A Devil and Two Kings
Title:A Devil and Two Kings
Author:lilacsigil
Recipient:quenya_tattoo
Characters: Daredevil, Kingpin
Rating: PG for violence
Summary: Wilson Fisk thinks himself the equal of kings, and perhaps only a devil would dare disabuse him of such a notion.
Many thanks to likeadeuce for a wonderful beta and to st_aurafina for sensory input.
Wilson Fisk was not the first Fisk to hold utter control over the fishmarkets of Billingsgate and Bridge Ward, but he was certainly the first to reach further. His family had, indeed, been London fishmongers for many a year: the Fisk sons grew large and strong on the rich diet that nobody but a fishmonger or a lord could maintain, and their minds sharp and ambitious. Wilson Fisk was in charge now, and, as terrifying as his bulk and strength seemed - he was the size of a bear, and twice as mighty - it was his mind that other folk feared. He never forgot a name, nor a debt; and if it so happened that a man or boy went missing, well, it was best to assume that Fisk had kept an accounting and there was no need to go making enquiries.
All this and more Matthew Murdoch had heard in but one afternoon. He'd had to get within a quarter-mile of the Fishmongers' Hall before the name "Fisk" crossed any man's lips. By the time he crossed Fenchurch Street and the odour of the fishmarket was not just in his nostrils but in his throat, it was more common than an oath. "Fisk told my brother so." "Would Fisk allow it?" "If Fisk found you out!" For all their babble, there was a lack of detail that made Murdoch more than a little suspicious: Fisk had created a reign of fear without ever specifying what, exactly, he might inflict upon his enemies. The fear was so effective that, in truth, the man had no enemies, or at least none who might speak a word or two in the hearing of a poor, blind bard. If Fisk's enemies were silent, then, perhaps his friends would be looser of tongue. Not a few of them, it seemed, were drinking here at the Swan Inn. Matthew had been bending their ears with merry tunes, meanwhile catching their conversations: though his material earnings were poor, he had gathered much of value.
"Oh, the fishmonger is the most merry of men,
His finger's in every pie, they say."
Matthew strummed his lute with theatrical flourish and wandered amongst the wooden tables, gaining a few laughs and a hearty slap on the rump from the innkeeper's wife. His perambulations took him deliberately away from the two men at the table near the door, to a distance where they would not think he could hear them. The contrast of their rough speech and soft velvet-trimmed garments told of men too quickly elevated and too well paid for any legitimate trade. Most mercenaries would smell of steel, and businessmen of whatever their trade might be - spices, silks, slaves - but here everyone smelt mostly of fish. The taller of the two men - an fellow Irishman, by his speech - wore the smell lightly, like a cloak, rather than sweating it from his skin like everyone else. A newcomer, then, though he seemed familiar with his surroundings.
Others in the tavern gave them wide berth, and they had been moments away from breaking into fisticuffs at least twice. Matthew suspected that the moment they thought their voices unheard beneath the bard's merry tune, their tongues would loosen and their business be known. He sorely missed his usual haunt in Westminster: the parliamentarians that favoured the establishment were so used to him that they did not bother to lower their voices, the tables smelt of wood and beer, not fish and piss, and Mistress Karense at the bar always had a mug of ale ready to wet his throat and soothe his voice.
"The ladies all know he's an upstanding gent,
Who doesn't just eat fish on Friday."
The local man spoke the first part, his voice cracked in fear. "Fisk will have my guts for his garters! You ordered those pikes made: you must now pay him."
"Tell your master what I did tell you, you whoreson Turk! Ireland's at peace and we need none of his dealings now," the Irishman hissed back.
Matthew sang on, his interest caught and ears pricked.
"The farmer's girl was a fine, saucy lass,
Who'd not tasted fruits of the sea.
The fishmonger slipp'd her the finest of eels,
And now she'll be eating for three."
"I'll not be your panderer again, O'Neill."
"You'd rather I smiled and scraped before the man who funded my enemies' battles while he bankrupted my father?"
