The Anatomist's Dream (37 page)

‘Let's try and get up to the roof,' Philbert suggested and Oort agreed, Philbert being his new best friend, Philbert – a little absently – returning the favour. They pushed aside the heavy mildewed curtain that separated the gallery from the landing and saw the stairwell continuing up, passageways tunnelling off into the gloom hiding doors and rooms and other runways that riddled the tower like maggots running through rotten meat. They nodded their common agreement and up they went, the way at first lit by a few firebrands set into iron bracelets, feeble flames dimming every colour that might have been to mouse-back grey. They shivered as they passed the last lit corner, feet stumbling on the stairs, pushing each other on, laughing, a little scared and then excited, racing like fleas for the top, bursting out through the trapdoor like jack-in-the-boxes into the clean air and wind of the night. Breathing hard they ran along the gangways between the parapets, throwing snowballs out in wide arcs from the castellated walls, watching them disappear into the darkness as they fell.

‘Look, there's the camp!' Oort called and pointed, and they could just about make out their tents, could see Oort's donkey loosely tethered, his head in his beet-bag apparently asleep, and Kroonk next door with her offspring snug inside their wattled shed, Lita and Lorenzini's cart nearby, glinting brightly in the gleam of a fire.

‘But look at the lake,' Philbert called out to Oort as he moved around the tower, leaning his elbows into the snow for a better view. They gazed down at the scatter of booths that were ­huddled on the ice beneath the thick horse-hair blankets and moth-eaten tapestries that served for their roofs. They were lit here and there by fires in bowls jammed on poles whose thin wooden legs were lodged into the ice, people wandering from one place to another, taking slow, steady paces as they headed for their beds, knowing that the spectacle at the castle was the last unwrapping of Rupert's Christmas Box, all trading to cease at midnight, and the following morning all to clear the place and be off far and away.

Philbert turned his head towards the clatter of horses' hooves coming down the lane from the tree-line, iced-over puddles cracking and splintering beneath their weight. Together he and Oort ran around the parapet and leaned dangerously over the edge to watch the latecomers arriving from the track and straight into knee-deep snow, the wind having blown it into drifts now the stable-boys had ceased their labours to sweep it away, believing all the guests to be already inside and everyone staying for the entire night of revelry that would last well towards dawn. These latest arrivals had no choice but to dismount, lead their horses back to the trees where they tied them up before making their way with difficulty back along the snow-bound trail, wrapping their cloaks tight against the wind, finally reaching the moat and over the planks into the courtyard.

By now both Philbert and Oort were shivering with the cold so they headed for the little booth they could see stranded on the wide flat field of the roof, startled when the flagsmen popped their heads out like turtles, having been detailed to stay here the whole night through to make sure the flag was still flying good and true come morning, no matter what the weather flung at it.

‘What the . . . ? Who the . . . ?' they said at first, but seeing the two laughing boys they ushered them in, not often having company.

‘Escapees from the fairground, I'm guessing,' said the ­skinnier one, introducing himself as Albert and his companion as Artus, his cousin. They poured the two lads some warm beer into pots and forked up hot sausages from the small brazier that stood at the centre of the small room.

‘Unusual for us to get visitors,' commented Artus, offering the boys his pipe, Oort accepting politely, his face turning grey as the hot briar-smoke struck his lungs, handing it back quick as he could, the two men laughing at his attempted bravado. But they were kind enough, showed the two boys card tricks and how to make the red lady disappear, how to grease a corner so she would slip through the pack unnoticed until she needed picking out again. They could just about make out the noises that were drifting up from the Great Hall down below and Albert asked the lads how the show was going, and who they had on display.

‘I can do
this
!' offered Oort, lifting up the table with one hand, swivelling it on his fingers.

‘Aagh!' yelled Artus, ‘mind the beer
,'
j
ust managing to catch the jug before it fell.

