“Very well, you may stay if you wish but you do so in peril of your soul. The witch may appear contrite but he’s sure to summon many hideous demons to his aid and we may have to battle with all the legions of Hell before this night is over,” said Bos. Both warders looked at each other nervously and Prometheus pressed home the friars’ advantage.
“I fear your paltry partisans will be of no use against The Great Marquis Sabnock who commands fifty legions of The Damned. The slightest wound from his sword will fill with devilish maggots that gnaw a man’s flesh from his bones whilst he still lives and it is said that the screams from any mortal man wounded by The Great Marquis Sabnock would chill the heart of Satan himself,” the Nubian added gleefully. At this news, the one-eyed warder ‘s face turned as white as his colleague’s beard and he took a step back towards the cell door.
“As you wish, Father, but I’ll have to lock the door… just in case,” said the one eyed warder, his voice trembling with terror.
“You must do your duty my son, and you can trust us to do ours. May God bless you and keep you for there is bound to be great evil abroad this night,” said Bos kindly. The warders scurried from the cell crossing themselves furiously. As soon as they’d left, the priests threw back their cowls and grinned at Thomas.
“By all the saints you got my message!” said Thomas. He spoke in a whisper but nothing could hide his delight at seeing Bos, Quintana and Prometheus.
“Did you think we weren’t coming?” laughed the Nubian.
“I admit I was beginning to think perhaps my picture had been lost or misunderstood,” said Thomas.
“I swear by the Queen of Spain’s tits you’re no Leonardo but at least I had the wit to work out your meaning, I hope you’ll remember that!” Quintana said proudly.
“So what do we do now?” said Bos.
“For the moment we pray,” said Thomas with a smile and he carefully outlined his plan. When he’d finished, Bos unwrapped his bundle. The woollen wrapping turned out to be a spare disguise for Thomas and as well as concealing its true purpose, the cloth had hidden two swords with a piece of wood tied between their crossguards so the weapons appeared to be a crucifix. Bos untied the wood and handed one sword to Thomas who took it gratefully. The blade was dull and pitted with rust but it felt good to have a weapon in his hand again. Prometheus and Quintana also unwrapped their swords, which had been similarly disguised as crosses, and when all four men were armed Bos began to pray. In a voice loud enough for the warders to hear, the ex-priest spoke the words of the prayer to drive demons from the possessed.
Is it not written, that it is by the finger of God that I drive out demons and the kingdom of God shall come upon you. For you cannot drink from the cup of the Lord and also from the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and of the table of demons. Yet are we who travel the paths of light not stronger than he who walks in darkness?
The warders outside the cell heard Bos’ Latin and though they did not understand the words, they felt much better. They felt certain the holy men would weave a web of prayer around the witch that would be far stronger than any iron chains or stone walls. Soon it would be morning, the headsman would dispatch Thomas Devilstone’s corrupt soul to hell and the world would be a safer place for good Christian folk. The warders looked at each other and breathed a sigh of relief.
Bos’ prayers continued until darkness fell whereupon Quintana called through the door’s little window to request a light for the cell’s candles. The grizzled warder duly fetched a rushlight but he was careful to pass it through the tiny window’s bars rather than open the cell door. He may have been old but he was wise to most tricks his prisoners tried to play. As the light flared in the cell, the monks’ prayers began again and the guards settled down for a comfortable night.
The first indication something was wrong was the strange hissing that sounded like bacon frying in a pan. The guards thought perhaps the friars were cooking their supper but then the screaming began.
7
THE KING’S WHARF
“Oh dear God … no … please no!” shrieked a voice from inside Thomas’ cell. To the nervous warders outside, it sounded as if the speaker was suffering all the torments of the Holy Inquisition and as the friars’ cries grew louder the elderly guards grasped their spears more tightly.
“In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ … back … back … you fiend!” wailed another voice from the cell.
