The bigger man came back into the room carrying some kindling and a basket of logs.
'At least you'll be warm,' he said to Thomas with evident amusement. He had a small clay pot filled with glowing embers that he used to light the kindling, then he piled on the smaller logs and held his hands to the growing flames. 'Nice and warm,' he said, 'and that's a blessing in winter. Never known a winter like it! Rain! We should be building an ark.'
A long way off a bell tolled twice. The fire began to crackle and some of the smoke seeped out into the room, perhaps because the chimney was cold. 'What he really likes,'
the big man who had laid the fire said, 'is a brazier.'
'Who?' Thomas asked.
'He always likes a brazier, he does, but not on a wooden floor. I told him.'
'Who?' Thomas demanded.
'Don't want to burn the place down! Not a brazier, I told him, not on a wooden floor, so we had to use the hearth.' The big man watched the fire for a while. 'That seems to he burning proper, don't it?' He heaped a half- dozen larger logs on the fire and then backed away. He gave Thomas a casual look, shook his head as if the prisoner was beyond help and then both men left the room.
The firewood was dry and so the flames blazed high, fast and fierce. More smoke billowed into the room and gusted out of the windows. Thomas, in a sudden spurt of rage, dragged at the manacles, heaving with all his archer's strength to pull the iron ring from the wall, but all he achieved was to cut the iron gyves further into his bleeding wrists. He stared up at the ceiling, which was simply planks over beams, presumably the floor of the chamber above. He had heard no footsteps up there, but then there came the sound of feet just beyond the door and he stepped back to the wall.
A woman and a small child came in. Thomas crouched to hide his nakedness and the woman laughed at his modesty. The child laughed too and it took Thomas a few seconds to realize that the boy was Jeanette's son, Charles, who was gazing at him with interest, curiosity, but no recognition. The woman was tall, fair-haired, very pretty and very pregnant. She wore a pale blue dress that was belted above her swollen belle and was trimmed with white lace and little loops of pearls. Her hat was a blue spire with a brief veil that she pushed away from her eves to see Thomas better. Thomas drew up his knees to hide himself, but the woman brazenly crossed the room to stare down at him. 'Such a pity,' she said.
'A pity?' Thomas asked.
She did not elaborate. 'Are you really English?' she demanded and looked peeved when Thomas did not answer. 'They're making a rack downstairs, English-man. Windlasses and ropes to stretch you. Have you ever seen a man after he's been racked? He flops. It's amusing, but not, I think, for the man himself.'
Thomas still ignored her, looking instead at the small boy who had a round face, black hair and the fierce dark eyes of Jeanette, his mother. 'You remember me, Charles?' Thomas asked, but the boy just stared at him blankly. 'Your mother sends you greetings,'
Thomas said and saw the surprise on the boy's face.
'Mama?' Charles, who was almost four, asked.
The woman snatched at Charles's hand and dragged him away as though Thomas carried a contagion. 'Who are you?' she asked angrily.
'Your mother loves you, Charles,' Thomas told the wide-eyed boy.
'Who are you?' the woman insisted, and then turned as the door was pushed open. A Dominican priest came in. He was gaunt, thin and tall with short grey hair and a fierce face. He frowned when he saw the woman and child. 'You should not be here, my lady,' he said harshly.
'You forget, priest, who rules here,' the pregnant woman retorted.
'Your husband,' the priest said firmly, 'and he will not want you here, so you will leave.' The priest held the door open and the woman, whom Thomas assumed to be the Lady of Roncelets, hesitated for a heartbeat and stalked out. Charles looked back once, then was dragged out of the room just before another Dominican entered, this one a younger man, small and bald, with a towel folded over one arm and a bowl of water in his hands. He was followed by the two robed servants who walked with folded hands and downcast eyes to stand beside the fire. The first priest, the gaunt one, closed the door, then he and his fellow priest walked to the table.
'Who are you?' Thomas asked the gaunt priest,
though he suspected he knew the answer. He was trying to remember that misted morning in Durham when he had seen de Taillebourg fight Robbie's brother. He thought it was the same man, the priest who had mur-dered Eleanor or else ordered her death, but he could not be certain.
The two priests ignored him. The smaller man put the water and towel on the table, then both men knelt. 'In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost,' the older priest said, making the sign of the cross, 'amen.' He stood, opened his eyes and looked down at Thomas who was still crouching on the pitted floorboards. 'You are Thomas of Hookton,' he said formally, 'bastard son of Father Ralph, priest of that place?'
'Who are you?'
'Answer me, please,' the Dominican said.
Thomas stared up into the man's eyes and recognized the terrible strength in the priest and knew that he dared not give in to that strength. He had to resist from the very first and so he said nothing.
The priest sighed at this display of petty obstinacy. 'You are Thomas of Hookton,' he declared, 'Lodewijk says so. In which case, greetings, Thomas. My name is Bernard de Taillebourg and I am a friar of the Dominican order and, by the grace of God and at the pleasure of the Holy Father, an Inquisitor of the faith. My brother in Christ' – here de Taillebourg gestured at the younger priest, who had settled at the table where he opened the book and picked up one of the quills – 'is Father Cailloux, who is also an Inquisitor of the faith.'
'You are a bastard,' Thomas said, staring at de Taillebourg, 'you're a murdering bastard.'
He might have spared his breath for de Taillebourg
showed no reaction. 'You will stand, please,' the priest demanded.
'A motherless murdering bastard,' Thomas said, making no move. De Taillebourg made a small gesture and the two servants ran forward and took Thomas by his arms and dragged him upright and, when he threatened to collapse, the bigger one slapped him hard in the face, stinging the bruise left by the blow Sir Lodewijk had given him before dawn. De Taillebourg waited till the men were back beside the fire. 'I am charged by Cardinal Bessieres,' he said tonelessly, 'to discover the whereabouts of a relic and we are informed that you can assist us in this matter, which is deemed to be of such importance that we are empowered by the Church and by Almighty God to ensure that you tell us the truth. Do you understand what that means, Thomas?'
'You killed my woman,' Thomas said, 'and one day, priest, you're going to roast in hell and the devils will dance on your shrivelled arse.'
De Taillebourg again showed no reaction. He was not using his chair, but standing tall and arrow-thin behind the table on which he rested the tips of his long, pale fingers. 'We know,' he said, 'that your father might have possessed the Grail, and we know that he gave you a book in which he wrote his account of that most precious thing. I tell you that we know of these matters so that you do not waste our time or your pain by denying them. Yet we shall need to know more and that is why we are here. You understand me, Thomas?'
'The devil will piss in your mouth, priest, and shit in your nostrils.'
De Taillebourg looked faintly pained as if Thomas's crudity was tiresome. 'The Church grants us the authority to question you, Thomas,' he continued in a mild voice,
'but in her infinite mercy she also commands that we do not shed blood. We may use pain, indeed it is our duty to employ pain, but it must be pain without bloodshed. This means we may employ fire' – his long pale fingers touched one of the pokers on the table
– 'and we may crush you and we may stretch you and God will forgive us for it will be done in His name and in His most holy service.'
'Amen,' Brother Cailloux said and, like the two ser-vants, made the sign of the cross. De Taillebourg pushed all three of the pokers to the edge of the table and the smaller servant ran across the room, took the irons and plunged them into the fire.
'We do not employ pain lightly,' de Taillebourg said, 'or wantonly, but with prayerful regret and with pity and with a tearful concern for your immortal soul.'
'You're a murderer,' Thomas said, 'and your soul will sear in hell.'
'Now,' de Taillebourg continued, apparently oblivious to Thomas's insults, 'let us start with the book. You told
