Chapter 1 - THE ROAD OF BELLS
By noon, Thomas had learned that silence was worse than screaming.
Screaming meant someone was still alive.
Silence belonged to houses with doors left open, tables set for meals nobody would finish, dogs waiting beside bodies, and churches where candles had burned down into puddles of wax beneath saints who appeared to be staring at nothing.
The refugees moved west in a long, broken line.
No one called it a caravan.
Caravans had leaders.
Caravans had destinations.
This was simply a river of frightened people flowing away from one place because the place behind them had become unbearable.
Thomas walked near the edge of the road.
His mother’s wooden cross hung from his fist.
He had tried putting it around his neck, but the cord smelled like Elena’s skin.
He could not bear it.
The old traveler from the hill walked beside him.
His name was Aldren.
He claimed to have been a wool merchant once.
Now he carried everything he owned in a sack tied with rope and wore boots patched with pieces of dead men’s shoes.
Thomas had not asked where the pieces came from.
He already knew.
“How old are you?” Aldren asked.
“Sixteen.”
“Then you’re old enough to stop looking behind you.”
Thomas did anyway.
Saint Aldric had disappeared below the hills.
Only smoke marked where it had been.
“My mother was there.”
Aldren grunted.
“So were many mothers.”
Thomas hated him for that.
Then hated himself because the old man was right.
A woman ahead began vomiting beside the road.
The line of refugees widened around her immediately.
Nobody helped.
Her husband tried holding her upright.
Someone shouted, “Leave them!”
Another person threw a stone.
It missed the husband.
The woman raised her head.
Blood ran from her nose.
The crowd panicked.
People pushed.
A child fell.
Thomas moved before thinking.
He pulled the child away from trampling feet.
Aldren grabbed his collar.
“Don’t touch anyone.”
“He would have been crushed.”
“That is not the worst way to die anymore.”
Thomas shoved the child toward his father.
The man muttered thanks and dragged him away.
Thomas looked back at the sick woman.
Her husband held her.
Refused to let go.
Within minutes, the entire refugee column had left them behind.
Two shapes kneeling beside the road.
Becoming smaller.
Then nothing.
Thomas remembered Elena.
Go.
He walked faster.
By evening, the refugees reached a village called Mereford.
Or what remained of it.
The church door stood open.
No bell rang.
A cart blocked the main lane.
Three bodies lay beneath straw.
One had rolled half out and was face-down in mud.
The village well had been covered with wooden boards.
Someone had painted a cross over it in pig’s blood.
Aldren stopped.
“Bad place.”
Thomas looked around.
“Every place is bad.”
“Some are worse.”
Hungry refugees entered anyway.
They searched houses.
The first scream came from a cottage near the church.
A man ran out carrying a smoked ham.
Another refugee chased him.
They fought in the road.
The ham fell.
A woman grabbed it.
Three people attacked her.
Within seconds, six people were fighting over meat while a dead family lay inside the house.
Thomas watched.
His mother’s words returned.
People are always themselves.
Was that true?
Or did hunger create new people?
He did not know.
Aldren pulled him toward a barn outside the village.
“We sleep there.”
“Food?”
“Later.”
“There may not be later.”
Aldren looked at him.
“That sentence will kill you faster than hunger.”
Inside the barn, fifteen refugees had already gathered.
A young priest sat in one corner.
He looked barely older than Thomas.
His robe was torn.
His hands were covered with dried blood.
Nobody sat near him.
Aldren noticed.
“Priest.”
The young man looked up.
“Not anymore.”
“Convenient.”
The man smiled weakly.
“My name is Brother Luc.”
“Brother is a priest name.”
“Then Luc.”
Thomas sat near the wall.
Luc saw the wooden cross in his hand.
“Your mother’s?”
Thomas stiffened.
“How do you know?”
“You hold it like something stolen.”
Thomas looked away.
Luc did not ask more.
Night fell cold.
No fire.
Smoke might attract people.
Or thieves.
Or worse.
The barn filled with the sounds of breathing, coughing, whispering, and people trying not to cough because coughing now sounded like a confession.
Someone outside screamed.
Then another.
Nobody moved.
Thomas lay awake.
He saw Elena beneath every shadow.
He imagined her still at the gate.
Maybe soldiers had found her.
Maybe rebels had carried her somewhere.
Maybe she had not died.
Hope was crueler than certainty.
Aldren whispered beside him.
“Sleep.”
“I can’t.”
“You will.”
“How?”
“Your body will betray your grief.”
Thomas stared into darkness.
“Did you lose someone?”
A long silence.
Then Aldren answered.
“Everyone.”
That ended the conversation.
Near dawn, Thomas woke to a hand over his mouth.
He fought.
Luc leaned over him.
“Quiet.”
Thomas froze.
Outside the barn, men spoke.
Not refugees.
Horsemen.
Five, maybe six.
One laughed.
“We take the young ones.”
Another voice answered, “Men too?”
“If they can work.”
“And sick?”
“Leave them.”
Aldren was already awake.
He held a knife.
Thomas had never seen it before.
Luc moved between sleepers, waking them silently.
A woman began to panic.
Aldren covered her mouth.
“Quiet or they hear.”
The barn door opened.
A man entered holding a torch.
He wore chain mail under a dirty cloak.
Not a soldier of any lord Thomas recognized.
His nose had been broken many times.
He smiled.
“Well.”
Behind him came three others.
Swords.
Clubs.
One carried rope.
“Out,” the first man said.
Nobody moved.
He kicked a sleeping old man.