“By the power of Christ I compel thee to return to The Pit!” cried a third voice as great clouds of purple smoke began to creep under the cell door. The warders looked at each other, wide eyed with fright, as the foul smelling smoke slowly filled the passageway. The stench was worse than a cartload of rotten eggs cracked all at once and in the next moment the befouled air was riven by the sounds of clashing swords.
“Do not open the door, we’re doing battle with the Great Marquis Sabnock himself, keep the door firmly shut until he’s defeated!” cried one of the friars from inside the cell. The warders were only too happy to oblige, no power on earth would induce them to open the cell’s door but as a thick billow of smoke wafted through the tiny window, a bat flew through the bars into the stairway. The terrified creature fluttered and swooped between the warders as it tried to find a way out, whilst the equally terrified men screamed and waved their arms to drive the hellish vermin away. In answer to their piteous screams, Bos’ face appeared at the barred window.
“By all the saints he’s cunning, the Great Marquis Sabnock has turned himself into a bat to escape us. Where is he can you see him?” Bos asked urgently.
“He’s out here, the demon is attacking us!” screamed the warders.
“Don’t let him bite you, if The Great Marquis drinks your blood, you’ll become a slave of Satan for all time. Open the door and let us out, we’ll use the power of Christ to recapture this Prince of Darkness!” Bos said. The friar’s words were exactly what the warders wanted to hear. They knew they could not defeat a fiendish Great Lord of Hell, even one who had taken the form of a bat, so they forgot the priest’s earlier instruction and gratefully unlocked the cell door. Almost before the key had turned, the door burst open and the coughing, spluttering friars burst into the passageway. In the confusion the warders did not notice that four monks, not three, had emerged from the cell.
“Leave us… let us face this peril alone, be gone I say or you’ll be damned for all eternity!” Bos roared. He stood in the passageway holding his sword in his huge fist and looking like the vengeful St Boniface before the pagan oak. The sight only added to the warders’ panic. Calling loudly to St Michael to save them, the petrified guards threw down their weapons and ran down the spiral stair.
“Come on, we mustn’t let the other guards gather their wits or they’ll discover they’ve been tricked by nothing more than a saltpetre candle and a terrified bat!” said Thomas and he followed the fleeing warders down the stairs shouting strange incantations as he did so. Their luck held until the four friars reached the centre of the darkened inner ward but before the fugitives could reach the gateway to the outer ward, they were confronted by a loose skirmish line of yeomen warders advancing cautiously across the grass towards them.
“By the blood stained bollocks of the Blessed Abelard, we’re trapped!” Bos cried.
“Get back, behind me,” snapped Thomas as he fumbled for the second of his smoke bombs. Once he’d pulled the candle free of his robe he took hold of the match cord, which he’d tied around his waist in imitation of a friar’s cincture, and blew on the end. The cord glowed red, for he’d had the good sense to set it smouldering before leaving the warmth of his cell, and as soon as he touched it to the greasy candle’s black match, the powder-encrusted paper began to fizz.
“May I?” Prometheus asked, holding out his hand.
“With pleasure,” replied Thomas and he handed the spluttering candle to the Nubian who promptly hurled it into the night sky. The bomb spiralled through the darknes
s, scattering a trail of sparks like a tiny comet, and landed on the grass behind the warders. A moment later the advancing yeomen were engulfed in more clouds of thick, purple smoke.
“The wizard has opened another portal to The Pit! You men must surround this new gateway and stop Lucifer’s fire-breathing dragons from leaving Hell. You must defy their flesh-ripping claws and sulphurous breath, you must smite the legions of Beelzebub that will surely follow. Have courage or we’re all damned!” Quintana cried at the confused yeomen staggering out of the fog. The yeoman stopped in their tracks. They looked at the crazed hooded monks in front of them, then glanced at the billowing clouds of purple smoke behind.
“We can’t fight Satan’s armies!” One of the yeomen shouted and that was a signal for the rout to begin. The elderly, corpulent warders threw away their weapons and ran for to the safety of the White Tower, the great stone keep at the centre of the fortress, and the sound of their hobnailed boots clattering on the donjon’s wooden stairs was quickly followed by the slam of a heavy door.
