The Seer and the Scribe (27 page)

“A cut that deep must have bled heavily,” Volmar said, examining the bloodstained cobblestone floor below the body of Matthias. He followed the path of the bloodstains across the stable floor and saw how they came from the stall where the horses had been earlier yesterday afternoon. “Judging by this trail of bloodstains, it appears that Matthias had the cut before he was lifted and hung from the rope.” Volmar stood inside the stalls where four horses had been tied up. “This is where Matthias must have encountered the two men, perhaps while he was saddling his horse. The struggle, and perhaps the stabbing, took place in here.”

“This is ridiculous!” Rudegerus loudly countered, his face a deeper shade of red than usual. “There's no possible way you can determine that!”

Abbot Burchard was already on his hands and knees with Brother Paulus and Volmar, examining the irrefutable blood droplets. “Then how else would you explain these bloodstains, Brother Rudegerus?” the Abbot said, looking up at him. “I am open to all possibilities.”

Volmar stood up and drew a simple diagram of the stables on his parchment, indicating where the bloodstains were in reference to where the body was hanging. “Don't you think it is odd how the bloodstains vary in size? Underneath the body there are large stains. Then medium bloodstains all the way up to here,” he said pointing to
the stall, “and then, inside here we see that the bloodstains look like small kernels of corn.”

Brother Paulus rose to his feet with some effort given his advancing age. He stood next to Brother Volmar and studied the younger monk's diagram. “Bloodstains vary in size, depending on how far they have to fall. If a person is standing, and blood is dripping from his calf, there is only a small distance from the floor, such as these small bloodstains here,” he said, pointing to the area inside the horse's stall. Slowly and together the two monks walked the distance from the stall back to the body. “However,” Brother Paulus continued, “if our victim is carried, the distance to the floor is greater, so the bloodstains will be larger in size, like we see all along this portion of the trail.” He pointed to the medium-sized bloodstains.

“And,” Volmar continued, “The bloodstains should be larger as we see here under the victim's body since it is hanging much higher. So, taking the size of the bloodstains into consideration, it would confirm our suspicions that someone must have carried Matthias's body from the point of death inside the stalls to hang him out here from a rafter after he had already died, to make it appear as a suicide.”

“Well done,” Abbot Burchard said with clear admiration. “Brother Rudegerus, do you have anything to add?”

“All of this is mere conjecture, Father! How can you possibly believe that this tragedy is any more than a mad man hanging himself out of despair?” Rudegerus crossed his arms defiantly, though his voice betrayed apprehension.

“What is even more curious and deeply troubling, Brother Rudegerus, is how you are determined to hold onto such falsehoods even in light of these facts.” Abbot Burchard studied Rudegerus as he continued. “The poor man I spoke with yesterday evening wanted to return to his family. He expressed no intentions of killing himself. I am grateful that the evidence suggests that his soul is not condemned to burn in Hell. There are no longer questions in my mind. Matthias's body is to be buried in consecrated ground. We are investigating a murder, not a suicide.”

Lodge Outside of Staudernheim

6
^th
of November, Before Dawn

Yanking on the reins of his horse, Ulrich came to a full stop in a clearing outside the village of Bermersheim, due west of the monastery at Disibodenberg. They had reached the crest of the hill and the force of the wind was almost unbearable. The village lay below, blanketed in a snowy peaceful slumber. Ulrich turned to Donato and spoke authoritatively, over the whine of the wind. “If I remember, there's a hunter's lodge about a mile up the way in that direction. There we can search Atif's and Matthias's belongings for the relic.”

The younger man nodded in agreement, his nose red and numb from the cold. The trek up the hillside was slow going, as both men were dragging the leads of reluctant and tired horses. Ice beneath the snow made it even more dangerous. Ulrich was the first to dismount. He hitched the reins of his two horses to a post before heading to the door. The wind had blown the snow into high mounds nearly waist deep against the lodge's sturdy log walls. If he hadn't known where to look, the lodge would have been lost in the storm. The door swung open after a swift kick.

“These blizzards are worse than I remember,” Ulrich said, waiting a moment so his eyes could adjust to the dim light. He gazed up the stairs to the loft above, half expecting to see someone from his past come down the steps to greet him.

