Shadow of Night: A Novel Page 3

  “Until we go back, this will be your home,” he continued, trying to reassure me.

  The room’s solid furnishings were familiar from museums and auction catalogs, but the Old Lodge would never feel like home. I fingered the thick linen of the towel—so different from the faded terry-cloth sets that Sarah and Em owned, all worn thin from too many washes. Voices in another room lilted and swayed in a rhythm that no modern person, historian or not, could have anticipated. But the past was our only option. Other vampires had made that clear during our final days in Madison, when they’d hunted us down and nearly killed Matthew. If the rest of our plan was going to work, passing as a proper Elizabethan woman had to be my first priority.

  “‘O brave new world.’” It was a gross historical violation to quote from Shakespeare’s Tempest two decades before it was written, but this had been a difficult morning.

  “‘’Tis new to thee,’” Matthew responded. “Are you ready to meet your trouble, then?”

  “Of course. Let’s get me dressed.” I squared my shoulders and rose from the chair. “How does one say hello to an earl?”

  2

  My concern over proper etiquette was unnecessary. Titles and forms of address weren’t important when the earl in question was a gentle giant named Henry Percy.

  Françoise, to whom propriety mattered, clucked and fussed while she finished dressing me in scavenged apparel: someone else’s petticoats; quilted stays to confine my athletic figure into a more traditionally feminine shape; an embroidered smock that smelled of lavender and cedar, with a high, ruffled neck; a black, bell-shaped skirt made of velvet; and Pierre’s best jacket, the only tailored article of clothing that was remotely my size. Try though she might, Françoise couldn’t button this last item over my breasts. I held my breath, tucked in my stomach, and hoped for a miracle as she pulled the corset’s laces tight, but nothing short of divine intervention was going to give me a sylphlike silhouette.

  I asked Françoise a number of questions during the complicated process. Portraits of the period had led me to expect an unwieldy birdcage called a farthingale that would hold my skirts out at the hips, but Françoise explained that these were for more formal occasions. Instead she tied a stuffed cloth form shaped like a doughnut around my waist beneath my skirts. The only positive thing to say about it was that it held the layers of fabric away from my legs, enabling me to walk without too much difficulty—provided there was no furniture in the way and my destination could be reached if I moved in a straight line. But I would be expected to curtsy, too. Françoise quickly taught me how to do so while explaining how Henry Percy’s various titles worked—he was “Lord Northumberland” even though his last name was Percy and he was an earl.

  But I had no chance to use any of this newly acquired knowledge. As soon as Matthew and I entered the great hall, a lanky young man in soft brown leather traveling clothes spattered with mud jumped up to greet us. His broad face was enlivened with an inquisitive look that lifted his heavy, ash-colored eyebrows toward a forehead with a pronounced widow’s peak.

  “Hal.” Matthew smiled with the indulgent familiarity of an older brother. But the earl ignored his old friend and moved in my direction instead.

  “M-m-mistress Roydon.” The earl’s deep bass was toneless, with hardly a trace of inflection or accent. Before coming down, Matthew had explained that Henry was slightly deaf and had stammered since childhood. He was, however, adept at lipreading. Here was someone I could talk to without feeling self-conscious.

  “Upstaged by Kit again, I see,” Matthew said with a rueful smile. “I had hoped to tell you myself.”

  “What does it matter who shares such happy news?” Lord Northumberland bowed. “I thank you for your hospitality, mistress, and apologize for greeting you in this state. It is good of you to suffer your husband’s friends so soon. We should have left immediately once we learned of your arrival. The inn would be more than adequate.”

  “You are most welcome here, my lord.” This was the moment to curtsy, but my heavy black skirts weren’t easy to manage and the corset was laced so tightly I couldn’t bend at the waist. I arranged my legs in an appropriately reverential position but teetered as I bent my knees. A large, blunt-fingered hand shot out to steady me.

  “Just Henry, mistress. Everyone else calls me Hal, so my given name is considered quite formal.” Like many who are hard of hearing, the earl kept his voice deliberately soft. He released me and turned his attention to Matthew. “Why no beard, Matt? Have you been ill?”

