Midnight Never Come (33 page)

“Father Thames,” she said, respectful and solemn. The glamour that had disguised her all day was gone, but the shadow beneath the arch protected her from prying eyes on the riverbank. Only Deven could see her, a silver figure with her head bowed. “As the moon calls to your waters, so I, a daughter of the moon, call to you. I humbly beseech the gift of your presence and counsel. Secrets lie within your waters, the wisdom of ancient times; I beg you to relate to me the tale of Suspiria, and the curse laid upon her. I ask this, not for myself, but for my people; the good of faerie kind may hang upon this tale. For their sake, I pray you hear my words.”

Deven hardly breathed, both from anticipation, and from fear of being overheard. The river licked the planks of the starlings, within arm’s reach of the top edges. Every flicker of motion caught his eye — what sign would be returned? A face? A voice?- — but it was never more than debris, floating through the narrow gaps of the races.

He waited, and Lune waited, and nothing came.

Then another sound laid itself over the quiet murmur of the water. Only when it recurred could he identify it: not speech, but choked-off breath, the ragged edge of fading control.

“Please,” Lune whispered. Formality had failed; now she spoke familiarly. “Please, I beg you, answer me.” The river made no reply. “Father Thames . . . do you wish her power to endure? Or do our acts mean nothing to you? She has warped her court. I can scarce remember where I was before I came here, but I know it was not this cold. I served her faithfully, beneath the sea, in Elizabeth’s court, anywhere she has bid me, and now I am hounded to the edge of my life. There is no safety for me now, except in her overthrow. Without your aid, I have nothing. I . . .”

The words trailed off into another ragged breath. Her shoulders slumped with weariness, abandoning the armor of purpose and drive that ordinarily held her together. Her hands clutched the edge of the starling, white-knuckled in the night.

He should not have followed her. Deven was watching something private, that she would not have shown if she knew he was there. And it stirred something uncomfortable within him, where resentment had lodged itself when first he saw her true face.

That was, after all, the crux of it. Her
true
face. The other was a lie. He knew it, and yet some part of him had still grieved, still resented her, as if she had somehow stolen Anne Montrose from him — as if Anne were a real person, kidnapped away by the faerie woman.

But Anne had never existed. There was only ever Lune, playing a part, as so many did when they came to court.

Yet the part she played was a part of her, too. There had been more truth than he realized to the words she said back then: she could be at ease in his presence, as she could not elsewhere. Perhaps the Lune who existed before the Onyx Court had been more like Anne.

Or perhaps not. He had no way of knowing. But one thing he did know: Lune
was
Anne. He had loved this faerie woman before he knew the truth, and now that he did . . .

His feelings had not vanished when her mask did.

It might be foolish of him — no doubt it was — but also true.

“You do not have nothing,” he murmured, mouthing the words soundlessly to himself. “You have your own strength. And the aid of the Goodemeades. And . . . you have me.”

Slack water had come, the turn of the tide; the river was never more quiet than now. Why, then, did he hear a sound, as if something disturbed its tranquility?

His first thought was that a boat approached; one hand went for his sword, remembered he did not have it, and groped instead for his knife. How would he explain their presence here? But no boat was near, and his fingers released the hilt, suddenly weak with shock.

The water between the two piers was swirling against all nature. The surface mounded, rose upward, then broke, and standing upon the Thames was an old man, broad-shouldered and tall, gray-bearded but hale, with centuries of wisdom graven upon his face.

“Rarely do I speak, in these times that so choke my waters with the passage of ordinary life,” the spirit of the river said. His voice was deep and slow, rising and falling in steady rhythm. The murky gray fabric of his robe shimmered with hints of silver in its folds. “But rarely do two call me forth together, mortal and fae. Thus do I come, for the children of both worlds.”

Deven froze. Lune’s head came up like a doe’s when it hears the hunter’s step. Could she see him, concealed behind the edge of the pier?

Father Thames was not looking at him, but still he felt shamed. He could not hide from the venerable spirit.

