The French Executioner (57 page)

He half fell from the horse, reaching up to pull at the turf-lifter Haakon had carried ever since Munster. It slipped past
too-weak fingers and in its fall dislodged the sword that Januc had thrust up into the saddle bags. He managed to catch that,
even draw it slightly from its scabbard. Leaning it against the upright of the gibbet, he bent down for the turf-lifter, dragging
it the few paces to the exact centre point where the four roads met.

He had barely begun to dig when a horse’s neigh alerted him. He only just made it back to his sword by the time they rounded
the bend from the village.

‘Well, Executioner.’ Cibo’s words rode out on a smoky plume in the frigid air. ‘Here we are again.’

‘Indeed.’

Jean tried to stand upright, resting his hands on the pommel of his sword. He saw Beck was alive, twisting against her bonds,
against the gag that held her mouth.

‘The hand. Give it to me.’ The words were wheezed out.

‘You are too late. It is buried. See?’ Jean held up his shovel.

‘Then you will dig it up again. Or you will watch your friend here die.’ At Cibo’s gesture Heinrich dismounted and pulled
Beck after him, throwing her to the ground. ‘But wait! I don’t believe you have had time to bury it yet. Nor the strength.’
That cough again, the blood unchecked at the lips. ‘You, of course, will die very soon. But I can yet live. All I need is
the witch’s hand. Search him, Heinrich. Find it. Then kill him.’

‘At last.’ As he crossed over to Jean, Heinrich von Solingen was almost smiling.

Jean raised his sword, letting the scabbard slide off. Von Solingen simply took the weapon from Jean’s strengthless hand and
thrust it into the midden heap where, swaying slightly, it cast the moonshadow of a moving crucifix onto the ground. He reached
behind the Frenchman’s back and pulled the hand from its hiding place.

‘Now, may I kill him, my Lord?’

‘Yes, Heinrich. And I will kill Salome.’ Cibo had pulled his hunter’s crossbow from his saddle bags, was fitting a bolt into
the notch. ‘Alas, I am disappointed not to be able to experience the end of her performance. But let her see her reward before
she dies, at least. Cut his head off and bring it over here.’

Heinrich von Solingen placed Anne’s hand on top of Jean’s sword, then awkwardly drew his own with his unbroken left hand.
‘I have been waiting for this moment.’ The two shattered faces were a hand’s breadth apart. ‘The last of your cat lives.’

‘Oh,’ said Jean wearily. ‘I’ll see you in hell,’

A shadow passed between the moon and the rising sword, and a black shape settled on the gibbet’s crossbeam. They had all seen
the bird, or one much like it, somewhere before, and when it opened its beak and squawked the word ‘Hand!’ two of them realised
where.

The word made the German pause, sword on high, and in
that moment something erupted from the gibbet midden, bursting from the very depths of the muck, soiled scraps and bones picked
clean. Only the gleam of two eyes split the blackness; that and the moonlight flashing on the stiletto blade that flew straight
up, like an arrow shot from hell. Its flash was the last thing Heinrich von Solingen saw before the dagger entered his left
eye and his head exploded in white light. The midden creature rose as the German fell, accompanying him all the way to the
ground.

‘Fugger!’ yelled Jean, and the mud animal leapt backwards from the body, knife still clutched in hand.

‘Ogres pursue me! Devils bite my legs!’

The cry of shock from the Archbishop drew the Fugger’s gaze to the horses. All he saw was a mounted demon, blood streaming
from his ghastly maw.
The blood of his last victims,
the Fugger thought,
with me destined to be the next meal.

‘You shall not have me!’ he cried, raising the dagger.

A bolt flew, passing through the Fugger’s palm and on into the wood of the gibbet beam, pinning his one hand there.

‘Oh, Daemon, oh my dear!’ the Fugger cried as he sank down to his knees, his hand stretched out above him, a crucifixion half
complete.

On his horse, Cibo tried once more to slot the string into the trigger notch of his crossbow. But as soon as he took his hands
from the reins, his high-spirited horse began to circle around and his weakened fingers kept slipping on a string made slick
by his own blood.

‘Come on,’ he muttered. ‘One last bolt for the executioner.’

