Shadow of Night (31 page)

“Nothing serious?” Matthew frowned.

More shadows scudded across the countess’s face. “Any sickness that afflicts my children is serious,” she said softly.

“Forgive me, Mary. I spoke without thinking. My intention was only to offer what assistance I can.” My husband’s voice deepened with regret. The conversation was touching on a shared history unknown to me.

“You have kept those I love from harm on more than one occasion. I haven’t forgotten it, Matthew, nor would I fail to call on you again if necessary. But Anne suffered from a child’s ague, nothing more. The physicians assure me she will recover.” Mary turned to me. “Do you have children, Diana?”

“Not yet,” I said, shaking my head. Matthew’s gray glance settled on me for a moment, then flitted away. I tugged nervously at the bottom of my jacket.

“Diana has not been married before,” Matthew said.

“Never?” The Countess of Pembroke was fascinated by this piece of information and opened her mouth to question me further. Matthew cut her off.

“Her father and mother died when she was young. There was no one to arrange it.”

Mary’s sympathy increased. “A young girl’s life is sadly dependent upon the whims of her guardians.”

“Indeed.” Matthew arched an eyebrow at me. I could imagine what he was thinking: I was lamentably independent, and Sarah and Em were the least whimsical creatures on earth.

The conversation moved on to politics and current events. I listened attentively for a while, trying to reconcile hazy recollections of a long-ago history class with the complicated gossip that the other three exchanged. There was talk of war, a possible Spanish invasion, Catholic sympathizers, and the religious tension in France, but the names and places were often unfamiliar. As I relaxed into the warmth of Mary’s solar, and comforted by the constant chatter, my mind drifted.

“I am done here, Lady Pembroke. My servant Isaac will deliver the miniature by week’s end,” Hilliard announced, packing up his equipment.

“Thank you, Master Hilliard.” The countess extended her hand, sparkling with the jewels from her many rings. He kissed it, nodded to Henry and Matthew, and departed.

“Such a talented man,” Mary said, shifting in her chair. “He has grown so popular I was fortunate to secure his services.” Her feet twinkled in the firelight, the silver embroidery on her richly colored slippers picking up hints of red, orange, and gold. I wondered idly who had designed the intricate pattern for the embroidery. Had I been closer, I would have asked to touch the stitches. Champier had been able to read my flesh with his fingers. Could an inanimate object provide similar information?

Though my fingers were nowhere near the countess’s shoes, I saw the face of a young woman. She was peering at a sheet of paper with the design for Mary’s shoes on it. Tiny holes along the lines of the drawing solved the mystery of how its intricacies had been transferred to leather. Focusing on the drawing, my mind’s eye took several steps backward in time. Now I saw Mary sitting with a stern, stubborn-jawed man, a table full of insect and plant specimens before them. Both were talking with great animation about a grasshopper, and when the man began to describe it in detail, Mary took up her pen and sketched its outlines.

So Mary is interested in plants and insects, as well as alchemy,
I thought, searching her shoes for the grasshopper. There it was, on the heel. So lifelike. And the bee on her right toe looked as though it might fly away at any moment.

A faint buzzing filled my ears as the silver-and-black bee detached itself from the Countess of Pembroke’s shoe and took to the air.

“Oh, no,” I gasped.

“What a strange bee,” Henry commented, swatting at it as it flew past.

But I was looking instead at the snake that was slithering off Mary’s foot and into the rushes. “Matthew!”

He shot forward and lifted the snake by the tail. It extended its forked tongue and hissed indignantly at the rough treatment. With a flick of his wrist, he tossed the snake into the fire, where it sizzled for a moment before catching light.

“I didn’t mean . . .” I trailed off.

“It’s all right,
mon coeur.
You cannot help it.” Matthew touched my cheek before he looked at the countess, who was staring down at her mismatching slippers. “We need a witch, Mary. There is some urgency.”

“I know no witches,” was the Countess of Pembroke’s swift reply.

Matthew’s eyebrows rose.

