~ IAN ~
Ian spent the afternoon in the solitude of his chambers, his mind drifting constantly towards the Testimony of Eia, still sat mockingly on his shelf. Read me, it seemed to shout. Let the old stories in. But he would not.
Sergeant Pratley had caught up to Millie Farmer, on Ian’s behalf, and made arrangements for a midnight rendezvous. That would be fun. Millie was young and attractive, and no doubt would be some pliable flesh. Still, Ian couldn’t think about Millie Farmer. There was only one woman he’d allow himself to dwell on.
So he thought of her, those vibrant eyes and that little laugh and the way she used to throw her hair back as she ran, and it took him back to the happier days of his youth. To be young and invincible again... It was in this remembrance that the afternoon faded into evening. Dusk had descended, by the looks of the fresco on the wall—the one with the gaudy scene of a sun passing across a marbled sky—when there came a knocking at his door.
“What is it?” he yelled, not getting up from the bed he’d spent the last three hours sat on.
Sergeant Pratley’s muffled voice came through the door. “A visitor, sir.”
“Tell him to bugger off.” It would be Chris, it was always Chris. Whatever Chris wanted, Ian couldn’t be arsed to deal with it. Chris would talk for hours. Ian might miss his rendezvous with Miss Farmer. He couldn’t very well explain to Chris that he was planning on screwing some young thing while across the stars his wife cried.
To his annoyance, the door opened. “He won’t listen to the Sergeant, so you can tell him to his face.” Caroline popped her head around the door, a pout on her face. “I need to talk to you, Ian.”
He felt his face go bright red. “Of course,” he said, flustered. “Whatever you want. If anyone else comes, Sergeant, I’m not in.”
“You’re getting all the action today, sir,” Sergeant Pratley shouted from outside. “I’m proud of you.”
“Cheeky bastard.”
He got up and shut the door himself, taking time to be sure the lock had caught. Caroline had made straight for his bookshelf. She was a picture, he mused, in a gown of coral silk that hugged her curves generously. Her hair fell effortlessly down her back in a fiery cascade. She always managed to make it look like she’d given it no attention at all. That hadn’t gone away with Chris’ efforts to proper her up, and Ian was glad of it.
She’d found the Testimony and was leafing through it idly. “This is a well-read copy,” she noted. “Ian, have you been hiding something?” She turned to fix him with an amused smirk.
He shook his head. “It’s a loan. I’ve barely touched it, if truth be told.” Of course, truth not be told. He’d read it for hours the other day, and since then he was forever drawn back to it, but he wasn’t about to get into all that. Back in Borrowood, he’d been the first to laugh at jokes about the death of the faith. Caroline would gloat if she thought he’d gone religious after all. He didn’t need that from her.
“The man didn’t want to ease you in, obviously. This is a depressing book, Ian. I hated it every time I read through it.”
“How many times did you read through it?”
“Too many,” said Caroline. “There was a period when I couldn’t stop.”
“Even though you didn’t enjoy it?”
She nodded. “Even though I didn’t enjoy it.”
Ian frowned. “So why did you keep reading it?”
Caroline hesitated for a second. He could see her lip twitch as she made to speak, then thought better of it. “It spoke to me. Bits of it. In ways I’ve never felt since. The eulogy for Matheld cuts me up. And Emonie the huntress always made me tingle a bit inside.”
He hadn’t got to that part. “Fill me in. Emonie the huntress?”
“The one who got sick,” said Caroline. “She got sick, and then the tide came in and she couldn’t swim away, so she drowned. But of course it turned out she wasn’t dead after all. She died with her brother and her sister. Their funeral… I don’t know, I guess it made me think of Armand and Tessa—what it would be like if the three of us died. It was too easy to imagine Nana Raine sat on her little chair by the window, rocking herself quietly to sleep because she’s all alone. It felt so real a part of me still won’t accept that it wasn’t.”
“How can it have been real? You’re not dead, and neither’s Armand. Tessa wasn’t either, last I saw her—though that was some years ago now, I confess.”
Caroline smiled. “Tessa’s fine,” she said.
“And how are you? I’m not used to having visitors.”
She looked at him, for a long while she looked, and then suddenly she lurched forward towards him. He put his arms out to catch her as she fell forward, collapsing into him amid a wave of sobs. “I can’t do it anymore,” she said, her voice muted by the woollen sleeve she was speaking into. “Chris and me. I can’t cope.”
