The Blood of Caged Birds (Mortalsong Book 1)

by J. M. Stredwick

  I nestle into him. He, on his side, lay behind me. He stiffens as I move my body closer, as it is a painful closeness. I can hardly breathe, having never been so close to a man in all my life. I think of the alien way that the practice of lovemaking winds the bodies so closely together, so close that it is why a married couple are called one.

  We lie there, still as ghosts, until Benjamin decides to move his arm. He curls his arm round my middle, pulling me closer still, pressing himself against me in a show of affection. His face is buried in my hair, and he breathes longingly. All we can see is pieces and parts of the other person. A neck, a hand, a glint of my gown, and his eyes, so deep, furiously staring at me as I roll to face him.

  “Giselle,” he says, twirling a curl between his fingertips. “I want you.”

  “Then have me,” I respond bravely.

  “I don’t understand,” he says, resting another hand on my shoulder, teasing the placement of my sleeve capping. “How have you changed your mind so easily? After everything. What can I do to show you that I would do anything to keep you safe—to love you like a man should?”

  “I am afraid.” I look away, my head clouding, darkening with it. “It does not feel real. Everything that we have. Everything that we’ve spoken of. You have drawn me out of my skin in a way that I am still unsure of. I’ve never been so vulnerable, and it is frightening.”

  “Ah, and why are you afraid of being vulnerable?” he asks me.

  “You could tear me apart. You have everything that I am in your grasp. Now that you have it, now that you’ve conquered all of me, I am afraid you will cast me aside. Is that not what husbands do to their wives?”

  He smirks, and he drags his fingers gently across the skin of my chest and upwards under my chin. His expression glows with a simmering heat, like embers teased by the flames.

  “I have not conquered all of you,” he speaks low, and leans close so that his lips graze my own. “I know that it will take a lifetime to discover every part of you. I plan on spending many, many years finding them. Mind, body, soul.”

  He laughs, and I return his laughter quietly.

  “So charming, Benjamin. No wonder I said yes to you so easily,” I simper, feeling the heat of my body melding with his own.

  “There was a reason we were attracted to each other the night of the ball,” he says, burrowing his face into my neck, kissing lightly there and then taking my skin between his teeth, sucking softly for a moment. My cheeks redden, and I shut my eyes, enjoying the play of it.

  “Why is that?” I ask him breathlessly, attempting to maintain control.

  “Fate,” he purrs, glancing up at me before kissing me further. “You say that our choice was hastily made? I would still choose you, even if we’d courted for a year. There’s no other woman I want next to me. In my bed. At my side. If I could live forever, my infinite amount of years would be spent trying to please you.”

  I smile, drunk on his words, smiling languidly as he whispers them against my skin. I wrap my arms around his neck, pulling him to my face.

  “Then I shall spend my life serving you in the exact way that would please you as well,” I promise him.

  No more words have to be spoken. Not then, though I am sure we will entertain many arguments throughout the years. In that moment, there on the hard floor of the cart, we begin undressing. I feel a deep pinch when he accesses me, but he is slow and kind, the way he moves is generous and almost relaxing, with rolls of his hips. His hands scale my body and run through my hair. He kisses me, and I am dazed by him. At one point he stares down at me as if he is enthralled, then his eyes shut, and he lets out a long sigh.

  We sleep well.

  Claire

  I have seen too much now. Alphonse has explained it all and now I know the truth. It feels like the truth, like a comfort in my bones. It’s like a veil has been lifted, and I now understand that immortality is what we are all searching for. That time gives us anxiety, that we were never meant to be expendable like we are now.

  We left that house with everything. He stole every paper, every map, every journal. We packed up all of the materials that Monsieur Vauquelin was using and put it in the back of a carriage he rented for the day. Alphonse buried his bloodied shirt in the ground of the alleyway and switched it for one of his others that were luckily kept in his chambers at the flat.

  “We’ll find you suitable clothing in Marseille,” he reassures me.

  Then he does. He buys me a modest linen gown that one of the peasant women might wear. He is able to exchange my opulent gown for a few of these simple gowns and sturdy leather shoes, a traveling cloak, and gloves. I feel strange as I wear these new clothes, as if they are a new skin I am supposed to live within and I cannot find myself. I am only able to glance at myself as we board the ship that we’re to take, and when I catch that glance, I find that there is no difference between me and any other poor woman. I could be one of them.

  It is a mighty little sloop that we assemble. Alphonse wastes no time and barters with a man in a tavern, asks him to come with as his first mate and tells him that he will be recompensed grandly. This man follows us aboard and they get to work.

  “How will we know?” I ask him.

  “I’ll know my father’s ship,” he tells me as he wrangles the sails and knots the ropes.

  We have decided to follow them. I had to persuade him, but I did it. I told him that his father would find out about what he’d done, that Monsieur Olivier Vauquelin would know, and that they’d most likely disown him. I told him that he was nothing to them, and I could see that this wounded his tight ego. The only option I pushed upon him was the take up of our own designs to find Benjamin and Giselle, and follow them until we are able to warn them of the truth.

