‘Have you ever suspected,’ Fitzgerald sat down on a stool, ‘our noble Edward of Warwick or, more possibly, his mentor, Richard Symonds?’
Matthias wrapped the blanket round his shoulders more tightly. He felt cold again. He was now certain that the presence he had met in Oxford was here in Dublin. But what could he do?
‘There’s nothing,’ Matthias declared, ‘nothing at all I can do. If I go to a priest, I’ll be arrested as a heretic or a warlock.’ He glanced at his two companions. ‘Aren’t you frightened?’ he mocked bitterly. ‘Aren’t you terrified of me?’
‘I am afraid of nothing,’ Fitzgerald retorted, ‘nothing that walks on legs.’
‘The second thing?’ Matthias asked. ‘You said there were two things?’
‘Ah yes.’ Fitzgerald got to his feet. ‘Richard Symonds has been talking about you. Dark hints about your secret powers. Time and again he reminds our young prince of your debt to him. It may be time he comes to ask that you repay it.’
Fitzgerald and Mairead then left. Matthias kept the candles alight, crossed himself and climbed into bed. He accepted he could do nothing, except pray and wait.
The next morning Matthias went to Mass in a chantry chapel of Dublin Cathedral. The priest who celebrated it reminded him of his father. Matthias abruptly realised that, in his imprisonment and flight from Oxford, he had lost the list of quotations his father had provided. On his return to his chamber he took a piece of parchment and wrote them down from memory. When he had finished, Matthias studied his scrawled words: these might provide a key to the mystery which confronted him. He also speculated on why he had experienced such harrowing hauntings the previous night. Was this a sign the Rose Demon was close? Or was it something he was to experience throughout his life?
Matthias returned to his duties. Christmas was approaching and the weather had turned cold and bleak, the clouds heavily massed, grey and lowering, bubbling with the threat of violent winds and drenching rain. All preparations for the invasion now came to a halt. The Irish lords had promised what they could. Edward of Warwick would now have to wait until spring arrived and the English exiles sailed from Flanders with whatever help they could provide. News still came from England. Tudor again paraded the boy who, he claimed, was the real Edward of Warwick, through the city of London. Symonds openly scoffed at this, dismissing it as a sign of the usurper’s growing anxieties. So confident did Symonds become that he and young Edward were often closeted for hours, detailing arrangements of what would happen once they had seized the English crown.
Symonds also worked hard to keep Matthias well away from the young prince, sending him through the city with messages, treating him no better than a lackey. Matthias did not object. He was already forming secret plans that, if and when the invasion should sail, he would leave the Yorkist rebels as swiftly as possible.
Symonds’ hold over the young prince became more apparent. By the feast of the Epiphany, six days into the New Year, Matthias no longer received invitations to join council meetings. Fitzgerald and Mairead were elsewhere, so he was left to kick his heels, though he suspected it was only a matter of time before Symonds moved against him openly. The Archbishop’s palace was now a hotbed of intrigue with masked and cowled messengers coming at all hours of the day and night. Sentries stood at every doorway, guards patrolled the grounds. Symonds began to issue letters talking of ‘Judas men’ spies, possibly assassins, with designs on the young prince’s life.
On the Feast of Saints Timothy and Titus, towards the end of January, Symonds summoned Matthias to a meeting in his opulent chamber at the other end of the palace. Symonds, swathed in furs, slouched in a throne-like chair, stretching beringed fingers towards a roaring fire. Servants and lackeys stood in the shadows ready to satisfy his every whim. Matthias was made to sit on a stool opposite. Symonds studied him for a while. Matthias gazed coolly back. In the few months since arriving in Dublin, Symonds had changed: his face was fleshy and reddened by the banquets and feasts he had attended. Veins, high in his cheeks, were an eloquent witness to his nightly carousing. Symonds sucked noisily on his teeth and snapped his fingers.
‘Clear the room!’ he ordered. ‘All of you outside!’
Symonds waited until the door closed behind them. He jabbed a finger at Matthias.
‘I am rather disappointed with you. I brought you to Dublin because I thought you were for the House of York. You should help our cause but what do I have? Nothing but a sickly man who spends most of his time closeted with Fitzgerald and his trollop!’