The room provided a reasonable amount of comfort. There were two heavily carved but faded tapestry chairs in front of a stone hearth, a modest table, a cupboard and a large wardrobe. Cobwebs hung from the beeswax candles swinging overhead on a chandelier fashioned from antlers.

Donato stomped his boots on the floor, trying to warm his feet. “This old lodge may have once afforded its owners a modest sense of luxury, but given its present state, I dare say the only satisfied inhabitants are the rodents.”

“It is gloomy. But at least we are out of the wind,” Ulrich said, sweeping the table clean with his arm. Shards of crockery crashed to the floor. He tore open Atif's traveling bag that had been strapped to his horse, pulling out everything that was in it.

Donato went to satisfy a more pressing need. He found some flint in a tinder box beside the hearth and took several logs from the nearby woodbin and placed them on the iron grate. “I thought Brother Gerard warned us, saying the Holy Relic loses its powers unless it is given willingly to its new owner. Matthias's dead fingers didn't exactly bestow the Spear of Destiny into our blood-stained hands.”

Ulrich ignored the comments and frantically turned to Matthias's traveling satchel. He ripped it apart, exposing multiple inside pockets. With more care, he took his knife and unraveled the stitched hems. “Ah, my friend, you're forgetting about accidental death. Legend says that if the original owner dies by accident such as being torn apart by a wild beast, then the Holy Relic's powers are passed on to the next man who finds the spearhead.” Ulrich was growing more fanatical in his search. He flung dried fruits and salted meats from the satchel across the room.

“Hey, what are you doing? I'm hungry! Let's salvage some of this. We have a long night ahead.” Donato squatted down and picked up some of the remains off the dirty floor. He found an oil lamp, grateful that it was partially full, and lit its wick with a twig from the raging fire. He adjusted its flame and took it with him to the wooden cupboards hoping to find some sort of earthenware plate or jar and watched in dismay as several mice went scurrying when he opened it. What he would have given for a cup of warm cider and a slice of fresh bread! “Of all nights to be snowed under—we should be distancing ourselves from this region, not spending the night here, right under their noses.”

“Nothing!” Ulrich bellowed, sinking his knife into the table. Skins lay strewn about as if from a wild animal's feeding frenzy. The older man raised his fist into the air and cursed Heaven. “I will not surrender to such trickery,” he cried out with a fierce anger. “Do you hear me? I will not give up!” He crossed the room and sank into one of the two chairs.

Donato went to the table and searched through the scattered mess, all that was left of Matthias's earthly belongings. He thought about the edicts he swore to uphold. His soul was far from pure. “All my life,”
he ventured, “I trained to heal those in pain. When did I start wishing for their deaths?”

Ulrich stared into the golden flames, now breathing hot and licking the grate, swallowing the chill in the air. The glow had brought not only life but memories as well into the room. For a moment, the older man saw a specter of a woman watching him from the opposite chair. He had felt her presence ever since he'd entered the lodge. Her face was drawn and much older than he remembered. She was cradling their daughter who was asleep in her arms. Suddenly she drew back the blanket and revealed to him the corpse of their lovely child, Anya. The little girl's yellow hair hung like catkins from a bleached skull.

Donato dislodged this ghastly mirage when he sat down in the chair opposite the older man. “There's a line that you can cross between God's mercy and God's wrath,” he said ruefully. “I'm not sure about you, but I fear the eternity of torment in Hell for the evil we set about and accomplished these past two days.”

Ulrich brought his fingertips together, trying hard to stay focused on the present moment and to keep the younger man from seeing how shaky they'd become. In fact he was trembling all over as if he himself, like a snake, was shedding one skin to reveal another. “We've committed unforgivable sins before,” he murmured.

“But that, my friend, was in the name of war. This is something else. I know, in the name of Brother Gerard we were sent to hunt Matthias down and seize the Holy Relic for our just cause. Yet, now that the deed is finally done and we still do not have the relic, I can't help but feel our actions will not go unpunished.”

“It is far more foolish, I think, not to have known our enemy better. Matthias must have grown tired of the hunt.” Ulrich chuckled, a bitter, mirthless sound. “Now, I'll have to return to the monastery.”

