The Game Of Kings Part 33

Ignoring Lennox totally, Henry Wharton flung his arms in a wide gesture of exultation, divesting himself with a twist of bow, quiver, helmet and pack. They fell on the table with a crash. "Lymond! You've got him?.

Repressively, Lymond himself answered. "I dislike being discussed as if I were a disease. n.o.body 'got' me," he said. "And where have you been, my billy: to the devil and back to have your beard combed?.

Before Grey's astonished gaze, the scene of a moment before began to repeat itself. They had to hold the young man, struggling, away from the Master. Grey shoved him into his father's grasp and said sharply, "You control him. What's so inflammatory about . . .

Wharton answered curtly. "Made a fool of himself at Durisdeer in February. Milked like a cow tree..

"How?.

Lymond, irrepressible, answered. "It was a wonderful beard he had, a magnificent pelt. He was bearded like a Dammar pine, of the fas.h.i.+on of prophets and pards, one hair sitting here, another there.

But was it fitting? Was it well-considered? I asked myself: peach or nectarine, clingstone or freestone, bald or-forgive me-downywhich?.

"What," said Lord Grey impatiently, "did he do to Henry?.

"Shaved and cropped him with his own knife," replied Lord Wharton shortly, and the angry faces around the table, with the furious exception of Harry's, broke into ill-repressed smiles.

"A picture," observed Lymond. "It isn't considered proper to shout in church. Besides, Lord Lennox is talking..

He had cour.age, or a singular rashness. Tom Erskine, his hands gripping the tapestry, wondered also, jaw set, if Lymond had observed what he himself had just seen: the smallest stirring in the inert body of the messenger Acheson, lying stunned on the marble face of a tomb.

It forced Erskine himself to a decision. With infinite care he edged along the narrow pa.s.sage behind the tapestry, reached the spiral stair, and slipping down it, stepped out on the wide, stone-flagged balcony which overhung the south transept where Lymond stood. Bending low, Erskine crossed the flags and lying still beneath the stone bal.u.s.trade, raised his head cautiously and peered below.

From his low and castellated rampart he caught a glimpse of a yellow head. He raised himself higher. At the same moment Lymondstepped back two paces before Lennox, who was shouting abuse: this brought him halfway along the table with his right side to the balcony and the catafalque with Acheson on his left.

He was, then, keeping the messenger under his eye. A moment later the Master turned his head to speak to the Countess of Lennox and raised his eyes a fraction, searching the stilted lancets and then, briefly, the wide Midnight Stairs and the gallery at their head. Erskine was by then almost certain the quick blue glance had identified him.

Someone was saying vehemently, "That's a lie!.

Lymond seemed undisturbed. "Don't be simple. Didn't you know that Margaret spent her sojourn in Scotland with me?.

The woman raised her brows. "Haven't we had enough of this? When I was captured, I was taken to Lanark. Matthew knows that. The offer of exchange came from Lanark, not from you..

Lymond replied gently. "I naturally covered my mediator by giving him good credentials, but he did not, I'm afraid, come from Lanark. How deceitful of you not to have told your spouse. I wrote my offer of exchange, I remember, on the back of a letter from Lord Lennox to his wife which in itself was a thing of joy. I recall, for example .

Lord Lennox shot a pale glance at his wife. "There is no need to go on with this nonsense..

I recall, for example, a good many things, but don't excite yourselves. I shan't embarra.s.s the dynasty. Didn't you know she was using the war as a fulcrum for her fis.h.i.+ng line with myself as the prey? I was to be driven into the nets since, unlike the beaver, my self-defence stops short of unserviceable gestures. Do you find that objectionable? Pitiful? Even a little ludicrous, perhaps? A self-interest so insanely exclusive that it includes even murder?.

Now Margaret as well was on her feet, her eyes burning. Lennox was pale; around the table the others looked angry and uncomfortable, as if mesmerized into allowing the intolerable scene to go on.

The man Acheson stirred again.

"Murder?" repeated Lord Grey. "Oh: the Stewart girl? She was killed riding..

"She was killed riding, by an arrow. She was threatened, pursued, her young guide killed, and done to death herself as surely as if the arrow had been directed at her.

"If your eyes burned from their sockets now you would be lost and terrified and appalled as she was-and you are men. You're not inenemy country, in the hands of a cruel and bitter woman; or galloping blind on a frightened horse over unknown fields with a dead body behind you and a pack of the hounds who killed him baying at your heels. That isn't only murder: it's murder of a very special and d.a.m.ning kind, and there is a name for those who engage in it . . .

The admirable voice was stripped, as was Lymond's whole bearing, of his normal pleasant negligence. He went on.

