When the gilded stagecoach that would carry her back to civilization crested the hill, her fingers shook with nervous energy as she gathered up the seaweed guide that Lieutenant Calloway had redelivered to her bedroom. Hidden safely between Chordaria flagelliformis and Cutleria multifida were Roger’s letters. She did not intend to let them leave her person until she arrived in Caligo, not after the calamity with Dorinda.
Offering his arm to Sibylla in the hallway, Lieutenant Calloway led her out into the courtyard where guards already flanked the royal carriage. Her feet halted in the snow, and she turned for a final look at Helmscliff estate. Its gray bricks and steepled towers loomed against the clouds. Her eyes swept the windows to glimpse Lady Wayfeather standing in the music room as if expecting Sibylla for lessons. Sibylla lifted her hand to wave, but Lady Wayfeather merely shut the curtains.
She turned back to the carriage where Captain Harrod Starkley was descending its folding step. He wore his dark blue uniform and a surly scowl. At his unexpected appearance, Sibylla had to stop herself from running to him in an unseemly manner. Lieutenant Calloway merely grunted and smoothed his mustache. The two men sized up one another. In spite of Harrod’s distinguished naval honor and superior military rank, Lieutenant Calloway chose not to bow. As the son of a famous general and as a lower nobleman from Highspits, he must have decided Harrod was beneath him. Each man reached for Sibylla’s hand to help her into the carriage.
Sibylla nearly toppled out again at the sight of her concertina’s hexagonal case lurking on one of the benches. She’d always had a horrific time with the instrument, and her skills had never improved despite a decade’s worth of practice. In fact, she had deliberately left the concertina sitting in a corner of the music room with the hope of never seeing, or hearing, it again. Lady Wayfeather herself must have placed it in the carriage as a misguided gesture of farewell, or perhaps she feared the ghost of Sibylla’s languishing talent might haunt Helmscliff’s dreary halls. Either way, the concertina could not arrive in Caligo intact.
Resigned, Sibylla sat beside it with her back to the driver, clutching the seaweed book in her lap. Harrod joined her, and the driver coaxed the horses into a trot.
“Is your highness in good condition?” asked Harrod.
“No one mentioned you’d be escorting me home. I’m so glad you’re here, Harrod. I’ve had the worst visitor, and I mean to tell you everything.” She’d only feel comfortable discussing Dorinda once some distance had been placed between her and Helmscliff. In the meantime, she slyly tapped the concertina case. “Do you think we could lose this thing on a particularly bumpy stretch of road?”
His disapproving scowl softened, and he cracked a genuine smile at her suggestion. “Ladies, yes. You really are terrible at that thing. But first, your highness, you’ll be just delighted to read his reply.”
Harrod handed her a scrap of paper crumpled with such little care that she’d have mistaken it for street-side rubbish. So Roger had written after all. Perhaps Harrod had said something to him about her impending return. She unwadded the paper, expecting a message of anticipation.
I thank your highness for putting me in my place. I will stay far from well-born ladies since you say so. Now leave me alone
yr most hmbl & obt svt
rxw
“Is that all?” It took less time to read than a signpost but upset her more than a bad performance of Salston. She dug her nails into her book’s leather binding.
“Your highness shouldn’t expect so much from my brother,” said Harrod with a commiserating lilt.
Sibylla folded the uneven ends of Roger’s “letter” together. To her surprise, when she lifted the cover of the seaweed guide to slip it inside, she found a piece of finely folded correspondence from Lieutenant Calloway awaiting her there.
My dearest lady,
I cannot stand to be parted. Each day will be a hollow mollusk without your face to look upon. Though our love must be kept a secret, my ardor swells greater for you each passing day.
I will live tirelessly to please you, to instruct you in the gentle tides of desire and the ebbs of adoration. Do not fret or struggle to know your worth to me. No other woman shall ever quench my thirst.
Once I have persuaded my father and you’re finally rid of her royal majesty’s rule, we will be together once more.
