Lady Gallant (40 page)

"I have the cipher."

Sebastian offered his horse a handful of grain while he studied Christian. "Did you ever think she might be sending messages to someone who isn't our enemy?"

Resting the heel of one boot on the toe of the other, Christian gouged at the leather with the handle of the whip. He kept his mouth shut. His father snapped out one word:

"Christian!"

The whip flew across the stable, smacking against a wall, as Christian sprang erect and turned his back on the Earl. "You don't understand. All I could think of was you lying in your own blood, dying, and her being the cause. She betrayed us."

"You don't know that, my headstrong."

"I'll be certain by this evening."

"And when you're proved wrong?"

"It isn't possible, and in any case, I have yet to find the little mouse. It's been six days and she hasn't appeared. I've set watches at Becket's house, and Flegge's, and about the palace. I even sent men to follow the Queen, but they're not back, and I don't think Nora would have gone to Mary."

Sebastian brushed grain dust from his hands and approached Christian. Laying a hand on the younger man's shoulder, he shook his head.

"You must find her soon."

"I know. I can't sleep for imagining what could happen to her. God's blood, I think I'm in Hell."

"No," Sebastian said. "In love, mayhap, but not in Hell."

Christian turned his face away. "I can't love a traitor."

"You don't. Now come with me to the kitchens. You're not hieing off on one of your skulkings until I see you put meat in your stomach. You haven't eaten more than a few mouthfuls in two days."

Under his father's eye, Christian forced himself to down a meal half the size of his usual serving. Late that night, after the Earl had retired, he slipped away through the concealed passage beneath the chapel and into the city, where he met Inigo and Hext. Near the shop of Unthank, Christian donned a black mask with slits to accommodate his eyes, nose, and mouth, and they took to the roofs. Slithering, leaping, and clambering, they ca-pered from rooftop to rooftop until they reached that of Unthank and dropped through a window in the attic.

Christian shoved open the door that led to the third floor and listened. He heard nothing but the snores of Unthank's servants. He took a step, but Hext barred his way with one arm and took the lead, drawing his sword. Resigned, Christian cast an irritated look at Inigo, who grinned and bowed Christian on.

They floated through the dark house to the shop below, and paused at a panel in the wall of the stairwell. Christian felt along the seam, pressed with three fingers, and heard a click. The panel swung back to reveal emptiness lit by a vague glow. Down a flight of stairs, voices rumbled. With Hext in the vanguard, they descended the stairs silently, but once they gained the shadows at the end, Christian stepped in front. He waited in the darkness just beyond a pool of light where four men stood about a fifth tied to a chair.

The prisoner was a corpulent man of about thirty, dressed in a merchant's gown, his mouth stopped with a leather gag. Christian stepped into the light, and four pairs of eyes snapped to him. Unthank sighed and dropped his hand from his sword hilt, as did Simon Spry and two apprentices. The prisoner's eyes bulged.

"Hugo Paderborn," Christian said. He breathed the name softly, and Hugo's eyes nearly popped out of his head. Christian smiled a slow, lazy smile. "A fat goose ready to be gutted and basted. Remove the gag."

Unthank sniffed. "You'll regret it, my lord."

Upon hearing this form of address, the prisoner whimpered. Christian flicked his hand, and an apprentice slit the gag with a knife. Immediately the room filled with an unnaturally high whine, an octave above the range of a howling dog and several times more annoying.

"O God, don't kill me, don't kill me, please don't kill me. O God O God O God help me. Jesu deliver me, Christ the Savior deliver me, O Christ O God help me O God help me O God."

Christian gritted his teeth and clamped his hand around his sword hilt to keep from slapping Hugo. "Cease this blubbering at once."

"O God O God O God help me. Jesu deliver me, Christ the Savior deliver me, O Christ O God help me O God help me O God."

On and on Hugo whined, his pleas interspersed with whimpers and grunts. Christian lost what little patience was left to him after days of worry and frustration. Swooping down on Hugo, he slapped the man's flaccid cheek once, then again. Hugo's little red mouth formed an O, and he burst into tears.

Christian threw up his hands. "God's blood."

