Satan's Fire (A Medieval Mystery Featuring Hugh Corbett) by Paul Doherty Read Free Book Online Page A

of men-at-arms, shields locked together, lances out, now ringed the tavern. On the stairs outside there was a heavy footfall and a deep voice cursing every taverner as ‘fatherless, misbegotten spawns of Satan’. Corbett grinned.
    ‘My lord of Surrey is about to arrive,’ he murmured.
    The chamber door crashed back on its leather hinges.
    ‘Poxy knaves! Ingrate bastards!’ de Warrenne shouted, his red face covered in sweat. He lumbered into the room like an old bear. ‘Well, Corbett, you bloody clerk! What do we have here?’ The earl pulled back the ragged coverlet and stared down at the corpse. ‘Fairies’ tits! Who’s he?’
    ‘Apparently a serjeant, probably an arbalester of the Temple Order,’ Corbett replied. ‘He came into this chamber with his crossbow and tried to slay our king.’
    ‘And who killed him?’
    ‘We were just debating that, my lord. Maltote thinks it was God, but Ranulf believes that if every sinner in York was to be so punished, the whole city would be a sea of fire.’
    De Warrenne hawked and, going back to the door, bawled down the stairs. A group of royal archers came up.
    ‘Take that out!’ de Warrenne ordered. ‘I want it dragged to the Pavement in York and hung from the highest gibbet!’
    The archers neatly stripped the bed and wrapped the corpse in soiled sheets. De Warrenne looked out of the corner of his eye at Corbett. ‘Oh, and get some bloody lazy clerk to write out a notice: SO DIE ALL TRAITORS. Fix it around the bastard’s neck!’
    De Warrenne hustled the archers and their grisly burden out of the room, slamming the door behind them. ‘And the bastard’s name?’
    ‘Walter Murston.’
    ‘The king will want an answer to all this.’ De Warrenne snapped. ‘I don’t trust those bloody fighting monks!’ He came over and kicked the ash away with his boot, spurs jingling on the wooden floor. He stared through the window. ‘I am frightened, Corbett.’ He whispered. ‘I am terrified. I was with the king thirty years ago when the Assassins tried to kill him. A man pretending to be a messenger.’ The old earl narrowed his eyes, breathing heavily through flared nostrils. ‘He got so close, so quickly. The king was quick. He brained him with a stool. Now they are hunting him again.’ He gripped Corbett’s arm; the clerk stared unflinchingly back. ‘For God’s sake, Hugh, don’t let them do it!’ De Warrenne glanced away. ‘We are all dying,’ he murmured. ‘All the king’s old friends.’
    ‘Tell His Grace,’ Corbett replied, ‘that he will be safe. Say that I will join him at the abbey of St Mary’s.’
    De Warrenne stomped across the room.
    ‘Oh, my lord Earl?’
    ‘Yes, Corbett.’
    ‘Tell the king I will not return to Leighton Manor.’ He forced a smile. ‘At least, not until this present business is finished.’
    He paused and listened as de Warrenne stamped down the stairs, hurling abuse at everyone in the tavern below. Ranulf and Maltote were standing in the corner watching open-mouthed.
    ‘What’s the matter, Ranulf?’ Corbett asked. ‘If you don’t close your mouth, you’ll catch a fly.’
    ‘I’ve never heard de Warrenne call you Hugh,’ Ranulf replied. ‘He must be very frightened . . .’
    ‘He is. The Assassins’ boast is never hollow.’ Corbett closed the window. ‘But let’s leave. This place stinks. Ranulf, bring that saddlebag.’
    ‘Who are the Assassins?’ Maltote asked.
    ‘I’ll tell you later. What I want to know is why a member of the Templar Order is carrying out their instructions!’
    They walked back down the stairs and into the taproom, a low, dank chamber, its ceiling timbers blackened by a thousand fires. At the far end, near the scullery door, sat the landlord surrounded by his slatterns; he was gulping wine as if his life depended on it. He took one look at Corbett’s face and slumped to his knees, clasping his hands before him.
    ‘Oh, Lord have mercy on me!’ He wailed, staring piteously, though