Your lieutenant and son of most honorable General Calloway,
Viscount of Highspits,
Quincy
Was the man insane? He’d concocted an imaginary love narrative between them that rivaled Salston’s greatest tragicomedy: The Whipping Mistress of Whipperton. She cursed the salacious playwright, who’d surely inspired this ridiculousness, beneath her breath. At least Harrod would be amused. She was about to share another laugh with him when she realized he had been staring wretchedly at her the entire time.
By the look on his face, discussing Dorinda would have to wait. Sibylla tapped his knee. “Have out with it. We agreed to the concertina’s unfortunate demise, so why do you look as though you’re about to hear me play the abhorrent thing?”
“I haven’t come from Caligo just to escort your highness home.”
“Ah.” Sibylla paused, listening to the slosh of snow, the squeak of wheels and clomp of hooves. White flakes melted on the windowpane. “Father sent you to warn me of the queen’s search for illegitimate children. He’s too late.” She hesitated, afraid to openly broach the topic of her half-brother. Even carriage footmen had been known to divulge overheard conversations, given the right enticement. The queen herself had learned of the late Prince Consort’s untoward relations with prostitutes from a similarly attended ride.
“Prince Henry said nothing to that effect.” Harrod stared out the window, distracted by the cliffs overlooking Tyanny Valley. “But then, the queen has always been relentless. Your highness might consider it from her point of view. Myrcnia is a lovely country, but we don’t command the massive armies of, say, Khalishka. Every ruler needs legitimacy. The Emperor of Khalishka has military might. Our own beloved regina has magic. Some might say that’s all she has. Pardon me if I speak frankly, your highness, but a Myrcnia with a fractured royal bloodline, where any bastard with demonstrable magic could petition the church for legitimacy, would not remain a united Myrcnia for long. If I were in her royal majesty’s shoes, I’d do the same.”
“How exceedingly unhelpful. I suppose your recommendation is to tell her what she wants to know.” Sibylla chafed at his iron love for crown and country.
“I hardly think your highness will do as her royal majesty pleases now, after holding out for so long.”
Sibylla released an ink-bee into the air to ease her nervous tension, as she could take no other precautions to protect her secrets while inside a carriage. “At least you’re assured. Then I take it you’re accompanying me in order to apologize on behalf of a certain deplorable letter writer.”
The bee flitted before Harrod’s racked face before dispersing into the air.
“Your highness.” Harrod jammed his hands between his knees and bowed. Positioned like a bowsprit, he spoke to her knees. “I need your help.”
Sibylla flattened her back against the carriage cushion. “Are you soused with spruce liquor?”
“There’s someone I know, a brother in arms of sorts, bound to hang from the yardarm by week’s end. He’s accused of murder.” Harrod didn’t move.
Sibylla squeezed the cushions. “If you don’t stop bowing, I’m going to strike you with this book.” She rapped the seaweed guide to emphasize her point. “It’s heavy.”
“Your highness, please.”
“I’m not a barrister, and until you tell me what you want, I can’t say yes.”
He cleared his throat and straightened. The Order of the Kraken gleamed on his chest. “First, I have no illusions this man is innocent. But, it is beyond the realm of possibility that he would have committed all the crimes he’s accused of. Second, I’ve used my connections, both in the n
avy and private sector, and no one, not even the Admiral of the Fleet, has been given leave to see the prisoner.”
“You should give up hope, then. As much as I commend your responsibility to your comrade, there’s nothing I can possibly do. My influence in the capital is sorely lacking.”
“There is something.” He hesitated. “A royal prerogative of service.”
She sharply inhaled. Only recently, she’d seen Dorinda, herself a tattooed recipient of such a prerogative. Sibylla felt a wave of disgust. The royal prerogative of service was just a pretty term for contracting a Straybound. Sibylla had sworn she’d never stoop to take one herself, her royal claim be damned. She didn’t need a murderer to carry out her duties. And Harrod knew this. He wouldn’t dare ask for such a favor, even if his own brother were bound for the scaffold. Fortunately, Roger practiced medicine, not murder.
