The thought of Elizabeth’s execution boiled constantly in his stomach. From the moment he woke until sleep clutched him away, he was haunted by the image of his daughter locked in the cell. Even in his dreams, the threat hanging over his little girl tortured him.
He was in one of the many empty buildings left by those who’d fled the city. He’d come across the place by chance and now used it to spy on William. The rooms had largely been stripped bare, although the occupants must have packed in a hurry as they’d left behind several chairs, kitchen utensils, candles and a lantern.
Below, four men emerged from the double doors of William’s quarters. Jack sat forward and stared hard. One of them was William, another was Harold. The other two he didn’t recognise.
Finally, a chance.
He ran down the stairs and unbolted the door to a covered walkway that ran along the side of a tavern. The tavern’s wall consisted of little more than thin wooden slats, through which he could see men drinking and puffing on hookahs.
He slipped down the walkway. The door swung open behind him – the only way to keep it closed was to bolt it from the inside. He would have preferred to have locked it to stop anyone else using the building, but he didn’t have the key.
He reached the main road and stood waiting. William and the others appeared from a side street, paused for a moment and then walked away in the direction of the Tower.
Jack ran across the road, darting out of the way of the carts that rattled in both directions. He saw William and his comrades disappearing into the busy crowd. His chest shivered and he took a sip of jatamansi.
He followed William at a wary distance. He tried to act nonchalantly, and stopped a few times to study the wares in the open-fronted shops. As far as he could tell, no one noticed him.
William was constantly interrupted by people who wanted to shake his hand and talk to him. At one point a mob of children gathered around him and shrieked with delight so loudly Jack could hear them even over the sounds of the city.
Jack followed as the group passed near to the Tower, continued to the stretch of wall to the north, and came to the heavily fortified Ald Gate. Guards stood to either side of the arch, watching the few people passing in and out. An elephant ambled past, dragging a gun on a carriage.
William and his comrades went up the steps to the parapet beside the gate. Jack slipped into a doorway near to the wall, took out a roll of paan and chewed the spicy mixture, attempting to look like an innocent bystander doing nothing in particular. From time to time he glanced up at the ramparts, trying to do it casually, as if checking the weather.
William walked along the wall. The battlements were now thick with guns and in the distance Jack could see that more were being winched up using wooden cranes and scaffolding. William seemed to be inspecting the artillery and stopped to speak to the men, who stood to attention beside their guns.
After twenty minutes, William came back down and the group went into a nearby house, along with a number of other soldiers from the ramparts.
Jack waited further up the street for at least an hour. Finally, William appeared, still with Harold and the others.
Damn.
Would William ever be on his own?
Jack shadowed the group as they worked their way through the streets and he soon realised they were travelling back to their billet.
Damn.
Should he try something before William went inside again? But what? William on his own was a formidable foe, but with Harold and the others at his side there was no chance.
Jack felt light-headed as he watched William go back into his billet and shut the double doors. He gripped the knife through his tunic and his eyes smarted a little at the thought of Elizabeth.
He ran back to the building beside the tavern, back up to the room on the third floor. There was no further movement from William’s quarters.
He waited. A few people came and went, but William remained inside.
Jack stayed in the room until the early evening. Sunset painted the sky red.
The Rajthanan army was due tomorrow. He massaged his face. He wanted to do something. Perhaps this would be his last chance. But he was tired. He felt old.
Without planning to, he found himself whispering an Our Father. The Latin words had been lodged in his head since childhood, but he couldn’t remember the last time he’d spoken them. It must have been years ago, with Elizabeth.
Finally, he conceded that there was nothing further he could do that night.
He went down the stairs, unbolted the door and went out into the walkway. He could see the lantern-lit interior of the tavern through the wooden boards. Light, voices and tobacco smoke dribbled out between the gaps.
A door rattled open a few feet up the walkway and the burly barman, wearing a stained tunic, rolled a barrel towards the street, the wood clattering against the stone. Jack had seen the man a few times, although they’d barely acknowledged each other.
