MURDER OF RUTLAND
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30th December 1460, Wakefield
The crimson Lancastrian banners billowed in the wind above him. A menacing thing, Edmund thought as he was roughly dragged by his arms towards the enemy camp. He wondered if that's what death felt like, red hot pain. It was what awaited him now, that or months of being a prisoner of war, locked in some muddy dark cell with little to no food.
Either way, he felt strangely reconciled with the idea. There wasn't any fear. Only the deep and dark knowledge that this was, in fact, the end. Whether it be the end of his life or the end of the boy he was up until now, it mattered little. The Edmund Plantagenet that he knew today would perish. Or, at least, what little remained of him.
His father's blood still coated his hands and his armour. It had begun to dry when they'd captured him, barely far enough from the battlefield to be called flight. Whatever Edmund's plan had been when he listened to Salisbury and fled, it was long behind him now. It was something he couldn't pay attention to. Not unless he wanted to make things more difficult.
Salisbury, the man's name rang through his head as his eyes caught on the thing in front of him. Lord Clifford, a man Edmund rarely knew but heard plenty of tales of, stood with his sword unsheathed. Blood splattered his face, and he was grinning viciously. If Edmund had ever allowed himself to wonder what the Devil might've looked like, he was sure he now had the answer.
At Clifford's feet laid a severed head. The head of a man Edmund knew. Salisbury, the name rang through his head again. For the first time since he'd fled, Edmund felt the slightest fear get ahold of him. The look on Salisbury's dead face was stoic, as it often had been when he lived.
Clifford paced back and forth with his eyes trained on Edmund. He looked like a rabid wolf surveying his prey before he attacked. The grin on his face was tight with anger, something that Edmund didn't quite understand. And he didn't think he wanted to. Whoever this man was, whatever he wanted, he would be the one to set out Edmund's judgement today. Death or life, Edmund doubted either one would be good. A strange, murky part of his mind craved the axe, so his existence might be cut short.
"You are Edmund of York, are you not?" Clifford spat out Edmund's name like it was the vilest of poisons. Whatever answer Edmund might've provided was wiped away by the man's fist backhanding him across the face. The men that had previously dragged him there let go and allowed him to fall into the mud. His arm barely caught him before his face plunged into the ground, and his cheek ached distantly. He still couldn't focus on the pain of anything.
When he fled, emotions ravaged his mind and body until he couldn't think. Pain, terror and grief tore into him like the claws of a beast, leaving him a fresh mauled corpse ripe for the taking. Maybe that was why he didn't fight when the men caught him or dragged him here. There was nothing left in him, not a shred of emotion other than a sense of sadness so far away he could barely feel it.
He'd been wrong before. He wouldn't die. He was already dead.
"I'd expected you to be brash, like your father," Clifford continued, a mocking edge to the tone of his voice. "I'd say it's a pity that he's dead, but the bastard deserved more suffering than he got." A strange and overwhelming sensation of anger burst through Edmund, but it dwindled and vanished almost as soon as it came. Still, it must've shown on his face because Clifford's grin widened.
A single stray tear ran down Edmund's face. He hadn't even realised he'd been close to crying. It didn't matter, he supposed. Everyone around him was dead. His father, his cousins, the men he'd sat around the fire with before the battle. It was only a matter of time before his mother and brothers joined him, and his sisters too.
No, a voice barked in the back of his head. Muted, like it was screaming into a pillow. Edward will save them. He could certainly try. And knowing Edward, he'd probably get close.
A man stalked sluggishly towards Clifford, dressed in the usual dress of a man of the church. His hands were brought together in a plea. For what, Edmund didn't quite understand. It wasn't like Clifford would listen to him or anyone else. The wild look in his eyes promised violence, and Edmund was content with that.
"Save him," the chaplain urged, his voice rough and croaky with age, "for he is the Prince's son, and peradventure may do you good hereafter." Clifford laughed, his eyes not tearing away from Edmund's bloodied and bruised face. Edmund looked down at his armour, just as streaked with crimson as the rest of his body. He wanted to laugh. Wearing such rich armour had been a foolish notion. Mayhaps he might've survived had he looked like every other man on the field.
"Your father slew mine," Clifford seethed from between gritted teeth. Something flared in the man's eyes as Edmund looked back up, and he knew it was the end. Vengeance was not something one could escape. And Clifford craved it more than anyone else Edmund had ever seen. "And so I shall do the same to you and all your kin."
Edmund jerked forward as Clifford gripped his shoulder tightly. Without looking away from his eyes, Clifford plunged the hilt of his dagger deep into Edmund's chest. A morbid crunch and squelch followed the action, and Edmund inhaled sharply. Moments later, his lungs flooded with blood. He'd missed, Edmund laughed to himself. The fool had missed his heart.
