Hell and Earth

Will had cause to remember those words a fortnight later on October the second, when broad noon turned to darkness over London Town as if a tarnished silver coin had been slid across the disk of the sun. A strange twilight strangled the city’s voice to desperate murmurs as every foot paused, every voice hushed, every eye lifted and then quickly fell again, unable to bear the light of even a half‑occluded sun.

Will shaded his eyes with his hand, pressing his forehead to the rippled glass and lath of Tom Walsingham’s casement window and tilting his face to the side. “It seems a year for ill omens, ” he said softly, and did not look down until Tom came to draw him away from the window.

“What, a cloud across the sun?” Kit came up too–the three of them were alone, Ben and George having been left home from this particular council of war – and glanced through the window. “Ah. I don’t suppose I missed a rain of fire while I was away? ”

“Nay,” Will answered, and pulled Tom toward the door. ‘That’s a terrible sight.”

“Don’t look upon it,” Kit warned. “Wilt burn thine eyes. Tom, have you smoked glass?”

“Nothing so useful,” Tom answered as the three men emerged from the garden door into a world that seemed to Will even stranger and more alien than Faerie. In those places where gold and auburn leaves still clung to the trees and bushes, the dappled shadows moving underneath them formed diminishing crescents, layer on layer of moving images.

Will thrust his hand under the branches of an oak, watching the gleaming crescents shrink upon his skin. The air seemed thicker in its darkness, and hung with sparkles like a summer night. “Camera obscura,” he said, gesturing Kit and Tom to join him. Somewhere beyond the garden wall, he heard someone sob and the sound of a window breaking. “Look at this. The leaves make the pinholes.” He almost fancied he could feel the light brushing his skin as the leaves tossed in time with the breeze.

“Sweet buggered Christ,” Kit said. “I need my books.”

“What books?” asked Tom alertly.

“Oh, I had – ” He paused, as if considering. “A Ptolemy, and Brahe’s Die Stella Nova,an Agrippa, some of Dee’s work – ” Kit stopped and looked around, realizing that Tom and Will were staring. “Research,” he said. “Faustus.In any case, I loaned them all to Sir Walter and he never gave them back. A most notorious thief of books, that one–”

Tom coughed into his hand. “I have some volumes of Ficino.”

“Please?” Kit looked up, exactly as he had admonished Will not too, and closed his left eye. He seemed to pay no notice as Tom returned to the house.

Will cleared his throat, the unease swelling in his belly. “Kit?”

Kit looked down and smiled at Will. “Fear not,” he said. I doubt an eye that won’t be damaged by a knife will be blinded by the light of a half‑dimmed sun.”

“What art thou seeking?”

“The way the moon moves,” Kit said, taking the book from Tom’s hands when Walsingham returned with it. He angled the pages to catch what light he could, but read with ease words that Will would have found incomprehensible in the unnatural twilight. He watched as Kit riffled pages, seeming to know what he was searching for even if he did not know quite where to find it.

“Sidereal,” Kit murmured, and some other words that meant nothing to Will. Tom watched with interest, hands on his hips, head cocked to one side and the wind ruffling his silver‑streaked auburn hair. The strands too made pinholes as they rose and fell; as the eclipse ground toward totality, Will watched the tiny crescents scattering Tom’s face first fade to nothingness and then reemerge as twisting rings of light.

Will risked a glance upward and caught his breath at the image of the sun occluded, a jet‑black round crowned in twisting fire that reminded Will of Lucifer’s writhing, shadowy tiara in reverse. “Sweet Christ,” he swore, but it was more of a prayer, really.

“Ah,” Kit said, and clapped the book shut like a pair of hands. “No,” he said. “Not good at all.”

“It’s an omen, then?”

“Yes, and as ill as you’d like to make it. ‘Tis, again, a marker of the end of things, and an overthrow of balance and harmony. If Elizabeth and her famous temporizing were a force to keep England in symmetry, and in accord with God and nature–”

“Aye?” Will’s feet would not quite hold him steady.

Kit shrugged, and handed the book back to Tom. “You are witnessing the end of her power, gentlemen. And the death of whatever peace our sufferings, and those of the poets and intelligencers who came before us, and the Queen’s cool brilliance at the chess of politics, bought for Mother England.” Kit swallowed and looked down. “The sun will be in Sagittarius at the end of this month and the beginning of the next.”

“And?” Tom and Will, as one voice.

“And,” he said. “The best date for a sacrifice would be November fifth, I think. Fifteen Sagittarius.”

“That’s when Parliament is to meet,” Will said, as the sun began to emerge from its enshadowment. “They were–”

“That late in the year? That’s–”

It was Tom who finished, both hands raised and bound tight in his hair. “They were prorogued,” he said. “The session bound over. On account of plague.”

“Plague,” Kit said, looking at Will for confirmation.

“Aye,” Will said, abruptly sick with exhaustion. “I heard the King discuss it with Robert Cecil, not two months since.”

It was a week later, only, that a sturdy tapping at his door drew Will’s attention and he rose. “Who’s there?”

“Echo the Nymph,” Ben answered deadpan. Will lifted the latch and stood aside to let the big man into the room.

“Thou lookst more like a Narcissus to me,” Will said. “What brings thee to my humble doorway, Ben?”

“Thou’rt invited to a gathering,” Ben answered, shaking rain from his cloak. “A party of sorts.”

“Tonight?” Will gestured to the leaves of paper spread over his table, where they would catch the watery light from the window. “I’ve too much work.”

“Thou’rt only the most‑sought playmaker in London,” Ben answered, careful not to drip on the papers as he bent to inspect them, his massive hands laced behind his back. “Surely thou canst pass a night with friends.”

“I owe Richard a fair copy by Monday.”

“Five days,” Ben said. “Thou dost work too much, Will. And how canst thou refuse an invitation from Robert Catesby, to dine with him and his recusant friends on a cold Wednesday night?”

Will set the latch with a click. “I beg thy pardon?”

Ben turned, his homely face unimproved by his grin. “Call it luck or call it happenstance. I’ve been working on Catesby and Tresham six months now, Will. And been overheard to mention once or twice that thou–and thy brother Edmund – had once or twice missed out loud the more permissive “ways of Warwickshire, with regard to the old religion. If thou takest my meaning. And they did.”

Will pinched his lower lip between his teeth and ran his tongue across it, forcing himself to stop when he remembered it would chap. “Catesby is one of Baines’. He’d never believe I’d welcome any Promethean plot. Not after twelve years fighting them, and all the advances I’ve spurned.”

“Not to hear him talk about it.” Ben shrugged. “Not Promethean, anyway. Catesby’s aims are strictly political, and he’d love the great William Shakespeare to come in under his banner of revolution. I suspect if he knew the sort of black sorcery his friends get up to he “would be even more appalled by them than he is – for all he’s willing to compromise and let politics make what bedfellows they will, he’s a good Catholic, and wouldn’t be damned for sorcery. I think they mean to use him as they used Essex before him, as a sort of stalking horse. Come, get thy cloak.”

“Thinkst thou to educate him, then?”

“I’ll tell thee more on the way to the tavern,” Ben said, and handed Will his shoes. “No, I don’t think so at all. Not that he’s uneducable. If anything, he’s a good man, strong in his faith, willing to die for it. A fighter for freedom, and his two chief lieutenants are also quick and true.”

“And they’re plotting against the Kang.” Will latched the door behind them when they went. “What way are we going, Ben?”

“To the Irish Boy. Age before beauty, gentle Will. Lead on.”

“Then we shall have to wait for a handsome passerby, or we shall never get anywhere,” Will noted, but he did not tarry. The afternoon was cold, the rain something more than a drizzle. “Ben, it pains me to ask this of thee–”

“Aye, Will?” The banter fell from Ben’s tone like the stagecraft it was; Will could feel the weight of his expectancy.

“It wasn’t thee told Salisbury about our Bible‑crafting, was it? When thou wert so unhappy with me?”

“Nay, I’d never do such a thing. Slather thy name in mockery and eat it with relish, aye–”

“It was mustard, not mockery,” Will said. “And the coat of arms was my father’s conceit, in any case.”

Ben laughed. “But something that could bring thee real harm? Never, my friend.”

“That’s bad,” Will answered. “Because if it was not thee, then Chapman has spoken more than he should, and where the wrong ears could hear it.”

Ben grunted, tugging his hood up higher. “I would not be startled to discover it. In any case, I think thou shouldst consider what the Catholics offer,” he said with a wink. “Thy family will thank thee for supporting the old faith. And with such men as Catesby and Tresham, and Guido Fawkes–who thou wilt meet tonight. He was a soldier in the Low Countries when I was, that last.”

“Fighting for the Queen?” Will asked, and Ben shook his head.

“Fighting for the Spaniards. A man of strong convictions. They call him the soldier‑monk, of all things.”

There was a throb of admiration in Ben’s voice; Will sighed to hear it. Nothing worse for an intelligencer than to come to admire the men he will betray.

Aye, and nothing more vital for his credibility with those men.“I’ll make thee proud enough, for a soldier‑bricklayer,” Will said, and Ben laughed at the subtleties behind that statement as they passed under the sign of the Irish Boy.

The tavern’s common was bigger than the Mermaid’s, but not over crowded. Will counted eleven men drinking by the fire, a hum of cheerful conversation flagging only a little when he and Ben entered. Catesby stood, his golden‑blond locks glowing like the sun, and came across the rush‑strewn planks to greet them. Another man rose as well, a walrus‑mustachioed redhead Will had seen somewhere before, not quite so handsome as Catesby but broad‑shouldered and nearly as big as Ben, though not so portly.

Catesby introduced the redhead as Fawkes. Will shook his hand–switching his cane to the left to do so–while Ben dragged a bench over and repositioned a table to make room. Will was seated and introduced about; he was amused to note he’d come far enough as an intelligencer in twelve years that he felt secure in remembering each name and each face without the need to scribble notes.

The evening’s entertainment was much as promised, the playmaker finding himself wined and dined by men who were–for a change – more interested in his personal and political leanings than in his celebrity, and who gave very little away. The role came to Will with enough ease to unsettle him, and it unsettled him more when he remembered that some of the men he sat beside were relatives, acquaintances.

Acquaintances who plot against the throne,he reminded himself. And then he sighed, and thought of Edmund or Annie hanged for no more sin than clinging to the Catholic faith, and wondered if he had chosen the right side after all.

It’s not the side that’s right,he reminded himself. It’s the side you’re on.

And thank you, Kit, for that piece of intelligencer’s wisdom.Will felt queasy with more wine than he was accustomed to drink. He looked up at Ben, who was regarding him with a knowing sort of pity, and Ben nodded and stood.

“Gentlemen, thank you,” Ben said. “I fear Master Shakespeare is a bit poorly, and perhaps I should escort him home.”

“No, Ben,” Will said, although he accepted help to stand. “I’ll manage. You stay for the evening. I’m just tired and in pain.”

“Art certain?” As Ben led him toward the door. “The streets are not as safe as they were.”

Aye, which is saying something, as they were never in particular safe. The King’s Peace doesn’t hold much sway in London any longer.“I’m certain,” Will said.

Fifteen minutes later, when unseen ruffians dropped a bag over his head and hustled him into a carriage, he had wit enough left to find a measure of irony in those words.

He kicked rather helplessly, but whoever held him –a big man smelling of mutton and damp leather –had every advantage, and Will found himself shoved unceremoniously to his knees, his fingers numbed from a thin cord wrapping his wrists. Helpless as a jessed and hooded hawk, damn them all.

The carriage lurched and rattled on for a little while, and he was just as casually carried out of it and up a flight of stairs, and deposited on a mattress. Still blindfolded, Will heard another scuffle, but was able to do little about it with his wrists bound behind his waist and his vision baffled. He knew Kit’s voice when he heard it, however, and shouted, trying to shove himself to his feet and measuring his length instead on the rush‑covered stones.

The fall knocked the wind from him, a spasming pain that wouldn’t let him fill his lungs. He wheezed, worming forward on scraped knees and bruised chest, and then grunted once as someone dropped a knee between his shoulders and pinned him hard. “None of that, old man.”

The scuffle ended abruptly enough that he knew it was not Kit who’d won it. Oh, bloody hell,he thought. Damn‑fool Kit, when wilt learn to bring friends on these missions of mercy?Will did not hear Kit’s voice again, but he heard a man grunting with effort as if he lifted something unwieldy, and then the slamming of a heavy, strap‑hinged door. Damn it. Damn it. Damn it to Hell–

Act V, scene vii

This dungeon where they keep me is the sink

Wherein the filth of all the castle falls.

–Christopher Marlowe, Edward II,Act V, scene v

Kit woke in absolute blackness, with a ringing head, and tried to remember how he had gotten there and why he was lying on a dank, lumpy surface with the taste of earth on his lips. He summoned a witchlight first, wondering that the darkness was so complete that even he could not see through it, and when the hoped‑for blue glow failed to materialize around his fingers he swore softly and rolled onto his back.

He lay on earth, he decided, burrowing his fingers into it. Packed earth, and foul; it reeked of sweat and filth and the long tenancy of terrified men. He cast his right hand out, and his left, and found stone blocks on either side. The walls of his cell, if it was a cell. He snapped his fingers again, to spark light, and nothing answered his murmured incantation except a strange clatter and a heaviness, a constriction on his fingers. His head throbbed as if John Marley were on the inside, banging Kit’s skull with his tacking hammer, and Kit hunched forward between his knees and tried to take some inventory of the situation.

Feet, bare. His head swollen as a broken fist, and oozing blood from a welt on the left side. His cloak was missing, and his sword – he chuckled under his breath in recognition of what was gone. No external sound reached him–

–No. Not quite true. Somewhere far above, he heard… not so much the sound of footsteps as the echo of the sound. “I might as well be at the bottom of a well,” he said out loud, to hear something besides the half‑panicked rasp of his own hurried breaths. His voice echoed too, peculiarly: from above, rather than from any of the sides.

Carefully, wary of his head and his dizziness, Kit stood in the darkness and extended his arms. His palms lay flat against the walls on either side – masoned stone, he thought–and whatever rings encircled his fingers clanked on the blocks. A harsh, heavy clank, and not the ring of silver or the clink of gold.

He lowered his hands, feeling the moist earth under his feet – heels, ball, toes–and drew another deep breath. The stench of a place men have died in, aye.

And something else.

Thick and raw, the stench of the Thames.

“The Pit, ” he said, and sat down on the floor again, shaking his head. “I dreamed this.”

He knew where he was now, and he knew who had him. He was in the oubliette at the Tower of London, and he was in the power of Robert Poley. And by extension, of Richard Baines.

In absolute blackness, Kit paced the cramped circle afforded him. His right hand trailed on the damp stones of the wall. He had no fear of tripping; his feet knew the path, and the dank earth was where he slept when he grew too tired to walk. Wasting energy,he thought, but he could not sit still. “The sink wherein the filth of all the castle falls,” he mumbled, but it wasn’t, quite. More an old, almost‑dry well, lidded in iron as much to keep light out as the prisoner in, for the sides were twenty foot and steeply angled.

He had paced forever.

He would be pacing forevermore.

The iron rings–or so he thought them, groping in the darkness –on his hands wouldn’t come off. He’d tried, and all he’d gotten for his trouble was a clicking pain as if he were trying to yank each finger individually from its socket. Upon pulling harder, there had been the stretch of tearing flesh and a slow, hot trickle of blood, but the rings had not shifted.

A strange sort of irritation, first an itching and then a raw, hot pain, grew in patches on his torso and his thighs. To pass the time and to stave off whatever sorcery Baines might be working, so far out of reach above, he told himself stories. Bits of verse –Nashe’s plays, half memorized, Kyd’s Tragedy,Will’s Titus,and Kit’s own words. The Greeks and the Romans and the Celts. The Bible.

Anything to keep from thinking of his own predicament, and worse. To keep from remembering how he had failed Will. Because when the throbbing in his head had subsided, he’d remembered how he’d been surprised.

Coming to Will’s rescue.

Just as Baines would have known that he would, having seen it before. Stupid, Kit, to leave anyone alive who know what William means to thee–

He’d stepped from the Darkling Glass, his sword in his hand and witchcraft on his lips –and straight into a sorcerer’s trap.

He slept twice more. His belly cramped with fear more than hunger, and his dry throat turned his recitations into a mumble. He dragged his ringed fingers along the stone, and thought to dig through the floor with his fingers, but all he did was tear his nails and score his fingertips on buried rocks. He came to know his domain intimately, an oval four feet by five feet, with a slimy, echoing drain that stank even worse than the earth but at least ensured he wasn’t sleeping in his own piss.

The cramping belly reminded him of something, and he smiled. If Baines plans to use me for whatever blackness he had planned on the fifth–

–won’t he be surprised when Faerie kills me for my absence in a couple of days?

Kit closed both eyes. It made no difference: he walked, and turned, and walked, and turned in a blackness as deep as if his eyes had frozen into ice. He hadn’t seen real darkness since Hell; he barely remembered it, but whatever bound his magic bound his otherwisesight as well.

Mehiel’s brands burned on his chest and sides. “All very well,” Kit said to the angel, a whisper like a rasp dragged over his throat. “Couldst speak to me, thou knowest. Would help to pass the hours. And ‘tis not as if we’re unacquainted.” A cracked‑lip grin, blood paying for a pun. And not a good one at that.

The chafe of unoiled hinges served his warning of the shaft of light that seemed to boil his eyes from his head. Kit covered his face in his hands, swearing, and hated it that he knew who saw him cringe.

“Art yet hungry, puss?”

Sweet God in his heaven.Kit could never speak loud enough to be heard from the depths of the oubliette, with the fire in his throat. And damned if he would plead and whisper. He stood, looking up, and shaded his left eye with his hand. Nay,he thought, wishing he had the wherewithal to speak. But could use a drop of wine, hast it to spare–

Things dropped. A cloth wrapped bundle, a wineskin– praise Christ–something round and heavy that Kit’s blurry eyes could not quite make sense of. The objects variously thumped and clanked; Kit blinked back tears. “Good puss,” Baines said. “Make it last a day or two. I’ll be back for thee when I can.”

Dignity, Kit.It was what he could do to walk to the edge of the pit rather than scramble. He reached for the wineskin and paused, fingers trembling like Will’s.

The scold’s bridle lay beside the skin, tilted on its side, a maniacally grinning iron skull face that gaped open, unlocked.

Ignoring it, Kit reached for the skin. It sloshed, and he hoped it was water or ale, and nothing stronger. Still, he wouldn’t drink in front of Baines. A few more minutes.His hands ached with desire.

“Puss, be brave.”

Oh, that turned his stomach enough to give him strength. He looked up again. Baines–resolving now as Kit’s eyes adjusted to the light–leaned down, his hand on the enormous lid of the oubliette. “Hast made the acquaintance of thy friend Edward the Second’s ghost yet, pussycat? They tell me he still screams.”

Stupid bastard. Edward died at Berkeley.

Kit made a rude gesture and swore without breath. Baines grinned–a white flash of teeth–and lowered the lid silently, without even the catharsis of a ringing slam. The silence lingered. Kit lowered his head in the darkness. His laugh came forth a voiceless sob.

He sat on the floor and drank half the lukewarm small beer, rationing it, then laid his face down on his arms and cried.

I have to get out of here. The bastards have Will.

Act V, scene viii

What a piece of work is a man, how noble in reason, how infinite in faculties, inform and moving how express and admirable, in action how Like an angel, in apprehension how like a god.

