devilstone chronicles 01 - devils band

by richard anderton

  Thomas returned to his bewildered companions a few moments later and he was carrying his copy of The Munich Handbook. Holding up the book so everyone could see, he quickly thumbed through the pages to show them Leonardo’s designs for armoured wagons, giant crossbows multi barrelled cannon and boats that could sail underwater.

  “With such weapons I can make whomsoever I choose king of England and those who join me will win more titles than Columbus and more wealth than da Gama. Moreover these machines can do much more than conquer England for Richard de la Pole!” Thomas said triumphantly and with growing excitement he promised that Leonardo’s war machines could help Prometheus take back Nubia from the Funj, or drive the Hapsburgs from Bos’ homeland. If they wished, they could even spread the word of Luther all the way to the gates of Rome.

  “Do you know how to build these contraptions?” Bos asked suspiciously.

  “And if you do, will they work?” Prometheus said.

  “I do and they will,” Thomas lied. Bos and Prometheus looked at each other and after a brief conversation between themselves the Nubian spoke.

  “Very well Englishman, Bos and I will go with you on the condition that you build more of these weapons of war to help us end the tyrannies in our homelands,” Prometheus said quietly.

  “What about you Portugee, you’re lucky that your homeland is at peace so will you continue into Germany or return to Portugal?” Bos added. In reply Quintana spat over the side, he’d no intention of going back to Lisbon, where several jealous husbands were waiting to avenge insults to their wives’ honour, but he didn’t relish the prospect of venturing into the heart of The Hapsburg’s German Empire alone.

  “Do you expect me to die of boredom guarding some cabbage eating count’s crumbling castle whilst you all become rich in England? I want my share so I’m coming too, but first I’m going to find something to eat,” he said. The others laughed and together they went in search of breakfast.

  At Coblenz, The Steffen left the Rhine and joined the Moselle, a river which led into the heart of Burgundy. At first the river flowed lazily through narrow looping gorges with vineyards marching down the steeply sided hills to the water’s edge, like Malcolm’s army coming to drink. The tops of the highest hills were crowned by fairy-tale castles with tall slender towers whilst prosperous towns crowded the slopes beneath their walls. Beyond the ancient city of Trier, the Moselle entered a wider valley, filled with broad water meadows and sleepy villages, and Thomas’ first site of their destination was the great square monolith of Metz’s cathedral.

  For the last few miles of the journey, The Steffen’s progress was slowed by crowds of gaily painted barges bringing a cornucopia of goods to Metz’s numerous markets. A customs post at the city’s water gate was collecting tolls and the labyrinthine processes of officialdom created a long queue of river traffic. Fortunately, the red and white Hansa flag speeded The Steffen’s passage through the throng and by midmorning on the fourteenth day of their voyage, Shobery moored his vessel in the shadow of the huge cathedral which rose up from the quayside like a great gothic cliff.

  The wharfs of Metz were as busy as those of London and crowded with boatmen cursing in all the tongues of Catholic Christendom. Bos, Prometheus and Quintana were excited at the prospect of exploring a new city but this wasn’t Thomas’ first visit. Whilst he was apprenticed to Agrippa, his master had taken a position as legal advisor to Metz’s council so master and pupil had spent two years living here. During his stay, Thomas had seen Richard de la Pole several times, usually at one of the city’s numerous tournaments and festivals, but he’d never met the White Rose in person.

  He asked Nagel how long it would take to be granted an audience with the Yorkist Prince. The trumpet player didn’t know but he planned to call on Petrus Alamire, the second of Wolsey’s turncoat spies, who still had the White Rose’s favour. Alamire would be able to arrange a prompt introduction so as soon the gangplank had been lowered, Thomas and the others set off through the thronging streets.

  Alamire lived on the other side of the city, close to Metz’s German Gate. It wasn’t far but their journey took the five men through a large market square where half a dozen heavily armed soldiers, dressed entirely in black, had gathered on the steps of a church. The sight of their broad brimmed hats, square cut beards, voluminous sleeved doublets and baggy breeches made Thomas think they must be German landsknechts but he knew men in imperial service rarely wore black.

