Candace Robb: A Vigil of Spies

Bishopthorpe Palace, late September 1373

Archbishop Thoresby held up his hand to silence Brother Michaelo’s arguments. ‘God’s will does not align with ours, Michaelo. We tried and failed. The chapter will not choose my nephew Richard to succeed me. It is finished.’

Though His Grace’s voice was weak, his personal secretary heard in it the clear resolve. He reminded himself of the fourth step of humility in St Benedict’s rule — To go even further than [simple obedience] by readily accepting in patient and silent endurance, without thought of giving up or avoiding the issue, any hard and demanding things that may come our way in the course of that obedience … We are encouraged to such patience by the words of scripture: Whoever perseveres to the very end will be saved . Bowing, Michaelo began to back away from the great bed.

‘I had not realised how much you had set your heart on Richard succeeding me,’ said Thoresby. ‘Why, Michaelo?’

In his mind’s eye, Michaelo was back at the wretched day ten years earlier when he lay at the entrance to the abbey oratory, his forehead pressed to the cold, indifferently cleaned tiles, while his brethren shuffled past him. A few stumbled on his robes, one grazed his foot, another kicked his right hand. Then came a long silence in which his attempts to pray that this prostration might signal his repentance and his humility were overridden by his self-loathing. He could not believe that God wished to hear him. Ten years in Thoresby’s service had restored his belief, his ability to pray. He’d believed that in the service of Richard Ravenser he would yet be safe from himself.

‘I cannot return to St Mary’s Abbey, Your Grace.’

‘That choice passed with Abbot Campion’s death. We spoke of a modest priory in Normandy where you might retreat into silent prayer. My nephew will see to that.’

A small priory in his native Normandy, near his kin, in perpetual retreat. Michaelo knew it to be a wise choice, and yet he doubted his ability to surrender to it. He was but thirty-five, too young to die to the world. He doubted that years of silent prayer and mortification of the flesh could protect him from the inevitable encounter with a young monk who stirred his desire. This was the devil undermining his courage. The devil who knew him.

‘God go with you, Your Grace,’ Michaelo murmured, then turned and withdrew from the sickroom. Alone in the corridor, he slumped against the wall and prayed for the strength to remain by His Grace’s side to the end, for the fortitude to resist the terror that bade him flee before despair overcame him. As the archbishop’s personal secretary, Michaelo had found his way to grace as if residing in the presence of a man of grace had transformed him. But he feared for his strength once Thoresby died, and his death was imminent. The archbishop would not live to see another Christmas, so predicted the healer Magda Digby. Brother Michaelo felt the devil hovering over his left shoulder, whispering darksome thoughts in quiet moments.

His only hope had been in His Grace’s winning the dean and chapter’s support for his nephew, Sir Richard Ravenser, to succeed him as Archbishop of York. Ravenser had asked Michaelo to serve him as his personal secretary if he won the election. But, except for a few of the Thoresby/Ravenser kin in the chapter and their old friend Nicholas Louth, the canons supported Alexander Neville, for King Edward apparently approved of him, or so claimed the Neville family in their aggressive campaign.

Michaelo rubbed his left shoulder. Already it ached with hellish cold.

Monday

Captain Owen Archer stood in a shaft of sunlight with his lieutenants, Alfred and Gilbert, his scarred but handsome face grim as he spoke to them. As Brother Michaelo rushed about, overseeing the preparations for the large and grand company of guests expected to arrive by mid-afternoon, he caught snippets of the captain’s commands. The fair Gilbert was to ride out with a group of guards to surround the company as it approached, and the lanky, balding Alfred was in charge of the guard protecting the perimeter of the manor of Bishopthorpe. Noticing a deep shadow beneath Archer’s good eye and how he wearily rubbed the scar beneath his leather eye patch, Michaelo remembered their conversation the previous evening.

Archer had reluctantly admitted that he would miss Archbishop Thoresby, and that he resented the danger Princess Joan’s visit presented. With King Edward and his heir and namesake both ailing and the Archbishop of York on his deathbed, the Scots might anticipate sufficient disarray in the northern defences that they could easily seize Prince Edward’s wife as she travelled so far north. The French had no love for Prince Edward, who had proven his military prowess on their soil all too frequently, and the new King Robert II of Scotland, having renewed the Franco-Scottish alliance, might enjoy handing Edward’s wife to the French king to prove his worth.

‘His Grace should have peace in his final days and not be worrying about the possibility of such a disaster,’ Archer had said, smacking the table with his hand. ‘I would have it so.’

His voice broke with the last words — that was when Michaelo plumbed the depths of the captain’s affection for the archbishop. It surprised him. Archer had spent a decade resenting His Grace. Michaelo wondered at this change.

‘They say the fair Princess Joan has ever been headstrong. Pray she suddenly changes her mind and rides south,’ Archer had added.

But Michaelo welcomed the distraction of a royal guest in the palace. In his opinion, it would cheer them all. Though he admitted to himself that the captain and his lieutenants hardly looked cheered.

Breath. I’m fighting my own body for breath. My flesh wants to cease this struggle, but my spirit is not ready. I will soon meet St Peter at Heaven’s gate. But not yet, dear Lord, not yet .

John Thoresby, Archbishop of York and sometime Lord Chancellor of England, reminded himself of this when tempted to complain about how weary he was, how frustrated he was with his struggle for full, satisfying breaths. He was still alive, choosing to blow on the dying embers to tease out more life, and every moment was precious.

Never in all his long life had he felt so keenly the separation of mind and body. He was a little forgetful, but, for the most part, his mind was still robust. He felt betrayed by the weakness of his body, which trembled now with fatigue as he adjusted his legs, trying to stretch out a cramp without attracting the attention of the healer Magda Digby, who watched so discreetly from her seat beside the foot of the bed that he sometimes forgot she was there.

‘Thou art cramping.’ She rose and reached beneath the covers, exploring his calves, then pressing and pulling just the right muscle, showing it how to relax.

Despite his attempt to hide his discomfort from her, Thoresby was grateful for her ministrations. ‘God bless you,’ he murmured.

She made a quiet, chuckling sound.

‘He will bless you if my prayers are worth anything,’ said Thoresby. Their playful interaction lifted his spirits.

‘Thy god may do as he pleases,’ said Magda. Clear blue eyes in a wizened face, the wrinkles exaggerated by the smile that engaged all her features — eyes, mouth, cheeks — she held his gaze for a moment, her expression affectionate, kind and teasing. Then she nodded, satisfied, and returned to her chair — a stool, actually. But, as she was a tiny woman, her spine still straight and strong, she preferred it to the cushioned chair the archbishop’s personal secretary, Brother Michaelo, kept offering her, which would leave her feet dangling in the air.