AYCLIFFE’S BLACK-BEARDED FACE, hard, sharp eyes, and frowning lips were frighteningly familiar. So was the sword at his side. The more I gazed on him, the more my panic rose and my eyes turned toward the floor.
“You,” he said into the silence. “Asta’s son.” Though it was a struggle to lift my eyes, I did so. His gaze showed such disdain, I could feel my wrath rise within. Here was the man who had been so cruel to my mother. Who had treated me with such contempt and wished me dead. Who had murdered Father Quinel. Who had abducted Bear.
“The wolf’s head,” he said. “How dare such a filthy peasant as you even presume to put your foot within this place?” He turned toward the entryway.
“If you’re intending to call the guards,” I said, “tell them Lord Furnival’s son has come.”
He halted and turned back to me. His swarthy face had become pale. “What did you say?”
“I am Crispin,” I said, working to keep my gaze steady on his face. “Lord Furnival’s son.”
I saw him glance over my shoulder at the image of Lord Furnival, comparing me to him.
“You’re nothing of the kind,” he said and once again turned to go.
“You know what I’ve said is true,” I said, hoping he wouldn’t hear the quaver in my voice. “You’ve always known.”
Again he paused. “You’re not even human,” was his reply.
“I’ve proof,” I insisted.
“You can’t prove what isn’t so.”
In haste, I took out my cross of lead from my leather pouch. “It’s written here,” I said, holding it up. “It was my mother’s. Given to me when she died. She wrote the words on it.”
“Words? What words’?”
“It reads, ‘Crispin—son of Furnival.'”
For a moment he was still. Then he said, “Anyone can write words.”
“Not anyone,” I said with growing anger. “It was my mother. And I believe them. As do others. And people will need only look upon me to see who I am. And when I say I am the grandson of Lord Douglas—”
“Give that cross to me!” he cried, holding out his hand.
“No,” I said. “It belongs to me.”
Furious, he stepped forward and lifted a fist as though to strike me.
In response I held up my hand, using the cross that rested in my palm as a shield.
He hesitated.
“I know what happened,” I said. “Lord Furnival brought my mother to Stromford. He left her there with me, making you our keeper and granting us only a living death. When Richard du Brey came to Stromford with news that my father had returned to England and was mortally ill, you were charged with killing me. It’s you who fear me. You fear I’ll become your lord.”
He made no response, but his eyes told me that I was right.
“It was you who killed Father Quinel,” I went on. “To keep him from telling me who I was. It was you who said I was a thief and proclaimed me a wolf’s head so that any man might kill me.”
“Your mother was nothing but a servant,” Aycliffe said. “She was too low to reach so high. She forgot her place. It didn’t serve her well. There’s an order to things which God Himself has put in place. It can never be changed. How can you expect to stand against it?”
“I came for something else,” I said, hardly able to contain my fury.
“Money?” he said.
“Your soldiers took a friend of mine.”
He said nothing.
“He goes by the name of Bear,” I continued. “A great red-bearded man.”
“What about him?”
“If you’ll let the two of us—both him and me—leave Great Wexly, we’ll not come back. You’ll never see me again.”
After a moment he said, “How can I be sure?”
I lifted my trembling hand. “I’ll swear it on this cross.”
“You forget,” he said, “you’re a wolf’s head. All I have to do is call the guards. Anyone may kill you. You’re nothing.” So saying, he turned about and stepped from the room.
I reacted by reaching down, snatching up the dagger, and leaping forward, flinging myself at his back.
I took him by such surprise that with a cry, he stumbled, tripped, and fell, crashing to the ground. Even as he struggled to reach his sword, I was on him again, knocking him down a second time.
I pressed the dagger’s point into his neck. “If you call the guards, I’ll kill you,” I cried, pushing his face to the floor.
Panting heavily, he made no response.
Summoning all my strength, I drew the blade against his neck. Blood began to flow. “What you wanted for me,” I said, “is about to happen to you.”
“Will you,” he whispered desperately, “swear upon that cross and in the name of God, that if I let you and this man go, you’ll never come back and make no claim upon the house of Furnival?”
“Willingly.”
“And you’ll give me that cross?”
“When we have passed through the city gates.” Even as I spoke I worked to keep my hand steady so he never ceased to feel the pressure of the dagger’s point. “But you,” I said, “must swear first.”
“I … will,” he said, as though it was a painful thing to say.
I released him.
He sat up, and touched his neck, looking at the blood that smeared his fingers.
“Swear,” I said holding up the cross of lead but keeping the dagger near.
He hesitated, but then he said, “In the sacred name of Jesus, I, John Aycliffe, swear that I shall allow you—Asta’s son—and the man called Bear, to leave this city insofar as you have sworn never to return, never to claim Lord Furnival to be your father, and to leave the cross with me.”
Then I said, “In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, I, Crispin, do swear that if you let Bear go, he and I will leave Great Wexly and never return. Nor will I ever make claim that Lord Furnival was my father. Furthermore, once out of the city I’ll give you the cross.
“Now,” I said, “take me to Bear.”
His reply was to gaze at me with eyes full of hate. But then he got to his feet and began to walk away, saying, “Follow me.”