The Ringed Castle (52 page)

‘They come in sets,’ Lymond said. ‘With two small
pi
drums and a set of stone chimes. You are going to tell me that you want to leave St Mary’s.’

They had stopped outside his tent. ‘Yes,’ said Adam. ‘Was it so obvious?’

‘The lack of enthusiasm has been obvious. To leave before the campaign, I suppose, would have looked like pique, or like cowardice. So, you have discovered that your conscience will not let you put soldiering before other things. I wish you had found it out before.’

‘I did not know it before,’ Adam said. ‘I can’t stay. Plummer can use all his arts, and they will let him teach them, and follow him eagerly. I cannot stand silent.’

‘No,’ Lymond said. ‘Then you are better away.’

Adam Blacklock said, ‘There is one thing.’

‘Yes?’ A steaming horse was being led away from the Voevoda Bolshoia’s tent, and there was the dark shadow of a man, standing waiting beside the guards.

‘You refused me opium, I was told.’

‘It is possible,’ Lymond said, ‘to bear pain without it. If I can do so, then I expect it of you. Is that all?’

‘Ludovic d’Harcourt wishes also to leave,’ Blacklock said.

The dark figure had come forward. Stained with travel; his beard uncombed, his face splashed with mud, he did not at first seem what he was: one of the Tsar’s principal couriers. Lymond greeted him, and in a few words provided for his comforts, and, before he let him go, opened and read by the torchlight the rolled dispatch he had brought in his pouch.

The questions he then asked the messenger were swift, brief and pointed, and the answers, as he turned back to Blacklock, had not, Adam saw, pleased him at all.

‘D’Harcourt too?’ Lymond said. ‘Our evangelist. I wonder who else is pining for the role of Feodorit, the Enlightener of the Lapps? Whoever they are, if you will round them up, they had better all travel with me. I have been called back to Moscow. I shall be leaving the bulk of the army with Guthrie, and riding back to the Kremlin tomorrow.’

Without the army. A recall, therefore, direct by the Tsar.… ‘Why?’ said Adam.

‘I have no idea. Perhaps the forces of winged retribution. The prophet Elijah being fed to the ravens. Like Baida, I have killed my three pigeons.’

‘Two,’ Adam said.

‘Two died instead of Vishnevetsky. One died instead of my brother. Long ago. Attar, the Persian poet, saw the destiny of souls as a flight of birds across the seven valleys of Seeking, Love, Knowledge, Independence, Unity, Stupefaction and Annihilation, before at last being lost in the divine Ocean and thenceforth happy. A charming, if sterile, conceit. Next time, the bird may escape,’ Lymond said. ‘Happy pigeon. Next time, the archer may die.’

‘Happy archer,’ said Adam; and shut his lips, and went off.

*

As once before, the Chosen stood in support round Ivan Vasilievich when he received in audience his Voevoda Bolshoia, and the white-robed guard with their silver axes lined the coloured walls of the anteroom and did not salute him, since Supreme Commander to Ivan Vasilievich was as Ivan Vasilievich to Christ, our most merciful Tsar. And in the Golden Chamber, adorned with Sylvester’s disputed frescoes:
The Baptism of Vladimir, The Destruction of the Idols, The Deeds of Vladimir Monomach
, stood all the familiar faces: Adashev and Kurbsky and Sheremetev, Palestsky and Kurlyatev, Vyazemsky and Pronsky-Shemyakin. And the small group of priests, including Sylvester himself and the Metropolitan Makary, his two fingers upraised in blessing as the Voevoda saluted the ikon and the Tsar.

So these two men, so close in age, so far apart in birth and training and temperament confronted one another. Against the black gowns of his churchmen the Tsar’s robes of brocatelle and cloth of gold and raised velvet knotted with silk glowed like enamel: the brooched
alkaben
over the
ferris
, the caftan over the
shepon
, and the
shepon
over the shirt with its collar, four fingers deep, of jewels and pearls. On his head, a deep kolpak concealed his short auburn hair, and his feet were in soft velvet shoes, the toes curled and jewelled.

Cap in hand the Tsar’s favourite knelt, in caftan and tunic, while Ivan Mikhailovich Viscovatu smiled and intoned. ‘Great master, and King of all the Russians, the Voevoda Bolshoia strikes his forehead before thee, for thy great favour in receiving a gift.’

