Everyone remember where we left off last week, The Bastard Executioner fans? The Wolf made himself known — as Lady Love’s equally introspective and peace-minded half-brother. Annora revealed herself to Father Wilkin as much more than just a peddler of potions, but a predictor of fates. Milus revealed that he’s pretty much going to set Wilkin up for some unplanned killing every single episode. And Jessamy reveals, well, nothing new. She’s been a nutter from the start.
• The Bastard Executioner Season 1 recaps: Episode 1 and 2 | Episode 3 | Episode 4 | Episode 5 |Episode 6 | Episode 7 | Episode 8 | Episode 9
We open this week’s episode, “Behold the Lamb,” with the visiting Robinus, Archdeacon of Torture, holding the mass he promised Lady Love, doling out communion with Father Ruskin. Before Milus can take a turn at the chalice, Tell comes for him. They cross themselves and leave. Somebody else’s body and blood is taking precedence.
While the shire goes about its business, Wilkin checks on Toran, who never did make it to church. They have a heart-to-heart about what went down with Norris, what should become of the remaining murderers Locke and Tell, and their own impending servitude to Milus. Well, and also, the googly looks going on between Lady Love and Wilkin. Everyone sees them, Wilkin.
Wilkin says Love is just … curious … about him. Wilkin has a talent for understatement.
Before they can delve too far into that last part, there’s a hubbub in the shire, which turns out to be the arrival of the poor guy who’s going to take the fall for Wilkin and Toran burning up poor Baroness Pryce — we’re calling her Lady Trula now — because they took ol’ Milus at his word.
Well isn’t this complicated?
Speaking of Pryce, he’s apparently on his way to Ventrishire, where he will be put up in what Love quickly points out is her dear departed husband’s trysting room. She hopes a few days of trolloping is not what Milus has in mind for their guest. Nope. Milus has the comfort of but one lady in mind for the neighboring baron. Oh, and by the way — look. Here’s the guy who confessed to the reason Pryce needs comfort in the first place, dangling by his arms from Wilkin’s chains. Talk amongst yourselves.
OK, just you, Lady Love.
Love sits beside the now-lowered man and asks why he was so willing to throw The Wolf — his supposed commander — under the bus, er, burning carriage, but refuse to finger the mere minions who helped him carry out the deadly deed. The guy insists The Wolf ordered the death, so he’s the worst offender. Well then, what a big, fat, red-haired, horrible asshat of a man, Love says, knowing full-well that her brother is slim and shares her own dark coloring. The prisoner takes the bait.
Love pulls Wilkin aside and asks why on God’s green the guy would do that when it’s only going to lead to a horrible death. “Frightened men tell desperate tales,” he answers. Most times, “the truth and its responsibility” are far worse to liars, he adds. Some just tolerate the quagmire better than others. Ain’t it the truth.
Elsewhere in the castle, Tell calls Toran over and tells him that a rebel camp has been spotted and — what with Norton and Huxley still out there (or not) somewhere — they need a fill-in to go quash it, however that must happen, if you get his drift. No decree. Nothing of record. Everyone splits the spoils.
Toran says he’ll go.
Meanwhile, Wilkin charges in on Milus to ask what the hell is up with the fake prisoner. Milus lists all the reasons that the man is better off dead than alive then shows him documents from the (none-the-wiser?) Pryce and himself that will give the man’s wife and sons a safe life in Ventrishire. His life was going to hell in a hand basket, anyway, so he’s happy to split the difference, says Milus. The crime is “solved.” Everybody (sort of) wins.
Then Milus tells Wilkin that’s there’s more to the Chamberlin that meets Wilkin’s eye — no doubt! — and that he has gotten by with the same cunning and experience that drives Wilkin so nuts. But his ultimate loyalty is to the shire. And so what if he benefits most from the spoils of his success — so does Love, the one Wilkin loves best.
Yeah, Wilkin. Everyone knows. You guys leave the doors open on private moments a lot.
Tell interrupts the meeting to say that he and Toran need a word with the Chamberlin. As they leave, Toran and Milus exchange a hard glance.
