The Dragon Waiting

by John M. Ford

  Richard seemed about to say something, but did not. Dimi thought the Duke must have been reminded of his late brother's dining habits.

  Dimi cut the last seal and lifted the lid; inside were scarlet strawberries as big across as two thumbs, moist and shining and so fresh they had only the faintest sweet scent.

  "Please tell the Queen that the King is well," Richard said to Mancini, "but he expresses a loneliness approaching melancholy. I therefore respectfully... I humbly request that Her Grace send the King's brother the Duke of York to join him."

  "In response to such a request—" Mancini began.

  Richard chopped his hand through the air. "I'll have her actual response, sir. Further make clear that the Duke will not be in a secret sanctuary, but in the Royal apartments, available to view. And tell the Queen that Doctor Argentine approves strongly of the idea."

  "Your Grace."

  Mancini went out. Richard signaled, without a word, to Dimitrios. They knew how Mancini would leave the Tower; Dimi moved faster, by a longer route. On the way he stopped in a small arms closet and changed his outer clothing; he was out on Thomas Street just ten ticks of the Tower clocks after Mancini, and in perfect sight of the messenger.

  Richard said that an attempt to merely discover Elizabeth Wood- ville's sanctuary was no breach of an oath against entering it. That distinction did not concern Dimitrios; another did. But he told himself that he was not spying, not committing frauds of himself. He was hunting a human's nest, through a winter forest of building.

  And since Richard would not give him leave to go to Wales— or to question Rivers in Pontefract—this was the only way he had of searching for Hywel and Cynthia.

  A coach rattled up Budge Row, crowding pedestrians to either side. Dimi watched it; it could stop in an instant to pick up Mancini, but it passed him by. "'Ware, sir!" Dimi heard, and nearly got his feet rinsed with slops. He crossed the street, his boots quiet on the paving stones, his breathing under complete control. All the people around him faded, except for one, and Mancini stood out like a figure on a shield. Dimi was faintly aware of the smell of acid and leather as he crossed Cordwainer Street, as a brachet may know there is a hare in the woods without abandoning the problem of the hart.

  And then suddenly the whole shape of the forest changed.

  Mancini was crossing the huge plaza surrounding the London Pantheon, making for the artless complex itself. Damn you, Dimi thought, and at the same time, How clever.

  He did not stop, though he knew what would happen. He thought of closing in on Mancini, but that would not lead him anywhere not of his quarry's choosing. And, Richard's distinctions or not, he dared not be caught pursuing the Queen's intermediary.

  Dimi actually succeeded in following Mancini through three floors and dozens of turns of the Pantheon. Then Mancini made a sharp turn; then there were two men in fawn suits of clothing; and then there were none.

  Dimitrios found himself in an empty cubicle, not more than three yards on a side. On the front wall was a relief of two-faced Janus, a few dried sprigs of fir twined around it. The left and right walls had at one time been mirrored, to create endless reflections of the worshipers; but panels of mirror were missing and broken, and only one white stone bench was left. Dimitrios sat down, between imperfect doubles of himself.

  Richard forgave him, of course; Dimi supposed his master knew that forgiveness was not what he wanted.

  "Parliament has set the Coronation for three weeks from now; there'll be a week's celebrating with the Iambolc feast to finish it off. Elizabeth has to come out for the Coronation, after all." He shook his head. "Dimitrios, you know more of the law of Byzantium than I, and unlike the lawyers you'll tell it in English. Does the Empire have a law of temple sanctuary?"

  Dimi said "The state may make no law that favors a faith. Since not all faiths have a rule of inviolability, such a law would favor those that do. In the end... it was decreed by Justinian, after the last Tarsite riots, that if the gods wished to keep sanctuary they would themselves punish its violators. He said, 'Let those who would be safe in their gods pray, and keep a spear sharp.'"

  Richard looked thoughtful. "And keep Mysteries hidden, eh, brother?"

  "Yes, brother. The caves have always been a strength to us."

  Richard nodded. "You see, my father broke sanctuaries, and asked Thor to strike him if he did wrong. Edward did the same. No doubt Elizabeth thinks no better of me."

