At times they wore tartans to declare their proper clans. Blood scarlet for Lalena’s closer kin, the Mac Sanglair. Blue stitched with silver for a proper Mac Tier. Harlequin tartans of yellow and black, else serpentine scaled for Scalen. Just as oft, individuals came dressed as knights, as monks, as kings in ermine. A cousin came entirely clad in flowers. Housemistress Grumble sniffed disapproval. My groom Edward stared transfixed, entirely approving.
I could have driven the lot away. Might have stamped foot, slammed door, commanded my new wife to keep her mad kindred beyond the gate excepting visiting hours every third Sunday. I did not. I liked her people fine. I now lived upon a stage where performers came and went, delighting to make me laugh, else shiver in awe. Lalena and I sat evenings side by side, holding hands, Theseus and Hippolyta watching the mad theatre of our courtiers. Only a dull fool would stand and call halt to the play.
But how the creatures quarreled! Rushing up and down stairways, slamming doors, stamping feet. Shouting and declaiming in more tongues than Pentecost in a madhouse. Then they’d declare peace loud as war. Run laughing through the halls. Else leap upon chair or table, singing songs in praise of their family. Voices of impossible beauty echoing from dining room or stairway banister, atop the book shelves of the library.
The house servants enjoyed the quarrels. Quite oft they took sides, not that they knew the context of the fight or the even the language of the combatants. But the inevitable singing always sent them fleeing back to their proper duties. It rang too eldritch, too unearthly.
* * *
Back to tavern, obituary, chiming clock, magic key, impossible passage. I fled clockwork man and mad Ed, madder Em down the dark hall. Darted through a random door to plunge blinking and stumbling into… a bright wide hall. Morning sun placed folds of light upon the polished floor, the sweeping stairway. A place of peace. White roses in a vase upon the letter table. I recognized the vase. Chinese, decorated with dancing cranes. That was my vase. What was it doing in Keeper’s tavern? I waved sword, menaced the roses, demanding answer. A petal drifted down in reply. I tapped it with blade point. Tap, tap, tap. At third tap I dared look about, admit to myself the obvious. I stood in the front hall of my own house.
Another door opened. No uncanny portal, but the door to my study. Out came Lalena, gaze cast down. Hair escaped bonnet’s prison, covering face for a veil of sorrow. No dance in her step now. Shoulders and form showed no grace of a creature claiming kinship with foxes and stars, wind and flame. She walked burdened as pallbearer in gray rain. Of a sudden my heart ached. To see her in sad thought, thinking herself alone… Worse invasion than spying in the bath. And I’d cast this shadow of grief upon her? I was a beast.
She stopped, brushed hair, beheld my silent self. We stood a while so, considering one another. Lines beneath eyes declared she’d not slept for days. But she had. Beside me last night. I studied a red scratch across her cheek. Not there when we’d gone to bed. Had she felt so vexed she tore at herself?
“Rayne,” she whispered. Took half-step towards me. Stopped, looked about as if she’d never seen the hall of our house before. Considered the arrangement of white roses on the letter table. Took breath, straightened back, returned hair to bonnet prison.
“Well, there you are,” she said. “Been hiding?”
I looked behind, expecting the infinite hall of doors. Perhaps the clockwork killer, else a mad Espada. But no, here was a coat closet. I poked head within, sniffed at boots, a broom. My old French officer’s jacket. Fool thing kept wandering from my wardrobe.
“Not me, no,” I said, shutting the door.
“Why is your sword drawn, dear heart?” she asked. I turned gaze to my hand, the weapon therein.
“Saw a mouse,” I affirmed. First thing that came to mind. I sheathed sword to indicate ‘the matter is concluded’.
“Ah,” she said. She wore blue silk dress, laced at throat. I did not recognize it. The bonnet tilted sideways as she considered my red periwig, the hat, the mail shirt. She opened mouth to inquire further. Closed it. Looked down, discovered a picnic basket in her own hand, matching prop to my sword.
“I thought perhaps…” she paused. I nodded, anxious to hear what she thought.
“I was just thinking myself,” I observed. A lie. My head held no more thought than a scarecrow’s straw noggin. Lalena nodded, I nodded. Good God, we were children again, digging toes into the dirt.
She took breath to recover balance and adulthood.
