Perfect Shadows Part 5

"Anne was Queen in fact, if not in name, and the most dazzling members of the court, the poets and musicians, swarmed around her. Wyatt, and Norris, and George her brother, but none of more wit and ability than Anne herself. The King still doted on her then, and the future seemed so bright.

"George was clever, with a vicious tongue and a slas.h.i.+ng wit, but as quick to laugh as to quarrel, and much taken with the foreign lady so suddenly in their midst. They were not long out of the merchant cla.s.s, the Boleyns, and Nicolas, under various names, had been doing business with them for years. As a favor to him I was presented to Anne, and, in her mercurial way, she took a fancy to me though as a rule she much preferred the company of men. George would ever love where his sister did, and soon he and I were lovers. He was my first love, and the thought that he would age and die while I would live on unchanged was unendurable. We made the exchange, and I foolishly thought that our future was secure.

"Nicolas and I left England soon after, intending to return in the fullness of time, but-" her voice broke, and she choked back a sob before continuing. "Anne did not produce the expected son, and Henry was not a man to be thwarted, but rather one to turn upon any whom he felt had misled or betrayed him, however much he may have pretended to care for them. He hated George, as did others: the aging Henry for his youth and beauty, the others for his pride and superior intellect. That was not enough to condemn him, though, so George was accused by his wife, a sour and insanely jealous b.i.t.c.h, of incest, of adultery with his own sister!

"When we returned to England they were dead. Anne, George, Norris, Brereton, all the brilliant youth of Henry's court, so that he might wed a placid jade with a face like cream and all the wit and sparkle of a farm-house cheese. He had them beheaded, you see. And so I lost my love forever.

"Then so many years later I saw him again, swaggering through the London streets, a poet and a playwright. You, Kit, were so like him as to make one think of miracles, if one did not remember that the Boleyns, like the Marlowes, were a Kentish family. George had at least one b.a.s.t.a.r.d, and I know that he provided for the child, arranging for either apprentices.h.i.+p or dowry, depending upon the child's s.e.x, which I never knew."

"I had wondered why you so favored me. My-tastes? habits? - were no secret, and of a nature to repel most women, I would have thought. You were not the kind of woman to try to cure me of my 'affliction' at least. I do have one rather uncomfortable memory of having to leave off frequenting the Anchor, because one of the wenches was sure that the right woman could make me change my ways, and she, of course, was that woman." I stifled a laugh. "On the other hand, depending upon how one looks at it, one might say that the right woman did indeed make me change my ways." Rozsa looked at me quizzically for a moment, then joined in my laughter. It did not occur to me until later that her laughter seemed somewhat forced.

The following evening I woke before dark. I dressed and made my way downstairs alone, and followed the sounds of soft voices to the little parlor where I was wont to meet Geoffrey and Nicolas. The door was ajar, and the note of anguish in Rozsa's voice stopped me even as I lifted my hand to push it open.

"But he's a stranger! A ghost! I think after all, Geoffrey, that I did much harm in making the exchange with him. Better he should have truly died than to live on a cripple, with only half his wits!" I could hear her pacing, and drew back a little into the shadows of the hall." He is almost like a child, but a child in a man's body. It is not just the reading-he is diffident where once he was decisive, hesitant where he was hasty. You did not really know him before, the reckless brilliance, the edge of his humor. To see that razor wit become a sickle of leather! And his present state is souring even his few memories of what he was. He cannot think now what he might have thought then, or how." There was a m.u.f.fled thump as she threw herself down on a chair.

"Give him time, sweetheart. I took eleven years to regain my full sensibilities-Marlowe has not had even eleven months," Geoffrey said, his voice kind, as it never was when he spoke to me. She stood and commenced to pace again.

"Perhaps you are right. I shall return to Paris, to give him more time to heal. I cannot bear to be with him now; I lose my George all over again with every glance at him-I had not remembered that there were worse things than dying!" She was so distraught that she pa.s.sed me in my dark corner without noticing me. When she had gone I started to slip back to my room, only to find Geoffrey watching me from the doorway. He motioned me in, and I took my accustomed chair. I sat staring at my hands, too stunned to speak. After a moment Geoffrey s.h.i.+fted in his chair.

"I am sorry, Christopher, that you heard that. Rozsa is very upset-"

"Yes. It must be a truly horrifying thing, to throw a lifeline to a drowning poet, and drag a disfigured half-wit back in his place," I said bitterly, and he raised his hand.