"Better you than I."
O'Neill had heard enough, it seemed, for he stood and strode out of the Inn, leaving his companion to throw down a careless handful of coins. Matthew, smiling, doffed his hat before the man addressed as Turk, though he smelled entirely like a local man.
"Penny for the song, good sir?"
"Out of my way!" The man shoved past him, in a manner more annoyed than wary, and out the door. No-one else seemed to be inclined to pay Matthew for his song - too early in the evening for these sort to part with their coins - so he bowed with a grand excess of politeness and slipped out of the Inn himself. He took a moment to scramble up the side of the inn - the rough criss-cross of the timbers made his task simple - and stash his lute under the half-rotten thatch, where it would be safe until he returned.
When Matthew stepped into the hustle and chatter of the street, the tall Irishman, O'Neill, had already travelled further than even Matthew's fine ears could hear, but the second man, Fisk's man, had tied his coin purse but loosely, and to follow his jingle-jangle was child's play. The man strode as quickly as his bandy legs would allow, straight towards the river; Matthew followed quietly over the cobbles, past the wide-skirted dames and barrow-pushing fishmongers with an ease that no other could manage, to judge by their shoving, their curses and the squelch of the filth beneath their feet. Matthew's prey, though, walked without dalliance into the awesome stench of the fishmarket itself. No man who entered here would leave unmarked, and Matthew grimaced at the thought of his own hair and clothes being marked in such a manner: it was like to feeling the stink of Fisk's sullied soul glide over his skin. No matter. Fisk's doings needed undoing. God had not stopped him: perhaps only a Devil would dare the oily darkness of Wilson Fisk's domain.
Fisk's ambition had far outgrown his station, as the desires of merchants had done ever since coin was invented. Matthew was not a man with a great regard for English ranks: in Ireland, his homeland, a chieftain gained his place through mettle and a gathering of consensus, whether that be through force or name or charm It was not right for Fisk to gain a good name through usury, blackmail and threats, to be given the respect of men on whose broken backs he rose to power. Fisk had visited King James at the palace more than once this past fortnight, and Matthew needed to know why a hulking fishmonger - even one of honeyed tongue and growing wealth, -would be in the confidence of a King. This day, however, a man had returned to his master to report on something close to Matthew's heart: the recently declared peace in Ireland. If Fisk wished to interfere with the truce and reignite the war that had left Ulster stricken by famine, Matthew would not hesitate to stand in his way.
Fisk's man did indeed jingle his way to St Michael's Lane, and to the dank and unimpressive building there that Matthew had spent many a night watching this last month, his strange senses tracking the forms of those who came and went. This wooden stronghold frustrated Matthew: the windows were thickly glassed and often shuttered, muffling sound. Besides, they were never opened but to empty the chamberpots of a morning. A man of Matthew's talents would not normally be frustrated by such things, but Fisk had chosen this location carefully: a little way back from the Thames, fish guts and rotten remnants were thrown into the streets rather than the river, and thousands upon thousands of gulls had an easy feast. The fat birds dove into the gutters and returned to the filth-spattered rooftops to devour their reeking prizes, shrieking and squalling to drown any hope of overhearing Fisk's dealings. Matthew had considered, on occasion, his chances of entering the building itself, but the risk was great, and the likelihood of actually hearing some titbit of use was rather low. Today, however, Fisk's man would surely report to him, and Fisk would set him to watch - perhaps harm - the Irishman who had refused Fisk's dealings, and Matthew could not let this opportunity slide by.
There was but a single man watching the rooftops, and even he was alert largely to the goings-on in the street, particularly those outside the bawdy house across the lane. Matthew dug his fingers into the crevices between the bricks and swarmed up to the roof in a moment, appearing directly behind the watchman. In a swift and silent motion, Matthew threw his sturdy jacket over the man's head - he kicked out, scattering gulls, but gave no cry - and smothered him into unconsciousness. Matthew gagged him, with a strip torn from the helpfully excessive fabric of his blindfold, and used the man's own belt to tie him to the tall, crooked chimney. He hoped to be in and out, quick as a mouse, but the watchman was hale and might well revive before Matthew was done. The watchman's way back into the house was clear - a small dormer window that was opened frequently enough to avoid total encrustation with the gulls' shit - and Matthew nimbly swung himself down from the rooftop and into the house of Wilson Fisk.
