Something had been painted on the smooth planks covering the walls of the chancel. There were no marks of axe blades on the crude paintings, nor had they been defiled with soot or excrement; the Warriors of God who had camped there evidently didn’t have the time. Or the inclination.
Reynevan moved closer.
The picture covered the entire chancel. It was actually a cycle of pictures, a sequence of scenes presented in order.
The Totentanz.
The painter hadn’t been a great artist. He was actually rather mediocre—and most probably self-taught. Who knew, perhaps for reasons of frugality the parish priest or curate had taken up brush and paint? The figures had been painted primitively, with amusingly distorted proportions. The spindly skeletons—so comical they were terrifying—were cavorting and leading the painting’s various dramatis personae in a dance of death. A pope, an emperor in a crown, a knight in armour holding a spear, a merchant with a sack of gold and an astrologer with exaggeratedly Semitic features. All of the figures were comical, woefully pathetic and aroused, if not laughter, then smiles of pity. Death itself was pitiful and grotesquely ridiculous in its pose and shroud, delivering its eschatological memento mori, written above its skull in angular black letters. The letters were painted neatly and the words were legible—the artist was a decidedly better calligrapher than a painter.
Come forth, you mortals
All lament is in vain
You shall have to dance
To my tune!
The hex unexpectedly pulsated with magical power. And Death suddenly turned its grotesque skull. And stopped being grotesque. It became ghastly. As the church’s shadowy interior became even gloomier, the painting on the planks became brighter. Death’s shroud shone white, its deathly eyes blazed, the blade of the scythe gripped in its bony hands flashed horribly.
In front of Death stood the Maiden, one of the allegorical players in the deathly procession, stooping modestly. She had Jutta’s features. And her voice. It begged Death for mercy in Jutta’s voice. Her pleading voice resounded in Reynevan’s skull like a flute, like a little bell.
I am a beautiful bride
Fair before the world…
When it responded to Jutta’s pleas, Death’s voice sounded like bones being crushed, like iron scraping on glass, like rusty cemetery gates creaking.
Already you are changed,
Now bereft of colour!
Reynevan understood. He tumbled out of the church, leaped onto his horse and urged it into a gallop with cries and jabs of his spurs. The cruel voice still croaked in his ears.
Already you are changed,
Now bereft of colour!
He could see from a distance that something wasn’t right in the convent. The gate—which was usually securely locked—had been flung open and the shapes of people and horses were visible in the courtyard. Reynevan hunched over in the saddle and forced his mount into an even more desperate gallop.
And that’s when they caught up with him.
First a spell was cast, a thunderous jolt of power that panicked the horse and flung Reynevan from the saddle. Before he managed to get up, a dozen men rushed out from ditches and behind trees and fell on him. He drew his knife from his bootleg and with two sweeping cuts managed to slash two of them, stopping a third with a short stab to the face. But the others fell on him. They stunned him with heavy blows and knocked him to the ground. Kicked him. Pinned him down. Overpowered him. And bound his wrists behind his back.
“Tighter.” He heard a familiar voice. “Pull the ropes tighter, don’t spare him! If you break anything, it matters little. Let him have a taste of what awaits him.”
They jerked him upright. He opened his eyes. And trembled.
Before him stood the Wallcreeper. Birkart Grellenort.
Reynevan’s head was spinning from a punch in the face and his cheek and eye were stinging as though scorched by red-hot iron. The Wallcreeper swung, hit him again with a reverse blow, with the back of his gauntleted hand. Reynevan tasted blood in his mouth.
“That was just to attract your attention,” the Wallcreeper explained softly. “To make you concentrate. Are you concentrating?”
Reynevan didn’t reply. Twisting his head, he tried to see what was happening beyond the convent gate and identify the riders and pikemen moving around in the courtyard. One thing was certain—they weren’t Black Riders from the Company. The men holding him looked like ordinary hired thugs. Beside the thugs stood a small fellow with a round face and clothing identifying him as a Walloon. And eyes revealing him as a wizard. It was that Walloon, Reynevan guessed, whose spell had flung him from the saddle.
“Did you delude yourself that I would forget about you?” drawled the Wallcreeper. “Or that I wouldn’t find you? I warned you I have eyes and ears everywhere.”
He swung and struck Reynevan’s already swelling cheek again. His eye, tender from the previous blow, began to water. As did his other. And his nose began to run. The Wallcreeper leaned over towards him. Very close.
“I had the impression you were still not giving me all of your attention,” he hissed, “and I demand it all. Think hard. And listen carefully. You are caught. You will not escape with your life. But I can get you out of it. I can save your skin. If you promise me you’ll take me to… You know who. To that astral being who disguises himself as a huge halfwit. You’ll save your life if you take me to—”
“I say! M’Lord Grellenort!”
A knight in full plate armour looked down on them from the height of the saddle. He was on a horse in a caparison with a blue and silver chequerboard pattern. Reynevan recognised him. And remembered him.
“The duke demands he be brought before him. At once.”
“Have you decided?” the Wallcreeper hissed. “Will you take me to him?”
“No.”
“You will regret it.”
The convent courtyard was teeming with horsemen and foot soldiers. Unlike the Wallcreeper’s motley and rather ragged thugs, the bowmen and foot soldiers in the courtyard were attired decently and uniformly in black and red livery. Armoured men, both esquires and knights, predominated among the horsemen.
“Bring him here! Bring the Hussite!”
Reynevan knew that voice. He knew the physique, the handsome, manly face, the nape fashionably shaved in the knightly mode. He knew the black and red eagle.
The armoured men in the convent courtyard were commanded by Jan, Duke of Ziębice. In his ducal person, in an ermine-trimmed cloak over Milanese armour.
“Bring him closer.” He beckoned imperiously with a jerk of his head. “M’Lord Marshal of the Court Borschnitz! M’Lord Grellenort! Bring him here! And get that Walloon out of my sight! I can’t bear magicians!”
Reynevan was brought closer. The duke looked down at him from the height of his knightly saddle. His eyes were bright, blue-grey. Reynevan now realised whom the eyes and features of the abbess’s face reminded him of.
“The mills of God grind slowly, yet exceedingly fine,” declared Jan of Ziębice nasally and loftily. “Slowly, but exceedingly fine, yes, yes. You’ve renounced your religion and the cross, Bielawa, you Judas. You have engaged in witchcraft. You planned to murder me. You will be punished, Bielawa. Punished for your crimes.”