‘So we're not missing much then,' commented Albert, taking the beer jug from his cousin, refilling all their mugs. Both men looked up as the wind grew suddenly fiercer, forcing the flag into standing and the pole to hum, making the icicles cut and shift from the mast and shimmy to the ground with the sound of a lonely black-backed diver calling from the lake. The noise from down below had crescendoed and all wondered what new gift the Christmas Box had brought, Philbert being the first to figure out that the greatest of the acts had already gone and that something else must be afoot, and that something was very wrong. And then they all heard the steady thumping of heavy boots on the bare stone steps leading up to the roof and Albert looked at Artus, and Artus looked at Albert, and then both looked at their guests.

‘Get under the flags, boys,' Albert whispered. ‘There's a whole heap of them back there behind the table. Burrow yourselves in and don't come out until we say.'

Philbert was in mind to stay and stand whatever was coming, fists already clenched, but Artus pushed him roughly back and strong-boy Oort grabbed Philbert's arm and held him down, pulling a load of old and rotting flags and banners over their heads. Oort didn't see the trembling of Philbert's hands, which had already beaten another person to death with just a rock, nor his anger, but Oort was the stronger of the two by far and held his friend pinioned beneath his body as if to shield him, holding up one corner of the flagging heap so they could see Artus and Albert carefully pick up caps and capes and tread steadily out of the booth, leaving the door open, trouser-legs held from the snow by bands of string. Philbert and Oort couldn't see much but could hear distinctly the clanking of iron-tipped boots on stone and the trapdoor being lifted, angry shouts as heavy bodies heaved themselves up and out onto the snow-covered roof.

‘There it is, lads! Well don't just gaup at it. Get the bloody thing down!'

They next heard Albert and Artus edging their way across the roof, the crunch of their clogs as they hit fresh snow.

‘What's this?' said Albert, and then came the soft sound of whip against wet-hide and Albert's startled cry and a man's voice, deep and loud from a rain-barrel chest.

‘So here's who put it up. Don't you know that flag's an insult? Get it down! Get it down now!'

The man who'd emerged with the others from the trapdoor pushed Albert forward, making him stumble in the snow, his own men leaving off struggling with the ropes they didn't know how to work. Artus hurried forward between them, pushing at the men messing with his precious flag.

‘Don't pull on the guy-leader, you'll just tangle it . . .
ooomph!'

One of the men hit him square across the face with a leather-gloved fist, a wet crump as Artus's nose-bone broke, his blood spraying in an impressive arc across the snow.

‘Let them be,' growled the barrel-chested man, ‘but get that bastard flag down, here and now.'

Albert started grappling at the ropes, unwinding the leader from the double-armed hook and Artus, despite his broken nose, getting up from his knees to help, their cold fingers stiff and slipping on Artus's blood which kept pouring from his nose. But it was a task they'd done a thousand times and soon the enormous flag was down, though still the wind tugged at it and tried to wrap it around the pole. Several of the interlopers grabbed at the cloth, held it fast, one of them spitting on the field of Prussian blue. The barrel-man took a tinderbox from beneath his cloak, struck it to the flag, though it was too damp to burn.

‘You!' he pushed Albert, ‘go and get your lamp and whatever fuel you've got and bring it here.'

Albert didn't need asking twice and went running as best he could through the tracks he and his cousin had already made, back to the booth. Once inside, he spoke quietly to Philbert and Oort, whose heads were poking out of the heap.

‘Be quiet, lads. Don't make a sound, you hear me? Not a sound. And don't come out, whatever, you hear me. Don't come out.'

They could see his hands shaking as he lifted the lamp and dragged out a small barrel of oil, started back outside. Philbert moved in defiance but Oort held him fast and Philbert soon subsided, understanding this was a battle they could not win
,
no matter how strong Oort might be and how many men Philbert had already murdered. As Albert moved to leave the booth one of the interlopers came in to take the barrel of oil from him. His nose twitched, and he looked curiously at the table that had been set a little skew by Oort's strongman show.

‘Sausages,' he murmured, ‘I smell sausages,' but before he
'
d a chance to investigate his leader shouted out for him.

‘I'll give you devil-damned sausages if you don't get a move on! We've work to do, you slug-head. And no work, no pay!'

