The King's Man

by Alison Stuart

  ‘You fool! Now you add murder to the crimes already to your account?’

  Kit started and took a step back into the gloom of the corridor as he recognised Lucy’s voice. She must have been out of his line of sight.

  Ambrose shook his head. ‘Not murder. Not Annie. I never … ’

  Kit took a deep breath and drew his sword.

  Throwing back the door he stepped into the room.

  Morton looked up and his eyes widened, the colour draining from his face. Lucy followed his gaze and screamed.

  Morton laid his sister down on the floor and rose to his feet, taking a step backward.

  Kit kept his eyes on Morton, only sparing Thamsine a quick glance to reassure himself that she was unharmed. She stared at him open-mouthed. Mercifully, the child stopped screaming.

  Absolute silence descended on the room.

  ‘You’re dead!’ Morton’s voice held a note of hysteria.

  Kit’s eyes met Morton’s. He saw genuine fear in the handsome face and knew he had the advantage.

  ‘Dead?’ Kit shrugged and took another step into the room. ‘I may be just an apparition … or I may not be. Are you willing to find out?’

  Kit balanced the pistol lightly in his hand, trying to give an impression of confidence he did not feel.

  ‘I assure you, the ball in this pistol is real enough,’ he said.

  ‘As is the ball in this one,’ a cool voice to his left said.

  Kit grimaced. He had forgotten about Lucy. He glanced at the large, heavy pistol she held pointed at him.

  ‘Shoot, Lucy,’ Morton said.

  Kit’s eyes met Lucy’s and he knew in that instant that she wouldn’t fire.

  ‘This is between you and him,’ she said, lowering the pistol.

  Morton gave a strangled cry and Kit turned back to face him. Kit tightened his grip on the pistol butt and raised it, his finger resting on the trigger. With his thumb he pulled the hammer back and fired. Nothing happened. The powder was damp. He threw the useless pistol to one side and reached for his sword.

  Morton seized the advantage.

  ‘You really do have a death wish, don’t you, Lovell?’

  Ambrose’s own weapon hissed from the scabbard. He balanced it lightly in his hand.

  ‘This will be interesting. You were a good swordsman, Lovell, so I hear. But I’m better, and left-handed you’ll be no match for me.’

  Kit hardly heard his words, only saw the red flashes of anger before his eyes. He did not need reminding of the reason he now fought with his left hand. He forced his breathing to slow. “Never, never fight in rage”, his sword master had told him. The same sword master who had taught him to fight with his left hand.

  Kit stepped forward. The two swords engaged with the barest ring of metal. Kit, calm now, met his opponent’s eyes and they circled each other, gaining each other’s measure. Ambrose gave first with a lightning attack. Kit countered with a stop thrust, his blade grazing the sleeve of Morton’s jacket. Morton stepped out of measure and regarded Kit with a new wariness in his eyes. He had underestimated his opponent.

  Kit took advantage of his opponent’s uncertainty, striking on the pass. This time his blade seared through Ambrose’s sleeve, drawing blood. Ambrose hissed and responded with a furious forward attack, forcing Kit back against the table. Kit parried and riposted, thrusting Ambrose away from him and allowing him to slide out from underneath his opponent’s sword.

  Ambrose moved in again, forcing Kit onto his back foot. Backward and forward they moved across the room, their swords making sparks in the dim light. Ironically, the fact Kit fought left-handed was to his advantage. A right-hander faced with a left-handed opponent would take time to get the measure of his opponent and Kit could see the beads of perspiration on Morton’s brow.

  They knew each other’s weaknesses. Kit had a bad leg, had been weakened by illness and hampered by having to use his left hand. Morton had the advantage of height, reach and fitness but the injury to his left ankle, the legacy of his encounter with Jem, obviously troubled him, so Kit did what he could to force Ambrose onto that foot.

  Back and forth they moved across the room. Sheer determination and a burning desire to kill this man pushed Kit on against an opponent who seemed to be tiring. Sweat sheened his forehead and his lips parted as he tried to draw in breath. Morton drew back before renewing his attack, his mouth set in a line of cruel determination. He feinted, drawing Kit’s sword out of line and then closed in with a redoublement. Kit realised he had been trapped and stepped out of measure but, with a wall to his back, he had nowhere to go.

