The King's Falcon (Roundheads & Cavaliers Book 3)

by Stella Riley

  Feather-head was already sweeping around in search of his blade. Luckily, it had landed several yards away near the spiral steps. Ashley calculated that if, as he’d intended, his boot had struck the precise point on the wrist which rendered its owner’s hand useless, he had about a minute of one-on-one fighting to bring the pretty fellow down. Without wasting a second of it, he launched a fierce, driving attack with both knife and sword that gave his opponent no opportunity to do more than attempt to defend himself as he retreated. His mouth set in a hard line and not taking his eyes off the man’s face for an instant, Ashley completed a series of moves that gave him the opening his wanted. Deflecting the enemy blade with a savage parry, he drove his own deep into Monsieur Fleur’s right shoulder at the spot that would disable his arm, whilst simultaneously hooking his feet from under him. The man howled and dropped like a stone. His hat rolled away across the cobbles, revealing bright, almost too-blond hair and the traitorous wink of a diamond in his ear.

  Ashley made the connection but hadn’t time to think about. The bastard wasn’t going to die any time soon, so he’d question him later. Meanwhile … he swivelled, just in time to deflect the sword-point that was about to be driven into his back.

  Bloody hell, he thought, trying to recover his breath and feeling stickiness on the fingers holding the knife. Persistent, aren’t they?

  Feather-head lunged. Ashley parried, produced a clever and little known riposte and glided out of the way. Feather-head charged again, grunting. Ashley responded with a swift counter-exchange. Then, allowing the blades to tangle, he locked them together, bringing Feather-head within easy range of the knife. Feeling the sharp, slender point piercing the side of his coat just beneath the second rib, the man came to an abrupt halt, his gaze frozen like that of a rabbit in the light.

  Ashley never killed by accident or if he didn’t have to. Feather-head’s current position was such that he couldn’t do a damned thing to defend himself. Consequently, Ashley was just about to end the bout by inflicting serious but non-fatal pain when there was a tell-tale scrape of metal … and Feather-head hissed, ‘Henri – now!’

  Withdrawing the knife a fraction, Ashley smashed his knee into the fellow’s groin and pivoted at the same moment – but he was a second too late. Even as Feather-head howled and went down clutching his balls, a sword was thrust deep into his own thigh and withdrawn with such excruciatingly savage clumsiness that he lost both his balance and all sense of what he was doing. His sword clattered to the ground and he dropped involuntarily on to his good knee on the cobbles. He tried to think past the blinding agony but, before he could gather himself, a boot smacked into the back of his skull, sending him down on his face. Henri, he supposed hazily, had found his blade; and, since his right arm was paralysed at the shoulder, he was using his left. Badly.

  Groping for his own sword-hilt but failing to find it, Ashley rolled over just in time to see Henri poised to take another wild stab at him. There wasn’t much he could do but he tried anyway, instinctively twisting to one side to avoid the blade and bringing up his knees in preparation to ram his feet into Henri’s stomach. He escaped the second thrust by mere inches but the attempt to use his legs sent pain screaming through his entire body. His vision blurred, then darkened on the image of Henri coming at him again.

  And, as he felt himself sliding towards oblivion, he thought, Now? God has a sense of humour after all.

  ~ * * ~ * * ~

  ENTR’ACTE

  London – October 1652

  Colonel Maxwell contemplated the three letters lying on his desk.

  The first had arrived in early September and consisted of gossip and an offer – in return for a substantial sum of money – to furnish Secretary Thurloe with proof that the young king in exile had married his mistress. The rumour was an old one and, in Eden’s view, unlikely to be true. As for the gossip, most of it would already have been reported by their own agents – and this letter was clearly not from one of their own agents. A single glance at the code, a basic binary so simple a child could crack it and certainly not one of his, had told him that. But he’d dutifully deciphered it and asked Thomas Scot what he wanted done about it.

  ‘For five hundred pounds? Nothing,’ had been the blunt reply. ‘The fellow must have windmills in his head. Offer him fifty. Or, better still, send somebody reliable to deal with it – if you take my meaning. Whatever the man’s got is probably a forgery anyway.’

