The Herald of Day

by Nancy Northcott

  Darkness swelled behind her eyes. She couldn’t pass out now. Mustn’t.

  A sandy-haired, bearded man looked down at her. His eyes hard in a weathered face, he hooked a chain that bore a plain onyx disc around her neck. The chain pulsed against her throat.

  “She’s secure,” he said. His words seemed to come from a great distance.

  Another man, tall and grizzled and impassive, knelt at her side. He gripped her hand, and energy flowed into her from him. Up her arm, across her shoulders, and down her back it rolled. The pain eased, then died. Dazed, she stared at him.

  His mouth moved. Gradually, the words made sense “ … netted a couple more Gifted. The reward’ll be welcome, even split amongst us. Stand them up, and let’s turn them in so we can collect it.”

  The soldiers pulled her to her feet and bound her hands behind her. Her bodice sagged off her right shoulder, revealing her breast down to the corset edge. Her cheeks blazed with embarrassment.

  The magical strike to her back must have damaged the bodice. She couldn’t straighten it with her hands bound. The corset’s whalebone held it upright, but rough edges jabbed into her back. A subtle hum from the amulet buzzed in her ears.

  The leader fingered it. “Don’t try your magic.”

  They shoved her toward Jeremy, who wore similar bindings. Blood trailed from cuts at the corner of his mouth and over his left eye. If she could use her magic, she could heal that.

  “How did you find us?” he demanded.

  “Felt your magic as you came near. The pair of you have a great lot of power. Too bad you decided to use it.”

  So these men weren’t sent for them. The encounter was pure bad luck. Worse luck, that they had a Gifted leader.

  The guards formed around them. “You can march,” the leader said, “or we’ll drag you. Move out.” He kept a hard, painful grip on her arm, hurrying her along.

  They walked east, toward the Tower, not toward Whitehall. “Where are we going?” she asked.

  The leader turned a stony look on her and touched her amulet. Orange light flared at his fingertip. The chain suddenly blazed hot against her neck, pain shooting into her chest. Down her limbs. Her legs collapsed.

  “Miranda!” Jeremy’s voice sounded far away.

  The leader caught her, his finger steady against the stone. Weight compressed her chest. Struggling to breathe, she writhed in his grasp as he edges of her vision turned black.

  “You mean to give me trouble?” he asked.

  She shook her head.

  He removed his finger, and her chest expanded in a great whoof of inhaled air. “See that you don’t.” He jerked her upright and onward, his hold like a band of iron.

  Stumbling, she gasped for breath. Her chest burned, and her arms and legs ached, but she battled her fear. Giving in to it would paralyze her.

  “We’re going to the Tower,” he said casually, “where you’ll learn what trouble really is.”

  The Tower. Site of beheadings and torture. If she and Jeremy went in there, they’d never escape.

  Chapter 29

  Plodding along amid the guards as the day brightened, Miranda fought the mental haze the amulet generated. She couldn’t even think clearly, let alone try to find a way to escape.

  A middle-aged woman opened a house door and began sweeping the stoop. The city was coming to life, as it hadn’t during their battle in the street. Any commotion usually drew a crowd, but not in Wyndon’s England. Now people feared being noticed. No one made eye contact with her or, apparently, anyone else.

  Another detachment of guardsmen stalked down the street. They veered toward the group holding Miranda and Jeremy.

  The newcomers stopped before the guards, blocking the way. “We’ve an assignment for you,” a man’s harsh voice said. “Captain Bartlett’s orders.”

  Miranda’s captor tightened his grip until she gasped in pain. “We’ve Gifted prisoners to deliver and a reward to claim.”

  “You can claim your reward at the Tower later,” the newcomers’ leader said. “Now you’re to make for Wapping Stairs and break up a cabal of Gifted rebels. If you catch them, it’ll more than double your prize.”

  “You go, then.”

  “The captain wants you to handle it.” The man paused, then shrugged. “Your funeral. Move out, lads.”

  “Wait.” Miranda’s captor yanked her forward as his men parted ranks. “Take them, but I’ll have my reward, if it comes out o’ your skin.”