"That is not fair, Christopher, either to you or to Rozsa. I tried to warn her, though she did not want to believe me. But neither has she seen the progress you have already made. You will heal, that I do promise, though it may take a very long time, a very long time indeed. During that time, however, we will-you will be-"

"Put under charge? Given a keeper? Who shall be burdened with that honor? You?" He nodded, and I was angry, suddenly and furiously. We stood at the same moment, and Geoffrey caught my arm, holding me almost effortlessly. I struggled but it was useless. He savagely pushed me back into the chair, no less angry than I.

"Do not spurn us, Christopher," he hissed. "You have this choice, and this choice only, to live upon my terms, or to die, here and now." He meant it. I could see it in his eyes. If I so chose, he would kill me before I could change my mind. I looked down, trying to think. "Well?"

"I want to live," I whispered. "Whatever the terms." I raised my eyes to his, and he nodded coolly and started to walk away. "But," I added, and he wheeled to face me. "But, if it is possible, I'd rather not see Rozsa for a time. I'd fain not put her to the strain of another such performance as last night's; she hid her feelings most adroitly." He relaxed slightly, and nodded again. He left, and I sat staring at the fire for a long time, still trying to think.

When I was well enough, we traveled to Italy, and there I felt for a time that I had come home. Geoffrey had me drilled in equitation, in swordsmans.h.i.+p and any other discipline he thought necessary to maintain my current social position; I was gratified to find that I mastered my lessons in n.o.bility as easily as I had once mastered grammar and rhetoric. Before long I was able to ignore, if not forget, the pain and sense of failure Rozsa's words had given me. The injury that had taken so much had at least left my arrogance relatively intact.

When the first year had pa.s.sed, Rozsa joined us there, and she and I struck an uneasy peace, as of siblings raised apart and meeting for the first time as adults. The plots of plays lay thick as autumn leaves upon the ground there, and I had fretted over my inability to write them until Rozsa had proposed a simple solution: I would dictate, and she would write them down. We had made more than one attempt at this compromise, but I found that whatever spark had fired my talents had burned out of me, and the words I produced were stilted and awkward, worse than any of the "jigging rhymes" I had so despised in my lifetime. I gave the endeavor over to Rozsa, who found that she had a taste for it, and contented myself with collaborating on plots and staging, while she wrote the plays. I wondered at the time if she truly appreciated my help, or if she merely humored the half-wit. I still do not know.

Chapter 6.

Nicholas Skeres was pimping for several doxies, the eldest a raddled forty, the youngest no more than fourteen. He approached me as I lounged against the wall of the shabby dockside tavern, and began trying to induce me to make use of them. The pa.s.sing years had not been kind to him, I noted. His muscle had run to fat, his matted hair was thinner, greyer, and alive with vermin, as was the ratty beard that failed to cover his sagging jowls. I merely shrugged and turned away to continue my conversation with one of the lads frequenting the place, but that was enough to let an astute pander guess where my interests lay. He wandered off, but watched me speculatively as I later left the crowded room.

More than three years had pa.s.sed since we left England. I had had a surfeit of traveling, longing to return to my native land and to embark upon my overdue revenge, so we had returned to Blackavar, leased to us for an indeterminate length of time. I had been well coached in the royal role of Geoffrey's younger brother, our presentation at court being imminent, but vengeance drove me to my old haunts, some of the more disreputable taverns and inns of London. At Geoffrey's request I prowled incognito, for, he said, while such disreputable occupations were not uncommon in royal younger brothers, as he had reason to know, they were still an embarra.s.sment. Within three months I had succeeded in tracing the first of my murderers.

It was several nights later that I returned to Skeres' den. I caught him eyeing me, and gave the lout a good look at the heavy purse I carried. The ugly man drew a thin, pretty youth into a dark corner, speaking to him earnestly, gesturing towards me, the mysterious man with the heavy purse. The boy looked defiant, then scared, finally nodding in apparent resignation before making his way through the smoky room. His invitation to entertain me was given sulkily and obviously under duress, but I feigned not to notice and followed the young man from the inn. Lige, Elijah Lyly, as he had introduced himself, explained that the dark and twisting alley was a short cut to his lodgings and drew me after him into the darkness.

"This is not the way to your lodgings, is it, Elijah?" I said softly, turning the starveling boy to face me. I had not fed in almost a week and the awareness of his pulsing blood was all but overpowering. "I will not hurt you," I breathed, and drew the young man into a kiss. Lyly resisted, but only for a moment, then the fascination overtook him and he relaxed-I had learned my lessons well. My teeth found the vein and his sweet blood filled my mouth. I forced myself to take but a little, then withdrew, speaking to the dazed youth in a low and lulling murmur.

