In Ashes Lie Read online

  In Ashes Lie

  MARIE BRENNAN

  Hachette Digital

  www.littlebrown.co.uk

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Acknowledgements

  PART ONE - Trust in Princes

  SUNDAY SEPTEMBER 2, 1666 - The Battle for the River

  PART TWO - That Man of Blood

  MONDAY SEPTEMBER 3, 1666 - The Battle for the Stone

  PART THREE - When the King Enjoys His Own Again

  TUESDAY SEPTEMBER 4, 1666 - The Battle for St. Paul’s

  PART FOUR - The Living Few

  WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 5, 1666 - The Battle for London

  EPILOGUE

  Author’s Note

  extras

  about the author

  Teaser chapter

  In Ashes Lie

  The notion that they would deliberately undermine the King was disturbing.

  “That,” Lune said, “is just shy of treason.”

  “Or past it.” Antony dropped without looking into the chair a hobthrush hurried to place behind him, and glared away the fae who were unabashedly eavesdropping.

  Lune recognized the bleak hardness in his eyes. It had grown over the years she’d known him, from his first arrival in this court as a young man with scarcely enough whiskers to call a beard. She made him her consort because she needed his stubborn loyalty to the mortal world; he accepted because he dreamed of changing that world for the better, with faerie aid. But he was a single man, whatever aid he had, and all too often his efforts ended in failure.

  It saddened her to see him thus, growing older and grimmer, year by year. How old was he now? How much longer would he last?

  I will lose him some day. As I lost the man before him.

  BY MARIE BRENNAN

  Warrior

  Witch

  Midnight Never Come

  In Ashes Lie

  In Ashes Lie

  MARIE BRENNAN

  Hachette Digital

  www.littlebrown.co.uk

  Published by Hachette Digital 2009

  Copyright © 2009 by Bryn Neuenschwander

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  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, without the prior

  permission in writing of the publisher, nor be

  otherwise circulated in any form of binding or

  cover other than that in which it is published and

  without a similar condition including this

  condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  All characters and events in this publication, other than

  those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious

  and any resemblance to real persons,

  living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book

  is available from the British Library.

  eISBN : 978 0 7481 1184 8

  This ebook produced by JOUVE, FRANCE

  Hachette Digital

  An imprint of

  Little, Brown Book Group

  100 Victoria Embankment

  London EC4Y 0DY

  An Hachette Livre UK Company

  Acknowledgments

  I habitually put my research bibliography on my website, both to help any reader who wants to know more, and to acknowledge the scholars without whom I could never write these books. Where the latter is concerned, I must single out the late C. V. Wedgwood, who did more than any other historian I read to bring this period to life. Any historian will mention, for example, the attempted arrest of the Five Members, perhaps quoting one or two of the famous lines from the incident; Wedgwood goes on to say that Charles was accompanied by his nephew, and the Earl of Roxburgh was propping the door open, and some of the courtiers in the lobby mimed firing at the men in the Commons. Such details are more valuable than gold to a writer of historical fiction. All of the “real event” scenes in the first half of this book owe their truthfulness to Wedgwood; for the second half of the book and the Great Fire, I refer you to my Web site, and all the other scholars listed there.

  I also owe an enormous debt of gratitude to those who aided me directly. Aside from all the wonderful LiveJournal folk who recommended references to me, I must thank Meriel Jeter and John Schofield at the Museum of London; Susanne Groom of Historic Royal Palaces; and Gwen Thomas, Robin Pyke, and Kate Robinson of the National Trust at Ham House. Ellen Rawson and Ian Walden rescued me from being at the mercy of the Sunday bus schedule in rural Oxfordshire; John Pritchard supplied me with valuable information about the history of the Vale; and Lothair Biedermann lent me a spot of help in placing labels on the map at the front of this book.

  I don’t have names for all the individuals at the Guildhall Library and London Metropolitan Archives who aided me in my documentary research while I was in London, but all hail the honorable order of librarians, without whom I would have been lost.

  And particular thanks to Kate Walton and Alye Helms, for more late-night (and sometimes afternoon) conversations about the book. Their comments kept me on course when I was lost in the wilds of seventeenth-century history—and one well-timed question from Kate regarding the Cailleach Bheur saved my sanity when I needed it most. The Kate in this novel is not named for her, but she feeds my general conviction that anyone with that name must be an excellent person indeed.

