Young - Sons of the Blood

Also by Robyn Young

The Insurrection Trilogy

Insurrection

Renegade

Kingdom

The Brethren Trilogy

Brethren

Crusade

Requiem

Sons of the Blood

Robyn Young

www.hodder.co.uk

First published in Great Britain in 2016 by Hodder & Stoughton

An Hachette UK company

Copyright Robyn Young 2016

The right of Robyn Young to be identified as the Author of the Work

has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright,

Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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 written permission 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 being

imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance

to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library

ISBN 978 1 444 77774 1

Hodder & Stoughton Ltd

Carmelite House

50 Victoria Embankment

London EC4Y 0DZ

www.hodder.co.uk

Acknowledgements

Thank you, as always, to my agent, Rupert Heath, and to Nick Sayers, my editor at Hodder & Stoughton, for believing in me even when I doubt myself. My gratitude goes to the fantastic team at Hodder, with a special shout out to Kerry Hood and Lucy Upton, but no less of a thank you to everyone there whose support I continue to appreciate enormously.

Thank you to Dan Conaway at Writers House and Meg Davis at the Ki Agency, and a big round of applause to Camilla Ferrier at the Marsh Agency and all who have worked so hard to wing the books beyond these shores. And, of course, thanks as ever to all my publishing teams overseas.

I am much indebted to Kirsten Claiden-Yardley for reading the manuscript so thoroughly and saving me from historical howlers, and to fellow wordsmith, Harry Sidebottom, for hunting the halls of Oxford and finding me such an expert. Any mistakes that remain are my own to bear. My appreciation also goes to Alison Weir for listening patiently to my plot and for not rolling around on the floor with laughter.

My gratitude goes to Michael Buckmaster-Brown for the incredible experience with black powder weapons (and for making sure I didnt shoot myself). And a thank you also to the very helpful Yeoman Warder in the Tower of London for pointing out the old staircase that might have led in the princes time from the Garden Tower (now known as the Bloody Tower), to the Wakefield.

Last, but by no means least, my love and appreciation go to all my friends and family who have shared in the journey and cheered me along on both fair and foul weather days. But most especially my love to Lee. Thank you, darling, for everything.

For Grandad, for the stories

Contents

Chapter 1

They came for him at dawn, riding hard along the Roman road. The rising sun sparked gold off sword pommels, flashed its fire in the curved blades of axes. Beneath the billow of mud-spattered cloaks the padded bulk of the soldiers brigandines were clearly visible. The men pricked their palfreys bloody, their muscles straining with the unrelenting pace, blisters raw on the ridges of palms even through the leather of their gloves. The damp and brittle air turned the horses breaths to plumes that gusted white through flared nostrils. Patches of hoarfrost that mottled the road were smashed to splinters by pummelling hooves.

No banners were raised above the company and they wore no livery, anonymity as well as haste their ally this April morning. Where Watling Street cut its blade-straight course towards the Great Ouse, the last of the sentries who had ridden on ahead to silence any word of their coming joined the company and, together, the horsemen thundered towards the small market town of Stony Stratford and the object of their race: the boy who had become king.

Thomas Vaughan pushed open the inn door, shielding his eyes from the mornings gold glare. It was market day and the thoroughfare outside the Rose and Crown was busy. Stepping into the bustle, he made his way down the street. It was still early, but the spring sun, gleaming full on the whitewashed faades of buildings, held a burgeoning warmth. Its brightness was reflected in the faces of the merchants who called to passers-by. Most of those who thronged the street had been up for several hours already, in workshops or out in the fields. They had now come looking for a meal to break their fast, drawn by the smell of grease-mottled pies and cauldrons of stewed meat and barley.

As Vaughan moved through the crowd, he sensed many eyes on him and the calls of traders came loud and eager in his direction. Although his hose and boots were stained with horse sweat after the ride from Ludlow and his clothes made for travel rather than style, in his feathered cap and richly brocaded doublet and cloak he still cut a striking figure among these men and women in their workday drab. Despite the unwanted attention, it felt good to be out and moving. Hed been awake long before dawn, unable to sleep, and the restlessness that had curled tight in him had only grown with the slow-passing hours.

It was hard to put his finger on the exact reason for his unease. The news that had reached them after the sudden death of the king of angry scenes in London between the queen-dowager, Elizabeth Woodville, and allies of her brother-in-law, the Duke of Gloucester, over arrangements for the coronation was unwelcome, but not unexpected. It was a difficult time and tempers would be heated by the fires of uncertainty. Maybe it was something in Gloucesters dogged insistence that he join their company to escort his nephew into London that had spiked a nerve in him? Or maybe, Vaughan reasoned, he was looking for threats where there were only shadows. With all that had happened this past year events that had left him looking over his shoulder, waiting for a blade in his back it was unsurprising his trust had been frayed.

Still, caution was often a better friend than imprudence, something hed learned well in his sixty-three years, which was why, yesterday, when Gloucesters invitation for their company to dine with him in Northampton had arrived, it was agreed that Anthony Woodville, Earl Rivers, would go alone to assess the dukes intentions before they merged their parties for the planned procession into London. Rivers, the new kings uncle and governor, had left late in the afternoon to ride the eighteen miles north. A number of his men had gone with him, while the rest of the royal escort fanned out into nearby hamlets to find beds for the night, leaving young Edward in Stony Stratford with just a small band of guards and servants, his half-brother Richard Grey, and Vaughan, his chamberlain.

Ahead at a crossroads, where the stalls and crowds thinned, the street was dominated by the monument that honoured Queen Eleanor. The pale stone of the gothic arches that surrounded the statue of the long-dead queen seemed to glow in the sunlight. A magpie was perched on the cross that crowned it. There were twelve such memorials on the road from Lincoln to London, erected two centuries ago by King Edward I to mark the places where his wifes body had rested on its way to burial. Passing the monument, Vaughan made his way towards the Great Ouse that looped, serpentine, through the meadows, its waters almost encircling the town.