Ink and Steel pa-3

by Elizabeth Bear

  “Will,” he shouted, loud enough for Will to hear it through ears that would never stop ringing. “Run!”

  Will forced himself to his feet, de Parma’s blood already soaking through hisshoes. It shone on the floorboards, glossy, and Will tore his eyes away with a grunt. Kit extended like a dancer, infinitely more graceful than Ben, the totality of his body and his will focused, it seemed, on the firelit silver of his swordpoint. Running wasn’t possible. Will staggered toward the door.

  “Marley. God. You re dead, you son of a whore.”

  “Oh,” Kit said cheerfully. “God has very little to do with it, and my mother’s virtuous to a fault, I fear. What shall it be, Master Poley? Thy heart?”

  But a bulky shadow filled the doorway, and Will skidded to a stop fast enough that he went to one knee in the rushes and the blood.

  “How about an eye, and into thy brain, dying instantly? Too good for thee, but time is short and we must make…”

  “Kit. do.”

  “Good evening, puss,” said Richard Baines, as Kit turned to face him. “I should have known my kitten would never be so uncouth as to die without bidding me one last farewell.”

  I am Envy.…… I cannot read and therefore wish all books were burned.

  CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE, Faustus

  The tip of the blade shimmered, so close, so close. Kit settled himself for the lunge, the perfect motion of body and sword and strength that would carry his blade into Poley’s left eye and carry with it a perfect, a holy revenge.

  And then Will’s panicked squeak, and the voice… God. The silken, caressing voice of Richard Baines.

  Bile and blood cloyed Kit’s tongue. He stepped back from Poley, unable to turn his blind side on Baines for the second it would take to make sure.

  “Dick,” he said, and extended the rapier over Will’s shoulder. He let the tip sway on a gentle arc between Poley and Baines, a motion including both ofthem. Kit feigned deafness to the shiver in his own voice, swallowed a mouthful of saliva and put his back to the window as he croaked, “Will, comeback here, please.”

  Will didn’t stand, just skittered backward in a crouch that looked like it hurt him. De Parma’s blood reddened the palms of his hands, the knees of his hose.

  Across the line of Kit’s rapier, Baines smiled and came a half step closer, a half step beyond the reach of Kit’s lunge. “Thou hast aged not a day. And the eyepatch suits thee. Did it hurt very much?”

  “No,” Kit answered. “No. It didn’t hurt. Much.”

  Baines nodded. “Not compared to some things, aye? Sweet puss. There’s nowhere to run, thou knowest. Back to the wall, and I can wait here all night, and thou hast nowhere to go.”

  There’s a knife in my boot, Will. Kit felt fingers fumble it as much as he felt anything but the ice snarling his limbs.

  “Kit,” Will hissed, grasping the window ledge to stand a little behind him, where he could not foul Kit’s arm, “he’s unarmed. Kill him.”

  And it was true. Baines stood just inside the doorway, limned by candlelight, those big hands hanging open at his sides. Kit could imagine he saw the outline of his own teeth, sunk in the heel of the left one. He shuddered, and brought his gaze back up to Baines eyes. Better the eyes than those gentle, terrible hands. “He never needed weapons before.”

  “Kit, shut up.”

  Poley had a dagger, no good for throwing or he would have thrown it. Kit barely spared him a glance. He caught the light winking off the blade in Will’s hand as Will skinned it.

  “What are we doing?” Will spoke in an undertone that Kit matched with a murmur, aware of Baines watching his lips for a hint of what he said.

  “Get ready, William, my love. If this doesn’t work, I’m sorry.”

  “Put down the little knife, puss, and I’ll be gentle” Baines stepped forward.

  Kit flinched, and Baines smiled.

  “What are we doing, Kit?”

  Kit never dropped his eyes. He felt with his left hand, slipped it around Will’s waist, shifted his weight in a way he hoped Will would understand. Will switched the dagger to his left hand and gripped Kit’s belt with his right. He moved with Kit, in unison, and Kit nodded. No hesitation.

  “Running away,” Kit answered, and let his knees go as weak as they wanted to, dragging Will backward through the window and the glass.

