‘She must have been held up,’ Julius said. He looked at Nicholas. ‘She hasn’t been well. She ought to be with the nuns.’
‘I didn’t know she hadn’t been well,’ Kathi said. ‘I think she’s wonderful for her age. Mick Crackbene thinks the same. Did I tell you about all the papers they found, from Eccles and Coldingham?’
‘Come on, you’re drunk,’ Nicholas said. After the first second, it was just like his usual voice. She wasn’t drunk, and he knew it.
Julius said, ‘Wait a moment. Tell me more. Juicy scandal?’ He wasn’t nearly such a good actor.
‘You’d need to ask Mick or the Prioress. I don’t remember the details. It was all in the papers. Julius? Is my kerchief over there?’
‘Where are the papers?’ Julius said. ‘Your kerchief? No.’
‘I left it somewhere,’ Kathi said. ‘Try the top drawer.’
She looked up as she said it. Nicholas was standing quite still. Then he looked down and met her eyes.
Julius said, ‘The drawer’s empty. Look, take mine. So where are these papers?’
Beside her, Nicholas let out a long, slow breath. Kathi said, ‘No, it’s all right: My kerchief’s here after all. The papers? Goodness, they burned them. Far too juicy, as you said.’
‘Burned them?’ Julius said. ‘Burned a conventual record of births? They’ll excommunicate the lady.’ He had begun by smiling, and then had ceased to smile, although his voice was still rallying.
‘Is that what they were?’ Kathi said. ‘You’d better report it to the Cistercians, or Bishop Prospero. Although he isn’t very reliable either. He wanted to bring you your Bologna papers, but someone else had got rid of those, too. It’s mysterious, isn’t it? It’s like Nicholas, really. Without records, people just don’t exist. And if they don’t exist, they can’t claim anything.’
‘What is she talking about?’ Julius said.
Nicholas lowered the back of his hand to her neck, and let it rest there, half curled, as if in gentle admonishment. His eyes had changed to the look that was hers, mixed with other things. Understanding. Compassion. He said, ‘She is rather drunk. What do you think she is saying?’
‘I don’t know. I think we’d better all go,’ Julius said.
Nicholas didn’t move. He had given her the initiative. It was the greatest gift he had ever given her. Kathi said, ‘I was talking about identity. And the habit of killing. All those hunting mishaps in Poland. The dove in the church—do you remember? Ludovico da Bologna had his doubts about that. Do you think he removed the papers at Bologna? Or was it even Bessarion?’
Although an educated man, Julius had never been excessively quick. He was just coming to realise what she was telling him. He had not yet fully grasped what he was being told about Nicholas. He said, ‘Poland! I’ll tell you what I remember about Poland. I recall lying between life and death because that fool tried to kill me.’ He flung himself down in Dame Euphemia’s chair with an angry half-laugh. ‘What is all this?’
Nicholas said suddenly, ‘That was true. I did try to kill you. Most of the time, though, it wasn’t worth while. Avoiding you was a game. I didn’t mind, or not much. But sometimes, you and Adelina together were insufferable. Did you tell her, before you killed her, that you always knew who she was? Just as I’m telling you now?’
He had come into the open. Avoiding you was a game. He would know that Julius would never stand for that. At last, at last, Nicholas was compelling Julius to confront him. And before someone else. Before her, a witness.
It was no time to be morbidly thankful. It was time to attack, even with guesses. Kathi said, ‘And the fight in the High Street, the other day, Nicholas. You knew Julius had tried to kill Simon before, and that he had hounded his sister to death. But you didn’t denounce him before, and you didn’t then, even though you had just carried Simon and Henry to Kelso. You had just come from Kelso, and yet you didn’t call him to account! Why? What excuse could you possibly have?’
She waited. When he answered her, he didn’t look at her at all, and the answer wasn’t for her. ‘I had made a promise,’ Nicholas said. ‘To someone who was trying to spare me, she thought, from a lifetime of conflict. I was also arrogant enough to think that I could lead him away from it. But he couldn’t leave it alone: it was too exciting. Wasn’t that the way of it, Julius?’
‘What are you saying?’ said Julius.
Nicholas said, ‘What Kathi knows. What everyone will now get to know. That you and I are second cousins. That you have been trying to extinguish my family, and I have done nothing about it. Until now.’
