by Andy Duncan
I flung a pebble into the far corner of the rooftop, hoping it would make a noise loud enough to draw their attention. I suppose it landed. If so, it made not a sound.
One guard began walking the battlement toward me. His attention was directed outward, however. Sitting with my back to the inner wall, willing myself to disappear into the shadow, I watched him stroll into view. He stopped, still with his back to me, and stared downstream. A few steps, and he’d all but trip over the pike, and More’s head.
I risked a glance behind me. One guard was picking his teeth, another leaning on his elbows, both looking across Southwark.
I stood and crossed silently to my guard, swinging the bag with the not-More head. It clouted the guard at the base of the skull. As he dropped, I kicked him between the shoulder blades, and he toppled over the wall. I dived for cover again. Only someone who was listening for it, as I was, would have noticed the splash, far below.
The two remaining guards continued their murmurous conversation on the far side of the platform. I rolled into a crouch, looked over the crenellated wall that sheltered the stairs. My new friends were standing just barely within the torchlight of a taper on the far wall. They stood side by side facing the city, overlooking the rooftops that lined the bridge below. I wished them to separate, willed them to do so, but my will failed. There they would stand, barely a man’s width between them, until they registered their companion had not rejoined them, whereupon they would seek and, not finding, sound an alarm. How to separate them sooner?
Water, moaned a voice at my feet.
You scarce will believe, ye who read this letter, that I did not spring backward, though my leg muscles spasmed in that desire; my overriding desire, to produce no noise whatsoever, saved me, I think. I only hopped, once, silently landing in place with my feet planted a bit farther apart, to either side of the lump of darkness I knew to be More’s head. I did not cry out. I did not breathe. I only stared down at the darkness between my feet, desperate to resolve a shape that began to move, to rock to and fro, like an inverted turtle, until it tipped and rolled to a stop against my left boot, its staring eyes reflecting the moon as its only movable limb, its long adderlike tongue, probed the air. Of course, I thought with insane clarity, that’s how he could roll over. Face down, he pushed away the stone floor with his tongue.
Water, More repeated, more loudly this time.
The guards! They would hear!
With no more thought than this—nay, with no thought at all—still on the keen iron edge of terror, and preferring to be anywhere but against that More-head, I stood and strode forward, fast, noiseless, toward the two guards, who marvelously yet had heard nothing, still had their backs to me. In mid-stride, slacking neither my pace nor my direction, I returned the favor, turned my back to them, walked backward until their faces came into view and my shoulder blades thumped against the wall between them.
“Wha?” said the one on my right.
I smashed the heels of both hands into the guards’ noses. As they fell backward I fell forward atop them, rode them down to the floor and crushed their faces with all my weight, my arms locked in place like bars. Out of respect, I did not watch. Instead I looked to the stars, found Ophiuchus beset, the writhing serpent-head and serpent-tail to either side, and the scorpion beneath his feet. The guards made scarcely any noise, only a grunt or two and one gurgle, as a gentlewoman’s stomach might have done, and yet after they died, as I relaxed and flexed my cramping arms, the tower was quieter still. I saw the guttering taper, the flailing flags, but their sounds did not register. As I re-crossed the platform in search of More (his eyes! his tongue!), I moved in a silence like that of a dream, or of a daze from a clout on the head. I heard only the blood and snot and eyestuff pattering from my hands, which I held away from my body as if to distance myself from what I’d done.
I had killed before—had, indeed, likely killed the first guard, not five minutes earlier—and I have killed since, but my work atop Stone Gate that night, and as I left that accursed tower, was of another order. I blamed More, at the time. Whatever animated his head, I felt, was animating me. My body would ache for a fortnight.
I rounded the wall. More’s head was gone. No—it was there, nose wedged into the join of wall and floor. But surely I had left it over there, beside the pike?
Water, said More’s head.
