He returned to the Hayreddin an hour later with a hired coach and both horses. Night was falling, long shadows melting into the permanent gloom of the capital’s alleys: the perfect time to smuggle his family ashore unnoticed. Wrapping his cloak closer against the evening chill, he boarded the French galiote and made his way down to the cabin. The prospect of breaking the bad news to his wife slowed his steps, but there was nothing else for it. He forced a smile and opened the cabin door.
Kit was awake and sitting on Sandy’s lap, listening to his uncle tell him a story. Mal leant against the doorpost for a moment, wondering how many times this scene had played out across the centuries. Five hundred years, Sandy – or rather Erishen – had said, though not always with Kiiren. There must have been other amayi? before that, their names lost among the brothers’ fractured memories.
“Come,” Mal said, reluctantly interrupting the tale. “Curfew will be upon us soon, and I want you out of the city before the gates close.”
He led his wife up onto the deck, followed by Sandy carrying Kit half-hidden under his cloak and Susanna trailing in their wake. Youssef barked instructions to his men in a mixture of French and Arabic, and four of them disappeared into the ship, re-emerging a few moments later with the women’s baggage.
“Did you bring enough?” Mal said, looking back at them.
“Most of it is Kit’s,” Coby said with a sigh. “You would not believe how tiresome it is to travel with a small child. Susanna is a saint for bearing with all the work.”
“Better than her old life in Venice, surely?”
“Of course,” Coby said. “How could she not prefer honest employment to a life of wickedness?”
Mal suppressed a grin. Tempting as it was to point out his wife’s hypocrisy, he did not want to spoil their last few moments together. Though perhaps it was time to break the ill news? No, he would wait until they were in the coach. Best not to draw attention to themselves.
Kit stirred briefly as they got into the coach, blinked up at his uncle and settled down again with a beatific smile on his chubby features. Susanna sat stiff as a poker on the bench beside them, not taking her eyes off Kit.
They travelled in companionable silence for a while, Coby resting her head on Mal’s shoulder as they bounced along the cobbled streets. It was slow going up the hill to Bishopsgate, the horses straining at the traces and the coachman cursing like a Billingsgate fishwife.
“There’s something I have to tell you,” Mal said at last, swallowing his dread. “I’m not coming to Rushdale with you.”
Coby’s head jerked up. “What?”
Mal held up his hands to forestall her protests. “I am sorry, my love. Business keeps me here in the capital–”
“What business?”
“You know what business. The same as always.”
“But – I’ve not seen you in months. Can it not be delayed?”
He told her about Lady Frances’s invitation. Coby’s expression became grave.
“She hardly ever visits her father’s house, not since he died,” Mal went on. “If she wants to meet me there instead of at Whitehall Palace, there must be something badly amiss.”
The coach slowed to a halt. Mal stuck his head out of the window and discovered they had reached the city gates.
“I’ll come north as soon as I can,” he said, and leant over to kiss her farewell.
For a moment he thought she would deny him, then she melted into his arms and kissed him with such fervour that he was sorely tempted to go north after all. When the coach started moving again, he gently disentangled himself from his wife’s embrace, nodded farewell to his brother and leapt down into the street.
The coachman’s lad handed him Hector’s reins and he sprang into the saddle with a muttered curse. He would have to ride hard to get across London Bridge before the Great Stone Gate closed, and right now he could hardly see a damned thing. Wiping his eyes with the back of his sleeve, he kicked the gelding into a trot.