Meanwhile, Calo and Ash are working out in the animal yard when two of Robinus’ men come and asks for them to be unshackled because the archdeacon needs to see them.
“What’s an archdeacon?” Ash asks Calo
“Something we don’t need,” Calo responds. Poor Calo has no idea that the Archdeacon is the least of his problems here in Ventrishire.
Berber the Moor is rounded up, too, but not before Lady Love asks him for all the written records he can find on a particular family name. His creepy boss offers to do the job instead. Is there a reason this guy looks so much like The Wolf, or am I the only one who thinks that? Maybe I just need more looks at The Wolf.
Ah. Turns out the summons is part of Robinus and Cormac’s Seraphim hunt. One by one the men are stripped, searched for the telltale tattoos and dismissed with a liberal dousing of holy water.
This week’s battle takes place in the offending camp, where the nomad men are no match for the guard. Well, all except one, who makes a break for the hills, then takes out Denley and steals his stallion when the knight pursues. Toran and Wilkin fret that Milus will think it is they who killed the guardsman, and Tell isn’t too keen on letting them take the time to set the record straight. But he says he won’t rat them out either, so there’s that.
Back at the castle, Toran and Wilkin refuse their share of the camp raid and go to check on the safety of their comrades, while Tell delivers Denley’s body to Milus. This cannot end well.
Lady Love performs a little concert for her court and visitors on the stringed instrument Pryce presents her as a gift. Very nice. Let’s talk about ruling together as one. Eh, let’s talk about it tomorrow. Maybe then Pryce will have an original thought, Love sneers accusingly to Milus.
The twins rush up to tells Wilkin that Lady Love needs her straight away, which turns out to be a fib. After finding that to be the case, Wilkin hurries home to check on his family, mistakenly believing that they are whom Milus will go after to even the score. (Where IS that baby? He — or she — gets shelved as much as The Walking Dead‘s Baby Judith does, I swear. I’m coining a phrase for it: Pantry baby. This show has a case of the pantry baby’s. We only get said baby out when we need a prop.)
In the animal yard, Calo gets up to relieve himself and a cloaked Milus knocks him stupid, then tells him a gnarly story about D’arbonne, the pedophile who ran the foundlings home that was Corbett’s shelter as a child. Says he taught them patience with a hot iron just like the one Milus is holding now and he called Milus his “little lamby” when he sodomized him. Which was often. Now Milus would like Calo to call him the same. Calo knows where this will lead. Yell, dude! There are other guys mere yards away and would Milus really take the chance at being caught killing you outright?
We’ll never know. Calo obeys the Chamberlin’s orders, Milus caves his skull in with the iron, then plants the weapon in the yard boss’ hand and hustles back to the castle — but not before Wilkin spots the cloaked figured hurrying through the night.
The next day, Wilkin calls shenanigans and Milus says it was an even exchange for Denley’s death. “I am not a man of idle threats,” he hisses to Wilkin. “You more than anyone should know that.”
Finding Berber in the transcribers’ chamber, Ruskin asks him what the archdeacon wanted with the men he summoned to the chapel, while Berber’s boss hides in the shadows and listens. The moor tells him that Robinus gathered up everyone with no paper trail, because heretics keep no records. The tattoos would give them away as seraphim. Robinus found none in the assembly, splashed them all with holy water and sent them on their way.
Ruskin asks what the offending markings might look like and Berber — getting his drift — smiles and tells him that Annora is no heretic. And Robinus is no holy man. He gives Ruskin directions to Annora’s cave in the woods to clarify the matter.
Speaking of wise women, Love confronts Milus with her discovery that no previous documents exist for the man in the dungeon either, save for a few newly-filed ones. What might he know about that?
Well … he knows that Pryce may be the shire’s only hope and that their Baron was barren and everyone else knew it, too, so that little fib isn’t likely to hold up much longer, so … . Love slaps him a good one. They apologize to each other, but Love says she has been traded into marriage once before and she’s not about to do it again. He tells her it’s the only way she will keep her place in the kingdom, and that even though their prisoner might be innocent, today’s execution is “an act of justice greater than the man.” It’s something, all right.
