Lady Changeling

by Ken Altabef

  Theodora felt her strength returning. “We weren’t created by your god, but by the touch of another.”

  “The devil!”

  She snickered, “Not exactly.”

  “Then it’s for certain,” said the priest, “The Lord will strike you down.”

  Theodora glanced at all the destruction they had caused. I can’t say I wouldn’t deserve it.

  As soon as the bell was silenced, Redthorne felt her vitality begin to return. She was already neck deep in the iron tar, its power well on the way to sucking the life out of her. But she wasn’t going to go under. She wasn’t.

  She fought her way back to the surface, inch by painful inch. And as she did so, the entire illusion began to weaken and fade. The ghostly hands of Griffin Grayson disappeared. She found herself on the floor of the crypt, spitting out a mouthful of dirt.

  “Bastard!” She kicked the mahogany coffin but didn’t have enough power in her leg to knock it over. It was too solid, too heavy.

  Enough, she thought. The lens isn’t here and I’ve not strength enough for any more of the old man’s deathtraps.

  Redthorne brushed herself off and hurried back along the crypt tunnel. She was glad when the starry sky showed itself once again through the opening at the end. Not soon enough. She stumbled and tripped over something on the ground and went down. She gasped, finding herself face to face with the lifeless, staring eyes of another corpse.

  Not to worry. It was only the body of the caretaker she had killed on the way in.

  Chapter 39

  Eric Grayson awoke from nightmare to nightmare. His wife was a monster.

  It was a crushing thought to have first thing in the morning, the same one he’d experienced several weeks ago. The idea had been driven away that early summer morning and forgotten, as by some charm he’d been made to believe that it had just been a dream. But now he faced the stark reality that it was a truth.

  Theodora, or Clarimonde as she had revealed to him, was a faery spy. Clarimonde. He found it hard to think of her with that name, though it suited her perfectly—strangely mysterious and beautiful. But there was no beauty in the terrible things she had done to him. So many deceptions, so many lies.

  Everyone has secrets, he told himself. Everyone.

  He wasn’t blameless in this either. He’d been naïve to believe her cover story of spirited waif, when she had obviously been so much more. He’d been blinded by her charms, whether magical or just plain feminine wiles. He should’ve known better.

  He didn’t know if she had a part in Fitzroy’s death but it seemed unlikely she was personally responsible. ‘She’ll kill you.’ Isn’t that what she’d said? ‘I won’t be able to stop her.’ Saying those words, she’d sounded helpless and desperate. She’d had very little part in those murders. It was the other one, Redthorne, who’d been responsible. He was sure of that.

  But the way she’d turned against him, made the others believe he was insane, convinced them that he was a murderer, that he was mad with the Rot. And then subjecting him to the perverse interrogation of that Italian alchemist…

  No, it wasn’t the fact that she was a faery that made her a monster. It was all those other things she’d done.

  He rolled over slowly. His entire body ached and his head throbbed painfully like the tolling of a bell. Like the iron bell they’d heard ringing on the estate last night. What the hell had that been all about? His estate. He couldn’t stand not knowing.

  The early morning sunlight glinted harshly off both sea and sand. He’d slept under a makeshift windbreak Ketch had built for them on the beach. Eric felt as if he’d had about a barrel too much to drink. The aftereffects of the alchemist’s poisons, no doubt.

  He brushed away some loose sand from his bare chest and arms. At least he no longer appeared as if he had the Creeping Rot. The faery’s charm had worn off, either from time or distance.

  “Mornin’, squire.” Draven Ketch sat nearby, sharpening a wooden pole with brisk strokes of a broken clamshell. He had three such spears already lined up beside him in a neat little row.

  Eric groaned as he sat up. His head weighed a ton.

  The pirate continued fletching the makeshift spear, all the while keeping his eyes on Eric. “So tell me, how are you goin’ to help me escape?”

  “I’ve got a plan.”

  “I was hopin’.”

  Ketch laid a hand-rolled cigarette on a flat stone and struck flint to it. “Enlighten me,” he said, taking a puff.

  Eric smelled Spanish tobacco.

