The Outlaw and the Upstart King

by Rod Duncan

  “Jago will do whatever he’ll do,” she said. “The men who hurt you will be dead.”

  “But I need to see them when they know they’re beaten.”

  “Let it go.”

  But he would not be reasoned with. She sighed. “I’ll need a set of men’s clothes. I wouldn’t get ten paces in this dress. And a man’s hat. Wide brim is best. Could you get that for me?”

  “I’ll try,” he said.

  “Then you can show me the way to escape and I’ll be gone.”

  Chapter 34

  Elizabeth didn’t come with them. Elias watched her walking away, as if she didn’t care about the Patron’s order, though he knew she did. When she was gone, he followed behind Firehand, who in turn followed behind the wagon. The framed mirror rattled in the straw as the wheels bumped over stones. With each new judder, he found himself tensing. The urge to reach for his own small jar of glycer-fortis seemed ironic. But his heartbeat skittered with the thought of the bomb and the thousands upon thousands of musket balls that surrounded it. He touched the glass in his pocket but pulled his hand away again. He’d had his morning dose.

  People stared at the section of the table as they passed. Some laughed. But if any of the watchers thought the placing of it was a breach of custom and practice, they kept it to themselves.

  When it was done and he stood back to look at the piece of table standing on the turf, he found himself marvelling at Jago’s genius. Fully assembled, it would have suited a grand hall. But there was something mesmerizingly wrong about a single section, placed alone on the green swathe next to the cliffs. A crowd had already gathered by the time the empty cart began rolling its way back. At first they kept a distance, but then one was touching. Others followed. Please be gentle, Elias thought.

  The slice of table wasn’t itself in the way of anything, but onlookers were blocking the track. A wagon of kegs and crates had been forced to stop and the oath-wrights were shouting for a way to be cleared. The crowd parted and the cart rolled forwards again. Wine bottles clinked against each other as it moved.

  Elias caught sight of the carter and felt a stab of pain in his chest. His heart stopped for a space of three beats and was then racing to catch up. The carter was the man with scarred knuckles that he’d seen outside Charity’s house. It was the brute, her husband. Her brother was there as well, stepping around the cart.

  It seemed that neither had seen him. But then he glimpsed a woman in the crowd. He only caught view of her shoulder and part of her head before she was hidden again, but he knew her. It was Charity herself.

  She began to shoulder her way in his direction. He angled his face, hoping she wouldn’t see him. For a moment he couldn’t move his feet. Only when she started up the slope did he find the power to turn away. He was weaving back through the crowds towards the camp when she caught up.

  “Elias.” She grabbed his arm.

  “You shouldn’t be here!” he hissed.

  “Don’t you want to see me?”

  There was no time to explain the danger. Even such contact as they’d had might have been seen. He broke her grip but she followed. He cut right, away from the crowd, towards the edge of the cliff.

  “Elias!”

  “We can’t be seen together.”

  “Are you ashamed of me?”

  “No! Look, there’s a way down to the rocks. Just follow behind.”

  “Is it where you men go to bed the camp followers?” It hadn’t sounded like a joke.

  “It’s where we can be alone.”

  “They told me you’re sweet on Jago’s woman. They said you slept with her.”

  “Who said?”

  “Someone. Is it not true?”

  “It wasn’t true like that.”

  “So you did sleep with her?”

  “We were taking shelter. There was only the one bed. It’s not as if you haven’t had other men.”

  “Not since I met you!” Again, that catch in her voice.

  They’d been tracing the edge of the cliff. Now they came to the place where a steep scree slope gave access to the beach. But looking down he saw that the cove was already in use. A man and a woman lay on the pebbles, her underneath, his bare arse showing above as he pounded away.

  “Is that where you’re taking me?” she asked.

  They stepped back, out of view of the rutting couple.

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “Take me to your tent.”

  “We’d be seen. They’d think…”

  “What?”

