Indigo - The Swordswoman's Tale - Chapter 3

Chapter 3

A Rescue - a Duel - What Came After

Of course, I had no intention of dueling the Baronet.

I find myself imagining you, whoever you are, reading this; sometimes I think you are my Queen, no matter that I know she is dead. Sometimes - now, as I scratch these words on parchment, and my girls have sleepily gone away to their own bed, and my tea has gone cold and it is too late to ring for more, though the summer’s night is cool and rain blows through the open windows and I am filled with too many memories - my imagination turns bitter, and I see you as you most likely are: a tight-lipped priest of my Lord Codlatan, with a sour disposition and a paunch in your belly, mopping the disapproving sweat from your brow as you catalog the sins within these pages before they are burned. (And I hope your yard has stiffened at least once as you read, perhaps so much you had to pull and stroke it for release, and that the shame of spilling your seed has driven you to mortify your flesh, perhaps with a whip, or a hair shirt; I would hate to think my words have no effect.) I fancy now I hear you gasp, as I tell you: though I accepted the Baronet’s challenge in the hall, I would not be seeing it through. “But,” you say, your voice choked and flustered, “what of honor?” Perhaps, you stammer. “Ah,” I say, lifting the cup of cold tea to my lips, “what of it?” I sip. “I have no need of it.” And your face flushes with outrage, and your lips screw up in a sneer. “How,” you say, “like a woman.”

Indeed. Well, I say this to you: Women in this hateful world cannot afford morals, or honor, not with the way you treat them, you men and all your talk of “honor.” And if, through the deception I began so long ago, I have avoided more than my share of what you deem a woman’s lot. What of it? I still learned the lesson long ago, as every girl who hopes to grow into a woman must. Let the baronet cling to his honor; I take what I want, because I can, and damn the consequences. A pox on you and your honor.

And now I read those words I wrote last night, and I sigh. Fine sentiments, perhaps, when it is late at night, and one stares out the rain-slicked window and imagines raising a fist to one’s enemies, mouthing a speech fit for one of Tenemus’s plays; another to awaken, alone, with aching head and muzzled wits and old wounds sore and creaking with the damp, and to read them scratched in haste on good parchment. I contemplated screwing it up and starting over, but decided not to. I have nothing to hide, or will, when I am done. Especially not my follies. And that little diatribe was such a small one. There is a kernel of truth to it, besides.

No, instead, I got out of my bed, and almost immediately slipped upon the silken dressing gown Eliza had let fall the evening before. I picked it up, and the pair of drawers, the chemise Lucy had torn, or perhaps I’d torn, a pair of stockings - rather, one of a pair; its mate seemed to have been lost. And them fine clocked silk bought in Cydonia and imported from the East. And I stood there a moment, casting about for their proper places - and then I stopped, shook my head, smiled, and tossed the handsful of lace and silk upon my bed. Clarissa, of course, will put them away, and further take the chemise to Mrs. Woolf for repair. I am not used to having servants; they came to me late in life, and servants, really, are something one must have been trained to almost from birth to make good use of. (Otherwise, they make good use of you, and you and your home run to their liking, not yours. Then, worse things have happened to me.) Chuckling, I dressed myself in harem pants (a costume I find most comfortable for lounging about mornings, or late nights), and the discarded dressing gown, and a pair of old slippers. I rang for Clarissa, rolled a cigarette with the Baronet’s device, and sat by the balcony, its glassed doors open (it is still raining, lightly, but the air is cool and refreshing), and sat down to resume this latest chapter in my narrative. Which, I am afraid, has gotten off to a rocky start. So. To begin again:

I had no intention of dueling the Baronet. Then, I had every reason to suspect he had no intention of dueling me - which was why I’d had my man, Monsieur Orphé, stand guard outside the girls’ door. As I met him there, he proved to me my suspicions were not unfounded.

“A man has been here twice now. Most insistent.”

“Where is he now?” I asked.

“Downstairs. He is too fat, and breathes heavily, climbing the stairs.”

“Fetch the carriage, and bring it under the window of this room. Hurry.”

He touched his hand to his forehead and left.

I might have had some trouble had Molly been more resolute in keeping up with the fashion in locks. I had occasion once, in service to my Queen, to try one of Chihuly’s new patent barrel locks, and was nearly a full hour crouching in a dimly lit hall, trying to get two small springy bits of metal to stay still, finding the proper pressure to twist and spring it open by touch alone. Fiendish little things. But this was a simple tongue-and-groove that I could have easily forced with my dagger, though that would have made too much noise. Instead, it fell to the skeleton key I keep tucked away in my purse for just this sort of emergency. A quiet snick, a tiny squeak of hinges, a creak of floorboards, and I was inside.