  Dimitrios did not reply. Richard looked out a window, said "It would be so much easier if the gods would stop us doing what we should not." He sighed. "As well ask that we not want to do it.... I have another task for you, brother, and this one won't please you, either."

  It was, Dimi supposed, what he wanted: punishment. "Of course, Richard."

  Richard's eyebrows rose, and the corners of his mouth. He turned the ring on his little finger. "Well, it's not so horrible as that. You know Hastings has been intercepting Mancini's letters?"

  "I heard him say it."

  "Well, for an old councillor he's shown a remarkable lack of guile. He's had the letters opened, copied, and resealed—without examining the originals. The Bull knows what he expected to find that way. You were a mercenary; you know sieges and secret messages. I want you to get one of those letters itself, and look it over."

  Dimi thought it was the perfect punishment detail: making him spy again.

  "Ask your German friend to help; he must know chemicals, and cipher mathematics How is Professor von Bayern, by the way?"

  "He was well when last I saw him," Dimitrios said, and thought that it was a bad sort of truth; better truth was that he had not seen Gregory in weeks, and did not even know if he was finding his food.

  Surely, though, he must be. The Tower must have an old-established system for feeding them.

  Gregory lay very still in the dark, on his narrow bed, dressed in only a pair of hose. A little light seeped in around the draperies; he did not have a pin-board to block off the window. There was no fire. He was not cold, not able to be, and in the gray haze of light he could see as clearly as an ordinary man at noonday.

  He was aware his little clock was no longer ticking. It had a superlative Swiss spring, which could drive it for sixty to seventy hours; so he had been on the bed for at least that long. It was possible that he had been asleep for some of the time, but he doubted it.

  When the light failed, he thought, he would dress, and cross London to Baynard's Castle. Wetherby would let him in, and see that he had some blood from the kitchen. Some animal's blood. He was just hungry enough, now, so that he would not mind its taste, would not be reminded of what tasted so much better.

  He had been three days in this room. It had been eleven days since he had taken a capon from the Tower kitchens. After feeding, he cooked the bird in his room and ate it.

  He passed all the flesh in lumpy pale flux. His body was refusing to accept food. Not strictly true: all foods save one.

  One of his kind had called it "the perfection." "Why on earth would you resist it? You fill your body with garbage, but the body knows its own. Men don't eat grass, but the cattle that graze on it; vrykolaka do not drink from cattle—"

  He had wound the clock, loaded his gun—not the smallest one— and gotten into bed. Now the clock was unwound, the gun unused. He was done with the bed as well.

  There was a knock. "Gregory?" It was Dimitrios's voice.

  "A moment," he called; it hurt his throat. He put on a robe, wound his spark lighter and struck a lamp to life; the brilliance was excruciating, and he put on his darkest glasses before opening the door.

  "Gregory, I—are you all right? I mean... were you asleep?"

  "Resting, yes. I am fine, only a little tired."

  "Well. I'm... glad you've got work to do.

  "A man must keep busy."

  "Are you busy now?"

  "No. Come in. Forgive the light."

  "Of course." Dimi reached inside his jacket, produced a thick envelope
with a seal. "This is a letter from... someone the Duke suspects of spying. I'm supposed to examine it for secret writing, and I thought you could help."

  "Well, I..." He looked at the window. It was not yet dark. And he had not used the skills in so long. "I'd be glad to help as I can." He took the envelope. "Let me get some things from my bag."

  The hot blade of a knife slipped under the seal, freeing it intact from the heavy paper. Wearing his white silk gloves, Gregory eased the sheets out. He wrote notes on their order and orientation in the envelope. "The Alexandrine Library," he told Dimi, "requires a course in the handling of precious manuscripts. Hm... do you read Italian?"

  "Enough to read orders and broadsheets."

  "I can read technical works. Between that and your vernacular, let us see what is here."

  The answer, after an hour or so of reading word-and-phrase and arguing over idioms, was Nothing. "He seems to have a great interest in English court costume," Gregory said. "You are certain he is not a social philosopher making a study?"

