The Lark's Lament: A Fools' Guild Mystery Read Online Free PDF Page A

whatever builder had come here had some beauty in his heart.
    Folc turned left just before reaching the transept and led me down a flight of steps. He opened a door and stepped out into the corner of a gallery that enclosed an irregularly shaped cloister. Off to the right, a low doorway split by a column revealed a small room, maybe ten feet square. He went inside. I had to duck to avoid cracking my head on the lintel, and found myself in a librarium.
    “There.” He pointed.
    On the floor on the other side of a wooden bench lay the crumpled form of a monk, his white robe soaked in dark crimson. His head rested near an oaken bucket.
    Someone had splashed his blood over the books and scrolls on the shelves that lined one wall. On the stones above it, the killer had painted the words, FOLQUET: COLD IS THE HAND THAT CRUSHES THE LARK .
    “What do you have to say about that, Fool?” demanded Folc.
    “Looks like the world wants you to know it’s still there,” I said.

TWO
    You are the jester of this courtyard.
    —SUZANNE VEGA, “GYPSY”
    “Husband, is everything all right?” I called from inside the tent, kneeling with my bowstring back at my right ear. Helga knelt to my left and back a step, her bow steady in her hands. For now.
    “Everything is fine,” he called as the giant monk with the giant club beckoned. “I will be back soon. Get the wain loaded.”
    “Fine,” I shouted back.
    Portia whimpered behind me.
    “Hush, little fool,” I whispered to her. “Everything is fine.”
    We held position until we counted all the monks leaving, my man in motley at the van.
    “Stay here,” I whispered. I put my bow down at the edge of the tent and stepped cautiously outside. I saw no one.
    “Fine,” I said, and Helga emerged. She was trembling now that it was over. I gave her a quick hug of encouragement. “You did well, Apprentice,” I said. “Which one were you aiming at?”
    “The one to the left of the leader,” she said.
    “Good,” I said. “I had the one on the right. If anything happened, Theo would have taken on the giant, but the two closest were likely to be the most proficient in battle. And the signal?”
    “If he said, ‘all right’ instead of ‘fine,’ then we attack,” she said.
    “And how do we attack?”
    “I stay in the tent shooting for as long as I can while you come out with your sword, screaming like a deranged harpy.”
    I looked at her sternly. “I would prefer avenging angel, Apprentice.”
    “Yes, Mama,” she said, grinning.
    Portia started crying at being left alone. I fetched her from the tent, and she settled in to suck. I sat on a tree stump.
    “Where were you aiming?” I asked as Helga began to break down the tent.
    “At the body,” she said. “That’s the nice thing about shooting at monks. No armor.”
    “You can’t assume that,” I said. “They might have been rogues, or bandits dressed as monks, but armored underneath. Go for the throat if he’s standing still. Otherwise, aim for the thigh. It’s a big target on a man, and it will take him out of battle right away.”
    “Yes, Domna,” she said. She looked out at the abbey. “Will he be all right?”
    “Don’t worry, he’ll wriggle out of it. He can talk the very Devil into selling his soul.”
    “What if he has to fight his way out?” she asked.
    “Theo against eleven monks?” I laughed. “No contest. You’ve never seen him fight, and I hope that you never do, but he’s quite deadly when need be.”
    “Have you ever killed anyone?” she asked me.
    “Yes,” I said, shifting Portia to the other breast.
    “More than one?”
    “Yes. But I don’t like to talk about it.”
    “Why not?”
    “Because then it becomes a story,” I said. “Then I become someone in a story named Claudia, and that makes it less of me. And I don’t want to ever become complacent about it. Does that make sense to you?”
    “A little,” she said. “It will make more sense when you tell me what