But Eliza was awake already, and looked up, eyes wide, as I slipped into the room. A small stub of a candle flickered uncertainly on the low table by their bed. Lucy still slept, her head pillowed on her sister’s lap. Eliza pulled the sheets up to her waist, careful of her sister. Her chemise was still unlaced, and one hand leapt up to hold it shut. Her hair spilled down in disarray, and her mouth pursed in a small moue of disapproval, a schoolgirl’s attempt to gather dignity. “You,” she said.

“Me,” I said. I locked the door and crossed swiftly to the window. It was narrow, but wide enough, and though we were only on the second floor, it was too high to jump or drop safely. I would need some rope. I threw the window open and secured it.

“I heard voices. My father’s. What is wrong?”

“Much. What do you have that you cannot bear to part with?” In the corner I could see two trunks, one larger than the other, but both great heavy things, with frames of oak, wrapped in leather.

“I do not understand. I am traveling back to school; that trunk has some of my books, and all of my clothing.”

Lucy stirred. “Eliza?”

“Shh.”

“You don’t understand,” I said. I couldn’t yet hear the sounds of Orphé bringing the carriage round, but it did take time to rouse the horses and harness them. “There is turmoil in the kingdom. The Queen is about to die. Your father has put you in my charge, for safekeeping, and we have very little time.”

“Father!” said Lucy, a quiet little cry, and she sat up abruptly. The sheet fell away from them both, revealing Eliza’s long legs, her black stockings still neatly rolled above her knees, her white thighs pressed tightly together as her other hand leapt to tug her chemise down, over her hips. Lucy’s chemise fell from one shoulder, unnoticed, as she stared at me with wide eyes.

“It’s all right, Lucy,” said Eliza, reaching out to tug her sister’s chemise back into place. “It is most improper for you to be here, sir.”

I was once again feeling that lightness of head, that weakness of knee. “I do many things that are improper, but trust me.” I smiled. “It is for your safety. Is there anything in those trunks that you must have?”

“Why do you not retreat from the room, sir, and allow us both to dress more properly?” asked Eliza. “Better yet, why not wait until morning?”

I let my smile drop and crossed the room in two strides, snapping my hand out to catch her chin between thumb and forefinger and lift her face. Her eyes flashed with sudden fear and anger, even as Lucy gasped and squirmed away from me. “Listen closely,” I said, “and keep quiet, or I shall gag you with those sheets and carry you out over my shoulders. We are to make our escape now, this very night, and we are to travel as lightly and as quickly as possible. Your father wants you safe and away from the coming troubles, and I intend to see that you are. Is that clear?”

And still she had the fire to glare at me and say, wrenching her jaw from my hand, “Forgive me if I find you hard to believe.”

I slapped her, not hard, but quick, so that it stung, and surprised her. Her cloudy green eyes teared up and she lifted her hand slowly from the hem of her chemise to her flushed cheek. “That,” I said, “is immaterial.” Outside, I could hear hooves clopping into the innyard; I leaned out the window to see Orphé leading the carriage from behind the stables.

Of course, I had not bound myself, nor had I buttoned my jacket. Lucy gasped, catching sight, no doubt, of my breasts, small as they are, pushing out my weskit. “You are a woman!”

“Yes,” I said. “Get out of that bed, the both of you, and take only what you can carry from your trunks.”

“Our clothing,” said Eliza.

“I will buy you more clothing. Now is not the time for modesty or propriety. Move!”

Eliza stood, slowly, the hem of her chemise falling to its resting place, midway between her hips and her knees. She laced it up between her breasts and pulled it tight, her face still taut from the shock of my slap. I held out my hand to Lucy, who still cowered on the bed; she looked to Eliza, who nodded curtly, before reaching out to take it. I pulled her slowly up and to her feet. Eliza is almost my height, tall for a girl, and Lucy comes up only to her nose. But for that, and their eyes, one might easily mistake them for twins. Eliza pulled Lucy to her, and the sisters clutched each other, their eyes still fearful. I reached out, and stroked their cheeks in turn, first Lucy, then Eliza; then, leaning in on a sudden impulse, I kissed Eliza on the forehead, thrilling at the touch of my lips to her warm, sweat-dewed skin. I drew back to see her eyes still fearful, and Lucy still looking on with some concern. My hand still against Eliza’s cheek, I blotted away the tear from her eye as gently as I could with my thumb. “I am sorry I slapped you,” I said. Her hand clutched mine, circling my wrist with her small fingers; it was hot, and damp, with anxiety. “Truly, I mean you no harm. Please. Get your things. We leave in two minutes.”

“Who are you?” whispered Eliza.

I did not answer. Monsieur Orphé was calling to me, hoarsely, from beneath the window: “Lady!”

