by Anne Lyle
"I-I'll return when you're dressed," Mal muttered, and hurried down the stairs to the lower chamber, suppressing the urge to vomit.
He had seen mercifully little of the Huntsmen's bloody victim, but now he knew what drove them to such fear and loathing. The ambassador's spine ended in a stubby hairless tail, about the size of Mal's thumb, which twitched obscenely like a rabbit's scut. Making the sign of the cross Mal retreated into the bedchamber that had been set aside for Lodge. Tonight he was damned well going to sleep in here, and to Hell with Leland's instructions.
He could not hide forever, unfortunately. Steeling himself, he walked through into the dining room, where breakfast had been laid out. A dozen of the skrayling guards were lined up behind the benches awaiting their master. Mal took a stool at the far end. His appetite had fled, but he snatched up a tankard of small ale from the breakfast table, wishing it was something stronger as he downed it in one.
Kiiren arrived a few minutes later, dressed once again in his blue robe.
"Good morrow, Catlyn-tuur," the young skrayling said.
Mal got to his feet and bowed, though more to cover his own discomfort than out of courtesy. The ambassador took his place at the head of the table and a servant helped him to slices of bread and cold beef. Mal couldn't help but watch the skraylings closely, expecting some new and dreadful revelation of bestiality, but as at the banquet the ambassador conducted himself with a prim courtesy that would not have shamed a prioress. Even the skrayling guards ate in a civilised manner, though they slouched on the benches in a way no English lord would have tolerated from underlings. The ambassador, on the other hand, sat bolt upright on the hard wooden chair. Mal hid a smile. Having a tail really was a pain in the arse.
When breakfast was over the ambassador retired to the parlour, and Mal felt obliged to follow. He scarcely had time to wonder what to do or say next when one of the castle servants entered the room, carrying a velvet cushion to which was pinned a large gold pendant.
"A gift for His Excellency," the servant said to Mal.
"Bring it here," Kiiren told him.
The servant looked taken aback at being addressed by a skrayling, but complied. "From my lord the Earl of Northumberland," he said, kneeling before Kiiren.
The centre of the pendant was an oval of blue fluorspar the size of a hen's egg, with faint veins like ripples in water; around it were set seed pearls and tiny beads of jet in a pattern reminiscent of skrayling designs.
"Allow me, sir," Mal said.
He took the pendant and examined it. Henry Percy was famous for his knowledge of alchemy, an interest which had helped earn him the nickname "the wizard earl". The back of the pendant was smooth, however, with no sign of poisoned needles or hidden mechanisms. He handed it to Kiiren.
"I thank your master for most kind gift," the ambassador said, bowing low.
"A splendid offering," Mal said, after the servant had gone. "No one who sees it can doubt the giver, either."
"How so?"
"Blue and gold are the Percy colours, and the central gem may have been mined in Northumberland; my own home county produces a similar mineral. And these lozenges," he pointed out the design of the setting, "are found on their family's coat of arms."
"Coat of arms?"
"A shield bearing symbols of great antiquity, which is passed down from father to son. Each family has its own design."
"Our people are not so very different, then," Kiiren said.
"How so?"
The skrayling ran a grey-nailed thumb under the necklace around his own throat. It consisted of cylindrical ivory beads carved into elaborate patterns similar to the ones on their clothing, interspersed with round beads of gleaming grey-black metal. Mal had noticed all the skraylings wore them, though he had assumed they were merely a fashion.
"This is marked with signs telling name of my father and his clan. Father gives to mother, and then mother to child, as proof of kinship."
"Proof? Do fathers not acknowledge their children amongst your people?"
"We are not like you. We do not take mate for always. There is mating, and then we part."
Mal laughed. "A lot of men would prefer your way."
The pendant turned out to be only the first of an endless flow of gifts, sent by courtiers eager to show off their loyalty to the Queen by favouring her guest. Scented gloves, jewelled daggers, falcons, books of poems: all had to be checked for signs of poison or other treachery. The gifts were then arranged on a cabinet, apart from the falcons, which were taken to the Royal Menagerie for safekeeping.
Examining the gifts for poison was one thing; looking for secret messages was going to be more difficult. Mal needed privacy and time, neither of which was likely to be in generous supply for a while. So far no letters had been sent to or by the ambassador, at least not openly, and Mal's initial examinations of the gifts had revealed no hidden notes or suspiciously blank pages that could hold invisible writing. If anyone was trying to communicate privily with the ambassador, they were using more subtle means.
He had just handed over the latest gift, a pair of German pistols inlaid with ivory panels depicting the death of Actaeon, when he realised the ambassador was addressing him.
He inclined his head. "Sir?"
"Please, have this gift from us."
He gestured to a skrayling servant, who held out a small box of pale wood about the size of a child's palm. Mal took it, quite forgetting to bow. As he opened the box, he let out a low whistle. Nestling in folds of velvet was a black baroque pearl as big as his fingernail, attached to a hoop of the same dark metal as the beads on the skraylings' necklaces.
