The Errant Flock by Jana Petken Read Free Book Online

eyes wandered past the man. The home consisted of only one room, which reeked of burning pine and eucalyptus logs. A baby slept in the crib.
    The new mother, looking weary after just giving birth, cowered in the bed and was already weeping and mumbling. “Please …no,” she said, as though motherhood had heightened her instincts. David ignored her and scanned the rest of the room.
    An ugly brown curtain running along a rope and stretching from one wall to the other formed a partition. A table and two chairs sat by the window, and a small hearth filled the corner wall at the far side of the bed. A chamber pot half filled with piss sat by the door, as though just about to be thrown outside, and next to it were two dirty plates, an empty cooking pot, and a wooden cup.
    “Where is the other member of your family?” David asked the man.
    “There is no one else. Our other child died recently.”
    “Why was its death not registered?”
    “She died a couple of days ago, just before my wife gave birth …”
    “You registered the birth, did you not?”
    “Yes, but …”
    “So why did you not register the death?”
    “Who are you?” the man demanded. “Why has the duke sent you to my home carrying a sword? What have I done wrong?”
    Nothing! David wanted to scream. The young father and his wife had done nothing wrong. They were sacrificial lambs.
    “We’re good Christians,” he heard the man say. “Is this because we weren’t in the procession or at Mass? As you can see, my wife’s not yet ready to leave her birthing bed … and the baby can’t go out. I have nothing to give you but a few maravedis … You won’t find anything much of value here. For God’s sake, tell me what you want.” His words tumbled out in quick succession.
    Studying the man for the first time, David guessed he must be about eighteen years old. He was particularly young to have fathered two babies. “Shut up,” he said harshly. “Bring your infant to me and don’t ask any more questions.”
    The man hesitated. Confusion and then fear settled in his eyes.
    “I said show me the child!” David hissed the words. Had he shouted them, they would not have sounded more fearsome.
    The baby was asleep in a crib constructed with both pinewood and tightly weaved straw. The man lifted his infant, wrapped in a patched linen blanket, and then held it in his outstretched arms in front of David.
    “Remove the blanket. Show me the babe’s sex.”
    The man wept. The mother, who was sobbing quietly, began to pray. “Please don’t harm my child … Oh, holy mother of Jesus, save us …”
    David looked at the baby’s tiny body, confirmed the sex, and that it had not been circumcised. He felt his own eyes well up with tears, and drowning in shame and helplessness, he struggled to breathe. If only God would strike him down where he stood.
    The point of his sword was still tickling the young father’s belly. He took a step backwards and gestured to the crib. “Put the infant back in there.”
    When the young father had laid the baby down, he straightened and turned to face David. His eyes wandered to the corner of the room. David sensed that the man was looking for a weapon. For a second, he wondered whether to let the innocent victim kill him rather than go through with this evil … A thought rushed through his mind. Should he tell the infant’s parents to leave their baby and run for their lives? No, for not only he but the entire Sanz family would be punished if there were no dead bodies discovered in this house. He had to stop thinking and act. There was no saving these people. It was much too late to turn back now.
    The young father opened his mouth to speak. His words hung in the air as David thrust the sword into the man’s belly, running it straight through until it stuck out of his back.
    Grunting, David pulled the sword out of his victim and watched him sink to his knees between the bed and the crib.
    The mother’s piercing