–William Shakespeare, Hamlet,Act II, scene ii

It was Robert Poley who unhooded Will, much later, in a candlelit room with an arrow slit that showed only blackness but admitted the stink of the Thames. There was a narrow pallet on the floor, a straw tick and some blankets, and a single sweet‑smelling beeswax pillar flickering in the embrasure.

Will didn’t speak at first. Poley stepped back, a rough dark brown woolen sack dangling from his fingers, and gestured with his other hand to the oversized roaring boy holding Will’s elbow. Thick fingers released the knotted ropes at Will’s wrists; he gasped at sudden prickles, white‑hot pins and needles jabbing his fingertips and palms. “I beg your pardon, Master Shakespeare, for the undignified circumstances of your appointment here, ” Poley said.

“Appointment?” Will pressed his useless hands together, trying to squeeze blood back into the veins. “In absolute precision of language, Robert, thou must admit this is an abduction, and not a social call.”

Poley smiled when Will thee’d him. “As it may be.

Will swallowed and let his aching hands fall to his side. He wobbled, and the big man grabbed his elbow again to steady him. “Where’s Kit? What dost thou plan to make of me, thou cur?”

“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean,” Poley answered. “You will be quite well and safe, Master Shakespeare. My lord Salisbury would never permit you to come to harm; you are one of England’s treasures in your very own person. But simply too much trouble to be left lying about until things are more certain.”

Will turned his head and spat, though it took him a moment to work enough saliva into his dust‑dry mouth to manage. “Cecil. I should have known–”

“You’d be surprised how little you know.” Poley rested his knuckles on his hips, the image of a fighting cock. “Then again, perhaps you wouldn’t. In any case, you’ll be safe and sound here until it’s possible to set you at liberty. You might try to get some sleep, and I beg your pardon for the rudeness of the accommodation. There are better rooms available, but I am not prepared to explain your presence there.”

Kit … ?” Will asked, and Poley shook his head even as he moved toward the door.

“There are things we’re not prepared to discuss,” he said. “That’s one. A pleasant night, Master Shakespeare. Anything you have need of, simply ask my friend Allan here. I’m sure you will have company from time to time.

Will looked up at the big, balding blond, who offered him an amiable and gap‑toothed smile. Allan, now named, turned to follow Poley from the room, leaving the candle behind.

The heavy door shut behind them, and Will turned to examine his cell. The room was cold through the unglazed window. He was glad of his winter cloak and doublet; some thoughtful person had tucked his gloves into his cloak pocket, and he drew them on. There were blankets enough on the bed, he thought, although he had not been laid a fire and the room, in fact, was hearthless. Perhaps they’ll permit me a brazier when it grows colder.

A thought which almost paralyzed him, when he realized he’d accepted that he might be trapped here for some time to come. No resignation,Will told himself, kicking his boots off and sliding chilled feet under the rough but warm woolen blankets. The straw tick smelled clean, at least; he hoped that meant it wouldn’t be crawling with lice and bedbugs.

He pinched out the candle and composed himself for sleep.

Morning came slowly, after long hours of tossing and worry. He sat up and shuffled to the embrasure in stocking feet, unmindful of the chill. His bones ached of a morning, winter and summer, these days; it was only a matter of degree. “God protect the halt and the lame,” he muttered. “Also the purblind fools. And one Kit Marlowe, wherever he may be.”

The slit would have been just wide enough to get his head into. A black bird the size of a small dog perched inside the opening, eyes gleaming like jet beads pressed into the black cloisonnй of its plumage. “Good morning, Master Raven.”

It cocked its head at him as if it understood, and fluffed its wings. The right one hung at an angle, broken once and healed askew. Beyond it, Will could see sunlight on gray‑white walls, and beyond them the rippled expanse of the Thames.

“I seem to have a problem,” he remarked, and tightened his grip on the ledge. “I don’t suppose youhave any bright ideas?”

The raven tilted its head the other way, and then departed in a flurry of feathers and cawing when the door clattered and swung open behind Will. Its flight wasn’t quite level either, and Will frowned as he turned to face whatever the morning might bring.

While Thou art looking out for the halt and the stupid, Lord, let me put in a word for a crippled bird, as well.

And as the Earl of Salisbury limped into the doorway, Will laughed and amended his prayer. All right, Lord. Mayhap not all the lame.

“My lord,” Will said, more aware than he liked of his uncombed hair and stocking feet. He stopped himself from pushing a hand through his curls to settle them, and fumbled in his pocket for a coin to fuss instead. Not long now, and that trick won’t steady thy hand any longer.He could tell from the trembling in his fingers even as he rolled the shilling across their backs. “What is the purpose of this outrage?”

Salisbury pushed the heavy door a little more open and came forward, the sleeves of his black robe rippling in the cold breeze from the window. “This will never serve,” he said, casting a disdainful eye over the cell. “I will not have your health at risk.”

“My lord‑“

“Peace, Will.” The Earl drew himself up to his full, slight height as if the gesture pained him. “Thou’rt here for thine own protection.”

Will swallowed, knowing how hoarse he must sound. “You’ll risk Ben Jonson on a fool’s errand–”

“Master Shakespeare,” Salisbury said. “Thou needst ale before thou dost speak again, to judge by that throat. Come, let me see thee breakfasted.” He stood aside, gesturing to the door through which he’d passed.

Will hesitated, and then stooped painfully to pick up his boots. He hadn’t time to work his feet into them, and his previous night’s captors had taken his cane, but he hobbled along as best he could.

“Master Jonson’s more Walsingham’s than mine,” Cecil said while they walked, as if speaking to an old companion. “Although I will admit I haven’t my father’s sense of which of you intelligencers and agents is playing what end against which. No, Jonson’s not reliable enough to suit. But which of you sturdy scoundrels can choose a side and stand with it? My men, Baines’ men, Walsingham’s men, Poley’s men. Who can tell one from the other?”

“And what side do you support, my lord?” Will pitched his voice low, a servant’s deference, and hoped Salisbury’s expansive mode continued, although he dreaded to learn the source of it.

“Mine own, of course. Which is to say, England and her crown, and the best way to assure a strong England is to assure a decisive King. Thy Walsingham doth consider these Catholics and Puritans and Prometheans are the threat… the PrometheusClub? As ridiculous as Raleigh and his School or Night. Like boys playing at capture the fort, and they have no concept of what’s truly at stake.”

Will did not pause his stride. He noticed with amusement that his limp and Salisbury’s matched admirably. Will trailed a hand along the wall as a substitute for his cane, in case his balance should desert him. “And what’s that, my lord Earl?”

Salisbury brushed Will with a sidelong glance as if to see if he made mock. “Sovereignty,” he said. “Do not think that England’s is by any means assured.”

“My lord?” Will almost skidded to a stop in his stockinged feet as Salisbury turned on him. Something filled the Earl’s eyes – not fury, precisely, or desperation, but whatever it was the player’s part of Will’s mind saw it and recognized it as motivation.

And saw in that silence the thing that Salisbury wouldn’t say. James is a terrible King.

“Let us merely say,” Salisbury continued, in the teeth of that long hesitation, “that the Scottish influence among the courtiers does not serve to unify us, and leave it at that. In any case, Master Shakespeare, I would see thee safe–”

“I will be missed.”

“Thine absence will be explained. ‘Tis not as if thou wert not noted for the occasional abrupt disappearance.”

“And Kit Marlowe?” Will interrupted, and then held his breath. “The Prometheans who worry you so little, my lord, have taken him hostage as well.” Not on my orders.”

“No,” Will said, remembering the sound of a blow, a skull thumped hollow as a melon struck with a knife.

The Earl pressed his lips together and considered long enough that faintness made Will light‑headed. And his words sent Will’s stomach plunging hopelessly. “Regrettable,” Salisbury said. “Truly regrettable. But I need them more than I need Marlowe, Master Shakespeare, for the next month or so. Conspiracies are useful–a force that may be directed to profitable service, like a waterfall through a millwheel, but I learned well from my father that they must not be plucked before they are ripe. I mean to use these conspiracies as he would, to secure the future of the realm.”

Will closed his eyes and dropped his chin, hearing finality in the tone. “My lord.”

“I’m sorry,” Salisbury answered, and Will almost thought he meant it. “Come. Thou knowest Sir Walter Raleigh, dost not? He’s a guest here as well–in a pleasanter section, although his teeth are quite pulled these days. I have no doubt he would welcome a little company. Shall we call on him?”

Will nodded, smoothing his face so his panic would not show before this man. I’m safe. One problem attended to.

But Kit and Ben are not, and neither is Tom.

Act V, scene ix

Can there be such deceit in Christians,

Or treason in the fleshly heart of man,

Whose shape is figure of the highest God?

Then if there be a Christ, as Christians say,

But in their deeds deny him for their Christ,

If he be son to everliving Jove,

And hath the power of his outstretched arm,

If he be jealous of his name and honor

As is our holy prophet Mahomet,

Take here these papers as our sacrifice

And witness of thy servant’s perjury.

–Christopher Marlowe, Tamburlaine the Great,Part II, Act II, scene ii

Kit sat in that darkness too deep for his witch’s sight to pierce, even had he the use of it, and ran his fingers over the rugged surface of the scold’s bridle Baines had left to keep him company. He’d thought at first he might force it to pieces and use the cast‑iron straps to dig, but the welds proved strong. He knew every inch of the thing’s surface by now, had bloodied his fingertips with worrying at it, with picking at the spikes on the mouthpiece and exploring the curve of the cheeks. It weighed as much as a small child in his arms, resting against his knees, and holding it close to his breast was the only thing that silenced the savage pain in his brands any more.

The wrenching in his belly, the agony that told him he must return to Faerie sooner rather than later, or die in pain he wouldn’t have to find unimaginable–

–there was no help at all for that.

Kit sighed, and curled his fingertips into the earth, pressing his matted hair back against the stone. A lump like a church door had risen and fallen on the side of his head, and Baines had not returned.

Another spasm dragged at his belly; he wondered if it was what a hooked fish felt, or a man who suffered with the stone. “Christ,“he prayed wetly. The agony pressing his brands out–until he would have sworn they bulged redoubled–arced, flared, and settled.

Kit caught his breath and took another slight sip of beer, before resuming his interrupted monologue. “Well, Edward? You know, Your Majesty, I have to imagine it can’t have hurt that much. I mean, at first, certainly. But not like slow impalement, or breaking on the wheel. Hell, probably not so much as–”

Oh, shall we not think about that?He wondered if Mehiel’s thrashings were like a breeding woman’s experience of carrying a baby under her heart. Pregnant by God. But ‘twas not God that knew me–mayhap when ‘tis born, ‘twill be an Antichrist.

Pity thou’rt not Catholic, Kit: couldst ask the Virgin Mary.

Pussycat, thou’rt raving.

Why, so I am. And knowest thou reason why I should not rave?

Aye.The small, still voice inside of him. The one he’d known with such certainty once. Thou’rt scaring the baby, puss.

Meaning Mehiel. Meaning the thrashing thing within him, terrified– terrified?

Angel?

Mehiel?

And somehow, as if in response to the suddenly gentle tone of his questions, the tearing sensation faded. And Kit clenched both hands on the straps of the scold’s bridle and cursed himself for a fool who would whip a failing horse until it fell over dead in the traces. Aye, and he’d torn from God’s mercy and rammed up the arse of a sodomite, tortured and raped, and what do you get him?

He couldn’t quite hold back the giggle as he laid his forehead against the straps of the bridle and clutched it tight against his breast. Why, fucked by Lucifer. Of course.

“Mehiel.” A tentative whisper. “Angel, dost hear me?”

«And angels of the Lord are thee?»

A voice for a moment he mistook for his own defiant tones, the spiked irony he saved for moments of abject vulnerability. This one is– oh. Mehiel?

A flicker, a suggestion of bright yellow wings barred in black. A voice that was not the voice of his conscience or the voice of his faith, but was very much his ownvoice after all. A sense of a head upraised, and hesitance. Kit thought if the angel stood before him, it would have cringed, and then forced itself upright. «Greetings, who was Christofer Marley.»

“Thou knowest I can’t stand to be called that,” Kit said, but he said it wryly. “Why speak to me now, angel of the Lord?”

A soft silence, with a small voice following. «Thou didst never listen before.»

Which wasn’t something he could answer, exactly. And no excuse he could make.

«And now,» Mehiel barely whispered, «thou must listen all the closer, or we will be lost eternally, and hope lost with us»

“Can I be more damned than I am now?”

«Always.» the angel answered, and Kit sighed and set the bridle aside.

“All right,” he said, before another blade of agony curled him to his side, gasping until the spasm had passed. There was no hope in his breast, but he grimaced in determination and cracked his bleeding fingers one by one. Despair was a sin, after all. “Never say die. What happens if we climb? There’s always a way out if you look hard enough. Canst fly?”

«My wings are bound in thee–» the angel began, but the rest of his comment was lost.

«Ah, Sir Poet,» A voice like brushed silk, and there would have been no mistaking this one for his own, or for that of Mehiel. «Is alwaysa way. Come to me, my love; I am the way.»

There was light, suddenly. Light cast from over his shoulder, and as he found himself standing he turned to it, turned into it. The scent of pipe tobacco surrounded him, a comforting memory of Sir Walter Raleigh’s chill parlor and many late nights.

“Mehiel?”

«Do as you must.» the angel whispered in his ear, and folded himself taut within a flurry of remembered golden feathers.

Kit took a deep breath, and walked into the light.

Act V, scene x

For thou wilt lie upon the wings of night,

Whiter than new snow on a raven’s back.

Come, gentle night; come, loving, black‑brow’d night,

Give me my Romeo: and, when he shall die,

Take him and cut him out in little stars,

And he will make the face of heaven so fine

That all the world will be in love with night,

And pay no worship to the garish sun.

–William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet,Act III, scene ii

The crippled raven found Will in his new room and seemed well pleased with the wider window, for all it must rattle the glass for attention. Will didn’t think this typical behavior in a raven, but perhaps the pampered birds at the Tower had been hand‑fed into audacity. He opened the casement, despite a cold, sharp wind that whittled past the edges of the palm‑sized panes: the bird hopped into the air as the frame swept the window ledge and then settled again in its own footsteps. It cocked its head at him, wise‑eyed and glossy, and fluffed its lacquered feathers. “Is a predilection for charity branded on my thumb?” Will asked mildly, and flicked the raven a bit of boiled egg, trying not to think how it resembled a plucked‑out eye. The ravens had their reasons for staying close by the Tower.

The bird pecked it up and looked for more, and Will laid the next crumb closer and stepped away from the window. Southampton had had a cat for company. I’m not certain a raven is much of a companion, but it’s either that or tap out messages to Sir Walter on the wall in code.

By the fourth bit of yolk, the raven was crouched on the lip of the window frame, its peaked head bobbing between heavy, crookedly spread wings. Will tossed the fifth bit on the floor and held his breath. The bird’s black cold‑chisel beak dipped once or twice as it examined the room, Will, and the bit of egg with suspicion. Will chirruped as he might to a chicken, feeling foolish. It crouched, about to hop down onto the floor–

–and vanished backward in a tempest of black feathers, shocked into flight by the clatter of the bar outside Will’s door being drawn from the braces and hurled unceremoniously to the floor. Will startled, turned too fast, and fell sprawling, forearm and hip slamming the floor near hard enough, he thought, to strike sparks between bone and stone. It hurt too much for him to manage a shout, or more than a rasping whimper. The door burst open, wide strap hinges creaking, and Will pushed himself to his knees with the arm that wasn’t numbed from fingertips to elbow.

And then he blinked, and sat back down among the rushes and herbs strewing the floor, because it was neither Salisbury nor Allan the guard who entered, but Ben Jonson, Tom Walsingham, and Murchaud, the Prince‑Consort of the Daoine Sidhe.

“Will! ” Ben was the first to start toward him as he sat foolishly blinking, cradling his injured arm in his left hand and hugging it close to his chest. “Thou’rt hurt. And it’s freezing in here, the barbarians – ”

“Nay,” Will said, shaking his head. “Just a fall. Just a tumble – ” He wiggled his fingers slightly, to show the arm unbroken, and panted in pain. “Robert Poley took my cane, damn him to Hell.”

Murchaud had turned with Tom to brace the doorway, both of them facing the hall, and the Elf‑knight’s blade was drawn. “Master Shakespeare,” he said; Will heard tautness of emotion in his voice. “Where is Sir Christopher?”

Will swallowed a whimper as Ben lifted him to his feet as easily as swinging a girl across a threshold. “I know not, Your Highness,” he answered. He leaned on Ben’s arm while testing his leg and decided it might almost hold his weight. “You could not find him in your Glass?”

“No,” Murchaud said without glancing over his shoulder. “Hast a looking glass?”

“I have a window.”

‘ ‘Twill serve. …” Murchaud stepped back, tapping Tom on the shoulder as he moved into the room. Tom followed without taking his eyes from the hall until Murchaud stepped in front of him and swung the heavy door shut. “Sir Thomas, if you would be so kind as to drag that table over?” A moment later, and they had it barred from inside, while Will clung to Ben’s arm.

“Damn,” Tom said, turning to face Will. “Damn. I’d hoped we’d find Kit if we found you–”

“How did you know I was missing?” Will’s eyes followed Murchaud as the Prince moved to the casement and dragged it shut. He sheathed his sword and tugged two‑handed to be sure the frame had latched.

“When”–Tom glanced over at the elf–“His Highness noticed Kit was missing, he sought you. Realizing your circumstances, he came to me. Ben was my idea.”

Ben grunted. “And still we have no Marlowe.”

“No,” Murchaud answered in a low and worried tone. “And he’ll be dead with Faerie‑sickness if we do not find him soon. Come along, mortals.”

“Wait,” Will said. “Sir Walter Raleigh is in the next chamber. Should we see to his liberty too?”

Rather than meeting Will’s eyes, Tom looked at Ben. “Sir Walter’s a legal prisoner of His Majesty’s,” he said. “And not a loyal subject held illegitimately. I cannot countenance it, I fear–and every minute we tarry here is a minute Kit is dying.”

Regrettable,Will heard Salisbury say again, and nodded while Tom lugged a footstool toward the window. “Right. ‘Tis the side we’re on.”

Murchaud held a hand out, ready to pass him through the glass, and Will limped away from Ben’s steadying hand and went.

Act V, scene xi

Of, thou art fairer than the evening air

Clad in the beauty of a thousand stars;

Brighter art thou than flaming Jupiter

When he appeared to hapless Semele:

More lovely than the monarch of the sky

In wanton Arethusa’s azured arms:

And none but thou shalt be my paramour.

–Christopher Marlowe, Faustus,Act V, scene i

Kit stepped through the light again, but this time there was nothing beyond to support his bare, bruised feet.

He fell.

Into infinite cold and blackness, tumbling hopelessly, arms windmilling, the scream in his throat vanishing into silence as it passed his lips, his fingers freezing so they might shatter and–

Lucifer caught him by the wrist, pulled him close, cradled him in the warm snowfall of wings. Breath hissed into Kit’s lungs, the frozen tears melting on his cheeks. “Christ!” he wheezed. “Christos!”

«Kepler,» Satan answered, and flung his wings wide. He held Kit’s hand in his strong, perfect fingers, though, so that Kit scrolled out alongside him like a ribbon let flap in the wind – but Kit could feel no wind pressing at him as they fell. They tumbled in preternatural calm, or perhaps Kit’s initial impression had been wrong, and they merely floated like puffs of thistledown in the air.

