The Tudor Conspiracy

Chapter Eleven

I stalked through London like a specter. The cold congealed my breath, emptying the streets of its habitual vagrants, pickpockets, and vermin. While curfew was supposed to secure the city and protect the citizenry, as I traversed the maze of tenements and taverns downriver from the palace, I knew the gates’ closure only signaled the onset of a different sort of activity, most of it criminal.

But not tonight. Tonight, it was as if London itself mourned my dead squire.

I was heedless of my safety, taking shadowy alleyways as I made my way to the water steps, my hand on my sword. I would have welcomed an assault; I wanted to shed blood, to satiate the rage and disbelief I already knew would haunt me forever.

Soon I was standing at the river’s edge, gazing upon a vast expanse of rippled viridian. The moon was veiled in the overcast sky, but its icy glow wasn’t needed. The frozen Thames emitted its own luminescence, an eerie nimbus that captured tendrils of mist drifting like tattered silk over its motionless surface. On the far bank, I discerned errant firelight.

I forgot you’re like a cat when it comes to water …

I spun about, with a stifled gasp. I had heard him so clearly, I expected to find him behind me, grinning, my faithful scamp who had refused to stay put in our room.

No one was there.

Returning my eyes to the embankment, resisting a surge of helpless tears, I gleaned rows of forlorn wherries, all useless now, the boatmen left to fend for themselves as best they could until the river thawed. Peregrine had assured me this way would be safest, faster, and I had no time to waste. As I stood there, though, I was gripped by a horrifying vision of getting halfway across and hearing a spidery crack, looking down to see the ice give way under my feet. I knew the river still flowed under its cold shield; its embrace would be swift, inescapable. I’d plunged into the Thames before. I had no desire to do it again, though death felt like a merciful respite at this moment.

I looked down at my boots. Taking my knife, I lightly scored the soles and took up handfuls of snow, rubbing them into the grooves. It might help stop me from slipping.

I sidled out onto the frosted edge. Fear cut off my breath. I told myself to focus, take slow steps, one foot in front of the next, as if I moved across a newly polished floor. As I progressed, the city disappeared behind me in the mist, but the noise of the south bank ahead did not yet intrude. The clouds parted for a glimpse of the moon; her silver halo dazzled, scattering diamond fragments across the river. With the black sky above me, embroidered with a thousand brilliant stars, and the Thames like a fantastical sea, bewitched in midmotion, I came to a halt. It struck me how cruel the world was; even as a child died in agony, nature could clothe herself with such majestic indifference.

Then I moved forward again, almost losing my balance, slipping and scrambling toward the shore. The cold I’d ceased to feel only moments earlier returned with vicious suddenness. I drew the hood of my cloak further over my head, my feet like blocks of ice in my boots as I clambered up the Southwark bank.

Sidestepping discarded drift nets, I stared at an odd tableau ahead: fire pits tossing sizzling embers into the air and the smell of bacon thick. I could see crowds; as I approached, to my amazement a night fair burgeoned before me.

Divided by meandering narrow dirt lanes were tables under sagging tarps held up by ropes, laden with piles of tarnished platters, pyramids of goblets, threadbare carpets, faded tapestries, splintered knives, and old cloths. In the tarry light of the fire pits, street vendors and alewives circulated offering meat pies, pastries, and other foods while crowds mingled-mostly men, from what I could discern under their layers of clothing, but also some women, bold and strutting, all perusing the displays. The vendors hawked their wares with tireless enthusiasm, though in subdued tones more suited to a graveyard than a market site. It seemed no one wanted to alert the authorities.

I was careful to not draw attention, keeping my head lowered as I blended with the crowd. At first I mistook the jumbled silver pieces on a nearby stall for looted goods, though it struck me that surely such wealth could not have gone unreported, much less unconfiscated. Then I saw an upholstered prayer bench, complete with gilded angels on its carved frontispiece and worn velvet cushion for the knees. I paused. Beside it were heaps of torn book clasps, many of which had chipped enamel iconography, and a wood trough such as pigs might use, filled to the rim with coiled rosaries.

The fair was selling rapine from the monasteries.

