Michael shook his head, his breathing rapid and panicked. Annoyance flickered across Harly’s face, and his voice lost any note of kindness.
“We both know you have no choice!” he snapped, but the shift in Michael’s expression from fear to resentment seemed to bring him up short.
“Look.” He held out his hands, palms-up, placating though still impatient. “You’ll be fed and warm and looked after. You will have to do things you don’t want to do, but you will be in control of what those things are. You may say yes or no, and the men will listen. And the money is good.” He lowered his voice to a harsh whisper. “Probably good enough to buy you a way out.”
This caught Michael’s attention, and he stared at Harly. The man shook his head, quelling any more discussion of this treasonous concept, but the idea of it was enough, and Michael read in the man’s louder thoughts a few details which told him such a hope wasn’t impossible.
“All right,” Michael said finally. “I’ll try... Thank you.”
Harly nodded once, sealing their agreement, then changed the subject, standing to leave as he did so. “The healers say you will be well enough to leave here at moon’s end. I’ll send someone to escort you to the Red Boar. She’ll bring you some clothes, too—Pol’s grown out of some things which I’m sure he’ll be most happy to share, so it won’t cost you anything.”
And with that Harly was gone, but Michael could only think about the impossible—a way out!—and he began to hope again. He clung to that hope during the rest of his hospital stay, determinedly not thinking about its source.
On the appointed day, a woman named Risa arrived to fetch Michael back to the Red Boar from the charity hospital. She was tall and elegant and beautiful in a way he’d never seen before. She smiled at him with a genuine friendliness no adult had shown him since he’d last seen Nanna Whiltierna.
“I brought all kinds of things for you.” She dropped an armload of clothes onto the bed. “Up you go! Out of bed and start trying things on. Goddess, you’re amazing-looking! I thought Harly was just talking you up to make us all feel dull and ugly, but he sure wasn’t.”
Michael blushed and climbed out from under the white covers to stand in his hospital gown before this lovely woman. She handed him a pair of trousers, and he pulled them on before discarding the gown to try shirts.
“This is temporary, just to get you started. Oh, we’re going to make you famous!”
She’d brought a somewhat shabby but clean coat with her, too, which she helped him shrug into once he was dressed to her satisfaction. When she’d turned him back around for a final inspection, however, her face fell.
“Oh, that’s right. You’re marked.” She half-whispered the words, and that’s when he noticed the gloves she was holding. She quickly hid them behind her back, breathing out an embarrassed, “I’m sorry.”
Biting his lip to distract himself from the desire to cry—a reaction that came too easily lately—he shook his head. After a moment, he managed to speak. “It’s fine. I don’t want them anyway.”
Both of them knew he was lying. Michael longed for gloves. His hands hurt with cold so much of the time that he’d almost forgotten what it felt like to be truly warm. Even the hospital wasn’t really warm enough. But gloves were out of the question. Gloves were impossible.
Risa put the gloves back into the sack and stuffed the leftover clothes in after them, hiding the evidence of her mistake. Turning, she gave him another stunning smile, then waved for him to follow her as she strode off.
Risa led him out through the maze of white canvas dividers and more solidly-built corridors and out into the street, her long, dark bronze hair flowing like a cape behind her. Eyes turned and gazes followed them, but for once Michael knew most of them were looking at her rather than at him. He liked being hidden in someone else’s shadow.
He thought they might be walking all the way to the inn, but Risa stopped abruptly beside a small carriage Michael hadn’t realized was awaiting them, tossed the sack of clothing onto the seat, and climbed in. She reached down to help Michael up, and then gave their direction to the driver.
As the hackney moved through the crowded streets, Risa began to explain the Red Boar to Michael. She made it seem like something wonderful, though Michael knew he would never be able to experience it the same way, thanks to his heightened senses—but just the idea that some people didn’t mind so much made him question his own reactions. Maybe he was being too particular. Maybe it wasn’t such a big deal.
