The Enchanter's Forest

Chapter 4

Unaware of what was being planned for him by the two powerful women out in the forest, Josse had dressed himself in his habitual tunic and hat and set off on Horace for the heathlands to the south and east of the Great Wealden Forest where he understood that Florian of Southfrith had his home. He lives with his beautiful wife in a modest but very fine manor house near Hadfeld, Brice had said. Well, the man’s name and the place where he had his abode ought to be enough for Josse to locate him.

He had followed the same path that he had taken the previous day for the first part of his ride then, when he emerged on to the open, heathery country on the far side of the forest, branched off to the south-east. The going was easy and he let Horace amble along at a steady, unhurried pace. While he remained close to the dense woodland behind him, withies, hazel and rowan grew alongside the track, giving him some shade, but as he progressed further into the open countryside, the trees finally gave out and he felt the full strength of the morning sun beating down on him. Now it was the gorse that held sway: the gentle slopes over which he rode were glowing with the dense yellow of the flowers, so that the air was redolent with the sweet, heavy, intoxicating scent. Horace’s big hooves brushed the wild thyme, which contributed its own clean smell. Josse could hear the delicate twittering of linnets and he spotted a pair of wheatears — white arses, as they were commonly known — flying low over the heather.

It was, he decided, a perfect day for riding and he wished that he had no fixed purpose but could saunter on until fatigue and hunger finally drove him home. But he did have a purpose, and an urgent one at that. Clucking to Horace, he increased his pace to a smart canter and set himself to the task of finding Hadfeld.

Presently he noticed that the landscape was changing. Encroachments had been made into the heathland and there were increasing numbers of assarts, where the untamed countryside had been claimed and converted into farm land. Sheep grazed the wiry heathland plants and there were large areas of bracken, fenced off like a crop, and Josse guessed the plant was being grown for fuel. Nothing ate bracken; he recalled Sister Tiphaine once telling him that it caused sickness in most animals but that, in small doses, it was useful as a contraceptive. He smiled to himself; whatever could they have been talking about to have prompted her to tell him that interesting little fact?

He came to a hamlet of four or five low, huddled little dwellings, outside one of which a couple of women sat over a huge basket of nettles. Observing as he approached, Josse noticed they were tearing the tops from each stem and throwing them into a cooking pot, setting the remaining stems and leaves aside in another basket. One of the women looked up and gave him a grin; she was a round-faced woman in perhaps her mid-twenties, pleasant looking except that she was missing all but three of her teeth.

‘You have a good harvest there,’ he remarked, returning her smile.

‘Aye, and the blisters to prove it,’ she said with a bubbling laugh. ‘But nettles is free, sir knight, and ours for the picking, and the tender young shoots make a tasty meal. The rest of our haul will go for nettle beer.’ She winked at him as if anticipating the pleasures of an evening of mild intoxication.

‘I wish you joy of it,’ he said. ‘Am I on the right road for Hadfeld?’

‘Aye, more or less. Keep on till you reach the stone cross and then turn left, then right. That’ll take you to Hadfeld.’

‘Who are you after?’ the other woman asked. She was older but had the same features; an elder sister? ‘I’ll wager it’s young Florian.’

‘Aye, it is,’ Josse agreed.

‘Thought as much.’ The woman nodded sagely.

‘Do many folk come seeking him just now?’

‘Aye, but most of them in truth are seeking Merlin’s Tomb, which is nowhere near Hadfeld but lies just within the forest, some-’

‘Thank you; I know where the tomb is,’ Josse interrupted.

‘Been there already?’ the first woman asked.

‘I. .’ Josse hesitated, reluctant to discuss his business with two inquisitive strangers.

‘He’ll be after our young Florian to demand his money back,’ the woman said to her companion in a whisper deliberately pitched loud enough for Josse to overhear. Glancing up at him, she added, ‘The cure lasted but a day and then back came the troubles, double fold.’

Despite himself, Josse laughed. ‘I am not sick, thank the good Lord, and it was not to seek for help that I visited Merlin’s Tomb.’