  Intra-act: Chorus

  These things, with many other shall by good & honest witness be approved to be his opinions and Common Speeches, and that this Marlow doth not only holdthem himself, but almost into every Company he Cometh he persuades men to Atheism willing them not to be afeared of bugbears and hobgoblins, and utterly scorning both god and his ministers as I Richard Baines will Justify & approve both by mine oath and the testimony of many honest men, and almost all men with whom he hath Conversed any time will testify the same, and as I think all men in Christianity ought to endeavor that the mouth of so dangerous a member may be stopped.

  RICHARD BAINES, A note Containing the opinion of one Christopher Marly Concerning his Damnable Judgment of Religion, and scorn of gods word, recorded May of 1593

  Baines lunged, shouldering Marley’s slender blade aside. A half second toolate; the edge of Marley’s doublet brushed his fingers, and Kit and the crippled playmaker hit the glass with no sound of splintering. They vanished as if they’d tumbled into peat-blackened water. Baines caught himself hard against the windowsill before he could follow, headfirst through shattered glass and the shutters knocked wide, into the garden below. Something in his elbow popped, and he grunted as he pushed back. Fray Xalbador’s blood slipped and stuck under the soles of his boots. “Damme.” Quiet and wry, an edge of admiration in it Baines would not have permitted Marley to hear.

  “Christofer Marley,” Poley said, not releasing his dagger. “Jesus fucked Mary and Joseph. Nick wasn’t drunk after all.”

  Baines pressed his palm against cool glass, tentatively. The sensation was mundane, diamond-shaped panes and strips of lead between. He strode acros sblood and stopped not far from Poley. “You sound like our pussycat, Robert. Such blasphemy.”

  Poley looked up at him, blowing the hair out of his eyes. “I buried that man, Dick.”

  “Aye, and he’s come back from the grave?” Baines rolled his shirt-sleeves up. “Put the damned dagger away, as it did you so much benefit last time. Are you sure you killed the right poet?”

  Poley turned his head and spat. “I checked his brands before we buried him.”

  “But that was no ghost managed the friar so neatly. And you saw the eyepatch: Ingrim struck him fairly and laid him down.”

  The slender blond agent nudged de Parma’s flaccid corpse with his toe. “We’ll have to dispose of this.”

  “We’ll wall him in the cellar,” Baines answered, already calculating the losses and advantages of the Inquisitor’s bloody death. “Damme, we’re short a sorcerer.”

  “Aye. And moreover, it seems our Kit’s exhumed himself with a touch of the glamourie.” Poley raised a hand and rapped lightly on the window glass, tilting his head as if to assess the rattle of the sash against the frame. “The old bitch must have had him off overseas, or he’s been laying low. Still. As long as he’s living…”

  Baines lifted his chin in comprehension. “We won’t have to enchant another, when the time comes. How did he survive a stabbing and a burial, then?”

  Poley wiped his blade, unnecessarily, on his breeches and slipped the dagger into its sheath. “Sorcery? If he were a sorcerer, I would know it. A poet, yes, and a good one, but the real use of him was…”

  Baines saw Poley’s eyes widen as he, Baines, hesitated. If the light were better, he imagined he would have seen Poley blanch. “You think Mehiel had something to do with it.”

  “I think,” Baines answered, considering, “we may find Master Marley difficult to keep dead, if that is indeed what happened to him. An unexpected incidental result.” He shrugged. “But I mastered him once. Can do it again.”

&n
bsp; “He slipped your lead once,” Poley reminded.

  “Only because de Vere gave him too much rope.”

  “Come, Dick. Help me wrap the friar so he doesn’t drip down the hall.” Baines crouched, dragging a woolen blanket from the bed. He lifted de Parma sbody by the sticky dark auburn hair, and heaved in unison with Poley. The little man was strong for his size.

  “If our pussycat’s returned to my safekeeping, I can promise you that won’t happen again.”

  Act III, scene i

  Orlando:

  Then in mine own person I die.

  Rosalind:

  No, faith, die by attorney. The poor world is

  almost six thousand years old, and in all this time

  there was not any man died in his own person,

  videlicit, in a love-cause. Troilus had his brains

  dashed out with a Grecian club; yet he did what he

  could to die before, and he is one of the patterns

  of love. Leander, he would have lived many a fair

  year, though Hero had turned nun, if it had not been

  for a hot midsummer night; for, good youth, he went

  but forth to wash him in the Hellespont and being

  taken with the cramp was drowned and the foolish

  coroners of that age found it was ‘Hero of Sestos.’