  The truth. I find myself smiling a catlike smile. This is what scientists, the geniuses of Paris, would love to know, isn’t it? They’d love to study this, to test and examine. But no, men like Vauquelin are the deciders, the beholders of information. I don’t know if I am altogether convinced of it, but I want to know more. Who would hear something like that and turn away from it without question after what I saw?

  On our third day lounging off the coast, Alphonse grows weary.

  “Do you think they decided to go on foot?”

  “No,” I told him. “She said that their plan was to start Benjamin’s merchant business straight away.”

  Then, when the sun is an ochre dreamscape above us, I see something. The sails fly high and are plump with wind. I see their family logo on a flag, squint my eyes to see it, but it is there.

  “Alphonse!”

  He stumbles up from the cabin below and smacks his hands together. “We’re in business.”

  I watch them wrestle the ropes and draw up the anchor. The man who Alphonse asked to help us works efficiently beside him, as if they are a machine. We cut through the water swiftly so that we will be just before them. They will have to pass us.

  The water glitters in the morning light, little spectacles with every flash. I want to dive in and swim to them. I wave my hands out, wave high above myself and attempt to catch their eye. Their ship, much larger than ours, begins to shift their course.

  “They’re turning. Why are they turning?” I wheeze, placing a hand on my stomach.

  “Fuck,” Alphonse mutters and we change course so that we are able to follow.

  Our ship is much slower than theirs.

  “They had to have seen us!” I yell. “They were right there!”

  “Where are you going?” Alphonse whispers to himself.

  We are in line to follow them, but there is no match between our speeds. We did not think of this. I never imagined they would ignore us.

  “What are they doing?” I ask him, striding up to him so that we are face to face, “Why didn’t they stop?”

  He rakes a hand through his tousled hair and shakes his head.

  “My guess?” He views me darkly. “We switched our damn sails. Remember? I di
dn’t want any link back to my father or Vauquelin and they saw us, but why would they stop? They’re trying to escape.”

  I let out a frustrated noise, raging against the wind.

  “Giselle!” I scream, hands gripping the wood of the ship’s wall.

  I scream again, but this time in agony. How could this happen? She is lost to me now. What if I’m never to see her again? Am I responsible for her relationship with Benjamin? If I had not made her entertain me with the games I used to play, the sickness in my head, would we still be in this position? I crumple against the wood planks, hands threaded down upon my skull.

  “Can we follow them?” I ask him, tearing back across the boards.

  “We will try.” He nods as if his duty is to me.

  “We’ll be miles behind them, but we will try to keep sight of them,” Alphonse explains further.

  “Bad luck,” the sailor chuckles to himself, as if this entire situation is rather amusing.

  I cannot breathe. The anger within me is like a fire pushing against my lungs. I want to string him up for dead.

  I continue to watch them as the day progresses. I watch their ship, a tiny brown blotch on the skyline, grow further from us. Do they notice that they are being followed? Perhaps they have not looked behind. I worry that Benjamin will become paranoid if he realizes, and I fear that then we will lose them for good.

  “They’re headed for the Atlantic,” Alphonse tells me as he stands at the helm.

  We exchange glances. There is no reason we can understand that they would be headed in that direction. I look over the edge of the boat, stare into the roiling blue green water. I think about the siren that his father was said to catch. Do beasts and creatures really exist? I think that they do. I cannot get the image of the translucent being that Alphonse slaughtered out of my mind. It haunts me even here.

  “What if I were a siren?” I say to Alphonse. “I could have been…once.”

  He smiles, perhaps too generously for the moment.

  “And you could have been the son of Zeus,” I add.

  He shakes his head, “What a pair we would have made.”

  I come back to stand beside him.

  “I want to know who I was before,” I tell him. “How do you discover it?”

  Alphonse shrugs, fingertips slung on the steering knobs.

  “We will find that out together. If Vauquelin is able to do it, we can do it too. We have to study everything. Funny, I thought you were not interested in this. Don’t tell me you want to search out the blend of blood that can bring us immortality too?”

  His grin is curling, as if he knows that anyone would think upon it, desire it and let it rip them apart like an illness. I have not thought of it much, only, a bit.

  “You look at me in that way and you scare me, Alphonse. I could not kill people to discover it. It is not right.”

  “You’d be surprised at the lengths you’ll go to if pressured hard enough,” he speaks in a way that makes me think he is reliving his past experiences.

  “In any case,” I blow out a breath, “if my sister is what is supposed to bring this to them, how can you ask me that?”

  “There could be other ways. Vauquelin does not know all. And now, we have everything he owned. Some of those journals are from his past lives, from all over the world. Some of it we may not be able to read, but we can have them translated. We can take it up where he left off, if you wanted it.”

  “All I want is for my sister to be safe,” I snap. “That is all I want.”

  “Say we do that. Then what will you do? Return to your betrothed in France?” he inquires.

  “I cannot answer that,” I say.

  His eyes narrow, but he accepts my answer. I wonder if he stills wants me, if he still desires me as his wife. But now, being on the ocean, I know that I will never marry. I will always be free. I will do what I have to in order to retain this freedom. I prefer my stained skirts to the Parisian ensemble. If I never wore a jewel again, I would be better for it.