The stall owner lumbered up to me-a potbellied, bearded man with pitted skin. He babbled at me in an incomprehensible language; it wasn’t until he was jabbing his finger at my chest and repeating his words that I suddenly understood he spoke English.

“Buy or go,” he said. “You no look here.”

For a moment, I couldn’t move. As I met the man’s yellowed eyes I had an unbidden recollection of a time now gone, a time I had never witnessed but had only heard about, when these holy refuges for the sick, weary, and poor once dominated the realm, until they fell prey to King Henry and his break with Rome.

I felt a sudden rush of heat, a searing desire to grab this man by the scruff of his jerkin and remind him that what he so callously sold as scrap had once been revered by hundreds of monks and nuns, who’d been turned out of their ancestral homes. I knew in some remote part of me that it was my grief and I mustn’t let it get the better of me. I could not indulge a meaningless altercation now, not when my real target lay ahead. Yet even as I fought to stay focused, I wrestled with my compassion for the queen. Mary had clung to her faith against all odds, unaware that what she sought to salvage had already been forsaken.

The man’s hand dropped to his belt. Before he could draw his weapon, I strode off, leaving the fair behind for the rows of hovels clustered together like moldering mushrooms. The barking of dogs and agonized roar of a bear being taunted in a pit curdled the chill; on the thresholds I now passed lurked figures in tattered gowns, some no older than girls, their gaunt faces painted in a mockery of enticement. A lewd invitation floated to me, a cocked bony hip and beckoning finger …

I had reached the whorehouses.

I came to a halt, uncertain of which way to turn. In the night it all looked the same-filthy, decrepit, and corroded by suffering. The visceral pain of Peregrine’s death collided with my understanding of the damage Renard brewed with Mary’s marriage, which would pit her in a battle against her Protestant subjects, and all of a sudden I wanted this errand done with. I wanted to fulfill my mission and get as far from the court and London as I could.

When I finally espied Dead Man’s Lane, I kept to pockets of shadows, my senses attuned. The Hawk’s Nest came into view, a far different building from its daytime incarnation-the shutters of the upper story pulled back, candlelight winking in the mullioned glass, the faint sounds of music and laughter drifting on the cold air.

The front door opened. Two men staggered out, silhouetted by the light spilling from inside. I could see at least one of them wasn’t from the neighborhood. He was tall and well built, with a fur-trimmed mantle tossed across his shoulders: a courtier by the looks of it, and of evident means. His companion was slender, smaller. As they careened down the alley where I lurked, the boy let out a lascivious giggle.

I palmed my blade. They came closer, tripping over each other and laughing. I could smell the alcohol wafting off them from where I hid in a doorway. All of a sudden, the boy yelped as the courtier swung him to the wall and began groping him with drunken urgency, the boy emitting squeaks of feigned protest.

I pounced.

The courtier froze when he felt my blade at his throat. “He’s a little young, don’t you think?” I hissed in his ear, and the boy pressed against the wall opened his mouth to shriek.

I glared. “I don’t want you. Get, now!”

He didn’t need to be told twice. Slipping around his companion, the boy ran off.

The courtier tried to elbow me. I pressed my poniard on his neck hard enough to give him pause. “Gutter rat thief,” he slurred. “Kill me if you like, but I don’t have anything to give you. That boy-cunny took all my coin.”

“I don’t want your money,” I said. “Just tell me the password. Or would you prefer I turned you in to the night watch for consorting with an underage boy?”

He chortled, swaying. He could barely stand upright. If I hadn’t had my arm about him from behind, he’d have impaled himself on my blade. “That’s a fine one. They’re all underage, you fool. That’s the Nest’s specialty.”

“Password,” I repeated. I pressed harder, enough to make him gasp.

“Fledgling,” he said, and as I lessened my pressure on the blade, he abruptly whirled about, less drunkenly than I’d supposed. I had no choice but to slam him on the side of his head with my poniard hilt.

He dropped like stone.

Grabbing him by his sleeves, I dragged him into the doorway and yanked his mantle from him. It was expensive, a dark green damask lined in fleece, the outer edges trimmed in lynx. I threw it over my own cloak. Hopefully the bastard wouldn’t freeze to death.

Tugging up the mantle’s furred cowl, which almost covered my entire face, I shoved my knife in my boot and strode to the brothel door.