  But these are all lies: men have died from time to

  time and worms have eaten them, but not for love.

  WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, As You like It

  Kit grunted as Will fell atop him. The hard landing broke Will’s startled shout, for all Kit cushioned them both as best he could without losing his grip either on Will or his rapier. Threads on Kit’s doublet snapped, pearls splashing, powdering between bodies and stones.

  Will rolled, scrambling to his feet with the dagger at the ready, bad leg dragging. He turned, trying to cover Kit and still stay out of his way, and then hesitated, amazed. “Kit.”

  Kit pushed himself to a crouch, wheezing. “Damme, but that was closer than I like them.”

  “Where are we?”

  “William, my love.” Will dismissed it with a half-formed judgment on Kit’s habitual extravagance.

  “Faerie.” Kit dragged himself up the wall as if his ribs pained him.

  Will winced.

  “Drink nothing while thou here lingerest. Neither shalt thou dine, lest like Proserpine thou dost find thyself obligated to the underworld.”

  “Faerie.” Will shook himself, a chill only half excitement crawling the length of his spine. “Why this course? With the Inquisitor dead, I don’t see why you left Baines and Poley.”

  Kit straightened, consternation a furrow across his forehead. “I should have had Poley,” he admitted. “I couldn’t see Baines well enough to know if he was armed, and I didn’t dare risk keeping my back to him if he was. It was a mistake.”

  “Why did we come here instead of going after Baines, then? And why was he talking to you like that?” The bitter taste of something half understood, which he understood no better when Kit glanced at the floor and turned away.

  “Come along, Will. We’ll get you cleaned up a little, and I’ll see if you can be presented to the Queen. Or I suppose I could send you back through the Glass now, safe and sound in your lodging.”

  “I’m in Faerie, and all you can think of is sending me home?” Will struggled to keep up; still shedding pearls like snowflakes from his shoulders, Kit caught Will’s blood-covered sleeve and helped. “Before I’ve seen the place?”

  “You could lose your life in a night. Or be trapped here.”

  “I’ll risk it. Just this once. For an hour. Why did you pass your chance at Baines?”

  “Because I wasn’t sure I could kill him.”

  “He wasn’t armed.”

  “Christ wept!” Kit turned on Will with enough force that Will staggered a step. “I wasn’t sure I could kill him, Will. Why are you after me? I came to help, didn’t I?”

  Perversity flared in Will. “Came to help. Aye. And where were you all the long last year, and the one before that, and the one before that? How did you know about Baines?”

  “I read thy letter. You read my … oh. How did you… And this is the night he chooses to take it? Did you read any of the papers with it? Ben’s play?”

  Kit shook his head. “I read the letter only, and panicked. And a good thing: you would not have wished to make an intimate acquaintance of Master Richard Baines.”

  “I’m glad you have the poems.” Will hoped his voice hid his desperation. They moved through narrow corridors; with a little amusement, he realized, despite rich hangings and the smooth golden stone underfoot, that Kit shepherded him through the castle on the servants trails. Just as well. Will’s blood-soaked shoes left brush marks on the flags. The walls were almost translucent, glowing mellow amber. Will laid a hand on one, surprised to find it cool. “Do you suppose I could reclaim those? Ben has my other copy, and I don’t expect him back from Stratford for a month.”

  “It may be a month gone by when you return home,” Kit said, and Will couldn’t miss the relief in his voice at Baines as a dropped subject. “But, aye, of course. May I keep the plays?”

  “In addition to Ben’s,” Will answered. He ducked so Kit wouldn’t see his blush. “There’s two comedies of mine.”

  “Oh?”

  “A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Which Satan said he rather liked. Rather in advance. And As You like It,” Will said. “If thou couldst see the boys we have now, thou wouldst strangle me in my sleep for a chance to write for them.”

  Kit changed the subject again, leaving Will to wonder at his discomfort. “Here’s my door. There’s half a chance hot water awaits thee, if I know the castle’s staff. I’m off to fetch Morgan. I won’t be above half an hour.”

