B008257PJY EBOK (28 page)

“After tomorrow, you’re absolved of your oath.”

“Would Lancelot have followed Mordred? Answer me, Richard!”

They had reached a tree. Bare of leaves in golden August, blackened as if by fire, it stood alone on the ridge of the hill. Richard halted, placed his hands on his friend’s shoulders. “You’ve not seen war, Francis. I have. I’ve seen blood running from the wounded. I’ve seen the dead in the mud, villages destroyed, children starving. I’ve seen the agony of mothers and wives…” He swallowed. “I hate war, Francis. Let it end.”

“Some things are worth fighting for, Richard.”

The hammering of steel and twanging of bowstrings rose in volume as archers and men-at-arms checked their equipment for the morrow. Metal flashed in the light of campfires; men were cleaning weapons of steel that could sever arms and rip out entrails. There was little conversation, some nervous laughter. Without exception, the men were subdued, their faces pensive. Only a madman felt no fear on the eve of battle, Richard thought. His shoulder throbbed. He dropped his arms.

“Is death our reward, or our punishment?” he asked softly. The question hung in the air for a long moment.

“No one knows what death is,” replied Francis at length, “whether it’s not perhaps man’s greatest blessings, yet people fear it as if they know it to be the greatest of evils.”

“I believe it is our reward,” said Richard quietly.

Across the dark meadows drifted the silver chimes of nearby Sutton Cheney Church where they had prayed at Vespers earlier. The breeze had picked up. Richard looked at the lone, blackened tree, bereft of life, yet standing firm, its maimed branches held high. He stretched out a hand, leaned against it. Charred bark crumbled beneath his weight, disintegrated in his fingers, and fell to the ground. Richard withdrew his hand. “Have you ever wondered, Francis?” he whispered.

“Wondered?”

“How small a part of life is taken up by treasured moments… how large a part is suffering?”

“It’d take a dull mind never to question such a thing. Even the barbarian infidels have considered it. They believe every soul must pass through seven valleys before reaching God. Like seven dark nights… Only after its greatest suffering, in a place they call the abyss, does it reach the valley of hymns and celebration.”

In the silence that fell, the chirping of crickets blanketed the night. The clear notes of a lyre floated on the summer air and so sweet was the melody that men hushed to listen. A flute joined in and a woman’s rich voice began to sing a plaintive refrain, filled with yearning. Richard let his eyes seek the shadows as images floated before him. He saw Anne smile at him, eyes tender and loving, and heard Ned’s laughter echo through the castle gardens. Again from his father’s torch-lit halls came the deep tones of troubadours recounting tales of noble knights. He closed his eyes against the memory of those dazzling moments, lit by the reflection of so much joy. They had been, he thought now, like rose petals flung over one long, endless funeral cortege.

The song rose in volume. Richard knew the words. It was the lament he had sung as a boy at that long-ago banquet at Middleham. He added his rich voice to hers,

Love, thou art bitter; sweet is death to me,

I fain would follow love, if that could be;

I needs must follow death, who calls for me,

Call and I follow, I follow…

The notes faded into the darkness.

“Camelot was a dream,” he whispered. “Were we fools to dream such dreams, Francis?”

“What would life be without dreams?” Francis said as softly. “But the truth is that man is flawed. Camelot was destroyed by greed and ambition. Evil often triumphs over good.”

“Yet the dream does not die. Arthur still lives and there will always be those who believe, who will strive for ideals against all odds. Surely that counts for something in the end?”

“Maybe, in the end, the quest is all that matters.”

“You’ve been a good friend, Francis.”

Francis’ eyes glistened.

Through the thin, sparse branches of the suffering tree, Richard looked up at the dark sky crowded with thousands of glittering silver stars. They poured out of the deep blackness towards him and seemed so close, so very close, that if he put out a hand, he felt he could touch one. He reached up, but all he caught was a stunted branch of the burned tree. It snapped in his hand with a loud, brittle crack.

“Tell them, if anything happens to me— tell them I tried, Francis—”

Francis had no chance to respond. A messenger was rushing down the slope.

“My lord, Sir John Nesfield has arrived! He awaits in your pavilion.”

Richard tensed, looked at Francis. “’Tis that matter I told you about, Francis. Come.”

