The Silver Skull

by Mark Chadbourn

  No Dee here to keep the people safe, he thought. Only the harshness of daily life.

  Will was not blind to the irony that the city’s brooding aspect reflected his own state of mind. Miller’s death lay heavy upon him. He would never reveal it to Nathaniel, or anyone else, for that matter, but he felt the world slipping under his feet as it had after Jenny’s disappearance, only this time the stew of emotions was infected with guilt and a sense of his own personal failure in defending Miller’s life.

  A cold anger seethed beneath the surface, demanding retribution, and answers. Nothing was going to stand in his way.

  They left the carriage near Cowgate, where the noblemen, ambassadors, and rich clergy made their homes, and slipped quietly to the address Walsingham had given them, a three-hundred-year-old three-story house of solid stone with a fine oaken door and an iron knocker. Will gave the coded rap, and after a moment they were admitted by a man carrying a candle. He was in his early fifties, almost six foot six, thin and elegant, with a hooked nose and swept-back white hair.

  “Alexander Reidheid?” Will said.

  “Master Swyfte!” Reidheid shook his hand furiously. “It is an honour—such an honour!—to have the great hero of England in my home!”

  Nathaniel sighed loudly.

  “Lord Walsingham speaks highly of you,” Will said. “He claims you know the comings and goings of every man in Edinburgh, and that your understanding of the subtle moods of this city is beyond peer.”

  “He flatters me.” Reidheid’s cheeks flushed, but he was pleased with the compliment.

  Primping her hair, a woman of around twenty-five entered shyly. She was pretty, with delicate, upper-class features, brown hair in ringlets, and green eyes that flashed when she saw the guests.

  “My daughter, Meg,” Reidheid said. She curtsied as her father introduced Will and Nathaniel. Will noticed Nathaniel about to register his tart weariness at another woman fawning over England’s great hero when Meg’s eyes skittered quickly across Will and settled on Nathaniel himself. Nathaniel was clearly taken aback by the attention and did not know how to respond.

  “Perhaps Meg could show Nathaniel our quarters while we discuss more important matters,” Will said. “And I would be grateful if your servant could also make arrangements to collect the body of our driver who met with misfortune on the way here. Nat will provide directions.”

  Shuffling with baffled discomfort at this new predicament, Nathaniel followed Meg to the rear of the house while Reidheid led Will into the drawing room where a fire roared in the grate.

  “I apologise if you find the temperature unpleasant,” he said. “Increasingly, I struggle to get warm. It appears to be an affliction that affects all our kind sooner or later, as though those damnable things suck the life and warmth from us.”

  “And you would have more experience of them here in Scotland than we south of the border.” Will took a seat next to the fire, while Reidheid poured two crystal glasses of amber whisky.

  “They torment the countryside as they have always done, haunting the glens and the lochs, and they move freely through our city. But here they have chosen to play a quiet game in recent years. They can pass for mortals, if they so choose, and they slip between the cracks of everyday life, causing mischief and misery in subtle ways and only intermittently.”

  “Their attention has been elsewhere,” Will said, “on the search for a key to a great weapon, which had been hidden in the city. Now they hunt for the final thing they need to complete their plan.”

  Reidheid handed Will the glass. “Uisge beatha, in the native tongue. The Water of Life. It keeps me warm when there is no fire in the grate.” He pulled his chair close to the hearth. “The poor and rich alike have long learned to protect their homes with salt and herbs and cold iron, and to watch where they walk after dark has fallen.”

  “You have seen new activity from them in recent days?”

  “They call them the Unseelie Court here. It is an old name, coloured by centuries of torment.” He sipped his whisky reflectively. “There is a place in Edinburgh not far from the castle that is known as the Fairy House. The local people understand it to be haunted, or cursed. It is said that anyone who ventures within never comes out. No one is ever seen inside, although the lights blaze intermittently. The downstairs rooms are said to be guarded by a demonic black dog.”

