If only you knew what I have brought with me into your sanctuary, Alymere thought bleakly, then you would have reason to be afraid. He did not give voice to the thought, but apologised. "Sorry father, but it is difficult sometimes to think of us as anything other than cursed. Perhaps it is a blessing that my ill-fated line will come to an end with me."
The priest was not so easily pacified. "You are maudlin, my son, which is understandable given how this life has treated those you love and hold dear, but look at the people you serve: the farmers, the fishwives, the boys born into a life of scrimmaging and struggling for every mouthful of bread and tell me you are truly cursed, my son. Every day I see true hardships and true heroism side-by-side and thank the Lord for His gifts. And like it or not, to those people, you are one of those gifts."
"There are more ways of suffering than privation, father," Alymere said, and something in his tone struck a chord with the priest, who bowed his head in acquiescence. "If any man should know that, I would have thought it would be you."
"I do not mean to diminish your suffering. Sometimes I forgot how young you are, my lord. I see the knightly garb and the proud jaw and forget the trials you have faced in your short life. My apologies."
"There's no need to apologise. In many ways you are more than right; I have lived a life of privilege, and for most of it have not wanted for anything; not love, not food, nor a roof over my head. No matter my personal hardships, I should thank the stars for my good fortune. All I can say is that it is too easy to be consumed by one's woes. I think too much of the things that I have lost, instead of remembering the things that I have. Despite my best efforts, I am alive, I have my health, my looks," he chuckled a little self-deprecatingly at that, his fingers instinctively moving to touch his ruined cheek, "and in but a few hours the fates will conspire to make me master of the house I was born in, and all that I lost will be mine once more. But, and here is the God's honest truth, priest: I would gladly give up my inheritance if it meant my uncle, my mother, my father — anyone I have ever loved, for that matter — if any one of them were restored to me." He shrugged. "But if wishes were fishes I too could feed five thousand. Debating the relative merits of one sadness over another serves no-one, so rather than grow ever more maudlin, let us ride out if you are willing?"
"Of course, of course. Let me collect a few things and we can leave."
The priest bustled around, snuffing candles and dousing oil burners before beginning to gather the objects of his faith: a small wooden cross from the stone altar, a stoppered vial of blessed water from the font, and his battered Bible from the lectern. He moved with familiarity through the richer darkness once the candles and burners were out, collecting a rough hessian sack. He emptied out the few remaining root vegetables that filled it, and then refilled it with the things he had collected. He slung the sack over his shoulder and stopped as the realisation hit him. "Ah, I have no horse, my lord, only my feet." He looked distraught. "No matter how fast I walk, I fear we won't make it in time; it is days to the manor from here," his voice trailed off helplessly.
"Fear not, father, there is room on my horse for two, and Marchante is more than capable of bearing us both. If we leave now we will be back at the house for dawn."
"Then we must not tarry a minute longer than necessary. With God's speed, let us away."
The priest took a few moments to close up the church, and then, as Alymere untied Marchante's reins from the tree he had tethered him to, mounted up. Alymere swung up, joining the priest in the saddle. Desperately uncomfortable on the horse's back, the priest wrapped his arms around Alymere's stomach and buried his face in the folds of his cloak, clinging to him for grim life as Alymere spurred the great warhorse on.
If the priest felt the Devil's Bible beneath Alymere's shirt, he gave no indication.
Alymere, however, was painfully aware of its presence. He felt the leather binding prickle hotly against his skin as the words churned through his mind. This time the voice was recognisably Blodyweth's.
Do this one thing for me…
Promise me now, make this the one promise you keep.
Or the Devil take your soul…
When they reached the Devil's Tree there was no sign of either the crow or the leather-faced crone. The moon was obscured by low lying cloud, but a sliver of it shone through, turning the road silver.
Alymere spurred Marchante on, willing Sir Lowick to hold on for just a few hours more.
Thirty-Seven
They reached the manor an hour before dawn.
Early morning dew weighed down the tips of the grass. Together with the moonlight it looked as though thousands of gemstones had been scattered across the lawn. Marchante cantered out of the trees, trailing branches pulling at them, and the priest stirred.
"The house is awake," Alymere said, seeing the lamps burning in the upstairs windows.
They rode to the door.
Two servants were there to meet them before they could dismount. The grief was fierce in both of them. No-one spoke; one of the servants took Marchante's reins and led the warhorse around to the stables to see him fed and watered, while the other offered the priest his hand and guided him up the short steps to the house. Horse and priest alike visibly steamed in the pre-dawn chill. He tugged at his vestments uncomfortably, trying to adjust them after the long ride before giving up and following the servant inside.
Alymere raced up the steps behind him and through the door.
He tried to read the house, to prepare himself. Sir Lowick had drummed the necessity of thought into him. Logic and reasoning were the greatest gifts of God, according to the old knight. He believed it was possible to know far more about what you were walking into if only you used your eyes and your mind together. So that was what Alymere did now.
There was an air of mourning about the house. It was obvious despite the lamps in the upstairs windows. Much of the ground floor was draped in shadow.
Bors came down the stairs wearily. The wooden boards sighed beneath his weight. Each step appeared to lessen him until by the time he reached the bottom he was no longer the invincible giant Alymere had met outside of Camelot, but a normal man stretched to the point of breaking. He had never loved the big knight more. There was no doubting the toll the long night had taken on him, both mentally and physically. He looked as though he had not slept for days — which, Alymere realised, was probably the case; he had almost certainly ridden through the one night to bring Sir Lowick home to die, and had then sat his bedside vigil through another — but the worst of it was in his eyes. Alymere recognised the spectre that haunted them for what it was: the ghost of his own mortality.
Bors was a man whose strength defined him; strength of body, strength of mind, of faith, conviction, character. It gave him courage, and in a curious way, cloaked him in immortality; the kind of immortality every knight needed to charge recklessly into battle time and again with only his sword and shield between him and death.
And now his friend was dying an ugly death, robbed of his own strength, and it had hit him hard. Not only that he was dying, but the manner with which death had claimed him. No amount of martial skill, no thickness of armour or swiftness of sword could have saved him from a poisoned cup.
It was no surprise that it would haunt a man like Sir Bors de Ganis. He could just as easily have been the one to drink from the parlay chalice.
"He is still with us," Bors said, seeing the dread in Alymere's face. "But we are talking minutes rather than hours, lad."