“I’m to be your mentor, Harly said.” Risa slipped her arm through his and patted his hand. “And I’m honored, now I’ve seen you, that Harly trusts me to look out for you.”
Kind-seeming or not, Michael knew Risa was not going to look out for him out of the goodness of her heart. Though her thoughts didn’t tell him any details, he could sense her excitement at the prospect of the money she’d make off of his good looks. Rueful, Michael supposed whatever training he was in for could be counted as some sort of an apprenticeship, and yet he had no confidence in his ability to meet his end of this bargain he’d struck.
“I’ve never done anything unless I was forced to,” Michael whispered. “I hate it. It hurts. It hurts so much.”
Risa bit her lip, frowning in sympathy. Her feelings matched her expressions so exactly, it was almost shocking. “It’s bad, I know. We’ll do what we can to make it easier.”
She sat up straighter while managing to pull him even closer to her as if she were giving him a hug. “You can get past being scared and angry. It’ll be hard for you at first, I know, but you’re in charge. Anyone tries anything you don’t want them to, just say so, and if they still try, Daren will throw them out, and they’ll never come back. They look out for us better at the Red Boar than anywhere.”
“Why is it so different?” Michael caught glimpses of really awful things in Risa’s memory, and he also got the sense that memories like hers—and his—weren’t that unusual. If the Red Boar were so unlike the rest, there had to be some reason.
Risa flounced her shoulders in an elaborate shrug. “Harly didn’t always have money. His sister was a streeter—just like us—and she died while he was away at sea, before he got rich.”
“Pol’s mother?” Michael asked, surprised.
Risa nodded. “Yes. I’m not sure Pol knew, though. He was very young—I was just a child myself when that all happened. She had a bad runner who didn’t watch out for her. She did a bit of healing on the side, too. Learned the old ways from her ma. Herbs and such—nothing...special.” Risa sighed and shook her head. “She was so nice. Helped my ma out, too, when I was born. But some highborn got mad at her.”
Michael had long wondered why the woman in Pol’s memory had died the way she had. This revelation was not comforting.
“He said she was a witch and had her taken up in front of the magistrate. The healing made things worse, but she probably would have been convicted in any case. They burned her the next day and took Pol off to JhaPel.”
“Shize,” Michael breathed, horrified by the speed with which Pol’s life had been destroyed. It’s always so fast...
Risa nodded agreement with this. “By the time Harly got back, moons had passed, but it was such a shock! This was back when they first started burning witches, so he had no way to even expect it, you know?”
Michael found this piece of information especially stunning. “Really?” He wished he’d landed in Camarat back before all this had changed.
“Sure! They’d exile them or send them to the sweats or what-have-you, my ma said. Poor Effie Rayvin, though. Just bad luck, I guess, to get in trouble right at the start of it all. Harly never got over it. He does try to make up for it by looking out for us, thank the goddess.” They both fell silent then and rode the rest of the way to the Red Boar without another word.
Michael struggled with what Risa had said for the rest of the long ride through the twisting streets of Fensgate. She acts like it’s normal to...do th
ings with people for money. He didn’t think he would be able to think that way. Ever. He wanted to get through whatever he had to do so he could make enough money to escape to... Somewhere else. Somewhere far away from Robyn and JhaPel and burnings and Fensgate and everything.
He wondered if such a place existed.
# # #
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Flannery Llorka watched Jarlyth as he packed, her face impassive. She’d already packed and sent her bags ahead to her ship. For Tristella, she’d once more dressed in her Templar journeyman’s uniform—a level he himself had never reached.
Almost... A wave of shame and guilt washed over him at the memory of how hard he’d resisted his destiny, how much he’d resented its usurpation of his own dreams.
Vail had not Spoken to him since the night of Nylan’s birth. Maybe she believed she no longer needed to prod him after he’d lost his heart to the infant prince. Maybe she’s too horrified by my failure.
“Promise me you’ll come back,” Flannery said. They were not going together this time. She was sailing for home. He wasn’t.
