The Blackthorn Key (4 page)

Part of the third floor was kept for storage, too, but for Master Benedict's other passion: books. The only thing that compared with my master's obsession with discovering new recipes was his obsession with discovering new books. He passed that on to me, too. Besides our daily lessons, Master Benedict expected me to study on my own, not just recipes and how raw materials reacted, but from his endlessly growing collection of tomes. From these, I learned philosophy, history, theology, languages, the natural sciences, and whatever else sparked my master's imagination during his weekly trips to see his friend Isaac the bookseller.

A landing at the top of the stairs swung around to Master Benedict's
private rooms. More books lined the walls, making the passage so slight, you had to squeeze against the railing to get to the door. Opposite my master's quarters, a ladder led up to a hatch in the ceiling. I unbolted it and climbed into the evening chill.

The roof of our home was flat. I liked coming up here on hot summer nights, where the air was cooler and, high above the cobbles, not nearly as rank with the smell of the streets. Tonight, unfortunately, I wasn't spared; the winds were blowing from the northeast, sending over the stink of boiled fat and urine from the soap maker's shop four streets away.

We housed our birds up here in a walk-in wood-and-wire coop at the back corner of the balcony. They fluttered their wings noisily as I unlatched the hook to their shelter. A few of the bolder ones poked around my shirtsleeves when I entered, losing interest when they saw the bucket I carried was empty. One pigeon, a plump salt-and-pepper-speckled girl, flapped down from her perch and tapped at my toes.

“Hello, Bridget,” I said.

She cooed. I put the scraper on the dirt and picked her up. She was warm, her feathers soft in my fingers. “I got kicked out,” I complained to her. “Again.”

Bridget nuzzled her head against my thumb in sympathy. I cradled her in the crook of my elbow and pulled a handful of barley from my pocket, watching absently as she pecked the grain from my palm. My mind was still on the conversation I'd been booted out of. Stubb had always been a slimy thing, but after this new murder, the way he'd eyed our shop made my stomach twist. It was no secret that my master's business did well, and it was equally no secret that Stubb didn't like the competition. I knew he'd tried to buy our shop several years back. After Master Benedict refused to sell it, Stubb had accused my master of stealing his recipes. No one took him seriously, but tonight it made me wonder: How far would a man like Stubb go to get what he wanted?

And why was he here, taunting Master Benedict about the murders? Did he know something about them? Six men had been butchered now, three of them apothecaries—and the latest victim knew my master.
Closer and closer
, I thought. Tightening, like a noose.

I shivered, and not from the cold. Important things were being said downstairs. Yet here I was, stuck on the roof! Well, Master Benedict could send me away if he wanted to. But if I finished my duties up here, I'd have to
return to the workshop. “And if I happened to overhear something,” I said to Bridget, “that wouldn't be
my
fault, would it?”

I took Bridget's silence for agreement and got to work. The floor of the coop was thick with grayish-white gunk. Bridget, flapping from shoulder to shoulder, nibbled the hair behind my ears as I scraped the top layer of poop off the dirt and slopped it into the bucket. When I was done, I lifted Bridget from my collar and set her in the straw at the back, far from the draft, where she could be warm and snug. “I'll bring your breakfast in the morning,” I said.

She bobbed her head at me and cooed goodbye.

•  •  •

We didn't keep birds just for fun. Pigeon poop was valuable. Sometimes we sold a bit of it to the market gardeners—it was particularly good for growing asparagus—but we made something out of it much more precious than fertilizer.

Back in the workshop, I unsealed a cask in the corner. The stink that blasted from the barrel nearly made me pass out. Gagging, I dumped what I'd scraped from the coop into the slop inside, then topped the whole thing up by unbuttoning my fly and peeing into it—another job for the apprentice. Afterward, I resealed the cask. I wouldn't open
it again for three more months, when I'd wash the nasty mix out and put it into trays in the sun, where it would dry into spiky white crystals of saltpeter.

When I'd finally finished, I crept to the door and put my ear to the wood, half expecting the conversation to be over. But whatever they were talking about must have been really important. Stubb was still here. And he was near to shouting.