Jean saw his death in the string creeping slowly to its notch. Then, looking down, he saw something else. For the moon had
finally cleared the last great bank of cloud and its beams shone on the sword thrust into the earth, and on the hand that
lay atop it. These, he realised, were the three central elements of the journey to this crossroads: the hand of the Queen,
the sword that had taken that hand, and a full
moon’s light. The alignment came together in his mind, then in his vision again, for he saw the hand shift on the pommel,
grip it. Beyond the hand, an arm led up to bare shoulders, and above them, fixed upon him now, were the question and the answer
in the eyes of Anne Boleyn.

She was dressed in a simple shift of silk, and her brow was encircled with a wreath of meadow flowers.

‘You see?’ Her voice was soft. ‘I promised we would meet again.’

Jean reached out and took her hand, felt that strange and wondrous pressure, and it filled his limbs with a surge of power.

‘Listen to me, Jean. Use all your strength now and you will not need to use it ever again in my cause. I will help you. Lift
your sword.’

It would not shift at first, despite the eleven fingers pulling on it, then it came from the earth in a rush. Ten more fingers
interlaced over its leather grip, just as he heard the click of a string snagging a notch, the sound of a bolt dropping into
a groove. Just as he realised what they must do.

‘Now, my Queen?’

‘Now, Jean Rombaud.’

‘Give me the hand!’ Cibo cried, levelling the crossbow at the man now standing there with his square-tipped sword raised before
him and the object of all Cibo’s hopes clutched against the grip.

‘Gladly,’ said Jean and Anne together, as he bunched his once powerful muscles in that familiar curl and then released them.
The sword flew along a moonbeam towards the man on the horse; a crossbow bolt met but didn’t deflect it on its flight. The
heavy blade took Cibo in the neck, just where the weapon was most keen, in that little space on the front edge no more than
the breadth of two hands. The sword made no pause there but passed on through to land, tip first, in the soft earth beyond,
just before the Archbishop’s head reached the ground. The head rolled over twice before ending face up
towards the sky, the eyes wide as if looking for shooting stars.

A moment later, a hand fell upon it, a small sixth finger settling near the parted lips. Blood no longer flowed through them.
But for Giancarlo Cibo, Archbishop of Siena, the healing touch was, of course, too late.

It was late when he set out on his quest, driven by the promise he had made her. As he walked down the avenues of vines still
bulging with fruit, the setting sun fired the forest ahead of him, the ochres, umbers and brilliant siennas of the trees burnished
to a flaming gold. Above, all alone in the impossibly azure sky, one small fist of a cloud was beginning to bruise from purple
to grey.

He limped into the forest under the canopy of a copper beech, metallic leaves like spear points thrusting down on him. Here
he paused, swishing his stick through the heads of the tall grass, considering the nature of what she had asked him to do,
his twin tasks. He knew that he had been observed in his walk through the vineyards, that they would not have retreated far
into the trees before setting up their ambush. Probably just ahead, where the little trail widened out through a grove of
chestnut. There would be plenty of ammunition and steep slopes to give the advantage of height. It was where he would have
chosen, were he the ambusher.

There was nothing for it but to move steadily forward. The light filtered sideways through the trees, dappling the undergrowth,
but there were still many leaves on them. The summer had been endless, no great wind sweeping in from the Maremma to shake
the foliage down. This was the first day he had felt even a hint of something cooler in the light
breeze, though his old wounds had sensed the season’s change first, as they always did.

There was the snap of a stick, the slightest of rustles to either side and even … was that the hint of a whisper swiftly cut
off? He advanced boldly for he had his mission, and the only way to accomplish it was to draw them out.

The first projectile that struck him was from above and he thought
Gianni,
because the boy loved to climb, was never out of a tree. The second was harder and more accurate, the chestnut catching him
just below the ear, and with some sting to it. That would be Anne, because she had her mother’s arm, her unerring thirst for
the target. After that it was impossible to guess at the thrower, so heavily did the missiles come, in single bullets, in
concentrations like cannon shot. He staggered under the storm, as was required of him, and finally fell forward onto the forest’s
mossy floor.