The four monks looked at each other in triumph but there was no time to celebrate their victory. Thomas only had one more candle and they still had to reach the outer ward and cross the moat. Bos grinned and told the others to follow him whilst he repeated his performance of a deranged priest exorcising demons. Thomas and the others were only too happy to stay behind the Frisian as the giant, red bearded ex-priest ran towards the postern in the Wakefield Tower. Holding his sword high in one hand and the wooden token with the password in the other Bos screamed at the bemused warders guarding the gateway to run for their lives.
“In the name of St Michael slayer-of-demons you must flee! The Devil himself has been unleashed and The Constable has given orders all men must retreat into the safety of the White Tower or perish!” Bos yelled. The two warders recognised the priest they’d admitted a few hours earlier and they knew better than to disobey a man of God, or the Constable’s password, so they too gratefully abandoned their post and joined their fellows in the headlong flight into the keep.
As soon as the guards had disappeared into the night, the fugitives ran to open the gate that led to the Outer Ward. The postern was fastened with locks, and they had no key, but the large main gate was secured with a heavy wooden beam that sat in two iron brackets. The seasoned oak was as strong as steel, and would have withstood any battering from outside, but Prometheus and Bos easily lifted the timber out of its brackets and cast it aside. As they did so, Quintana and Thomas hauled open the gates and they all ran into the outer ward.
“Just the outer wall and the moat to cross,” said Bos and he turned to lead his companions back the way they’d entered but Thomas stopped him.
“That way, we’ll be caught quicker than a drunken bishop catches the pox. Even if the warders at the outer towers have run away, we’ve no keys to open the gates so follow me,” said Thomas urgently and without another word he set off at a sprint in the opposite direction to The Tower’s barbican.
The others couldn’t fault Thomas’ logic so they followed him to the Cradle Tower, a small bastion in the southeastern corner of the outer walls, which guarded a postern that opened onto a narrow bridge over the moat. At the other end of this wooden trestle was the King’s Wharf and beyond that was the River Thames. The Cradle Tower had been built to serve as the king’s private entrance to his royal fortress and it was manned at all times by two of The Tower garrison’s most trustworthy men. The commotion from the inner ward had alerted these two sentries who’d abandoned their supper to investigate and they gruffly challenged the four rapidly approaching monks.
“In the name of the king stand fast and identify yourselves,” shouted the first warder, levelling his halberd at Thomas’ chest.
“We’re poor servants of Christ fighting all the furies of Hell, now stand aside for we must fetch help from the Church of St Catherine!” yelled Thomas and he ran straight at the confused sentry. The yeoman was loath to cut down a friar, even one apparently out of his wits, so he hesitated and as a reward for his piety Thomas knocked the man’s spear aside and smashed the pommel of his sword into his face. The second warder was so astonished at the sight of a priest clubbing his comrade to the ground, he failed to notice Prometheus’ haymaking punch heading towards his chin. The Nubian’s fist landed on the man’s jaw with a smack and the second warder fell to the ground like bag of wet washing. With both sentries silenced, Quintana began to search them for the keys.
“Don’t bother, the keys to all the gates and posterns are handed to the Constable at sunset,” said Thomas calmly but the others looked at him in horror.
“If we can’t get out why in the name of Martin Luther’s whore of a mother did you bring us here? We’d have been better off trying to bluff our way through the main gate!” cried Quintana.
“I hope you know what you’re doing Englishman because we have company,” said Bos, pointing at the lines of flickering torches moving along the inner and outer walls’ walkways.
“Inside!” replied Thomas and he bundled his companions into the Cradle Tower’s guardroom. The small gloomy chamber behind the open door had been furnished with a crude wooden table, several long wooden benches and a ladder that led to a trapdoor in the vaulted roof. After using the table and benches to barricade the door, the four men climbed the ladder, pushed open the trapdoor at the top and scrambled onto the tower’s parapet.
“Now what, it’s too far too jump to the bridge, we’ll have to dive into the moat,” said Bos peering over the battlements.
