Striker dangled the key before me with a questioning look. Agnes began to reach for it, but I shook my head.
“Nay, Striker should have it,” I told her. “We will sail before these are removed.” I looked to Striker, and he nodded solemnly.
“Thank you,” Gaston whispered without looking at either of them.
Striker smiled and patted my matelot’s shoulder before crawling off the bed. He glanced at those remaining, and looked to me with a raised eyebrow. “You two need anything else?”
“We will be well for a time,” I said. “I do not think they will trouble us.”
“Will must sleep,” Gaston said. He was still not looking at the others, and his fingers were tight about mine.
“Well, we will address the matter,” I said to Striker.
“Rest. Try not to get shot again,” Striker said with a grin and left us.
I squeezed Gaston’s fingers. He sighed, his eyes remaining upon my midsection.
I looked to our guests. Vivian was sitting anxiously at the edge of her chair, the baby held close to her chest; thankfully little Jamaica was sleeping. Agnes was regarding Vivian and the Marquis with surreptitious annoyance. The Marquis only had eyes for us, and I could see him boiling over with things unsaid. They made me very tired.
“We truly need to rest now,” I said. “I do not feel my death is imminent.”
“I will be quiet,” Vivian whispered. “Please let me stay.”
“You might need something. It’s not as if either of you can move like that,” Agnes said.
I looked to my matelot, and found his gaze had become locked upon his father. Gaston took a long shuddering breath as the Marquis approached.
“I love you,” the Marquis whispered to him. “And I am proud of you.”
Gaston released a hoarse cry, and collapsed across my belly to sob. His father sat on the edge of the bed and rubbed his back.
“I am so sorry I have caused you such pain,” the Marquis whispered huskily. Tears rolled down his cheeks, and he looked to me with worry.
I gave him a reassuring smile and nodded. Despite how distraught it made Gaston, I felt his father was doing the correct thing. Gaston’s Horse needed to hear those words from him. It would not hear them so well later, when he was calm.
“I will leave you to care for Will, now,” the Marquis said.
Gaston clutched at him with his free hand as the Marquis stood.
His father squeezed his hand. “We will talk again before I sail. Do not worry. Now you should rest.”
Gaston released him with a small nod. The Marquis smiled at me and left us. My matelot moved, and raised my arm so he could slip between it and my side, and thus rest his head on my good shoulder.
I considered asking Agnes for more laudanum, but speaking seemed more than my tired body wished to do, and so I closed my eyes and let the exhaustion carry me under, beyond even the pain’s reach. I hoped I sank beyond the reach of capricious Gods for a time.
Seventy-Four
Wherein We Stand in the Face of Madness
I dreamt I could not wake. My shoulder ached, yet the pain could not convince me I was not dead. There were moments when I was sure I lay in the guest room watching pipe smoke curl across the ceiling while people played cards, and there were others when I thought that peaceful image to be a thing I was attempting to console myself with while I actually lay weighed down and trapped beneath my sins in an anteroom of Hades, listening to devils gamble for my soul. For the longest time I could not rouse myself to dispel or confirm either notion. I drifted on the smoke and the tide of consciousness, ebbing to and fro.
Eventually a salient sensation gave me a hold on reality, both figuratively and literally: my fingers were being squeezed. I clung to that contact, and slowly pulled myself from the morass.
Gaston held me in this life. He was a great yet reassuring weight along my left side: his head on my shoulder; my arm behind him; his leg over mine. I squeezed his fingers. He responded by squeezing back and nuzzling my neck, then he pulled away and rested his head on the end of my shoulder. I smiled and opened my eyes, turning my head enough to see his green orbs a nose-length away. Our breath mingled as I studied him. He appeared calm and in control, though sorrowful.
“How are we?” I breathed.
“Better, because of you,” he sighed with a sad smile. “How are you?”
I took a moment to think on it. “I am pained, but relieved. I feel we have weathered another storm. At least I pray it is behind us.”
