The Last Days of Magic (52 page)

“Sorry,” she said to the dead man, “but that felt . . . right. I was trained to be a warrior, you know, born to it. Better than selling spells. People are always wanting one to bring a disfiguring goiter to a rival. What use is that? Doesn’t make me feel like this.”

She paused.
What am I saying?
she thought, and she leaned against a tree, sighing heavily.
What did I just do? My darkness is leaching away the last of my will. Too often I don’t recognize my actions as my own anymore.
To her surprise she found herself contemplating joining the rebellion. Might it give her a purpose that she could hold on to
while she still had some access to her old self remaining? Killing brought its own power—the corpses at her feet reminded her of that. Could she use it to channel her darkness into a different outcome? At the thought of rejoining the Celts, fear rose in her throat, tasting of bile.
No, I cannot do that, not reconcile with them, not yet,
she thought. She had to protect Deirdre above all else.

She looked at the dead archers and made a decision. She would work from within and attack the English when their backs were turned, as with these two, or in the night. First she would have to hide Deirdre somewhere away from the English and the Celts. Liam would help with that. Even if they were not reconciled, he was that type of man. She hurried toward the witch path, anxious to make a start before she changed her mind.

She was about to climb in when her dress snagged on a low tree branch. She tugged at it. Another branch coiled around her arm. She tried to pull free. A tangle of branches and twigs wrapped around her and pulled her against a fragmented trunk, each branch a composite of bits of wood, the whole thing resembling a haphazard puzzle. She cast a spell, shattering a number of limbs. They quickly reassembled and reconnected with the tree, drawing her in tighter.

“You will not escape,” said a Skeaghshee appearing from behind the tree.

“What do you want?” Aisling demanded.

“To fulfill my king’s last wish. I constructed this tree from broken pieces of those felled by the English. I animated it by releasing the latent hate each shard bore from the Skeaghshee who died with it. Then I bribed that farmer to hire you, so you would come through this path.”

“Order this tree to release me or I’ll burn you where you stand. You don’t have the power to bind my enchantments.”

“None can stop what has started. This tree wants nothing more, and nothing less, than your death. And it will have it. I am the last of my clan. This was my last task. I go now to the After Lands.” The Skeaghshee pulled a dagger and slit his own throat.

Aisling cast enchantment after enchantment. Branches broke and reformed, flashed to ash and regenerated, each time tightening their grip upon her. She abandoned that tactic. “Please,” she pleaded with the tree, her breath labored. “Please. I have decided to fight the English, those that hurt you. Give me one more chance to help your land. Help our land. Please.”

The tree was pitiless. It closed its branches around her, crushing her. She attempted to send out a call through the Ardor, but the tree was drawing all in the area into itself. The limbs squeezed, and she felt a rib crack. She tried to cry for help, but it came out as a gasp: “Liam . . .”

U
PON
ARRIVING
at Dublin Castle, Richard immediately ordered de Vere’s body brought to his bedchamber. Members of the VRS League carried the coffin up from the cellar and placed it on two trestles in the center of the room.

“Remove the lid,” Richard ordered. “Now get out. Get out! Get out!” The exorcists retreated from Richard’s flailing arms and out the door. He stooped over the coffin and stared at his old lover. How could he have forgotten this man? How could he have left him here?

One of de Vere’s cheeks was mostly gone, revealing emaciated muscles and black teeth. Despite the cold of the cellar and the best efforts of the VRS League, without Orsini’s knowledge of the Egyptian method to preserve the dead, de Vere’s body had begun to rot. Richard pulled off his gold ring and placed it on de Vere’s finger, carefully positioning the withered hand so the ring would not slide off. Then he kissed what was left of de Vere’s lips.

. . . . .

Richard’s troops received no orders from their king and so were content to limit their patrols to the lowlands around Dublin in an attempt to avoid skirmishes with the rebels. Emboldened by Richard’s unexpected lack of offense, Liam and Art soon harried the English even there.

It had been three weeks since Richard reached Dublin, but he had not left his bedchamber when Nottingham brought unwelcome news. Richard was lying on the floor next to the coffin. The diptych depicting Isabella as the Virgin Mary sprawled broken in the corner. “Why do you disturb Us?” Richard mumbled. He pushed himself up, stood in his disheveled robes, and gazed down upon de Vere’s decaying face.

Without formality Nottingham said, “A messenger just arrived with news that Henry of Bolingbroke has landed in Yorkshire and marched unopposed to London. He is accompanied by Thomas of Arundel.”

Richard looked up, confused. “Henry? Landed?”

“Yes. Of the Lancasters. Remember, you exiled him and Thomas?”

“Unopposed?” Richard’s stance straightened.

“All those lords still loyal to you accompanied you here,” said Nottingham. “Henry’s allies are burning out the last of your vassals in Cheshire. Henry has already petitioned Parliament to name him king. He has imprisoned your heir and the queen.”

“No. No. No. This cannot be happening.” Richard pounded both fists on the edge of the coffin until it tipped off the trestles, spilling de Vere’s body across the floor, causing one if its arms to break off.

An eerie calm settled over Richard. He walked around the broken body to within inches of Nottingham’s face. “Ready Our ships,” he ordered.

“Your Royal Majesty,” said Nottingham, reverting to a formal tone and taking a step back, “we cannot sail against London. Where will we go?”

