The Doomsday Code

CHAPTER 52

1194, Sherwood Forest, Nottinghamshire

Liam awoke into a fog of thudding agony. Every movement sent sharp splinters of pain through his head. He was looking up at a clear blue sky through branches of leaves that jostled and swayed. Another pleasant summer’s day it promised to be, but it was cool … cool with the damp of dew; a morning yet to properly get going. He wondered how long he’d been out for. A day?

He decided not to turn his head; it ached far too much. He could hear activity around him: the chopping of firewood, the clang of a ladle against a metal cooking pot. The jangle of horses’ harnesses, the scrape of a blade being sharpened along a whetstone.

‘Master Locke!’ a voice nearby called out. ‘He is awake now!’

Liam snapped his eyes quickly shut again. He heard more movement around him, men stirring, the clank of things being put down, the soft crunch of footsteps on pine cones slowly approaching him. His mouth was covered with a gag of foul-smelling material; some thug’s sweaty rags, no doubt. But his eyes clenched tightly, the lids flickering, were giving him away.

‘You’re awake, fool … I can see it,’ growled a deep voice. A booted foot kicked him roughly in the side of the ribs and Liam grunted painfully. He opened his eyes to see a tall man with long untidy locks of sandy-coloured hair looking down at him. ‘See now? I knew you were awake.’ The man smiled, then squatted down beside Liam.

‘Hmmm, so, you’re the sheriff who’s been giving me so much trouble?’

Liam could say nothing, his mouth clogged with the dirty rag, his hands bound behind his back with twine.

‘And so young, as well,’ he uttered, cocking his head curiously. He spoke in a lowered voice. ‘You know, you did a far better job than the previous idiot. He managed to turn Nottingham and most of the county against him … made my life very easy here. No end of starving malcontents joining the cause every day.’

Liam looked over his shoulder at the gathering crowd of ragged men.

‘But you, young man … you’ve turned things around, haven’t you? Made things very difficult for me. John chose wisely this time. A noble with a brain for once.’ He smiled sadly. ‘Which makes it a real shame that I have to do this.’

The man stood up and turned to the assembled crowd. ‘Pick him up! Let’s see what the Hood wants done with him!’

A dozen pairs of rough hands seized and hefted him on to his feet. Liam looked around at the camp — an odd assortment of flimsy wooden shacks, wattle-and-daub huts and cloth tents stretched over frames made from branches. Among the growing crowd, he spotted men mostly, one or two women and no children. It had the look of a semi-permanent settlement, not an overnight camp but a year-round dwelling haphazardly built in and around the mature oak trees.

The tall man who’d spoken led the way through the camp towards a round hut with wattle-and-daub walls and a squat conical roof of branches and reeds. Bigger than the others; more effort had gone into it. Liam suspected it was their leader’s hut.

The Hood.

He watched the tall man duck down and disappear inside through a low door, leaving him alone with the crowd. He felt hands pushing and shoving him, a punch on his back that painfully jolted his head.

‘French scum!’ someone hissed at him.

Another cursed, then spat a fat gobbet of spittle into his face. ‘Go back to Normandy!’

Liam tried to reply he wasn’t French, that he wasn’t some arrogant Norman aristocrat, but the gag filled his mouth and the best he could do was grunt.

Probably wouldn’t have mattered if he could have made himself heard; he was wearing expensive clothes, a dark green velvet smock, fine linen leggings and leather boots, that marked him as a noble whatever he might try to say.

The tall man emerged through the low door and stood up straight, raising his arms to hush the hubbub of noise in the crowd.

‘He says it is for you to decide the sheriff’s fate!’

Liam felt his legs give, as most of the crowd roared with approval.

Oh that’s not good.

‘Kill him!’ shouted several voices.

‘You really wish to show John, the pretender … show him what we think of his Norman lackeys?’

The crowd shouted its agreement. Liam looked at the tall man, trying to make eye contact with him. He sounded different from the others, a different accent, perhaps educated. And wasn’t there a hint of regret in his voice? As if he’d rather they chose another fate for him?

I need to talk to him!

He twisted his head from side to side, trying to work the gag out of his mouth. But already he was being dragged by the mob, hands struggling through the press of bodies to get a grasp on him, pinch him or land a punch on him.

He could feel the rancid cloth rammed into his mouth loosening, able to find enough space at the back of his mouth to bunch his tongue up and push the cloth forward. It made him gag and he fought the urge to vomit.

Ahead of him he saw the crowd part, making space around the flat top of a broad tree stump. It was about a yard across and a yard high — like a roughly hewn table-top.

‘Send his head back to Oxford!’

Head? Oh God please no …

Liam saw someone place a wicker basket beside the base of the stump. He began to buck and squirm against the grasp of the men dragging him, causing them to wrench him forward more roughly.

‘Come on, pig! We’ll put ye on a spike when we’re done!’

Strong arms pushed him against the tree stump and grabbed his shoulders to bend him down over the rough flat top.

Liam frantically worked his tongue against the gag, pushing the material bit by bit out of his mouth. But even then, even if he could scream something, he was sure nothing was going to stop them now. They wanted their dark-haired Norman head.

His arms were twisted behind his back and the jagged splinters of wood from the stump ground and mashed away against his cheekbone as several hands firmly pressed his head down. He rolled his eyes to one side to look up — and wished he hadn’t. A thickset man was standing beside the stump, enjoying the moment and flexing his muscular arms as he wielded a broadsword in both hands.

‘One stroke! One stroke!’ several in the crowd began chanting.

‘Aye! ’Tis always one good stroke!’ the man roared in reply.

‘Not so, Seth!’ another man bellowed. ‘Did take more than three on the last!’

Close your eyes, Liam, he told himself. Best not to see the blade coming down.

But he couldn’t. He couldn’t take his eyes off his executioner. The man making a big show for his crowd, stepping round the stump and limbering up with long swooshing swoops of the sword.

The material of the gag was now almost entirely pushed out of his mouth, but still over it. He tried screaming at them to stop, but his words were muffled.

In his peripheral vision he spotted the tall man, looking down at him with a stern expression. And beside him, a foot taller, the sinister form of the Hood, motionless, a face lost in the dark shadows of his cowl. Their presence hushed the baying crowd until it was quiet enough that Liam could hear the soft rustle of a breeze chasing through the oak leaves far above them.

‘You wish this?’ said the tall man. ‘You wish to send his head as a message to those who rule yer country?’

The crowd roared in response.

‘So be it, then,’ he said with a tone of regret in his voice. He nodded slowly at the executioner. ‘See it done. And mind it’s a clean blow. This young Norman deserves a quick death.’

‘Aye,’ nodded the executioner. He took a couple of steps over to Liam and gently rested the sword’s cold blade against the back of his neck. Liam felt its weight, the razor-thin edge biting into his skin.

And then he felt the weight of the blade being lifted.

Lifting for the swing.

Oh God, oh Jay-zus …

Liam jerked his head, bucking and kicking as hands pressed harder to hold his shoulders still.

‘Best hold still!’ one of the men holding him warned. ‘Unless you want him to hack at you like a hog on a spit?’

As the executioner sucked in a breath and his sword hovered for a moment above his head, Liam jerked his chin once more, finally freeing his mouth above the cloth gag.

‘Please! I’m not French!’ he heard himself screaming, shrill and terrified. ‘I’m — I’m — from the future!’