Stepping around the edge, onto the nearer half of the starling, Deven made his most respectful bow, as if he approached the Queen herself. “We are most grateful for your presence.” A back corner of his mind worried,
What form of address does one use for a river god?

Lune rose slowly to her feet, staring at him. She seemed to speak out of reflex. “As he says, Old Father. You honor us by rising tonight.”

Deven moved far enough that they both stood before the spirit, on opposite sides of the arch. The fathomless eyes of Father Thames weighed them each in turn. “Daughter of the moon, you spoke the name of Suspiria.” Lune nodded, as if she did not trust her voice. “An old name. A forgotten name.”

“Forgotten not by all,” she whispered. “We seek knowledge of her — this mortal man and I. Can you tell us of her? What wrong did she commit, that she was cursed to suffer as if human?”

The spirit’s gaze fixed inexplicably on Deven, who tried not to shiver. “She came to me for this tale, begging every night for a year and a day until I took pity on her and spoke. Her mind was clouded by her suffering. She did not remember.

“ ’Twas long and long ago. A town stood upon my banks, little more than a village, save that the chieftain of the mortal people dwelt within its palisade, and thereby lent it dignity beyond its size. Within the hollow hills lived the faerie race, and there was often conflict between the two.

“And so a treaty was struck, a bargain to bring peace for both peoples. Faerie kind would walk in freedom beneath the sun, and mortals go in safety beneath the earth. But ’twas not enough simply to agree; the bargain must be sealed, some ritual enacted to bind both sides to honor its terms. The son of the chieftain had gone more than was wise among the faerie people, and seen many wonders there, but one stood high in his mind: the beauty of an elfin lady, who of all things seemed to him most fair.

“Thus was it proposed: that the treaty be sealed by marriage, joining a son of mortality to a daughter of faerie.”

The measured, flowing cadence of Father Thames’s words carried the rhythm of simpler times. Not the crowded, filthy bustle of London as it was now: the green banks of the Thames, a village standing upon them, a young man dreaming of love.

The river god’s eyes weighed Deven, seeing deep into his thoughts, and the admission he had not spoken aloud. Then the spirit continued on.

“But the lady refused her part.

“The dream that might have been was broken. The peace that would have been faded ere it took hold. Spurned, the man cursed her. If she held mortality in such disdain, then he condemned her to suffer its pangs, to feel age and sickness and debility, until she understood and atoned for her error.”

Lune whispered, “The Onyx Hall.”

At last Father Thames shifted his attention to her. “The time for treaties between the two peoples has passed. The beliefs of mortals are anathema now, and drive fae kind ever farther into the wilderness, where faith and iron do not yet reach. Only here, in this one place, do faeries live so closely with human kind.”

“But ’twas not enough, Old Father,” Deven said. “Was it? She created the Onyx Hall, and still was cursed. How did she escape it in the end?”

Water rippled around the hem of the spirit’s robe. “I know not,” he said simply. “That which occurs upon my waters, along my banks, from the dawn of time until now: all that lies within my ken. But that which is done beyond my sight is hidden to me.”

In Lune’s gaze, Deven read the thoughts that filled his own mind. They still did not have the answer they needed: what pact Suspiria had formed. But this tale mattered, if only because it helped them understand the being that had once stood where Invidiana did now.

“I will bear you safe to shore,” Father Thames said, and held out his broad hands.

Without thinking, Deven stepped forward to accept. Only when it was too late did he realize his feet had left the starling. But he did not fall: the surface of the water bore him like a slightly yielding carpet, against all the custom of nature.

Lune took Father Thames’s left hand, and then the river flowed beneath them. With gentle motion it carried them out from under the bridge, slantwise across the breadth of the water, until they came to the base of the Lyon Key stair, within sight of the Tower wall. When his feet were securely on the stone, Deven turned back.

Father Thames was gone.

Then he looked at the rippling surface, and understood. The river god was never gone.

“Thank you,” he murmured, and Lune echoed him, her own words no louder than his.

B
RIDGE AND
C
ASTLE
B
AYNARD
W
ARD
, L
ONDON
:
May 6, 1590

Lune realized, as if through a great fog, that she stood openly on the bank of the Thames, her elfin form undisguised, Michael Deven at her side.