He frowned. “I am not well, Will. The storm still rages, I am merely lying with you in a quiet hollow beneath the winds. Once we move…”
“Non,” I sighed quickly. “Outside, not inside. I do not feel I am well, either.”
He smiled wryly. “You are surely not, but it is an ailment I hope you will be afflicted with until the day you die.”
I found his humor a well-needed balm; yet I wondered at it. He seemed quite well indeed despite his concerns. I failed to keep this new thought from my face.
He frowned. “Will?”
“I am sorry,” I said quickly. “It is the pain.”
He nodded, and his eyes flicked to the others with fear. “I…”
“I will handle them,” I whispered, nearly relieved to see some sign of his madness. “What do you require?”
“A pot and water, and more laudanum.”
I nodded, and slowly turned my head to the right, amazed anew at how a wound in one place could cause so much pain in another. I was sure I could not move my toes without intensifying the ache or eliciting some twinge in my shoulder.
I was greeted with a sight that I was sure would be the way of things for many months in our absence. Liam, Bones, Nickel, and Agnes were playing cards. All were smoking pipes, their faces intent behind the drifting smoke. From what I could see of the piles of coins, Nickel was ahead. If any had heard us speaking, or realized we were awake, they did not show it.
I spoke loudly enough for them to hear. “I pray that when I die, if I should go to Heaven, I will be greeted by fine friends playing cards.”
Liam chuckled and turned to face me. “That’ll likely be the story. As ya be the luckiest bastard that e’er lived, and iffn that will serve ta get ya to Heaven, ya will be the last ta go. And by God, iffn ya can get there, the rest o’ us will too.”
Bones laughed heartily at this.
Agnes had stood and crossed to the bed. She laid fingers on my forehead as if I might be feverish. I supposed she did not know what else to do to determine our condition.
“We need water, and a pot, and more laudanum,” I told her.
She nodded, but she was frowning at Gaston. I turned to look, and found his eyes closed as if he pretended to still sleep.
“He will be well in time,” I assured her.
“Before you sail?” she asked quietly.
“I think not,” I sighed.
“Then we will not marry before?” she asked.
Gaston tensed.
I smiled at her. “Do you still wish to marry him?”
She shrugged and frowned upon me with curiosity. “Aye, why would I not? Does he no longer wish to marry… After Christine and all?”
“I do not know,” I said honestly. “We have not been able to discuss it. However, I feel it will need to wait until after we return.”
She shrugged again. “I am well with that. I just…” She shook her head. “Will you need help with this?” she asked as she retrieved a chamber pot from under the bed.
“Nay, we will manage,” I said.
“Then I will fetch water.” She turned to the door.
“Agnes,” I said sharply enough to halt her. “What were you thinking?”
She sighed and looked to the others before turning her back on them and coming to lean close to me. “What if you do not return?” she whispered. She glanced at Gaston with guilt. “I do not wish to be a bother, but… I have thought on it, and decided I would rather be a marr
ied woman than a girl no one knows what to do with for the rest of my days, whether I am provided for or not.”
Gaston’s grip upon my fingers had tightened to a painful intensity, and I knew without looking that it must have been obvious to her that he was not sleeping.
“That is probably wise,” I sighed. “We must discuss it, and see what Gaston feels.”
She nodded and left us.
I looked to the others, not sure of what they had heard. I spoke loudly for them. “While I am relieved and pleased to have awoken to fine friends watching over us, we would now appreciate some time alone.”
“Aye, let’s end this,” Bones said as he tossed his cards down.
“You only wish to stop because you are losing,” Nickel said with a smile as he scraped the last hand’s coins into his winnings.
“Ya think o’ a better reason?” Bones asked.
“Ya might be the second luckiest man I know,” Liam sighed.
“Only at cards,” Nickel said. “Will trumps me in all else.”
With a round of chuckles, they nodded at me politely and left the room. The sun shone quite brightly through the door.
“Did we sleep through the night?” I asked Gaston when we were at last alone.