  In fact, to shock peaceful citizens and thumb their noses at The Emperor’s laws dictating what the lowborn could wear, the bloodthirsty German mercenaries called landsknechts habitually wore the most colourful and outrageous costumes their tailors could devise. Huge hats decorated with enormous feathers, tight doublets with slashed sleeves, beribboned breeches, striped hose and obscene codpieces all made from contrasting colours were the norm but whilst the cutthroats in Metz’s market square wore the same style of clothing as imperial landsknechts, their hats, doublets, breeches and hose were all entirely black. Even their armour had been blackened with soot.

  “The Black Band! I fought these murderous scum in Frisia and I prayed never to meet them again,” hissed Bos as he caught sight of the soldiers

  “Have no fear, the men of the Black Band have abandoned The Holy Roman Emperor and now serve the White Rose as his personal guard,” soothed Nagel.

  “They don’t look like a royal guard, they look like mountebanks at a hiring fair,” said Prometheus looking at the men with disgust. Four of the soldiers were lolling idly against halberds decorated with fox tails fastened below the axe blades. The fifth was beating an enormous drum whilst a sixth was haranguing passers-by, boasting loudly of the loot he’d won, and the women he’d ploughed, during his many campaigns with the Black Band.

  “They’re recruiting, I told you the White Rose is mustering an army and these are the men who will drive the Tudors from England,” said Nagel.

  “The White Rose at the head of the Black Band, what a colourful war this shall be!” said Quintana. The men lingered awhile to watch the wide-eyed barrow boys and costers who’d stopped to listen to the recruiting sergeant. Thomas and the others had seen enough of war to know the reality of life on campaign was a world away from the tall tales the sergeant was telling, yet each man felt his soul stirred by the call to arms.

  The cathedral bells summoning the city’s monks to their noonday prayers broke the spell and Nagel hurried the men away. Twenty minutes’ later they arrived at a tall, half-timbered tenement with upper storeys that leaned precariously over the street. A large wooden trumpet hung from chains attached to one of the first floor’s overhanging beams and for those who had their letters there was an engraved brass plaque by the door. The plaque declared that this was the place of business of Petrus Alamire, composer, copyist and doctor in the craft of mining. Nagel bundled the men inside.

  The shop’s interior smelled pleasantly of vellum and freshly ground inks. The shelves lining the walls were piled high with scrolled manuscripts and more parchments were pinned to a long string that cut the room in half like a curtain. Thomas glanced at the beautifully illuminated pages that had been hung from the string to dry. With great skill, an artist had decorated each page with exquisite miniatures depicting heraldic beasts, scenes from the bible and other vignettes. There were no words written on the vellum only the strange symbols belonging to the language of musicians.

  There was a curved window to one side of the door and in this bay was a large lectern angled to make the most of the natural light. The lectern hid whoever was seated behind it but Thomas could see the feathery tip of a goose quill dancing above its topmost edge. Nagel coughed politely and a surprised, owl-like face appeared. The face was round and friendly and belonged to a plump man his fifties. He wore a simple black bonnet on his head from which wisps of grey hair escaped like smoke from a draughty inglenook. The man also wore two circles of glass, held together by a wire frame, clamped to his nose. Thomas had heard of t
hese instruments, which could restore sight to a blind man but he had never seen such wizardry.

  “I have returned Master Alamire and I’ve brought the alchemist named Thomas Devilstone as we agreed,” said Nagel with a polite bow. Petrus looked at his guests and beamed with delight.

  “Master Thomas Devilstone, I am delighted to make your acquaintance,” he said in good, if heavily accented, English. “I once had the pleasure of meeting your tutor, tell me is he well?”

  “As far as I know Master Agrippa is still in Geneva,” said Thomas with more than a hint of sadness. He still regretted their bitter parting and at times he missed the wisdom of the great magus.

  “Forgive me, I was forgetting your paths had diverged, he went to the Swiss Cantons while you returned to England where the Tudor usurper and his dastardly cardinal have served you ill but enough of idle gossip. You’re among friends here in Metz and the White Rose is eager to meet you. The Lord Richard feels every moment England groans under the Tudor yoke is like a stroke of the lash to his own back, so come, we will hasten to Haute Pierre without delay,” said Petrus.