Pacing back and forth in front of Paderborn, he waited for the man to stop sniffling. A minute passed, but the prisoner only redoubled his efforts by raising his voice to a wail. Christian whipped out his dagger and leveled the point at one of the bulges on Hugo's neck.

"Shut your mouth or I'll stick you."

Hugo caught his lower lip between his teeth and stopped at once, wriggling to avoid the metal tip that nicked his skin. Christian sheathed the dagger, then rested a boot on a low stool, propped his forearms on his thigh, and subjected Paderborn to a silent examination. The longer he watched the man, the more whimpers escaped Hugo's tightly shut mouth.

"I have but one question for you," Christian said at last. "Who is your master?"

"O God O God O God."

Christian laughed and addressed Unthank. "Where is that toy of yours?"

Unthank signaled his apprentices, and the two brought out a metal object slightly larger than a man's head. Made of iron, it consisted of four bars joined into a rectangle. The top bar was pierced by a thick screw, which in turn clamped onto what looked like a skullcap that hung in the middle of the rectangle. Christian patted the instrument.

"Now, Paderborn, my jolly whale, you have less than a minute to tell me who your master is before you don this pretty cap. If I don't have my answer, these two lads are going to turn that screw until your head pops like a dropped melon. I, of course, will stand clear so that your brains don't soil my raiment."

"O God O God O God O God O God."

Glancing at the apprentices, Christian lifted a brow. "Lads?"

The apprentices hoisted their instrument, and Hugo wailed. Everyone froze, though, as the door at the top of the stairs opened and a voice called down, "I know that whine."

Christian whirled about, drawing his sword. Hext and Inigo stepped between the stairs and Christian while the apprentices backed away from the prisoner and felt for their own weapons. A slight man came down the steps, unperturbed by the weapons. Masked similarly to Christian, the newcomer walked calmly into the midst of the armed men and stopped before Christian. As the man stepped into the light, Christian cursed and sheathed his sword. Everyone followed his lead, and Hugo started crying.

"What are you doing to my printer, Misrule?" the newcomer asked.

"You're supposed to be in France."

"I'm not in France," came the bland reply.

"Have you heard of the recent difficulties?"

"Yes, and I thank God the one dear to you was spared. I called upon him, and he sent me after you with a few words of ire that I won't repeat."

Christian folded his arms over his chest. "I but seek to protect those close to me and those I revere." Without taking his eyes from the visitor, he added, "Show our fat goose the novelties of wearing your toy, Unthank."

"Ohhhhhh."

"Misrule, I know you're angry, but I can't let you squeeze the brains out of one of my best servants."

Christian went still. The only movement visible was a vein pulsing at his temple. Slowly he lifted a hand, and Unthank began untying the prisoner. Christian turned his back to the room and contemplated the bricks on the wall and his new Hell.

Paderborn was escorted out, and soon Christian was alone with the visitor. When the door above shut, Christian walked to the chair vacated by Paderborn, lifted it above his head, and hurled it against the far wall. Splintered wood and chunks of brick went flying, but the noise was nothing compared to the obscenities that erupted from Christian's mouth.

The visitor made no sign of alarm. He removed his mask to reveal thinning hair and heavy-lidded, sensual eyes, then calmly folded the mask into a square.

"Both you and the Princess," he said, "have the habit of throwing things when aroused. Do you think she will continue after becoming Queen?"

Christian turned on the man, breathing hard, his body taut with the effort to contain the hatred he felt for himself. "Cecil, do you understand what has happened?"

"Someone is trying to expose you."

"Or kill me and my father, and I blamed Nora. May God forgive me."

"Yes," Cecil said.

"But Paderborn serves you."

Cecil nodded.

"And Nora was sending messages to Paderborn."

"I know."

Covering his face with his hand, Christian sank back against the wall. "Merciful God, Cecil, you don't know what I've done."

"I shudder to imagine it, considering your willful nature and your lust for vengeance. Nora but assuages her pain at seeing so many suffer by giving me what news she gathers at court." Cecil put a hand on Christian's shoulder. "Lad, you're still in danger. Retire with your family to the country while I make inquiries. You'll be safer away from the city, and you've mistakes to correct."

