Ravenspur: Rise of the Tudors

by Conn Iggulden

  Richard of Gloucester broke off as Earl Rivers bounded up the gangplank, making it creak. Anthony Woodville had grown a dark beard that lay upon his armour like a spade so there was no telling where his chin ended. Richard repressed his irritation as the man greeted them and bowed. Rivers had inherited his father’s title in the struggle for power. The queen’s brother had seen his main chance in King Edward and remained close ever since. Richard nodded to the man, though he had been enjoying the quiet conversation with his brother – an intimacy rare in Edward and treasured all the more because of it. With Lord Rivers standing idle at his shoulder, there would be no more privacy.

  Instead, Richard turned to the rail to look out over the docks. His brother was a fine leader in war, only a fool would deny it. Yet in peace, Edward surrounded himself with thick-limbed knights and thick-headed barons, men who owed him their advancement and were willing to waste it in drink and hunts. Richard had little time for any of them – and the queen’s brutish brother least of all. Yet he smiled and inclined his head even as Anthony Woodville thrust his presence upon them, exclaiming on the rain and the cold.

  ‘Gentlemen,’ Edward said, suddenly. He still had the knack of making his voice travel, though he did not seem to shout. It boomed across them and even men on the next ship along stood still in their tasks and turned towards him.

  He unsheathed a huge sword then, the priceless gift of Charles le Téméraire, resting the point of it on the wooden deck so that it dug in. Edward knelt and all the standing men sank down with him. Even those in the ropes bowed their heads and clasped hands through the rough ropes. Edward gripped the bared blade so that the polished cross of the hilt was held before him.

  ‘I ask Our Saviour, Our Lord Jesus Christ, to guide us on our voyage and keep us safe. I ask my patron saint and all the saints to give us the strength and the will and the honour to take back what has been taken from us. “Placebo Domino in regione vivorum” – “I will please the Lord in the land of the living”. In England, gentlemen, where I am king. On sea and on land, I ask for your favour, Lord. God grant us peace when we are done. And strength until then. Amen.’

  The final word was echoed by the men. On the ships already at sea and those still tied to the shore, every head had been bowed in common purpose, though very few had heard his words. Sixteen hundred men made the sign of the cross and rose to their feet with a great graunch and clatter of armour and weapons. Edward smiled, showing sharp teeth.

  ‘Now take me home, gentlemen! I would see my England once more.’ The ship’s crew raced about their tasks, heaving on ropes and directing clumsy soldiers when they needed them. The Mark Antony seemed to shiver as the last ropes were cast off. The sails cracked taut in the breeze and the motion changed subtly, becoming a live vessel on the deep. Edward crossed himself once again. Leaving the coast of Flanders was not an ending but a fresh start. He could barely contain his desire to set foot on English soil once more, almost a physical pain he had denied for the months of banishment. Even more, he wanted men like Warwick to understand who he was at last and to be afraid. There was but one king of England. As his ship broke out in formation with three dozen more, the wind and their speed increased. The great prow plunged into the sea, coming up with a beard of green water and dropping down once again. Spray surged over Edward and he walked forward into it, delighted by the sting of cold and everything it meant.

  ‘Go on!’ he shouted, though whether it was to the men aloft or the gulls or the ship herself, no one could say. ‘Go on!’ He was coming home, to settle all his debts and to take his crown, even if it was spattered with blood.

  ‘The brave men of Parliament resist, my lord, because they think they can serve two masters.’

  ‘Well, we must show them they cannot!’ Warwick retorted. ‘And I am weary of being baulked by these little men. King Henry summoned this Parliament. They have all taken oaths of loyalty to him – and they witnessed the execution of the Earl of Worcester for treason. A lesson for all! Yet still they seem determined to block me and make themselves a mockery.’

  Derry Brewer sighed, examining the bottom of a pewter mug and raising it to be refilled. He had not grown tired of the service and fawning courtiers at the Palace of Westminster. The addition of a fine pewter badge on his tunic and a word in a few of the right ears had earned him the appearance of respect. Servants bowed when he entered a room and ran when he asked for ale or wine or a steak and kidney pie. He found he enjoyed the ease of life under such conditions.