  With a flick of his sword, Morton twisted Kit’s sword from his hand, the point of his own sword resting neatly at the base of Kit’s throat.

  ‘You surprise me, Lovell,’ he said. ‘You’re a far better swordsman than I gave you credit for.’

  As Kit’s exhausted mind tried to formulate a plan to extricate himself, Morton’s sword wavered and his face contorted in pain. Kit seized the moment and slipped out from beneath the blade. He scrambled for his own sword. As he straightened, prepared to meet Ambrose again, the other man staggered backward, his sword falling to the floor with a clatter. With a cry of pain, he fell to the floor, doubled over and vomiting.

  The youngest girl started to scream again. Lucy stepped forward and stood beside Kit. She looked down into Morton’s pain-wracked eyes.

  ‘It’s a horrible death,’ she said.

  Kit stared at the woman. He had never seen such utter calm before.

  ‘What have you done?’

  Lucy smiled down at Morton. ‘Monkshood. I keep a small supply with me, just waiting for the right occasion. I simply added it to the soup. I don’t advise anyone else to drink it.’

  Realisation that Lucy had poisoned him flickered across Morton’s face.

  ‘Bitch! Why?’ He spat saliva and vomit as he spoke.

  ‘You don’t deserve to live,’ Lucy said. ‘You’re a monster.’ She laid a hand on her belly and looked down at where Thamsine still knelt with Annie Morton’s head in her lap. ‘This is his child, and no child deserves a father like Ambrose Morton. Did you really think that Lovell was the father? Kit was long gone before this one was conceived. It was fun watching your face though, when you thought it was his!’

  Kit couldn’t bring himself to look at Thamsine … not yet.

  Morton turned desperate eyes to Kit.

  ‘Kill me,’ he said. ‘Better to die at the end of your sword than this … ’ He doubled up, screaming in agony again.

  Lucy placed a hand on Kit’s sword hand.

  ‘Don’t kill him, Kit. I want to stand here and watch him suffer for every act of depravation, degradation and murder he has committed.’

  Kit glanced at Roger.

  ‘Take the children out of here.’

  Roger nodded. Carrying his youngest daughter, and with an arm around the older girl’s shoulders, he left the room.

  Kit shook off Lucy’s hand and stepped forward. He stood for a moment looking down at his adversary. He had a man’s disgust of poison. It gave him no pleasure to watch this man writhing on the floor in his own vomit and faeces. He raised his sword and drove it down into Ambrose’s throat. The blood spurted high into the air. Ambrose gurgled and lay still. Overcoming a rising nausea, Kit crouched down and closed the desperate, agonised eyes.

  He looked up at the sound of boots in the hallway and Jem burst into the room, a pistol brandished in each hand.

  Jem looked down at Morton’s body and swore. ‘There’ll be none to mourn him, I wager, just that baggage – ’ He waved a pistol in Lucy’s direction.

  Kit rose wearily to his feet. ‘I have a job for you, Jem. Take that baggage to the nearest port and see she boards a boat.’

  ‘Now?’ Jem asked uncertainly.

  ‘Now! I want her out of this house.’

  Lucy smiled. She walked over to Kit and laid a hand on his cheek.

  ‘Goodbye, Lovell. We had some fun, whic
h I will always remember fondly.’

  ‘The coin, Lucy,’ Kit said.

  Her eyes flashed momentarily but she saw no quarter in Kit’s face. She turned and dropped the coin bags on the table and swept from the room like a queen.

  ‘Kit?’

  At the sound of Thamsine’s voice, Kit turned at last to look at her. For a moment a hundred unvoiced questions and answers flowed between them. There would be time for that later. He walked over to her and looked down at the girl.

  ‘This is his sister?’

  Thamsine nodded. ‘There’s no hope, is there?’ she asked.

  Kit looked at Annie’s grey face and blood-flecked lips. He watched the shallow rise and fall of her chest and shook his head.

  ‘It’s only a matter of time. All we can do is make her comfortable.’

  He stooped down and picked Annie up. She moaned. ‘It’s all right, Annie,’ he whispered. ‘There will be no more pain soon.’

  Thamsine rose to her feet, wiping her blood-stained hands on the black skirt. ‘What about Ambrose?’

