Ink and Steel

Act II, scene xix

It lies not in our power to love, or hate,

For will in us is over-rul’d by fate.

CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE, Hero and Leander

In absolute blackness, Kit paced in the cramped circle afforded him. His right hand trailed on the damp stones of the wall. He had no fear of tripping; his feet knew the path, and the dank earth was where he slept when he grew too tired to walk. Wasting energy, he thought, but he could not sit still. The sink wherein the filth of all the castle falls, he mumbled, but it wasn’t, quite. More an old, almost-dry well, lidded in iron as much to keep light out as the prisoner in, for the sides were twenty foot and steeply angled. He had paced forever. He would be pacing forevermore. A strange sort of irritation, first an itching and then a raw, hot pain, grew in patches on his torso and his thighs. To pass the time he told himself stories. Bits of verse, Nashe’s plays, half memorized, Kyd’s Tragedy, Will’s Titus. The Greeks and the Romans and his newest acquisition, the Celts. And none of them could drive the mocking voice of Richard Baines out of his mind.

“Good puss. Wait there, I’ll be back for thee when I can.”

“Damn you, Baines, don’t leave me alone down here.”

“Oh, thou wilt not be alone. There’s rats and frogs. And they tell me Edward’s ghost still screams. He’ll be company for thee; thou hast so much in common. Dost remember the irons, puss? Thou canst look forward to their acquaintance again.”

Kit closed both eyes. It made no difference: he walked, and turned, and walked, and turned. Christ, Richard. For the love of God, what made you such a monster?

“Froggy frogs,” someone answered. Kit startled, felt about him. He kicked something that rolled and rattled in darkness, a heavy iron jangle, but nothing that felt like flesh.

“Master Troll?”

“Froggy frogs. Froggy frogs. Froggy frogs…” faint as an echo up a drain pipe.

Kit felt after whatever had rolled. Maybe a tool, something that could be used to dig, or pry, or climb. He found it after some scrabbling and sat down against the wall to explore it with his fingers. Round, a sort of ball of iron straps… . It smelled of rust, the cold savor of iron. He felt inside it, and yelped when something pricked his thumb.

Oh. Of course he would have left this here for me to think on.

Carefully, almost reverently, Kit laid the scold’s bridle aside and scrubbed his hands on his breeches as if he had inadvertently grabbed two fistfuls of meat writhing with worms. His breast burned, his belly, his thighs. In five discrete patches, now, one for each brand, an agony as fresh as the day they had been seared into his skin. How did I get here?He didn’t know.

“Hurm. And harm.”

“Master Troll? Is there a way out of this pit? This oubliette?” A forgetter, some helpful portion of his mind supplied. Where you put someone to forget them. But Baines said he’d be back. ‘Listen carefully, Kit. Can you hear Edward screaming?’

There must be a way out of this.

“Ah, Sir Christofer.” A voice like brushed silk. “There is always a way. Come with me, my love. I am the way.”

There was light, suddenly. Light cast from over his shoulder, and as he found himself standing he turned to it, turned into it. The scent of pipe tobacco surrounded him, a comforting memory of Sir Walter Raleigh’s chill parlor and many late nights. He walked through it, heard voices hanging on a glittering arpeggio, felt air stirred by a suggestion of wings.

God.

He walked past, and through. Found himself elsewhere, in a tower room, high in the air: an autumn or early winter evening and the unmistakable reek of the Thames, the cry of ravens in the graying light. Harsh wood scraped Kit’s knuckles; something writhed ineffectually against his grip. He looked down, at the skinny, stripped man of middle years he pinned against the rough table, in an all-too-familiar pose.

God. God, hear me now.

The man was familiar too: his black hair, high forehead, terrified gray-blue eyes. As familiar as the lazy oval scarred by a set of good young teeth at the base of Kit’s left thumb, the saddler’s muscle ridging his forearms under thick golden hair. The pain from his brands was a symphony now, bright as holy words written in his flesh.

Will. What is … Oh, God. That’s Will. I’m Baines.

