Warlord's Gold: Book 5 of The Civil War Chronicles (25 page)

Forrester was grudgingly impressed that Kovac had checked how many weapons had been taken during the pair’s escape. He eyed the mercenary along the length of the black barrel, fixing his sights upon Kovac’s chest. He knew the range was too great for any kind of accuracy, but the horsemen were bunched, making the likelihood of hitting one of them much more realistic. ‘But that means two of you will die this day! Is it truly a wager you are willing to make?’

Kovac snapped rapid orders and the three troopers surged out, two to his left, the other to his right. Forrester cursed viciously. ‘Where’s that musket?’ he hissed at Dewhurst.

The Hawk scrambled to his side. In his talon-like fingers he clutched the weapon, and he settled down beside Forrester, training the barrel on one of the cantering targets. ‘Ready, sir.’

‘Check your coals, Sergeant.’

Dewhurst pulled the trigger. The match fell slightly long, overreaching the pan by a fraction that might render the musket impotent. He immediately coloured, smothering his embarrassment by busying himself with the match’s readjustment. ‘Thank you, sir.’

‘Wisely and slow, Sergeant,’ Forrester said. ‘So says the Bard. They stumble that run fast.’ There was no profit to be made in berating the man. Dewhurst, Forrester reckoned, was entitled to be nervous.

The horsemen had fanned out, dividing a single, static target into four that were fast-moving and obscured by trees. Kovac went left, whooping at his snorting bay so that great clods of soil flew up in its wake. The beast whinnied in its exhilaration, weaving at speed through the trees at right angles with the grove. He was daring Forrester to discharge his guns, waste the two paltry shots he had. And yet Forrester knew there was nothing else to be done. He had no sword, nothing with which to stand and fight, and the cavalrymen would be on them in moments.

‘What now?’ Dewhurst hissed.

‘Pick one and pull the trigger,’ Forrester returned. ‘And try not to miss, there’s a good chap.’ He moved the musket sideways, keeping the muzzle fixed upon Kovac. ‘The leader’s mine. If that card falls, the rest of the pack just might collapse as well.’

Two of the horsemen came directly at them, screaming, teeth bared, drawing their swords as they stood in their stirrups.

‘Hold,’ Forrester warned. ‘Let them come close.’ But even as the words left his mouth, he realized Kovac had not turned his mount in to face them. He kept going, galloping to the fugitives’ right, and Forrester understood that the Croat meant to outflank them. The fourth Roundhead would be following suit, he guessed, heading about their left side to attack the rear. There was no time. Even if they got their shots off, what good would it do? He pushed back off the low bough, breaking the trance between muzzle and target. ‘Forget it, Sergeant!’

Dewhurst twisted back to stare in horror. ‘Sir?’

‘Now, man!’ he barked, pausing only to grasp the bandolier, slinging it over his neck in one motion. ‘Back to Oberon before we’re surrounded!’

Dewhurst did as he was told, scrambling out from the tangle of branches to run after Forrester. The captain reached the jet gelding and handed Dewhurst his musket. He clambered up on to the horse’s bare back, reaching down to take the long-arm again, and wheeled the mount about. ‘We make our stand here, then ride like the devil. Ready?’

The sergeant’s beaklike face pecked the air. ‘Ready, sir.’

The first two cavalrymen crashed through the brush. One from the direction of the initial charge, the other from the rear. They were each twenty paces away, and Dewhurst raised his musket and fired, immediately vanishing in a cloud of his own powder smoke. Oberon juddered, hooves thudding as he tried to bolt, but Forrester held him still, hauling at the reins with every ounce of strength and hoping the rough-stitched halter would bare the strain. He saw that the second horseman was Kovac. The air was smoke-misted and grey, but he took aim nonetheless. Kovac snarled, sword high and glittering, and Forrester fired. The smoke billowed about his head so that he could see nothing. He did not wait for the remaining two attackers, instead slamming the musket across his lap and grasping Dewhurst’s outstretched arm. He hauled the sergeant up just as the next rider burst into the grove, and raked Oberon’s flanks with his boots, cursing his gaolers for confiscating his spurs. Oberon lurched forwards, rearing slightly so that his two passengers were forced to cling to his mane and to each other.