  “A touch of ague, nothing more. Marriage has cured me. Where are the rest of them?” Matthew glanced around for Kit, George, and Tom.

  The Old Lodge’s great hall looked very different in daylight. I had seen it only at night, but this morning the heavy paneling turned out to be shutters, all of which were thrown open. It gave the space an airy feeling, despite the monstrous fireplace on the far wall. It was decorated with bits and pieces of medieval stonework, no doubt rescued by Matthew from the rubble of the abbey that once stood here—the haunting face of a saint, a coat of arms, a Gothic quatrefoil.

  “Diana?” Matthew’s amused voice interrupted my examination of the room and its contents. “Hal says the others are in the parlor, reading and playing cards. He didn’t feel it was right to join them until he had been invited to stay by the lady of the house.”

  “The earl must stay, of course, and we can join your friends immediately.” My stomach rumbled.

  “Or we could get you something to eat,” he suggested, eyes twinkling. Now that I had met Henry Percy without mishap, Matthew was beginning to relax. “Has anyone fed you, Hal?”

  “Pierre and Françoise have been attentive as ever,” he reassured us. “Of course, if Mistress Roydon will join me . . .” The earl’s voice trailed off, and his stomach gurgled with mine. The man was as tall as a giraffe. It must take huge quantities of food to keep his body fueled.

  “I, too, am fond of a large breakfast, my lord,” I said with a laugh.

  “Henry,” the earl corrected me gently, his grin showing off the dimple in his chin.

  “Then you must call me Diana. I cannot call the Earl of Northumberland by his first name if he keeps referring to me as ‘Mistress Roydon.’” Françoise had been insistent on the need to honor the earl’s high rank.

  “Very well, Diana,” Henry said, extending his arm.

  He led me across a drafty corridor and into a cozy room with low ceilings. It was snug and inviting, with only a single array of south-facing windows. In spite of its relatively small size, three tables had been wedged into the room, along with stools and benches. A low hum of activity, punctuated by a rattle of pots and pans, told me we were near the kitchens. Someone had tacked a page from an almanac on the wall and a map lay on the central table, one corner held down with a candlestick, the other by a shallow pewter dish filled with fruit. The arrangement looked like a Dutch still life, with its homely detail. I stopped short, dizzied by the scent.

  “The quinces.” My fingers reached out to touch them. They looked just as they had in my mind’s eye back in Madison when Matthew had described the Old Lodge.

  Henry seemed puzzled by my reaction to an ordinary dish of fruit but was too well bred to comment. We settled ourselves at the table, and a servant added fresh bread along with a platter of grapes and a bowl of apples to the still life before us. It was comforting to see such familiar fare. Henry helped himself, and I followed his example, carefully noting which foods he selected and how much of them he consumed. It was always the little differences that gave strangers away, and I wanted to appear as ordinary as possible. While we filled our plates, Matthew poured himself a glass of wine.

  Throughout our meal Henry behaved with unfailing courtesy. He never asked me anything personal, nor did he pry into Matthew’s affairs. Instead he kept us laughing with tales of his dogs, his estates, and his martinet of a mother, all the while providing a steady supply of toasted bread from the fire. He was just begi
nning an account of moving house in London when a clatter arose in the courtyard. The earl, whose back was to the door, didn’t notice.

  “She is impossible! You all warned me, but I didn’t believe anyone could be so ungrateful. After all the riches I’ve poured into her coffers, the least she could do was— Oh.” Our new guest’s broad shoulders filled the doorway, one of them swathed in a cloak as dark as the hair that curled around his splendid feathered hat. “Matthew. Are you ill?”

  Henry turned with surprise. “Good day, Walter. Why aren’t you at court?”

  I tried to swallow a morsel of toast. Our new arrival was almost certainly the missing member of Matthew’s School of Night, Sir Walter Raleigh.

  “Cast out of paradise for want of a position, Hal. And who is this?” Piercing blue eyes settled on me, and teeth gleamed from his dark beard. “Henry Percy, you sly imp. Kit told me you were intent on bedding the fair Arabella. If I’d known your tastes ran to something more mature than a girl of fifteen, I would have yoked you to a lusty widow long ago.”