“None to whom I would introduce your wife. You know I don’t like to speak of such matters, Matthew. When he returned safe from Paris, Philip told me what you were. I was a child then and understood it as a fable. That is how I wish to keep it.”

“And yet you practice alchemy,” Matthew observed. “Is that a fable, too?”

“I practice alchemy to understand God’s miracle of creation!” Mary cried. “There is no . . . witchcraft . . . in alchemy!”

“The word you were searching for is ‘
evil
.’” The vampire’s eyes were dark and the set of his mouth forbidding. The countess instinctively recoiled. “You are so sure of yourself and your God that you claim to know His mind?”

Mary felt the rebuke but was not ready to give up the fight. “My God and your God are not the same, Matthew.” My husband’s eyes narrowed, and Henry picked at his hose nervously. The countess’s chin rose. “Philip told me about that, too. You still adhere to the pope and the Mass. He saw past the errors of your faith to the man underneath, and I have done the same in the hope that one day you will perceive the truth and follow it.”

“Why, when you see the truth about creatures like Diana and me every day and still deny it?” Matthew sounded weary. He stood. “We will not trouble you again, Mary. Diana will find a witch some other way.”

“Why can we not go on as we have before and speak no more about this?” The countess looked at me and bit her lip, uncertainty in her eyes.

“Because I love my wife and want to see her safe.”

Mary studied him for a moment, gauging his sincerity. It must have satisfied her. “Diana need not fear me, Matt. But no one else in London should be trusted with the knowledge of her. What is happening in Scotland is making people fearful, and quick to blame others for their misfortunes.”

“I’m so sorry about your shoes,” I said awkwardly. They would never be the same.

“We will not mention it,” Mary said firmly, rising to say her good-byes.

None of us said a word as we left Baynard’s Castle. Pierre sauntered out of the gatehouse behind us, jamming his cap on his head.

“That went very well, I think,” Henry said, breaking the silence.

We turned on him in disbelief.

“There were a few difficulties, to be sure,” he said hastily, “but there was no mistaking Mary’s interest in Diana or her continued devotion to you, Matthew. You must give her a chance. She was not raised to trust easily. It’s why matters of faith trouble her so.” He drew his cloak around him. The wind had not diminished, and it was getting dark. “Alas, I must leave you here. My mother is in Aldersgate and expects me for supper.”

“Has she recovered from her indisposition?” Matthew asked. The dowager countess had complained about shortness of breath over Christmas, and Matthew was concerned it might be her heart.

“My mother is a Neville. She will, therefore, live forever and cause trouble at every opportunity!” Henry kissed me on the cheek. “Do not worry about Mary, or about that . . . er, other matter.” He wiggled his eyebrows meaningfully and departed.

Matthew and I watched him go before turning toward the Blackfriars. “What happened?” he asked quietly.

“Before, it was my emotions that set off the magic. Now an idle question is enough to make me see beneath the surface of things. But I have no idea how I animated that bee.”

“Thank God you were thinking about Mary’s shoes. If you’d been examining her tapestries, we would have found ourselves in the midst of a war between the gods on Mount Olympus,” he said drily.

We passed quickly through St. Paul’s Churchyard and back into the relative quiet of the Blackfriars. The day’s earlier frenetic activity had slowed to a more leisurely pace. Craftsmen congregated in doorways to share notes on business, leaving their apprentices to finish up the day’s tasks.

“Do you want takeout?” Matthew pointed at a bake shop. “It’s not pizza, alas, but Kit and Walter are devoted to Prior’s meat pies.” My mouth watered at the scent coming from inside, and I nodded.

Master Prior was shocked when Matthew entered his premises and nonplussed when questioned in detail about the sources and relative freshness of his meat. Finally I settled on a savory pie filled with duck. I wasn’t having venison, no matter how recently it had been killed.

Matthew paid Prior for the food while the baker’s assistants wrapped it. Every few seconds they gave us furtive glances. I was reminded that a witch and a vampire drew human suspicion like a candle drew moths.

