The Queen's Exiles (33 page)

She laughed. “True, they’re a thirsty lot.” The news had reached them this morning. The Sea Beggars had taken Vlissingen! The city was a strategic port that guarded the entrance to Antwerp, the trading capital of Europe, and it had opened to them, just as Brielle had. Astonishing! And wonderful. Immediately after, word came of a proclamation by Prince William from his exile in Dillenburg. Praising the victory, he called on all the Dutch people to rise up against their cruel and bloodthirsty foreign oppressors.

“Do you think the Beggars can do it?” Fenella said, looking out at the wide river that led to the sea. “Take back their country?”

“It could happen, if they can hold these naval bases, Brielle and Vlissingen. They’ll have access inland, and access to the sea for arms and supplies and food. And men. Victory is a great recruiter.”

She nodded, delighted by the possibilities. Already rumors were galloping in from other towns that they, too, were eager to open to the Beggars.

“But Alba will strike back like Zeus from Olympus,” Adam said. “He’s got battle-hardened armies, and his rage will be fierce.”

As if hearing Adam, the clouds suddenly blotted the sun. Fenella shivered. She had personal knowledge of Alba’s ferocity. Memories of his dungeon chilled her.

“You’re cold,” Adam said. “Shall we go back?”

She turned to him. “Why didn’t you go with La Marck?”

He looked at her soberly. “It’s time for me to go home, Fenella. Past time. I must report to the Queen. I shouldn’t even have stayed this long, but I wanted to make sure you were all right.”

Part of her was thrilled at his last words, but another part felt like she was falling, tumbling off the wall as Berck had tumbled. She had known that Adam would eventually go, of course, but she had pushed that reality to the back of her mind. It lurched out now, and the blow spun her like chaff in the wind.

“Will you stay here?” he asked. “Until . . .” He didn’t finish.
Until your husband comes back.

“No. My gold is still with the Antwerp banker.” She forced a smile. “I’m quite rich, you know.” She looked out at the water. Her smile faded. “I’ll go to Antwerp.”

“Good, I’ll leave some men to escort you. After that you’ll go to England, I hope. As long as you’re in this country you won’t be safe from Alba. Doorn must understand that.”

She needed no persuading. She had already given this a lot of thought. From England she would send word to Claes that she had gone there to wait for him. Her stay would be temporary. As soon as he sent for her to rejoin him, she would do so.

“You know I’ll do anything I can to help you in England,” Adam said.

“I know. Thank you.”
Anything,
she thought sadly,
except be my love
.

That night, she could not sleep. A shutter somewhere in the house kept banging. The wind had built all day. It moaned past Fenella’s window. She tried to ignore it, but sleep still evaded her. Her body had almost healed, but she doubted her heart ever would.

A knock on her door startled her. Who would come knocking so late? It was closer to dawn than midnight. Perhaps . . . news from Claes? She got up and whirled on her robe. She opened the door.

“Fenella.” Adam’s voice was an urgent whisper. “I must talk to you. Can I come in?”

“Of course, what is it?” He strode past her. She had never seen him so agitated. She shut the door.

“This letter came,” he said, holding up the paper. He plowed a troubled hand through his hair. “I had to tell you. Before I go.”

“Go . . . to England?”

“To Brussels. I’m riding out tonight. Now.” He thrust the letter at her. It was grimy and crushed from its travels. “Read.”

She quickly scanned the few lines.

Fenella looked up in wonder. “Clever children! Adam, you can get them back at last!”

“Or get killed. It may be a trap.”

“What? How?”

“My wife used the children to bait me before.”

Fenella gasped. “But why would your daughter agree to such a thing? She and Robert were both ready to flee with you.”

“I don’t think she did agree. Frances likely made her write this. Or Frances may have written it herself.” He shook his head, bewildered. “Or maybe it’s all true and they really
have
escaped. That would be wonderful. But I just don’t know.” He slipped the letter into his pocket. “Either way, I’m going to find out. I only came to tell you. If they are on their own I have just two days before they start tramping here on foot, with no money, prey to every evil on the road. I have to get to them before they leave the house.”

“But if you’re right about your wife she’ll be lying in wait for you. Adam, you must not go alone. You need help.”

“No. I’ve told Curry I’m going, but my men didn’t sign on to risk their lives for this. Besides, I may have a better chance alone.”

“No, you won’t. Your wife will be looking for you, expecting you.” She tugged off her robe. “Just give me time to get dressed. Saddle a horse for me.”

“What? No, Fenella, don’t even think of—”

“I’m coming with you, and that’s that. You need someone your wife doesn’t know.”

R
ainclouds threatened Brussels, darkening the evening sky. The air was sultry, humid, sticking Fenella’s thin muslin skirt to her legs as she reached the walled property of Carlos Valverde’s house. She stopped where the line of bay trees stood like sentries along the wall. She saw no armed men standing guard. Saw no one at all except an old woman on a donkey plodding farther up the street. The gate to Valverde’s house lay open.

