‘Indeed, you do think highly of yourself. That a mere man should speak to a Queen of the Unseelie Court like an equal,’ she mocked. ‘Were you here beside me, I could, if it suited me, peel away your flesh to the rough construction that is your essence. But we are craftspeople, delicate and skilled, and we can find subtler ways to teach harsh lessons.’
‘I have seen some of those ways. One whisper in an ear that can turn thoughts in such a way that it drives a man mad.’
‘We see the weakness in all men’s hearts. That one flaw that we can prise apart with a few words until it becomes a yawning chasm. I see into your heart.’
Will glanced back down the steps to his master, assuring himself that Cecil could not overhear the conversation. ‘I know my own heart well enough.’
‘No, you do not. No man does. You only think that is the case, and that is why the truth drives you from the illusion you all hide behind to stay sane.’ Beyond her muted words, he heard a faint scraping as if she were stroking the door. He imagined a lover’s caress and shivered, despite himself.
‘You waste your breath—’
‘I see sadness, a deep, abiding sadness.’ The Queen rolled the words around her tongue with pleasure. ‘I see the pain of loss and separation, a life that has become corrupted by mystery to such a degree that it can no longer be lived. You would rather know the truth and be destroyed than live in this twilight world any longer.’
Will raised his head in defiance. ‘And I feel anger,’ he replied in a low voice, ‘for you stole from me the only thing I ever valued.’ He shook his head and his blood spattered across the door.
‘I hear the impotent cry of the wounded child.’ Her breathy words sounded low and closer still. He presumed she had pressed her cheek against the wood. Now they were barely separated, like two lovers teasing towards an embrace, her seductive voice luring him in. The hairs on his neck tingled as if she had brushed his skin. He should break the enchantment and leave that place without a backward glance, he knew, but the rage in his heart held him fast. He sensed her smiling. Yes, she knew his weaknesses well.
‘You see sadness,’ he whispered, ‘you see rage, I know, but you do not see fear.’
She laughed again. ‘Fear is the sane response to us.’
‘Then I am not sane, and proud of it. Tell me your weakness.’
‘The very definition of insanity. You presume I would bare my throat to you.’
Will glanced back at Cecil who had retreated further down the steps. The spymaster quivered in the wan light of the guttering lantern flame. ‘You will tell me.’ Will kept the confidence in his voice, luring her in as she had attempted to ensnare him. ‘For sport. A mere man is no threat, you have said so yourself. What have you to lose by indulging my desire to seek my own destruction?’
‘You think yourself clever. Perhaps you are, by the standards of man. Yet there is much you do not know – about the Unseelie Court, about yourself, and your place in this world. Nevertheless, I agree. Our weakness is something your kind would never understand – honour. Our word is unbreakable, even though it mean pain, or loss, or defeat. Do you find any gain in that knowledge? Does your kind even understand what honour means? I think not,’ she added with cold contempt.
Will folded the information away and continued lightly, ‘Is it true that you have made your home in the New World?’
‘Would you visit my palace, O man?’ she enquired. He heard a crackle of dark humour in her voice.
‘I am sure you would offer me all the courtesies extended to every mortal who has crossed from this world of hard things into your moonlit realm.’ He waited a moment and then added, ‘Yet perhaps I could offer a few common courtesies of my own.’
The Faerie Queen laughed. ‘Oh, what sport that would be. Would you wave your sword at us? Would you rage and curse and threaten? Before we fell upon you like wolves?’
‘We have more steel in us than you imagine, Your Highness.’
‘Then I extend an invitation to you, should you wish to prove yourself,’ she replied with cruel glee. ‘Damn yourself. Sail to the New World. Cross the gulf between our realms, if you can find a gate, to the place where both lands exist as one, and then follow the great Orinoco until you reach the confluence with the Caroni. Along that river you will discover the fortress of the Unseelie Court.’
