Текст книги "The butcher of Avignon"

Автор книги: Cassandra Clark

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Текущая страница: 19 (всего у книги 20 страниц)

**

He forced her along the gallery that ran high up above the floor of the Grand Chamber. It was the best place to view the pattern of the glazed tiles made by the skilled craftsmen from Byzantium on the floor below.

Now, although she was not close enough to the parapet to see, worshippers would be kneeling on them, the pope himself would be standing on them with his arms raised to receive the Eucharist, the choir would sing the responses while standing on them, and an ironic and misplaced holiness would fill the stone vault with its hymns.

Incense was spreading an intoxicating languor as it floated upwards to the gallery. To recall the wayward soul to the ineluctable passage of time a bell sounded, emptying with diminishing overtones into the empyrean.

Escrick was immune to everything but Hildegard. ‘I can’t wait.’ His grasp tightened as he dragged her to a standstill and forced his mouth over hers. The heat from his body carried a powerful stench of raw meat, horse dung and his own personal smell. She tried not to breathe it in. He lifted his mouth from hers long enough to snarl, ‘Shut your eyes as you did in Florence. Surrender to me. Say my name.’ He squeezed one of her breasts but she refused to cry out at the pain. ‘Say it!’ he repeated.

‘Escrick –’ she gasped.

‘Tell me you want me.’ He squeezed again.

‘I want you – ’

‘And only me.’

‘Escrick, I’m fainting – ’

‘Say you want only me.’

‘Only you.’ She was gasping with pain and rage and the violent desire to wrench from out of his grasp but he was overpoweringly strong, no match for any but the most muscle-bound champion of the militia.

He backed her against the wall. Nearby, further along, was a door. It was ajar. As he pressed against her, she moved in his embrace and when he dragged her skirt up she slid along the wall, with Escrick, breathing hard, mirroring her moves until they were close to it. Taking him by surprise, she suddenly wrenched herself from his under his weight and hurled herself through the opening. Putting her shoulder to the door, she slammed it hard into his face as he sprang after her.

He yowled like a wounded beast. Curses followed. It was a moment or two before he recovered sufficiently to throw his full weight against it.

By the time it flew open and he burst after her, she was running up the stairs and into a labyrinth of narrow passages and arcades. Ducking and weaving under the roof supports she ran blindly until, gasping for breath, for life, she squeezed through a gap between two pillars and found herself in an open gully on the outside of the building.

She flattened herself against the stonework and held her breath. Somewhere in the corridor came the clatter of Escrick’s mail boots on the stone paving, followed by a bang as a door ddown below was flung back, more footsteps, this time fading, and then the sound of another door opening, distantly. His footsteps receded.

She glanced round. The last people to walk the gulley must have been the masons as they put the finishing touches to the gargoyles on the roof more than a decade ago.

A cacophony of screeches started up when she made a move. An eagle owl with huge wings outspread was streaking down towards her with its hooked beak darting for her eyes. She pulled her hood over her face and beat wildly to deflect it with her spare hand then began to crawl slowly along the gulley towards a niche behind one of the stone gargoyles. More hawks began to circle the towers of the palace with inhuman screeches at the interloper.

She dare not look down but crouched in terror as the birds corkscrewed into the air then dropped towards her, only at the last moment spinning away with baffled cries as they understood this new prey was unreachable. Their endless screams would surely draw attention to a human interloper in their eyrie. When one of the larger hawks stooped to attack she reached into her sleeve and threw a morsel of bread, earning enough time to crawl further along the gully into a cavity underneath the stone-work. The wind grasped and tuckered and tried to loosen her grip but little by little she edged out of sight of the birds.

There was no sound of Escrick climbing onto the roof. He would not expect her to have risked climbing outside. He would be searching the labyrinth of passages in the tower.

Somehow she forced herself to crawl further along until she found a space out of sight of anyone climbing onto the roof. With the wind still blustering at her robes she tucked the spare fabric into her belt and crouched down to plan a way of escape.

How long would she have to remain here? She would have to sit it out until it seemed safe enough to return inside. A sob of fear at the height of the building blurred her thoughts for a moment but she fought it back. She would not fall if she was careful and it might be some time before Escrick brought help to search her out, some long time before they thought of looking up here for her.

