Darkwitch Rising (38 page)

“Why do you do it?” she said, and Weyland knew she was changing the subject deliberately. “Why degrade Jane and Elizabeth and Frances and gods alone know how many other women in this way? What pleasure can it possibly bring you?”

“Every time I degrade a woman, any woman,” Weyland said, “I degrade
you
. That’s what makes it so enjoyable, sweeting. That I have the power to take a goddess and turn her into a whore with every woman
I force down to that bed beneath the sweating, hungry body of a sailor, or apprentice, or some vicious soldier, angry and violent from the murder he has inflicted in the name of crown or country.”

She was about to reply, but there came a sound from the front door, and Weyland cocked his head. “Unclothe yourself,” he said. “I hear a knock at the door.”

Weyland led the man up the stairs and to the door of the room.

Noah lay on the bed, her face turned to the door. One of the filthy grey sheets was pulled up to her shoulders.

Weyland looked at her, but could find in her eyes and face no hint of fear or nervousness, so ushered the man into the room.

He was tall, and burly, with a huge pendulous gut.

And he was eager. He groaned with lust the instant he set eyes on Noah.

Weyland leaned against the doorjamb, feeling unaccountably tense.

The man almost stumbled in his haste to get to the bed. His hands fumbled with his breeches, his chest heaving in his anxiety, then he pulled out his erection.

Weyland saw Noah’s hands whiten where they held the sheet.

The man reached down, his breath now a continuous rasp, and jerked the sheet violently away from Noah.

He pulled Noah’s legs apart, knelt down between them, and—

Weyland grabbed him by the shoulder and hauled him off the bed. The man, furious with lust, leapt to his feet, and pulled back a fist, ready to strike Weyland.

Weyland’s form shimmered. For a moment it appeared as if a man-bull stood there, and then it was gone, and all that could be seen was Weyland’s fist driving into the man’s face.

“Get out,” said Weyland. “
Begone
from this house!”

The man was slowly backing towards the door. His nose dripped blood, and his hands fumbled at his breeches. “I’ll see you ruined for this, you foul whoremaster!”

Weyland took a threatening step forwards, and the man almost fell in his haste to get out the door.

“Ruined!” he cried, then bolted down the stairs.

Weyland drew in a deep breath, then turned back to the bed.

Noah was now standing on the other side, the sheet wound about her.

“Get dressed,” Weyland snarled, then he turned and left the room.

Barely had he reached the bottom of the staircase when Weyland heard a commotion in the lane outside the house, and then a banging on the front door.

Weyland strode to the door and flung it open, half-expecting to see the frustrated client there.

When he saw who it actually was, his mouth dropped open.

The deacon of St Dunstan’s stood on the step, his face flushed with excitement. Normally the officers of the church had nothing to do with their near neighbours—they knew well enough what service the members of this household provided—but now all that seemed forgotten in the deacon’s excitement.

“The king!” he cried. “The king! The king!”

Jane appeared at Weyland’s shoulder. “What
news
of the king, then?” she said.

“They say his ship lies off Dover, and that he shall land this very afternoon. Charles is
home!
”

And with that he was gone, and, from the sounds drifting down the laneway, most of London had by now heard the news.

The king was off Dover, and his feet would tread English soil once more this very afternoon!

Weyland pushed the door shut, then looked first at Jane, and then very slowly turned and looked up the stairs to where Noah stood at their head, still with the sheet wound about her.

“So your lover is home. How glad is your heart, Noah?” Weyland smiled, cruelly, intent on recovering all the ground he had lost when he tore the man away from Noah. “I think it is time we thought about preparing a small and very private reception for him, don’t you think?”

Noah stared at him. Then she drew in a breath, visibly trembling.

“It was you who came to me and healed my back, wasn’t it?” she said. “You are the strange physician.”