I went to the window and leaned out as, behind me, the sisters went to their trunks in a rustle of linen and wool. “Throw me the rope,” I called down to him. The carriage was below the window, and Orphé sat his perch in the driver’s seat, almost high enough for me to snatch the old top hat from his head. He lifted the rope from the bench beside him - bless his foresight! - and threw its soft, heavy coils up to me. The bed was already wedged into place between the wall and the window sill; I tugged on it, to satisfy myself that it would not move, then began tying the rope about the bedpost. Eliza knelt before her trunk, lifting out three or four small octavo volumes. Lucy stood beside her, hugging her bare arms closely to herself, watching me with an unreadable expression in her fierce blue eyes. Eliza began tugging a dress from the trunk, something black and stiff. “Leave it,” I barked.

“But,” she said, looking up, “what will we--”

“Leave it,” I said. “I have told you I will buy you more clothing. Come here.”

She stood, slowly, reluctantly, clasping the books to her breast.

“Come here,” I repeated, perhaps a bit more firmly.

I watched her as she walked, careful of the feet of her stockings on the old wood floor. Her eyes were downcast. I held out my hand to draw her in, and as I gripped her shoulder I looked past her to see Lucy again. Lucy had not moved, and though her right hand still clutched her left arm, lifting her small breasts, holding in place the chemise that once again was sliding off her shoulder, her left hand had dropped and was - unconsciously? - rubbing at the bare white skin of her thigh, between the ivory hem of her chemise and the top of her black stocking, two inches above her knee. Her right stocking had unrolled below her knee, falling to the smooth swell of her calf. When I tore my gaze from her legs back to her face, was there a hint of a smile there? Then, I did not think so; now, I’m not so sure.

But Eliza was there, almost in my arms. “Give me your books,” I said.

Wordlessly, she handed them to me. The top volume, I noticed, was from Lucas’s interminable History of Cydonia. Leaning out the window, I called to Orphé, and dropped them into his hands.

“Now,” I said. I sat on the windowsill, bracing one foot on it. “Come here.” She took a step closer to me, her eyes still downcast. “Closer.” She looked up then, a question in her eyes. “We are about to leave this room through the window,” I said. “Unless you can safely climb down a rope, you’re going to need to hold tightly to me as I carry you down.”

She drew herself up then, and looked me in the eye, her mouth once more in that schoolgirl’s defiant purse. The slap was wearing off, perhaps, or the unreality of the situation was bearing in on her again; really, this isn’t the sort of thing they teach you at girls’ schools, the proper etiquette for a nighttime escape in one’s underthings, with a madwoman in trousers. I grabbed her by the arm and pulled her to me, hoping the shock would keep her off- balance, docile. It seemed to me then that Lucy looked to her sister for direction, and that if I could control Eliza, I would hold them both. “Sit upon my lap,” I said. “Do it.”

The purse of her lips melted, and the flash in her eyes flickered and died as her face slackened. Unaware, and rather fetchingly, I thought, she worried at her lower lip with her teeth as she took one stumbling step closer to me, and turned to sit side-saddle on my braced thigh.

“That won’t do,” I said. “I must hold the rope,” and I lifted it, by way of example, “with both hands. You must hold onto me, and tighter than that.” Dropping the rope on the sill, I braced her back with my left hand as, with my right, I took hold of the soft skin of her thigh and lifted her leg, turning her about so she sat astraddle me. (And if I were looking down then, and thrilled to see what I suspected, that in the heat of the still late summer’s night, she had gone to sleep without a scratchy pair of knickers? If I caught a brief glimpse of a small patch of blond hair and a pair of pink lips before I pulled her snug to me, and felt the heat of her against my belly, and knew that she was perhaps not so proper as she put on airs to be? More fool me, then, to let my head float with thoughts of the taste of schoolgirls, to let my heart skip a beat at the thought of her beauty in my hands. There were questions raised here that I did not ponder, warnings I did not heed. Then, why should I have behaved any differently now than at any other point in my life? I plunged headlong down the course that would bring her to my hand, and had damned the consequences long before.) And she gasped, frightened, throwing her arms about my neck as I took hold of the rope and leaned back, out the window. Looking over her shoulder, past her cloud of blond hair, I saw her sister, standing still across the room, tugging now at the hem of her chemise. I caught her with my eyes. “Stay still and say nothing,” I said, firmly. “I will be right back.” And then I toppled backwards out the window, as Eliza clutched at me, a little shriek escaping her lips.

My muscles protested as I walked slowly down the side of the inn, and the rope burned the skin of my palms. I wished I’d had the foresight to pull on gloves. Eliza was not so heavy as Molly, but only just; and I am, as I have said, getting old. And at any moment I expected the front door to burst open, to see the Baronet there, rapier gleaming in the night, to stop this horrible monster from making off with his girls. My heart was in my throat, and my blood raced, intoxicated on a heady draught of fear and lust, and my legs quivered, my arms ached, my ribs creaked as Eliza clung to me, murmuring a prayer to Our Lady under her breath, her lips fluttering warm and damp just above the skin of my neck, where she’d buried her face, her eyes, no doubt, shut tight.