"I…" Mal closed the box. "This is too rich a gift, Your Excellency."
"It is fashion of your people, is it not?"
"Yes, sir."
"Then wear it, in honour of our visit."
Mal inclined his head in submission. Drawing his dagger he cut the silk ribbon threaded through his earlobe and replaced it with the pearl earring. The unfamiliar weight and movement would be a distraction for a while, but he supposed he had better get used to it. Much like the skraylings themselves.
"It's… beautiful."
Coby stood in the yard of the new theatre, gazing up at the painted canopy over the stage. On a background of deepest blue, figures representing the moon and planets paraded around a gilded sun, and the canopy itself was supported by thick pillars painted with such artifice, she would have sworn they were made of marble.
"Worth the wait, eh, sir?" Master Naismith said, beaming at Master Cutsnail. "Come, let's around to the tiring house and you can see it from within."
Coby followed them back out into the field and round the outside of the theatre to the back door. Master Naismith produced a large iron key and unlocked it, then ushered his business partner inside.
"This is where the players dress for their parts," Coby translated for Master Naismith.
The tiring room took up almost the entire ground floor behind the stage. Benches ranged down both sides, with pegs above them awaiting costumes. Already the room held a faint hint of the dusty, magical smell Coby always associated with the backstage of a theatre, though here it was masked by the resinous scent of new wood.
"What is this?" Cutsnail asked, going over to the staircase in the centre of the room.
"The under-stage, sir. Please, come this way."
Master Naismith stayed above whilst Coby and the skrayling went down to the cramped area under the stage, backs bent and heads scraping on the underside of the boards. Fresh sawdust drifted down on them at every footfall from above.
"Here we store all the engines needed for our play," Coby said, trying not to sneeze.
She pointed out the miniature wooden castle on its wheeled base, the pair of wave engines, and the cannon. The wave engines were her favourite, a pair of complicated contraptions of blue and green canvas sheets attached to cables, wheels and gears, long enough between them to span the entire stage and each powered b
y a crank handle at the off-stage end.
She ran a hand over the surface of a wave, making the canvas ripple like the real thing. "I wish I could show you how they work, but you will have to wait until the play is performed."
"And this is the new trapdoor?" Cutsnail gestured to the complex mechanism of timber, iron and wood in the centre of the under-stage.
"Yes, sir," Coby said, biting her lip and watching his reaction.
Cutsnail inspected the pulleys and gears, rubbing the engine grease between two fingers and sniffing it with professional interest. Coby unlatched the trap, then released the counterweight so that the bottom section rose smoothly upwards to become flush with the stage.
"There is another in the stage canopy," she added, "to lower gods and the like from the heavens. I can take you up to see it if you wish."
"Gods? I thought you Christians had only one god."
"Yes, but some of our plays are about ancient times, before Christ came to save us. In those days people believed in many different gods."
"Ah, I think I understand. But thank you, I have seen enough."
She showed Cutsnail back up to the tiring room and thence upstairs to the office. To her annoyance Dunfell had turned up, and was fussing over some paperwork with Master Naismith. The duke's secretary fell silent when he saw Master Cutsnail, however, his expression turning to one of guarded politeness. It was a strange reaction from a man in the duke's service, who must see more than his fair share of skraylings.
Cutsnail appeared not to notice anything amiss, but it was impossible to know if that was through genuine ignorance of humans or simply lack of visible reaction. The foreigners' faces were hard to read at the best of times, their expressions concealed or distorted as they were by the tattooed lines.
"Thank your master for showing me the new theatre," he told Coby. "Now I must be about my other business."
"Certainly, sir."
She showed him out of the back door, lingering a while to enjoy the sunshine. It was oddly quiet without the constant hammering and cursing of the workmen. For a moment she was taken back to Sunday afternoons with Master Catlyn, sneaking into the empty building to spar and talk. She closed her eyes, lost in blissful memory.
"Naismith! Is Naismith there?"
She blinked against the light as Master Eaton came running round the curve of the theatre wall.
"In the office," she said as he pushed past her. "Why, what is it?"
She ran after him, heart in her mouth. Judging by the look on the actor's face, something was very wrong.
"Rafe?" Naismith put down his ledger.
"It's – Hugh Catchpenny," Eaton panted. "He's dead."
Coby stared at Master Eaton, aghast.
"What?" Naismith looked almost as shocked as she felt.
"Killed in a brawl last night. Skull smashed in, so they're saying."
"Dear God in Heaven."
Dunfell stepped forward. "Who is this Catchpenny?"
Coby bit back a snide remark. Six weeks with the company, and he still could not remember the names of the men on stage.
"A hireling, a player of small parts only," Naismith replied distractedly. "Still, he must be replaced."