Ian felt suddenly awkward. He pivoted around, turning her so she was next to his bed and then pushing her lightly onto it. She gave the springs a test as she landed, and Ian quickly took a step back, before she felt the urge to come to him again. He couldn’t be too close to her. It wouldn’t be right.
“Can’t cope? What’s happened?”
“We had a row,” she said. “Stupid thing. Just a normal row like we always do, and I told him to find somewhere else to sleep. That was a few days ago now. I haven’t seen him since. He’s not been to the suite, Sergeant Marris won’t tell me where he’s going. It would be different if I could trust him, but I can’t. How do I know he’s not with some other woman?”
“He’s not,” said Ian, though he didn’t know for sure. For Dani’s memory, Chris had to be honest. Nothing else would make it all be worth it. And it had to be worth it.
“I found something,” said Caroline. “I don’t think Chris really understood what it was. I think he found it funny.”
“Well, is it funny?”
“No,” said Caroline. “Look, I hate that I’m putting this on you, but I have to tell somebody. My poor heart will burst if I keep this to myself, and then I’ll die.”
He’d never seen her looking so earnest. “What is it?” he said, biting back a spell of nervous laughter.
“A figurine. A man, carved in wood and then discarded like it’s nothing.”
“A figurine? In the lake?”
She nodded.
“Well, where is it? Can I see?”
Caroline shook her head. “I don’t have it with me. I daren’t. Ian, somebody’s after me. A while back, there was a man... I don’t know how, but he knew who I was, and he wasn’t friendly about it.”
Ian turned towards the door, thinking to call for Sergeant Pratley. “Have my security. I don’t need it, I can handle myself.” And it would make it easier to hide his meetings with Millie Farmer.
“It’s not my safety I’m worried about,” said Caroline. “Look, Ian, it’s with a girl up north at Plateau Watch. She doesn’t need anything, she’s keeping it safe, just... Her name’s Bessily. Bessily Edwards. If you hear the name, if someone so much as whispers it, find me.”
He gratefully shepherded Caroline out, asking Sergeant Pratley to escort her home. That was a masterstroke as far as he was concerned; with the Sergeant walking with Caroline, there’d be nobody to see as he headed to the northern fortress.
The air was brisk but clear, and the wind around him was actually comforting as he made the long walk, but two hours was longer than it had sounded in his head, and by the time the walls of Plateau Watch came into view his bollocks were beginning to chafe.
“Master Fitzhenry,” said a woman stood beside the main door, suddenly straightening. “What brings you here?”
“I’m looking for somebody,” he told her. “Bessily Edwards. Do you know her?”
Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.
The woman nodded. “I know Bessily. Let me take you to her.”
She led Ian through the fort, past several soldiers sat at breakfast, and all the way out the other side. It opened out into a yard, planted with infant crops and furnished with one incredible view of the hills and declensions all around it. Bessily Edwards, it turned out, wasn’t in the fort at all. She was instead to be found in the stables which had been built next to it. The soldier brought Ian to where a dark-haired woman was stood with an older gentleman, a tough bugger with a thick white moustache and leathery hands. Both looked curiously at Ian as he approached.
“Look lively, girl,” said the man. “That’s the Corrack.”
“Mister Fitzhenry wants to speak with Bess,” said the soldier.
The man looked at Ian, then turned to the dark-haired woman—Bessily, presumably. “You been getting up to mischief?”
“No, Master Speke,” she said, shaking her head.
“Don’t worry, Bessily hasn’t done anything wrong,” said Ian. “I’d just like a word, if possible.”
The man grunted. “I can spare her for five minutes. I can spare her for the whole day, if you want to take her. She’d get just as much work done.”
Ian thanked him and beckoned Bessily to follow him, walking until they were well out of earshot—and out from under the stable roof, too, in case there was a troublesome echo.
“I understand you’re acquainted with Doctor Ballard,” he said.
Bessily’s eyes widened—they were the same bright green as Caroline’s, he noted. “She told you—”
Ian shook his head. “I don’t know or care how you came to know her—I hope I don’t offend you in saying that. Caroline gave you something the other day, for safekeeping.”
Bessily nodded along.
Good. She knew what he was on about. He smiled. “I’d like to see it, if that’s not too much trouble.”