‘Mind,’ the barman grumbled as Jack stepped back into the doorway to let him pass. The barman glanced up and grunted at Jack, but said nothing else, and soon disappeared into the street.
Jack went in the opposite direction and came out at a busy road. He crossed over to an alleyway and then came to an empty courtyard with a well in the centre. The well was boarded up, probably dry. He paused for a moment and leant against a wall, watching the light fade to grainy darkness. He felt too tired to go on, but there was nothing wrong with him – no chest pain, no shortness of breath. His heart was beating normally.
He swallowed, pulled himself together and walked on into the growing dark. He was determined to get a good night’s sleep – he would need all his energy for when the Rajthanans arrived.
But for many hours he didn’t sleep. He lay awake on his sleeping mat, listening to the snoring of the other soldiers, his mind flitting uncontrollably from memory to memory. He thought of Elizabeth, as always, and William and Jhala and Katelin, the thoughts piling up feverishly, the living and the dead, the past, all merging into a chaotic present.
He didn’t know why, but he kept recalling the time he was promoted to sergeant. He was standing in Jhala’s office, while his guru sat at his desk, studying a piece of paper. It was summer and a bee had found its way into the room and buzzed against a window. Behind Jhala, the wall was lined with books, journals and folios. Jack was always amazed by how many books Jhala owned.
‘I’ve won.’ Jhala beamed and prodded the paper with his finger. ‘Colonel Hada’s agreed to the scout company.’
Jack knew that Jhala had been arguing with Hada for a year that the regiment should form a specialised scouting unit – with Jack and William, and their powers, at its heart. Hada had been dead against the idea and was still sceptical about the merits of native siddhas. Jack had even overheard Hada say to Jhala once, ‘This idea that we can teach natives these things, it’s foolish nonsense. It’s like training performing monkeys.’
But Jhala now held up the paper. ‘It’s an order, signed by the Colonel. We can go ahead with it, Casey.’
Jack was struck by the way Jhala said ‘we’. Jhala had been talking about the plan for months, but he’d never spoken in these terms before.
‘It’s down to you, Casey,’ Jhala said. ‘You and Merton. You’ve proved what native siddhas are capable of. Even the Colonel’s had to come around to the idea.’
Jhala stood, walked over to the dusty window and gazed out with his hands behind his back. ‘Casey, you’ve been my best disciple. I’m promoting you to sergeant.’
Jack felt suddenly taller. He squared his shoulders and raised his chin. ‘Thank you, sir.’
The words didn’t seem enough. He’d wanted this promotion for years. And he was stunned that Jhala had called him his ‘best disciple’. Jhala had never said anything like that before.
Jhala pointed out of the window. ‘Take a look.’
Jack walked across and stared out at the parade ground. Soldiers and followers strode in every direction.
On the far side stood the flagpole, the standard of the regiment rippling in the breeze, the three red lions circling each other endlessly.
‘I plan to make our new company the best in the regiment,’ Jhala said. ‘Then one day I’ll lead this regiment and you’ll be my sergeant major. And we’ll make it the best damn regiment in the European Army.’
‘Very good, sir.’ Jack believed in Jhala completely at that moment. He had no doubt that together they would do it . . .
But now, as he rolled over on his sleeping mat, the memory stung him.
It was that day, more than any other, that had made him believe he had a bond with Jhala. His guru had called him his best disciple and promoted him to sergeant. He’d said they would rise through the ranks together.
But had there really been a bond?
Jhala was threatening to kill Elizabeth if Jack didn’t give him William.
And hadn’t Jhala blocked Jack from learning new powers? Hadn’t he cheated Jack out of his chance to become a proper siddha?
It looked as though he had.