Except that what surrounded them was blackness, velvet and complete between the pricked‑out diamonds of a thousand million stars, and they swam among those stars like dolphins sounding the deeps. “Strange fish,” Kit said, and shook his head. “Kepler. The German astronomer.”

«Aye,» Lucifer answered, and Kit could hear the pleasure in his “voice.” I’ve passed a test?«This is his universe, my love, as before I showed thee Ptolemy’s. Is’t not lovely?» His hand tightened on Kit’s, squeezing the iron rings around Kit’s fingers.

The poet winced in pain, but Lucifer took no notice. Rather, he lifted his right hand to point. «See Mars?»

A racing red pinpoint, a droplet, a globe. Kit focused on it and grinned in dumb wonder as his eyes seemed to adapt, his focus grow closer. He saw veils of mist and shining white glaciers on the surface of the round ochre world, and two moons no bigger than afterthoughts tumbling like puppies through the red planet’s sky. “Oh, Lucifer,” he said. “Which is the truth, then, my lord? This, or what thou didst show me before?”

«They are both true,» the Devil answered. «A11 stories are true. But this story is becoming more true than the other. Look thee; there is thine earth.»

Kit blinked through watering eyes. The soft blue‑and‑white sphere spun like a top far beneath them. He could see the hurtling globe of the moon arcing about it, and a smaller body sharing Earth’s path that seemed to play a flirtatious dance, approaching and retreating. “What is that?”

«Ah,» Lucifer answered. «She’ll not be discovered for four hundred years. They shall name her Cruithne when they do. A moonlet, a captured wanderer fallen into the orbit of some greater, brighter thing.»

“Strange,” said Kit, “that such a thing should have a name, when I myself do not.”

«Dost mourn thy namelessness, who was Christofer Marley?»

And Kit blinked, hanging there among the stars, watching the world spin like a top with his fantastically powerful vision. And thought of Will saying that he had never had time to tell Amaranth about the oaks.

«I could protect thee. Take thee from that place where they have thee so sorely imprisoned. Save thy life.»

“Aye,” Kit said, tugging his aching fingers firmly out of Lucifer’s grip. He floated, hugging himself, and took a miraculous breath of nothingness. “I’ve been lucky at the brink of death before–”

Lucifer chuckled like breaking glass. «So say you.»

“Thou sayest otherwise?”

It was a spectacular thing, to see an angel shrug. «The blade entered your brain, who was Christofer Marley. It broke through bone and severed the great artery above and behind the eye. You died.»

“But I–”

«You died.»

He would not let Lucifer see him tremble. “The Devil asks me to believe him.”

The Devil… winked. «The Lord works in mysterious ways. When he works at all.»

And Kit, quite suddenly, saw through him. He swallowed. How have I been so blind so long?“But couldst protect me, Lightbringer?”

«Lightborn, aye. I never liked that role so well as the others thou didst grant me.» Lucifer smiled, that glorious expression that turned his crown of shadows into the gentle darkness of a moonlit night.

Kit looked up, regarding the serpent for a long, long moment before he answered. “What sort of apples are you peddling this time, old snake?”

“The same old apples every time,” Amaranth answered, her hair twining out of the shadows around her face, her heavenly blue eyes gone the flat color of steel. Kit forced himself to watch the transformation, clenching his fists until blood broke around his rings. The image lasted only a moment, and then the twisting tail was wings, the crown of snakes become a crown of shadows once again, and Kit’s breast ached with the beauty of the angel who reached to take his crimsoned hands.

“Oh, yes. Thou always wert the teacher, wert thou not? The seducer with truths, the bestower of knowledge and power. The rebel condemned to torment. Mankind’s scourge and seducer, warden and guiding star,” Kit said. “The serpent and the apple. The gift of terrible knowledge. The light‑bringer, the fire‑bringer. I know thy name, my lord.”

«I have many names, my love.»

Kit drew a breath that hurt. “Prometheus.”

«A11 stories are one story.» Lucifer said, and drew Kit–unresisting–close, and kissed him with a lover’s passion. «Come now love, and I shall free thee from thy prison, and thou shalt dwell with me.»

The kiss was a brand on Kit’s mouth before he pulled away, and he felt the wild tumult of Mehiel, within. He reached for poetry, and could not find his own, but there was other verse would serve. Kit drew breath and quoted his old friend Sir Walter Raleigh into Satan’s face– “If all the world and love were young, and truth in every shepherd’s tongue, these pretty pleasures might me move to live with thee and be thy love. ”

And the devil laughed. «Doth thy shepherd lie to thee, Sir Poet? It is the way of shepherds. Lying creatures, the more so when they talk of God.»

“Father of lies,” Kit answered, with a shrug.

«But all my lies are Truth. Dost love me, Kit?»

Kit edged away from the angel, and found his back scraping the rough damp wall of the oubliette. Dirt moved under Kit’s feet, a transformation sudden enough to dizzy him. Lucifer’s halo filled the grim little room with light, and he seemed suddenly more beautiful than ever. Something fragile and almost mortal, unreal, outlined against the sweating stone.

“How could I ever love anything else, once having been loved of thee? I can’t comprehend thy logic, Father of lies. Both ends against the middle. Like a two‑headed serpent devouring itself. Christ. What canst thou hope to obtain?”

Lucifer smiled only, and in the sadness of that smile Kit knew the answer. “Oh. For the love of God.” Oh, he if right: we are more alike than not, my lord Morningstar and I.

«For the love of God. One way or another. Dost judge me? Begrudge me?.» Lucifer beckoned, cupping feathers brushing the stone.

Kit shook his head, and did not come closer. “What would I not give for the same?”

«Mortals are everso clever. And you tell stories. Sooner or later one of you will tell the story that will set me free. That will make Him to love me again, for He cannot forgive me my trespasses as He is, and I cannot be content without Him.» The angel sighed and looked away. «Why should such as I care what story that is?.»

“A lover’s quarrel, Lucifer? That’s all?”

«What is more divine than love?»

Kit hadn’t an answer. He balled his fists again, freshening the drip of blood, and came to the center of his prison. “Forgiveness,” he said, and smiled. “Forgiveness is more divine than love, my lord Lucifer. That was Faustus’ fatal flaw too, thou knowest. I’m always startled how few understood.”

«That Faustus could not be forgiven? Mustn’t the fatal flaw come from within and not without?»

“No,” Kit answered. “He could have been forgiven. Anyone can be forgiven, who repents. Faustus had opportunity, time, and chance to repent, again and again and again. But he never meant to. Never meant to repent, my lord Prometheus.”

«Then what was his fatal flaw, Sir Poet?» Lucifer’s eyes sparkled. He tilted his head aside, lovelocks drifting against the exquisite curve of his neck. Enjoying the game.

“‘But Faustus’ offence can ne’er be pardoned,’” Kit quoted. “‘The serpent that tempted Eve may be saved, but not Faustus.’ Faustus’ flaw was the sin of Judas, who deemed his transgression too great to repent of, and thereby diminished the love of God, who can forgive any offense, so long as the sinner wishes forgiveness. Faustus sinned by hubris. I for one had always thought it plain, but they say the playmaker is the last to see the truth in any play–”

«Hubris, my love? And is that thy sin as well?»

Kit laughed. “No, not my sin. My sin is not hubris. My sin is love, in that I love my sin too well to wish to repent of it. I am not Faustus.” He looked up into Lucifer’s cerulean eyes. Read my mind now, Lucifer Morningstar.

The angel blinked once, considering, and the barest part of a frown creased the corners of his mouth. His wings expanded on a breath, a slight wind stirring. He nodded once. «Wilt come with me, then, Christopher Marlowe? And comfort one another in our exile, until the world shall change?»

Kit’s laugh hurt, sharp edges that cut the tender inside of his throat. “Even thou–”

«Even I?»

“Even thou hast forgotten my name.”

«Come with me. Let me be thy shepherd, and bring thee from this dismal place.»

Kit turned in the open circle of Lucifer’s wings and let his eyes rove over the seeping stone walls of the abandoned well, the rough round shape of the scold’s bridle kicked into the corner, the dank and odorous earth under his feet. “No,” he said thoughtfully.

«Kit?»

No.” He couldn’t quite manage the defiant glance over his shoulder and the lift of his chin he would have liked, but his voice stayed steady and that was a victory in itself. “No, my love. Thank thee. I’ll do it on my own.” And then he turned away again, blood oozing from his fingers and the flutter of Mehiel’s approval like a heartbeat in his breast, and waited for the light to fade around him.

The first touch of returning agony came as the darkness told Kit he was alone. Golden wings, golden eyes, a dream of memory and warmth as Kit dropped to his knees, body clenched around a scream he was still too proud to give voice. «God loves a martyr, Sir Poet.»

God’s welcome to get himself fucked too.

Act V, scene xii

Came he right now to sing a raven’s note,

Whose dismal tune bereft my vital powers,

And thinks he that the chirping of a wren,

By crying comfort from a hollow breast,

Can chase away the first‑conceived sound?

–William Shakespeare, King Henry VI Part II,Act III, scene ii

Ben and Tom were shuffled back to Tom’s study – over predictable protests, for which Will felt a great deal of sympathy. But he would not permit them to stay in Faerie without the assurances that he held, when any amount of time might pass them by in the mortal realm.

Once they had parted company and Murchaud had brought Will through to the Mebd’s palace, Will slumped to the floor of Murchaud’s night‑shadowed chamber and buried his face in his hands while the Prince went about, lighting candles that failed to lift the gloom. Murchaud unlaced his outer sleeves and drew them off. He tossed them carelessly across the foot of the bed and began unbuttoning his doublet with fingers he stopped to massage now and again, as if they ached. Will watched in fascination a Prince–still moving like an old man–playing his own body servant. “Your Highness, are you well?”

“Iron‑sick,” he said, in a tone that brooked no more questioning. “London is full of the stuff.”

Will nodded. “What do we now?”

The Prince shrugged on a woolen jerkin in deep blue, with golden knotwork. He leaned back against the wall. “We beg my mother for help.”

The white tree on the bluff over the ocean was hung with icicles like curtains of glass, creaking faintly in the wind. Morgan’s cottage, once they passed through the icy, snowless beech wood, was white as bone and black as aged oak among the weathered stems of the garden. The gnarled canes of ancient roses twisted about the crimson door, woven tight as the withy hurdles the farmers of Will’s youth used to keep sheep properly divided in the pastures.

Despite the biting cold, the door stood open and a big, shaggy copper‑colored dog lay across the threshold, the crochet‑hooked tip of his tail flipping deliberately. He rose as Will and Murchaud approached and ambled into the cottage, turning once to glance over his shoulder and prick alert, shaggy ears covered in the same luxurious coat that swayed about him when he moved. A moment later, Morgan stood framed in the doorway, the dog leaning his cheek against her hip and watching with gaze bright through a fall of hair. She shaded her eyes with her hand against the wintry sunlight and called out. “I was not expecting thee this morning, O son. And in such company.”

“We have a bit of problem, Mother,” Murchaud interrupted. “Master Shakespeare has witnessed Sir Christopher taken captive by the Prometheans. We must find him – ”

“ – quickly, if he is to live. Thou didst try with seeking‑motes? And consult the Darkling Glass?”

Murchaud pursed his lips at her, one eyebrow rising. Will made himself meet Morgan’s eyes past the Prince’s shoulder. “Thank you your tisanes and tinctures, madam, “he said. “They have made a difference.”

She met the gaze for a moment, then snorted and dropped a restraining hand to the dog’s neck. “Come in. Come in.”

Will followed Murchaud through the doorway and was most thoroughly inspected by a canine nose along the way. Inside the cottage it was warm as summer, despite the open door –another touch of Morgan’s homely magic – and sweet‑smelling cakes were baking on the hearthstone, their crusts just golden‑brown on the side closest the coals.

Morgan crouched to turn them, moving quickly to keep her fingers from scorching, and stayed crouched by the fire long enough to fill a kettle and hang it on the kettle‑arm. She stood and turned around. The dog observed her from his post by the door, whining a little.

Murchaud rattled down three mugs and set them out on a bench while Morgan measured herbs into them. “Scrying by water, do you think? Or by the cards?”

‘If the Glass won’t show it, water won’t,” Morgan answered, measuring herbs into the mugs. “And the cards are not suited for questions with – definite –answers. So I fear we will have to find someone to ask.”

“Ask?” Will said. The trickle of steam from the kettle’s spout became a jet that stood out eighteen inches. He moved forward, taking a square of toweling from a wall peg to shield his hand, and poured for all three of them, ignoring the twinge from his bruises.

“Aye,” she said, as Will hung the kettle up again. She stirred honey into each mug, and handed him one. He cupped his aching hands around the warmth and cradled it to his chest.

“Whom do we ask, my Queen?”

She smiled at Will over the rim of her mug, flecks of mint dappling her upper lip. “The things that listen in the crevices and quiet places, of course. And the things that listen to the things that listen there.”

Morgan led them speedily over frost‑rimed beech leaves, to the edge of a talking brook that trickled between glassy walls of ice. She turned at the frozen bank and followed it upstream; Murchaud steadied Will as they scrambled in her wake. Despite his worry, Will straightened his spine and breathed the cold scent of crunching leaves, drank deep the welcome air of Faerie and felt its strength fill him up.

They came up to a little plank bridge with darkness beneath. The icy brook chattered louder there, echoing from the underside of the arch. Ridiculous in the season, but Will could have sworn he heard a frog chirp. Morgan stopped short where the slick silver boles of the beech trees still broke the line of sight into slices. “Go on ahead, sweet William,” she said, tossing her long red hair over her shoulder.

“There’s something across the bridge?”

“Perhaps,” she answered. “But thy business is with the one who lives under it.”

With one doubtful glance at Morgan, and ignoring the low, uncertain noise that issued from Murchaud’s throat, Will shuffled down the bank. The slope was rocky and slick with frost. He clung to flexing twigs and underbrush to steady his uncertain descent, his bruised hip aching when he slipped.

And faintly, over the singing of the brook, he heard other singing: “For thy delight each May‑morning, hurm, If these delights thy mind may move, harm …”

“Come live with me and be my love,” Will finished, under his breath. Strange he–it?–should be dinging that.“Hello, the bridge!” he called, feeling silly. Icy silt crunched under his boots.

“Hurm, harm,” a slow voice answered. Something shifted in the dark archway. It might have been mottled a greeny‑brown like weedy water, shining with healthy, slick highlights in the reflected light. “Master Poet,” it said, in reedy tones of slow delight, “have you also come to offer me a poem for passage?”

“No,” Will said. A bridge‑troll. What else could it have been?“What would you take in trade for the answer to a question?”

“Ask me the question and I will tell you the price.”

“Tell me the price and I will tell you if I wish the question answered,” Will said, having some little idea of how such bargains worked.

“Hurm,” the troll said. “Very well. ‘Twill serve, ‘twill serve. Quest your question, then.”

Will drew a breath. “Where is Sir Christofer Marley, that I may find and rescue him?”

“Ah. Harm. No charge for that one, Master Poet. No charge. For knolls troll what trolls know, and I know I cannot answer it: there is no person by that name.”

Will let his head fall back upon his shoulders. “Too late,” he said. “Kit’s dead.”

The troll coughed, and Will got a glimpse of long fingers as it demurely covered its gaping, froggy mouth. “Perhaps a different way of phrasing the question, hurm?”

Will blinked. Never ask me,Kit had said, and now Will thought he understood. “Where is – ” my lover?But that was a question “with too many answers to serve Will’s purpose, to his sudden chagrin. “Where is the poet whose song you were just now singing, Master Troll?”

The troll chuckled, seeming pleased at his care, and trailed long fingers crooked as alder in the water. “And on to the matter of payment, froggily froggily. Would give me a song?”

“Any song I have,” Will said without hesitation.

“A bauble?”

“Nothing could be as precious to me as Kit’s life, Master Troll.” Will thought of Hell, and a quiet garden, and tried not to let the troll see the cold sweat that dewed his forehead. An animal was picking its way cautiously through the brush not too far away. Leaves crackled while Will waited.

“Hurm, harm.” The troll lifted a crooked finger and pointed. Give me the ring in your ear.

Automatically, Will reached up and let his fingers brush the warm, weighty gold. “It’s magic,” he said, though he was already fumbling with the clasp.

“Trolls know what trolls know.”

“It lets me stay in Faerie without being trapped here.”

“Then you’d better hurry home, hurm.”

Farther upstream, beyond the bridge, a stag crashed out or the underbrush and paused at the top of the bank. It gave Will a wild look, then bounded through the stream.

“Stag,” the troll said, following his gaze. “Good eating. The earring, harm?”

Will tossed it gently, underhand. The troll picked it out of the air like a flycatcher after gnats and popped it into his mouth. He belched a moment later –a toadlike, bubbling sound–and croaked: “Look down wells and look in the dark wet places. Look in forgetful places, and for forgotten things. Ask those that know the secrets whispered under earth and between stones.”

“That’s all?”

“That’s all I know,” the troll said. “Don’t drink the water, mortal man. Go home now.”

Will refused Morgan’s tisane, over her smile, when they had returned to her cottage. She said nothing about the troll’s pronouncement, but Murchaud grumbled. “He told us nothing but riddles.” He rubbed his hands as if they still ached.

Will shook his head. “Nay. He told us everything he needed to. Ask those that know the secrets– ” He stood. “He’s a Faerie. Do youexpect him to play straightforward?”

Murchaud looked up. “Where are you going now?” Will smiled. “To strike a bargain with a snake.”

Act V, scene xiii

Faustus: When I behold the heavens then I repent And curse thee wicked Mephostophilis, Because thou hast depriv’d me of those joys.

Mephostophilis: ‘Twas thine own seeking Faustus, thank thy self. But thinkst thou heaven is such a glorious thing? I tell thee Faustus it is not half so faire As thou, or any man that breathe on earth.

– Christopher Marlowe, Faustus,Act II, scene ii

When the rasp of the hinges heralded Baines’ return, Kit was again huddled around the rough, round shape of the scold’s bridle. He’d lost track of the comings and goings, the feedings and tauntings, and could now think only, of the ever‑rising pain, and wonder when it might release him. Curled tight as a caterpillar, his fingers laced through the bridle as if the touch of iron could ease his agony, he still flinched when the light struck his face. “Puss,” Baines said. “I’ve bread and cheese and a little ale for thee.”

Kit whimpered. The thought of food made burning bile rise in his throat.

“None of that, puss.” A gentle voice, as something struck the floor far enough away to pose him no threat. “Mehiel won’t let thee perish. And thou’lt need thy strength for our little ritual, wilt thou not?”

He did not want to cringe in front of Baines, skin welting and hair matted with filth. He got a fist against the earth and shoved himself to his knees, raising a face that Baines grimaced to see. “And I see thou’lt need cleansing beforehand.”

“It’s a hazard,” Kit mocked, finding the ghost of his voice, “of residence in a filthy dungeon. What day is it?” Then – “Oh–!” a cramp like an uppercut to the belly doubled him over. He bit down on a whimper and a flinch.

“Near on Hallow’s Eve,” Baines said. “Only another week or so of our hospitality to look forward to.”

“And then what happens?”

“Nothing thou hast not already proved thou canst withstand, brave puss,” Baines said. “I imagine it might even be less unpleasant than Rheims, if thou dost cooperate a little.”

“And then the sacrifice.” Every word like speaking broken glass. Kit shivered and dropped his gaze to the floor, wondering if they’d let him die cleanly, at knifepoint, or if it would be something drawn out and ugly.