  The old man put down his quill and snatched up a cloak. As he wrapped the threadbare cloth around his hunched shoulders, Nagel hustled Thomas and the others outside. Much to their annoyance, the little party had to retrace their steps across the city but, as they walked, Thomas introduced his companions and asked if they could serve as his assistants. Petrus confirmed that the White Rose welcomed any man who could wield a sword and who hated the Tudors.

  De la Pole’s palace lay in the west of the city and occupied a pleasant, open space between the River Moselle and Metz’s citadel. The site had once been home to the Abbey of St Symphorien, a daughter convent of the cathedral, but more than half a century ago the French king’s army had destroyed its cloisters and chapels during a vicious siege. The ruins had been left untouched until the Cathedral Chapter had leased the site to Richard de la Pole.

  It was a condition of the lease that the derelict buildings were restored but instead of a humble monastery, the White Rose had built a palace fit for an exiled king. La Haute Pierre now boasted a wide moat, spanned by a wooden drawbridge, and a high curtain wall complete with turrets and a gatehouse. From the outside, the palace looked like a smaller version of the Tower of London and the sight made Thomas and the others nervous. Having spent many months casting charts and spells to aid a Tudor king, Thomas felt somewhat apprehensive about entering the last stronghold of the House of York. Similarly, after their recent incarceration, Prometheus and Quintana were reluctant to enter another English fortress.

  Even Bos, whose unshakeable belief he was predestined to enter heaven was better protection than any armour, felt unsure of himself. He eyed Haute Pierre’s sentries, who were dressed in the hated black livery, with pure loathing as he remembered the men, women and children cruelly slaughtered by the Black Band during the Frisian Wars. Yet, in spite of their misgivings, each man understood that if the White Rose was victorious, he would reward his most faithful servants with land, wealth and titles. Eventually, the lure of Yorkist gold and Thomas’ promises of future glories were enough to quieten their fears and the four men followed Nagel and Petrus into the palace of La Haute Pierre.

  Beyond the gatehouse was an enormous open courtyard several hundred feet across but instead of a single keep or donjon at the centre there were four square buildings that looked more like rich merchants’ houses than military barracks. Between these buildings and the high curtain wall there were wide swards of grass, each edged with a line of trees along each side. In times of peace, the fine ladies of the court would stroll along these shady avenues whilst minstrels played lutes and their lovers recited poetry but the White Rose was preparing for war, not peace.

  All around the courtyard, groups of sweating men in braies and shirtsleeves were being trained in the use of a variety of weapons. Some were fencing with giant double-handed swords whilst others learned to handle the eight-foot long poleaxes called halberds. On one side of the courtyard, a hundred new recruits were being drilled in the use of even longer pikes and beyond them, twenty arquebusiers were practising with their devilish handguns. As men of war themselves, Thomas and the others had a keen interest in the new firearms so they insisted on stopping to watch the handgunners discharge their weapons.

  After loading their arquebuses with powder and shot, each gunner braced his weapon against his hip and squeezed a serpent shaped lever. The lever pressed a glowing match cord against the touchhole in the gun’s breech, there was a loud hissing sound as the charge of powder took fire and the gun roared into life. A moment later, the courtyard was filled with great clouds of smoke and the wooden post, that served as a target, shattered as a score of iron balls smashed it to splinters. Nagel’s guests looked at the devastation with professional appreciation and asked if they could fire the weapons themselves but Petrus insisted there was no time.

  “Come, we must hurry, the White Rose does not like to be kept waiting,” he said. The musician hurried his guests towards the largest of the courtyard’s four buildings whose façade had been decorated in the fashionable Venetian style. The ground floor boasted an open loggia of rounded arches and Corinthian pillars, the second floor featured balconies with Turkish balustrades and an elaborate Moorish spire topped each lancet window on the highest floor. Between the windows, which had been glazed with expensive Murano glass, the walls were decorated with brightly coloured tiles arranged in geometric patterns.