A leering gargoyle with tangled locks provided a vantage point from behind which she could peer down into the main courtyard and yet remain out of sight. As she reached for a handhold, a piece of stone broke off and she saw it go spinning over the edge of the gutter to fall without a sound into the yard far below.

**

Cramped and cold and fearing to move but thankfully still unseen, she watched the comings and goings in the courtyard. Eventually, the recognisable shape of Escrick Fitzjohn appeared, accompanied by a figure wearing a long, black cloak. It must be Athanasius. Someone had set him free.

Both men walked slowly along, staring upwards as if trying to catch sight of a movement that would reveal her hiding place to them. A group of men-at-arms joined them. She was frozen, both with the cold and with the more abstract feeling of fear. She told herself that if she kept still long enough they might go on thinking she had found a hiding place inside and she prayed that they would lead themselves on a wild goose chase and search the hundreds of chambers in the palace. They would probably imagine no woman would dare climb out onto the roof of such a frighteningly high edifice.

The hawks had lost interest in her. If she kept still enough they would forget she was here at all.

She watched the men below through a chink in the sculpted stone as they walked the entire length of the yard with their attention fixed up towards the spires of the roof. Then she watched them walk back again. A crowd of onlookers gathered. Everyone was staring upwards and pointing. She saw Sir John Fitzjohn’s colours down there. No sign of Sir John himself.

Eventually, the men moved off and entered la Grande Chapelle for the next office, followed by a few onlookers. The day shortened. Shadows filled the corners of the yard. Eventually, a posse of riders rounded the corner of the stable yard. They looked like toys, so small and distant were they,

It turned out to be quite a large retinue, prepared for travel by the look of the sumpter wagon that followed. She stared more intently. A litter was slung between two horses. The cardinal on a high-stepping grey was surely Cardinal Fondi. The litter must be carrying Carlotta and her daughter.

When the cavalcade reached the gatehouse a figure in white stepped out to meet them and, with a wave of one hand, watched the horses jostle under the arch onto the lane outside. She daren’t even imagine it was Hubert.

The cavalcade continued to ride out through the walls. She was high enough to see them take the road on the other side going east. Fondi’s pennants fluttered above the wall of the enclave for some distance. He was travelling away, then. Not back to the villa on the other side of the bridge – but taking the road to Urbino.

Escrick Fitzjohn and Athanasius had long since disappeared but some men-at-arms sauntered back, looking about as if they expected Hildegard to appear from out of the ground in front of them. Where was Escrick? Her ears strained to hear the sound of anyone clambering onto the roof but it was the intermittent shrieks of the hawks and the whine of the wind round the gargoyles that assaulted her ears without end.

It was desperately cold. Her teeth would not stop rattling. She pulled her hood over her face and breathed into it to get warm. If she could only stay up here long enough among the stone gryphons, the basilisks and the manticores, and all the other beasts of nightmare the masons had imagined, they might believe she had escaped from the palace altogether.

She could stay for as long as she did not need to eat or drink. Her scrip contained her usual small flask and a morsel of bread and cheese. They would last. Things were not so bad. When it was dark she would make a move. If only she could stop herself from looking down.

**

Time dragged. It gave her plenty of time to think about Escrick Fitzjohn. His strange pursuit of her was like an obsession. She was blamed for everything bad that had happened to him since they first met. His dreams of what he would do to her when she was in his power were made worse by the erotic attraction he seemed to feel for her. She shivered with a fear that was more than physical.

He had made a remark about the guild of pages that bothered her. We have them safe. What did he mean by that?

Were they imprisoned in the tower as the miners had been imprisoned? Would Sir John stand for that? It would be a gross insult to have his own body servants imprisoned by a foreign power. Maybe Escrick only meant that his brother held them?

She recalled the brutality Sir John had doled out to Edmund for the slightest misdemeanour. She remembered Edmund’s white rage and feared for what he might do if he found himself imprisoned. If he fought back he would be brutally restrained by the greater forces of Fitzjohn’s men-at-arms.

She thought of Bertram, so steady and sure with the practicality of a merchant’s son. Of little Elfric and his grief at his brother’s murder. Of Simon, the youngest, and his determination to keep up with the older boys. Of Peterkin. This was surely something he could not talk his way out of. She tried to reassure herself with the thought that they were not children. They would know how to behave to keep themselves safe. They were not ignorant striplings as Escrick imagined. They were apprentices for war.

