Assassin's Reign: Book 4 of The Civil War Chronicles (15 page)

Massie blinked hard, forcing the gnawing doubts from his mind. Around him men, women and children, soldiers and civilians, scuttled this way and that, some carrying clods of turf to bolster the growing glacis, others hefting bushels or dragging the newly carved storm poles. The sight gave him heart like nothing else. He might not have been a zealot when it came to religion or politics, and part of him still hankered to join the sovereign and his all-conquering armies, but the people of Gloucester were worth fighting for. They had come out in their droves to plunge elbow deep in mud as the ditches were scoured from the earth, and they had not ceased in their eagerness to help make their city more defensible. The city corporation had been a thorn in his side, of course, questioning every penny that went towards tools, weapons or materials for a siege that was still just a possibility, but he could expect nothing less from such blinkered bureaucrats. They were the silver-haired, sober-faced aldermen that knew much about coin and nothing of war. But the common folk had been invaluable in their support, and he found himself wanting to lead them to victory, however unlikely that might be.

‘God bless you, sir!’ a woman shouted from one of the houses hugging the road beside the Alvin Gate. Massie gave his most confident smile, added a little bow that made the woman coo like a pigeon, and moved on, Harcus grinning broadly at his side.

They continued, intending to follow the line of the rampart down to the Outer North Gate. Massie looked at the younger man. ‘They’ll come for us soon enough.’

Harcus seemed to beam at the prospect. ‘We’ll send them packing, sir.’

Massie could not help but laugh. ‘You’re like an excitable puppy, James.’

‘Thank you, sir.’

Times were perilous, Massie mused, but which path would truly reward the ambitious man? He could be a junior officer in the victorious Royalist army, safe but wing-clipped, or the unlikely champion of a seemingly doomed cause. He took a deep, steadying breath, and strode on. Perhaps he had taken leave of his senses. Or perhaps this city would be the making of him after all.

‘Sir!’ The man who had hailed was on horseback, and he rode towards them at a brisk canter from the direction of the cathedral.

Massie halted his progress and turned to lift a hand in greeting. ‘Captain Backhouse,’ he called as the rider drew close. ‘Welcome home. How went your patrol?’

‘Governor, sir,’ Backhouse said breathlessly, swinging a leg across his saddle and slipping nimbly to earth. He moved quickly to where Massie was waiting, removing his helmet and offering a snappy bow. He was several years older than the colonel, but shorter by three or four inches, and had to crane his neck to look up at the city’s military commander. ‘A successful patrol indeed, sir. Returned last evening, and I shall take them out again imminently, with permission.’

‘You have it,’ Massie replied.

Harcus stepped forward, unable to control his enthusiasm. ‘And you say the last was successful, sir. You saw action?’

Backhouse glanced at Harcus. ‘We did not engage the enemy, alas, but we return with spoils nevertheless.’

Harcus seemed to shiver. ‘Oh?’

Backhouse propped the newly polished helm beneath his armpit and turned his gaze back to Massie. ‘Deserters, sir. Three of them, taken out to the east.’

‘Ours or theirs?’

‘Theirs.’

Massie was not surprised. Regiments leaked men like water from a cracked bucket. On garrison duty, marching with an army or quartered for winter, the common sort would always prefer the comforts of home than a rough regimental billet. Not to mention the risk of disease or battle that came with it. ‘Will they turn their coats? I cannot afford to feed prisoners.’

‘Oh yes, sir, that they will.’ Backhouse could not help but brandish a smug smile. ‘But these men are not just the usual rabble, Governor. Not a bit of it.’

Stryker sat before the cold hearth on the ground floor of a large, timber-framed house on a road Robert Backhouse had identified as Westgate Street. The lawyer-turned-harquebusier had told him the previous evening that the building – quite grand in this modest area – was owned by a Dutchman named Commeline, but Stryker had not seen the man or his family. There were, however, telltale signs of his occupation. He was, according to Backhouse, a wealthy apothecary, and the room in which Stryker, Skellen and Buck had been locked for the night was indeed replete with shelves that were themselves crammed full of strange-coloured jars and vials.

‘Moses’ stones!’ Skellen hissed beside one of the shelves. He was clutching a large jar at arm’s length, covering his nose with his free hand.