“Are you mad? I'm sure by now the district Magistrate and his lynch mob are searching the countryside looking for us, even on such a night as this. Thank goodness it's still snowing. Our tracks will soon disappear.” Donato shook his head in despair. “Ulrich, you must have a death wish, going anywhere close to that monastery tonight. You'll be arrested, tried, and hung before noon tomorrow if you so much as take another step inside Disibodenberg.”

“You may be right. But, not if I decide to wear a disguise.” He staggered over to the massive wardrobe and flung it wide open. Clothes musty and moth eaten were neatly folded on its shelves.

“You know this place,” the younger man asserted, watching his partner change his clothes.

“I was wondering when you would catch on,” he smiled. “Long ago I knew this place well. I went on hunts here in the surrounding forests with my father and later brought my own family here for a breath of fresh air.”

“Fresh air . . .”

“It could be rather stuffy living under the auspices of a vain and rich family. Speaking of vanity, how do I look?” Ulrich hunched his back and traipsed about the room with an obvious limp, his clothes hanging from his frame like foul rags.

“Frankly, you look like a very disagreeable hunchback.” Donato crossed his arms, clearly disturbed by the direction their plans were taking.

“Do you remember that monk we recognized?”

Donato answered warily. “Yes, the nervous one with the crooked nose . . . by now he's found the body we left him tucked neatly under a blanket in his bed.”

“I'm beginning to suspect he must have not only overheard our conversation but decided to seize the Holy Relic himself.” Ulrich added with a sneer, “He should be more willing to talk now.”

He was so close to Donato, the younger man could smell the stench of his old clothes and the turn in his thoughts. “I wish we didn't have to kill Atif.”

“Couldn't be helped, an accident really.” Ulrich spoke from underneath his eerie hood. “We couldn't have him tell Matthias we were so close.” All that was visible were his remarkable deep brown eyes flecked throughout with gold.

Donato studied his hands, turning them over in disgust, answering Ulrich crossly and with genuine regret. “More innocent blood.”

Ulrich tore off his hood, ignoring his companion's pitiful display of remorse. He went and stood thoughtfully staring at something propped up in the back corner of the wardrobe. “I remember this cane,” he said, reaching for it, knowing full well that doing so put him on another path, a much more dangerous one. Ulrich rubbed the cane
against his cheek, a boyish ritual of affection. Quietly he turned its handle, removing a long thin sword hidden inside its clever scabbard. He touched the edge of the sword with his finger, testing its sharpness and was pleased. “Speaking of innocent blood, I got my first taste of it with this sword when I was five. I never knew rabbits could scream.” He swung the sword about, severing the air with satisfaction.

“So young and merciless,” the younger man said, aghast. “And you came from a long line of gentlemen?”

“As old and revered as time.” Ulrich laughed, long and loud. “The difference between me and you, my good friend, is quite simple. I do not have a conscience. It neither squirms nor is repelled by the shedding of innocent blood. It is your strength and your weakness.” And with a single thrust, the older man sunk the long needle-like sword through Donato's heart with the same precision and skill he had taken Atif's life two nights before.

The younger man's mouth formed the word as he gasped in revulsion at his friend's unexpected deed. “Why?” he asked, falling to his knees, the pain only now being felt as if a hard boot was stomping on his entrails.

“Plainly stated,” Ulrich hissed, “I want to make history, not be its squirming victim. Whosoever possesses the Spear of Destiny has the power to shape the destiny of this world. Do you think I would want to share such incredible power with another man?”

“What about Brother Gerard?” Donato said, now coughing up bright red blood.

“This search was never for him. I possess loyalties towards no man. It is better this way, my friend, for you will never have to face the humiliation of being caught off guard again.”

Donato crouched over, the pain like lightning shooting through every blood vessel in his body. All the lights had been put out except one, and here he fixed his attention. His vision blurred before the darkness fully consumed him. In the meager light coming from the hearth, he saw Ulrich returning to his chair, his fingers laced together, watching him die. The young man stiffened slightly. Someone else was in the room and she too had the same look of horror on her face as Ulrich burst out laughing.