Love recognizes this scheming. She tells Milus that her once-powerful grandfather’s credo about effective leadership was “a mind that is open and a heart that is shut tight.” A very wise man, beams Milus. A very sad man, says Love, stalking away.
Meanwhile, Berber’s boss tattles on the Moor to the Archdeacon, and Wilkin apologizes to Toran for not telling him the whole truth of who he is. Just then, little Luca shows up, says he wants to be just like his dad. Wilkin compromises and ships him off with Unclle Toran to work on his math via some measuring.
As Love decides “what one wears to watch a man pulled apart,” Wilkin comes calling again, saying he delivers “a truth that will bring comfort.” Isabel is protective, but Love allows the intrusion and sends her away.
See, Love, this is how rumors get started. But also plans. Ones that don’t involve Milus’ input.
Wilkin tells her the truth. The whole truth. About himself. About her dead husband. About the night Ventris sent Brattle’s command to their certain deaths and how only a miracle spared him. This is the outcome of that, he says, and he isn’t sure what all of it means, but he is sure the condemned man shouldn’t have to die for his lies. Love is to deliver the scroll he places in her hand to Pryce’s chancellor after giving Wilkin a bit of time to wrap up a few things. He’s sorry for everything, but his time with her alone has been worth the punishment that will befall him.
KISSING! She looks a little iffy about it, but … KISSING!
Before he leaves, he assures her that, despite his denial at the end of last week’s episode, he did see the same vision when she touched his wounds. And he believes the baby boy was theirs … not his and Petra’s. Whoa.
Speaking of babies, Pantry Baby is nowhere to be found when Wilkin returns home to make his peace. He tells Jessamy that she is a good wife and a good mother ….then leads her to bed. Wha? If he’s planning to swap in for the condemned man, he’s now going to leave Luca, Pantry Baby and potentially another kid favver-less … and Ash, Berber and the Moor to fend for themselves?
Except we can’t have a show called The Bastard Executioner without said executioner.
Returning to his punisher’s chamber, Wilkin finds Tell there, rips Petra’s cross from his neck and reveals himself as Brattle, husband of its original wearer. A brief battle ensues before Love interrupts it and demands that the prisoner be brought to the square. Tell grabs the cross back and leaves.
When they’re alone again, Love tells Wilkin that his confession supports no logic. He would never have willingly killed Lady Trula — so who did give the order? And why was he so willing to kill Tell and his man just now.
“They were not innocent,” he protests.
“So you choose who lives and who dies?” she argues.
“This is about my guilt and no one else’s,” Wilkin stammers.
“Well, you must be so relieved to be down from that dreadful cross,” Love spits.
Oh Love. How you can flummox a man.
Wilkin begs her to let him end his torment and do right by the innocent, but she won’t have it. She tells him that he is what she has been waiting for all along — the key to the life she always thought she would have. And to make that happen, he needs to be Maddox for just a while longer.
In her cavern, Annora shows Ruskin her tattoos, then hands him a book that will better reveal to him what they mean. It’s the book of Nazarene. Read it, she tells him. Then they will talk. Annora finds the Dark Mute outside in his Templar’s armor. We’re being watched, she tells him. By two men, says the Dark Mute — but we only see the Archdeacon’s man, looking stymied.
Back in Ventrishire, the Baroness asks Pryce to escort her to her seat for the execution, casting a pointed glance at Wilkin. Wilkin casts one back once she is seated. Then he signals weakly and the terrified innocent is torn limb from limb by galloping horses.
So what say you, TBX fans? Were you shocked when Wilkin revealed himself to Love — and to Tell? What do you make of Wilkin having no visions for the last two episodes — or am I reading too much into that? Were you shocked that he bedded the kooky Jessamy? Did you believe that he would really leave Berber, Ash and Toran — and Luca! — to fend for themselves? What’s Ruskin’s real story? Who’s next in Milus’ rampage of transference-issue murders? Let’s talk about it in the comments section below.
New episodes of The Bastard Executioner premiere Tuesday nights at 10/9CT on FX.