  “You’ll have it, all right.” The other leader gripped her arm, not as hard as his comrade had. The helmet’s steel brim cast his eyes into shadow, but she knew him. Lucius. The head of the Gifted Conclave. Had he sided with Wyndon? Or was this a rescue?

  One of his men took custody of Jeremy. The other troop marched east, toward the Tower and, beyond it, Wapping.

  Heading back up Tower Street the way they had come, Lucius murmured, “Take heart, cousin, but show no sign.”

  Not a turncoat, then. Miranda bit back a smile.

  More shops were open, and more people stood on their front steps. No one looked at the passing group.

  The guard detachment turned toward the river on Harp Lane, then ducked into a narrow alley between a house and a tavern. Still in good order, they marched down a narrow set of stairs and into the tavern’s cellar.

  The last man slammed the door. “Locked and warded, Lucius.”

  Miranda and Jeremy grinned at each other.

  “Mere thanks aren’t enough,” Miranda noted, “but I’m grateful.”

  Jeremy bowed to Lucius. “Indeed, and my thanks as well.”

  “Thwarting the Lord Protector,” Lucius assured him, “is a pleasure. We’ll have someone see to your back, Jeremy.”

  Lucius raised his hand, and lanterns on the wall flared into brilliance, revealing meat hanging from rafters and casks of beer or wine around the walls. He smiled at Miranda, then at Jeremy. “I imagine you’d like to have those amulets off. We’ll find a serviceable bodice for you, Miranda, don’t fear.”

  One of the other men untied her hands and unhooked the pendant she wore. He passed it to Lucius, who regarded it with icy eyes.

  Turning it in his hands, Lucius commented, “Simple to use but a nasty piece of work.” He gave it to one of the other men. “Take one to Callista. We’ll need the other.” To Miranda he said, “Callista’s trying to discover how to defeat them.”

  The man who’d removed her amulet doffed his cloak and laid it around her shoulders. She smiled her thanks.

  With a comforting pat on her arm, he walked over to Jeremy. “Let me look at your burns, cousin.”

  Accepting a tankard of ale, Miranda asked, “How did you find us?”

  “You and Jeremy are special targets for Wyndon. I’ve been scrying for you. I saw you leave the tavern, saw you captured.”

  One of the men handed her a plate of bread and cheese as Lucius said, “We came as soon as we could. Then it was a simple matter of showing the guards something they expected to see.”

  “I’m grateful, of course, but won’t those men report catching us?”

  Lucius smiled, his eyes bright with enjoyment. “Our man at the Tower will record that two unnamed Gifted were brought in and will pay those guardsmen their reward. Once paid, the men won’t care what became of you.”

  “Have you been in hiding all this time?” She adjusted the cloak around her shoulders for more coverage.

  “I move from place to place, bolt holes I prepared long ago. The head of the Conclave must be ready for trouble. I’m fortunate to have these few of my blood kindred and a score of others I know I can trust.”

  She glanced around at the grim-faced men in guard leather and steel. “Thank you,” she told them. “All of you. I thank you with all my heart.”

  They nodded acknowledgment, and Lucius’s eyes twinkled. “Making trouble for the protector is their favorite sport.”

  The twinkle faded as he added, “We’ve a plan to stop him. It’s dan
gerous, a single roll of the dice on which all depends, but we cannot wait for ideal conditions. Too many people are suffering. Having you and Jeremy in hand gives us a way to draw Wyndon out. Are you interested?”

  “Extremely,” Miranda said.

  “The guard unit we sent to Wapping Stairs won’t find a cabal there. While they may assume their quarry had moved on, they might complain about upstarts sending them out of their way. We cannot afford to have our man at the Tower draw too much scrutiny. We must act tonight if we can.”

  So there was no time to sleep and thus none for Richard to try to instruct her in reaching the afterworld. Not that he’d thought the chances of success were very good.

  As Lucius detailed his plan to capture Wyndon, one thought kept running through Miranda’s mind. If Wyndon had manipulated history through the afterworld, he knew how to travel there. He could release Richard. But he wouldn’t do so voluntarily.

  Could he be tricked into doing so? Was his need for revenge strong enough to draw him into a fatal mistake?