  ‘Richard, they are just men,’ he said. ‘Tutored men who know their Latin and their Greek, yes. Men who can figure a little if you give them a piece of chalk and a slate and you don’t need an answer that same morning. Yet they are not above manoeuvring for their own survival, if you understand me? They have homes and hearths, wives and mistresses and brats to feed. All of which can be taken away and given to others, if Edward of York comes back.’ He shrugged as Warwick looked in anger at him, refusing to apologize for what he knew was true. The men of Parliament were trying to walk an impossible line. If Edward returned they could still show him they had delayed and been loyal. If Lancaster continued to hold the throne, they would begin to scurry over one another for that favour instead.

  Derry despised the lot of them, but then he always had, ever since the long-dead Speaker Tresham had set two dogs on an old friend. Dogs with tools and a brazier. Derry expected no aid from such men – and nothing but frustration and obstruction. As a result, they could not disappoint him and he found it oddly refreshing. Warwick had not had the same revelation and struggled on.

  ‘I have half the houses in London filled with men, Derry, sleeping in every attic and basement, packed like cordwood in the taverns – and stealing the ale as soon as the owners are asleep, as I hear in some complaint and bill just about every day.’

  ‘So build a barracks to house them,’ Derry said with a shrug. ‘Outside the city a way, where they can’t bother the young women. Grant them a meadow where they can sweat and train.’ He saw the idea sink in as Warwick drank, his Adam’s apple bobbing. Warwick gasped as he finished the pint, shaking his head and raising the mug for another.

  ‘All right, perhaps I will. That is in London though. All the while, I have a fleet beating up and down the coast of France looking for their ships, enduring winter cold and rot and broken boards – and men who fall from the rigging and dash out their brains on the decks in high winds. Others who get some fever and die screaming. Yet they remain, out there, sweeping up and down, never knowing when York will be sighted.’

  Warwick paused to press a knuckle against the joint of his nose and his eyes, breathing out in a sigh or a groan.

  ‘And all the time, as I bleed fortunes into the sea, the king’s Parliament, these grain sellers and lawyers from the shires and the towns and the cities, cannot even be relied upon to see the wind has changed! York has gone. Lancaster has returned after a decade of their poisonous rule. My brother John appears before me each morning to announce he has had no word of his title in Northumberland. The rents from half my old lands are still pouring into the coffers of other men and when I bring it up, I am told to apply to the courts! Perhaps King Henry has been too gentle with those whitebeard lawyer bastards! It took three months just to attaint Edward of York, like his father before him. That cursed line! All I have managed for Clarence is to make him Lieutenant of Ireland, while his old titles lie in disuse or disputed. Must I spend the rest of my life in a courtroom? I tell you, the gift of Towton was that so many seats were empty after it. Edward had titles by the dozen to award his favourites and by so doing, to secure his support. Advise me, Derry! Would you send these Parliament men away, in King Henry’s name? They will mutter and argue until the trumpets are blown for the end of the world, I swear, while I have a dozen men owed favours – and no titles or estates to give them.’

  ‘The men of the Commons are just afraid of one great shadow falling across them again. We struck at Edward of York and the luc
ky whoreson slipped the blow and ran. Like King Arthur’s return, they are expecting him home in the summer. The whole blessed country is expecting him home.’ Derry took advantage of that moment of sad declaration to sink half of the pint he had been poured, smacking his lips appreciatively.

  ‘That is the heart of it,’ Warwick said softly. ‘And I am ready for him.’

  Derry made a snorting sound into his beer, spattering bits of froth.

  ‘You cannot keep an army camped in London for the winter, my lord. Borrow more from the priories and build your barracks. That is my advice. The wheels of Parliament grind slowly. They’ll vote you the funds you have spent in the end, but you cannot run dry, not now.’

  ‘By God, I was the richest man in England, once!’