  "We didn't really expect a message in the plain text."

  "I cannot swear there is none. Word lengths may encrypt, or perhaps we should read every twelfth word... but let us try something else." He pulled the table lamp close, swung its lenses aside, held a page of the letter near the flame. Almost no light showed through.

  Gregory took the warm sheet away. It seemed unchanged. He rubbed it between thumb and forefinger. It was a very thick vellum, and there was something about its feel. "How often does Herr Mancini write his letters?"

  "Every two or three weeks."

  "And does he expect them to be collected into a library volume?"

  "What?"

  "This is book paper, an expensive book paper. Feel it." He handed a page to Dimi, rubbed his fingers again on the one he held.

  He felt a minute slippage.

  "Now, what is this?" He held the paper to the lamp again; touched the knife to the very edge of the sheet, rocked the blade.

  The paper split in two.

  On the inside surfaces of the separated sheets were characters in a faint brown ink, written along the weave of the paper.

  "A heat-developing ink," Gregory said, "but where we could not see it develop. Here, let us open the rest of these surprise packages."

  Shortly they had almost twenty pages of brown script, none of it readable through encipherment.

  Gregory looked to the window; no light came in.

  "Do you think you can break it?"

  "I hope... was meinst du?" He looked at Dimitrios, at the letter. "I know some of the methods. But it could take time... I was going to leave here, tonight."

  "Leave? Where for?"

  "To... the Duchess Cecily's house. I was offered... her hospitality, as we all were. And it is so much quieter than the Tower. Especially with the preparations for Coronation."

  Dimi let out a breath. "Across London? I'd thought you meant Scotland, or worse. Look... do you have the time to work on this? Really?"

  "Yes, I do." He wondered if Dimitrios had caught him in his lie.

  "Then take the letter with you. Lord Hastings is Captain of Calais; letters get lost at sea. Send word when you've done it."

  "Thank you for your confidence."

  Dimitrios looked surprised. "I... of course, Gregory. Do you need help moving your things?"

  "No, thank you. I was almost ready to go."

  Dimi looked him up and down, at his bare chest showing through the loose robe. Ah, you have caught me, Gregory thought, but that was not a lie.

  "Well. Good night, then, Gregory."

  "Good night, Dimitrios."

  Gregory put on his gray gown, put the silent clock and the gun and the letter into a shoulder bag with some more clothing. He tossed on his green cloak, was about to blow out the lamp, when he thought: Pliny's Transposition.

  If he had to encipher a long letter every few weeks, transmitted long distances so that keywords could not be readily exchanged, it would be the system of choice

  It will keep across town, he thought, and cupped his hand around the lamp flame.

  No. It would not. By the time he reached the gates, the Hein- zelmannchen would have begun kicking holes in the word-lattice building up in his mind.

  He took off the cloak, spread the pages of the letter out on the table, found a sheet of drawing paper for constructions and calculations.

  At the back of his mind, where he forced it to stay, lest thinking too much spoil it, was the thought that he was not hungry now.

  The cipher began to break down. He had been worried that the clear text would be in colloquial Italian, as unintelligible to him as the cipher, but it proved to be in a workhorse Latin.

  By the second page, Gregory knew that its author was not an Italian. His Latin and his cipher proved it. That is, he was not an Italian by loyalty.

  By the time Gregory was finished, and dawn was lighting the window, he knew a great deal about the loyalties of a great many persons. And one for whom loyalty was not the issue at all. And he knew whom Margaret of Anjou had seen in his face.

  He turned toward the window again, eyes closed, feeling the sunlight burning him. People would not be bustling yet, and that was necessary for what he intended.

  He stood. There was no more time to waste. He could not wait until the sun was higher; he had to make the most of their natural disadvantages.

  Giles the Tower porter was in the hall, leaning on a rack of poleaxes, asleep standing up by appearances. Gregory walked past him without a sound, keeping his shoulder bag close to his body. He reached to Giles's belt and in a fluid motion slipped a key from the porter's belt. Giles sniffled and twitched, but did not wake.