Dinner was comfortable and cozy, though Matthew seemed a bit preoccupied. Soon after I’d finished my pie, footsteps sounded on the wooden stairs.
Not Kit,
I thought, crossing my fingers,
not tonight.

When Françoise opened the door, two men in familiar charcoal livery were waiting. Matthew frowned and stood. “Is the countess unwell? Or one of the boys?”

“All are well, sir.” One of them held out a carefully folded piece of paper. On top was an irregular blob of red wax bearing the impression of an arrowhead. “From the Countess of Pembroke,” he explained with a bow, “for Mistress Roydon.”

It was strange to see the formal address on the reverse:
“Mistress Diana Roydon, at the sign of the Hart and Crown, the Blackfriars.”
My wandering fingers easily summoned up an image of Mary Sidney’s intelligent face. I carried the letter over to the fire, slid my finger under the seal, and sat down to read. The paper was thick and crackled as I spread it out. A smaller slip of paper fluttered onto my lap.

“What does Mary say?” Matthew asked after dismissing the messengers. He stood behind me and rested his hands on my shoulders.

“She wants me to come to Baynard’s Castle on Thursday. Mary has an alchemical experiment under way that she thinks might interest me.” I couldn’t keep the incredulity out of my voice.

“That’s Mary for you. She’s cautious but loyal,” Matthew said, dropping a kiss on my head. “And she always did have amazing recuperative powers. What’s on the other paper?”

I picked it up and read aloud the first lines of the enclosed verses.

“Yea, when all me so misdeemed, I to most a monster seemed, Yet in thee my hope was strong.”

“Well, well, well,” Matthew interrupted with a chuckle. “My wife has arrived.” I looked at him in confusion. “Mary’s most treasured project is not alchemical but a new rendition of the Psalms for English Protestants. Her brother Philip began it and died before it was complete. Mary’s twice the poet he was. Sometimes she suspects as much, though she’ll never admit it. That’s the beginning of Psalm Seventy-one. She sent it to you to show the world that you’re part of her circle—a trusted confidante and friend.” His voice dropped to a mischievous whisper. “Even if you did ruin her shoes.” With a final chuckle, Matthew withdrew to his study, dogged by Pierre.

I’d taken over one end of the heavy-legged table in the parlor for a desk. Like every work surface I’d ever occupied, it was now littered with both trash and treasures. I rooted around and found my last sheets of blank paper, selected a fresh quill, and swept a spot clear.

It took five minutes to write a brief response to the countess. There were two embarrassing blotches on it, but my Italic hand was reasonably good, and I’d remembered to spell some of the words phonetically so that they wouldn’t look too modern. When in doubt I doubled a consonant or added a final
e.
I shook sand on the sheet and waited until it absorbed the excess ink before blowing it into the rushes. Once the letter was folded, I realized that I had no wax or signet to close it.
That will have to be fixed.

I set my note aside for Pierre and returned to the slip of paper. Mary had sent me all three stanzas of Psalm 71. I took up a new blank book that Matthew had bought for me and opened it to the first page. After dipping the quill into the nearby pot of ink, I moved the sharp point carefully across the sheet.

They by whom my life is hated With their spies have now debated Of their talk, and, lo, the sum: God, they say, hath him forsaken. Now pursue, he must be taken; None will to his rescue come.

When the ink was dry, I closed my book and slid it underneath Philip Sidney’s
Arcadia.

There was more to this gift from Mary than a simple offer of friendship, of that I was certain. While the lines I’d read aloud to Matthew were an acknowledgment of his service to her family and a declaration that she would not turn away from him now, the final lines held a message for me: We were being watched. Someone suspected that all was not as it seemed on Water Lane, and Matthew’s enemies were betting that even his allies would turn against him once they discovered the truth.

Matthew, a vampire as well as the queen’s servant and a member of the Congregation, couldn’t be involved with finding a witch to serve as my magical tutor. And with a baby on the way, finding one quickly had taken on a new significance.