Still, he would die. It would be a slower death than he'd hoped for. But he would die. He knew that, felt death knocking on the door. Its caress was cold yet strangely comforting, and Edmund let himself be lulled by it as he fell backwards to the ground. His blood seeped into the dirt and the snow, painting the ground beneath him red. He felt it as his skin cooled, lacking the warmth of his blood. The sky was beautiful that day. It was the only thing he could focus on. Bright blue, like Edward's eyes.
Edward... God, he hoped he didn't do anything foolish. His brilliantly kind and daring brother. What would he do when he learned of this? It hit him then that he never got to say goodbye. Not in the way that it mattered, at least. And his mother. He hadn't said goodbye to her either. He'd fled, like a coward. Left her in the hands of the Lancastrians. She shouldn't have to cry for him. He wished he could tell her not to.
With his eyes staring up at the bright blue sky, he sent out a prayer for her and the rest of his family. And then his wandering gaze stopped. All emotion and life dissipated from them, like ash on the wind.
An eerie silence fell over the Lancastrian troops around him, leaving his ears ringing. They all watched him lay in the snow, unknowing of the chain of events this very moment unleashed. Somewhere close to him, Clifford let out a contented sigh.
Edmund Plantagenet, Earl of Rutland, left the world with one final cold breath.
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The letter in Jasper's hand was a sword hanging high above Grace's head. She could only stare and wait, gripping her skirts tightly, as he read it. The stoic look on his face did little to calm her nerves, which were running rampant with every painful second that passed. The longer she waited, the more she knew what the letter carried. Still, she chanted over and over in her mind, please don't be dead, please don't be dead, please don't be-
Then her uncle pursed his lips and sighed, an acceptance of defeat. A lump formed in Grace's throat and she struggled to inhale for a moment. The burning in her eyes was something she couldn't chase away, and when the first tears escaped and hit her cheek, she wasn't the least bit surprised.
No, she cursed the heavens in her mind, not Edmund. Jasper looked at her with pity, and it made everything hurt so much worse. Edmund, that quick-witted timid boy, who sat with her when she felt lonely. The brother that sat patiently with his siblings as they studied, willingly explaining something to them a hundred times over, all without losing composure even once. A man who loved to read, write, and expand his knowledge in everything there was. He was dead now, laying in a field somewhere, not breathing.
"I'm sorry, Grace. He was executed after the battle by Lord Clifford." A searing pain rushed through her, like a thousand hot tongues of fire licking at her insides. After the battle. He had lived through the worst of it. Only to be cut down without a chance to defend himself by a man so far beneath him that he looked like a rodent in comparison. "They say the Queen ordered it."
Grace's mind stuttered to a jarring stop. No, that couldn't be right. Her stepmother wouldn't order that. Or, at least, she prayed she wouldn't. Her stepmother was miles away in Scotland, nowhere near the battle when it occurred. But there was no way to confirm the order hadn't come before the battle. God himself knew Queen Margaret was driven by anger and a taste for vengeance. Was it truly so absurd as to suggest that she commanded all York traitors be executed if captured?
She didn't think it was. But she couldn't raise any protest now, not even in Jasper's presence. So she bit her tongue and blinked away her tears. There was no time for that now.
"Salisbury is dead too," Jasper continued when he noticed the slight shift in her demeanour. Grace slowly inhaled. Salisbury had been Cecily's grandfather. The girl should be allowed to know, she knew. Even if she was a thing of stony silence and sorrowful stares into the distance. When Grace voiced this, Jasper agreed, and Cecily was sent for.
Grace wasn't sure what she expected. The unchanging expression and ice-like stare was not it. Crying seemed like a given, but not a single tear was shed by Cecily Neville when she was told of her grandfather's and cousin's death. She only stared, just as she had done so often here at Pembroke. There was so little feeling in her that Grace sometimes had to wonder if the girl was alive at all.
"I am sorry for your loss, my lady," Grace told her when only silence followed Jasper's announcement. Cecily's deep brown eyes seemed darker than usual when they turned to look at her, like two dark pits of nothingness. It was chilling how devoid of anything they were. There was nothing to suggest that Cecily was saddened by the news at all. Nothing, other than the tightly clenched fist hidden in the folds of her skirts. "We will pray for your grandfather and Lord Edmund at Mass."
"Save your prayers," Cecily said stiffly. "I do not need them. And neither do they." Grace stared blankly, unsure of what to say to that. Cecily curtsied, the movement unhurried and languid, before she turned to leave the room. The silence that reigned afterwards was stifling, and Grace was too afraid to even inhale.
She is right, she thought, finally drawing in a long bout of air. The dead don't need your prayers.
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A/N
Rip Edmund :/