Immediately upon closing the window against the gulls' shrieks, Matthew caught his breath at the deep silence that inhabited the house: the walls here were thick and the servants meek. From this dusty storeroom, he could hear perhaps a dozen people in the house: a man and three women in the kitchen, a woman scolding a maid almost directly below Matthew's feet, another maid softly humming "The Contrary Wife" as she scrubbed a floor, and the shifting feet of guardsmen, one at each of the front and back doors. Below it all rumbled Fisk's voice, like the sea that roared through the cave-riddled cliffs of Matthew's childhood home. Another man was with him, on the ground floor, but their words were inaudible at this distance. Matthew slipped quietly out the door and down the stairs, knowing well that none of the household were nearby. He crouched low near the bottom of the stairs, beneath a heavy picture frame, content that he would hear anyone approach long before they saw him.
"…without Fury's meddling," Fisk said, as Matthew drew close to his doorway. "The King has the Irish on his hook. Why, then, would he let them go on such easy terms?"
"Could he be short of money, Master Fisk?" It was the man Matthew had followed from the inn.
"Until the last man in the kingdom is bled of his last shilling, a king is never poor. No, my heathen friend, it means that the king has placed his choices on the scales, and crushing the Irish is of less weight than we suspect."
"What did he weigh it against?"
Fisk chuckled warmly. "A good question! Perhaps a few of my words may have gained purchase in that heathen skull of yours. And here is a question in reply: what does a king hold to be of importance?"
"God? His throne? His people's safety?"
"We cannot know the mind of God, and the other two are not simple or sudden occurrences that he can isolate and consider. Go on."
"Assassination, then?"
"Yes. He fears for his own person, for he is, like all of us, one sharp blade away from discovering God's intentions for him."
Perched on the stairs, Matthew smirked. Indeed, he had put the fear of the Devil into the superstitious King James, something he never would have dared with Queen Elizabeth, though she, like her heir, was no friend to the Irish. It was rather delightful to see that his plan had not only worked as he intended, but inconvenienced Fisk into the bargain. It would hardly be beyond a man such as Fisk to be profiting from war and the suffering of others.
"Master Fisk, surely the Irish would not be able to enter the Palace and approach the King. And since the Spanish departed, there is no one else who cares a whit about their war."
Matthew heard the deep leathery creak of Fisk rising from his seat, and quick footsteps as the Turk retreated across the room.
"If you do not care about this war, and, in particular, the coin that you have not brought me this day, you are a greater fool than even I suspected."
"Sir, I did not mean-"
"More pity to you, then. Yet, if your mouth did not fulfil its God-given duty considerably more often than your brain, perhaps you would not be so remarkably useful to me."
"I - I am useful, Master Fisk?"
"Indeed. And I may even have another task for you, one of enviable simplicity."
"Yes, Master Fisk!"
"Ask the gentleman on the stairs why he believes I can't see him in my mirrors."
Before Fisk had even finished his sentence, Matthew was running back up towards the roof. A loud bell rang in the room below, in time with Fisk's laughter, and, before Matthew had reached the second floor, he could sense the forms of two doughty maids dashing into position on the stairs. The larger swung a broom at him and the other grabbed for his sleeve, but he easily ducked and instead swung himself over the banister, dropping lightly down to the ground floor. A guard rushed at him with a heavy cudgel; Matthew leapt, planting a hand on the man's shoulder and avoiding his rush, only to lose a lock of hair to the swinging sword of the man beside him.
"Run him through!" the Turk bellowed enthusiastically, though he made no motion towards the fight himself.
