The rebels mark, p.1
The Rebel‘s Mark, page 1
Also by S. W. Perry
The Angel’s Mark
The Serpent’s Mark
The Saracen’s Mark
The Heretic’s Mark
Published in hardback in Great Britain in 2022 by Corvus,
an imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd.
Copyright © S.W. Perry 2022
The moral right of S. W. Perry to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities, is entirely coincidental.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Hardback ISBN: 978 1 83895 398 0
E-book ISBN: 978 1 83895 399 7
Printed in Great Britain
Corvus
An imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd
Ormond House
26–27 Boswell Street
London
WC1N 3JZ
www.corvus-books.co.uk
For Jane.
Into Ireland I go. The Queen hath irrevocably decreed it…
And I am tied in my own reputation.
ROBERT DEVEREUX, EARL OF ESSEX, 1599
I’m off to the wars
For want of peace.
Oh, had I but money,
I’d show more sense.
MIGUEL DE CERVANTES, DON QUIXOTE
PART 1
The Death of Kings
1
The Atlantic Ocean, sixty leagues south-west of Ireland, September 1598
Since the sandglass was last turned, the storm has stalked the San Juan de Berrocal from behind the cover of a darkening sky. It has sniffed at her with its blustery breath, jostled her with watery claws, spat at her with a sudden icy blast of rain. Along the western horizon where the twilight is dying, flashes of lightning now ripple. Whenever the carrack rises on a wave crest, they seem brighter. Nearer. It is only a matter of time, thinks Don Rodriquez Calva de Sagrada, before the accompanying thunder is no longer drowned by the roaring of the sea and the screaming of the wind.
Drowned.
Don Rodriquez has faced death before in the service of Spain. He has made voyages longer and more uncertain even than this one. But to drown… that, he thinks, would be an ignominious death for a courtier of The Most Illustrious Philip, by the Grace of God, King of Spain, Aragon, Valencia, Mallorca, Naples, Sicily and Sardinia.
The deck cants alarmingly as the San Juan plunges down a vertiginous slope of black water. Don Rodriquez flails wildly for something to hang on to. His hands seize the wooden housing of the ship’s lodestar, brightly painted red and gold – the colours of Castile. Beneath his numb fingers, the wet timber is as slippery as if the paint were blood. But to let go, he is sure, would result in him sliding off the deck and into the maelstrom surging mere feet below. He is beginning to wonder if the captain – fearful of interception by one of those sleek English sea-wolves bristling with cannon and possessed of Lucifer’s luck – has made a fatal error of judgement.
As the deck soars upwards again, leaving Don Rodriquez’s stomach somewhere in the depths of the ocean, the captain – a short, taciturn fellow with the darting eyes of a scavenging gull, and whose seaman’s contempt for the landsman who chartered his ship has not abated since they left Coruña – pins his chart against the lid of the lodestar box. The corners thrash wildly in the gale like the wings of a bird trying to escape the hunter’s net. ‘Be not dismayed, my lord!’ he says with an insulting smile as the index finger of his free hand, encased in the thick felt of his glove, makes landfall in the pool of dancing light cast by the helmsman’s lantern. ‘God, in his infinite mercy, has provided us with a safe anchorage – here.’
Don Rodriquez leans forward to study the map. It is a portolan chart, purchased in Seville for more maravedís than he had cared to pay. Everything on it – from the compass bearings to the harbours and inlets, promontories and coves – is based upon reports from Spanish fishermen who once plied these waters. But since the outbreak of the present war between the heretic English and God-fearing Spain there have been few enough of those in these waters. What if the map is out of date, and the English have built a castle where the captain’s finger now rests? Besides, it will be utterly dark soon. Not even a lunatic would consider a night landfall on such a treacherous coast. And only a lunatic who was heartily tired of life would do so in the face of an approaching storm.
‘Here’ turns out to be some distance from Roaringwater Bay, where the captain had promised to put them ashore at first light.