Behind Lymond were two of the changing band of Russians who travelled with him and served him. Each of them held a box wrapped in silk, and each box was passed in turn to the Chief Secretary Viscovatu, who handed them in his turn to the Tsar. Ivan Vasilievich, without looking at his Supreme Commander, opened them.

The first held an ikon, dressed with an embossed silver mounting which hid nearly all but the calm tempera face with its arched brows and pouched, close-set eyes and long, reeded nose above the thin, drooping moustache. In the second box was a gold gospel cover, with its figures threaded and outlined with uneven pearls, and blue sapphires and crimson almandines set high in the filigree. For a long time the Tsar studied them, then, giving them to other hands, he looked at last at Lymond.

Lymond said, ‘Wrested by the Tartar from a Christian altar, and now to be restored there by Christ’s friend, the Tsar of all Russia.’

‘Give me your hand,’ Ivan said. And receiving it, held it, while Lymond stood by his footstool. ‘Hast thou travelled well?’

‘Through the mercy of God and your grace, very well,’ Lymond said. ‘God give your grace good health.’

Releasing him slowly, the Tsar laid his powerful hand again on the shaft of the sceptre of crystal and gold in his lap. ‘They say,’ he said, ‘you bring me a victory.’

‘They say kindly,’ Lymond said. ‘We have burned twelve Tartar settlements and raided Devlet Girey’s town of Ochakov, killing many and releasing many Christian souls, with almost no loss and no harm to your servants. I bring you an army high in heart to defend you against all your enemies. I bring you the allegiance of Prince Dmitri Ivanovich Vishnevetsky, at present in Cherkassy, who is to build a fort below the cataracts of the Dnieper against the Perecop Horde, and who will join us, when we are prepared, to remove Devlet Girey and his host as your Highness removed the Khan of Kazan. The way to the Crimea is known to us, and its strength. In one year, if you will trust me, it shall be yours.’

He spoke, as he always spoke, in the clear, unequivocal cadences of the Slavonic tongue. And he listened, as he always listened, to the rumour, the voiceless burden of thought in the room.

An ear less finely tuned than his would have told that something was wrong. The silence when he had spoken confirmed it. Then the Tsar said, ‘For what you have done, we know how to reward you. Receive now our token. As for the future, it is time for our plans for you to be made known.’

Adashev, the soft-spoken Councillor with the pleasant, pockmarked face carried the Tsar’s gift to Lymond. It glinted in his hands: a necklet of pendant medallions linked with gold, openwork beads; each plaque bearing an image in cloisonné enamel, set with blue and green sapphires and garnets. He laid it over Lymond’s bent head and over the caftan, where it sparkled, a major artefact, close to the sacred
barmi
of princes; an unwise, a violent token of favour. The Tsar Ivan Vasilievich said, ‘It is our wish that you should travel to England.’

Lymond stood up. Because he knew Viscovatu was smiling; because he sensed the satisfaction on Kurbsky’s face, he did so smoothly but his eyes, wide and cold, were scanning that big, raw-boned face with its jutting nose and soft, reddish beard; and saw that there was colour on the high cheekbones, and a deeper furrow on the heavy, ridged brow. Lymond said, ‘As close as the shadow and the stile are the Tsar’s wishes, and his servant’s deeds to fulfil those wishes. I am to travel with Chancellor?’

The Tsar, braced to counter resistance, was visibly solaced; the brow lighter; the deep-set eyes anxious instead of majestic. ‘You were right,’ Ivan said. ‘The Muscovy merchants would accept no commissions. They would give no undertaking to carry our demand to their mistress: that if her people wish to stay here and trade, they must supply me with what my people must have: skilled artisans to teach us, and arms and munitions to defend ourselves from Antichrist and Mammon, the wolves on our borders.’

‘They fear you mean to attack,’ Lymond said. ‘And that the Teutonic League, Livonia and Poland and Lithuania, the German princes and the Hanseatic trade, all dear to the Emperor Charles, would then suffer.’

The Tsar’s hand was tight on his rod. ‘I have told them,’ he said. ‘I have told them that if there is to be peace and not bloody war, if they desire calm seasons to trade in, they must see that my poor weakened country can defend herself against those who would run burning and scourging across her. I have told them that if we take arms against any man in aggression, it will be against the heathen, the Tartar. For how can I repeat in my prayers the words I
and the people given to me by Thee
if I do not save them from the ferocity of our age-long enemies?’

