The Assassin of Verona

by The Assassin of Verona (retail) (epub)

  Hemminges crept a little closer still. If these three men could be quietly dispatched then might they fall on the others and seize them pat. If the camp woke then it would be a different and more deadly matter. Too much turned on these few moments. Hemminges wished he had more courses of action to put before the outlaws than this hazardous one. He’d racked his mind, and there were none. The outlaws were no soldiers to stand and fight at push of pike. A frontal assault could not be borne and Aemilia’s insistence that they take the soldiers as a prize had put out of contemplation bloodier, more brutal and safer stratagems. So they were left to the dark of night to give them hope, yet there was hope: the outlaws were not soldiers but some of them were woodsmen and could move with a deadly softness. To this Hemminges trusted now.

  The three guards by the fire rubbed their arms for warmth and spoke in low voices to each other, too far and too quiet for Hemminges to hear. Cold minutes passed as he waited, pressed flat to the damp earth. At last the three men set out again for their posts and he steadied himself for action. He closed his eye and let three breaths pass as he heard the guard come closer. He opened both eyes and saw the man, now little more than a shadow beside a tree ten yards away. Hemminges rose to a crouch and began to close upon him. His breath was tight in his chest as he tried to still its sound. A noise from the other side of the camp made the man’s head turn sharply but Hemminges had expected it for at this same moment two other men were crouching and moving forward and one among the three of them had to be first upon his prey. By the sound of it, it was not Hemminges who struck first.

  ‘Bernardo?’

  Hemminges heard the guard’s whispered query toward the camp and then he rose up and in two swift strides was on him, the hood he held in his hands opened and swallowed the man’s head whole. He turned and twisted and tightened and felt the man’s hands come up to claw at the bag’s closing and the muffled grunts from within the leather. The guard’s thoughts turned belatedly to the dagger at his belt and he reached down for it, blind hands scrabbling. Hemminges dragged the man back and to his knees. One hand he kept clamped on the tightened thongs of the bag, with the other he pounded the soft ribs of the guard causing shuddering gasps to echo from the cavern of the bag. The hands that had sought the dagger now flailed desperately at the bag’s tightening noose then at the fist that crushed the air from his ribs. The struggling went on a minute more, in ebbing waves of effort, and then stopped. Quickly Hemminges loosed the bag and lowered the man to the ground, and the guard’s breath came back to him in a shuddering heave. Hemminges turned him on to his belly and with swift movements snared his hands behind him. Roughly, he pushed a rag into the man’s mouth and bound it in place. He heard a call like the hoot of an owl and answered with his own. He felt the guard stirring beneath the knee that he had in his back and he leant low to the man’s ear and whispered dire warnings of an urgent death if he should make a sound. The man went still. Still too was the night. Hemminges felt his hands tighten on the man’s shoulders as he waited for the third call. The wait was an agony of anticipation. All three must fall; it took but one to sound the alarum. Just as he feared all was lost, an owl cried out again from the third quarter. All the guards were taken. Now for the rest.

  From the darkness crept the other outlaws, moving towards the tents and sleeping places of the small troop of soldiers. Now in threes and fours they fell on single men and quickly bound them. The outlaws closed on the tents of the officers at the centre of the camp.

  Something must have stirred the Ancient. As they approached his tent its side was pulled back and he stepped out, caught sight of the outlaws in the light of the fire and cried the alarm.

  ‘Help, help, we are attacked!’ he roared as he drew his sword.

  Tommasso, who in youthful excitement had taken the lead, was stunned by the sudden change from silence to roaring noise. The boy shuddered to a halt and gave the most piteous wail, a sound to be heard in the dreams of men long years from that moment, as he looked down at the blade of the Ancient’s sword thrust through his chest. Tears sprang to his eyes and he reached out a hand, as if to pull the blade from him, but his fingers clutched at nothing as he fell back. Luca, creeping up behind, saw his brother fall and, roaring, leapt forward to crack his cudgel over the Ancient’s skull. The man fell to the ground and the outlaws poured over him, stamping, stabbing and crying out.