Julius frowned. He had flushed with surprise and resentment. He said with open belligerence, ‘No one will get to know unless you two leave the room.’
Kathi said, ‘Open the second drawer. That’s the outer cover of a note Nicholas left when he walked out to surrender to Purves. The letter names you. I found it, and I’ve given it to everybody.’ She fixed him with a cold, hazel eye. She had had no chance to give it to anyone. It was stuck in the cuff of her sleeve. She prayed that he couldn’t see it.
Julius’s face never changed very much. He stood, looking angry and peevish, and then said, ‘You just said: it was a game. So we stop. You keep your promise. I’ll go away.’
Rigid, she waited. The hand at her neck turned, and smoothed her shoulder, and dropped. Then Nicholas said, ‘No. Kathi will leave, and you and I will conclude this between us.’
‘She’ll bring help,’ Julius said. But his eyes gleamed.
Nicholas turned. ‘Will you?’ he said.
‘No,’ said Kathi. ‘If something is worth buying, it is worth the fullest extent of its price.’ Then she said, ‘But his arm?’
‘If he can lay hands on a bow, he can manage a sword,’ Nicholas said. He looked at her, and she left, to go to her children.
OUTSIDE, IN THE rest of St Mary’s, an army of four hundred picked men were brought in from the cold and settled under the roofs of the huddled buildings and halls of the Priory. They came from Edinburgh and its surroundings, and represented all the great families loyal to the King, and owing friendship to Anselm Adorne and his companion who, together with a Genoese bishop, had offered their lives on the King’s business, and whom (they had heard) a renegade troop proposed to attack. They arrived in time to catch the brutes on the run, and pursued and cut down more than a few, before their leaders called the hunt off. Then, turning back to the Priory, the men from Edinburgh had learned for the first time of the death of Cortachy, and how it had been done. At that, their wrath had been so great that Huntly had had to use threats and brute force to prevent them from issuing all over again to chase and kill the whole band. Cold anger was better than hot, and would help make the most of this weapon that Albany’s rash friends had provided. Time enough for retribution after that.
Meanwhile, silent and sobered, the Sinclairs and Prestons, the Arbuthnotts and Gordons and Ogilvies, the sea captains and merchants and the burgesses found themselves quarters for what was left of the night, and the seven men from the Floory Land went to seek Nicholas, and found Jordan and Crackbene. Soon, they were installed in the single big day-room with pallets. Nicholas, it seemed, had gone to do something, and Julius and Kathi had disappeared.
Tobie said, ‘They’ll be in the chapel.’ They had been carrying the dead there, with Camulio’s help. Huntly had given his own cloak to cover Adorne, and Andreas, from the moment he came, had not left him. Tobie hadn’t yet been to the chapel, or brought himself to visit Fat Father Jordan in the infirmary, although Wodman had gone. Tobie, like the rest of them, wanted to see Nicholas, and was worried about Kathi. Then he thought to ask where the children were.
Kathi had placed them in one of the cellars, but they weren’t there now. Presumably, they would all be together, Kathi and Margaret and Rankin, possibly in the kitchen, or the dormitory, or somewhere else warm. A small party set off and split up to find them—Kathi’s brother Sersanders, and the children’s grandfather Archie
of Berecrofts, and Father Moriz and Tobie and Jordan. It was bright inside the buildings and cloisters, where the lamps had all been renewed, but dark outside the garth. It was a little while before Father Moriz called something, and the searchers all went to look.
He was outside, upon that stretch of ground between the Priory and the walls, where the row of barred cellar windows threw their scalloped light on the snow. One of the bars of one of the windows was missing, leaving a very small gap, but one large enough for a child. And outside, and not far away, were two children lying together, one protecting the other, in a turmoil of hoof-marks. The boy, lying below, was unconscious. The girl, her arms stretched around him, was dead.
• • •
LEAVING NICHOLAS, KATHI ran. She had been away for half an hour instead of a few minutes. Outside, she could hear voices and horsemen: it was hard to tell what was happening. She wondered at first whether to go to the cellars, but decided that the archer would have brought out the children by now. Margaret and Rankin had lived here for more than two weeks; they knew all the nuns and, with Tobie about, they would be in the best possible hands. She would find them. And then she would go to her uncle. She wondered if her brother and Andreas were here, and recoiled from imagining what they must be feeling. As she felt. As she would feel, doubled and redoubled, if something happened to Nicholas.