  “This place is all gossip. Your husband will get to hear.”

  “Take me there!”

  So he did, not running, but walking swiftly. Clouds had gathered, making it feel like dusk, though it was mid-afternoon. Hoping the low light would hide them, he strode towards his decrepit tent, as if to pass it. Then, at the last moment he crouched down and crawled in through the flaps.

  “Why did you come here?” he whispered, when they were lying facing each other.

  “You asked me that already.”

  “I thought you stayed at home when they took their trips.”

  “Would you rather I had?”

  “It’s not safe here.”

  “Then why did you come? Was it to follow that woman?”

  He couldn’t explain. But neither could he bear the hurt in her. So he placed a kiss on her lips, just as he’d done once with Elizabeth. But it wasn’t the same. Instead of staring at him in shock, Charity closed her eyes. Instead of going rigid and turning away, she shifted closer. And he, instead of trying to stifle her question, was answering it.

  Somewhere between the first touch of her lips and the moment when the heat of her body made him forget, he wondered if he had changed. But he didn’t even know what that meant.

  Elias woke to see the shifting light of a campfire cast on one side of the tent and blackness on the other. He pushed himself up onto his elbows. The movement roused her.

  “You can’t be here,” he whispered. Then he kissed her again, unsure how he’d been tempted to bring her so close to Jago and his men.

  “I can’t not be here,” she said, when the kiss broke for a moment and they were holding each other.

  “If they found you…”

  There’d been so many girls and women. Each he’d let go without regret. A few had tried to trick him into staying. He’d thought that perhaps, if he found the most perfect one, the most beautiful, then he might feel something in return.

  He looked into Charity’s face. There was a sturdiness about her, a homeliness, a weight like the ballast that stops the boat from rolling. If she’d been beautiful, perhaps he’d never have seen what lay beneath. Or perhaps it was his desperation that had done it: the impossibility of any relationship between this married woman and himself, a man whose only purpose and destiny were revenge. Yet somehow he’d glimpsed her. In the few nights they’d spent together, he’d crossed the border into an unknown land. Ink is ink, she’d said, as if such things mattered not at all, as if her innocence stopped her from knowing the truth. But now it seemed she knew things which he would never be able to grasp.

  “Charity,” he said.

  She kissed him again, more passionately than before. It was an answer to the question he hadn’t thought to ask. He yielded to it, feeling as though he was vanishing into her.

  “I didn’t mean it to happen,” she said, when the kiss was over. “It was a game. We were having fun, weren’t we? And then… I shouldn’t have come back to you. But I’d never felt it like that. Not before.”

  “Not with your husband? Not ever?”

  “I loved him. I still do.”

  “But he broke your nose.”

  She pulled back as if stung. “No. That was when we were children. Some boys were hitting my brother. I knocked one of them down. I got this in return. I always had to look after him.”

  “Why?”

  “Because he’s my brother.”

  “But why did they pick
on him?”

  “He was different. He’s different still. You asked if I’d get in trouble – if my husband would find out I’ve been with you. He knows. He always knows. I told him I was coming. That’s the way we do it. I love him. But our marriage has never been…” She seemed unable to find the word she was looking for.

  “I don’t understand,” said Elias.

  She took his hand and placed it above her breast. He could feel her heartbeat, fast and heavy. “There are three of us in the house,” she said. “My husband, my brother and me. But I’m the only one who sleeps alone.”

  Mind reeling, Elias dropped onto his back. He stared at the canvas and the tent poles above. Those few words had changed his world into another. Everything he understood about her had been turned around.

  “Your brother… he likes men?”

  “No. Just one man.”

  “Your husband.”

  “Yes.”

  “You married so they could be together.”

