by Prue Batten
She clasped her hands over her middle as her stomach cramped, resulting in a dash to the garde-robe. Afterward, she had a moment of intense exhilaration but then another rush of anxiety. Never in her life had she been so nervous. Why? It doesn’t make sense because it is all going to be so easy.
Tonight I shall wear the robe to bed and in a heartbeat I shall be immortal, so why should I be afraid? The glacial face stared back at her from the looking glass. I will be remembered tonight. Never ever forgotten. What people see tonight will go down in history. Immemorial, immortal.
The maid returned to the chamber carrying the emerald gown and Severine slipped into it whilst the maid buttoned the thirty buttons down the centre back. The lithe silk garment fell in pleats from underneath her breasts, from a décolletage that almost defied etiquette and her arms were covered tightly by the silk, finishing in dagger-sharp points over the top of her hands. The maid passed her a sash of peacock blue silk and she tied an enormous bow beneath her breasts.
‘Oh!’ The girl’s eyes opened wide. It was enough, that tiny gasp. Knowing she surpassed perfection, Severine dismissed the maid. She wanted to admire herself for a little, to stand in front of the mirror and smile and simper and catch herself glancing over her shoulder.
She screwed emerald drops into her ears and picked up her mask, a colombina festa fantasia; gilded and decorated with peacock plumage, both green and white, but with that startling turquoise eye in the tip of each feather. Everything about her was startling unforgettable.
Her stomach fluttered again and she groaned a little, making a dash for the wine decanter, her gown rustling and whispering. In a common, un-ladylike swig, she threw back a full glass and waited, hands pressing down on the top of the table. Another. Yes, it helps. Her limbs loosened as the wine unleashed euphoria. ‘Be calm, Severine,’ she muttered, ‘face your magnificent destiny.’ She refused to countenance a faint voice far far away - ‘You’ll find out.’
Luther had never been as filled with berserk anger in his life. He wondered how to tell Madame the woman had slipped through his fingers. Others must be helping Adelina. He had never had to deal with Others until meeting Madame with her insane desires and he hated the woman for the trouble she caused him as he bent to her desires. He hated Adelina with a passion as well, for the pain she induced. He despised the female race! If he should find Adelina tonight, he would kill her as soon as he had the location of the robe. Oh he’d kill her alright, no second chances. He didn’t want the bitch now, she had too much to answer for.
He pulled on the tailored frock coat he had bought, figured silk that clung to his broad muscle. He looked in the mirror and was struck by the elegance of his attire. At least that had been worth Madame’s lunatic endeavours. He preened, for a moment entirely unaware that a sow’s ear was always a sow’s ear and never a silk purse. As he turned to admire the drape of the tails over his back, he thought he noticed a figure in the mirror - misty, indistinct, a faint apparition.
He spun around as the candelabra caught the sheen of dark hair. But there was nothing.
He coughed, breath caught in his throat, his heartbeat racketing in his chest, and sat on the bed to slip into the patent leather dancing slippers. Hearing a noise and turning his head, he caught a waft of perfume, Other in its fragrance. And a tinkle of a laugh that set tremours tripping down his backbone.
He flashed a nervous glance to all the dark corners of the room... Nothing.
Then a distant voice calling, ‘You’ll find out!’ and ending in a gurgling shriek.
He jumped to his feet and flung hands over his ears, squeezing his eyes shut. Enough! This is just tension, he thought. He hurried to the decanter and upended it into his mouth, swallow after swallow, and then went to his desk to finger those things that gave him the most comfort.
His wicked arsenal stretched across the polished surface, glistening in the lamplight. They could mame, kill in a stroke. But, his insecurities said, they were useless against Others who would stand invisibly behind him and mesmer before he could even strike, despatching him like a speck of detested dust. He wiped the beads of perspiration from his upper lip and caught sight of his face in the mirror. For the first time in his sordid life he glimpsed anxiety in his eyes as he realised he had no weapon to protect against the Others, or with which he could attack.