King Richard was ten when he shouldered the burden of kingship, limited though the Council made his control. Richard’s own father had been fourteen when he commanded a battalion in the French war and led his men to victory against the odds at Crecy.

Richard himself had been fourteen when he led the rebels out to Mile End to avoid a massacre. A boy could marry at fifteen and take on the responsibilities of fatherhood, sign legal documents, own property. The guild was not made up of infants. They would find a way.

Her thoughts turned to Escrick again. He was the one who found Maurice in the treasury. Had killed him in cold blood. Had been forced to wait for Clement to view the body after the long night service and the end of lauds. Had been unable to take the knife from the fingers set in the grip of rigor mortis. It was Escrick who had gone to the mortuary a few hours later and when the hand relaxed had slipped the knife from Maurice’s dead grasp. His personal reward for a service rendered.

He was the stranger at le Coq d’or who had offered a jewelled dagger, in ignorance of its true secret, to the highest bidder. Taillefer had stolen it back and tried to make his escape and been killed under the bridge on the raft of debris that had built up against the bank and made a sort of fragile bridge of its own. He had not needed to go onto the bridge of St Benezet and had not fallen from it but tried to escape along the river bank onto the only refuge he could find.

And the Scottish nun? By then Escrick knew Hildegard was in Avignon and on his trail, tried to silence her and, in the darkness of the night, had made a dreadful blunder.

She wondered if, in fact, he realised that the jewelled dagger was more important to his master than the price of rubies. His heart would have stopped if he realised he had made another disastrous mistake by stealing it for merely personal gain.

She thought of the figure in white who had come out just now to say adieu to Fondi and his contingent.

It was Hubert de Courcy. Saying farewell to his ally, his fellow Clementist, the enemy of King Richard. Fondi. His job done. The supply of poison safely delivered. Now back on the road to Urbino.

Hubert. Her feelings got the better of her for a moment and tears flooded her eyes. Blinking them away she became more determined than ever to escape back to England. She would see Mr Medford. Show him the poison. Tell him every detail of what had taken place. The fight to save the king would continue. Woodstock must be defeated.

Night fell like a shroud over the palace. Hildegard felt colder than ever. A brief respite came when the wind dropped around midnight. Even so she could scarcely move by the time she decided to force her frozen limbs to life and risk climbing back inside the palace.

**

With her hood up and her dark cloak fastened by its usual silver pin, she looked like any other monastic coming from the night office in the chapel.

Conscious that her Cistercian habit of white stamyn might draw attention, she pushed its long sleeves out of sight and made herself less conspicuous by merging with the tail end of a group of black-robed Benedictines. When they filed along towards the guest wing she followed. Her first task was to find out what had happened to the guild of pages. Her second task would be to collect the phial of poison from her chamber. And her third task would be to find a horse and ride for England.

It was unfortunate that Hubert de Courcy and his two Cistercian brothers should be leaving the chapel at the same time as the Benedictines. They suddenly appeared from out of a side door and she could not avoid walking past them. Head down, she carried on after the others. When she came to the door leading into their dormitory she hesitated, hoping to slip away unnoticed, but when she turned to glance down the passage Hubert was standing at the end staring after her.

She swiftly bent down as if she had dropped something and when she stood up he had disappeared.

With a sideways glance into the dormitory she made her way to the end of the passage and descended a flight of steps. They led into one of the yards and keeping to the shadows she walked round the edge until she came to a door that seemed to lead back inside. Another flight of steps took her as she had hoped to the entrance to the wing where Sir Jack was staying.

All she had to do was to avoid coming face to face with him. With a vague idea that she might ask one of the kitcheners what had happened to the pages, on the assumption that the boys would have to be fed, she decided to try the kitchen first but before she could get inside she had to pass the porter in his lodge.

**

He was visible through the open door. A single cresset burned in a bracket on the wall behind him. He had a short sword lying on the bench where he was sitting but it was in a worn leather sheath and looked as if it had not been used for some time.

He was busily cleaning his nails with the tip of his meat knife. After a while he finished with that and began to sing a tune about a husband cheating on his wife. He thumped one fist on his knee to keep time. After a few verses he got bored with that and began to pick his teeth with the same knife he had used for his nails.