Bessily was hemming and hawing, dragging her boots in the dirt. “I’m not sure Doctor Ballard would like that.”
“It’s okay,” he said. “I’m a good friend of Caroline’s. In another life we might even have been married.”
“You’re not, though,” said Bessily. “Married, I mean.”
He shook his head. “No, I’m not. But that doesn’t mean I don’t need your help, Bessily. I’ve seen a similar figurine myself. I just want to know if the one Caroline found is similar.” It was a lie, but it was a justifiable one. Bessily wouldn’t show him anything otherwise. Caroline had done a good job instilling some distrust in the girl.
She thought for a second, then nodded. “Come with me,” she said. “It’s in my bedroom.”
It had been not long after noon when Caroline had paid her visit, but it was nearly evening when Ian finally made it back to his quarters—giving him just long enough to prepare for his rendezvous with Millie. It wasn’t even like Bessily Edwards had bestowed great hospitality upon him. She’d shown him the idol, ugly as it was, and then ushered him away. The poor thing had stopped to glance twice at every shadow that so much as danced. Ian had been glad to get away.
The way to the lake was hard to find even in twilight, when there was still a hint of the former day’s sun. The Northern Road, the road to Plateau Watch, would take him close, but it was too visible. It required a cut through the plaza, and there was no saying who might spy him there. So he was to take an alternative route. Much of the valley was bordered by steep cliffs; the more gentle slopes were filled with row on row of trees, dark silhouettes lurking and looming. These wooden sentinels were the repose of malignant spirits, so the stories claimed. Ian always liked ghost stories. He’d devoured them since he was old enough to read, learned all the hallmarks.
This was the period of his life when he came to regret reading so many of them. Here, alone in the near-darkness, wandering a strange land on the way to an illicit rendezvous, his imagination was king. Every shadow was a watcher. Every firefly a wisp-light. The distant shrieks of nocturnal birds were the wails of the dead. There wasn’t even a moon to give him light; the both of them had conspired to shroud his way with darkness. His heart was racing. Blood rushed to every extremity.
Now is not the time for an erection.
Caroline’s idol lingered in the crook of his mind. It had a sly grin, a devilish malevolence to its face. His head transposed sinister shadows over the top of the memory, and in that new light the figure attained a distinct hue of evil. He could well imagine some lumbering creature—not a man, but something in that ilk—hiding in the cover of the trees and their darkness. The idol had to have been based on something. Why was it safe to assume that it was just a crappy carving of a man? Was it not just as possible that it was an excellent representation of something unknown that wanted to eat his blood?
You’re being silly, Ian. You can’t eat blood.
He wondered why he’d arranged this. Not meeting Millie. She’d warm his bed for as long as she wanted to, and then probably disappear to her own life. He gave it a month, tops, before she got bored of him. Much longer and he’d end up getting bored of her. So the hookup wasn’t an issue. But he could have had her come to his chambers, or suggested anywhere else. He’d never even been to the lake. Caro had described it to him, in terse words. Up the western face of the valley, between the trees, then north a bit, then east. The sort of specific directions that were invaluable.
Still, he had plenty of time. How far off course could he go?
I bet those soldiers thought the same thing. Poor buggers.
Months without a trace. Surely by now they’d at least have found some bones or something.
He was thankful he’d brought a coat. The still air was perfectly temperate, but there was an icy breeze that blew every now and then, and it bit. Every gust whistled wildly amidst the ranks of faceless trees. It was as if they had grown in those specific spots to funnel frigid air directly at Ian. He could see in his mind’s eye the savage smiles of the arboreal spirits who had spread those seeds long ago.
If there were Gods, they were dicks. A kind god would quell the wind and light his way to the lake, maybe fill his pockets with freshly-minted bushels as well. He held his hands up to the sky, challenging Lightness Skerrett’s beloved Gods to prove their benevolence.
It started to rain.
“Fuck you,” Ian shouted, pulling the collar on his coat up as far as it would reach. He pressed on. Lost.
And then, just as thoughts of giving in and going back home started to linger in his mind, he found it. The lake. Well, a lake, in any case, and a huge one. He could scarcely see the far shore. Darkness and rain had done a number on visibility, and in the light of day it was probably impossible to miss the other side, but there was nothing to say that it wasn’t an endless lake. Nothing but a few floating lights. If he really squinted, perhaps that was the shadow of a person he could see passing in front of one of the lights? But then again, perhaps it was something different altogether. In a lot of old stories, there were strange floating lights—ghost lights, they were called. Harbingers of some ominous future. Perhaps that was what he could see. Who would be camping up here on a night like this?
