Isabella's Heiress (43 page)

“How badly are you hurt?”

“My ribs.”

“Can you get up?”

“I think so.”

“Emma, we cannot stay here. We must be in the open as soon as possible. Only then can we be free to…”

Sister Ignacia paused but Emma knew what she was going to say.

“We can't outrun them, we both know that.”

“I know but all the same, why make it easy for them.” The flames of her torch illuminated a defiant face as Sister Ignacia's words rang off the walls.

Emma winced as she got to her feet. Her breathing was shallow as the pain in her sides refused to allow her to takes full breaths. Sister Ignacia picked up the fallen torch and it instantly re-ignited. She handed it back to Emma before heading back in to the darkness. The air was thicker down here and Emma was reminded of the tunnel to Newgate. Water dripped from the roof and she pulled the collar of her coat tight around her neck. The ground beneath her feet was uneven and she found herself having to stoop in some areas as the floor rose before falling back down to a more comfortable level.

“Don't they know about this tunnel? I mean they must know about its exit.”

“They have no idea. This is something that we hoped would never be used.”

“So what do we do when we get outside?”

“I do not know, we must hide until the very last minute. Father Eamon will know how to find us but it is imperative that we stay hidden from the mob.”

“That shouldn't be too difficult. They all think I'm upstairs.”

“Do not be too sure. They will take no chances. The realm is filled with their people. Someone will see us, it is inevitable, and when they do, we will be hunted down. We can only hope that Father Eamon is back by then.”

The passage was winding left and right as well as up and down and Emma was becoming increasingly claustrophobic. Even with the torches, it was impossible to see beyond the length of her arm and the wall behind
was lost to the blackness as soon as she passed. Emma's mind started playing tricks on her, as the sound of water splashing to the floor took on a life of its own. Footsteps sounded like thunder as she became convinced that their every move was being followed above them in the street.

The ground beneath Emma's feet started to rise again, only this time the roof rose with it.

“We are nearly there, Emma.” Sister Ignacia's voice was little more than a whisper but her words carried on down the passage behind them and Emma cringed. Then the torch in front of her stopped. Emma watched as Sister Ignacia swept the torch left and right. At first she thought her eyes were deceiving her but as she realised they weren't, her heart sunk.

Sister Ignacia was waving the torch in front of a brick wall.

“I thought you said we could get out of here!” Panic was weakening Emma's legs and she suddenly felt very tired.

“And we can. This is the end of the tunnel.”

“Yeah, I had noticed. The wall was a bit of a give away.”

“This was always the way it was supposed to be. The wall leads onto a mooring. It had to be bricked up to stop the tunnel being discovered. We can only hope that the mooring has survived the fire.”

Emma gave Sister Ignacia an incredulous look. “And if it hasn't?”

“Then we get wet.”

Sister Ignacia started to sweep lower with the torch until she reached the bottom right hand corner and stooped down to pick something up. She turned to Emma, holding out the torch.

“Please, hold this while I break through.”

Emma could see a wooden mallet in Sister Ignacia's
right hand. Its tapered handle led to a large cylindrical head, next to it was a chisel, which was almost as long as the mallet.

Sister Ignacia turned back to the wall and Emma lifted the torches to the ceiling, trying to provide as much illumination as possible. Slowly bricks and lime mortar started to fall away in gentle cascades of grey and red dust.

To her relief, Emma realised that this was going to be a relatively quick job given the tools and before long, there was a small pile of rubble to the right of them. After she had created a narrow opening, Sister Ignacia looked through.

“Hmm, well at least the mooring is still there.”

Emma didn't know what to make of this but didn't say anything, choosing instead to close her eyes and try to ignore the heat from the fire above her which was now filling the void of the tunnel. It took another ten minutes before there was a hole wide enough for them to climb through. Emma waited for Sister Ignacia to get out before gratefully dropping the torches and climbing out into the open air. The wooden platform on the other side was old, rickety and less than a meter wide but Emma needn't have worried about falling in. As she struggled to cope with the furnace-like heat from the flames, she looked out onto the Thames.