  “What is it?” Lucius asked.

  Miranda glanced around them. He and she were alone in a corner. Softly, she said, “Richard is trapped in the realm between life and death, the one he mentioned to you, but he yet lives.”

  Lucius frowned, and she added, “It’s how Wyndon changed the past, by traveling through there.”

  Lucius studied her, eyes narrowing. “Go on.”

  “Richard has discovered the way to restore the true sequence of events, but he cannot leave that place to do it without help. He meant to try to teach me, before Jeremy and I had to flee, but he wasn’t optimistic about our chances of succeeding.”

  Lucius studied her. At last, he said, “For the moment, let’s say I believe you. If you could help Richard, he would be free already. Whose help do you need?”

  “That’s the tricky part. Richard cannot last much longer without true food and water, but the only other person who knows how to enter that realm is Lord Wyndon. If your plan succeeds, there may be a way to convince him.”

  Moonlight tipped the ripples from the barge’s oars with silver and shadowed the passengers’ faces. With rhythmic, swishing strokes, the small band of Gifted traveled toward Whitehall and a confrontation that could determine England’s fate.

  And Richard’s.

  Miranda had never sought a fight. Never wanted one. But she couldn’t shrink from this one. The man at the Tower, who turned out to be the Lord Lieutenant, its commander, had sent word to Whitehall that she and Jeremy had broken under interrogation, revealing themselves as two of the protector’s most sought-after fugitives. Wyndon had ordered them brought to him.

  So much depended on so few, but Lucius had insisted some of their group stay in reserve, to continue the resistance if this plan failed.

  Close to the bank, the barge drifted downriver. The city stood silent around it. With midnight drawing nigh, most Londoners had long since gone to bed. Miranda and Jeremy sat in the barge’s center with the absence of bindings concealed by their cloaks.

  Lucius and his band, seventeen men and three women, including Anne Wilfleet, the fishmonger’s daughter, had magically disguised their features lest the palace guards recognize any of them before they reached Wyndon. Fighting their way out of the palace would be difficult enough without also fighting their way in.

  “There won’t be hangers-on about Whitehall this late,” Lucius said quietly, “and the guard will be light.”

  “I wish I had more practice using magic as a weapon,” Miranda admitted.

  “Starting fires provides a distraction at minimum,” Lucius said. “If you use that skill judiciously, it can also kill. Just do what you can.” Turning to Jeremy, he added, “You could have remained behind. Your prayers would mean much to some of us.”

  “I, too, will do what I can,” he said.

  Ahead, a fish jumped. Ships at anchor loomed like dark hulks in the moonlight. The waves lapped against their hulls with soft, slapping sounds. On another barge near Whitehall’s garden stairs, upriver from the main stairs for the palace, three of Lucius’s wizards waited to carry the group to safety.

  Moonlight shone white against the sprawling palace’s stone walls. With the tide out, Whitehall Stairs rested against the muddy bank. The oarsmen beached the barge.

  “Halt,” ordered a man at the top of the stairway. “Who goes there?”

  The man in the front of the boat replied, “Important prisoners, Lady Hawkstowe and Jeremy Winfield. The Lord Protector wants to question them himself.”

  The guard raised a lantern, peering into the darkness. Lucius thrust Miranda forward so the light struck her face. The guard chuckled. “I reckon you’ll eat well tomorrow. Take them to the banqueting house. I’ll send word to his lordship.”

  Miranda’s and Jeremy’s companions hustled them up the creaky stairs, then down a corridor. Several armed men in the red and blue of palace guards fell in with them.

  Miranda’s stomach churned. She’d never dreamed of a struggle with such high stakes. She took a slow breath in and let it out, then drew another. Her stomach didn’t settle.

  All the while they walked farther from the river, making their escape route longer and more complicated.

  Ahead of them, the banqueting house jutted from the palace’s bulk. Candlelight glowed faintly in its windows. To its left lay the privy garden. It could be reached from the banqueting house by descending a staircase in the corridor on that side of the building. To avoid the palace’s many residents and guards, their group would exit into the garden and race through it to the river stairs between the garden and the bowling green.