  “It wasn’t anyone’s business,” she said. “But they’d have made it their business. There was talk already. And threats. They’d have killed them. There was no one to stand for them, except me. He’s my brother. He found love. I never did. It seemed easy. And I wasn’t losing by it. I could have my fun when they were away. We agreed it all from the start. Let people think what they wanted. I didn’t mind. If they were happier to think me a trull than to know my dear, sweet brother loved another man – that was their shame, not ours. But then you came to the inn that night. And now I don’t know what I’m doing any more.”

  The picture of them outside her house flashed in his mind. They’d stared at him as if making some great discovery. He’d thought they might attack.

  “When I saw them that day…”

  “They knew who you were,” she said. “They knew what we’d done. And what I felt for you.”

  “What do you feel?”

  “Love,” she said.

  The word stung. “But you don’t know me!”

  “You’re right. I don’t know you.”

  “I’m a bad man.”

  “I know you are. You bedded a married woman, remember?” There was laughter in her voice this time. But compassion also. For them both, perhaps.

  “I was acting. Playing the rogue for your fantasies.”

  “We were both acting.”

  “But when I told you I’d come back to take revenge – that part was true. That’s who I am. It’s why I’m here, at the Reckoning. There’s something rotten in me. You can’t love me!”

  She put her fingertips on his mouth, stopping his words. It took him a fraction of a second to understand that something had changed. She’d tensed. Her head was angled to listen.

  He held his breath. At first it seemed to be the wind in the canvas of a tent. But there were no tents near enough for that. The same sound came again: a footstep close outside. From instinct his hand shifted to where his knife would have been. But there were no knives on the Island.

  Their voices had grown louder in the heat of confession. What they’d said would put her in danger. Her brother and husband, too. But only if they’d been heard.

  “What is it?” Her whisper was little more than a breath.

  Elias felt for his trousers, slipping his legs into them before crawling to the mouth of the tent. He crouched outside, then stood to look around. If someone had been listening, they were now hiding themselves.

  “Get dressed,” he whispered.

  There was no need to say more. She’d picked up the urgency of his tone. In the space of five heavy heartbeats, he’d pulled on his shirt and she was crawling out to join him. He grabbed for his cloak and began to lead her away, taking a line closer to the cliff than the camp.

  “What’s happening?” she whispered when they were beyond the camp.

  “We need to get you off the Island. Fast.”

  “Why?”

  “Go to your husband. Leave here tonight.”

  “But when will I see you?”

  He didn’t answer because every truth he might have said would have hurt. And there was no more way for him to lie to her. His world had changed with a sickening lurch. He’d been ready to greet death. His own and his enemies’. That had made him powerful. But suddenly, he wanted to live. The fact of it was terrifying.

  They skirted the Williams camp and started off across the rolling land towards the rock ridge. He pulled her along. She stumbled but he kept going, faster if anything. The watch fires of the oath-wrights lay ahead, one on either side of the ridge. At last he could see the turf in front of them and there was no more stumbling.

  But as they ran the last few yards, an oath-wright stepped into their path. Elias’s first thought was to dodge around him, but that would have meant a swift death. He slowed and stopped, almost losing balance on the slippery mud. He was still holding Charity’s hand.

  “Who are you?” the oath-wright demanded, not quietly.

  “Elias,” he said. “Here under Jago’s protection.”

  “And the woman?”

  “Charity of New Whitby,” she said. “Unaligned. I was delivering wine.”

  “And stayed after sunset?”

  She nodded.

  “Why?”

  “Business.”

  “A whore as well as a wine trader?”

  “Yes,” she said.

  She’d said she didn’t mind how other people thought of her. It had made a kind of sense. But as the oath-wright stared at her body Elias felt sick.

  “It’s irregular,” the man said. “She should have left while it was light.”

  “Is it against the rules?”

  “I have to search her.”

  “No,” said Elias.

  But Charity stepped forwards and raised her arms. The oath-wright kept his eyes on Elias’s as he began feeling down her sides. Elias clenched his fists. Then it was finished and Charity stepped back.

  “Can I go?”

  “You may,” said the oath-wright.

