The Alchemist of Souls (Night's Masque, #1)(120)

"None of my business, eh?"

Ned willed himself not to struggle. That would only encourage a bully like Baines.

"Still, it's a bit early in the morning to set you loose in the taverns," the intelligencer growled in his ear. "So how about you tell me what's so urgent?"

"No."

"No?"

The pressure increased until Ned yelped in pain.

"No," he whispered to the wall. Not this time. He would not betray Mal again.

"Do you serve your Queen or not?"

"All right, all right!" His mind raced, trying to come up with something that would satisfy the intelligencer. "I was going to the Tower to see Mal. Thought he might know what was happening with the contest, what with the Mirror burning down and everything. I owe Henslowe some money."

Baines released him with a grunt of disgust. Ned raised a hand gingerly to his cheek, and hissed as his fingers brushed raw flesh. This was going to be a beauty of a bruise, and maybe a scar to boot.

"Well then," Baines said, "in that case we can go together."

"What?"

"Walsingham wants to know what happened yesterday. Seems your friend Catlyn was in the thick of the action."

"No!"

"What do you mean, no? He was there, wasn't he?"

"Yes. Yes he was," Ned sighed. This was all going to come out soon enough. "But you'll be wasting your time. He's not at the Tower."

Baines drew his knife. "If you're lying to me again, Faulkner–"

"It's the truth. Mal was taken from the Tower last night."

"Who by?"

"How should I know? All I know is, he's gone."

"So that's what Naismith's whelp was doing here. And here's me thinking you boys were just getting together for a game of Hoodman Blind." He smirked. "I think you'd better come with me anyway."

"No, I–"

Baines seized him by the arm.

"You can come quietly and with all your guts on the inside, or not. Up to you."

He marched Ned down to the river and they caught a wherry across the Thames, disembarking on the quayside under the shadow of the Tower's outer walls. Ned fully expected to be dragged inside and thrown into the darkest dungeon, but they carried on past and turned left at the top of Tower Hill.

"Where are you taking me?" Ned asked, trying to keep his voice from quavering.

Baines made no answer. After a few yards they turned right into a narrow street lined with tall timber-framed houses. Baines stopped at one of the doors near the far end, knocked, and they were let in.

"This is Walsingham's house," Ned hissed, when the servant had left them to wait in the black-and-white panelled atrium.

Baines nodded curtly. Ned stared down at his cracked and scuffed shoes, feeling very shabby in the starkly elegant surroundings of the spymaster's home. The servant returned a few moments later, saying Sir Francis wanted to speak to Baines, and the intelligencer disappeared through a doorway set into the panelling. Ned was left in the atrium to ponder his fate. Should he run now? There didn't seem much point; Baines would just hunt him down and bring him back here again. In pieces.

Eventually the servant reappeared and conducted Ned through the same door, down a passageway and out into the garden. Baines stood, hands folded behind his back, on the far side of a small lawn. Beyond him, the Queen's private secretary was a blot of inky darkness against the jewellery-box colours of the flower bed. Ned pulled the cap from his head and clutched it nervously in both hands as he approached them.

"Baines tells me Maliverny Catlyn has gone missing," Walsingham said, clipping a long drooping stem from a honeysuckle and dropping it into a basket at his feet.

"Yes, m'lord." Ned swallowed, then added, "Spirited away by magic, m'lord."

The shears clicked loudly, then were silent. Walsingham turned to face him, his dark eyes burning like embers in his parchment complexion. Ned clutched his cap tighter.

"Magic," Walsingham said. "Do you mean to say witchcraft?"

"I– I don't know, m'lord."

"I am no lord. 'Sir' will suffice."

"Aye, m'lord – I mean, Sir Francis."

"Why was this not reported to me sooner?" Walsingham asked Baines.

"I didn't know nothing about it, sir, not until Faulkner opened his mouth just now."

"Then perhaps," Walsingham said, "you would be so good as to find out."

"Yes, sir. Right away, sir." Baines snapped a bow and went back into the house.

Ned gazed after him, wondering what he was supposed to do now.

"So you are Edmund Faulkner, the one survivor of a certain little conspiracy," the spymaster said.

Ned couldn't think of an answer that wouldn't incriminate him further, so he merely ducked his head in obeisance. Walsingham tossed the shears into the basket with a clatter that made Ned jump.

"Nervous as a cat on a kennel roof," Walsingham said with a smile. "So, what have you not told me yet?"

"Nothing, sir."

"Come now, there must be something more. There is always more to a story than first seems." He gestured for Ned to walk with him back to the house. "This is no simple plot to replace a bodyguard with his double, is it?"