“I’m not swimming any moat, I’m a king and kings do not flap about in water like common fish. Besides it stinks worse than a diseased whore’s pisspot,” said Prometheus wrinkling his nose in regal disgust at the stench rising from the moat.
“You won’t have to swim,” Thomas promised but for the moment he had no idea of how they were to reach the bridge. He had hoped to pull up the ladder from the guardroom and use it to climb down to the bridge but the bottom rungs had been chained to an iron ring in the floor and there was no time to wrench it free. The Cradle Tower’s guards, who’d now recovered their wits, were yelling for their colleagues to come to their aid and their cries were answered by more shouts from The Tower’s inner ward.
“It seems as if our beef eating foes have at last realised they’ve been tricked and I reckon we have about three minutes to get off this parapet or we’re all dead,” said Quintana grimly.
“Give me your cinctures,” said Thomas and snatching hold of the cords he quickly knotted them into a rope. He fastened one end to the parapet and tossed the loose end into the darkness.
“After you Englishman, I’d hate to be the one to snap such a slender thread or encounter any guards on the King’s Wharf,” said Prometheus politely. Thomas didn’t hesitate, he climbed over the wall and lowered himself to the bridge below.
Despite the darkness, Thomas could see the King’s Wharf at the far end of the bridge. He knew this broad, cobbled quay was cut off from the rest of London’s waterfront by high wooden palisades and blockhouses at each end so, gripping his sword tightly, he walked cautiously along the bridge. When no challenge came, Thomas guessed the watchmen who were supposed to patrol the docks and warehouses were lying drunk in their blockhouse so he signalled to the others that it was safe to descend. A minute later, the four men had joined him by one of the derricks that leaned into the dark like a giant heron hunting for lampreys.
“So where’s the boat?” said Thomas expectantly.
“What boat?” queried Bos.
“Your drawing didn’t show any boat,” added Prometheus.
“I’m Portuguese, saltwater runs in my veins and I can sail anything that floats but you never said anything about a boat,” countered Quintana.
“But how, in the name of Beelzebub’s great hairy arse, are we supposed to get to France or Flanders without a boat?” Thomas cried in exasperation. Without some sort of vessel the four men were trapped on the waterfront and the shou
ts from The Tower were getting louder. In another minute the keys to the postern would have been fetched from The Constable’s office and the quayside would be swarming with heavily armed men.
“Perhaps I can help, Master Thomas,” said a soft voice with a heavy German accent.
The four fugitives spun on their heels and saw a small man emerge from the shadows. He was aged about forty but stood no higher than Thomas’ shoulder. His cleanshaven face was full and round but his build was slim and he had the graceful walk of a dancing master. The man was clearly not from The Tower’s guardroom or the city’s nightwatch because he wore a long black merchant’s cloak wrapped tightly around his shoulders and a plain black bonnet was crammed on his head.
“Who calls my name?” said Thomas pointing his sword at the man.
“I’m Hans Nagel, the trumpet player,” said the man, spreading his arms wide in friendship, but before he could say another word Thomas leapt at him, his sword flashing in the moonlight. Taken by surprise, Nagel stepped back in terror and slipped on a pile of dung. The slip saved his life, the sword sliced only air but as Nagel sprawled across the damp cobbles his opponent quickly recovered his balance. In the blink of an eye Thomas was standing astride Nagel’s chest with his sword’s point pressed against the helpless man’s throat.
“I know your name Nagel, you were one of Wolsey’s spies and you’re supposed to be dead!” Thomas bellowed and he lifted his sword to strike the cowering Nagel’s head from his shoulders.
“In the name of God’s Mercy wait, you know only half the story, Wolsey’s not my true master, I now serve the exiled Yorkist prince Richard de la Pole, he heard of your plight and sent me to bring you to the safety of Metz. I sent the note warning of your arrest and I paid the crone who gave you the white rose, What’s more I have a Hansa ship waiting at The Steelyard,” Nagel pleaded.
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