  Elias caught her eyes one more time before she started away across the rock ridge.

  “Wait!”

  Jago strode down the slope towards them, flanked by Firehand and Logan.

  The oath-wright stepped in front of Charity, barring her way.

  “Stop that woman!” Jago called. “We have business to discuss.”

  Chapter 35

  It was Logan’s voice that woke Elizabeth. Or perhaps it was the movement of the furs as Jago stood. There’d been urgency in both. At the fortress the Patron had slept naked. Here he slept fully clothed and ready for action. She opened her eyes to see him leaving the tent and listened to his footsteps running away in the direction of the rock ridge. Then there was only the rippling of canvas and the wind hissing over the guy ropes outside.

  It felt strange to be alone and unwatched. Her heart quickened as she slipped through the tent flaps. The campfires had burned themselves out. She shivered as the chill air cut through the thin fabric of her night shirt and the chemise beneath. There were no voices, no distant songs. Closer to dawn then, than to midnight. The moon seemed to drift in the sky. The shadow of a cloud swept over the rolling turf of the Island. Grabbing a blanket from the tent to wrap around her shoulders, she stepped out in the direction of the wagons, unable to see the ground or even her own feet. The moonlight returned as abruptly as it had left. She crouched and waited. If she’d been the only person on the Island, the scene would have been no different. But knowing there were sleepers all around, her senses tingled. The tiniest noise sounded like a shout.

  Under the cover of another cloud she set off again. This time she reached her destination before the moon returned. The wagon cast its own shadow. Crouched next to a wheel she was well-hidden. The tarpaulin covering the load hung loose around the rear, trailing almost to the ground. Even if someone had been watching, they wouldn’t have been able to see her clambering up underneath it. She hardly noticed the prick of a loose nail on her ankle as s
he wormed herself in. But lying on her back in the wagon, she felt the sting of it. The scratch was nothing. But blood on the white linen of her nightshirt would be awkward to explain. So she licked her finger and rubbed the drop away, waiting for it to dry.

  The tarpaulin blocked out the moonlight, but for a thin strip at the back. Feeling blind, she touched her fingertips to the table.

  The previous night she’d sneaked out and gone through other wagons, exploring three different sections. They had yielded no clue. Another two parts had already been set up near the rock ridge, where they stood like a strange statue. Everyone who passed took time to stare at them. So close to the oath-wrights, those sections were out of her reach.

  With the flat of her hand she followed each of the table legs, and then began to sweep the underside, searching for any irregularity. Elias had seen the construction of the table, but they’d not shown him the trigger. That was what she needed to find. If they were to live through the next few days, they had to figure out how Jago planned to detonate the bomb.

  She didn’t know what the trigger would feel like. But she’d surely recognise it when she found it. It would need to be hidden from view. And now she knew that Jago was having the pieces placed one by one, it seemed clear that what she hunted for would be in the final part. Once that part had been placed, even the Patron couldn’t go back.

  She almost missed it in the sweep of her hand: a slight ridge where there should have been sanded timber. She traced it around four sides: a square, roughly the size of her hand, standing a fraction proud of the surface. Working her fingernails into the edge, she began to ease it free. It shifted then stuck then shifted again and finally fell, revealing a void.

  Her eyes had adjusted to the dark as well as they might, but she couldn’t see what lay within. She held her breath and inched her fingers into it. Touching metal, she stopped. Something smooth and rounded had been fixed to the side of the hole. Out of context, it took her a moment to realise that she was feeling the casing of a large watch. The glass had been left open. She felt the dial and the hands. A taut thread ran from the winding key. Steadying her finger, she followed it with the gentlest touch, reaching the opposite wall of the void, where another object had been fixed, a contraption of wood and wire. Her mind flashed back to the storehouse in Jago’s fortress. Rat traps had been strewn about the floor. And here was another. But this one had not been rigged to break a rodent’s back.