  Dramatis Personae

  The Royal Family of England

  Charles Stuart, first of that name—King of England, Scotland, France, and Ireland

  Henrietta Maria—Queen to Charles I

  Charles Stuart, second of that name—Prince of Wales, and after King of England, Scotland, France, and Ireland

  Catherine of Braganza—Queen to Charles II

  James Stuart—Duke of York, and brother to Charles II

  James Stuart—late King of England, Scotland, France, and Ireland, and father to Charles I

  Mary Stuart—late Queen of Scots, and mother to King James

  The House of Lords

  William Laud—Archbishop of Canterbury

  Thomas Wentworth—Lord Deputy of Ireland, created Earl of Strafford

  Thomas Grey—Lord Grey of Groby

  John Mordaunt—Viscount Mordaunt of Avalon, and a Royalist conspirator

  Edward Hyde—later Earl of Clarendon, and a Royalist conspirator

  William Craven—Earl of Craven

  Maxwell—Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod

  The House of Commons

  John Glanville—Speaker of the House of Commons

  William Lenthall—Speaker of the House of Commons

  Sir Antony Ware }

  Thomas Soame }—aldermen and members for London

  Isaac Penington }

  John Pym—a Parliamentary leader

  John Hampden }

  Denzil Holles }—allies of John Pym

  Arthur Hesilrige }

  William Strode }

  Sir Francis Seymour—a knight and member of Parliament

  William Prynne—a member of Parliament

  The New Model Army

  Oliver Cromwell—a general and member of Parliament, and later Lord Protector of England

  Henry Ireton—a general and member of Parliament

  Thomas Fairfax—Lord Fairfax of Cameron, likewise a general

  Thomas Pride—a colonel

  Edmund Ludlow—an officer

  Richard Cromwell—son of Oliver Cromwell, and second Lord Protector

  George Monck—general of the Army in Scotland

  Londoners

  Sir Morris Abbot }


  Thomas Alleyn }—Lord Mayors of London

  Sir Thomas Bludworth }

  Sir William Turner—an alderman of London

  Katherine Ware—wife to Sir Antony Ware

  Burnett—manservant to Sir Antony Ware

  Thomas Farynor—a baker

  Humphrey Taylor—a Puritan

  Benjamin Hipley—a spymaster

  John Lilburne—leader of the Leveller movement

  Marchamont Nedham—a printer of news

  John Bradshaw—Lord President of the High Court of Justice

  Elizabeth Murray—suo jure Countess of Dysart, and a Royalist conspirator

  John Ellin—a doctor

  Samuel Pepys—a diarist

  Robert Hubert—a traitor

  Sir Michael Deven—a mortal man, now dead

  The Onyx Court

  Lune—Queen of the Onyx Court

  Valentin Aspell—Lord Keeper

  Amadea Shirrell—Lady Chamberlain

  Nianna Chrysanthe—Mistress of the Robes

  Sir Prigurd Nellt—a giant, and Captain of the Onyx Guard

  Sir Cerenel }

  Sir Essain }

  Sir Mellehan }—knights of the Onyx Guard

  Sir Peregrin Thorne }

  Dame Segraine }

  Gertrude Goodemeade—a brownie of Islington

  Rosamund Goodemeade—her sister, and likewise a brownie

  Sir Leslic—an elf-knight

  Lewan Erle—an elf-lord

  Carline—an elf-lady

  Angrisla—a nightmare

  Tom Toggin—a hob

  Bonecruncher—a barguest

  Blacktooth Meg—the hag of the River Fleet

  Foreigners, exiles, and deceased fae

  Fiacha }

  Nuada }—Ard-Ríthe, High Kings of Ireland

  The Dagda }

  Conchobar—King of Ulster

  Eochu Airt—ollamh and ambassador from Temair

  Ailill—King of Connacht

  Medb—Queen of Connacht

  Feidelm of the Far-Seeing Eye—poet and ambassador from Temair

  Nicneven—the Gyre-Carling of Fife

  Kentigern Nellt—an exiled giant, and brother to Sir Prigurd Nellt

  Halgresta Nellt—their sister, likewise a giant, now dead

  Cunobel—an exiled knight, and brother to Sir Cerenel

  Ifarren Vidar—an exiled lord

  Orgat—a powrie of the Border

  Cailleach Bheur—the Blue Hag of Winter

  Wayland Smith—King of the Vale of the White Horse

  Irrith—a sprite of Berkshire

  Invidiana—late Queen of the Onyx Court

  City of London

  PROLOGUE

  The Spark

  PUDDING LANE, LONDON: Sunday, September 3, 1666

  The bakery lay silent and dark in the small hours of the morning, lit only by the faint glow of embers from the hearth. Faggots of wood sat under the beehive dome of the oven, awaiting the morning’s burden: loaves of bread, pots of baked meat. Sunday was a day of rest, but not of fasting, and so the baker must to work.

  The embers flared and subsided. By law, a baker must extinguish his oven and hearth every night, for in a city of timber, fire was an ever-present threat. But kindling the flames anew each morning was a tedious chore, and so most let their ovens fall cold in the night, but banked the coals of the hearth for easy revival.

  A cherry-red fragment collapsed with a sigh, and sparks leapt free.

  In the house above, Thomas Farynor slept soundly. Business was good; he supplied ship’s biscuit to the King’s navy, and in these times of war with the Dutch he did not lack for work. He and his daughter Hanna had both a maid and a manservant to look after them and help with the running of the bakery.

  Sparks had escaped the hearth before. They died soon after, reduced to black cinders that stained the rafters, the walls, and the brick-laid floor. But tonight one drifted farther than most, dancing on the invisible currents of the air, until it found a resting place on the fuel piled in the oven.

  A tiny flame kindled on a splinter of wood.