He spun on his heel and climbed the distance to his pavilion, with Francis in pursuit. He pushed the flap open and entered. Inside, by a table, in the flickering light of the candles, stood the trusty knight and his charge, a beautiful golden-haired boy in black velvet. Nesfield bent a knee in obeisance and the boy gave a low bow.

“Nephew,” said Richard, inclining his head in cordial greeting. “Welcome.” He sank down on the cot and drew the boy to him by the shoulders. “There is much to be said and little time, so I shall be brief. This is my friend, Francis Viscount Lovell. ’Tis important that you know his face.”

The boy stared dutifully at Francis, trying to commit him to memory. Richard sat very still, watching. He remembered the day at Greenwich Palace in the garden with Meg and the boy in gold and white satin who tripped out of the hedges after his ball. Meg had been taken with little Richard but he’d felt no kinship with his namesake. His own words echoed in his ears: “He is a Woodville.” He blinked, forced the memory away.

“I wish you to know that I regret what has happened, nephew, and I intend to make amends. Once Tudor is dead, the danger to you is past. I have sent to Rome for a dispensation to declare you legitimate. If victory is mine tomorrow, I shall acknowledge you as my heir. But if I fall—” He faltered, found his voice again. “If I fall, you must flee over the seas. When the time is right, you’ll be sent for. ’Till then, ’tis death to be a Plantagenet.” Richard dropped his hands from the boy’s shoulders and rose. He went to his desk, withdrew a key from inside his doublet. Unlocking a silver casket, he took out a small square of parchment attached to a circle of ribbon. The document bore a large red seal from the Great Seal and a smaller one from his signet; a rare double seal.

“Take this with you and keep it safe always. If I am vanquished, use it to convince the crowned heads of Europe and my royal sister the Duchess of Burgundy that you are indeed my rightful heir to the throne of England.” He hung the document around the boy’s neck, tucked it carefully inside his doublet. He searched his face. “One more thing. Did your mother give you a password?”

“Aye, my lord uncle. She gave me one when we parted in Sanctuary. It’s—”

“Don’t tell me! Don’t tell anyone! Keep it secret until the time is right. Do you understand, nephew?”

The boy met his gaze steadily with his own clear intelligent eyes, which were so blue they might have been Neville eyes. A rush of sudden pain twisted Richard’s heart. Another eleven-year-old prince had once taken his measure with just such a look, but those eyes had been filled with rejection and fear. How different might it have been!

“My lord King, I do understand—” The boy’s voice came to Richard as if from across a vast distance. He roused himself from his thoughts.

“—and I thank you.” The child’s tone was strangely old for his years, and by the stress he laid on the last word, Richard knew he understood, and forgave, and might even bear in his heart a trace of affection for his uncle. Thanks to Elizabeth, he thought. Sweet, gentle Elizabeth.

“You must take a name to hide your identity,” said Richard. Gazing at the boy he was flooded by memories: the death of his own father; the flight across the seas with Warwick to Burgundy; the long, endless days of exile when he hadn’t known if Edward lived or died, or what would become of him. He’d felt like an orphan, yet he’d had George with him. This boy, little older, had no one.

“Your last name shall be Warbeck,” he continued.
Warbeck
, Flemish for “orphan.” It was bitterly apt. “Your first, ‘Perkin’.” There had been a boy named Perkin in Bruges, a likable boy, son to Philip the Good’s Master of the Wardrobe. “You will live with a Portuguese Jew named Sir Edward Brampton. Have no fear. Brampton has my full confidence and is loyal to York unto death.” He nodded to Nesfield who arranged the boy’s cloak around him and tucked his golden hair carefully beneath his hood. He took his hand.

“Guard him well, Nesfield,” said Richard.

“With my life, Sire.”

“And keep well away until you know the outcome of the battle. If you must flee, Tyrell will give you safe passage through Calais to Burgundy. Tell Brampton the future of England lies in his hands. He must not fail.”

“Aye, Sire.”

Richard watched them cross the tent. At the flap, little Richard turned. “Farewell, dear uncle. I shall pray for thee.”

“And I for thee, Dickon,” Richard replied in a husky voice. How strange to hear himself call another by that name! “—that God keep thee safe and grant thee a long and fruitful life.”

The boy looked at him for a long moment, his mouth quivering, then went out into the night. Richard stood silently, head bowed, gripping the side of the table. Finally he brought his gaze to Francis. “Your friendship has meant a great deal to me, Francis… I thank thee from the bottom of my heart.”