  Behind the central arch of the loggia, two black-clad sentries stood by a pair of bronze doors decorated with scenes of David, Saul and other biblical kings smiting their enemies. Petrus muttered a few words and the sentries permitted them to enter the richly furnished ante-chamber to La Haute Pierre’s great hall. Once again de la Pole’s preference for lavish luxury over military necessity was in evidence and the visitors marvelled at the rich tapestries that hung from the walls and the oriental rugs, not rushes, which carpeted the polished stone floors.

  “Who says rebellion ne’er doth prosper?” whispered Quintana staring at the luxurious furnishings appreciatively.

  “Truly, the White Rose knows how to live like a king,” agreed Prometheus.

  “Bah, Our Lord teaches that we should not gather treasures on earth where moth and rust doth corrupt,” sniffed Bos.

  “And where thieves break through and steal,” added Prometheus out loud, but in their minds all four men were imagining how victory in battle could lead to such wealth for themselves.

  Their daydreams were interrupted by the arrival of de la Pole’s steward. This tall, thin servant was dressed in the white and mulberry livery of the House of York and he told Petrus that his master had given strict instructions to allow no one into the great hall until he’d finished his supper. Thomas protested that his visit was in answer to the White Rose’s urgent and personal invitation but the steward insisted his master could not be disturbed. After several minutes of fruitless argument, Petrus’ pleas for patience carried the debate and the visitors reluctantly agreed to wait.

  The great hall of Haute Pierre was a large wood-panelled chamber decorated with magnificent frescos depicting Yorkist victories over their Lancastrian and Tudor enemies. The hall could seat more than a hundred and fifty people but Richard de la Pole was dining with just two other men. On his left sat the Bavarian soldier of fortune Georg Langenmantel who was a seasoned veteran of the Black Band and de la Pole’s most trusted lieutenant. On his right sat John Stewart, Duke of Albany and Earl of March. Though Albany was a Scot, with his own claim to the throne of the Stewart kings, he’d been driven into exile by the intrigues of Henry VIII and he had as much reason to hate the Tudors as his host.

  They sat at the high table, at the far end of the hall from the cavernous fireplace and despite the paucity of diners, their meal had been a sumptuous affair. Rare delicacies such as sugared lampreys, spiced larks and roast swan had been eaten off golden plates and the best Burgundian wines had fil
led their jewelled goblets. As a final refinement, the diners did not stab their meat with the points of their daggers, as was the usual German or English custom. Instead, they followed the new Italian practice of placing their food in their mouths with little silver forks.

  In spite of such a rich diet, the forty five year old Richard de la Pole was still slim and athletic. As well as a tall and sturdy frame, the White Rose was blessed with a handsome face, lively brown eyes and a full head of wavy, chestnut coloured hair, which he kept as neatly trimmed as his full, red beard. At first sight, the casual observer might be forgiven for thinking that he and Albany were brothers as the Englishman was barely four years older than the Scot and both princes carried themselves with the same air of regal arrogance common to those with blue blood filling their veins.

  Like his counterpart, Albany wore his auburn coloured hair and beard cut short however his eyes were blue and his mouth was thin, almost cruel, compared to de la Pole’s full and generous lips. The two exiled princes also dressed alike, each favouring the latest French fashion for tightly fitting, striped silk doublets decorated with pearls and embellished with baggy slashed sleeves. Albany had arrived at Haute Pierre exactly six months after de la Pole’s visit to the king of France and besides an entourage of fifty Scots men-at-arms, he’d brought letters from Francis asking the Yorkist prince to accept the Scottish duke as the French King’s ambassador.

  The White Rose had no objection to Albany’s appointment but he was angered by Francis’ insistence that the Scot should be given full details of his invasion plans as well as command of any French forces sent to aid a Yorkist restoration. No doubt the French king hoped that their mutual loathing for the Welsh Tudors would reconcile these hereditary enemies, and France would win two allies for the price of a single army, but this reasoned logic did nothing to soothe de la Pole’s sense of irritation. Francis’ letter had made him feel like a wife ordered to take her husband’s mistress as her maid and Albany’s proud and condescending manner did nothing to help the situation.