Son of the Night

by Mark Alder

  Philippa passed her hand over the stack of counters she had made, scattering them across the board.

  Did she really mean . . .? Her face looked wan.

  Well, a country’s line could not be given over to devils. That was an inversion of an order set by God. Devils were servants, monstrosities created to torment the monstrous, the damned souls of Hell. The Black Prince was a formidable enemy, the fiery and reckless John of Gaunt the next in line to the throne. It would be good to have the English side of the family at each other’s throats – honourable to rid the world of a usurping devil. It would be insupportable, as a guest of the prince, to kill him. But only if he were truly a prince and not something sent from Hell. To kill a prince on a battlefield was one thing. To intrigue and cast sorcery against him quite another.

  ‘Your other children—’ he said.

  ‘There is no doubt about them.’

  Eu picked up a counter and studied it in the firelight.

  ‘All right. But I beg you write to your brother and have him remove La Cerda from my lands. You won’t get your ransom any other way.’

  “I will do it. I swear.’

  ‘Then I will write to Navarre. He is suspected as he grows. He is intelligent and ambitious but he is close to the prince. He will be able to find Osbert.’

  ‘Good. That is the holy sword Joyeuse, is it not?’

  ‘Yes.’ Eu was, of course, allowed his weapon at court as no noble of the blood would ever use it against his captors. Such would be a disgrace.

  ‘Then let us use its power.’

  ‘If God grants it to be so.’

  ‘If God grants it.’

  The two knelt together and Eu put the naked sword on the floor before them.

  Philippa spoke :

  ‘By this blessed sword that Thou hast ordained as the scourge of all wickedness, which is the protector of the Church, of widows and orphans against the works of evil, which is the terror and dread of all wickedness in both attack and defence, hear our prayer. Let Thy ears be attentive to the depths of our beseeching, Lord. Royal virtue, joy of the mind, recall the anguish and sorrow Thou didst endure at the approach of death, when filled with bitterness, insulted, and outraged. Thou didst cry out in a loud voice that Thou wert abandoned by Thy Father, saying: “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken me?” By this anguish, I beg of Thee, not to abandon us in our anguish, O Lord God. Amen. Set our anguish at an end and light us the path Thou wouldst have us tread.’

  The sword shone its holy blue light and the two remained kneeling for a long time. A cry of ‘Goodness!’ and Philippa for an instant thought God had spoken – but it was not God, just the old lady-in-waiting, stirring from her sleep.

  She sat up, tears streaming down her face.

  ‘Forgive me, My Lady, My Lord, forgive me.’

  ‘What is it, Goedelle?’

  ‘I have an awful dream,’ she said, ‘an awful dream.’

  ‘What dream ?’

  ‘I was in church, but no church I have ever known and you were beside me, My Lady. The window was all broken in, all smashed, but a horrible man like a devil was rebuilding it. And he had in his hand a piece of the glass and he gave it to you, Lady, saying blessings on you and telling you God wanted you to have it.’

  She crossed herself.

  ‘And then the window was nearly mended and in it shone an angel in the shape of a knight, all colours of the rainbow. Only one piece remained and the man, the evil little man, said, “Finish the window, as God intends,” and you put in the piece of the window and the angel spoke. Lady, I fear to say what it said.’

  ‘Speak, Goedelle, tell me.’

  ‘It said that it had come to wipe away your son and all your line. It said he was cursed of God.’

  Philippa went to Goedelle and hugged her.

  ‘Just a dream. Just a dream.’ Then she turned to Eu. ‘Find this man Osbert. Something must be done.’

  18

  ‘The letter.’ Charles of Navarre extended his hand to the messenger. ‘You were not easy to find, sir,’ said the young squire. ‘The letter came to Champagne and I had the honour—’

  ‘Get out!’ The man stank. Everyone stank nowadays, Charles was finding. He took out a handkerchief dabbed with perfume and breathed in the deep, spicy smell.