A Signet

London was a big city. And I was going to do some shopping.

"I
’m going out.”

Françoise looked up from her sewing. Thirty seconds later Pierre was climbing the stairs. Had Matthew been at home, he would no doubt have appeared as well, but he was out conducting some mysterious business in the city. I’d woken to the sight of his damp suit still drying by the fireplace. He’d been called away in the night and returned, only to leave once more.

“Indeed?” Françoise’s eyes narrowed. She had suspected I was up to no good ever since I’d gotten dressed. Instead of grumbling about the number of petticoats she pulled over my head, today I’d added another made out of warm gray flannel. Then we argued about which gown I should wear. I preferred the comfortable clothes I’d brought from France over Louisa de Clermont’s more splendid garments. Matthew’s sister, with her dark hair and porcelain skin, could pull off a gown of vivid turquoise velvet (“Verdigris,” Françoise had corrected me) or a sickly gray-green taffeta (appropriately called “Dying Spaniard”), but they looked ghastly with my faint freckles and reddish-blond curls, and they were too grand to wear around town.

“Perhaps
madame
should wait until Master Roydon returns,” Pierre suggested. He shifted nervously from one foot to the other.

“No, I think not. I’ve made a list of things I need, and I want to go shopping for them myself.” I scooped up the leather bag of coins given to me by Philippe. “Is it all right to carry a bag, or am I supposed to stick the money into my bodice and fish the coins out when necessary?” This aspect of historical fiction had always fascinated me—women stuffing things into their dresses—and I was looking forward to discovering whether the items were as easy to remove in public as the novelists suggested. Sex was certainly not as easy to arrange in the sixteenth century as it was made out to be in some romances. There were too many clothes in the way, for a start.

“
Madame
will not carry money at all!” Françoise pointed to Pierre, who loosened the strings of a bag tied around his waist. It was apparently bottomless and held a considerable stash of pointy implements, including pins, needles, something that looked like a set of picklocks, and a dagger. Once my leather bag was included, it jingled at his slightest movement.

Out on Water Lane, I strode with as much determination as my pattens (those helpful wooden wedges that slipped over my shoes and kept me from the muck) would allow in the direction of St. Paul’s. The fur-lined cloak billowed around my feet, its thick fabric a barrier to the clinging fog. We were enjoying a temporary reprieve from the recent downpours, but the weather was by no means dry.

Our first stop was at Master Prior’s bakery for some buns studded with currants and candied fruit. I was often hungry in the late afternoons and would want something sweet. My next visit was near the alley that linked the Blackfriars to the rest of London, at a busy printing shop marked with the sign of an anchor.

“Good morning, Mistress Roydon,” the proprietor said the moment I crossed the threshold. Apparently my neighbors knew me without introduction. “You are here to pick up your husband’s book?”

I nodded confidently in spite of not knowing which book he was talking about, and he pulled at a slim volume that was resting on a high shelf. A flip through the pages revealed that it dealt with military affairs and ballistics.

“I am sorry there was no bound copy of your physic book,” he said as he wrapped Matthew’s purchase. “When you can part with it, I will have it bound to suit you.”

So this was where my compendium of illnesses and cures had come from. “I thank you, Master . . .” I trailed off.

“Field,” he supplied.

“Master Field,” I repeated. A bright-eyed young woman with a baby on her hip came out of the office at the back of the shop, a toddler clinging to her skirts. Her fingers were rough and ingrained with ink.

“Mistress Roydon, this is my wife, Jacqueline.”

“Ah. Madame Roydon.” The woman’s accent was softly French and reminded me of Ysabeau. “Your husband told us you are a great reader, and Margaret Hawley reports that you study alchemy.”

Jacqueline and her husband knew a great deal about my business. No doubt they also were apprised of my shoe size and the type of meat pie I preferred. It struck me as even odder, therefore, that no one in the Blackfriars seemed to have noticed I was a witch.

