Assassin's Reign: Book 4 of The Civil War Chronicles (25 page)

Thomas Pury gaped first at the men who now ran back to the city gate, and then at Massie.

Massie grinned, facing his entourage and speaking loud enough for all to hear. ‘Let there be no doubt, gentlemen. We are for the Parliament! Let His Majesty do his worst!’ He turned to Harcus, who seemed to be raised permanently on his toes. ‘James, tell the men to fire the suburbs.’

‘Aye, sir,’ Harcus replied enthusiastically. ‘Everything?’

‘As we have arranged,’ Massie said firmly.

Pury stepped across him, his face hard. ‘Is there no other way, Colonel? That is more than two hundred homes.’ He wrung his hands in agitation. ‘The cost, sir.’

‘The cost is nothing,’ Massie said, ‘if we lose the city. We raze everything outside the walls to clear our lines of fire and to deny the malignants a place in which to shelter as they plot our destruction.’ He glanced at Harcus. ‘Do it.’

Massie turned away from Pury, even as Harcus bounded down the ladder. He stared at the enemy. ‘God preserve you, Your Majesty. But may He keep you from our city.’

CHAPTER 10

Near Chipping Barnet, Hertfordshire, 11 August 1643

Lisette Gaillard and Cecily Cade had ridden northwards, the capital firmly at their backs, until dusk made the roads treacherous. When finally they had eased their heaving mounts to a gentle trot, there were no accompanying hoofbeats from determined pursuers, no shouts of alarm, no warning shots. Taking their chances with the dense woodland at their flanks, they plunged deep into the summer-swollen foliage until they were sure the sound of horses could not be heard from the road. There they made camp.

They hardly spoke that first night, for both were exhausted, and a lack of victuals did nothing to lighten the mood. They sat, knees drawn to their chests, before a pathetic little fire. Cecily chewed a small scrap of salted meat, the only food Lisette had to offer, and nibbled the shredded corner like a rodent.

Lisette watched intently, struck by the girl’s fragility, and chided herself for lacking the forethought to bring ample provisions, but events had simply overtaken her and she had been forced to act quickly. The riots in London had escalated beyond her hopes, developed from whispered grumbling to open, ranting dissent, shrouding the capital’s streets in powder smoke in a matter of days.

‘Who are you?’ Cecily had said after a time.

‘Lisette Gaillard.’

‘But what is your role in all of this?’

‘A friend,’ Lisette had replied tersely, relenting a touch upon seeing Cecily’s arched brow. ‘From the Queen.’

‘The Queen?’ Cecily was stunned.

‘She felt my talents would expedite this task.’

Cecily lent forward, her nose breathing into her ragged sleeve, green eyes wider than ever. She had looked up then, staring at Lisette with unconcealed puzzlement. ‘But they send a—’

‘Woman?’ Lisette had interrupted hotly. She looked into the fire, feeling her expression turn sour. ‘Aye, well, there were supposed to be others, but they have let us down, mademoiselle. It is just you and me now.’

Cecily had met the Frenchwoman’s gaze. ‘That poor man.’

‘Quigg gave his life to save you.’ Lisette decided not to mention the protesters. ‘We must not waste his sacrifice.’

The next day a brief scouting expedition found the road teeming with soldiers. Riders, Lisette assumed, sent up from London on a hunt for two women. They stayed in the forest, ignored the complaints from their hungry bellies, and prayed the men would not stray too far from the road.

Now, as morning lit countryside eerily devoid of activity, they set off again.

‘Where will we find General Hopton?’ Cecily asked as they ventured on to the compacted and cracked earth.

‘He is still in the West Country, as far as I am aware,’ Lisette replied. She had had no contact with her masters in several weeks. ‘We should go to Oxford.’

Cecily shook her head. ‘No, Miss Gaillard—’

‘Lisette.’

‘Lisette. I must speak to Sir Ralph and none other.’

‘Not even the King himself ?’ Lisette said in disbelief.

Cecily tilted her head to one side. ‘You can gain me an audience with him?’

Lisette shrugged. ‘I imagine he will wish to know where your bloody money is, will he not?’

