As they did she peeped through the crack and got a good look at them. They wore the uniform of the Queen’s Guard but there was something about them. Something less ordered, less smart.
Imposters.
Of course. Starrick had infiltrated the guard, posting his own men inside and outside the palace. How else could they hope to pull off what was basically to be a massacre? She swallowed, hoping that at this very moment, Jacob would be learning the same from Abberline.
She let herself out of the office and back on to the Axminster carpet, hurrying along the corridor. She found her way to the White Drawing Room and let herself in. There she hunted for the plans she needed, keeping one ear on anything happening outside.
She found them. Spreading them out on a desk, she bit her lip with the excitement of her find. Unlike the plans of the palace she had already studied, these included everything. Every room was accounted for, every corridor and passageway marked. These were the Prince Consort’s personal plans.
And …
She caught her breath.
There was the vault.
She wished Henry were here to see this. She savoured the thought of his reaction. In fact, she thought, she savoured the thought of spending a lot more time with Henry Green when this was all over.
But that was for later. Right now she could only hope Jacob was neutralizing the threat from Starrick’s men so she could concentrate on making her way down to the vault. She went to go, then caught sight of herself in a long mirror at one end of the drawing room, adjusted herself, smoothed her dresses, and then, with the blueprints hidden in her cleavage, let herself out of the drawing room and on to the corridor beyond. She made one more stop to avoid sentries along the way and then was quickly back into the throng of guests, anonymous and invisible once again. Now for the vault …
Just then came a voice that stopped her in her tracks. ‘There you are.’
Damn. It was Mary Anne Disraeli, a friend and ally, and not someone to be easily palmed off.
‘I have someone I am simply dying for you to meet!’ exclaimed Mrs Disraeli and, brooking no argument, took Evie by the upper arm, leading her through the guests, skirting the ballroom and to the terrace outside. There stood a woman that Evie Frye recognized. Such a recognizable woman, in fact, that the young Assassin had a moment of simply being unable to believe her own eyes.
‘Your Majesty,’ said Mary Anne Disraeli, giving Evie a surreptitious squeeze to remind her to curtsey, ‘may I present Miss Evie Frye.’
Her Royal Highness, wearing the dark garb that was now her custom and an expression to match, looked upon Evie with a mixture of disinterest and distaste, and then quite unexpectedly said, ‘You are the one responsible for Mr Gladstone’s mishap?’
Evie blanched. The game was up. They had been discovered. ‘Y-your Majesty, I apologize …’ she stammered.
And yet … the queen was smiling. Apparently Gladstone’s ‘mishap’ had left her most amused. ‘The cake is particularly good,’ she told Evie. ‘Enjoy the ball.’
With that she turned and left, a footman scurrying to her side. Dazed, Evie simply stood and gawped, too late realizing that she was all of a sudden the centre of attention. She was in plain sight, and not hiding.
She moved to quickly go, but the damage was done and a hand grasped her upper arm, and this time it wasn’t the friendly, assuring grip of Mary Anne Disraeli, who had drifted off in search of more socializing. No, this was the firm custodial grasp of Crawford Starrick.
‘May I have this dance … Miss Frye?’ he said.
It was a breach in protocol that drew gasps from those around them, but Crawford Starrick didn’t seem to care about that as he led Evie to the middle of the terrace – just as the orchestra began to play a mazurka.
‘Mr Starrick,’ said Evie, joining him in the dance, hoping she sounded more in command of the situation than she felt. ‘You’ve had your fun, but the game is over.’
But Starrick wasn’t listening. Eyes half closed, he seemed transported by the music. Evie took the opportunity to study his face. With satisfaction she noted the tiredness and anxiety written into the dark rings and wrinkles round his eyes. The Assassins’ activities had truly taken their toll on the Templar Grand Master. Any other leader might have considered capitulation, but not Crawford Starrick.
She wondered about his state of mind. She wondered about a man so consumed with victory he wasn’t able to admit defeat.
‘One, two, three,’ he was saying, and she realized that he was gesturing around them at the rooftops overlooking the crowded terraces. Her eyes went to where he was looking. Yes. There they were. Men in the uniform of the Queen’s Guard but evidently Templar marksmen, half a dozen or so. As she watched, they levelled their rifles, pointing them into the courtyard below, awaiting a signal.
The massacre was about to begin.
‘Time is a wonderful thing, Miss Frye,’ Starrick was saying. ‘It heals all wounds. We may make mistakes while dancing, but the mazurka ends and then we begin again. The problem is that everyone forgets. They trip on the same mistakes over and over again.’
Evie tracked her eyes from the men on the rooftops, expecting the shooting to begin at any second. What was he waiting for?
And then he told her. ‘This dance is nearly over. Soon the people will forget the generation on this terrace, the ruin you nearly wrought on London. When the music ceases, Miss Frye, your time is up and mine begins once more.’
So that was the signal the men were waiting for.
The orchestra played on.