Loath as I was to touch the damned thing (abomination! impossibility!), I wanted nothing from life, at that moment, but to heave More over the parapet, give him all the water he could drink, and to cast myself in after him. Perhaps I should have done those things, or one of them.
“Hush!” I said.
When would the next guards come on duty? When would the absence of tramping footfalls overhead be noticed? What signals, what duties, would be missed? I worked quickly. Ignoring More, I freed not-More from his sack, with some effort—I had to shake it, my assault on the first guard having got head and fabric somewhat intermingled—and it finally rolled onto the floor with a deep groan that made me yelp in horror. But ’twas only More again, complaining. I jammed the pike into not-More’s neck, working it in deeper than necessary, wishing it were More. I hoisted the pike with effort, the head now even heavier at the weighted end of a pole, and set the hilt into place with the first sense of relief I had felt in an hour. I stepped back, snatched up the taper, and held it high, to check my handiwork. As he flickered into view, not-More sagged sideways, and I was sure for a moment that its savaged flesh would tear away and drop it into the Thames—but it held, and I foolishly continued to hold aloft the light, in a terrible elation, until a voice from below cried:
“Ho! What’s the matter up there? Who’s light?”
“No matter,” I cried, even as I returned the taper to its sconce—too late. I heard behind me, from the outer wall, a scrape like nails against flint.
“What’s this?” said the same voice—no longer loudly, but half to himself, in a sort of wonder, yet distinct for all that. I looked at my grappling hook as it twitched, flexed, skittered sideways, like a crab in lantern-light. He who had yanked it bellowed, “Intruder! Ho, the tower! Hoy!”
I snatched up More. He tried to bite me, the wretch, as I shoved him into my sack. To fling the hook over the wall was the work of a moment. With my snarling burden I strode away from my ruined lifeline, to the head of the wooden stairs, saw no one, and sprinted down, three planks at a time.
I found myself in a narrow stone chamber, barely wider than the flight of stairs. Beneath the stairs were casks and crates, but no guard, and no doors either. The only door faced me, a stone archway that framed a landing and a more substantial set of stone steps headed down. I had just reached the top when I heard a roaring and pounding from below, as if a cohort were charging, and torchlight flared and brightened ’gainst the stone wall visible at the curve.
I dropped my More sack—he squeaked as he hit the floor—and looked about, gauged my position. Above, in the open air, I would gain room to work, but so would they. Here was better. I stepped back three paces, positioned myself, and waited, as that fell force rose within me.
The leader of the party gained the stone landing but stopped at sight of me. I wonder what he saw. I stood unarmed, hands and sleeves besmirched with gore, a twitching sack at my feet. I know that I smiled. But what more did he see? Whatever it was, it stopped him like a barred gate, and the others clustered behind. Five total. One axe; three swords; the fifth, a torch in one hand and a rapier in the other. Fine.
“Which of you,” I asked, “is the youngest?”
They said nothing, but two in the back glanced at the torchbearer, a beardless boy. They all looked wary, but he, terrified.
Their leader looked me up and down. “Who the fuck are you,” he snarled, “to question us?”
I smiled even wider. “I’m the ratcatcher,” I said, and sprang.
Afterward, I rose
from my work on the floor and faced the one I’d left standing. The boy’s quaking face was red with blood not his own. His shaking torch cast shadows that rocked the room. He choked back something, and dropped his weapon with a clang. He kept the torch, though. He was a dark-eyed, lovely boy. I have never been partial to boys.
“Your job,” I said, “is to run below, and tell the others.”
His jaw worked, his throat pulsed. He made no sound.
“That I am coming,” I said.
Still he stood, trembling. The room filled with a smell harsher even than blood, and a puddle spread at the boy’s boot.
Christ, cried More, muffled by sacking. Christ!
I took one step toward the boy, pursed my lips, and blew air into his face.