“Peace, pussycat.” There was– Christ–pride in Baines’ voice; the tone was enough to make Kit wish he had something in his gut to vomit. “I’d rather burn a cathedral than see thee come to any lasting harm. What a waste of eighteen years’ work thatwould be.”

Kit bit down on his lip to stop the whimper, and managed only to convert it to a whine. Mehiel,he thought, like a prayer. Mehiel, Mehiel, Mehiel–

“Rest well,” Baines said. “You’ll need your strength.” And gently closed him in.

The darkness was complete. Kit bit his fist against a rising wave of pain and nausea, his teeth gritting on the iron bands. He tasted his own clotted blood, the rank sickliness of the infected, swollen flesh on either side of the immovable rings. It hurt to bend his fingers; he wondered how long he had before gangrene started to claim them, one by one.

Mehiel

«Sir Poet.» A stirring, as of distant attention drawn close.

Is’t true what Baines said, just now?Kit reached out in the darkness and found the scold’s bridle, lifting it with battered hands. The touch of that iron soothed his pain, just a little. Enough to almost concentrate, even in the unhelpful dark and quiet of the pit. The effect of iron on Faerie magic, perhaps. Art keeping me among the living, angel?

The angel hesitated. «I bear a little of thy hurt,» Mehiel replied. «As much as I am able.»

Ah.Kit stroked the scold’s bridle with the flats of his palms. He wondered if it was the same one, if his own blood seasoned that rusty metal. He did not stop to think what his suffering might have been without the angel’s intervention. Morgan’s words were truth, all those years ago. I would not survive this separation from Faerie.

“And Deptford? Didst aid me there, as well?”

«Did what I might.» Shyly, as if his questions embarrassed the angel. «Not what I might have managed once, by the grace of God.»

Kit’s hands bled again, but at least it smelled of copper and not pus. They knotted tight on the bridle; it fell open on his lap. “Baines will– Baines will hurt us again.”

Silence, long and bleak. «Aye.»

“The Morningstar said it was our own fear that crippled us.”

«The Morningstar,» Mehiel said wryly «wounds with truth.»

And tempts with the thing you long for most.There was regret in that thought. Like not living alone, Kit?

Aye. And isn’t that the thing that frightens thee most, as well?

Kit weighed the instrument of torture in his hands. “How brave are we, Mehiel?”

«We are a very small angel, Sir Christofer.»

He breathed through clenched teeth. “It’s all right, Mehiel. We’re a very small poet, too. And call me Kit, an you will.”

It was dark enough that Kit didn’t bother to close his eyes before he lifted the scold’s bridle and – hands moving as jerkily as if an inexpert puppeteer were at his strings–fitted it to his face. He had to wet his tongue on the flat, warm ale that Baines had left, and began to work the bit into his mouth. Dull blades pressed his tongue and palate, not quite sharp enough to prick blood to the surface if he didn’t fight the thing.

His hands shaking, the hinges rustling rather than creaking, he closed it around his face and sat there in the darkness, holding the edges together for a full ten counted seconds before he permitted himself to fling it away. It rang from stones on the far side of his narrow prison.

He wasn’t sure if the salt and iron he tasted was blood and the bridle, or Mehiel’s tears.

Or his own.

But the pain wassmaller.

* * *

Kit crouched in darkness, stronger for the bread and ale he’d forced over his iron‑numbed tongue, his trembling hands pressed to the iron bands across his cheeks, below his eyes. I can do this.

We can do this.

Mehiel, coiled in a tight, black‑barred ball of misery, shivered and did not answer.

We can endure this. We endure. We live. We cooperate if we must. And then we find our vengeance.

«Vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord.»

As thou wishest it. We willlive, Mehiel.

“Froggy frogs,” someone whispered. Kit startled, felt about him. He tore the bridle from his head again; it rolled and rattled in darkness, a heavy iron jangle, but his hands brushed nothing that felt like flesh, slick or otherwise. Losing my mind. And who could wonder?

“Master Troll?”

“Froggy frogs. Froggy frogs. Froggy frogs – ” Faint as an echo up a drain pipe.

“Master Troll ! There’s a way out, sir?”

“Hurm.And harm.”Something that luminesced faintly squeezeditself from a narrow space in the floor, expanding like a rose from a stem, and loomed over Kit.

“Sir Poet,” the troll said, a green‑mottled pattern of dim light against the darkness of the cell. “There’s no way out but through,” he answered, and reached a long hand through the darkness. Spatulate fingers rasped against Kit’s filthy hair, found his earlobe, and tugged.

“What? Ow!”A wincing pain to add to all the greater pains, and suddenly the sensation of a small thing burrowing out of Kit’s intestines ceased.

“A gift,” the troll said, sounding inordinately pleased with himself, and sat down beside Kit with his back to the wall, still glowing faintly.

“And now we escape?” Kit said hopefully, raising his fingers to touch the heavy warm circle throbbing in the lobe of his left ear.

“And now we wait,” the troll answered complacently. “Tell me a story, frog‑and‑prince.”

Act V, scene xiv

I durst, my lord, to wager she is honest,

Lay down my soul at stake: if you think other,

Remove your thought; it doth abuse your bosom.

If any wretch have put this in your head,

Let heaven requite it with the serpent’s curse!

–William Shakespeare, Othello,Act IV, scene ii

Amaranth was easy to find. Her long green‑and‑silver body lay like a jeweled ribbon dropped on the dust‑colored winter grass near that strange white tree; her woman’s torso rose among the ice‑covered branches, her hands upraised like a supplicating sinner’s.

Will glanced over his shoulder at Murchaud as they came up the hill. “Shall we interrupt?”

“Go thou on,” Murchaud answered. “She likes thee better. I’ll stay for thee here.”

Will dug his toes in to climb the slick bank, leaning on a birch limb he’d liberated from the wood –a temporary walking stick – as he climbed. Amaranth heard him coming, of course, or perhaps felt the vibration of his footsteps through the ground. She turned from the waist, the flakes of ice she had been brushing from the tree’s pale branches dusting her arms and shoulders and the complaining mass of her hair. Thread‑fine snakes coiled tight against the warmth of her skull in the Novembery chill.

“Good afternoon, my lady,” Will said. A silvery tone came to him on the same cold breeze that snapped the brave green and violet banners on the Mebd’s shining turrets: the cry of a fey trumpet, climbing the rise.

“Hello, William, “she said. The trumpet sounded again, burying her words under a landslide of music. “The Prince is going to be late for the rade if he lingers here.”

“Rade?”

“The Faeries ride on London,” she said. “Time’s slipped past thee while thou wert in the wood, I fear.”

“What day is it?” Thickening worry, as his hand rose to his naked ear. I could have lost a lifetime in the time it took to walk back from the troll’s bridge. And think you not that the Prometheans will kill Kit out of hand, should they find the Faerie court tromping through London?

In the mortal realm?” She dusted ice from her hands. It fell like snow through still air, sparkling on her scales where it landed. Looking up, Will could see that she’d cleaned half the boughs already. “It is Hallow’s Eve.”

Damme,” he said. Almost a month gone.The knowledge made him reconsider his fear for Kit, as well. And if Kit be not dead already, so long out of Faerie, it is only that so the thing is protecting him.Will would have swallowed, but his throat was too tight. . He would not bury Kit before he saw the body. Not a second time. “Thy help, Amaranth–”

“All thou needest ever do is ask,” she answered, lowering her human torso so that he looked her directly in the eyes. Something flickered across their opaque surfaces, a blue so bright he thought first it was the reflection of the unreal sky of Faerie. “Although”–a tongue‑flicker of a pause–“I will not vouch that the answer will be always yes.”

He laughed despite the worry gnawing in the pit of his belly. “Why art thou so willing to help a poor poet?”

Dead grass hissed against her scales as she shifted, swaying. “A snake never shares what she knows unless it serves her own purposes. Thou shouldst comprehend such things by now.

“Aye,” he said. “I should. And she never shares her reasons, either.”

“Perhaps because we have friends in common, thee and me.

“… perhaps. How is thine eye for a riddle, Amaranth?”

“If ‘tis a riddle with an answer–”

Will sighed. “I asked a troll where to find Kit, who is held captive by the Prometheans. Wilt help me for his sake?”

“Aye,” she said, “and thine own sake as well. Tell me thy riddle.”

Will closed his eyes, blessing a memory drilled into sharpness by grammar school and years of playing thirty scripts in repertory. “Look down wells and look in the dark wet places, he repeated. “Look in forgetful places, and for forgotten things‑Ask those that know the secrets whispered under earth and between stones.” And then he peeked through half‑closed lashes, hoping to see some sign of enlightenment cross her face, and half afraid that he would not.

“A snake should know such things,” she said, and seemed to consider. “An oubliette,” she said at last. “Forgetful places and forgotten things. An oubliette that used to be a well, perhaps? Is there such a thing in London?”

Will’s held breath rushed out of him with the words. “There is indeed, and a famous one,” he gasped. “Lady, if it would not kill me, I should kiss thee.”

“If it should not kill you,” Amaranth replied, “I would like that. And now?”

“And now,” Will said, “I must discern how I may invade the Tower of London, from which I have myself only recently escaped. And I must convince Murchaud to stay his mother’s ride until we have safely recovered Sir Christopher.”

Act V, scene xv

What is beauty, saith my sufferings then?

If all the pens that ever poets held,

Had fed the feeling of their masters’ thoughts,

And every sweetness that inspir’d their hearts,

Their minds, and muses on admired themes;

If all the heavenly Quintessence they still

From their immortal flowers of Poesy,

Wherein as in a mirror we perceive

The highest reaches of a human wit;

If these had made one Poem’s period

And all combin’d in Beauty’s worthiness,

Yet should there hover in their restless heads,

One thought, one grace, one wonder at the least,

Which into words no virtue can digest…

–Christopher Marlowe,

Tamburlaine the Great,Part I, Act V, scene i

The troll’s company kept him sane, and the earring–Will’s earring, Kit got the troll to admit in its usual circuitous manner–kept the agony at bay. The news of Will’s escape was enough to grant Kit new strength of intent. He’ll come for me. He won’t leave me here.He knew it, with the same calm certainty with which he’d known that he could not leave Will to take his own place in Hell.

Somehow, whenever they heard the sounds of the bolts being shot above, the troll always managed to squeeze its enormous bulk into the handspan‑wide clay drain before Baines could lift the lid and see it. Kit wondered, and chalked it up to magic, and didn’t try to touch the troll after the time his iron bonds raised blisters on its slick, shiny hide.

On All Saints’ Day–the troll said–Baines came back with more food and water. “Only a few more days until we’re needed.”

“Fifteen Sagittarius,” Kit murmured, taking no comfort in having been right. He gritted his teeth, knowing that he had to get out of the Pit if Will was to have a chance of finding him. “I’m ready to bargain, Baines.”

A chuckle. “Not faking your death of chills and ague any more, I see. What do you have to bargain with, then, Kitten?”

Edward de Vere’s old nickname for him. Kit clenched his aching hands against his thighs. “Myself,” he said. “You said you wouldn’t kill me. After.”

No, Baines answered, leaning down with his hands on his knees, like a man bending to converse with a very small boy. “In truth, puss, I’d hurt you as little as I know how. I’m not without pity or heart.”

Does it mean the irons again?” Strange, how he could think of that so calmly, when his mind skittered away from the rest.

Not as bad–Kit, give me thy parole that thou wilt not fight nor try to flee, and I’ll bring thee up so we can discuss this like civilized men.”

«Kit, what art thou about?»

He tasted the angel’s fear. Stalling.“Come and get me.”

Baines let a long ladder of rope and dowels unwind down the side of the oubliette and stood back from the edge. He must have had it ready there by the rim, just in case Kit broke. It galled Kit to know how predictable he had been. “I can’t climb with these hands, Dick.” They were better than they had been, but still swollen and infected around the bands.

“Thou’rt scared of a little pain, puss?” A pause. “Aye, and tie the bridle to the bottom of the ladder before thou dost ascend. I should not like to have to climb down after it.”

Wishing the troll still stood beside him, Kit did as he was bid, and then made his laborious way up the height of the ladder, his fingers leaving streaks of bloody lymph on the rungs while he prayed thanks to the troll for its company, and to Mehiel for his strength.

“See?” Baines grasped Kit’s wrist in a hand like a manacle and almost lifted him over the edge of the pit. He tugged the ladder up behind, and tipped the lid shut with a booted toe. Kit stood, examining his hands in the light, and did not realize that he might perhaps have tackled Baines and plowed him into the oubliette until Baines turned back to him. “Let me have a look at those hands, puss.”

Mutely, Kit held them out. Baines clucked. “They need cleaning, aye. But I think thou wilt not die of poisoned blood, for all it hurts thee. Still, thou art brave, puss. Art not?”

Despair crushed the breath out of Kit. «This is what moves mortals to suicide, Kit. Is it not?»

Kit nodded mutely, an answer to Mehiel more than it was to Baines. “What will you have of us?” And then realized too late what he’d said, when Baines quirked a little smile and examined him from filthy toes to matted hair.

“Nothing until you’re bathed,” he said. “Then you may rest until Tuesday.”

“And what happens on Tuesday? ” 15 Sagittarius.

“Parliament meets,” Baines answers. “The old King dies, and his sons and his peerage with him, and we take Princess Elizabeth and make her Queen.”

“Elizabeth’s a girl in short skirts.”

“The better to raise her as she should be raised, ” Baines answered. “Mr. Secretary–the Earl of Salisbury–will be Lord Protector. And I can control Salisbury.”

And I’m sure Salisbury thinks he can control Baines.“Salisbury knows of this? You would murder a Kingand shed that sacred blood on England’s stones?”

“As Edward the Second was murdered?” Baines smiled. “Sacrifice, puss. A murder serves no purpose. The sacrifice of the head of God’s Church in England, along with his Archbishop, timed to coincide with the subjugation of an angel–”

«Kit!»

Not now, Mehiel.

“I see,” Kit said. “How can you be so sure of Mehiel’s subjugation, Dick?” His arms itched, but he would not scratch the filth on his skin before Baines.

Baines smiled. “Walk with me. I think I know just the room to keep thee in. It will be barred, I fear.”

“It would not be like you to be negligent with trust.”

“No. ‘Twould not. This is where the choices enter into it. Thy choices as well, puss. Oh”–interrupting himself–“I’ll have someone fetch thee a salve for those hands. Poor puss. As I was saying–as Mehiel does, so must do God. Especially once we have weakened the influence of the Church of England so, and here on British soil, where the Catholic dogma has already been broken.”

“I know,” Kit answered. He let Baines open the thick ironbound door and hold it for him. Together they paced the corridors, Kit so weak with exhaustion that it was all he could do not to stagger. He knew better than to humiliate himself by trying to escape.

“The angel can be influenced by thee. By what thou dost. Willing or unwilling.”

“Willing is better.”

“Of course.”

“And that’s all you want of us? And then we’re free?”

“Us, is it now?” Baines sounded pleased, and Kit shuddered.

“As you wish,” he answered, biting his tongue on everything sharp he wanted to say. Stay alive,he reminded himself. Justice later.He studied his feet, the skin red and irritated under a layer of dirt.

“Not free, perhaps. Not at first. But eventually, it could be aspired to. Thy very existence, Kit, and that angel in thy bosom, binds God to earthly will as he has not been bound since the Archangel impregnated Mary. We’ve counterfeited a prophet.”

Lucifer,Kit thought, in pain. Oh, Morningstar. Thou art as clever as thou art beautiful my love.He swallowed. “The Christ preached tolerance.”

“Aye, and the God we’d give the world is much the same. A God for the common man, rather than a God for Popes and Kings. Is that so wrong?” Baines’ voice almost took on a pleading note. “It’s peace we offer the world: an end to the black sorceries that foul men’s minds, an end to the power of Faeries who steal babes from cradles and poets from graves. A Senate like Rome, perhaps, or a democracy like Athens. Peace. An end to tyranny.”

A Senate whose power is founded in blood.Kit closed his eyes. As the power of the Tudors and Stewarts is not?Baines fell silent, and they walked together–slowly, in deference to Kit’s weakened state–until they came to a barred oaken door. Can there be an end to Kings?

“Your quarters, ” Baines said, lifting the bar.

Kit paused in the opening. Morgan wants peace. The Mebd wants peace. Baines wants–ha!– peace. The King’s peace? Or the peace of Rome?

Who would have thought three separate peaces so irreconcilable?“I’ve thought on what you said.”

“Aye?”

He nodded. The words that he forced out were the most difficult he’d ever spoken.

“I’ll cooperate.

It was almost worth it, he thought later, to be clean and cleanly dressed, and to lay himself down in a bed furnished in white sheets and woolen blankets, while a cold November rain pearled on the glass. A crooked‑winged raven huddled in the embrasure beyond, and Kit remembered the story he’d spoken of with Murchaud, by the bier of Arthur, King of the Britons. I wonder if the legend that Britain will fall if the ravens ever abandon the Tower of London is linked to the story that Arthur’s soul became a raven when he died?

But the story’s not true. I know where Arthur lies.

«All stories are true.» something whispered against his ear. He meant to answer the angel, too, but the last thought he managed before warm old sleep claimed him was that his pillow smelled strangely of Will Shakespeare’s hair pomade.

Despite everything, it helped him sleep.

Act V, scene xvi

Knock, knock; never at quiet! What are you? But this place is too cold for hell. I’ll devil‑porter it no further: I had thought to have let in some of all professions, that go the primrose way to the everlasting bonfire.

–William Shakespeare, Macbeth,Act II, scene iii

“There,” Murchaud said, tapping the cool surface of the Darkling Glass. “There is your cellar, Master Poet, and there is your oubliette.”

“Not mine, surely.” But Will stepped closer, leaning forward over Murchaud’s shoulder. “Can we see inside?”

“‘Tis dark,” Murchaud answered. “But fetch a lantern and I’ll send you through to have a look.”

“Fair enough,” Will answered, and went to find a page. He returned with the requested lantern, as well as a pry bar and a rope. “How do I get him back?” If I can get him out at all.

“I’ll come with you,” Murchaud said gently.

Will swallowed, his pulse dizzying. “Just as well,” he said, hefting the silver crowbar in his hand. “There’s no guarantee I can lift that lid alone.” He hesitated, and looked up at Murchaud as Murchaud took his hand to lead him through the mirror. “Does a Prince of Faerie love a mortal man?”

“It’s not encouraged.” The Elf‑knight stepped forward, and Will went with him.

Faint light filtered into the rough, cold chamber. Will’s breath smoked in raw air; he was surprised to notice that Murchaud’s did not.

The Elf‑knight stayed close to the unfinished stone wall, as far from the massive iron cover of the oubliette as practical. He was dry‑washing his hands as if they ached, until he noticed Will looking. Then he folded his arms one over the other and waited in a stance as falsely relaxed as parade rest.

Will leaned on the pry bar and bent over the oubliette, worry pressing like a thumb into the hollow of his throat. The chisel tip of the bar left a paler gouge in the floor when he lifted it again. “It’s unlocked,” Will said. “That likes me not.”

“Can you lift it?”

“No.”

The Elf‑knight came forward, tugging black hide gloves over each long finger.

“Take the far end, ” Will offered. Murchaud bent down beside him and grasped the butt of the bar once Will had seated it under the lip. With a well‑oiled creak, the cover lifted a few dark inches. Will gagged at the reek that filtered out. He and Murchaud shared a grim look, and Will said, “‘Tis recently occupied.”