‘But you cannot be sure. I have suffered much to protect the location of my father’s wealth.’

‘So have many others,’ Lisette said caustically, thinking first of Christopher Quigg and then of Andrew Burton. Stryker had passed on the salient facts of it well enough.

‘Have I wronged you, Lisette?’ Cecily asked.

Lisette stared into the gaunt young woman’s eyes for a moment. She was a shadow of the person she must have been when young Burton had first seen her, and Lisette could well imagine the effect such bright eyes and raven hair had had on him. She shook her head. ‘No.’

Cecily’s intelligent gaze narrowed. ‘But you do not like me.’

‘I neither like nor dislike you, mademoiselle,’ said Lisette bluntly, and that was partly true. The other part of her despised the wealthy, arrogant English gentry, a class to which the Family Cade clearly belonged. Such was the heartache and death on account of this scrawny girl; first to protect her and now to rescue her. And it was all for the much-needed funds she promised to deliver. That, at least, was worth fighting for. But was it worth
this
?

‘Before we make our next move,’ she said abruptly, ‘we must find you some proper clothes.’ Cecily looked down at her tattered dress and offered a reluctant nod.

Within the hour, they spotted a dark funnel of smoke meandering skyward above the treetops in an unbroken column, for there was no breeze to diminish or bend it. They took a side track that looked likely to lead them to its base.

The branches hung low about them as they rode. Eventually they were forced to dismount, walking their horses the last fifty or so yards, until the trunks abruptly ceased and the land opened out into a clearing, at the centre of which was a large house. At least, the land had, at one time, been manually cleared of the woodland that encircled it. Now, though, they could see that the grass immediately surrounding the brick-and-flint building was wildly overgrown, and the timber animal pens positioned around the small estate were dilapidated and empty.

Lisette handed her reins to Cecily. ‘Stay here,’ she said. ‘Don’t scream if you see a fox.’

Cecily looked as though she might issue a stinging retort, but she nodded silently and stayed near the tree line, while the Frenchwoman moved quickly across the grass to the house’s low wooden doorway. She half expected a cry of alarm to ring out through the trees, but no sound stalled her as she pushed firmly against the door. To her surprise, it yawned inwards without resistance.

A foul smell brought tears to Lisette’s eyes as she stepped into the gloomy interior, and she paused to steady herself. The stench of putrefying flesh, enriched by the warm air, was bitter enough to bring bile to the throat, yet it was strangely tainted with a lingering sweetness. She turned back, thinking to leave this sorry place immediately, but the wan visage of Cecily Cade stared out at her from the tree-thrown shadows, and she knew she must press on.

Tentatively, she edged over the threshold. In front of her was a tight spiral staircase, while to her immediate left was a large chamber, the house’s main hall, and she could see that a big table dominated the centre, surrounded by four high-backed chairs. To her right was another, similarly proportioned room, though it was a more cluttered affair. There were cooking utensils hanging from hooks along the walls, clay pots of various sizes jumbled on a table and several shelves, and a large bake-oven in one corner. At the bakehouse’s far end was another door, and she guessed it would lead to a buttery. She stepped towards it, keeping her breathing shallow to avoid taking in too much of the pervading stink, and wondering if she might lay her hands on some food therein. But her progress was abruptly curtailed by a creaking above her head. She moved silently to the foot of the staircase and drew her knife, squeezing the bone handle harder than was necessary, the cold solidity reassuring as her knuckles turned white. She felt her throat tighten as her heart quickened.

‘Who is there?’ The voice of an elderly woman echoed down the wooden steps.

Lisette had been utterly still, but now she leaned over the bottom step to call a response. ‘I mean you no harm, Goodwife.’

More creaking, louder this time as this woman moved closer to the staircase. ‘You speak strangely, lass.’

‘I am not from hereabouts.’

‘Oh?’ The woman paused, evidently picking her next words carefully. ‘Do not let those bold-faced Roundheads hear you, for they’ll think you a Boglander.’

‘Boglander?’

‘An Irish,’ the woman replied in a nasal tone pitched high through age. ‘They’d have you dancin’ from the chates afore sundown.’

