Evie decided to bide her time some more. Below, the Ceremony of the Keys was taking place, but she was watching something else. Away from the ceremony two guards were dragging a constable away. The man was protesting in no uncertain terms, but his curses fell on deaf ears.
Except, not quite on deaf ears. Down below was another Yeoman Warder. Evie saw him looking on fretfully as the constable was frogmarched towards the Waterloo Barracks at the western end of the complex.
The look in his eyes. That was him. That was her man.
Spurred into action, she climbed down from her perch and into the ward close to where he stood, still a picture of indecision. From the shadows she attracted his attention with a low whistle, identified herself as a friend of Henry and watched a look of grateful trust overtake his features. ‘Thank heavens you’ve come,’ he said, and went on to tell his tale.
What emerged was a picture of the Templars extending their tendrils into the Tower hierarchy itself. Many of the beefeaters were Templar imposters. Many were still loyal to the Crown, but gossip and suspicion reigned and the balance of power was being tipped.
‘That Thorne woman has gone into St John’s Chapel.’ He jerked a thumb towards the keep, where the apse of the chapel was visible. ‘I could help get you in.’
She nodded. Do your worst.
‘All right, for this to work, you’ll have to pretend to be my prisoner.’
And with that, he took hold of her arm and marched her across the apron of the ward towards Waterloo Barracks, manoeuvring her over the threshold and then into the main entrance hall.
Straightaway she could see the extent of the Templar infiltration. They mocked her with it as she was led through the barracks.
‘Nice to see an Assassin in chains for once,’ called guards.
Taunting her.
‘The Templars own London, Assassin. Don’t forget it.’
The ally led her into a passageway for the cell block, closing the door on the men in the outer barracks.
Here there were two sentries standing guard at a door in the far end. Like the others, the sentries were goading her. But now Evie Fry made them eat their words. Pretending to slip free of her captor, she sprang forward in a fencing stance and triggered her blade in the same instant, thrusting it through the tunic of a startled guard. The second man never stood a chance. Still low, Evie punched forward with the blade, jabbing him quickly in the thigh then taking advantage of him doubling over in pain to thrust upwards into the space between his collarbone and neck. He gurgled and slumped to the stone. Dead.
Her ally had watched, given her the thumbs up and with the quiet assurance that he would organize the fightback slipped away. In moments she would hear the sound of battle from outside.
In the meantime the short battle had been fought to the accompaniment of anguished cries from the other side of the locked cell door. The constable had been making his presence known for some time now, and sensing action a short distance away, called, ‘Is someone out there?’ Voice muffled by the thick wooden door.
She came to it, put fingertips to the wood, lips close to it. ‘Yes, a friend.’
‘Oh, that’s good. Say, friend, could you get me out?’
Evie was a good lock-pick. Her father had made sure of that, and she made short work of the door, finding herself in the grateful presence of a red-faced, excitable constable.
‘Thank you,’ he told her. ‘It’s treason, is what it is. And desecration of the chapel. Miss Thorne told me to be grateful they didn’t kill me outright. The nerve.’
‘She’s after an object of great power,’ Evie told him. ‘She can’t be allowed to steal it.’
The constable’s face fell. ‘Not the Crown Jewels?’
Evie shook her head. ‘Something much more important.’
Henry’s friend had seen to it that the barracks had been made safe. Blood-soaked bodies were testament to that. The western section was theirs. Outside, the constable spoke to his men. ‘All right, gentlemen,’ he told them, ‘we are facing an enemy we never expected – traitors in our midst,’ before outlining a plan of action and series of signals for when the men should strike back at the Templar stooges.
The men dispersed and then, at a signal from Evie, launched their attack. In the ribbons of the inner and outer ward and in the courtyard outside the keep, the constable’s men descended quickly upon the Templar guards. There were minor skirmishes but Evie could see the battle would be short and easily won. She was not even required to activate her blade as she made her way to the entrance of the White Tower.
There, she ran quickly and nimbly up the steps, then knocked on the door, praying those inside were still unaware of the rebellion taking place in the wards.
She tensed, waiting, ready to dispatch whoever was unfortunate enough to answer. However, no answer came. Steeling herself, she tried the great handle of the door and found that it turned. Next, she slipped inside.
Damn.
Straightaway she felt the point of a pike at her neck and realized she’d walked into a trap. At the same time, the razor-sharp edge of a Wilkinson sword was placed to her forearm, just above the gauntlet, prohibiting any movement. She felt a warm droplet of blood make its way into the collar of her jacket, but the pain was nothing compared to her chagrin at being so easily caught.
‘Looks like we’ve caught ourselves an Assassin,’ sneered one of the three men, ‘only for real this time. There’ll be no slipping your guard. No freeing the constable so that he can rally his men. We’ll be taking you to Miss Lucy Thorne. Let’s see what she wants to do with you.’
