Ned nodded thoughtfully. That seemed to be the story so far, if you survive, you win.
Dr Caerleon twitched up a set of dividers from the table clutter and pointed to another pair of astronomical parchments. “Beware Master Bedwell. these two have crossed your way before! Both were a prominent threat last year. They are so again. One may save you, the other threaten your life!”
The astrologer was certainly correct there. He recalled both charts as belonging to those twin banes of his existence, Don Juan Sebastian and Skelton, though which was more of a danger was difficult to say.
“If dire portents weren’t enough, according to this set of calculations,” the astrologer waved towards a further pile of scribbled sheets several layers deep, “these coincidences predict that between the Compline and Vigil chimes, unless you make the right choice, you’ll be dead!”
“What!” Ned was expecting and hoping for discussion of differing option as had happened last year, not this escalating series of warnings culminating in his imminent demise if he made a mistake.
“What happened to each person makes their own future?” That may have sounded shrill and nervous, but by the saints in heaven he certainly felt it.
Dr Caerleon’s brows came together into a frown and he shook his head gravely. “That my lad is always true. The stars can predict some but not all. Fate and chance still play their parts in the crystalline dance of the spheres. However all these charts are beginning to lock into fixed patterns. When that is so, your options of choice correspondingly diminish.”
Ned slumped down into the nearest stool. He wasn’t fool enough to want the sugar coated comfits that astrologers usually doled out, but this was more than a lad could take. It appeared the stars themselves conspired against him! Then he recalled his earlier argument with Mistress Black. Well damn him, he was right. He’d been so in the beginning and he was doubly so now. If he could he’d shake his fist in defiance at the constellations. Red Ned Bedwell was a man of parts, skill and cunning! He’d faced down the Cardinal’s men, Norfolk’s and the Queen’s. As a gambling man, he wouldn’t have put a bent groat on his chances last year. Yet here he was, hale and relatively hearty.
He gave a shrug, shedding the plaintive whining of his daemon, and straightened up. If it was his time, he’d damn well wasn’t going down without a fight. “I care not for augury, doctor. My fate is my own. So what can I do to frustrate the plans of my foes?”
Perhaps the old man had been waiting for just this statement. The hint of a knowing smirk tugged at his lips and Dr Caerleon slowly nodded, pulling several more sheets out from his cluttered table. “As far as the stars allow, I discerned that five men are embedded in this perilous conjunction. More hover on the edge, but tis these five that are crucial. From interpreting their signs and influences, they are all ambitious. One chart is in the ascendant, if I read it correctly a man of great learning and power, at the peak of Fortuna’s wheel. He is ruthless and formidable. I believe from their association, he in a manner, directs the rest.”
Ned frowned. He had little understanding of the methods of divination used, but that sounded uncannily like Sir Thomas More.
“The rest of these charts display the signs of strength and power. They would be men of position, and at least one, I think, has the imprint of Royal authority.”
That was a risky claim to make. It implied that Dr Caerleon had consulted the Royal horoscope. Ned already knew that the astrologer had been forced to do so last year, and as a man already officially dead, the punishment for this act of treason seemed pretty irrelevant. On another level it also gave him an inkling of how far the doctor had delved into forbidden areas to divine Ned’s future. That at least was reassuring.
Dr Caerleon put aside what could have been More’s chart, and spread out the other four on a space that Nerys had quickly cleared on the table. The astrologer muttered quietly as he marked off a scale on one of the charts, then pointed to a shared pattern of figures.
“As I said earlier,” Dr Caerleon tapped at the charts sharply and frowned even more darkly at Ned, “I see in these four great dangers for you this night. All are conjoined, and having referred to your chart, I fear they encompass your death, Master Bedwell.”
Definitive word from the Crystal Spheres on his approaching demise didn’t exactly encourage confidence in Ned despite his previous affirmation.
“From this chart it very confusing. From what I can ascertain, each must have a different motive for your destruction.” Caerleon looked positively offended as he waved a hand angrily across the charts. Whether it was the difficulty of the work or the stymieing of his future plans, Ned could not tell. More disturbing news-those wanting Red Ned dead multiplied from two to six. What, did they breed like maggots?
Ned wryly peered at the incriminating astrological notations. Wasn’t there any good news at all? “Doctor, any man may face his enemies with confidence if he knows their weaknesses. Can you find any?”
The old physician raised one eyebrow and began to shuffle, once more, through the myriad charts and scribbled notes. Ned tried not to let the long search dampen his spirits. His daemon didn’t help by listing dozens of great men who’d succumbed to prophecy. His better angel attempted to inspire him by reminding him that all these events were, of course, written up by philosophers as moral fables after the said timings and deaths. Perhaps they may have been exaggerated? As inspiration, it failed.
Ned was at the point of jumping up and running from the room when Dr Caerleon gave a triumphant cry and pinned a symbol with his finger. “Aha! I knew I’d seen it! This is their only mutual flaw, Master Bedwell, and your only chance! All these men are prey to the canker of distrust. The stars indicate they are so disparate that cooperation is only out of the shared bond of interlocking interest.”
That wasn’t much to base any plan upon. And for another thing, it also implied a closer acquaintance between his enemies than he was hoping for. So that was it? Trust? Ned was painfully aware that if he wished to live out the night a few more questions needed answering, but how to discover such elusive answers from an unpredictable Dr Caerleon?
The actors at the Inns would insist that such a revelation required some earth shattering pronouncement such as a peal of thunder or the low toned voice of a prophet wreathed in sulphurous fumes. Instead Ned had recalled the two salvaged coins and unwrapped them from within his kerchief. Some may call what he was going to try pure hedge wizardry, and Ned Bedwell, apprentice lawyer, a modern man in learning and knowledge, may have been expected to sneer at it as unfounded superstition.
If…
If it wasn’t for a childhood spent in the fields of Essex. It was old Will Acton, a man of many skills and prodigious thirst. The local justice and the parish priest both loathed him, supposing he was the root of the villagers disdain for lawful authority and their missing tithes. The people of the village thought differently, and if they lost anything like a beast or had a problem to solve, then it was his door they’d come knocking on first. He had an uncanny ability to help out. Well, one day he showed a young, inquisitive Ned how he did it. A pray to St Michael and two fresh willow branches held loosely in his hand and, as if by magic, they pointed the way to the stray lamb, or hinted at a solution to a rancorous dispute. How amazed Ned had been at the success of this simple method, and it was that memory that caused him to put the two mismatched coins onto the charts. “Dr Caerleon, you are an astrologer of great experience and deep learning. I realise this could be considered a petty request and maybe not worthy of your talents, but could you tell me where these were bound?”