The sounds of pursuit echoed in the alley's mouth, and I turned to face the hounds, placing young Lyly safely behind me. Skeres and two companions spread out to flank me in the small yard at the alley's end. One man, a ruffian called Thomas Cully, laughed and showed a rusty blade, while the other, a stranger to me, hefted a short but weighty club. Skeres stood back and set the lantern he carried carefully on the ground then motioned the other two forward. He leant against the wall to watch the fun.

I lazily drew the Italian snaphaunce pistol from beneath my cloak and leveled it at Cully's head. The two stopped and glanced uncertainly at Skeres, who cursed softly at the sudden appearance of the pistol. Too swiftly for mortal eyes to follow, I smashed the gun's long barrel against Cully's skull, dropping him, and caught the second knave with the rebound before aiming the pistol at Skeres. His face pale under the dirt, he tried to plead with me, but fell silent at an abrupt movement of the pistol.

"Elijah," I said softly, "go to sleep until I bid you wake," and Skeres' eyes widened to see the youth close his eyes obediently, although he remained standing against the alley wall.

"And now, Nick, it is time for the reckoning," I murmured. I pulled off the eye-patch I wore and turned so the lantern light fell on the puckered, purple scar. "Do you not know me, Nick? No? Marlowe, who paid so many reckonings for you, whom you repaid with treachery and murder?" I ignored the strangled sound Skeres made. "Yes, I died, but I yet live, or at least after a fas.h.i.+on. How?" Keeping the pistol level, I pulled the boy to me, sinking my pointed canine teeth into his throat again, my gaze never straying from Skeres, as he watched in horror. I raised my head and licked the blood from my lips just as Skeres, with a cry, hurled himself at the alley mouth. I dropped the pistol and was on him before he had gone two steps, catching him by the thin, greasy hair. I had scooped Cully's knife from the ground in pa.s.sing, and I slashed it against the terrified man's throat, tearing through vein and artery, windpipe and gullet, with one brutal motion. I coolly stepped out of the way of the fountaining blood, retrieved my pistol, and stood watching in grim satisfaction as Skeres pawed at his throat in a futile attempt to staunch the flow.

"Be thankful, Nick," I hissed. "Yours is a quick death. The others will not be so fortunate." There was a protesting gurgle from Skeres, and he died. I turned to Lyly. "Elijah," I said," come with me." At the mouth of the alley I woke the young man, after admonis.h.i.+ng him to remember nothing of the night's encounters.

A few nights later I struck up a fresh acquaintance with the lad, and eventually found him a place with the Lord Chamberlain's players. There was no inquiry into the death of Nicholas Skeres, so I a.s.sumed that his two fellows, upon awaking to find the corpse and the b.l.o.o.d.y blade, had been at some pains to conceal the deed.

Not long after Skeres' demise a letter came for me. I took it to Geoffrey to have it read. It proved to be a cunningly written invitation from Robert Cecil, to meet with him in order to discuss matters of "mutual interest and benefit". Since it was well known that Cecil had a desire to spread his, and England's, influence onto the continent, it did not take much thought to see what he was carefully not saying-he wanted to recruit an agent to act in his interest in the east. Geoffrey accompanied me to the meeting, much to Cecil's dismay, though he tried manfully to cover it.

"Prince Geofri, Prince Krytof, please, be seated. Will you take wine?" He signaled the servant who stood nearby and soon we were comfortably sitting near the fire. Cecil's glance strayed to my face, trying to read me whenever he thought that neither of us were looking. He was a small, scholarly man, as brilliant in intellect as he was twisted in body, and he must have realized from my lack of expression and the satisfied look on Geoffrey's face that things had somehow gone awry. That realization was confirmed when Geoffrey pulled the letter from his doublet. "That letter was meant for your brother, your grace," he said stiffly, and Geoffrey nodded.

"Yes. However my brother Krytof can neither read nor write, not his own language, nor any other," Geoffrey answered the implied accusation bluntly, ignoring, as did I, Cecil's shocked look, and offering no explanation. "He brought this to me that I might read it to him, but, had he been able to read it himself, be a.s.sured that he would still have brought it to me. My brother will not be suborned, Lord Robert. If you have matters of 'interest and benefit' to him, they are so to me also."

"Your grace, I meant no offense, and I implore you to take none. I had not wished to trouble your grace with what might after all be but a trifling matter, and I had no idea of your brother's . . .inability," Cecil said smoothly, trying to cover his confusion. He was plainly appalled; it had obviously never occurred to him that so elegant a prince as I might be unable to read. It was also obvious that that incapacity, moreover, rendered me useless for any purpose Cecil might have had in mind. He seemed to realize that his thoughts were abroad upon his face, and sighed, schooling his features to impa.s.sivity before continuing his business.