Another shot rang out, cracking across the grove in the sharp report of a pistol. The other riders would be upon them, Forrester knew, but he did not look back. Oberon reached a gallop, thrashing across the leaves with a raging whinny that rose above the shouts of the men. Out of the corner of his eye he caught a glimpse of Wagner Kovac through the smoke, the implacable hunter had been punched clean from his saddle and lay flat on the forest floor. Forrester crowed to the trees, for they had escaped, and as they pushed through the ring of elms and out into the open wood, he could feel Oberon picking up speed, as if angels had lent the redoubtable gelding their wings.

‘
Ha
!’ Forrester cried. ‘They won’t follow now their damned leader’s down! No, sir, they will not! To Basing with us, Sergeant Dewhurst!’

He twisted back when his companion did not reply. It was only then that he understood why Oberon could gallop at such pace. Dewhurst was gone.

St Mary’s, Isles of Scilly, 13 October 1643

Titus Gibbons hated the rebellion. His Cornish roots and penchant for rich living lent him a natural antipathy for the new kind of Englishman who would turn the country on its head. But it was more than that. A deeper feeling, one that stirred his very heart’s blood. Those men who seemed intent on shattering the long-held traditions and principles upon which his own character was moulded did not understand the world beyond Land’s End or Dover, Carlisle or Berwick. They knew nothing of the savages found in the New World, or the pizzle-slicing Turks plaguing the Mediterranean. They had never seen whole cities of blackamoors, nor the slant-eyed multitudes that came from the most easterly reaches of civilization. But Titus Gibbons had seen them all, traded with them in European, African and Asian ports. And they had taught him one thing; England, for all its divers faults, was to be cherished.

‘As far as I’m concerned,’ he said as he sipped wine from his goblet and leaned closer to the fire, ‘any man meaning to change my country must go through me first.’ He supped again, listening to the roar of the storm outside. The tempest had renewed its anger in the last few hours, and he was pleased to have docked after weeks at sea. The
Stag
was at anchor out in St Mary’s Pool, but it was safe enough in the shelter of the harbour. Even so, he took another sip in private salute to those of his crew left aboard her stomach-churning decks.

‘Will we win this war?’ Captain William Balthazar’s gentle voice reached him above the crackle of the hearth.

Gibbons closed his eyes, revelling in the heat of the flames on his face, imagining the film of sea salt being scorched away from his skin. ‘Losing faith, Captain?’

Balthazar was standing further back, staring out of a large window at the dim dusk. They were in the governor’s suite of rooms on the upper level of the castle’s central house. ‘It is difficult to gauge matters from so distant a range. You visit all the ports, you see the manner of things with your own eyes.’

Gibbons drained his cup, set it on a little table at his side and bent to pet his dogs. The animals were curled about his chair, snoring loudly. ‘I suppose you are rather isolated out here.’ He smiled as the mastiff, Sir Francis, rolled over to allow Gibbons access to his belly. ‘Yes, we’ll win. We have to win. God is on our side.’

‘You believe that?’ Balthazar said distantly. He set his own goblet on a sideboard that was set along the wall adjacent to the window.

‘I believe enough people believe it.’

‘I hope you are right.’

Gibbons straightened, twisting in his seat to look over at the man left in charge of the Isles of Scilly. He liked Balthazar. The bespectacled officer was soft as a new-born pup, but he was also a kindly fellow, and such men were few in days of war. ‘As do I. Things are not easy. The Parliament has the navy, they have most of the ports. They have London’s wealth and the forges of the Weald.’

Balthazar turned and removed his spectacles to rub the bridge of his nose. ‘But our armies are in the ascendancy.’

‘They are,’ the privateer conceded, sensing his earnest host was engaged in an exercise to overcome his own secret doubts. ‘But some brave fool named Massie held Gloucester against the King himself.’

‘Gloucester is of no great import.’

‘But it was so unlikely a thing that it did unfathomable good to the rebels’ spirits,’ Gibbons said. ‘It was victory there that made Essex’s success at Newbury possible.’

‘He did not win,’ Balthazar said, his tone querulous.

