‘I can’t see properly out of it,’ murmured James, with commendable composure. ‘Everything is blurry . . .’
Makepeace spent a few moments in silent consultation with the doctor.
‘Your eye should mend,’ she said, ‘in a day or two. A friend of mine says he’s seen the like before. And he says that if we wash out that burn and dress it you’ll lose that leper-look in a few weeks.’
‘Friend?’ James’s brows rose in consternation. ‘Makepeace — what have you done?’
‘Me? What did you do?’ Makepeace could not resist giving him a small, fierce punch in the arm. ‘You used me to hide that charter! Then you ran away without me! I waited at those stocks for ages! I thought you’d been caught and hanged!’
‘I always meant to come back! But everything happened so fast. Symond had a plan — he said he’d use the charter to threaten the family, and get some of his estates ahead of time. Then he’d set up his own manor, with no Inheritance or ghosts, and he’d bring us there to join his household. And nobody would trouble us while we had that charter.’
‘You should have told me!’
‘He made me promise silence,’ James said simply. ‘A man who breaks his word is better dead.’
‘Well, you broke your word to me when you threw yourself face-first on a pile of Fellmotte ghosts!’ Makepeace gave him a sharp little pinch, as if they were much younger children. There was an angry joy in voicing her frustration.
‘I’m sorry!’ hissed James, and seemed to mean it. ‘If I could take it back I would! If you had been there that day, you would understand. When I found Sir Anthony bleeding on the ground, and he beckoned me over . . . it felt like Providence. As if some star of my birth had shaped me for that moment! That one chance to become something . . . great.
‘And it was greatness, Makepeace! You don’t know the things I could do when I’d Inherited. The languages that sprang into my head, the sword moves I suddenly knew, and all the dealings of the court laid out for me like a web on a loom! And to give orders and see things done, to watch doors open, to have everything possible—’
‘To chase your own kin across two and a half counties,’ Makepeace interjected sharply.
James put an arm around her shoulders and squeezed her tightly for a few seconds, then kissed the top of her head.
‘I know,’ he muttered into her cap. ‘I was the Lord of Fools. I thought I would still be myself, and change everything. But I was just a puppet. The bean in the cake — that’s what you said, wasn’t it? Giving up my freedom for a game of lordship.’
He sighed.
‘I felt . . . sorry for him too,’ he admitted, sounding embarrassed. ‘Sir Anthony. He was still one of those devils, but when he was lying there in his own blood he looked frightened, like any dying man. It was hard to say no. I know, ’tis a stupid reason.’
‘Yes.’ Makepeace remembered her own helpless desire to save Livewell’s disintegrating ghost. ‘A stupid reason. But not the worst kind of stupid reason.’
She hugged him back, and sighed.
‘You’ll have another game of lordship to play when we reach Grizehayes,’ she said under her breath. ‘You must play Lord of Misrule in good earnest, and play it well, or we’re both for the pot.’
‘What about you?’ James studied her face with a concerned frown. ‘What have you done to yourself, Makepeace?’
‘Don’t worry.’ Makepeace squeezed his hand, and searched for the right words. ‘I’m not haunted against my will. I just made some new friends.’
‘So there are ghosts inside you?’ James seemed to be struggling with the idea.
‘James.’ It was Makepeace’s turn to admit to a betrayal. ‘I have always been haunted, for as long as you have known me. I brought a ghost with me to Grizehayes, and nobody guessed. I should have told you. I wanted to tell you. But you were right, I am a coward sometimes. Trust frightens me more than pain.
‘He is my friend, and my battle-brother. We are woven into each other. I want you to understand him, so you can understand me. Let me tell you about him.’
During the long and wearying ride, the carriage stopped now and then for a change of horses, but not to break the journey. Occasionally there would be sounds of challenges outside and muffled voices. Sometimes passwords were exchanged, sometimes coins or papers, sometimes gunshots.
With a sense of inevitability, Makepeace saw the countryside change and revert. Lush fields yielded to moorland. Damp lambs followed the black-faced sheep down the paths between the gorse mounds. Everything was so familiar it hurt. The sights and colours locked around Makepeace’s mind like a familiar shackle.
The convoy halted in a little copse, just after sunset. The driver and one soldier stayed to look after the carriage and horses. White Crowe, Makepeace and James continued on foot, accompanied by five other soldiers wearing Fellmotte colours. Makepeace recognized a few of them from the neighbouring villages, and was sure she had once bought ladles from one of them. But war had recast them all. They had new costumes, and new roles to play.
White Crowe had found an eye-patch of black cloth for James. Thankfully nobody expected James to lead the troop while he was injured and half blind. If he had, the others might soon have guessed that he no longer wielded the skills and knowledge of an Elder.
Grizehayes they saw from a distance, its distinctive towers silhouetted against the last violet glimmer of the fading day. However, it was no longer alone.
On the darkling expanse around it, where once there had been flat, unbroken ground, a straggling, ramshackle town seemed to have risen up from the very earth. Clusters of dun-coloured canvas tents had sprouted, and among them campfires glowed like scattered embers. The camp was a crescent shape, curling its tapering arms to embrace Grizehayes. However, it did not encircle the great house completely, and there was still a wide, wary distance between the nearest tents and the ancient grey walls.
It was true, then. Grizehayes was under siege.
One soldier vanished into the darkness to scout ahead, and soon returned.
‘Our guards on Widow’s Tower have seen our lantern signal and returned it,’ he said. ‘They know we’re here, so they’ll be ready to let us in through the sally gate.’
‘If the enemy saw the signal in the tower, they’ll know the household is signalling to someone in the dark,’ said White Crowe. ‘They’ll be watching for us. Quiet as death, everyone. They’ll have scouts of their own outside the camp, far away from the fires so that their eyes can adjust to the dark.’
Gingerly they crept through the darkness skirting the edge of the camp, following White Crowe’s lead. They nearly blundered into a clutch of enemy musketeers, but noticed them in time, thanks to the quiet rattle of their bandoliers, and the pinpoint glow of their slow matches.
Makepeace briefly wondered about grabbing James’s hand, running towards these strangers and surrendering. It would save her from Grizehayes, but seemed like an excellent recipe for getting shot.
At last the group cleared the tip of the camp’s crescent, and now there was only a dark expanse of uneven ground between them and the distant walls. Makepeace could make out the dark, arched outline of the small sally door at the top of its flight of steps.
‘Run,’ said White Crowe, ‘and stop for nothing.’
As they sprinted for the door, there were a few cries from the direction of the camp. A single optimistic shot rang out, but the bullet flew wild into the darkness. Only when Makepeace reached the portcullis with the others did she dare to glance back. A few dark figures were running from the direction of the tents, but faltered as rocks were hurled at them from the tower above.