“We must look,” Murchaud answered. “Hold the bar.” He took his hands away slowly enough that Will, sweating, could take the strain. Will’s forearms trembled with effort, but for once his hands weren’t shaking–with palsy or with fear.

“Your Highness,” Will said. “‘Tis steel – ”

Murchaud ignored him, squatting with easy strength and slipping his gloved hands into the crack. He grunted – once– his only outward sign of pain. And stood and raised the lid as if it weighed nothing, laying it open so gently as to make no sound. He leaned it back against the hinges and pressed his hands together, palm to palm, and then he turned away. “Lower the lantern, Master Shakespeare.”

Will sighed, tied the rope to its handle, and slowly let it drop into the pit, terrified of what he might find. He struggled to let the rope out smoothly so that the candle wouldn’t flicker. “Leaving me to face this alone?” he asked Murchaud when the lantern was two‑thirds of the way down.

“Nay,” the Elf‑knight replied, returning. He’d stripped the gloves off, and Will could see the blistered and peeling flesh on his hands. “Perhaps,” he said, in a tone that made Will pause and look up.

“There are reasons it’s not encouraged,” Will said, understanding.

“What is not encouraged?” Murchaud was looking down now, leaning ever so slightly forward into the pit and watching the light flicker on its damp mortared walls.

“For elf‑Princes to love mortal men.” The lantern swung lower, revealing a blessedly empty pit. Will breathed a shuddering sigh and let the rope go slack, his hands falling to rest at his waist.

A faint smile softened the elf‑Prince’s face, half concealed by his fine black beard. “So our Kit is learning,” Murchaud said, turning to look at Will. “You are breaking his heart, Master Shakespeare.”

Will began pulling the lantern up. “And I should leave such tasks to you, Your Highness?”

“It’s a heart, I think, has been broken enough.”

“Ah.” The lantern retrieved, Will turned away. “Shall we search the cellars for him?”

‘He washere. But he is long gone.”

“How do you know?”

“The troll told you. And besides” – a delicate wrinkling of that aristocratic nose –“I can smell him.”

“Can you smell where they tookhim?”

“Alas.” Murchaud stepped back. “The trail is cold.”

“I’m a fool,” Will said suddenly, dropping his left hand from his earlobe. He looked up at Tom, who leaned in silent contemplation against the casement, frosting cool glass with his breath. “A fool and twice a fool.”

Ben closed Kit’s Greek Bible carefully over the ribbon and set it aside. “How a fool, Will?”

“Because here we sit, wracking our brains on how to save Kit and thwart Salisbury, the Catholics, andthe Prometheans, and the answer is in our very hands.” He reached for his cane and struggled up before Tom could help him. “My cousin William Parker. Baron Monteagle. Who owes me his life, I might add, and is close with Catesby and his lot.”

Tom blinked. “How does that assist us, Will? Perhaps if we could sort one plot from another we would stand half a chance of averting them, but they’re intertwined as nettles, my friend.”

“Look at what we know.” Will raised his left hand and ticked off points. “Kit saw signs in the heavens that the fifth of November was the day on which the Prometheans would arrange their sacrifice. He saw the downfall of old ways, the death of Kings.”

“The King has been useful to Salisbury,” Ben said. “I do not think Robert Cecil stands to overturn the monarchy.”

“No,” Tom answered. “But the Catholics do.”

“And the Prometheans,” Will answered. “And knowing how they operate, we must assume that Baines and Poley and their lot are using my Catholic cousins as some sort of a stalking‑horse or distraction – ”

“Fawkes and Catesby have been fussing about Westminster a great deal lately,” Ben said, leaning back in his chair. He lifted his enormous hobnailed boot and propped it on the low bench before the fire. “And they’ve been less than forthcoming of late. Parliament meets in four days. I imagine what happens will happen then.”

“What if they assassinate the King?”

“Hell,” Ben answered. “The King, the Queen, and both their sons will receive the House of Lords that day. If anything happened, it would be all England’s peerage and the royal family down to Princess Elizabeth – ”

“Who is all of nine years old.” Tom laced his fingers together as if he really wished to strangle something.

“Aye,” Ben answered. “Well, there’s your Catholic plot. What do the Prometheans want?”

“The Prometheans have Kit,” Will said, “and the Fae have been intending something for a long while now, and biding their time. Both sides treat Kit as if he’s some sort of accounting piece. And I swear he knows why, although he will not tell me.”

“What about thy Prince? Or the Fae Queen who came to nurse thee in thine illness?”

“MyPrince?” Will smiled at Tom. “Kit’s Prince, you mean. You know, I rather suspect he’s watching us now: I would be, were I in his place.” Will glanced up and around, and calmly addressed the air above his head. “Prince Murchaud? Are you listening, Your Highness?”

A shimmer hung on the air, and Murchaud stepped through it. “You know me too well, Master Poet. And Kit is not a counting piece to me.” The Prince nodded to Ben and Tom once each. Ben swung his boots down to the floor.

No. But he is important to your plans. And those of your wife.” Will lifted his chin to catch Murchaud’s gaze, thinking when did I grow so comfortable challenging Princes?

“Valuable,” Murchaud answered. “I can tell you what it is my wife seeks: sovereignty for Faerie, and freedom from old bargains.”

Lucifer,” Will said. “Everyone wants to remake the world.”

“Indeed. And the Prometheans’ ritual will give them the power to do it. Or us, if we manage to take that power from them. Since you discovered where they are holding Sir Kit, and we failed to retrieve him, the Mebd has decided that the Faerie Court will ride to the Tower of London on the fifth of November, shortly before dawn.” Murchaud folded his arms, the green silk of his sleeves draping heavily. His brow creased; Will thought the expression was disapproval. “Once the Promethean ritual begins at which Kit’s presence is so necessary.”

Will glanced at Tom for advice. Tom merely inclined his head slightly. Continue.

“We wait until they begin? Is that not dangerous?”

“I do not know where Kit is,” Murchaud answered. “I can make a strongly educated supposition as to where the ritual will be held.”

Will sighed. “Kit. I’d not see him endure torture.”

“The Mebd is unimpressed by suffering. The Daoine Sidhe ride at dawn; I cannot stay them longer. There will be power raised that dawn, and all are loath to miss it. And–”

Will waited the Prince’s hesitation through. “Aye, your Highness?”

“–once the Prometheans’ power is raised, and linked to Kit, he becomes the keystone to their ritual. If the Queens come to his rescue then, once the power is in him–”

“You mean, once he’s raped and savaged.”

“Yes.” Silence, as Murchaud turned and met their eyes. “If my mother or my wife can command Kit, then, then they can command all of that strength, and claim a victory over the Prometheans. They hope.”

“And we leave Kit trapped a few more days, under who knows what sort of duress–”

“They must bring him from his cell to complete the ritual,” Murchaud said. And then he cleared his throat, after a long pause. “It will likely be in the Roman chapel that’s buried under the Tower precincts. Some of us… some of us might choose to arrive a few hours early.”

Will chewed his lip. “I shall be there. I’m sure Sir Walter would not begrudge a companion or two to keep him company in his captivity, and a late night of drinking and dicing is not unheard of among men who have no business in the morning, except with their prison walls.”

The Prince nodded to Will’s cane. “Thou’rt not going. Thou hast not the strength.”

“You could barely stand the iron realm long enough to see me freed. What if there’s bars? An iron gate? I’d hate to explain to your mother how I permitted you to burst into flames in a mortal prison.”

Ben snorted laughter, and a smile even lifted the corner of Murchaud’s mouth.

“Thou’lt walk back into a prison after we risked our lives to get thee out?” Tom asked mildly.

“There’s a difference between being kidnapped and held in secrecy, ” Will said, “and walking in the front gate in plain view of everyone. Salisbury wouldn’t dare hold me publicly, especially not were I in the company of Sir Thomas Walsingham and the esteemed playmaker, Ben Jonson, a favorite of Anne of Denmark’s. I’m a Groom of the Bedchamber, a King’s Man. And His Majesty is veryfond of my plays.”

“If His Majesty survives Tuesday night,” Ben said.

Will shrugged. “Two can play at Salisbury’s game. He as much as told me England needed a King who was willing to make decisions, or let them be made for him by competent advisors. I cannot guess what his disposition of events is likely to be, if the King does die at Westminster, or even if he intends the King to die or merely to shock him into action rather than this endless equivocation, at which he does not excel as Elizabeth did. But if several upright citizens can all attest that Salisbury knew treason was planned in advance–”

“Then he can hardly hope to benefit from it, if it is carried out successfully,” Ben finished in Will’s silence. “And so he must prevent it. Your logic’s sound, I wot.”

“I’ll attest it,” Tom said. “I’ve not much to risk. My star at court is less than bright these days, in any case–and I do not find James’ entourage as much to my liking as Elizabeth’s.”

Ben rose, slowly, and turned to Will. “With Chapman having been in Salisbury’s pay, it’s likely the Earl knows us well enough to anticipate every move we make, Will.”

Will shook his head. His bare left ear felt strange. “In any case, we can only do our best.”

“It will mean Catholic heads when the plot is discovered.” Ben sounded resigned rather than angry. He pressed the meaty, branded heel of his right hand to his eye socket.

“It may help a little,” Will answered, without real hope, “that the warning comes from a Catholic mouth.”

Will himself went to see Monteagle, wearing his scarlet livery, his thinning hair tied back with a ribbon to match. The Baron was at home, and Will was shown in at once and offered mulled wine and ale with spices, which he accepted gratefully. Then he stood beside the fire in the parlor, warming his chilled toes and fingers, and awaited his host’s convenience.

It was not long in coming.

“Cousin,” Monteagle said warmly. “Thou comest at an interesting hour.”

“So I’ve heard,” Will answered, making as much of a bow as he felt capable of just then. “What do you know about Robert Catesby and Westminster, Cousin?”

Monteagle blanched. “Are you here as a King’s Man?” he asked carefully. “Or on behalf of the Earl of Salisbury ?”

“I’m here as a loyal subject of the crown,” Will answered. “You do know something, then.”

“I’ve told Salisbury everything I know,” Monteagle answered. “I should not tell you this, Will, but I trust your motives–Francis Tresham is Salisbury’s man too. The King’s advisors are well aware of the plot. I take it they have not yet spoken to the King?”

“I do not know the answer to that for certain,” Will said, but he thought perhaps he did. “Will you do me a favor, Cousin?”

“Anything.” Monteagle’s voice was serious, his face calm. A steadier man, Will thought, than the foolish boy who had ridden with Essex only four and a half short years before.

“Let Salisbury know that if he does not approach the King by the end of the day–”

“Someone else will?” The Baron nodded. “Aye.” And sighed. “I like it not, Will. We’re hanging men we grew up beside. It does not seem–meet–to choose sides against them.”

Will shook his head. “It is neither meet nor fair,” he answered. “But it is politics. What’s the nature of the treason? Do you know?”

“Aye,” Monteagle answered. “There’s thirty‑six barrels of gunpowder concealed in the cellar under the House of Lords. Catesby and his friends planned to blow the whole damned Parliament to Glory.”

Act V, scene xvii

What, Mortimer, can ragged stony walls

Immure thy virtue that aspires to Heaven?

–Christopher Marlowe, Edward the Second,Act III, scene iv

On his second night in his room in the Salt Tower, Kit had tried to make his escape through the reflections in the narrow windows; he’d been unable to touch the power or the Darkling Glass at all, and he had wondered at how easily the iron rings on his fingers quelled all the strength he knew he had in him.

He had no clock. Nor was he vouchsafed candle or paper or anything to read. And so he paced, from the bedstead to the window and the window to the bed, pausing occasionally to pick a splinter of the rush matting from the tender sole of his foot or to trace the old markings scraped into the wall–a pierced hand, a pierced heart. Symbols of the passion of the Christ, etched there by Jesuit prisoners who had inhabited his cell before him. At least Kit was fed–what he could force himself to eat of it–and twice a day had a moment’s glimpse of another human face when Baines–or Poley, in his Yeoman’s livery–came to see him cared for.

Two nights later, Kit was simply bored,and sick unto madness with waiting.

“And yet like Faustus in his final hour I count the seconds,” he muttered. He leaned against the embrasure, supported on his forearms, and pressed his forehead against the glass. Baines would come for him before midnight, and then the ritual–he couldn’t bring himself to think of it in more concrete terms–would begin.

«And thou’rt willing to submit to this for a little less pain, a scrap more of dignity?»

When rape is inevitable–Kit answered, and told himself he didn’t remember the exact timbre of Baines’ voice, asking didst thou like it, puss?

I’m willing to submit if it means I’ll get a better chance at Baines,he answered. It’s not as if I could avoid–

«There’s always a way.»

And then Kit realized the angel was looking at the window.

“If we lived, we would be crippled.”

The angel bowed his head. «Kit, we would not live.»

And damn myself for a suicide? Or wouldst thou keep me from dying again, Mehiel? ‘Tis not so far to fall, methinks–«‘Tis some twenty‑five feet from thy window, onto cobblestones. It should suffice. Thou wouldst die with thy brands intact–»

Die, damned a suicide.

«Thou who so boldly defied Lucifer, and told him thou wouldst not repent thy sins, for they were sins of love?»

Kit paused. Slowly, he raised his hand and opened the window latch, then pushed the glass wide and laid his hand on the rough mortared stones of the wall. He leaned out into the icy night air. The windows were small, but a small man might slide through them. Far below he could see lights scattered around the Tower precincts like flower petals on the sheets on a marriage bed. “Die with my brands intact,” he “whispered, as a clock struck half eleven. “Then thou wouldst – ”

«It is suicide for me as well.» Mehiel said calmly. «I will cease to exist. And thou wilt be damned. But Lucifer and the Prometheans both will be thwarted.»

The cold wind tugged Kit’s hair, a sensation like the caress of Lucifer’s feathers. The crippled raven who always came to visit at suppertime landed on the window ledge, strangely awake in that midnight hour, and on an impulse Kit reached out tentatively and touched its black jet wing. He felt the slick surface of feathers, the deeper warmth of the flesh, and wondered if he’d been a fool to send Lucifer–and Lucifer’s promises of love–from him. The raven endured his caress, and Kit stifled an impulse to gather it up in his arms and cradle it close like one of his small sisters with a poppet.

“Mehiel,” he said, softly. “Art become so tainted by mortality, after twelve years my companion, that thou shouldst preach suicide?”

«An it save God, I am prepared to make the sacrifice.»

“Despair is a sin, angel,” Kit said, and closed the casement frame.

* * *

Baines came for them as the clock struck eleven.

Look, here’s the warrant, Claudio, for thy death:

‘Tis now dead midnight, and by eight to‑morrow

Thou must be made immortal.

–William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure,Act IV, scene ii

A heavy bell tolled midnight, and Will laid his cards faceup on Sir Walter’s ornately carved black wooden desk and raised his eyes.

It’s time,” Murchaud said from his place against the wall. Light‑colored stone with the look of hasty mortaring and great age caught the candlelight, outlining his dark‑clad frame.

Will nodded and stood, resting one hand on smooth waxed wood. “You know where the magic will be worked, Your Highness?”

“There’s a temple under the Tower,” Murchaud said, straightening away from the wall. Unlike Will, Ben, and Tom, he had arrived by unusual means, and still wore his rapier at his hip. “More a chapel, really. Twill be not a comfortable place for me, but I am content to suffer it.”

Sir Walter,” Tom said, rising and bowing. “I am afraid we must then bid you adieu–”

Go,” Raleigh said graciously, rose, and tapped on the door, summoning the guard to inform him that the guests “were ready to be excused and that he himself was ready to go up to bed with his wife, Elizabeth.

If those guests managed to vanish into the shadows between the Garden Tower and the gate, how was he ever to know?

Accurs’d be he that first invented war!

They knew not, ah, they knew not, simple men,

How those were hit by pelting canon‑shot

Stand staggering like a quivering aspen‑leaf

–Christopher Marlowe, Tamburlaine the Great,Part I, Act II scene iv

This isn’t so different from climbing down to Hell,Kit thought, balancing himself with a hand on one wall of the ragged stone stairwell. His shadow writhed before him, cast by the torches Baines, Poley, and the four others walking behind carried.

All in all, he would have preferred the demon with the glowing maw.

He was exquisitely careful how he placed his bare feet on the ragged stone, annoyed all over again that Baines hadn’t given him back his boots. He had to give the bastard credit: on a floor like this one, it was an effective means of keeping him from running.

At least his skin and hair and clothes were clean, and the puffy flesh around his rings was peeling with eczema now rather than infection. Which was an improvement of sorts, and so was the cloak warming his shoulders. Not his own fey cloak–this one was as white as the woolen doublet and breeches that would have made it all that much harder for him to run. If he had planned to. And where would I run?Or perhaps all that white served to mark him a virgin sacrifice, which was a thought worth a slightly hysterical giggle.

“How far down are we going, Richard?”

“All the way,” Baines answered.

The wall grew moist under Kit’s fingertips, wet, sandy earth gritting between his skin and the mortared stone. “It’s a wonder the river hasn’t washed these tunnels away,” he commented. “How old are they?”

“Since Arthur’s day.”

Which was a strange choice of words. Kit almost wished they’d bound his hands, but then he probably would have fallen down the stairs. Essex refused the blindfold,he thought. Can Marley do less?“These must be Roman ruins?”

“Puss, must you chatter so?”

Kit shivered at the fond correction. “I am understandably somewhat nervous, Dick.” The quaver in his voice was less showmanship than he would have wanted it to be.

«Be bold,» Mehiel chanted in his ear. «If thou hadst listened to me, thou wouldst be beyond this fear and pain.»

Aye, and on to others.

«I still fail to comprehend thy plan.»

That’s because I do not have one, other than that I will not die tonight, but live, and thwart Richard Balneo another day.

зAnd if he has remade our God into the image he pleases–»

Mehiel,Kit reminded, my power may be chained and my magic shorn from me, but I am a bard, a poet, and a warlock too. And there’d a half‑completed Bible in Tom Walsingham’s study that says that my God has as much claim on the world as the God of Richard Balneo and… Lucifer.

«Prometheus, thou meanest.»

Aye.Kit steadied himself against the wall and stretched over a step too crumbled to be safe. “Watch your step, Richard.”

«Hast thou the power to do this thing?» Wonder on the angel’s voice, those golden eyes shuttered by dark lashes.

You never know until you try.Kit swallowed dryness, and tried to hush his thoughts so the angel would not overhear his fear. The force of will to defy Richard Baines, and wrest his own greatest sorcery away from him? I can’t even best the man in a verbal jousting match. What think I that I can take control of a sorcery in which I am only the catalyst, the sacrifice?

«Sir Poet,» the angel reminded gently, «thou art the man did tell the Prince of Darkness where to take his blandishments.»

From the way his shadow stretched before him in the fluttering light, Kit could see that they were coming to the bottom of the stair. A low tunnel vaulted with Roman arches stretched away before them.

Aye,Kit answered. But Lucifer Morningstar doesn’t frighten me like Richard Baines.

Now entertain conjecture of a time

When creeping murmur and the poring dark

Fills the wide vessel of the universe.

From camp to camp, through the foul womb of night,

The hum of either army stilly sounds,

That the fix ‘d sentinels almost receive

The secret whispers of each other’s watch:…

–William Shakespeare, Henry V,Act IV, chorus

The Earl of Salisbury limped up the stairs with a half‑dozen men‑at‑arms at his back. “Your Highness, ” he said, raising his chin to look over Will’s shoulder. “Master Shakespeare–”

“Stand aside, my lord,” was Will’s answer as he continued his descent. His cane clacked staccato on the steps as he stumped downward.