‘I told you not to go poking around,’ was Stryker’s reply.

‘You were right in that, sir,’ Skellen muttered, hastily returning the jar to its perch and backing away as though the entire shelf had assumed a sinister air. ‘Stank like Satan’s pizzle!’

Stryker could not help but laugh, though it was a tired sound even to his own ears, and he leaned back in his creaking chair and dug a filthy palm into his eye. He wondered what Backhouse had told his superiors, and whether they would believe the story. They had not yet been shot or hanged, which, he supposed, was a good sign, but the night had been a sleepless one nonetheless. The lock had turned in the door as soon as Backhouse installed them in their temporary lodgings, and the shuffle of feet in the corridor beyond told them a pair of guards had been detailed to keep them inside.

‘What now, sir, if you’ll allow the question?’

Stryker blinked until his eye stopped stinging and turned his head towards the large window that faced the street. ‘Wait, Mister Buck. Bide our time. Convince the authorities here that we are committed to the rebellion.’

James Buck had been peering forlornly out of the window since dawn, watching the comings and goings of Gloucester’s people like a dog chained outside a butcher’s shop, desperate to be on the opposite side of the glass. ‘I had hoped they would not lock us up like common criminals.’

‘Not like criminals,’ Stryker replied, lacing his hands behind his head. ‘Deserters. Which is what we are. They will not give us freedom to roam until they can give us their trust.’

‘But I have—’ Buck blurted, his sallow face creasing with consternation.

‘You have Ezra Killigrew’s muck to shovel, I know,’ said Stryker, his voice dropping to a whisper. ‘But you know this game, sir. You are an experienced player. It is never simple.’

Buck ran a pale hand through his oily hair and paced into the room, his own voice suddenly constricted. ‘I do not like being unarmed.’

Stryker frowned. ‘Nor do I, sir, I can assure you. But you cannot have expected anything less.’

Buck’s slim jaw quivered as he gritted his teeth. ‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘No, you are right, of course.’

‘We must be patient, Mister Buck,’ Stryker said calmly. In the corner of his eye he noticed Skellen leaning against the wall, arms folded, studying Buck with something akin to amusement. ‘There is nothing else for it.’

‘Patience.’ Buck repeated the word, sighing heavily. ‘And what will you do when we are free, sir?’

‘Initially I had thought to speak to the other officers,’ Stryker said, glancing at the door, voice still hushed. ‘Gauge their feeling. Whether they have the stomach for a fight.’

Skellen moved in from the wall. ‘No longer, sir?’

Stryker looked up at his sergeant. ‘Now, it seems, I will meet Massie himself.’ He shrugged. ‘According to Captain Backhouse, leastwise.’

Skellen wrinkled his battered nose. ‘The chief bastard himself. Doubt it. Backhouse is full o’ piss an’ wind if you ask—’

A sharp metallic crack of a turning lock cut the sergeant’s words off in his throat. The three men turned to stare at the door. At its foot, where a chink of light streamed in above the threshold, they saw shadows dancing to the rhythm of shifting feet. Stryker stole a quick glance at his companions, noticing that, where Skellen’s brow had lifted in intrigue, Buck’s entire face had become rigid, like a corpse, and he had shied away to his old place at the far window.

The door swung inwards, screeching painfully on its hinges, light flooding in its wake, and a group of dark figures filed into the room. Stryker rose to his feet, waiting for his eye to adjust to the gushing brightness that so far obscured the newcomers.

‘Mister Stryker,’ a familiar voice came from the doorway.

Stryker squinted at the party that now numbered five. ‘Captain Backhouse?’

‘The very same,’ Backhouse replied, moving further into the room so that he could be more easily identified. ‘You are well rested, I trust?’

‘We are, sir, thank you,’ Stryker lied. His sight had regained its sharpness now, and he dipped his head to the other men, none of whom he recognized, though three were blue-coated musketeers that presumably served as an escort. ‘Your servant, gentlemen.’