“Change is coming, Benedict,” he said. “You want to be on the right side this time.”

“I don't have a side, Nathaniel,” my master said. “These squabbles don't involve me.”

“Perhaps gold will, then. With the right connections, the right backing, we could make a fortune—”

“Money is not the issue,” Master Benedict said. “I have no part in any of this. You have the wrong man.”

Stubb snorted. “Pretend all you like. You'll choose, one way or the other.”

There was a pause. “Is that a threat?” my master said.

Stubb's voice became as smooth as oil. “Of course not, Benedict. After all, what do I have to do with this sordid business? Nothing. Nothing at all.”

I heard Stubb's heavy footsteps, then the creak and
slam of the front door. For a moment, there was silence. Then Hugh spoke to my master, so quietly that I had to squash my ear against the wood to hear him. “What do we do now?”

“We be careful,” Master Benedict said.

“And if Pembroke talked?”

“He wouldn't.”

“Not everyone can stand under torture,” Hugh said.

“No, but Nathaniel wouldn't know that, anyway. He's just guessing.”

“A bloody good guess.”

“Stubb's not a problem,” Master Benedict said. “It's that apprentice we need to watch out for.”

I frowned. What apprentice? What did he mean?

“Three of the six were right, Benedict,” Hugh said. “We can no longer tell ourselves this is a coincidence. If Stubb can figure us out, it's only a matter of time before the others do. Simon's already fled the city.”

“To where?”

“France. Paris, I think. He'll have nothing to do with us anymore.”

There was a pause. “Do you want to leave, too?”

“You know I don't,” Hugh said. “But we can't keep this
up forever. Stubb was right about that. We have to make a choice, and soon.”

My master sighed. “I know.”

•  •  •

When Master Benedict opened the door to the workshop, I pretended I'd just finished with the cask.

“I'm afraid I can't eat with you tonight,” he said. “I have to go out.”

That wasn't unusual. Master Benedict often left home in the evening, not returning until well after I'd gone to sleep. “Yes, Master.”

He heard the catch in my voice. “What's wrong?” he said. “Are you upset about before? Come here.”

He put his arm around my shoulders. “I'm sorry I was cross with you,” he said. “But God's breath, Christopher, sometimes you make me wonder if Blackthorn will still be standing when I come home. You must think before you act.”

“I know, Master. You were right. I'm not upset about that.” Though I still didn't want to scrub the floors.

“Then what's the matter?”

“What did Stubb want?” I said.

“
Master
Stubb,” he chided gently, “wanted the same thing he always wants. A quick path to riches.”

“Then why was he talking about the murders?”

“Ah. So that's what's troubling you.”

Now that I'd finally said it aloud, the rest rushed out like the Thames after the spring thaw. “There's a gang of assassins on the loose and no one can stop them and Tom thinks it's the Catholics but his mother thinks it's the Puritans but I think it's worse than either and even the king is scared and you knew the last man they murdered and
they're killing apothecaries
.” I took a breath.

“So?” Master Benedict said.

“Well . . .
we're
apothecaries.”

“We are?” He looked surprised. “So we are! How nice for us.”

“Master.”

He laughed affectionately. “Never mind the murders, boy; your imagination will stop your heart. There is no ‘gang of assassins.' No one is hunting apothecaries. And Nathaniel Stubb is harmless.”

But he threatened you!
I almost cried out, before I realized that would reveal I'd been eavesdropping. I floundered for something to say and finally settled on, “So we'll be safe?”

“As the king's breeches,” he said. “Now, settle down.
I'm in no danger. And as long as you don't build any more firearms, neither are you. There's nothing to worry about.” Master Benedict patted my shoulder. “I promise.”

•  •  •

I wanted to believe him, but I wasn't sure I did. I mean,
someone
was murdering these poor people. And it had sounded like Hugh felt the same.

Three of the six were right
, he'd said.
We can no longer tell ourselves this is a coincidence.
What did that mean? Nothing good, I was sure. Whatever it was, they clearly weren't going to tell me. If I wanted to find out, I'd have to do some more eavesdropping.