“Yes,” I said, straightening the seams of my gloves. “Do you sell unbound paper, Master Field?”

“Of course,” Field said with a confused frown. “Have you filled your book with commonplaces already?” Ah. He was the source of my notebook, too.

“I require paper for correspondence,” I explained. “And sealing wax. And a signet. Can I purchase them here?” The Yale bookstore had all kinds of stationery, pens, and sticks of brightly colored, entirely pointless wax along with cheap brass seals made in the shape of letters. Field and his wife exchanged glances.

“I will send more paper this afternoon,” he said. “But you’ll want a goldsmith for the signet so it can be made into a ring. All I have here are worn letters from the printing press that are waiting to be melted down and recast.”

“Or you could see Nicholas Vallin,” Jacqueline suggested. “He is expert with metals, Mistress Roydon, and also makes fine clocks.”

“Just down the lane?” I said, pointing over my shoulder.

“He is not a goldsmith,” Field protested. “We do not want to cause Monsieur Vallin trouble.”

Jacqueline was unperturbed. “There are benefits to living in the Blackfriars, Richard. Working outside the regulations of the guilds is one of them. Besides, the Goldsmiths Company will not bother anyone here for something as insignificant as a woman’s ring. If you want sealing wax, Mistress Roydon, you will need to go to the apothecary.”

Soap was on my list of purchases, too. And apothecaries used distillation apparatus. Even though my focus was necessarily shifting from alchemy to magic, there was no need to forgo an opportunity to learn something more useful.

“Where is the nearest apothecary?”

Pierre coughed. “Perhaps you should consult with Master Roydon.”

Matthew would have all sorts of opinions, most of which would involve sending Françoise or Pierre to fetch what I required. The Fields awaited my reply with interest.

“Perhaps,” I said, staring at Pierre indignantly. “But I would like Mistress Field’s recommendation all the same.”

“John Hester is highly regarded,” Jacqueline said with a touch of mischief, pulling the toddler free of her skirts. “He provided a tincture for my son’s ear that cured its aching.” John Hester, if memory served, was interested in alchemy, too. Perhaps he knew a witch. Even better, he might
be
a witch, which would suit my real intentions admirably. I was not simply out shopping today. I was out to be seen. Witches were a curious bunch. If I offered myself up as bait, one would bite.

“It is said that even the Countess of Pembroke seeks his advice for the young lord’s
megraines
,” her husband added. So the entire neighborhood knew I’d been to Baynard’s Castle, too. Mary was right: We were being watched.

“Master Hester’s shop is near Paul’s Wharf, marked with the sign of a still,” she continued.

“Thank you, Mistress Field.” Paul’s Wharf must be near St. Paul’s Churchyard, and I could go there that afternoon. I redrew my mental map of today’s excursion.

After we said our farewells, Françoise and Pierre turned down the lane toward home.

“I’m going on to the cathedral,” I said, heading in the other direction.

Impossibly, Pierre was standing before me. “
Milord
will not be pleased.”

“
Milord
is not here. Matthew left strict instructions that I wasn’t to go there without you. He didn’t say I was a prisoner in my own house.” I thrust the book and the buns at Françoise. “If Matthew returns before I do, tell him where we are and that I’ll be back soon.”

Françoise took the parcels, exchanged a long look with Pierre, and proceeded down Water Lane.

“Prenez garde, madame,”
Pierre murmured as I passed him.

“I’m always careful,” I said calmly, stepping straight into a puddle.

Two coaches had collided and were jammed in the street leading to St. Paul’s. The lumbering vehicles resembled enclosed wagons and were nothing like the dashing carriages in Jane Austen films. I skirted them with Pierre on my heels, dodging the irritated horses and the no-less-irritated occupants, who stood in the middle of the street and shouted about who was to blame. Only the coachmen seemed unconcerned, chatting to each other quietly from their perches above the fray.

“Does this happen often?” I asked Pierre, pulling back my hood so that I could see him.

