9. Phoebe

P HOEBE The King's Wark, Port of Leith, Scotland, the same day

T HAT NIGHT, AS I ' D promised, I started my letter to Valentine. Finding a moment to write had proved challenging. Not because there was no space for me to sit – our lodgings here took up the whole of the square tower's third floor. I hadn't relished climbing all those weathered steps that circled up the turnpike staircase, with its damp scent of old stone and its sensation of confinement, Logan's cloak brushing my face once as he led the way, my father pressing close behind. I'd had to breathe, and focus on more pleasant things.

The rooms were worth the climb. The stairs, set in the tower's corner, brought us to a door, which opened first into the parlour. It was wainscotted in rich, dark wood that matched the floorboards, softened by a woven carpet. Two windows looked towards the waters of the harbour, letting in the light. Both windows were so deeply set into the thick stone walls that they formed private nooks, with benches built to either side – the sort of seats where, as a child, I might have curled myself for hours to watch the ships.

But there were also proper chairs here, and a small, round table, and a hearth.

And from the parlour, two more doors that opened to the bedchambers.

These rooms were designed for the comfort of someone who travelled with servants. While the larger chamber had a lovely bed with broidered hangings, there was also a rough pallet bed set on the floor nearby.

‘'Tis not a parliament,' was Logan's answer when my father raised a protest. ‘There'll be no debates. Ye'll take the bed, I'll have the pallet. I'll be fine.' And that had been the end of that.

I was given the smaller bedchamber. Although it had a soft bed and a small basin of fresh water I could wash with, it was darkly panelled all around, its one small window set too high to be of help, and when the door was closed the room felt airless.

And when darkness came, it brought the fearful dream.

Apparently, I never made a sound when it did visit me. My father said I sometimes stirred or frowned, but never cried out. Never called my mother's name. Not even when I reached the moment where I rolled upon the bed and saw my brother lying there beside me, dead.

I wakened suddenly, adjusting to the strangeness of the room, the sheet so tightly tucked about me that I panicked for a moment from the fear I, too, might be a corpse wrapped in a shroud – until I heard my father snoring through the wall, and the familiar sound relaxed me.

Sleep, I knew, would not return. It never did, after the dream. But I would never have a better time to finally write my letter.

I had tried to write it earlier, within the confines of my chamber, but it proved impossible. And Logan and my father had been sitting talking in the parlour, making it impractical for me to use the table there. But now they were both shut up in their chamber, and the parlour was my own, in all its solitude.

Outside the sheets, the air bit sharply through my linen shift. Had I been home, I could have donned my loose gown, but that useful garment was one of the things I'd had to sacrifice when packing for this journey. In its place, I took the finely woven blanket from the bed and wrapped it round me in the manner of the women I'd seen earlier upon the wharf, so that it made a kind of mantle, leaving my head bare. My feet were bare as well, but that could not be helped. At least they made no noise as I slipped out into the parlour, crossing the soft carpet to the hearth, where last night's coals had been banked well to leave the faintest glow beneath the heaps of ash.

By stirring deeply, I drew flame enough upon a thin wax taper from the box that hung nearby to light the candle at the table, where my father's writing tools and paper still lay where he'd left them.

He'd brought so much paper. I could not think why.

There was one full quire of five-and-twenty sheets stacked on the table, and I knew three more quires had been rolled to line our portmanteau, so there were plenty to be shared. I took one, folded it to write my letter, chose a sharpened quill, and drew the ink pot near while settling in the chair that faced the door of the large bedchamber, so I would have some warning if it opened.

Valentine had only asked for word that I was safe, but after giving that, I told him of our voyage north, although when I began describing Leith I paused, because my own impressions of this town were so different from Valentine's unpleasant memories of Scotland. I compromised by writing mostly of the King's Wark, and of Lady Lindsay, saying: She is such a gracious hostess and so pleasant in her manner I confess I find it difficult to yet believe she sprang from the same line as Andrew Logan. He is here, and —

There, again, I paused.

And… what? What could be written about Logan without spoiling the letter?

I was staring at the candle flame and thinking when the object of my thoughts spoke from the darkness, near the far wall.

‘Are ye foundered still upon the final word that would define a Leither?'

Logan's voice was quiet, but he must have found the way I jumped amusing.

My heartbeat leapt, and raced, and settled as my irritation rose. I saw his outline now. He sat within one of the window nooks, his white shirt showing pale against the stone wall in the shadows.

‘Have you been there all this time?' I asked.

‘Aye.'

I'd have gone straight past him, walking from my chamber to the hearth, and he had let me pass without a word. ‘A gentleman,' I told him, ‘would have made his presence known.'

‘Ye ken I'm here the now.'

I could not argue that.

He asked, ‘Why are ye not abed?'

To my surprise, I answered honestly. ‘I had a dream. It wakened me. Yourself?'