‘Then you’re the lucky one,’ the older woman said, all levity suddenly absent from her voice and her face, ‘for there’s more ’n one family hereabouts lighter in the pocket and still tormented by worry over whatever it was drove them to the forest tomb in the first place. People ain’t best pleased with young Florian,’ she added darkly. ‘If you’re a friend of his, sir knight’ — the look she cast at Josse suggested she would think the less of him if he were — ‘then maybe you should warn him to watch his step and his back.’

He met her gaze levelly. ‘I am no friend of his,’ he said quietly. ‘Now’ — he deliberately changed the subject — ‘Florian’s dwelling is indeed at Hadfeld, as you imply?’

‘Aye, it is,’ the first woman confirmed. ‘You’ll likely find him away from home, since he spends each and every day down at his tomb. But his wife will be there. You could wager that fine horse of yours on that, and your hat.’ Both women chuckled.

‘Thank you, both of you,’ Josse said. With a courteous nod of the head, he kicked Horace and went on his way.

The reason why the women had been so sure that Florian’s wife would be at home became evident as soon as Josse rode up to the house. Building work was under way and a woman stood on a mounting block very near to where the workmen were toiling, closely watching every move they made.

Josse dismounted and tethered Horace to a ring set into the wall beside the open gates. The house was not large but it was well-built and compact, with a pleasing symmetry to its dimensions. Flower beds had been placed either side of the door, beneath small windows set high above them in the smooth stone. There were lilies and gillyflowers in bloom, sweet-smelling and sending out a strong perfume. Outbuildings on the far side of the house appeared to have been carefully repaired. Money had been spent — recently, by the look of it — and must, judging by the buzz of activity and the gang of workmen, still be pouring out.

Walking across the courtyard, Josse approached the woman on the mounting block. He swept off his hat and said, ‘Madam? Have I the honour of addressing the wife of Florian of Southfrith?’

Without so much as glancing round, the woman said, ‘He is not here and is unlikely to return until the light fails. You’ll find him at Merlin’s Tomb.’ The bored resignation in her tone suggested that this was not the first time she had made the remark that morning. In addition, the woman spoke of her husband so scathingly that Josse thought he detected dislike.

‘Aye, so I have been informed,’ Josse said, maintaining a polite tone; he did not find it easy when the woman had not the manners to turn and address him face to face. Recalling the reason he had thought up for visiting Florian’s home, he went on, ‘They told me your husband is having a solar built’ — it had been a good guess, as had just been proved — ‘and I wanted to ask him if he’s satisfied with the builders he has engaged and, if so, what the name of the master builder is.’

‘He’s over there’ — she pointed, with a long, fine hand bearing a large garnet set in a gold ring, towards a thin, dark, nervous-looking man standing on top of a partly built wall with a plumb line in his hand — ‘and he’s called Josiah.’ She spoke with an accent and Josse guessed that her native tongue was French. ‘As to satisfaction, it is not possible to say until the work is complete.’ At last she turned to look down at Josse and he saw a pale face, the smooth skin very slightly olive in complexion, the black eyes almond-shaped under fine, dark brows. She was unsmiling and she stared at him as if he were something smelly on the sole of her narrow calfskin slipper. Lifting her delicately pointed chin in a gesture of pure arrogance, she said, ‘And just who are you?’

In no hurry to answer, largely because he could tell she found it irritating, Josse studied her. She was not tall — petite would be the word, he decided — and the slim-fitting silk gown showed a narrow waist and hips but surprisingly generous breasts; the bodice looked as if it had been designed for a woman even better-endowed. The gown was of a pale pearly grey and the colour must have been chosen with care, for it complemented the woman’s skin tone perfectly. Her eyes, he now saw, were not black but very dark blue. What he could see of her hair, which was drawn back off her face and covered by a circle of fine silvery net held in place with a silver circlet, was glossy, smooth and black as midnight.

She would have been one of the loveliest women he had ever set eyes on. But beauty, in Josse’s opinion, needed a smile: the scowl that the woman wore drew her brows together, etched downward-sloping lines in the beautiful face and soured the wide mouth; in short, she had the look of a malevolent child thwarted of its latest unreasonable demand.

‘I am Josse d’Acquin,’ he said eventually.

‘I see.’ The frown eased a little. ‘And you say that you are wanting to build a solar?’ She sounded as if she found the suggestion faintly risible.