“A royal prerogative might untie the tightest of nooses,” she said, “but it’s hardly a pardon. I wouldn’t wish such a fate on a close relative, not to mention your dubious cohort. He may live, but he’d be beholden to me. You’ve seen what it’s like to be tossed about on royal whims.”
“Dammit, I know.”
“And I could discard, most permanently, this man if I wished. It often happens with the Straybound.”
“Your highness.” Harrod leaned forward, and for a moment, she thought he intended to bow again. Instead, he placed his hands over hers. “Sibylla, please. I’m asking you for this.” He barely refrained from groveling.
Still, he’d never used her first name before. This brother in arms must have saved his life once – a debt Harrod now felt honor bound to repay. She freed her hands, took a breath, and stared at the carriage ceiling. Anyone else and she’d have refused. “Oh, Harrod. I’m going to be in so much trouble.”
She opened the seaweed guide. Pressing her fingernail along the binding, she tore out the blank page at the end of the book, its expensive paper perfect for penning an official document.
She paused. Harrod had never asked anything of her in all their years of knowing one another. There was more to this than he let on. “Are you certain he’s innocent?”
Harrod nodded stiffly, and she didn’t have the heart to press him to unveil his secrets when she kept so many of her own. Sibylla flexed her fingers, black crescents of ink welling underneath her fingernails. She had seen royal prerogatives set behind glass in the palace depository, but reproducing one without the proper signet required steady concentration.
“The name?” she asked.
Harrod shifted forward. “Ah, best left until a justiciar is present. You have my word: he’s innocent. And in need of a saving grace – even if that comes via Straybound branding.”
She reviewed the paperwork. “Are you certain this is right?”
“Oh, quite, I’ve seen this done before. If you’ll just indicate at the bottom that I’m acting as your executor, I promise your highness that when the matter is concluded, we’ll find a suitable place for my… cohort in your service.”
Sibylla handed Harrod the writ, but he remained half-bowed as if he’d just lost to a bruiser in the ring. Hoping to enliven his mood, she grabbed the leather handle of the concertina case and opened the carriage window. “Now there’s only one matter left to attend to. What do you shout on the high seas? Man overboard!” She waited for his dry smile, then pitched the instrument into the dark.
The clop of horse hooves on paving stones woke her. The dim morning light flickered across Harrod’s face as he snored. Pulling the blanket around her shoulders, Sibylla leaned against the window. The fog and brick of Caligo seemed colder and darker than her memories of painted stucco and gilded gates. How long before she could walk its narrow alleys again and buy oysters at the docks?
As they approached the palace, streets widened and gutters emptied until finally she didn’t see anyone pissing or passing out.
The carriage slowed as the horses began the climb toward Broadbriar Street and the highest point of Caligo – Malmouth Palace. Her childhood home. Sibylla noted the excessive number of guards stationed along the exterior wall. She hunted for familiar faces, but they were all strange to her now. The palace, however, hadn’t changed. After the death of the prince consort a decade ago, the royal grounds underwent an expensive refurbishment that included scouring the grim exterior, adding a wing, and restoring the century-old marble fountain by the famous sculptor Obden. And to garner favor with the public, a section of the gardens had opened for visitation.
Curious, she kicked Harrod’s leg and he started awake. “Why are there so many guards?”
“For the Emperor of Khalishka’s extended visit. All hands on deck, as it were. His imperial majesty – Emperor Timur – had so much fun touring his newest territories, he’s decided to stroll along our coast as well. When the Cabbage King decides to swoop in for a visit, you can’t very well say no. Besides, if we put on an impressive enough show, perhaps he’ll lower the tariffs on Myrcnian cheese.”
Sibylla hoped to gain more from the emperor’s visit than a tax reduction. Emperor Timur’s reputation for starting and ending wars in his favor did not paint him as an obvious solution to her worries, but a royal bastard could easily disappear into Khalishka’s countryside. Her grandmother would never think to look for Prince Henry’s illegitimate son in the lofty post of Ambassador Extraordinary, and Sibylla would still be able to contact him. And, if the queen did think to look for him there, he’d already have a host of connections abroad. Now she need only convince Khalishka they needed a Myrcnian embassy.