Enough for the slug-head and he retreated back out into the snow with the barrel of oil and took off the lid, poured the contents over the flag, soaking its lion and thistles, staining the green and the white, slicking the snow with dark rainbows beneath. His leader took the lamp and smashed the glass, held it directly to the canvas which took with a whoomph and a firm hold of flame.

‘You,' Albert was pulled forward, ‘get that back up,' and Albert heaved on the painter and hauled the burning flag high into the night sky, Rupert's lion disappearing in a golden mane of flame. The wind carried the embers over the castle walls, pinpricked the sky with light, but the snow had begun to fall again, hiding it from anyone even if they'd been looking, which they were not. Damp black cinders drifted onto the shoulders of the mercenaries who brushed angrily at them, making the marks worse. Their leader looked up once more and grimaced as the burning flag was let go by the wind and collapsed against the mast with a dull flicker.

‘Get rid of them,' he said as he trudged back to the trapdoor and let himself down. ‘And be quick about it. Time we were gone.'

Artus and Albert stood in the snow, blood beginning to cake on Artus' chin and cheeks.

‘Please,' said Albert, his fingers clutching at the bottom hem of his coat.

‘Don't,' said Artus, shaking his head, and no one knew whether he was begging for his life or trying to convince his cousin to be brave. It made no difference to the men who marched towards them. It made no difference to Albert and Artus as those men took out their daggers and slit the flagsmen's windpipes one by one. It made no difference to the half-arsed burning of the flag above them, or the wind that whipped the last flames briefly into being before smothering them completely between fold and mast. It made no difference to Philbert and Oort, hidden beneath the pile of mouldering flags
,
who caught the scent of copper and iron that comes when hot fresh blood is leaving heart and home for the last time, spilling out onto the cold indifference of the snow.

Oort and Philbert listened as the men left, cursing and wiping their knives upon their trousers before slipping back down through the trapdoor from whence they came. As soon as he felt it safe Philbert sprang out of the booth to find that the last flicker of life had abandoned the flagsmen, who lay like slaughtered pigs. Philbert took it all in in a moment. He knew it would be futile to check for signs of life but was fighting furious, and as much as he was anxious about what he might find down below he swung himself straight down the trapdoor and went as fast as he could at the steps, cold hands reaching out to the dark walls, Oort lumbering on at his back, a soft whining coming from the strong-boy's throat as he tried not to cry. Philbert got down the stone stairs fast as he was able in the darkness and pushed past the mildewed curtain to gain the rickety planks of the minstrel gallery from where he gazed down onto the great hall, utterly unprepared for what was there. His hands went to his mouth in useless supplication, for surely to God this could not be happening.

The Gift Box and its guests were well and truly unwrapped and undone, some skewered to their seats by lances, the shafts still wavering gently like dying pendulums; others had fallen forward into plates of food that still steamed softly, their necks neatly tied with wire garrottes tightened hard into their flesh. Yet more lay with their heads laid back upon the neck-rests of their chairs, sliced open like so many raw and fat-spotted salamis. Worst of all was Frau Fettleheim, whose great gut had been hacked from side to side, intestines sliding away from her open stomach, the grey-green glisten of them coiling and spilling over her outspread knees, blue eyes half-veiled by a final blink. Away to the wall, where the last few acts of the Fair had been taking their ease by the fire, was Alarico, the White Jester, spread-eagled on the ember-singed hearth-rug, arms flung wide, white skin bloomed with pink for the first time in his life as capillaries burst all over his body, his feet faintly moving as he tried to crawl over to La Chucha Lanuga who was sitting a few yards away upon her stool, head bowed low, the jewels in her dark hair winking in the firelight, the beads of her beard catching at the hasp of the knife that was buried deep within her chest. A horrid rasping came from the White Jester's open mouth as he strained for one last sight of his wife, his wonderful Peruvian rose. The only other movement in the room came from the Atheling Rupert who was cradled in his throne, a sword plunged right through his belly into the grain of wood behind, Adam's apple bobbing weakly beneath his pale skin, eyes upturned, gazing at the two white faces that had appeared between the gallery railings and bizarrely Rupert tried to shake his head, thinking
they shouldn't be
there
,
the floor's unsafe
.
I always meant to
get it fixed 
. . .