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helmet off the gray-haired guard and was beating the armed man about the face with the butt of his knife.
    â€œHere!” said the abbot, snatching the ring from his little finger and throwing it at John.
    John caught it, and examined the blood-bright stone and the delicate work of the setting. It was a lady’s ring. Tom was still hammering the guardsman’s thick gray hair, and blood was flowing.
    â€œThat man’s head is too thick,” called John. “Leave him.”
    Tom looked hard at his companion, argument in his eyes.
    John slipped the ring into his pocket. Tom rose to his feet, breathing hard. “I’ll need to have a word with our good abbot, John. You may wait down the road.”
    The knife in Tom’s hand was blue and bright, fresh-whetted that morning.
    â€œYou will not spill his blood,” cautioned John, climbing to his feet and standing protectively over the abbot.
    â€œWhy would I so much as prick him?” said Tom. “I only want to give him a message from Lord Roger.” Tom smiled apologetically.
    Tom was going to kill the abbot, John knew. Why else would he be so careless, uttering his lordship’s name?
    Tom shrugged. “Walk on down the road, John,” he said, almost kindly. “I’ll join you soon.”
    John’s staff was on the muddy road two strides away. His knife was in its scabbard at his side, but a cross-belly reach to tug it free from the new leather scabbard would take a long moment.
    The abbot said, “Heaven honors mercy.” His voice was gentle even now, although breathy and thin.
    â€œListen to the fat lecher begging for his life,” said Tom cheerfully. “Have you ever heard such a cowardly sinner?” He gave the churchman a kick, and the abbot’s breath was ragged. The man rolled to one side, unable to utter the words that twisted his lips.
    John seized Tom’s tunic, gathered it in his fist, and half raised the yeoman to his toes. Do not touch him again .
    John never said the words.
    He saw it happen, as clearly as a story-play on market day, a pantomime acted out in deliberate step by step. The guard rose up on one knee, wincing with the effort. He gripped his spear and steadied the weapon. Such heavy spears were never thrown, to John’s knowledge, but always used from horseback.
    Before John could move, or speak a word, the iron-tipped spear was in the air.

Chapter 9
    John carried Tom Dee across the hill in the growing darkness, the injured man’s breath rattling in and out of his body. Blood streamed from the spear wound in Tom’s back, soaking into John’s tunic, and several times Tom tried to speak.
    â€œWe’re almost home,” John said.
    John knew his prayers well enough, and said them, and he trusted that with speed and the grace of Heaven there was still hope. But when he paused to give Tom water from a stream, the wounded man’s lips were cold, and his legs and hands were icy. Everyone knew that death began with the toes and the fingers and marched inward, toward the lungs.
    Tom gave a half smile, a hitch of one corner of his mouth, and spoke. The words were unmistakable, but John said, with a forced laugh, “We’ll have plenty of time to talk over ale, Tom, around the fire.”
    â€œFly, John,” Tom said without sound.
    Flee Lord Roger .
    The wounded man was a heavy load, and sometimes he gripped John’s sleeve in pain or as he tried to communicate some urgent further word. Tom seized the amulet around John’s neck, and held it the way an infant holds a paternal finger, or a sick man his crucifix.
    Help me, Heaven, prayed John silently.
    And to the grass and hawthorn, the stones and tree stumps, he added in a low voice, as Hilda had taught him, “Help me, creatures of the hill.” But Tom’s limbs went slack, and his mouth gaped, opening and closing with every stride, although he still breathed.
    John burst into the great house