She wants to kill me, thought Evie. But even so, they say that every cloud has a silver lining and here was hers. Lucy was in the chapel right now and she was searching for the Shroud. Certainly, thought Evie. Take me to Lucy Thorne. You’re only taking me closer to it.
Any plans she had for escape were swiftly shelved. Instead she relaxed, allowing the blade of the pike to remain where it was, the sword to stay in place. The last thing she wanted to do was draw their attention to her gauntlet.
They did exactly as she wanted them to do. They brought her into the chapel.
Knocking and entering, they came upon Lucy Thorne, who was startled by their entrance and looking unusually flustered. Evidently she’d failed to find the Shroud of Eden, and her cheeks were flushed as she turned to Evie, flanked by her guards in the doorway of the darkened chapel.
‘Welcome, Miss Frye,’ she hissed. ‘Would you care to tell me where the Shroud is?’
Evie said nothing. There was nothing she could say.
‘As you wish,’ said Lucy. ‘I shall find it without your help. And then I’ll strangle you with it.’ She stalked across the room, hands going to the panelling, pressing her ear close to the wood to listen for telltale hollowing and the sound of secret compartments within.
At the same time, Evie was readying herself for battle, sizing up her enemy. In the chapel were four opponents, but Lucy Thorne had already fought Evie once and lost. She was depending on the Yeoman Warders, who were off their guard. They thought that having delivered Evie into the custody of Lucy Thorne their job was done.
Evie allowed her arm to drop a fraction, removing it from the immediate threat of the Wilkinson sword and then, all at once, dropped to one knee, engaged her own blade and buried it into the groin of the man standing nearest to her.
It was ugly but it produced a lot of noise and blood and, as she had often been taught, a lot of noise and blood is as helpful as surprise when it comes to a successful attack.
The guard fell screaming; his comrades shouted. But the pike had already been removed from her neck and with one gloved hand on the stone floor she was pivoting in order to face the second man. It was as though she punched him in the stomach, only with blade and gauntlet, and the blow drove him across the room, clutching at a stomach wound that would bleed out in a matter of seconds.
When it came to the third man, she wasn’t so lucky. He had not been able to bring his pike to bear but instead used the pikestaff, swinging it round to clobber her on the side of the head. She staggered, knowing the lack of pain for what it was – a delayed agony – and slicing wildly with the blade.
She caught his clothes, opened a gash, but it wasn’t nearly enough to finish him off. He darted to one side, more agile than he looked, and tried to hit her again with the pikestaff, aiming once more for the side of her head.
This time, however, he missed but she didn’t. Her strike was true, and she rammed it into his heart so that he fell, dead almost before he hit the floor. The other two men writhed and screamed, their final death throes noisy, but Evie was launching herself at Lucy Thorne, blade out, knocking aside the boot knife that had appeared, relishing the surprise and fear in her opponent’s eyes, knowing the battle was won and allowing herself the grim satisfaction of feeling her blade strike home.
And now, at last, Lucy Thorne lay dying. Evie regarded her, almost surprised at her own lack of pity. ‘You sought a tool of healing in order to extend your own power,’ she said simply.
‘Not mine, ours. You are so short-sighted. You’d hoard power and never use it, when we would better the condition of humanity. I hope you never find the Shroud. You have no idea what it truly can do.’
Curious, Evie bent to her. ‘Tell me then.’
It was as if, in the last moment, Lucy Thorne decided against it. ‘No,’ she smiled, and died.
Evie reached into her jacket for her handkerchief, which she carefully spotted with Lucy Thorne’s blood, folding it and replacing it. Next she retrieved the key then stared dispassionately around St John’s Chapel. The warders were dead in pools of their own blood; Lucy Thorne lay looking almost serene. Evie paid them silent compliment, then left and made her way back along the flickering passages of the keep until she reached the entrance. There she stood at the top of the steps and looked out over the courtyard, where the constable and Henry Green’s Yeoman ally were rallying their men now the battle was won.
The Shroud was not here, she thought. But the Tower of London had been returned to the Crown, and that at least meant a job well done for Evie Frye.
During her journey back to base her thoughts went to Lucy’s last words. It was true, Evie had thought of it as an instrument of healing. Naively, perhaps, given the Templars’ interest. But then she had learnt it gave eternal life – and now this. Was it possible that Lucy Thorne had known something Evie didn’t? Mulling over it, she remembered something she had read once, a long time ago. And then later, as soon as she was able, Evie put pen to paper and wrote to George Westhouse.
76
Crawford Starrick couldn’t remember when he had last partaken of his beloved tea. His usually ordered life had taken on a distinctly chaotic tinge. The stress was beginning to show.
Not only had Lucy Thorne been stymied in her efforts to find the Shroud, largely due to the interruptions of Evie Frye, but the other Frye twin – it hurt Starrick to even think his name, Jacob – had also been causing trouble. Templar agents were falling beneath his blade; plans the Order had spent years laying in place were being undone. Starrick had come to dread the knock on his office door, for every time one of his men arrived it was with more bad news. Another member of the Order dead. Another scheme confounded.
