CHAPTER XXXV
“I don’t know why I let you talk me into this,” Mal said as Grey’s men snapped the manacles around his wrists.
He shuffled out of the stables into the courtyard, blinking against the sunlight. Sandy was likewise chained at wrist and ankle; Coby remained free, and was now dressed in women’s attire again. Mal wondered if she had managed to conceal any lockpicks or weaponry under the full brocade skirts. If not, or if she was searched, this could be a very short mission.
“Henry wants us prisoner more than anything else in the world,” she said in a low voice. “He will be too eager to take charge of us to think about anything else.”
“She is right,” Sandy put in. “Jathekkil may be a twice-reborn guiser, but he is at present a boy, and a boy’s emotions rule him. He will strut and gloat a while, and not stop to consider that we came to him willingly.”
Grey limped across the courtyard towards them, his pain-racked features smoothed into an approximation of a smile. The duke was taking far more pleasure in this plan than was entirely necessary.
“What of your men, my lord?” Mal said quietly. “Can they be trusted to play their part?”
“Of course. They are not amateurs like Frogmore. They may be Huntsmen, but I hold their loyalty.”
“I hope so.”
Grey’s men fell in around them. Most were in the duke’s blue-and-white livery with his scarlet unicorn badge on the left breast, but two were rough-looking fellows in leather jerkins and threadbare trews. Their pupils were still slightly dilated from last night’s dose of qoheetsakhan.
“Henry won’t notice, will he?” Mal asked Sandy.
“I hope he will be too pleased to see us to question the means of acquiring us.”
“And Grey was telling the truth, that they are real Huntsmen?”
Sandy shuddered. “Oh yes.”
“I’m sorry you had to go through that, but we need them to be able to fool Henry.”
His brother nodded. It was a necessary part of the plan. If Olivia questioned the men, she would use nothing as clumsy as torture. Mal needed the men to have some genuine memories of hunting skraylings, to distract her from the false memories Sandy had given them of capturing the twins.
Four liveried men with pole-arms led the way out of Suffolk House, followed by the three prisoners. Behind them came more retainers, this time with crossbows, just in case the captives changed their mind and tried to run for it. Last of all came the Huntsmen, sauntering along the street with heads held high. After all, they truly believed they had captured the King’s worst enemies and would be rewarded for it.
Passers-by stopped and stared as they walked along the Strand towards Ludgate. At first the duke’s livery was enough to stop any questions, especially here on the road to Westminster where nearly all the houses belonged to the great lords of the realm. As they passed under the gate, however, the jeers began.
“You’re a pretty pair,” a man called out. “What yer done, eh? Both fucked the wench, or one another?”
One of Grey’s men lashed out with the butt of his pole-arm and he withdrew, cursing. Mal tried to close his ears to the catcalls and obscenities, wishing his wife could be spared this ordeal. By the time they reached Tower Street they had attracted a following of street urchins armed with mud and worse, and he was almost thankful for the Huntsmen, whose glowering presence kept the wretches from coming too close.
At the end of the street they turned left up the hill and approached the first gatehouse.
“What is this?” The guard’s eyes narrowed in suspicion as he took in their little procession.
“A gift for His Majesty from my lord the Duke of Suffolk,” the lead retainer said. “An escaped prisoner, and two of the King’s chief enemies.”
“Here, I know ’im.” The other guard pointed at Mal. “Didn’t I see Captain Monkton flog you, that one time? Years ago, it was…”
“I’m glad to see we’ll be among old friends,” Mal replied.
“Oh, we’ll be friends all right,” the man said with a leer. “Come on, better get them safe inside.”
They followed one of the Tower guards across the causeway into the castle proper. A feeling of unease came over Mal as they passed into the inner ward. How many times had he been here? More often than he cared to recall, but never under such dangerous circumstances. If this did not work… But he could not allow himself to doubt, not now.
To his surprise they were not taken to the Bloody Tower, where Henry’s household had been based earlier, but into the inner ward and through a massive gatehouse to the White Tower itself. Tall double doors opened onto a flight of worn stone steps that led up to the great entrance, and Mal had to be careful where he trod.
At the top the guard directed them through another set of doors into the great hall of the keep. The vast chamber had been swept clean and its walls hung with every faded tapestry the castle could provide. At the far end a canopy had been set up over a wooden dais. A small dark-haired figure perched on the throne beneath, and even in the gloom the light glinted on the golden crown he wore.
The retainers’ pole-arms thudded on the flagstones in time to their booted footsteps as they marched down the hall with their prisoners. As they got closer, Mal spotted a red-faced page kneeling by the dais, and courtiers standing amongst the pillars on either side. King Henry got to his feet.
“Sir Maliverny Catlyn.” He looked the three of them over. “Where is your son?”
“My lord Grey did not think it appropriate to send him, Your Majesty. After all, he’s the innocent party in all this. Besides, it might not be safe–”
“Not safe? Where could be safer than the greatest castle in my kingdom?”
“There was a fever, Your Majesty.”
“No. There was no fever in this castle. No one here has been stricken down, have you?”
The courtiers shook their heads and murmured agreement.
“You see?”
“But your brother–” Coby put in.
“My brother was murdered.” Henry folded his arms, as if daring anyone to disagree. “On my uncle’s orders.”
“Your uncle, sire?”
“Arthur, the would-be usurper. Why do you think he fled to his castle in Warwickshire? To avoid arrest, and to rally his own troops. Even now he plots to raise an army and seize the throne. My throne.”
Mal kept his features carefully blank. Had Olivia’s machinations come to fruition already, or did the boy-king believe the rumours about his uncle? Just how much in control of events was he, when it came down to it?
