The Land of the Silver Apples - Farmer Nancy - Страница 21

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“Yes, beloved master,” said Brutus, planting himself on Guthlac’s chest.

That must be the abbot, Father Swein,thought Jack.

The slaves led Jocelyn, she of the night terrors, to the edge of the pit. She moaned piteously. They stood her on the edge with her back to the water. “No, no, no, no,” she wailed.

“That’s only the demon talking,” Father Swein assured the other patients, who were blindfolded and could not see what was happening.

“Please, oh, please,” she begged. A slave shoved her brutally. She fell backward, screaming, into the pit. Jack leaped to his feet. Her cry was broken by a loud splash, and at once howls arose from below. It sounded as though all the fiends of Hell had risen from the depths and were fighting over the poor girl.

Jack, from his new height, could see down into the water.

The slaves were throwing Jocelyn around like a bundle of clothes. They submerged her, pinched her, pulled her hair, and slapped her face. Jack clutched the ash wood staff. He couldn’t do a thing to help her.

“Pay no attention,” intoned the abbot. “Satan is difficult to cast out, but St. Filian will overcome.”

Jocelyn must have fainted, because Jack couldn’t hear her cries anymore. She was carried, dripping, up the ladder and laid out on the grass. She seemed dead until a spasm shook her body and she vomited on the ground.

“Take her to the orchard and bind her to a tree,” ordered Father Swein. “Her mother can collect her in the morning.” There was not a scrap of pity in his voice. He might have been talking about a mangy dog.

One after another, the patients were backed up to the pit and shoved in for the slaves below to torment. Jack hated them, but he realized they were, after all, condemned felons with no experience of mercy. The monks were different. They cheered as though they were at a ball game and made bets over which patient would last the longest before passing out. Jack absolutely despised them.

The last to go was Guthlac in his cocoon of rope. No one had blindfolded him. It was far too dangerous to get near his snapping jaws. Two men dragged him to the edge and rolled him in. “Whuuuuuh!” roared Guthlac like an enraged bear as he went down. Not a bit of the fight was taken out of him.

Jack was delighted to see him sink his teeth into the first man who approached.

But then it went horribly wrong. The slaves dragged him under the water and continued their devilish howling while holding him down with their feet. Jack watched in stunned horror. He was seeing cold-blooded murder! Even the monks were shocked. “Father Swein! He’s been down too long!” one of them cried.

The abbot slowly approached the edge of the well. He gazed over the pit, contemplating the scene below. “Bring him up,” he said at last. The men swam aside. Guthlac rolled to the surface like a dead seal. He was too heavy for the ladder, so he was pulled up by rope. Brutus bent down to untie his bonds. “No need for that,” Father Swein said.

“Master, he’s dying,” said Brutus, not stopping. “I can save him if I press the water out of him.”

“You will step back.”

“No, master,” said Brutus. He turned Guthlac onto his stomach and began pushing on his ribs.

“You will step back.”The abbot signaled to other slaves, and they pulled Brutus away. “This happens occasionally with the larger demons. Sometimes only death will drive them out. We have saved this man’s eternal soul.”

Brutus, as he had in the hospital, changed from a hero to a buffoon in the blink of an eye. “Begging your pardon, beloved master. Brutus is a half-wit, always was. He doesn’t know dung from a dewdrop.”

“That’s true,” said Father Swein as the slave proceeded to cower in a most nauseating way.

Jack felt dizzy with rage. These monks were as bad as Northmen. Worse, for they had no honor. They pillaged those who believed in their goodness and lived like kings with their fried oysters and sacks of Spanish wine.

“Who’s that standing on the wall?” said the abbot. Too late Jack realized his mistake. In his attempt to see into the pit, he’d come out into the open.

“That’s the lad St. Oswald cured!” said the monk who had cared for him in the hospital. “You’re looking at a miracle, Father. Last night he could barely wiggle. I always said St. Oswald was powerful—”

“Be still,” said Father Swein. “I remember he had a sister. Small demon possession or something. I haven’t seen her yet.”

“She left with the families. Father changed his mind,” said Jack.

“You lie,” the abbot said. “I can see your father hiding behind the willow.”

At that, Giles Crookleg emerged. “I’ve changed my mind,” he declared. “You can keep the Holy Isle ink. I’ll take Lucy home.”

“Oh, no, no, no,” said Father Swein, smiling to hide the menace Jack saw in his eyes. “We can’t have a demon trotting around, even a small, pretty one.”

“Begging your pardon. Your treatment isn’t suitable for a little child.”

“Oh, but it is,” the abbot said, amusement quirking his thin lips. “She’ll feel so much better with that nasty imp out of her.”

“I can’t allow it. I’m sorry.”

Father Swein signaled to his slaves. Father stood squarely in their path. Crookleg he might be, but he would not back down from a righteous fight no matter how many men opposed him. Jack had never been so proud of him.

“I can’t allow it either,” Jack cried, standing as tall as possible with his ash wood staff in his hand. The slaves guffawed, and Father Swein permitted himself a smile.

Pega burst out of the willow, dragging Lucy after her. “I’ll lift her up to you, Jack. Grab her hands.”

But Lucy—perverse as always—screamed, “Let me go, froggy! I hate slaves touching me!”

Pega dropped her at once.

“Pega—” Jack pleaded. But help came from a most unexpected direction.

Brutus was one of the men sent to subdue Father. When he caught sight of Lucy, he halted in shock. “Back! Back!” he ordered the others. “This is one of the Fair Folk.”

“The Fair Folk are accursed demons!” thundered the abbot. “Obey me at once, or I’ll hand you over to King Yffi!”

Brutus planted himself beside Father. “I’ll not move an inch!” he shouted, once more the hero and not the buffoon. “My mother served the Fair Folk, and I shall do no less!” The slaves stared openmouthed at him.

“Move, you scum, or I’ll have you all burned alive!” roared Father Swein. They surged forward and joined battle.

Jack knew Father and Brutus couldn’t hold out against so many, and now the men in the well were swarming up the ladder. He trembled with rage at the treachery of the abbot. Come forth,his mind called as he grasped the thrumming staff until his knuckles whitened. Break down these walls. Cleanse this foul place.He didn’t know what forces he was summoning, only that his cry sank into the deep places of the earth and echoed in vast, buried caverns that had never seen the sun. The staff shook in his hand. His hair crackled.

Thunder rolled through the ground. The stones groaned beneath Jack’s feet, and a shudder caused everyone to stagger in the courtyard. Jack fell to his knees. A second quake sent rocks tumbling in clouds of disintegrating plaster. Jack saw St. Filian’s Well split in two. Water burst out in a great plume and dashed itself against the wall. Jack was thrown onto the willow. He grabbed branches desperately as he fell down.

When he sat up, he saw a river foaming through a break in the wall. The flood was so huge, he couldn’t hear the slaves screaming. He could only see their mouths opening and closing. Water cascaded into the pit, going on and on, not filling it up, but plunging into a freshly opened chasm at the bottom. It swept up poor Guthlac and carried him along. One tongue flicked out and caught Father Swein as neatly as a frog picking a single fly out of a swarm. With a scream, the abbot was dragged off.

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