C
harles II’s fleet set anchor off the south-eastern port of Dover during the evening of the 24th of May 1660. Charles was in no hurry to land. He did not wish to appear anxious, nor as if he arrived in arrogance, nor even as if he was the invader and needed to rush ashore with blade drawn. The king had also heard from a delegation which had rowed to his flagship that the reception at Dover still needed a few hours to arrive at its full magnificence. Thus it was he told his officers that they would spend the night on board, breakfast, attend to some pressing matters of business during the morning (unlike the decades of his exile, Charles now had to attend to all matters of state that needed the king’s attention and decision), and then row ashore during the afternoon of the 25th.

There was one other public consideration in this dallying. It lacked but four days to Charles’ thirtieth birthday, and the king had expressed a wish to enter London on his birthday, that being a fortunate coincidence, and a propitious one at that.

Preparations for the landing commenced just after two in the afternoon. While there was a general and highly excited hustle and bustle on deck, Charles spent a quiet moment with Catharine in their cabin.

They were both accoutred splendidly for the occasion. Charles wore a deep blue velvet suit with a
sparkling silver and gold vest. Ribbons and jewels adorned all his fingers, as well as the sleeves and cuffs of his coat and the buckles of his shoes and the wide band about the hat that currently sat waiting for the king’s favour on a table. Charles’ abundant, wavy black hair had been washed and left to lie about his shoulders and his moustache had been freshly groomed: his entire appearance sparkled and snapped with authority and joy and majesty.

Catharine wore matching clothes, although the fabric of her gown was primarily the silver and gold of Charles’ vest, and her accessories—ribbons, bows and swathes of elegantly draped silk—were of the same deep blue velvet as her husband’s suit. Her hair, like Charles’, had been freshly washed and groomed, and hung in heavy wings to either side of her face before rising into a complex knot on the crown of her head. Pearls and diamonds wove their way through her braids and about her delicate neck. Her fingers gleamed with diamonds, rubies and emeralds.

Her face, like Charles’, was taut and pale with worry.

“My God, Charles, what shall we find?”

“A people who shall acclaim us,” he said.

“That was not what I meant.”

He sighed, and turned to one side to pick up and fiddle with his broad-brimmed blue velvet hat. “I have not heard from Louis. Not from anyone.” He looked back at his wife, and raised his eyes.

“And I have felt nothing. No echoes of pain or misery such as I felt two nights ago. I pray that Louis found her in time.” She rested her hand on Charles’ arm. “Charles, she
will
be well. Noah is a powerful woman. A
goddess
. No one knows that better than you. She will not be a pawn, even if Weyland has her.”

Charles laid a hand against her cheek, then kissed her mouth, careful not to smear any of her carefully
applied make-up. “I am well served in you as a wife,” he said softly. “Whatever happens, with you at my side…”

“At the least we shall win for ourselves a kingdom,” she said, and grinned, “with considerable less fuss than the last time. Charles, put aside your cares, keep that smile on your face and go forth now and do what you must. Sitting here and worrying shall advance our cause not a whit.”

“You are as wise as you are beautiful.
England
shall be well served in you as queen.”

At that moment there came a discreet knock at the door, then it opened.

It was James, Duke of York, Charles’ younger brother and Loth-reborn. He had joined Charles just as he was leaving The Hague after spending most of the exile years with their mother in France.

“James,” Charles said, giving his brother a nod.

James was a “not quite” copy of his older brother. He was not quite as tall, not quite so dark, his hair not quite so curly or luxurious, his features not quite so handsome, and they exuded not quite so much power as did Charles’. Nonetheless, he emanated a particular peace, which Charles put down to his adherence to the Christian faith.

“It is time to go ashore,” James said, a strange tightness to his voice.

“What, James,” said Charles, “do you hear the thud of the stag’s hooves on the forest floor?”

“Charles—” James began. He stopped, and Charles saw just how emotional his brother was.

“You are glad to be home,” he said.

“Aye,” said James, “I do not think I could ever bear to be parted from this land again.”

Charles gave a small smile, although his eyes were wary, as they always were when dealing with his brother. “I am glad for it,” he said, then he turned to
Catharine. “Now, my darling, let us go to the deck, and endeavour to get ourselves into the Admiral’s barge with the least ruin to our finery as possible.”

He gave Catharine his arm, and led her forth onto the deck.

After a moment, James followed.