Will felt a squirming sensation deep in his head. He reeled away from the door as his mind’s eye was flooded with a vision of startling richness. At first he struggled to comprehend what he was seeing. A monstrous black spider as big as Hampton Court Palace squatting on a verdant landscape, where green hills rose above the treetops of a mighty forest. Iron cartwheels wider than the grey Thames, revolving within a sphere. And then he found himself looking down on a grim fortress with soaring walls of black basalt and gold.
The Fortress Crepuscule, the Faerie Queen’s voice echoed in his skull. Your kind will always find our home, should that be your wish. But it is much harder to leave.
His gaze drifted down a vertiginous cliff, across a stone labyrinth set in the forest to a high tower with a soft white glow emanating from the summit. He heard himself murmuring, ‘What is that?’
The Tower of the Moon. The beacon that illuminates the way between our worlds. As long as the light shines, the paths remain open.
‘Swyfte!’ Will heard Cecil’s strained voice as if it were rising from a deep well. ‘Take your leave now before she steals your wits!’ The spy snapped out of his delirious vision into the cold grey of the Lantern Tower.
The Queen of the Unseelie Court scraped her nails down the door. ‘While you mortals are base lead, my people are gold.’ For the first time Will heard a hint of yearning in her voice. ‘And our home is gold. A golden city, which the men of that hot land call Manoa. The wonders you would see there, mortal. It would drive you mad.’
‘One day, Your Highness. One day I will sail there and bring the vengeance of the English to your doorstep.’
‘And as your life ebbs away, try to read some meaning in the entrails of your suffering. There will be none.’
Will forced himself to break her spell and turned away from the door. ‘I have purpose in my life, Your Majesty. I will never be deterred from finding the truth.’
‘Truth?’ she repeated with dark humour. ‘Would you know the greatest secret of all? We are all in cells, to greater or lesser extent. This world you see around you is a prison, though the bars and locks are hidden. But who is the gaoler, ask yourself that? And what does it take to escape?’ Her voice grew fainter. Will imagined her drifting away from the door into the confines of her dismal cell. ‘Even as we speak my people rise from their silent chambers under hill and under lake. I hear them in my heart, drawing nearer. One vow is on their lips: to stop you recovering the mad magician, who is your final hope. You will never set sail from this city. You will die here, all of you. The end is close. Say your prayers. Kiss your loved ones. The end is close.’
A laugh, like cold crystal, fading away into the lonely dark.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
THE MAN SURGED through the sea of bodies flowing along Cheapside in the wan morning sunlight. Furious servants heading to the market yelled curses and apprentices searched for stones to hurl at his back, but still he ran, casting anxious glances over his shoulder. He was swarthy-skinned, the wide-brimmed felt hat he had used to hide his identity long since lost.
Will thundered in the running man’s wake. ‘Queen’s business,’ he bellowed. The crowd peeled away on either side. He was lighter on his feet than the other man, stronger and faster, though he had barely slept since his haunting conversation with the Faerie Queen.
Sensing his pursuer was closing the distance, the fugitive threw himself into a flock of geese, kicking wildly until he drove them into a frenzy of honking and beating wings. The birds scattered across the street in Will’s path. Without missing a step, the spy vaulted on to the back of an apple cart trundling through the flock, scrambled over the sea
t beside the startled carter and leapt across the flapping obstruction, allowing himself a tight smile. His prey was oblivious of what lay ahead. As they passed the towering five-storey houses near the Great Conduit where apothecaries sold herbs and spices, he watched the runaway glance round in shock. At the eastern end of Cheapside, at the Stocks Market confluence of three great thoroughfares, an army of labourers was milling around with armfuls of cordwood for the ring of beacons that were to be built beyond the city’s northern wall, while men in sun-burnished burgonets and cuirasses looked on.
The swarthy man put his head down and tried to weave his way through the confusion without drawing attention, but the towering heap of firewood blocked most of the trivium and the three streets were choked with jumbles of carts and frustrated merchants. As the fugitive stumbled, trying to force his way through the throng, Will called out again, ‘A traitor to the Queen! Stop that man!’
Three pikemen swung their weapons towards the runaway. When he veered away from them, Will sprinted the last few yards and hurled himself forward. The two men crashed across the cobbles. Will leapt up in an instant, drawing his knife and pressing the tip against the fugitive’s neck. The man snarled in Spanish. Will only grinned.