  The man bowed and retreated from the room. It was a day room beneath the keep that looked out on a grey moor beneath a grey Norman sky. Well, this was the nearest he could be to Paris and be safe. And Normandy, though another country, was safe so far. His banners flew there in a blustery breeze alongside those of the Norman lords. They had courted him a little since he had come to his Norman lands – his by ancestral right. His nobles knew which side their bread was buttered. Philip was old, John an idiot. Difficult to know who to ally with when the old king died. Charles and his mother, with their solid claim to the French throne, were a good outside bet for those lords who Paris held in contempt anyway. Well, one part of Paris, the occasional Paris that sometimes held the itinerant court. Another side might welcome them more.

  Before him stood a ridiculously dressed man, all brocade and swirls of a sort no merchant should be able to afford, let alone dare to wear. This was Etienne Marcel, clothier, the head of the so called ‘Third Estate’ of Paris, part of the legislative assembly that advised Prince Philip, for all the notice he took. Charles indulged the outrageousness and pretended to lend a sympathetic ear to the merchant classes, for who knew what the future might bring?

  Other nobles were right to look down on such men, but not clever to dismiss them. He recognised their energy, their usefulness, even their power. And Philip was ignoring the estates, dismissing their problems. The country was racked by English ‘routiers’, rogue bands of men and devils who stalked the countryside, burning and killing wherever they went. The men were their own masters, the English king having no command or use for them, though disdaining to do anything to stop their plundering ways. ‘Why will he not ban devils from his realm?’ said the clothier. ‘Too much use for them,’ said Charles. ‘He wants devils in his own court. He thinks of his own needs, not those of his people.

  I am different. Let me lend you two hundred men to help protect your trade.’

  It was a gesture – some of the routier bands were three times that number each – but it was more than Philip seemed willing to commit. Since Crécy he had been paralysed, torn by indecision, advised by idiots. His nobles would not come to his command any more, particularly since he had mustered them to fight the English at Calais and turned back with a fit of the collywobbles at the neck of the marshes. His lords had gone home without drawing a sword, or getting a penny in recompense for the expense of the journey. ‘My dear Marcel,’ said Charles, ‘would you now excuse us. I have family business to attend to. Do walk in our gardens here and it would be my delight to entertain you at dinner.’

  ‘You are too kind.’ Marcel bowed deeply.

  Charles smiled. ‘I am a prince for all men.’

  Marcel left, one or two stupidly attired flunkies following him out. ‘I don’t know why you deal with those people,’ said his mother when the merchant was gone. ‘They are parasites, neither labouring nor fighting and most of them not even praying. Men of no honour or worth. A drain on the kingdom.’

  Charles shrugged. ‘I am a friend to all.’

  There were more powers in France now than the nobility acknowledged. The low men had risen up for Lucifer and secured Calais, or a good bit of it. Merchants, thought Charles, might one day be a power to themselves, and so were at least worth trying to understand, or even cultivate.

  ‘Pass the letter to me, son,’ said Queen Joan. She dipped a little stick into a tiny bottle she held in her hand and dabbed it at her eye. Belladonna, to make the pupils grow larger and therefore to make the person seem more attractive. She blinked heavily. ‘They have cut this with perfume. I’m not sure it altogether works.’

  ‘You are thinking of entertaining, Mother?’

 
‘No.’ She blinked. ‘Just trying this out. A present from ladies of the court.’

  Charles opened the letter, resting it on the great tawny cat on his lap.

  ‘It’s in code,’ he said.

  ‘Let me see.’

  She put her bottle to one side and came over to him. He gave her the letter begrudgingly. Always poking her nose in, that woman. ‘It’s the cypher of Champagne,’ she said. ‘Our ancestral lands.’

  ‘Is it safe?’

  ‘Not very – but it’s something we share, or used to share, with the Count of Eu.’

  ‘It’s from him? In England?’

  ‘That’s his seal.’

  ‘And ?’

  ‘His land has been taken over by the rogue La Cerda.’

  ‘I hear of that man more often than I hear the bells of the hours.’ And that in Normandy. My God, were Charles in Paris his ears would no doubt be ringing with that detested name. ‘Eu says Prince John must be separated from false friends.’

