Geoffrey Condit (24 page)

    “You  were my sworn man,” breathed the duke in disbelief.  His hand closed on his sword.

    “He is helping to serve the King’s Justice,” Peter said, and passed the torch to Barristar.  “Light the rush lights, Barristar.  Let’s see what we have here.”

    “Your Grace, the other exits,”  a blond servant said. voice urgent.  “We can still save ourselves.”

    “You think he came unattended, Ralph?”  The duke shook his head.  In two’s and three’s Peter’s men entered, guarding exits, the tall window embrasures, weapons ready.

    “This is war, Lord Trobrdige.  I reserve the right to execute any sworn man who has betrayed me,” the duke said, face set and red.

    “As Barristar said, you’ve caused too much mischief,”  Peter said.  “The King will want some explanations before you face the headman’s sword.”

    The blond servant edged forward, eyes desperate, uncertain.  “I’m leaving.”

    “Will you let him pass?” the duke asked.  “He is no threat to the King.  He has a wife and small daughter.”

    “Barristar?”  Peter gestured to the servant.

    “He is no threat,”  Barristar said.  “A body servant.”

    “Drop your sword and a walk slowly to the door.”  Peter motioned with his head past him.

    The man threw the sword to the stone floor where it clattered and lay still.  When he was abreast of Peter,  the man turned to look at the duke.  Peter’s eyes followed him.  The duke raised his head in question.  The man leaped at Peter, dagger in hand, kicking Peter’s sword away.

    Peter grabbed the man’s knife hand.  They swayed back and forth, grappling,  trying to find an opening.  The man brought his knee up to Peter’s groin just when Peter twisted and kicked.  The man grunted in pain, his free hand loosening on Peter’s wrist.  The man turned, using his body to lift Peter over him and onto the floor.  Peter went down, his grip on the knife hand slipping.

    Peter landed in the floor rushes, stone floor knocking the breath out of him in a bruising jolt.  But he twisted  and came up like a cat, facing his own sword in the other man’s hand.  Peter feigned to the left, and lunged, his own dagger out.  For a brief minute, they grappled and swayed together before Peter’s superior strength jerked the sword loose and sent it flying.

    Peter pulled backwards, tripped, and went down in a tangle of arms and legs.  A sharp pain seared across his ribs - the knife had scored.  A sticky warmth spread over his side.

    “Killed him!” roared the duke.

    They rolled over and Peter brought his elbow down into the other man’s groin.  The man shrieked, his grip on Peter’s knife loosened.  It shot up, burying itself in the man’s neck below  the left ear.  Blood sprayed over Peter’s face and doublet.  The man went limp.  Peter pushed away from the dead body, and knelt gasping for breath, his hand pressed to his side.

    “My lord?”  A retainer knelt, handkerchief in his hand.  “How bad are you hurt?”

    “Not bad,”  he said through the pain.  “A knife blade across the ribs.”   Peter stanched the blood, and looked at the duke.  “A trained assassin?”

    “A desperate man,”  the duke said.  “A loyal one.  I’m sorry he didn’t plant the knife deeper.”

    Peter wiped some of the man’s blood off his face with the back of his hand.  He stood, tested his arms, and was surprised at this range of motion before the pain brought him up short. “One less man to dance the hempen jig,”  he said, and found the high-backed master chair from the table behind him and sat down.

    “Your Grace,”  Peter said, “has miscalculated again and on a larger scale.” He pushed the reddening cloth against the wound.

    “I came close.”  The duke’s defiant smile wavered.  “I raised a panic in London.”

    Peter chuckled.  “But you didn’t raise the southern lords.  Jack Howard, the Duke of Norfolk, put an end to that in a hurry.  The southern lords shied away.  Even now they seek to submit to the King.”  He wiped his bloody dagger across his torn doublet, then drove the point into the arm of the chair.

    “You look strangely aggrieved for a man who has won his greatest victory,”  the duke said, pitted face struggling for composure.  “What would do this?”  His voice caught.

    “This plotting starting a long time ago.  Nearly three years,”  Peter said, taking a deep breath to steady the anger, to keep his rage under control. “Where did you get the idea?”

    Buckingham stared at the fire, face sardonic, composure restored.  The new lit rush lights along the walls sent armed shadows to Peter’s men to guard the walls.  “You wish a confession?  I think not.”

    “I’m not asking a confession runny with emotion.  But how about the truth?”  Peter said.  “I want to know.  You owe me that.”