‘Er — it has been suggested.’ That was the truth; Josse’s servant Will had been dropping hints these five years past at least and more than once a local mason had just happened to pass by — undoubtedly summoned by Will — to propose to Josse the same idea.

‘New buildings don’t come cheap,’ the woman said rudely. She eyed his garments minutely, from the feather in his favourite and well-worn broad-brimmed hat to his comfy old riding boots.

Refusing to be drawn, Josse merely said, ‘So I imagine.’

She took hold of a fold of her skirt, swishing the gorgeous silk to and fro so that it made a soft, rustling sound. He caught a glimpse of an underskirt in a deeper shade of silver grey and saw a flash of exquisite, pure white lace, stiff and costly. She tapped her slim foot in its soft leather slipper. ‘Of course,’ she said languidly when she had evidently reassured herself that Josse had noticed every item of the display, ‘my husband is a very wealthy man.’

‘Indeed,’ Josse said mildly.

‘Oh, yes.’

‘That must be quite delightful for you, my lady.’ He wondered if she would detect the irony.

‘Naturally, it is.’ Apparently not. ‘My husband claims that it is his privilege to give me pleasure by buying me whatever I desire.’ She gave an artificial little sigh, as if she could not quite believe her generosity in allowing her husband the huge favour of allowing him to spend his money on her.

‘Perhaps he is fresh to marriage?’ Josse asked. ‘It is well known that a new bridegroom often indulges his bride.’

‘We are two years wed,’ she said sharply. Then, forcing a smile that went no further than her lips: ‘Florian likes to ensure my favour, sir knight. I had many suitors and he does well not to forget that he had to face much competition for my hand.’

Watching her, Josse thought but did not point out that her former popularity was hardly relevant now that she had made her choice and was married to Florian. It seemed highly likely that she used the reminder of it as a stick with which to beat the unfortunate Florian whenever his attention slipped from his decorative, spoiled wife and his purse-strings began to draw closed.

Josse was beginning to feel very sorry for Florian of Southfrith.

It was hot in the courtyard. The sun was beating off the flagstones and the walls of the house and the air was dry and full of dust. The woman on her mounting block, predictably, had taken the only patch of shade. A better-mannered person would, Josse thought, by now have invited him inside the house and offered him something cool to drink. Florian’s wife contented herself with staring at him impatiently and making it perfectly apparent that she wished he would go away.

‘I am grateful for your kindness and your time, lady,’ he said, increasing the irony. Bowing, he added, ‘I will leave you to your overseer’s duties.’ And that, he decided as he straightened up, was verging on plain rude; to suggest to a rich man’s wife that she was forced to labour like a workman was an insult.

Colour flew swiftly into her face. She seemed about to make some vitriolic reply but, with an effort, she controlled herself. Then she turned her back.

Josse walked back across the courtyard and out through the gate, freeing Horace’s reins from the hitching ring and swinging up into the saddle. Looking back, he saw the door to the house suddenly open from within. A woman dressed in black emerged on to the steps; she wore a long veil whose edge came down low over her eyes so that Josse could not see her face clearly. However, her figure, her posture and the harsh voice which called out in French suggested strongly that she was the young woman’s mother.

‘Primevere, que fais-tu la au plein soleil?’ demanded the older woman. Primevere, Josse thought. Primrose. A singularly unfitting name for Florian’s haughty wife, whose looks and nature were far removed from the simple prettiness of a primrose. ‘Tu seras bronzee comme une rustre!’ The older woman spat out the pejorative word like an oath.

‘I am not in the sun, Maman,’ the younger woman called back. ‘There is no danger whatsoever that I shall start to look like some rustic lout, so there is no need to make such a fuss.’

The older woman had just noticed Josse.

‘C’est qui, lui?’ she demanded of her daughter, jerking her chin in Josse’s direction.

Primevere turned to stare at Josse. ‘His identity is not important,’ she said dismissively. ‘He is just leaving.’ Then she climbed down gracefully from her mounting block, took her mother’s outstretched hand and went with her back into the house, slamming the door behind her with a loud and eloquent bang.