Salisbury did not move. “I will not have thee risk thyself in this, ” he said. “Thy King needs thee to shape what will follow, Will. There’s nothing thou canst do to help Marlowe now. They will have already begun.”

Will stopped, one step above Salisbury and leaning forward. He wanted to close his eyes at the declaration, remembering the heat of a crimson iron close enough to curl his lashes. The hand that did not hold his cane tightened on a bit of silk in his pocket, and something pricked him. The enchanted nail Kit had given him, and Will drew strength from it.

He could have glanced over his shoulder, but he knew what he would see: three big men standing shoulder to shoulder, Murchaud with his blade catching lanternlight, the others half crouched and ardent for whatever might come. Tom cleared his throat but held his tongue, granting Will precedence this once.

“Then have your men run me through, Mr. Secretary,” Will replied. He drew himself up, balancing against the wall so he could lift his cane off of the step, and looked down at Salisbury from his greater height and the advantage of the stairs. “Because if I am alive, I am going down these stairs, and I am going in the service of England.”

The man Elizabeth had called her Elf never glanced down. His eyes sparkled in the lanternlight as he rubbed a gloved forefinger against his thumb, and visibly came to a decision. “The treason is safely under control,” Salisbury argued, his soldiers shifting impatiently behind him. “Fawkes will be arrested tomorrow, Catesby as soon as suits us. They’ll give evidence that I can use to bring Baines under control once and for all, and their networks with them. The Baron Monteagle has been most forthcoming–”

Will almost dropped his cane. “That’s what this has been about,” he said, and shook his head. “You still think you can rule the Prometheans. Rulethem?”

“Every man can be ruled,” Salisbury said, provoking a dry laugh from Ben. One of the men‑at‑arms started forward; Salisbury halted him with a flick of fingers so slight that only Will’s training as a player let him see it. “Baines is too useful to waste.”

Will swallowed dryness. The trick with the pewter coins. Of course. Blackmail, plain and simple: Salisbury never intended to see Baines hang.

Merely to let him know that he could see him hang, if he so chose.“If every one could be ruled,” Will said softly, “Lucifer the Prince of God’s angels need never have fallen into darkness, my lord Salisbury.”

“We have the conspiracy dead to rights.” Such hubris, such arrogant certainty. “The realm’s ire will rise against the Catholics and in defense of the King. James will move from upstart crow to beloved monarch, and the royal family will regain public sympathy. Baines will perform his Black Mass in front of my witness, and I shall own him. And England will be strong and united again in the mind of her people.”

“In front of your witness?” Not Kit, surely. He would not permit himself to be so used–

“Robert Poley, ” Salisbury said with a satisfied smile, “works for me.”

Will set his cane back down on the step and leaned on it, dumbstruck. His mouth opened, and closed again; he felt as breathless in air as the fish he was certain he resembled.

Tom caught Will’s elbow in passing, and shouldered Salisbury aside. Murchaud and Ben fell in behind, and Will was never certain whether it was something in their eyes or Salisbury’s stunned failure to issue a command that kept them all alive.

“Sir Thomas!”

Tom’s auburn head swiveled on his long neck, fixing Salisbury with a glare. “Perhaps you should look to your own nest, cousin. That seems to me a cuckoo’s egg you are roosting there,” he commented. A pause, a dismissive, calculating glance. “Sir Francis thought the same thing, once.”

The Earl just stood with his arms akimbo like wings, watching them squeeze past. Will patted Salisbury’s black‑robed shoulder as he went by. “The Faerie will be here at dawn,” he said helpfully. “Expecting a skirmish with the Prometheans. Perhaps it would be well for you to decide which side you wish to be on when they come, my lord. Incidentally–”

“Master Shakespeare!”

Will narrowed his eyes and offered Salisbury his coldest, most stageworthy stare. “–I will not fail to see that the King learns of your hesitance to interfere with this autumn’s treason at your earliest convenience, despite having all the knowledge in your hands. If you should choose a side other than the one I find myself allied upon.”

See, see where Christ’s blood streams in the firmament!

One drop would save my soul–half a drop! ah, my Christ!–

Ah, rend not my heart for naming of my Christ!

Yet will I call on him: O, spare me, Lucifer!–

Where is it now? ‘Tis gone; and see where God

Stretcheth out his arm, and bends his ireful brows!–

Mountains and hills, come, come and fall on me,

And hide me from the heavy wrath of God!

–Christopher Marlowe, Faustus,Act V,scene ii

Kit hesitated in the half‑crumbled archway, the torches failing to illuminate the darkness beyond. “There’s a step down,” Baines said behind him. “Have a care among the rubble.”

“Perhaps if I had a light – ”

“Perhaps if you had a weapon, puss?” Baines came up beside him, a hulking form, breathing softly. He smelled of soap and wine and rosewater and lightly of fresh sweat. “You wouldn’t club me with a torch and make your escape, would you?”

Barefooted over broken stones?Kit didn’t dignify the comment with an answer. “Cleaned up for the ceremony, Richard?”

A companionable hand on his shoulder made him shiver. “I thought thou wouldst prefer it.” Baines brushed past Kit, ducking to pass through the arch, and stepped down. He paused, holding his torch high, and surveyed the chamber beyond.

Kit caught the glitter of firelight on marble, heard the slow drip of water spattering against stone. He grasped the wall with his left hand and stepped carefully onto damp, slick stones outlined with jagged shadows, expecting at any moment to slice his bare sole open. Richard Baines turned back at the sound of stones shifting lightly and held up one meaty hand to help him over the rocks, handing him down like a lady out of a carriage.

Kit gritted his teeth and accepted the assistance.

The chamber didn’t quite look Roman, he thought. Admittedly, the once‑frescoed ceiling was matted with mold and dangling roots, and the flickering torchlight showed mineral streaks and water damage on walls that might once have been painted plaster. The floor was slimy with ash‑fine mud; it sucked between Kit’s toes, and under the surface he could feel a hard, pebbly surface that must be tile. He wondered what design the mosaic would have shown if black silt had not occluded it.

“I can think of more pleasant places for an assignation,” Kit admitted, drawing his white wool cloak tight in the raw underworld cold. Dripping water freckled his shoulders and tapped against his hair. He pushed damp strands off his forehead, wiping water from his eyes with the back of his hand.

“But few with older power,” Baines answered. “And none of those in London. Come on, puss. We’ll need a canopy to keep the brazier dry. Come and help me set it up. Pity it’s my lord and master who will have the shaping of thy power tonight: I would have liked it for myself, thou knowest.”

Baines moved toward the wall. Kit followed carefully as Poley and the other robed men scattered around the chapel. Nothing Like Last time,Kit told himself. For one thing, all of those men are dead. Either hanged as Catholic traitors, or on the end of my knife.The memory of de Parma’s sticky lifeblood spilling over his hand warmed him; his rings clinked as he rubbed his palms together.

Something rustled in the darkness, disturbed by the torchlight. Bats,Kit worried, and then he saw a row of wire cages tucked behind a pillar and a slumping arch, and a dark lantern with the aperture turned toward the wall. The gleam of a too‑blond head, and capable shoulders straightening.

“Good evening, Robin,” Baines said over the hollow plink of falling water. “Is everything in readiness?”

“Every raven in the Tower,” Catesby said, resting a hand on the hilt of his sword. “I’m just about to leave for Westminster: one last meeting with Guido and a check of the powder barrels. I don’t Likethis, Dick.”

“None of us Likesit,” Baines said softly, as Kit came up beside him like a dog at heel. “But we do what we must, for God. Innocents will die–”

“Aye. And you’ll avail yourself of black arts for power.” Catesby cast a pitying glance at Kit. “Is this our poet, then?”

“I am,” Kit answered, before Baines could do it for him, and extended his right hand.

“Christopher Marlin, Robert Catesby,” Baines said, stepping back to keep the hissing torch clear of a stream of water. Catesby slid Baines a sidelong glance and opened his mouth.

Kit cut him off. “You were about to say that I am a bit unprepossessing, Master Catesby?”

A startled glance back. The torchlight made Catesby’s nose look long and beaked. “How did you know that, Master Poet?”

Kit smiled. “Words are what I do, ” he answered. He stepped past Catesby, stubbing his toe among the jumbled stones but doing himself no serious harm. A row of unhappy black birds huddled on a long iron bar within, crouched shoulder to shoulder with their feathers ruffled against the cold. Despite himself, Kit looked for one with a twisted wing, but couldn’t see it. “What are the birds for, Dick?”

The torch bobbed and guttered as Baines coughed into his hand. “The sacrifice,” he answered.

What is your substance, whereof are you made

That millions of strange shadows on you tend?

Since every one hath, every one, one shade,

And you, but one, can every shadow lend.

–William Shakespeare, Sonnet 53

Will paused in Murchaud’s shadow, half wishing he had a weapon in his hand and half glad he did not. “Downward?

“Ever downward,” the Elf‑knight answered, glancing over his shoulder for Tom and Ben before he started moving.

“There’ll be an echo,” Ben murmured. “Keep your voices soft. And we shall have need of a light.”

Murchaud blinked. “Of course you will,” he said. “How foolish.” Of himself or of them he did not say, Will noticed, but he waved his left hand in an airy arc, swarming green motes flickering into existence in the path of his moving fingers. They scattered, swinging low to the ground in twining pursuit, and illuminated the ground by Will’s feet, and Ben’s, and Tom’s. “Master Shakespeare,” he said, “can you manage the steps?”

“I’ll manage what I have to,” Will answered. “Could we make more expedience? Every moment we hesitate is a moment that Kit is in danger. ”

“By all means,” Tom said, setting his boot down carefully among a school of witchlights that danced about his feet like minnows in shallow water. “Let us make our way underground.”

So, so; was never devil thus blest before.

– Christopher Marlowe, Faustus,Act III, scene ii

He was thankful for so many things.

That it wasn’t Baines who undressed him, but two of the other men, and that they did it with impersonal disinterest. They stripped him only to the waist, and left his feet free when they bound him standing between two pillars, and not helplessly prone on some clammy altar. That there was wet stone giving steady purchase under his bare feet instead of the greasy mud, and that the lengths of white silk binding his arms wide as wings were soft around his wrists, and tied so he could clench his hands tight about them, his fingers leaving rusty stains of blood where they had cracked around the iron rings.

Poley’s men had set up a rough pavilion not too far away, and the warmth of the braziers protected by its span just reached Kit. A warmth that he was also thankful for, because the water that dripped slowly onto his hair and shoulders, leaving delicate branching trails of silt down his skin and slowly soaking the waist of his breeches, was so cold it burned. A cut he hadn’t noticed stung on the bottom of his right foot, and he could feel the warm stickiness of a trace of blood.

He tossed his head to flick his dripping hair from his eyes, and then wished he hadn’t, because Baines climbed up the three swaybacked steps to the dais and smoothed the muddy locks back with thick, gentle fingers. Kit flinched from the touch as if it burned him, and in his heart he heard an angel whimper. “You could have lent me a hat.”

“Sorry about that, puss,” he said. “The roof leaks a little. You’re all over gooseflesh. Shall I fetch your cloak for now, until we’re ready to begin?”

“It’s past midnight and gone,” Kit answered, gritting his teeth so that they would not chatter. “What are we waiting for?”

“The man of the hour,” Baines answered, and brought the white wool cloak to drape over Kit’s shoulders. He drew the hood up to shelter his head and settled it carefully. “‘Twill soon be over, and then we can all get good and thoroughly drunk.”

Poley emerged from the shadows on the far wall, carrying an end of one of the long iron cages Catesby had been tending. Kit watched, idly twisting at the lengths of cloth restraining his wrists. He should thank Baines for that, he supposed. The bindings were calculated to do him very little harm, no matter how he struggled.

Baines turned and walked down the steps to Poley, and Kit tried to relax into a state of waiting readiness, calling poetry to mind. What a pity thou has’t ne’er written a comedy. If ever, now would be the time for a happy ending–

He smiled to himself, and quickly dropped his head to hide that smile behind his hood and the fall of his hair. If his own work wouldn’t do to hold him together through this, he knew the play that would. Even if I “like this” not at all. Thank thee, Will. In mine extremity, I knew I could trust in thee.He drew a long, slow breath, tasting mold and wet upon it, and shaped the well‑loved words. as I remember, Adam, it was upon this fashion bequeathed me by will but poor a thousand crowns, and, as thou sayest, charged my brother, on his blessing, to breed me well: and there begins my sadness. My brother Jacques he keeps at school, and report speaks goldenly of his profit: for my part, he keeps me rustically at home, or, to speak more properly, stays me here at home unkept.

He closed his eyes and leaned into the poetry as he leaned into the cloths that bound him, and his lips moved silently. I can bear this. With Will’s help.

I can do this.

I can–

«Kit.» A low urgency like panic in the angel’s voice that wasn’t quite a voice, and Kit looked up, his mute recitation stumbling when he saw who had entered the crumbling chapel, his brow ringed in shadows and his wingless body wreathed in light. Lucifer Morningstar had eyes only for Baines, sparing Kit not so much as a glance.

“Prometheus,” Kit whispered, leaning forward to see the red slick stain wetting the left side of the devil’s silken shirt.

“As I am summoned,” the fallen angel said formally, tilting his head so that the torchlight and the brazier light and the light of his own pale halo reflected on his hair in red and golden bands, “so have I come.”

His voice was a bare whisper, resonant of violoncello and the wind through midnight trees. It pressed Kit’s heart to thunder in his chest; all pretense of ignorance forgotten, Kit hurled himself backward against his restraints.

“I told thee no!” he shouted, fabric burning his skin. His feet went out from under him with the force of his struggle, but the cloths held him upright. He sagged against them– Like Christ from the cross–his arms lifted and spread wide, his shoulders bent open by the weight of his body, the bad one wrenched to pain. The cloak dropped to tangle about his ankles, leaving his bare back cold, the ghost of warmth fled. His hair hung in his eyes. He sobbed in pain and got his feet under him.

Lucifer did not turn his head, but Baines did, and smiled. “Hush, puss,” Baines said, a low tone that nevertheless carried. “Or I’ll yet see thee in that bridle thou dost so hate.”

Kit permitted his head to tip back onto his shoulders, and let his lashes shield his eyes from the dripping water, and the cloth hold his body up. He was too tired to fight further.

Outmaneuvered,he thought, listening to footsteps approach. Lucifer stood beside him, then, and Kit could imagine the rustle of wind from his wings. He pictured the slightly crooked, narrow‑bridged nose, the golden skin and hair, the strong line of Lucifer’s jaw. «Thou didst give thy consent, Sir Poet.»

“Because I thought it would thwart thee,” Kit answered aloud, refusing to look into those still, blue eyes. He didn’t want to encourage the false intimacy of Lucifer reading his thoughts. There would be enough false intimacy soon.

«I am rarely thwarted long. Dost thou never lose thy power to intrigue?»

“Get it over with,” Kit said. Not an answer but a command.

«Master Baines,» Lucifer continued, as if Kit’s answer meant nothing to him. «Do see about removing those rings.»

“The rings keep his power in check, my lord Prometheus.”

«His power is mine.» Lucifer answered, and that was all. Baines obeyed, the rings that Kit could not budge sliding smoothly into his captor’s hands. Kit kept his eyes tight shut, unsurprised when they cut his remaining clothes away. He could smell the coke, the tang of the hot irons, and knew he would soon smell his own cooking flesh.

The thought troubled him surprisingly little.

Not nearly as much as the soft touches of a paint‑brush on his skin, marking his body with intricate warm symbols. He did glance down then, and saw Baines crouched beside his feet, delineating sigils in a medium Kit knew by its sharp coppery smell was blood. The blood, he realized, of the first of the three dozen birds that fluttered in Poley’s long cage. The brush Baines used was a carefully pared raven’s quill.

“You’re killing the Tower ravens,” Kit said foolishly.

Baines glanced up at him and smiled. “Very clever, puss. Would you care to tell me why?”

“England will fall.”

“Leaving one less faith in Europe,” he said, dipping his brush. The blood had clotted, and he set the basin aside as Poley brought him the death of another sacred bird in a little white stoneware cup, a fresh trimmed quill balanced across the top. “Before you know it, everyone shall believe as Prometheus’ children will them to.”

You were halfway kind to me,Kit thought, with a sidelong glance at Lucifer. “Was my consent so important to you?”

«No man can be damned without consent.» the Prince of Lies answered. «Nor saved neither.»

That will teach me to say yes to anything.

“That doesn’t explain your kindness. Or that you promised me the power to deal with mine enemies.”

«All stories are true.» If Lucifer had been wearing his wings, they would have flicked tight shut just then. Kit found the fallen angel somehow–diminished–without them. Iron jingled in his hand. «Where are thy rings now? Where is thy cloak? Where are thy boots and thy blade? Where is thy name?»

You have them,Kit answered.

Lucifer laughed, and let the rings fall like drops of frozen blood, to ring on wet stone. «No power left but thine own, and that of my beautiful brother. All thy hoardings and borrowings stripped away. And yet though thy power will not be enough for thy purposes, it will suffice for mine.»

“How can you be so certain you can use my strength?” If I cannot outwill Baines, can I be certain I can outwill Lucifer?Somehow, the dripping water did not carve runnels in the patterns Baines painted over every inch of his body. Kit mourned the ravens, surprising himself, gritting his teeth as Poley brought Baines a third bowl of blood.

“Because my story is truer than thine,” Lucifer answered, “and because thou didst give thy consent.” Kit hissed in shock; the voice shook his body like a hard‑carilloned bell. Then he hissed again when Lucifer bent down and kissed his open mouth, and Kit felt the rustle of wings within.

Kit was bloody to the hollow under his chin. Cold water dripped from his hair, beads trickling between the bumps of gooseflesh.

He watched the conspirators move about the chapel, seeing plainly in the darkness again now that the barbed rings were off his hands. The cessation of that pain alone was such a relief that he could not stop flexing his fingers against the silk, leaving smears of color upon it. He didn’t look at Baines, even as Baines leaned close enough to him that Kit felt his breath hot on his skin.

Instead, Kit looked out into the darkness, wincing as Poley drew the very last raven from the cage, mastering its struggles as easily as Baines – time and again –had mastered Kit’s. He wrung the black bird’s neck and it fell limp in his hands, relaxed. Kit winced in grief.

Last one,” Poley said, after he had drained the blood from the bird and brought the vessel up to Baines. “He looks – interesting. ”

Kit turned his eyes away as Baines patted him on a red‑daubed shoulder. He watched Lucifer poke idly at a coal‑filled brazier, the rod stock in his hand brilliant red at the tip.

I’ve played into his hands. Again.

Gold and black. «I told thee so.»

Kit didn’t think the angel really deserved an answer.

Duke: There rest. Your partner, as I hear, must die to‑morrow,

And I am going with instruction to him.

God’s grace go with you! Benedicite! [Exit.]

Juliet: Must die to‑morrow! O injurious love,

That respites me a life, whose very comfort

Is still a dying horror!

–William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure,Act II, scene iii

“There must be something,” Will said tiredly, leaning back against the dank stone wall. His shaking hands ached with the cold; his feet were numb things at the bottoms of his legs.

“Nothing,” Murchaud answered, both hands raised over his head as he pressed the blank stones of the wall near a trio of identical arches. His sword, still clenched in his fist, caught the light of Tom’s lantern and reflected it back through cold drips of water.

Will tugged the hood of his cloak up and stepped away, back to the edge of the inadequate puddle of light.