Eventually he flung the knife down and glanced round with a loud sigh. His chair creaked as he leaned back in it, yawning and stretching. Hildegard, hidden behind the door and observing his performance through the crack, willed him to go to sleep but, despite his yawns, he was as lively as a cricket. He stood up and began to pace about the entrance hall, stretching now and then, shuffling a little series of dance steps from the farandole that by and by brought him towards the open door. He leaned against the door post and gazed longingly out into the courtyard.

A lot of noise was coming from over the other side and he watched for a few minutes as if making up his mind whether to go out and join them. It was evident a hunt was going on.

Hildegard shrank back into the shadows. She wondered if she could say anything to the porter to bluff her way past but she was worried that the rumour of her escape from the clutches of Clement’s personal body guard would have been told in such a way as to make her capture an enticing prize.

She waited impatiently to see what he would do next. If he stepped outside she would be across the floor and down the stairs before he turned back.

To her chagrin he returned to his lodge, rubbing his hands against the cold and blowing out his cheeks. When he sat down he pulled some dice from his sleeve and began to throw, playing against himself. When he won he cheered audibly, other times he uttered a soft curse but whether it was the same ‘he’ each time or whether he changed sides to even the odds against himself she could not tell.

I certainly can’t stand here all night, she decided when his game began to bore her. With her hood well over her face she waited until he dropped one of the dice and had to bend down to search for it under the bench and then she stepped to the door of his lodge as if she had just walked across the yard.

‘Greetings, master. It’s a raw night,’ she announced boldly in French.

He looked surprised. ‘What are you doing out? Lost your way after matins?’

‘Not at all. I’m told Sir John was suffering from the gripe earlier. I’ve brought the potion he asked for.’

‘First I’ve heard.’

‘It’s not the sort of thing he broadcasts. The workings of his bowels he regards as private.’

‘You’re right there. Butt of too much ribaldry already. Butt, get it?’ He stood up, slapping his backside and chortling at his own joke. ‘I’ll come with you, sister.’

Her heart sank. ‘I need to get water from the kitchen first.’

He pointed with his thumb. ‘Down there. I’ll wait here for you.’

‘My thanks, master.’

Before she could get away he told her, ‘There’s activity over the other side of the courtyard tonight, all right. You must have seen it. They’re ransacking every hole and corner for that witch. Reckon they’ll be starting over here next.’

‘Doubtless.’

She walked away, stiff-backed with fear in case he called her bluff. When she gained the stair that led downwards she let out a long breath.

With no time to waste, she hurried into the unlighted kitchen where the spit boy was a sprawled shape beside the glowing embers of the fire.

Crouching down beside him, she whispered, ‘Young master, wake up.’ She had to repeat it several times before he opened his eyes.

With her fingers softly on his lips she said, ‘Shush now…I have a question. For our lady’s sake, where is the esquire of Sir John being kept?’

In the firelight the boy looked half-asleep and was too drowsy to think clearly, but it worked in her favour because he muttered automatically, ‘Under lock and key in the store where the sacks of grain are kept. But here -’ he sat bolt upright. ‘Who wants to know?’

‘No-one. You have seen no-one. This is but a dream. Go back to sleep.’

After a glance to see if the person bending over him had a knife to stick in him, he sank back into his rags and covered his head to demonstrate agreement.

**

The store rooms were down a short adjoining passage. It was pitch black once she left the glow of the kitchen fire but out of the darkness she unexpectedly heard a voice.

It was Edmund and it came from a door on her right. She was about to knock softly upon it when she heard him say, ‘On the count of three. One, two, and -’ exactly on the count of three four voices broke into a raucous song. It was so loud and sung with such deliberation she guessed it was some kind of ploy. Its timing could not have been worse.

With a hurried glance behind her she was about to look for a hiding place when the sound abruptly stopped.

‘That’s not bad but we need something to drum with.’ Edmund’s voice.

Before the chorus could start up again she knocked on the door, louder than intended, and called, ‘Edmund?’

An uncanny silence fell on the other side.

She knocked again a little more quietly. ‘Edmund, it’s me, Hildegard of Meaux.’

He must have pressed his lips to the other side of the door because she heard a whisper of sound, then the question, ‘Are you alone? Answer only yes if you are.’

‘Yes.’

There was a scuffle. ‘Praise be! We heard what happened. You turned yourself into a witch and vanished. Are you all right?’

‘So far. What about yourselves?’