But then, he’d come up here for a cheap fuck. Who was he to judge the motives of anybody else?
Millie Farmer had beaten him here. She was sat on a patch of sandy grass, a dozen feet from the waterline. Nobody had filled her in on the weather situation; her arms and her legs were bare and goosepimpled, and she was shivering gently. She brightened when Ian sat beside her. “I didn’t think you’d come,” she said. “I figured you’d think I was crazy and stay away. Or bring a load of armed guards to arrest me.” She shot a look behind her. “You didn’t bring armed guards, did you?”
“If I wanted you arrested, it would have been when you made a scene at the Lord Constable’s tower. Don’t forget that my sergeant had you in custody then.”
“Oh.”
A violent shiver took her. Ian sighed inwardly, then removed his coat and draped it around her. Typical that he had to be the one who was cold. “Here’s how this is going to work,” he said. “You don’t know me. I will initiate contact, or else Sergeant Pratley will on my behalf. He’s the man who caught you this morning. This is only sex—any lovey shit and I will have you arrested.”
“Arrested for lovey shit?”
“Okay, not arrested.” The cold had got to Millie’s face, he noticed. Her cheeks were blushing. Dani Carrigan had been a blusher. This Millie had better not go too close to the water. He found himself leaning closer towards her, breathing in the aura of honeysuckle and angel’s breath. “You know what, the lovey shit’s fine.”
A nightbird hooted. Ian could see the glow of its eyes. How long had it been watching them? They were both sweaty and exhausted, in states of partial undress. The rain, thankfully, had stopped, but the lake water had only made the wind stronger. He reached for his coat. It wasn’t where he’d left it. Millie was wearing only the dress he’d found her in.
The coat had been cast off at some point. He couldn’t remember whether it was him or Millie who had thrown it, but they’d done so carelessly. “No, no, no.” He dashed forward to retrieve the coat, and too late. It had landed in the water, and begun to slowly sink. By the time he grabbed it, it was half-sunk and quite waterlogged.
So they’d both be shivering on the way back home.
The rain’s end meant that Ian could see across the water. There were lights, a dozen of them. He squinted to see what was around them. By now, night had fallen completely. He could just about make out the odd silhouette passing in front of one of the lights. Very little else.
The faint sound of voices, maybe?
“Was that to your liking, Master Fitzhenry?”
“Ssh.” He strained his ears. It was definitely voices he could hear. Men talking. They were too far away for him to make out their words.
Somewhere behind him, a dead leaf crunched. He snapped his head round. There was someone moving just beyond the treeline. If they caught him with a woman who wasn’t his wife...
“We need to move,” he whispered, pulling Millie to her feet.
“I need to dress myself,” she moaned. “I can’t go to Mistress Snyder half-naked, she’ll have my hide.”
“Now.”
He picked up everything he could see abandoned on the ground, and made a diagonal north-east. His intention was to get in the cover of the trees as soon as possible without running directly into the approaching figure, and he hoped he’d picked the right direction.
He was running too fast. He’d forgotten that he was dragging Millie along by her arm, and she couldn’t keep up. Halfway to the trees she stumbled and fell, and that was it. He went down too. His knees took the full force of the landing. They’d be bleeding, undoubtedly, but there was no time to check.
Floorbound, he made a quick mental calculation. The woods were too far away still, and they wouldn’t be thick enough immediately to keep them out of sight. None of the trees’ trunks were wide enough to hide behind. Just a short way to his right, though, was a large rock, sticking out of the ground. They could crawl that far.
Millie made a noise of complaint as he tugged on her arm, but he ignored her. He ducked behind the rock, and made sure Millie was behind it too. “Keep down,” he hissed.
Then he poked his head round the side of the rock, tentatively. They’d made it just in time. The walker was already emerging into the open. His boots were heavy as he trudged along the ground.
The mint moon was full tonight. Moonlight caught his face at just the right angle, and for a moment the man was brightly lit. It made his identity unmistakeable.
The question, therefore, was why Oliver Wrack had come to the lake at night.