The Doomsday Code

Liam cocked his head then turned to Becks. ‘Did he just say we can’t enter here?’

‘Affirmative.’

‘Well, it’s not so hard, then, this Old English.’ He turned back to the young man, wearing the white robe and black apron of a Cistercian monk. ‘Can … you … understand … me?’ he said slowly.

The boy swallowed, eyes darting left and right, and up at Bob’s expressionless big-boned face. Eventually his shaking head nodded. ‘A-aye …’

Liam relaxed a little. This is going to be easier than I thought.

‘We’re after someone called Cabot. He’s supposed to live here. Do you know him?’

The boy’s eyes narrowed.

‘This is Kirklees Priory, right? We got the right place, have we?’

‘Kirk-laigh,’ the boy uttered.

‘Yes, Kirklees Priory? This place?’

The boy nodded slowly. ‘Aye, Kirk-laigh.’

‘And Cabot? Is there a man called Cabot living here?’

The frowning again.

‘Information,’ uttered Becks quietly.

‘What?’

‘Your pronunciation of the name may be incorrect.’

‘Well then, how would you say it?’

‘Try Car-boh.’

The boy’s eyes widened at the sound of that. ‘S-seek ye … S-Sebastien Cabot?’

Liam shrugged. ‘Aye, that’s him.’

The boy pointed a wobbling finger towards a low, thatched stable on the far side of the gardens. ‘Yonder … B-Brother Sebastien tends to the h-horses.’

Liam handed the boy a broad smile. ‘Thanking you.’

They crossed the gardens, watching the silent monks edging back from them. In the stillness a cluster of loose chickens happily pecked and clucked brainlessly. Liam pulled open the barn door; it creaked deafeningly in the still grey morning. Inside it was dark save for faint dapples of weak light that had found a way through threadbare patches of thatch above. He could hear the hoarse rasp of animals breathing.

‘Is there a Say-bas-tee-en Cay-bow in here?’ He cringed at his own mangling of the pronunciation.

‘Aye!’ a voice called back. Grating and deep. ‘Who seekes him?’

‘Uhh … my name’s Liam.’

He heard the scrape and rustle of movement from somewhere among dark stalls and a moment later a robed figure emerged into the thin light of the open doorway.

Cabot wore the same Cistercian robe and apron, but looked unlike the other pale-faced monks still standing amid furrowed lanes of turned soil like forlorn ghosts. He stood an inch shorter than Liam, but a great deal broader; wide shoulders accustomed to bearing old muscle. A greying beard covered pockmarked and leathery skin, and battle-hardened muddy green eyes stared out beneath a thick brow broken by a livid pink scar that ran diagonally across the bridge of his nose and down across his right cheek.

‘Liam, is it?’ he growled softly.

‘Liam O’Connor. But you can call me Liam.’

‘Liam, ye say?’ he said again, rolling the name around his mouth. ‘Tis a name I’ve not heard before.’ Cabot glanced over his shoulder at Bob. ‘Ye have the look of a man-at-arms, sir?’

‘Nay,’ replied Bob. The rumble of his deep baritone stirred the horses in the darkness.

‘Mr Cabot, is there a place we can talk? Somewhere …’ Liam looked back over his shoulder at a dozen faces, still slack-jawed, still standing motionless with garden tools held in their hands, watching and listening curiously. ‘Somewhere private?’

Cabot glanced at Becks. ‘She cannot enter the priory itself. My brothers seek to avoid distractions of the flesh. The stables will do.’

The old man nodded and waved them into the dim interior of the stables. At the far end of the long building were guest lodgings, little more than four bare stone walls, a couple of wooden cots softened with a hay-stuffed sack and a tiny rectangular window in the gable wall that let in the poorest glimmer of light. He sat down on one of the cots and gestured for the others to do likewise.

‘Dark times as these,’ Cabot began quietly, ‘my brothers outside are full of fear. Evil stalks these woods, stalks this country. So ’tis — ’ he spread his hands — ‘we are all most cautious of strangers.’ His eyes narrowed and the scar across his brow flexed. ‘Ye know of my name, Liam of Connor. Tell me how is that?’

Liam gave a small defensive shrug. ‘That’s a little difficult to explain, Mr Cabot. But … well, we came here because we got a message to find you.’

‘A message, say? By who?’

‘Well, that’s the thing. We don’t exactly know.’

‘So, ye seek me. Now ye have me. For what reason is it?’

Liam made a face. ‘Not really sure of that either.’

Cabot shook his head, confused for a moment, then he laughed. ‘What good is this, then? I have horses I need tend to this morning.’ He made to get up.

Liam decided to play their trump card. ‘Mr Cabot, have you heard of a thing called the Voynich Manuscript?’

Cabot stopped and resumed his seat, considering Liam’s words for a moment then shook his head. ‘Voynich? I have not heard of such a thing.’

‘Well then — ’ Liam bit his lip — ‘have you written some sort of important manuscript?’

‘Of course not!’ Cabot laughed. ‘I wield a sword far better than I do a quill.’

‘Well, how about someone else here? Is anyone working on any manuscripts? Scrolls of any kind?’

He shook his head again. ‘We keep scrolls of prayers and records of the priory. This is a place of quiet devotion to God. That is all. Now … if that be the last of yer questions I must ask ye and yer fellows to go about yer business,’ he said, hefting himself wearily to his feet.

Liam cursed quietly. Almost as an afterthought he had one last try. ‘Mr Cabot, what do you know of Pandora?’

The word stopped Cabot in his tracks. He glanced at Liam, at the other two. Finally, in a voice almost as soft as a whisper he spoke. ‘Ye know of this?’

Great, what do I say now? Liam decided the only thing he could do was to bluff his way. He nodded sternly. ‘Oh yes, Mr Cabot … I know all about Pandora.’

‘These two?’ the old man asked, a furtive glance again at Bob and Becks. They both took Liam’s lead and nodded.

Cabot pulled absently on his beard, studying Liam silently. ‘Ye do not have the look of the order about ye, lad. Ye look barely old enough to be a squire.’

Order? What order? Jay-zus, what do I say now?

‘But … ye do, sir,’ he said to Bob. ‘A fighting man if ever I saw one. Ye have come back?’

Bob glanced at Liam for help. All Liam could do was nod vigorously for him to say something.

‘Aye,’ said Bob slowly, ‘I … have … returned.’

‘Do ye know of King Richard’s predicament? Does he return?’

Bob’s eyelids flickered for a moment before he replied. ‘King Richard will return in five months.’

Cabot cursed. ‘Then his rage will know no bounds! There will be much blood! He will kill all in his way to find it again. God have mercy on us if we have not found it by then.’

It?

Liam looked at Cabot. ‘Find … err … it?’ He wished he had the slightest idea what ‘it’ was right now. It would make bluffing his way through this conversation a thousand times easier.

‘Yes! It is lost! They say it is the Hooded Man who has taken it.’