The Raven's Heart

by Jesse Blackadder

  “What in the name of God was that?” he asks.

  We stand up and I shake my head to clear the ringing in my ears. We take a step and my boots crunch on a litter of small black shapes on the white snow. The air is thick and choking.

  To go back the way we came is to pass William’s hiding place. The only way we can move is forward, in the direction of that roar. We feel our way along the wall until we come around a corner into Blackfriar’s Wynd. It is so dark that I cannot make out the buildings near Kirk O’Field properly. The Old Provost’s House at the south end of the quadrangle is invisible.

  I take a step and kick my boot on a massive stone lying in the middle of the street. At the same time a sharp, acrid smell reaches my nostrils. Behind me cries and shouts rise in a cacophony.

  “Come away,” Red takes my arm. “Some evil has happened here.”

  I strain my eyes to peer into the darkness. Suddenly I hear footsteps running up behind us. We both swing around.

  “Alison!” It’s William, a dark shape against the snow. “Get away from here!”

  Red pulls me away from the square, but a commotion of voices and lanterns is coming along Blackfriar’s Wynd. The night watch.

  I can hear voices rising, doors opening. In moments the area will be covered with people.

  “Go the other way,” William says urgently. He runs toward the light of the lanterns.

  “Gentlemen, something has happened!” he cries.

  “What brings you here so fast?” One of the watch challenges him.

  “I was drinking with friends and the crack shook us from our seats.”

  “Take him, till we know what mischief has been done here,” the leader orders.

  Red will not be resisted this time. He pushes me away from the square and back in the direction of the High Street. He has to fight against a tide of people, hastily dressed or still in nightshirts, crying out, holding up lanterns, hurrying past us in the direction of Kirk O’Field.

  Sophie is waiting at the door and at the first knock she throws it open and pulls me inside.

  “Thank God,” she says. “What has happened?”

  “There’s been an explosion at Kirk O’Field,” Red says behind me.

  “Where the King is?”

  Red nods. “The Queen was there this very night.”

  Sophie shudders. “See what you can find out.”

  Red nods and backs away. Sophie shuts the door and bolts it. “Are you hurt?”

  “No,” I say, but my voice quavers and my legs are shaking.

  “It was a near thing, by the look of you. Come and tell me.” Sophie puts an arm around my shoulder and helps me to the chamber where the fire is stoked high. She lowers me to a comfortable chair close to its warmth.

  “Bring whisky,” she says to the maid.

  “Bring Isobel,” I say.

  I do not know what Isobel sees, but she comes straight to me and in her childlike way flings her arms about my neck. She is warm and alive and I cannot help but return her embrace.

  ≈ ≈ ≈

  The King is dead.

  By the time Red comes back with the news, the light of Monday is turning the gloom into gray along the dim streets. They found the King lying in an orchard away from the explosion that destroyed the Old Provost’s House, near naked, his body unmarked, one of his manservants dead beside him.

  I sink into a chair.

  “I do not see how he could have been thrown so far, even by that explosion, without a mark upon him,” Red says. “This is murder.”

  Sophie looks grim. “Here is your evil, then. What of the Queen?”

  “The Queen’s party returned to Holyrood a few hours earlier,” he says. “She is safe.”

  “And the city?”

  “There are armed men everywhere and any who try to leave are questioned.”

  Sophie walks up and down the room, twisting her fingers. “You won’t be able to get to Leith. You’ll be under suspicion, missing from the Queen’s service at such a time.”

  I shake my head to clear it from the image of Darnley, stinking and corrupt, on the Queen’s arm just days ago. “But William is under arrest.”

  Sophie catches me by the arm. “Listen to yourself! You don’t owe him loyalty.”

  “It was Edmund and Jock who tried to hurt me. William was about to stop them. He came out to warn us and was arrested.”

  She shakes me. “There will be riots. You must hide until it’s safe to leave.”