  ‘That’d leave him rather lonely. He has a point, though, doesn’t he? I’ve always liked the count of Eu.’

  ‘We were once neighbours when we possessed our lands in Champagne. Before the Valois bastards robbed us.’

  ‘Has he many friends?’

  ‘Very many. The lords here love him more than they do us.

  As constable he has settled their differences well and favourably.’

  ‘Interesting,’ said Charles. ‘He could be a useful ally.’

  ‘Undoubtedly. And, by luck, he wants a favour.’

  ‘Yes ?’

  ‘You know the sorcerer of the court? Osbert the Mage.’

  ‘I know he threw poison in my face at Crécy.’

  ‘No time to bear grudges,’ said Joan. ‘Or rather, small ones. The man is useful to us now. Eu wants him in England.’

  ‘For what purpose?’

  ‘To aid Queen Philippa.’

  ‘No one knows where he is. But tell him we will find him.

  Though, if I do find him I will tear out his throat.’

  ‘Do not harm a useful man.’

  ‘He burnt my face,’ said Charles, as if that trumped all arguments. He surveyed the snapping chains of his banners. ‘ There is a cold wind blowing on the Valois if we make alliance with England.’

  ‘She is Valois.’

  ‘The Valois who have treated us so basely, not her side of the family. With him on our side . . . With the English on our side . . . Oh, Mother, war is a marvellous thing for the ways it opens, the new friends it finds. We could reclaim our birthright.’ His mother put her hand on his shoulder.

  ‘Do not dream it. The angel said you would never be king of France.’ Charles’s cat’s eyes betrayed no emotion. ‘Yes, mother, but as I have grown I have come to see there is one thing the angel overlooked.’

  ‘What is that, son?’

  ‘I disagree with it.’

  Charles sat down. For a moment he seemed like the child he was, swinging his legs from the tall chair.

  ‘I have pondered hard on what the angel said, and on my devil father. It means half my nature is base. Half is that of a servant, a mere jailer.’

  ‘The baser blood is overwhelmed by the royal,’ said his mother.

  ‘You are wholly my son, my heir.’

  ‘It is in a devil’s nature to defer to royalty, to bow and be cowed. Why not in mine?’

  ‘As one plant is grafted to another to strengthen it, the weak qualities of both disappearing, so you are made.’

  ‘So I am stronger than a king?’

  ‘The angel at Pamplona has acknowledged you. You do God’s work, son, nothing could be clearer.’

  ‘I do. I am a king, therefore my work is God’s work. He has favoured me. I am marvellous agile, dainty on my feet, strong and fast, so much cleverer than any crowned head of Europe, an Aristotle among asses.’

  ‘You are.’

  ‘So how do I gain the power I seek? Isabella overthrew a king.

  She would know. Can you not use Isabella’s magic? She used spells to turn herself into a powerful seductress. We could seduce La Cerda. How good it would be to use him.’

  ‘It would not be possible.’

  ‘Why not ?’

  ‘My son, do you not see? A man who has the strength to overthrow kings, to become a king, has the strength to resist all but the strongest enchantment.’

  ‘So why don’t we use the strongest enchantment? Why stop at La Cerda? Why not enchant Prince John and have La Cerda killed?’

  ‘I have no idea how such a magic might be made.’

  ‘But Aunt Isabella might. I will write to her for advice.’

  ‘You would not want to go through with what she would recommend.’

  They sat for a while, Charles looking at the letter, too proud to ask her what it said. Eventually, he said what was on his mind. ‘The Valois cannot be allowed to reign for ever, Mother. You have raised me to think of nothing else.’

  ‘And so I have.’

  ‘Pay Eu’s ransom,’ he said.

  ‘It’s a fortune. We hardly have that much money.’

  ‘You told me we were rich.’

  ‘Not that rich. Edward’s demands are outrageous. He doesn’t want Eu back – he respects him too much and fears his cunning.

  Philip is an easier opponent without him.’

  ‘Have I been lied to, Mother? He wants only 120,000 florins.’

  ‘That is too great. It would leave us penniless.’