Francis did not respond immediately, shaken by a rising dismay as he stood regarding Richard: the dark hair bobbed at the ears, the cleft chin and firm set of the jaw, the sad turn of the wide mouth. And the intense grey eyes. Such unspoken pain glowed in those eyes that his own misted looking at them. Blessed Heaven, could it be true that past the morrow he might never again see this face he had loved as a brother? He took a step forward and in a lightning flash, they were in each other’s arms, clasped in a fierce embrace.

“If there’s any justice in the world, victory is yours tomorrow,” Francis whispered in a choked voice.

“Pray for my soul,” said Richard, thickly, unsteadily.

Then Francis was gone.

Alone in the tent, Richard sank down on the bed, his head in his hands, staring at the ground. He bent over, picked up a handful of the red earth at his feet, let it spill slowly through his fingers.
Is death our punishment or our reward?
Caxton’s book lay on the desk beside the silver casket. He reached out, picked it up, flipped it open to Arthur’s death:

Then spake the bold Sir Bedivere:‘My King!

…he who hates thee, he that brought

The heathen back among us, yonder stands,

Mordred, unharm’d the traitor of thine house.’

Then spake the King: ‘King am I, whatsoever be their cry;

And one last act of knighthood shalt thou see

Yet, ere I pass.’ And uttering this, the King

Made at the man.

Then Mordred smote his liege

Hard on the helm… while Arthur at one blow,

Striking the last stroke with Excalibur,

Slew him, and, all but slain himself, he fell

Richard fingered the last line, remembering a plank table in a dim parlour of an inn long ago. In his mind’s eye, Anthony Woodville smiled at him. Your favourite par
t?
he’d asked. His own answer came to him unbidden.
When Arthur slays Mordred. For justice is done.

Truer words he’d never spoken. Aye, death wouldn’t be so hard if he could take foul Tudor with him! Foul Tudor who had attacked his honour with his damnable lies and destroyed his happiness with his evil plots; Tudor, the dragon of his nightmares who had shorn him of hope. By God’s blood, tomorrow that dragon would be no more, for he would set his eyes upon its hideous hide and slash it into a thousand bits!

He rose, flung the book aside. It struck the casket, which fell to the ground, spilling its contents. He seized his sword from where it rested against a coffer and unsheathed it from the scabbard. He held it up to the flickering candlelight. It glinted wickedly. Did he want to die? No more than he wanted to live. John’s words echoed in his ears:
You can’t go forward if you keep looking back. In last year’s nest, there are no eggs.

True, but if he lived, what he tried to forget, he would always remember.

He threw his sword on the bed, sank down beside it, and dropped his head into his hands. His eye fell on a small object at his feet. He picked it up. The miniature likeness of himself that he had promised Elizabeth had fallen from the casket. There was something else. A book…
Tristan and Iseult
. He reached under the bed, pulled out the small leather-bound volume. He dusted the grains of red earth off the cover. The flyleaf bore his inscription,
Loyaulte me lie, Richard of Gloucester
. The book fell open in his hands:

Close visor, lest an arrow from the bush

Leave me all alone with Mark and hell.

He blinked with disbelief. Elizabeth might well speak those words to him, were she here. So many coincidences. Meaningless coincidences. How had Anne explained it? Like a map drawn in duplicate, blurring the lines and rendering the map useless. The map of our lives.

He rose wearily.
Just a little further
, he told himself. He summoned a messenger, gave him the book and the portrait, and directed him to Sherriff Hutton.

He lay down on the bed and closed his eyes. Soon it would be dawn.

~ * ~

Chapter 33

“But let what will be, be.”

Sleep would not come to Richard. The last candle had burned itself out when someone called his name. He answered, and received no reply. He rose from bed, looked around, but could discern nothing in the deep darkness of the tent. He went to the opening, pushed back the flap. It was a black night, utterly silent. He froze. Holy Ninian! The camp was empty! What had happened to everyone? Had they all deserted him, every last man? He shut his eyes on an anguished breath.
Treason!
He took an unsteady step forward and halted. From his distant right came the thunder of hoofs. He peered into the night. Something glittered in the darkness like stardust. Strange… it was armour! So they were knights. But whose? His, or Tudor’s?