears in my eyes.

I wake from a nightmare of grasping hands and hissing mouths into the far worse nightmare of my life without Elizabeth. I check that my weapons and armor are beneath my bed. Tristan is back in bed, facedown and snoring. I let him sleep and walk down the day stairs into the cloisters, where I hear voices. Belisencia sits on the grass with three servant girls and one of the two halberdiers who earned my suspicions yesterday. The five of them eat bread and strawberries and walnuts. Belisencia’s smile is a spring that has bubbled up from the depths of her soul.

“Good morning to you, Sir Edward.” She practically sings it.

I grunt a good morning and take a seat.

“Are we leaving today?” Belisencia asks.

“Looks that way.” I stare at the halberdier—a thin, auburn-haired man with eyes that bulge—and take a husk of bread from a basket on the grass.

Footsteps sound in the arcade. The second of the two suspect halberdiers steps into the garth and freezes in place when he sees me. He is even thinner than the first and has a nose so long you could churn butter with it. He looks like he wants to flee, but he simply exchanges a look with the other halberdier and joins us.

Gooseflesh rises on my arms. There was true fear in the man’s eyes. I want to get our horses and leave the abbey right now, but I know I am overreacting. These men would not be the first commoners to fear me. Perhaps they heard about my outburst in the alchemist’s tower.

“I’ve done nothing but travel since I met Tristan and you,” she replies. “It’s madness.”

One of the halberdiers shrugs and speaks through a mouth full of bread. “Im dese dimes of madness, ondy madness will dave us.”

I stop chewing and stare at him. My breath quickens. I try to convince myself that I am being foolish. “What did you say?”

He holds up a forefinger, swallows, then says, “In these times of madness, only madness will save us.”

I rise slowly. “Where did you hear that?”

He shrugs, his smile drying up. “I…I just…I don’t know. I’ve just…heard it somewhere.”

I throw the loaf of bread at him. “
Where did you hear it
?”

He bats the bread away, flinches at the tone of my voice. “I…don’t remember,” he holds up a hand toward me. “Calm yourself. It’s just a saying.”

It is indeed just a saying. Sir Gerald’s saying.

I recall the lone horseman I saw riding south yesterday when I looked out the tower window.

“Belisencia, get Tristan!” I run through the arches of the arcade.

“What?” She remains seated, her face twisted with confusion.

“We’re leaving. Now!” I yank the door to the church open and run through the nave, feeling like a fool for reacting like this. Perhaps the expression came from a poem that many people have seen. Perhaps I should read more books. I throw open the front doors of the church.

Yes, I am a fool. But only because it took me so long to react.

A long column of horsemen file through the inner gatehouse. I run south, toward the river, but a dozen men in brigandine and kettle helmets race toward me from the docks. I break toward the north wall. I can loop around. If I reach the stables I can…I can… I’m not sure what I can do, but I must try something. Belisencia peers out through the church doors.

“Get Tristan!” I shout. “Head for the stables!”

I curve around the north side of the church and run as fast as I can. Fatigue sets in swiftly. My wound is better, but I am not fully healed yet. My pace slows as fire sweeps through my lungs. I hear the deep thud of hoofbeats behind me. A fit of coughing forces me to slow even further. Two horsemen holding spears rumble past and wheel to face me. I fall to my knees, coughing. Spearheads gleam before me.

“This one might die before we can kill him,” one of the horsemen says.

The horsemen lead me back to the church doors. Belisencia and the two halberdiers are in the company of the soldiers that I saw arriving from the docks. At least twenty horsemen have assembled halfway between us and the inner gatehouse. Two standards flutter above them. The first is a lion and staff, which I do not recognize. But I know the second very well: the three roosters. Sir Gerald of Thunresleam.

The doors to the church swing open and a group of soldiers in chain-mail tunics walk outside. Two of them hold Tristan. I close my eyes. We are surrounded, they have Tristan, and I am a fool for leaving my weapons in the dorter. At least I could have died fighting.

“Tristan!” Belisencia tries to run to him but a guard holds her back. “Who are they?” Her voice trembles. “Why do they have Tristan?”

“They are Sir Gerald’s men,” I say. “We might have mentioned Sir Gerald on our travels. Insane. Cruel. Wants us dead.”

“No!” The thick tears leap from her eyes. “How did he get into the monastery?”

I watch the horsemen make their way toward us. “How do most enemies breach enemy walls?” I pound one of the halberdiers in the face as hard as I can, shattering his broomstick nose. He drops to the earth like pigeon shit as Sir Gerald’s men take hold of me. “Someone on the inside opens the gates.”

Chapter 52

Most of the horsemen stop a dozen paces from the church, but two of them amble closer until they are directly in front of us. Both are fully armored. The first rides a dappled charger and wears one of those hideous new hounskull helmets with the muzzle-shaped visors. The other rides a monstrous black destrier and wears a bascinet helm. The visor of this man’s helmet has been replaced with a steel mask made to look like an animal face—a roaring ape of some sort. I have not seen the helm before, but I have seen the black destrier.

Sir Gerald has been on the wrong end of cannon blasts the last two times we met. The most recent was the gun explosion that killed Isabella the Witch and ravaged part of Gerald’s face. His new helmet hides the scars of that meeting. There will be torture in store for us. I do not know what kind of torture, but I imagine it will make Alexander the Cruel seem saintly.

“Sir Edward.” Gerald’s voice trembles, although I cannot tell if it is with excitement or hatred. “Sir Tristan. How wonderful to see old friends.” His voice sounds tinny from behind the mask.

“What’s that on your face?” Tristan says. “A baboon?”

The steel mask turns toward Tristan. “It is the great gorilla of the Africas. The most powerful creature of the jungle.”

“Is that how you see yourself?” Tristan laughs and points to the three roosters of Gerald’s crest. “You Thunresleam knights and your little cocks. Always getting above yourselves.”

Sir Gerald turns to the man at his side. “I shall wear his tongue as a pendant before the day is done.”

“Release him,” I say. “Tristan had nothing to do with Sir John’s death.” Sir John, Gerald’s hero, died at the Battle of Lighe, fighting a French army. The same French army whose survivors Alexander the Cruel strapped to wagon wheels. But the French did not kill Sir John. He was torn apart by plaguers that I led to the battlefield.

Mea maxima culpa.

The ape mask turns toward me. “There is more than enough guilt for both of you.” He gestures to the man at his side. “This is my new ally, King Brian.”

The man raises his dog-face visor and frowns. “Am I allowed to call myself a king?” Sweat glistens on his trimmed, black beard.

“Of course you are,” Gerald replies. “King Brian of Yarmouth. Those with land and castles are the new kings. We must each carve out our kingdoms.”

The man nods. “As you say.” He leans forward in the saddle and addresses us. “I am Brian Hastings, King of Yarmouth. And any enemy of King Gerald is an enemy of mine.”

Belisencia sucks in a sharp breath and slips behind Tristan.

Gerald points to the halberdier behind me. “You there. I need to take these two men somewhere. A place where I can peel their skin off and urinate on the pulp.” He cackles and looks at King Brian. “You can piss on them, too. We can piss on them together!”

King Brian’s smile is a strained one. “Very kind, really, but—”

“No, no, I insist. It will seal our alliance. A symbolic gesture. Pissing on our enemies together.”

King Brian shrugs meekly. “I suppose.”

“You can take them to the undercroft of the dorter,” says the halberdier. “There’s a tub there.”