Chapter Twelve
She must have slept because she woke with a mixture of fear and rage, rage at Tom.
It had hardened with the night and stayed with her during the day as she made sharp marks on the parchment.
She felt distressed and betrayed. She knew it was her own fault for talking to Tom.
Why had she trusted him? She’d been an ignorant child when she knew him before. She didn’t know who he was now.
The Priory was sullen, a spark gone out of it as the monks went about their duties.
Maykin’s body had been dragged clean of the stones as soon as it was light, and placed into a winding sheet.
As Oswyn’s body had not yet been buried, the decision was taken to put both bodies in the same grave, and hold the ceremony for them both.
All other duties were stopped for this to happen right away, the Inspector eager to have it done and the Prior seeing no reason to wait any longer.
Poor Maykin, Linnet thought, always claiming to be so close to Oswyn and now pressed up against him for all eternity.
After most of the light was gone, she went to the kitchen for food, and Tom was there. His open, friendly face made her want to slap him.
‘Come sit with me, Linnet?’ he asked.
She shook her head and pushed past him, going to sit with Isabelle in the far corner, turning her back to him.
When they were done eating, she tried to get past him without him seeing, but he stopped her, puzzled by her manner. Seeing she wasn’t going to talk to him, he turned to Isabelle instead.
‘Come see what I caught today – it’s an ink-fish.’
Isabelle’s attention was caught and she followed him out. Unwillingly, Linnet followed. She liked seeing the strange things he found in his net, but she wasn’t forgiving him.
The moonlight was good enough to pick out their way to the shore, and he had kept it in the prow of his boat, in a pool of water, surrounded by wet sacks, so it was still alive. One of the creature’s eyes stared balefully at them, with an edge of Linnet’s same fury, she thought.
‘Can you eat it? Why is it called an ink-fish?’ Isabelle asked.
‘You can eat pretty much anything you take from the sea, but you’d want to cook it well. Some won’t though, they say it’s a sinful creature. If they got hungry enough, mind… Sometimes it has ink in it, black ink.’
‘It’s not always easy to know sinful creatures,’ Linnet said, but she was also thinking about what the ink would look like, how it would write on the page and whether it would keep its colour well.
Isabelle was busy poking the animal with a stick, squealing a little as the tentacles reacted, until the creature snatched the stick and tossed it over the side.
They all stood amazed for a minute.
‘I’m going to put ’im back,’ Tom said suddenly. ‘Any creature that knows how to do that deserves another life at least.’
He picked it up warily at arms’ length, the tentacles swirling around in the air, looking for purchase, and threw it out into the dark sea.
Isabelle squealed at the splash, then ran off laughing and chattering with Pol who had been watching it all with close attention but from a very safe distance, leaving Tom and Linnet there.
‘What’s up with you then? Is it Maykin? We are all sad, I know—’
‘I saw you with Godfreyd.’
The words came out as a low hiss, far harder than she’d intended, and he flinched as if she’d stung him.
‘Saw me where?’
‘The stables, you were touching.’
He sat down heavily in the beached boat, the breath knocked out of him. She could see a tinge of grey in his dark hair now, caught in the moonlight, and the shadows carved deep lines on his face. The silence between them grew, sharpening with the ever colder night air.
‘What do you want me to say then, Linnet? I won’t say I’m sorry, it’s who I am.’
What did she want him to say? She wanted remorse from him and to have a better sense of who he was, but also she wanted an apology, for telling her secrets, and she wanted to know what he’d said.
How much was she in danger? She’d trusted Tom, more fool her, but she would never have trusted Godfreyd.
‘Why Godfreyd?’ she settled on at last.
It was the biggest of her burning questions, one she kept coming back to.
She thought Tom was a better judge of men than to be keeping company, to be sinning, with one she found so unpleasant.
She didn’t care about what they’d been doing.
She knew it was a sin but she knew a lot of things were sins that bothered no one.
‘He’s not all he seems—’
‘Nor are you,’ she snapped, and again he recoiled.
‘He’s not just the arrogant monk you see. He’s kind, he worries, he was crushed by his family casting him out.’
‘Casting him out for what you and him do together – I’m right, aren’t I?’
Tom nodded, shame staining his face, but then angry too.
‘You’re no one to tell me what’s sinning and what’s not, Linnet. You’ve told me about your thieving and your – whatever happened with them indulgences. You’ve no right to stand as priest above me.’