We parted amicably enough, but from that night the rumors about us, and about me in particular, took on a decidedly baneful tone. Just as the rumors reached their peak, we were invited by one Lord Haggard to finally be presented at court upon the occasion of the knighting of Thomas Walsingham at his country house, Scadbury, at Chislehurst. We were pleased to accept.

Chapter 7.

Walsingham slowly climbed the stairs to his bed, shaking with fatigue and numb from the sleeplessness his impending Knighthood had visited upon him. Thank G.o.d that was over, and thank G.o.d that he and Audrey kept separate chambers; he could not face her malicious chatter tonight. He had given his body-servant leave to visit the kitchens and the man was probably roaring drunk somewhere by now. Well, he was tired enough to sleep in his clothes tonight, and not for the first time. He pushed open his chamber door and was surprised to find the room well lit already. It wasn't Dermot, his valet, though, because no one came to a.s.sist him. His eyes swept the room and he started violently when he noticed the figure watching him from the shadows of his bed-curtains. His sudden fear and bewilderment pushed him back towards the door.

"Stay," the stranger said, and the voice stopped Sir Thomas dead where he stood. He knew that voice. He lunged forward and swept the curtains aside, then stepped back in confusion as the candlelight fell full on the face of the man reclining insolently on the bed, propped up by pillows and resting his boots on the counterpane. It was not Kit, of course; Kit was dead. This was one of the foreign princes that Lord Haggard had brought with him to present at court, Krytof, the younger of the two. Walsingham thought the striking young man had been staring at him earlier in the evening, now he was certain of it and found himself staring back like a fool. He hadn't been so attracted to anyone since Kit-he wrenched his attention back to the man in front of him.

The prince was exotically dressed, completely in black, which accentuated the extreme pallor of his skin. He wore a black silk doublet appliqued with black velvet arabesques, and full soft black velvet trousers that met knee-high black calfskin boots, in place of the exaggerated pansied slops, padded canions and hose, and the painted slippers that fas.h.i.+on demanded. Indeed, like the trousers, the boots were an obvious affectation, as no gentleman would wear them except when riding, preferring to show off his calf-muscles (padded, if necessary), and ankles. The s.h.i.+rt was an affectation too, and an expensive one, as not just the falling band, but the whole thing was made of the finest cobweb lawn, dyed to the deepest black, the most costly of colors. It was so sheer that one could see the well-formed muscles of his arms through the open sleeves of the doublet and, since he now had the doublet unfastened, his finely sculpted collar bones and an intoxicating expanse of upper chest. Suddenly Walsingham, in his sapphire velvets, paddings, and jewels felt vulgar and gaudy, tricked out like a harlot at Saint Audrey's Fair.

The prince was smiling as if he could read thoughts, the plain black silk eye patch he wore giving his quizzical expression a sinister cast. "I am not going to hurt you," he said, and the lazy, amused voice tugged at Walsingham's memory again, but his eyes denied his panicked thoughts.

"What are you doing here?" he rasped out." This is my private chamber." The dark man nodded and patted the bed next to him. Walsingham found himself inching forward, only to be stopped dead again by the light falling on the man's languid right hand as it rested on his raised knee. He had to get a closer look, he had to. He crossed the remaining distance in two steps and grasped the unresisting hand. He turned it to the light, and saw there what he feared to see, the odd T-shaped scar he knew so well. He crumpled on the bed. "No, no, it's a trick, isn't it? Who are you?" The last came out in a broken whisper.

"Why, Sir Thomas, you know right well who I am, you were there when we were presented at court. I am Prince Krytof of Sybria, here with my older brother Prince Geofri." His amiable voice hardened into tones as menacing as the whisper of a snake's pa.s.sage over a stone floor. "What you must needs concern yourself with, Tommy, is who I was."

"Who were you then?" The words jerked out as though hooked, while the prince rubbed the scar thoughtfully with his left thumb.

"Do you remember when I got this? You had not married, then. We wandered the grounds of Scadbury like two lovers in Arcadia, and I carved your initials in the great beech out there. Do you remember how the dagger slipped?" He ran the tip of his forefinger down the line that formed the upright of the 'T'. "You were very upset, but I told you I would gladly suffer more than that for you-"

"And you took the knife and slashed across the cut to carve a 'T' into your own flesh." Walsingham's voice, spent and colorless, rose to a note of hysteria. "No! You died! I know that you died-" he gabbled, his eyes flicking nervously to a small casket on a nearby table. His visitor raised an eyebrow and seemed to flow upright off the bed, a shadow crossing the room to open the small chest. Walsingham's thoughts lurched again.