The second part of Josse’s mission was less straightforward: there did not seem to be any obvious way of discovering where Florian had found the bones that he had transported to the clearing in the forest. Where, Josse wondered as he rode along in the sun, trying to distract himself from his growing thirst, would a man go to find bones? A burial ground? Some grave sunk beneath the aisle of a church? A wealthy family’s private vault? He had no idea which suggestion, if any, might be the right one.

He caught sight of a small church ahead, set beneath trees to one side of the track. He saw as he drew nearer that someone was sitting on the step of the open door; the priest was taking his ease in the cool shade with a mug of beer and a thick hunk of dark and dryish-looking bread.

‘Greetings!’ the priest called out as Josse rode up. He waved the mug. ‘Will you take a drop? It’s as cold as my subterranean cellar can make it! There’s water in the trough for your handsome horse, too.’

Deciding that this was probably not the happy priest’s first mugful, Josse willingly dismounted, tethered Horace in the shade beside the trough and went to seat himself on the doorstep.

‘A-a-ah!’ he said with deep pleasure as his buttocks encountered the cool stone.

‘Good, eh?’ the priest said with a smile. ‘Here.’ He handed over a second mug and Josse drank gratefully.

‘That’s worth a long, hot ride,’ Josse said when he had taken the edge off his thirst.

‘You’ve come far?’ asked the priest.

‘From Hawkenlye Abbey.’

‘I see.’ The priest eyed him shrewdly. ‘Come to have a look at the rival attraction?’

‘Aye.’ There seemed no point in denying it.

‘Do you believe what is being claimed for those particularly large bones?’

Josse paused. ‘I do not want to believe,’ he said, ‘but I am forced to admit that there is a power to the place — to the bones, perhaps — that I cannot explain.’

The priest sighed deeply; all happiness had abruptly left his cheerful face. ‘That’s what they all say,’ he muttered glumly.

‘Father,’ Josse began tentatively, ‘let’s say for argument’s sake that those are not the bones of Merlin but that Florian of Southfrith found them elsewhere and took them into the forest, then claimed to have unearthed them there and to have discovered that they are miraculous.’

‘That would amount to fraud, which is a very serious allegation,’ the priest said warningly.

‘Oh, I make no allegation’ — Josse spoke swiftly — ‘I merely outline a hypothesis.’

‘Go on.’ The priest sounded guarded.

‘Well, if it happened that way, I’m asking myself where on earth such bones might have been found? Are there any such within your church and its immediate surroundings, for example?’

Now the priest was studying him closely. ‘There are, but no grave has been disturbed.’ The smile breaking out again, he said, ‘I checked.’

Josse laughed briefly. ‘You have entertained the same thought, then, Father?’

And the priest said very quietly, ‘Yes.’

After a thoughtful pause, the priest spoke again. ‘You ask where a man might find a skeleton. Sir knight, such a task is difficult but not impossible. The chalk downs to the south of us were long inhabited by our forebears and, like all men, in their due time they died. Now it is an interesting thing, but it is my observation that sometimes our ancestors burned the bodies of the dead, for I have seen for myself how some graves contain burned bones bundled up in small spaces, accompanied by offerings to the pagan gods that the people worshipped.’

‘The bones in the tomb are not burned,’ Josse put in.

‘No, no, I am told not, but I was about to say that there are also to be found upon the Downs burial sites and barrows that contain whole skeletons, carefully laid out as if with reverence. In much the same way, indeed, as we bury our own dead, save that it was the custom of our forefathers to lay bodies north-south and not, as we do, with their feet to the east so that they can rise up and face the Holy City on the Day of Judgement.’

‘You have seen such skeletons on the Downs?’ Josse demanded eagerly; if this priest had come across such a thing, then why should not Florian have done so too?

‘Yes,’ the priest admitted. ‘Yes, I have.’

A thought struck Josse. ‘The burial place that you speak of — is the skeleton still within?’

‘Yes.’ Again, the disarming smile. ‘I checked that too.’

‘But that’s only one such grave,’ Josse said, determined not to have this exciting new possibility dismissed out of hand. ‘Florian could very well have found another similar grave and-’

‘-and robbed it of its occupant.’ The priest nodded slowly. ‘Yes, sir knight; that is exactly what I find myself thinking.’