  “With blood all over thy breast?” Will asked gently.

  Kit brushed at it with the backs of his fingers, scattering another pearl. “She’s seen worse,” he said. “Your poems are on the bed. Drink nothing, not even the water.” He shut the door before Will could thank him, or make sense of the ragged darkness in Kit’s expression.

  Kit’s chamber was big enough for a Prince, the floor covered in a stunning extravagance of Araby carpets, the curtained bed broad enough for five.

  I wonder who he shares it with,Will thought, and put the thought away. Tapestries and painted cloths muffled the walls; their subject was pastoral, and Will did not think Kit had chosen them. The aftermath of combat made him dizzy. He washed, then sorted his poems from the other papers and rolled them tight, finding a bit of ribbon in his purse to tie them with. Will breathed easier once those too-revealing sonnets were tucked inside his doublet; less easily when the door opened and Kit led a woman of middle years and black Roman beauty in.

  A woman clad in a man’s white cambric shirt, riding boots, and green breeches that were almost trunk hose, cut tight and close to her hips and thighs.

  “My lady,” Will said, making a somewhat unsteady leg, noticing Kit’s discomfiture as an adjunct to his own.

  “It’s a bit of a pleasure to see Marley flustered.” She snorted like a mare and scanned him lengthwise, shaking her head hard enough that the peridot clusters in her ears tangled in the escaping tendrils of her hair. “The legendary William Shakespeare,” she said, and turned to Kit. “A little unprepossessing, isn’t he?” Her smile softened the comment into a flirtation; Will didn’t understand why Kit blanched and leaned heavily on the edge of the clothespress.

  “My lady,” Will said, feigning hurt, “I am accounted the most charming of playmakers.”

  “Given thy competition,” I do not wonder, she said. Her hips moved marvelously under the tight dark brocade as she crossed the carpet. Will kept his eyes on her face, the green-black eyes she never lowered.

  “Wert injured?”

  “No,” he said. She reached up and tilted his face side to side, clucking her tongue. Despite himself, her fingers stroking his beard, the sc
ent of her skin like mint and citrus, he couldn’t help but smile. “What is t? You sound exactly like my wife.”

  “I hope that’s a better compliment than if I said you sounded like my husband.”

  “Tis the greatest compliment I can offer,” Will said as she stepped away. “Do I pass inspection, madam?”

  “You seem unhurt. We’ll talk of the other things later.” Before he could do more than startle, she moved toward the door. “You washed your hair, at least. I’ll see you clothed; we’ll present you to the Mebd tonight, after supper.”

  Kit cleared his throat. Morgan turned to him and smiled, and Will’s breath swelled his throat for a moment as he tried to decide if the smile was a lover’s, or that of an indulgent guardian.

  “My boon, my Queen,” he murmured. Her chin lifted, and the smile grew amused. Of course. A little show of feeling in her pockets, until Kit touched his collar.

  Will realized that the other poet had changed clothes, or his shirt and doublet at least, and washed the rusty red spatters from his hands. He keeps clothes in her rooms. That answers one question. Or does it?

  Morgan laughed and unpinned something winking gold from the cambric of her shirt, coming back to Will. “Have you a place for an earring, Master Shakespeare?” He lifted his hair, showing the bit of silk that kept the hole from closing. Kit nodded when Will caught his eye, and so Will ducked his head and let her untie the cord and slip it from his ear. A little gasp as she tugged the hole open and slipped something into it: a substantial ring, warm from the heat of her bosom. “There,” she said. “A favor from a lady. A favor that will permit thee, Master Shakespeare, to come and go from this land to that land as thou wilt, without years cut from thy life whilst thou in Faerie dwelleth.” Kit came forward beside her, rubbing at his eyepatch as an exhausted man might rub his eye. As Morgan stepped back, Will touched the earring, feeling heavy gold swing. “A rich gift, Your Highness.”

  “We have a special love of poets here,” she said. “Don’t we, Sir Christofer?” She turned to kiss Kit on the cheek. Will saw his friend pale, but Kit did not step away, and in fact smiled as if at a favor. The door shut behind her, concealing the sway of her hips, and Will touched the earring again. “Do you trust this?”