Horehound sat on the edge of the snow-fringed marsh. He was freezing and famished. He wanted to sleep and dream about a charcoal fire above which venison steaks, basted with oils and herbs, slowly roasted. He shook himself from his reverie - he had seen men of the woods lose their wits; hadn't that happened to Fleawort three winters ago, when he had run himself to death chasing a stag no one else could see? The cold was intense. Horehound's belly had had nothing more than watery viper soup, and he realised how desperate the situation had become. Game was growing scarce, or was it simply that they were losing their skill? Foxglove had died chattering his sins while Horehound pretended to be a priest and mumbled words that sounded like Latin. One day he would ask a priest if Foxglove would have escaped the pains of Hell. Horehound stuck a finger in his mouth and rubbed his sore gum. The idea which had occurred to him in the warmth of Master Reginald's kitchen had grown like a seed in the ground. He'd crouched behind the tombstones and watched the King's man. The stranger was like Sir Edmund - a just, honest officer of the law.
'I'm sure it is here.' The outlaw known as Skullcap nudged his leader.
[...]
'There!' he exclaimed.
Horehound edged nearer and moaned quietly at the sight of the corpse bobbing in the shallows. Skjullcap, stretching out his cudgel, forced the corpse to turn. Horehound glimpsed a mud-encrusted face with long hair; the dried blood ringing the mouth had mixed with the slime ... ...
THE MAGICIAN'S DEATH
Paul Doherty
A mystery featuring medieval sleuth Hugh Corbett
England and France, 1303
By the door, Sigurd shifted a little on his feet. The gesture was not lost on the Emperor. 'But what to do now, you say? Tell them, Captain, that ...'
I was genuinely curious to see what the Emperor would decree, but at that moment a movement by my side distracted me from his words. Aelric, who had stood by me in silence all this time, was moving forward, unbidden. He staggered a little, as though under a heavy burden, and there was a dull emptiness in his eyes. You might have thought he had drunk too much, save for the deliberation with which the axe lifted off his shoulder and settled in his hands. The weight seemed to compose him: his stride stiffened, and the muscles of his arm tensed as the blade came up beside his head.
'What ...?'
Almost numb with surprise, and almost a second too late, I saw the impossible truth and sprang forward.
[...]
A roar sounded from above, and I looked up. Sigurd was standing over me, a tower of rage and fury. His face was ashen, shaken, but there was not the least compunction in his eyes.
'You betrayed us,' he breathed. 'Everything.'
His axe swung down, and hot blood splashed against my cheek. At a little distance, Aelric's head rolled free across the floor.
A MOSAIC OF SHADOWS
Tom Harper
A Byzantine Mystery
Constantinople,
late 11th Century
THE CLERKENWELL TALES
Peter Ackroyd
London, 1399
The friar, Exemewe, stepped forward, among the men of high degree, and bowed towards Geoffrey de Calis. 'The game is begun,' he said in a low voice. 'The oratory was well burned with Greek fire. The death in the cloister of St Paul's came by chance, as I believe, but it served our purpose well enough.'
'Who are these people you lead?'
'Broken-down people. The helpless and hopeless ones of this world. There is Richard marrow, a carpenter who would creep to the cross if he could. Emnot Hallyng, whose head is higher than his hat. Garret Barton, a malignant man who fights the world. There is one of Paul's manciples.'
'Oh?' Geoffrey de Calis raised his head. 'Which one is that?'
'Robert Rafu.'
'I know him to be cowardly disposed. He eats too little.'
'Hamo Fulberd, a marvellously ill-favoured youth. He is marked down for an especial doom.'