Summoning a glamour took tremendous effort. She should not have let her guard down, out there on the starling; not only had Deven been listening — why had he followed her? — but allowing herself to relax her control had been a mistake. Weariness dragged at her like leaden chains, and she could not focus.

What face could she wear? Not Anne Montrose. Not Margaret Rolford. Her first attempt failed and slipped, without even being tested. She took a deep breath and tried again. The illusion she created was a poor one, unnaturally generic; it would seem strange, like a badly crafted doll, if anyone looked at her closely. But it was the best she could do.

She surfaced from her concentration to find Deven watching her with an odd expression.

“Have you somewhere safe to go?” he asked.

Lune forced herself to nod. “There’s a chamber in the Onyx Hall I have been permitted to claim as my own.”

He bit his lower lip, apparently unconscious of the gesture. “But will you be safe there?”

“As safe as I may be anywhere at court.” It sounded stiff even to her; she did not want to appear like she sought pity. “We should part. ’Tis not safe for you to be seen with me.”

They still stood a little below the surface of the wharf, not that it would protect them much. Deven gave her a frank appraisal. “And if you go there now, tired as you are, will I be any safer? Weariness can drive any man to error.” His mouth quirked wryly. “Or any woman. Or faerie.”

Lune did not want to hear of the risk. She had measured it herself, time and again, even before she fell out of favor. It was the way of the Onyx Court. One mistake, one wrong word . . . she was so very tired of that world.

“Come,” Deven said, and took her by the hand.

She followed him in a daze, too tired to ask questions. He led her through the streets, and it seemed like they walked forever before they arrived at a house. Lune knew she should protest — her absence might raise suspicion — but pathetic as it was, the thought of spending even one night outside the Onyx Hall was enough to make her weep with relief.

A single candle lit their way, kindled from one by the door; up the stairs they went, and then something made an appalling amount of noise as Deven dragged it from under the bed and out the chamber door. “Sleep here for tonight,” he said, before he left her. “I’ll keep near.”

That was not safe. But Lune was well past the point of arguing. She collapsed onto the bed, barely pausing to pull a blanket over herself, and slept.

When morning came, she found herself in a small, moderately appointed bedchamber. On the floor beside her was a large, empty box; the noise must have been Deven dragging a mattress free of the truckle bed.

Her glamour had faded while she slept. It had been too long since she ate from that loaf of bread. Lune closed her eyes and rebuilt it, far better this time, making herself into an auburn-haired young woman with work-roughened hands, then pinched off another bite from the lump she carried with her. She dared not leave it behind in the Onyx Hall.

In the neighboring chamber, the mattress lay on the floor; Deven she found downstairs. Pausing at the door, Lune looked around at the modest pewter plate on the sideboard, the cittern in one corner, with two of its strings broken. She had thought briefly last night that the place might belong to some former agent of Walsingham, and had been both right and wrong. “This is your house.”

He’d glanced up at her approach. “Yes.” After a pause, he added, “I know. I should not have brought you here. But I was tired, too, and did not know where else to go; it seemed unkind to put my father in danger. We shall not do it again.”

It was too late to undo. Lune came forward a few steps, smoothing the apron over her skirt. She looked like a maidservant for the house. “I’ll take my leave, then.”

“They know about me, do they not?” The room was dim, even though it was morning; Deven had kept the windows shuttered, and only a few lights burned. They accentuated the hollows in his face. He had not been sleeping well.

“Yes,” Lune said. Taking a deep breath, she added with sincerity, “I am sorry for it. I cannot play the part of a man, and Walsingham would not take a woman into his confidence. The only course open to me was to attach myself to someone in his employ.” That skirted too close to the wound between them. “They knew you were my contact in his service.”

He was dressed once again as a gentleman, though not completely; his servants were nowhere in evidence. The sleeves of his doublet lay across his knees, and the aglets of his points dangled loose from his shoulders. “Would I still be in danger, had it ended at that?”