  ‘Yes, my lord, my old heart breaks for the reverses you have endured,’ Derry said, eyeing the gold rings on Warwick’s fingers. ‘I’m sure it is just malicious gossip, what I heard about you allowing your captains to take the merchant vessels of any other nation as their payment, all under the seal of King Henry. Some might call it piracy, my lord, but I am not one of those who leaps to accusations, or even cares particularly, as long as he does not have to hear complaints about it after. If you do not earn a fortune from your cut, then let it be as I say – speak to the moneylenders to tide you over this winter. You will be rich again, in a year or two, when they see the country thriving in peace. The one thing all those merchants hate, is war. Their cargoes and cogs stolen by ruthless pirates, armies eating all their food. No, son, peace is where the money is. War interrupts trade – and trade is our lifeblood. They say Henry the Fifth borrowed so much he almost broke London. If he hadn’t won and captured all sorts of wealth, well, perhaps we’d be speaking French, really, really badly, Mon-sewer.’

  ‘And until then, I must just depend on those Parliament old women, mustn’t I?’ Warwick said waspishly. His face and neck had grown flushed as he realized how much Derry Brewer knew of his arrangements. ‘Just as I depend on you, Brewer, to tell me where York and Gloucester have hidden themselves – then to reach out and strike at them.’

  Derry used his one good eye to effect, knowing that it had a piercing quality. He stared until Warwick looked back into the depths of his own mug.

  ‘You used to have a … gentleman’s approach to such things, my lord. A restraint. I admired it in you then.’

  ‘Yes? Well, I have been attainted and my father was killed, Brewer. I am not as green, now, nor as patient. I want to see an ending – and I do not care how Edward of York is brought down. If he falls from a horse or is stabbed by his mistress, I will be as pleased. Take what chances you can. If he returns to England, nothing after that will be certain. Do you understand? I fought at his side at Towton, Brewer. I know the man. If we cannot stop him before he plants his flag, all we have won can be torn away. All.’

  Derry Brewer grimaced to himself as he drained yet another mug of the fine brown ale, feeling his senses swim. He had men in France and Flanders, looking for some sign of the brothers of York. There were a dozen rumours, but the pigeons had all been sent and had to be shipped back to the Continent. It all took time and he could not escape the sense that the hourglass had already been thrown against a wall. The sea was vast, so that entire fleets were no more than splinters against that watery deep. The Continent was dark and endless, even with the spies reporting back for King Louis. Belching, Derry placed his mug down and nodded to Warwick, rising to his feet to head out into the darkness and the rain.

  Daw looked over the grey sea, with the sun setting behind him. It was his favourite time of day, when gold and slate mingled in great bands across the waves, a pattern stretching into the far distance and all flecked with white. He was alone on his hill, as always. He’d kept a one-eyed dog up there for company for a while, but the village butcher had told everyone about it and they’d all said he couldn’t be trusted to keep an eye out if he was playing with his hound. They’d made him leave the animal at home and then of course it had gone, vanished like morning dew. His mam had said the animal had just skittered out of the door and never come back, but Daw had an idea the butcher had taken him for those horrible little pies he sold at market day. The man called him Jack Daw and always laughed when he did, like it was clever. Daw was short for David, that was all. He liked Daw. He might have liked Jack Daw if it hadn’t been the butcher who’d come up with it.

  He sighed to himself. He was fourteen years old and his leg was too twisted to do a man’s work for his food, that was what they all said. All he could do was stand still and stare until someone slapped him out of it, so they’d shown him the hill watch and the tiny hut up there for when it rained. He pissed into the bracken and emptied his bowels in a little pit not far off, with a nice slender ash tree to hold on to as he dipped down. At midday, his mam would bring him a few boiled eggs, or a bit of meat and bread, whatever she’d left over – and at the end of the month, the local merchants paid his mother for his labour. It was not such a bad life, he had come to accept. In the summer, others came up the hill on fine days, to enjoy the sun on their faces and the view. He hated those times and those people, standing on his shadow, as he liked to mutter to himself. It was bad enough when the widow Jenkins came stumping up to take the night shift on the hill, but all they ever did was exchange a nod. In two years, she hadn’t said a word to him and that was fine. He’d been alone so long, he knew no other way.