  So Eden had sent Sergeant Trotter to a tavern in Deptford with a terse reply, two troopers and certain unorthodox orders. Three days later, the sergeant returned with a paper documenting the marriage of one Charles Stuart to Lucy Walter at St. Germain-en-Laye in September, 1649 and the information that the man from whom he’d acquired it was merely a go-between. The latter was no surprise. As for the document, despite the most careful scrutiny, neither Scot nor Eden could reach any conclusion about its authenticity. Secretary Thurloe was informed of its existence, Scot filed it away for future reference and Eden dismissed the matter from his mind.

  A month later, another very different letter arrived. As soon as he saw it, Eden had the annoying feeling that there was something he ought to remember but couldn’t. Inevitably, it brought him to assume that there must be a connection with the other – only to realise very quickly that there wasn’t. The handwriting was completely different and this time the code was a good deal more sophisticated.

  The question was, whose code was it? It wasn’t one of those Eden himself devised and changed on a bi-monthly basis and neither, he was fairly sure, was it a Royalist one.

  The Royalists liked inserting numbers to represent names of people and places; and Sir Edward Hyde had at least one extremely able cryptographer who’d developed another system altogether which had taken Eden the best part of two days to break and given him the most fun he’d had at work for some considerable time. He’d been tempted to send the fellow a note of congratulation but, in the end, common-sense had prevailed. He’d simply passed the translated contents – a warning to Hyde from Edward Massey that the loyalty of a supposed Royalist agent newly arrived in Paris was suspect - on to Thomas Scot. Scot, of course, knew as well as Eden did that Colonel Massey was absolutely right. Joseph Bampfield had been released from the Tower on very specific conditions at around the same time Massey himself had escaped from it.

  None of which had anything to do with the second letter which Eden had chosen to withhold from both Scot and Thurloe. Though its contents suggested that it had come from one of their own agents, the business of the code suggested otherwise. There was one simple rule for watertight espionage – and this fellow was breaking it. So, since he wasn’t one of Scot’s spies, the writer was either a freebooter of questionable reliability or Secretary Thurloe had his own irons in the fire. The letter alluded to a possible plot which would ‘permanently resolve, root and branch, the causes of future civil unrest and political disturbance’. It also stated that discreet measures were already being set in place and these could be activated when the order was given.

  The implications inherent in the report had worried Eden enough to hold on to it while he attempted, without success, to discover its author. He knew he ought to pass it on but the suspicion of what a so-called ‘permanent resolution’ might entail stayed his hand. And thus the letter had remained safely locked in his desk … until this morning when, wedged between a pair of urgent demands for naval supplies from Admiral Blake, the third one had arrived.

  The latest letter was in the same hand as the previous one and used the same code. It was also explicit.

  Eden’s brain recoiled instinctively from a plot that was both evil and unnecessary. It also told him that he was not meant to know about it and that the letters – presumably part of a larger correspondence – had somehow arrived on his desk by mistake. In one sense, he was glad that Thurloe’s system wasn’t entirely error-proof as yet. In another, he wished he hadn’t become privy to information which – one way or another �
�� he couldn’t just ignore.

  He considered his options. He could burn the report and feign ignorance; he could give the ciphered original to either Scot or Thurloe and pretend he hadn’t decoded it; or he could follow his immediate inclination and interfere. The first was cowardly, the second, risky and the last one well-nigh impossible if he didn’t want to be labelled a double-agent.

  It would have been helpful, he reflected, if he could have discussed his suspicions with either Major-General Lambert or Gabriel Brandon. But, having refused to fill Ireton’s vacant shoes in Ireland, Lambert had temporarily retired to his estates and Gabriel hadn’t set foot in London since the late King’s execution. Both of them were totally out of reach in Yorkshire.

  Eden read and re-read the newest despatch until its words were etched on the back of his skull. But no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t change his first conclusion for something more palatable … and no amount of watered wine sweetened the sour taste in his mouth.