  ‘The ropes, the ropes!’ cried Hemminges, pointing to the other two tents. It took a moment to understand his meaning but then the outlaws slashed through the ropes that held the tents up and they collapsed on those within leaving them a thrashing misshapen chaos of man and canvas. Now from one tent came oaths and threats and thrashes and from the other moans and pleas and the shape of a man hauling himself to his knees in supplication of mercy.

  When order was restored the outlaws were the masters of some eleven soldiers, some more bruised than others, one corporal of horse bound beneath his tent like a furled sail, still sending oaths to the sky. Oldcastle and his servant both looked tremulously about at their captors, and two dead men.

  Aemilia stood over the body of Tommasso, Hemminges beside her. Someone had closed his eyes and the Ancient’s sharp sword had left no obvious injury on him save that a dark stain covered his breast. For all that, one could not think him merely sleeping for his face still bore lips peeled back in pain as the blade had gone in. The Ancient’s body lay nearby, a mangled, broken, bloody thing. Hemminges could see that Aemilia’s face, even in the fire’s light, was as pale as poor Tommasso’s.

  ‘This heavy sight was made by my pleading,’ she said to him. Her eyes stayed on the dead boy.

  ‘It was,’ said Hemminges. ‘There might have been more such as he if another course had been taken.’

  ‘Or none at all,’ she said.

  ‘Mayhap none,’ said Hemminges. He’d no easy words for her. This was the course she’d argued for and now it was for her to take the good and the bad of it. She shuddered beside him, as if her body threw off a heavy cloak that had been draped across her shoulders, and turned about and walked away leaving Hemminges alone with the two bodies.

  Appoint a meeting with this old fat fellow

  ‘Blessed be the day.’

  Oldcastle’s greatest fears and greatest hopes had met with him within the same hour. Still bound, still on his knees in the centre of the soldiers’ camp, he shuffled over towards William.

  ‘William, William, William, is it you? Are you restored to us and we to you?’

  How open and clear was the delight on the old man’s face to see him, thought William; why then do I feel so little?

  ‘Not so fast, old man,’ cried Jacopo, dragging Oldcastle back by the wrists with his good arm and finding that Oldcastle’s bulk made for hard work.

  ‘This is my friend, William,’ gestured Oldcastle with his head, the only part of him not restrained.

  ‘I know no William, that is Adam,’ said Jacopo. ‘Now stay where you are put and silent too.’

  Oldcastle looked pleadingly to William. The terror in his eyes at Jacopo’s menaces moved him where Oldcastle’s delight had not. Is it only suffering that I recognise now?

  ‘Foolish, fond, old man.’ William came over to Jacopo and pushed him away. He took his dagger out and cut the ties on Oldcastle’s wrists. Jacopo began to bleat of traitors, spies and traps.

  ‘Oh hush, intemperate child,’ chided William without looking over at Jacopo. ‘This is no soldier, this is no danger, this is a good round man, much inclined to drink and good living.’

  Jacopo stamped away leaving William alone with Oldcastle who took William in an embrace, tears in his eyes.

  ‘And, by God, I could do with a drink. Fear makes for a terrible dryness in the mouth and I have been afraid this many a day. Cut loose my man Dionisio, Will, he’s no more a soldier than I am and has done me good service.’

  William went to find Oldcastle’s servant and release him.

  ‘Nick, you rogue!’


  Hemminges’ shout shot across the camp and was followed by a hasting Hemminges who took his old friend in a great hug that left the older man coughing.

  ‘At last we three are together again, glad be the day,’ said Oldcastle. Hemminges looked over at William, who was bent over Dionisio nearby, cutting his bonds. Hemminges leaned in to Oldcastle’s ear.

  ‘I am not so sure we are. William is changed. Isabella is dead and it has taken something from him. He is not the man he was.’