It was completely frozen over.

Samantha hugged her mum, her tears and sobs were muffled but her shoulders betrayed the depths of her grief. Father Eamon and the black monk watched on, one with a pang of sorrow for the event that was unfolding in front of them, the other with complete indifference to the situation. Neither could do anything to change what was happening
but both were intent on ensuring that the other didn't try and it was this impasse that found them standing in the hallway waiting to see what would happen next.

“He's upstairs dear, in bed. Uncle Stephen is with him.”

Samantha looked up the stairs and looked back at her mother, “Mum I…”

“Why don't we go up together?”

“Okay.”

Samantha's voice was meek as her mother led her by the hand and they walked slowly upstairs. The black monk went to follow but Father Eamon stepped in front of him and cut off his route.

“You can wait. It is not your time yet.” The words came out in a low growl and the monk backed off. Father Eamon headed up the stairs behind the two women and watched as Samantha walked slowly into her father's bedroom. The monk was at the bottom of the stairs but stopped its ascent when Father Eamon looked down.

The scene in the bedroom was one of silent pain. Samantha broke down as she saw her father struggling for breath. He was a shadow of his former self, his sunken cheeks hollowing out as he sucked in air. Again Father Eamon felt the twinge of pain he had felt downstairs for the two women.

“Dad, oh dad.” Samantha was trying to keep it together and the effort was written across her face.

The man in the bed slowly turned his face to look at her and gently whispered her name, “Samantha.” He slowly lifted his right arm and Samantha took it, gently sitting by him on the side of the bed.

“I'm sorry I couldn't have been a better father to you.”

Samantha wept at these words, “You're the best father anybody could have had.”

The words were met with a weak smile from her father
as he took in another rasping breath. “Don't worry, Sam, I'll always be looking down on you and your mum and I'll be with your sisters.”

The words struck a chord in Samantha and her eyes widened. “Dad, I have a letter I found a little while ago. It's from Emma.” There was a pause before she carried on. “It's for you.”

The room fell silent. Samantha's mum looked stunned and the man on the other side of the room froze. Both were looking directly at Samantha who turned to face her mother.

“Mum, I'm so sorry, but I didn't know how to tell you.”

For a second her mother seemed lost for words but she quickly regained her composure. “Where is it?”

“In my bag.”

Her mother reached over and picked up the bag, passing it across to her daughter. “Quickly, before it's too late.”

Flames tore up the sky as they ripped through the city. The plane was no longer twilight but instead alternated between pitch black and a deep, molten orange. Panic infected first one street then another and Emma had to be careful not to be seen as the fire and the clatter of hooves could be heard in nearby streets and people were now running on to the Thames in an effort to escape. They had been lucky so far but Emma knew it would not hold out.

“We should head for the churchyard.”

Emma almost jumped out of her skin at the sound of Sister Ignacia's voice. “You scared the shit out of me!”

A brief look of amusement crossed Sister Ignacia's face. “St Magnus the Martyr is the other side of these houses. If we can make it there, we can get into the church.”

Emma failed to see what getting into the church would do but it had to be better than staying here. They slipped past a crane sitting between the ruined warehouses that went to the waters edge and ducked in to an alleyway that ran north. The fire had burnt itself out here and all that was left was the charred husks of the buildings it had touched. As they picked there way through the ashes, Emma could see a large church ahead of her, its brick façade blackened but otherwise undamaged by the fire.

“Quickly, we must get inside.”

Sister Ignacia urged Emma on and they ran towards the front door. As they reached it a cry went up behind them. Emma spun round to see a group of people to their south screaming and pointing. They were agitated and started running towards them. Emma turned back to see Sister Ignacia struggling with the main door to the church. Then, despite the flames, it suddenly went very quiet.

Smoke filled the road less than ten metres away and she new what was coming next. First one then two sets of arms reached out of the smoke. Emma wanted to move but was frozen to the spot as two Gentle Men left the cloud and turned to face her.

“
Ehhmmaa
.”