This man moved with the a.s.surance and grace of an accomplished swordsman and duelist. Kit had never moved like that, could never move like that, and Kit had not been so tall, his face so angular nor his hair so dark. Walsingham watched, frozen, as the bloodstained handkerchief was lifted from its resting place, and then the man was back beside him, without seeming to have crossed the intervening s.p.a.ce. Krytof 's face had gone even paler, except for two splotches of intense color splas.h.i.+ng his flat cheekbones like the paint on one of Ralegh's savages.

"Is this your idea of a memento, then," he hissed, his single eye glittering. "Did he tell you how it was, Tommy? Did Frizer tell you what he did to me? Shall I tell you? Shall I tell you now?"

"He said it was quick, p-p-painless. He said that you-that K-kkit was drugged, and did not wake when-when-" Walsingham faltered, and fell silent before the younger man's bitter laughter.

"When I was butchered? Oh aye, they drugged me, but I did wake, defenseless and beset by enemies, to hear them plotting my murder, and I knew I was powerless to stop them. Skeres held me down while Frizer gloated and showed me the dagger bought especially for my slaughter, then he stuffed my mouth with silk, with this, and he slid the dagger into my eye, slowly, so slowly that it seemed to last for hours. Try to imagine that, Tommy, the sheer agony, the helplessness, the despair.

"But even that was far from the worst, Tommy, far from it. Do you know what the worst of it was?" The voice was soft, softer than the defiled silk he held, and as terrifying, as implacable as death. "The worst thing was that I knew that you had sent him to murder me, that you had sent the one man who would most enjoy my vulnerability and suffering, to dispatch me like a dog for which you had no more use. That was the worst thing, Tommy." Krytof sat staring into s.p.a.ce, his blind side towards Walsingham, twisting the handkerchief in his hands, and Sir Thomas realized that the whimpering sound he'd been hearing came from his own throat. He forced the back of his hand away from his mouth.

"You lie!" he said recklessly. "You cannot be Kit! Kit is dead, dead and buried. I do admit there is a resemblance, a slight one, but you're too young-Kit was twenty-nine when he died, and you're no more than five and twenty. Kit was, Kit was a scholar, and you cannot even read!" He hurled the last words with a scorn he hoped would cover the greensickness he felt. The handsome, maimed face turned towards him, the lips curled in a wry smile that Walsingham knew only too well, and he understood that, no matter how loudly he protested, his belief was written on his face.

"That is true, I cannot read," Krytof paused and held up the fingers of his left hand, unstained by ink for the first time in their acquaintance, "or write, Tom. That, too, was taken from me." The long fingers caressed the patch he wore, then reached for Walsingham's hand. He tried to jerk away but the grip on his wrist was steel. "That's a fine jest, is it not? The one thing that made my life worth living . . . what makes your life worth living these days, Tommy? What could I possibly take from you in return?"

Walsingham whimpered again, and drove the words out through his closing throat. "Are you going to k-k-kill me," he quavered.

"Why do you ask me that? Do you feel you deserve no less?" his companion said, grinning humorlessly. He leaned back on the pillows, pulling his unwilling victim with him, first stroking his hand, then forcibly pulling the rings from the puffy fingers. "You have let yourself go to seed since you've wed, Tom," he said, tossing the rings to the floor. "I've thought about killing you, of course. I killed Skeres, you know," he added conversationally, as he loosened and cast aside Walsingham's ruff and started on the doublet and s.h.i.+rt. "I lured him into an alley by playing drunk and flas.h.i.+ng my purse, then, when he followed, I cut his throat and told him why as he bled to death. I enjoyed that. But you, no, you I will have to think about." Walsingham shuddered, but the relentless voice went on.

"Do you remember how you used to visit Bedlam and prod at the lunatics with your sword? It could be you chained there in your own filth for the gallants to j.a.pe and jab at, remember, if you try to tell anyone what has pa.s.sed here tonight. But now, come here, my not-so-pretty Tom, come to me." Walsingham felt the hand tangle in his hair, wrenching his face up, and he struggled to free himself, tears blinding him and that hateful voice filling his ears. "You used to like to play at rape, Tommy, making believe that I was forcing you . . . is it too real now? I could force you, you know, but I won't, or at least, no more than this. . . ." and those cruel lips pressed against his, the tongue pus.h.i.+ng into his mouth. He felt the desire kindling in his groin, and he knew that he wanted to be forced, wanted this man to master him, to make him submit to his demands. Then the cool lips moved to his neck, he felt sharp teeth piercing his throat, and he lost himself in a welling sea of pleasure.

