The Dragons of Archenfield (Domesday Series Book 3) Read online

  “On what account?”

  “Several matters need to be raised,” noted Ralph as he glanced down at the document in front of him, “but one in particular dominates all others. Archenfield.”

  “What is the problem?” asked Orbec. “I hold land in the hundred of Archenfield, it is true, but Redwald here will show you the charters which support my claim.”

  “Maurice Damville also has claims upon that land.”

  “False claims.”

  “That remains to be seen.”

  “It was seen, my lord. By your predecessors.”

  “Yes, my lord,” added Redwald, responding to a nudge from his master. “The first commissioners rejected the testimony of Maurice Damville and found in our favour.”

  “That was before a third claimant appeared.”

  “A third?” Corbin was surprised. “This is news to me.”

  “Why did he not come forward before?” said Orbec.

  “Because he was prevented from doing so.”

  “By whom?”

  “By someone who stood to gain by his absence.”

  Orbec raised an eyebrow. “Is that an accusation against me?”

  “Only you will know that, my lord,” said Ralph.

  “Who is this third claimant?” pressed Corbin.

  “You took a vow of silence,” chided Hubert.

  The reeve held up his palms in apology, then put three fingers to his lips by way of a promise not to interrupt again. He watched intently from his bench.

  “May I know the name of this man?” said Orbec, calmly.

  “You already do.”

  Ralph's gaze was searching. He was finding the witness extremely difficult to fathom. Richard Orbec gave nothing away. His manner was relaxed and his face expressionless. Ralph could see the soldier in his bearing, but there was much more to the man than that. Deep secrets lurked behind those green eyes.

  Orbec made his first mistake. Assuming that he was in the presence of men who spoke exclusively in Norman-French, he addressed his reeve in Anglo-Saxon.

  “We must both tell the same story, Redwald.”

  “Yes, my lord.”

  “I'll not yield a square yard of Archenfield.”

  “Nor shall you.”

  “I have not built up my estates to see them cut down as they were in Normandy.” Orbec was adamant. “That will never happen again. Take note.”

  “I do take note, my lord,” said Gervase Bret in the same tongue. “I note that you are as proficient in this language as I am, yet without my advantage of a Saxon mother.”

  Orbec was duly startled. Ralph was exasperated.

  “We will not conduct this examination in gibberish.”

  “Saxon is a fine language,” said Gervase, slipping easily back into Ralph's own tongue, “but I believe you will hear no more of it in this hall.” He looked at Orbec and got an answering nod. “I felt it only fair to warn you, my lord,” he said. “Be fair with us in return.”

  “I will be.”

  “To return to the subject of dispute,” said Ralph. “The land concerned runs along the border between Archenfield and the hundreds of Ewyas and Golden Valley. It amounts in all to a total of …” Exasperation showed again as he consulted the document in front of him. “Why must they confuse me with all these carucates and numbers of ploughs? The hide is the simplest measurement of land.”

  Gervase came to his aid. “The total area is just under a thousand acres. Use mat as a round figure.”

  “We can account for every acre,” asserted Redwald.

  “So can Maurice Damville,” countered Hubert.

  “Not to mention our third claimant,” said Ralph with a grin. “Is the name of Warnod familiar to your ear?”

  “It is,” admitted Orbec with a noncommittal shrug. “I believe that the land under discussion once belonged to his father. But Warnod is hardly a claimant. The poor man was murdered at his home in Llanwarne.”

  “His kinsmen will inherit his land,” said Gervase, “and they will contest this claim on Warnod's behalf.”

  “He has no kinsmen in this county,” said Orbec, firmly.

  “Can you be sure?”

  “Certain of it.”

  “Then he may have willed his holdings to another.”

  “That, too, would produce no third claimant.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because we cannot know who the beneficiary is unless we have sight of a will,” argued Orbec, “and that went up in smoke when the house was burned. Along with this supposed charter that legitimates his claim to my land. The name of Warnod does not belong in this dispute at all. No will, no charter, no claim.”

