The Nameless Day by Sara Douglass

CHAPTER NINE

The Feast of St. Silvester

In the first year of the reign of Richard II

(Thursday 30th December 1378)

— I —

IN THE DAYS AFTER the death of Edward III, Lancaster labored from early morning until late each night, working with the members of the Privy Council to secure England for the Black Prince. Until the prince arrived home, Lancaster would

act as regent. Urgent messengers were sent to Bordeaux, and it was expected that the Black Prince would arrive in London by mid-January at the latest. It was not simply England at stake, but France as well. The death of a king was always a chaotic time, and never more when the outcome of a war hung in the balance.

One of Lancaster’s first actions was to put out word that King Edward had died a natural death of old age, hastened by his drunken participation in the Yuletide celebrations. Whatever Lancaster and his immediate confidantes suspected, no word was mentioned of demony, or any unnaturalness associated with the king’s demise.

On behalf of his father, Bolingbroke undertook an exhaustive search for the mummers who had surrounded the king at his death: none were ever found.

The preparations for a great funeral were begun, and Edward’s body was embalmed and laid to rest on a bier before the altar of Westminster Abbey.

Lancaster also quietly began the preparations necessary for a renewed spring campaign in France. No doubt the Black Prince was also likewise engaged, but Lancaster was a prudent man, and knew that it took many months to arrange an army of invasion.

There was also one other matter Lancaster attended to in these days: his wedding to Catherine. He had waited many years to make Catherine his wife, and not even the death of his father or the possible unrest of England would prevent him realizing his ambition, even if it must needs be a few days delayed.

ST. STEPHEN’S Chapel, attached to Westminster palace, was possibly the most beautiful building in England. The spires of its clerestory, the soaring upper roof of the nave, rose almost to the height of the spires and towers of Westminster Abbey, and certainly far above those of Westminster Hall.

But if St. Stephens did not quite eclipse Westminster Abbey in the height of its spires, it far outstripped it in the beauty and magnificence of its adornment. This was the chapel of kings, and it had been constructed and decorated to enhance the power and glory of England’s monarchs. Light flooded down from the stained glass windows set high in the clerestory, washing over the silver and gold and gems set into and about the high altar. The nave was characterized by a delicate arcading of elegant arches and columns, exquisitely painted and gilded. The entire floor was not the usual stone flagging of Gothic cathedrals, but consisted of brilliantly patterned tiles of azure, scarlet and ivory. Over the past thirty years the best of English painters had embellished all the chapel’s walls, depicting the lives and devotions of past generations of English royalty, as well as complete cycles of scenes from the bible, angels holding draperies and the lives of warrior saints.

St. Stephen’s was a space of the most serene spirituality, as well as the grandiose majesty of the deeds of English kings and princes.

Here John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, took as his third wife, Lady Katherine Swyn-ford, on the evening of St. Silvester’s Day in a quiet and subdued ceremony.

The nuptials were short, the mass markedly attenuated, and the bride and groom pale and weary—but still desiring to legitimize their love match.

The immediate members of their households were present. Hal Bolingbroke;

Lancaster and Katherine’s bastard children, Henry and Joan Beaufort; Prince Richard (who had slept well and looked alert and excited); his mother Joan of Kent who, due to her degree of fatness, was one of the few to sit throughout the ceremony; six or seven of Lancaster’s most senior retainers; his and Katherine’s personal servants—valets, pages and ladies; John Wycliffe, who was there to act as witness to a degree of religious ceremony he publicly deplored; and Thomas, who stood back a little from the assembly to, again, observe as much as listen.

During the ceremony, Margaret, who stood in the group of Katherine’s ladies at the bride’s back, turned and glanced at Thomas. Her expression was unreadable, but Thomas thought he saw tears in her eyes, and wondered if she hoped that somehow she also might find a husband to legitimize her own shame.

He looked to Joan Beaufort, rumored to be Raby’s intended wife. She was dressed plainly, but with arm and finger rings bejeweled with exquisite gems.