  Kit gave the body a cursory glance. ‘The living are more important than the dead,’ he replied.

  ~ * ~

  Kit laid Annie on the bed with the tenderness of a father for his child. He stroked the dark hair away from the girl’s forehead and looked down at Morton’s sister. Annie was unconscious at last, her face peaceful.

  ‘He loved her, didn’t he?’ he asked, looking up at Thamsine.

  She nodded. ‘She was the only person who loved him completely and unconditionally. His mother saw him only as a means to her own ends. She was a hateful woman.’ Thamsine shuddered at the memory of Isabelle Morton’s sharp, dissatisfied face.

  ‘Aunt, can I come in?’ Rebecca appeared at the door.

  Thamsine turned to look at her niece. ‘Rebecca, you should be in bed.’

  ‘Rachel’s asleep but I couldn’t … ’ Rebecca crossed to the bed and picked up Annie’s hand. ‘She’s dying, isn’t she?’

  Thamsine nodded.

  ‘She saved my life. I want to stay with her.’

  Thamsine drew the girl to her side and slipped an arm around her shoulder.

  ‘If you wish, dearest,’ she said.

  Kit straightened. ‘I think I should find Knott and see to freeing the servants, and … ’ A shadow crossed his face. ‘ … deal with other matters.’

  Thamsine nodded. After fetching a cloth and a bowl of water, she sat down beside Annie to watch and wait for death to claim her.

  It would not be much longer. The girl’s breath rattled in her throat. Thamsine hoped she no longer felt pain. On the other side of the bed, Rebecca sat with her fingers locked around Annie’s hand, her face twisted in grief. The two of them sat into the dark, wet night, unspeaking, waiting for death.

  At some point a shadow crossed the doorway and Thamsine looked up. Kit leaned against the door watching them. He did not enter the room or speak. In the dark, Thamsine could not see his face but she felt his energy as a palpable force, his love reaching across the dark void.

  ‘Do you want me to stay?’ he asked.

  She shook her head. ‘No. You must be exhausted. You will find my bedchamber at the end of this corridor.’

  She listened to his boots echoing on the floorboards, heard the sound of a door shutting and shivered as silence descended on the room again.

  Annie gurgled and a river of bright blood ran from the corner of her mouth. Rebecca’s hand tightened as Annie’s eyes opened and she gave one last, gulping breath and lay still. Thamsine wiped the blood away and stood up, closing Annie’s eyes. Rebecca laid her head on the bedcovers and began to sob. Thamsine walked around the bed and put her arms around the child’s shoulders.

  ‘She died loved, Rebecca. Come, dearest, there is nothing more we can do here and I think we both need our beds.’

  She raised Rebecca to her feet and walked her to the bedchamber she shared with her sister. Rachel was already asleep, her face still stained with tears but peaceful. Thamsine helped Rebecca undress and tucked her into the bed.

  ‘Aunt Thamsine,’ Rebecca said, ‘I am scared. Will that woman come back?’ Thamsine shook her head. ‘No, she’s gone. We’re quite safe now.’ She bent and kissed the girl. ‘Try to sleep.’

  Rebecca nodded and curled up next to her sister.

  The overwhelming silence of the house sat heavily on her shoulders as Thamsine trudged wearily to her bedchamber. Her door stood ajar, a candle burning low on the table. A trail of clothing marked Kit’s progress from the door to the bed, where he lay sprawled across the covers, still half-dressed and sound asleep.

  Thamsine poured water into the washbowl and scrubbed at the blood and the memory of the night’s terror. She stripped to her shift and looked down at the sleeping man.

  ‘Kit?’ She shook his shoulder.

  He opened one eye and gave a sleepy smile. Despite her exhaustion she felt a warm glow in the pit of her stomach.

  ‘You can sleep in the bed or on the floor,’ she said, ‘but not on top of the bed.’

  ‘In the bed sounds good.’

  He pulled himself up and divested himself of the remainder of his clothes before sliding under the covers next to Thamsine.

  The rain continued to lash at the windows as Thamsine curled up against the warm, live body of her husband. She ran a hand through the soft hairs on his chest.

  ‘You keep doing that and I’ll forget how tired I am,’ he murmured sleepily.