The next morning he woke alone, lying across his bed fully clothed, his velvets ruined and reeking from his body's emissions. He would have thought the previous night's encounter but a dream were it not for the rings scattered among the rushes on the floor, and the handkerchief missing from the casket on the table.

Chapter 8.

The late night air was cool, as I made my way back to Blackavar House, enjoying the quiet power of the stallion I rode across the fields and delighting in jumping the small streams and stiles. I had been warned of the dangers inherent in so approaching Tom, but Geoffrey had not thought of the most perilous: even though Tom was the author of my murder, I found that I loved him yet; even though he was aging, I desired him yet.

Upon my return I found Geoffrey practicing sword in the candlelit Hall. Invigorated by the ride, I plucked a bated blade from the rack near the door, pausing only long enough to rack my own rapier out of the way before falling to. It was a good bout, almost seven minutes pa.s.sed before I stood with Geoffrey's slender blade at my throat, my own held carefully in surrender. At least, I thought ruefully, I can hold onto it now.

Geoffrey smiled, showing his sharp white teeth, and said, "Come, let us rest and speak for a time," indicating the chairs pulled up to the hearth. "Did it go as you thought? Good." He poured two cups of the white Rhennish wine and pa.s.sed one to me. Even though it was neither nouris.h.i.+ng nor intoxicating, I found the flavor refres.h.i.+ng after the recent exercise. I s.h.i.+fted a bit, stretching my boots out to the fire.

"Frizer's blackmailing him, of course, which has interesting possibilities," I reported. "I will have to pay a call on that one soon, I think, after I see how things are running with Tom. He, Tom, I mean, knew that I cannot read, so someone at Cecil's is less circ.u.mspect than his master might wish, or he has bruited it about himself." It had been less than a week since the letter had summoned us to the Lord Secretary's.

I yawned, and rose to go to my bed, but a sudden thought turned me back at the threshold. "Have you heard the latest prattle concerning us?" Geoffrey shook his head. He had shown an interest in the rumors flying about us, and had managed to turn more than one to our advantage. It had been speculated, among other things, that I had lost my eye dueling, or that it had happened while I had been fighting as a mercenary, that I was not Geoffrey's brother, but his hired a.s.sa.s.sin, his bodyguard, his lover or his victim, depending upon the inclinations and imaginations of those telling the tales.

"Well," I continued, "now it seems that you forbade me to learn to read, hoping thereby to curb those ambitions that come so naturally to younger princes. When I defied you, you had my eye putout, or even did it yourself depending upon who tells it, promising the other would follow if I did not abide in my ignorance, and that I am not loyal to you, but obedient only out of fear." I stopped to swallow before going on. There was an uncomfortable amount of truth in that last conjecture. I forced a smile. "Truly, I could not have written a better scene myself in the old days!" As I departed with Geoffrey's sardonic laugh ringing in my ears, I could not help but reflect that these rumors were milk and water compared with some of the tales told of Geoffrey and his family in his breathing days.

It was hot in the banqueting hall at Nonsuch, and I found that the habit of using perfumes as a subst.i.tute for bathing a less than endearing one among some of the English aristocracy.

We were dancing, and I, in the somber black Geoffrey had chosen for me, must have appeared as a raven among the brilliantly colored and bejeweled tropical birds of the court, darker even than the occasional Spaniard or puritan found there. My partner, all in white and dripping pearls, vaulted towards me, proud of her skillful control in the Volta's high leaps, but I saw that she had misjudged the last one and was coming down hard upon her ankle. Without thinking I caught her up in my arms, and the music staggered to a halt, the other dancers standing around me as if turned to stone. Ignoring the building hum of outrage and menace, I carried her to her place under the canopy at the end of the room. "Are you injured, Majesty?" I asked her quietly, setting her gently down.

"Call me cousin, Prince Krytof, for you are no idle flatterer, or at least not so by nature, and I shall name you my Shadow," she replied in equally soft tones, laying her long fingers on my dark doublet. "And, my thanks to you, my ankle is but a little jolted, not broken." She swept a keen glance over the room, then rapped my arm smartly with her flat Italian fan, scolding me loudly. "You forget yourself, Sir Shadow! I am not one of your rustic maids to be whisked away at your whim!"

