Big big thank you to my dear friend and beta NoPondInTheForest!
Londoners were, it seemed, waiting impatiently for the so-called big day, but why such a day was bound to be so big, they unanimously seemed to have absolutely no idea. The Doctors and Clara might have been really close to finding it out, but their luck shifted the instant Robert Cecil – Queen Elizabeth's Secretary of State – and his men burst into the Cheshire Cheese and threatened every single man within its walls. His intimidations rapidly had the effect he had intended, and by the time the notorious royal emissaries left, the time-travellers' informant and all the other men in the tavern had long opted for silence, so they kept their mouths shut.
In light of everyone's obvious discomfort and reluctance to speak, the three time-travellers eventually chose to leave the tavern. They hadn't been roaming the streets for too long when they suddenly stumbled across a bridge. Letting aside those typically sixteenth-century smells that had previously contributed to making her dizzy, the truth was that Clara couldn't help but marvel at the wonders of a city of London that was unquestionably unknown to her. Slowly but surely, she approached the bridge, and after taking a few steps across, she sluggishly motioned to the right and came closer to the barrier, her round dark eyes wide-open as they wandered about. She let her arms rest on the parapet as she looked down at the several small sailing boats scattered on the fresh and sparkling waters of the river. Standing not far behind her was the Eleventh Doctor, who had also taken a few steps over the bridge before stopping to contemplate the river as well. Unlike Clara, he was positive that this was not the first time he had seen it. The river had been different that time, that much he could remember. The waters had seemed clearer and calmer. And now, come to think of it, had he in fact not caught a salmon back then? And as luck would have it, wasn't it a salmon he was actually seeing right now, jumping repeatedly out of and into the water?
The Tenth Doctor had not stopped to look at the river at all, not even fleetingly. Clara and the Eleventh Doctor had hardly stepped on the bridge when his back had already been turned on them. His eye had happened to be caught by a green vine that crawled up a brick wall, covering it completely except for its arched top, where a keystone was in full view. And if that was a keystone, as it perceptibly was, then undoubtedly there had to be…
"Then undoubtedly there has to be an arch right behind the branches," he heard the Eleventh Doctor say right behind him, as if he had been reading his thoughts. Well, what a stupid thought, he said to himself! Did he honestly need more proof that he definitely had?
"Well, if there is an arch right behind it," the Tenth Doctor went on, "then the vine's not covering a wall – it's hiding a door! And may I add, very effectively."
"So it would seem. And," added the Eleventh Doctor, his finger moving round in circles in front of his other self's nose, "that spiral thingy carved on the keystone must definitely be an indication that things are about to get better, don't you think?"
Getting a firm hold of their screwdrivers, the Doctors buried their hands among the leaves and started to sonic whatever might be hiding behind them. It was only a few seconds later that they both heard the sound of metal clicking coming from behind, and with equally satisfied looks on their faces, they started to push, looking even more satisfied the moment a now-not-so-secret door started to give to their pressure.
Clara only turned to them the moment she heard the loud sound made by the dragging of the disguised door, then ran towards the Doctors and helped them push. The door wouldn't open completely, but they managed to sneak in as soon as it opened just enough. A timid ray of sunlight sneaked in after them, shining directly on a rusted metal lever right next to the door. After the Eleventh Doctor pulled it down, the door automatically came back to its original position, locking them all in the darkness. Much to Clara's relief, shades of blue and green soon started to shine not only on the stone walls, but also on the floor and the ceiling, accompanied by the familiar buzzing sound of the Doctors' screwdrivers. The smell of humidity filled their nostrils, and the sound of water dripping echoed in their ears as they walked along between cold walls of stone that seemed to stretch for as far as their eyes could see.
"The question remains," suddenly said the Tenth Doctor, who had long been willing to break the silence now that there was absolutely no one else around, "why would the prisoners in the Tower of London be executed in private? This is Tudor England, for god's sake! The people love executions!"
"You don't think it's all just a bait, do you?" suddenly asked Clara.