Henry seemed to remember his other visitors at last.
“Who are they?” he said, pointing at the Huntsmen.
One of the men bowed, not ungracefully. “Just loyal citizens, sire, what captured these traitors.”
“You two captured them? Not the duke?”
The Huntsman shrugged. “We knew his father of old, if you get my drift, sire.”
Henry’s eyes narrowed like a cat spotting a mouse. “Really? Well, gentlemen, it seems we have much to talk about.” He flicked a hand towards the prisoners. “Take them away and put them somewhere safe. I’ll deal with them later.”
A yeoman warder directed them to an all-too-familiar tower at the far end of the outer curtain wall.
“Is this Monkton’s idea of a jest?” Mal asked the warder.
“Who?”
“Captain Monkton, of the Tower militia?”
“Oh, that Monkton. No, he ain’t here.”
So, Monkton was still rotting in prison in Cambridge. The thought brought a smile to Mal’s lips.
“Oi, what are you looking so cheerful about, traitor?” The warder struck Mal in the back of the knees and he stumbled and fell, twisting sideways as he did so to avoid cracking his skull on the cobbles. Coby hurried to his side and helped him up.
“Is the woman a prisoner as well?” the warder asked Grey’s men, unlocking the door at the base of the tower.
“I want to stay with my husband,” Coby said, before any of them could answer.
“Right you are, madam,” the warder said. “If you want to be locked up here, that’s your business. My business is to keep the guilty ones in, not the innocent out.”
He led them up a narrow flight of stairs and unlocked the door at the top.
“Plenty of room for both of you in there,” he said, ushering Mal and Coby inside.
“What about my brother?” Mal cried out as the door began to close. “He’s not well, he needs an attendant–”
“Sorry, sir, can’t have you all in one cell. Your brother will be comfortable enough on the floor above.”
He closed and locked the door, and their footsteps receded upwards.
“It was worth a try,” Mal said, shuffling around the room in his chains. “Do you know, this is the very cell I was held in, all those years ago?”
“When Monkton had you hauled in off the streets of Southwark, do you mean?”
“Aye. Ten years, can you believe that?” He cocked his head on one side, peering at the wall. “I remember these carvings like it was yesterday. Though I think there are a few more of them now.”
“Some of the prisoners must have been here a long time,” Coby replied, crouching to examine an elaborately carved roundel resembling a zodiac or horoscope.
The note of fear in her voice was unmistakable. Mal crossed the cell, rattling his manacles in frustration. She looked up and stood to embrace him.
“I hope you’ve brought your lockpicks,” he murmured against her headdress.
She looked towards the door. “As soon as the guards have gone, I’ll free you.”
They stood there in silence for what seemed like hours, and at last the footsteps came back down and past them and the door at the bottom of the stairwell slammed shut.
“Do you have a knife?”
“Just a seal-cutter, in the lining of my left boot. I thought they’d find anything larger.”
“Good. Easier than using my teeth.”
He sat down on the bed and she pulled the boot off and extracted the tiny blade, a thumb’s length of wafer-thin steel made for cutting the seals from letters. She took off her bodice, turned it inside-out and began carefully cutting the seams.
“What are you doing?”
“I could hardly walk in here with my tool-roll, could I? Especially in these clothes.” She bit her lip in concentration as she picked away some thread. “So, whilst you and Sandy were busy with Grey, I borrowed needle and thread from Lady Frances and made a few… alterations.”
She put down the blade and pulled a metal rod from the unpicked seam with a grin of triumph.
“You’ve sewn your entire set of skeleton keys into your clothing?” he said, trying not to laugh.
“Not all of them. I left out the small ones that are only any use for jewellery boxes and the like, and a few of the very largest.”
Within half an hour she had an impressive collection of metal tools laid out on the blanket between them, and she unlocked Mal’s fetters in short order. The lining of the bodice lay in ruins, but she put the garment back on as tidily as she could. Mal took great pleasure in tucking all the stray bits of fabric inside: all around her waist, at the back of her neck, along the front where the stiffening plumped up her breasts… He bent to kiss the soft warm skin, taking her in his arms as the hunger enveloped him. She giggled and made ineffectual attempts to push him off.
“We don’t have time for this,” she murmured into his hair.
He raised his head. “We have until sunset. After that, we may never get time again.”
Ned folded his arms and held his ground. Lady Frances might be a duchess, but she was only a woman when all was said and done.
“I swore to my best friend that I would guard his son with my life. I can’t do that if he’s half the breadth of the Thames away.”
“You exaggerate, Master Faulkner. Christopher will be only a few yards distant from the guest apartments. If there is any trouble, you can be with us in moments.”
“And how will I know if there’s trouble, if there’s half a dozen stone walls between us?”
She sighed and drew him towards the window.
“My husband has men on the main gate–” she gestured towards the streetward entrance to Suffolk House “–and in the gardens also, lest anyone approach from the river. If we are attacked from either side, the alarm will go up.”
“And if we are attacked from within?”
“You are accusing my servants of treachery?”
Ned chewed his moustache. How much to tell her? Hell, fuck Mal’s tiptoeing around the truth; secrecy was for sneaky bastards like Henry.
“Not your servants,” he said. “The enemy. They’re sorcerers; they can appear out of thin air, bringing devils and who knows what with them.”
Lady Frances made the sign of the cross, though to her credit she did not quail.
“What are we to do?”
Ned thought back to their escape from Anglesey Priory.
“For a start, arm your men with all the crossbows you have. A few steel-tipped bolts should slow our enemies down. But most of all, make sure Kit – Master Christopher – doesn’t take off that necklace he’s wearing.”