Screams from behind her told Emma the crowd that had been bearing down on her was now running in the other direction. She would have given anything to be facing a thousand of them instead of the two abominations she now looked upon. Their faces had a victorious look on them as they closed in on her and their hands were clawing the air as they moved. But then they stopped and looked down. There was a rumbling noise that seemed to be coming from below her feet. As quickly as they had appeared the two Gentle Men slipped back into the mist. Emma thought she heard them moan but the rumbling that was getting louder by the second drowned any noise they may have made out.

Emma was knocked off her feet as the ground started to shake violently. She got up only to feel herself jerked sideways but this time it wasn't the ground, it was Sister Ignacia. She had managed to get the door open and pushed Emma into the church nave before closing it behind them.

“We will be safe here.”

“What's going on?”

“The plane is changing but this church will remain as it stands in all the realms!” Sister Ignacia had to scream to be heard. It was an effort to stay on their feet as the world dissolved into a wild blur but they made it and Emma felt sister Ignacia's arms wrap tightly around her as they collapsed to the floor in between two rows of pews. Emma thought she could hear herself scream but she couldn't be sure as the noise around her was deafening. To her left a pew fell forward, starting a domino effect on the ones in front of it. It was the last thing Emma saw before everything went black.

Samantha's hands were shaking as she unfolded the paper. As she started to read, her voice failed. Her father patted her on the hand and she took a deep breath and tried again.

“Dear dad…”

The black monk lunged forward in a last ditch bid to stop her, his eyes piercing the back of Samantha's head with a desperate stare but Father Eamon was ready for it. He grabbed it by the throat and forced it down on its knees.

“You've failed! You've tried to stop this but you've failed! Now watch as your plans come to nothing.”

His words were little more than a hiss but they sliced their way through the monk who could only manage a whimper in response. Father Eamon turned his head towards Sam as she continued reading.

“… I know you blame me for Lisa's death and there isn't a day goes by when I don't think about what I did. If I could turn the clock back or give my life for hers I would do it in a heartbeat.

“I have tried to speak to you about this and in truth part of me is glad that you blanked me as I don't know if I
would be strong enough to say what I truly feel, so I guess this is my way of telling you.

“I love you dad, I know it hasn't been easy for me to say but I do. I hope that some day you can find it in your heart to forgive me for all the pain I have caused. I know that I do not deserve it and I know that it is not my place to ask for it but it tears me up to think that we will never speak again. One day I hope that we will all see Lisa but until then all I can do is hope and pray that you will find it in your heart to speak to me again.

“I will always love you,

“Emma.”

The sound of weeping filled the room as Emma's mother sat on a chair her hand covering her mouth and Samantha's uncle covered his eyes in a vain effort to staunch the tears.

On the bed Samantha's father managed a small smile as he let go of his last breath and, as it left his mouth, it formed his final word.

“Emma.”

Outside, the last of the sun gave way to darkness.

The black monk struggled to free itself but Father Eamon forced his hand in to its hood. It let out a high pitched scream and fell to the floor writhing, smoke coming from under its robes. Within seconds it had stopped moving and the monk, robes and all, turned to ashes before blowing away on a slight breeze but Father Eamon didn't see any of this. He was already out of the door and racing down the street.

Emma rubbed the back of her head in a vein effort to get rid of the throbbing that had settled into her temple. She
was sitting with her back to one of the pews, looking at the opposite row that had capitulated during the tremors and was now tilted forward, like carved wooden dominoes, all the way to the pulpit.

Sister Ignacia was up and about but even she was struggling to shake off the effect. For the last minute or so she had spoken only in Spanish and Emma hadn't understood a word she said but after a few more seconds of it, she seemed to regain her equilibrium and she turned to Emma.

“This may buy us some time but we will have to leave here. They know where we are now and will surely be back soon.”

“But this is a church, they won't come after us in here will they?”

“A church is no defence in this realm. I only got us in here to protect us from the fire.”

Sister Ignacia motioned to Emma to get up and they headed towards the front door. She looked out of the window and after a couple of seconds, slowly opened the door itself. Once she was satisfied, she slipped outside and Emma followed her.