Matthew dropped to the floor, rolled to his back and kicked upwards with both legs, driving the swordsman into his cudgel-wielding companion. Both guards fell to the floor in a tangle of limbs, the sword skidding away across the boards. Twisting to his feet, Matthew found himself face-to-face with the Turk and his rancid breath. Turk swung a surprised punch directly at him, but the blow was easily avoided, even at such close range. Now Matthew was close enough to freedom that he could hear the conversations of passers-by in the lane outside.
The carefree chatter was suddenly drowned out by the sound of enormous footfalls, shaking the floor with their mighty tread. Matthew wrapped his fists in the Turk's billowing shirt and gave a hearty shove straight at the source of the heavy sound: Turk hit Fisk square in the chest, but Fisk was not staggered in the slightest. Matthew scrambled for the door, but Fisk was swifter still, lunging forward with terrific speed and grabbing Matthew by the throat. Though Matthew tore at the man's huge arms, Fisk did not loosen his grasp for a moment. Instead, he lifted Matthew off the ground, holding him at arm's length, so that Matthew's feet dangled in midair.
A noise oddly like the sea roared in Matthew's ears as his breath was choked from him. He kicked at Fisk, but the man's bloated arm was longer than Matthew's leg, and he could not reach to kick his vitals. Fisk shook him like a cat with a jawful of rat: his skull rattled, Matthew hung still, his breath barely seeping past Fisk's rough hand.
"I have heard tell of a blind Irishman who fights better than he ought. A man who knew Sir Nicholas. I did not realise that this man was also a ruffian and a spy. Who are your masters now? The O'Neills? Speak!"
Fisk shook Matthew again, and firmed the grasp on his throat.
"I have…no masters…" Matthew gasped.
Fisk eyed him beadily. "You, a man alone, would dare threaten a king?"
"I would dare…anything."
"As would I." Fisk's laugh was sudden and both his excess flesh and Matthew's limp body shook with its force. "Times have changed, this year past. James is King now, shining the light of righteousness on his land. But you are a blind man, and perhaps you do not know that when the light is bright, it only means that the shadows deepen." His voice sobered, and quieted. "If you try to work from the shadows, little man, you will soon learn that the dark places of this city are mine. They will spit you out on my doorstep, and I will rend you limb from limb with my own two hands. And that, any fool can understand."
Fisk flexed his mighty arm, bringing the half-strangled Matthew close to his face; Matthew sucked in a wretched, tiny breath of air and flexed his body upwards. His right boot met Fisk's elbow with a dull sound like a rotten cabbage hitting the floor, and suddenly Fisk's crushing hand was gone. There was no cry of pain, but the hit had been sound enough, and the moment Matthew's body hit the floor he was already rolling backwards and up to his feet.
The door! It was again blocked, by the guard with the sword, and Matthew had no desire to lose more than a mere lock of hair to the man's blade. Fisk reached for him, left-handed, but Matthew knew the man's speed now, and slipped past him, dashing into the man's parlour, where he had been meeting with the Turk. No door led from this room, but Matthew had now given up on such niceties. He seized a heavy chair and hurled it with all the force he could muster, straight through Fisk's front window and into the street, and followed it with a diving roll out of the confines of the house, into the freedom of the lane. Fisk's bellow chased him, but not, it seemed, Fisk himself.
The girls of the bawdy house shrieked at his appearance, but no man moved to stop him as he fled, draggled and torn, through the streets of Billingsgate. There was no rest until Fenchurch street was nearly a mile behind him: then, perhaps, he could be assured that no man had pursued him.
Matthew slumped against a friendly door, panting and holding his throat, which was as bruised as if he had escaped the hangman. Fisk was right: times were changing. For all his politesse and royal visits, Fisk was setting himself up as a king. Matthew would not tolerate that hubris, nor would he wait for the fullness of time to punish Fisk, as Matthew's own pride had today been laid low. King James was rightfully bound by custom, sovereignty and manner; Fisk's bounds were non-existent.
And if good men were too afraid to battle the evil in their midst, why, then perhaps a Devil would dare.