* * *

The clouds overhead had scattered, and the glacial moon now shed a colorless glow over the building. I rapped on the door and waited, counting the seconds under my breath.

A slot in the door slid open. “Fee,” said a gruff voice.

“Fledgling,” I replied.

The sound of bolts grinding preceded the door’s opening. The smell of wood smoke and a blast of warmth greeted me; as I heard the clanking of tankards and laughter, I realized I faced a closed passageway lit by cressets on the walls. There was another door at the end of the short corridor, from which the sounds of entertainment reached me.

The front door slammed shut behind me. A hand yanked back my cowl. The voice barked, “Weapons, if ye please. And yer cloak, too.”

He hadn’t recognized the mantle had a previous owner. Nevertheless, he posed a problem-a titan with the crunched features of a pit mastiff and hands the size of hams. He also had a wheel-lock pistol shoved under his wide studded belt; despite my misgivings, I was impressed. One didn’t see a weapon of that caliber every day.

The man glared at me. Slowly I unhooked my sword harness and wrapped it in both of my cloaks. “Be careful with it,” I said. I had no intention of relinquishing my hidden poniard. He eyed me up and down, my fine Toledo-steel sword gripped in his fist.

“Fee,” he said again.

I frowned, started reaching into my pouch for coin.

“Fee!” he roared.

God’s teeth, were there two passwords? I said coyly, “I’m new, you see, and a friend recommended that I-”

He grasped me by the front of my doublet, thrusting his face at me. If he decided to start using his fists, I wouldn’t stand a chance unless I could get my blade out.

“Who recommended ye?” he asked, and I replied softly, “His lordship the Earl of Devon. He suggested we meet here. He says it’s the finest establishment of its kind.”

“Earl, ye say?” He tightened his fist about my doublet, scrutinizing me. Just as I began to think I was going to have do something very unsavory to get myself out of this predicament, he grunted and let me go, signaling to the door at the end of the passage.

“Earl’s man’s in there. See ye report to him first. I don’t like strangers who don’t know the fee, and he don’t like visitors who come lookin’ for his master.”

I bowed my head and stepped past him; without warning, I felt his hand shoot between my legs. He gripped my codpiece in a breath-quenching vise. “Nice,” he said, his breath rank in my face. “Come see me later, if ye like, pretty man.”

“I’ll consider it,” I managed to utter, feeling as if he had just castrated me. He gave me another breath-quenching squeeze. As I gulped against the urge to double over and cup my genitals, he reached up to a box above the shelves where a multitude of customer weapons and cloaks were stashed. He pulled out a thin cloth mask and thrust it into my hand.

“No faces in the common room. Rule of the house.”

I muttered my gratitude, affixing the white lawn mask in place and tying its ribbons about my head. My groin throbbed; I feared I’d lost my ability to ever raise my yard again.

Apprehension coiled in me as I stepped through the far door and into the common room. Laid out like any well-to-do alehouse, it was ample, with herb-strewn rushes underfoot to reduce the chill of the plank flooring and tallow lights flickering on wide board tables, where men sat drinking, playing cards, or dicing.

All ordinary enough, until I realized the wavering figures by the hearth who swayed against each other were all men; the lithe servers weaving their way between tables carrying flagons or platters were male, too. There wasn’t a woman in sight.

Every customer who turned to stare at me wore a mask.

Two men seated at a nearby table, both clad in open doublets of patterned cloth, expressed interest; one smiled invitingly at me while his companion whispered in his ear. I returned the smile but moved past them, scanning the room for the earl’s man. I pondered how to contend with this complication. Courtenay had sent his man after me on the bridge; I didn’t expect him to be exactly welcoming.

I spotted him seated at a table near a narrow staircase, hunched alone with a tallow wick floating in an oil dish and a tankard before him, his hood pulled over his head. Did the mask rule apply to him? I surmised the cloak and weapon policy did not.

He reared up his head as he sensed my approach, throwing his hood backward. I bit back a gasp. His left eye was a welted hole. It explained why he’d failed to see me in the gallery, huddled in the window alcove. The rest of him didn’t look much better; his face was a mass of scar tissue that twisted his features from brow to jaw, the skin so puckered and knotted it no longer resembled flesh. There was damage visible even under his gray-flecked beard, as if someone had taken a mallet to him, followed by a cauterizing torch and crude sutures.