Monsieur Orphé met us at the bottom, lifting Eliza from my arms as she whimpered and clung to me for a moment. He did so easily, tugging gently until she let go, catching her under her knees with one arm and her armpits with the other, holding her before him with no visible effort, so that she could lean against his broad chest. He stood still, waiting for some word as to what to do next, and I stood a moment too, the rope in one hand. I looked at Eliza there in his arms, her chemise bunched around her hips, the sweet curves of her legs in the black stockings, the bare white swell of her buttocks. I reached out and brushed her cheek with my fingertips, and she shrank from my touch.

“Make her comfortable in the carriage,” I said, “and keep her safe. I’ll be back in a moment.”

He nodded, and I turned and, with heavy, aching arms, climbed back up to their window.

I could hear the pounding even as I reached up for the sill. “Lucy! Eliza! Girls! Answer me!” The Baronet’s gruff voice lent me strength and speed, so that I almost flew through the window, landing in a crouch, my hand on the hilt of my sword. Lucy stood where I had left her, her right hand still clutching her left arm, her left hand smoothing the hem of her chemise nervously. She had a small, excited smile on her face, and her eyes shone, which gave me pause.

“Girls!” The doorknob rattled, then the pounding resumed. “You must let me in! You are in danger!”

I stood, beckoning to Lucy, and she half-ran across the room, flinging herself upon me. Startled, I staggered backwards, and she nearly fell before I caught her. She wrapped her legs about my waist and her arms about my neck, and I thrilled to feel the bare skin of her buttocks and thighs in my hands. She was lighter than her sister; still, her unexpected exuberance nearly knocked us both to the floor, or even backwards, out the window.

There was one final blow to the door, a heavy one, a kick, perhaps, and a “Blast!” Then the sound of footsteps, pounding down the hall to the stairs.

We would have to be fast, faster than the rope. I turned towards the window. “Duck your head down, girl,” I muttered, “so I can see.” Shifting her weight as well as I could to one hand, I lifted the other to brush her floating blond curls from my eyes.

“You’ve come to take us away,” she whispered, in a small, light voice.

“Yes,” I said, after a moment.

“Good,” she said, and, to my astonishment, she pressed a small but definite kiss to my throat.

I took hold of the window frame with one hand. “Hold on tight,” I said. “This will be hard. I need both hands.”

Her arms and legs tightened about me, and I leaned so that most of her weight fell on my shoulders and above my hips. I grabbed the window frame with the other hand and, stepping up to the sill, levered us up onto it. “Duck,” I said, and, balancing precariously there, made sure nothing would catch when we jumped. I looked down as much as I could, but I couldn’t see past her shoulder. I remembered where the roof of the carriage was, below us, but that isn’t the same as seeing it.

“Oh,” she said, and I felt her shiver there, as if from pleasure, or a chill.

“Here we go,” I said, and jumped.

Luckily, I did not catch the luggage bar with my head, or across my back; luckily, my sword did not catch, to thrust its hilt into my side, or Lucy’s. I managed to land mostly on my buttocks and my feet, so that I did not roll on top of her, and though she is lighter than her sister, still, she was more than enough to knock my breath from me, and stun me.

“Lady!” I heard Orphé cry, and felt the carriage shake as he climbed up to the roof.

Lucy was laughing breathlessly, uncaring that one foot was pinned beneath us. She grabbed my head in her hands and pressed kisses on my cheeks and forehead and one long one on my mouth, her sweet lips closed but pursed, melding themselves to mine; a little girl’s kiss, a sister’s kiss. “Oh,” she said, “oh.”

“Lucy,” I said, “get up--”

“Monster!” bellowed the Baronet, and Lucy jerked her head up, her mouth tightening into a slim, expressionless line.

“Oh,” she said. “Him.”

I pushed her up and off of me, and Orphé was there, helping, his dark hands shocking against her pale flesh. The sudden blast of danger had cleared my head; I no longer wasted time surreptitiously stealing glances, watching for a flash of cunny, the chemise to slip from her shoulder, baring a nipple pale in the cool starlight. As soon as Lucy was disentangled from me, half-limp in Orphé’s arms, I scrambled to my feet. “What shall I do?” asked Orphé, his eyes also fixed on a point behind me.

I turned, there on the roof of the carriage.

The Baronet stood there, in the doorway of the inn, silhouetted in the lurid light of a fire. In one hand he held a bare blade, an epée from the looks of it; his other held a knife, and that knife was pressed against Molly’s throat. She stood before him, clutching a sheet to cover her nakedness, pinned by his curled knife-arm.