Author:lilacsigil
Recipient:quenya_tattoo
Characters: Daredevil, Kingpin
Rating: PG for violence
Summary: Wilson Fisk thinks himself the equal of kings, and perhaps only a devil would dare disabuse him of such a notion.
Many thanks to likeadeuce for a wonderful beta and to st_aurafina for sensory input.
Wilson Fisk was not the first Fisk to hold utter control over the fishmarkets of Billingsgate and Bridge Ward, but he was certainly the first to reach further. His family had, indeed, been London fishmongers for many a year: the Fisk sons grew large and strong on the rich diet that nobody but a fishmonger or a lord could maintain, and their minds sharp and ambitious. Wilson Fisk was in charge now, and, as terrifying as his bulk and strength seemed - he was the size of a bear, and twice as mighty - it was his mind that other folk feared. He never forgot a name, nor a debt; and if it so happened that a man or boy went missing, well, it was best to assume that Fisk had kept an accounting and there was no need to go making enquiries.
All this and more Matthew Murdoch had heard in but one afternoon. He'd had to get within a quarter-mile of the Fishmongers' Hall before the name "Fisk" crossed any man's lips. By the time he crossed Fenchurch Street and the odour of the fishmarket was not just in his nostrils but in his throat, it was more common than an oath. "Fisk told my brother so." "Would Fisk allow it?" "If Fisk found you out!" For all their babble, there was a lack of detail that made Murdoch more than a little suspicious: Fisk had created a reign of fear without ever specifying what, exactly, he might inflict upon his enemies. The fear was so effective that, in truth, the man had no enemies, or at least none who might speak a word or two in the hearing of a poor, blind bard. If Fisk's enemies were silent, then, perhaps his friends would be looser of tongue. Not a few of them, it seemed, were drinking here at the Swan Inn. Matthew had been bending their ears with merry tunes, meanwhile catching their conversations: though his material earnings were poor, he had gathered much of value.
"Oh, the fishmonger is the most merry of men,
His finger's in every pie, they say."
Matthew strummed his lute with theatrical flourish and wandered amongst the wooden tables, gaining a few laughs and a hearty slap on the rump from the innkeeper's wife. His perambulations took him deliberately away from the two men at the table near the door, to a distance where they would not think he could hear them. The contrast of their rough speech and soft velvet-trimmed garments told of men too quickly elevated and too well paid for any legitimate trade. Most mercenaries would smell of steel, and businessmen of whatever their trade might be - spices, silks, slaves - but here everyone smelt mostly of fish. The taller of the two men - an fellow Irishman, by his speech - wore the smell lightly, like a cloak, rather than sweating it from his skin like everyone else. A newcomer, then, though he seemed familiar with his surroundings.
Others in the tavern gave them wide berth, and they had been moments away from breaking into fisticuffs at least twice. Matthew suspected that the moment they thought their voices unheard beneath the bard's merry tune, their tongues would loosen and their business be known. He sorely missed his usual haunt in Westminster: the parliamentarians that favoured the establishment were so used to him that they did not bother to lower their voices, the tables smelt of wood and beer, not fish and piss, and Mistress Karense at the bar always had a mug of ale ready to wet his throat and soothe his voice.
"The ladies all know he's an upstanding gent,
Who doesn't just eat fish on Friday."
The local man spoke the first part, his voice cracked in fear. "Fisk will have my guts for his garters! You ordered those pikes made: you must now pay him."
"Tell your master what I did tell you, you whoreson Turk! Ireland's at peace and we need none of his dealings now," the Irishman hissed back.
Matthew sang on, his interest caught and ears pricked.
"The farmer's girl was a fine, saucy lass,
Who'd not tasted fruits of the sea.
The fishmonger slipp'd her the finest of eels,
And now she'll be eating for three."
"I'll not be your panderer again, O'Neill."
"You'd rather I smiled and scraped before the man who funded my enemies' battles while he bankrupted my father?"
"Better you than I."