‘Is there nowhere closer? Every extra hour I am ashore is an hour given to the English to contrive our ruin.’
With an impertinence he would never dare risk on dry land, the captain says, ‘We made a pact, my lord, did we not? I am not to ask why a grand courtier of our sovereign majesty wishes to interrupt his voyage to the Spanish Netherlands to spend a night in Ireland. In return, the same grand courtier shall leave all decisions of a maritime nature to me. Yes?’
‘Yes,’ admits Don Rodriquez despondently. ‘We agreed.’
‘Trust me – I know these waters,’ the captain adds. ‘I have sailed them before, with the Duke of Medina Sidonia.’
The man’s familiarity with the coast of Ireland is why Don Rodriquez hired him in the first place. Now, thinking on the fate that befell the commander of the grand Armada, he is beginning to have second thoughts.
Another wave of watery malevolence sends the San Juan into a plunge even more sickening than the last. The sea breaks over the elegantly carved Castilian lion on her prow, and for a moment Don Rodriquez fears she will go on plunging into the deep, never to rise again. From beneath the deck planks, a shrill female scream carries clearly against the clamour of the gale.
‘You had best go below and comfort the noble lady, your daughter, and leave me to my duties, my lord,’ says the captain, fighting the wind for possession of the chart as he tries to tuck it back into his cape.
Don Rodriquez, being a man of honour, objects.
‘You may think me a cosseted courtier, Señor, but I am also a soldier, and I have voyaged in His Majesty’s service before. My arms are still strong. Let me stay here. Direct me as you will.’
The captain glances at his passenger’s well-manicured hands, the fingers laden with bejewelled rings. He looks at the pretentiously styled black curls on his head, the conceit of a man just a little too old to carry them off. A landsman of the worst kind, he decides. A danger on a storm-tossed deck, not only to himself but to all around him.
‘Voyaged where?’ he asks. ‘On the Sanabria, in a pleasure barge?’
‘To New Spain. To Hispaniola.’
The captain looks Don Rodriquez up and down, wondering if this is little more than a courtier’s boasting. ‘You never told me that at Coruña. Was this recently?’
‘Twenty years ago,’ Don Rodriquez admits.
‘Ah,’ the captain says, barely bothering to keep the scorn out of his voice. ‘In that case, your place is not here, my lord. I suggest you go below and leave me and my crew to our profession.’ Then, with the sly smile of a Madrid street-trickster, he adds, ‘I hope you and the women have strong stomachs. We’re in for a tempestuous night.’
Beyond the shuttered windows of the smaller of the two grand banqueting chambers at Greenwich Palace, on the southern bank of the Thames some five miles downriver from London Bridge, the early-September dusk is troubled by no more than a few high wisps of cloud, as insubstantial as an old man’s breath on winter air. Inside, the candles have been lit, the dining boards and trestles cleared away, the covers of Flanders linen folded up and carted off to the wash-house, the plate and silverware removed. As for the diners, if indigestion is in danger of making its presence publicly known, they are doing their level best to suffer in silence. Elizabeth of England does not appreciate having her masques interrupted by vulgar noises off-stage.
Dr Nicholas Shelby and his wife Bianca have removed themselves to the gallery, amongst the other palace chaff who don’t merit a place closer to the players. As a consequence, they have an uninterrupted view of the assembled courtiers bedecked in their late-summer plumage: satin peasecod doublets and venetians for the men, low-cut brocade gowns cascading richly over whalebone farthingales for the women – all striking languid poses around a raised dais covered in plush scarlet velvet. In the centre of the dais stands a gilded wooden chair emblazoned with the English lion and the Welsh dragon. Upon the chair lies a plump cushion covered in the finest cloth of gold. And upon the cushion, like a petite pharaoh perched on a ziggurat, sits a woman with the whitest face Bianca has ever seen.
‘She’s smaller than I expected,’ Bianca whispers into her husband’s ear.