"Certainly he must," said Dunfell, "and with someone less quarrelsome, by Heaven. My lord Suffolk–"
"With all due respect, sir," Master Eaton said, advancing on him slowly, "this is too little a matter for the notice of a great man like Suffolk. Is it not?"
Dunfell retreated, his round visage as pale as the moon.
"Ah, um, yes. Yes, I suppose so."
"Well, there's nothing for it," Master Naismith said. "We shall have to hire a replacement."
CHAPTER XII
At eleven o'clock a yeoman warder announced that the ambassador's barge was ready. Baron Howard of Effingham, the Lord High Admiral, had offered to show the ambassador around the royal dockyards at Deptford. Effingham also happened to be the patron of one of the competing theatre companies. Mal wondered how many palms the admiral had greased in order to get this early introduction to the judge of the competition.
The two skrayling elders, Scarheart and Greatyard, had also been invited, and they sat with the ambassador under a canopy in the centre of the barge, shaded from the heat of the sun. Even at this early hour it was beginning to get uncomfortably hot. Mal soon began to wish some other colour than black had been chosen for his livery, or even that he could join the skraylings in the shade. Instead he stood behind the ambassador, hand on rapier hilt, though in situations like this his role was more ceremonial than practical. If anyone chose to take a shot at the ambassador from the riverbank or a passing boat, there was little Mal could do short of throwing himself in front of the arrow or bullet. And he was not about to throw away his life for a skrayling, no matter how important.
"Catlyn-tuur?"
"Sir?"
"Please, talk with us. Sekaarhjarret-tuur wish to know more about you."
Mal sat down on a cushion opposite the skraylings, arranging his rapier behind him. Perhaps this was an opportunity to find out why they had asked for him in the first place.
"What would you like to know, sir?" he asked warily.
"You are from place called Peak, north of here?" Kiiren asked.
"Peakland, in Derbyshire." His heart sank. So that was it. No sense in trying to conceal things, then. "Rushdale Hall," he added.
Kiiren conveyed the information to the elders, who nodded and smiled at Mal. He smiled back, confused. If the skraylings knew about him and Charles, why were they so pleased? Foreigners! They made no sense.
"May I ask when you are born?" Kiiren said.
Mal frowned. "In the ninth year of Queen Elizabeth's reign, the year of Our Lord fifteen hundred and sixty-seven."
"Twenty-six years ago."
"Yes."
Kiiren leant forward. "What count of days? What time?"
"The first day of November," Mal replied. "I know not the hour. Why, do you desire to cast my horoscope, sir?"
"I do not know this word. What is… horror scope?"
Mal spent the rest of the journey to Deptford explaining what he knew of astrology; anything to keep the skraylings from enquiring further about his own history. Fortunately they seemed well acquainted with the movement of the stars, though they called the constellations by different names. Kiiren seemed keen on teaching him the names of everything, and he did his best to oblige, though the skrayling tongue was harder to pronounce than any language he had come across in his studies. He was relieved when the massed white sails of the shipyard came into view, and he could rest his dry throat a while.
Ned woke late to find Gabriel gone and a note on the pillow. Gone home to fetch clean linens, it said. Meet me at the Bull for dinner? Dammit, how was he to break the bad news to Gabriel there? Still, he had to get it over with. He whiled away the rest of the morning practising his card shuffling and dealing, then slipped the pack in his pocket and headed out.
The Bull's Head was abuzz with gossip, something about a fight outside the Castle on the Hoop. He found Gabriel with the rest of Suffolk's Men at their usual table in a nook near the fireplace, and slid onto the settle next to him. Gabriel reached for his hand and squeezed it. His face was drawn and pale, and his free hand gripped his tankard like a vice.
"Something wrong?" Ned murmured.
"One of our hirelings is dead," Gabriel replied. "Killed in a fight."
"Anyone I know?"
Gabriel shrugged. "Hugh Catchpenny."
"Thin, pockmarked fellow? Works for whatshisface, next door to the Lewes Inn?"
"That's the one."
"Huh." Ned beckoned to a passing pot-boy. "Another ale, if you will." He glanced at Gabriel. "No, make that two."
Naismith was going over the parts with Eaton and Hendricks, trying to work out if they could double up and manage without the lost actor.
"I don't see how it can be done, sir," Hendricks said at last. "The costume changes for some of the smaller
roles are tight enough as it is. There will be mistakes made if we try for more."
"We could give Catchpenny's part to Fletcher," Rafe added, "and hire someone to take his place. There would be few lines and cues to learn, it's mostly walk-on parts."
The actor-manager got to his feet. "Gentlemen!"
The taproom fell silent.
"As you know, there has been a terrible tragedy this day, the loss of our good friend Hugh Catchpenny. Now, melancholy as this business is, some good may come out of it for someone. Suffolk's Men are left a player short, and as you know, we are set to perform before the Ambassador of Vinland next week."