Jack shut his eyes. With a great effort, he forced the swirling thoughts from his head. These ripples across the pool of his mind weren’t helping Elizabeth. They were just distracting him, making him weaker. On the battlefield, and in yoga, you had to focus your mind on one thing and forget everything else. And here he was, lying in the darkness letting his thoughts run totally out of control.
Without planning to, he found himself making a decision. He would forget Jhala. For weeks his thoughts had kept returning to his guru, but that was a waste of time and energy.
He would put Jhala out of his head now. Never think of him again.
It would be as if Jhala were dead.
He took a deep breath. He had to get some sleep.
16
Apillar of dust rose in the west. The crowd along the battlements shifted and spoke softly. Jack, Charles and Saleem glanced at each other, but said nothing. They were near the New Gate – on the west wall of the city – having found a spot after hearing that the Rajthanans were approaching. Sergeant Kendrick stood nearby, watching through a spyglass.
The scent of rot wafted up from the piles of refuse in the ditch running along the outside of the wall. Beyond the ditch, the narrow Fleet River flowed down a culvert and out into the Thames. Further off, large houses lined the road to Westminster. Westminster Mosque glimmered a mile away.
The dust cloud grew larger.
The musket on Jack’s shoulder was a familiar weight. He’d marched hundreds of miles with a musket at his side.
‘There,’ someone shouted.
A murmur travelled along the wall. Faint, moving dots appeared in the base of the cloud. Jack borrowed the glass from Kendrick and the Rajthanan forces crystallised in the haze, marching in an immense column that coiled along the north bank of the river. The sound of kettledrums, low and cavernous, and of blaring horns floated over the city.
At the head of the column rode hundreds of cavalrymen – Rajthanans in russet and Europeans in blue, their lances glinting as they pointed at the sky. Behind these stomped thousands of foot soldiers – mostly French and Andalusian, judging by their officers’ green and silver turbans. A forest of standards rose from amongst the men and flashed in the wind.
Elephants, with armour on their heads and blades on their tusks, lumbered behind the infantry, some carrying ornate covered howdahs on their backs.
Further back, still indistinct, came the horse artillery, followed by the heavy guns drawn on wheeled carriages by avatars that looked like beetles from this distance. To the rear came covered wagons, then the baggage train and finally the ramshackle line of the followers, so long it was impossible to see the end of it.
Dust enveloped the entire column, turning the men and animals into grainy apparitions.
Jack handed back the glass. He remembered all the times he’d marched with such an army, feeling the enormous power of it, thinking how their enemies must be shaking with fear. Looking at Charles and Saleem, he knew the two lads had no idea what the Rajthanans could unleash on them. As well as the guns, the Indians had war avatars – new, unimaginable devices were created all the time. What did the English have to combat these? Only a handful of Sikh siddhas.
‘How many do you reckon?’ Charles asked no one in particular.
‘Forty thousand – no more,’ Kendrick said quickly.
But Jack had marched with an army of forty thousand and he knew the one before them was much larger – maybe 60,000. It was larger than any army he’d ever seen.
‘Well, we have a hundred thousand.’ Charles said.
Jack had heard the figure of 100,000 bandied about often over the past few days. There might be that many men left in the city who were prepared to fight, but how many of them were trained soldiers? When Jack looked along the battlements he could see mostly men in army uniform. But when he looked back and down into the city, there was a mass in civilian clothing – standing in the streets, looking out from windows, clambering on the few flat rooftops – who carried ageing matchlocks, swords, axes and crossbows. He even saw a few bearing scythes and pitchforks.
The army collected like a pool of water in the open ground to the north of Westminster, then spread out, one wave arcing to the north and the other to the south, occupying Westminster itself. Four riders appeared from the murk, one carrying a pole with a white flag. They stopped on the edge of a field just to the west of the Fleet River.
‘They want a truce. They’re afraid of us,’ said someone along the line.
The men laughed but the sound seemed high-pitched and thin, whisked away by the wind within seconds.