    “Send your men to the exits.”  The duke gestured to the table.  “We’ll talk by ourselves.”  When they alone, the duke began in a low boastful tone  “At the time King Edward sickened, I knew a number of things.  He had named Richard Lord Protector for his sons and the Realm.  There was no love lost between the Woodville’s and Richard.  The greed and fear of the Woodville’s would provoke them to try to overthrow Richard and take control of the Protectorship and Regency Council.”  He walked to the fire and warmed his hands.

    “Helping Richard was my attempt to get included in government.  The closest I got with Edward was heading the tribunal that passed judgment on his brother, George, Duke of Clarence.”   He looked at Peter, fire craving sharp shadows in his feral face.  “Then I met Bishop Morton.” His eyes closed and flashed wide.  “I never met a man who could make treachery and treason seem, not only palatable but morally right. One thing lead to another and soon we laid plans to destroy you.”   He gave a low hurting laugh.

    “It was like a strange delicious dream.”  He shook himself, sucking in a deep breath, still pleased with himself.  His tone hadn’t changed, still boastful and lecturing.  “He was so sure I sometimes wonder if he laid a spell on me.  He was so sure.  I didn’t wake up until he fled.” 

    “And Catharine?”

    “Morton surveyed my household and suggested we use Catharine and her virulent Lancaster emotions to arrange your implication in a manufactured treason.  He planted Northrop.  A friend of his from Cambridge.  He was a master stroke.  We knew most things before they happened.”  He sighed and straightened.  “Everything fell into place.  Catharine worked perfectly, exactly as Morton predicted.”  He hitched his chair closer to the table.  “But we didn’t count on her falling in love with you.  And she started using her brains, and not her emotions.  Always dangerous in a woman.”  He smiled ruefully, and spread his arms  “Now it is finished.  Maybe.”

    “Maybe?”  Peter said, incredulous.  He sat straighter, amazed at the duke’s statement.

    “There is always a chance.”

    Peter laughed.  “God’s Blood, man. You tried to take the King’s Crown.”

    “I gave him the Crown when we intercepted the Woodville’s and took the princes into custody.”

    “You and Morton maneuvered him into it,”  Peter said, not amused. “He should have put Edward on the Throne and continued the Protectorship.” He pulled the dagger from the arm of the chair, and drove it into the table, feeling satisfaction when the blade sank into the wood.

    “I gave him the Crown,”  Buckingham said stubbornly.  “That is worth something.’

    “Not enough,” Peter said, “to save you from the fate of Lord Hastings, Lord Rivers, and Lord Grey.”

    “The dignity of the ax.”  Buckingham began to shake, and his voice shrilled.  “I can’t believe that.  Not for me.”

    “Maybe not, Your Grace.”  Allan Carnahan stood in the doorway, Catharine before him, his sword across her throat.

    Peter jerked to his feet, sword in hand.  “Stay back,”  he warned his men who were already moving forward. “Hold your places.  Catharine?”

    “Peter!”   Her face was drained and shocked, eyes only for his face.

    “Someone else’s blood,” he said, when he saw her eyes drop to his side.  “A scratch.  You?”

    She swallowed. “I’m unhurt.  He ambushed us.  Three of our men went down.  He grabbed me and rode here.  The rest of the men were fighting.  His and ours.”

    Two of Carnahan’s men crowded in the door behind them, triumphant expressions on their faces.  “We out ran them, Butcher.”

    Buckingham strode toward the men by the door. “We can leave.  Take Lady Trobridge as hostage.”

    “Not so fast, Your Grace, ”  Carnahan said.  “How many years have you yearned to feel your sword in my flesh, Lord Trobridge?  How many times have you wept inside after seeing your face in a mirror or revulsion reflected in other people’s faces.  Now is  your opportunity.”   The man grinned.  “This is war.  In war we can meet.  No problem of rank to stop us.”   He took a deep breath, and stared at Peter.  “I swore an oath of vengeance over my dying son,”  He shook his head in affirmation.  “You don’t understand how a mercenary worn with violence and self indulgence  can love,”  he said quietly.  “But I did.”  He passed Catharine to one of his men, and advanced in to the room, kicking a stool out of his way.  “Now is the time.  If she tries to escape, kill her.  This won’t take long, Your Grace.” He looked at Peter, his mouth set, eyes wide. “You want your woman all warm with your child.”  He inclined his head.   “Fight for them.”

    A hard knot of anger and hatred blocked Peter’s throat.  He cleared it with effort, felt the constricted pain.  “Clear the room,” he ordered his men.  His eyes caught Catharine’s.  Slowly he smiled.  “I will not fail you.”  He bowed to her, and turned to Carnahan.  “This is indeed what we’ve both waited for.”  He retrieved his dagger from the table.  Then rolling his shoulder he felt the ache from old wounds and the sting from the new bloody slice across his ribs.  He cleared his dry constricted throat once more.

