Eifelheim

“The pest has all but destroyed the Holy City,” Ansgar told Dietrich. “We fled to the hills at the first sign and Heaven had mercy on us. Florence is devastated, Pisa…”

“Bordeaux, too,” said Eleazar from atop the cart. “The pest appeared around the docks, and mayor de Bisquale set the district afire. That was…” He counted fingers. “…second day of September. But the fire burned down most of the city, including my master’s warehouse — also the Chateau de l’Ambriero, where the English stay. The princess Joan was to wed our prince. She was already dead from the pest, I am told, but the fire consumed her body.”

Dietrich and the pilgrims crossed themselves and even the Jew looked unhappy, for the pest slew Christian, Jew, and Saracen with equal disregard. “It has not come to the Swiss,” Dietrich volunteered.

“No,” said the Jew. “Basel was clean when we left. So was Zürich — though that did not stop the town from expelling my people because they thought we might bring it.”

“But…,” Dietrich said, shocked, “the Holy Father has twice condemned that belief.”

Eleazar only shrugged.

Dietrich dropped out of step with the wagon and found himself next to the Basler merchant, who was leading his Wallachian horse. “What the Jew won’t tell you,” the man murmured, “is that the Swiss have a confession. A Jew named Agimet admitted to poisoning the wells around Geneva. He and others had been sent out by the Kabbalists with secret instructions.”

Dietrich wondered how much the story had been embellished in its travels from mouth to mouth. If Christendom possessed krenkish far-talkers, the same story could be told to all, which might not ensure the truth, but would at least ensure that all heard the same lie. “Did this Agimet affirm his confession afterward?”

The merchant shrugged. “No, he denied everything, which proves he was lying; so he was tortured a second time and afterwards affirmed.”

Dietrich shook his head. “Such confessions are unconvincing.”

The Basler remounted his gelding and from that height asked, “Are you then a Jew-lover?”

Dietrich said nothing. The danger was past, now that the bad air had been blown beyond Paris; but fear lingered in those towns that had been spared. Panic fed on rumor; and the pyre fed on panic.

So caught up in his thoughts did Dietrich become that not until he bumped into the back of the Danish pilgrim did he find the caravan halted and the supposed guards, joined by knights under the falcon ba

On the ground, with his throat neatly slashed, lay their captain. Dietrich remembered that he had come with the Jews from Basel, while the other armsmen had been hired in Freiburg to guard the casket. The dead man wore the Hapsburg eagle on his surcoat, but Dietrich had only that glance before he and the other captives were chivvied like so many sheep up the trail to the gates of Falcon Rock.

X. November, 1348

The Commemoration of Florentius of Strassburg

Pilgrim, merchant, priest, Jew were all one to the Herr von Falkenstein. His interest had lain entirely in the casket. But the possibility of individual ransoms added an extra pleasure to his coup, so he interviewed his prisoners, one by one. When it came Dietrich’s turn, the guards marched him before the high seat and threw him before the Herr with no great gentleness.

Phillip von Falkenstein was dark complexioned, with hair that fell in ringlets to his shoulders. He wore an ankle-length, dark green dalmatic cinched at the waist and, over that, a brocaded surcoat bearing the falcon crest. He wore his beard narrow and it seemed to Dietrich that his face had the pinched look of an empty man.

“What do you offer for freedom?” said Philip. “What is your most precious possession?”

“Why, my poverty, mine Herr. If you would take that from me, I will endure.”

The guardsmen lining the great hall shifted their feet. The castle stone was damp and cold and smelled of niter. Falkenstein looked at him sharply and slowly a red crescent split his beard. At that signal, subdued chuckles rippled through the room. Herr Phillip said, “Who is your master and what will he do to ransom you?”

“My master is Jesus Christ, and he has already ransomed me with his blood.”

This time Falkenstein did not smile. “I grant each man one jest. Two marks you as clever. Now answer straight. Who do you serve?”

The guards stiffened a little when Dietrich reached inside his scrip, but his knife had been taken from him along with the copper wire. Only the krenkish head harness, mistaken for a sacramental of some sort, had been left him. He pressed the sigil, as he had done repeatedly since being captured. “Mine Herr von Falkenstein,” he said distinctly. “I am Dietrich, pastor of Oberhochwald, a village in fief to Herr Manfred von Hochwald.”

“Will he pay to have you back? Does he like clever priests who make jokes at his expense?” He turned to his clerk and whispered some instruction.

“The Duke will not take kindly to this theft,” Dietrich suggested.

Philip’s head snapped up. “What theft?”

“It requires no subtlety of thought to suppose that the casket contained material of some value to Albrecht. Silver, I suppose.”

Philip nodded and one of the guards stepped forward and slapped Dietrich across the face. “Frieburg is rightly mine,” Philip told him. “Not Urach’s; not Hapsburg’s. I’ll have my dues.”

After that, he sent Dietrich back to his cell.

By Florentius’ Day, the sky beyond the window had turned sullen, and a bitter wind pressed its way into the cell. In the distant sky Dietrich marked the lazy jot of a raptor. Dark clouds gathered in the southwest. He could taste a metallic crispness of the air. A formation of storks flew south.

Falkenstein was a greedy man, and that often meant a stupid man, but Philip did not lack for cu

Dietrich leaned through the balisteria and peered down the sheer walls of the keep to the ragged bedrock of the precipice. Not that Falkenstein need fear anyone leaving.

The distant bird had come closer and Dietrich saw now that it lacked wings. Before he had quite grasped that, the apparition swooped toward his window, and he saw that it was a Krenk wearing a peculiar body harness. Hovering, the creature packed a sort of earth to the slit window, into which he pressed a small, shining cylinder. Dietrich heard a shout from above and the clatter of hobnails on stone. He yanked the head harness from his scrip and strapped it on.

“…away from the window. Move away from the window. Quickly.”

Dietrich ran to the far corner of the cell just as thunder clapped and the air hurled him against the door. Shards of masonry pelted him; pebbles stung his cheeks. His ears rang and his arms and legs went numb. Through the dust he saw that the slit window had become a gaping portal. As he stared, a portion of the balustrade above slid loose with a grinding rasp, and a shrieking armsman plummeted, arms flapping uselessly, past the hovering demon.

“Quickly,” said the voice in the head harness. “I must carry you. Do not lose your grip.” The Krenk entered the cell and, with a swift motion encircled Dietrich with a girdle of some sort that snapped onto an eye on his harness. “Now we see if the weight exceeds the craftsman’s boast.” The Krenk sprinted toward the hole in the wall and leapt into the sky. Dietrich had one glimpse of terrified faces along the battlements, then the winds had him, and his rescuer soared through a hiss of arrows.