The Tainted Relic (33 page)

‘The Master-General of the Dominicans did just that,’ acknowledged Urban. He glanced uneasily at the bundle his master still held. ‘He said Holy Blood relics cannot possibly exist for complex theological reasons that I do not understand, and he has ordered the destruction of what he terms “heretical idols of veneration”.’

‘I do not want this relic consigned to the fires of ignorance: what God has seen fit to place in our hands is not for man to burn. It is not a common Holy Blood relic, anyway: it is different, because of the curse it carries.’

‘The curse,’ mused Urban. ‘Is it true that a dragon bewitched it, in the days of King Arthur?’

‘Do not be ridiculous,’ replied Andrew curtly. ‘Dragons cannot speak. The Knights Templar took the relic into their care, and I learned its history from one of them, a man named John Mantravers, of South Witham. He saved my life.’

‘But the Knights Templar were suppressed, and their leaders executed years ago,’ said Urban, uneasy with the notion that Andrew had cavorted with heretics.

‘Some refused to renounce their Order, and Mantravers was one of them. He told me that this piece of the True Cross was once in the possession of an Arab called Barzak, whose duty it was to protect it from infidels. When our blessed Crusaders liberated the Holy City, Barzak uttered a violent curse when his family were considered enemies and slaughtered. But his curse was too strong, and it became the bane of good men, as well as bad. Prior John de Burgo is a case in point: he is not wicked, but if he had taken hold of the thing to “prove” it holds no power, it would have meant his death regardless.’

‘So, you decided to take it to Norwich and give it to the Benedictines,’ surmised Urban. ‘They do not hate Holy Blood relics, and will treat it with the reverence it is due. You did the right thing, Father.’

Andrew nodded, relieved that the novice had been so easy to convince. He had anticipated all manner of recriminations–he was sure he himself would not have been so readily accepting, had their roles been reversed. ‘Before I took it, I removed it from its vial, to make sure it was the same splinter that caused Mantravers all his trouble. It would have been a pity to arrive in Norwich and discover it had been exchanged at some point. I had to be sure.’

Urban gazed at him. ‘But that means…’ He trailed off, not liking to give voice to the awful conclusion.

Andrew nodded. ‘It means I will die as soon as I relinquish it from my keeping. But I grow weaker with each passing day anyway, so it matters little now. However, I may be obliged to ask you to carry it for the last stage of its journey.’

‘But if the relic’s curse is genuine, then I may die, too.’

‘Only if you remove the splinter from its vial.’

‘Then I will not touch it,’ said Urban, relieved. ‘I will keep it wrapped up.’

Andrew stopped walking and opened the pouch, carefully removing the tiny box that held the small tube of glass, green and misty with age. Urban gazed at it in fascination, then stepped back sharply when Andrew removed the gilt stopper and slid the contents into his hand. The relic was not much to look at–just a rough piece of silvery-grey timber with a curious stain blackening one end.

Andrew held it up between thumb and forefinger. ‘That will not be enough, Urban. Only if you truly believe in the relic’s power will you see your quest through to the end. You must hold it in your hand and feel its strength. If you are not up to the task, then tell me, and I will recruit another servant. Cambridge has friaries and convents a-plenty, so it should not be too difficult to find a substitute.’

Urban was stung by the notion that he could be so easily discarded. ‘Of course I shall do as you ask,’ he cried. ‘I vowed to carry out your wishes, and I will do so as long as there is breath in my body.
I
will not abandon you.’

This last comment was spiteful, and Urban was ashamed when he saw Andrew wince. The old friar’s former favourite, on realizing he had learned all he could from Andrew, had left him for other, more knowledgeable masters, and Urban knew he had considered it a betrayal. It was unkind to have made such a remark, and he regretted it immediately.

Andrew rested his wrinkled hand on the younger man’s shoulder, partly for support and partly as a gesture of affection. ‘I know. I have every faith in you. Hold out your hand.’

Urban shuddered as Andrew moved the stained wood towards him.