"I have no very gratifying memories of Crawfordmuir. I offered myself for sale, as I remember, in exchange for the truth. Your wife was eager to buy, Lord Lennox; but she also deals in adulterated coinage. She told me something was unprovable which I knew could be proved, and she told me a man had been killed whom I knew to be alive-so I withdrew my offer. But to save Christian Stewart from these attentions, believe me, I should have honoured it at any cost..

There was a grandeur in Margaret Douglas's fury. "Stop your foul tongue! You paltry, conceited liar!.

"Did Christian Stewart die? How did she die?.

Lady Lennox stepped before him, shaken with rage. "She died of a fall from her horse. It was no fault of mine. She's better off than she ever was as a mistress of yours! Only you won't blacken my name from revenge in front of these people!.

The answer was implacably hard. "Look at your husband's face. Look at Lord Grey. Blacken your name! Are you known, do you imagine, as Zen.o.bia?.

She whirled on Grey. "Take him away! Can't you stop this?.

"And al was conscience and tendre herte," said the clear, forbidding voice. Grey cleared his throat. Wharton's eyes were fixed on the roof corbels and their coats of arms; his son, standing sulkily by Grey, was biting his lip. The Earl of Lennox looked hard at his wife, his eyes glancing white like pale, sea-washed pebbles. Lymond addressed him, not looking anywhere near Acheson; not allowing anyone's attention to stray to the white marble and the uneasily stirring body.

"Oh, you haven't been chcated. You are one with Black Douglas and Royal Tudor, and through her with any man from the highest to the most humble whom she wants to dominate. Any man. The rotten apple, Lennox, hangs lowest. There's more ambition in one of those tears of fury than in the whole of your G.o.dforsaken career. You must let her push you; you can't rest any more; you can't fail her or she'll destroy you. Won't you, Margaret?.

Acheson groaned.

With sharp distaste Lord Grey said to Lymond's guards, "Take him away!" but Margaret was already advancing on her tormentor. With all her considerable strength she struck at his mouth with the back-driving flat of her hand and Erskine, his heart in his teeth, saw the Master call smoothly on his reserves.

The woman's wrist was caught and pulled to him. Then, behind the s.h.i.+eld of her body, he side-stepped and s.n.a.t.c.hed. With young Wharton's bow and quiver in his free hand he backed to the stairs, dragging Margaret, wildly struggling, with him.

He held her, one-handed, until he reached the foot of the steps; then hurling her from him an instant before she fought quite free he turned and raced up the wide, shallow treads.

Erskine was ready. As Lymond crashed breathless beside him in the shelter of the bal.u.s.trade his sword was out, ready to cut back the expected rush; but the other man was already on his feet again with the bow strung. There was omy one arrow. He said under his breath, "Keep down, d.a.m.n you!" and as Erskine knelt, Lymond took aim below.

Wharton and his son, hallway up the stairs, halted.

"Get back!" said the Master.

There was a long pause. Lennox, at the foot of the steps, was bent over his wife. Grey, still at the head of the table, hadn't moved; the two guards stood helplessly beside him.

Against a bow and a fine marksman, their swords might be unbarrelIed shooks. The Whartons recoiled down the stairs and the tilt of the bow followed them. Behind, the gallery was empty, a hall-open door leading to the deserted monks' dormitory, the day stairs, the cloisters, the refectory, the storehouses: a thousand hiding places and a thousand exits.

They held the hour in their fingers, like a day lily. They had merely to destroy Acheson and go.

The bow in his hands, Lymond stood motionless. Erskine was turning on him, riven with urgency, when he saw the movement above his head. On the narrow ledge to the right, the twin of his own former stance, a man stood with a hackbut.

From that ledge there was no turnpike down to the gallery, but the arquebusier had no need to come closer to Lymond to have him fully in range. Erskine turned, frantic exhortations in his mouth, and saw, at last, why Lymond had made no effort to shoot.

For Acheson had moved. Sitting up, hands on marble, he was attempting weakly to stand. Until he did so, he was totally screened by the parapet. And there was only one arrow.

The loading of an arquebus is a protracted affair. Hidden under the low wall, Erskine had a terrible leisure to watch this man's quick fingers. He saw the glimmer of the manipulated barrel and knew from the tightening of Lymond's fingers on the bow that he also had seen.

The Master gave it no other attention. He was talking, the limpid, carrying voice penetrating the transept below as Acheson, disgruntled and b.l.o.o.d.y, rubbed his black head and muttered.