Christian lifted his face from his hands and stared up at the ceiling. "But the Princess…"

"Balances between the Spanish and the French, keeping both guessing which she favors while she courts allies at home. It is my task to multiply the numbers of subjects about the Queen who clamor for Mary to name Elizabeth her heir. You can't serve our lady if you're dead. Go to the country."

"I must find my wife." Christian eyed a stool, the only other piece of furniture in the room.

"Do so, and then leave London. The Princess wills it." Cecil glanced at the stool, too, and put his body between it and Christian.

Thwarted from giving further vent to his fury, Christian snapped at Cecil, "You could have told me she was a friend."

"What kind of spymaster reveals the identities of his intelligencers to all and sundry?"

"God's breath, what a miserable mishap," Christian said.

"Unfortunate, but not without remedy."

When his comment was met with silence, William Cecil departed as silently as he had come.

Christian heard the panel above his head snap shut. Bracing himself against the wall with both hands, he allowed his head to droop while he thought. Nora, cowering, shy little Nora, braved death to aid Princess Elizabeth. He reeled under the strain of fitting this picture to the one he had formed of the girl. His most vivid and recent memory of her was of her wide, frightened eyes. She was so small and so afraid. So courageous, too, it seemed, for how much more courage did it require to risk death when one was small and frightened and a woman, than when one was a man trained to defend himself.

« Christian winced and his body cringed. "Everlasting damnation."

Images of what he had done penetrated his senses in flashes of memory. His mind reeled at the pictures—of himself standing over Nora in the bridal bed, taking her heart in his hands and tearing it in pieces; of Nora's face dissolving into horror as she realized it was he lying over Mag's naked body; of Nora huddled in her bed so hurt that she wept without stopping.

Christian grimaced, squeezing his eyes shut to block the pain and remorse. He whispered softly to himself, "No."

He remembered the last time he saw her. It was then that he'd noticed a change. Always before, even when she feared him, she'd followed him with her eyes, as if he were the only object of her interest. But that last time, though she had looked at him, that consuming interest had vanished.

As guilt flayed him, Christian considered for the first time the possibility that he might have killed the love of the only woman to whom he had ever considered surrendering himself. Close on this revelation came fear. Sailing in on bat's wings, putrid and festering, it settled over his spirit like the cloak of a leper.

Reeling under the onslaught of remorse and fear, Christian slid to the floor. Guilt fed his fear, stoking it into a bonfire of terror as great as that he'd experienced at nearly losing his father. He'd almost killed her body with his cruelty, and there was a good chance he had killed her love. Nora, great of heart, cou-rageous for anyone but herself, quick of wit, and elegant of mind… and full of secret sensuality until he had made her fear love.

Shaking his head, Christian gazed at a wall sconce without seeing it. "
Christ. "

He couldn't find her. She might be dead because of him. If she'd been hurt from his blindness… He covered his face with his hands and willed the moisture in his eyes to disappear. For once, he couldn't accomplish the feat. The phrases of an old song thrummed in his head.

Shall she never out of my mind,

Nor shall I never out of this pain?

Alas, here she doth me so bind

Except her help I am near slain.

Had he killed her love? Christian shivered and rose to his feet. He would search her out and ask her. It would be the most difficult task he'd ever set himself, but he would fight to gain absolution from her.

It was a hard thing, this guilt, a carrion thing, a punishment worthy of his crime. Christian almost laughed at himself as he headed for the stairs. Never had he imagined that one day he would crave a woman's love more than he craved revenge on Jack Midnight—and never had he thought to fear his fate at the hands of a dainty mite like Nora Becket.

By the next morning Christian had successfully concealed his remorse. The Earl summoned him to his study, only to be interrupted by Simon Spry. The thief barely got out three sentences of his report when Christian leaped on him. Propelled by a boot to his buttocks, Spry flew out of the room to land in the hall. Christian swooped after him, pausing in the threshold, arms and legs braced to attack.

"Don't tell me you can't find her, you pig-sticking runt. You're going to search London from one end to the other if I have to kick you every inch of the way."