Chapter 39: The Grey Angel

Edmund Ashworth, Earl of Morland, had discovered that fear was an excellent substitute for sleep. It sharpened the senses, quickened the blood, and—most annoyingly—kept one utterly, miserably awake. He had not slept in thirty hours. His eyes felt like two stones in a riverbed, and his mind, usually so content to drift, now raced with the image of the scarred man in the grey cloak.

They had taken refuge in a cramped safe house off Thames Street, a merchant’s counting room that smelled of tallow and old wool. Walsingham had provided it, along with a boy who brought bread, cheese, and watered ale, and who asked no questions. The boy had also brought a message, sealed with the spider’s own ring.

Cecily read it aloud, her voice low. “He says the Queen has agreed to see you tomorrow at Nonesuch. She is hunting today, and he advises you to be in the presence chamber by the tenth hour. He also says—‘the Falcon is not the only bird we must trap. There is a second, one who flies closer to the throne. I have a name for you, but it must be spoken in person.’”

Edmund stared at the bread in his hand as if it had betrayed him. “A second bird. Of course. Why have one traitor when you can have a flock?”

“It is the nature of nests,” Cecily said, “to be full of vermin.”

He did not argue. He was too tired. He ate the bread and drank the ale, and then, because the floor was as good a bed as any he had known in the past two days, he lay down on a pile of sacking and closed his eyes.

He dreamed of the lute. The melody was one he had composed in his youth, a gentle pavane for a girl he had once loved, before he had learned that love was a great deal of effort. In the dream, he played it perfectly, the notes falling like rain on a still pond. And then the strings broke, one by one, until there was only silence and the cold pressure of a knife against his throat.

He woke with a gasp. The room was dark. The candle had guttered. Cecily sat in the corner, her knees drawn up, a dagger in her hand. She was watching the door.

“You slept two hours,” she said. “That is more than I have had in three days.”

He sat up, rubbing his neck. The dream had left a phantom ache. “You should have woken me.”

“And have you snore through the footsteps of a hired killer? No. I prefer to be the one who hears death approaching. I am better at it.”

He did not have the strength to argue. He rose, stretched, and moved to the window. The street below was quiet, the fog rolling in from the river. Somewhere out there, the Falcon was hunting. And somewhere closer, a second bird was waiting to fly.

“What do you think Walsingham means by ‘closer to the throne’?” he asked.

Cecily did not look at him. “It could be anyone. The Queen’s physicians. Her ladies. Her fool, even.”

“Her fool would be a better choice than her cousin. At least the fool is expected to be mad.”

“One cannot be mad and a traitor at the same time,” Cecily said. “Madness excuses everything. Treason excuses nothing. They are opposites.”

Edmund considered this. “I think,” he said slowly, “that a man can be both very sane and very treasonous, and use his sanity to hide his treason. It is the sanest men who are the most dangerous.”

She turned to look at him, and for a moment, her sharpness softened. “You are not as lazy as you pretend, my lord.”

“I am exactly as lazy as I pretend,” he said. “It is merely that my pretending requires a great deal of effort.”

A knock at the door. Three taps, then two, then one—the signal Walsingham’s boy had been told to use. Cecily moved, silent as a cat, and opened the door a crack. A hand passed through, holding a rolled paper. She took it, closed the door, and unrolled it by the candle’s dying light.

“It is from Mistress Alice,” she said, her voice tight. “She says the widow with the blue door has been watched since we left. She moved to a second house, in Southwark, near the bear pit. She says we must not go there—it is a trap. She also says the Falcon is not one man. He is three. Three brothers, all trained in the Spanish Netherlands. They call themselves the Grey Angel, because they strike together and are gone before the blood dries.”

Edmund felt a chill that had nothing to do with the cold. “Three brothers. And we have only seen one.”

“We have seen one,” Cecily agreed. “The other two may be closer than we think.”

She turned the paper over. On the reverse, in Mistress Alice’s hand, was a name.

“She says this is the second bird. The one Walsingham does not yet know. She says it comes from the highest source she has—a servant in the Queen’s own privy chambers.”

Edmund took the paper. The name was written in ink that had not quite dried, as if the widow had written it in haste.

*Sir Walter Raleigh.*

He stared at it. Raleigh. The Queen’s favourite, the golden man of the New World, the poet and pirate who had brought tobacco and potatoes to England’s shores. Raleigh, who had the Queen’s ear and her trust. Raleigh, who had been given monopolies and titles and the favour of a sovereign who did not give favour lightly.

“It cannot be,” Edmund said. “Raleigh is… everything.”

“Everything is exactly what a traitor needs,” Cecily said. “Power. Access. Trust. And a reason to want more. The Queen has given him much, but she has not given him everything. A man like Raleigh does not like to be denied.”

Edmund folded the paper and tucked it into his doublet. “We must tell Walsingham.”

“We must be certain first,” Cecily said. “Mistress Alice has been wrong before. And if we accuse the Queen’s favourite without proof, we will not be the ones who die—she will.”

Edmund looked at her. There was something in her voice, a tremor he had not heard before. He had seen her face down armed men, walk through burning warehouses, and hold a knife to a traitor’s throat without flinching. But now, in the dim candlelight, she looked afraid.

“Cecily,” he said gently, “what is it you are not telling me?”

She met his eyes, and for a long moment, she said nothing. Then she reached into the bodice of her gown and withdrew a small, folded letter. The seal was broken.

“This came to my mother’s house this morning,” she said. “It was addressed to me, but in a hand I did not know. I opened it because I thought it might be from you.”

She held it out. Edmund took it. The paper was fine, the writing neat and precise. It read:

*Lady Thorne,* *You are in danger. The Earl of Morland is not what he seems. He is not the lazy fool he plays. He is a weapon, and when the weapon has served its purpose, it will be discarded—and so will you. If you wish to save yourself, come to the sign of the Golden Hind in Southwark, and ask for the man who wears a hawk’s feather in his cap.* *—A Friend*

Edmund read it twice. Then he laughed, a short, bitter sound. “A friend who signs no name and sends you into a trap. How very friendly.”

“It may be a trap,” Cecily said. “But it may also be the truth. You are a weapon, my lord. Walsingham has used you. The Queen has used you. Even I have used you. What happens when the fighting is done?”

He looked at her. The candle flickered, and in its light, he saw not the sharp-tongued widow who mocked his laziness, but a woman who had been alone for a long time, and who had learned that trust was a coin best spent sparingly.

“I do not know what happens when the fighting is done,” he said. “But I know this: I will not see you walk into a trap to find out.”

He took the letter and held it to the candle’s flame. It caught, curled, and blackened, the words turning to ash.

Cecily watched it burn. Then she nodded, slowly. “Then we go to Walsingham,” she said. “And we tell him about the Grey Angel, and the second bird, and the name in my mother’s letter.”

“And we hope,” Edmund said, “that the spider has more webs than we think.”

He moved to the door, then paused. “Cecily. Whatever happens tomorrow—at Nonesuch, at the court, in the Queen’s presence—I want you to know something.”

She raised an eyebrow. “That you are still in need of a nap?”

“That too,” he said. “But also this. I am not a weapon. I am a man. A lazy, cowardly, nap-loving man who would rather be anywhere else than here. But I am a man who will not discard you. Not now. Not ever.”

For a long moment, she did not speak. Then, very quietly, she said, “And I am a woman who will hold you to that, my lord.”

She opened the door, and they stepped out into the fog, where the Grey Angel waited, its three heads watching from the shadows.