But Madame does! The ring!
So now he, the assassin Luther, must hide behind the skirts of a woman.
Behir, he hated her! He hated all women! For so long he’d enjoyed taking what he wanted from them. He had thought it was concupiscence but now he realised it was cruel misogeny, a desire to dominate and have them fear him because in fear there was power and in such power the creation of enjoyable lust.
He would not hide behind Severine. She too had emasculated him but he had been too caught up in the lust for gems, possessions and status to see it. By her whimsical quest for immortality, she had rendered him impotent against the worst enemies in the world of Eirie and she would pay. She and Adelina would both learn that one didn’t cross Luther. What was Madame’s would be his - a simple matter of brutal conveyancing.
Glancing in the mirror again, he delighted to see fear had vanished in as swift a manner as the lights of the Teine Sidhe. He snatched up his diavolo mask, admiring the bold red against the ebony of his coat and the pristine white of a diamond studded cravat and stockings.
So caught up in his perceived superiority was he that he didn’t hear the voice once again whispering ‘You’ll find out!’
At the Pensione Esperia, the companions had dressed for the Carnivale Ball and the hob had dashed downstairs to call for a gondola. Between Adelina and Phelim there hung a heavy silence, each individual racked with thoughts on the possible progression of the evening.
Phelim looked across at Adelina as she struggled with the heavy black silk gown, trying to drape the back of it. He moved close to her, smelling her fragrance and longing to be intimate, to touch her man to woman; to slide his fingers down the skin of her neck, onto her shoulders. Instead he calmly fixed the folds of the gown where they were twisted and eased the high-cut collar at her back where her curls flicked the top edge. As his fingers felt the hair graze his skin, he experienced a shudder of desire so strong, he could barely understand it.
‘You know,’ he said, shaking his head a little to settle his composure. ‘You and I both have a duty to accomplish tonight. Yes, I am aware there is something you must do.’ He didn’t enlarge. To reveal the hob had informed him would be to betray a confidence and might make it necessary for a revelation of Phelim’s own task. ‘I will help if I can, Adelina.’ He turned her round so that she looked up at him with her wide hazel eyes. He saw an element of anxiety and confusion and he ran his finger down her cheek. ‘Don’t worry,’ he spoke softly. ‘All will be well.’ He kissed her cheek, surprised as she leaned towards the light pressure of his lips.
But then she drew back, running her hands down the front of her silk gown. ‘The design reminds me of the stumpwork gown,’ she noted as she glanced over to the shrouded shape hanging behind the door. ‘It’s a pity we all have to wear black.’
Gallivant, who had returned to tell them the gondola had been called and who had watched the exchange between Adelina and Phelim with interest, responded. ‘Black is what everything is till midnight but once the Days of the Dark are over, you may be surprised at what might happen’. He smoothed the wrinkles from his white stockings and breeches and tapped his feet in their velvet dancing pumps. Anything could happen, he whispered to himself as he fingered the edge of his coat. Patterned with cut velvet flowers in shades of ebony, he liked the way it clung to shoulders that seemed to have broadened. Running his hands over a freshly shaved chin, he felt there was a harder angularity to his face as if youth had finally been chased away. The Stitcher’s doing, he surmised. The trials of being a carer.
Adelina watched Phelim out of the corner of her eye and wondered at the similarity and otherwise
between he and Liam, feeling his lips again on her cheek, remembering his brother’s clasp in the van hours before he died. With the thought, her stomach flipped upside-down and she sat with a thump. Fortunately the others were busy gathering together the masks and tying them on, so were unaware of her distress and she had time to smooth her belly and feel her child beneath the full drape of the silk folds. When Gallivant approached her with the colombina, she smiled at his own choice of mask. ‘Pinocchio, Gallivant?’
‘Sink me, well what do you expect? I have danced to your tune, Threadlady, since I met you and I still do. The very instruction to allow you room to complete your task on your own is evidence enough. You still pull my strings.’ He gave a jerky puppet-like bow as he handed over her mask.