‘I did not ask you to bring me,’ Matthias returned. ‘And I did not wish to be sick. As for Master Fitzgerald and Mairead, they are my friends.’
‘Are they now?’ Symonds leant forward. ‘Are they now, Master Fitzosbert?’ His lips curled. ‘You have no friends! I brought you because of that woman Morgana. On reflection I wonder who you really are. A Judas man, eh? One of the Welsh usurper’s snivelling spies?’
Matthias made to rise.
‘If you leave, I’ll have you killed!’ Symonds snapped.
Matthias sat down on the stool but his fingers drummed on the hilt of the dagger pushed into his belt. Symonds smiled.
‘In a few days it will be February,’ he said. ‘The weather will change: the sea will be less choppy, the winds not so rough. We wait impatiently for de la Pole’s fleet to sail from Flanders.’ He banged the arm of his chair. ‘And the fleet must come. Now, in Ireland they claim. .’ He paused and stared at one of the rings on his finger. ‘They say with the right sacrifice the elements can be placated.’ He glanced at Matthias.
‘What are you asking?’ Matthias asked impatiently.
‘I was a priest,’ Symonds sneered, ‘but I no more believe in such nonsense than you do, Master Fitzosbert! You and your haunting nightmares! Oh, I’ve heard of them! Yours won’t be the first Black Mass I’ve attended.’
Matthias’ heart sank: from his studies in Oxford he knew about such blasphemous rituals.
‘And,’ Symonds continued, ‘it won’t be the last!’
‘You wish me to participate in secret rites? The Black Arts? Aren’t there sorcerers and wizards enough in this rain-soaked isle?’ Matthias protested.
‘Oh, I could fill the cathedral with charlatans,’ Symonds retorted. ‘But you are different, aren’t you, dear Matthias? I have had you followed. Why did those ruffians not attack you? And, in that tawdry alehouse the old witch who talked to you about the Dearghul? And those nightmares which woke the palace?’ Symonds pursed his lips and glared at Matthias. ‘Do you think I’m a fool?’ he hissed. ‘People are talking, Matthias! Here we are in an old, draughty palace, the latrines are frozen, the rushes cannot be changed. Why is it that servants say your chamber smells so richly, like a rose garden on a summer’s afternoon?’
Matthias realised that Symonds not only resented him but feared him. He viewed him as a practitioner of the Black Arts and was probably terrified that Matthias might use these to exert influence over Edward of Warwick.
‘Now, I’ll tell you what will happen.’ Symonds stared up at the rafters. ‘Today is Thursday. At the beginning of February, you and I will meet again. There are some old ruins at the east end of the cathedral grounds. People say they once belonged to the Druids, the ancient priests who lived here before St Patrick arrived. Let me see these powers of yours. Let us call on the Dark One and see what assistance can be given.’
‘This is foolishness!’ Matthias protested.
‘No, Master Fitzosbert, this is politics. I intend to topple Tudor from his throne.’ Symonds’ eyes gleamed with fanaticism. ‘I, as Archbishop of Canterbury, will, one day, place the crown of Edward the Confessor on this prince of York in the Abbey of Westminster. If I have to make a compact with hell to achieve it, then so be it.’ He gestured with his fingers. ‘You are dismissed!’
Matthias was halfway through the door.
‘Oh, Matthias,’ Symonds grinned round the chair, reminding Matthias of a gargoyle, ‘accidents can happen. You should be careful you are not abducted by some English merchant and taken back to London or Oxford!’
Matthias left the chamber. In the gallery outside he met Mairead and Fitzgerald, who had recently returned to the palace. He was so angry at what had happened, he just brushed by them and spent the rest of the day in his own chamber wondering what to do. There were knocks on the door but he refused to answer. Later in the evening he asked a servant to bring him up some food. He drank deeply and, when he awoke, darkness was falling, the palace was quiet and he was bitterly cold. He built up the fire, stripped and went to bed. This time he slept peacefully, slipping into a dream.
Matthias had never experienced the like before. He knew he was dreaming but he couldn’t, he didn’t want to