He flipped his case closed with a loud thump then turned, a false smile pasted on his lips. He wanted to feign good cheer. He wanted to find some way to calm his friend’s fears. But she knew him too well, and she probably suspected what he was doing. At least she isn’t trying to stop me.
“Let me go with you, Jary.” She’d asked before, but when he’d said no, she’d stopped. Now, she couldn’t prevent herself from trying one last time. “You shouldn’t go alone.”
“You can’t. Your vow—it’s worse than treason to break a Templar vow. “
“Please, Jary.” Flannery reached her hand out, not quite touching his arm.
He almost wished she would touch him. He would have liked to have known what she was thinking. His Sensitivity had never been very strong nor had it needed to be. A touch made things clear.
Nylan would just know. Dear Vail, protect him. He must be suffering so much, and I just keep failing him.
“I can’t let you, Flan.” He turned to look into her expressive eyes. “I can’t. I have to do this alone.” She nodded stiffly and took a small step backwards, away from him.
She’s in love with me, I think. A touch would have told him if it were true, but that would also have been unfair.
Though she’d recently turned sixteen, he still remembered the small girl she’d been on that long-ago night of Nylan’s birth. It was hard to forget that and see her as a grown woman, no matter how strong and smart and practical she’d become.
“I wish you’d let me help you,” she whispered.
“You have helped. Far more than you know.” He smiled at her, touched by her devotion, and in that moment, the dangers he faced all rose up before him.
What if I never make it back? What if I fail? What if this is all the time we have? He didn’t think of her as anything but a friend, an ally, a pretty young woman who would one day be amazing beyond anything he could ever hope to deserve.
But she loved him, and he was frightened.
The distance between them vanished, and as their lips met, all of her emotions flowed into him with a clarity and sweetness he hadn’t expected. He knew then that he should never have touched her. The truth of her emotions cut him like knives, but her kiss was as warm and sweet as anything he’d ever known.
He ended the kiss too abruptly and turned away from her to pick up his case. “I have to go,” he said, gruff-voiced, and hurried from the room, feeling like the biggest coward the world had ever seen.
#
The man wanted Michael to kiss him good-bye at the door. After he left, Michael leaned with his forehead pressed to the dark, polished wood, his hand gripping the latch, his heart hammering in his chest. He breathed carefully, concentrating on each inhalation, each exhalation, but nothing ever helped.
He turned away from the door abruptly and ran across the luxuriant carpet, pushing through the smaller door into the bathing room where he threw up in the flusher. Cyra padded across the small room from the corner where Michael had made her a bed. She rubbed comfortingly against his leg, purring.
Tears ran down his face, and he wiped at them with the back of a hand as he eased himself down to sit on the floor beside Cyra. “I should never have said I’d do this. I can’t get used to it. I can’t do it right. I don’t know how anybody does this.”
A soft tapping on the outer door resolved into a pattern, and Michael knew it was Risa. He didn’t call out for her to come in. She would anyway, whether he told her to or told her to go away, which was his more usual response. He stayed where he was, knowing she’d find him. He was too tired to care anymore.
She called out his name, her footsteps soundless, lost in the ridiculously plush carpet.
Even the nikking floor is like a bed around here.
She pushed open the bathing room door and peered around, finding him at last. He didn’t look up. He already knew what he’d see if he met her gaze. Worry, fear, disgust, anger. She’d said it all before. He’d heard it all.
I’m so tired.
“Goddess wept.” She knelt in front of him and brushed the hair away from his face to get a good look at his latest acquisition. “What in the Fires is wrong with you?”
“Leave me alone,” he breathed, though he didn’t try to escape her touch or her scrutiny.
“No!” She caught his chin and yanked his head sideways to take a better look at the abrasion marring his pale skin. The man kissed him hard and painfully, his beard stubble scrubbing against the boy’s face. More marks trailed down from his ear to his collar bone, bruises mapping the progress of the man’s lips. “You let him do this.”
