The Traitor's Blade, Kevin Sands [fiction novels to read txt] 📗

From the stables, we crossed Scotland Yard, then into the Court. From there, it was a path through the pastry and the kitchen and around the buttery, before entering the heart of the palace via the chapel. We passed close to our quarters; then a zigzag path through the corridors led us straight past the king’s section of the palace.

“This is the first time,” Tom said, “we actually know where we’re going.”

No one stopped us; we’d been seen enough around Whitehall the past few days that our faces were familiar. We watched carefully the whole time, but seeing nothing out of the ordinary, we moved on.

The arrow directed us outside, through the Stone Gallery, and suddenly we were in the Privy Garden. We skirted the garden itself, heading south until we reached the apple trees that lined the edge of the grass.

“Which tree should we look at?” Sally said.

The X had been marked over the third tree up, but there were more here than the map showed. “Let’s start at the third from the end, and go from there.”

“What are we looking for?” Tom said.

“I don’t know. Maybe an actual X?”

“The little arrow is aimed at the ground,” Sally noted.

“So let’s look there, too. Maybe what we’re trying to find is buried. Check to see if the earth has been disturbed.”

There wasn’t enough light to see in the orchard; we had to run back inside to get lanterns. Then we began to search. Sally checked the bark for marks. Tom and I inspected the soil around the trunks. He reached the fifth tree before he called to me. “Christopher.”

I went over. He knelt on the grass in front of a darker spot on the ground. The earth here had been turned over recently, then patted down.

Tom was already digging his fingers into the dirt. He rooted around for a moment, then stopped. “There’s something.…”

He pulled out a little object wrapped in cloth. He shook the soil off, then unfolded the wrapping. Metal glinted in the flame.

It was a key.

“What does it open?” Sally said.

“I’m guessing whatever we find at the end of the arrow,” I said. “Let’s go.”

CHAPTER

44

WE WENT FASTER THIS TIME. The arrow led us past Westminster Gate, over the tennis courts, then back into more apartments, until we reached the room where the arrow ended. It was beside the old tiltyard, where knights had jousted in the days of Elizabeth and Henry VIII.

On the map, this room was circled. It was one of three rooms listed with the number 33. The door was closed.

“What now?” Tom whispered.

He and Sally kept watch as I knocked at the door, softly. When no one answered, I tried the knob.

Locked.

I remembered what Lord Ashcombe had said. Nothing is locked in the palace.

Fingers trembling, I inserted the key we’d found buried by the tree in the Privy Garden. It turned smoothly.

Clack.

I stood there, hand on the knob, but I didn’t open it. “Just a second,” I said to the others.

“Where are you going?” Sally said.

I hurried back through the corridor, catching up to a pair of servants we’d passed along the way. “Excuse me?”

I showed them my map, keeping the message with the long arrow hidden. I pointed to the quarters marked 33. “Could you tell me whose rooms are these?”

“Colonel Darcy’s, sir,” the older servant said.

I had no idea who that was. But I thought it might look suspicious to ask, so I just said, “Thank you,” and turned to go.

“You won’t find him there, however,” the man said. “The colonel is in Cambridge for another two weeks.”

“Oh.” I decided to chance it. “Is someone staying there instead?”

“Yes, sir. Colonel Darcy was gracious enough to permit the Baron of Oxton to stay at Whitehall while the colonel is away.”

The Baron of Oxton.

Domhnall Ardrey.

The man I’d seen outside the palace gates. The man who’d appeared in the Banqueting House.

I thanked the servants and hurried back.

We went inside.

I left the door unlocked, in case we needed to make a quick escape. We found ourselves in a sitting room, a bedroom to the left. The rooms were dark; I took one of the blankets from the bed, to stuff at the bottom of the door so no one passing would see the light from our lanterns.

“What are we looking for?” Tom whispered.

The Templars’ map showed a scroll of paper. “A letter,” I whispered back. “Or something like it.”

That was just a guess, but it gave us a place to start. And we needed to hurry. We had no idea where Lord Ardrey was. He might come back at any time.

Tom and I began at the desk, shuffling through the papers atop it, before opening the drawers. Sally took the bedroom.

Nothing in the papers seemed of interest. Most looked to be documents for a land deal near the baron’s estate in Scotland; if that was a threat to the king, I couldn’t see how. The rest was private correspondence, mostly gossip.

Sally joined us in the sitting room. “Anything?” I said, and she shook her head.

Tom glanced nervously at the door. “What now?”

This couldn’t be it. The Templars’ letter had led us here; there had to be something to find. “Check everywhere. Hiding spots. Secret compartments. Anywhere you can think.”

Sally returned to the bedroom to give it another look. Tom checked the couch. I stayed with the desk, knocking at the wood, prying the panels to see if anything popped out. Eventually, frustrated, I yanked out the drawers and dumped them on the floor.

Nothing. Nothing hidden, nothing underneath. I crawled under the desk—

And there it was.

Tucked under the wood, right at the back. By pulling the drawers out, I’d exposed a secret panel. Pressing the front of it made the panel pop open, and a letter, folded tightly, fell to the rug.

I grabbed it and crawled out from under the desk. Sally, who’d heard the commotion, hurried from the bedroom to find me sitting at Tom’s feet, holding the