‘Forgive me,’ Backhouse said, suddenly sounding awkward. ‘I must introduce you, sir, to the—’

‘Worry not, Captain,’ another man said. It was a young voice, but delivered with an unmistakable tone of authority. The speaker moved out from behind one of the grim-looking bluecoats, took off his dusty hat to reveal brown hair that framed a narrow, pallid face, and returned Stryker’s short bow. ‘You are Captain Stryker, sir?
The
Captain Stryker, formerly of Mowbray’s Foot?’

The man was almost the same height as Stryker, who looked him directly in the eye, cocking his head to the side. ‘You have me at a disadvantage, sir.’

The young gentleman’s thin mouth twitched at the corners. ‘Edward Massie, sir. Governor of Gloucester.’

Stryker stared at Massie for longer than he had intended, but he could not help but be taken aback. This was not what he had expected. The plain clothes, a complexion that would have better suited a light-deprived miner than a soldier, those big, sorrowful eyes and the sheer youthfulness of the man together served to give Massie the image of callow, world-green inexperience.

But what had Stryker been expecting? Some sword-toting knight, clad in medieval armour and twirling a mace like a twig? Perhaps a rakish cavalier, all lace and colour and bravado, more akin to the king’s Teutonic nephews than this soberly dressed young gentleman who looked as though he might be more at home behind a clerk’s desk. He chided himself for the preconception, but the thought that Massie might be more suited to writing poetry than commanding a garrison continued to gnaw at him.

‘Governor,’ Stryker said, having to force the words into his mouth, ‘it is good to finally meet you.’ He glanced at Backhouse. ‘The captain, here, has mentioned my service to you?’

‘Not a bit of it, Stryker,’ Massie replied. ‘Your name is known to me. At least, your family name—’

Stryker shifted his feet uncomfortably. ‘I prefer simply Stryker, sir.’

Massie gazed at him in mild bafflement, but shrugged nevertheless. ‘A veteran of the European wars, like myself.’ His large eyes, like gleaming brown coins, seemed to bore right through Stryker’s head, as if scouring his very mind. ‘I learned my trade with the Dutch.’

‘As did I,’ Stryker replied, wondering how many years such a young man might possibly have accumulated. ‘The Swedes, too.’

‘Just so,’ Massie said, pressing the hat back atop his head. ‘That is where you came by your—’ he hesitated for a moment, ‘
injury
?’

Stryker felt the scar twitch slightly in the place where his left eye once sat, as it often did when unwanted attention was drawn to it. ‘Sir.’

‘And you mean to join our great cause?’

Stryker nodded. ‘Aye, sir, I do.’ He glanced over his shoulder at Skellen, who had been silent in the shadows. ‘
We
do. This man is my sergeant, William Skellen, and—’

‘James Buck, sir,’ Buck stepped forward so that his frame was suddenly black against the window light. ‘Not a confederate of these fine men, insomuch as we ran into one another in the country outside of Bristol, but I am of the same mind. The King’s cause is rotten, sir. Parliament’s just. I would enlist with you forthwith.’

‘Good, good,’ Massie said, bobbing his head, though his face remained unreadable. ‘And what service might you bring our God-fearing city, sir?’

‘I was a mere clerk, Colonel. I am little use with powder or steel, but I had hoped you might find some employment for me.’

Massie pursed his lips briefly, tilting his head to the side. ‘Your fingers are impressively clean, Mister Buck.’

Stryker saw that Buck’s pale skin had suddenly taken on a strawberry hue. He half expected the young intelligencer to make a run for it there and then. ‘Fastidious fellow,’ he said, deciding to lend some assistance. ‘Washed his hands and face in every brook and stream we crossed, isn’t that right, Sergeant Skellen?’

‘Had a jest or three about it, sir,’ Skellen replied without hesitation.

‘I . . . I do not like the ink stains, sir,’ Buck offered weakly.

Massie smiled. ‘Then perhaps clerking is not the vocation for you.’ The smile faded as quickly as it had come. ‘And what of our mutual enemy? What can we expect?’

‘Sir?’ Buck blurted uncertainly.

‘You were a clerk, sir, so you would have seen papers. Messages passed between generals, ammunition orders, requisition orders for supplies. What is our misguided monarch planning, sir? Are we to face him? If so, when? Or does his gaze fall elsewhere now that Bristol has fallen?’