With a wail, he leapt into the stairwell, somehow kept his footing, and ran downstairs screaming, just ahead of me. Still he held on to the torch. O dutiful boy! Excellent boy! More clamped beneath one arm, my way lighted by the now much older once-boy, I ran in a downward stone spiral, around and down, around and down, past windows of increasing size, around and down, deeper into the swirling river-stench, until I reached a window just large enough, and vaulted through, knowing not whether I was over roofs or over water but hoping I was low enough. I was over water, and low enough. I plunged beneath the surface and sank, afire with sudden cold but glad of the respite from the smell. As I dropped ever deeper, my cheek was brushed by what may have been a kicking rat, my shoulder bumped by what may have been a spiraling turd, my chest gnawed by what was certainly the struggling head of my lady’s father, biting at my heart as we descended into the dark peace below London. Ay, low enough!
I dared not return to my inn, in my bedraggled state, with my unpredictible charge. Instead I repaired to a haven I had noted earlier—a nearby plague-house, marked by a bundle of straw on a pole extending from an upper window, and a foot-high cross slapped on the door in red paint. Local gossip said the surviving family members had long decamped, and the neighbors dared not set foot in the place. From the adjoining rooftop, I gained entrance to the house via its upper storey. I made fast the shutters, risked a single lighted candle, and gnawed the bread, cheese, and onion I had stowed there before my assault on the Gateway. Then, somehow, I slept.
I was awakened by More.
Where is the light?
Be silent, I said. The candle is beside you. Look.
I pulled the bedraggled thing from the sack, set it on the table. His neck looked to have been cut clean, but at an angle. The head listed to the right, as if cocked to hear a confidence. The skin puckered on that side, beneath More’s weight.
Where is the light? Ay, am I damned? Am I such a sinner as that?
I cannot say, I told him. But you must be quiet, in any case.
God knows, I am no heretic, said More. I sought out heretics. I had them killed. They put God’s word in the English tongue, in the mouths of fishwives. They rejected the Apostle of Rome. They were protestants to God. I was Lord High Chancellor, but I served the Lord who was higher still. They were as bad as Luther, and Luther is the shit-pool of all shit.
Were they beheaded, too? I asked.
No, burned, said the head. Purified in the flames, and delivered shriven unto God. It was all I could do for them, poor misguided devils. I hope soon to clasp their hands, my prodigal brothers. And yet.
Yes, I asked.
Where is the light?
I turned the head to face the candle, my fingers sinking into his temple as into a soft pear. This made the lace atop the table twist into a gyre; it was intimate with More’s neck now.
More moaned. Where is the light? Ah, Christ my Savior, what is this place?
I believe it’s an apothecary’s, I said. We are upstairs.
But where?
London, I said, mere rods from the Stone Gate. You’ve not gone far.
Ah, Christ, I smell it! The Thames!
You’ll not smell it long. I’ll deliver you to your daughter.
My daughter? Where is she? What business have you with my Meg?
She tasked me with an errand, I said. With the delivery of your head.
He emitted a wail, like a cat that is trod upon.
Ah, you wretch! you cullion! you ass-spreading ingle! You are a worse shit even than Luther. Meg wanted only my head, but you! Pestiferous, stew-dwelling, punk-eating maltworm! You have stolen my soul!
Hush, man. I have only your head. I know naught of your soul.
He wailed the louder, though his lips were closed. I seized his screaming skull two-handed, wrenched at the jaw until, with a tearing sound, it opened a space. I snatched up an onion, wedged it into the opening. The wailing continued. I seized the candlestick, toppling the candle, and smashed the head with the base. I saw only that I had opened a savage dent, as the flame toppled into my wine and went out, leaving me in the dark with this howling dead thing. In despair, I cried:
Shut up! For Meg’s sake, shut up!
Meg, it said. Meg. And said no more.
At the time arranged, I stood ’midst the merrymakers on the Bank, on the lip of a bear-pit, a laden pouch slung over my shoulder. The bear below was a sleepy-looking fellow that lumbered in circles along the earthen wall and swatted at the refuse hurled down. Its bristly collar was all a-point with spikes. These did little to allay the general impression of boredom. The criers’ voices were hoarse and listless, even as they insulted one another and their customers.
