License to Quill (32 page)

Shakespeare shrugged. “I guess you could say I came in with the breeze,” he replied in his natural Warwickshire accent. “This is my homeland. I was born here. The Arden is as much a part of me as my mother.” The playwright was not lying. His mother had been born Mary Arden.

The women were not moved by this proclamation. However, Shakespeare saw some curiosity on their faces when one of their warriors presented them with his possessions. Some shards of glass fell out of Bacon's telescope as the elder removed it from its sleeve.

“What is that?” asked the younger. “Some sort of tool?”

The playwright smiled smugly, for the instrument had been damaged. They would never know what it was. “It's for digging,” he said, thinking back to Percy's threat to Thomas Wintour.

The elder set the device aside with Shakespeare's playing cards and his rapier to examine them in more detail later. “You intruded upon our meeting,” she said, “so I will ask you one more time: Why are you here?”

“Honestly, I got lost,” the actor replied. “I was in the forest looking for some toadstools.”

“Toadstools?” asked the younger.

“At this hour?”

“They're for my wife. She is sick. I am sorry I intruded, but I saw your fire and hoped that you would help me find my way out.”

“I thought you were familiar with these woods.”

The bard theatrically ran his eyes over the clearing. “Evidently, not these parts.”

The seated elder sharpened her senses on the playwright.

“Did you find any toadstools?” asked the younger.

Shakespeare shook his head. “No, I am sorry to say. If you have any, I will gladly buy them off you.”

The two women exchanged glances. “If that is all you need, we will give you some and help you find your way.”

The playwright's heart leaped. “Thank you, ladies.” He bowed.

But then …

“Nuuurrrrrrgh!”

A voice cried out so full of sorrow that it made Shakespeare wince. The assembled turned their heads to the writhing Hobgoblin, who hobbled into the circle like a marionette. He was mangled, mad with pain, and rendered half dead from his injuries. The playwright had to look away from the disfigured bandit, who apparently still had a flair for rhyming even without his silver tongue. The villain spoke in rasps and wheezes behind his metal mask, but nevertheless pantomimed to the cunning folk that something foul was afoot.

The younger woman walked up to the creature and held his broken hands. “What are you saying?” she asked with empathy.

Enraged, the Hobgoblin pointed his stubby fingers toward Shakespeare, and then his sawed-off stump to his toadies: the blinded Snell and the deafened Shorthouse. The creature sneered at the playwright and then flapped his arms like a bird, shrieking.

With this revelation, the two women looked to each other in shock, and then back to Shakespeare.

The bard's eyes shifted nervously.

“So, you came here with the raven,” said the elder.

Shakespeare smirked. “I told you, I came in with the breeze. Not the birds.”

The women scowled.

Suddenly, a loud whinny filled the clearing. The playwright's smile faded and his heart sank. It was Aston.

The magnificent horse was being pulled toward the bonfire. The stallion resisted furiously, but nearly a dozen men had ropes tied around his neck.

“There is no need to be rough with him!” Shakespeare shouted.

Enchanted, the younger woman beheld the horse with widened eyes. After whispering something to her sister, the elder nodded and the younger approached the animal.

“Tell me more about your sick wife,” the elder woman taunted the playwright. “Where does she live? Somewhere near that we may ride to?”

The bard swallowed. After weighing his options … “What can I say?” He surrendered. “You found me out. I'm just a vagabond. I am not even married!” the dramatist lied with all his skills.

The elder was not convinced.

The younger, meanwhile, walked straight up to the stallion and stroked his shining coat. The horse snorted fiercely and stomped the ground, nearly crushing the woman's toes with his hooves.

“I would be careful with that animal!” the bard cautioned. “He's not exactly friendly.”

“No horse like that has ever existed on these isles. What are you doing with him?” the elder woman asked the playwright.

“With your permission, I would like to ride him out of here.”

The stallion bucked, forcing several of the painted men to lose their grip. As Aston reared onto his hind legs, one of the glass balls from his saddlebags fell into the grass.