  Afterward, Farynor would claim he banked his fire safely when the day’s business was done. He raked his oven clean, swept the bricks of the floor—and so he had, but sloppily. His daughter Hanna, inspecting the kitchen before she retired at midnight, saw nothing to fear.

  But now, an hour later, the room glowed with new light.

  Smoke wreathed the sooty beams of the ceiling. The Farynors’ manservant, asleep on the ground floor, frowned and tossed beneath his blanket. His breathing grew ragged; he coughed once, then again, until at last he waked to the danger.

  With a hoarse shout, he tore his way free of the bedclothes. The kitchen was well alight by now, hearth and oven blazing merrily, the debris on the floor, the piles of ready wood. The wall timbers, dried by a long summer of drought, smoked and were hot to the touch. He stumbled his way by reflex toward the stairs, barely able to see in the choking gloom.

  The cloud pursued him upward. Crying out, the manservant pounded on his master’s door. “Fire! In God’s name, wake—the house is alight!”

  The door swung open. Farynor, scraping sleep from his eyes, did not seem to understand. But when he went to the head of the stairs and saw for himself the scene below, all drowsiness fled. “God Almighty,” he whispered, and ran back through his room to the adjoining door.

  Hanna woke but slowly, and her maid more slowly still. Once up, they hurried on their shoes, while Farynor lent his man a pair. But as fast as they moved, they tarried too long: the flames had claimed the foot of the stairs.

  The maid screamed and clutched at her mistress, gagging on the thick air. “We must try,” Hanna cried, and gathered up the skirt of her shift. With one sleeve over her face to filter the air, she forced her way against the punishing heat, down into the hell below.

  “Hanna!” Her father plunged after her. Already she was lost in the blinding smoke, but an instant later he heard a scream. A lurching body crashed into him, fire leaping up the side of her shift; they fell hard against the wooden steps, and his hands flew without thinking, beating out the flames. Hanna wept with pain as he dragged her bodily upward again, into the illusory safety of the chamber above.

  “The window,” his manservant said, while Hanna’s legs collapsed beneath her. “We must try to climb out.”

  On an ordinary night, Farynor would have called it lunacy. But when the only alternative was death—“We cannot climb down, though.”

  His man was already unlatching the window. “Then we go across. Onto the roof—if you go first, I will help your daughter.”

  Expansions years ago had jettied the upper floor outward so that it overhung the street. Farynor gasped in the fresher air, then forced his aging body through the narrow opening, clawing for the eaves above. His grip slipped, almost sending him to the street below, but his manservant caught his foot and gave him the push needed to lift him safely over the edge. Hanna was next, biting through her lip when the manservant gripped her blistered legs.

  “Help!” she cried, as soon as she had her voice again. “Fire! Wake, rouse yourselves—fire in Pudding Lane!” Movement flickered in other windows. Theirs was not the only house whose upper stories overreached the boundary of its plot; she could almost touch the windows across the way, where faces pressed briefly against the glass, then vanished.

  Pain and smoke set her to coughing, but by then Farynor had the cry. So Hanna was the one to see their manservant haul himself up over the edge of the roof—but where was the maid?

  “She will not come,” he said, eyes wild and bleak. “She fears the height too much. I tried—”

  Hanna bent and shouted toward the open window, but there was no reply.

  They could not stay. Moving carefully, the three eased their way along the edge of the roof to the neighbor’s shutters. Farynor kicked against these, bellowing. Figures had begun to appear in the street below, most in their nightshi
rts, some with breeches and boots on. They knew what would be needed.

  The shutters opened abruptly, scraping Farynor’s bare leg. Reaching hands eased his daughter through into safety; then the baker, then his man. Heat radiated from the wall between the dwellings, but as yet there was no fire, and the house’s leather buckets had been brought already, to soak the beams and the plaster in between.

  In Pudding Lane, the parishioners of St. Margaret’s Fish Street rose to their duty, arranging bucket lines, flinging soil and dung, pails of milk, anything that came to hand. On this, the Lord’s day of rest, they settled themselves for battle, to save themselves and their homes from fire.

  PART ONE

  Trust in Princes

  1639-1642

  “Consider seriously whither the beginning of the

  happinesse of a people should be written in letters

  of blood . . .”

  —Thomas Wentworth, first Earl of Strafford

  May 12, 1641

  The beating heart of London’s commerce sweltered like an oven in the early heat, dampening undershirts and linen collars, and subduing the voices that echoed off the walls. In the open stone of the courtyard, the sun hammered down on the hats and caps of the finely dressed merchants and customers who met to conduct business or exchange news. Some took refuge in the gallery ringing the space, where shade offered a relative degree of relief.

  Upstairs, in the tiny enclosed shops, the air was stiflingly close. Sir Antony Ware fanned uselessly at his dripping face with a sheaf of papers—a petition foisted on him by a man outside. He might read it later, but for now, it served a better purpose. The fingers of his free hand trailed over a bottle of cobalt glass, while from behind the table the shopkeeper beamed encouragement at him. Those who patronized the Royal Exchange tended to be the better class of men, but even so, for this fellow to claim a baronet and alderman of London as a customer would give him a touch of prestige.