‘He did not lose,’ said Gibbons bluntly. He rose from his seat, making the hounds twitch and grumble, and strode to the sideboard. Set on its ornate walnut and mother-of-pearl surface was a thin-necked wine decanter, the kind he had often seen used in French ports. He took it up and replenished his goblet. ‘And that has served as a spur. The bastards in the north have begun to turn things about, our supporters under Newcastle are on the back foot. And now there is talk of an alliance with the Scots.’

‘A Royal alliance?’ William Balthazar bleated hopefully. When Gibbons ignored him, moving instead to stare out of the window, his face flushed. ‘Oh, Christ.’

Gibbons gave a rueful smile. ‘It was rumour only when I heard. Let us hope it has come to nothing.’ He took a lingering draught of the crimson wine. ‘You are fortunate to be out of it.’

Balthazar looked at him, his gaze angry. ‘We are hardly out of it,’ he blustered. ‘Why, only two weeks ago a Roundhead assault party was foiled in its attempt to take our fair islands.’

‘Curious,’ Gibbons said, leaning into the pane of glass so that he might counteract the glare from the flames to peer out at the windswept eve. ‘Why would they bother with the Scillies? With the utmost respect, of course.’

‘Of course,’ Balthazar echoed irritably. It was his turn at condescension. ‘We are a strategic gem, Captain Gibbons, you must know that. Consider how important we have been to the King’s ships.’

‘I do not question that, sir, but the rebellion in the south-west is in its death-throes.’ Gibbons stared at the empty courtyard below. Sentries would be up on the walls, huddled in the corners of each of the star’s eight points, counting the hours until their turn on duty was at an end. Beyond the sturdy stone, a little way down the grassy slope on which the castle perched, a gallows stood like a lone giant against the wind. It was dark and tall, forbidding against the grey of the ocean horizon. The noose moved with the wind, never still, pointing the direction of each gust as though invisible bodies already swung from its thick loop. ‘But one must ask oneself: why would they spare men in the taking of Star Castle when they ought to be pouring everything into wresting back Devon and Cornwall? Not to mention Bristol. I mean no disrespect when I say that these islands are small beer by comparison.’

‘I cannot answer the question of Westminster strategy, Captain Gibbons.’ Balthazar left the window and went to refresh his own cup, leaving his spectacles on the sideboard in its stead. ‘All I know is that a fluyt by the name of
Kestrel
was lost off our waters, and it was found to be carrying Parliament men, bound for St Mary’s.’

‘Found to be carrying them?’ Gibbons asked. ‘How, if it was lost? You took prisoners?’

The captain of Star Castle nodded. He was a meek man, but a hint of steel came into his tone as he spoke. ‘We did, aye. They languish in our dungeons even now, awaiting transport back to England, save their leader. A murderous cabal of ruffians if ever there was one. I dread to think what horrors might have been inflicted upon our good folk had they been able to land.’

‘They sound positively hell-spawned, Captain Balthazar. I congratulate you on their capture.’

Balthazar dipped his head in acknowledgement. ‘They were led by a rogue who looked like the devil himself. All scars and malice.’

Gibbons remembered the gallows. ‘The chates are for him?’

Balthazar glanced out of the window and nodded. ‘Never a better fate was prescribed.’ He placed a hand across his left cheek and eye socket. ‘The knave has but one evil eye and half his face is missing, like so. It is a vile thing to behold, ’pon my honour, it is.’

Titus Gibbons stared at Balthazar, who still held a hand against his face. ‘One eye? Tell me, Captain, what is his name?’

CHAPTER 12

St Mary’s, Isles of Scilly, 13 October 1643

‘I’m just sayin’ you can’nae fail to be impressed,’ the croaking Scots accent echoed in the darkness.

‘Don’t you ever shut that trap o’ yours?’ a man with a voice hewn by the rough taverns of Gosport retorted harshly.

Captain Innocent Stryker listened to his men snipe in the gloom, punctuated only by the damp-sounding coughs of the other prisoners and the harrying wind. Only Barkworth and Skellen, he reflected, could pick a fight in a windowless cell when there was practically nothing to talk about. The thought made him smile, something for which he was grateful. He was sitting on the cold floor to one side of the cramped chamber, knees drawn up to his chest, while the rest of the captives were strewn about like so many rag-dolls, some huddled for warmth in the centre, others seeking solace in the darkest corners. No one had come to them in the days since he had given Tainton the location of the treasure, save the stony-faced garrison men.