“Out!”
The old man cried out.
The bandit hit him with the torch.
Fire caught in his hair.
Chaos exploded.
People ran.
The bandits grabbed whoever they could.
Thomas saw a girl dragged by the arm.
She bit the man holding her.
He punched her in the face.
Thomas moved.
Aldren caught him.
“No.”
Thomas looked at the girl.
Maybe fourteen.
Blood from her nose.
Terrified.
“Let go.”
“No.”
Thomas pulled free.
He grabbed a wooden pitchfork near the wall.
A bandit turned.
Thomas drove the fork into his thigh.
The man screamed.
Thomas had never stabbed anyone.
The sound shocked him.
The bandit fell.
Thomas stood frozen.
The man looked up.
Then swung a club.
Luc struck first.
A shovel hit the bandit’s head.
Once.
Twice.
The second blow made a sound Thomas would remember for years.
Wet.
Final.
Luc stood over the body, breathing hard.
The former priest stared at his own hands.
“God forgive me.”
Aldren shouted, “God can wait!”
The barn caught fire.
Someone had knocked over the torch.
Dry hay burned immediately.
Smoke filled the roof.
The bandits outside began shouting.
Thomas grabbed the girl.
“Run.”
They escaped through a rear opening.
Refugees scattered into fields.
Horses screamed.
One bandit chased Thomas.
Aldren appeared behind him and drove the hidden knife into the man’s side.
Not once.
Three times.
Efficient.
Practiced.
Thomas stared.
Aldren wiped the blade on the dead man’s cloak.
“You ask too many questions with your face.”
The barn collapsed.
Flames lit the fields.
The surviving refugees gathered near a hedgerow.
They were fewer now.
Eight.
The girl Thomas had helped introduced herself as Agnes.
Fourteen.
Traveling with an aunt.
The aunt had disappeared in the fire.
Agnes wanted to go back.
Luc stopped her.
“No.”
“She may be alive.”
“Then she will come.”
“And if she doesn’t?”
Luc looked toward the burning barn.
He had no answer.
Thomas did.
“Then going back won’t change it.”
Agnes stared at him.
He realized he sounded like Aldren.
That frightened him.
They walked.
By midmorning, black smoke rose behind them from Mereford.
Not just the barn.
The whole village.
Someone had set houses on fire.
Maybe bandits.
Maybe refugees.
Maybe villagers trying to burn sickness out of walls.
The road narrowed near a forest.
There they found twelve bodies hanging from trees.
Men.
Women.
One child.
Signs were tied around their necks.
POISONERS.
Thomas looked at Aldren.
“What does that mean?”
Luc answered.
“People think strangers poison wells.”
“Do they?”
“No.”
“How do you know?”
Luc looked tired.
“Because every town blames a different stranger.”
A body turned slowly in the wind.
A woman.
Her shoes missing.
Aldren stared at the signs.
“Keep moving.”
Thomas did not.
He saw a bucket beneath one hanging man.
Inside lay crushed herbs and dead rats.
Evidence.
Or something made to look like evidence.
He remembered the doctor beaten in Saint Aldric.
People needed a cause they could hit.
Disease could not be punched.
A stranger could.
Agnes whispered, “Who did this?”
Nobody answered.
Then bells began ringing.
Far ahead.
One church.
Then another.
Then another farther beyond.
Different towns.
Different valleys.
The sound crossed the countryside.
Not celebration.
Not prayer.
Death.
Aldren closed his eyes.
“It’s ahead of us.”
Thomas looked west.
The road had been hope.
Now the bells said otherwise.
Luc crossed himself.
Agnes began crying.
Thomas held Elena’s cross.
For one moment he wanted to turn back.
Not because Saint Aldric was safe.
Because it was known.
A terrible known place felt gentler than a road where every horizon carried bells.
Then movement appeared between the trees.
Dozens of people.
Not refugees.
Men in white cloth.
Barefoot.
Their backs were bloody.
Some carried whips.
Some carried crosses.
They walked in a line while chanting.
A man at the front shouted,
“THE PESTILENCE IS GOD’S HAND!”
The others answered,
“WE MUST CLEANSE THE SIN!”
They struck themselves with leather cords.
Blood flew.
Agnes stepped behind Thomas.
Luc whispered, “Flagellants.”
Aldren’s face hardened.
“Trouble wearing faith.”
The procession stopped.
Their leader looked at Thomas’s group.
His eyes settled on Luc’s torn priest robe.
Then on the blood covering Luc’s hands.
“You.”
Luc did not move.
The leader pointed.
“You abandoned your vows.”
Luc answered quietly.
“My church died.”
“God’s church does not die.”
“Everyone inside it did.”
A murmur moved through the flagellants.
The leader stepped closer.
“What sin brought this plague?”
Luc looked at the hanging bodies behind them.
“Fear.”
The man struck him.
Thomas grabbed the pitchfork.
Aldren stopped him again.
The leader smiled.
“You travel with a blasphemer.”
He looked at Thomas.
“At a thief.”
Agnes.
“At an orphan.”
Then Aldren.
His smile vanished.
“And a murderer.”
Thomas looked at Aldren.
The old traveler’s hand moved toward his knife.
Too late.
Flagellants surrounded them.
The leader raised his cross.
“Come with us.”
Luc wiped blood from his lip.
“And if we refuse?”
The leader smiled.
Behind him, men uncoiled their whips.
“Then we learn which sins you are hiding.”
Thomas tightened his grip on Elena’s cross.
May you like
The plague had not caught them yet.
Men had.