    The years of pain.  The years of seeing the scar.  The years of reliving the agony while Carnahan carved and laughed, with no release until he fainted from the pain.  His  murderous rage boiled out.  Eyes wide with unshed tears, hands shaking, he stood there, projecting all his anger and hatred at Carnahan while the room was cleared.  Carnahan smiled thinly, uneasy, and nodded slightly as if he understood.  No mockery or crude words escaped him.  And Peter sensed a strange kinship and camaraderie in the silent man receiving his anger.

    Flanked by two of Peter’s men, the duke stood by the fire.  Catharine sat in a chair, a sword point at her back, eyes wide in her pale face, her gaze on Peter, her hands in her lap.

    When the hall was finally cleared, Carnahan raised his sword in salute. Peter returned the salute, razor sharp weapons shinning in the torch light.

15

Doublets flung to one side, shirt points unlaced for movement, they circled each other, swords at guard, each a master of his weapon.  Carnahan stepped in first with an experimental thrust.  Blue sparks  worked where the blades touched and jarred.  Peter parried, and Carnahan stepped back.  “Beautiful, Lord Trobridge.  This duel should prove all we expect.”

    Peter’s hand tingled from the jarring attack.  He cursed silently, sensing that Carnahan’s confidence was real.  Adrian’s words worked in his head.  ‘You have to shake the confidence of your opponent, then he will begin to make mistakes.’  But Carnahan echoed supreme confidence, command, sparkling self control.  A man born in his element.

    Peter began to feel the rough unsettling emotions; fear from Catharine, concern for their men, begin to ebb and stretch out.  When Carnahan rushed in with a slashing attack, Peter beat the whipping blade back, forcing the man to retreat.  Then he suddenly lunged and drew blood from Carnahan’s left shoulder.  When red widened across his upper shirt sleeve, Peter stepped back and laughed, relief spreading within, growing from his stomach.

    Shaken, Carnahan ran his fingers over the wound.  “A scratch.  Clever though.”  He began to circle Peter, a wolf looking for an opening.

    Pain seeped into Peter’s consciousness.  The flurry of activity tore at the wound in his side.  Stinging, searing, burning along his ribs.  Fresh blood stained his side.

    “Ha!”  Carnahan said, then looked puzzled.  “But I didn’t touch you.”

    “A souvenir from your blond colleague.”  Peter gestured to the body in the corner of the stone hall.   Fatigue from his earlier struggle, and now the new pain wore at his energy.  He tightened his lips and focused his concentration.  Against a fresh and formidable opponent like Carnahan he could not, would not last.  His only chance was to carry the fight to Carnahan, and hope the man made a mistake.

    Peter moved in, exploring every avenue of Carnahan’s defenses.  The blades clicked and rang.  Sparks flew and muscles strained. Sweat sprang on foreheads and soon their linen sagged, sweat  drenched, against their bodies, outlining heaving chests, and corded muscle.  One careless mistake and it would be over, steel in yielding flesh, letting out warm red life.

    After a series of dazzling moves, Carnahan over reached, and Peter’s blade nicked the wrist of his sword arm.  Blood dripped to the floor, and ran red on the tight cuff of his shirt sleeve.

    “Would you care to give up, Carnahan?  I can guarantee you a hanging with no torture.”  Peter tapped his blade several times, and then launched an intense attack which forced Carnahan to give way.  For the first time Peter saw the other man’s composure crack.  Carnahan’s tempo slowed, and he went on the defensive.  I have a chance.

    Carnahan forced a smile.   “No hangman’s noose for me, Lord Trobridge.  I die only by the sword.”  He picked up the dead man’s dagger.  “But I have an appetite for your wife’s warm fresh flesh.  Perhaps after I’m done...”

    A roar of anger erupted from Peter’s men.  Carnahan’s words shook bile loose, and Peter tasted the bitter liquid.  He spat in the floor rushes, clearing his mouth.   The bitter after taste stayed.  “Keep back,” he warned his men.  “He’s mine.”  They held, weapons ready, wanting.

    “Smart move. You discipline your men well.  Tell me, do you use the lash, the hangman’s noose, or hot irons to keep their devotion?”

    Peter smiled, his scar puckering.  He stepped forward, testing Carnahan’s defense.  “Something you have little knowledge of, Carnahan.  I treat them without your prescription of terror and pain.   I treat them like men.  I give them good arms, superior training, dignity, money, and care for their families.”