“You did,” he said softly, and sat to reach for the pot. He nestled it in the bed linen between us and drained himself with evident relief. Then he assisted me into rolling toward my left side so I could do the same.
I waited until he had finished leaning across me and off the bed to slide the pot under it before I spoke.
“You cannot face them at all?” I asked kindly.
“All is shame and guilt and fear,” he whispered as he moved to sit with his legs crossed tailor-style beside me.
“Agnes will return shortly,” I said. “I hope,” I added, as the pain and thus my desire for laudanum was increasing with every passing moment.
“I must face her,” he sighed. Then he frowned. “Why does she think we are to marry?”
I frowned, as I struggled to remember why he would not know of that, and then I realized there was much we had not discussed. “Oh Gods,” I breathed. “Your father will accept her. He… apologized for causing trouble by not accepting her in the first place. And… her uncle is a Duke, after all. So I asked her if she would be willing to marry you. I am sorry. You were sleeping, and… Then things transpired with Christine as they did, and...”
His fingers were on my lips and he smiled ruefully. “So I can simply marry Agnes now? And he will accept me even after…”
“Apparently,” I said with a smile.
“How did you manage…” he asked with wonder.
“Your father wishes for you to be happy, and he wishes for you to be able, and… Well, he would rather you marry a girl you wish than not at all.”
“But, non,” he said with growing consternation. “Why does she not revile me after what I did?”
I smiled. “None do. Well, except Christine. No one reviles you. They all feel you were provoked. They blame Christine. And Christine…” I sighed. “She shot me because she realized no one would allow her to shoot you. She was enraged that all should hold you blameless due to your madness.”
“But…”
Agnes hurried in with an onion bottle of water. She seemed pleased Gaston was sitting and willing to meet her curious gaze. “How are you feeling?” she asked him.
“Confused…” He said with great honesty. “You do not hate me?”
“Nay, why would I hate you?” she asked as she came to perch on the edge of the bed.
“Who struck you?” he asked.
Her lip was quite livid and swollen.
“Christine,” she said with a frown and glanced at me.
“He slept through your fight, and then was still drowsing before Christine so rudely woke him, and so he has missed much,” I said. I vaguely remembered telling him of the girls fighting, but he had been so very sleep-addled I wondered if he recalled any of it. Then I realized there was much of the explanation of her fight with Christine that I would not have him hear at the moment. I stopped her before she began to speak. “Agnes, please fetch the laudanum. There is much that must be discussed, but I would rather speak with Gaston alone, first, please.”
If she fought me on this, I thought it likely I would shoot her and he would not marry her, either.
She went to the medicine chest and looked through drawers. “I do not remember where we put it. We threw everything in here after tending your wound.”
I was squeezing Gaston’s fingers. He was still watching her with a mixture of awe and confusion.
“So if you still need to speak alone, I suppose I should tell the Marquis he must wait a bit longer,” she said. “When I left to fetch the water he asked of you and I said you had woken.”
Gaston sighed raggedly and slumped over my belly, much as he had when his father spoke with him when I was brought to this bed.
“Do you remember your father speaking to you, here?” I asked.
He nodded. “I have been thinking I dreamed it. And…” He shook his head. “So everyone… I did not wish to look at anyone when we tended your wound. I thought they all spoke to me because of you… that…”
“No one hates you,” I said kindly. “You are loved. Even now.”
He sobbed.
Agnes had found the bottle and she now stood beside the bed gazing at him with sympathy. She extended her hand, but stopped and glanced to me. I nodded reassuringly, and she sat and rubbed his back.
“No one hates you,” she whispered.
“Why?” he growled, and he rose to look at her with the Horse’s eyes at its worst. “Why? I raped her! I would do the same to you!”
She left the bed and stood beside it. Her eyes did not leave him, but they did not fill with fear, either: rather her surprise transmuted to curiosity.
I tightened my grip on his hand, but as he was already grinding my bones to dust with both of his, I felt there was little danger he would release me and reach for her across my body.