“We haven’t been… ,” and halted.
“Well, it was… ,” I tried.
She tossed head in anger at words’ failure. “Ach and seven hells to damnation’s termination, man, I’d hoped we might sit. Eat. Talk. I, I’ve somewhat to say to you. We might bide each other’s company for a minute, perhaps a full hour.” She waved the basket. “Picnic even, in our hideaway.”
“Picnic?” I replied, empty of comprehension. Then recalled Mistress Grumble in this very hall, this very morning. Hand-wringing upon the peace plan of picnic. Hours ago, by my memory. But not by the present sunlight. Angled scarce a degree more than when I left for the tavern, obituary in pocket. Did I stand here now, and at the same time march to Keeper’s tavern, in defiance of death and my wife’s trust?
Strange fancy that I stood in two places. Here with Lalena and her picnic basket. Whilst my younger, more arrogant self visited bloody lunatics. Thinking he’ll get breakfast, the fool. But I now had second chance to make peace with my wife. No words further. I strode to Lalena, hand out in offer to carry the basket. Our eyes met, hands brushed. Her face turned bright as mirror to the sun.
With that touch, all quarrel lay slain. We turned, raced up the stairs. Covering mouths to smother laughter. Dodging behind a corner as some cousin danced past whistling. We tiptoed down a hall while a maid banged about in a closet, cursing wonderfully of towels betrayed and sheets unmade. Fleeing by stops and starts, as scouts through enemy lines, unchallenged by servant curiosity, family politics or mad conversation. At last safe into our bed chamber and out the window.
The halls and rooms of our home formed mad labyrinth. As below, so above. The roof echoed a matching maze of chimneys and gables, forests of chimneys with slate-sloped valleys known only to pigeons and cats. Here we might lie beneath day’s sky, beyond mortal window or in-laws’ eye.
Lalena held no opinion of heights, of slippery slates and sudden plunges. I did, but not near so much as I loathed trysting with my wife whilst servants and relatives whispered beyond the chamber doors, discussing the state of our marriage, our positions in bed.
Hands clasped like children, down these slates, up this slope, around that cornice, till we came to a leveled spot that gave no window a view. Picnic basket set, blanket spread beneath city-smoke sky. We sat, trembling with shy joy.
Lalena tossed aside the bonnet, letting hair free to order itself in a wonder of pollen yellow lines. I removed the idiot hat, wig, and mail shirt. I uncorked the wine. She took the bottle, poured into green glasses that shook in our hands. We took sips small as cat kisses. Sampled bits of bread and cheese, offered one another grapes and sliced apple. We commented on the weather, laughed at the names of cheeses. Fell silent, gazes meeting, breaking, meeting. At some point I reached a hand forwards to brush a lock of hair from her cheek, above the red scratch. She purred like some cat-cousin, rubbed chin against my hand. Of a sudden, breathing came hard for the both of us. We pushed basket aside, knocking cups aside, freeing the blanket.
* * *
After our lovemaking, I lay content to hold her, silent. She lay head upon my arm. Together we stared up at the smoky city sky. No sun rays yet reached our rooftop hideaway. Clouds in plenty, scudding intent on the secret plots of the sweeping wind. Birds darting, cawing wry obscenities upon our unfeathered presence. I took no offense. When Lalena spoke, it was to those clouds and birds.
“I was twelve,” she began. “Living in Edinburgh.” Eyes turned sad. “With Da.” Eyes turned dark. �
�And with Grandmere.” She shook head. “Ah, man, have you ever watched a candle burn low and lower, till it’s just the tiniest blue soul of a flame? One last gasp from dark?”
I nodded yes. I’d seen this very thing. Toying with her hair, the plain yellow straw-straight strands of her magical hair.
“If life were fire, that was all the light I cast at twelve. A candle near snuffed. Grandmere and Da were vampirics of the old school. Curtains tomb-sealing every windows. Rising at sundown. Tea in the garden at midnight. Harpsichord practice.” She held out hands, cupped the palms, weighed the music within.