His movement might have been a shrug. ‘Your father snores.'

I bristled. ‘He can't help that.'

‘I was not complaining. My own father did the same.'

His father, too, had been a Messenger – a smaller man than Logan, and more friendly, who had whistled in the Close and found a cheerful word for everyone. He'd seemed well loved by all his family, and his death was unexpected, from some wound that spread a poison in his blood. Four years ago, that would have been, or five. Not long enough to make it any easier for Logan.

He had turned his head away, to look out of the window at the darkness of the harbour. I'd have told him I was sorry for his loss, but I suspected Logan did not want my pity.

And he killed my sympathy with his next words.

He said, ‘I'll take that letter.'

‘What?'

‘I cannot let ye send it.'

‘Why not?'

He rose from his seat. He was half dressed, in shirt and breeks and boots, and cast so dark a shadow on the wall behind him that I nearly did not see the red edge of his scarlet doublet in the dim light, hanging from a wall hook by the window. He took something from its pocket, and approached me.

‘This is why not.'

Holding out a narrow, folded document, he all but dared me to accept it from his hand. I did.

He told me, ‘Read it,' so I did that, too.

An open warrant , it began, to Andrew Logan, one of the Messengers of His Majesty's Chamber .

I stopped, and glanced up at him. ‘Surely this is private?'

‘Read it.'

Whereas Sir David Moray, knight, was lately called to answer questions touching on the death of our beloved Prince, and instead departed out of the kingdom without permission, therefore in His Majesty's name you are to make your speedy repair to Scotland, there to apprehend the said Sir David Moray upon his return, and to bring him hither to us for his examination; in the execution whereof you are not to permit him to speak to any other person but in your hearing, and if there be any papers or books upon his person you will seize and seal those up and bring those hither also, with all speed. You may freely call upon the aid and assistance of all His Majesty's public officers, but forasmuch as this business is of a most special nature, we command you to use all secrecy, and to charge those whom you employ in this service to do likewise.

When I looked up this time, I'm sure the shock showed plainly on my face. ‘Sir David Moray?'

‘Aye.'

‘But of Prince Henry's men, he was the most… the most…'

‘Aye.' Logan's tone was curt. ‘Ye see why this does call for care, and secrecy.'

It all seemed strange. ‘I can't believe Sir David Moray could have ever harmed the prince. There must be some mistake.'

‘'Tis not for ye nor I to judge. Our task is to deliver him to London, and while keeping to these orders.' He took the warrant back from me, and with his hand outstretched, he said again, ‘I'll take that letter.'

‘But I am writing to Valentine.'

He didn't follow my argument. ‘Why should that matter?'

‘Because,' I replied, using Valentine's words, ‘he has the trust of those who write my father's orders, and your own. He knows of all of this already.'

‘Did he tell ye so himself?'

I nodded. ‘On St George's Day, before we sailed.'

‘What did he say?'

‘He knew that we were coming up to Edinburgh to meet you, and he said that he knew why.'

Logan's frown looked darker by the candlelight. His tone was absent as he told me, ‘This is Leith.' Then, ‘But he said nothing of Sir David Moray?'

‘No.'

‘Then I would not assume that he knows all, no matter how he sought to charm ye.'

‘He did not—' I bit my words back with an effort, trying to maintain my temper. ‘He is a gentleman.'

‘Unlike myself. I understand. But even so, I cannot have ye writing to him. As the warrant says—'

‘I'm only writing to him,' I explained, ‘because he wished to know that I was safe.'

That made him slant a long look down at me, his eyebrows raised. ‘Ye're travelling with me. That makes ye safe.'

The ego of the man! I longed to raise a further protest, but we'd reached an impasse, and I knew it. Logan never let me have the last word, and he was not going to let me keep this letter. I admitted I could see his point – the warrant was specific in its wording, and it bound him and those working with him to obey its rules. ‘We take an oath,' he'd told me, in the stables at his house, ‘to keep our business secret.'

He was right, but I would yield on my own terms.

Ignoring his outstretched and waiting hand, I rose and rolled the letter tightly. Crossing to the hearth, I pushed it deep into the embers I had stirred, until the letter caught the flame and burned.

While I knelt and watched it, Logan offered me an olive branch. ‘When this is done,' he said, ‘and we are all come home again to St Bartholomew's, ye can tell Fox that ye tried, and I prevented it. I've no doubt he'll forgive ye. Ye can say I was a tyrant. He'll believe it.'

‘Anybody would believe it.' I could tell, the instant I had said the words, that I had gone a step too far, but words, once spoken, could not be called back again. They hung there, ugly, in the air between us.

Straightening, I slowly turned to face him.

Logan stood, as always, square and solid, his eyes level on my own. ‘I'd not say anybody,' he replied. ‘There may be some among my friends whose views are not so prejudiced. But they are common men, like me, and such as ye and Fox would never ken the views of common folk, now, would ye?'

