The Doomsday Code

CHAPTER 38

1194, Nottingham Castle, Nottingham

It took a word of command from Cabot and a mere glimpse of the king’s royal seal to convince one of the castle guards to take them immediately into the main keep. They found the Sheriff of Nottingham hunched over a round oak table, on which a dozen thick candles cast a flickering glow across cluttered stacks of parchment and a plate of food uneaten and forgotten.

‘What is it now?’ He stirred drunkenly. Bleary eyes opened, and at the sight of strangers in rags, spattered with blood, he lurched back in his chair and fumbled clumsily for a longsword on the table. It slid off the table along with a small stack of parchment and clattered uselessly on the floor.

‘Sire!’ said the guard, a young lad with tufts of ginger hair poking down from the rim of his helmet. ‘Sire! ’Tis not villains!’

The sheriff stopped fumbling for the blade on the floor and looked up. ‘N-not villains?’ His rheumy eyes narrowed behind a tangle of dark greasy hair. ‘We are safe? They — they have … gone?’

‘The fool is drunk,’ growled Eddie under his breath.

‘Aye, sire,’ replied the young guard, ‘they have dispersed, as last night.’

The sheriff collapsed back into his chair with a sigh of relief, resigned to leaving his sword where it lay on the floor. He muttered a prayer of thick unintelligible words and then reached across the table for a goblet of wine.

‘Sire,’ said Cabot, stepping forward, ‘we are on royal business. His Lordship, Earl of Cornwall and Gloucester — ’

‘Oh yes? What d-does John want of me now, eh?’ He grinned up at them and then upended the goblet into his open mouth.

‘We have come directly from John’s keep in Oxford,’ said Cabot. ‘On his orders.’

Nottingham laughed again. ‘Orders? I have orders, eh?’ He attempted to pull himself to his feet, stumbled a solitary step towards them before losing his balance and sprawling on to the floor. He lay where he was and began whimpering. Finally, while they waited for him to pick himself up, they realized he was snoring.

‘He is of no use to anyone,’ said Cabot.

‘Bob,’ Liam sighed, ‘lift him on to his bed.’

They watched Bob heft the sheriff carelessly over his shoulder and cross the hall to a large oak-framed mattress.

Liam turned to the guard. ‘Is he always so drunk?’

The young man was unsure whether he should reply.

‘Answer the man!’ barked Eddie.

‘Aye, s-sire. ’E …’e’s turned to drink.’ The guard looked anxiously at them. ‘Dreadful afraid, ’e is.’

‘Of what?’ asked Liam.

‘The people, sire! The people out there! Every night now they come out. Every night they gather and try an’ burn them gates.’

‘Lad, where are the captains? The sergeants? Who is in charge here?’

The young guard shrugged. ‘Many ’ave deserted. They gone to serve other masters.’

‘So who is in charge?’

‘The sheriff,’ said the lad.

‘There are no captains?’

‘No, sire. Just other … other men at arms, sire.’

‘How many?’

‘We are at ’alf strength. Perhaps no more than two ’undred, sire. But more leave each day.’

‘So why’ve you stayed?’ asked Liam.

‘Because … because there’s food ’ere. Because I’m afraid what them people out there goin’a do to me, sire. I ’eard stories of soldiers caught leavin’ this castle … what them outside ’ave gone done to them.’

Eddie cursed. ‘This castle will not hold the people of Nottingham out much longer if all that is left inside are frightened boys.’

Cabot nodded. ‘This is not a good situation for ye to take charge of, Liam.’

The young guard’s eyes widened and Cabot noticed that. ‘Aye, seems this young man is to be yer new sheriff.’ He tossed a nod at the snoring body on the bed across the hall. ‘I am sure he can do no worse a job than that drunken fool, William De Wendenal.’

Cabot turned to Liam. ‘So, lad … there are things it seems that need yer immediate attention here, before we go looking for a certain item.’

Liam nodded silently. Jay-zus, I’m supposed to be running a castle now?

‘Right,’ he said with little enthusiasm. ‘Right … yes.’

He became aware that Cabot, Eddie, the young guard — even Bob — were all looking at him, waiting for him to say something.

Why me? Why is it always me?

‘Errr … all right,’ he said finally. ‘Right,’ he said once more for good measure. ‘Umm, OK.’

Eyes on him still.

‘So, then, Eddie?’

‘Sire?’

‘I’m going to put you in charge of the men here.’

His jaw dropped open. ‘Sire?’

‘That’s right, you’re the garrison commander now. I want you to take command on the walls for the rest of tonight. All right?’

‘Aye, my lord!’ Eddie barked with enthusiasm.

Liam expected him to turn and go immediately but then he realized the man was waiting to be dismissed. ‘So then, uhh … you can go now.’

‘Sire!’ Eddie turned on his heels. ‘Come on, lad!’ he barked at the young guard. They clumped heavily out of the hall and a minute later Liam thought he heard his parade-ground bark echoing up the stone walls from the bailey outside.

Cabot filled the quiet hall with the sound of his soft wheezy laugh. ‘So, Liam of Connor, mysterious traveller from the future. It seems now ye have become a part of history. Ye are the Sheriff of Nottingham.’

‘This will cause contamination,’ cautioned Bob. ‘And it is exceeding our mission parameters.’

‘Yes.’ Liam nodded. ‘I’m well aware of that.’ He glanced at the snoring drunk on the bed. The man was clearly unfit for his role; a nervous wreck. A drunken nervous wreck. Perhaps the situation had done that to him. The stress of it, being in charge of this hopeless mess. He’d learned enough now to know that this country was in a perilous condition, bankrupt and on the verge of complete anarchy. A resentful population taxed to their knees and now starving. The noblemen — barons, lords, earls who should have been the backbone of authority providing men-at-arms and money to maintain order — were all conspiring against John, refusing to pay the tributes they owed.

A mess. A terrible mess. But a mess that was not his nor Bob’s concern. That’s how this history was meant to be anyway, right?

‘I’m afraid, Mr Cabot,’ said Liam, ‘that fella snoring away over there … he’s still the sheriff.’

‘Ye understand this castle is the administrative centre of the north!’ said Cabot. ‘Do ye understand that? If it falls into the hands of marauding peasants, if they overrun this place, then the country north of Oxford will be lost!’

‘Right. But it’s not our business. If it happens, then it’s meant to happen. That’s how history goes.’

Cabot studied him silently. ‘Ye would let that happen? If order collapses, the land will be awash with the blood of innocent people!’

Cabot was probably right.

‘Information: there are no records in history of a popular uprising of peasants successfully overthrowing the Sheriff of Nottingham,’ said Bob.

Liam looked at him. ‘You sure?’

‘Affirmative.’

‘Oh that’s just grand, that is,’ he sighed. ‘You’re telling me this is all wrong — right? That this shouldn’t be happening?’

Bob nodded. ‘It appears we are experiencing incorrect history.’