“One couldn’t breathe in that house. The damned dusty purple velvet cobweb gravestone drapes smothered the air, crushed the light. The sun hated us, or so they taught. I never dared its touch. But I began to sneak out a’nights. Took to running up and down hills and farm roads.” Now eyes brightened, red lips smiled. “Wind is family, you know. One of the old ones. Ah, night’s sweet breath filled girl-self like cold glass. I would twirl and laugh and shout at the moon. Leap ten feet into the air, brush the nearer stars with fingertips. Land barefoot back upon the earth, fingers keeping a dusty light.”
She considered these fingertips, which once brushed stars.
“Other times I’d creep the city streets, when fog made skulking easy. Choose some soul and follow ‘em about, else spy in windows to catch a bit of bright lives, free hearts. One night I watched a beggar boy playing penny whistle ‘neath a pub lantern. Poor lad, couldn’t pipe half so well as any kin of mine. But sitting alone whistling his boy-thoughts, he seemed so nameless, so free of earth’s cares. I pretended he was an old one in secret.
“I came other nights, to mock his bad piping, envy his free skipping. He had a hovel home he’d seek out when rain or cold vexed. Slyer lad than I took him. Boy must’ve noted my spying. Never paid least mind, seemingly. Let me get close and closer. A few nights and I didn’t bother to hide, just stood in sight, swaying to his penny pipe puffing.
“Ah, I was careless. Perhaps on purpose. He must’ve followed me home. Perhaps… perhaps I wanted him to. Came a night I sat studying something Latin and dusty. Then heard piping. Shook me more than faery calls. I rose, went to the curtains, pushed and pulled a dozen back. There he stood beneath my very window. Oh!” She covered face with hands. I did not speak; just held her. She trembled, leaf in soul-storm.
“That fool boy. Leaned against a tree, piping away. Smiling up at my window. Father would beat him dead. And Grandmere? She’d drink him dry as spider with fly. I tried to shoo him off. ‘Course he didn’t leave. And I felt so happy, Rayne. I had someone courting me. Like a poem or song. Sunrise, I went to sleep shameless, grinning with joy.”
I pictured Lalena at twelve, lying in dark bed, blond hair upon pillows, staring up at the ceiling, alive with thought of a boy whose name she didn’t know. She took breath to finish the tale.
“I rushed out the very next night. To tell him never to do so fool a thing again. Searched every city corner, every alley. Didn’t find him. He must have come straight to my window, whilst I wandered listening for his penny piping. Sun’s rise chased me home, where I heard voices in the garden. Found Father and Grandmother standing ‘neath my window. Dawn shining red upon their damned beloved faces. They beat me for skipping out the house. Told me they’d chased off a thief. But the boy never came again. Never saw him further.”
She reached for her dress, searched a pocket. Pulled forth the bloodstained penny whistle. Held it in fingers that had brushed stars.
“Ah, Da and Grandmere, they ate him,” she sighed. “I pretended otherwise. Told myself they’d just put a fright to the lad, so’s he never came near again. But to see this remainder of him, like a bone. It brought it all back. How happy he’d made me. My life’s candle shining for a night. And I never had chance to thank the boy, any more than to warn him.”
We lay silent. What to say? I had a rival for my wife’s love. A dead child who still held place in her heart. What of that? Hearts are large houses. Lalena cherished an entire mad nation of family within her love. One boy would not crowd me out her arms. I took the hand holding the penny whistle, gave hand and bloody remainder a solemn kiss.
“Why didn’t you say when I asked?”
She hid face in my shoulder, spoke to the shelter therein.
“Why didn’t I tell my husband that his mad wife led an innocent to his death? That she was raised by murdering beasts, and half their same spirit? That she wanted -” She stopped, said no more.
I might have laughed. What was past blood to the bloody Seraph? I did not laugh. Merely kept silent, a tight hold about her. I pictured myself outside her adolescent window. Playing the lute, perhaps. She’d come to the balcony as a sea foam Juliette, moonlight showing woman’s form beneath girl’s gown. So we lay, and so I dreamed, until the bells of the cathedral began to toll long slow lament.
Lalena looked up, blinking teary eyes. “Why do the bells ring? And so sad?”
“The King’s dead,” I sighed. Near added ‘again’, but did not. Poor weary tyrant. I’d need go back farther than this morning if I hoped to get his scribble upon the Charter.
She frowned, sensing secrets. Leaned upon elbow, propping head, giving me sharp look.
“Now you say what was in the news scrap,” she commanded.