‘You were no one special to him. I’ve seen him with others. Why did you trust him with my secrets? I trusted you.’ It was a quiet shout, the key to why she felt so betrayed by her friend.
He flinched when she mentioned others but didn’t look surprised.
‘It were nothing, just words when we were chatting.’
She got up abruptly.
‘It was not nothing. It was my secrets I was telling you and you were spilling out freely to your fellow sinner, your monk lover. I’ll not be talking to you again, Tom, I can see I can’t trust you.
You’re not who I thought you were. I knew you were flawed with your love of the dice, but you’re sick at heart, aren’t you?
A sinner to the core, a shadow of a man who doesn’t know the meaning of the word friendship. ’
As she turned to go back up to the Priory, she bumped straight into Cassian. How long had he been standing there? A glance at his shocked face told her he’d heard much.
Tom tried to speak but Cassian held up his hand. ‘I’ll not be hearing from you, sinner. Spreading your wickedness about this Priory. Brother Benedict told me sommat, but I hadna taken his word for truth. Now I ken otherwise.’
And with that, the novice left. Linnet looked at Tom’s stricken face and almost felt pity but the anger overcame her again, and she left too.
The next day she resolved to avoid Tom, even though her anger was waning. She would come back to him in a few days, tell him why her secrets were dangerous, explain why she didn’t want him to tell anyone, not even Godfreyd if he was always talking to him.
She busied herself with the work, getting lost in the manuscript, still working out the text but very close to finishing.
‘Have you seen Tom?’ It was the Prior, standing in the light from the doorway. Maybe Tom was hiding away too.
‘Not since yesterday,’ she replied, but that didn’t seem to satisfy the Prior who wandered about the Scriptorium, picking up a dish of ink here, a brush there.
‘He should have been out fishing with the others this morning and they were asking after him. They thought I’d put him to work but I’ve not had anything for him since our trip to Inner Farne. It’s not like him, Linnet, he’s a man of habits.’
She held back a laugh, he was certainly a man of habits, Godfreyd’s habit for one. If she could laugh, was she nearer to forgiving him?
She nodded politely and waited for the Prior to go, which eventually he did but not before instructing her to ready a desk and chair for Brother Luke.
Isabelle came in next, Pol perched heavily on her shoulder, asking after Tom, she wanted to find another ink-fish.
‘I don’t think he fishes one of them out each time, but why ask me? Go down the shore and ask there. I’m busy and I’m not his keeper.’
Isabelle made a face and left, but not before Pol, hopping on the table, had almost spilt the ink, and not before Isabelle had taken a scrap of parchment, thinking Linnet hadn’t seen her.
Linnet shrugged. It was too small to be of use to her and the child may as well play with that as anything else.
She was so deep in her work that she wasn’t aware Isabelle had come back until she saw the scrap returned with her drawing of the ink-fish. Five arms, not eight. But she’d caught the beaky look on the creature’s face and it made Linnet laugh.
Maybe she’d show it to Tom later, a bit of a peace offering, if not coming directly from her, a way back into their friendship again.
Next was Cassian. The novice was agitated, looking about him rapidly, but not catching her eye. She wondered if he’d said something to the Inspector about what he’d overheard.
‘Has ye seen Tom? I’m – I have to—’ He stopped, unsure about what to say next.
‘No, not since yesterday. Have you asked amongst the fishermen or been to the inn?’
‘Aye.’ He sat down heavily. As if he’d forgotten she was there, she could hear him begin to pray, a muttering and a confusion of words in Latin and English, and then, without any warning, he slumped to the ground and began to fit.
He moved violently and she could see the stain growing on his habit where he had pissed himself.
Linnet froze. Should she get Godfreyd? Call for the Inspector?
Try to help him? But even as the questions flurried through her mind, Cassian sat back up, the light coming back to his eyes as he wiped his mouth to rid himself of the froth that had gathered there.
He patted himself too, flinching as he felt the wetness at his groin.
He looked at Linnet, his face overcome with shame, and a touch of fury.
‘Are you – do you need me to…?’ She faltered to a stop.
With an effort he got up, she could see tiredness sweeping over him like a tide.
‘Nay, it’s nothing. Ye saw nothing, ye ken?’ And with that he was gone.