A trap? That’s what Adam believed, and maybe he was right. Maybe his wife had left the gate open to lure him inside. On the other hand, if Kate and Robert were hiding alone in the house they might have left the gate open in the hope that Adam was coming for them.

If they’re even here,
Fenella thought. That was what she had to find out. The only thing she knew for certain about the house was that Valverde and his family were long gone.

She tramped through the gate and into the courtyard, her gait a little unsteady, not from the few swigs of brandy she’d taken, which hadn’t been enough to make her drunk, but from the clumsy wooden clogs on her feet. And she was terribly nervous. Despite the evening’s humid warmth she felt chilled in her thin, drab dress. The muslin, once poppy colored, was faded to a dingy pink, and grease stains mottled the bodice, cut low almost to her nipples. Passing through the twilit courtyard she pushed her mobcap farther askew on hair made blowsy to complete the effect. She saw no one, heard no sign of life, not even a dog. She reached the front door. The windows visible from here were dark, including the ones upstairs. She felt a sliver of hope. If Kate and Robert were camped inside they would be careful not to proclaim their presence with light. She took a deep breath.
Do it.

“Let me in!” she yelled. She made her eyes lazy like a drunk’s, raised her fist, and banged on the door.

It opened. A grizzled man glowered at her above his breastplate, one hand on the handle of his sheathed sword. Fenella’s heart jumped to her throat. Adam was right: soldiers! Beyond this one three more stood watching in the dim hallway, a small lantern casting the only light. Boots thudded behind her and she glanced over her shoulder to see five more soldiers fall in between her and the street. Where had they come from?
If they arrest me it’s the gallows this time.
Her mouth was so dry her lips stuck together until she forced out her voice. Fear made it easy to slur the words. “Where’s the poxy commander? I’ve got a bone to pick with him.”

The grizzled soldier glared at her. “What do you want, woman?”

“Commander bloody Valverde! He got
his
bone in but never paid for it.” She barged past him. “Let me at him!”

“Hold on.” He grabbed her arm, making her stagger.

“Whoa there, lover.” She groped for his shoulder as if she were so drunk she needed his support.

He relaxed with a smirk now that he understood. “Back out you go, doxy. You can’t come in here.”

She shrugged out of his grip with such force it tugged her left breast free above her bodice. The men’s eyes went to it and she made no move to cover herself. “I
am
in, and I’m not leaving till I get what Valverde owes me. Where is he?”

“Not here.”

“Ha!” She let her brandy breath hit his face and he winced at the vapor. “This is his house, right? And you’re his men, right? Maybe one or two of you know me, came round for some fun behind the barracks.” She pointed to a bearded fellow down the hall. “You there. Jurgen, isn’t it? I’d know that big salami of yours anywhere. Oo, look at it grow!”

A couple of them chuckled. The grizzled one didn’t. He held the door wide open. “On your way, now.”

Fenella tucked her bodice up to cover her breast, eyeing a staircase that led to the upper floor. “Valverde!” she bellowed. “Where is the rat?”

“I said you can’t—”

She stormed for the staircase and dashed up the steps. “Valverde, you pisser, come out! You know you owe me!”

The grizzled fellow shouted in irritation, “Stop that stupid doxy!” and two soldiers hurried up after her.

“Valverde!” She threw open a door. A bedchamber lay in gloom. Empty.

The soldiers reached the top of the stairs with the grizzled fellow right behind them. “Hey there, halt!”

She dashed on and threw open another door. A half-dozen soldiers looked up from a table where they sat playing cards, a single lantern burning, the window shutters closed tight. She shut the door just as the three who’d come upstairs reached her. Two grabbed her arms. She bellowed again, “Valver—”

A door opened. A woman frowned at the commotion. Rich clothing, a sharp-featured face, arrogant bearing. “What’s going on?” She glared at Fenella. “Who is this?”

“No one, Lady Thornleigh,” the grizzled man said. “Sorry, my lady.”

Fenella froze in the men’s grip.
Adam’s wife!
She pulled her frazzled wits together and blustered on. “Is Valverde in there with you?” Her eyes raked the room behind Frances Thornleigh. A bedchamber. Perched on the edge of the bed a girl and a boy, holding hands. Her heart told her this could only be Kate and Robert. Their pale, worried faces moved her. They were frightened—by their own mother. Fenella channeled all her loathing for the woman into a dark jest. “Make sure he pays you, dolly bird.”

Frances Thornleigh made a face of disgust. “Throw this trollop out.”

Fenella shouted curses as the soldiers dragged her down the stairs and pushed her out the front door. “To the street with her,” the grizzled fellow told the soldiers in the courtyard, and two of them manhandled her out through the gate. The last thing she saw as they turned back was a third soldier, a lanky man with a pockmarked face who ambled over, curious about the whore they were tossing out. Fenella ducked her head and hurried down the street.

That pockmarked face. Never would she forget it. The captain in Alba’s palace. At Alba’s command, he had slit the beggar girl’s throat.