  “Where the hell did you get that? You didn’t have any tobacco when we searched your pockets in my house.”

  “I have a good hiding place.” Ketch grinned, taking another puff on his twist.

  Eric wondered if that meant what he thought that meant.

  “Don’t look at me like that,” added Ketch. “All pirates use it. Now, what about this plan?”

  “It’s simple. I just need to get my hands on my grandfather Griffin’s lens.”

  “Lens?”

  “It’s a sort of a weapon. Used for killing faeries.”

  “Faeries?” Ketch blew smoke, his eyes half-closed as if wondering whether he was being put on. “And how do they figure into this?”

  “My wife is a faery spy.”

  “That so?” He paused in thought. “I fucked a faery once.”

  “Oh, Christ.”

  “True. Down on the beach in Tortuga. At least I think it was the beach. Funny thing, I first met her in a tavern in Nassau, drinkin’ with some free men of the sea.”

  “Is that what pirates call themselves these days?”

  “It’s what we are. You want to hear this story or not? I was pretty well soused that night but I noticed a scullery boy walk in. At least everyone thought she was a scullery boy. That’s what we were made to think. She was dressed the part, tight pants, short hair and all. Hard to see her face in the dim light. But I knew different. I sensed it. Well, I can smell a tart a mile off. I got closer and I saw—she showed me—a smile. Heh! That pretty face just twisted somethin’ inside me. Got a whiff of her perfume too. Something I never smelled before. No point in tryin’ to describe it. Had me standin’ at attention right there in the tavern, if you know what I mean. Hell, I was drunk like I said, but I never wanted anyone the way I wanted that one. I had to have her. Or die tryin’.”

  “I know the feeling,” Eric said, recalling his recent picnic lunch with Theodora on Murch’s Island. He’d smelled that perfume too.

  “Not a bad feelin’,” said Ketch. “I wish there was more to tell about that night but a tussle broke out behind me and I turned my head. When I looked back she was gone. And me all hot and horny like that. Hah-heh! And I damn near stayed that way for three years after. Just about spoiled me for other women, too. I kept thinkin’ about that little boy-girl. A woman with long fine hair and big teats all gussied up in a fancy dress just didn’t do for me anymore. Well, I made do, you understand. But I thought about that little one quite a bit.”

  He stretched out the hand with the cigarette, offering Eric a puff. Considering where the cigarette had formerly been, Eric declined the smoke.

  “And then one night I was laid out on the beach in Tortuga. Yeah, I was drunk again. And alone. You have to be drunk on the beach in Tortuga anyway, especially if you’re alone. But suddenly she was there. She came out of nowhere, not a stitch of clothing on her, and just climbed aboard. That was some night. Hah! I had her in just about every which way a man can have a woman. Front, back, and sideways. It just went on and on, like it’d been buildin’ inside me all that time. Three years of wantin’ and waitin’ and I spent ’em all in one night.

  “Her kiss was quick and cold and tasted of the earth. But she had a way about her. She moved against me like she was part snake, part wolverine. Tore up my back worse than the bosun’s whip. I nearly strangled her right in the middle of the whole damn thing.” Ketch shook his head. “Like beddin’ a wild beast. But I guess you
know all about that?”

  “It’s not like that with us.”

  “Oh? How is it then?”

  “Um...uh...regular.” No, not just regular, he thought. Spectacular in its own way.

  “She was gone in the mornin’,” Ketch continued. “Her joke on me. Heh! I may very well have given her the clap. My joke on her, I guess.”

  Ketch chuckled merrily, then added. “Never saw her again. At least, not when my eyes were open. She was quite the beauty that one.”

  “They can look any way they want.”

  “I know that. But still…”

  Eric felt hunger clawing at his stomach, but there didn’t seem to be anything to eat.

  “So, you didn’t say, how do you intend to help me escape?”

  Eric regretted having made that promise but at the time he’d had no choice. “We’ll sneak back onto my estate. We can’t go back down the coast. They’ll be watching the shore, and the smuggler’s tunnel will be guarded or blocked. So we’ll have to work our way around inland. It’s a long walk but we’ve got all day. I just wish I had some boots.”