Unfortunately, diplomacy with Khalishka was mired with difficulties. When the Khalishkan Empire, long desirous of an eastern warm water port, annexed Arenbough – the slender country wedged between Myrcnia and Ulmondstedt – the queen signed a treaty of alliance with Ulmondstedt’s parliament, which provoked the Khalishkan government to levy an extra import duty on Myrcnian cheese. Many considered this outcome a failure of the queen. Some even believed she should have officially renounced Ulmondstedt as an ally.
“What do you think of our relationship with Khalishka?” Sibylla tapped thoughtfully on the cover of her seaweed guide.
“Strained to say the least – our entire military has been on edge for months. But the emperor’s procession is expected to go smoothly, and the queen is even planning one of her famous spark shows.” Harrod shrugged. “A show of power for the powerful.”
Whenever the queen wanted to impress the masses or foreign dignitaries, she trotted out her special recreation of King Roderick’s Great Geese Feast.
Centuries ago, when a flood of the Mudtyne River threatened to decimate the city’s population with famine, a desperate King Roderick sighted a large flock of geese migrating over the capital. He immediately took to Hangman’s Tower where he shot forth sparks from his fingertips over the city. Fully cooked fowls fell from the sky, the famine was ended, and the people rejoiced. Nowadays, the queen used floating paper lamps instead of live birds, and the people collected the burnt ash in silver dishes.
It was not a good sign. Her grandmother hadn’t bothered with the extravagant ceremony in years.
As they approached the palace’s front gates, Sibylla nudged Harrod’s foot. “After you’ve settled affairs, I expect to meet this fellow of yours. Well ahead of the Binding ceremony, if you please.”
“Your highness knows that’s impossible.” Harrod lurched forward as a carriage wheel hitched into a divot. “Tradition dictates that until the Binding is completed, your highness shall be kept at a distance from the condemned. For your safety.”
The Binding ceremony was the final pact in the Straybound contract and would take place within Sibylla’s personal chapel inside St Myrtle’s cathedral, presided over by Archbishop Tittlebury. Once completed, the convicted murderer would be reborn in the eyes of the church, absolved in the eyes of the law, and magically bound to their royal patron for life. Sibylla’s stomach nervously turned.
“But if, as you said, the
condemned in this case is an innocent man, I’d like to speak with him to ensure he understands the price.”
Harrod averted his eyes. “Then I’ll try to bring him by before his six days of probation are up.”
As the carriage squeaked to a halt at the front of Malmouth Palace, Sibylla pondered Harrod’s odd request. He wasn’t the sort of man to be overtaken with sentimentality. His former comrade-in-arms must be special indeed. Why else would Harrod have begged her for such a cruel favor? Still, if this man had saved Harrod’s life then she also owed him, though the thought of taking on a Straybound left her cold and shaken.
11
After his sham of a consultation with Mr Murray, Roger was hauled off to a private cell. The jailer removed his chains, reminded him that washing-up water would be provided once a week and food once a day unless he paid for extra privileges, then locked the iron door. Roger paced, glad at least to use his legs again. Just two strides wide and four strides long, the cell contained little more than a bucket, a wash basin, and burlap sacking on a stone ledge that served as a cot.
Roger wiped the blood from his face as best he could. Then he wrapped himself in the filthy burlap and slept for what felt like days. When he woke, he’d lost all sense of time. His shouts went unanswered, so he lay on his side and watched a smudge of gray, fog-filtered sunlight creep across his cell floor. Throughout the day he paced, sipped brackish water from the basin, and scraped his sore teeth against the impenetrable crust of a biscuit the jailer shoved through a hatch.
Just as the light-smudge reached the far wall, a folded parchment slid under his door. Roger pounced on the official-looking document and read:
Mr Roger Weathersby, though not fit to stand before the magistrate, was this morning convicted of ten counts of brutal and unnatural murder, vile acts of indecency, and resurrectionist activity. Despite every effort of the defense, the aforementioned Roger Weathersby has been justly sentenced to die tomorrow at noon. He will be hanged
The Resurrectionist of Caligo Page 11