  If Wyndon chose to see his supposed prisoners somewhere else, they would still make for the garden stairs.

  Their escort led them inside, up a staircase, and into a long, high-ceilinged room. The few candles left most of the painted ceiling in shadow. Flanked by two doors, a dais bearing a single chair stood at the far end. They marched toward it.

  “Prisoners to their knees,” the palace guard said.

  Lucius and his men pushed Miranda and Jeremy forward and down, then stood behind them. There they stayed for long minutes.

  At last, two more uniformed guards entered from the left doorway behind the dais. After them came Wyndon. He stalked in and seated himself.

  Miranda’s mouth went dry. Although she swallowed hard, fear still tasted coppery on her tongue, but she was supposed to appear afraid.

  Wyndon’s lips curved in a tight, hard smile. “Lady Hawkstowe. Reverend Winfield. We meet again at last.” He glanced at Lucius. “You commanded this unit.”

  “I did.” Lucius dropped his disguise and stepped forward. “Henry de Vere, I arrest you in the name of the Gifted Conclave.”

  Wyndon stared at him, then laughed. “You senile fool. I’ve scoured London for you, and now you deliver not only two of my prize quarry but yourself.” On that last word, golden light erupted around his hands and roared toward Lucius, whose green blast blocked it.

  With a deafening boom, the power bursts exploded, shattering windows. One of Lucius’s men fired another blast toward Wyndon. His two guards dropped, clutching their throats.

  Two burly men and Anne Wilfleet flung magical bolts at Wyndon, backing Lucius. The combined blasts blew their target off his feet.

  Behind Miranda, something exploded and knocked her to her knees. Small stones and other bits of debris rained down her, and she covered her head. Her ears rang from the noise. Surely it would draw the entire garrison here.

  Jeremy helped her up. “Keep your head low.”

  Nodding, she coughed from the dust in the air. Her heart pounded, and her ears rang, but her mind felt oddly clear. She looked around for Lucius.

  He and another man had Wyndon in their grasp, dragging him from the dais. One of the amulets hung around his neck.

  “To the river,” Lucius shouted.

  As their group hurried toward the door Wyndon had entered, Miranda glanced back. The f
ront wall of the banqueting house was a gaping hole that showed the palace yard and the dark night beyond.

  One of the men ran to peer through it. “Guards coming that way.”

  “Hurry,” Lucius said. “Will, Edgar, Anne, covering fire.”

  The fishmonger’s daughter and two men dropped back, hands glowing with magic. In the middle of the pack, Miranda and Jeremy rushed past the dais, into the corridor, and down the stairs. Miranda’s heart pounded wildly as they bolted into the privy garden. In the moonlight, the statues in each of the square plots looked like ghostly sentinels.

  Soldiers rushed into the garden from the royal apartments, near the river wall. No escape that way.

  The soldiers opened fire. Gunshots echoed in the night, and clouds of gunpowder smoke quickly obscured the guardsmen. From the corridor window behind the Banqueting House, bolts of magic whizzed out at the fleeing group in a rainbow of colors that heated the air but flew wide.

  At her side, Jeremy said, “They won’t risk hitting Wyndon. Come on, we’re heading for the street.”

  Hustling her along, he added, “Stay close to the building. It makes the angle of fire more difficult.”

  When she blinked at him, stunned that a man who’d foresworn battle knew that, he said, “My brother’s a naval officer, remember?”

  From a window above the garden, a burst of blue power crashed into the fleeing group.

  Three men fell, screaming in agony. The air stank of smoke and burned flesh. Miranda clenched her teeth against nausea.

  A tall man near the front stopped. Feet braced, he blasted the garden wall by the street. It collapsed as another blast from the corridor above struck the ground, spewing shrubbery, turf, and shattered marble into the air.

  Miranda, Jeremy, and several others reeled from the blast and fell. Dust hung in the air around the rubble, a pile at least five feet high. She coughed again as dust clogged her nose and mouth.

  She and Jeremy pulled themselves up and rushed on. They scrambled over the wreckage of the garden wall and found themselves in the street with the ornate, checkerboard gate on their right. To the left, a plainer one with round towers some distance away marked the end of the palace.