“Let them go,” he yelled, his voice harsh. “There’s still time to save the place.”

“Go,” I said to Orphé. “I’ll catch up.”

Wordlessly, lifting Lucy with one arm, he turned to take his seat, clucking to the horses. I stepped to the edge of the carriage and, as it jolted into motion, stepped off it, falling lightly to the ground. The carriage rattled toward the gates, Lucy’s laughter pealing in its wake.

“Your choice,” I called to the Baron, walking slowly towards him. “Chase your daughters, or settle with me.”

His eyes flicked from the departing carriage to me and back. I was close enough now to see him lick his lips.

“No decision?” I said. I picked up my pace, and drew my sword from its sheath. “Fine. Close enough to first light for my taste.” It was a tricky move. I couldn’t do it fast enough to startle him into motion, but had to press him so that he couldn’t decide, couldn’t realize that this was, indeed, happening. I watched his eyes widen as I lifted the sword to shoulder height, watched him mull his options in those small black eyes sunk into his lined and weathered face, but too late. I lifted the blade up at an angle and then whipped it down, just missing Molly’s face and shoulder to slash his cheek and ear. Swearing, he did just what I wanted him to; stumbled back from Molly, letting go of her as his clapped his knife-hand to his wounded face (he kept hold of the knife, damn him), trying to get room to raise his sword. Molly tripped over her sheet and fell, trying to get out from between us. I skipped to one side, slashing at his sword arm, and he fell back from my blow just in time. I drew him away from her, trying to give her time to escape. A referee would have called off the duel at this point, given the Baronet the victory for my un-gentlemanly conduct, but I wasn’t trying to duel him. I was trying to kill him.

The burning inn was already hot enough to be uncomfortable, and bright enough to put me at a slight disadvantage. Patrons were already stumbling outside, though it sounded like more than one was trying to put out the fire. I feinted high, then as his blade jerked up to parry (slow, and fat) slashed down at his unprotected belly. He caught the blow on his knife-arm, and cried out. “Blast you!”

I slashed again and again, herding him away from the inn, and from Molly. Someone was helping her to her feet. “Indigo!” she cried, I think. He settled into the classic Estravi stance, his side to me, his knife hand back and high, and seemed puzzled by my own: squarely facing him, sword down, almost touching the dirt. His face screwed up, almost as if he were about to protest, and then settled into something approximating resolve. The moment before he decided to strike, I stepped quickly to one side and in, thrusting at his back; alarmed, he fell back, his sword swinging awkwardly to one side to try to parry. A simple flick of my wrist and my blade nicked his sword arm, blooding him a third time. His face was pale, and gleamed in the firelight with nervous sweat. “What,” he said. “What.”

I toyed with him. I prowled back and forth before him, lashing my blade like the tail of a restless cat, and he started at every move. I suppose I had it in mind to try and break him from his rigid stance, and I thrust once or twice at his legs, but he still goggled at me, shuffling, turning to keep his side fixed towards me, his knife wavering there above his head in a wrist too tightly held to do any good, as if we were in some narrow hallway at Oxbridge, settling a point of honor over a chambermaid, a number of black-gowned, disreputable dons placing bets on who’d be the first to yield. It soon palled. Abruptly, I turned my back on him, took two steps away.

“Wait,” he said, his voice already hoarse with effort, or fear.

“Lady’s sake, man,” I snarled, spinning to face him. He hadn’t advanced at all, still stood there, knife up, sword trembling in his pudgy, white hand. “I’m trying to kill you! Do something!” His knife jerked in his hand as he took a shuffling step towards me. A drop of blood fell from it to stain his shirt, above the reddened slash I’d made across his paunch. His knife gleamed darkly with blood. Yet he hadn’t touched me.

I spun back to face the inn.

Molly lay sprawled some yards from the door, where one of the patrons, an older woman in worn grey clothes and a shawl had dragged her. The sheet, half torn away, was black with blood that seeped into the dust. Two men ran inside, carrying buckets of water from the stable, as I took a step towards her, then another. “Molly?” I called, gently.

—Perhaps the knife twisted in his hand, slick with her blood; perhaps I saved myself with the spontaneous gesture I made, reaching out to her with my left hand as I took another step. Perhaps killing someone was merely something the Baronet, in the end, could not do. The blade snagged on my jacket and turned, raking a burning line along my shoulder and upper arm and ruining the cloth as it ripped free. If he’d followed up, if he’d used his sword at all, I’d have died that night. Instead, he staggered to a halt, a numb look on his face as I didn’t fall down, but turned and struck in one motion. I had no leverage or depth for a true thrust, but nonetheless managed to sink half the blade’s length through his chest and out his back. I left it there, quivering, as I walked across the innyard to Molly. My hands shook and my head was full of rushing blood. I felt taut, tightened to the breaking point, as if some sudden move would shatter me.