    “And after their dead man’s pay is spent, do you turn out their families?”

    “It’s never spent, Carnahan.  That is what you don’t understand.  When you take a man as yours, he and his family are yours for life.”  Peter fought across the room close to Catharine.  He dare not look at her, but concentrated on the other’s blade.  The pain in his side stung.  Fatigue worked his sword arm and his legs. He slowed and made his first mistake.  Not reacting fast enough, he felt Carnahan’s steel touch his shoulder, and enter his muscle.  Blood spurted.  Carnahan backed away  to admire the bleeding wound.

    Peter heard Catharine gasp, and caught her gaze.

    “Be strong, my husband,”  she said fiercely.  “You are Adrian’s master.  Carnahan cannot be better.”

    “You think not, Lady Trobridge?”  Carnahan laughed.  “Let me spell it out for you.  Your dear husband is twice wounded and must deal not only with the pain and loss of blood, but also the creeping fatigue from fighting his previous foe.”  He backed further into the room.  “I have killed thirty-four men in duels.  No, LadyTrobridge,  I think your husband is mine.  It is just a matter of time.  The bade went deep, and he can feel cut muscles.  While I am fresh and lightly scored.”

    Peter circled Carnahan, and stepped in the center of the room.  “When was Adrian, your sword master, Carnahan?”  He shook himself and forced concentration, his body warring against him.

    “Fifteen years ago, before I carved your pretty face.”  He moved forward, and beat on Peter’s sword to wear him down.

    “Before he went to Henrich Duer’s school for sword masters.  Before he learned the tricks Henrich had to teach him.  I lured Adrian away six years ago, and have been his student since.”  His shoulder throbbed, and continued to bleed.  Carnahan’s constant hammering on his blade wore on him, and he knew he could not last  much longer.  But when he searched Carnahan’s defenses for an opening Peter found every avenue closed.  Carnahan parried every attack with ease, and sensing the end was near, pressed his  attack.

    Peter stumbled, and Carnahan, surprised and off balance, blundered forward.  Peter’s punishing blade cut the man’s dagger hand, forcing him to drop the knife.  Peter whipped back catching the hilt of Carnahan’s sword, and wrenched with every ounce of energy he had left.  It spun out of the man’s hand.  The point of Peter’s blade rested on Carnahan’s throat.  “One of Herr Duer’s tricks, Mister Carnahan..”  He spoke to his men.  “Lash his hands.  We ride to the King at Salisbury.”

    Stricken, Carnahan stared back.  He turned to the men guarding Catharine.  But two of Peter’s retainers had already disarmed them.  For a moment Carnahan looked as if he’d run, eyes like cornered prey.

    “Give it up, Carnahan.  You have at least two more days of life left if you stop now.  Two days.  A lot can happen in two days,”  Peter said.  The man relaxed.  Guards lashed his hand behind his back ,and haltered his legs.

    Flanked by two of Peter’s men, Buckingham stepped forward.  “You mean this?  To turn us over to the King?”  His  voice shrill, grated in Peter’s ears.

    Peter sat down suddenly, sword loose in his hands.  He stared up at the Lancaster prince.   “You have much to answer for, Your Grace.  I’m sure, at the very least,  the King would want to question you about your military exercises.”

    “Do not make light of me, Lord Trobridge.”

    “Forgive me, Your Grace,”  Peter said.  “I think he’ll give you a quick trial before the Vice Constable, and cut your head off in market square.”

    Buckingham recoiled, but kept his mouth shut.

    “Why didn’t you kill me, Trobridge?”  Carnahan asked.  “I would have killed you.”  A wadded handkerchief in his hand stanched the blood from the wound.  Another bandage was tied around his shoulder.

    “My desire to kill you ran to ashes when I realized what I’d become if I let the hate continue.”  Peter frowned.  “I saw your pain over Castor Breckenridge.  It was the same as my pain over my friend’s death.  Where does it end?  What do we gain from hurting someone, the killing, the degrading?”  He shook his head.

    “Control,”  Carnahan said, face hard, and eyes focused on Peter. “Control of men.  Control of situations.  Power.  What else is there?”

    “Control?  Unwilling men doing your bidding out of fear?”  Peter said, eyes sad.  “Ruined lives so a man can gain something that belongs to someone else?  Madness.  That is what this has been about.”

    “Your plea will go unheard, my lord, until people lose the desire to possess, to control,”  Carnahan said bitterly.