“What do you want?” he snarled in a raw voice. His speech was slurred, but not in the way men garbled when they were drunk. He didn’t move a muscle. He didn’t need to. I had no doubt this man had seen battle. He could be on his feet, with a dagger in my gut, before I had time to blink. Still, as I recalled the note he’d left in my room, and what it had done, I had to stop myself from lunging at him to carve out his rancid, black heart.

Yet he didn’t appear to recognize me. With the mask covering my face, I could be anyone. I cocked my hip, affecting a playful tone. “I’m told you’re the earl’s man. I was hoping he might like company tonight?”

He didn’t glance at me again, raising his goblet to slurp its contents. I could see why his enunciation was strange; his upper lip was gone, his mouth misshapen as if it had been spliced and put clumsily back together. He must have lost most of his teeth, too, I thought, as a trickle of ale dribbled into his beard.

“His lordship’s not interested,” he said. “Find some other custom, drudge.”

Excellent. He’d taken the ruse. He thought I was one of the whores.

I said, “I’m very accomplished.”

“Bah.” He flicked his gloved hand toward the general vicinity of the room. “Save your tricks for someone who cares. The earl only likes them hairless as skinned squirrels.” He let out a chortle, amused by his own joke. Again I controlled the urge to kill him and be done with it. He was only the messenger; he hadn’t placed the order.

“Pity.” I let out an exaggerated sigh, bending down as if to adjust my boot before I pivoted toward the staircase. As I’d hoped, he was quick as a lion, on his feet and yanking me about. “Not so fast, catamite. Don’t I know you from somewhere?” Then he paused. “Is that a needle you’ve got in my gut? If so, I warn you I’ve a much bigger one and a mind to slit you open with it like a spring calf.”

I stared into his eye. “Perhaps I’ll slit you first.” I pushed on the knife. “Don’t think I won’t.” When I saw the sudden change in his expression as he realized who I was, I added, “Or we can go about our business as gentlemen and you can tell me where he is.”

He could have yelled. Instead he said, amused, “Is that the way it is? Well, then, go ahead. I’ll be here when you come down.” He pointed up the stairs. “Last door to the left. Watch out for cats.” He guffawed, turning back to his tankard.

I started up the creaking stairs, my knife in my hand. The ceiling sloped low. I hated enclosed spaces almost as much as I did deep water. When I reached the landing I glanced over my shoulder. He was no longer at the table. He wouldn’t go far, though. He would be waiting for me, like a monster in a nightmare.

Yanking off the mask, I stuffed it in my breeches pocket. The passage before me was cramped and poorly lit, punctuated by narrow doors that couldn’t be very thick, judging by the moans and slapping of skin I could hear from the rooms beyond. The air was fetid, a sour mixture of old rushes, cat piss, and sex.

I took a step forward. Something streaked past me in a dark blur down the passageway. A cat. As I eased past the doors, my eyes adjusting to the gloom, I began to see other cats, nestled by the walls, hissing or watching me with opaque eyes. The ceiling seemed to lower over me; I actually tiptoed past the animals as if they might attack.

By the time I reached the last door on the left, I was dripping sweat; it was hot as Hades from the rising heat of the hearth downstairs and God only knew how many illegal charcoal braziers in the rooms. The entire building was a firetrap; it explained why cats converged here, though I couldn’t possibly imagine why anyone would keep so many indoors, except to keep the rats out.

Raking a hand through my damp hair, I put my ear to the door. I heard nothing within. I tried the latch. I was starting to turn it when the door flung open-“I’ve been waiting for hours!”-and the earl grabbed hold of me, trying to embrace me.

I threw him aside. Courtenay’s eyes snapped wide. Slamming the door shut, he whirled to me. His chemise was unlaced, revealing a slim white chest; his features were twisted with rage and flushed with what I assumed was a liberal intake of wine. He started to come at me, his teeth bared, then stopped short when he saw my drawn poniard.

His eyes narrowed. “Who in bloody hell are you?”