“You damn women!” he was growling. “You do not care! You only want to be fucked! You do not care what trouble it will cause!”
She began to frown.
“Agnes!” I snapped. “This is his madness talking.”
She nodded.
“Oui, I am mad,” he snarled at me. “But you are madder! Why do you wish for me to marry one of them? Why?”
“Because I love you,” I said calmly.
“Why? Why are you so intelligent and wise in all things but that?” he roared. “Why can you not see me as I am?”
I smiled sadly. “My love, why can you not accept that you are worthy of love?”
“Non,” he said and shook his head with a child’s stubbornness.
“Oui. Now quit thrashing about and let her give me that damn laudanum. Tell her how much to use.”
He closed his eyes tightly and sobbed, rocking back and forth as he attempted to control himself.
I glanced back at her. She was watching him with wide but sympathetic eyes. I was very proud of her. We, in the end – and the beginning – had chosen well. It remained to be seen if she would feel the same, though.
“Agnes,” I said kindly. “He will recover. Please bring that over.”
She nodded, and came to the head of the bed and perched on the edge again. She began to pour the drug into the mixing cup, and I could see it was far more than either of us should have.
“Nay, half that,” Gaston said quickly before I could speak.
She nodded, and poured some back in the bottle, and proffered the new amount for his inspection. He nodded. She mixed it with water and gave it to me.
“Now the same for me,” he said calmly.
She did the same thing and handed him the little cup. He downed his dose quickly and returned the cup to her. She set it and the bottle next to the water on the night table.
“I will tell everyone you are still… not well enough for guests,
yet.”
“Thank you,” I murmured.
“I am sorry,” Gaston said and pawed tears away.
She shook her head and chewed on her lip. “So…” She frowned and sighed. “Nay, now is not the time. I will go.” She stood.
“For what?” I asked.
She flushed. “To speak of arrangements,” she sighed. “I am being… selfish.” This brought a deeper frown and blush.
“What arrangements?” I asked.
“For the wedding,” she said with a sigh. “I would not have you think I am a silly chit, though. It can wait.” She turned and headed for the door.
“Here,” Gaston said with a ragged breath. “See if Theodore or my father can arrange for the wedding to be here in the house. I do not wish to go to a church.” He stopped and gazed at her with concern. “Unless you feel it must be in the church and…”
“Nay, nay,” she said quickly. “I will see what can be done.”
“Thank you,” he breathed. “I am not so… Will knows what to do when I am like that. I am not like that as often as I used to be… before Will.”
She nodded. “You are like a very angry dog. I will just stand still if it happens again.”
“I would not hurt you,” he said quickly. “Truly… not even the worst parts of me wish to harm you. But I say things sometimes…”
She nodded. “You are just barking. I trust you.” She came quickly to the bed to lean across me and kiss his forehead. Then she leaned over and kissed mine. “Everything will be fine,” she assured us. When she was back at that door, she paused and turned to add, “I will keep everyone out and see to things.” Then she was gone.
I smiled with relief.
Gaston regarded me with tears filling his eyes yet again.
“See,” I chided gently. “You could not even drive her away. You are cursed to be surrounded by stupid people.”
With a sob, he threw himself down beside me and buried his face in my shoulder to cry.
I murmured sweet things of great import but little coherence to him until the drug at last took us both.
I next woke from a pleasant dream I could not remember. I thought it odd that I was sure it was so very pleasant, and it seemed to permeate all I perceived. I gazed with bleary eyes upon the flicker of lamplight upon the ceiling, and found it warm and cheerful. Likewise, I found comfort in the snoring and the murmurs of unseen voices from the dark beyond the door. My matelot lay next to me, on his back with his limbs spread wide in trusting sleep. And that same trust was what had walked with me into the world of the living from the land of dreams. Though my shoulder ached fiercely, my mouth was parched, my head throbbed, my stomach rumbled, and someone plotted in the night nearby, I felt no discomfort or worry of the heart or soul. All was well with the world, and I need but address each little problem one at a time.
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