Now he raised his head from his hands and regarded the nervous scrivener who sat on the other side of his untidy desk, patiently awaiting his dictation. Starrick took a deep breath that was indistinguishable from a sigh and said, ‘Take this down, then I want it sealed until you receive further orders.’
He closed his eyes, composing himself, and began his dictation: ‘Miss Thorne. You supplied me with the means to secure London’s future. The city thanks you. The Order thanks you. I thank you. But the Shroud can be worn by only one. Therefore, I hereby dissolve this partnership. I promise to endow you with an income into your old age, but that is the most I can do. May the father of understanding guide you.’
There. It was done. Starrick sat listening to the scratch of the secretary’s pen as his words were duly transcribed. Yes, he thought, the Shroud can be worn by only one, and he found himself relaxing almost sleepily in the knowledge that it was his destiny to be the one.
A knock at the door startled him from his absorption and straightaway he felt his jaw clench, reality intruding with the promise of more bad news, further havoc wreaked by the junior Frye club.
In that regard at least, he was not disappointed. ‘What is it?’ he snapped.
Entering, an assistant looked nervous. One hand fiddled at his collar, loosening it. ‘Miss Thorne, sir …’ he said in a faltering voice.
‘What of her?’
‘I’m sorry, sir. She’s dead.’
One thing his associates had learnt – or been forced to learn – was that you never knew with Starrick what he was going to do next. The two attendants held their breath as his shoulders rose and fell heavily and his hands went to his face as he absorbed the news.
All of a sudden he peeked through his fingers. ‘Where is the key?’ he said.
The assistant cleared his throat. ‘There was no key found on her body, sir.’
Starrick’s fingers closed as he contemplated this new and even more unwelcome development. Next his attention went to a bowl on his desk that he began to turn over in his hands. His face was reddening. His men knew what was to come. One of his outbursts. And sure enough, the room was filled with his frustrated shriek, his hair, usually so neat with pomade, in disarray as the bowl was lifted high, about to be dashed to the tabletop, until …
The shriek died down. With exaggerated care, Starrick placed the bowl on the table. ‘The Shroud will be mine,’ he said, to himself more than his men. ‘Even if I have to raise hellfire to do it.’
77
‘Please tell me again where we’re going,’ said Evie, as she and Henry passed through iron gates and towards a set of benches at the opposite end of a leafy square.
In truth, she had been enjoying the walk. Time spent with Henry was a blissful antidote to the killing that had become so routine in her life. Her father had always warned her against becoming inured to it. ‘A killing machine is a machine, and we Assassins are not machines,’ he said, making her promise never to lose her empathy. Never to forget her humanity.
At the time she had wondered how that could ever happen. After all, she had been brought up to respect life. How on earth could she fail to be moved by the taking of it? But of course the inevitable had happened, and she had discovered that one way to cope with slaughter was to shut herself off from it, disallowing access to those parts of her brain that wanted to reflect upon it. And more and more she found it a simple process to do that, so that sometimes she worried she’d lose all sense of her true self in her own survival mechanism.
Henry was a means of pulling back from all that. Her feelings for him helped Evie to centre herself, and his reticence to take up arms served to remind her that there could be another way. He had told her about his life before he met her. She knew that he had once been where she was now and had returned from it. His was a tattered soul but nevertheless intact. He was an example of how it could be don
e.
Still, now came the next phase of their mission to retake London, and whatever her feelings for Henry they would have to wait. Restoring the Brotherhood was her main priority.
They were close now. So close. Since events at the Tower the twins had struck again and again at the heart of the Templar organization. They had hit them where it hurt most. In the wallet. After neutralizing Twopenny, Jacob had closed down a counterfeit ring, helping to restore order to the city. Jacob had also put an end to the activities of Brudenell, who was working for the Order by trying to prevent the passage of legislation harmful to them.
Each successful operation had seen the Assassins’ stature grow in the eyes of those in the East End and even beyond; Henry’s gang grew exponentially. The Templars might have taken London by worming their way into its middle echelons but the Assassins were reclaiming it by working their way up from the bottom. The urchins who streamed through the streets saw the Assassins as champions and were eager to help in any way; their elders were more cautious and more frightened but offered their tacit approval. Henry would often return to his shop and discover goodwill gifts left on the doorstep.
All of this was of benefit of course. But in Evie’s mind (though not in Jacob’s) it took second place to issues of the Shroud. Now they had recovered the key, they still faced the problem of not knowing where it was kept. They knew where it wasn’t – it wasn’t in the Tower of London. But where could it be?
And so she asked Henry again, ‘Where are we going?’
‘I found a letter from the Prince Consort among Lucy Thorne’s research,’ he told her, ‘dated 1847.’
The Prince Consort. Prince Albert for whom Queen Victoria mourned still.
‘1847?’ she said.
‘The year the prince began renovations to Buckingham Palace,’ he explained.
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