A flurry of wings, and the cries of falcons, or perhaps of women in unimaginable grief or unspeakable pleasure. The light shattered like a hurled looking glass. Kit awakened in the evening dimness behind Morgan’s bedcurtains, his head pillowed on her nightgown-covered thigh, and groaned with the simple agony of opening his eye.

“Where is he?”

Her voice, lazy and collected and very much awake.

“Where is who, Sir Kit?”

He raised his head, wincing, and looked up her body at the woman lowering her book to regard him.

“Whosoever it was that beat me in my sleep.”

“All your own doing, I fear.” She laid the cloth-bound volume aside and reached down lazily to smooth his rumpled hair. “You re a sorry drunk, Kit. Do try to avoid it in future.”

“I don’t recall,” he answered. Vaguely, a memory of walking ever-so-carefully through her door, the click of the latch, her hands unbuttoning his pearl-embroidered doublet and unbuckling his sword. A brief check informed him that he was half dressed, at least, and Morgan seemed clothed and composed. “What befell?”

“You fell into mine arms,” she said, quite gently, “and wailed like a pup pulled from his mother’s teat. And when I thought you’d cried a whole world’s tears, you cried a few more in your sleep, and tossed and turned. But slept the morning through and then the afternoon, and whimpered whenever I rose or left your side. Still dreaming?” Her fingers were gentle.

He laid his head down on her thigh again, and sighed in the simple comfort of her touch. I could have liked her, if things had been different, for all she is wild and cold.

“Aye,” he said, and then sat upright, the spinning room competing for his attention with remembered horror. “Baines. And Will. Prophetic dreams.”

She let her hand fall from his arm. “What of?”

“How did you know of my dreams?”

“Sweet, Murchaud isn’t so sound a sleeper as that. They are somewhat spectacular.” She smiled.

He blinked, considering. “Morgan, thank you.” It fell from his lips unheralded, and he paused a moment to examine the sentiment behind it. —‘Thank you for saving my life?’ ‘Letting me awaken with some shred of my dignity intact, after last night’s display?’ ‘Just being there?’— He didn’t know.

He stood and collected his clothes from the back of her chair, and struggled into them while she laughed. “People will talk.”

“Let them,” he answered, and licked his palm to push his hair back from his face. Impulsively, he bent and kissed her on the cheek.

She covered the place with her hand, her expression unreadable. “Such haste.”

“I’ve an obligation,” he said, stamping his boots down, still quite dishevelled. Anon?”

“Anon,” she answered, and did not rise to see him to the door. But he could hear her laughter chasing him as he fled back to his own room, and … Someone had been there before him. A single candle burned on the mantel, and propped up beside it was a tall silver blade. Something shimmered before them, half real. A bundle of papers of mismatched size and color, ragged at the edges, so thick it was rolled and tied with a grosgrain ribbon instead of folded and sealed.

Kit hesitated in the doorway, his sleeves unbuttoned, head aching and stomach sour, his rich court doublet hanging open over last night’s crumpled shirt. Do you ever feel at the mercy of conspirators, Sir Christofer? Why, no. Never in my life.Sblood, he cursed, and kicked the door shut with his heel before he crossed the room. He snatched the letter from the mantel, and brought it across the room to the window and the last light of sunset to read. Sorting the pages rapidly, he recognized sheets of plays and poetry, Will’s hand and someone else’s, shoving them all aside until he found the thick ten pages of letter.

“Oh, Will.” Head pounding but no longer spinning, Kit sat on the edge of the bed to read Will’s shaky, hasty secretary’s hand. When he finished, he set the pages aside and stared for a moment out the window, watching the pale phosphorescence of the twilit sea, hoping it would calm the cold terror in his chest. As if entranced, he stood, buttoned his sleeves and laced his points, buttoned the doublet, adjusted the hang of his sword, and settled a dagger on the right side of his belt. As an afterthought, he slipped a dirk into his boot, and then as he reached for the door he glanced down and laughed at himself, going to war in court silks and pearls.