82
When the mazurka ended …
Evie’s gaze went to the rooftops again and her heart leapt to see the familiar figure of Jacob, now in his Assassin’s clothes, as he moved in on one of the marksmen and slit his throat.
She knew her brother. She knew that if there was one thing she could depend on him for, it was to get this particular job done.
And he did. By the time the dance was ended, the rooftops were empty and Starrick was suddenly roused from his reverie. Furious then frantic, his eyes went to the rooftops, saw them empty and then found the smiling face of his dance partner as she said, ‘I have a feeling someone is about to cut in …’
He bared his teeth. ‘Then with regret I will relinquish you.’
He was fast. His hand had reached to snatch the key from her neck before she had a chance to stop him. Then he turned and was hurrying away, leaving Evie gasping, her hand at her throat. Around her came outraged cries. ‘Did you see that? Did you see what he did?’
She moved quickly away in Starrick’s wake but lost him in the crowd. Behind her scandal raged but she put her head down and made her way to the edge of the terrace, grateful for the sight of Jacob who took advantage of the sudden tumult to emerge.
She pulled the papers from her décolletage, thrust them into Jacob’s hands. ‘Here,’ she said quickly, breathlessly. ‘The location of the vault. Go.’
He looked at the plans, eyebrows knitted. ‘Just like that? No plan?’
‘No time for plans. I’ll catch up as soon as I’m rid of this –’ she gestured at the hated dress, took her gauntlet from Jacob’s outstretched hand scooped up a satchel containing her Assassin’s garb, and then made off in search of a suitable spot for her transformation.
Jacob ran. The vault marked on the blueprint was located close to the wine vaults, and presumably had been constructed at the same time before being struck from the plans and disappearing into secrecy. Its door was hidden, seemingly just another section of ornate panelling. But as Jacob arrive
d he saw it ajar, no doubt opened with the key that Crawford Starrick had stolen from Evie.
The party was a long way behind him now. Probably they were still clutching their pearls after what happened between Starrick and Evie. This part of the palace was deserted, silent.
Except not that silent. As Jacob made his way along a narrow tunnel towards the vault he heard the dull thump of an explosion from ahead. Starrick had unsealed the vault.
Jacob tensed. He heard his knuckles crack. His blade made less noise as he flexed his forearm to engage it.
Even more cautiously now he made his way towards the blown-out vault door. Stepping through he found himself in a room of medieval architecture. So, it was older than the wine vaults, which dated back to the remodelling of the palace in the 1760s. In fact, it looked very much to Jacob as though the current palace had been built on top of the vault.
Despite himself, he suppressed a smile. How Evie would have loved to have made this discovery for herself.
At the centre of the vault stood the Templar Grand Master, having opened a box he’d found there. The trunk was a receptacle the like of which Jacob had never seen before. A dark grey futuristic rectangle inset with strange angular indentations, inscriptions and carry handles. And for a second all he could do was stare at it, as transfixed by it as Starrick. Just to lay eyes on the crate was enough to convince him that there was something other-worldly and unknowable about it. Perhaps Evie was right to place such store in these artefacts.
Crawford Starrick still wore his suit, but draped over it was a shimmering piece of linen that appeared to exude the same sense of suppressed energy and menace as the box. Even as Jacob watched, patterns seemed to form and dissemble on the golden cloth, and different colours glowed. Inside the box was a series of what looked like decorative baubles, and either they too hummed with power or were reflecting it from the crate. Still Jacob was hypnotized, falling into deep belief, feeling the call of the artefacts – until, with an effort, he shook his head to free himself of it, stitched the smile back on his face and stepped forward to greet the Grand Master.
‘Aren’t we a little too old to put faith in magic?’ he said.
Starrick looked up at him with a puzzling expression that Evie Fry might have recognized from the dance. Only now he was so transported it was almost beatific.
‘Come now,’ he said with a smile. ‘Allow an old man his indulgences.’
‘I will allow you nothing,’ said Jacob, bemused and stepping forward.
Starrick took no steps to defend himself, merely smiled indulgently. The smile of the truly wise. ‘The young think they can make their mark on this world, a world entirely built to exploit them.’
Jacob shook his head and drew himself up to gang-leader stature. ‘I don’t think I can make my mark, old man, I know.’
Starrick’s face hardened. He was back in the here and now, drawing ancient power from his find.
And then Jacob attacked.
83
Henry had decided. He would leave the Assassins to whom he had become a burden, and leave Evie to whom he was a liability. He had spent his entire life running away from the knowledge that he was an unfit Assassin. Held prisoner in the grounds of St Paul’s Church, Covent Garden, Henry understood that it had caught up with him.
Awash with memories, he had closed up shop and extinguished the lights at the front, retiring behind the curtain to his workroom. Clocks ticked and he wondered what Evie was doing now. No doubt she and Jacob were arriving at the Queen’s Ball. When they returned it would be the end of the line. Either way, win or lose, this battle would have been fought to its conclusion: the Assassins would be once more in the ascendance, with the rule of the London Templars at an end, or they would be having to retreat, regroup, think again.