  I pace the room, my heart racing. William let me go, when Jock and Edmund would have carved agony into my flesh. He must have known what was to take place, and now they will carve their own agony into his flesh to find it out. I cannot let it happen.

  “I’m going to Bothwell,” I say. I turn to Isobel. “Go back to your family. Give them the bond.”

  “No!” Isobel starts up out of her chair, her face working. “I want to sail with you.”

  “Do you really think, once you step back into those palace gates, you’ll be allowed to leave again?” Sophie asks, shaking her head. “You have your moment to escape. Seize it, for God’s sake. Break whatever spell the Queen has over you.”

  “It’s not the Queen I go for,” I say. “It’s my father.”

  ≈ ≈ ≈

  By full daylight Edinburgh is alive with raised voices, whispers, knots of people on street corners speaking in urgent tones, women sobbing, the Queen’s guards everywhere. Somewhere in a dungeon carved from rock, William waits, incarcerated. They will be keen to question the first man found on the scene, and such questioning, in the midst of Edinburgh’s fear, will be harsh.

  At Kirk O’Field, searchers move through the rubble and the crowds gather to watch. Bothwell’s men are everywhere too, pounding on doors, entering houses, blustering up and down the streets in a show of strength and activity, as though the perpetrator of this deed might still be sitting in a nearby house, waiting for capture. Everyone has a story to tell the soldiers. There are women tugging at their sleeves, arguments breaking out. Everywhere dust and char and shattered stones are covered in a light fall of snow. The sky is lead.

  I find Bothwell standing in the square, his face grim as he watches the soldiers carefully.

  “My Lord?”

  He swings around, startled. “You! What are you doing here?”

  “It’s William,” I say. “The night watch took him.”

  He reaches out a hand and takes my arm. “When?”

  “As soon as it happened. He was here after the explosion. He was the first person they saw.”

  He leans close. “How do you know this?”

  “I was passing,” I falter.

  “Passing Kirk O’Field at two in the morning just as it blew up?” His grip on my arm tightens. “I told you not to leave the Queen.”

  “Is she safe?”

  I cry out as he crushes muscle and skin against bone. “She is safe, thank God. Now keep your mouth shut.”

  He calls over a man standing nearby. It is French Paris, his terror plain on his streaked face.

  “Take this one straight to the Queen.” Bothwell gives one last twist to my arm as he hands me over and I bite down hard to keep from making a sound again.

  French Paris hurries me along the street.

  “Where is your father?” he hisses in my ear.

  “He was taken by the watch,” I say.

  “Oh Jesus. Oh God.” He crosses himself with his other hand.

  “Is this the evil you spoke of?”

  “Be quiet. I’ve spoken to you of nothing.”

  The approach to Holyrood is crowded with people. French Paris and I push through them until we reach the gate. The guard checks us carefully before opening the tall gate a crack so that we can enter the palace grounds. It closes behind me with a sharp clang.

  Fifty-six

  Seton allows me to take a warm posset into the bedchamber and when the Queen sees me through the gloomy light, she holds out her arms. I embrace her as tho
ugh I have never left.

  “It is a nightmare,” she whispers, her voice breaking. “Are you a ghost?”

  “I am real, Your Grace.” I tighten my arms around her.

  She lets go and stares at me with awful eyes. “They meant to kill us both. It’s God’s will I didn’t sleep at Kirk O’Field, or my son would now be an orphan and this country without a ruler.”

  “But you are safe,” I say.

  “I cannot bear to be alone.” She falls back on her pillows. “Every moment I can hear the sound of assassination.”

  “No one can harm you here,” I say, offering the posset.

  She clutches my wrist. “I am too afraid to eat or drink.”

  I put the posset to my own lips and swallow a mouthful. She stares at me for a long minute and at last, tremblingly, reaches out for it and sips.

  “Rizzio was murdered through that very door and I was imprisoned in this room by my own husband. Now he lies murdered too. No one is safe.”