"I crave your pardon, cousin! I was carried away, and thought that action might win you, where diplomacy has so often failed," I answered smoothly, equaling her volume and dropping to one knee." Eastern barbarian I may be, but wild horses would not induce me to act to your dishonor." I had soon learned to play this flirting game to her great satisfaction, and to my own considerable advantage, as did any man who wished to find advancement at Elizabeth's court.

"A certain Wild Horse would be more than happy to see you dragged away at his heels were he here tonight," a broad Devon voice behind me drawled sarcastically. I rose and whirled to face the man, but relaxed when I saw who stood there.

"How-now, my Ocean-water? I did not think you so fond of my lord Ess.e.x that you would be pining for him," Elizabeth said, her coquette's tone at once dismissing me and enticing Ralegh closer. I bowed to the Queen, and gave Sir Walter a slight nod, which was returned along with a piercing blue stare, then wandered out into the moonlit grounds. The day had been hot and airless, the evening only now beginning to cool. I had walked for some time away from the palace when my enhanced sight told me that someone was lurking in the shadow of the little wood just ahead of me. I gave no sign that I had spotted the man and a few steps further on I recognized him. Tom.

As I pa.s.sed the spot he drew himself a little deeper into the shadows, a small sigh escaping him when I pa.s.sed by, apparently without seeing him, then a gasp of terror as my hand shot from behind him and closed over his mouth.

"Well, Tommy, waiting for me?" I said with no little malice. "How flattering, just when I had thought that you were avoiding me." My hand dropped to his shoulder and Tom sagged against me, shuddering at my touch, as if fighting back a sob. "Why not try telling me the truth, Tommy. It would be such a novel deed for you." Tom's pale blue eyes stared up, reflecting a stray beam of moonlight in tears of impotent dread. "Stop it, Tom. I told you before that I'm not going to hurt you-or at least, not very much. Let us find some spot where we may talk." I gave him a little shake, suddenly irritated by his abnormal timidity. Eventually we made our way to the carefully tended "Wilderness" and I dropped down into the sweet smelling gra.s.s, pulling Tom down beside me. "Now, isn't this pleasant?" Still holding him by the wrist, I reached over and stroked his hair, smiling at the s.h.i.+vering reaction. "You cannot decide, can you, whether you desire me more than you fear and despise me, or if it's the other way about," I continued in the darkness, amus.e.m.e.nt and disdain equally combined in the quiet tones of my voice.

"I could never hate you . . . I was waiting for you," Tom extemporized. I could almost hear his thoughts clacking along: If I was Kit a little flattery should do the trick. His Kit had always doted pathetically on admiration, and if I were only a feigned Kit, well, then I was mad, and what harm could it do? "I wanted to see you again, as we were, uh, in my chamber. I-I need you," he let his voiced break off in a ardent sigh, reaching his free hand up to touch my face, wondering if his design was working. I could read his every thought as easily as I once read books. I plainly saw that part of him wanted it to work, wanted me to be as besotted with him as his lost Kit had been, wanted to manipulate me as he had the others, while at the same time another part of him wanted to grovel at my feet and beg for favor.

"G.o.d's Teeth, Tom, but what a tawdry little wh.o.r.e you've become! You should have trod the boards: even the Rose has never seen a performance like this. Do you think you're still seventeen and the prettiest boy in England? Think again," I purred, the words as cruel as knives, as cruel as I could make them. He tried futilely to wrench away from my restraining hand only to have his wrist twisted viciously. My lazy inspection of his person must have left him horribly aware of his thinning hair and the beginnings of the paunch that he had tried to hide with the stuffed peascod belly of his doublet. A red flood of hatred washed over his face, hatred for me, a handsome, elegant, and above all, much younger man.

"I will see you destroyed, dishonored, and begging for deliverance, and I shall spurn you and walk on," he raged and I laughed.

"It won't work, Tom, whatever petty little plans for revenge you devise. Now, what were you really trying to seduce me into, killing Frizer for you?" He lurched away, and this time I let him go, amused by his tumble back into the long gra.s.s.

"Well-a-day, Tom! It would seem that shot hit in the gold," I chuckled and stood up, brus.h.i.+ng the leaves from my clothing, offering my hand to help him up. He ignored me, scrambled to his feet and began to back away. "Not that way, Tom. The Wilderness verges on the duck pond just over there and I am quite certain you would find the water disagreeable," I laughed. Moving far too quickly for him to see, I crossed the s.p.a.ce between us to grasp his elbow, pinching a nerve and numbing his arm when he tried to jerk away. "Don't be recalcitrant, Tommy. Remember, I'll not hurt you, not seriously, if I can help it. But tell me about Frizer. Where is he now?"

"In Eltham. He's running a tavern there. But you must not kill him! It would all come out then-I'd be ruined!"