Thomas wondered what she felt, watching a rite that, together with an Act of Parliament, would make her not only legitimate, but one of the most eligible women in England.

And she was to be given to Raby?

The ceremony was almost finished when Thomas heard the door at the end of the nave open and close and hurried footsteps move up toward the wedding group.

He turned and looked.

A messenger, smeared all over with the mud of his travel and the consternation of the news he carried, was heading straight for Lancaster.

Thomas grabbed the man’s arm as he passed. “Stop!” he whispered. “Whatever news you have can wait a little longer!”

The man trembled, as if he considered tearing himself free of Thomas’ grip, then nodded reluctantly.

Thomas, keeping his grip on the man’s arm, looked back to Lancaster and Katherine.

The chaplain was intoning the final words over them and, as Thomas watched, Lancaster turned to his new duchess and kissed her gently.

Thomas leaned close to the messenger. “Go to Bolingbroke,” he said. “Tell him what news you have. He will then pick the best time to tell Lancaster.”

Again the man hesitated, then nodded. He moved hurriedly toward Bolingbroke, murmuring apologies as he pushed past several of Lancaster’s retainers, then caught Bolingbroke’s attention and whispered frantically in his ear.

Thomas’ eyes narrowed. The man’s news must be devastating, for Bolingbroke visibly shuddered, and turned pale.

Lancaster and Katherine turned away from the chaplain and began to accept the congratulations and well wishes of those about them when Bolingbroke stepped up and caught his father’s attention.

“Yes?” Lancaster said.

“My lord…” Bolingbroke hesitated, as if the news he bore was so grievous he could hardly annunciate it. “My lord, this man has just ridden from the port of Dover, where a fishing vessel has brought such lamentable tidings I fear this will

prove to be one of the darkest days in—”

“What tidings?” Lancaster said, grasping his son’s shoulders and staring him in the eye.

“Your brother Edward, heir to the throne, is dead.”

Lancaster’s hands tightened, and a tremor shuddered over his face. “What?” he whispered.

“A storm,” Hal continued, also almost in a whisper, “and more that in this gathering I should not discuss, has stolen breath and warmth from the Black Prince.”

There was a faint cry, and then a mighty thump, as Joan of Kent fainted.

Instantly, there was a scurry of activity, but Thomas, as appalled as anyone else, noticed that amid all this action, only one person remained still and calm.

Richard.

As Thomas became aware of it, so also did Lancaster. He turned from Bolingbroke to Richard, and dropped to one knee before the youth.

“My liege,” he said.

Richard’s eyes flared with excitement… and something else.

Triumph, Thomas realized, and then dread as he had never felt before swept through him, body and soul.

Soon both England and the demons would crown their new King… and he would be one and the same man.

Thomas turned slightly, and saw Wycliffe.

He was grinning with as much triumph as Richard.

CHAPTER TEN

Compline on the Feast of St. Silvester

In the first year of the reign of Richard II

(night Thursday 30th December 1378)

— II —

WESTMINSTER PALACE was quiet and still. The approaching New Year’s festivities had been irretrievably dampened by the twin deaths of Edward III and his heir, the Black Prince. Edward had sat the throne for over fifty years and, loved as he was, most people had accepted that he was reaching the final years of his life. But all had thought the Black Prince, another Edward, would reign after Edward III. The Black Prince was a known quantity: courageous, splendid, just. He would have made an admirable king.

But this boy, Richard? Few Londoners knew much about him. He had been a pale-faced youth they could have begun to know at their leisure once his father had

assumed the throne.

The Lancastrian party had remained at Westminster after the wedding, although on the morrow Katherine and her retinue would depart back to the Savoy Palace.

For now Thomas and Hal stood close together in the quiet and warmth of the stables in the alley behind the palace of Westminster. All the grooms and stable boys had bedded down for the night, and Bolingbroke and Thomas, unsure whether demons could horse-shift as well, had moved to an empty stall twenty paces from the nearest living creature.