O'Neill had heard enough, it seemed, for he stood and strode out of the Inn, leaving his companion to throw down a careless handful of coins. Matthew, smiling, doffed his hat before the man addressed as Turk, though he smelled entirely like a local man.
"Penny for the song, good sir?"
"Out of my way!" The man shoved past him, in a manner more annoyed than wary, and out the door. No-one else seemed to be inclined to pay Matthew for his song - too early in the evening for these sort to part with their coins - so he bowed with a grand excess of politeness and slipped out of the Inn himself. He took a moment to scramble up the side of the inn - the rough criss-cross of the timbers made his task simple - and stash his lute under the half-rotten thatch, where it would be safe until he returned.
When Matthew stepped into the hustle and chatter of the street, the tall Irishman, O'Neill, had already travelled further than even Matthew's fine ears could hear, but the second man, Fisk's man, had tied his coin purse but loosely, and to follow his jingle-jangle was child's play. The man strode as quickly as his bandy legs would allow, straight towards the river; Matthew followed quietly over the cobbles, past the wide-skirted dames and barrow-pushing fishmongers with an ease that no other could manage, to judge by their shoving, their curses and the squelch of the filth beneath their feet. Matthew's prey, though, walked without dalliance into the awesome stench of the fishmarket itself. No man who entered here would leave unmarked, and Matthew grimaced at the thought of his own hair and clothes being marked in such a manner: it was like to feeling the stink of Fisk's sullied soul glide over his skin. No matter. Fisk's doings needed undoing. God had not stopped him: perhaps only a Devil would dare the oily darkness of Wilson Fisk's domain.
Fisk's ambition had far outgrown his station, as the desires of merchants had done ever since coin was invented. Matthew was not a man with a great regard for English ranks: in Ireland, his homeland, a chieftain gained his place through mettle and a gathering of consensus, whether that be through force or name or charm It was not right for Fisk to gain a good name through usury, blackmail and threats, to be given the respect of men on whose broken backs he rose to power. Fisk had visited King James at the palace more than once this past fortnight, and Matthew needed to know why a hulking fishmonger - even one of honeyed tongue and growing wealth, -would be in the confidence of a King. This day, however, a man had returned to his master to report on something close to Matthew's heart: the recently declared peace in Ireland. If Fisk wished to interfere with the truce and reignite the war that had left Ulster stricken by famine, Matthew would not hesitate to stand in his way.
Fisk's man did indeed jingle his way to St Michael's Lane, and to the dank and unimpressive building there that Matthew had spent many a night watching this last month, his strange senses tracking the forms of those who came and went. This wooden stronghold frustrated Matthew: the windows were thickly glassed and often shuttered, muffling sound. Besides, they were never opened but to empty the chamberpots of a morning. A man of Matthew's talents would not normally be frustrated by such things, but Fisk had chosen this location carefully: a little way back from the Thames, fish guts and rotten remnants were thrown into the streets rather than the river, and thousands upon thousands of gulls had an easy feast. The fat birds dove into the gutters and returned to the filth-spattered rooftops to devour their reeking prizes, shrieking and squalling to drown any hope of overhearing Fisk's dealings. Matthew had considered, on occasion, his chances of entering the building itself, but the risk was great, and the likelihood of actually hearing some titbit of use was rather low. Today, however, Fisk's man would surely report to him, and Fisk would set him to watch - perhaps harm - the Irishman who had refused Fisk's dealings, and Matthew could not let this opportunity slide by.
There was but a single man watching the rooftops, and even he was alert largely to the goings-on in the street, particularly those outside the bawdy house across the lane. Matthew dug his fingers into the crevices between the bricks and swarmed up to the roof in a moment, appearing directly behind the watchman. In a swift and silent motion, Matthew threw his sturdy jacket over the man's head - he kicked out, scattering gulls, but gave no cry - and smothered him into unconsciousness. Matthew gagged him, with a strip torn from the helpfully excessive fabric of his blindfold, and used the man's own belt to tie him to the tall, crooked chimney. He hoped to be in and out, quick as a mouse, but the watchman was hale and might well revive before Matthew was done. The watchman's way back into the house was clear - a small dormer window that was opened frequently enough to avoid total encrustation with the gulls' shit - and Matthew nimbly swung himself down from the rooftop and into the house of Wilson Fisk.