As he tied it on for her underneath the upswept tawny curls, she spoke in a whisper. ‘You are still my friend, Gallivant and I will love you all my life for what you have done for me. But tonight you must just be patient, I beg you.’
He finished tying the ribbons, saying nothing, just bowed again over fingers that were tremulously cold and curled them in his hand and kissed them.
Gallivant and Adelina slipped down the stairs ahead of Phelim and he watched them go. He prayed to Aine to watch over them as something told him things were about to change. Even the weather had begun to alter - damp and eerie seafog had replaced the rain, floating amongst the cupolas. Yes, things are about to change.
***
I felt as if a nest of worms were inside me. They wriggled and writhed and I had never felt as stretched with nerves as this night. Phelim’s words, even his touch, had made things worse although I knew he meant to ease me. Even as a prisoner at Mevagavinney and wracked with grief and hate, I had never felt like this. And do you know, I had still not decided what I should do. My mind vacillated from one extreme to another - to do or not to do until I felt torn apart by my indecision.
Now, beloved companion of the book, I would ask you to replace the pamphlet and take up a pair of tweezers. You will see that we have reached that book of which I spoke earlier - the only one on the whole robe that is not concealed, hanging as it is from the bride’s wrist.
If you are still with me, it means that you have not defied my warnings and have left it well alone. I spoke the truth, you see. It has a charm placed upon it, more like a curse in fact, that if you touch the book or the pages with your bare fingers then you will, quite simply, die.
You will shrivel and curl and blacken as if you had been placed upon the fire. Why, you ask? Read on, holding the book with tweezers, turning the pages likewise and you’ll find out.
Chapter Forty Three
At eleven o’clock, the seafog with its cobweb drizzle was dissolving into the Venichese air. Fingers of moisture grasped at the conical chimneys, carved crockets and balustrades. The night-sky had lightened from leadened black to faint ink with traces of cloud wafting across the firmament and allowing a shy Lady Moon to peak at the earth below.
Veniche held its breath. Gondolas ferrying customers cut through the dark canals like black knives and the gondoliers spoke in hushed but urgent voices, calling for leeway. The canals became filled with miniscule flickers of yellow light from the prow lamps, and slowly the city brightened as more and more craft ventured into the waterways.
But shadow and innuendo still pervaded hidden alleys and less public ways. The dark humps bridging the canals echoed with the footsteps of eager Venichese citizens desperate to get to a ball or a dinner or some waterside celebration and not be caught in the black corners of a shadowed city.
Early dinners and drinks had taken place in the subtle light of a torch or a candelabra, even in the most luxurious palazzos, for no one would be seen to break the Dark by lighting their domain too brightly. Thus it had been for the guests of the Museo Director - a dusky room with a long table lit by one candelabra and the invitees chuckling as they endeavoured to eat and drink without spilling for one could hardly see one’s platter and goblet, let alone the silver salt-cellar.
Severine, loosened by her wines and some narcotics, laughed with the rest. The glacial spark in the grey eyes was more pronounced, the cheeks flushed and she could hardly help the upward tilt to the corners of her carmine lips. The candelabra caught the flash of her earrings as she turned to listen to the clock strike the half hour.
Sitting with Luther aboard her gondola minutes later, her mind ticked down through the seconds of this last half hour, knowing she would be at the Gate and within reach of her dreams. She fingered the ring, sliding it round and round her finger.
Luther watched as the battered gold caught the light of the prow lamps. I could get it, he touched the stiletto in his cumberbund. One jab upward under the ribs and it would be mine...
‘Contessa, we have arrived,’ the gondolier called down under the canopy.