  “The charter survived, my lord.”

  “How do you know?”

  Gervase picked up a scroll of parchment from the table.

  “Because I have it here in my hand.”

  Orbec was visibly shaken. “How did you come by it?”

  “The document was sent to Winchester.”

  “By whom? Not Warnod, I'll wager. He would never trust a Norman tribunal to find against a Norman. Another hand is at work here. Who sent that document to the Exchequer?”

  “We have no idea,” said Ralph, blithely. “It is one of the things we came to Hereford to find out.”

  The brewhouse was at the rear of the premises, attached to the house by a short and aromatic passageway. There was no way to keep all the fumes out of the house itself, but Golde had done her best. A thick curtain hung in front of the door and absorbed some of the pungent odours of her profession. Rushes and herbs inside the dwelling acted as a further barrier against the pervasive smell of ale.

  When Golde came in, the girl was in exactly the same spot with exactly the same distraught look on her face. Golde put a consoling arm around her sister's shoulders and lowered her onto the wooden stool in front of the fire. The house on Castle Street was not large, but it was always warm and impeccably clean.

  Golde knelt on the flagstone to hold her sister's hands between her own. She squeezed them gently.

  “Spare yourself, Aelgar,” she said, softly.

  “How can I?”

  “You were not to blame.”

  “But I was, Golde. I was.”

  “You punish yourself for sins you did not commit.”

  “I will never forgive myself.”

  “Aelgar!”

  “I helped to kill the one thing I held dear.”

  “That is not true.”

  “What life is left to me now?”

  “A good life. An honest life.”

  “Bereft of all joy. My hopes are shattered.”

  “Rebuild them, sweet sister.”

  “Nobody could rebuild after such a loss.”

  Golde became wistful. “I did.”

  It was Aelgar's turn to offer condolence. She bent forward to kiss her sister's forehead. Both of them let tears run freely for a few moments. Golde then controlled her pain and stood up. As the elder sister, she had to be strong enough for both of them.

  She looked down at Aelgar and let out a long sigh.

  “What a cruel blow too much beauty can be!”

  “I feel as if I want to scratch it away out of spite.”

  “That is not the way, Aelgar.”

  “Then what is? What is? Teach me, please.”

  The entreaty brought Aelgar to her feet. She was a few inches shorter than Golde and years younger. Barely nineteen, she still had the bloom of youth on her cheeks. She wore a plain gunna of green linen and a white wimple. The heart-shaped face was distorted by grief and striped with concern, but its essential loveliness shone through. Golde had the more mature charms, but few men noticed her when Aelgar was present. The latter's innocent beauty was almost overwhelming.

  Golde took her sister by the shoulders.

  “Watch and pray,” she advised.

  “I have done little else.”

  “Hold fast to your memories. Let them stay you.”

  “They only p
luck at my entrails, Golde,” said the younger woman. “I dare not sleep for fear that those memories will haunt me afresh. I must know,” she said with sudden intensity. “I must find out the truth.”

  “In time. In time.”

  “Now, Golde. I have a right to be told.”

  “Yes, Aelgar,” conceded the other. “Who has a better right than you? I will go to them again.”

  “Take me with you!”

  “Stay within and mourn in private.”

  “But I have questions of my own to ask.”

  “Put them to me. I will seek the answers.”

  Aelgar's intensity drained slowly out of her. She dropped to the stool again and stared into the flames with a wan expression on her face. Her voice was distant.

  “The worst is over, Golde. I fear nothing now.”

  “I do.”

  “What?”

  Golde took her sister's hand again and kissed it.

  “What do you fear?” asked Aelgar.

  “Him.”

  Maurice Damville led the charge. The shepherd was herding his flock on the lower slopes when the riders came over the crest of the hill. Damville and his knights could not resist the temptation. Spurring their horses into a frenzied gallop, they tore down the incline with battle cries and obscenities mingling on their lips.

