Kytchyn’s gesture saved my life. Suddenly he jerked forward with a high-pitched scream, and to my horror I saw a crossbow bolt embedded in his upper arm, blood welling red over his white surplice. He staggered against the wall, looking at his arm in horror.
Barak drew his sword and ran leaping to the window. The pock, faced man who had followed us from Cromwell’s house was standing there, glittering blue eyes fixed on Barak as he fitted a new bolt to his crossbow. Barak, though, was almost on him and the man paused, then dropped the weapon with a clatter and fled across the yard. Barak threw himself over the window sill, regardless of broken glass, but the man was already at the abbey wall, clambering up. Barak grabbed at a flailing foot, but he was just too late; the assailant disappeared over the wall. Barak clambered up and, his elbows on the wall, looked down at the street for a moment before letting himself down. He picked up his sword, walked back to the window and climbed through again. His face was like thunder.
I bent to comfort Kytchyn. He had crumpled to the floor, clutching his arm and sobbing as the blood welled between his fingers. ‘I wish I’d never seen those papers,’ he moaned. ‘I know nothing, sir, nothing. I swear.’
Barak knelt down, lifting Kytchyn’s hand from his wound with surprising gentleness. ‘Come, fellow, let’s see.’ He studied the arm. ‘It’s all right, the head of the bolt’s come out the other side. You need a surgeon to snap it off, that’s all. Here, lift your arm.’ Trembling, Kytchyn obeyed. Barak took a handkerchief from his pocket and made a tourniquet, binding the arm above the wound.
‘Come on, friend, there’s a surgeon across the way that tends to injuries among the drovers. I’ll take you there. Keep your arm raised.’ He lifted the trembling Kytchyn to his feet.
‘Who’s trying to kill me?’ the clerk squealed. ‘I know nothing, sir, nothing.’
‘I think that bolt was aimed at me,’ I said slowly. ‘It would have hit me if Kytchyn had not moved when he did.’
Barak’s face was serious, his joking manner gone. ‘Ay, you’re right. God’s pestilence, how did he know we were here?’
‘Perhaps we were followed from the house.’
‘There’s someone who will be able to tell us,’ he said grimly. ‘I’ll take Kytchyn to the surgeon, then I’ll have a little word. Pock-face won’t come back, but stand away from the window just in case. I’ll not be long.’
I was too shocked to do anything but nod obediently. I leaned back against the wall as Barak helped the moaning Kytchyn outside. My heart was thudding as though it would leap from my throat, my whole body cold with sweat. The place suddenly seemed deathly quiet; it was too far from Sir Richard’s house for him to have heard anything. I groaned involuntarily. Cromwell had put my life in danger a second time. I looked at the crossbow lying where Barak had left it on the floor, squat and deadly. I jumped at a sudden clatter, but it was only the crows returning to their perches.
A few minutes later I heard voices, Barak’s and another’s. The big doorkeeper was propelled through the doorway, protesting loudly. Large as the man was, Barak had his arm pinned behind him in a vice-like grip. He released him and sent him spinning across the room. He fell with a crash among the debris.
‘You’ve no right!’ the gatekeeper shouted. ‘When Augmentations hear about this—’
‘Pox on shitting Augmentations!’ Barak shouted. Grabbing the man’s dirty robe, he hauled him to his feet again. He had sheathed his sword but now pulled a wicked-looking dagger from his belt and held it to the doorkeeper’s flabby throat. ‘Listen to me, arsehole. I serve the Earl of Essex and I’ve authority to take what measures I like. Like slitting your weasen-pipe, see?’ The man gulped, his eyes wide. Barak took the doorkeeper’s head and jerked it round to face me. ‘That priest I brought out just now was struck by a crossbow bolt intended for my master there, Lord Cromwell’s lawyer. And the only person who could have let him in was you, you fat whore’s cunny. So talk.’
‘I didn’t,’ he babbled, ‘There are other ways in—’
Barak reached down and gave the man’s balls a hard squeeze, making him roar.
‘I’ll tell,’ he shouted, ‘I’ll tell!’
‘Get on with it then!’
The doorkeeper gulped. ‘Shortly after you arrived, sir, another man came up to me. A strange-looking fellow, looking like a clerk; he’s had the smallpox. He held up a gold angel and asked what the two of you were doing here. I - I told him you were meeting someone. He offered me the angel to let him in too. It was a gold angel, sir, and I’m poor.’
‘Let’s see it.’
The watchman fumbled in his belt and produced the big gold coin. Barak grabbed it. ‘Right, I’ll have that. It’ll pay for our friend’s surgeon. Now, this man. Was he carrying anything? A crossbow, for example?’
‘I didn’t see a crossbow!’ the man howled. ‘He had a big satchel, I didn’t know what was in it!’