She came across Jordan, Nicholas’s son, sitting on the ground in the garth, weeping openly. She glanced about, saw no one else, and dropped beside him. ‘Jordan?’ It couldn’t be about Adorne, although Jordan had admired him, she knew. He couldn’t know what his father was doing. She couldn’t leave him like this, when word of any kind might emerge from that room. She imagined she could hear the swords biting and clashing from here. She said, ‘Jordan, what is it?’
He jerked his head up. She caught the glare of two distended grey eyes; then he cried out in a voice of appalling, of unrecognisable stridency. ‘Your son killed her! Your stupid son ran away, and she went too, and it killed her!’
Tobie’s voice said, ‘Jordan, go and stay with Mick Crackbene. Kathi, come with me.’
She resisted. She said, ‘Who was he talking about?’
But she knew. And everything else left her mind.
BEHIND HER, NICHOLAS had locked the door of Dame Euphemia’s room and drawn his sword. Julius, still behind the desk, had laid his sword on its surface and was looking at him. Unlike Nicholas, who had thrown off his borrowed garment, Julius still looked dapper, even though his well-cut doublet was stained and slashed, and his hose were unembroidered and smelling of horse. He said, ‘This is silly.’ He was smiling.
‘No,’ said Nicholas. ‘Pick up your sword.’
Julius said, ‘You didn’t even know how to fight when we first met. Or to ride. It didn’t stop us from enjoying life.’
‘No,’ said Nicholas. ‘Pick up your sword.’
Julius said, ‘So what put this idea into your head about Andrew Liddell? You didn’t have it in Bruges.’
‘I had it in Fleury, aged seven,’ Nicholas said. ‘My mother knew. I knew when you dropped into Geneva, after you finished in Paris. Then you went to Bologna—did it never strike you that people like Bessarion and Fra Ludovico sometimes read records? Next, you came back to Geneva, and followed me eventually to Bruges. I asked Tobie to lock up his poisons in case you used them on Jaak and blamed me—but instead, you simply waited for me to ruin Jaak for you. Proof that you were a Liddell as well as a St Pol? Crackbene saw your early papers in Coldingham, or Ada did. And there was proof, wasn’t there, in the Liddell grazing ground at Dunbar, which mysteriously belonged to the St Pols?’
‘Ada!’ Julius said with derision.
‘She’s quite a good witness. But there are others; either already in place, or soon found. Lucia’s death? Jock Ross can tell about the hound you borrowed, and that you didn’t come back to Blackness when you said you did. Adorne nearly killed Simon, he told me, by being given the wrong lance. There was an arrow at Venice which wasn’t from some outraged Muslim source: Umar traced that, and told me. And even today—Alex Home told Kilmirren that Applegarth had betrayed my visit to York, and you know Applegarth well. He wasn’t surprised when you entered this room. You killed him so that he wouldn’t compromise you, in case you had to come back.’
It was odd, watching the expressions crossing Julius’s face: impatience; defensiveness; hurt disbelief; peevish annoyance. At the end, annoyance mostly prevailed, although he persisted—out of habit, you would say. ‘That’s in your imagination, but even if it wasn’t, didn’t we have good times together? And why are we fighting if we’re kin? Am I not Simon’s full cousin? Come on. This is nonsense.’
Nicholas said, ‘I could only be related if I were Simon’s son.’
‘Well, of course you are,’ Julius said. ‘Only there’s no proof. I’ve searched, but there isn’t. Not, of course, that you mind. What hurt and mystified you was the rejection. Why should anyone hate you so much that they hounded everyone near to you? Don’t you know?’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Nicholas. He didn’t want to hear. Especially, whatever he guessed, he didn’t want to hear it from Julius.
Julius looked him up and down. ‘Well, surely. Wodman could tell you what all the old Archers knew. Simon got your mother pregnant, and since she was wealthy and titled, your grandfather forced him to marry her. When the child was born dead, Simon was delighted. But meanwhile his father had found out about the peculiarities of Jaak de Fleury, and he was told that old Thibault was the same. When you were born, it gave him a perfect excuse for claiming adultery, and repudiating both the marriage and you. He thought you were tainted.’ He paused. ‘You thought that was just an excuse? It wasn’t. He loathed you. You must feel the same about him. So do I. I’m your family, Nicholas. Now we can say so. Now we can kill the old man together.’
