The Queen's Viper Read online

  Viper listened as Burghley had reviewed the day’s pageantry. He and Elizabeth carefully constructed the propaganda inherent in her ceremony. The Coronation Parade, led by wicker and plaster effigies of the hero Corineus, and the conquered giant Gogmagog, symbolic of London’s ancestral history, had four stopping points. The first was near the Spread Eagle tavern and St. Bennet’s church on Grasyus street.

  A thought struck Viper with such clarity that she had almost revealed herself to personally inform Burghley of her epiphany. There would be no better place for a Catholic assassin to strike, than at the site where Elizabeth would re-legitimize her mother, the woman held responsible for dividing King Henry VIII’s heart and his kingdom. Rome’s message, that no Protestant ruler would be safe from their god, would ring louder than the bells at Westminster Abbey.

  At that point, Viper departed without saying farewell and hastened east to Grasyus, a street named after its grass market, where she now conducted a lengthy search for threatening persons. She uncovered nothing except scores of excited citizens.

  Artillery fire interrupted Viper’s reminiscence. The cannons announced Elizabeth’s departure from the Towyr, and the onset of the procession. The traditional start of a Coronation parade, London’s Towyr was the same place where Viper and Elizabeth began their quest to secure the princess on the throne, thereby improving humaine aeir for Viper’s benefit.

  The cannon fire continued for the duration of Elizabeth’s half-hour journey westwards to the massive triumphal arch over Grasyus street. Commoners angled for a glimpse of the oncoming entourage. Fathers hoisted wriggling children up on their shoulders to see Lords and Ladies bedecked in flowing crimson garb, guiding white horses with scarlet reins, as they passed beneath the monumental wooden arch.

  Built for Elizabeth’s Coronation, the arch supported three horizontal levels. On the first, roses surrounded statues of Elizabeth’s grandfather, King Henry VII of Lancaster, and his wife, Elizabeth of York. Their robes were as red as the blood spilled by the war of the Plantagenet Kings, the Wars of the Roses, from which Henry VII emerged victorious. Intertwined red and white rose vines wound to the second level leading to Henry VIII, Elizabeth’s father.

  Beside him, displayed for the first time in thirty years, was a statue of Elizabeth’s mother, Queen Anne.

  As one of her initial actions as queen, Elizabeth had planned on telling her Government to formally renounce the convictions laid upon her disgraced and beheaded mother. Viper had instructed Elizabeth otherwise.

  “Elsewise, they may also call you traitorous, e’en though you are the Crown,” Viper had said. “There are enough Catholics in your State that would see you dead. The love you bear your mother need not change in your heart. Only, keep it safely locked away, that nothing will make you regret its influence upon you. Woo your Court with her passion, tempered by your hard-won patience.”

  Heeding Viper’s proposal, Elizabeth re-legitimized her mother to English Royalty through symbolism. On the arch, Queen Anne rested within a Tudor rose, high above the crowd. A white eagle, wearing a crown and gripping a gold sceptre in its right talon, perched on a stump above her right shoulder. King Henry VIII held out a large bouquet of red and white roses to his wife. A split pomegranate, the spill of its ruby seeds representing fertility, lay between them.

  Elizabeth’s gold-gilded coach approached the arch and her audience roared with delight. The crests of Elizabeth’s ancestors, carved upon the upright supports, reached high above the collective mist from the crowd’s breath. The heraldic display traced Elizabeth’s lineage back to the legendary King Arthur.

  Designed by Master Dee, one column of the structure hid a platform attached to a rope and pulleys. In the other, two men waited within a large wheel. Elizabeth’s carriage would pause inside the arch long enough for her to slip, unseen, through a door into the column with the platform. Once inside, the men in the opposite arm would be signalled to start running. The wheel, rope and pulley system would then elevate Elizabeth to the uppermost level.

  Elizabeth would appear at the top as if by magic, supported by the historic royals that came before her. Unopened, white lilies, carved from wood and painted in perfect detail, massed around a gold throne in the middle of the arch’s highest level. When Elizabeth sat down, her body weight would activate a second set of pulleys and wires, causing the flowers to open. The lily, a symbol of the Virgin Mary, would bloom out of season in the presence of a virgin queen, in front of St. Bennet’s, a church dedicated to the heavenly virgin. The effect would be tantamount to magic.