“What is that?” the younger asked in her native tongue. She picked up the amber sphere and studied its clouded contents.

“That's just a suppository,” said Shakespeare.

The glass orb was cracked. As the younger woman examined it, it began to leak onto her hands. The woman sniffed the liquid, and her eyes lit up with recognition. She looked back at the snorting animal. “Hold him down!” she commanded. The painted warriors pulled their ropes until Aston's head was bowing. The cunning woman walked up to him and held her moistened hand under his nostrils.

Shakespeare gasped. “What are you doing?”

Aston turned his head, following the scent.

“What are you doing!” the bard demanded. He fought against his captors with so much anger that the elder slapped him across the face to calm him down.

The young mistress stared straight into the animal's eyes. Her pulse quickened. She then lifted the sphere over her head and broke it open, dousing herself in the mare urine. She stepped toward the snorting animal and let him run his nostrils over her. Aston's anger dissipated, replaced with curiosity. And then, arousal.

“Let him go,” she ordered. The painted warriors dropped their ropes, and the cunning woman led the stallion off.

“Leave him alone!” the playwright cried. “Aston! Get back here!”

“He is not your horse anymore,” the elder woman explained.

Shakespeare shut his eyes as tears began to form in them. “What are you going to do to him? What are you going to do to me?”

The woman whispered to her servants, and then looked back at Shakespeare. “You've been spying on us. Haven't you?”

The bard struggled in both mind and body. “I told you: I was lost!”

“Yes, you were looking for medicine. Just as I imagine you were the last time you intruded. When you mutilated our brothers here.” The elder pointed her chin toward the Hobgoblin and his toadies. “You came into this forest both times when we met with the Englishmen.”

The bard's nostrils flared. “You can say and think whatever you like, but please leave my horse out of this. Bring him back to me!”

The elder smiled menacingly. “No. My sister clearly wants him, so I will pay you for him.”

“With what?”

The cunning woman rose to her feet. “With medicine.”

The elder turned her back on Shakespeare while her bodyguards seized him. Behind their painted faces, the bard could see the elder mash a few things together in a crucible. The woman's primary ingredient was ergot, a fungus that grows on rye. She mixed the substance and then placed the crucible into the fire to stew. Once the charm was ready, she poured it into a chalice fashioned out of the skull of a Roman soldier killed in battle. She then walked back to her captive with the steamy brew and told her warriors to hold his mouth open.

“You saw me whisper to that Englishman before he struck at my face. Do you want to know what I shared with him?”

Shakespeare struggled against his captors, unable to speak.

“I told him we had no intention of killing his silly pope. We sent our sister overseas to subdue him; to force-feed him the slavery that men like you have forced upon us since your arrival. Our lands have been destroyed and our people slain under all your kings and Caesars, under all your popes and bishops, under all your lords and houses.” The woman's eyes glared. “You think you can defeat us, but we will
never
leave these isles. We are Albion. We will never forgive, and we will never forget.”

The woman poured her hot mixture down Shakespeare's throat, scorching it. The elder grinned and told her men to let go of their prisoner. The bard doubled over and coughed violently into the grass. As his hands covered his face, Shakespeare shoved a handful of
terra sigillata
from his cloak into his mouth. The bard swallowed with difficulty, but then looked up at the cunning woman and said: “I prefer claret.”

The elder woman's brow furrowed.

And then there was a whinny, accompanied by a shriek.

The cunning woman and her bodyguards turned their heads to see Aston racing toward Shakespeare. Behind the animal, the younger witch was screaming on the ground with an arrow sticking out of her wrist.

Another arrow shot through the clearing. And then another and another nearly every second. Cunning warriors began falling in rows, giving Shakespeare the time that he needed to take his sword back and run to Aston. Sir Francis Bacon's broken telescope got left behind.

The women shouted orders in ancient tongues as the bard was reunited with his companion. However, as Shakespeare leaped onto Aston's back and fled the clearing, a painful blow nearly knocked him off his saddle.