Through the gathering crowd, Cecil barged his way from where he had been overseeing his hastily planned gathering of fuel. ‘What have we here?’ he snapped.
‘A Spanish spy.’ Will sheathed his blade as the pikemen levelled their weapons at the prisoner. ‘Our earthly enemies see an opportunity to make mischief while we are so distracted.’
The spymaster leaned in close and whispered, ‘Prompted by the Unseelie Court, no doubt. That witch Malantha of the High Family is working her wiles upon Philip of Spain.’
‘Threats wait in all quarters. We must never lower our guard.’ Will’s attention was caught by Grace and Nathaniel pushing their way through the throng. Grim-faced, they stopped beside the labourers unloading the wood from the carts, their eyes urging him to come over.
‘To the Tower with him,’ Cecil barked. ‘We will see how loose his lips are after he has rested ’pon the rack.’
As the spymaster directed the pikemen, Will made his way over to his two friends. ‘Grace, I know I have not seen you since my return from Liverpool, but now is not the time—’
‘This is not a social visit,’ she interjected, clasping her hands together against her emerald skirt. ‘I have grave news.’
‘Give her a moment of your time, Will,’ Nathaniel put in. ‘You will not regret it.’ The spy had rarely seen his assistant looking so serious.
‘Speak, then,’ he said.
Grace glanced towards Cecil, still strutting along the ranks of pikemen. ‘When I was at Nonsuch, I overheard your master speaking . . .’ she paused, blanching, ‘of Jenny.’
Will furrowed his brow, remembering Cecil’s mention of Jenny the previous night. ‘He knows little about her.’
‘Not so.’ Grace recounted what she had overheard as the court fled Nonsuch. Will felt his pulse quicken. Could this be true? Cecil had some knowledge of what had happened to Jenny that day so long ago? The spy looked over to where the Queen’s spymaster bustled about, gesticulating at the assembled troops. He felt a cold nugget of anger form in his stomach. Were that so . . . should the spymaster have kept such information from him . . . he could not be held responsible for his actions.
Always the voice of caution, Nathaniel said, ‘Perhaps Grace misheard. And it is often hard to divine the truth from eavesdropping.’
‘Perhaps.’ Will continued to watch Cecil, now in deep conversation with the commander of the pikemen. He knew the nature of the man, and all the things of which he was capable.
Grace leaned in and whispered, ‘This business you are involved in in Liverpool, and here in London, does it concern Jenny?’
‘I cannot say,’ Will replied truthfully, for anything involving the Unseelie Court was linked to his love’s disappearance.
‘Do not treat me like a child.’ Grace raised her chin in defiance. ‘She is my sister, and I would know what you know.’
Will could barely draw his gaze from Cecil. He felt the anger starting to burn through him. ‘You know you must not ask me these things,’ he said, more sharply than he intended. ‘We will talk later.’ Unable to contain himself any longer, he strode over to the spymaster. ‘I would have words,’ he said curtly.
Cecil began to dismiss him, until he saw the cold look in Will’s eyes. The spymaster edged to the lee of a cart where they could not be overheard, and nodded.
‘I am told that you have information about my Jenny’s disappearance,’ Will said, as calmly as he could.
Practised at revealing nothing of his innermost thoughts, Cecil only pursed his lips in thought.
‘Last night you feigned ignorance of her,’ the spy snapped. ‘You know more than you are saying.’
‘I know nothing.’
‘Do not lie to me!’
‘Or what, pray tell?’ Cecil blazed. ‘Are you doubting my word?’
Will steadied himself. This was not the time. ‘If you know anything of what happened to Jenny, tell me now.’
Cecil snorted. ‘What has come over you? You conjure these suspicions out of thin air. Why should I know anything about your woman? Walsingham was spymaster when she disappeared, was he not?’
Will searched his master’s face for a long moment. Grace had been adamant in her assertion of what she had overheard, and Cecil was a man enveloped in secrets. There was a mystery here, for sure, but Will could see he would get no joy from the other man. He frowned, weighing his options, his suspicion of the spymaster grown a hundredfold.