  “They have a house they call their own within the city?” Will ruminated. “And no one has raided it?”

  “We have an uneasy relationship with the Unseelie Court in Edinburgh.” There was a rueful note in Reidheid’s voice. “A black carriage stood outside two days ago. No one was seen leaving it, or entering the house, and it left shortly after.”

  “No one would ever be seen. I need to explore the inside of this Fairy House.”

  Reidheid started. “I have watched that foul place for many days and nights. I can see no safe way in.”

  “Then it will have to be unsafe.”

  Nathaniel and Meg entered with a platter of cold beef, bread, and cheese and some ale. They were both quiet and respectful, but Will saw them exchange warm glances as they laid out the food on the table.

  “I would also have access to the Palace of Holyroodhouse,” Will said as he sliced the beef.

  “An audience with the king will not be an easy thing to arrange—” Reidheid began.

  “I do not want an audience. I want to prowl around his private rooms, poke my nose in his closets, go through his clothes, sift his jewels, rap on his walls, prise up his floorboards, and generally skulk around and make a nuisance of myself.”

  “It is the most heavily guarded residence in all of Edinburgh,” Reidheid protested.

  “Then I have two impenetrable buildings to penetrate.”

  “And you do like to penetrate the impenetrable,” Nathaniel whispered to him.

  “Father?” Meg began. “The king has a ball tomorrow night.”

  Reidheid considered this for a moment, then said, “Perhaps I could garner you an invitation. A visiting luminary. I am sure James will think you might brighten up the festivities and perhaps provide a welcome talking point for the members of the court who find these events overly familiar. Would that serve your purpose?”

  “A palace swarming with people in which to lose myself?” Will nodded. “Perfect.”

  “And wine, and women,” Nathaniel muttered.

  Will loaded his plate and poured some ale from the pitcher before settling back by the fire. “Then let us make haste, for there is little of the night left.”

  “You intend to visit the Fairy House this night?” Reidheid asked incredulously. “You have not slept. Surely after some rest—”

  “I have fire in my blood,” Will replied, “and an urge to make the Enemy pay for the wrongs they have inflicted upon my friends. Sleep can wait.”

  HAPTER 21

  rom the pitch of the roof, Will looked out across Edinburgh’s jumbled mass sprawling around the winding, ancient ways, the grand stone houses glimmering with candlelight, the soaring backdrop of the great hills beyond. The wind tearing at his hair brought with it the salty aroma of the port at Leith two miles distant.

  He stood atop one of the highest lands in the city, after picking his way past crowded apartments to bribe his way through the window of the topmost lodger. Balancing on the ledge with the dizzying drop to the cobbles far below, he briefly wondered if he was as mad as the lodger accused him of being, before hauling himself up and over the edge onto the slick tiles.

  “I wish you could see this, Nathaniel,” he said. “The world looks less harsh from on high.”

  Steadying himself on the balls of his feet, Will loped along the pitch of the roof. Progress was hazardous. The gusting air currents channelling through the wynds threatened to pluck him down the steep slope to the vertiginous drop at the end. Occasionally the wind direction changed and he was blinded by choking smoke from the rows of chimneys.

  Whenever he came to one of t
he wynds that broke up the run of housing, he leapt the narrow gap, constantly aware of the black gulf beneath his feet. His landings were always a scramble for purchase, one wrong foot or twisted ankle a death warrant, but he kept up a relentless progress towards his destination.

  As he neared the Fairy House, he leapt onto the roof of one of the lands and felt it shift beneath his feet. The highest story had been attached only recently, with nailed boards and beams but no proper joints as far as Will could tell. It felt as insubstantial as a pile of randomly heaped firewood, swaying whenever he shifted his weight, held up by luck and hope more than anything. Dropping to all fours, he edged along the top until he could move to the adjoining roof.

  Finally he landed with barely a whisper of a footfall on the roof of the Fairy House, a five-story residence that had long since seen better days. Missing and broken tiles peppered the roof, and tufts of grass and elder sprouted from where birds had dropped seeds.