‘We’re about to break free. We have a plan to lure the guard down here. Our moves are planned the way we planned the game with the pig’s bladder. Simon, as smallest, will escape unnoticed in the turmoil and race to the stables where he’ll saddle horses. We’re going to storm the bridge and get across to Villeneuve.’

‘They’ll expect you to do that. You’d be better to escape along the bank towards Pont Saint Esprit where you can make a river crossing. You’ll be in the Kingdom of France almost as soon as you leave the palace.’

There was a silence. She thought she could hear a whispered discussion.

‘Is that where you’re headed?’

‘That’s my intention, yes, after I’ve attended to a little business.’

‘Then we’ll have a horse ready for you too.’

‘How are you going to lure the guard?’

‘Like sirens luring Ulysses,’ came the reply, ‘by the sweetness of our singing.’

The rest of his words were lost as a light blazed behind her. With a clutch of fear she saw a white shape gliding towards her on sandalled feet. A flaring cresset made shadows leap across the walls.

‘Hildegard? What in hell’s name are you doing here?’

She backed against the wall. It was Hubert de Courcy. Now all was lost. There was nowhere to run and he would hand her over to the guards unless she could get away.

Waiting until he was almost up to her, she suddenly reached out and dashed the cresset to the ground. He stumbled, taken by surprise, but, trained in combat as he was, he immediately blocked her escape with his body as she charged against him. Flames from the cresset leaped around their feet as they struggled. He kicked them to one side.

‘Stop, Hildegard! I’m here to help.’

‘Get out of my way!’

‘Listen to me! The guards are crossing over to this side of the courtyard -’ When she tried to speak he held one hand over her mouth and put his lips close to her ear. ‘Listen. They’ve scoured every inch on the other side of the palace. The fact that you’ve vanished without trace is making them talk about witches. There isn’t much time. We’ve got to leave now.’ He released her.

‘We?’

‘I’m coming with you to make sure you get safely back through France.’

‘Hubert, you’re a Clementist – ’

She could feel his astonishment as he jerked back. ‘Never!’ he snarled. ‘I’d rather make a pact with the devil. Now come on.’

‘Fitzjohn’s pages -’ she indicated the locked door of the store room. ‘They’re prisoners.’

‘I know. That’s why I came down. To see what I could do to release them. I didn’t expect to find you here – ’

Just then the sound of metal-shod boots rang on the floor above.

‘Too late!’ Hubert grabbed her by the arm and pulled her after him back along the passage. When they reached the kitchen, men were already clattering at the top of the steps, maybe tipped off by the porter. Hubert pulled her back as he swerved into the wine cellar next door.

‘Hide among the barrels. They can’t move every one. If they do we’ll take them by surprise and go down fighting.’

Without arguing she ran deeper into the cellar and began to climb up onto the stack of wine barrels, high enough to be out of sight of any arcing torchlight. She had to lie full length, her body almost touching the curved brick of the ceiling.

Then, suddenly, unaware of the approaching guards, the boys began to sing. It was very loud even from a distance. They were bellowing at the tops of their voices. The guards changed direction. A fist thumped on a door. The guards were shouting now as well.

How many were there? It was impossible to tell from the noise they made. It could have been three, it could have been ten.

Not ten, surely? No more than three, to be hoped. The boys could handle three.

Suddenly mayhem broke out. The door must have been pulled open. Something happened causing a loud thump. A loud yell followed, then the sound of lightly running feet. Simon. A confusing melee of shouts and crashes followed. Prepared to find a nun despite the noise of singing, the guards were clearly astonished at their reception. Hildegard heard their shouted arguments: follow them, don’t let them escape! And: keep on the trail of the bloody nun. And a more plaintive voice asking: has she changed into a pack of devils?

Escrick’s familiar voice growled above them all, silencing them. ‘Let Jack sort out his own problems. One of you go after the lads, to show willing.’ Receding footsteps hurried after the boys up the steps.

Escrick’s voice darkened. ‘We go after the nun. We find her. We kill her.’

Footsteps approached the wine cellar.

There must have been three of them. One despatched to pursue the boys. Two remaining to enter the wine cellar and begin their search.

**

Hildegard could hear the sounds getting closer. They were banging on the wine barrels with the hilts of their swords as they probed between them on both sides of the stacks.

A stranger’s voice muttered, ‘No sign of anybody, captain.’