  Viper surveyed the expectant crowd, as beautified as the street. Dressed in the types of clothes normally reserved for Sunday services and weddings, a mother fussed with her daughter’s unruly hair.

  “I would keep my hair free, like the queen must wear hers today,” the girl whined. She pulled off her coif and tossed it on the ground alongside wood fencing that lined the road.

  A man, who leaned heavily on a walking stick, bent over and picked up the head covering. “She is not the queen till she hath been anointed by God,” he corrected. He offered the coif to the girl and his hood retracted. His aeir glowed sharp with spite, a phantom ear where his left ear should’ve been.

  The mother wrapped her arms around her daughter’s shoulders. “She is near enough anointed.”

  With a curt nod, the man retreated into the crowd muttering, “If God wills my hand, it shall not be so.”

  Only Viper heard his statement amid enthusiastic shouts from the eager watchers.

  Only Viper saw the handle of a small musket beneath his black cloak.

  Viper tensed for action. The Daoine Tor didn’t care for the politics of humaine religions. However, she couldn’t let this man kill Elizabeth and put a halt to the feast her queen’s aeir provided.

  The man with the missing ear kept his right hand beneath his cloak, on the weapon. He remained calm among the people who hungered for the virgin. Viper checked out the crowd in a frenzy. If she grabbed the assailant, the humaines might be alerted to her existence, since they would see him struggling with an invisible force.

  Elizabeth’s carriage entered the arch. Cries of “Gloriana!” erupted from the kerchief-waving crowd. Viper’s heart thumped in her chest.

  The assassin pushed through the choking mass of bodies, using his stick to nudge people out of his way. He needed to be closer to Elizabeth to get an accurate shot.

  Viper vaulted over the crowd and raced on the roadway in the opposite direction to the mounted Nobles. The horses whinnied without throwing their riders as she sped past. The immortal jumped onto the arch, clinging to Queen Anne’s statue.

  Viper overturned the fences next to the structure with her elldyr creft. Onlookers pushed forwards to the base of the arch. In the surge, the assassin couldn’t withdraw his arm to target Elizabeth. Viper intensified her efforts and cast her elldyr towards him.

  The mob jostled the man, and her magic drifted, useless, into the empty space behind him. The immortal power-dove at the robed gunman before the oncoming humaines reached the arch. She jammed her fists into his upper body. The impact knocked him onto his backside. Viper somersaulted past him and sprang to her feet. She spun around, grabbed him by the scruff, then dragged him from view into an alley with incredible speed. With their attention solely on the arch, the humaines in the street didn’t notice the man’s disappearance.

  Viper flung the assassin into the foul smelling muck between the buildings. “The stench of thy traitorous sweat o’er powers the filth in the street,” she snapped. The immortal abruptly abandoned her concealment. She appeared surrounded by violet flames, talons of elldyr slashing at his body.

  “Dominus Christi!” the man gasped. He had a young, scarred, clean-shaven face. He crossed himself, a flash of white at his collar.

  “A Catholic priest! Who sent ye to kill the queen?”

  “I am a dead man to the world. I travel only for souls, touching neither State nor policy. I hath no suc
h commission, save to serve the will of God.” He pointed his unsteady gun at her.

  Viper’s hostility coursed through her elldyr and lit both gun and powder. The priest-assassin’s hand caught fire. Joyous outbursts from the street obscured his cry of pain. Viper descended upon the priest. She grasped his blistering hand and, hoisting him into the air, snuffed the flames between her breasts. His body dangled from his charred limb.

  “Men hunger to be gods. Thou cannot have gods without demons.” She dug her nails into the base of his neck with one hand and into the side of his head with the other. Blood slicked his face and spine as he bucked. His legs thrashed, excrement fouling the plastered walls. The priest’s aeir funneled into her.

  “No one shall undo what I hath done,” she spat as she tossed his carcass among the refuse.