Josse shook his head, troubled and confused. A thought struck him, one that he had not considered before. ‘Has it actually been stated that the bones at Merlin’s Tomb are capable of working miracles?’ he asked. ‘And if so, was the word spread by Florian of Southfrith or by popular rumour?’

The priest eyed him steadily. ‘That I cannot say,’ he murmured. ‘What I will tell you, sir knight, is this: it was those ruffians now doing guard duty at the tomb who first emerged to tell of the wonderful discovery in the forest. I saw them and I heard what they had to say, and their words made me angry for they were sacrilegious. They spoke of Lazarus being brought back from the dead and of the raising of Jairus’ daughter; of the healing of the blind and the dumb, of the man who took up his bed and walked, of the release of those possessed by devils.’ He leaned forward and, in case Josse had missed the point, said vehemently, ‘Those are the miracles of Jesus Christ, sir knight, and of him alone! The ruffians had been well trained and none actually said that the new tomb could perform such feats, but then they did not need to, for the implication was there and more than enough to convince the simple and the desperate.’

‘I see,’ Josse said. If what the priest said was true — and there was no reason why it should not be — then this new information amounted to yet more damning evidence against Florian. To imply a miracle-working ability to his fraudulent tomb rather than to state its healing power outright — as the Hawkenlye community did about their holy water — was both cynical and clever and also typical of what Josse was coming to recognise as Florian’s nature.

You should warn him to watch his step and his back, the woman at the roadside had said.

How right, Josse thought, she was.

Helewise half longed for and half feared Josse’s return. She was keen to hear what he had to report of Florian of Southfrith’s home and household but she dreaded having to pass on to him what had been decided for him.

It had not occurred to her that he would refuse the task. She thought about it now as she waited for him. After quite a short time she found she simply could not imagine him saying no.

He arrived late in the afternoon and came into her room looking hot, tired and dusty from the road. His tunic and undershirt were unfastened almost down to the waist and she could see his strong neck and chest. As if he noticed her eyes upon him, hastily he straightened the garments and secured the leather lace.

‘I am sorry to appear before you covered in sweat and muck,’ he said, ‘but it has taken me some time to rub down and settle Horace and I did not want to make you wait while I saw to myself as well.’ He grinned. ‘I thought you might be impatient to hear how I got on.’

She answered his smile but experienced a sudden surge of guilt; poor Josse, here he was, diligently trying not to keep her waiting longer than he must, yet in so doing, lessening the time between his present frame of mind, whatever that might be, and how he was probably going to feel once she had told him what had been decided. ‘Oh, I don’t mind a little honest sweat,’ she made herself say.

His grin widened. ‘Quite a lot, actually.’

‘Hm?’ She wasn’t really listening.

‘Quite a lot of — oh, never mind.’ Approaching her and leaning with his hands on her table, he said excitedly, ‘I went to Florian’s house. He has a very decorative crosspatch of a wife upon whom he’s lavishing everything he’s making out at Merlin’s Tomb. She has a brand-new gown and slippers, her mother has moved in and they’re building themselves a solar!’

Helewise said, ‘Oh, really?’, sounding pathetically uninterested even to herself.

He noticed too. ‘Well, I thought it was relevant,’ he muttered. Then, before she could answer: ‘That’s not all. I met up with a priest down near Hadfeld and he reckons it’d be reasonably easy to locate a skeleton out on the Downs and transport it into the forest.’ Eagerness spilling out of him in spite of her lack of reaction, he said, ‘This is how I see it, my lady. Florian needs money — I’ve seen his wife and, believe me, a man with the misfortune to be wedded to such a creature will always need money — and, like everyone else, he’s been knocked back hard by what he had to pay towards the King’s ransom. His wife threatens to withhold herself unless he starts bringing home the little and the not-so-little presents that she’s used to and young Florian is racking his brains for a means of making some cash. He’s out riding on the Downs one day and notices a piece of bone sticking out of the ground — aye, all right, my lady’ — she had made an involuntary sound of disbelief — ‘I’m not saying it’s what did happen, I’m only saying it could have done — and, jumping down from his horse, he digs around for a while and discovers that he’s unearthed an intact skeleton, moreover that of a particularly large man. Now, this is where it becomes really interesting!’