  Mature? Widow? I had just turned thirty-three.

  “Her charms have induced you to stay home from church this Sunday. We must thank the lady for getting you off your knees and onto a horse, where you belong,” Raleigh continued, his accent as thick as Devonshire cream.

  The Earl of Northumberland rested his toasting fork on the hearth and considered his friend. He shook his head and returned to his work. “Go out, come in again, and ask Matt for his news. And look contrite when you do it.”

  “No.” Walter stared at Matthew, openmouthed. “She’s yours?”

  “With the ring to prove it.” Matthew kicked a stool from under the table with one long, booted leg. “Sit down, Walter, and have some ale.”

  “You swore you would never wed,” Walter said, clearly confused.

  “It took some persuasion.”

  “I expect it did.” Walter Raleigh’s appraising glance settled on me once more. “’Tis a pity she is wasted on a cold-blooded creature. I wouldn’t have delayed for an instant.”

  “Diana knows my nature and doesn’t mind my ‘coldness,’ as you put it. Besides, it was she who needed persuading. I fell in love with her at first glance,” said Matthew.

  Walter snorted in response.

  “Don’t be so cynical, old friend. Cupid may yet catch you.” Matthew’s gray eyes lit up with the mischief born from certain knowledge of Raleigh’s future.

  “Cupid will have to wait to turn his arrows on me. I’m entirely occupied at present fending off the unfriendly advances of the queen and the admiral.” Walter tossed his hat onto a nearby table, where it slid over the shiny surface of a backgammon board, disturbing the game in progress. He groaned and sat next to Henry. “Everyone wants a bit of my hide, it seems, but no one will give me a speck of preferment while this business of the colony hangs over my head. The idea for this year’s anniversary celebration was mine, yet that woman put Cumberland in charge of the ceremonies.” His temper rose again.

  “Still no news from Roanoke?” Henry inquired gently, handing Walter a cup of thick, brown ale. My stomach lurched at the mention of Raleigh’s doomed venture in the New World. It was the first time anyone had wondered aloud about the outcome of a future event, but it would not be the last.

  “White arrived back at Plymouth last week, driven home by foul weather. He had to abandon the search for his daughter and granddaughter.” Walter took a long draft of ale and stared into space. “Christ knows what happened to them all.”

  “Come spring, you will return and find them.” Henry sounded sure, but Matthew and I knew that the missing Roanoke colonists would never be found and Raleigh would never again set foot on the soil of North Carolina.

  “I pray you are right, Hal. But enough of my troubles. What part of the country are your people from, Mistress Roydon?”

  “Cambridge,” I said softly, keeping my response brief and as truthful as possible. The town was in Massachusetts, not England, but if I started making things up now, I’d never keep my stories straight.

  “So you are a scholar’s daughter. Or perhaps your father was a theologian? Matt would be pleased to have someone to talk to about matters of faith. With the exception of Hal, his friends are hopeless when it comes to doctrine.” Walter sipped his ale and waited.

  “Diana’s father died when she was quite young.” Matthew took my hand.

  “I am sorry for you, Diana. The loss of a f-f-father is a terrible blow,” Henry murmured.

  “And your first husband, did he leave you with sons and daughters for comfort?” asked Walter, a trace of sympathy creeping into his voice.

  Here and now a woman my age would have been married before and have had a brood of three or four children. I shook my head. “No.”

  Walter frowned, but before he could pursue the matter further, Kit arrived, with George and Tom in tow.

  “At last. Talk sense into him, Walter. Matthew cannot keep playing Odysseus to her Circe.” Kit grabbed the goblet sitting in front of Henry. “Good day, Hal.”

  “Talk sense into whom?” Walter asked testily.

  “Matt, of course. That woman is a witch. And there’s something not quite right about her.” Kit’s eyes narrowed. “She’s hiding something.”

  “A witch,” Walter repeated carefully.

  A servant carrying an armful of logs froze in the doorway.