The scene that met them could not have been more different. The burnt embers of the fire were gone and now there was a cobbled street running north to south. Emma looked up Fish Street Hill but it was empty, there was nobody around, not a single person to be seen, then she looked towards London Bridge.

“Where is everybody?”

“They are sheltering from the night.”

Emma felt a shiver race down her back and her eyes started to dart around.

“Quickly, we need to head to the bridge.”

Emma followed Sister Ignacia as she headed south. The shops on either side of the road were elegant flat fronted
buildings with signs hanging over a metre in front of them from poles suspended from the first floor telling passing custom what they sold. They were pretty to look at but afforded no cover whatsoever.

After a couple of seconds Sister Ignacia disappeared to her left. As Emma caught up she saw that a piazza with a covered walkway carried on down to a hanging bridge that stretched across the street.
It looks like the bridge of sighs,
Emma thought to herself, grateful for the brief lull that the cover gave her nerves. Before too long though it was over as the piazza came to an end and they found themselves back on the cobbles, desperately looking for any kind of cover but finding only shallow doorways.

The throbbing was returning to Emma's ribs. In all that had happened, she had forgotten about the injury she had sustained getting through the tunnel but now, as things started to quieten down, it returned to remind her it was there. Every step felt like somebody was thrusting a knife between her ribs and it was all she could do not to cry from the pain.

Sister Ignacia gave Emma a desperate look,“Quiet!” She had thrown herself in to a doorway and Emma froze. Two doors down a curtain twitched and for the briefest of moments, a light shone out into the street. It illuminated the shadow of a horse, half-hidden between two buildings at the southern end of the bridge. Its shoes echoed off the cobbles as it pulled in to the street and Emma held her breath as the rider looked up and down the road before jerking the horse's reins with his right hand and heading away from them.

Sister Ignacia watched as the horse and rider disappeared from view. “It can only go as far as the south side of the bridge before it has to come back, which should give us some time.”

Sister Ignacia set off down the road but Emma was finding the going harder and harder until eventually she had to stop as she caught her breath. Ahead of her Sister Ignacia turned to see that she was now alone. She returned to find Emma buckled over clutching her ribs.

“Emma, I know it hurts but we must move. We cannot be found out here.”

“I understand that but where are we going.”

“The river, it is still frozen. If we can get onto it, then the dark horsemen will not be able to reach us and the black monks will be at the same disadvantage as we are.”

They passed under the walkway that Emma had thought looked like the Bridge of Sighs and as they did so; she caught a glimpse of another one a few metres down and then another one after that. The dark was slowly giving up its secrets. Each walkway was a storey high and had three sash windows set in ornately carved frames that had cherubs and seraphim's on each corner.

“When do we get on the bridge?”

“We are on it. We have been on it since we left the church.”

Emma looked back to the church. The elegant porticoes along the front of the piazza and smart shop fronts gave no hint that they were above the Thames. In the distance, a horse could be heard turning around.

“Emma, there is a chapel halfway down the bridge. If we can reach it then we can get down on to the river but we need to hurry.”

Sister Ignacia supported Emma as they moved along the bridge. Above them shop signs creaked gently as they swung left and right, their rusted chains grating as the links scraped against each other. Some showed the sign of the cobbler's boot, while others showed pawnbrokers balls but all looked like they had suffered years of neglect. The
elegant wood frames were splintered and the shops they advertised hadn't fared much better as leaded windows hung loosely on their hinges with little diamond panes of glass missing from their settings.

Further down the bridge the clipped sounds of the approaching hooves got steadily louder. The rider was making a slow and deliberate search of all the shops as he went along and it was now a race to see who arrived at the chapel first. Emma, dragging her feet whilst being carried by Sister Ignacia, or the dark rider taking his time coming from the other direction.

“How far?”

“Not far. It is just beyond the next few shops.”

Emma put every last piece of effort into getting herself upright and forcing the pace as they set off on the last part of the walk. She saw the chapel at the same time as the rider, who at that moment chose to look up.