    “Henry Stafford, Duke of Buckingham, you have been found guilty of high treason.  Of planning, inciting, and conducting rebellion against your lawful King.”  Sir Ralph Assheton, Vice Constable of England, stared at the trembling man standing before him.  Dark rage congested Assheton’s face.  Peter watched the dreaded man known as The Black Knight struggle for composure.  Buckingham cast fugitive glances around the large pavilion erected in a field outside of Salisbury.

    “Have you anything to say before I pronounce sentence?”  Sir Ralph’s worn heavy features betrayed disgust.  He did not look at the man before him.   Peter stood. to one side, back of the Vice Constable, sickened at the sight of the duke falling apart.

    “I ... I demand to see the King.  His Grace must see me,”  Buckingham said, his voice hurried, speech almost slurred.

    “You demand?”  Sir Ralph said, voice rising, contempt staining his words.  “The King will not grant you an audience.”  He cleared his throat.  “The verdict of treason demands death, but mindful of your past services to the Crown, the King does not demand vengeance.  You will not be hanged, gelded, disemboweled, and then beheaded while still living.  For that you should thank the King’s mercy.”  He paused.  “Many sought to persuade him otherwise.  Tomorrow at ten o’clock you shall pay the supreme penalty for your crimes.  You will be beheaded in market square.”  He waved a meaty hand in front of his face as though brushing away a bug.  “Remove the traitor.”

    A medium-sized man with a square beard bent over the shocked Buckingham.  John Milton, Sheriff of Shropshire, whispered something in the condemned man’s ear.  Buckingham’s eyes, near wild with disbelief, darted around the tent. Then he shook his head as though finally comprehending.  He took a step toward the Vice Constable.  “It’s not a priest that can help me, it’s the King.”  But Assheton, papers in hand, was already leaving the tent, and if he heard did not respond. Two men-at-arms, with John Milton, escorted the shaken man away.

    The tent emptied until Peter sat alone.  He pulled his cloak closer, and remembered another time and trial -  after the Battle of Tewkesbury where York buried forever the hopes of the House of Lancaster.  In the small wood paneled room Peter had stared stricken at his uncle.

    “Is that your decision?”  Edward IV, tall, blond, terrible in his strength and beauty, waited.  Then he said impulsively,  “God, man, swear fealty to me now, and you’re free with our pardon.”  He looked at Peter’s father.  “Plead with him, Richard.”

    The tension in the small room raked into the men.  “Will, please.”  The two simple words carried everything, the hope and the fear, the past and the future, held in a phrase.

    William Trevor, face seamed with dirt, eyes hollow with fatigue, smiled.  “I thank Your Grace.  I cannot.  I’m sworn to the Duke of Somerset and Lancaster.”  He turned to Peter.  “Your agony, Peter.  I wish I could take it away.  People have different needs and destinies.  Can you understand that, lad?”

    The ghastly realization of what was to come swelled in Peter’s throat and spilled out in his voice, all agony and tears.  “No, I don’t.  It doesn’t need to be.  Uncle Will, say the words.”

    “I’m sorry, lad.  Richard, take care of our heir.  Teach him to love justice.”  He turned to the King.  “I’m sorry, Your Grace.  I’m ready to join the others.”

    “If that is your will.”

    The trial had been short; before the heavy and grizzled John Howard, Duke of Norfolk, and England’s Earl Marshall, and dark and slight Richard Plantagenet, the eighteen year old Duke of Gloucester, the King’s brother, and England’s Lord Constable.  The man Peter had saved from certain death.  The King in white shirt, sober brown doublet, and dark silk hose, sat to one side, a circlet of gold on his golden head, and listened impassively while the charges were read and the pleas taken. 

    Peter sat with his father and the other York lords, participants in the tension, witness to the brisk business of ordering death.   His uncle caught his eye, and smiled with a nod.  William  Trevor stood, battle stained and weary, with the other twelve battle captains and their lord, Edmund Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, in a guarded roped off square before their judges.

    Peter felt his father’s fingers bite into his arm, and turned to see a face wrecked with grief, aged before its time.  Unshed tears trembled, then streamed down Peter’s cheeks.  He wiped them away with his free hand.  Peter could only listen, as one by one each man was pronounced guilty and sentenced to death.  Richard’s young voice, measured, said,  “The King, in his mercy, does not seek vengeance.  He waives the right of disembowelment.  The right of honorable burial is granted.”

    Peter sucked in a deep breath, remembering.  His father had insisted he watch the executions the next day.  Shaking with anger and grief, his father said,  “I want you to remember what dynastic ambition and misplaced loyalties mean, the horrors they engender, and the lasting pain they inflict.”