  ‘We will reap the rewards. Philip would be sure to welcome us back for delivering his fine captain to him. Eu would be in our debt. We could attach conditions to his return to assure that.’

  ‘Nothing can be assured. Instead of La Cerda in your way you have Eu.’

  ‘But if Eu could be made to promise to recommend us for the constableship – or to give it away. He is a man of his word and very influential with the king.’

  ‘You are dreaming, son.’

  Charles blinked, his pink tongue flicking at his ivory teeth. ‘My will, as king, is that we do this.’

  ‘And mine as regent is that we do not.’

  ‘We play for the highest stakes now, Mother. With Eu home, La Cerda’s time will be harder and we may come back to favour with Prince John. Think what riches we will reap then. He must soon be king. And the count of Eu cannot live for ever.’

  ‘I won’t wager the family’s fortunes on the whims of that idiot John. Son, you must think bigger. This is not about countries or who is and is not the king. It is what the Valois took from us when they forced my husband to swear fealty to them as kings.

  Remember, you swore calumny on all of France.’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘So forget intriguing with Eu. England must be our friend now.

  Let us invite them to Normandy. Let them no longer be bottled in Calais, but free to cause what havoc they may. Or, if the game plays differently, let us betray them to Philip.’

  ‘You have a safe cypher?’

  ‘The safest,’ she said. ‘I have a subtle ink indeed, made of tiny devils. Write what you will, but as you are a king and they respect your wishes, then a word and they vanish.’

  ‘Show me.’

  She went to her table and picked up a bottle, elaborately worked in a net of silver.

  Charles took it and opened it. Inside a black shiny mass of tiny bodies writhed, each finer than a hair.

  ‘These are devils?’

  ‘They are. Left by Hugh Despenser at the Temple when he went to Crécy to die. Write to the English. To the Black Prince, if you will – he is incautious. We will ally with them and bring them here.’ Charles took the bottle to a table, cut a feather into a nib and dipped it in.

  ‘Charles,’ he wrote in a blotchy hand on the table. It looked exactly like ordinary ink.

  ‘Tell it to be gone,’ said his mother.

  ‘Be gone,’ he said.

  The ink was suddenly a mass of tiny writhing bodies that slithered back into
the bottle.

  ‘This is marvellous safe, Mother.’ He would write to Edward for sure but he would also, he thought, write to his aunt Isabella and to Eu. There was more than one path to power in France and he would see which one opened before deciding to tread it.

  19

  For three days the king struggled, and Dow struggled to control their men. By the 4 August, what could be looted had been looted, who could be raped had been raped, and the men were too drunk or too hungover for any more slaughter.

  ‘We will go to every door,’ said Dow to Montagu. ‘We will reclaim what has been stolen and we will distribute to every man and woman exactly what they need. The rest of the money will be used to rebuild the town, our Eden.’

  ‘You will provoke a riot,’ said Montagu. ‘Better to let what is be. The worst offences can be dealt with later.’

  ‘We’ll deal with them now. We will take them one at a time. Men who imagine themselves separate from others are weak. Come for one, and come by name – the others will think themselves safe. Only when we have dealt with the worst of them will the rest realise we mean to come for them too. They will hand over their gold.’

  It felt as though there were a ferret gnawing at his guts; his hands trembled and his tongue was dry. Everything undone. Well, he would have to remake it. If that meant blood, it meant blood. As a temporary measure.

  He had established a court in the guildhall and surrounded himself with Luciferian zealots – his own Cornish people. Cornwall had kept the light of Lucifer burning in even the darkest time. These men had lived as bandits on the moors for years, sharing everything, no thought of one man putting himself above another. They had no leader, though they recognised the wise from the foolish and they were bound by a common language. Come for one of them and you come for them all.

  The guildhall seemed the best place for the trials. When you have killed a man for laughing at you, then it is easier to kill those who commit more grievous sins.

  The first in was Thomas, a wrecker from Hull. He had killed four in a family of tanners – all but the mother, who he had raped on the corpses. He had become drunk and boasted about it to some men of Cornwall. They had brought him to the hall.