Will wrote by candlelight, late into the warmth of the evening, and was not surprised when a familiar cough interrupted his study. “Good evening, Kit.”

“Hello, my love. I brought thee supper–”

Will glanced at the window surprised to see that twilight had faded to full dark. “Thou’rt considerate.”

“Thou’rt like to starve to death, an I did not. What is it has thy fancy so tightly, Will?” Kit laid his bundle on the edge or the table, well away from Will’s papers, and unwrapped linen to produce a pot of steaming onion soup and a half loaf of brown bread folded around a still‑cold lump of butter that was just melting at the edges.

“Fey food,” Will said, and pushed his papers aside. “Or the homely sort?”

“Both,” Kit answered. “Morgan’s cooking. Thou didst not answer my question – ”

“Oh, a tragedy,” Will answered. “Something to catch James’ fancy. Witches and prophecies. We have problems and problems, Kit. Thou didst not speak to Mary Poley of our testaments, didst thou?”

“Nay,” Kit answered. He pushed the crock of soup in front of Will, and laid a spoon alongside it. “Talk while thou dost eat.”

“Someone did.” The soup was good, thick with onions cooked transparent. Will reached for the bread, which he could manage more comfortably through his stiff throat if he soaked it well in the broth. “Or worse, she heard it from Robert Poley and his flock.”

“How would Poley know?”

Will shrugged, surprised at his own appetite. “Salisbury? They’ve made Poley a Yeoman of the Tower, Kit.”

“They?”

“Salisbury. Who was Sir Robert Cecil.”

“Thou sayest it as it were a refrain.”

“More and more it seems to be. And I am at a loss to ferret out why. You probably haven’t heard that Essex was the Master of the Armoury before his ill‑fated ride.”

“Master of the Armoury, and then beheaded there.” Kit propped a hip on the window ledge, his back to the embrasure, and adjusted a folded‑back cuff as if hiding his pleasure at the irony. “Hast spoken with Sir Walter?”

“Words in passing, only. I’ll see if I can bring this play to him for comment before I make the fair copy. It might cheer him.” Will pushed the soup away, his appetite fading. “He needs cheering, Kit.”

“Shall I steal him away to Faerie, then?”

“Would he go?”

“Not unless he could conquer it for England.” Kit grinned. “So ask thyself what Cecil wants, Will.”

“What Salisbury wants.”

“Whatever.”

Will sighed. “I’d like to stamp him as his father’s son, and a servant of the Crown even when he does not agree with the Crown’s objectives. But I think he has been unafraid to manipulate even Princes, when it serves his goal. And his goal may be no more than ambition.”

“He’s Secretary of State. Surely that’s enough to satisfy any ambition.”

“I am not sure that’s so. In any case, he’s ordered Ben Jonson and me to infiltrate the Catholic underground in London.” Will looked up in time to see Kit flinch. Kit drew his knee up, bootheel hooked onto the window frame. “That means Catesby and Tresham.”

“Catesby is cheek by jowl with Poley,” Kit commented. “If Poley is truly such a fine friend of Ce – of Salisbury’s, then one would think he could get Poley to risk himself playing intelligencer in this case.”

“Except Salisbury knows Poley’s linked to the Prometheans through Baines – ” Will shrugged. “I’ll be damned if I understand it, Kit. Mayhap Salisbury expects to see the whole mess of them eradicate one another. And–” Realization stopped his voice.

Kit leaned forward. “Will?”

“–Poley must have heard about the Bible from Salisbury. But Salisbury is not supposed to know it’s being writ. Tom Walsingham would never tell him.”

“Tom Walsingham doesn’t tell his teeth what they’re chewing,” Kit said fondly. “So from whom would he have heard it, then?”

“Christ,” Will said. “I hope not Ben. But more on Catesby–now, it seems, is the ideal time to move. There is a rumor he’s looking for men of strong Catholic belief to join some agency of his. He’s been seen about with Poley, aye, and Richard Baines as well. And Salisbury says he has a letter from a Captain Turner that says Catesby and a fellow named Fawkes are planning what he ever so helpfully terms ‘an invasion.’ The good Earl wants Ben and me to play at being disloyal Catholics.”

“Baines is ordained a Roman Catholic priest, Will, for all I think his faith plays the hypocrite more even than mine own. If Catesby wants Catholics–Well. Poley and Baines both know thou art more than a mere Catholic.”

Will nodded. “But Poley also knows” –a pressure in his throat, but he did not let it change his voice–“how Hamnet was buried, and how often my family’s been fined. Monteagle will vouch for me, in any case: he owes me his life after that damned stupid rebellion, and he knows it. A new King, and worse times for the Catholics, and things change. Men change their opinions, and all Catholics are not Prometheans.”

“Any more than all Puritans are.” Kit nodded, as if seeing the logic. “Your opposition is not to Catesby. Only to those who use him, so unwittingly.”

“As they used Essex, and discarded him when they were done.”

“Hell,” Kit said. “As they used and discarded one Christofer Marley, playmaker – ” He stopped, fingers tight on the cloth of his sleeves, and closed his eyes for a moment. “I beg thy pardon, Will. Pray continue.”

I made the right choice not to ask him what became of Oxford,Will thought. “Catesby had been imprisoned for recusancy again, but he’s out, and building a … congregation”

“A congregation and not a private army?”

“Is there a difference, in this age?” Will sighed. “I haven’t a choice. Remember old Sir Francis and his damned lemons out of season?”

“It was a good conceit.” Kit stood and crossed the rush‑covered floor in a few short strides. “He swallowed enough bitterness for his queen to know the taste of it. I do not think Robert Cecil is such a civil servant as that. But be cautious, Will: it’s easy enough to hang for treason even when one acts on the orders of the crown. I’ve seen it happen, King’s Man.”

“Queen’s Man,” Will corrected, with a smile. “I’m only a player for James.”

“Good,” Kit said, and laid both hands carefully on Will’s shoulders, with a precision that belied the force of choice behind that action. “I’d hate to think I had to defend thy virtue from a king.”

“He suits my fancy not at all,” Will answered, and let his head fall back against Kit’s belly. “I’d find something better to be forsworn for, if I were of a mind to be forsworn.”

Kit bore the touch for a moment and stepped back. “I dreamed of thee again. Thee, and a pouch full of silver coins, every one of them tainted in poison. I knocked them from thy fingers – ”

Will pivoted on his stool, away from the table, so he could watch Kit pace. “And?”

“And a flock of ravens arose, startled by the sound, and then the ravens dove on the coins and were transformed into magpies. And the magpies touched the silver – it was shillings, all shillings. Forty of them.” Kit’s face went dreamy as he pressed a palm to the window glass.

Will stood, a bit unsteadily, and came up beside him. “And then what happened?”

“The magpies died. Every one. And turned into gray‑feathered doves as they fell. Damned if I know what to make of that for a prophecy.” Kit’s shoulders rose – slowly – and then dropped.

“I do,” Will answered, shaking his head just a little, remembering the weight of a pouch of coins in his fingers on the eve of the Essex Rebellion. Remembering Robert Catesby’s considering glance as Will took it from his hand. “The plague. And that sickness that almost killed me, four winters back.”

“And did kill Spenser and Walsingham. Aye.”

“Coins. It’s spread on coins, Kit. Ensorcelled silver, that taints any hand that touches it.”