And Henry? He sat at the central table, with documents and inscriptions laid out around him, maps and plans over which he and Evie had pored, and put his face in his hands, thinking back to his life as a child and the years he had spent as The Ghost. A lifetime of delusion and shattered dreams and failure.
Years ago he’d thought of leaving the Brotherhood. You can’t turn your back on a belief, he’d thought at the time.
Yes, he decided now. Yes you could.
He drew a blank piece of paper towards him, reached for his stylus and inkwell.
‘Dear Evie,’ he wrote.
And then he was stopped by a sound from the front of the shop. It came again. Knocking.
Henry stood, reached for his blade and began to strap it on as he moved through the curtain, bare feet noiseless on the floorboards as he traversed the clutter of the shop to the door. He shook his sleeve, obscuring the blade and studied the glass of the door where he could see a figure, an outline he recognized at once.
‘Come in,’ he said, opening the door and throwing glances up and down the busy Whitechapel street outside.
Over the threshold, stepping from the balmy evening outside into the darkened, oppressive atmosphere of Henry’s shop, came George Westhouse. ‘You’re armed,’ he said, by way of a greeting. Trained eyes.
‘We have the Templars cornered,’ replied Henry, ‘and you know what a cornered rat does?’
‘It attacks shopkeepers?’ said George.
Henry tried to force a smile but smiles never came easily to him and sure enough the muscles refused to obey. Instead he closed the bolts, turned and led George through the tottering shelves to his workroom. There he brushed aside the letter he had begun and directed George to a chair; previous occupant, Evie Frye.
George carried a small leather satchel that he placed on the tabletop as he sat down. ‘Perhaps you’d like to fill me in on events in the city?’ he said.
Henry told him how, with the help of his information network, Jacob had organized the gangs in the East End, then successfully carried out a series of operations against the Templars, severely weakening their position; how he and Evie had discovered the likely location of the latest Piece of Eden; how Evie and Jacob were at this very moment at the Queen’s Ball, Evie seeking the vault where the Shroud was kept …
At mention of the artefact George’s eyebrows raised.
Yes, thought Henry, more accursed artefacts. More death in the name of baubles.
‘And you’ve had a willing cohort in the shape of Evie Frye, no doubt?’
‘We had different reasons for seeking the Piece of Eden,’ agreed Henry. ‘She wanted to witness it. She wanted to look upon the powers of the First Civilization. I had already done so. I wanted to make sure that that power never fell into the hands of the Templars.’
‘“Had” you say …’
‘I beg your pardon.’
‘You said you had very different reasons for seeking out the Piece of Eden. What makes you think these events belong in the past tense?’
‘I have every faith in the twins. Even if Evie should fail to recover the Shroud then I am confident Jacob will neutralize Crawford Starrick. Either way, the Piece of Eden will be safe for the time being.’
‘And that’s it, is it?’ George pointed across the table to where Henry’s ‘Dear Evie’ letter lay. ‘Nothing else?’
Henry looked at him. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Nothing else.’
George nodded sagely. ‘Well, then good. That’s very good. Because, you know, as Ethan told you, and as your mother told you, the Assassins need their analytical minds as much as they need their warriors.’
Henry avoided George’s eye. ‘A true Assassin would be both.’
‘No, no.’ George shook his head. ‘What you’re descr
ibing isn’t a person, it’s an automaton. Our organization – any organization – needs a conscience, Henry. It’s an important function. We may be slow to recognize it on occasion, but the fact remains it’s a vital function. Whatever you do, I’d like you to remember that.’
Henry nodded.
‘Right, now that’s clear, perhaps I should come to my next order of business …’
George opened the satchel, removed a leather-bound book and slid it across the table to Henry. ‘Evie contacted me about this. A book she dimly remembered seeing in her father’s library, which may or may not contain some information about the artefact you seek.’
Henry frowned at him and George shrugged. ‘Yes, all right, I knew about the Shroud. I merely wanted to hear it from the horse’s mouth. Well, another horse’s mouth.’
Curious, Henry drew the book towards him, slipped open the cover and straightaway felt a tickle of the old excitement. Contained within was what looked to be a series of testimonies handed down throughout the ages – details of battles fought, assassinations carried out, treasures won and lost – all of it referring back to the very earliest years of the English Brotherhood.
Had Evie come across something about the Shroud, perhaps? Something that made no sense to her at the time but which resonated now?
George watched Henry’s face with a smile. ‘It took some finding, I can tell you,’ he said. ‘Hopefully it will be of use.’ He stood to go. ‘No doubt you will want to read it at once, so I shall leave you in peace. You’ve done well, Henry. Your mother and father will be proud. Ethan would be proud.’
When Henry had locked up after George he returned to the book. They knew that the Shroud was reputed to offer eternal life, and from that Evie assumed the artefact had healing abilities.
However, she had since become convinced that it also contained some greater, perhaps darker power. Her curiosity had sparked a memory; the memory had brought her to this book.
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