‘Smaller?’ Nicholas answers. ‘What did you expect – an Amazon?’
The court has assembled tonight to enjoy a recital of excerpts from Master Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene, performed by the best actors the Master of the Revels has contrived to drag out of the Southwark taverns and transport – standing fare only – on the ferry from Blackfriars.
On the assumption that mirth at the expense of royalty is probably treasonous, Bianca stifles a giggle. ‘Has she let you see what she hides behind all that white ceruse yet?’
‘Of course not. I’m not allowed to actually touch the sacred personage of the sovereign.’
‘Then how can you treat her if she falls ill?’
‘That’s only half the problem,’ Nicholas replies. ‘What if I have to cast a horoscope before making a diagnosis? If it turns out to be inauspicious and I say so out loud, or write it down, I could be sent to the Tower for imagining her demise. At the moment, that’s treason.’
‘But you don’t believe in casting horoscopes before making a diagnosis, Nicholas. You never have.’
‘But the College of Physicians will insist on it. Otherwise they’ll accuse me of not doing my job properly. Remember what happened to poor old Dr Lopez? Being the queen’s doctor didn’t save him from his enemies.’
‘How can I forget?’ Bianca says, rolling her eyes. ‘I see his head on the parapet of the gatehouse every time I cross London Bridge. It’s been up there since before we went away.’ She pulls a face. ‘Except for the jaw, of course. That must have dropped off and fallen into the river while we were in Padua.’
Nicholas rests his elbows on the balustrade and turns his face very close to hers. ‘If you want the truth, I don’t believe she ordered Sir Robert Cecil to call us back to England because she wanted me to be her physician. She can call on any number of the senior fellows from the College. They’d stab each other with a lancet to get the summons.’
Bianca pushes a rebellious strand of dark hair back under the rim of her lace caul. Holding his gaze, she whispers mischievously, ‘Well, it wasn’t because she was in need of a good dancing partner, was it, Husband?’
Nicholas feigns hurt feelings. ‘It’s not my fault I can’t dance a decent pavane or a volta. My feet spent their formative years wading through good Suffolk clay.’
‘Are you telling me that we subjected ourselves and our infant son to several uncomfortable weeks aboard an English barque all the way from Venice just to satisfy the passing fancy of an old woman who wears whitewash on her skin?’ Bianca asks. Then, as an afterthought, ‘And if that’s her own hair, then I’m Lucrezia Borgia.’
Given his wife’s known skills as an apothecary – and the long line of Italian women on her mother’s side whose art in mixing poisons is still infamous throughout the Veneto – Nicholas winces at her choice of comparison.
‘She likes to hear reports from foreign lands,’ he says, ‘particularly concerning the new sciences. She was very interested to hear about my studies with Professor Fabricius at the Palazzo Bo. She understood everything I told her about the professor’s views on the mechanisms in the human eye.’
‘Mercy! Who could possibly have imagined such a thing: a woman – a queen – understanding the musings of a learned professor?’
Nicholas has learned not to rise to the bait. ‘Besides, I believe she’s grown weary of being nagged by her old physicians,’ he says. ‘It is my diagnosis that she has chosen to discomfort them by favouring someone they all hold to be a dangerous rebel – someone young; someone who still has all his teeth.’
‘You’re her plaything,’ Bianca announces with sly enjoyment. ‘My husband – an old woman’s sugar comfit.’
‘It hasn’t done the noble Earl of Essex any harm, has it?’ Nicholas counters, nodding in the direction of Robert Devereux, lying like a favoured greyhound at the foot of the dais. At thirty-two – four years younger than Nicholas – he makes an elegant sight, only slightly less pearled and bejewelled than the queen herself.
‘No, too thin in the calf for me,’ Bianca says, surreptitiously running the instep of her right foot along the back of Nicholas’s leg. ‘And far too primped.’
