Blood on the Sand by Michael Jecks

Author:Michael Jecks [Jecks, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781471111136
Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK

Berenger’s face was itching. Tooth Butcher had come with the army from Percy, and now appeared to have adopted Berenger as his own personal experimental patient. Every few days Berenger would see him in the roads and he would peer closely at his stitching with every sign of satisfaction. No matter how often he heard the barber tell him to leave it alone or he would scratch it into gangrene, he could not help but worry at the edges of the bloody clots.

‘You’ve seen gangrene, haven’t you, Frip? It’s a horrible thing. Eats away at you under your skin. And it all comes about, I reckon, because of daft buggers like you, who keep fiddling with your scar, and before long you’ll have killed off the skin and got yourself diseased. You do that, and I won’t be answerable. It’ll be a coffin for you, and that’s the truth.’

‘As a barber, you are good; as a bone-fixer or hacker off of other men’s limbs, you are competent, I’ll give you that. But when it comes to things like this, you have no idea how greatly it plagues me! I have to scratch to get some relief!’

‘It’s your life, Fripper. And I’m not your mother. Just don’t come running to me when you find that your face is falling off and you’re being eaten away from inside, that’s all I’m saying. Got that?’

Berenger took his advice and tried to keep his hands from his face – but Christ’s cods, it was difficult! On an evening like this, when the bitter wind was blowing, shrinking a man’s balls to the size of acorns, it was even harder. The chill seemed to inspire the scar tissue to produce greater heat in comparison. The worst of the scabs had fallen away, but the feeling of tightness, and the sense that inside the wound there was a scrabbling of insect feet trying to escape, was utterly maddening.

Things were not eased by the discussion he was forced to have with Sir John and Sir Peter of Bromley. Sir Peter made it clear he thought the full responsibility for the death of the messenger lay at Berenger’s door, and insisted that Berenger was demoted; no longer a captain, but merely a vintener again. He had demanded that Berenger be reduced to the rank of archer, but there Sir John drew a line. He threatened to take the matter to his friend Prince Edward, and on hearing that, Sir Peter reluctantly backed down. Sir John was known to have the Prince’s ear.

In those times, the only ease Berenger knew was when Béatrice took to caring for him. For the first few days after returning, when it felt as if he was going to have to scratch the whole of his face away, he was soothed by her soft hands. She draped cool cloths over his wound, murmuring gently to him all the while. When he opened his eyes and saw her face, he was struck by the compassion there.

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