"A bait?" the Doctors asked. They'd been so shocked by such unexpected question that they grinded to a halt, thus forcing Clara to do so herself.
"Yeap," she replied gazing at them, not being able to believe that they hadn't even considered that possibility. "That runaway groom business, right? That's still bothering the Queen after nearly thirty years. And I guess, when someone's spent so long planning their revenge, they'd be capable of doing anything, don't you reckon?"
"Oh!" exclaimed the Tenth Doctor, keeping his lips rounded as he narrowed his eyes. "So you think she's…"
"Orchestrated it all," interrupted the Eleventh Doctor.
"Exactly," she replied. "Tudor England cannot exist without public executions, right? You said so yourselves."
"Actually, it was me! I did say that," interrupted the Tenth Doctor. "Chinny here would just fit into the category of by-stander."
"Oi!"
"No executions!" interrupted Clara, knowing that, unless she did so, the Doctors would be putting up another quarrel in the blink of an eye. "That's the point. What if that was deliberate? If she really knows you…"
"Oh, but she doesn't really know me that well, Clara," the Doctor interrupted.
"One doesn't really need to know you very well to know that a mere warning won't stop you from coming, Doctor," she said.
"I still can't see why she'd need to stop the executions," said the Tenth Doctor.
"To make us believe something dodgy was going on," replied the Eleventh Doctor as he darted his proud eyes to his impossible girl. "Possibly with an alien or two involved. That way, she'd make sure we stayed."
"Exactly!" added Clara. "Not that I'd mind to be fighting aliens again this time, Doctors, but for some reason I doubt that the Queen and the Zygons have been e-mailing in their free time for the past thirty-eight years."
"What's that thing over there?" suddenly whispered the Eleventh Doctor. He took a few steps ahead until he stopped in front of the roughly metre-high object he had just spotted.
"A staircase?" said Clara, putting her hand on the railing as she got closer.
"A spiral staircase," added the Tenth Doctor.
"A spiral staircase! That's wonderful! I love spiral staircases!" said the Eleventh Doctor, his enthusiasm sparkling in his lively wide eyes.
That emotion, however, changed the moment he pointed his sonic screwdriver downwards and its green light lit a dark passage that he momentarily wished he had never found.
"Are you really sure this was the right thing to do, Sandshoes? I'd swear we've been going round and round in circles for weeks, and you know what? It's really boring!"
"Of course this was the right thing to do, Chinny! We didn't have many other alternatives, did we? Mind you, the staircase is really long, I'll grant you that."
"Long?" asked his future self right behind him, his voice absolutely filled with indignation. "This is not long. This is infinite!"
"You have a problem with that? I thought you said you loved spiral staircases."
"And I do, but not necessarily never-ending ones!"
"In any case," the Tenth Doctor went on, "that would explain the dripping and the humidity. We must be going to the other side of the river."
"I no longer care where I'm going, Sandshoes, but I'm telling you for your own sake, that it'd better be good!"
"Doctors, look," interrupted Clara, pointing down as the blue light of the Tenth Doctor's screwdriver lit the space right beneath them. "I think we're getting to the end of the staircase."
"Thank goodness!" cried the Eleventh Doctor.
The Doctors and Clara quickly descended the few steps that separated them from solid ground, the three of them equally impatient and just as incredulous. The two Time Lords turned the lights of their screwdrivers off as the details of the place they were now in were revealed by the torches that had been lit inside it, an indication that the place they had just reached in was used frequently. It was a cold, humid, and perfectly square-shaped vaulted room, with large stone walls that were partially covered by moss. In the middle of each wall there was an archway, and the Doctors didn't need to inspect them at all to understand that they were the entrances to four different and possibly far-reaching passages.
"Well, Chinny," said the Tenth Doctor, "which way shall we go now?"
Spinning on his heels, the Eleventh Doctor silently took turns to examine each archway. They all looked identical at first sight, but on closer examination, he noticed how there was something, one very little but interesting thing, that was different about them.