  Flattening himself out, he moved down the pitch of the roof to the edge where he could peer over to the cobbles far below. A black carriage drawn by a sable stallion waited outside the front door of the house. There was no sign of any driver. All of the house windows were dark, and no sound issued from within.

  Crawling back up the pitch to the roof’s ridge, Will inspected the chimney stack, which was cold. As he’d guessed, the hole was wide enough to admit him, though a tight squeeze. The biggest danger was that he would climb down into the maze of flues and become trapped, especially in a chimney that had not been kept in good repair.

  Steadying himself on top of the stack, he lowered himself into the hole, feeling for footholds in the crumbling brick. Amid the suffocating stink of soot, his clothes and skin were soon black. Unable to see anything in the dark, his senses focused on the tips of his fingers searching for cracks in the brick and the ache in his leg muscles as he braced himself against the sides of the chimney to stop him falling.

  As he made his way down, intermittent noises floated up from the lower floors: garbled voices speaking no tongue he recognised, their emotions seesawing in an extreme and disturbing manner, from barks of anger to frightened mewling to shrieks of insane laughter and mocking whispers; a sound like a blacksmith’s hammers on an anvil, which came and went, echoing dimly then resounding near at hand; a dog growling that sounded disturbingly close, on the other side of the brick; and then music, pipes and a fiddle, eerie and haunting, fading in and out.

  Feeling with his feet, Will came to a junction in the flue and decided to take the right-hand path. After a few feet, it turned so sharply he had to force himself around the bend a fraction of an inch at a time, leading with his sword which he had to flex and maneuver through the gap. His muscles were compressed so hard they ached, and his chest constricted so tightly that he could barely catch a breath.

  Halfway around the turn, he became afraid he was jammed, unable to go forwards or backwards. He rested for a moment, fighting to breathe, and then relaxed his muscles just enough to edge on.

  Finally, he rounded the turn, but he’d barely lowered himself another six feet when he realised the flue was blocked. Some of the stones had collapsed in on another turn—he could feel them grinding beneath his feet—but however hard he pressed, the obstruction would not shift.

  There was no way to go but back. Steeling himself, he dug his fingers in the cracks between the stones and hauled himself up. Sweating, choking, every muscle burning, he came back to the turn. It was even harder going up, and it took him the better part of half an hour to maneuver himself around it in tiny increments, dragging with his fingertips and pushing with the tips of his boots. Again he got stuck halfway around, and this time it took so long to relax his muscles, he became concerned he would suffocate before he could move.

  Once he’d pulled himself up to the junction and rested his head for a moment, breathing deeply, he realised there was a current of air rising through the other flue. It gave him heart, and once again he began his slow descent.

  He’d passed the worst of it, and now there were regular junctions that led down to the large stone fireplaces in every room. But though the distant sounds continued to rise through the flues, there never appeared to be any noise coming from any room he passed.

  When Will estimated he’d reached the second floor, he slid down towards a fireplace, bracing himself just above the hearth to listen. When he was sure the chamber was empty, he dropped into the hearth in a cloud of soot. The room was bare apart from a cracked mirror above the mantelpiece which revealed a white-eyed black figure. Moving swiftly across the dirty floorboards to stand by the door, he waited for any who might have heard his arrival.

  The house was silent. What had happened to all the noises he had heard in the chimney? he wondered. Opening the door a crack, he peered out into the corridor where a candle flickered in a holder on a small table.

  Not so empty, then, he thought.

  He moved quickly along the corridor, checking the rooms on either side. All were bare. Outside the last room, the boards creaked loudly, and there was a corresponding growl from the first floor, followed by heavy paws padding onto the stairs. Lightly, Will bolted up to the next floor.

  Flickering light on one wall brought him to a halt just near the turn. Peering round, he saw a figure—male, although the brown hair was long—moving away from him slowly, holding a candle aloft. Below, the sound of padding paws continued up to the second floor, accompanied by another deep, penetrating growl.

