Chapter Five

If the journey to the Elbe was arduous, then over the next few days, as the coaches and wagons left Bohemia behind, it grew much worse. Snow began falling from the sullen skies, at first a few aimless and circumspect flakes, then more heavily. The winds gathered in the east and blew across the crescent of the Carpathians, along the Moravian Highlands and into the Giant Mountains, howling among the boulders and snowdrifts through which the caravan fought its way. The few towns it passed through dwindled to villages whose dozen-odd houses clung like swallows' nests to the sides of steep hills. Then the villages shrank to only a few houses and soon disappeared altogether. The road, too, threatened to disappear. In some places it had been made almost impassable by rockslides, in others by snow. To travel in this season, the servants muttered among themselves, was uncivilised. After all, even wars-even Ferdinand, whose Walloons and Irish had stopped in Prague to begin their looting-waited for the spring. Yet each morning, no matter how foul the weather, no matter how steep the roads, no matter how many passengers had fallen ill with fever or how many horses were lamed by wind-galls or split hoofs, the sad journey continued. Soon there were no signs of life in the snowscape except for the wolves that appeared as the roads ascended in dog-legs through the forest. The wolves arrived singly at first, later in packs of ten or twelve, half-hidden among the scarps of granite, following the wagons at a distance. Then they grew bolder, creeping close enough for Emilia to see their yellow eyes and the sharp outlines of their muzzles. Skinny and ill-fed as beggars, they scattered at the muffled report of a harquebus. The sound of the weapon also startled the passengers, for rumours had begun spreading up and down the caravan that the Emperor's mercenaries were in swift pursuit, though it was impossible to imagine how anyone, even the Cossacks, could have sped along roads as treacherous as these.

The first leg of the journey finally reached its end at nightfall on the ninth day. The caravan toiled past a monastery and, after crawling downhill, stopped not at one of the usual inns but before a castle whose lighted arrowslits shone unevenly in the invading darkness. Emilia, huddled in the chariot, her toes frostbitten, fancied she could hear the grumble of a river. Leaning forward, she peered through a crack in the window-curtains and saw a group of men in long coats and wide-brimmed hats hurrying across a courtyard, whose perimeter was rimmed with dozens of coaches of all sizes. The portcullis ground and scraped, then a pair of heavy doors boomed shut behind them. Breslau, someone said. They had reached Silesia.

The exiled court stayed for less than a week in the ancient Piast castle. This was not to be their final destination, merely one more staging-post for the fugitive court. Emilia found herself housed with three other ladies-in-waiting in a chamber that, though it had no windows, was prey to mysterious draughts and dustings of snow. The Queen slept in a chamber somewhere nearby. She had been taken dangerously ill almost as soon as the caravan arrived in Breslau, and so Emilia saw nothing of her. Only the physicians attended her, shuffling in and out of the royal apartments with their faces long and grim. After a day or two, rumours were bruited about the castle that she had died. Then a day later it was her unborn babe who had died-for another rumour, a more reliable one, claimed she was with child. Finally, the pair of them, mother and child, were said to have expired together. Truth became as scarce as firewood and fodder. More snow fell. The Oder froze. Then, on Emilia's fourth day in the castle, Sir Ambrose Plessington paid her a visit.

She was in her chamber at the time, alone, reading a book. When the knock came at her door she didn't rise from the cramped bed because she, like the Queen, was now indisposed. She had felt unwell for the second day in a row. Her monthly pains had arrived a few days earlier, but no monthly flow. Her head ached, as did her teeth, and she was sleeping poorly. Even reading had become a chore. For want of her own books she was reduced to reading ones from the Queen's collection. For the past day she had been reading Sir Walter Raleigh's Discoverie of the large, rich, and beautifull Empire of Guiana, with its blissful descriptions of warm climes and sepulchres filled with treasure. She had been lulled to sleep-her first in more than a day-when the knock on the door startled her awake.

She was surprised to see Sir Ambrose, of course. He had not spoken a word to her for an entire fortnight; indeed, he had not appeared to notice her at all. She, on the other hand, had watched his every move. From the quarter-lights of her chariot or the windows of inns she would watch him supervising the loading or unloading of the crates or riding alongside the Queen's carriage with the scimitar bouncing at his hip. Other times he galloped out of sight, travelling far ahead of the convoy, finding passages through the mountains or scouting for Polish troops, a band of whom he was reputed to have killed and left to the wolves. Three of his mounts were lamed by these antics and had to be destroyed, yet Sir Ambrose himself looked none the worse for wear.

'I do not disturb you, I hope?'

He had stepped nimbly into her chamber, which he, in his swollen boots and beaver hat, almost seemed to fill. Forced to duck his head under the lintel, he looked like a man entering a tent on a battlefield. When he straightened to his full height his appearance was no less martial, for the scimitar hung from one hip, the pistol from the other. But he was also bearing a lantern and, under his arm, a book. After making a bow, he paused, his bustling motions for once arrested. His head was cocked to one side like that of a painter critically examining his subject.

'You were asleep?'

'No, no,' she blurted, finding her voice. She had pushed herself upright on the bed and was holding Raleigh's Discoverie to her breast like a shield. 'No, sir. I was reading, that is all.'

He took another step forward, straw rustling under his boots and his dark gaze giving her a careful appraisal. The plume in his hat grazed the hammer-beams. 'You are unwell, Mistress Molyneux?'

'No, no,' she stammered again. She had no wish to tell anyone of her illnesses, least of all Sir Ambrose. 'I am perfectly well, thank you, sir. My habit is to read in bed,' she explained, raising the book and then feeling herself flush.

'Ah,' he was nodding his enormous hat, 'quite so. I am told you are a dedicated reader. Yes, a veritable Donna Quixote.' He smiled briefly to himself, then scratched at his beard with a forefinger. 'And in fact this charming habit of yours, Miss Molyneux, is what brings me to you.' He bent forward with a creak of boot leather and placed the volume on the table beside the door. 'The Queen wishes you to have another book for your pleasure. Along with her good wishes.' He bowed and turned to go.

'Please…' She had swung her legs over the edge of the bed. 'What news is there? Is the Queen unwell, sir?'

'No, no, the Queen is quite well. You must not believe everything you hear.' Pausing on the threshold, he winked. 'Nor should you believe all that you read.'

'I beg your pardon?'

'Sir Walter Raleigh.' His wind-burnt features had broadened into another smile as he nodded the brim of his hat at her book. 'Guiana is not the paradise that Sir Walter describes. I bid you a good day, Miss Molyneux.'

Then he was gone, disappearing down the corridor before she could ask about Vilém or indeed about anything else. But all at once she felt hopeful. He must have learned of her reading habits from Vilém. Or was it from the Queen instead? No, most probably Vilém, she decided. How else would Sir Ambrose have known of her liking for tales of chivalry? She had been careful not to tell the Queen of this passion, for the Queen detested all things Spanish.