"Keep your voices down," said Lymond. "Don't move. Don't shout for help. I can kill any one of you from here." His eyes were tranquil, of a clearheaded strength: there was no hint in them of the day's exhaustions and disasters. Talking, he moved slowly along the wall, trying to uncover Acheson. The hackb.u.t.ter, in his haste, dropped something with a small b.u.mp and picked it up again.

teach you a lesson with some ex cathedra observations," Lymond was continuing. "You may feel a little foolish; you don't appear so to me. Wharton is a master of his profession: it's a profession where one cannot stay detached, and he has paid that penalty. But he knows very well that corrective pressure and armed coercion are two of the longest, least successful and most offensive ways of waging a war..

He paused, his eyes flickering to the obscured figure of Acheson and back to the upraised, angry faces. "Every war has the man on the balcony, the man in the tree, the man in the doorway. He stings; he frightens; he causes loss of face; but he is always caught in the end. Turn aside to hunt for him if you must, Lord Grey; but don't ever unleash your vanity on his track. Today .

In the heavy eyes, new life suddenly blazed. "Today," said Lymond, "such an error has cost you a war..

"Lord Grey?" said an uncertain voice: Acheson's voice. "Take me to Lord Grey? I've a dispatch . . . about the Scottish Queen..

Grey said "What?" as the glimmer of a slow match swept through the dark transept like a firefly. The black mouth of the hackbut, steady as a wand, inexorable as Melpomene, turned like a dark flower to its killing, and Erskine cried softly, "Oh, G.o.d!.

Adam Acheson repeated, dizzily, "It's about the Queen"; and walked out into the centre of the floor.

The fine bow drifted in Lymond's hands like the frail, side-slipping glide of a heron; the steel tip steadied, sparkling, and his knuckleswhitened. In the darkness opposite, the hackb.u.t.ter's arm jerked. Lymond smiled once, with a kind of surprised pleasure, and releasing the deadly, unerring arrow, shot Acheson through the heart.

The explosion of the hackbut drowned Margaret's scream. Aiming for Lymond's body, given the brilliant, unmoving target of his white s.h.i.+rt, the marksman made no mistake. He was defter, indeed, than he meant to be; because the shot, raking the stone coping of the balcony, acquired missiles and satellites of its own and struck home not once but several times.

Lymond flung up his head, turned half around with the force of the explosion. The bow fell. For one second-two--he held fast to the broken coping, defying the heralds of agony and an easy darkness. Below, Erskine caught a glimpse of the circle of white, upturned faces about the fallen body of Acheson.

Then the riven flesh and burst vessels made their protest, the freed blood springing liberal and scarlet through the fragments of Lymond's s.h.i.+rt. Erskine saw the long hands loosen, the sudden, uncontrolled sway; but was not prepared for the drowned, revealing blue gaze meeting his like a blow.

"And died stinkingly martyred," said Lymond. with painful derision; and losing hold bit by bit, slipped into Erskine's gentle grasp.

Knight AdversaryAnd also hit behoveth . . . that they first have the cureof themself, and they ought to purge themself froalle apostumes and alle vices . . and that theyshewe hem hole and pure and redy for to hele other.

1. Strange Refuge

THE bell of Hexham Abbey opening its lips to the pagan moon, sent its voice across the river: Vice mea viva depello cuncta novica; and the men waiting across the water in a blackened and doorless dovecote heard it; and heard also the rattle of approaching hoofs.

Somebody-a hospital, a manor, a priory-had once owned five hundred fat pigeons here, and had housed them fittingly with four. teen tiers of holes and ledges, a bathing tub ifiled by a spring, a stone table and a tall and creaking potence, its revolving arms scanning the circles of tiered nests so that two men on its wheeling perches could pocket the warm squabs.

Now the broken doorway admitted rats. But rock doves had found a way through the glover to the safest, topmost nests; and when Erskine's men went in, birds arose with the sudden rattle of an emptied topsail. Waiting for Tom to return, they could see shocked golden eyes darting from the lantern edge high above.

The sudden inaction, agitating to Erskine's men, was dreadful for Richard, bereft of his prey and of any part in the climax of this.h.i.+deous marathon. He would have been at the gates of Hexham fifty times if Stokes had let him. If Erskine could get in, then why not himself? If Erskine failed, wasn't it his duty to replace him? And who gave Erskine the right to annex another man's quarrel.

Stokes, luckily, was gifted with patience. As the light faded he returned his decent, sensible answers, without pointing out that but for Lord Culter himself, they would all have been safely on the Edinburgh road hours since. Eventually, even Richard relapsed into silence, and occupied himself with an explosive pacing of the dusty floor.