Lisette was emboldened by that. ‘You are for the King, Goodwife?’

‘Aye, lass,’ the woman called down.

‘Then I will tell you that I am French, and for the King also.’

‘Then you are welcome, for I despise the rebellion with all my heart.’

Lisette saw a shadow snake across the top of the staircase. A body followed. The woman was indeed old, her face tarnished by deep wrinkles and brown liver spots. A grey shawl was wrapped tight about her shoulders, despite the warmth of the day, and a coif framed her face. But it was none of this that captured Lisette’s attention. The woman’s eyes were as white as the coif, as though the sockets were brimming of milk. They stared directly out in front, unable to discern the steps down which the woman now descended, simply twitching uselessly in their ancient hollows. ‘How could I not, after what they did to my Robert?’

Lisette met the woman halfway down, taking her by the elbow and guiding her the last few steps to the firm safety of the brick floor. ‘Robert is your son, perhaps? Wounded in battle?’

Tears welled in the woman’s waxen eyes. ‘God forgive me, lass, for I wish that were the truth of it.’

Only then did Lisette realize that the awful smell in the house had been stronger on the staircase. She stared up at the ceiling, then back to the blind woman. ‘Robert is here, isn’t he?’

‘He is, lass. My husband.’

‘And he is upstairs.’

The woman nodded slowly. ‘Though I know I shall see Hell for it, I cannot bury him myself.’

Goodwife Hulme had lived in the area all her life. She was either seventy-five or seventy-six, and as wizened as the trees encircling her home. The house was even older than its occupant. It was a yeoman’s farmhouse constructed in timber and thatch more than a century earlier and refurbished in flint by her husband in his prime. That husband, Robert Hulme, forester and smallholding farmer, had been in his eightieth year when his skull had been crushed just above the left temple.

‘They came near two weeks back,’ the elderly woman had said when Lisette returned with Cecily. As soon as cursory introductions had been made, the three women made their way upstairs, Mistress Hulme clutching the Frenchwoman’s arm. Now they stood side by side in the doorway of the Hulmes’ bedchamber. The old woman gazed sightlessly at the far window, its mullions painted a brilliant white that matched her eyes. Lisette and Cecily stared down at the bloated body.

‘Who came?’ Lisette asked gently, fighting to keep the disgust from her voice.

‘Is it as bad as I imagine?’ Goodwife Hulme responded.

Lisette ignored the question. She would not describe the stinking corpse, fat with rot, its skin turned to marbled blue at the face and jet black at the fingers. The wound was the size of a fist, though a fist had not made it. The head had caved inwards, blood pooling where Master Hulme lay, and even through the corruption of decay Lisette could still see the sticky tangle of ragged flesh, shattered bone and matted hair. ‘Who came here?’

The wrinkled face screwed into a mask of anguish. ‘Parliament men. Four of the knaves.’

‘Forgive me, Goody Hulme,’ Cecily said, taking her sleeve from her mouth and nose, ‘but how could you know?’

‘This is Parliament country,’ the old woman said simply, unable to see the look exchanged by her guests. ‘The men stank of black powder, leather and horse flesh. Their boots clinked with spurs, and they called one Sergeant. They was soldiers.’ A frail hand rose to her grey mouth as she let slip a small gasp. ‘My poor Robert. He fought ’em off, he did. I did not see the brabble –
could
not – but I heard it all right. All screams and curses, and then silence. They took what coin and plate they could lay their sinful hands on, for that clinked loudly enough, but then nothing. It took me a long while to find Robert’s body. And when I finally did, I knew that it would lay there till help came.’

‘But none came,’ Cecily said.

‘We are so secluded here. Robert always said it was a blessing from the Lord. How wrong he was.’

‘What of the pens?’ Lisette asked. ‘Where are your livestock?’

‘The Roundheads return on occasion,’ Mistress Hulme said bitterly. ‘They steal them when their bellies grumble. I hear the piglets squeal as they’re dragged away, though one day they were all gone.’ She shrugged. ‘Now they only come when they need shelter, or to water the horses. We—
I
—have a well.’