Michael swallowed, tasting bile. His throat was so sore. He threw up afterwards almost every time. “He likes it rough.” Michael gave a disinterested half-shrug. “He pays for it.”
“But there’s no reason to say yes to the likes of him! You have plenty of men interested in you who’d pay ten clinks for the privilege of kissing your feet!” Her voice caught, and Michael sensed her real fear for him and her anguish. “Please, Michael,” she breathed. “Stop this. Do you want to die?”
He didn’t reply. They both knew the answer.
Everyone had been patient and had given him time to get used to the idea, time to discuss this new life with all the girls at the Red Boar and a few hand-picked young men who had once plied the same trade at other Houses in Fensgate. Harly had arranged more intimate training with another of these young men, one who was gentle and patient with Michael’s fears. Michael had thought he could do it. He’d thought he could shut off his feelings and endure in exchange for his hope of eventual escape.
“I have to go back downstairs.” Michael pushed himself to his feet with difficulty. Risa belatedly caught his arm to help him up, but she gasped when she saw the bruises marring the rest of his body.
He looked up into her eyes. “Why does it matter, Risa?” he asked. “It isn’t like my life’s worth saving.”
“You pick the ones who’ll punish you.” Her shock vanished beneath a wave of disgust. “You want to be hurt.” She turned away from him in a whirl of lace and long, shimmering-bronze hair and stomped silently back out of his suite.
He limped over to the gaudy, gold-framed mirror hanging above an equally gaudy, marble-topped basin. The entire bathing room was a parody of luxury, made as much for seduction as it was for actual use.
As if seduction were necessary. He stared at himself in the mirror and knew Risa was right. It had been unthinking on his part, but that did not make it any less true. He had tried to do things the right way, accept offers from gentle, undemanding men. But he’d been unable to bear kindness. Worse, he could not stand to feel any pleasure. If he was sickened now by what he did, he had been nearly unable to function afterwards when he’d enjoyed what was done to him in any way.
.:She cares about you,:. The Voice said. It sounded weary and defeated, as if it, too, were close to giv
ing up on trying to save or even help him. .:You should listen to her.:.
Michael knew this was true, too. He knew he shouldn’t accept offers from cruel men. He knew he should be more careful. He knew he should forgive himself. Ethene would have died anyway.
He took his time washing and dressing. He had an outfit he wore as a sort of uniform, but there were other clothes at his disposal, too. Costumes and robes and things that were practically scraps of cloth—all to entertain patrons. All to make their fantasies come true.
Cyra blinked at him as he knelt to scratch her ears. “Who’ll take care of you if I die, huh?” he asked her. He didn’t think anyone would. He supposed that would have to be enough of a reason to keep going. And try to do better.
Michael trailed through the next several days, making some effort to be more careful and choose more wisely, but he hated being touched so much, he automatically stayed out of reach of his patrons until the last possible moment.
Lorel Burk didn’t even try to touch him, making his offer quietly, respectfully. As if he were a suitor, and I, some honorable young lady. It was so absurd a conceit, Michael almost laughed at the thought.
Michael took a breath and looked up into the man’s eyes through his lashes—a pose he knew to be quite striking. He bit his lip thoughtfully, as if he might say no, and the man almost whimpered. I can ask for a lot. He named a sum rather more outrageous than he usually asked for the services Burk wanted, and the man agreed without hesitation.
The pretence would involve Burk arriving at his door, again as some sort of suitor, so Michael preceded him up the wide, sweeping staircase to his suite where he changed into a simple black silk robe, took his hair out of its confining braid, and made a few other, less cosmetic preparations so that nothing would impede the man’s desires when the time came. He’d barely finished when the man gave his signal knock.
“So beautiful,” the man breathed when Michael opened the door to him. He swept in, almost slamming the door behind himself, and began shedding his clothes with intimidating speed. He never took his eyes off of Michael’s face, and Michael stared back, growing more and more nervous as the unblinking eyes bored into his.
SanClare Black (The Prince of Sorrows) Page 20