“Ale and elderberries!”
“Sweetmeats!”
“Flawn!”
“Here, this Florentine you just sold me—it’s all fat in the middle!”
“Well, it suits you then! Out of my way. Florentines!”
Likely customers ogled an oyster-wench’s ample bosom and, secondarily, the tray of shellfish her teats partially shaded. A gatherer outside a theatre collected admissions, one clank at a time, in a glazed money-box. At his waist swung the hammer that at day’s end would smash open the profit—or the head of any coxcomb who tried to relieve him of it.
“Suckets, Milord?”
“No, no,” I said, waving her past.
Suckets, said More.
She showed no sign of hearing it, but I stepped away, pressing the pouch closer ’neath my elbow. Suckets, More repeated. Through my sleeve and the fabric of the pouch, I felt something bite at my arm.
“Any ginger-bread?” asked another.
“Alas, no, but some lovely marchpane, me sister’s known for it. Melts on your tongue, it does.”
“Just like your sister!” Much laughter.
“It’s yer fat stewed prune I wants in me mouth, love, if it’s not been sucked off by now!” Even more laughter. The bear rumbled and farted, and the air above his pit fairly shimmered with the stink.
Damn you! I cannot eat! cried More. And yet I starve!
His was louder than any voice in the crowd, and yet no one reacted. So I did not react, either.
“Oh, you squirtings! Weasel-beak! Get on with your saucy selves. Ah, there’s a love,” said the hag, curseying to a gentlemen whose brocaded back was to me. “I thank you, sir.”
“Away with you, then,” he said, turning: William Roper, and alone in the crowd. He met my eye and cocked his head toward the street, then turned and walked away. I followed him across the thoroughfare, his feathered cap my guide through the throng. I followed him into an alley and around a stack of barrels. Madame stood there, her face streaked with tears. She twisted a bit of cloth in her fingers.
Meg, said More.
“It’s you!” she said, and took a wild-eyed step toward me—but stopped herself, and so did not rush to me, lay hands upon me, embrace me. “So William was right after all,” she said, more calmly. “I was sure you were seized, or dead.”
Meg! Ah, Meg! Finish me!
To the horrid v
oice in my pouch, she reacted not at all.
I bowed low. “Alive, and free to serve Madame,” I said.
“Free.” She looked all about, at an overhang of verminous thatch above, at a puddle of piss below, at the leaden sky and the barrel-staves, at everything but me and my noisy pouch.
I glanced at her husband, who gave me only the smallest shake of his head in reply.
“Here, Madame,” I said, and gestured at the pouch that swung heavily at my side, still wailing and moaning.
Drown me in the river, Meg! I am your father! Burn me in a pyre! Meg, you silly bitch, listen! Meg!
Madame made as if to reach for the flap, then snatched back her hand with such haste I heard it slap against the front of her dress.
Looking neither at him nor at me, she said, flatly, “William.”
Roper, sparing me a cold glance, stepped forward and lifted a corner of the flap a few inches. The moment he lifted it, More’s puling ceased.
“Why, ’tis not him,” Roper said.
“You lie, sir,” I said.
Roper’s face twisted in anger. “Dare you speak so?”
Madame looked faint. “What wrong have I done thee to warrant such cruelty?”
Roper and I spoke at once.
“Madame, please.”
“Silence, dog!”
“See for yourself.”
“Meg, let’s away.”
“I will see,” she said, silencing us. She lifted the flap, looked in, and breathed, “Oh.”
As I watched her face, her features seemed to smooth. The lines of care and middle years filled in like canals. Her eyes shone.
“That such a small vessel,” she murmured, “could contain such a great head.”
“Meg! You are mistaken, surely.”
“No. Look, William. Do you not see the mole upon his cheek, the cleft in his chin? As a girl I tried to hide flower-petals in there.”