“There is a taste of sorcery,” Murchaud said. “But it’s shielded and dark. I don’t know which of these paths to take.”

“I thought you knew where the chapel was. Your Highness.”

“Have you ever stopped to consider what a ridiculous honorific that is, Master Poet?” Murchaud moved slowly along the wall, trailing his hands over the stones nearest the dripping ceiling as if they might whisper something in his ear if properly coaxed. “Your Highness.Higher than what? At least Majestyor Graceare admirable traits to wish on a ruler.” His voice, softly cultured as ever, showed little sign of emotional strain until he dropped his hands to his side and swore. He turned his back to the abutment between two of the archways and leaned back on the dank stones, careless of his silk and velvet, his rapier angled across the front of his legs. “I can’t smell anything but mold and what magic they used to hide their trail.”

“Let me have the lantern, Sir Thomas.” Ben came forward, a hand on Will’s shoulder, and lifted it out of Tom’s hand. He crouched so the light was concentrated on the threshold of the first door. At the second he paused, running a finger over the stones, and at the third he bent very close for long seconds and then shook his head, finding nothing. “There’s a trace of blood through that second doorway, and what looks like a bare footprint on the stone–”

But?” said Tom, coming to retrieve the lantern.

“–but I think ‘tis not the way they walked.”

“Why not?” asked Will quietly, fiddling with the iron nail in his pocket to stop his hands trembling. He hated his hesitant steps for slowing them, hated the querulous nodding of his chin that he could not seem to stop.

Ben looked up, shook his head. “That, I know not.” Broad hands spread wide. “‘Tis but an intuition.”

“We should follow the blood,” Tom said, and Murchaud nodded. “Or we could split into pairs–”

“Aye, and be murdered all the more easily for our troubles,” Ben scoffed, standing.

It was Will, standing a little back from the other three and their conversation, who heard the rustle. “Gentlemen,” he murmured, amused when they all three fell silent. “Tom, a little light over here, an you please.”

Tom turned with the lantern just as Will turned, and a dark shape bigger than a terrier hopped awkwardly across the time‑heaved floor toward Will. He crouched, drawing his cloak tight so it would not flap and frighten the raven, and held out his hand. “How strange,” he said.

It fluttered into the air and landed on his fist, dry feet pinching and the impact as if somebody had smacked his hand with an overhand blow. He cushioned it, bending the elbow to take the weight, then standing with the assistance of his cane.

The bird cocked its head left and right, black eyes glittering in the lanternlight. It opened its beak and cawed once, harshly, with a tone of entreaty, and then stiff pinions brushed his doublet and chest as it lifted again and flew to wait in the third doorway, the one that Ben had hesitated by.

Will knew it by its twisted wing.

“Gentlemen,” he said. “I think we have a guide.”

They hurried.

The raven was impatient, and Will thought at one point that Tom was about to order Ben to carryWill. But somehow, four men and a bird managed to move through the low, tumbledown corridors in almost complete silence until the low murmur of voices and the flicker of torchlight ahead alerted them.

Ben and Murchaud went first while Tom hung back with the hooded lantern, one steadying hand on Will’s shoulder. The playmaker and the soldier moved forward with cat‑footed softness, stopping well inside the mouth of the tunnel. Will saw them silhouetted against the dim moving light beyond, and smiled. The darkness was their friend, the torchlight their ally; it would turn the mouth of this particular tunnel into a well of darkness for anyone in the open space beyond.

Will’s heart dropped into his gut at the expression he read on Murchaud’s face as the Elf‑knight leaned heavily on the wall, visibly restraining himself. Ben turned back to Tom and Will, waving them forward, and Tom left the lantern behind as he came.

The raven was heavy, rustling on his fist. Tom steadied him, but it was Ben’s big hands that almost lifted him up the last rubbled slope to the crumbling entryway, that turned his head with a gentle touch to see –

–Kit.

Naked. Wet. Shivering. A few steps up a raised dais on the far side of the red‑lit space, his feet planted shoulder‑width apart as if he held himself upright out of sheer defiance, his arms spread and bound wide. Shuddering visibly, even from fifty feet away, every time the two figures who stood beside him touched the skin of his face with the quills they held.

Will knew them both, and one of them was anything but a man.

Braziers bristling with the handles of irons stood under an improvised tent at the foot of the dais, and torches guttered here and there, but Kit’s flesh was redder than the firelight should paint it, and it took Will a moment to understand why.

“Holy mother Mary,” Will said. “Is that all his own blood?”

“I think, ” Murchaud answered softly, “that we should make haste to intervene, or our timely arrival will be wasted after all. Leave the Devil to me. Master Poet, if you would see to Kit’s freedom?”

Will lifted the raven off his fist and set it down on a high point of the rubble as Lucifer and Baines turned away from Kit and started toward the braziers. He drew his belt knife into his right hand and nodded, forcing himself not to think of what he was about to do.

“Ben and I will see to the rest of the rabble,” Tom said. ‘Baines is the one to watch. We three will go first and clear your path, Will–”

Don’t underestimate Robert Poley, either,Will thought, but all he said was, “Aye.” He took a single deep breath and nodded, his eyes trained on Baines as Baines and Lucifer separated, Lucifer climbing the stairs again and Baines moving toward a darkened corner of the chapel. “Go if you’re going, gentlemen.”

He was speaking to their backs. Murchaud’s silver rapier gleamed when the torchlight touched it, made itself a brand of darkness in between. The Elf‑knight slipped forward, half invisible in the shadows, and Ben and Tom flanked him. Will watched, fascinated, as Ben came up behind the lone man tending the braziers and broke his neck.

Kit, standing like a statue between the pillars, did not move. But Lucifer did, leaning close to Kit with a heated iron held negligently in his hand. He had not even time to turn to face Murchaud as the Elf‑knight’s advance metamorphosed fluidly into a tackle. “S’wounds,” Will muttered, limping forward, his knife concealed in the fall of his sleeve. “This is a fool’s errand if ever I’ve seen one.”

It’s no sin to deceive a Christian;

For they themselves hold it a principle,

Faith is not to be held with heretic…

–Christopher Marlowe, The Jew of Malta,Act II, scene iii

In a moment, the heat would touch him. Kit braced himself for the pain, tilting his chin down to his chest and imagining that his weight flowed like water through his pelvis and down his legs, anchoring him to the floor. He closed his eyes–a blessing anyway, as they tended to fall on the heap of mutilated ravens at the foot of the steps–and drew deep, heavy breaths. Mehiel stirred, so close to the surface that he could feel the muscles under his skin that would move the giant wings. He heard the rustle of feathers, smelled their warmth.

We’ve done this before,Kit assured the trembling angel. It’s only the fire.

One breath and then another, and then again. The air filling his lungs was thick and sweet, invigorating, full of the scent of fresh blood and hot metal. Very similar scents, some part of his brain mused, looking for a fresh conceit. Anything to distract himself upon. Mehiel. What are we going to do?

«Endure.» the angel answered.

«Be strong, my love.» Lucifer whispered in his ear.

Kit readied himself as best he could, gritting his teeth as if sheer willpower could keep him silent against what was to come. The fine hairs on his back melted under the nearness of the iron. The Morningstar’s long fingers tangled in his hair.

Something that Kit did not see struck Lucifer from the side, knocking him away, and the iron rang on the stones and then sizzled. The blow thrust Kit forward against his restraints, shoulders wrenched as his feet came out from under him. He yelped, a startled sound, and struggled back upright, twisting in futile desperation to seek the source of sounds of swordplay and a struggle. He couldn’t turn his head far enough to see anything of use.

But a moment later a hand was on his shoulder, and that he could crane his neck to see, and gasped in shock at the worry in blue eyes and a tight, hopeful smile. “Kit, can you hear me?”

“Will ! ” Kit glanced around wildly, glimpsed shadowy combat through blurred vision. Recognized Murchaud’s dark hair and nimble grace circling a laughing Prince of Hell, saw Ben Jonson brandishing a red‑tipped iron poker he must have snatched up from a brazier, and shook his head in wonder. “Will, they’ll be slaughtered – ”

The playmaker shook his head. “Your Prince assures me he can handle this, here, now. How badly are you hurt?”

Not at all,” Kit answered, and then saw where Will’s eyes rested. “‘Tis not my blood.” He pointed with his chin, while Will produced a dagger from his belt and sawed at tautstretched silk. Something about the wasted slaughter of all those birds made his breath catch in his throat, and he choked on it, refusing to cry now that he could almost taste safety. “They slaughtered all the ravens.”

“Not all.”

Kit sagged as Will severed the left‑hand restraint, surprised by Will’s strength as his friend hauled him to his feet. Kit looked up, trying to catch Will’s eye, but Will was moving hastily to free Kit’s other hand. “Not all?”

“I left a friend in the hallway …” Will’s sawing dagger parted the final shred of cloth. He glanced sideways as silver rang on steel. “Murchaud could use thy help, 1 imagine.”

Kit looked down at his naked, blood‑covered body, the short lengths of gossamer trailing from his wrists. At his fingers, swollen and raw. And bare of their restraining rings.

He smiled. “I don’t suppose thou didst bring me a blade, sweet William?”

“Alas,” Will said, and stooped slowly. When he stood, something long and dark speared from his hand: a length of twisted rod stock, drawn to a fine sharp point. It steamed slightly in the torchlight as Will reversed it in his hand and offered the looped butt to Kit. “Thy rapier, my love.”

It weighed more than a rapier, and would be useless for a cut. But the point was sharp, and the iron was heavy. He glanced over Will’s shoulder to where Murchaud fought Lucifer, falling back steadily before the Devil’s laughing, casual advance. Lucifer had drawn a blade from somewhere, a shadowy thing that flickered like his crown and rang like steel on Murchaud’s silver rapier. None of the others came near them; Tom and Ben stood back‑to‑back at the foot of the stairs, guarding Will and Kit. Ben still held the poker, Tom a brace of pistols. Between them they had three men at bay, a fourth one bleeding among the murdered ravens. Neither Baines nor Poley was anywhere in sight.

Kit snickered. The improvised weapon in his hand, the comfort of his friend at his side, were all the strength he needed. “Now all I need is a pair of breeches.”

Will pointed at a dead man, falling back a step. “That one looks about thy size.”

Lucifer’s dark blade struck sparks from a pillar as Murchaud ducked and cursed. Kit’s head turned. “And boots more‑so,” he growled, and sprinted barefoot and unclad over wet stones and slick mud to reach Murchaud’s side.

A moment’s eagerness for battle might race his heart and pulse false strength along his veins, but his long confinement had left him unfit and he knew it. Four steps down, a wave of vertigo caught him like a trap. He stumbled, expecting the hard stones on knees and forearms, the skitter of the iron bar on the tiles. There was shouting, nearby. The clash of iron on steel, blade on bar. Tom’s voice, Ben’s. A grunt, the sizzle of coals on wet tile as someone kicked over a brazier. Kit heard it all, scented, tasted. Pushed it away and dove.

And something caught him falling, a hard slap like wings cupping air, a jerk like a harness, a blaze of light around his hands and under his skin, silhouetting the crimson sigils painted on every inch of his flesh black on hot sunlight.

He sailed forward, the dark iron in his hand burning like a spear of light, a voice like a choir of falcons bellowing Lucifer’s name somehow rising from his throat, and everything a fury of gold‑barred black and searing light. “Behold!” Mehiel?

«Be not afraid, my friend.»

Except Lucifer straightened, that dark sword still in his hand. Kit saw through the haze of Mehiel’s wrath the edge smeared red with blood, the blade itself bottomless dark: a cut in reality, whatever lay behind it gleaming with silver motes like stars. “Murchaud, strikehim,” Kit cried in his own voice, but the silver blade was falling from the Elf‑knight’s fingers, and he was settling slowly, breathlessly back against the fluted pillar he stood before, both hands clutched across his abdomen and red welling through fisted fingers.

:Be not afraid: Mehiel said again, and–wearing Kit’s body like a suit of armor –raised his sword of light and purity to parry Lucifer’s blow.

But Lucifer barely tapped the blade, teasing, and stepped back, opening his guard to all but bare his chest. «Brother,» he said mockingly, «how it pleases me to fence with thee. Come, strike.»

His words resonated in Kit, and Kit shook his head, knowing that the words were meant for Mehiel. Mehiel, who knotted Kit’s fist on the butt of the poker and slipped steadily to the side, tapping lightly not at Lucifer’s breast but at Lucifer’s blade.

«Come,» the Devil whispered. «This is not stage fighting. Strike at me.»

And Mehiel did, but it was a wild blow and Lucifer deflected it without obvious effort. The angel in Kit said nothing, but Kit felt his confusion, his passion–

–his memory of Lucifer’s fingers lovingly carding Kit’s hair. Strike him!Kit urged, and Mehiel swung again.

Inadequate. And Lucifer did not strike back.

Mehiel lowered his sword and stepped away. «I cannot.»

Mehiel!

«I cannot,» the angel repeated. «I cannot strike. God forgive me. I pity Lucifer.»

Then let me strike him,Kit replied, and lifted the iron poker in his hand.

Come not between the dragon and his wrath.

–William Shakespeare, King Lear,Act I, scene i

Kit moved like a serpent, Will thought, and not a man. No. Not a serpent.

A dragon.

Will almost saw the massive wings that hurled him forward, didsee the halo of light that curled and flickered about his head and hands, the power and fluidity in his gestures as Murchaud fell and Kit lunged toward Lucifer. Will had just enough time to hear weapon crash against weapon once and then again before a hard arm clipped his neck and he found himself dragged backward, too startled at first to react.

“Master Shakespeare.” Robert Poley’s voice. Robert Poley’s broad‑palmed hand and rough fingers clenched upon Will’s jaw, stretching the tight muscles of his neck. He dragged Will backward, off balance, far stronger than Will. His other hand caught Will’s right wrist in a numbing grip, immobilizing the knife Will hadn’t had time to resheathe. “Do you suppose Master Merlin would surrender to ensure your safety? ”

“‘Tis possible,” Will admitted through gritted teeth, determined not to give Poley the satisfaction of hearing his fear. Foolish, he thought, as his heart raced dizzyingly. He bit his lips and let his body go slack, trying to roll and fall forward to the water‑slick tiles. Poley kept him upright with ease, his livery stiff against Will’s back, the ornate buttons gouging Will’s skin through layers of cloth. Lucifer was laughing, defending himself delightedly from the slender light‑wrapped figure who pressed him only tentatively. “But I do not think Master Merlin is in command, at present.”

“Pity,” Poley said, his grip tightening. At the foot of the dais, Will could hear Tom and Ben engaged in a passage of arms with whatever men remained. Poley sneered, still backing away, still dragging Will. “Then I’m afraid I have no use for you–”

Will heard another set of wing beats. Smaller, lighter, a cracking sound like paper shaken in the air. He ducked, bruising his throat on Poley’s thumb, and kicked back hard against the side of the other man’s knee just as something black and heavy barreled shrieking into Poley’s face.

Poley swore and pressed his face to Will’s shoulder, protecting his eyes. A good conceit, except his right hand’s grip loosened on Will’s wrist, and Will was ready for it. He ducked under the buffet of the raven’s wings and slammed the dagger into Poley’s right thigh. Poley staggered backward, fingers clenching on Will’s jaw, and Will clung to the dagger and let himself fall forward, shielding his face with his flat left hand.

Hot, raw‑smelling blood spurted, soaked his sleeve to his skin, sprayed his breeches and the back of his calf. He went to his knees and then forward as Poley fell.

The stones slammed the wind from Will, and somehow Will kept his dagger and rolled. He came up, saw blood fountaining, and backed away on his hands and knees until he was out of range. Somehow, the dagger remained in his hand. The pommel scraped on stone harshly enough to make him grit his teeth.

Will had opened a gash like a gaping mouth in Robin Poley’s inner thigh. Poley twitched and kicked on the stones, groaning as if he’d been kicked in the gut, red blood spurting between his clutching fingers and his other hand raised in a futile attempt to keep the croaking, stabbing raven from his eyes.

Will scrambled to his feet, spitting blood, wiping blood from his face with blood‑soaked hands, and turned to go to Kit‑

–just as Lucifer saluted with his star‑black blade, chuckled, and vanished like a cloud blown to tatters across the moon. Kit, committing to a lunge behind his poker as if behind a rapier thrust, measured his length on the silted tiles.

Poley fell slack, bubbling. The raven raised its head, jet eyes gleaming in the darkness, blood and vitreous fluid dripping from its beak, and regarded Will with feral intensity. Will looked away with an effort, eyes seeking Ben, or Tom.

Or Kit, who pushed himself up onto his hands and knees – naked again, no longer clothed in light, the bloody patterns marked on his skin blurred with effort –and swore most vilely. He turned over his shoulder, and met Will’s eyes. “I swear to God he planned that,” Kit said, and flopped over like a fish thrashing on a deck.

“Does that mean you know what he’s playing at?”

Kit shook his head, modesty abandoned. “Unless he was trying to awaken Mehiel,” Kit said, holding up a hand that briefly flickered gold. “In which case, he’s succeeded admirably. I don’t honestly believe he wants the Prometheans in power, though. Otherwise he wouldn’t keep interfering with their plans for him.”

Will saw movement alongside the shadows near the far wall. A lean figure in dark clothing, forcing himself to his feet. “Your Prince is still bleeding, Kit – ”

“Murchaud!” Blinking, startled, as if he had utterly forgotten the Elf‑knight’s existence, Kit turned away from the mortal men and hurried to Murchaud’s side. Kit pulled Murchaud upright, checking his injuries with a fussiness that left Will tasting bile and jealousy. “Art well?” Kit answered, and even by torchlight Will didn’t miss his hopeful smile.

“I’ll live,” the elf answered, straightening. “There is no iron in Lucifer’s blade, and naught else can harm me for long.” He glanced about the room, squeezing Kit’s hand before he let it fall. “It will bleed, but that is all. In any case, the Faeries will be here shortly, and even if Baines’ plans for Kit have been altered, there’s a scene or two yet to play.”

Will dragged himself up and staggered away from Poley’s corpse, threw his own blood‑slaked cloak over Kit’s bloody and goosefleshed body. Then he sank down on the wet tiles beside Kit and Murchaud, crossed his legs, leaned his elbows on his knees, and pressed his forehead into his hands. “This is all too complicated for me.”

Kit dropped down beside Will and lay back on the floor as if he reclined in a featherbed, drawing the cloak around him. Tom and Ben staggered over to them. “A timely rescue, gentlemen. Now find me a pair of trousers, and we’ll see if we can manage a timelier one.”

Ben limped heavily, blood staining the outside of his breeches. “Can’t find Baines,” he said, bending down to brace his hands on his knees, breathing like a runner.

“Bloody buggered Christ,” Kit answered, sitting up so Will could see the long curve of his back. “I imagine he’ll find us before the evening’s out. It’s all for naught. The war’s over for England and James anyway: the portents have spoken, and the Tower’s bastions are breached with the deaths of the ravens – ”

The heavy beat of wings interrupted Kit. He looked up as the crippled raven rowed heavily through the air and landed on Will’s automatically upraised fist.

Kit blinked. “A raven. Unwounded and alive.”

Will smiled, and Tom Walsingham coughed into his hand. “Just one. But one’s enough, isn’t it? All stories are true stories, or so Will tells me.”

“All stories – ” Will and Kit shared a glance, and it was Will who looked up first. “Kit, should we be asking ourselves what Lucifer wants?”

Kit shook his head. “I wonder if we should be asking ourselves what ‘tis he wants to become.He’s Prometheus, thou knowest. And the serpent Amaranth too.”

