Perfect Shadows (39 page)

“What is the meaning of this outrage? I am an Englishman, and
not to be treated so! I have friends, very highly placed friends, and—”

“You have no friends, Robin, and you never had. You are a tawdry
twisted little man who has come to the end of his tawdry twisted little life.
Did you think that you would never have to atone for the lives you warped and
ruined? Did you think that you could explain it all to God, and he would
forgive you? Well, perhaps you are right. You are certainly about to find out.”

“Who are you?” Robin shouted desperately, “You’re not Marlowe!
Marlowe is dead!” I nodded agreeably, and took a step back from the man, closer
to the candle, then removed the patch that covered my scarred eyelid. Robin
gasped again, but said nothing.

“Marlowe is dead, Robin, undeniably dead, but I yet live, at
least after a fashion. No,” I cut off the spluttering protests, “I do not wish
to know the whys of the thing, or how you were forced to do it, or even how I
forced the council into moving as it did. It makes no difference, you see. You
will die, and I will kill you. I’ve just not decided upon how, yet.” That was a
lie, though Poley could not know that. I would let the man stew all day, and
break his neck quickly and cleanly the following night. “Of course, the precept
‘an eye for an eye’ offers a certain ironic symmetry,” I added, tilting my head
to listen to the crowing of a distant cock, allowing the candlelight to fall
full upon the jagged ridges of the heavy scar before turning on my heel and
leaving the room, locking the door securely behind me. There was yet time for
Geoffrey to read Poley’s correspondence, if I hurried.

Geoffrey’s voice was steady as he read, but my gorge rose at the
crowing note in the terse tale of Hal’s capture and imprisonment. He had
married his Libby, there in the prison, and had thought that word could not be
taken to the Queen before he himself was well on the road back to Paris. But
Cecil’s spies were legion, and the tidings had soon reached his ears. He then
presented them to the queen as a perfect means to abate the objectionable
earl’s imagined influence on Essex, whose precarious position at court was
obvious to every eye but Essex’s own.

It scalded me to think of Hal imprisoned, though I had to admit
that the romantic role of captive would probably afford him some little
amusement, at least at first. Poley’s latest message to Cecil had been little
more than a wail of supplication, entreating the secretary to recall him to
London, and employ him there. We altered the message, advising Cecil that Poley
was going out of Paris for what might be a protracted time, and hinting at some
momentous news he would uncover.

“Take your rest now, Christopher,” Geoffrey ordered. “It grows
late.” I thanked him, and left. The late winter’s dawn was almost upon me; I
paused in the kitchens long enough to give orders concerning my guest, and
reached my bed in the gatehouse as the shrouded sun rose.

As the door closed behind the madman who had captured him, Poley
frantically sought a means to escape. The door was bolted and barred, and there
was no window. Even the candles were burning dimly in that airless space—the
candles! He wormed his way up the rough stones of the wall to his feet. The
candle was too high for his hands, bound behind him, to reach. He almost sobbed
in his frustration. Desperately he knocked the candle from the ledge with his
shoulder, but the fall put it out. He turned to the second candle, on a higher,
but narrower ledge. Carefully he nudged it over with his chin, gaining a
painful burn on his cheek, and filling what air there was with the stench of
his burning beard. Not daring to breathe he backed away. His luck returned to
him, the candle guttered for a moment, then the flame burned high in the
spilled grease. He tried to ignore the blistering pain in his wrists, and the
sweat that ran into eyes, but the pain was unendurable and he jerked his hands
from the flames. The sudden strain parted the strands that held him.

One of the servants came in then bringing the prisoner a tray to
break his fast, but when she pushed the door open he fell on her, snatching the
heavy tray from her hands and hitting her hard with the edge of it. She fell
dead, her slender neck snapped like a flowerstalk, and he made his escape into
the vast park surrounding the manor.

Poley had set off for the gates even as an unearthly howling
broke out behind him, only to lose himself in the blowing snow. It was no more
than a half hour before he found himself in a clearing in the wood, and
realized with dismay that he was lost. He hadn’t seen the grey shapes that
followed him, circled and surrounded him, until one of the wolves darted in and
nipped at his calf, where his hose was thin and torn. He had seen them then, so
many shadows in the snowy air, and he screamed. As if they had been awaiting
that signal, the pack closed in, and the smell of death had filled the air as
the dying man’s blood scalded the snow. Soon the wolves drifted away, leaving
nothing to show what had occurred but a few scraps of rag and bone, and a patch
of bloody ice, soon covered by the fresh falling snow.