She may have tried to reach out to me, but she was too weak, even then. I knelt beside her. “Careful,” said the old woman.

“She’s dying,” I said, more of a statement than a question.

“No excuse,” said the old woman.

Molly’s eyes already were distant, and wet; her mouth worked absently, trying to speak, to draw a breath. “You,” she said. I heard her. She frowned. My legs trembled, with exertion, with fear. Every breath I took fluttered in my lungs and did no good. I tried to touch her, but my fingers were numb. I bent to kiss her, but her lips was slack, and cooling.

I stood, pressing the back of my hand to my mouth, defying the sobs that threatened to wrack me.

“You!” the Baronet George Ponsonby roared weakly, his voice full of hate. I turned to look on him, the man who’d watched me frig Molly in the hall, who’d killed her somehow, who’d given one daughter to a Dukelet and tried to sell me another. He’d dropped his sword, and pointed at me with his knife, listing alarmingly to one side as blood poured down his shirt and trickled from his gut. My sword’s hilt bobbed as he took a step not so much forward as to one side. “You.” He tried to take another step, but fell to one knee, blinking as he hit, heavily. His knife did not waver. “I curse you,” he said, “in the name...” He blinked again. “In the name...”

“Too late,” I said. Taking hold of the sword, I planted my boot on his chest and shoved him over backwards, pulling my blade free. Blood bubbled up in the wound from his failing heart, and spilled down his throat, staining his ivory hair. Plucking aside his bloodied jacket, I fumbled through his pocket, finding the curious little cigarette box and pulling it free.

“You monster,” he whispered. I kicked him, hard, in the head. And again. And it feels good even now, when the scratch he left on my shoulder merely itches, to write those words. I killed him, and it hurt him terribly, and he had time to realize what had been done to him, and why. And then I kicked him when he was down. Too many who deserve just that never get it, in the end.

The inn burned, but the rough team of disgruntled guests had done an admirable job of containing it, fetching water in a chain first from the stable’s trough, then from the well itself, further away. They fell still as I strode toward them, bloodied sword in my hand. Inside, I could see the lanterns Ponsonby had smashed, strewing the oil about, the tables that had been scorched, the one blackened wall. Fire still licked at the bar. I stepped behind it and took hold of the shelf full of pretty bottles of whiskies and brandies and pulled it down, sending the liquor smashing to the floor. The fire licked at it and spread, quickly. Grabbing a surviving lantern, I threw it up the stairs, where it smashed on the landing. One of the bucket brigade, a beefy man with a full black beard, stared at me from the doorway as if I were mad. “Get out!” I roared at him, brandishing my blade. He fell back. The others did, too, as I stalked out into the innyard, and knelt by Molly. The old woman had gone. I closed Molly’s eyes for the last time and awkwardly lifted her in my arms, and felt a tear leak from my eye as my back ached, and my legs trembled, and she did not reach her arm around to steady herself, and her head hung limply, and did not lift to press a kiss to my cheek. I carried her into the burning inn and laid her on the floor, close to her pyre of liquor. I stood there a moment, in the heat, and saw the sheet catch fire. I could not bear to watch any more. Blinking away more tears, I seized a chair leg and made sure it was well aflame. Stalking back outside, I heaved my torch onto the roof, firing the thatch. “Go!” I roared once more, at the huddled crowd at the far end of the yard.

I stole a horse. The light of the burning inn stained the sky behind me in a lurid parody of dawn for an hour or more, before I topped the Wandike and started down its steeper western face. A mile beyond, on a small rise before the first thickets of the Coursan woods, I came across the carriage, close by a low and spreading oak, magnificently full in his late summer foliage, and dark in the early morning light. Orphé had hobbled the horses nearby, and built a fire. Eliza knelt before it, wrapped in a blanket. She stood as I cantered up the slope, clutching the blanket to her. I swung off the horse as it slowed, walking towards the others, and strode up to Eliza.

“What’s happening?” she asked. I grabbed her hands and pushed her back before me, until she fetched up hard against the side of the carriage, and I lifted her hands and pinned them above her head. The blanket fell open. She still wore her chemise, but had at some point removed her stockings. Fear flashed deep in her eyes.

“Where is your sister?” I asked, my voice as calm as I could make it. Unnamable thoughts had fluttered around my brain as I rode away from Molly’s pyre, and now that I found myself at my goal they crowded about my throat, and made speaking difficult. I had to hunt for the right words. I had no idea what I wanted - or rather, I knew what I wanted, what I had to have: I wanted to throw her to the ground and enter her, smash into her, plunge deep inside and through her until I felt some sort of release, some sort of emptiness; but I could not, I cannot. This need kept my face fixed, and made words hard to come by, and my actions rougher, fiercer than they needed to be. —If it is not an excuse for what happened next, it is something of an explanation.