“‘Twas Amaranth told me where to find thee, Kit,” Will said. He held out his hand to help the other poet to his feet. “I don’t understand–”

“Surely you don’t think the Father of Lies is limited to one shape only,” Kit said dryly, once his feet were under him. “You know how you said of Salisbury, he plays his game as if there is no other player, only pieces that sometimes move themselves?” His voice was quiet, his gaze hooded, as if he directed his commentary not to Will and Tom and Ben, but someone closer still. “Aye… .” Will glanced at Ben for assistance. Ben looked up from binding his leg.

“Sir Christopher, ” Ben said softly, “are you suggesting that Lucifer is playing both sides of the board?”

“I’m saying that his opponent is refusing to move, and he’s attempting to provoke–something. A commitment. Possibly just a response. We’ve walked into a lovers’ quarrel, gentlemen.”

“Walked, or been dragged?” Will shook his head.

Act V, scene xviii

We are no traitors, therefore threaten not.

–Christopher Marlowe, Edward II,Act I, scene :

It might lack of warmth, comfort, and sartorial splendor, but Kit was happy simply to be clothed. He’d resumed the white breeches–grimy enough now that they would be slightly better suited to skulking in the darkness–and pulled his shirt back on over the bloody sigils that patterned his flesh. He scrubbed the cloth against his skin to smear the marks, and looked up to see Will watching with an inscrutable expression twisting his mouth.

“What happens next? ” Will asked, when Kit would not look down. Will’s fingers idly stroked the rainbow‑dark plumage of the raven that perched on his wrist, and Kit’s fingers itched with the memory of feathers. If he closed his eyes, he was sure he would feel those enormous wings again, lifting him, bearing him up–

He was glad Mehiel hadn’t struck down Lucifer. Glad, and furious. Conflict is the essence of drama.He shrugged and turned to seek Murchaud, but the elf‑Prince was in conversation with Tom. “I’ll find a pair of boots,” Kit answered, and went to pull Poley’s off his dead feet.

They were too soaked with blood to wear, which was a pity, because they would have fit, unlike the too‑large ones Kit liberated from the corpse of the man Ben had killed, which rubbed his feet to blisters as the five of them wound back through the tunnels to the surface, a straggling line lit by two lanterns.

Ben took the lead on the argument that Baines was still ahead of them somewhere, and neither Kit nor Will in any condition to fight. Kit, leaning on a captured poker as he walked, raised an eyebrow at that, but the big man shrugged. “It looked from my vantage as if Lucifer made a point in failing to injure you, Master Marlin.”

“Aye,” Kit said. “I’m untouchable. Pity your charge is not, Will.” He gestured to the raven, who seemed quite content to nestle against the curve of Will’s neck. “I think I recognize that bird.”

“He’s prone to keeping company with the prisoners in the Salt Tower,” Will said, craning his head with amusement to see the witchlights that flitted from Kit’s hands, and Murchaud’s. “We made an acquaintance while I was there.”

“That is no natural raven,” Murchaud said from the rear of the group.

“Aye,” Will answered. “I had come to suspect as much. Some form of Faerie creature?”

“Some such thing, Master Shakespeare.”

Will staggered in exhaustion. Tom put a hand on his shoulder at the same instant that Kit caught his arm. The raven beat its wings heavily, but seemed loath to abandon its perch; Will yelped as its talons pinched. “And the sole thing betwixt England and destruction, if the legends of ravens and the Tower are true. We cannot even bring him away for the danger: he must stay in the Tower precincts.”

“That bird on your shoulder is the reason behind the legends,” Murchaud said.

Kit glanced over his shoulder at the elf‑Prince. Murchaud moved wearily, as if his bones ached, frowning as Kit met his gaze. “Too much iron?” Kit asked.

Murchaud nodded. “London is full of it.”

“The reason behind the legends?” Will’s voice, considering. He leaned heavily on Tom’s arm now, to Kit’s concealed annoyance. “That seems to me a statement that begs an explanation, Your Highness.”

Kit coughed, every breath still carrying the metallic reek of the ravens’ blood crackling and itching on his skin. He stopped with his hand across his mouth, his feet suddenly too heavy to lift, and turned to Murchaud in speechless amazement. His mouth worked once or twice. “But he lies in Faerie,” Kit said. “Thou didst show me his bier.”

“Beg pardon,” said Ben, at the front with the lantern. “But all this talking will make it certain that if Baines isahead of us, he’ll hear us coming.”

“Wait, Ben,” Tom answered. “I have a feeling we’d do well to hear this out. Kit, of whom dost speak?”

Kit didn’t look, didn’t lower his eyes from Murchaud’s. The Elf‑knight shrugged. “Aye. He sleeps in Faerie as well, but–”

“All stories are true,” Kit finished, and craned his neck for a better look at the raven. The bird cocked its head at him, a sideways twist like a girl tossing her hair, and Kit laughed low in his throat. “I’ll be buggered,” he said, and angled his gaze to meet Will’s eyes.

Will shook his head. “Thou’rt insane.”

“Arthur Pendragon,” Kit said, and so saying made his nagging suspicion crystallize with a sound like cracking ice. He turned to face Murchaud, and bit his lip on the smile he wanted to taste. “Turned into a raven when he died. Murchaud–”

“Aye?” The Prince did smile. “It changes nothing. We protect the bird, and we climb.”

“Oh,” Will said, craning his neck to examine the profile of the black bird on his shoulder. “And when we get to the surface?”

“We deal with my mother and my wife,” Murchaud answered. “We save the life of a mortal King. We do not let England or Faerie fall.”

“That’s something I’m not sure I understand,” Will said, still idly caressing the raven’s head. “What is it that they hope to accomplish here tonight, Prince Murchaud? Why are the Fae in London at all?”

Murchaud shrugged; Kit felt the heavy lift and drop of the Prince’s shoulders, the swing of his cloak, and spared a moment wishing for his own patchwork cloak. Baines probably burned it.The imagined loss stung. “It’s an auspicious night for the overthrow of regimes. Baines’ plans are not the only ones coming to fruition on November fifth.”

“No,” Kit said. “Lucifer’s as well – ” He was struck by a sudden, vivid memory of the Mebd’s golden hair spread between his fingers, the cool, smooth surface of a tortoise‑shell comb, and he stopped and lowered his voice so that only the Elf‑knight would hear. “Morgan’s. What’s Morgan after, Murchaud? I remember when first I came to Faerie, it was her ear thou didst whisper into, and not the Mebd’s.”

Murchaud rested a hand on his elbow, almost lifting him up the ragged stairs. Only pride kept Kit from leaning hard on Murchaud’s arm. “Thinkst thou so little of me, Sir Poet, that I must serve the agenda of my mother or my Queen, and have no passions of mine own?” The hand squeezed, pulling the sting from the words.

Kit shot Murchaud a sideways glance, and realized it was true. Exactly and precisely: he had indeed assumed that Murchaud served Morgan’s whims, and to a lesser extent those of the Mebd. “Very well,” he said. “What is it that thou dost seek?”

Freedom,” Murchaud answered succinctly. “We all have our own purposes in seducing thee, Sir Poet. Thee, and that which thou dost harbor.”

“Seducing me.” He laughed. “In Morgan’s case, breaking me into a shape of which she approved. She told me she thought I was the one who could reconcile Faerie and Hell, England’s crown and the Prometheans.”

“Aye. And the Mebd thinks that thou – and Mehiel – are the ones who can burst Faerie’s bond with Hell, can destroy the Prometheans so that we no longer need Lucifer’s protection from the avenging spirit the Prometheans would set as the Divine.”

“Lucifer is Prometheus,” Kit said. “I do not understand why he takes payment to protect us from himself.”

Murchaud laughed softly. “An old acquaintance of Robert Poley’s, and thou dost not understand how extortion works? Besides” – a modest pause – “Lucifer no doubt has plans of his own. Which he has not seen fit to share.”

“He maneuvers all the pieces,” Kit answered, climbing. Will slipped on the stairs. Kit reached up to steady him, and Murchaud steadied Kit. Above them, Ben kept climbing, inexorable as a Jewish golem,and at the rear, Tom followed. No one spoke, and Kit realized they were all listening as intently to his quiet conversation with Murchaud as if they leaned close over a candle‑lit table in some tavern, whispering conspiracies. “I believe I know what he wants, Murchaud.”

Murchaud turned his head. “Aye?”

“The love of God,” Kit said plainly, and winced at his own forgetfulness when Murchaud flinched and stumbled.

“Thy pardon, Kit – ”

“Nay,” Kit said. “Thy pardon, I cry. But that does not answer the question that holds me most.”

“Aye?”

“What is it that thouseekest, Elf‑knight? Thou hast not made that plain to me, but thou must have some use for me, or thou wouldst not have been so kind, so long.”

“I–” The Elf‑knight hesitated. “I am Fae.”

It was not an excuse, but simply a statement, and Kit nodded agreement. “‘Tis so. So tell me now.”

A low, solemn laugh. “Thou didst never ask before.”

“I make no argument. And I am asking now.”

“Faerie,” Murchaud said. “Sovereign.” He looked pointedly at the raven huddled on Will’s shoulder. “I would like to see the ghosts and legends settled. I’d like, perhaps, to know for a day what story I might walk through–”

“You want what Baines wants,” Kit said coolly. “You want to choose the nature of the Divine.”

“‘Tis futile,” Murchaud answered. “Say rather I’d prefer that some stories were just stories. That a legend could change without changing the world. Call it the inverse of the Prometheans’ goal–if they wish to shape the stories, I wish to not be shaped by them.”

Kit considered that in silence for a moment or two, and found himself in sympathy. Mehiel?

«Ask me not about morality,» the angel said unhappily. «when I, an Angel of the Lord, find myself in love with Lucifer Morningstar.»

Kit blinked at the words. In love.

«Hast another name for it?»

Slowly, thoughtfully, Kit shook his head. If I found a way to free thee, Mehiel–

«Thou must not,» the angel said. «Thou must not give thy life up needlessly. We will endure.»

–regardless. If thou wert freed, what wouldst thou do?

A hesitation as the angel pondered his question. Fleetingly, Kit wondered if an angel could lie.

«Go home.» Mehiel answered, after a little while.

Return to God’s embrace. Go back to Heaven, and out of Hell. Despite thy love for the Morningstar.

«Wouldst not thou? Wouldst choose love over Heaven?»

Kit chuckled softly. Mehiel.He laid a hand on Murchaud’s arm, and Murchaud gave him the edge of a worried smile in the inadequate, flickering light. I have.

Another pause for thought. «Wouldst choose love over duty, then? Over remaining true to thyself?»

And Kit thought of Edward de Vere, and shook his head. Thou art right. But what wilt thou take home to the Lord thy God that thou hadst not when thou wert taken? Thou, Mehiel. Thou who art a piece of God?

«Thee,» the angel answered without hesitation. «Man, mortal and fragile. I know thee now, and thou art more worthy of brotherhood than I had realized. And I will take in that brotherhood all thou art, and thy true‑love’s grief and pity over his son, over thy pain. I will take the Fae in all their sorrow and bitterness and their solemn pact with Hell.»

And the Love thou hast for another–

Silence. And then the angel, wondering, the flex of black‑barred yellow wings. «Love. For the Morningstar. Yes, I will bear that home as well.»

Aye.Climbing still.

«Sympathy.»

“Simple,” Kit said dryly. “Or sympathetic magic, rather.”

“I beg thy pardon, Kit?”

“Nothing, Will. I don’t think we need to worry about the Morningstar further, fellows. Lucifer has what he came for.” All my life is stairs, Mehiel.

«Better stairs than falling,» the angel answered, but he did not sound convinced.

There were no torches lit in the Tower’s great courtyard when the ragged, soaking little party emerged from the bowels of the earth. No mortal lights illuminated the scene: not even a few candles flickering dimly in the windows of the White Tower. There was only the ethereal moonlit glow surrounding the court of the Daoine Sidhe, who waited on their Fae steeds like so many ghostly riders on a procession out of Hell.

The Mebd sat her black horse sidesaddle in the center of the procession, and on her right side, on a milky gray the shaded color of alabaster, Kit was surprised to meet the eyes of Morgan le Fey. Cairbre the bard rode beside them, and a half‑dozen other Fae Kit knew more or less well –

–and, on a shaggy, floppy‑eared pony no taller than Kit’s breastbone, the gawky figure of Robin Goodfellow, elbows akimbo and knees disarrayed.

Kit felt Murchaud drawing himself up tall, and laid a hand on the Prince’s elbow. “Puck?” A stage whisper, and Murchaud looked at him and shrugged.

“She knows thou dost care for him,” Murchaud said. “Perhaps his freedom is a gift to thee, to reassure thee of her good will. They’re waiting for us, Kit–”

“No,” Will said, even more softly, raising one knotted, trembling hand to point to a figure clad in raven‑black, a gold chain glinting at his shoulders as he entered the spill of Faerie light. “They’re waiting for the Earl of Salisbury.”

Act V, scene xix

March all one way, and be no more oppos’d

Against acquaintance, kindred, and allies:

The edge of war, like an ill‑sheathed knife,

No more shall cut his master.

–William Shakespeare, Henry IV Part I,Act I, scene i

“Jesus wept,” Kit said, and started forward. Will held on to his sleeve and followed; Ben, Tom, and Murchaud paced them a little behind. Given pride of place by a Prince and a Knight,Will thought, amused despite the worry seething in the pit or his belly. Or perhaps they’re simply willing to let us be the ones to beard the lions. And the lionesses.

Salisbury turned as they came up on him, a double‑dozen guards and yeomen ranged at his back. He considered and dismissed first Kit and then the rest of the party–their bruises and scrapes, their mud‑spattered rags. “Gentlemen,” he said, in a tone that didn’t mean gentle.His black robes rustled as he turned, and Will fought the ridiculous desire to step behind Kit like a child twisting himself in his mother’s skirts.

Kit, whose battered dignity as he limped forward to face Salisbury lifted Will’s heart into his throat and brought tears to his eyes. Will blinked against sharpness, glanced over Salisbury’s shoulder, and caught the considering gaze of the Queen of Faerie on her horse that might have been carved from jet. The Mebd blinked once, long violet eyes closing like a cat’s, and Will dropped his gaze to the silent consideration between Kit and Salisbury.

Kit’s mouth was half opened to speak.

Even now, Will realized, he could sense Kit’s movements with a lover’s awareness. He wasn’t sure if that comforted or troubled him, but he stepped closer because he could, and raised one hand to touch the hackled raven crouched on his shoulder. A cold breeze coiled around his ankles with a physical weight, heavy with moisture from the wet paving stones. “My lord Earl,” he said, in his most carefully measured tone. “Your timing is impeccable.”

“Master Shakespeare?” Salisbury’s eyebrow rose at Will’s impertinence.

Oh, I’m making no friends tonight,Will thought, and didn’t care.

“What is that on your shoulder?”

“The salvation of the realm,” Will answered. He squeezed Kit’s elbow and felt Kit lean against him –not so much relaxing as seeking comfort and perhaps warmth, despite the way he almost flinched away from Will’s steadying touch. The air above ground was colder than in the tunnels, and Kit shivered violently. Will remembered the blood on his foot.

“Please,” Kit said wearily through the chatter of his teeth. Let us pass, my lord.”

Salisbury glanced from Kit to Will and back again, sparing his final glance for Murchaud. Tom and Ben were silent, tall pillars on either side of the poets and the Prince.

“If we’re all nominally on the side that does not look forward to a Promethean conquest of England and the Church,” Will said, lifting his chin, “I must agree with Sir Christopher. You misjudged Baines and Poley, my lord, and it is only through the bravery of these men behind me that the King and the crown were saved tonight.”

“Misjudged?”

Will smiled. He imagined it wasn’t a pleasant one, and thought the glance Kit angled him was proud and amused. “This raven on my shoulder is the last raven at the Tower, my lord. All the rest are dead.”

He wished he’d seen Salisbury take that short, ragged step back under circumstances where he could appreciate the victory. “Where are Baines and Poley?”

Will gathered his thoughts, but Kit beat him to the answer. “Poley is dead,” he said. Will admired the lack of apparent relish in his voice, and then blinked, startled, when he saw the golden earring wink in the shadows under Kit’s tangled hair. I’LL be damned–“Baines has perhaps gone to join Catesby and Fawkes and their friends. I can’t say–”

“Fawkes is in custody,” Salisbury said, smoothing the front of his robes. The silence that followed was all but thick enough for Will to lean into. The harness of the fey horses creaked with their breathing; the eyes of the Faerie riders rested on himself, on Kit, on Murchaud. “Catesby and his bravos will follow before dusk, I warrant. We know his movements well, and their plot is ended, the gunpowder seized, the kingdom quite safe.”

“Quite safe from explosions,” Tom Walsingham supplied, with a sideways glance at Will. Will nodded, sneaking his hand into his pocket to rub the iron nail in its silken pouch. “Safe from sorcery?”

“Sorcery–”

“Scoffs a man with the Queen of Faerie at his back and a magician close enough to spit in his eye?” Kit said softly. He glanced at Will.

Will picked up the cue as smoothly as Burbage might have, and continued. “The astrologer Dee would tell you the same. ‘Tis a night for the fall of kingdoms, Robert.”

Will could see Salisbury’s shock at his use of his Christian name, the ripple that spread through the guardsmen at his back. He bit his lips to keep from laughing at the casual way Kit pushed forward, all but disregarding Salisbury, moving toward the Fae. Will kept to Kit’s elbow, grateful when Murchaud came along on the other side, and Tom and Ben stayed with them as if drilled.

Kit limped heavily now, and Will kept a hand under his elbow to support him, limping himself. Murchaud shot them a sideways glance, and seemed as if he might move closer. And then bit his lip, nodded, and looked away. Will was surprised to find himself grateful for the Elf‑knight’s looming presence.

It was the Puck who came to greet them, his lop ears lolling like his pony’s, with the clop of unshod hooves on stone. Will took a breath in relief when Kit didn’t shrug off his steadying hand, instead seeming to lean harder. “I see you are forgiven, Master Goodfellow,” he said.

Aye,” Puck answered, his ears laid flat down the nape of his neck. “Art thou?”

Will squeezed Kit’s arm, sensing some unspoken context. He glanced up at Kit, who frowned. “Thou art the one who can answer that, Master Goodfellow.”

The Puck glanced from Kit to Will to Salisbury, sideways at Murchaud, and then over his shoulder at the silent, solemn Queens. “Yes,” he said softly. “I suppose I am. Your steed is ready, Sir Poet.”

“As long as it’s not white,” Kit answered, and followed where Puck led, toward the rear of the Fae guard. Salisbury stamped off in the opposite direction and stood, conferring with one of the yeomen.

Will hung back a little, with a glance to Murchaud. “Where are we going?

“Damned if I know,” the Elf‑knight answered. “I suspect it will involve hunting Richard Baines to ground, but nevertheless we should ask the Mebd.” With a single glance to see that Tom and Ben were following, he went to pay court on his Queen, taking Will’s elbow as Will had been holding Kit’s. Salisbury, still off to one side, didn’t manage to intercept them and take precedence; Ben and Tom moved to block his attempt. There’ll be Hell to pay over that.

The raven on Will’s shoulder twisted its head to look back at the soldiers, ruffling its damaged wing as if the cold air pained it. “There’ll be Hell to pay no matter what,” Murchaud commented quietly, and smiled when Will raised an eyebrow at him. “You were thinking out loud, Master Poet.”