  Oldcastle moaned to hear Hemminges’ news. A fresh fat tear rolled down his face and disappeared into his beard. He cried as much for Isabella as for his friend’s loss of her. She had been kind to him though she had teased him and he her, and he’d admired her. Why, she had played his games of wit and beat him at them and never admonished him for his excess of humour but forgave him his trespasses against her. He looked over at William and noted properly his gaunt cheek and pale lip. The subtle eyes still roamed unceasingly over all that passed but, alerted to it, Oldcastle now saw they had a dullness in them. The boy had aged a thousand years with Isabella’s death.

  ‘God above, mercy on him,’ said Oldcastle. He clapped his friend on the shoulder. ‘But we must look to what we have, we are joined once more. For England, then.’

  Hemminges shook his head. ‘The web is too tangled.’

  ‘Not for Will’s cunning.’

  Hemminges shook his head again. ‘He is much changed, Nick.’

  ‘How so?’ said Oldcastle but Hemminges was looking past him to the watchful Jacopo, out of earshot, but who studied them and the familiarity with which the two conversed. He began to walk towards Hemminges.

  ‘God’s will, John, but we are in a barful strife and must have Will’s brain to lead us out of it.’

  ‘There’s no rescue to be had from that quarter, Nick. We will speak more anon.’

  He broke off as Jacopo approached.

  ‘I will look to this prisoner,’ said Hemminges. For a moment Jacopo looked as if he would defy Hemminges but then William came to rejoin them, bringing Dionisio with him.

  ‘Jacopo, Orlando calls for you,’ he said as he approached. Jacopo nodded and went with a backward glance to the four men that lingered on Oldcastle.

  Oldcastle turned moist eyes on William.

  ‘Will, John tells me that Isabella is dead.’

  ‘There’s no more to say,’ said William, forestalling any words that Oldcastle might offer. He made to leave but stopped and turned himself long enough to say to his friend, ‘I am glad you are with us again.’

  He walked away and Oldcastle, astonished, watched him go with his mouth open.

  ‘It is as I said,’ said Hemminges sadly. ‘He is much changed. Come, I shall acquaint you what I know on the walk to this camp of rogues.’

  William walked away from Oldcastle with a catch in his throat. To see the pity in the old man’s eyes had near unmanned him; he’d felt his grief’s control breaking and fled from the source of his weakness. He could not bear to have his friend speak words of condolence, try to tease some meaning from an event that seemed to William senseless. Unthinkingly he’d crossed the camp and came now to the bodies of Tommasso and the Ancient. Two of the outlaws were digging graves for the men. A third knelt by Tommasso’s body, his head bowed, his hand resting on the dead boy’s shoulder. Though soundless, his heaving shoulders were testimony to his mourning. He looked up and William saw Luca’s red eyes glance over at him.

  Petro the priest approached and bent by Luca. ‘Do not mourn your brother, Luca.’

  ‘Why should I not when he is dead?’ Luca, turning sharply and searching for an outlet for his angry sorrow, spoke harshly.

  Petro looked down at the dead boy and crossed himself. ‘He is in heaven now, we need not mourn for those that have left this mortal coil to stand before God.’

  William wondered at this foolish reasoning. We do not mourn for those that are dead but for ourselves that they are lost to us. If Tommasso is in heaven it is no matter to Luca, who is in hell. William could bear to be around others no more. Their pieties, their reasons, all meaningless to him who longed for a meaning and was constantly offered proof that there was none. He left Luca to his mourning and the others to their work. To care was, in the end, to grieve.

  The outlaws led their captives through the darkness to their camp, bringing with them the booty of their victory. A few remained behind, to guard the horses and to finish the burying of the dead. Aemilia was not among them. She marched with the others and cast no backward glance to the dead or the mourning as she walked.

  The incense of a vow, a holy vow

  Valentine was straining under the weight of half a dozen swords, the outlaws’ spoil taken from the soldiers and now to be carried back to the camp. It was still blacker than Hades and, though the outlaws had lit torches for their return, with his arms full of iron Valentine had to make do with what light fell near him from those carrying torches nearby. For the twentieth time in the last ten minutes he stumbled over a tree root and cursed again the ignominy of his position. How little he deserved this fate. His sensibilities were not made for stumbles in the dark. Then, passing by him with a torch, came Aemilia striding through the night with purpose.