  Gregory put the key into its lock, turned it; it was a springless mechanism and it did not click. He pushed the door open the width of three fingers, looked in.

  The room beyond was very dim, with a fire too small for heat or warmth. A tall, thin man stood at a table near the wall opposite the window. He wore a light silk robe. On the table before him was an earthenware jar, metal-sealed. He was clipping the wires that held the lid in place.

  Gregory pushed the door open, stepped inside, closed the door. The man was slowly turning to face him, putting down his wire shears.

  "Good morning, sir," he said, smiling. "I do not believe we have met."

  Gregory said "I think you know why we have not, Doctor. I am the Fachritter von Bayern."

  "Eccelente! I have wanted to meet you, Professor, very much," John Argentine said. He took a step forward.

  Gregory reached into his bag. "Please stop moving." He rested the twin barrels of the gun on his left palm, his right thumb on the split trigger.

  Argentine stopped. He was still smiling. "I have had guns pointed at me, Professor von Bayern. In fact, I have been shot with them."

  "I also," Gregory said. "However, this gun was built by me. It uses fulminate locks, which are touchy but never miss fire. It fires two cylindrical bullets, three-quarters of an inch in diameter; the bullets are sawn radially to expand and splinter. You are a doctor; think about that. And think also that I know better than most where to aim."

  "I've been thinking that." He gestured toward the jar on the table. "Do you mind if I finish opening that? I think it'll interest you." He picked up the shears. "This has to be done properly: break the lead and it'll be full of strawberries. Ah. Ecco esso, Professore!"

  Gregory could smell it as soon as Argentine lifted the lid: warm, fresh, human blood.

  "There is quite enough for both of us, Professor." He looked sharply at Gregory. "In fact, you may have all of this; I can see you need it more than I, today. However have you been living? London is a big city, I know, and suspects foreigners, but—"

  "Be quiet." Gregory felt hollow. His head was full of sweet, blood- scented air. He did not have to be hollow, he knew; there was more than a quart in the jar, more than he had ever taken at one time.

  His mouth full of water, he said "The Kin
g?"

  "He'll be all right now," Argentine said. "They said a Ricci of Fiorenza treated him, and I can believe it-—rare disease, beautiful surgery. But it could not cure him, of course. I know the disease... I am a specialist in diseases of the blood and vessels, you see... and for this one only I am the cure. Forgive me, Professor. Only we." He looked at the jar. "Would you let me take a little of this for him? He's impatient. You know." Argentine put his finger into the blood—which still showed no sign of thickening or cooling—tasted it. "Can you imagine what it is like for him? He has never—will never—taste anything less than human food. Pleasures of kingship—"

  Gregory's gun kicked and roared. The jar of blood exploded, sending a red wave over the table and the wall and Doctor Argentine, who clutched at his arm, dropped to his knees. There was a smell of burning and a sizzling sound, and Argentine whimpered like a kicked dog.

  Gregory said "I did not mention the phosphorous filling, because I was not certain it would work." He tilted the unfired tube down to point at the shaking doctor. On the floor, little pools of blood were boiling.

  The door was opened, and soldiers came in with a nobleman leading them. All stopped and stared, weapons half out; they looked unwell.

  Gregory took his thumb off the gun trigger. "Your Grace." He reached into his bag, produced the translation of Mancini's letter. "We have a great deal of trouble. I hope that these are men you can trust."

  Cautiously, the Duke reached for the papers, glanced at them.

  "Yes, Professor, they are absolutely loyal to me," Buckingham said, and signaled for his men to close the door.

  Dimitrios looked from the window of the tiny council antechamber, across to Tower Hill: some carpenters were hammering and sawing, raising a scaffolding for the Coronation ten days away. The noise irritated him. Not that anything would have been soothing this morning, he supposed. Richard had ordered him to arm and wait here, with two of his troopers from the Border fighting and a number of household men.

  What they were waiting for, the Duke of Gloucester said, was a cry of Treason. It was not a thing to put men at their ease.