“I made no such bargain,” I protested.
“None of that. The ring on your finger and this my naked self says you so bargained, boyo.” Of a sudden she rolled over to sit astride my middle. Frowning down as though I were an unruly horse. Well, I am not. I am her husband, which is to say her lord and master.
So I sighed for lordship and mastery, reached for breeches tossed aside. Searched pockets, found the news scrap. Tattered and wrinkled now, as though the years fast consumed it. I passed this to Lalena. She read, invisible eyebrows twitching.
“Is today your birthday?”
“It is.”
“Well you should have said.”
“I had other matters. Death. Fate. Matters of state.”
She shrugged, sending pleasant vibration through her form, raising accord in mine.
“Good thing we found other business for you then,”
I said naught. She cocked eye to my silence.
“You cannot still be wanting to go to this meeting, man?” she demanded.
“No,” I said honestly. “Once is enough.”
A further silence. She bent low to read my eyes, brushing me with breasts, warming me with breaths.
“But… you can’t have been there, much less back. You are quite on live.” She gave my torso a squeeze with knees, emphasizing this quality of living.
How did I explain the madness at the tavern, the door to the past? Scarce understood it myself. Opened mouth to babble, but of a sudden she turned head, harkening to sound beyond my dull clay senses. Then whirled back to me. Eyes wide, frame trembling.
“What is it?” I reached up. Clearly she needed more holding. But she rejected this wise medicine, pulled away, rolled, came to feet. Head cocked to better hear distant cannon or ghostly whispers. Some menace approached, said her tensed form.
“Can’t be,” she whispered. “But I hear a cart by the front gate.”
Excellent. Not cannon or ghosts then.
“Eggs delivered, most like.” What the blast had taken her?
“Not eggs,” she declared. Waited. Then, “And there’s Edward shouting at the front door. Now Mistress Grumble. Hark to ‘em arguing.” More waiting. “Now there’s the shouting.”
I listened, heard faint clamor and city sounds. Surely her mind turned wind-whisper to mad tale. Lalena grasped her dress, slipped it on. I sighed for that message: tryst concluded. She climbed the slated angle of roof, peered over the peak as soldier scouting battlefield. Swore to herself in her barbaric, magic, tragic Gaelic.
“What do you see?” I asked.
She turned to me, blond brows angled in near invisible V for vampiric.
“Don�
�t be alarmed,” she advised. “But I am about to scream.”
Immediately I felt alarmed. It’s just human nature.
“Why would you scream?”
She shook head, declining to say. I searched about for enemies, horrors and foes. I spied sky, a quiet world of roof slates. Tops of the higher city architecture: the magisterium spire, the cathedral belfry. Nothing more.
Yet the scream still came. Not from my wife upon the roof. No, the cry sounded from within the house. A long operatic note of anguish. I knew that cry. Lalena’s. No two voices can so fright the soul yet break the heart. I leaped up, naked and ready to run or fight, else shake myself from dream fast turning nightmare. Lalena nodded in confirmation of prediction. She sat slumped upon the slates, covering face with hands.
“Next goes the window,” she muttered.
“Which window?” I asked. I resented these injuries to my new-built house.
“The dining room, east and western sides. I will pick up chairs, toss ‘em through the glass. Childish of me. But I was overwrought. I know myself in such states. Best I murder the furniture, not the servants.”
One could see the sense in that. I would have admitted so, but there came the crash of glass. Several panes by the sound. Lalena nodded, slid down slates on her bottom to stand before me.
“And next comes shouting, and a good many dear house guests shall think it good manners and better sense to bid a sudden adieu. The servants will run hiding. Except that Grumble. She’ll be patting me on the back, coaxing me to take sips of cordial.” Lalena shuddered. “Brave woman. White as her apron, and trembling so the spirits splash floor. But she keeps at it. Comforting and calming my mad self.” Lalena shook head in regret and admiration. “Took all my control not to bite her throat to pretty red lace.”
I rose. It came to me that we had come full circle from our first meeting. I stood naked on the roof of my house, while Lalena stood dressed. But I was still the sane one. And the house did not burn beneath us. Not yet, not yet.
“Why is the Grumble comforting you? For what?”
The Clockwork Tartan: Quest of the Five Clans Page 7
