Chapter 88: The Queen's Command

The captain would not be drawn further. He had his orders, and his orders were to bring the Earl of Morland to London with all speed, and beyond that he was a man of stone. Edmund, still feeling the heat of the beacon on his face and the ache of a long ride in his thighs, looked to Cecily.

She was already in the saddle, her grey mare dancing sideways at the smell of smoke. "You heard the man," she said. "The Queen asks for you. That is not a thing one declines."

"It is not a thing one survives declining," Edmund agreed. He turned to the captain. "How many hours?"

"We ride through the night, my lord. Fresh horses are waiting at Dartford. If the roads hold, we shall reach Whitehall by noon tomorrow."

"Noon." Edmund closed his eyes. The twentieth of August was three days hence. Whatever Essex had done, whatever game the Falcon was playing, the clock had not stopped. "Then let us not waste the dark."

They rode. The soldiers formed a tight knot around them, hooves drumming the packed earth of the Gravesend road, and behind them the beacon still burned, a false dawn staining the underside of the clouds. Edmund did not look back. He had spent too many months looking back—at his uncle's drowned face, at his father's name on a traitor's list, at the comfortable life he had lost the moment he had opened a letter not meant for him. Forward was where the danger lay, and forward was where the answers were.

By dawn they were past Dartford, and the river was a grey ribbon on their left, carrying barges and wherries and the ordinary commerce of a kingdom that did not know how close it stood to the edge of a knife. Edmund's mind, which he had spent years training to idleness, would not be idle now. It turned the pieces over and over.

Essex arrested. That was the centre of it. The Earl had been the brightest star in the Queen's firmament, her sweet Robin's heir, the darling of the war party. If he had been taken for treason, then either he had been foolish enough to reach for the crown, or someone had arranged the evidence to make it appear so. And the Falcon, who had ridden through fire to escape, had been moving south toward the coast—toward Plymouth, toward the ships, toward the signal that was meant to light the way for Philip's fleet.

"The twentieth of August," Cecily said quietly, riding close. "If Essex was to be the signal—"

"Then his arrest may have broken it," Edmund said. "Or it may have been the signal itself. A great lord taken up for treason would throw the court into chaos. Confusion in London, the fleet uncertain who commands, the Queen's attention fixed on her own household—and a beacon lit on the coast while every eye is turned inward."

"Then we are not riding to a triumph," she said. "We are riding to a disaster that has already begun."

They reached Whitehall shortly after noon, and the guard at the gatehouse looked at Edmund as if he were a ghost. Word had run ahead of them. The Earl of Morland, who had been sent to Plymouth on the Queen's business, had returned without warning, and the court was a hive of whispers. The captain handed them off to a gentleman usher who led them through corridors Edmund knew too well—the same corridors he had walked in his youth, when his only ambition had been to find a quiet corner and a cushion.

The Queen was not in the Presence Chamber. She was in her privy chamber, and only two men stood outside the door: Sir Francis Walsingham, grey and gaunt and leaning on a stick, and a young man Edmund did not recognise, holding a sealed packet.

"My lord of Morland," Walsingham said. His voice was thin, but his eyes were as sharp as ever. "You have come quickly. That is well. Her Majesty has been asking for you since dawn."

"What has happened, Sir Francis?"

Walsingham glanced at the young man, who bowed and withdrew down the corridor. Then the spymaster leaned closer. "Essex was taken two nights ago. He had gathered a company of swordsmen at Essex House and was preparing to march on the court. He claimed he was coming to protect the Queen from traitors in her own household."

"From Blanche," Edmund said.

"From the woman beside the Queen, whoever she may be. He had a list of names. Most of them were innocent. But one of them was not." Walsingham's jaw tightened. "The Earl was played, my lord. Someone put the idea in his head, fed him evidence, convinced him that only he could save the realm. He was to be the distraction. While he marched and the guard was drawn to Essex House, a signal was to be lit at Plymouth."

"The twentieth of August."

"Tomorrow." Walsingham's stick scraped the floor. "The Armada is already at sea. Our scouts sighted them off the Lizard three days ago. The Queen's fleet is at Plymouth, but Lord Howard writes that half his captains are uncertain of their orders—there is talk that Leicester's squadron has been compromised, that some of the ships are not to be trusted."

"Leicester's ships." Edmund's mind raced. "The Grey Lady's letter. The Essex crest. It was not Essex who commanded the signal. It was someone close to him, someone who used his ambition as a screen."

"Yes," Walsingham said. "And that someone is still at large. The Falcon escaped you at Gravesend. He will not have gone far. He will be making for the coast, or for London, or for wherever the true master of this plot is waiting." He paused, and his eyes rested on Edmund with something that might have been respect. "Her Majesty wishes to see you. She wishes to know what you found at Gravesend. And she wishes to know whether you will do what must be done."

Edmund looked at the closed door. Beyond it, the Queen of England was waiting—the woman he had served unwillingly, the woman whose death had been scheduled for tomorrow, the woman who had sent him into the dark and never once promised him safety.

"I have not slept in two days," he said.

"Neither has she," Walsingham replied. "Go in."

Edmund straightened his doublet, which was stained with smoke and road dust, and looked at Cecily. She nodded once, and he saw in her face the same resolve he felt in his own chest—the strange, unwelcome courage of two people who had run out of ways to be afraid.

He opened the door. The Queen sat by the window, a lute in her lap, her fingers resting on the strings but not plucking them. She looked up as he entered, and her face was old and tired and utterly without illusion.

"My lord of Morland," she said. "You look as though you have been dragged through a hedge and set on fire."

"Your Majesty is perceptive as ever," he said, and bowed.

"Come here," she said. "Sit. And tell me everything."

He did. And when he had finished, she set the lute aside and said, very quietly, "Tomorrow is the twentieth. You have one day to save my kingdom, my lord. What will you do?"

Edmund looked out the window at the grey river and the city beyond it, and thought of his bed, and knew he would not see it for some time yet.

"Your Majesty," he said, "I believe I shall have to pay a visit to Plymouth. But first, I need to ask you a question about your maids."