“I scheme only to prevent that event, Lord Ingleborough.” With gravity the Lord Chancellor bowed to his friends and wished them good appetite before pulling at a rope to sound the bell that would bring Tinkler from the shadows to bear a message to his master, Quire.
THE THIRD CHAPTER
Captain Quire sat up on his grey and grease-veined bedsheet, flicking an ankle free of a blanket which clung to it like a dying rat, staring at a diffident young girl who, with a basket, had entered the seedy room. “The sewing?”
“Yes, sir. I was sent to fetch it.” Bodice, petticoats and embroidered skirt too lavish for her station and evidently her own work. A good pair of hips; shy, sensual features. Quire grunted.
In his shirt Quire stretched a hand to the stool where all his torn and bloodstained clothing lay, black, damp, muddy. The shirt itself had blood on it. He peeled some patches off as his eye caught them, he brushed his thick hair back from his wide forehead and stared as she moved towards the stool. “My clothes are important to me. Those clothes. They are me. They are my victims. It’s why they must be washed and mended well, my girl. Your name?”
“Alys Finch, sir.”
“I’m Captain Quire, the murderer. Shakestaffs of the Watch seek me. I slew a Saracen last night. A young noble with a perfect body, unblemished. It’s blemished now. Twenty times my sword slipped into him.”
“A duel, sir, was it?” Her voice was trembling as she reached for the rags.
He drew out his blade from beneath the bedclothes; a finely made sword, a perfect weapon, the best of its kind. “Look! No, it was clever murder, disguised as a duel. We went out to the fields behind White Hall and there I killed him. You’re a pretty little dell, ain’t you. That’s good hair, brown and curly. I like it. Big eyes, full lips. Are you broken yet, young Alys?”
She took his breeches up and put them in her basket while his calm, terrible eyes looked at her bodice. “No, sir. I hope to marry.”
His smile was almost tender as he touched her shoulder with his unclean sword, as if he dubbed her a Lady. “Unlace, Alys, and let me see your buds. This sword"-he stroked her throat with it-"has killed so many. Some were fairly slain. But at my suggestion last night’s Moor was tying back his robe’s hems, bending, when I took him first, below the ribs and ripping up, swiftly, in and out. There were witnesses I could never have suspected on such a dark cold night.” Quire’s tone became momentarily bitter. “The trees were frozen. Our lanterns were shielded. But two soldiers, more’s the pity, of the Watch, came by-and one of them recognised me.” He directed her fingers to her laces and the blouse began to loosen, though she fumbled a great deal, out of fear. His voice was distant. “They attacked before my Saracen was properly dead-the slashes in my coat and doublet are theirs, and so’s this cut on my thigh.” He patted a place beneath his shirt. “The hole in the hose is where the Saracen struck at me with a knife from the ground, the traitor-I’d thought him dead-even as Tinkler took his boots from him, his lantern set aside. Fine, fancy boots, but Tinkler daren’t wear ‘em now. See his blood, there? And that, closer to the tip? A soldier I dispatched before his comrade ran away.” He held the point under her eye so that she became very still; he touched it to her lips. “Taste.”
The blouse entirely loosened, he pushed the linen back. She had small breasts, not full as yet. He prinked at the tip of one with the sword. “You’re a good girl, Alys. You’ll come back to me soon, eh? You’ll bring my sewing?”
“Yes, sir.” She breathed heavily but cautiously, having turned a strong colour.
“And you’ll be an obedient girl, shall you, and let Captain Quire be first to your treasures?” His sword-point fell from cleft to cleft. “Shall you, Alys?”
Roe’s eyes closed, rose lips parted. “Yes.”
“Good. Kiss the sword, Alys, to seal our pact. Kiss the soldier’s brittle blood.” She kissed as the door thumped. He directed her hands to her laces and looked lazily towards the sound. “Aye?” As an afterthought he pricked her shoulder for a red pearl, which formed. “Good girl,” he whispered. “You are Quire’s now.” He stretched up, grasped her, sucked the wound, then fell back upon the stained linen. “Who’s there?”
“The innkeeper’s wife. Marjorie, sir, with the food you ordered, and the suit.”
Quire wondered for a moment, then shrugged, keeping a good grip on his Toledo sword. “Come in, then.”
The woman floundered through, a coarse sea-cow, frowning at Alys Finch, who, with a quick breath, bobbed and made for the door.
“Soon, Alys.” Quire spoke affectionately.
“Yes, sir.”
Taking the dark suit from under his fat landlady’s arm, Quire began to dress, in evident dismay, while she placed the tray of mutton stew, bread and wine upon the chest at the foot of the bed. “These were the best you could find, Marjorie?”
“And I was lucky, Captain.”
“Then here you are.” He handed her an angel, a piece of gold.
“It’s too much.”
“I know.”
“You’re evil, through and through, Captain, but you’re a generous devil.”
“Many devils are.” He drew the stool to the chest, grasped the big spoon and began on the mutton. “It’s in their interest.” He was wiry, muscular and dangerous as he ate.
Marjorie lingered. “There was a fight up at the Seahorse, then? A rough place.”
“No rougher than this, and better booze. It was in White Hall fields, though. A duel, interrupted by the Watch, who now seek me.”
“It’s a foolish law that stops men duelling. Why shouldn’t they kill one another, useless slopgollops? The Queen’s too soft.”
“Ah, well, better that than too hard.” Quire, so used to being lured, adopted an instinctive neutrality. “And the law’s to stop murder under the guise of the duel, and to stop the decline in gentlemen bridegrooms. They were slaying one another at far too fast a rate. The Queen feared for the continuation of the aristocracy. No nobles would mean a dissolute future, in Chaos!”
“Oh, Captain!”
“’Tis true as this stew is tasty.” He did not flatter her.
“It’s good, that, you monster.” Mistress Marjorie folded her arms. “What were you doing with Crown’s dell?”
A dark grin. Quire put bread to stew, knowing a would-be cohort in sin. “Quickening her interest, awakening her blood, warming her up for the time I’ll need comfort, maybe.”
“You’d terrified her. She has a lad. Starling’s son.”
“Of course I frightened her. ‘Tis the best way to enrich her imagination and guarantee her curiosity, for she’ll want to test herself against me-and all the time tremble for enslavement. Don’t I frighten you, Marjorie?”
“I think I can control you.” But she was doubtful, holding on to her gold in one fist. She picked at the corner of her mouth.
“I’m glad you think so.” He was not ironic.
“But Alys Finch is no doxy for the likes of you.” Weakly. “She’s a good girl.”
“She is indeed. The Watch?” He had his doublet belted. He wriggled uncomfortably; he tied faded cotton about his long throat. He sat to drag on his jack-boots, lacing them above the knee.
“No closer. But they will be. Many know you stay here.”
He downed a sparing glass-"Aye"-found his hat, smoothed the feathers. “Finch and Starling? She’d lay a strange egg if allowed to pair, what?”
“Leave her to him. He’s a hot-tempered boy.”
“Oh, Marjorie, my interest wanes already. Let them build their nest.” He fingered the hat on his head and tilted it. He grinned at her, thin-lipped. “Maybe I’ll play cuckoo, later, when it’s spring.”
“You’ll be hanged by then.”
“Not Quire. Besides, Gloriana hangs no one. And even if the Law were changed I’d survive. For I am Quire the Trickster, Quire the Thief-I’ve too many deeds undone, as yet-too great a fascinated audience for my art, awaiting my masterpiece.” He sheathed the long sword, slipped knife in boot, poignard at his back. “And I’m Quire the Shadow. I’ll need a cloak.”