Either way, I couldn't do anything about it tonight. Hungry, I sliced a hunk of cheese from the wheel in the larder for my supper and downed it with a mug of beer. Then I did my punishment. I wrote out the cannon recipe in English and Latin until my hand cramped, then scoured the floors and the steps, all the way up to the roof. When I finally finished, three hours past nightfall, I barred the front door, shuttered the windows, then crawled under the shop counter to my palliasse and fell fast asleep.

A noise woke me. At first, I thought it came from the street. Then I heard it again, from the other side of the
counter. A ceramic jar clinked against the shelf.

I'd sealed up the shop before I'd gone to sleep. I hadn't barred the back door to the workshop so Master Benedict could return, but it was locked, and only my master and I knew where the key was hidden. And Master Benedict always entered the house through the workshop and went straight upstairs. He never came to the front.

But there it was again. A footfall, the gentle creak of the floorboards.

Someone was here.

I REACHED UNDER THE STRAW
, groping for my knife. My heart hammered at my ribs. A plan. I needed a plan.

I thought of several. I could jump out and surprise them. I could run and call for help. Or I could stay where I was and wet myself.

I gave option number three serious consideration. But if this was a burglar, he'd come around the counter. The most valuable remedies we had were here, on the shelves a few feet above my head. And if it was an assassin . . . I gripped my knife as if it were Excalibur. In reality, it was a two-inch blade, loose in the handle and dull as a
millstone. The thing had a hard time slicing apples.

I pushed myself to my knees and peeked over the counter. The coals in the fireplace still glowed softly. I couldn't see the intruder, but the dull red light cast a shadow of him on the wall.

A
huge
shadow.

He was a giant. Incredibly, impossibly tall.

All right, then. Fighting was right out. And wetting myself was not a plan. So: option number two. Sneak to the front, unbolt the door, run outside, scream like a girl.

But—Master Benedict!
I thought.
What if he's come home?
I couldn't just leave him.

The giant moved away from the shelves. He was carrying a ceramic jar, and not doing a good job of it. He struggled, grunting, and lowered it with a
thunk
on the table near the fireplace. Now that he was closer to the auburn glow of the coals, I could see the intruder better. He wasn't a giant at all. The man was tall, yes, but still human size. And while the shadow made him look broad, he was actually quite skinny. In fact, he looked exactly the same shape as my—

“Master?” I said.

Master Benedict leaned against the table. “Yes. Go to sleep.”

Not likely. My heart still whumped like His Majesty's cannons. What was he doing with that jar in the middle of the night?

“Are you all right?” I said.

“Yes, Christopher. I'm fine. Go back to sleep.”

I went to the fireplace, using the coals to light the wick on the lamp. When the lantern flared, I nearly dropped it.

Master Benedict looked like he'd just come back from a war. His wig was gone, his short gray hair revealed, spiked and dirty. His clothes were so caked with mud, the blue underneath was only a memory. There was something black smeared all over the right side of his face. It looked like soot.

“Did someone attack you?” I said. “Was it Stubb?” I shrank back. “Was it the killers?”

“No.” He tried to turn away, but his movements were clumsy, twitching.

I took his arm. “Let me help you.”

“I'm fine,” he said.

“Please, Master. Let me take you to your room.”

After a moment, he nodded. I lifted his right arm to wrap around me. He cried out in pain. It was then that I saw his coat was torn at the shoulder.

I took him through the back and upstairs, the lantern
lighting our way. His weight, resting on me, seemed to grow with every creaking step. At the top, I nudged the door open with my hip and brought him inside.

Master Benedict's bedroom smelled faintly of Egyptian incense. Against one wall, next to the fireplace, was a narrow bed with plain brown cotton sheets and a single pillow. A simple table stood beside it, one short leg steadied underneath with folded sheepskin. A chamber pot rested on the rose-carved elm chair near the desk at the open window; the desk was covered with papers and ash dust from the incense holder, blown off by the night's breeze. The rest of the space was piled with books, stacks and stacks and more stacks, each one at least a dozen high.
Isaac the bookseller
, I thought,
must be swimming in gold
.