Alys Clare
The Night Wanderer
The seventh book in the Aelf Fen series, 2016
For the Old Woo,
from OGH, with very much love
ONE
The death happened less than a week after my return to Cambridge. The season was autumn, the weather still mild and the leaves just beginning to turn yellow, bronze and copper: colours which made a pleasing contrast with the bright blue sky. The first frosts were still to come.
The body was found on the river bank, on a lonely willow-shaded stretch out to the west of the town. The throat had gone: torn out as if by a clenching fist with strong fingers and sharp nails. No human hand, surely, had that sort of force.
I’ve no idea why anybody thought it was a good idea to send for a healer. What did they imagine I would do? Join up the severed windpipe and put a patch on that gaping, yawning hole? Had I – had anybody – the skill, such an action might possibly have restored the corpse’s ability to breathe, but by then the poor man was past saving anyway because the ruptured vessels on the left side of the neck had allowed all the blood to drain out. By the time I got there, all we could do for him was pray for his soul.
And shiver with horror, for this was no ordinary death.
I had come hurrying back to the town and my studies with my mentor Gurdyman sooner than I had been expected, because I was following hard on the heels of Jack Chevestrier. We had got to know each other back in September, trying to help a lost woman find her way home, [1] and although our time together had been quite short, already I sensed there was a strong connection between us. In my sensible moments, I found it hard to understand how two such different people – a Cambridge lawman and a village healer from the fens – could have anything in common. But the fact remained that something had drawn us together. I had followed him back to Cambridge because I wanted to find out what it was.
I had already settled back into life with Gurdyman, who, when I presented myself at his twisty-turny house hidden in the maze of lanes and alleyways behind the market square, had looked up from his workbench just long enough to say, ‘Oh, you’re back,’ quickly followed by, ‘Go out and buy us a couple of pies, it must be long past noon,’ before diving back into whatever was absorbing him and ignoring me for the rest of the day. I was used to him, though, and I didn’t mind. Once we’d eaten, we got straight back into our work together; he’d been instructing me in the Nine Herbs Charm a few weeks back, before we’d been interrupted, and it soon became apparent that this was merely the first in a long list of powerful charms he was planning on teaching me. I reflected with considerable pleasure that I was exactly where I wanted to be: deeply involved in the studies that I loved with a mentor I greatly admired, and with the prospect of an intriguing friendship to pursue as soon as I had some free time. Life, I thought as the days went by, not without a little complacency and self-congratulation, couldn’t be much better, and happily I looked forward to the weeks ahead.
Which just goes to show that it is a mistake to take for granted the pleasure of calm, peaceful days where nothing much happens other than what you’re expecting will happen. As soon as I stared down at that throatless corpse, I sensed the presence of evil and, somewhere deep inside me where intuition counts for a great deal more than logic and reason, I knew the calm, peaceful days were gone.
I waited with the body while a lad ran to find an officer of the law. It had been discovered by a courting couple, who had slipped away to this quiet stretch of the river once their day’s work was done to enjoy some private time together before the cold of oncoming autumn made such outdoor assignations uncomfortable and impractical. The lad had come along shortly after the discovery, together with the boy who had dashed off to fetch me. He was now sitting hunched up some way down the track, as if determined to get as far away from the corpse as he could. He and his companion had been looking out for a shady place to fish.
I felt very sorry for the courting couple. They’d described to me how they found the body, or rather the young man had, for the woman was still too distraught to speak. She was only a girl, really, and apparently she’d fainted. The young man looked scared to death, watching her with anxious eyes, presumably in case she keeled over again. He really loves her, I thought. It was a strange thing to have noticed under the circumstances – probably I too was suffering from shock – but, nevertheless, I was heartened by that demonstration of the young man’s love. He hadn’t brought her out here solely to explore the plump young body, although that he definitely had done, for her gown was still unlaced. I would make sure to point that out tactfully, before he took her back to town. Perhaps she had wanted the intimacy as much as him, I mused, for men make a mistake if they think they always have to coax a woman, and…
My rambling thoughts were interrupted by voices and the sound of footfalls. Five men were coming along the path that ran along the river bank, one of them carrying a hazel hurdle. I recognized the man in the lead; he was, like Jack Chevestrier, one of the sheriff’s men.
My heart sank. It was only then, when I knew it wasn’t Jack who’d been sent to investigate the death, that I realized how hard I’d been praying it would be.
The law officer was a tall, skinny man with narrow shoulders, a prominent Adam’s apple and a face that came to a point, with a long, protuberant nose above a receding chin. His eyes, small, intensely dark and rather close together, increased the resemblance to a rat.
‘What’s all this about a body?’ he demanded belligerently. He looked at the young couple, a brief, lascivious grin twisting the small mouth as he took in the girl’s dishevelled gown, and then turned to me. ‘I know you,’ he said, jabbing an accusing forefinger at me. ‘You’re that healer girl. Did you find it, then, and reckon you’d try to save it?’ I noticed he hadn’t yet looked at the corpse, lying beneath the willows.
I paused to calm myself, then said quietly, ‘I didn’t find the body, no. This young couple did.’ The girl had made the discovery when, lying on her back, she had flung out her hand, then, wondering why it seemed to have landed in a sticky puddle, raised her head to have a look. That was when she fainted, and, as she started to come round, she’d been copiously sick. ‘Then these two boys came along.’ I pointed to the pair, standing a little apart and clearly trying to melt into the background. ‘One of them came running to find me.’
The lawman nodded, a sarcastic smile on his face. ‘Right, and you reckoned you’d act the hero and save a life? Is that it?’
He managed to make what would surely have been a laudable action into something faintly risible. I began to dislike him profoundly.
‘Saving lives is indeed what I am trained to do,’ I said, just about managing to sound polite, ‘but I realized as soon as I got here that there was no possibility of doing so in this case.’
‘Beyond your competence,’ the lawman said. He glanced at the two skulking lads. ‘They should have sought out someone with more experience. Some man,’ he added.
I made myself count to five, fighting down the hot, furious words. When I was pretty sure I could speak without spitting, I said, ‘The most experienced man in Cambridge could not have saved that poor soul.’ I hesitated, wondering if it was wise to show him up in front of his men, but then I thought, He deserves it, and went ahead. ‘As you would have seen yourself if you had bothered to look, the corpse has no throat.’
The girl moaned, bent over and threw up again.