On the floor below, two slender youths in gleaming breastplates are striking heroic postures. One declaims as loudly as his adenoidal voice will permit, “Upon a great adventure he was bound, that greatest Gloriana to him gave, that greatest Glorious Queen of Faerie land—”
‘Tell me again, Husband: which one is the Gentle Knight?’
‘Him – the one with the broken nose.’
‘Why does he have that silly painted horse’s head between his legs?’
‘Didn’t you catch the line about his angry steed chiding at the foaming bit?’
‘Foaming bit? It looks to me as though someone’s stuck a giant painted wooden pizzle onto his codpiece. It’s the sort of thing I expect to see on a Bankside May Day, not at Greenwich Palace,’ Bianca says, making a play of fanning the embarrassment from her cheeks.
‘Just try to imagine it’s an angry steed, please.’
‘So, the other one – the one with the superior look on his face – that’s Gloriana.’
‘Correct.’
‘And Gloriana is really Elizabeth.’
‘You have it in one.’
‘And this fairy land they’re in – that’s really England.’
‘It’s an allegory,’ Nicholas says slowly, a hint of weariness in his voice.
‘It’s a delusion, that’s what it is – a woman in her sixties being played by a boy who’s barely plucked his first whisker.’
‘Edmund Spenser is our finest poet,’ Nicholas protests, not altogether convincingly.
‘I’ll take Italian comedy – Arlecchino and Pantalone – over your Master Spenser’s allegory today and every day, thank you, Husband.’
A portly factotum from the Revel’s office, lounging unnoticed against the wainscoting, leans forward. ‘Some people prefer to listen to quality verse,’ he mutters, ‘rather than the bickering of other people who are clearly devoid of any artistic appreciation whatsoever.’
‘Sorry,’ says Nicholas.
‘How long will this go on?’ Bianca whispers.
‘It’s a very long poem.’
‘Do you think anyone will notice if we sit down against the wall and take a nap?’
‘Don’t worry,’ Nicholas tells her. ‘Gloriana herself will have nodded off long before the end.’
‘Then we can all go to bed?’
‘Bed?’
‘That painted pizzle has given me an idea.’
‘The players will all pretend she’s wide awake. So will the court. You can’t escape Edmund Spenser that easily,’ Nicholas says despondently. ‘I fear we’re in for a long night.’
Aboard the San Juan de Berrocal, Don Rodriquez huddles in the tiny cabin afforded by his status as a courtier and longs himself back in the Escorial in Madrid with his dying monarch. Anywhere but here, where the world seems as if it is trying to disassemble itself in a shrieking, plunging, battering paroxysm. Clasped in a terrified trinity with his daughter Constanza and her Carib maid Cachorra – calm, stately, brave Cachorra – his only comfort is that if tonight he must die, he will not die alone.
‘Is it to be thus, Father?’ Constanza asks in a moment when the howling of the wind, the crashing of the sea and the tortured groaning of the vessel subside just long enough for her voice to be heard. ‘Am I not to know the blessings of marriage and motherhood? Am I to perish in the company of common mariners? Is this the pass you have brought me to, my lord Father?’
To the mind of Don Rodriquez, common mariners are all that now stand between his daughter and a watery grave. But Constanza is made in the mould of her late mother, choosy about the company she keeps ever since she was old enough to distinguish one face from another. She is a plump, haughty girl, whose fingernails have been sunk in his skin almost from the moment he entered the cabin to warn her of the approaching storm. He cannot see her face in the darkness, but he knows the look she is wearing well enough: the full lips turned down at the edges; the eternal crease between eyebrows stiffened to the texture of a brush with kohl, charcoal and grease (Constanza cannot come down to breakfast each morning until Cachorra has properly applied it); the air of permanent dissatisfaction, despite never knowing a moment without luxury until she boarded this ship.
At least the storm has taken away her hunger, he thinks. Every day since leaving Coruña she has turned up her nose at the food, utterly unaware that the very mariners she so disdains are on hard rations because half the St Juan’s hold is packed with crates containing her trousseau.