  The sheep scattered in a mad panic and the old shepherd was knocked flying by the flank of a passing destrier. They pursued the fleeing animals for a few minutes, hacking at them to frighten or wound rather than to kill. When the cavalcade reassembled again, the flock was spread over half a mile or more.

  Damville's sport was not yet over. On the plain ahead of them was a small farm with a cluster of rickety outbuildings. A fresh-faced Saxon girl came out of the byre with a wooden pail filled to the brim with milk. She was no more than fifteen, but her hair was the colour of straw and her skin shone in the morning sunlight. Her bare arms were splashed with milk. One glance was all that Maurice Damville needed.

  He kicked his horse into a canter and bore down on the girl. Too frightened to run, she stood rooted to the spot until he brought down an arm to scoop her up and carry her off. The pail was dropped and its contents seeped into the grass. Urged on by whoops of envious delight from his men, Damville rode behind the cover of some bushes before he dismounted. The screams lasted for several minutes.

  In one swoop, the girl lost her milk and her maidenhead.

  Two hours in the shire hall had taught Richard Orbec some respect for the commissioners. They could not be deceived or fobbed off. Ralph Delchard was a stern inquisitor. Gervase Bret was a perceptive lawyer. Canon Hubert was relentless in pursuit of the truth. Orbec and Redwald put their case with skill, but it was severely weakened by the appearance of a charter which seemed to grant the land in question to Warnod.

  When Gervase had displayed the document and allowed the two men to inspect it, he made way for Canon Hubert to take over the questioning. The latter used a different method of attack. He bestowed a flabby smile upon Orbec.

  “You have been a most generous patron of the Church.”

  “I think I know my duty,” said Orbec.

  “Your gifts go beyond the limits of duty,” continued Hubert. “Dean Theobald was kind enough to conduct me around the cathedral. Your endowments are writ large in stone and timber. God will reward you for this munificence.”

  “It pleases me to hear you say that, Canon Hubert.”

  “You have, I am told, a private chapel at your house.”

  “I do.”

  “Consecrated by no less a person than Bishop Robert.”

  “He deigned to visit my abode and grace my table.”

  “Gratitude took him there,” said Hubert. “If all the marcher lords had your belief in Christianity, we should have far more churches and far less castles.” He leaned across the table to purr his question. “Why have you done all this?”

  “Because I felt moved to do so.”

  “Yes, but from what motives?”

  “Does it matter?”

  “Profoundly.”

  “I donate money and the cathedral is restored.” Orbec was dismissive. “That is all there is to it. The ceiling of the nave will look just as beautiful, whether my reasons for meeting its cost are shallow or meaningful. People will admire that ceiling many years after my reasons have followed me into my grave.”

  “You are trying to evade my point,” said Hubert. “But you raise an ethical dilemma about means and ends. Does a good result justify a bad reason? It does not, my lord. It never can. The church would rather be poor and honest than flourish on riches that have been wrongfully acquired. Reasons and results must be cohere.”

  “My wealth is sinful. Is that what you're telling me?”

  “I merely seek to establish a motive. Why?”

  “Because I am a good Christian.”

  “Whence comes this goodness, my lord?”

  “From the same source as your own.”

  “I wear my reason for all to see,” said Hubert, indicating his attire. “Is yours so shameful that it must be kept hidden?”

  “I came here to discuss my holdings,” said Orbec with vehemence. “My spiritual needs are not relevant here.”

  “But they are,” insisted Hubert, “because they help to establish your character. A man who seeks only to serve the greater glory of God is unlikely to seize land that is not legally his or to indulge in some of the corrupt practices that our investigation has uncovered. Good men do good works from pure motives.”

  Richard Orbec weighed his words carefully.

  “Then I am not a good man, Canon Hubert,” he said, quietly. “No soldier is or can be a good man.”

  “That is nonsense!” protested Ralph.

  “Men put on armour to kill.”

  “To defend themselves from being killed.”