  ________________

  We all sleep in one cabin. There are four bunks. Alphonse and I scatter the papers everywhere as our sailor helper snores, a flurry of parchment surrounding us like a witch’s circle. We touch the pages gingerly, feeling and smelling them as if we could detect something unsaid. Our candle gives us little light, and we keep the pages near to our faces as we search.

  “Greek,” Alphonse says. “I know a bit of it, not enough.”

  “What does it say?” I ask.

  “It talks about a girl, I think.” He peers down at it studiously, “Maybe your sister?”

  “What about her?”

  “I…” He brings the page closer to his face. “Gynaíka, but téras…”

  “What is that?”

  “Sylliftheí…katastroféas.” He throws up his hand. “I would guess that he captured this creature and discovered it was a monster. He says it was a powerful creature, a woman who feeds off of men.”

  I laugh. “It cannot be Giselle. She is as pure as a dove.”

  “Now. This life,” he reminds me.

  “We cannot know that it was her. It could have been any number of the creatures he’s captured to use in his experiments,” I tell him coldly. “We will never know for sure.”

  I trace my finger along my bottom lip and sigh.

  “Do we have enough provisions to follow them like this? Across the ocean?” I ask him. “Will our ship make it?”

  My father has done this. His world was not France, that was a mere blip in his everyday life. His world was trading and seafaring, exploring the ocean, just as we are now. I wonder if he’s in Africa safe and expanding his empire. I long to know. I wonder how many times he has come close to death and if we will make it. Has he been lucky? Will we be lucky enough to survive the catapulting of the waves?

  “We will have to stop. We will go as far as we can but with no idea as to where they are headed.” He gives a noncommittal drop of his brows. “My brother has always chosen risks over practicality. They could be headed across the world for all I know. But I think we’ll be fine to reach the New World, if that is the case. Obviously, we’ll try to stop them before then.”

  “Obviously.” I smirk.

  “Are you mocking me?” he asks me, a side of his lip pulling up.

  “No never, Alphonse. Why would you think that?” I begin to snicker. “You are always so serious. What made you this way?”

  He loses his half-smile, buries it deep within him. He holds tight to that part of him, allowing it to show only on rare occasions.

  “Killing.” He breathes.

  I am silent now, unable to fathom what he has endured. The ship rocks over the rise and fall of the waves, and the candles flicker. We are mad to do this, to think that we could approach such a massive opposition. But if I did not try, what would that make me? If I did not help her, what kind of woman would I be? I have always prided myself in being different than the rest. This is a challenge, a litany of pressures. Alphonse irritates me with his martyrdom. We are all born to suffer.

  “You had a choice. There is always a choice.” I feel as if I am preaching.

  I am no better than him. I can see that.

  “Is there?” He does not seem convinced. “Because I felt that I had none.”

  “You do not have to kill anymore.” I place my hand on his shoulder, fervent in my tone.

  I do not want him to lose himself to the chaos that eats his mind away. I will never know what it was like for him and he will never know what it was like for me. We are two broken pieces. Two instruments that will never play properly, always off tune. I see his hungry eyes the way they flash towards me when I put my hand on his shoulder. I take my touch away quickly so that he does not think I want anything more with him. Ever.

  “I’ll go up to see if they’ve decided to shove off in the middle of the night,” he says and jumps up from his seat on the floor.

  I am seated alone now in the halo of scrolls and parc
hment. I arrange the papers in an orderly way within the trunk again and then reach to the side where the brown leather journals are lined up along the backside. I reach for one that is labeled in English as volume twenty-four. It seems that each life he somehow found his way back to his journals and wrote in whatever language he was raised in. He must have been English before. English I am able to read.

  It is an account of a creature. My heart beats harder in my chest when I catch the phrase “Bone Woman.” I glance up to see if Alphonse is coming back, I want to tell him, but I cannot resist reading on.

  “I tracked my distorted creature to the middle of the ocean,” I read the words under my breath, “to an island. I watched her float on the ocean, staring at the sky. For many days, I followed her. She seemed hopeless, headed in no general direction until she washed ashore this place. I don’t know how many days I watched her. I followed her from one strange land to the next until we found nothing but ocean. She had been staying in the forests where we once lived, now Switzerland. Before, it was Gallia. She wants nothing to do with me now. She does not want my help. To make it easy for myself, I chained her to this place. She will not be able to leave until the malignancy of her being has been cured with the soul of the darkness that created her. Now, to find the mortal woman. She’ll be reborn in so many lives. The trouble will be locating her. One soul in a sea of millions.”

  I stop. The woman must be Giselle. What was she that her blood, infused into this woman, created a monster needing to be cured of darkness?

  I draw the book to my forehead and exhale.

  Giselle

  The high seas: that is what they are called. The ocean, in all of its natural chaos and redundancy of crashing waves, sloppy anger, and sudden serenity, accrues my respect. I look off the front of our Galleon. It is a multi-decked ship built for travel and commerce, having been bequeathed L’Estelle. I watch avidly as we slice through the waves, bouncing atop as if it is a pillowing beneath us. It is glorious, the smell of brine wrapping around my head, the wind jostling my clothes like a lover earnest to rid me of them.