Cambridge, a few days later

Brother Michael was blissfully unaware that his fine Benedictine habit would never be the same again. He held forth knowledgeably on all manner of subjects as he shared the Dominicans’ excellent dinner, and did not notice that his audience was looking not at him, but at his right shoulder. His colleague, Matthew Bartholomew, had tried several times to draw his attention to the problem, but had been silenced by a dismissive wave of the monk’s fat white hand. Michael did not like to be interrupted when he was of a mind to be erudite.

‘So, to conclude my thesis,’ he said pompously, revelling in the fact that no one had challenged his arguments for almost an hour, ‘I concur with the great theologian Francis de Meyronnes. During the three days between our Lord’s death and His resurrection, some of His blood became separated from His body and remained on Earth. Ergo, no relic containing Holy Blood is united to His divinity, just as it was not united to His divinity during the three days in the tomb. The blood of the mass, which
is
fully joined to His divinity, is thus far more worthy of veneration. However, this is not to say that Holy Blood relics are to be shunned–on the contrary, they are sacred and vital reminders of Christ’s resurrection and man’s subsequent redemption.’

He sat back, pleased with the elegance of his reasoning and certain that the Cambridge Dominicans would be unable to refute what he had said. He reached out with his knife and speared a roasted chicken, dragging it towards him and clearly intent on devouring the whole thing, despite the fact that the friars had already laid down their spoons and were waiting for the final grace. Michael was a large man, who used his position as the university’s senior proctor to inveigle invitations to some of the finest meals in Cambridge. It had been several days since his last grand repast, however, and so he was enjoying himself more than usual.

He had been summoned to the Dominican priory that day because one of its student novices had been involved in a fight–as Senior Proctor, Michael was obliged to investigate all incidents of violence among the university’s scholars. He had taken Bartholomew with him, anticipating that his friend’s skills as Master of Medicine might be required. The novice’s injuries were not serious, but Prior Morden was grateful for the physician’s services nonetheless, and had invited them to dine before they returned to their own college of Michaelhouse. Bartholomew, who had other patients to tend, started to decline, but Michael knew that the Dominicans ate well, and had accepted the offer before he could speak; the monk was acutely aware that the Black Friars’ supper would be far superior to anything on offer at Michaelhouse.

Prior Morden cleared his throat uncomfortably, and glanced at his assembled friars. He was a tiny man, so small he needed cushions on his chair to allow him to reach the table, and he had an odd habit of swinging his legs back and forth while he ate. It was fortunate they were short limbs, or his colleagues would have suffered cruelly from his vigorous kicks.

‘Well,’ he said eventually, his eyes straying from the monk’s flushed, greasy face to the vicinity of his right shoulder. ‘I see.’

Bartholomew could have told Michael he was wasting his time expounding to the Dominicans, who were known to be the least academically minded of the many religious orders that had gathered around the university in Cambridge. Morden had rashly mentioned an old chronicle in his library, however, which described an event in 1247: the third King Henry had presented Westminster Abbey with a phial containing blood from Christ’s passion. A violent debate was currently raging between Dominicans and Franciscans about the nature of Holy Blood, and whether it should or should not be venerated, and Michael had come down firmly on the side of the Franciscans. Bartholomew did not find the subject an especially engaging one, so kept what few thoughts he had on the issue to himself–there were far more fascinating topics to debate, and he felt it a waste to expend energy on a matter about which he was indifferent.

None of the Dominicans had spoken for some time, and the physician suspected they had understood very little of Michael’s complex analysis. Technically, Prior Morden and his friars should have been hammering on the tables with their pewter goblets, shrieking that the monk had spoken heresy within their halls. It would be what their order expected of them. But most had been more interested in their food than the monk’s erudite postulations, and Bartholomew sensed that they were bored by the monologue and wished their guest would talk about the murders he had solved or the disgraceful price of grain. Only one Black Friar looked as though he had followed what the monk had said, but he sat at that part of the table reserved for visitors, and was too polite to speak when he had not been invited to do so by his hosts.

Michael’s eyes narrowed, and he paused with a chicken leg halfway to his mouth. ‘Is that all you have to say? I think my assessment of the nature of Holy Blood warrants a more in-depth response than “I see”. Do you not agree, Matt?’

‘That theologian you kept citing,’ said Morden, before Bartholomew could formulate a suitably non-committal answer. ‘Meyronnes. I may be wrong, but I thought he was a Franciscan.’