  “A soldier is a violation of the sixth commandment. 'Thou shalt do no murder.' What else is a battle but an act of slaughter? You may dress it up in fine words and shower it with incense to make it smell the sweeter, but there is no disguising the truth. War is ritualised murder.”

  “Not if it is a just war!” argued Ralph.

  “The two words insult each other.”

  “A man is entitled to fight for his rights.”

  “Not with a sword and spear.”

  “I have great sympathy with your view,” said Canon Hubert, with a sidelong glance of reproof at Ralph. “Conquest will always contain the seeds of evil.”

  “The same may be said of the Church,” growled Ralph.

  “That is blasphemy!”

  “It is cold fact, Canon Hubert. Holy men march behind soldiers and reap the benefits of our labour. The Church's one foundation in this country is the Battle of Hastings.”

  “No, my lord,” said Hubert, complacently. “You fought and we sought reconciliation with God. That is why the bishops in Normandy drew up the Penitential Ordinance that was confirmed by the papal legate, Bishop Ermenfrid of Sion.”

  Richard Orbec rose involuntarily from his seat.

  “Take special note of the first article in that decree,” he said with unexpected passion. “Whoever knows he has killed in the great battle is to do one year's penance for each man slain. Remember that. Each man slain.”

  “You are too young to have fought at Hastings,” said Ralph.

  “There are other battles. With other deaths.”

  Orbec's mien had altered completely. Dignity and self-possession had been supplanted by wild agitation. But it was his expression which alarmed the others. The green eyes were hot coals of fire and the bearded face was twisted with hate. Even Ralph Delchard was taken aback at first.

  They were looking into the face of Satan.

  Chapter 4

  IDWAL THE ARCHDEACON SPREAD HIS OPINIONS EVENLY THROUGHOUT THE CATHEDRAL. During his short stay, therefore, he contrived to infuriate everyone to the same degree. His arrogance and his outspokenness were devastating. Robert Losinga,
Bishop of Hereford, a man renowned for his learning and revered for his Job-like patience, found the scholarly Welshman too great an affliction to bear. His command to the dean was simple.

  “Rid us of this tumult!”

  Theobald went off to implement the order from on high. It would be a delicate task. The laws of hospitality were being breached and Christian fellowship was being negated, but their visitor had brought it upon himself. He had caused more upset than a swarm of bees during a choir rehearsal. The dean should feel no compunction in directing him to the road out of Hereford.

  “Good morning, Archdeacon,” he said.

  “Bore da.”

  “You slept well?”

  “Fitfully,” said Idwal. “Fitfully. I was much distracted by some remarks you made about the Holy Eucharist. I will take issue with you on that account.”

  “This is not a convenient time for debate,” said the dean, hastily. “Let us postpone our discussion until a more fitting moment. During another visit, perhaps.”

  “Yes, I intend to come back here soon.”

  “When you have the whole of Wales to visit?”

  “I have met with such friendship,” said Idwal. “A man should always make a determined effort to see his friends.”

  Theobald swallowed hard. “Yes, of course.”

  They were in the half-built cathedral cloister, picking their way among the slabs of stone. Two canons darted out of the way as they approached, fearful of being drawn into another conversation with the evangelical Celt. Idwal was wearing his grubby lambskin cloak. Theobald's hope rustled.

  “You are dressed for travelling, Archdeacon,” he said.

  “My life is one of perpetual motion.”

  “You are leaving us?”

  “Unhappily, yes.”

  “Today?”

  “Within a matter of hours.”

  “This is sad news indeed,” said Theobald, rejoicing inwardly. “We looked for a longer visitation.”

  “My plans have been upset and I have been compelled to change my itinerary slightly.”

  “I wish you God speed!”

  Theobald could not believe his luck. Having racked his brains to find a diplomatic means by which he could evict the little Welshman, he was instead being confronted with a voluntary departure. It was the clearest example of divine intervention that Theobald had met in a long while and he offered up a silent prayer of gratitude.