  Caught between the two, Will weighed his choices. Just as he had decided to draw his sword, a door at the far end of the corridor opened and light flooded out. The figure paused and communicated in a low whisper with someone within before entering the room. The door closed behind him and the light winked out.

  Instantly, Will darted to the nearest door, listening briefly before opening it slowly. The room was in darkness. He slipped inside.

  Closing the door, he pressed his ear against it and waited. The padding reached the top of the flight of stairs and then moved towards him. It paused outside the door and growled again, disturbingly loud in the quiet. Will held his nerve. After a second, he heard the dog move on, and listened intently until silence returned.

  Will wondered if it was the same dog that had accompanied the Hunter in Alsatia. That would mean the Hunter was probably there too, he thought coldly, and perhaps even the Silver Skull.

  “Who are you?”

  He started at the voice, soft and dreamy with the burr of a Scottish Lowlands accent. In the dark of the room, a man sat on a chair looking out of the window, his back to Will.

  Drawing his sword in an instant, Will waited for the alarm to be raised, but the man did not move. After a second, Will cautiously approached. As the moonlight broke through the window, Will saw it was a man, not one of the Enemy. He was in his forties, grey streaks in his black hair, and grey eyes that had the faraway look of a sleepwalker.

  “Who are you?” Will asked.

  “John Kintour,” he replied. “Advisor to my queen, Mary.”

  “Mary is dead.”

  “No … no … I saw her this morn. So beautiful. The sun made her hair glow like fire.” His voice was as insubstantial as the moonbeam breaking through the window.

  Will passed his hand in front of Kintour’s face, but he did not blink. “How long have you been here?”

  “A day? A week? A month? A year?” He paused thoughtfully, then said, “They gave me food and drink. The most wonderful food … The taste … I had never experienced anything like it.”

  Will realised what had happened. One of the first rules during his induction as one of Walsingham’s men was that he should never eat or drink anything offered by the Enemy, for it would allow them to take complete control of you. Normally it was how they lured their prey for their sport, usually simple country folk drawn to hear the music on the hilltops or in the fields at night. Kintour was clearly not being kept a prisoner in the house for sport.

  “You
have had a busy time here,” Will said gently.

  “Yes. So many questions.”

  “And you answered them all?”

  “As best I could. Some were beyond even me. The location of the Shield—”

  “The Shield? What is that?” Thinking he heard a noise outside, Will glanced towards the door. After a moment he returned his attention to Kintour.

  “The Shield protects against the foul diseases released by the Silver Skull, of course,” Kintour said lazily. “It allows a man to move freely among the ranks of the infected and the dead, without any mark appearing upon him. That is what the Templar Knights said.”

  It was as Will had thought. Without the Shield, the Skull was a blunt instrument, laying waste to vast swathes of an enemy. With it, the attacker could loot the dead, or achieve more specific aims.

  “What do the Templar Knights have to do with this?” he asked.

  Kintour’s head rolled from side to side and he smiled faintly. “I was keeper of the records at the palace. So much to read … so many secrets. Among the sheaves of crumbling parchment, I found many relating to the Knights Templar. At first they made little sense. It was only when I realised they were written with an obscure cipher that the truth began to emerge. The Knights encountered the Silver Skull in the Holy Lands, and knew the terrible threat it was to all Christendom. They had to act to protect all good Christian men.”

  “What did they do?”

  “Separated the Skull from the Key and the Shield so it could not be used. They brought the latter two back here, to Scotland, and hid them well. The Skull … I do not know what happened to that.”

  “The Key and the Shield were hidden at the Palace of Holyroodhouse?” Will asked.

  “Hidden well. The Knights had many strong connections with Edinburgh and the surrounding area, and they were involved in advising King David when he built Holyrood Abbey in 1126. There were rumours of secret chambers beneath the abbey, and extending under the palace west of the abbey cloister. It was one of the secret locations across Europe where the Knights stored items of vast importance.”