  “As I said,” Kit affirmed with a nod. “Tom and I recognized the signs straightaway.”

  The maid dumped the logs in the waiting basket and scurried off.

  “For a maker of plays, Kit, you have a lamentable sense of time and place.” Walter’s blue eyes turned to Matthew. “Shall we go elsewhere to discuss the matter, or is this merely one of Kit’s idle fancies? If it is the latter, I would like to stay where it is warm and finish my ale.” The two men studied each other. When Matthew’s expression didn’t waver, Walter cursed under his breath. Pierre appeared, as if on cue.

  “There is a fire in the parlor, milord,” the vampire told Matthew, “and wine and food are laid out for your guests. You will not be disturbed.”

  The parlor was neither as cozy as the room where we’d taken our breakfast nor as imposing as the great hall. The abundance of carved armchairs, rich tapestries, and ornately framed paintings suggested that its primary purpose was to entertain the house’s most important guests. A splendid rendering of St. Jerome and his lion by Holbein hung by the fireplace. It was unfamiliar to me, as was the Holbein portrait next to it of a piggy-eyed Henry VIII holding a book and a pair of spectacles and looking pensively at the viewer, the table before him strewn with precious objects. Henry’s daughter, the first and current Queen Elizabeth, stared at him with hauteur from across the room. Their tense standoff did nothing to lighten the mood as we took our seats. Matthew propped himself up by the fire with his arms crossed over his chest, looking every bit as formidable as the Tudors on the walls.

  “Are you still going to tell them the truth?” I whispered to him.

  “It is generally easier that way, mistress,” Raleigh said sharply, “not to mention more fitting among friends.”

  “You forget yourself, Walter,” Matthew warned, anger flaring.

  “Forget myself! This from someone who has taken up with a witch?” Walter had no trouble keeping pace with Matthew when it came to irritation. And there was a note of real fear in his voice as well.

  “She is my wife,” Matthew retorted. He rubbed his hand over his hair. “As for her being a witch, we are all in this room vilified for something, be it real or imaginary.”

  “But to wed her—whatever were you thinking?” Walter asked numbly.

  “That I loved her,” Matthew said. Kit rolled his eyes and poured a fresh cup of wine from a silver pitcher. My dreams of sitting with him by a cozy fire discussing magic and literature faded further in the harsh light of this November morning. I had been in 1590 for less than twenty-four hours, but I was already heartily sick of Christophe
r Marlowe.

  At Matthew’s response the room fell silent while he and Walter studied each other. With Kit, Matthew was indulgent and a bit exasperated. George and Tom brought out his patience and Henry his brotherly affection. But Raleigh was Matthew’s equal—in intelligence, power, perhaps even in ruthlessness—which meant that Walter’s was the only opinion that mattered. They had a wary respect for each other, like two wolves determining who had the strength to lead their pack.

  “So it’s like that,” Walter said slowly, acceding to Matthew’s authority.

  “It is.” Matthew planted his feet more evenly on the hearth.

  “You keep too many secrets and have too many enemies to take a wife. And yet you’ve done so anyway.” Walter looked amazed. “Other men have accused you of relying overmuch on your own subtlety, but I never agreed with them until now. Very well, Matthew. If you are so cunning, tell us what to say when questions are raised.”

  Kit’s cup slammed onto the table, red wine sloshing over his hand. “You cannot expect us to—”

  “Quiet.” Walter shot a furious glance at Marlowe. “Given the lies we tell on your behalf, I’m surprised you would dare to object. Go on, Matthew.”

  “Thank you, Walter. You are the only five men in the kingdom who might listen to my tale and not think me mad.” Matthew raked his hands through his hair. “Do you recall when we spoke last of Giordano Bruno’s ideas about an infinite number of worlds, unlimited by time or space?”

  The men exchanged glances.

  “I am not sure,” Henry began delicately, “that we understand your meaning.”

  “Diana is from the New World.” Matthew paused, which gave Marlowe the opportunity to look triumphantly about the room. “From the New World to come.”

  In the silence that followed, all eyes swiveled in my direction.

  “She said she was from Cambridge,” said Walter blankly.