  “Kelp. You wrap your feet with kelp. It’s a lot tougher than it looks.”

  “Better than nothing I guess.”

  “So you’ll get us onto your estates. After dark, I’m guessin’.”

  “Yes. I know the grounds better than anyone. There will be sentries posted, of course, but under cover of night we won’t have any trouble.” Eric realized that this plan would give Theodora another full day running the estate, but that couldn’t be helped. “And then we get the lens. It’s hidden in the granary.”

  At least, Eric thought, it must be. Theodora’s insistence on finding the lens had worked its way into his dreams last night. He’d a wonderful dream in which he was a child again, he and Hake playing in the fort they had built in the granary. The play fort had been taken down in later years of course, but their secret hiding place probably had a few trinkets from their youthful days still in it. He remembered how Hake had been at the end, so paranoid that the faeries were reading his thoughts that he dare not even speak of where he’d hidden the lens. But it must have been someplace he knew Eric would look. A secret place. After the deaths of his family, Eric hadn’t looked for the lens, hadn’t even thought about it. There were too many other things to grieve over. But now he realized Hake would’ve hidden it in the one place they both knew. It must be there. I’d hate to see the look on Ketch’s face if it isn’t.

  “And this lens will kill the faeries?”

  “It’ll burn them. It’ll burn them all.”

  “How many blights are we talkin’ about?”

  “Only a handful.” It occurred to Eric he had no idea of the actual count. There was Stump of course and the one called Redthorne. He imagined there might be a few others. And Theodora.

  “After I’ve dealt with the faeries and restored control over my property I’ll give you a ship and two hundred sovereigns. That’s the deal.”

  Ketch puffed on his smoke. “I have to admit I’m feelin’ a little conflicted about this plan. You see, I happen to like faeries more than high-born English lords. Much more.”

  Eric couldn’t tell if he was joking. A chill ran across his bare shoulders, reminding him that his life was still in danger from all sides.

  “I’ve seen my share of odd things across the Caribbean,” said Ketch. “And I’m willin’ to allow that faeries may well be better than us. They love freedom, not money. And that’s more than I can say about any human being I ever met.”

  “I don’t know much about them,” Eric admitted. “They’ve been scarce ever since the Purge. My parents feared them. With good reason, I suppose. They did nothing against the faeries and were destroyed by them. You can’t trust a faery.”

  “And I can trust you?”

  “I keep my word.”

  Ketch took one last puff of his cigarette and flung the dog-end across the sand. “I believe you.” He swept his spears into a bunch.

  “You’ve wasted your time whittling that arsenal,” Eric said. “We don’t hurt any of my men. You’ll have to accept that condition or we go no further. Even if it means getting caught again. I have your word on that?”

  Ketch seemed surprised. “No one’s ever asked me for my word before. I’m a liar and a thief.”

  “Promise. You won’t kill my men.”

  “Absolutely, your grace. I promise.”

  Chapter 40

  Theodora’s ‘cousins’ were having a devil of a time dismantling the carousel. The wood and brass were no problem but the iron braces made the task especially difficult. They took turns smashing and chopping, the weakening effect of the iron making it hard for them to hold their human forms. None of them had suffered the long years of practice that Theodora had gone through. But maintaining the disguise was necessary for now, as two of Eric’s servants stood nearby watching them work.

  Theodora had posted most of the house guards around the periphery of the estate, safely out of the way, keeping watch lest some faeries might try to attack. After the debacle at the chapel yesterday, she’d had to keep the vicar under wraps, but as long as everyone kept to the plan there would be no more trouble. No trouble, except for lack of results. Her crew had spent the entire day rooting about the mansion and grounds with nothing to show for it. She could’ve told them as much—she’d been searching for the lens for ten years. The carousel was a last resort. Theodora had always felt uncomfortable around it, but she attributed her discomfort to the iron beams at its core. She didn’t believe they would find the lens here.