Jack heard horses on the cobbles below. Looking back, he saw two cavalrymen crossing the street to the gate, one carrying a white flag. The portcullis squealed up and the gates grumbled open.
The two riders clattered over the Fleet Bridge and followed the narrow road along the far bank. Within minutes they were beyond the line of buildings and into the open ground. They halted beside the Rajthanans and the six men remained there talking for ten minutes.
‘What’s going on?’ Charles asked.
‘Negotiations,’ Kendrick replied.
Less than two minutes later, the riders parted and the English came galloping back, rode into the city and dismounted in the square beyond the gate. The portcullis rattled down and the gates clanged shut.
‘There’ll be no truce,’ shouted a soldier who came running up the steps to the battlements.
Suddenly everyone along the wall was talking. The news flickered down the line and soon a man was saying to Jack and the others, ‘The Rajthanans said we have to lay down our arms and surrender completely. Sir Gawain’s rejected that, of course.’
‘So we’ll fight.’ Charles looked across the plains to the army already expanding to the north-east.
Barges appeared upstream and floated slowly down the turgid river. Some were pulled by teams of elephants that ambled along the bank, while a few had chimneys that belched smoke and were propelled by the avatar engines that churned within them.
The flotilla drew up at the Westminster quays, where the vessels were arranged in a line across the water and tied together. Wooden planks were laid over the decks to form a bridge-of-boats. Soon soldiers and followers were carrying huge sacks and crates across the bridge.
‘They’re surrounding the city,’ Jack said softly. The musket seemed to drag at his shoulder now and the knife was as cold as a new wound beneath his clothing.
They were surrounding the city. How would he get William out now? His task, already difficult, had just become much harder.
Kendrick nodded. ‘We’d better get back to our position. We need to make sure we’re prepared.’
‘They’re well out of range.’ The gunner shielded his eyes with his hand as he gazed across the plains to where the Rajthanan army was a sombre arc stretching west to east.
Kendrick stroked his goatee. The two men were standing besid
e a giant twenty-four-pounder gun on the battlements near to the Bishops Gate. The weapon’s muzzle was moulded into the form of a serpent’s head, with glaring eyes and grills of teeth.
Jack stood nearby, listening to the conversation as he watched the enemy make camp about a mile and a half away. As the day wore on, the army had fanned out in a huge oval and surrounded the city completely. Their shivering tents and standards were now visible in every direction.
Kendrick was inspecting his troops. The 9th had been assigned the area around the Bishops Gate, along with six batteries from the 2nd Native Heavy Artillery. The guns and mortars were dotted along the wall, most on wheeled field carriages but a few on block-shaped stands. Men stood to attention next to the weapons, pyramids of shot piled beside them.
A line of purple in the distance caught Jack’s eye. He tapped Kendrick on the shoulder. ‘Sir – siddhas.’
Kendrick lifted his glass and scanned the enemy. ‘Hmm. Quite a few.’ He handed the glass to Jack.
Off to the east, nearer to the Ald Gate, stood a collection of fifty purple tents and standards bearing the angular sigils of the siddhas. Jack had never seen a siddha encampment like it. He’d heard that in Rajthana the army had entire companies of siddhas, but in Europe you were lucky if you saw a single one on the battlefield.
A tent in the centre of the camp dwarfed the others. Standing three storeys high and hundreds of feet wide, it looked like a small palace. Windows, archways, pillars and cornices peppered its walls and it was topped by domes and spires flying brightly coloured flags. The walls and towers wavered in the breeze and here and there the canvas flapped open to reveal wooden
scaffolding beneath.
Jack handed back the glass. ‘That tent in the middle—’
‘I saw it,’ Kendrick said. ‘Must be the Mahasiddha’s.’
By now they’d heard who was leading the Rajthanan force – Mahasiddha Samarth Vadula, a siddha general known for his exploits in the New Colonies. Apparently the Mahasiddha had never lost a battle and his war avatars had decimated the Inca forces who’d opposed him.
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