She could not help but catch the edge of his fervour. ‘Yes?’

‘My lady, you are familiar with what has happened at Glastonbury?’

‘The monks have found the bones of King Arthur and his Queen and now the Abbey is a place of pilgrimage.’ She spoke as briefly as she could, not in the least wishing to engage in a long discussion of the rights and wrongs of the issue.

‘Aye, that’s it! Well, you know of it, I know of it, so the likelihood is that Florian does too. You agree?’

‘Ye-es,’ she said. She had an idea she knew exactly where this was going.

‘An enterprising and unscrupulous young man desperate for money finds some unusually large bones. He thinks, why not claim that these belong to someone very famous? Why, you said yourself that everyone knows about Merlin, so maybe the old enchanter’s name was the first one to pop into Florian’s head. He digs up the bones, smuggles them by night into a suitably awe-inspiring and tucked away place in the forest, creates a realistic-looking tomb and makes a lead cross inscribed with suitably confirmatory lettering. He covers up the bones, allows a couple of weeks or so for the undergrowth to grow back — and at this time of year that wouldn’t take long — then back he goes to make his discovery. He hires a few strong men to fell some trees so as to make access easier and to build a couple of flimsy huts, presumably promising to pay them out of the proceeds. Then he spreads the word that Merlin’s secret and long-lost burial site has been found, and the rest we know.’

‘The rest,’ she said slowly, ‘is that Florian is making twenty shillings a day or more out of pilgrims visiting a shrine that is nothing but pretence. If, that is,’ she added, ‘these bones are not those of Merlin.’

‘Aye,’ he said heavily. ‘Aye, that’s the crux of the matter.’ He gave a deep sigh. ‘My lady, every instinct tells me that they are not and yet. .’ He shrugged. Then he said, ‘But I cannot deny there is a force to the place or the bones, or perhaps both, although whether it’s what Florian claims it to be or something else entirely, well, I just don’t know.’

‘Ah.’ What had the Domina said? There is a force in that place that has been desecrated with which it is folly to meddle. Oh, dear God, and now here was Josse talking about some frightful force whose origin he did not even try to guess!

But he was waiting and she must collect herself and speak.

‘Sir Josse,’ she began tentatively, ‘I have spoken to the Domina.’

‘My lady, forgive me!’ he cried. ‘I have been so busy expounding on my own actions this day that I have omitted to ask you about yours! Please, tell me what happened in the forest!’

She looked up into his trusting, anxious face and her guilt waxed hot. But there was nothing for it but to report what had been decided. ‘After some discussion,’ she said baldly, ‘we reasoned that the surest way to disprove Florian’s claim is to provide proof that Merlin lies buried elsewhere. The Domina’s people have some idea that he has a shrine or a tomb or some such thing beside a fountain deep in a forest far away, and we-’

‘I’ll go there,’ he said instantly. ‘Tell me where it is and I’ll find it and bring back word of it.’

‘That was what we had in mind,’ she acknowledged. ‘We thought that proof of the location of the true Merlin’s Tomb, plus the revelation of just how much money Florian is making out of the false one, would convince the people that they are being tricked.’

‘Aye, you’re right!’ Josse exclaimed. ‘I’ll set out as soon as I can, my lady. I’ll make a start with preparing my gear — I can get everything ready very quickly once I’ve decided what I’m going to need — and I’ll make sure Horace has a generous feed. The pair of us will get a good night’s sleep, and then-’

‘Sir Josse, there is something else,’ she said gently. She could not bear to hear him make his plans so enthusiastically when he did not know the whole picture. ‘The place of which I speak is far away,’ she hurried on, ‘in fact, in Brittany, which the forest people know as Armorica.’

His face had gone stony. ‘Armorica,’ he repeated dully. She knew then that he had guessed what was coming.

‘You will need a guide who is familiar with the terrain and who will be able to intercede between you and the guardians of the tomb.’

‘The guardians are of the Domina’s people,’ he murmured.

‘Yes, indeed.’ She took a deep breath. ‘The Domina has proposed such a person and it’s Joanna.’

And Josse, his expression a touching mixture of distress and joy, said, ‘I guessed as much.’