They are obstinate,’ Lymond agreed. He considered the matter, without undue haste. ‘Chancellor is no politician. Robert Best, who returns with him, is little more than a draper. But Best has seen what our intentions are against the Tartar; he can report what we do with the resources under our hand, he can surely envisage what we might do, better armed. Why not let him support the case for you, and have the argument laid before the monarch of England by a Russian? Choose one of your councillors here to carry your prayer to Mary of England, and not a Scot, a former employee of France, a man whose countrymen are the foes of Charles and her traditional enemies. And while he is gone, I shall show you that without English armour, we may still take the Crimea.’

There was a little silence. Then the Tsar lifted his hand. Ivan Viscovatu said, ‘A Russian Ambassador has already been appointed to sail with the English Pilot Ritzert. A merchant from Vologda who can answer well the questions the English may ask about trading, and who knows what privileges we require in England in our turn. This man is Osep Nepeja. But of martial matters, he cannot speak. And you will not ask us to entrust business of such delicacy to the two disaffected of your own company who, it seems, are also to be of the party. Only one man has the ability, the knowledge, the persuasiveness to carry weight in such a transaction. And that man, our wise and noble Tsar has rightly decreed, is yourself.’

The Tsar said, ‘You will tell England that if we receive these arms, I shall declare war on Turkey.’

The sudden words fell on silenced air. Lymond drew a long, slow breath, standing still, the great collar of jewels steadily shining, his eyes holding, without mercy, those of the Tsar. ‘And what arms,’ he said, ‘and what Commander will you ask for which could make such a war anything but the self-immolation of Russia?’

The Tsar sprang to his feet, arm outflung, and the heavy cross by his chair, rocking, crashed to the ground. He said softly, against the hissing groan of his courtiers, ‘You give your sovereign monarch the lie?’

Lymond’s voice was as soft. ‘I have said that, with or without arms, I shall clear your land of the Tartar. I know Suleiman’s strength. There is not a nation on earth, Christian or infidel, which could overthrow Turkey at this moment. Your Highness knows that. Your Highness had ordered, for this reason, that no Turkish prisoners should be taken.’

‘I also know,’ said the Tsar forcefully, ‘that the campaign to Ochakov was a test. Was it not? It did damage—of course, for you are the finest soldier in Russia. I tell you this. My Council cannot deny it. It showed the way for a greater attack later on. It did something else. It plumbed the depth of the Turk’s displeasure, that his vassals should so be distressed. We shall know, by the end of the
summer, what force of janissaries Suleiman will give Devlet Girey when next he makes his attack. What we do not know is how Turkey will answer Devlet Girey’s overthrow.

‘I say to Mary Tudor of England that I shall make war against Turkey. I say to you that whether or not we declare war, we may finish with war on our hands. You say that, even with arms, we cannot prevail. I say that, with arms, we have English interest, we have the support of the Emperor Charles: we may have even the armies of the King of the Romans to help us, if by so doing he believes the Turk may be overthrown.… I say you underrate your powers as a commander. And I would ask you what will happen if, without guns and without armour or powder, we have to face the might of Suleiman’s army. Then no friends would come to our aid. Then our enemies would stand by and laugh, while Russia died, and the heretic rabble exhausted itself.’

‘You wish to provoke Turkey then?’ Lymond said.

The Tsar was still standing, but in his shining eyes there glowed visions. ‘When I have arms,’ he said. ‘When England sends me what I ask for. Then you shall strike a blow against the Tartar which will make Turkey rock. And even Sigismund-August himself will send his armies to march by our side. Baida has told me.’

‘I see,’ said Lymond. After a moment, he said, ‘He did not say he had received the honour of an audience.’

‘At Tula,’ the Tsar said. ‘The day after the army had left. He came to give me his loyal assurances.’

‘And to suggest that I should go to England,’ Lymond said.

‘He said, and wisely, that only by threatening Turkey could we hope to attract English support. All the world knows the danger in that. You have just spoken of it. He said only you could persuade the English that such is our plan.’

Lymond said, ‘Great as you are; great as your army is, you cannot declare war on Turkey. The English know this. You cannot use this argument with them.’

‘So Baida said,’ the Tsar answered. ‘If you say so also, then it rests in your hands to find other means of persuasion. Only you have the knowledge, as Viscovatu says. Only you have the tongue. Only you have the trust of us all, absolutely and implicitly. I have ordered you to go to England. Now I, your Tsar, beg it of you. Sail to London, the home of this strange, married Queen, and speak to her in her own tongue, but with the heart of a Russian. Bring me what I want.’