Somehow he could always tie my tongue with his disdain.

I should have told him I was sorry. Should have told him I was common, too. I should have told him anything, but I could only stand and meet his gaze with helpless eyes, until a firm knock sounded at the main door to the stairs and Logan turned his back to me and went to answer it.

The boy, young Hector, did not step into the parlour, but stayed on the threshold, looking hesitantly from myself to Logan. ‘Beg pardon, sir, but ye did say to tell ye if I saw a French ship in the harbour. One is coming in the now.'

‘Good lad,' said Logan. He took his doublet from its peg and shrugged it on and fastened it. ‘Ye wouldn't ken the name?'

‘I couldnae read it in the dark. Shall I go have another look?'

‘No need. I'm coming with ye.' Logan had his sword belt fastened on now, much to Hector's fascination.

Hector glanced at me again. ‘Forgive me, mistress, if I interrupted—'

Logan cut him off. ‘Ye interrupted nothing.' As he took the cape that had been hanging underneath his doublet from the peg and tied it carelessly across his shoulder, he asked me, ‘We are finished, are we not?' And daring me to tell him otherwise, he sent me a dismissive nod and followed Hector out.

Dawn came creeping faintly in its first pale streaks low in the eastern sky so shortly after Logan left that it seemed his departure had removed the darkness and allowed the light to shine.

My father, when he wakened, found me sitting in the window nook where Logan had been sitting, with my blanket-mantle gathered round my shoulders as I watched the sunrise spread across the waters of the harbour.

‘You are up before the birds, I see, as usual.' He smiled, and looked around the parlour. ‘Where is Logan?'

The full answer, of course, was that Hector had come to fetch him because of the French ship, and Logan had gone alone down to the wharf and was waiting there still. I could see him from here. He'd forgotten his hat in his hurry to leave, and he'd drawn his cape fully around him so none of his livery showed, though his size made him easy to spot.

But I felt too weary to give the full answer, so I simply said, ‘He went out.'

My father nodded sagely. ‘Chased him off already, did you? Ah, well, it was bound to happen. Shall we wait for his return before we call for breakfast?'

His acceptance of the situation stirred me to reply, ‘Are you not curious?'

‘About what?'

‘I am sitting in my nightclothes, I've been talking with a man, in private, and you're not demanding to know every detail?'

‘If it were another man, perhaps. But Logan is a man of honour.' As though it were obvious, my father added, ‘If I believed otherwise, I never would have let you join us.'

I'm not sure which rankled me more – that my father thought so highly of Logan, or that he felt he'd allowed me to join them, when in truth I'd been the one who had arranged things. ‘You seem very sure of his character.'

‘I am.' His face altered. ‘Why? Did he behave in any way that—?'

‘No.' My conscience pricked me for upsetting him. ‘Of course not.'

‘Well, then. As I said, a man of honour. Anyway, you may be in your nightclothes, but you're not indecently attired. Which reminds me, Logan brought you a present.'

I decided I couldn't have heard that correctly. ‘A present? For me?'

My father didn't hear me. He'd already disappeared into his bedchamber, returning with a folded length of light wool cloth of varied colours, woven in a geometric pattern. I knew what it was – I'd seen it many times at St Bartholomew's – but still I scarce believed it till my father said, ‘His mother sent it, actually. Apparently she worried for you riding all day in the open weather, with your face exposed to sun, or in the wind, and when she asked him whether you were well prepared, he did not know, and so she sent you this.' He handed it to me, and I allowed the fabric to unfold into the garment I knew it to be. My father carried on, ‘He says it's called a plaid.'

It took a moment for me to absorb the impact of the gift. My father cared for me and loved me, as did my Aunt Agnes, but I had been motherless for so long that it struck me in a tender, painful place to have a woman so concerned about my comfort in the weather that she'd wish to wrap me in her own clothes.

When I found my voice, it sounded small. ‘'Twas very kind of her to think of me.'

‘The Logans are a kind and thoughtful family.'

I nearly said, Not all of them . Instead, I only asked my father, ‘Why did Logan not give this to me himself?'

My father sent me the same look he always did when I was asking a question whose answer I already knew. ‘I'd imagine he thought you would better accept it from my hands than his.'

Logan was not wrong. But he had made the effort, notwithstanding. It felt petulant, on my part, given that we would be bottled up together for who knew how long, to not begin to make an effort, too.

I began with a small step. ‘Was it four years ago or five that Logan's father died?'

My father looked surprised. ‘Five. Surely you recall. It was the very summer Logan nearly died, as well. Why do you ask?'

‘I had forgotten,' I confessed. I turned my head away, to look out of the window at the stoic figure on the wharf. ‘I thought it was a thing that I should know.'