“Lucy,” she said, after a long moment, “Lucy is inside, sleeping. I don’t know where the man went... you’re bleeding--”

“Your father,” I said, fumbling with the catch for my rapier’s sheath, “would have sold one of you to me. Which?” Finally, I ripped it from my belt, snapping the lanyard, and threw it away, into the grass.

“What?” she asked, her voice flat with disbelief.

“He was not rich. I doubt you were attending one of the better academies. One of My Lady’s convents, I don’t doubt, taking in girls to help with the rent. Am I right?”

“You’re bleeding,” she said. “You smell of smoke. And blood. Oh, Lady,” she said, “oh, please...”

“Do you like it?” I asked, and I sneered, perhaps. “Some women find it an aphrodisiac. The reek of blood, of sweat, smoke and hot metal. It means their lovers have fought. Perhaps for them.” But she was shaking her head, slowly. “I’m going to wager something, Eliza. I’ve made many wagers in my life, and I’ve won most of them.” I shrugged one arm out of my jacket then, keeping her hands pinned against the smooth wood of the carriage, shrugged out of the jacket entirely. I winced at the pain in my arm. “So I’m not used to losing.” With my free hand, hardly knowing what I was doing, I began unbuttoning my weskit. “Keep that in mind. In this convent school, did you ever see what My Lady’s ladies do at night?” I ripped at the lacings of my shirt. Somewhere, unnoticed, my ruff had fallen away. In my room? During the escape, or the fight? “Did you ever see them put off their black gowns?” Her eyes never left mine, dulled now with fear and disbelief, her voice stilled. Her arms trembled in my hand. Her mouth fell open, slightly, no moue of disapproval, now, but an unconscious pout that unknowingly begged to be ravaged. “Did you ever see My Lady’s face with a painted smile?” And I forced my hand between her knees then, though she held them tightly together, and I forced my way along her thighs, though she tried to stop me.

“Please,” she said, “what--”

I swooped in until my nose almost touched hers and I felt her breath stirring my hair, lank and chilled with sweat. “Did you learn what they mean when they speak of honey-sipping?”

She said nothing; she did not nod, nor did she shake her head. But when I crushed her mouth beneath my own she pressed her lips shut only briefly, then opened them, hesitantly, for my tongue; and the grip she held on her thighs relaxed with a shiver, and my thumb, roughly, had her, and I found my way inside her schoolgirl’s purse. And she was warm in the cool dawn air, and wet with more than dew. I had my answer. I was quite rough, as if forcing my thumb deep within her, as if pinching her anus with my fingers, as if driving my thigh between hers and pressing her back against the carriage, holding her helpless there, sucking the breath out of her mouth as she panted and cried out, as if this would in some fashion release me. But I wanted her lost in herself, I wanted her bucking with pleasure, I wanted her to acknowledge me, to need me, I wanted to carry her to the very edge and leave her there begging until I so chose to topple her over it. I wanted this somehow to make up for Molly; I wanted her to take something from me she needed before I told her how her father had died. And though all of this is inarticulable, and quite impossible, in the end, roughly fucking her with my thumb and harshly jerking hips would get me no closer to my goal. She did not struggle, but she gasped beneath my lips, and her eyes squeezed shut in a wince of pain, not glory. I slowed myself, stopped, though my blood raced on. I kissed her, tenderly, softly, and felt her lips stir and open to me with slow wonder. My shoulder ached, and burned, from holding her arms up, and I let them go. She did not push me away. I slipped my thumb out of her and caressed her, gently, as her arms floated about me, and her tongue licked at my mouth.

“Who,” she said, “who are you?” as her fingers brushed my wound, and I hissed with pain. “Oh,” she said.

“Pay it no mind,” I said, but she held up her hand, and her fingers were red with fresh blood. Her eyes widened. “Shh,” I said, though she said nothing, and I took her hand in mine, as my other gripped her buttocks, as her legs parted more to allow me closer to her, and closer. I kissed her fingertips, tasting briefly the copper tang of my blood, then pressed her hand to my open shirt, wiping the rest away.

“You’re not a man,” she said.

“No,” I said. I kissed her fingertips again.

“Your breasts are very small,” she said. She tugged her hand free and reached out, to touch my left breast, to roll my nipple beneath her thumb. “Who are you? What is to become of us?”