Escrick shouted a curse. ‘She’s got to be in here.’

‘Bloody invisible, then.’

‘She can’t just vanish!’

‘Maybe she got out through the kitchen when we turned off to see what that racket was about?’

‘Mebbe you’re right.’

She heard them, still banging randomly on the wine casks, walk back towards the door.

And then a terrible thing happened. One of the barrels moved. Dislodged by the hammering of their sword hilts, it shifted on top of the stack. The sound brought them to a halt.

‘Hear that?’

‘She’s here. Somebody is.’

Heavy footsteps trod towards the wall of barrels close to where Hildegard was hiding.

The flaming torch one of them carried swung from side to side and in its sweeping glare she caught a glimpse of Hubert as the barrel he was lying on was dislodged and he was falling down between the toppling barrels to land with a thunderous crash on the cellar floor.

A dark shape loomed over him.

‘And who have we here?’ It was Escrick. His tone was gloating. ‘Is it a spy I see before me?’

**

Down below in the circle of light Hildegard saw Hubert rise to his feet but before he could do anything Escrick smashed one mailed fist into his face. Hubert staggered but came back with bunched fists but before he could return the blow the other man-at-arms grabbed him from behind. Once, twice, Escrick hit him in the face again until blood poured down his face. Hubert said not a word.

She watched as the guard jerked Hubert so hard back he nearly lost his footing. ‘A Cistercian?’ He spat. ‘You’re supposed to be one of us, brother. What are you skulking down here for?’

Escrick grabbed the front of Hubert’s robes and pulled him upright. ‘I know all about the Abbot of Meaux, don’t you worry, mate,’ he growled to his companion. ‘And where he is that bitch nun will be. Come on, abbot, you’d better tell us and save yourself from really getting hurt.’

Still Hubert remained mute.

Hildegard could not tell what happened next because they moved out of her line of vision. She could hear it though. The thwack of a fist into muscle. The hiss of metal as a sword was drawn. Punches, many of them. The heavy breathing of Hubert’s assailants. No other sound.

Then the guard spoke. ‘Any last words, my lord abbot?’

‘Wait!’ It was Escrick. ‘Let’s take our time and see whether his saints will swoop down to rescue him.’

The guard began to laugh. ‘I like that, captain! You’re full of good ideas!’

‘We’ll see it as a scholarly discussion on the power of angels. Does that suit you, de Courcy?’

‘I’m a papal legate,’ she heard Hubert say in a muffled voice. ‘Think twice before you go too far.’

‘I know you. You’re a spy. I’ve had my eye on you since you got here. You and your bitch, your doxy, that so-called nun, Hildegard. You’re both spies and you know what happens to spies when they’re caught.’

The truth came to Hildegard regrettably late. Of course Hubert was a spy. But not on behalf of Clement! It was obvious now. Why had she doubted him? Hubert, she whispered. Why could I not guess why you were here?

There was another muffled thump and a gasp of pain quickly repressed.

Escrick rasped, ‘Before you get down on your knees to pray, abbot, you’ll tell us what you know about this disappearing nun.’

Silence.

The thump of a fist.

‘I tell you, she tasted good when I almost had her earlier. That’s a feast I’m looking forward to.’

No response.

‘Talk, damn you. Where is she?’

‘You’d better do as he says,’ added the guard.

‘Or what?’ Hubert’s voice.

Another thump.

‘Where is she?’

Again nothing from Hubert.

‘That’s it. I’ll make him talk. Grab him by the – ’

Hildegard could stand it no longer. Levering herself onto her side so that she could get some purchase on the barrel next to her own she pushed with both feet until, with a roar, the barrel rolled off the one beneath and, crashing down, brought others with it so that the entire cellar was suddenly rumbling with crashing barrels, each weighing several tons as the carefully balanced stack gave way. Some splintered open as they hit the ground. Wine gushed out.

She prayed Hubert would be quick enough to get out of the way.

Wood continued to crack as the barrels fell, wine spraying over the floor. She heard the howl of a wounded man and a screamed oath reverberated throughout the cellar.

She slid rapidly to the ground. Hubert was flattened against the wall of barrels on the other side, trying to drag more of them down, while Escrick and the other guard, encumbered by their mailed boots, slithered in a tide of spurting wine and rolling, roiling barrels bursting in all directions.