  Viper’s hands hesitated in front of her, as if she’d never seen them before. Crimson stained her palms and clothes. A haunting sensation deep within her rejoiced, its song eerily captivating. She stripped off faeces-smeared clothes, eager to be rid of the stench of violence and humaines.

  Viper scaled the building to the roof, and beheld her queen. Elizabeth sat on the throne atop the triumphal arch. The structure wobbled as the crowd below clamoured for her attention. Guards ordered people to retreat, spears held out horizontally against the tide of humanity.

  Elizabeth stood among the radiant lilies, her long arms outstretched. “My good people, hear me,” she projected over the crowd. Her resonant, gentle voice subdued the masses. “I am thankful to receive your good will and am most humbled by your love. I pray unto you, turn not to violence. Hath not our countrymen fought amongst one another for far too long? I would see no man, woman or child harmed on this day, the day upon which I give myself unto you. Do not injure yourselves for the attention of your devoted Prince, for I love you all equally. This morning, I did strike my sword upon the London Stone, like my father, and all of England’s Kings, hath done afore me. I am the vessel of England’s glory. Worship not your Prince, but the promise of our golden future together.” Her glowing aeir ebbed over the over-eager assembly.

  That a queen pleaded for peace stunned the crowd. For a moment, their silence rang louder than had the cannon fire at the Towyr.

  “All hail Good Queen Bess!” a young man bellowed. Men, women and children took up the words, the repeated chorus a balm to their troubles. Subdued by Elizabeth’s love, the people knelt before her. Everyone placed a hand on the person in front of them, and they vowed their fealty to the virginal queen and the bounteous era her Coronation proclaimed.

  From: [email protected] (Jack Horncastle)

  Sent: May 15, 2012 15:05

  To: [email protected] (Ben Tarrant)

  Subject: woodhenge removal

  Ben,

  Now that the water is finally drained from the site, the woodhenge excavation in the Thames has the green light. The company that owns the land wanted us to haul out the wooden plinths and the upside down tree trunk from the middle when they were still submerged. Of course, they don’t know about our additional safety concerns beyond working under water. Enviro says there won’t be any changes to the river flow.

  Be careful. I predict that geophys can’t pick up what’s under the exposed roots and trunk. Keep a watch on the water, and its “wildlife.”

  I needn’t tell you how much A is keeping an eye on this project.

  Jack

  Jack Horncastle

  Senior Site Manager

  Atticus Appraisals and Archival

  From: [email protected] (Ben Tarrant)

  Sent: June 2, 2012. 22:00

  To: [email protected] (Jack Horncastle)

  Subject: Re: woodhenge removal

  You were right! We extracted the trunk and roots. The buried top of the tree is pristine and in BLOOM. Pictures attached – I can’t believe it! Could this be *the* tree??

  No activity noted after its removal. Mind you, we can’t shift the rocks around the residual hole and some kind of black liquid is pooling in the middle. I pulled back the crews. The media is glued to the queen’s events, not us. Photography ban done & site secured. Would like you to come out ASAP.

  Excavated artifacts are being processed as we speak – mostly junk. Mr. A will be interested in reviewing a few of them. I made those priority alpha like the others.

  I have guards on the site overnight, ready for … anything.

  B.

  -sent from my mobile phone

  13: The Old Kent Road

  30 St. Mary Axe, The Gherkin.

  June 4, 2012: noon.

  Prickling tenderness raked Viper’s right side. She thrust out her hand and ensnared someone’s wrist before she opened her eyes to survey her surroundings. Mid-day sunlight filtered through gauze curtains on the curved bank of triangular windows of her bedroom. Framed maps of pre-industrial London hung on oak panel walls. Two pristine 2nd Life Guard Officer’s swords used in the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II formed an X above the headboard. Viper lay on her back, a pale, lilac flower about to bloom from earth-toned bedding.

  “Let go. You’re hurting me,” Dhillon pleaded at her side. Viper gripped his left wrist.

  “Thou would lay hand upon me?” Viper’s eyes undulated with annoyance. She pulled the young man so close, she tasted the dread on his breath. The sensation on her skin spread to her cheek. His aeir shrank from where she held him. Dhillon’s foggy glasses drooped low on his nose. His eyes shifted restlessly, and his right hand stayed behind his back.

