As the strangeness wore off, I was able to focus on what people were saying, the texture of their clothes, the expressions on their faces. Matthew had told me our neighborhood was full of foreigners, but it sounded like Babel. I turned my head. “What language is she speaking?” I whispered with a glance at a plump woman wearing a deep blue-green jacket trimmed with fur. It was, I noted, cut rather like my own.
“Some dialect of German,” said Matthew, lowering his head to mine so that I could hear him over the noise in the street.
We passed through the arch of an old gatehouse. The lane widened into a street that had managed against all odds to retain most of its paving. A sprawling, multistoried building to our right buzzed with activity.
“The Dominican priory,” Matthew explained. “When King Henry expelled the priests, it became a ruin, then a tenement. There’s no telling how many people are crammed in there now.” He glanced across the courtyard, where a listing stone-and-timber wall spanned the distance between the tenement and the back of another house. A sorry excuse for a door hung from a single set of hinges.
Matthew looked up at St. Paul’s and then down at me. His face softened. “To hell with caution. Come on.”
He steered me through an opening between a section of the old city wall and a house that looked as though it were about to tip its third story onto passersby. It was possible to make progress along the slim thoroughfare only because everyone was moving in the same direction: up, north, out. We were carried by the wave of humanity into another street, this one much wider than Water Lane. The noise increased, along with the crowds.
“You said the city was deserted because of the holidays,” I remarked.
“It is,” Matthew replied. After a few steps, we were pitched into an even greater maelstrom. I stopped in my tracks.
St. Paul’s windows glimmered in the pale afternoon light. The churchyard around it was a solid mass of people—men, women, children, apprentices, servants, clergymen, soldiers. Those who weren’t shouting were listening to those who were, and everywhere you looked, there was paper. It was hung up on strings outside bookstalls, nailed to any solid surface, made into books, and waved in the faces of onlookers. A group of young men huddled around one post covered with flapping announcements, listening to someone slowly sound out job advertisements. Every now and then, one would break free from the rest, hands slapping him on the back as he pulled his cap down and set off in search of employment.
“Oh, Matthew.” It was all I could manage.
People continued to swarm around us, carefully avoiding the tips of the long swords my escorts wore at their waists. A breeze caught at my hood. I felt a tingle, followed by a faint pressure. Somewhere in the busy churchyard, a witch and a daemon had sensed our presence. Three creatures traveling together were hard to ignore.
“We’ve caught someone’s attention,” I said. Matthew didn’t seem overly concerned as he scanned the nearby faces. “Someone like me. Someone like Kit. No one like you.”
“Not yet,” he said under his breath. “You aren’t to come here by yourself, Diana—ever. Stay in the Blackfriars, with Fran?oise. If you go any farther than that passageway”—Matthew nodded behind us—“Pierre or I must be with you.” When he was satisfied that I had taken his warning seriously, he drew me away. “Let’s go see Mary.”
We turned south again, toward the river, and the wind flattened my skirts against my legs. Though we were walking downhill, every step was a struggle. A low whistle sounded as we passed by one of London’s many churches, and Pierre disappeared into an alley. He popped out of another just as I spotted a familiar-looking building behind a wall.
“That’s our house!”
Matthew nodded and directed my attention down the street. “And that is Baynard’s Castle.”
It was the largest building I had seen yet except for the Tower, St. Paul’s, and the distant prospect of Westminster Abbey. Three crenellated towers faced the river, linked by walls that were easily twice the height of any nearby houses.
“Baynard’s Castle was built to be approached from the river, Diana,” Henry said in an apologetic tone as we traveled down another winding lane. “This is the back entrance, and not how visitors are supposed to arrive—but it is a great deal warmer on a day like this.”
We ducked into an imposing gatehouse. Two men wearing charcoal gray uniforms with maroon, black, and gold badges strolled up to identify the visitors. One recognized Henry and grabbed at his companion’s sleeve before he could question us.