“What does the Crown look like? Can you tell me?”
“Oh yes. I have seen it myself. As you might imagine, there are few thorns left after having been divided amongst the many emperors and kings over the years. It is now a circlet of woven rushes, a weave of decorative design no doubt created by careful fingers. Thrust amongst the rushes are the remaining thorns.”
Crispin downed his cup. Before he could object, Brother Michael filled it again. Crispin decided wine was a good idea after all and gulped more. “And what does—” He took another quaff. Nicholas stared at him quizzically. “Does it—Are there qualities it conveys to . . . to anyone who might . . . touch it?”
“Qualities? Oh. You mean the relic’s power. Oh yes. It does have power. These thorns pierced our Lord’s very brow, drew His precious blood. Of course they are imbued with power. Greater power than other relics, you can be sure.”
“But what is that power?”
Nicholas rose. He paced and rolled his goblet’s stem between his palms. “I wonder why you are so curious, my friend. You seem to have a personal interest in this.” He looked up and his gaze penetrated Crispin’s.
Crispin, too, rose to stand close to the old monk. He set his goblet on a side table. “I do have a personal interest in it. But that is all I can say.”
Nicholas stared at him another moment and then shrugged. “As you will. Your reasons must be good ones. I trust you,” he said with more conviction than was warranted. Was it a warning? “The power of the relic—it is said—makes those who touch it, especially those who wear it, invincible.”
“Invincible? In what way?”
“To everything. To fear, to danger. Even to death.”
Jack lunged forward and grabbed Crispin’s arm. “Master! That’s what happened to m—”
“Silence, Jack.” Crispin gave the abbot an apologetic smile that did not seem to convince the old monk of a casual exchange. “I think what my Lord Nicholas means to say,” he said leaning toward the boy but looking at Nicholas, “is that a man can feel a sensation of invincibility.”
“No, that is not what I said.” Nicholas stared down his hawk nose at Crispin. “The invincibility is real. Perhaps a feeling of euphoria accompanies it, but a man is invincible while wearing the Crown. So it is said.”
Jack tugged at Crispin’s arm. “Master!”
“Be still, for God’s sake!” He turned in earnest to Nicholas. “The King of France has loaned the Crown to King Richard as a gesture of peace.”
Nicholas pursed his lips and nodded. “I have heard as much.”
Crispin drew back. “Have you?”
“I move easily through court, Crispin, as you know. I have kinship in high places. As you also know.”
“Yes,” said Crispin distractedly. “Why should the King of France wish to give such power to his sworn enemy?”
Nicholas’s chuckle turned into a throaty laugh. He looked once at Brother Michael, who didn’t get the jest. The abbot laid his hand on Crispin’s taut shoulder and said quietly, “Because, my dear friend, this power only falls to those who are pure of heart.”
Crispin blinked. “Pure of heart?”
“Yes. Men who desire no ill deeds to the innocent. Men who love God. Men whom the simplest man would trust.” He patted Crispin’s breast. “Pure of heart.”
Crispin almost smiled. “So the king is not capable of summoning such power?”
Nicholas casually looked over his shoulder. No one but Brother Michael stood there. “I shouldn’t say so. Perhaps it may even be treason.” Brother Michael raised his brows but said nothing. “The king’s counterpart in France is equally incapable.” He shrugged. “Truth is truth.”
Crispin smiled at Jack and winked. “Pure of heart, Jack.”
“God blind me,” he whispered and put his dirty fingers to his mouth.
“I also hear tell,” said Nicholas, “that the Crown is missing. His Majesty thinks it a French plot to embarrass him. You wouldn’t happen to know anything about it, now would you?”
“I, too, hear many things, my Lord Abbot. And I am the Tracker. If it is lost, you can be certain I can find it.”
“Oh I am certain of that. If it is lost.”
Crispin narrowed his eyes at the shrewd curve of the abbot’s mouth, but said nothing.
CRISPIN AND JACK TOOK the rest of the afternoon to walk back to the Shambles. Neither spoke until they turned the corner and the full stench of a day of butchering and burning offal reached their senses.
“Master Crispin.” Crispin looked down at the boy, who seemed unusually solemn. Jack bit his nails. “I know you got your own ideas. But wouldn’t it be better to be rid of that Crown? Maybe give it over to Abbot Nicholas for safekeeping. We shouldn’t be messing about with God’s power. We’re liable to get ourselves into a foul condition. Maybe even be cast into Hell for it.”
“Your thieving is likely to get you into more trouble, Jack.”
But Jack truly looked concerned. And Crispin could no longer deny his own discomfort with possession of the Crown.
Pure of heart. He felt far from pure of heart. Especially when he wanted to kill Miles Aleyn. Yet he hadn’t killed him. There was plenty of opportunity. The guards be damned. He knew he could have slipped his dagger’s blade up between Miles’s ribs and gotten away before any of the guards were the wiser. But he didn’t. He simply could not kill a man in that manner. Oh, he knew Miles was capable of such dishonorable feats, but not Crispin.
Pure of heart. “It is a curse,” he muttered.
“It is, sir, as I was saying,” said Jack, but not about the same thing. “We must rid ourselves of the Crown and right quickly.”
“Don’t be a fool, Jack,” Crispin sighed. “There is nothing dangerous about a few rushes and some old thorns—” Crispin’s words were cut off by a whoosh and an abrupt flash of hot pain. His shoulder slammed hard against a wall.
Jack screamed.
For a moment, Crispin was perplexed by what happened. But he snapped back to himself and glanced down at his own shoulder. An arrow pinned his coat to the wall, missing the shoulder with only a graze. An arrow with hawk fletching.
8
“CHRIST’S SOUL! MASTER CRISPIN!” Jack jerked forward, but there was little he could do.
Crispin reached up, curled his fingers around the arrow’s shaft, and yanked it from the wood. It tore a further hole through his coat and he swore at the ragged cloth. He pressed his hand to his left shoulder, felt a little wetness from blood, and didn’t worry further over it. “It is only a graze,” he said to Jack and examined the arrow. “More importantly—” He looked up and scanned the rooftops. Nothing but smoke and ravens. “Where did it come from?”
Of course, every man on the street was carrying a bow.
“It couldn’t have been no accident,” said Jack.
“No, not likely.” Crispin pointed to a rooftop across the lane. “He’d have to have been there. Possibly behind that gable.” Crispin trotted over the rutted street and looked for handholds on the building. The timbering bowed outward from the daubed wall at differing levels, offering places to put his foot. He did so, grabbing the exposed wood, and hoisted himself up the jettied wall. A windowsill offered more purchase for his foot until his fingers reached the eave and he hung on a corbel for a moment. He tried not to think of loose tiles before he swung his leg up and onto the roof. He pulled himself farther until his entire arm rested on the roof and he managed to roll himself onto the tiles. He stood at the edge and looked down at Jack on the street. “I could use that relic now, eh?”