‘I know no more than you,’ Cecil pressed through gritted teeth. ‘Why would I?’
Will felt queasy at the thought that his masters might have known something about Jenny’s disappearance for all these years and told him nothing. What reason could they have? Unsure of his ground, he stalked away, though a part of him wanted to drag Cecil to one side and beat the truth out of him.
Beside the pile of cordwood, he glanced back. The spymaster was watching him intently. Will knew that look and realized he should be on his guard from now on. He pressed on into the crowd, his shoulders heavy, and didn’t stop until he rested in an alley beside a grocer’s shop. Leaning against the damp wall, he closed his eyes, trying to calm his churning thoughts. If Cecil kept many secrets, he had a few of his own. Dipping into the leather pouch at his hip, he pulled out Dee’s obsidian mirror, which he had wrapped in a thick velvet cloth to keep safe. He studied the glass for a long moment. He would find the answers he needed whatever the cost.
CHAPTER TWELVE
AN ARC OF fire blazed across the night-dark fields surrounding London. Spirals of gold sparks, whipped up in the breeze, rose from the beacons enclosing the city from the marshy western reaches by the grey Thames to the riverside woods beside the eastern city wall. Carpenter leaned on the battlements at the top of the White Tower and felt the acrid smoke sting the back of his throat.
It had been four days since the Faerie Queen had issued her hate-filled warning, four long, wearying days of organizing the militia, spinning a web of deceit to sustain the rumour that the suspected attack came from Spanish agents, surreptitiously spreading a long line of salt and protective herbs among the beacons to bolster Dee’s failing defences. Four days of hope and worry.
‘Will our preparations be enough?’ he asked, rubbing at the scar tissue under his hair. It was an unconscious tic in moments of anxiety, harking back to that bitter night in Muscovy when the bear-thing had left him for dead.
‘Hrrrm,’ Launceston murmured, acknowledging the question without answering it. He looked across the slow-moving river towards an orange glow in the east. Another ring of beacons surrounded the docks at Greenwich where men laboured through the night to provision their requisitioned galleon, the Gauntlet, for its long ocean crossing.
‘Can you not offer me even a crumb of comfort?’ Carpente
r snapped. He fought down his bitterness.
‘What good would that do?’ the Earl breathed, his dry voice almost lost to the wind.
Carpenter prepared to give a barbed response, then thought better of it. What was the point in wishing his companion could comprehend such trifles as human feelings? Instead he muttered, ‘We are modern men, not superstitious fools like the country folk, and I have long since discarded the Bible’s cant. But sometimes I hope . . .’ The word caught in his throat. ‘Tell me, Robert, do you think there might be a God?’
‘If there were a God, would He allow a thing like me to exist?’
Carpenter heard no self-pity in his companion’s voice, only an acceptance of his unnatural urges. For a moment, he recalled the diabolic vision of the Earl drenched in blood. He felt surprised that the emotion it stirred in him was not disgust, but sadness. ‘I have had my fill of this business,’ he sighed. ‘It wears me down by degrees, and seals me away in a dark place where I fear I will never see the sun again. I would break away . . . and soon.’
‘Where would you go?’ The Earl drew his grey woollen cloak around him and stepped beside his companion to look out over the jumbled roofs of the city. ‘This business has stolen your life. No family, no woman, no friends, no trade. We company of travellers are all you have.’
Carpenter gave a bitter laugh. ‘This is it, then? You are my family, and Swyfte, and that red-headed maggot-pie Strangewayes? Kill me now and be done with it.’
‘The Enemy will come soon enough,’ Launceston said, looking up to the billowing smoke from the bonfires. ‘Even when Dee’s defences were strong, they still wandered across our territory. The alchemist only kept them from attacking in force. Now not all our charms will hold them at bay for long. We must hope that we can be at sea before they strike. At least if we can regain Dee we stand a chance of repelling them.’
And without Dee there is no hope at all, Carpenter thought.
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