The bard fell forward and held on to Aston with only one hand. His right arm was in excruciating pain and could no longer move. One of the cunning folk had hit Shakespeare with Thomas Percy's throwing ax, shattering his shoulder. The playwright screamed in agony as he pulled himself back into his seat. However, as he struggled to regain his breath, a great heaviness fell over him like a spell. The potion he ingested was beginning to go to work on him. The skies began to ripple, and the Arden awakened with monstrous eyes.

Drugged and broken, Shakespeare spurred Aston through the psychedelic forest as the painted men behind him mounted horses and joined in the chase.

 

Chapter XXXIV

The Kaleidoscope

The Arden exploded with thunder from more than one hundred hooves as the injured playwright raced his charger through the forest. The bard had only moonlight as his compass while the screaming madmen in pursuit had flaming torches and a shimmering horse to follow. Fortunately, Aston was able to maneuver the wooded labyrinth via scent, freeing his rider to contend with the cunning warriors behind them.

Shakespeare winced with pain as he looked back at the hell-knights. The painted riders hurled ancient war cries that pierced at the playwright's poisoned mind like arrows. Every sight and sound around him was amplified and distorted due to the foul concoction he consumed. The Forest of Arden flashed wildly with every heartbeat, breath, and blink, illuminating its wooded halls in a kaleidoscope of colors.

The bard shut his eyes and wildly shook his head. He needed to keep his wits together long enough to survive the manhunt.

Although a valiant attempt, the cunning folk's mixture worked quickly.

A shriek rang through the forest that echoed against Shakespeare's ears. The bard looked up into the exploding sky and saw a demon descend over him like a harpy. It was one of Bacon's ravens, and the bird swooped straight into the face of a cunning horsemen. The rider tumbled off his mount and was trampled to paste.

As Shakespeare watched through psychedelic lenses, he remembered that he had other weapons.

The bard held on to Aston while leaning back until his injured arm could reach into his saddlebags. The awkward posture forced Aston to slow, allowing their dogged hunters to close in. However, just when their vanguard was about to swing at Shakespeare, their horses collapsed from under them. Bacon's caltrops destroyed the horses' hooves, throwing their riders face-first onto the spikes.

Seeing that he needed to inflict more damage, the sweating, gasping playwright reached for his other countermeasures. He picked up his bag of glass orbs and held the leather sack in his teeth. One by one, he tossed the shining spheres over his shoulders. They crashed against the ground, causing several of the pursuing horses to stop and smell them. Just as Bacon had promised, riders flew off their mounts and collided into one another. The maneuver blocked the forest path, forcing the remaining horsemen to choose alternate routes through the woodlands.

More than half of Shakespeare's pursuers had been defeated.

The bard exhaled and looked in front of him, but then shook his head in disbelief. The forward trail seemed to bend and swirl like water in a funnel. Horrified, Shakespeare pulled on Aston's reins and led his horse onto a different path. However, as Aston galloped, flames began to dance around the fever-dreaming playwright. Shakespeare reared his horse in horror. He was riding directly into his advancing enemies.

The bard's mind was leaving him again. The painted horsemen appeared to him as screaming centaurs.

The playwright spun Aston and charged back onto the twisting path he had come from. The night sky was rippling like water and the stars were streaking past him like lightning. The glowing torches haunting Shakespeare grew larger and brighter. The playwright began to blather incoherently.

Delirium had conquered him. His mind was lost.

Shakespeare let go of Aston just as they approached a fallen tree. The stallion tripped over the log and came crashing down, throwing his poisoned rider off his shoulders.

The playwright landed hard on his fragmented back, causing the forest to erupt in a starburst of colors and screams.

The bard turned his head helplessly toward the torches racing toward him. One by one, they drew closer.

And then, one by one, they fell.

Second after second, arrow after arrow, their burning torches hit the ground, creating a path of fire from the final rider straight to Shakespeare. The dark figure was carrying a yew bow.