  His mam said there were boys and simpletons on hilltops all the way down the coast, stretching further than he could even see. Daw wasn’t sure whether he could believe her when she rattled off the names of towns he’d never known and would never visit. They were far-off places and he could not even imagine the fine people who lived in cities and knew stone houses and wide roads. Sometimes he dreamed of going south to see the others of his kind, imagining himself all weather-tanned and healthy like, just walking up and exchanging a nod with them, like equals. It always made him smile, though he knew he never would. No, he’d spend his life in all weathers and he’d watch the leaves grow green and then gold each year. He knew his hill better than anyone alive already and he’d come to love it in his observation, just as he loved the sea beyond with all its moods and colours.

  With care, he stuck a tiny piece of pork fat to a branch, stepping away so carefully he made hardly any sound at all. He looked up into the chestnut tree for the red squirrel who made its home somewhere high above him. Each day he’d been tempting the animal closer, trying nuts and a dab of honey, anything he could snatch from his mother’s kitchen. He had high hopes for pork fat. Everyone liked that.

  He stepped back and turned away to sweep his gaze across the horizon – and froze. In an instant, he had forgotten the squirrel. He ran forward to the very edge of the cliff, shading his eyes though the sun was weak.

  Ships. Out there on the grey, each as long as one of his fingers. He’d been standing in that spot in winter and summer for two years, with two more before that when he was the apprentice to Jim Saddler. The old man had resented his failing eyesight – and the boy who would replace him. He’d beaten Daw too many times to remember them all, but he’d taught him to read flags and banners and he’d taught him about Viking ships and how they were rowed or sailed and how French ships looked and the sort of colours they flew. Old Jim was in the ground a year, but Daw’s mind flickered as he stared at them, counting and remembering. Not merchants, clustering together for safety on the deep. Not English ships. Not one or two, but a veritable fleet, more than thirty, on his oath.

  Daw looked at the huge pile of wood some forty yards away from his little hut. It was part of his work to take it apart and rebuild it each week, to keep the wood dry. He had tarpaulins to pull over it in the storms, tying it all down. He knew it would light and that he had to move, but still he just stared, back and forth, fleet to bonfire.

  He shook himself awake, muttering curses under his breath. The oil lamp was lit in his shed, thank God! His first task of the day and
he had not shirked it on a cold morning, when he could have the pleasure of pressing his hands against the warming glass until it was too hot to hold. He snatched it up from its shelf with a sheaf of tapers, racing back to the bonfire. He went down on his hands and knees to insert the burning wands, blowing on them and stuffing in dry moss until the fire began to take hold. Flames wrapped around the balanced sticks like maypole ribbons of red, beginning to crackle and boil the sap still deep in the wood. When Daw was certain it was well set, he ran back to his hut and snatched up handfuls of tall green ferns, dumping them on the inferno to create a stream of grey smoke, hundreds of feet above his head.

  He stood then, with his hands on his hips, realizing he was panting and staring at the enemy fleet crossing the North Sea along the English coast. He did not look round when a warning horn sounded in the village below, though he could imagine the butcher’s cheeks growing red as he forced his breath down it. Daw grinned at the thought and then he became aware of another prickle of light.

  He turned, his eyes widening. Along the coast, further than he had ever gone, another bonfire had been lit. Even as he stared, he saw an even more distant point of light twinkle. He spun in place and his mouth opened further at the sight of another gleam some dozen miles away. Men and boys like himself, who were answering the warning, carrying it further. He could only see a tiny number, but Daw had a vision that left him gasping, of the bonfires spreading right along the coast, carrying his word. For an instant, he was afraid, but pride forced out the sense of worry. He smiled and wished his dog could have been there.

  Edward had been watching the coast slide by, miles away on the larboard side, with a sort of desperate longing. He had tried not to think of England in his months of exile. There had been no point to it while he was banished and unable to return. Yet then, with the chalk hills fading into brown and green, with the great curving cliffs speaking to something in his blood, he could only stare and hope.