Immediately upon closing the window against the gulls' shrieks, Matthew caught his breath at the deep silence that inhabited the house: the walls here were thick and the servants meek. From this dusty storeroom, he could hear perhaps a dozen people in the house: a man and three women in the kitchen, a woman scolding a maid almost directly below Matthew's feet, another maid softly humming "The Contrary Wife" as she scrubbed a floor, and the shifting feet of guardsmen, one at each of the front and back doors. Below it all rumbled Fisk's voice, like the sea that roared through the cave-riddled cliffs of Matthew's childhood home. Another man was with him, on the ground floor, but their words were inaudible at this distance. Matthew slipped quietly out the door and down the stairs, knowing well that none of the household were nearby. He crouched low near the bottom of the stairs, beneath a heavy picture frame, content that he would hear anyone approach long before they saw him.
"…without Fury's meddling," Fisk said, as Matthew drew close to his doorway. "The King has the Irish on his hook. Why, then, would he let them go on such easy terms?"
"Could he be short of money, Master Fisk?" It was the man Matthew had followed from the inn.
"Until the last man in the kingdom is bled of his last shilling, a king is never poor. No, my heathen friend, it means that the king has placed his choices on the scales, and crushing the Irish is of less weight than we suspect."
"What did he weigh it against?"
Fisk chuckled warmly. "A good question! Perhaps a few of my words may have gained purchase in that heathen skull of yours. And here is a question in reply: what does a king hold to be of importance?"
"God? His throne? His people's safety?"
"We cannot know the mind of God, and the other two are not simple or sudden occurrences that he can isolate and consider. Go on."
"Assassination, then?"
"Yes. He fears for his own person, for he is, like all of us, one sharp blade away from discovering God's intentions for him."
Perched on the stairs, Matthew smirked. Indeed, he had put the fear of the Devil into the superstitious King James, something he never would have dared with Queen Elizabeth, though she, like her heir, was no friend to the Irish. It was rather delightful to see that his plan had not only worked as he intended, but inconvenienced Fisk into the bargain. It would hardly be beyond a man such as Fisk to be profiting from war and the suffering of others.
"Master Fisk, surely the Irish would not be able to enter the Palace and approach the King. And since the Spanish departed, there is no one else who cares a whit about their war."
Matthew heard the deep leathery creak of Fisk rising from his seat, and quick footsteps as the Turk retreated across the room.
"If you do not care about this war, and, in particular, the coin that you have not brought me this day, you are a greater fool than even I suspected."
"Sir, I did not mean-"
"More pity to you, then. Yet, if your mouth did not fulfil its God-given duty considerably more often than your brain, perhaps you would not be so remarkably useful to me."
"I - I am useful, Master Fisk?"
"Indeed. And I may even have another task for you, one of enviable simplicity."
"Yes, Master Fisk!"
"Ask the gentleman on the stairs why he believes I can't see him in my mirrors."
Before Fisk had even finished his sentence, Matthew was running back up towards the roof. A loud bell rang in the room below, in time with Fisk's laughter, and, before Matthew had reached the second floor, he could sense the forms of two doughty maids dashing into position on the stairs. The larger swung a broom at him and the other grabbed for his sleeve, but he easily ducked and instead swung himself over the banister, dropping lightly down to the ground floor. A guard rushed at him with a heavy cudgel; Matthew leapt, planting a hand on the man's shoulder and avoiding his rush, only to lose a lock of hair to the swinging sword of the man beside him.
"Run him through!" the Turk bellowed enthusiastically, though he made no motion towards the fight himself.