Most people in the fleet clearly seemed to think that they had a place reserved for them in the Admiral’s barge, and it took almost an hour to manage to get both king and queen, several of the king’s dogs, as well as numerous officials, dignitaries and courtiers into the barge and still leave enough room for the sailors who must perforce do the rowing.

Charles and Catharine sat about a third of the way down from the bow, shaded from the sun by a canopy and from the spray by artfully raised canvas walls to either side of the barge. Next to them sat the faithful Sir Edward Hyde (created Earl of Clarendon as part of the king’s morning business aboard) as well as Sir Edward Montagu, while James sat just before them, his face continuously turned to the white cliffs and the swathe of green that topped them. More than anything else Charles would have liked to have had Louis at his side for this grand entry into England, but it was not to be. He took Catharine’s hand, and squeezed it, and smiled for her.

She could clearly see the worry return to his eyes and, to distract him, she tilted her head to where Samuel Pepys sat towards the rear of the barge, scribbling away in what appeared to be a notebook.

“Master Pepys is ever the busy secretary,” she said, and then looked to Montagu. “You are well served by Pepys, my lord.”

“Oh, aye, majesty,” said Montagu, then sighed heavily. “No doubt he sits there now, even on this
day of all days, and busies himself figuring how much I owe my creditors.”

Charles laughed and, half-rising from his seat, called out to Pepys. “What do you there, good Master Pepys? Is there not enough to entertain you on this day that you must worry at your lord’s accounts?”

Pepys smiled and rose, bowing at both Charles and Catharine. “Not accounts at all, gracious majesties! I take notes of all that happens about me, all that I see on this auspicious day. I keep a diary, and like to record all that I see as well as all I do, sin or no.”

Charles raised an eyebrow. “You record your sins? Truly? And what does your good wife say, Pepys, when she reads your diary while you are about your lord’s business?”

Again Pepys bowed. “I write only in cipher, majesty. There are few who could figure it, and my good Elizabeth most certainly not among them.”

Charles laughed, and waved Pepys back to his seat as he sat himself. “A diary,” he said to Catharine, half-shaking his head.

“Well,” she said, “he shall have many pretty things to write about today’s celebrations, no doubt. And,” she grinned, mischievously, “better a diary to record your victorious entry into your kingdom, perhaps, than years spent working a tapestry?”

Charles smiled at her reference to the magnificent tapestry that, as Matilda, she had caused to be woven to record her husband William’s victorious campaign over the Anglo-Saxon forces.

Then Catharine’s faced sobered. “Ah, I’m sorry, my love. I should not have laughed about Harold’s—”

He kissed her mouth, silencing her apology. “You do not need to apologise to me,” he said. “Never.”
They reached shore safely, save that one of Charles’ dogs shat in the barge, which sent Pepys to more furious scribbling, and the rest of the barge into uproarious laughter.

“I am but a man,” Charles said, disarmingly, as the laughter finally petered out, “and my dogs mess as those of any other man.”

From the barge they managed the dry sand with minimum difficulty (Catharine smiling in delight as she was carried over the waves sitting on the linked arms of two tall diplomats) where Charles immediately sank to his knees.

He grabbed two handfuls of the sand, and lifted them skyward. “I praise God in heaven,” he cried so that all might hear, “for my safe return to my beloved homeland, and beg Him to grant me the wisdom to guide my people bravely and well and in the manner to which He commends me.”

To one side, Catharine nodded, murmuring “Amen”, glad that Charles had the presence of mind to set the scene for a rule guided by God’s hand, and not as God’s divine agent on earth, answerable to no one, which was his father’s fatal error. She also wondered at the action, knowing most present were educated enough to know that William the Conqueror had done much the same thing when he first set foot on England’s beaches…save that when William had seized his two fistfuls of sand, he had cried out, “See, England is mine!”

She knew her husband’s diplomacy was second to none, but then in both of his previous lives his tact and wisdom had been deeper than that commanded by most men.

From the beach the royal party made their way to a cobbled area that bounded the wharves. There awaited them a huge crowd waving flags and flowers, at their fore the Mayor of Dover and the
man to whom Charles owed his restoration: General Monck.