"Perhaps I desire that. You could come crawling to me for favor and patronage, then."

Tom's anger choked him into silence. As we stepped into the lamplit stable-yard, he stopped, looking with horror at the stable cat. It had caught a mouse and was toying with it, letting it appear to escape; only to snare it again and drag it back. He glanced sidelong at me, and gasped at the smile playing over my face. "I'm the mouse to your cat, aren't I," he said wildly, "and for a cat-caught mouse there can be only one outcome." I loosed my grip and turned an amused glance on him, but he seized his chance and fled. A second later, as he ran, I watched him shudder at my sudden laugh. The mouse had met its fate.

"My lord," Jehan spoke softly from the shadows. "Prince Geofri wishes that you return to Blackavar at once." I nodded, and went for my cloak, but I was no sooner inside than Ambrose Willoughby, her majesty's Squire of the Body, pounced on me, saying that the Queen wished to speak with me at once. I followed the callow young man back into the hall, and approached the elderly woman under the canopy. "G.o.d's Blood, cousin! An unfaithful Shadow you are, to so wander away; I vow I sent the man after you fully half an hour ago. Now, come sit here, that we may converse." She nudged a cus.h.i.+on at her feet, seemingly unaware of the glares many in the crowd were turning on me. I bowed low then went down on one knee. "How now, you do not sit, my lord?"

"I fear I must ask your leave to attend upon my brother, who has summoned me to him, Majesty," I began, but she interrupted me. "You must call me cousin, my Shadow, as I instructed you. And if your brother, your sovereign lord, as we are well aware, requires your presence, well, then you must away, and our discourse must wait for another time. I would that all my subjects showed such devotion to their sovereign as you to yours."

"Maj-cousin," I smiled at the shrewd old woman before me with an affection as genuine as it had been unexpected, "no people love their sovereign as your people love you."

"Flatterer! Be off with you!" She smacked me with her fan again; I caught her hand and pressed my lips briefly to her slender fingers, heavy with jewels, then swept to my feet and backed away.

The hostile stares had not abated as I took my leave, and so I was not as surprised as some might have wished when I found the road blocked against me about a half-mile from the palace; they had easily got ahead of me by crossing the fields while I had kept to the road. There were four or five mounted young gallants and maybe twice as many bravos and underlings afoot. They had their faces covered, but not their clothing. I laughed aloud as I recognized Tom among them.

"I fear this is no laughing matter for you, my lord," the foremost sneered." Now, dismount." The gallants slid off their horses, standing ready.

"I think not," I said, noting the wooden clubs that many of them held, and belatedly realizing that I could be badly, maybe fatally, hurt. "Jehan!" I called, and the big wolf sprang from nowhere, causing the horses to rear in panic. I spurred my own horse through the confusion, the war-trained stallion las.h.i.+ng out with teeth and hooves at anything in range, while I sat the plunging back like the shadow Elizabeth named me. Within seconds we were free of the press and I kneed the stallion, causing him to half turn and rear, slas.h.i.+ng the air with his hooves. As coolly as if I were sitting on a garden bench, reveling in my vampire prowess, I drew a brace of long barreled pistols from the saddle holsters, and discharged one into the air. The night erupted with a deafening clap and sudden glare; immediately I rested the left-hand pistol upon my right forearm, sighted down the barrel, and fired at the leader, noting with satisfaction my target's dropped sword and crumpling form. Before the wounded man could even scream, I had wheeled the horse and was flying down the road away from my would-be a.s.sailants.

I heard Tom cry out just as a burning agony lanced through me, and I looked down to see an arrowhead protruding wetly from my left shoulder. The wooden shaft felt like a fire in my flesh, running along my nerves and through my veins, the pain eating away at my consciousness until I felt myself swaying in the saddle. I dared not stop, and fought against the faintness threatening to overwhelm me. Carefully sheathing the pistols first, I gave the horse his head. I know not how long I rode, but finally I became aware of the wolf running beside me and reined in the stallion. The horse was well acquainted with his lupine companion, and they touched noses before Jehan stood off a pace and resumed his human shape.

"We're safe for now Master," Jehan said, and stepped forward to help me dismount. He perceived the situation at a glance and quickly eased me to the ground, under the shelter of a hedgerow. "Bite on this, my lord, for I'm going to have to hurt you," he said, gently filling my mouth with a fold of my cloak. Then, so swiftly that it was virtually one motion, he snapped the head off the arrow and pulled the shaft from the wound. There was the crack of the breaking arrow, the white wave of agony, then nothing.

Chapter 9.