When I woke that night, Richard was waiting
there at my bedside. He had an ugly tale to tell in answer to my unspoken
question.

Later that afternoon, Richard told me, several of the servants
had become violently ill with what appeared to be food poisoning.

I cursed, remembering the candles that I had left burning at the
summons of the approaching dawn, reckoning that Poley had used the flames to
free himself, then awaited his chance. If it had been a vampire who tended him,
it would not have mattered, but poor, kind-hearted Lena, unable to imagine that
the orders to leave the prisoner alone extended to not feeding him, had had no
chance.

Without a word I dressed and crossed to the manor, where
Geoffrey was waiting for me. I felt much as I had at University, awaiting the
public whipping, and when the interview was over, I considered a flogging
preferable to the tongue-lashing I received. I swallowed the burning sense of
shame that welled in me at Geoffrey’s words, acknowledging my fault and my
responsibility, and gleaning what comfort I could with the scant approbation
Geoffrey had afforded me for not pointing out that I had, in fact, left orders
that Poley should not be disturbed. In my former life my rash nature might have
prompted a drawn blade, but I knew full well where that would get me now: flat
on my back with the point of Geoffrey’s steel resting in the hollow of my
throat, if I were lucky, and Geoffrey lenient. Dead, if not.

The years passed as years will, and the time came when we were
ready to return to England. On the evening before we were to leave Paris,
Geoffrey clipped the stitches that held the lids of my right eye closed. He had
noted a growing fullness behind the formerly slack lid, and resolved to
investigate. Jehan stood by with a basin and soft cloths, then bathed my eye
with warm herb-scented water. As the lids parted, Geoffrey gave a soft sigh of
satisfaction. The eyeball was regenerating, he told me, though when I viewed it
in the mirror, the pupil was as yet smoky and dull and the iris a startling
milky blue. I saw the light of the candle as no more than a soft ball of furry
gold, but it was light, and I was seeing it with my right eye.

“It is very likely that you will fully regain your sight in
time,” Geoffrey told me. “But for now, Christopher, you should continue to wear
the patch most of the time, but try to exercise the eye for a time every
night.” The scar across the lid, though its angry color had faded, was still
ragged and puckered, and I was vain enough to desire hiding such a blemish.

I watched Richard avert his eyes from it that same evening, as
he read to me, though he seemed unable to keep himself from casting sidelong
glances at it, try as he might to force his gaze away.

“If you will fetch me the patch from the table, Richard, I will
cover it up,” I said testily, unable to bear it any longer. Richard brought the
patch, and as he handed it over he asked how it had happened, the words coming
reluctantly as if both against his will and beyond his control. “I was held
down, and it was done with a twelve-penny dagger. That is when I died, Richard,
before I became the monster that I am.” Richard paled, then blushed a furious
crimson.

“I was wrong, my lord, to speak so that night, and I pray you
might forget my foolishness and my ingratitude,” he said stiffly, then relaxed
a little when I smiled.

“I do forgive it, Richard, even if I do not forget it. I won’t
bring it up again,” I said. Richard nodded solemnly and went to fetch some
wine.

He had never quite healed from the horrors of confinement and
assault, and indeed seemed truly comfortable only with me. We had fallen into
the easy relationship that one sometimes finds between siblings when their
relative ages have a sufficient disparity.

Rózsa had helped him a great deal, the threat of her sex blunted
by the boy’s clothing that she habitually wore. She had coaxed him into talking
of his ordeal, easing his pain thereby. I had thought that she might take the
boy as a lover, but she had not, saying that he was not yet ready for such a
step, and might never be. To the surprise of all, Rhys’s not the least, she had
set about seducing the handsome stableman, quelling his fears of her vampirism,
and setting him truly at ease with us for the first time since he and his
family had joined the household.

I forced my gaze back to the book in my lap, but my thoughts
wandered, and when Richard came back with the wine to mull at the fire, I
studied the changes the years had made in my companion. Richard had reached his
full height at five feet and nine inches, but he hadn’t yet filled out,
retaining the leggy coltishness of adolescence, and though the delicate bones
of his face had lost some of their androgyny he retained an almost startling
beauty.

