The Subtle Serpent

Ross was standing near the companionway entrance with a glum face. He saw her at the top of the companionway and came forward.

‘Nothing in the bilge, sister, except rats and filth as one would expect. No bodies, that’s for sure,’ he reported grimly. ‘Alive or dead.’

Fidelma was staring down at her palm. It was discoloured with a faint brown texture. She realised what it was immediately. She showed her palm to Ross.

‘Dried blood. Split not all that long ago. That’s the secondpatch of blood on this vessel. Come with me.’ Fidelma retraced her steps down towards the cabins with Ross close behind. ‘Perhaps we should be looking for a body in the cabins below?’

She paused on the stairway and held up her lamp. Blood had certainly been smeared along the rail and there was more dried blood on the steps and some which had splashed against the side walls. It was older than the blood on the linen cloth and on the handrail of the ship.

‘There is no sign of blood on the deck,’ observed Ross. ‘Whoever was hurt must have been hurt on these stairs and moved downwards.’

Fidelma pursed her lips thoughtfully.

‘Or else was hurt below and came up here to be met by someone who bound the wound or otherwise prevented the blood from falling to the deck. Still, let us see where the trail leads.’

At the foot of the companionway, Fidelma bent down to examine the decking by the light of the lantern. Her eyes suddenly narrowed and she smothered an exclamation.

‘There are more signs of dried blood down here.’

‘I do not like this, sister,’ muttered Ross, anxiously casting a glance around. ‘Perhaps something evil haunts this vessel?’

Fidelma straightened up.

‘The only evil here, if evil it be, is human evil,’ she chided him.

‘A human agency could not spirit away an entire crew and a ship’s cargo,’ protested Ross.

Fidelma smiled thinly.

‘Indeed, they could. And they did not do a perfect job of it for they have left bloodstains which tell us that it was, indeed, a human agency at work. Spirits, evil or otherwise, do not have to shed blood when they wish to destroy humankind.’

She turned, still holding her lantern up, to examine the two cabins adjoining the foot of the companionway.

Either the wounded person, for she presumed the amountof blood had come from someone who had been severely injured, had been gashed with a knife or a sharp instrument at the foot of the companionway or in one of the cabins. She turned into the first one, with Ross unwillingly trailing in her wake.

She paused on the threshold and stood staring around trying to find some clue to the mystery.

‘Captain!’

One of Ross’s men came clambering down behind them.

‘Captain, I’ve been sent by Odar to tell you that the wind is getting up again and the tide is bearing us towards the rocks.’

Ross opened his mouth to curse but, as his eye caught Fidelma’s, he contented himself with a grunt.

‘Very well. Get a line on the bow of this vessel and tell Odar to stand by to steer her. I shall tow her into a safe anchorage.’

The man scampered off and Ross turned back to Fidelma.

‘Best come off back to the barc, sister. It will not be easy to steer this vessel to shore. It will be safer on my ship.’

Fidelma reluctantly turned after him and as she did so her eyes caught something which she had not perceived before. The open cabin door had shielded it from her as she had stood in the cabin. Now, as she turned to go, she saw something unusual hanging from a peg behind the door. Unusual because it was a tiag liubhair, a leather book satchel. Fidelma was astonished to see such an item in the cabin of a ship. It was true that the Irish kept their books, not on shelves, but in satchels hung on pegs or racks around the walls of their libraries, each satchel containing one or more manuscript volumes. And such satchels were also generally employed to carry books from place to place. It was always necessary for a missionary priest to have Gospels, offices and other books and so such satchels were also designed to transport them on their missions. The tiag liubhair which hung behind the cabin door was one that was commonly slung from the shoulder by a strap.

Fidelma was unaware of Ross now pausing impatiently at the foot of the companionway.

She unhooked the satchel and reached in. Inside there was a small vellum volume.

Suddenly her heart was racing, her mouth dry, and she stood rooted to the spot. The blood pounded in her ears. For a moment or two she thought she was going to pass out. The volume was a small, innocuous looking manuscript book, its vellum leaves bound in heavy calf-leather and embossed with beautiful patterned whirls and circles. Fidelma had recognised that it would be a Missal even before she turned to the title page. She knew also what would be inscribed on that page.

It was now over twelve months since Sister Fidelma had last held this book in her hands. Over twelve months ago, on a warm Roman summer evening, in the herb-scented garden of the Lateran Palace, she had stood holding this little book. It had been the evening before she had left Rome to return home to Ireland. She had handed the book to her friend and companion in adventure, Brother Eadulf of Seaxmund’s Ham, from the Saxon land of the South Folk. Brother Eadulf, who had helped her solve the mystery of Abbess Etain’s murder at Whitby and later of the murder of Wighard, the archbishop-elect of Canterbury in Rome.

The book which she now held in her hands, in this mysterious abandoned ship, had been her farewell gift to her closest friend and companion. A gift that had meant so much to them in that emotional parting.

Fidelma felt the cabin beginning to rock and turn around her. She tried to still her racing thoughts, to rationalise the awesome dread which she felt choking her lungs. She staggered dizzily backwards and collapsed abruptly onto the bunk.

Chapter Three

‘Sister Fidelma! Are you all right?’

Ross’s anxious face was peering close to Fidelma’s as she opened her eyes. She blinked. She had not really passed out only … she blinked again and silently rebuked herself for showing weakness. However, the shock was real enough. What was this book, her parting gift to Brother Eadulf in Rome, now doing in the cabin of a deserted Gaulish merchant ship off the coast of Muman? She knew that Eadulf would not part with it so lightly. And if not, then he had been in this cabin. He had been a passenger on this merchant ship.

‘Sister Fidelma!’

Ross’s voice rose in agitation.

‘I am sorry,’ Fidelma replied slowly and cautiously stood up. Ross leaned forward to help her.

‘Did you feel giddy?’ queried the sailor.

She shook her head. She again rebuked herself sternly for such a display of emotion. Yet to deny the feeling would surely be a greater betrayal of herself? She had been fighting back her emotions ever since she had left Eadulf on the quay in Rome. He had been forced to stay in Rome as tutor to the Theodore of Tarsus, the newly appointed archbishop of Canterbury, while she had to return to her own land.

However, the year that had passed had been filled with memories of Eadulf of Seaxmund’s Ham and feelings of loneliness and longing, as if of a home sickness. She was home. She was in her own land among her own people again.Yet she missed Eadulf. She missed their arguments, the way she could tease Eadulf over their conflicting opinions and philosophies; the way he would always rise good-naturedly to the bait. Their arguments would rage but there was no enmity between them.

Eadulf had been trained in Ireland, at both Durrow and at Tuaim Brecain, before accepting the rulings of Rome on matters of the Faith and rejecting the Rule of Colmcille.