  * * *

  He arrived back in Cheapside to find Deborah setting the final stitches to the new shirt she had promised him. Laying her sewing aside, she rose, smiling and said, ‘You’re later than usual. And your face tells me that you’ve had a trying day.’

  ‘Something like that.’

  ‘Have you eaten?’

  ‘No.’ The room smelled of herbs and something else that he couldn’t identify. For the first time in hours, his mind started to settle. It might have been that soothing aroma – except that he knew it wasn’t. He said slowly, ‘But at the moment I don’t particularly want food.’

  ‘Ah.’ She took a couple of steps towards him, watching the acute tension he’d brought into the room with him turn into focus of a different sort. ‘Something else, then?’

  ‘Yes. I think … yes.’ He smiled, feeling the familiar tightening of his body as she came closer still. ‘Definitely something else.’

  Reaching out, Deborah trailed light fingertips along the thin, white scar on his cheek, always more prominent when he was troubled, and on down his arm until she could take his hand.

  ‘Come, then. Nicholas is out, supper will keep … and the cares of your day will wait for an hour.’

  ‘An hour?’ he murmured with a flicker of humour as she drew him towards the door. ‘You have a flattering idea of my stamina.’

  ‘No. I have a very precise idea of what you can offer me. And I won’t settle for less.’

  ‘Ah. Then I’d better apply myself thoroughly, hadn’t I?’

  She tossed a smile over her shoulder.

  ‘Don’t you always?’

  Inside his room, Eden closed the door and set his arms about her, breathing in her own particular scent. Sliding her hands into his hair, Deborah pulled his face down and nipped gently at his lower lip. He gave a low rumble of approval and captured her mouth with his own while she pushed his coat aside and tugged at the collar of his shirt, seeking his skin. He broke the kiss long enough to say on a small laugh, ‘Keep that up and this will be over in five minutes.’

  She sighed and licked his throat.

  ‘No. It will take longer than that for you to get my clothes off.’

  ‘Not necessarily. But on this occasion … perhaps.’

  And, spinning her round, he grazed her neck with his teeth while his fingers sought the laces of her gown.

  Slowly, enticingly, he unlaced, unhooked and untied until the floor around them was littered with her garments and Deborah wore nothing but her stockings. Eden surveyed her from head to foot, his eyes hot and intense, and said, ‘God. You look so unbelievably erotic, there’s probably a law against it.’

  Her breathing light and rapid, she said, ‘Or soon will be. My turn now.’

  Eden’s clothes disappeared rather more quickly in between deep, hungry kisses. And finally he was able to pull her close, flesh to flesh, his arousal hard and eager against her.

  They tumbled to the bed in a tangle of limbs, their hands and mouths avid for each other. She stroked the lines and muscles of his arms, shoulders and back, sobbing his name when he teased her breasts with his tongue. This was a delight that never failed them because at the core of the conflagration was mutual generosity – purely instinctive on his part, driven by love on hers.

  She was warm and willing and acutely responsive. Eden treasured every moan and gasp, every ragged breath and tremor … all of them fuelling his own already fierce desire. He knew the extent of her pleasure now; he knew how to send her soaring and how to keep her there, helpless with passion. And when he finally joined with her, the rhythm of their loving was always perfectly, effortlessly in tune.

  Some time later, lying with her head pillowed on his shoulder, he said lazily, ‘You always know what I need. How is that?’

  ‘I know when you are worried. Because of the nature of your work, I also know better than to ask you to talk about it. So I find other ways to help. Sometimes simple conversation over food, sometimes a glass or two of wine … sometimes, this.’

  She made it sound as though it was merely a matter of intuition, allied to trial-and-error. As ever, Eden suspected that there was more to it and, as ever, preferred to retain an element of doubt. He said, ‘For future reference, you should know that ‘this’ would always be my personal choice.’

  She slid her foot up his calf. ‘Mine, too.’

  ‘I noticed.’ And then laughed when she bit his shoulder.