A thin rain, warm as blood, spattered the Zenne River, which wound through the center of Brussels. Fenella hurried across the bridge to the island of Sint-Gorikseiland in the twilight, then down the jetty to Berck’s barge. She took a last look to make sure no one had followed her, then stepped aboard, opened the hatch, and slipped down the companionway to the cabin.

Adam and three of his men, weapons ready, stood watching her descend. Curry was closest to the steps.

“Don’t skewer me for a Spaniard, Master Curry,” she said wryly.

They relaxed. “Never fear, mistress. I may be jumpy, but I can tell a pretty woman from a poxy dago.”

She smiled, grateful that these men had come with her and Adam from Brielle. He had not asked them to, but they’d said they would not let him go alone, proof of the loyalty he inspired. Fenella knew how they felt, for she felt the same. He came to her and gently took her face in his hands. “I should never have let you go there. If anything had happened to you—”

“I’m fine,” she assured him. The love in his voice made all the danger worthwhile. “I saw them. Robert and Kate. In the house.”

“Alone?”

“No. You were right; your wife is there. And she has hired soldiers.”

“Soldiers? Not the duchess’s men?”

“No. From what I saw—” She stopped, not sure of the real meaning of what she’d seen. If it was what she thought, the danger was worse than Adam had expected.

“Sit down, rest,” he said, indicating the bench at the cabin table. “You’ve been through hell.”

She sat, grateful after her long walk. The scuffed table was grimy, sticky with ale, exactly as Berck Verhulst had left it the day he’d set out to join the Sea Beggars. It weighted her heart to think of her dead friend who’d given his life in the attack on Brielle. But she knew Berck would have welcomed her and Adam using his barge. An ideal place to hide.

Adam sat down across from her, waiting for her to go on. Curry took a stool beside the cold galley. The others, Morrison and Toth, sat on the narrow berth, and Morrison took up a mug of ale he’d apparently been interrupted in enjoying. Toth went back to whittling a stick with his dagger. Rain pattered on the deck above. All of them listened as Fenella continued.

“Your son and daughter are kept under guard. I counted fourteen men. They wore plain clothing, but I believe they’re soldiers of the palace guard.”

“Sweet Jesus,” Toth murmured in dismay, his whittling hand still. “Alba’s men?”

“What makes you say that?” Adam asked her.

“I recognized one of them, a captain from the palace.” She explained, getting through it quickly. The slaughter of that girl at Alba’s order made her sick. “I could be wrong, though, about him being from Alba. Your wife might have hired him privately, and the others, too. Mercenaries. But—”

“But if Alba did send them, he’s part of Frances’s scheme.”

“Do you think he masterminded it? Suggested it to her?”

“Or she went to him. To offer me.”

Fenella was appalled. That the woman’s hatred could go so deep!

“Either way, my lord,” Curry said grimly, “this makes black odds for us.”

He and Morrison and Toth waited in tense silence. Adam ignored their eyes on him and asked Fenella, “Where are they holding Robert and Kate?”

“I saw them in a bedchamber, at the rear of the second floor. They looked well enough, though frightened.” She explained about the soldiers she’d seen playing cards, and the ones in the courtyard, and gave the layout of the house, as much as she’d been able to see. “They kept it dim, I warrant to make you think there’s no one there but the children.” When she’d finished she said, “The Feast of Saint Hedda is tomorrow. They’ll be waiting for you.”

“And Alba’s no fool,” Adam said. “He’ll be expecting me to come with men of my own. Which means the fourteen you counted are just the guard. He’ll likely send more.” He looked at Curry and Toth and Morrison. “I want you to know what we’re up against.”

The three looked at one another, sober faced. “Pardon, my lord,” Morrison said, “but the four of us can’t fight a troop of battle-hardened Spanish
tercios
.”

Fenella saw the pain in Adam’s eyes. To have come so close to getting his son and daughter, to hear of them being held captive, but then to be forced to slink away, leaving them behind, this time forever—it was killing him. But Morrison was right. Alone, they had no chance against the might of Alba.

Adam told the men he’d give them his answer in the morning. They moved off to the forward berths, leaving him and Fenella alone. She said to him in sad wonder, “Your wife is the very devil. How can she hate you so much?”

“It’s more than that. I think it’s her way of keeping hope alive.”

“Hope?”

“That she might one day get home to England. If I’m dead, Robert inherits my title, my lands. She knows she can control the boy.”

Fenella shuddered. “But she must know she can
never
go back. She’s a traitor. She’d hang.”

“Not if the Queen was dead, too.”

What a dark, twisting labyrinth! It was beyond Fenella. She shook her head. “She’s mad.”

“Madness doesn’t stop people from trying to get what they want.” He plowed a hand through his hair. “I can’t leave without trying to get the children, Fenella. But you can. As for Curry and the others—”

“They’re still with you. So am I.” She reached across the table and took his hand. “And I’ve asked someone to visit us.”