  “The palace is swarming with guards,” I tell her.

  She clutches my hand. “You must stay with me. Don’t leave me, not for a minute. You and Seton, my two most loyal.”

  “Of course,” I murmur.

  She shudders and puts her face in her hands. “He’s here. Did you know that? When they have finished laying him out, I must go down and see him. It is so dreadful, I do not know if I can do it.”

  “They say he is not marked.”

  She stares at me. “How can that be? The explosion woke all of Edinburgh.”

  I raise my shoulders in a shrug. “I do not know.”

  “He had finished his treatment, did you know? He was to come to Holyrood tomorrow and we were to live as husband and wife again.”

  I remember the stench of him as we brought him from Glasgow and the gorge rises in my throat. Surely she cannot grieve for that prospect?

  She looks restlessly around the room. “We must leave here. It’s too dangerous. We must go somewhere safer than Holyrood. Dunbar, perhaps? Seton?” Her eyes meet mine again. “Edinburgh Castle,” she says. “Where monarchs go in time of need. We shall go there tomorrow. You must stay by my side.”

  “As you wish,” I say.

  ≈ ≈ ≈

  They hang the Queen’s bedchamber with black drapes. We dress her in the royal robes of mourning and braid her hair in tight plaits, severely drawn back from her face.

  I do not know what Bothwell says to the night watch, but he returns from the Tolbooth with William before darkness falls. I watch them cross the courtyard from the Queen’s window. William doesn’t walk like a man who has been tortured and I let my breath out in a trembling exhalation.

  Bothwell reports to the Queen’s bedchamber. She is seated by the fire, dressed in her mourning clothes.

  “Have you seen his body?” he asks.

  She nods, her eyes full of tears. “Have you found who has done this?”

  “Not yet. But I have men knocking on every door in Edinburgh. They won’t stop until they arrest the murderers.”

  “How can I ever feel safe again?”

  “I am sure the plot was not against you, Your Grace. You are safe.”

  “I am never safe,” she says. “I was in my husband’s bedroom not two hours before the explosion. They wished to kill us both, I’m sure of it. I thought having an heir would make me safer, but it simply means anyone plotting against me can seize my child and rule in his name.”

  Bothwell crosses the room to her side. “Hush. The best men in Scotland are guarding you and the Prince. It is a terrible thing your husband has died, but perhaps in time you will consider this a release.”

  She stares at him. “The murder of a king can never be a good thing.”

  He bows his head. “Of course not. But while we search for the criminals, we will keep you safe.” He glances at me. “You have Seton and Alison by your side, I am pleased to see. I’ll make sure they are protected too.”

  He stands. “I will leave you now, Madam. May I have a word with Alison?”

  She waves her hand in dismissal and I follow him from the room. The presence chamber is full but subdued and he walks through it and out into the corridor.

  “Come to my chambers a moment,” he says, leading the way.

  I expect to see William there and my heart is beating, but Bothwell’s apartment is empty.

  “I see you have brought William back,” I say. “What devil’s work have you made him do?”

  Bothwell grabs me where he hurt my arm earlier in the day, dragging me up on my toes. “I do not know what you were doing at Kirk O’Field, and I do not care to know,” he says, his voice hard. “But I tell you this. You will stay with the Queen now, until I tell you. You will comfort her and help her feel safe. If you try to leave, I will send men to get you. Understand?”

  I try to pull away from him, but he will not release me.

  “You will not speak to your father, nor send him messages,” he continues. “You will ask no questions, you will do as you are told by the Queen or myself. Anything otherwise will be at your peril.”

  I stare up at him. He frightens me. There is something in his demeanor I have not seen before.

  “Please don’t put my father in danger,” I say. “He has been through too much.”

  “No one is in danger, as long as you do what I say. I know nothing of this, and neither do you. Ask no questions.”

  I struggle and this time he releases me. “Go back to her,” he says.