  * * *

  Eden arose the following morning with a possible course of action in mind but loath to implement it until he’d taken the time to thoroughly contemplate the possible ramifications. He was also busier than usual with meetings outside his normal province.

  The last couple of months had seen General Fleetwood sent to Ireland in Lambert’s place and eventually, the drafting of an Act of Settlement for that beleaguered country. A commercial treaty had come into force between England and – amazingly, in most people’s view – Spain, under which England was to receive payment for intervening in the Franco-Spanish war; and meanwhile, as the Dutch War drifted indecisively on, Denmark had demonstrated its disapproval of the Commonwealth by throwing its support behind the other side.

  Finally, on November 18th, due to Admiral Blake’s frenzied insistence that he couldn’t continue to prosecute the war without increased victualing and re-fitting of damaged ships, the Parliament passed a Confiscation Bill for six hundred Royalist properties in order to raise the necessary funds. Then, before the dust had settled on that, came news that Cardinal Mazarin had finally given in and formally recognised the Commonwealth.

  Though he understood the need for money, Eden didn’t consider the Confiscation Bill any help in uniting the country. As for Mazarin … well, words came cheap and weren’t likely to amount to anything more than lip-service.

  Eden reached a decision about the plot letters and embarked on the appropriate preparations. It was while he was making painstaking copies of the coded originals that a bizarre notion struck him. In order to avoid awkward questions, he waited until Thomas Scot left for a meeting with the Secretary. Then he removed the marriage lines from Lucy Walter’s dossier and laid them on his own desk alongside the letters.

  Well, now, he murmured to himself. That’s interesting. And odd. But not, unfortunately, madly helpful.

  * * *

  Once back in Cheapside, he told Deborah he wanted an hour of complete privacy. Then he asked Nicholas Austin to join him in the parlour.

  Nicholas registered the Colonel’s unusually grim expression and said, ‘Something’s wrong?’

  ‘I believe so.’ Eden stared searchingly into the other man’s face and hoped he wasn’t making a huge mistake. He said flatly, ‘I need your help. But I also need to be very sure that I can trust you. Can I?’

  ‘Yes.’ The answer was immediate and utterly positive. ‘I owe you my life and my freedom. If there’s something I can do to repay you for that, you have only to ask.’

  Eden drew a long, steadying breath.
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  ‘Very well, then. I want you to take some information to Francis Langley.’

  Whatever Nicholas had been expecting, it certainly wasn’t that. He opened his mouth, closed it again and finally said weakly, ‘Oh. I’m beginning to see what you meant about trust.’

  ‘No. As yet, you have no idea.’ He gestured to a chair. ‘You’d better sit down. I’ve thought long and hard about this. The information you’ll be carrying is highly sensitive. Consequently, it’s too dangerous for you to have anything on your person that could be found if you were stopped. So I’m going to tell you what I believe is afoot and show you certain documents in my possession by way of proof of my suspicions – and you are going to remember it all, word for word. Clear, so far?’

  Nicholas nodded. ‘Yes. But do you know where Francis is?’

  ‘Sixteen, Rue des Rosiers, Paris. I’m assuming that he’ll trust you. But so that there will be no doubt in his mind, I’ll give you a letter for him. It’s one he’s been expecting for some time, regarding a personal matter and I’ll include – albeit in oblique terms – an instruction for him to take you seriously.’ Eden paused and then added dryly, ‘Not, when I explain what this is all about, that there’s likely to be any problem with that. If it wasn’t a bloody disgrace, I wouldn’t be involving myself in it at all.’

  ‘This all sounds somewhat … alarming.’

  ‘That’s putting it mildly.’ Eden perched on the corner of his desk and said, ‘I’ve come across information by accident. Information I’m not supposed to have. In a nutshell, there’s a plot to lure Charles Stuart and his brother James to the coast of France in order to assassinate them.’

  For a long moment, Nicholas simply stared at him. Then, plainly at a loss for anything more articulate, he said feebly. ‘Oh. God. You’re sure?’