She hissed in pleasure as I stroked her pussy again, velvety, and hot. “My name,” I said, “is Indigo.” I kissed her again, and this time she was eager, her body throwing off the cares and concerns of propriety. And then I knelt before her, and as she pushed my shirt off my shoulders, baring them, one bloody, one clean, I feasted on her. She tasted of peaches, and spice, and of the trace of my blood still on my lips; she tasted like a schoolgirl, like something clean and fresh and pure in the midst of all this. She tangled her fingers in my hair and rolled her hips, her calves tightened beneath my hand as I licked as deeply as I could inside her. I reached for her breasts with one hand, catching one and pinching her nipple between my thumb and fingers, twisting the thin fabric of her chemise. I could not let her pleasure mount without a little pain. She gasped, and as I let go, groaned, and I slid my hand down her flank to her buttocks, ducking beneath the hem of the chemise to caress her skin as I found her little nub, her boatsman, with my lips, and worried at it. She cried out, something wordless, throwing her arms back against the side of the carriage to balance herself as her hips bucked. And after a moment, I - stopped.

I rocked back on my heels and watched her for a moment, spread against the side of the carriage, hem rucked up, exposing her wet and gaping womanhood to me, the juices of her pleasure smeared along her trembling thighs, one hand pawing lewdly at her breast as her breath came in ragged, lusty pants. She was utterly beyond herself, and she was beautiful. And behind her, through the small glass window in the side of the carriage, I could see Lucy, awakened by the noise, perhaps, looking down on the scene, chewing absently on a strand of golden hair.

I stood up, grabbing Eliza’s hands to pin them once again above her head. They were languid, and she did not fight. The pleasure and the lust pooled in her hips and fighting for release slowed her, confused her. “Please, “ she said, “oh, please... What are you doing?”

“What do you want me to do?” I asked.

She tried to tug one hand free, but I held them firm. She tried to rub against me, press herself against my thigh, but I stood back from her. I took hold of her chin with my other hand and held her head still and looked into her eyes. Her hips bucked again, from frustration. “Please,” she said. “More.”

“More what?” I asked.

“Please,” she said, a whisper, her eyes pleading.

“You’ll have to tell me, Eliza.”

Her head shook once, slowly. “More,” she said, “oh Lady, more of that. Please. Oh.”

“What did the ladies call it? What words did they use? Tell me what you want.”

“Kiss me,” she said, and the words were barely even a whisper. “Kiss my purse. My cunny. Please. Make me cum--”

But I had already slipped a finger into her, so tight, so wet, and she went wild at the sudden sensation, crying out and coming in waves as I stroked her.

And later, I sat by the fire, stripped to the waist, and Eliza, still wearing that chemise, knelt behind me and washed the wound her father had made. She scrubbed at it lightly with a torn rag and cold water from the creek, and she went about it with a curious mix of repugnance and steely resolve, and perhaps a little tenderness. Her hair was still in disarray, and soot and dirt lightly smudged her chin and the breast of her chemise, where I’d grabbed her. The skin of her chest and throat were still lightly flushed, and her hand shook a little from time to time, but we said nothing about what we had done, and she did not meet my eyes, and we waited in silence for Monsieur Orphé to return with breakfast.

And after she cleaned the wound, she bound it with more cloth, torn from a clean shirt I’d fetched from my luggage. And then, as I sat there, still motionless, I felt her lean forward and press her lips gently, softly, to the skin above the dressing, and they were warm against my chilled skin.

“Your sister,” I said.

“What?” she said, looking up.

Lucy, also still in her chemise, and still wearing her stockings (a twig, I noticed, distractedly, had gotten snagged to the bottom of one dusty black foot), came over to us from the carriage, limping slightly, her eyes studying the fire. As Eliza stood, Lucy took her hand, and rested her head on her older sister’s breast. “You hurt my foot when we jumped,” she said.

I reached into the purse on my belt and pulled out their father’s device. With only a little clumsiness, I loaded paper and tobacco into it and rolled an only slightly misshapen cigarette. “Does Lucy know?” I looked up at them, and Eliza looked down at me, uncertain. “Does she know about sipping honey?”

She blinked, once. Lucy looked up at her. “Eliza?” she asked, in a warm, sleepy voice.

“Then we shall have to teach her,” I said. I plucked a burning branch from the fire and used it to light the cigarette. I inhaled, and held it for a moment, then blew the smoke out, luxuriantly. “Won’t we?” I said.

Taking Lucy in her arms, murmuring something to her, Eliza knelt beside me, and Lucy curled up like a cat, resting her golden head on her sister’s lap. “I’m hungry,” said Lucy.

“Soon,” said Eliza. She stroked Lucy’s hair. “We aren’t safe, are we,” she said, and some of that schoolgirl’s defiance had returned to her voice. “With you,” she added, as an afterthought, looking down at her sister.

“No,” I said. “But you are together.”

And I look at those words I have just written, and I realize most of the morning has flown; I have smoked three of the Baronet’s cigarettes as I scratched away on this stack of parchment, and I have not been brought my breakfast. I rang for Clarissa hours ago, it seems; I just rang again, and I hear nothing. I shall go find her.

Continued in Chapter 4

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