Now that I was face-to-face with the earl of Devon, the man who I knew was plotting against the queen, and who I believed had tried to poison me and instead taken Peregrine’s life, my desire for vengeance knotted like barbed iron about my heart. I took a moment to gauge him. He exuded the well-fed gloss of a noble, though I noted that without the extravagant padding of his finery, the effects of years of confinement in the Tower showed. Under his loose chemise and breeches, he was slender as an adolescent, his long-limbed body seemingly devoid of discernible musculature; despite his arrogant carriage, if it came down to a fight I had a feeling he’d have less physical strength than I.

“So you do recognize me,” I said through my teeth.

He smiled coldly. “You’re that no-name mongrel Renard has sent sniffing after me. You’ve a good nose, too, to have found me here. Pity you shan’t be telling him about it.”

“Oh? Are you going to try to kill me again?”

He let out a bray of laughter-until I stepped toward him and he saw the intent in my eyes. He went still as I said, “That surprise you left for me in my rooms killed my squire instead. He was just a lad. I will see you pay for it.”

He blanched, glancing downward to the blade I aimed at him. “I assure you,” he said slowly, “I’ve no idea what you are talking about.”

In the silent wake of his words, I searched his eyes. Unless he was the best actor I’d come across, he seemed genuinely baffled by my accusation. My rage faltered. Had I made a mistake? Was he telling me the truth?

“Let me refresh your memory. You ordered me silenced the other night because I saw you meeting with the princess. You sent your manservant after me.” He drew in a sharp breath as I stepped closer to him. The door was at his back; in order to get out he’d have to turn around to open it. “But he failed to catch me that night,” I continued, “so you had him follow me. I saw him on the bridge; he didn’t make himself inconspicuous. Though when he realized I’d seen him, he disappeared. Then I returned to the palace to find your note. Are you remembering any of this now? Because if you aren’t, I suggest you start. Your life depends on it.”

“Who are you to threaten me, you knave!” To my disconcertion, he reacted as any noble confronted by an inferior would. Heedless of my knife, he took a furious step at me, though he made the mistake of glancing at his discarded doublet on the bed. If he had a weapon, it was there. He’d have to come through me to get it. I gave him time to consider his options, even as I began to consider the possibility that his display of outrage was sincere. Not only would a guilty man have shown more caution, there was nothing in his demeanor to suggest any surprise that I was still alive.

If it had not been Courtenay, who had tried to poison me?

I shook my contemplations aside, lowering my blade. Courtenay’s expression shifted; with a lift of his brow, he pointed to a flagon on the side table. “May I? I’m parched.”

I nodded, watching him move to the table and fill a goblet. He eyed me over its rim. “I am sorry to hear about your … squire, was it?” He took a sip. “But seeing as I had nothing to do with his death and you’re still here, you must have another purpose in mind. Could it be blackmail, perhaps?”

“Now that you mention it,” I said coldly.

“Then you’re wasting your time. Contrary to how it appears, just because you found me in this disreputable establishment doesn’t mean I swive boys.” He gave me a languid smile. “But I know plenty of men at court who do. Shall I give you their names?”

I wasn’t taken in by his flippant manner. “I don’t care who or what you swive. I want answers, and you’re going to give them to me.”

“Oh, my. That almost sounds like a threat.” He downed the contents of his goblet and set it back on the table with the exasperated air of a man obliged to engage in a tedious conversation. “Answers, you say? For whom? Your master, Renard, perhaps?”

“He does have the queen’s ear,” I replied, and before I had time to react, Courtenay flew at me, his hand closed about a long, slim dagger he’d lifted unseen from the side table. He aimed the blade at my stomach; as I swerved to avoid being stabbed, he kicked at my legs, knocking me to my knees. I dropped my poniard. I was trying to retrieve it while avoiding him and getting back on my feet when he leapt on top of me, yanking my head back by my hair. He slid his knife against my throat; I felt its bite abrade my skin.

“I don’t like being accosted by common blackguards like you,” he whispered, and the feral glee in his voice was more unnerving than the sudden warm seep of blood down my neck. “I’ll ask you once, and if I don’t like what I hear, I will slit your throat: Who sent you?”

Without hesitation, I whispered, “Elizabeth. She sent me.”