Michael gazed at him, barely crediting that he should make such an observation when the name Meyronnes was on the lips of every scholar even remotely familiar with contemporary scholastic debate. Even Bartholomew, who was not at all interested in the controversy, knew its leading protagonists and the stances they had outlined. ‘Yes,’ he said warily. ‘What of it?’

‘Franciscans know nothing of theology,’ said Morden matter-of-factly, sounding relieved that he had got something right. ‘So, your thesis will be fatally flawed if you use
him
to prove your points.’

Michael sighed. Rivalry between the Orders was intense, particularly between Franciscans and Dominicans, and it was not unknown for scholars to dismiss entire schools of thought merely on the basis of who had proposed them. He saw, somewhat belatedly, that he would have to simplify his ideas if he wanted a sensible response from Morden and his slow-minded minions.

‘The blood relics polemic challenges some of the most basic tenets of our faith,’ he said, trying not to sound testy–he did not want to jeopardize future dining opportunities by revealing his disdain. ‘It concerns whether samples of Holy Blood–the most famous of which can be found at Hailes and Ashridge–should be venerated. The Franciscans say they should, your Order claims they should not.’

‘Well,’ said Morden again, still looking puzzled. His eyes dipped to Michael’s shoulder, and he rubbed a hand across his mouth. ‘We would of course say no, if the Franciscans say yes: it is only natural we should disagree. Christ’s blood is
not
holy, then–none of it, not a drop.’

‘But think, man!’ said Michael, becoming exasperated, despite his best intentions. ‘If you claim Holy Blood should not be venerated, then what does that say about the mass? You venerate the blood of Christ every day, so some of it must be sacred.’

‘Oh,’ said Morden, perplexed. ‘Well, if you put it like that, then I suppose it must be all right to revere these blood relics. However, as you have just pointed out, there are very few of them in existence. Most cannot be authenticated, and only Hailes and Ashridge have real ones.’

‘That is not true,’ said Bartholomew. Even he, a disinterested listener, was unwilling to allow such a wildly inaccurate statement to pass unchallenged. ‘There are flasks of Holy Blood in shrines all over the country. I hear some liquefy on special occasions, while others are associated with miracles.’

Michael’s attention was fixed on the hapless prior. ‘If you accept that blood relics
should
be venerated, then you are saying that the Franciscans are right and your own Order is wrong.’

‘I am not,’ said Morden, affronted. ‘I would never say the Franciscans are right! You are twisting my words with this complex theology.’

‘It is complex,’ agreed the visiting friar, apparently unable to bear the savaging any longer. He, too, addressed his comments to the monk’s shoulder, and the monk glanced behind him briefly, half expecting someone to be there. ‘And theologians from both Orders are proposing fascinating arguments.’

Morden remembered his manners and made some introductions, waving a tiny hand towards the visitor. ‘This is Brother Tomas from the university at Pécs. He says Pécs is near the Mediterranean Sea, although I have never heard of it. He arrived recently to read about angels.’

Tomas’s southern origins explained his dark, somewhat foreign looks and the lilting quality to his Latin. Bartholomew smiled at him, intrigued to meet a scholar who had travelled so far from home. ‘I understand Pécs has an unrivalled collection of Arabic texts on natural philosophy,’ he said.

Tomas returned the smile. ‘It has, and we—’

‘Well, I am pleased you came,’ interrupted Michael, rubbing his hands together. ‘Oxford is making a name for itself with brilliant arguments on the Holy Blood debate, but our own Franciscans are sorely hampered by the fact that these Dominicans rarely challenge their intellects. Now
you
are here, we can enter the arena and show the world the quality of our thinkers. Well, the quality of some of them, at least,’ he corrected himself, shooting a disparaging glance at Morden.

‘I would be woefully inadequate,’ said Tomas modestly. ‘Especially since Master Witney of Grey Hall in Oxford is studying in Cambridge this term–he is one of the Franciscans’ acknowledged experts on blood relics, and I cannot compete with him. He is staying at Bernard’s Hostel, where I am told the university houses its most auspicious visiting scholars.’