  ‘You can’t even begin to imagine what I … how…?’

  He laid a finger across her lips. ‘Please, Tham, there will be time enough for questions in the morning. Now, stop talking and either go to sleep or kiss me.’

  She wrapped her arms tightly around his neck, locking him to her. As their lips touched, the weeks of unspent grief and the loneliness poured out of her. He held her close, kissing her hair, letting the tears subside before he turned her face towards him and they kissed. Fingers meshed hair and tore at each other until they united in a frantic, almost violent release of passion. Thamsine cried out, not with pain but with yearning as he entered her. Her body moved in unison with his until the passion was spent and he fell away from her, their bodies slicked with sweat, breath coming in short, panting gasps.

  He slid an arm around her, drawing her towards him, and she fell asleep with her head in the curve of his shoulder.

  ~ * ~

  Rain still splattered against the windows in the light of a grey dawn. Thamsine woke with a start from a blood-stained nightmare and lay disoriented, trying to still her racing heart and to remember the identity of the person in the bed beside her.

  As memory returned she turned to look down at her sleeping husband. His unshaven face lay turned towards her on the bolsters. Even in the murky light she could make out every feature. He seemed thinner, his eyes sunken and on his neck a darker line. Her stomach clenched. It had been true. They had hanged him. For a moment she thought she would be sick at the thought of the terror he must have faced.

  With shaking fingers she touched the marks, letting her fingers brush the curve of his jaw. One eye opened and a slow smile twitched the corners of his mouth.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he asked.

  ‘Just seeing that you were real and not some avenging spirit … ’ she said.

  For a moment he didn’t move, just looked at her as she stroked his cheek and traced the curve of his mouth and the length of his nose.

  ‘I assure you I am quite real,’ he said, clasping her wrist and rolling himself onto his back, pulling her with him.

  She kissed his nose, her lips travelling down his unshaven face, the bruised neck, down his hard, lean body.

  ‘Tham … ’ he murmured, but she silenced him with a kiss as she slid down onto him.

  There was no urgency in the passion of the morning. No grief, regrets or pain to expunge. Just a love rediscovered and renewed. They lay entwined together in the full enjoyment of each other’s bodies. Th
ey slept for a little, but the house began to stir around them.

  Kit stared up at the bed hangings, Thamsine’s head on his shoulders.

  ‘What are you thinking?’ she asked sleepily.

  ‘I was thinking that it was probably time we got up. There are some things that need urgent attention this morning.’

  Things such as two corpses to give proper burials, Thamsine thought. She raised her eyes and touched the bruising on his neck.

  ‘Are you going to tell me what happened?’

  He swallowed.

  ‘Thurloe kept his word but not until he had me on the gibbet,’ he said. ‘They tell me if they had left it another minute I would have been dead.’

  He took a shuddering breath and she held him closer.

  ‘As far as the Commonwealth of England is concerned, Christopher Lovell is dead,’ he said.

  She looked away, fighting back the tears. ‘Too cruel,’ she said. ‘It’s been four weeks. Why didn’t you send me word?’

  He stroked her hair. ‘You don’t die on the gibbet and then expect everything to be as it was. I needed time, and I had convinced myself that you were better off without me.’

  She pushed him away and sat bolt upright, her eyes blazing.

  ‘How could you think that? If you knew for a moment what I have endured these last weeks, thinking you were dead!’

  ‘I’m sorry, Thamsine.’

  ‘Sorry?’ Her voice cracked. ‘Sorry?’

  Anger and grief spilled out of her. She beat her fists into his chest, the tears spilling down her cheeks. He grasped her forearms, stilling her and bringing her down to rest on his chest with his arms around her. All the sorrow she had borne over his death and her sister’s death poured out of her as he let her weep. Spent by emotion, she drifted into an exhausted sleep.

  When she awoke, she was by herself in the bed. Kit stood half-dressed beside the window, looking out over the garden.

  ‘Kit?’

  He sat down on the side of the bed and touched her face with the crooked fingers of his right hand.

  ‘That day, that last day … ’ he began, ‘ … I watched you walking away, knowing I would never see you again.’ He pulled her towards him, folding her tightly in his arms. ‘Thamsine, I’m never going to let you walk away again.’