Whitemantle by Robert Carter Page B

the Black House. But certain exalted ones may choose to take care! For perhaps the lowly Fellow was a soldier before he begged admission to the Happy Family.’
    Will marvelled at the oddly indirect language of the Fellowship. He had heard Gwydion use it when they had visited Clifton Grange disguised as mendicant Fellows. Now the curious but deadly exchanges sent a shiver down his spine.
    ‘How then if the lowly one might be commanded to stand aside? How then?’
    ‘All respect to the exalted! But he may suppose that this Fellow, lowly or not, might decide to send the first man to take another step towards him down to see for himself the fires of Hell.’
    A different Fellow pushed his way to the front. He too was an Elder, but one of the senior Brown Robes whose order dwelt in the House-by-Cripplegate. When he drew back his hood, painted eye sockets seemed to stare out from his skull like the eyes of a madman.
    ‘Why, oh why, should a lowly Fellow be believed, if Fellow he really is? Perhaps it is only an impostor who speaks in such a rude and obstinate way to Elders. Proof may be required! Else one may say that he himself is an incarnation of the very demon which fell to earth!’
    ‘Aye!’ the helpers cried, taking up the idea with enthusiasm. ‘Let him throw back his hood and show himself!’
    The crowd that now filled the alley was fifty or sixty strong. As those at the back began to chant, ‘Show! Show! Show!’ the brown-robed senior gathered himself as if for a fight, and spoke as directly as his station would allow. ‘Can it be this lowly servant has not heard our friends a-calling? Let him show himself! Or must these same friends force him to uncover?’
    ‘Force?’ There was scorn in the reply. ‘Such an ugly word. Shall it be said that these friends are going to force a lowly Fellow who is doing his duty by the Iron Rule, who moves in zeal and commits nothing contrary to the holy principle that binds all members of the Happy Family? Force, is it?’
    The Elder trembled with fury. He was not used to backing down. He cried, ‘How best to put an order such as this? Come now, friends: the lowly Fellow cannot kill us all! Now let him prove himself. Show, show, show!’
    The chant started again, but Eudas stood unmoving in the face of it, until it died away. Then he said, ‘The lowly Fellow has stated his case: the beggar belongs to him. However—’
    A moment passed. The chain continued to circle over-head, but then Eudas snapped his wrist and brought it snaking down into a dead heap beside him. With the next movement he put his hands to his hood and pulled it back onto his shoulders.
    Those who stared gasped at what they saw. From where Will crouched he could not see what had caused the reaction, but there were many in the crowd who turned away, while the rest goggled in frank horror.
    The Elder’s fingers reached out briefly, then he nodded, disappointed that the orbits of Fellow Eudas’ eyes were indeed vacant. The realization struck a dull note of fear inWill’s belly as he huddled lower against the foot of the chapter house door. Above him the brazen arm reached down as far as it could in a vain attempt to seize him.
    ‘Is it not wholly as the lowly one said?’ the big man asked in his quiet, deep voice. ‘Now, if the exalted ones please…he may be left to his work, and may peace attend all.’
    ‘There is peace only in Heaven,’ the brown-garbed one cried, making a sign in the air. ‘Perhaps this is something the lowly Fellow forgets!’
    ‘One may say he knows which of those gathered here upholds the Iron Rule, and which is trying to break it. How if someone should take report of what has passed to the Council of High Wardens? How if due consideration was made upon the facts?’
    Will watched as heads were bowed in fear, but then a voice at the mouth of the alley shouted, ‘This way, everybody! The bone demon went down Fish Street!’
    When the last of the crowd had bled away, the big