There were voices everywhere outside, now. The window flashed with gold from newly lit lanterns. Voices echoed through the rest of the building: only the Prioress’s wing, where they both were, was quiet. He had been told only what he had already guessed. This was the man who had brought about the deaths of Simon, and Lucia, and Henry, and who had tried to get Adelina to kill him in Moscow. This was the man whom Kathi had valiantly brought him to confront.
‘No,’ said Nicholas. ‘Pick up your sword.’
He should have remembered that Julius was adept with a knife. It came flying, just before the thrower vaulted forward, sword in hand, and followed up with a swing of the blade. Nicholas ducked. The knife struck the panel behind him and, before he could grasp it, shot skittishly behind a great cupboard. Staring after it, Nicholas barely saved Julius’s blade on his own, and hurriedly twisted away, moving nimbly sideways and backwards, among all the furnishings whose places he had memorised: the stools, the coffers, the towel-stand, the lectern, the haphazard piles of books. A globe. A crucifix fell, shattering the flask of wine, and Julius laughed. It had begun.
It had begun like the Floory Land battle with Simon, except that this was a much smaller room, and Nicholas had no dear acolyte, now, to push trestles into the other man’s way. Then, Julius had been unaccountably unable to help him. Then, he himself had exulted in the childish joy of the fight. Now, if he did not weep, it was only because he was too old to weep.
It didn’t matter. It had to be done. Nicholas lifted his sword.
He wanted steel between them: that was his mistake from the beginning, given the size of the room. Julius had a one-handed sword but Nicholas’s was of the kind that fitted his height and his build: its blade three feet long, its grip suited to his large hands, the right close to the quillons, the left settled next to the pommel. With that kind of weapon, you fought with your arms fully extended, the point facing forwards. A downwards cut from a sword of that weight could slice through cheek, neck and shoulder. A horizontal sweep, one hand pushing, one pulling, could cut a man nearly in half. Since he meant to kill Julius, that was how he intended to do it. It was
simpler in that neither of them wore armour. Julius had an open doublet over his shirt, and below that, only hose and light boots. Nicholas was dressed in two garments only: his hose and the shreds of his shirt. His feet were unshod, which was why Julius had laughed when the glass smashed.
He knew, of course, that Julius was shorter, and lighter, and had a more flexible sword. He also had the wit to use the terrain: to make a rampart of a desk; an impediment of every light piece of furniture. He took particular care, where he could, to limit the space where a great sword could be swung. Julius could not afford to be struck, even once. He began, quite effectively, to secure himself.
‘Poor Goliath!’ he said. His blade darted and flickered. ‘Do I see regret on your face? Do you wish you had told the girl to bring help? You could call, but I fear no one would hear you.’
He had his back to the window. Nicholas said, ‘Take a good look. It’s too high to jump, and there are too many people.’
‘My dear boy!’ said Julius. He moved, and his blade came from the right and the left. Nicholas parried the first, and flung himself out of the way of the other. Before he could lift his sword, his way was blocked by a prie-dieu. And as he thrust that aside, there was a sudden, unbelievable blow on his steel that almost wrenched it out of his hand. With his free arm—his injured arm—Julius had hurled something—a heavy box—at it. And now, his arm soaked in blood, he was leaping at Nicholas.
There was no time to bring the heavy sword up. He left it and rolled, gritting his teeth. Julius’s blade cut down to where he had been and then dragged itself out of the wood as Julius, gasping, kicked the great sword out of reach.
‘As I was saying,’ said Julius. ‘Who has need of a window? All I have to do is kill you, unlock the door, and escape.’ He brought his sword down again, hard, as he spoke, and it screamed across the surface of the Prioress’s best silver tray, snatched up a second before to deflect it. Then, because there was no alternative, Nicholas did what his young son had once done. What Gelis had done for him, twice. He slammed the great candelabrum to the floor and then, before Julius could move in the darkness, swung the full weight of it against the other man’s injured arm, and then against the opposite wrist. Its fingers opened, and Nicholas dragged the sword from them.
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