  Viper thrust him away. He landed backwards on a wooden Elizabethan chair. The leg spindles cracked beneath his weight and he tumbled to the floor.

  She pulled back the sheets. Her clothes from Camden Market had been removed, replaced by a dangerously short chemise of periwinkle blue satin. Viper slid her legs from the bed, one at a time, inviting his eyes to linger on her skin. She sauntered to where he lay and loomed over his body.

  “Owain sent me to check you.” Dhillon blurted, blinking rapidly. Viper felt the heat of his nervousness through the thin chemise. He braced himself with his right hand behind his torso.

  Viper crouched over him, her eyes predatory. “He wishes me harm?” She grasped his chin with her right hand. Threads of elldyr arced between her fingers.

  “No! You misunderstand.” Dhillon held up his left hand in protest. “We don’t use the word check as a threat anymore, except when playing chess. To check on someone means to assess their wellbeing.”

  Viper analyzed him with a quiet, “hmm,” as she stroked the underside of his chin and neck to his right shoulder. She thrust her hand down Dhillon’s steadying arm and twisted it behind his back. Her elldyr creft surrounded him. Viper straightened and yanked him off of the floor with both hands.

  A graceful strand of her magic withdrew the short knife that Dhillon had hidden in his belt at the small of his back. The energy brought the knife between them and pressed it into Dhillon’s neck. A bead of blood trickled into the fine links of the necklace under his shirt.

  “Make not my misunderstanding of thy language a ruse for thy smooth-tongued lies.” Supremacy, rather than humility, ruled her face. “If thou art indeed here for an honest task, then why conceal this paltry weapon?”

  His voice trembled as much as his body. “You threatened to kill Ivy and now she’s dead. I didn’t know what to expect. Before, on the road, you made the Earth go crazy. When we got back, Owain said Ivy had died. I thought you killed her.”

  “Impudent cur!” Viper spun him into the wall and immobilized him with one hand. She plunged the knife beside his head. He clutched for a charm on the necklace under his shirt. Appealing to his god for help would fail him like it had so many others. This time, she would not accept any human’s accusation against her.

  “Whilst ’tis true that the fire of my elldyr creft is beloved of no man, nor no woman, I did not kill Ivy. If she is dead, she died by humaine hands.” Viper ha
ted being blamed for the frailties of mortal bodies. She pressed her forehead into Dhillon’s. The swirl in her eyes drank in his cowardice. “I hunger, little man. And for thy insolence, I shall quench my thirst upon thee.”

  Viper licked a trickle of sweat at Dhillon’s mouth. Her tongue glided across his teeth. His eyelids half closed and his body softened as curls of elldyr circled his body. The runes on her arms glowed. His aeir cumulated beneath her fingertips.

  “Mistress! Please, stop!” Mouse called from the bedroom doorway. He propelled himself into the room with his hopping gait. Viper glowered at her Foundling, unmoved by the large adhesive bandage on his forehead or the scratches on his face. “My lovely Mistress, do not harm the boy, please. He is important. Oh, yes, yes, he is. I primed him for you, but not for this purpose.” Tears brimmed above the bruising of Mouse’s eyes. “Please.”

  Viper tossed Dhillon, unharmed, on the carpeted floor at Mouse’s feet. “Here is your pet.”

  “You are hungry. Yes, yes.” Mouse helped Dhillon to stand with soothing words. The young man rubbed his head. Mouse scanned him, then turned to Viper. “Together, you and I shall find you sustenance. We must recover your strength quickly. There is much to do. Much to do.”

  Mouse transformed into Owain as he ushered Dhillon from the room. The muscles of Owain’s face tightened and his voice sounded bolder. “Get Clare. She’s in the Rose Room, recuperating. Graeme’s in my office. Meet us there in an hour.” Dhillon nodded silently and started for the door.

  “Next time, wield bolder mettle.” Viper threw his blade across the room. The weapon sunk into the floor between Dhillon’s feet. He gulped and wriggled the knife free with a worried glance at Viper.

  “You art of a double nature, Foundling,” Viper said to Owain when they were alone. “You are as I remember you, yet you carry an authority such as I did not expect in you.”