The hoofbeats, like harried spirits, followed the tolling of the bell. Stokes, signalling silence, went himself to the miniature door and then fell back, the grin on his face red-lit by the low fire. It was Tom Erskine.

He was barely inside when Richard's hands seized his shoulders. "Well, d.a.m.n you: well?.

Erskine, looking queerly, jerked free. "We've stopped the message being delivered. Acheson was carrying it in his head..

"And Lymond?.

Nothing else and no one else mattered. Erskine's own gaze, newly fierce, newly level, beat down Richard's to the floor before he answered curtly. "They loathed and feared Lymond. If you believed he was England's secret insurrectionist, you're wrong. He killed Acheson himself..

There was no real change in the fanatical grey eyes. Richard said, "Where is he?.

Someone had already unloaded Erskine's horse. The heavy roll lay near the fire: bending, Erskine turned back the blankets.

Devoid of mischief or anger; silent; defenceless; Richard's brother lay at his feet. Erskine knelt by the plastic body, clothed and clotted with blood, and touched Lymond's hand.

"Is he dead?" They stared, like men mesmerized. Erskine said abruptly, "Stokes: collect the horses and get the men out. The job's done. We can't risk staying any longer. Quickly..

The exodus began against Lord Culter's unmoving figure. He repeated himself, without raising his voice. "Is he dead?.

Erskine's face was as hard as his own. "He won't survive an hour on horseback. We must leave him..

Richard swore coldly. "d.a.m.n it, how can we? He knows all Acheson knew..

"Then he can tell it to the pigeons," said Erskine harshly, and flung wide the rugs. "How long d'you think he'll live like that?.

"Someone might find him..

"All right. Someone might find him. That's your concern: he's your brother. That's why I brought him back. This is one decision I'm not making. I saw him risk his life to kill that fellow today..

There was no softening in Richard's face. "He had to choose between Grey and you, and he plumped for the likelier prospect, that's all. . . . Justifiably: you rescued him, didn't you?" His fingers slid up and down the quillons of his sword. There was a pause; then he pulled them away. "No. I'm d.a.m.ned if I do. I want him killed publicly and lawfully and painfully and fully conscious, at least. Take your men and get on the road. I'll stay and get him home later..

They were alone; they could hear the trampling as the horses were brought up outside. Erskine said, "You've fought him once already:isn't that enough?.

The firelight glinted in Richard's eyes. "Do you think he's innocent? I'm willing to save his life: what's wrong about that? And if he's guiltless he'll have a chance to prove it: what's fairer?.

Someone called to them through the doorway. Erskine stepped outside and returning, threw at Richard's feet his baggage roll and cloak. "You'll need these..

He added abruptly, "Come with us, Richard. Let him alone. You can't seal him alive in the larder like a b.l.o.o.d.y wasp with a fly..

There was no answer.

Erskine had to go. But in the dovecote doorway he glanced back, once. Richard had stooped over his brother and, with excited face, was scanning the engrossing tally of his wounds.

* * *Long after, Richard himself stood in the doorway, gazing out at the quiet night. Then, moving noiselessly, he collected the wood he needed and stacked it inside.

It was late. The fire, rebuilt under the overhung ledges, glimmered on his brother's face: the artless, sleeping face of his childhood.

But Lymond was now in the cold sleep close to death. Experienced soldier and countryman, Lord Culter had faced the spilled blood, the spoiled muscle, the split bone with no qualms; and had washed,cleaned and bandaged with steady hands, missing nothing: the scarred hands, the old whippings; the last degradation of the brand.

There was no more he could do now. The door cloth secure, he stretched at length by the fire, his saddle for pillow, and waited side by side with the silenced tongue which had mocked him so long. The cushats had long since returned sidling to their roosts. As stillness fell, they settled too, with frilled feathers and the rasp of dry feet. Then it was quiet, and the only sound in all the warm June night was Lymond's faint, gasping breath.

Through the darkest hours of the short night Richard slept, wrenched by sheer exhaustion from his vigil; and woke stupid, forgetting.

Then his bemused eyes picked out the pale, dawn-lit arches of the lantern above him and the wintry skeleton of the potence, and the dark, enclosing walls with their hundred upon hundred of empty sockets, black and salaciously flickering with the dying glimmer of the fire. And the wide, fathomless eyes of his brother, resting on him.

In that crude second, neither spoke. Culter rose, and stooping to the fire, rebuilt it with unhurried care. In its spreading light, pale hair gleamed beside him, and whitened cheekbones and white lips, all tinged to health by the flames. Roseate and sardonic in extremis, Lymond spoke with the least possible expense of sound.

"You still snore like a frog. Did Tom Erskine get me out?.