Barbara Denvil - The Flame Eater

The people crowded round. “Was that it, then mistress?”

“A fine tangle, lady, but not as profitable as we’d hoped. Eight miserable dolts and one fine gennelman without purse nor rings, what we can’t even finish off.” Then the man saw David and recognised him. “It’s Witton, lads. Look. The little bugger from next door is here after all.”

“I’m off back to own my little lad,” one woman said, shaking her head. “Ain’t no more fun to be had here and I were never no friend o’ Howard Witton, nasty bugger he were, and Liz not much better.”

“The son ain’t like the father. David’s a good boy, and a clever one.”

“No matter,” the woman said, wiping her hands on her apron. “I’m off. I ain’t waiting round here ’till the law turns up.”

“True, true.” Some of the crowd drifted away, looking back only briefly. “So you look after yourself now, lady. Reckon we’re not needed no more and will be gone afore the Watch comes this way.”

“The Watch? Of course.” It was what Nicholas had been waiting for. Emeline nodded, and without rising she thanked her new friends. “I hope no one is hurt?”

“A bruise, missus, no more.”

“There’s plenty of them other buggers hurt, and that’s what was asked of us.” David Witton’s neighbour grinned. “But I reckoned on seeing them Bambrigg boys. Good boys they are, and useful in a brawl.”

David was clasping hands, thanking and praising, knowing every soul who had come at Emeline’s request. “The Bambriggs work for my lord now,” he told them. “But both Harry and Rob are off on another errand. They’d have been helpful indeed, but when they were instructed to stay behind elsewhere, we had no way of knowing this would happen. We expected no organised attack.” He smiled. “Didn’t expect all of you to come either.”

“Thanks to the lady,” he was told. “Poor lass was in a right spin and said she needed help. Gave your name. So we come for you.”

“Besides,” added another, “we’s always ready for a good fight.”

Finally, David returned to his master’s side. Nicholas was still only half conscious, blur eyed and dizzy. “It is hard,” he murmured very softly, “to believe what I’ve just seen.”

“All true, my lord. We’ve been saved by the ruffians from the tenement, roused and brought to our aid by your ingenious lady wife herself.” And David knelt in the mud, his hands carefully testing where Nicholas had been wounded. As he examined, he began to explain what had happened at the end. “We thought we had beaten them, my lady,” he informed Emeline. “After I returned here, riding your horse as you graciously instructed, I found the fight almost won. We finished them off quickly, my lord and I, and the locals who’d come to our aid thought matters done with, and left. Our attackers were fair beaten and those not hurt set off running. Two dead, but their companions carted them away. To the river maybe, being the best place for traitors. We thought ourselves free, and hoped for the Watch to come by at last, since it’s close to their usual patrol. But both my Lord Nicholas and Lord Jerrid were badly wounded.”

The rain was just a chilly silver trickle now, puddling deeper into the mud beneath them. Emeline sighed. “What happened to Jerrid?”

“We believed we needed only to return home as quickly as possible, and summon the medick. It was too late to return to the Tower, so Alan Venter took the wounded Lord Jerrid up before him, riding west. He hoped to alert the Watch on his way, but Lord Jerrid was near fainting, so they set off at a gallop. My lord and I intended the same, and I was helping him mount his own mare, when we were ambushed.”

Emeline shivered, trying to adjust the soaked bandage falling from head to eyes across Nicholas’s brows. “Adrian?”

“Indeed, my lady. There was just his lordship and myself left alone, when along comes Sir Adrian and a clutch of louts. It seems those that ran from us before had run only to call for help, and waited, I believe, to see Alan and Lord Jerrid leave so we’d be without hope of defending ourselves. And the Watch didn’t come. We were hopelessly outnumbered, nine against two, and my lord barely able to stand.”

Nicholas pushed David’s administering hands away. “How is Adrian?”

Adrian sat alone, watching them. He seemed bemused and unable or unwilling to rise. He made no attempt to escape, and sat cradling his shoulder. His doublet was cut across the chest, its ribbons dangling beneath his cloak, but there was no sign of bleeding. Of his backers, three were dead, another dying. Two were badly injured and trying to stagger away from further retribution. The others had disappeared.

David murmured, “My lord, after this – the ruin – the treason – Sir Adrian cannot be left alive. He can never return home. To the sheriff, then? Or we wait a little longer for the Watch? Or I drag the constable from his bed?”

Nicholas murmured, “Let him go.”

Emeline whispered, turning from Nicholas to Adrian, and then again to Nicholas, “But what if he calls for help as before? What if he attacks another time? You can’t fight any longer, my love.”

“Nor can he.” Nicholas nodded towards Adrian. He held Emeline’s hand but was looking beyond her. “Give me a moment more, my sweet, and then help me to my feet. We’ve still one horse left between us, and David will see us back to the Strand. I don’t care where Adrian goes.”

Now she looked to David. “Can his lordship ride all that way?”

David nodded. “In my experience, my lady, there’s nothing his lordship can’t do if he wishes it. But apart from the original wounds which have reopened, he’s been slashed to the back of the head and deep across the knee. Perhaps more. You’ll need to support him on horseback, my lady, while I lead the beast by its bridle.”

Nicholas squinted up through the last gentle patter of the rain. He said, with almost a smile, “We were finished, you know, my love, before you magically materialised. David expected to die. I was already nigh dead.”

“Life is always unexpected, my lord, as the wheel turns, whether with turns of fortune for the better – or for the worst.”

“For the better,” Nicholas murmured, “with my beautiful wife appearing from the shadows like some voluptuous Sir Lancelot.”

Emeline smiled. “You must be feeling better, my love, to talk like that.”

“Let us hope so,” David said. “And hope too that Harry and Rob took that other traitor to the constable for questioning and are now back at the Strand. And more importantly still, that Lord Jerrid reached home safely and is being tended by the doctor at this moment, and did not fall in the gutter on the way.”

“Jerrid is very fond of gutters,” mumbled Nicholas. “But he survives. He always survives.”

“And you, my love. You would have been all right in the end,” Emeline assured him. “I was listening, ready to rush forwards, you know. I realised you were trying to delay, hoping the Watch would come.”

“It appears,” Nicholas said, “that the Watch was watching elsewhere. And now I’m going home. The other side of the city of course, and it will take me an hour, but I shall cling to that saddle, with your warm strong arms around me, my love. I want my own damned home and my own sweet wife and my own warm dry bed. I may never leave it again.”

“I wish that were true,” said Emeline. “But it will only be until the next adventure.”

His horse had wandered, nosing the moss along the side of the empty storehouse and the weeds between the stones. David grabbed its reins, brought the horse alongside and with some difficulty, helped his lordship mount. Then Nicholas reached down, and Emeline bounced up before him, cuddled side saddle, one arm around his waist.