"The carving on their keystones, huh?" asked the Tenth Doctor.
They all got closer to the same archway in order to take a better look.
"Okay," said the Eleventh Doctor, "so there are four archways, each of them obviously leading to a different place, and possibly on both sides of the two rivers. This is pretty much like a game of Monopoly. We're about to roll the dice and we have absolutely no idea what square we'll end up in, and we can only hope and pray that we won't end up in prison."
"What about the carvings?" asked Clara.
"Clues to where the tunnels lead," replied the Tenth Doctor, "exactly the same as before."
"Isn't that a boat carved on this one?" Clara asked.
"Looks like one, yeah…" the Eleventh Doctor answered.
"And isn't there a cross where there should be a sail?"
"Uh-hum…" said the Tenth Doctor. "Definitely is. So this tunnel must lead to some religious building close to the river…" he thought aloud.
"It might be related St Mary Overie," said Clara all of a sudden, now pointing at the keystone excitedly while the two wide-eyed, gape-mouthed Doctors turned to her. "Well, you know… St Mary Overie as in… Southwark Cathedral? I used to read tales about it. There was this woman called Mary who wanted to be a nun…"
"I don't like nuns," interrupted the Eleventh Doctor,
"No, neither do I," added the Tenth.
"…Her parents used the money they made with a boat that sailed across the Thames to build the nunnery which later became Southwark Cathedral."
"Well," said an astonished Tenth Doctor after a few more seconds of silence, "sounds good enough for me…"
"Yeah, yeah, for me too," said the Eleventh Doctor, his eyes drifting from Clara to the keystone and squinting. "Absolutely."
"Let's take a look at the others, shall we?" suggested the Tenth Doctor.
They all sauntered to the right and stopped right in front of another archway to inspect its keystone. This time, the carving on it showed a quill.
"Mmmm, I see," muttered the Tenth Doctor. "This archway must lead to The Globe."
"Maybe not," added Clara. "There are many theatres on the south bank these days, right? It might be The Globe, or Blackfriars, or The Swan, or even the R…"
"Okay, okay! Point taken!" hurriedly interrupted the Eleventh Doctor for some reason he couldn't quite understand, thus stopping Clara before she could actually utter a certain word which he was sure was coming next. "So this tunnel's likely to end at one of the Elizabethan playhouses."
"That's great news for those who want to get in without a ticket," said the Tenth Doctor as they moved to the right once again in search for the next archway.
They were all greatly surprised when they found that the carving on the new keystone was so unexpectedly big that it became perfectly visible long before they reached it.
"A siren," said the Tenth Doctor.
The two Time Lords kept staring at the keystone for a considerable while, then looked at each other. Their eyes looked narrowed and their lips were pursed, but none of them could find even a light remark to say, so they both remained silent, still trying to make sense of that carving.
"Oh, come on! Don't tell me you can't guess this one!" said Clara.
The Doctors looked at her with frowns and smirks full of offended reproach, although shame was written all over their faces. They looked back at the keystone, their brains working fast in desperate search for something clever and impressive they could finally say, but eventually their wait proved to be in vain.
"The Mermaid Tavern?" finally revealed a terribly amused Clara. "The meeting point of the playwrights of the time? You must have heard of it!"
"Of course we have heard of it, Clara!" grumbled the Eleventh Doctor. "The Mermaid Tavern! How hasn't heard about The Mermaid Tavern? The problem is… My brain! It tends to shut down under pressure."
"Oh, don't be ridiculous, Chinny!" Past Him interrupted. "You know pressure very well, you've lived under its influence your whole life, and Clara knows! Oh. well done, Clara, by the way! That was impressive".
"Of course that was impressive," replied the Eleventh Doctor matter-of-factly. "You know I only take the best."
"Maybe you do," interrupted Clara, "but once they're gone, you never speak about them again. What about you, Doctor?" she added, turning to her friend's predecessor. "When this is all over, will you tell me about your other friends or will I have to ask Captain Jack about them?"