“Do We still control Wales?” asked Richard.

“Wales? I have no word of fighting in Wales.”

“Well, go find out,” Richard commanded.

. . . . .

Less than two months after he had left in a fury for Ireland, Richard returned to Britain, landing in Wales on July 24. He climbed the sea stairs and walked across the garden and into the back gate of Conwy Castle. His ship was anchored in the estuary. No other ships
accompanied it. Previously, upon hearing that Parliament was likely to side with Henry’s claim to the throne, all the loyal lords and knights who had sailed with Richard to Ireland abandoned him and pledged their fealty to Henry in an attempt to keep their stations and their heads. Many had taken ships and slipped off in the night. Nottingham and a few others who still valued their honor had told Richard to his face that they were disavowing him. He had accepted their betrayal with uncharacteristic grace. Now, holed up in Conwy Castle with only two companies of his Cheshire archers, he would await the coming siege. He did not have to wait long.

Five days later sixteen ships arrived flying Henry’s banner. The estuary was blockaded while companies of fighting men disembarked and took the walled port town without resistance. A siege line was set outside the castle’s main gate. Thomas of Arundel’s ship arrived the next morning. After meeting with his captains at the inn that had been conscripted for his headquarters, Thomas retired upstairs to his private chambers.

Jordan and Najia rose in greeting when Thomas entered, slamming the door behind him. “I should have known—no, you should have foreseen that Richard would hole up in Conwy,” fumed Thomas. “We don’t have time for a siege! Every day that Parliament does not finalize Henry’s right to the throne increases the chance that the earls opposing Henry will mount a counteroffensive. They may even try to rescue Richard to use as a puppet. Richard needs to abdicate or be killed—quickly.”

Thomas sank into a chair at the table and poured himself a goblet of wine. “Just before I left London, Henry summoned me. He expressed . . .”—Thomas searched for the right word—“a distaste for further use of your magic. He also told me that the Vatican had offered to recognize him as the true king if he turned you over.”

“Henry was happy enough with our magic while we suppressed the spells and potions of Isabella, but now he plans to betray us?” said Jordan, stiffening. “If we burn, you burn.”

“It’s not yet time to worry. I convinced Henry that you and your woman remain more useful than the Vatican in his quest to be king.” Thomas drained the last of his wine. “Now prove me right.”

Najia leaned over and whispered in Jordan’s ear. They conferred for a moment.

“Thomas, does Richard still trust your word?” Jordan asked.

“Richard knows I’m true to my bond.”

“Then swear to him that no man will harm him if he comes out for a conclave.”

Thomas fetched a sheet of parchment, a quill, and ink from the sideboard and scratched out a letter. “If this works, you’ll both need to return to Ireland as soon as possible, for your own safety as well as mine. Now tell me what we do if Richard comes out for this conclave.”

30

London, England

February 1400

“H
ave you come to be my valentyne?” asked Richard, breaking into manic laughter as Najia entered his dark, windowless cell in the undercroft of Pontefract Castle, Yorkshire, carrying a torch and a small wooden box. His laughter stumbled to a halt as Najia closed the door and set the torch into a wall bracket.

. . . . .

At the same time, in the grand hall of the Palace of Westminster, London, Chaucer was standing at the podium reading his seven-hundred-line poem: “‘Ye knowe wel how, seynt Valentynes day . . .’” It was one of Chaucer’s favorite days of the year, as it was for much of the English court: February 14. Years earlier he had persuaded the now-usurped Richard to allow him to designate a date to celebrate courtly love. His new king, King Henry IV, was a strong proponent of the emerging English language, going so far as to give his coronation address in English instead of French, the first king to do this in over three centuries, so he had retained Chaucer’s services as Poet to the King, and the holiday had survived.

Chaucer spied yet another couple slipping through a side door of the hall as he continued reading: “‘Ye come for to chese—and flee your way—your makes, as I prik yow with plesaunce . . .’”

“Plesaunce” was one of the hundreds of words he had proudly added to the new English, this one meaning to give pleasure to the senses but without sustenance. Indeed, this was the day when all were liberated from their vows of marriage or betrothal and permitted to seek physical diversion with whomever they chose. For his festival
of debauchery, Chaucer had selected the ancient feast day of St. Valentyne—who, in the third century, had given parchment hearts to Christians about to be sent to their death in the arena. Chaucer was looking forward to finishing his reading so he could join the men and women of the court, each with red hearts stashed about their persons. A heart, when offered and accepted, secured a few minutes of passion in one of the many nooks and crannies of the palace.

. . . . .

Richard’s cell stank of rotting straw, the waste bucket in the corner, and Richard’s unwashed body. His robes were mildewed and shabby, and a long chain led from one bloody ankle to a bracket in the wall against which he sat.

As he watched Najia, his thoughts turned to the last time he had seen her, seven months earlier, when Thomas of Arundel had misled him. “Tricky Thomas,” he quipped to himself, and his laughter sputtered out again. He had known he would be able to defend Conwy Castle for months, even with his small force of archers, but Thomas had sent a letter:
“I only wish to negotiate your abdication,”
Thomas had written.
“You know I hold no love for you, but you also know of my unwavering love of Christ, and I swear on the True Cross that no man shall harm you or lay hands on you if you come out for a conclave.”