Too late, too late. Luther ground his teeth, appalled by his indecision. Severine pulled her black coat around her more tightly and held out a hand for Luther to help her out of the craft. Ever her lackey…
Gallivant could feel Adelina trembling beside him in their gondola and wished again she had not made promises she couldn’t, shouldn’t keep. I should tell her about Lhiannon I should, she needs to know before she gets to the Gate. Maybe it would be less of a shock from me. But I am Other and we have asked for revenge. Oh Aine, what should I do? He reached for her hand and clasped it and her cold fingers squeezed back.
Phelim sat in front. In a brief loosening of self-control, he soaked up the sights - the way the tiny gold prow lamps cast rippling reflections. The way the gondoliers called to each other. The masks. Because everyone was still ostensibly concealed in black, the scene was like a puppet show. Vibrant colombinas, voltos, gattos, pierrots, civettas, nasos - all floated mysteriously past as if unattached to a real body and with a sinister life of their own. Through the sockets one occasionally caught the glimmer of an eye but was it friendly or ominous? It was that question that brought the half-time mortal back to earth with a jolt. Malfeasance hovered in the air, almost tangible, and he wanted to grab Adelina and run but the souls warned in the cool way and he took note. He turned his gaze to the side, to that gondola poling past demanding leeway - it contained a diavolo, vivid red in the light of their lamp. He recognised the shining skull of the wearer and as he stared, saw the cold glitter of eyes from the mask. But then the mask looked away and the gondolier poled ahead. Phelim said nothing to his friends, it wouldn’t serve to alarm them.
The landing of the Ca’ Specchio was sparingly lit. One large torchère with dancing flames created macabre shadows on the walls as mask upon eerie mask alighted from one gondola and then another. Voices were still inclined to whisper, the minutes that ticked by massaging the hysteria and excitement.
Severine stood at the doors as the crowd flowed around her. Luther could see the emeralds in her hair flashing as little thrills of anticipation surged through her. Forgetting his own anger for a moment, he reveled in the feeling of being a part of all this striking nobility. He knew that as the clock struck midnight, cloaks and coats would be thrown off shoulders and the colour of gowns, tailcoats and plumage would be like those of exotic Raji birds. Now however, the black heightened the air of expectation, the race to an explosive climax.
Severine was having none of it. She would create her own small explosion as a prelude before the clock struck. She grasped the plaquets of her black coat and flung them apart, slipping the garment off the alabaster shoulders and revealing the daring dècolletage. Every one gasped. She stood defiantly and with hauteur, beautiful and sparkling in her peacock finery. ‘Luther, your arm, please!’ Her high-pitched voice shattered the shocked silence and as they walked to the stair to climb up to the waiting Director of the Museo, she thought, this is how it will always be. Shocked silence and then power resonating from my smallest movement.
Adelina and her escorts entered the palazzo foyer just as Severine began her emerald-clad climb. They heard the whispered buzz and stared
at that brilliantly coloured figure. Luther stepped jauntily by her side, casting looks of conceit upon those who would ignore him.
He looked down over the balustrade at the crowd and noticed a group entering... marked how the two men in front pushed the woman to the rear and closed ranks so she could not see Madame making her entrance up the stair.
Ignorant louts!
Phelim saw Luther’s gaze sweep over the crowd and grabbed Gallivant, the pair creating a protective wall behind which Adelina was concealed.
‘Adelina, I don’t think you should do this. It isn’t good for you or the baby.’ Gallivant begged the embroiderer. ‘Please will you reconsider?’
Adelina gave a small smile, filled with as much fortitude as she could drag from down in her dainty dancing slippers. Shaking her head imperceptibly, she moved forward with the crowd as they began to walk.
It was five to twelve.
‘Contessa,’ the Director simpered as he bent over Severine’s graceful hand. ‘Would you do me the honour of opening the Ball by dancing with me?’
Severine withdrew her fingers, aware of every eye in the ballroom upon her - the women in awe, the men in fascinated lust. ‘Just the one, Director, then I must dance with my escort, Ser Luther. He has signed my card quite copiously.’ She gave what could pass for a flirtatious smile and proceeded to the place of honour in the centre of the room.