"Shall we go for the last keystone?" asked the Tenth Doctor, determined to elude the question, as Clara rolled her eyes. The Eleventh Doctor and she didn't even have time to nod in agreement with his suggestion, since the younger Time Lord practically reached the last of the arches in one leap. His eyes moved in the direction of the keystone, and as soon as he glanced at it, he froze. No muscle or limb in his tall thin body moved in the slightest while Clara and the Eleventh Doctor walked next to him, and when it wasn't until they were finally standing by his side that he seemed to get a bit startled. For a brief moment, he seemed to come out of his lethargic state to struggle with his tunic in order to get his glasses out of the right pocket in his jacket. Eventually he took them and donned them, only to instantly freeze again at the sight in front of him.
The Eleventh Doctor was at this point wondering what it might be that Previous Him had just found and why it was having that effect on him. The moment his eyes darted to the carving on keystone he understood it all completely.
"Oh, I see," he said, pointing his forefinger at the keystone. "Nice flower. Rather pretty, isn't it? I love flowers! What flower is that anyway?"
"It's a rose," said Clara.
"Oh, a rose indeed! What a surprise! I hadn't even noticed! I'll tell you what. All flowers look exactly the same to me," he replied, nonchalantly.
Out of the corner of his eye, he looked at the Tenth Doctor, who was still looking at the carving unemotionally.
"Well," said Clara, "this is going to make things a bit more difficult this time, I'm afraid."
"Oh, is it?" asked her Doctor, suddenly looking frightened. "How? And why?"
"Because it's a rose, Doctor. Think about it!"
The Eleventh Doctor raised his eyebrows and rounded his lips, determined to come up with something really clever this time, but once again, he just couldn't. His gaze lowered as he understood how, out of the millions of small things and big things that he could actually say, out of all the truths and all the lies that were running through his head, that past version of him that was standing right behind him was unconsciously preventing him from making even the most casual reference to them.
"There are many significant roses in the history of England," Clara went on, much to her Time Lords' relief. "The Tudor Rose, the Lancashire Rose, the Yorkshire Rose…"
"And which one is this?" the still talking Doctor asked.
"I don't know."
"What?" he asked incredulously. "How can you not know? You've interpreted all the other carvings!"
"Doctor, were you listening when I said that this particular carving would make things more difficult?"
The Doctor and Clara kept looking at each other silently and hesitantly for a short while.
"So what shall we do now?" asked the Doctor, looking up, as if expecting an answer to be sent from up above.
"I think we should take this tunnel, Chinny," the Tenth Doctor replied unexpectedly.
"What?" asked Clara, shocked.
"This tunnel, I think we should take it!" the Tenth Doctor repeated, taking his glasses off and holding them tight in his hand. "I have no idea what that carving means or where this passage leads, Clara, but I think this is the right way to go."
The Eleventh Doctor looked pensive for a while before he finally spoke.
"Yes… So do I," he replied as he smiled softly while his eyes searched for the other Doctor, who was looking back at him intently.
"You can't be serious," said Clara skeptically. "Doctors, this is the only tunnel whose destination we haven't been able to guess, so why would you want to take it?"
"For that very reason, Clara," replied the Eleventh Doctor, "because we don't know what we'll find at the end of it."
"Are you sure?" Clara asked.
"Why shouldn't we be?" asked the Tenth Doctor. "It's a rose!"
The Tenth Doctor unexpectedly found himself thinking about how much he would have tried to bite his own tongue, and swallow those last words, and let them burn first his throat, then his innards, and ultimately his very soul, had he been in the company of Martha, or Jack, or even Donna. But for some reason, he had had absolutely no problem in saying that last word to his future companion Clara.
"So?" she said with a frown, crossing her arms over her chest.
"So…" hesitated the Tenth Doctor. "Everybody loves roses. I love roses! Roses are beautiful. Roses are… forever."
"Diamonds are forever, Doctor, not roses," said Clara.
"I've always thought diamonds to be extremely overrated," he replied, an almost imperceptible smile finally curling up his lips.