When they rolled him over, he saw they were all there, four faces staring solemnly down at their victim as if wondering what
to do with him next. He knew Erik would favour more bloodletting, while Maria-Carmine would be keen to practise some sort
of forest medicine. You could never tell which way Gianni would lean, his mind would already be on to something else. How
to climb even higher, probably.

But it was Anne who decided, of course. Though a girl, she was still the eldest and the strongest, and she had a ruthless
quality to her.
Another trait from her mother,
he thought, rubbing under his ear.

‘You are our prisoner. We will take you back to our castle, and there the Queen will decide your fate,’ she declared.

‘As long as the castle lies homeward, I will surrender my sword to your power, my Lady.’

Jean smiled at his daughter, and reached up with his stick. She grabbed the end of it and tugged, helping him to his feet,
where he spent a moment rubbing his knee.

‘And the Queen has a request of us. Gather your weapons, for she is going to make us a chestnut pie this night.’

This produced a cheer, for Beck’s pies were famous. When they had a sufficient quantity of the tufted brown nuts, they headed
back through the wood and along the vine-lined avenues. The heads, fair and dark, kept popping up amid the thick clusters
of fruit. Only Maria-Carmine walked with him, her little hand thrust in his. She was a quiet child, very like her ever-thoughtful
father.

‘Well,’ said Beck, studying the bounty of the forest spread out on her table. ‘A good crop indeed.’

The moon was full that night, the sky clear and their way well lit across the valley to the Comet. They had a delay at the
next house, for Maria-Theresa did not know where her husband was.

‘Always fiddling with something. He may be in the barn, Jean, you could look for him there,’ she said.

While the women compared their offerings for the feast and the children resumed the game of the day, Jean went around to the
barn. The door was open and a swath of moonlight spread across the floor to the olive press.

‘Albrecht? Are you there?’ Jean called.

There was a shifting from under the huge metal and wooden frame, and a creature’s head wormed its way out. Even in the moonlight,
Jean could see the creature was covered in oil.

‘Oh Fugger!’ He leant on his stick and laughed. ‘Haven’t you had enough of lying in the dirt?’

The Fugger pulled himself out from under the press and began a futile effort at wiping himself down.

‘It’s blocked. Again,’ he explained, rubbing his sticky hand on his smock.

‘My friend, Maria-Theresa is going to kill you.’

They left husband and wife there, little Maria-Carmine trying to scrape the oil from her father’s clothes and skin, the hapless
German standing unprotesting between his scolding wife and child. As they walked down through the Fugger’s
olive groves, their footfalls were accompanied by the rhythmic fall of an axe. It came from within the walls of the inn ahead,
and when they got closer they could see, through the gate, the gleam of a curved blade as it rose and fell.

It was the little Norseman who wielded the weapon. The larger one sat to the side shouting encouragement while he played with
the ears of a big hunting dog that looked as if it might have some wolf in it.

‘Is it that time already?’ Haakon stretched and rubbed the hound’s belly as it rolled in the earth before him. ‘Have you seen
this lazy whelp? All it likes to do is loll about. His father will be snarling in Valhalla while his fool of a son is having
his stomach rubbed.’

‘And you the fool doing the rubbing,’ observed Beck.

‘Aye.’ Haakon rose, stretched, then went over to take the axe away from his boy. ‘Good work, Erik. Anne, Gianni, why don’t
you take as much of the wood as you can to Mathias in the courtyard?’

It became a game, of course, and much wood was raised and dropped before the children staggered out under their burdens.

‘You can never have too much wood.’ Haakon was staring after the children, his mind elsewhere. ‘I have something to show you,’
he said suddenly and moved towards the house, calling out, ‘Michaela, we have visitors.’

Haakon’s wife stood in the doorway, rubbing floured hands on a cloth. She was a woman whose eyes always danced with a smile
in them, and Haakon always smiled when he saw her.

‘Is it ready?’ he asked.

She leant into him, her head resting on his shoulder, and looked mock seriously at Jean and Beck. ‘He thinks I have nothing
better to do than oil his carvings.’ She laughed at the slight hurt in his eyes. ‘Yes, man. It is ready.’

Haakon entered the kitchen and re-emerged a moment later holding a long, curved object wrapped in a cloth. He
shook the material off it, and a wooden scimitar, perfect in every detail, lay in his hands.