Paul Doherty: Herald of Hell

‘ Et Tenebrae Facta – And Darkness Fell’

Thibault wished the night was not so black. The rain had ceased but a dense fog had now descended, swiftly falling over both the river and city, creeping along the alleyways, lurking in the narrow yards, drooping from the gables and eaves of houses to clog the eyes and pinch the skin. Nevertheless, the regent’s Master of Secrets conceded to himself, the fog also provided a cover for subtle intrigue and tortuous treason which, if discovered, could send him to the scaffold on Tower Hill. He wiped his face and sat back against the stern of the narrow boat. He could only dimly make out the snow-white hair, creamy skin and milky blue eyes of his henchman, Albinus, who was straining at the oars. The man had become his soul-sharer, his father confessor, comforter and counsellor. If their treason failed he too would join Thibault on the scaffold. Albinus lifted his head and smiled through the murk at his master.

‘We must be careful,’ Thibault murmured, ‘ever so careful and prudent.’ Albinus just nodded and went back to pulling at the oars, holding the boat steady against the swell of the river. Thibault hitched his cloak closer about him and returned to his thoughts. He and Albinus were committed to the task set them by John of Gaunt. The King’s uncle and self-styled regent had taken Thibault to a secret chamber in the heart of his magnificent palace, an ideal place to plot the deadliest treason. No windows. The one and only door was thick and heavy, fashioned out of the purest oak. The walls of the chamber were covered in quilted tapestries displaying all the colours of Gaunt’s royal claims: the lions rampant of England, the silver fleur-de-lis of France and the golden crowns of Castile. A truly ambitious man, Gaunt nursed dreams of founding a dynasty which would span the kingdoms of Europe. He faced only one obstacle: his nephew Richard, the boy king of England.

In that secret chamber, lit only by a three-spigot candelabra, with no one else present and the room secured against any eavesdropper or court spy, Gaunt had whispered the most dangerous treason. One hand on Thibault’s shoulder, the other on his pearl-encrusted dagger in its purple-gold sheath, Gaunt had asked Thibault if he too could drink from the chalice being offered? Thibault had replied, without hesitation, that he would drain such a goblet to its dregs and lick the cup clean. Gaunt had smiled with that dazzling look of friendship which always captivated Thibault’s soul. Gaunt’s fingers fell away from the dagger whilst the hand on Thibault’s shoulder became an embrace. Both men were joined in a conspiracy which could end in royal splendour, or in the most excruciating execution. Thibault had witnessed men, naked except for a loin cloth, being tied to a sled and dragged at the tail of a ragged horse through the Lion Gate and up the rocky path to the soaring gallows on Tower Hill, the hangman’s nooses dangling like loathsome garlands against the sky. If discovered, Thibault could expect no mercy. The executioners would paint red lines on his naked torso to show where they would cut, before he would be half hanged, his belly split open, his entrails plucked out even as he breathed …

The strident cry of a gull startled the Master of Secrets from his hellish reverie. He breathed in sharply, coughing on the cold, salty, fish-tinged river air. Gaunt had shown him the true path their plotting would open – a glorious path, he reminded himself. A veritable highway leading to manor lands, rich pastures, profitable licences and lordships. Thibault’s heart, to quote the psalmist, had leapt like a stag. He, a lord! He, the offspring of a common whore and some wandering scholar, to be clothed in silk and ermine, to have his arms emblazoned on a banner carried before him by a herald, to sit in splendour close to the throne of a king who would exalt him even higher. All he had to do was keep faith with Gaunt, do his bidding and help spin a web which would entangle the kingdom. Of course, as now, danger threatened with many a potential slip between cup and lip. Thibault had, however, been most prudent as that web began to spread. The Master of Secrets played with the chancery ring beneath his gloved finger. He suspected his own clerk, Amaury Whitfield, had begun to realize how far this web stretched and what it entailed. Nevertheless, Whitfield could be controlled and, if necessary, dispensed with. Until then, the clerk had to be watched. Thibault moved restlessly. Whitfield had absented himself from the secret chancery, he and his minion, the scrivener Oliver Lebarge. They had both pleaded for boon days so as to attend the Festival of Cokayne at the Golden Oliphant, the tavern brothel run by that queen of whores, Elizabeth Cheyne.

Thibault glanced up as a horn blew, ringing through the bank of fog rolling across the surface of the river. Albinus rested on his oars and Thibault watched the bobbing light of a passing barge disappear into the blackness of the night. Albinus returned to his rowing and Thibault to his ruminations. Cheyne was a whore amongst whores. She reminded Thibault of his own mother, and that made him feel sick to his stomach. He loathed doing business with Cheyne yet at times he had no choice. The whore mistress, like all her kind, was a snapper-up of trifles which might contain real nuggets of political intrigue. Whitfield and Lebarge would be with her now, celebrating a world turned upside down, a bacchanalian feast where all kinds of filthy practices took place. Not that Whitfield would have joined them to the full. If the whispered gossip was truth, Amaury Whitfield, clerk of the secret chancery, was a veritable gelding in bed. Whatever, Thibault reflected, let him wallow in his sty. Soon Whitfield would have to return to the chancery and concentrate on that secret cipher. The document had been seized from the Upright Men, the leaders of the Great Community of the Realm who were plotting furiously to bring about violent revolution to topple both Church and Crown. Thibault hugged his arms close. He was playing a dangerous game, plotting against the Upright Men even as he journeyed secretly to meet one of their most prominent leaders. They both sought to foment rebellion and revolution, but to different ends. The Master of Secrets wondered how much he would learn tonight, both directly and indirectly. Would he discover more about the cipher seized from Reynard, the Upright Men’s wily courier, who was now reflecting on his sins in the grim fastness of Newgate prison? Or perhaps he would glean something about the Herald of Hell, the mysterious envoy of the Upright Men who appeared at night, all over the city, to warn those judged to be opponents of the Great Community of the Realm. Whitfield and Lebarge had been visited in their chamber in Fairlop Lane. The Herald had delivered his grim warning and disappeared, leaving Whitfield and Lebarge frightened out of their wits. Thibault had granted both men leave. Perhaps the charms of Mistress Cheyne and her moppets would soothe their humours, then Whitfield could return refreshed to the study of that mysterious document.

‘Master?’ Albinus leaned forward. ‘Master, we are almost there.’

Thibault steadied himself as Albinus pulled once more and the keel of the boat crunched on the gravel and silt surrounding the Black Vale, a small, desolate island close to the south bank of the Thames. The boat rocked slightly, embedded in the shale. Thibault rose and, once Albinus had secured the boat, followed his henchman up from the riverside. He felt the dagger in its sheath on his warbelt, on the other side a small hand-held arbalest with its quiver of barbed quarrels. At the top of the slight rise they paused and stared into the darkness. The fog had thinned. Thibault could make out the ruins which peppered this gloomy islet: jagged walls, the carcasses of ruined cottages. A bleak wilderness of dark, shiny pools, sluggish ditches and heaps of mud which fed the coarse grass, rank weeds and stunted trees which grew there.