Matthew dropped to the floor, rolled to his back and kicked upwards with both legs, driving the swordsman into his cudgel-wielding companion. Both guards fell to the floor in a tangle of limbs, the sword skidding away across the boards. Twisting to his feet, Matthew found himself face-to-face with the Turk and his rancid breath. Turk swung a surprised punch directly at him, but the blow was easily avoided, even at such close range. Now Matthew was close enough to freedom that he could hear the conversations of passers-by in the lane outside.
The carefree chatter was suddenly drowned out by the sound of enormous footfalls, shaking the floor with their mighty tread. Matthew wrapped his fists in the Turk's billowing shirt and gave a hearty shove straight at the source of the heavy sound: Turk hit Fisk square in the chest, but Fisk was not staggered in the slightest. Matthew scrambled for the door, but Fisk was swifter still, lunging forward with terrific speed and grabbing Matthew by the throat. Though Matthew tore at the man's huge arms, Fisk did not loosen his grasp for a moment. Instead, he lifted Matthew off the ground, holding him at arm's length, so that Matthew's feet dangled in midair.
A noise oddly like the sea roared in Matthew's ears as his breath was choked from him. He kicked at Fisk, but the man's bloated arm was longer than Matthew's leg, and he could not reach to kick his vitals. Fisk shook him like a cat with a jawful of rat: his skull rattled, Matthew hung still, his breath barely seeping past Fisk's rough hand.
"I have heard tell of a blind Irishman who fights better than he ought. A man who knew Sir Nicholas. I did not realise that this man was also a ruffian and a spy. Who are your masters now? The O'Neills? Speak!"
Fisk shook Matthew again, and firmed the grasp on his throat.
"I have…no masters…" Matthew gasped.
Fisk eyed him beadily. "You, a man alone, would dare threaten a king?"
"I would dare…anything."
"As would I." Fisk's laugh was sudden and both his excess flesh and Matthew's limp body shook with its force. "Times have changed, this year past. James is King now, shining the light of righteousness on his land. But you are a blind man, and perhaps you do not know that when the light is bright, it only means that the shadows deepen." His voice sobered, and quieted. "If you try to work from the shadows, little man, you will soon learn that the dark places of this city are mine. They will spit you out on my doorstep, and I will rend you limb from limb with my own two hands. And that, any fool can understand."
Fisk flexed his mighty arm, bringing the half-strangled Matthew close to his face; Matthew sucked in a wretched, tiny breath of air and flexed his body upwards. His right boot met Fisk's elbow with a dull sound like a rotten cabbage hitting the floor, and suddenly Fisk's crushing hand was gone. There was no cry of pain, but the hit had been sound enough, and the moment Matthew's body hit the floor he was already rolling backwards and up to his feet.
The door! It was again blocked, by the guard with the sword, and Matthew had no desire to lose more than a mere lock of hair to the man's blade. Fisk reached for him, left-handed, but Matthew knew the man's speed now, and slipped past him, dashing into the man's parlour, where he had been meeting with the Turk. No door led from this room, but Matthew had now given up on such niceties. He seized a heavy chair and hurled it with all the force he could muster, straight through Fisk's front window and into the street, and followed it with a diving roll out of the confines of the house, into the freedom of the lane. Fisk's bellow chased him, but not, it seemed, Fisk himself.
The girls of the bawdy house shrieked at his appearance, but no man moved to stop him as he fled, draggled and torn, through the streets of Billingsgate. There was no rest until Fenchurch street was nearly a mile behind him: then, perhaps, he could be assured that no man had pursued him.
Matthew slumped against a friendly door, panting and holding his throat, which was as bruised as if he had escaped the hangman. Fisk was right: times were changing. For all his politesse and royal visits, Fisk was setting himself up as a king. Matthew would not tolerate that hubris, nor would he wait for the fullness of time to punish Fisk, as Matthew's own pride had today been laid low. King James was rightfully bound by custom, sovereignty and manner; Fisk's bounds were non-existent.
And if good men were too afraid to battle the evil in their midst, why, then perhaps a Devil would dare.