  ‘Sebastian,’ Valentine hoarsely whispered at her as she passed and then again more loudly when she did not at first take heed of him.

  ‘Valentine.’ She came and walked beside him. The swords were in his way and he shifted them about, trying to find a manner of holding them that let him close enough to her to speak privately.

  ‘You are well, Sebastian?’

  ‘I thank you well, Valentine, and you?’

  ‘The better for seeing you and all unharmed. This is too dangerous a business for a woman.’

  He sensed rather than saw her bridle at his words.

  ‘Too dangerous for all,’ she answered him. ‘Or no danger to any. I did not see you in the fight, Valentine, tonight or two days ago when we robbed the pilgrims.’

  ‘“We”,’ he hissed, ‘what is this “we"? You and I are not to be counted amongst these horse-leeches, sucking at the blood of others.’

  ‘What fellowship else have we?’

  ‘What?’ Valentine’s horror at Aemilia’s ‘fellowship’ made him speak loudly and he quickly shifted the swords in his hands. At the same moment he stumbled again on a tree root and was forced to run forward to regain his balance lest the swords go flying out and increase his clatter. In a fouler mood than he had yet possessed, he waited for Aemilia to rejoin him.

  ‘Aemilia,’ he whispered, not caring overmuch now if anyone heard her called by her true name, wanting to appeal to the woman he loved, ‘this is madness. When we set forth, our thoughts were only to stay away from your father’s house long enough to make him realise that his love for you must make him bow to your desires. We spoke of inns and hot meals and warm baths and a honeymoon. Now, we’re stumbling through the dark, one of a band of runaways, wanton servants, villains, outlaws. We cannot continue in this vein, we must return.’

  ‘I told you I had a plan, Valentine.’

  ‘Oh so, and was it that we should engage in desperate fights by moonlight?’

  ‘If you’re in this peevish mood, Valentine, I think it best we part.’

  ‘Very well, then,’ Valentine declared with all his dignity on muster but as she walked away he called after her, ‘Sebastian, Sebastian, we must speak further. Find me in the morning, Sebastian.’

  He heard her agreement as she and her light disappeared ahead a moment before his foot caught a root again and he stumbled forward to slam into the trunk of a tree. His cursing was echoed by laughter from others of the outlaws as they passed by. Jesu, he thought as he felt about to pick up the swords he’d dropped, I must be from this place and I will be.

  But you’ll be secret?

  Orlando waved Jacopo away as William approached and then matched his stride to William’s.

  ‘Master Russell is quite the soldier, is
he not?’

  William was grateful for the darkness that hid his face from Orlando.

  ‘He seems so,’ answered William. Till he knew better what the outlaw chief desired, he thought, best to keep his answers short.

  ‘“Seems”? What proof more do you desire than his deeds of the last day?’

  ‘The office is not the man,’ answered William. ‘That he fights well does not make him a soldier.’

  ‘I forget how much you question appearance, Adam, when I should remember your own false facing.’

  ‘I am not false,’ William said, his voice harsher than he’d intended. ‘I am not the source of other men’s expectation.’

  ‘If you are not false, then others are. This Sir Nicholas, he is no knight by his bawling and pleading when we took him. Nor this Sebastian a pageboy for all her shorn hair.’

  William heard Orlando name Sebastian for the woman that she was. Where did this go?

  ‘Sir Nicholas is braver than many knights’, said William slowly, ‘that much I do know, for all that he does not shy from pleas and bargains for mercy.’

  ‘He knows Russell well and both have English names and speak our language with a grating burr that is not native to it.’

  ‘Perhaps, then, they are English? Come to your purpose, Orlando.’

  ‘You know them too?’

  ‘And if I do?’

  ‘If I recall me, England and His Holiness are not beloved of one another?’

  ‘His Holiness I’m sure loves all men, as befits his office and his faith, and as for England, you speak in generalities. Each man keeps his own thoughts and may have no more in common but that England was the ground that held their mothers when they birthed them.’