Finding my thoughts veering relentlessly towards Richard again,
I snorted and closed the book. Startled at the sound Richard looked up from the
hearth and smiled shyly. Unable to stop myself, I reached a hand out to touch
that impossibly black hair, watching the purple highlights following my
fingers, then reluctantly pulled my hand away. Richard caught it in both of
his, holding it a moment, then, shamefaced, letting go. “I am sorry, Richard,”
I said softly, but Richard interrupted, his voice hoarse and close to tears.

“No, I am sorry,” he said, turning his face away. “I know what
you want, and I—I do dream about you, sometimes, but I am frightened. No,” he
stopped me, “I know about Rhys and Lady Rózsa, and I know that you would not
hurt me, that you do not harm Jehan when he—when you—couple,” he drew a
shuddering breath, and went on. “The dreams always change, you see, and then
it’s not beautiful, it’s ugly, and you are cruel and laughing—” I gathered the
distressed young man to me, murmuring against the heavy hair.

“I will never harm you, Richard, nor even touch you without your
consent. I can do something about the dreams, however, and I will, if you will
trust me. Look at me,” I added, turning his wet face towards mine.

Hal paced by the fire, his face alight with excitement as he
told me of the Irish campaign, his long fingers moving as if they plucked his
words from the air. Essex had appointed him his Master of Horse, much to the
displeasure of the Queen, who, although she had eventually agreed to his
release from prison, still had little use for the handsome earl.

He told of the mud and the cold, the murky chambers that managed
to keep the smoke trapped inside despite the roaring drafts that pierced
through the heaviest clothing, and the constant fear when venturing out that
every hummock would suddenly sprout a berserk kern bent on murder. Many was the
time that the entourage would arrive at a destination with men missing, or dead
in the saddle. It was enough to make one believe in the Sidhe, he said and his
voice faltered. He flashed a bright smile at me, realizing that he had
completely lost the thread of his narrative. “But tell me, will you return to
the court?”

“I think not,” I answered, smiling. “It is somewhat—diabolic, at
the moment.” Hal looked blank for a second, then laughed heartily at my joking
reference to Cecil’s ascendancy. Even Libby broke off the pretty air she
played, laughing as she stood and laid the lute aside.

“I must take my leave, your grace,” she curtsied to me, and I
stood, catching her hand, pressing a brief kiss into the palm.

“Then you must send us more candles, for you take the better
part of our light away,” I said, smiling wryly at the awkwardness of the
compliment; I had never regained my facility with words. She was ravishing,
this girl that Hal had embraced prison for, the sort of beauty that would never
fade into a plain old age. She smiled again and Hal caught her into a swift
embrace before she skipped from the room. “She is beautiful, Hal, and well
worth the winning at whatever cost. But tell me now of Essex. What devil
possessed him to behave so?” Hal picked at the lace bordering his cuff, and his
expression clouded.

“You heard about his return from Ireland, then?” he said
tonelessly, and I nodded. Essex, after disobeying his orders from the council
at every turn, became convinced that his character was being undermined in his
absence, and had concluded a hasty and illicit truce with Tyrone then returned
to England without permission. Worse, he had barged his way into the Queen’s
bedchamber while she was undressed. I shuddered, thinking of that
confrontation. She was an old woman, but a vain one, who had not seen a mirror
for twenty years or more, burying her age under the layers of paint, the wigs,
cloth of gold, priceless lace, and jewels enough to furnish a dragon’s hoard.
When he beheld what she had been hiding Essex’s expression must have been
mirror enough to shatter every illusion that the old woman had so carefully
built. She would never forgive him that, I knew, and suspected that the earl
did, as well. He had been ill for the better part of the year that had passed
since his precipitate return from Ireland, and the return to favor for which he
prayed had never come. Essex had remained in exile from the court, if not
actually still detained, and it galled him, wearing away what little prudence
he may have possessed. He had begun to flaunt his precipitate knowledge of the
Queen’s person, to vilify her publicly, joking rudely about her twisted carcass
and balding head. He was looking to die, I thought, daring the woman who had
doted on him to strike at him now. He was like a sulky child crying “I don’t
care!”, and unable to convince anyone, least of all himself, that it was true.