“These new conveyances are a nuisance,” he said sourly. “It was much better when people walked or rode horses. But it is no matter. They will never catch on.”

That’s what they told Henry Ford,
I thought.

“How far is Paul’s Wharf?”

“
Milord
does not like John Hester.”

“That’s not what I asked, Pierre.”

“What does
madame
wish to purchase in the churchyard?” Pierre’s distraction technique was familiar to me from years in the classroom. But I had no intention of telling anyone the real reason we were picking our way across London.

We entered the precincts of St. Paul’s, where every inch not taken up by paper was occupied by someone selling a good or service. A kindly middleaged man sat on a stool, inside a lean-to affixed to a shed, which was itself built up against one of the cathedral walls. This was by no means an unusual office environment for the place. A huddle of people gathered around his stall. If I were lucky, there would be a witch among them.

I made my way through the crowd. They all seemed to be human. What a disappointment.

The man looked up, startled, from a document he was carefully transcribing for a waiting customer. A scrivener.
Please, let this not be William Shakespeare,
I prayed.

“Can I help you, Mistress Roydon?” he said in a French accent.
Not Shakespeare.
But how did he know my identity?

“Do you have sealing wax? And red ink?”

“I am not an apothecary, Mistress Roydon, but a poor teacher.” His customers began to mutter about the scandalous profits enjoyed by grocers, apothecaries, and other extortionists.

“Mistress Field tells me that John Hester makes excellent sealing wax.” Heads turned in my direction.

“Rather expensive, though. So is his ink, which he makes from iris flowers.” The man’s assessment was confirmed by murmurs from the crowd.

“Can you point me in the direction of his shop?”

Pierre grabbed my elbow.
“Non,”
he hissed in my ear. As this only earned us more human attention, he quickly dropped it again.

The scrivener’s hand rose and pointed east. “You will find him at Paul’s Wharf. Go to the Bishop’s Head and then turn south. But Monsieur Cornu knows the way.”

I glanced back at Pierre, who was staring fixedly at a spot somewhere above my head. “Does he? Thank you.”

“That’s Matthew Roydon’s
wife
?” someone said with a chuckle as we stepped out of the throng.
“Mon dieu.
No wonder he looks exhausted.”

I didn’t move immediately in the direction of the apothecary. Instead, with my eyes fixed on the cathedral, I began a slow circumnavigation of its enormous bulk. It was surprisingly graceful given its size, but that unfortunate lightning strike had ruined its appearance forever.

“This is not the fastest way to the Bishop’s Head.” Pierre was one step behind me instead of his usual three and therefore ran into me when I stopped to look up.

“How tall was the spire?”

“Almost as tall as the building is long.
Milord
was always fascinated by how they managed to build it so high.” The missing spire would have made the whole building soar, with the slender pinnacle echoing the delicate lines of the buttresses and the tall Gothic windows.

I felt a surge of energy that reminded me of the temple to the goddess near Sept-Tours. Deep under the cathedral, something sensed my presence. It responded with a whisper, a slight stirring beneath my feet, a sigh of acknowledgment—and then it was gone. There was power here—the kind that was irresistible to witches.

Pushing my hood from my face, I slowly surveyed the buyers and sellers in St. Paul’s Churchyard. Daemons, witches, and vampires sent flickers of attention my way, but there was too much activity for me to stand out. I needed a more intimate situation.

I continued past the north side of the cathedral and rounded its eastern end. The noise increased. Here all attention was focused on a man in a raised, open-air pulpit covered by a cross-topped roof. In the absence of an electric public-address system, the man kept his audience engaged by shouting, making dramatic gestures, and conjuring up images of fire and brimstone.

There was no way that one witch could compete with so much hell and damnation. Unless I did something dangerously conspicuous, any witch who spotted me would think I was nothing more than a fellow creature out shopping. I smothered a sigh of frustration. My plan had seemed infallible in its simplicity. In the Blackfriars there were no witches. But here in St. Paul’s, there were too many. And Pierre’s presence would deter any curious creature who might approach me.