  I cross the room and pause at the door. “Could you tell William I said thank you?”

  He turns from me. “No messages, I said.”

  Fifty-seven

  The whirl of the Queen’s life swallows me again. I am with her constantly. I hurry to her side in the small hours of the night when she cries out in horror; I help her dress and undress.

  I am Bothwell’s prisoner, but the Queen needs me, and in this I have never been able to resist her. My worn and battered love rises up like some old soldier on the field of war, alive against all odds. I am her protector now, and in that certainty there is some peace. Perhaps Sophie is right. Perhaps even without Bothwell’s compulsion, I would stay with her.

  She alternates between wild weeping and eerie calm, between planning to flee and settling herself to take control of her country again. But it has not occurred to her—or any of us—what her country is thinking.

  Edinburgh’s citizens mourn their twenty-one-year-old King as an innocent. Small shrines to his remembrance spring up in windows, candles burn into the night. I hear that each day people flock to the site of the explosion to weep and pray.

  There are as many theories about the murder as there are citizens in the burgh, and word of them finds its way even to Holyrood. There are those who live near Kirk O’Field who say they heard a small army of men run past before the explosion. Two women in Blackfriar’s Wynd claim they heard the King’s voice begging for mercy, calling, “Pity me, kinsmen.” It is sworn that the raven that followed the King from Glasgow croaked on the roof of the Old Provost’s House all through the previous day and that supernatural beings swept through the city streets in the night calling out a warning.

  Within four days, the first placard is hammered up during the night and it unleashes a torrent of them. Written in different hands, some with drawings, they appear through the city, put up each night afresh for the eyes of the people in the morning. On Saint Giles Kirk, the Tolbooth, the Mercat Cross, on the streets and crossroads. All different, but with one thing common. All accusing Lord Bothwell of the King’s murder.

  He appears unconcerned. As the Queen falters beneath the horror of the royal assassination, he steps up and assumes her responsibilities. Within a short time he is ruling the country in all but name, while the Queen takes to her chambers for days at a time or rides frantically and without purpose between different strongholds. We move to Edinburgh Castle, then to Seton, then to Holyrood, then Seton again, never more than a few days in each place,
each time attended by great trains of servants and guards and advisers. With the greatest effort of will, she attends to urgent meetings with her advisers and reads the flurry of letters pouring into Edinburgh from every corner of Europe, full of horror and outrage, demanding justice, every one carrying the heavy weight of suspicion.

  It has been a dark year for our Queen. She is not strong in body and I fear that she will not be able to face this. She falls into a swoon in front of all her court. At night she tosses and turns and cries out in her sleep. Seton and I do everything in our power to comfort her.

  “What do the people say?” she asks me one night when we are back at Holyrood and she is unusually calm. “Tell me truly.”

  “The people read the placards that are pasted around the town at night,” I tell her. “Many of them name Bothwell.”

  “Bothwell,” she says. “Without whom the country would have split asunder by now. He rules where I cannot. He is present, when even my brother decides this would be a good time to visit France. He has been ever loyal to me, but there is something about him that others cannot abide. He attracts strife. Why is that?”

  “He does not care who likes him.” Seton draws a comb through the Queen’s hair. “He does not bother to ingratiate himself. He knows he can win any fight, if need be, so he does not bother with pleasantries.”

  “What think you, Alison?” the Queen asks. “You have had much chance to observe him.”

  “He is a brute, but he has never wavered in his loyalty to you. There are few lords who could make that claim.”

  “Few indeed,” she says, and her eyes fill with tears. “Even my husband.”

  “Shh,” Seton says.

  “No, I must recall it, because around me he becomes more a saint with each new day he is dead,” she says, agitated. “They have already forgotten his cruelty, his drunkenness, his rages. They forget he refused to rule, that he barely even signed a document. Now he has become as innocent as a lamb.”

  It is true. Even I, cloistered with the Queen for most of the hours of each day and night, can feel the tide turning against her.