  Redthorne and Meadowlark stood at a comfortable distance. Redthorne made no concessions to propriety, wearing still her red leather outfit, her breeches much too tight and completely immodest for a country relation but not entirely out of keeping for a member of the Stump family troupe of vagabonds, shoemakers and circus performers. Meadowlark had cast aside his disguise as Stump for the moment, preferring to appear as a more moderate version of himself—a tall, thin man dressed in fine clothes. He seemed a reckless sort of a dandy wearing a red velvet hunting jacket with frilly cuffs, loose-fit leggings and knee-high calfskin boots. His hair was black and luxurious and left loose to fall in chaotic curls about his shoulders.

  “Something’s changed,” Redthorne said, looking up at the darkened sky.

  “Oh splendid,” said Meadowlark, “I live for change.”

  As they watched, a bizarre astral show played out over the fields in the distance. A flaming red meteor sped toward the earth, trailing a shower of glittering sparks. It disappeared in a red haze at the horizon but was followed down by three smaller meteors.

  “Was that it?” Theodora remarked. “The red flash? Moon Dancer spoke of this to me. She said we would see the beacon stars streaming earthward, conjured by that thing on the other side, thrown off like sparks from the flame.”

  “‘Tis true,” intoned Meadowlark. “True, true.”

  “All these meteors…” said Redthorne. “The monster rejoices in its growing strength.”

  Theodora looked away. “The red flash. We’re finished. It was all for nothing.”

  “Don’t you dare look away,” spat Redthorne. “This is all your fault. A complete and total failure.”

  Theodora glared back at her. Redthorne was seventy years her junior. Hardly even full grown. What did she know of the world? “I suppose you could have done better?”

  “Yes. Yes! I could’ve. And I’ll tell you why, Clarimonde. Because I would have bent him to my will. I would have pleased him, I would have teased him.” She ran the flat of her hand down along the subtle, almost boyish curves of her waist and hip. “I’d have made him beg for me. I would’ve made him tell me where it was.”

  “Tsst. He didn’t even know.”

  “Then I would’ve found someone else who did know and set to work on them.”

  “Oh, really. You think it was that simple?”

  “And if that didn’t work I would’ve razed
this place to the ground. Killed them all and taken what we wanted. That’s what I would have done. Now it’s too late.” Redthorne flicked a hand toward the carousel. “We’ll never find it tonight. And tomorrow… tomorrow will be too late. If there is a tomorrow. It’s coming. I can feel it coming. You’ve wasted all our time.”

  “Another war wouldn’t have helped anything. You don’t know. You didn’t live through the last one. Kill them all? That’s not what Moon Dancer wanted.”

  “Moon Dancer. What did she ever do for us? She made us hide, made us live in mounds and barrows underground. We should have fought. We could have won. Instead we live like slaves, oppressed and confined. We should be out under the moon, bathing in her light to keep our powers strong. We should be free to frolic in the sunlight too, in the woods and open fields, not skulking about in the night while the human folk sleep. I hate what she’s done to us. What she let them do. Your husband and his kind. Moon Dancer chose you—arrgh! A disgrace! We should’ve chosen someone else. A true faery. Oh, if only it had been me.”

  “You can’t be sure what you would’ve done.”

  “I’ll tell you what I wouldn’t have done. I wouldn’t have married him. I wouldn’t have settled in here. I would’ve had my way with him. Instead the reverse has happened. You’ve succumbed to Eric’s charms. A human. He’s manipulated you.”

  Theodora didn’t know how to react. There was some truth to those charges. More than she liked to admit. Was that what had happened?

  Redthorne seized the opportunity to dig even further. “You shared his bed, followed him around like a puppy, bore his children. Halfling children.”

  Theodora’s stomach churned. “Leave my children out of it. Do you understand me? I’m very proud of them.”

  “How proud can you be?” Redthorne pointed out. “You never bothered to tell them the truth. Have you? Have you told ever them what they are?”

  Meadowlark stepped between them. “Now, now, ladies. Let’s not come to blows over this. Children issue fair, a mother’s love and pride, I’m sure. What’s done is, I think, done. The past is behind us. Think how confusing it would be if it weren’t? It’s the future we have to concern ourselves with.”