He had heard music all over the world, music haunting and joyful, celebrating life and honoring death, music so strange its melodies lingered within him still, and he had made them his own, but this! If he could but remember their song, their secrets carried on the waves and lifting him in a swell of sound and harmony, beckoning, inviting him to know their secrets.
The mermaids had shared their songs with him, they were the soul of the sea, and he must write them down while they coursed through his body, making every nerve pulse with their urgings. He would not let them vanish like sea mist, he must write them down on the parchment he always carried in his cloak, but he had not his cloak. He must return to town and write them down, for if he did, if he could but write them down, he could play them, and they would be songs of such beauty that the town would build a statue of Ian Pierce with lute in hand, because he knew the secrets, the song of the mermaid, soul of the sea.
He hastened to town, melodies and words crashing within him had so taken over his senses that he could only feel his way back. He entered the Shipwreck Hotel, demanding parchment, demanding pen, grabbing at lapels as the melodies drowned him with their demands. He must write them down so they might flow out of him before the rush of their urgency did drown him.
His desperation and demands were unmet, for they had no parchment, the crash of glass, his own laughter and insults like shards of glass, glinting in his eye and fist meeting flesh. Harsh words and a vise-like grip on his arms, a trip across the cobblestones and cursing. The clang of a cell door and he with no parchment and the melodies, the sweet piercing melodies leaving him ebb by ebb and he would never know the secret of his soul and neither would his good neighbors. And instead of those melodies, inside his head clamored the melodies of every song he had ever heard.
He gave himself up to his infirmity.
Chapter Twenty-Five
She had petitioned her God in the dark cell but could not merely stand and pray, helpless. Who knew how long they would be there, or what plans Edward Carter had? She must do whatever possible to comfort and care for Sarah and Sabine.
Terror raced through her. She could do nothing except watch them all die. The two women would die first, and then her. And she would never again see the sea change in Ian’s eyes. Her very being railed against that possibility. She must do something.
She heard water dripping and the muffled rustling of rodents. The metallic scent of old blood rose from the packed dirt floor and dank cold seeped into her bones. Rocks lay scattered about the cave, nothing else. Through the dim light of the torches, she saw the outline of Sarah and Sabine huddled together, Sarah sheltering the younger girl. Jonas held a hand to his stomach. She would treat his wound and solicit his assistance.
She lifted her skirts and using a sharp stone, scored her shift and tore as much fabric from it as possible. She wrapped his torso, and then folded a square of cloth, instructing the man to put pressure on his wound. She placed the rock in her apron pocket.
“Jonas,” Maggie urged. “You must rally round and help me. If we are to live, all of us, you must help me.”
He trembled, the whites of his eyes glistened in the shadowy light. “For God’s sake,” she groaned and grabbed him by the shoulders. “You must help keep the women warm if you can do nothing else.”
She pulled him over to the women and set him down next to Sarah. Fear glinted in her eyes, her forehead covered in sweat, tremors racked her. And it came to Maggie that in Sarah’s mind, she was once again underground. Her arms encircling Sabine stiffened, and Sabine’s head lolled to the side.
“Sarah.”
No response. She would not let her sister slip into terror again.
“Sarah, we will get out of here, I promise you.”
She stared blankly.
“Look at me!”
She started. Her eyes struggled to focus. And Maggie remembered the words, the words that had soothed her that night she lay in bed and on her wedding day.
“Sarah. All is well. All will be well.”
“The darkness,” she panted. “Heavy weight, I cannot breathe, the shroud.”
“All is well,” Maggie repeated, and gently wiped her face. “Breathe, Sarah. All will be well.”
Her tremors stopped and indeed, as Maggie said the words, a feeling of peace came over her as well. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Jonas forage in his coat and pull out a flask.
“Why did you not tell me you had that?” She grabbed it from him. He screamed and reached for it. She held it up to Sarah’s lips and implored her to have a sip. Sarah sputtered at the putrid taste of the gin but swallowed a few mouthfuls. Maggie gave Jonas a few swallows and put it back in her apron.
She was just preparing to examine Sabine again when footsteps echoed down the passageway, and Edward Carter appeared with Sabine’s keeper. He slammed the cell door open.
“Are you dead yet, then?” He looked around, the lantern swaying in his hand and revealing Sabine and Sarah heaped together in the corner. “You look dead. What a waste of coin you are, damn you.”
His lantern light revealed Sabine’s blood flowing on the dirt floor. She must do something for Sabine quickly, or she would most certainly die. Carter gestured to the keeper, who carried a small parcel.
“Food. I want some meat on your bones when we sell you.” He shot Maggie a look of unbridled contempt. “Except for you, crippled slut. You I’ll just kill, when I get around to it.”
She backed away from him, feeling for the rock in her apron. He grabbed her by the ears and twisted them, then turned her around to wrench her arms behind her back, up and up and she felt her shoulder tear.
“I guess you haven’t heard what your new husband is doing.” He shoved her so she careened into the wall. He ground his hardened member against her. “He’s spent the day carousing at the Shipwreck. He was quite popular with the ladies. He must have tired of you already, then. Made such a nuisance of himself they threw him in gaol.”
No. She would not think about that. Not here. Not now. She straightened, fighting dizziness. “We need water or ale.”
“You need whatever I desire to get you. And I’m not inclined at this time.”
He spat at her feet and turned around. The two of them went out the door.
She parceled out the food and urged Jonas and Sarah to eat. Her wrath had at least warmed her, and she forced herself to think what she must do. Her eyes adjusted once again to the dark. She grabbed the torn piece of chemise and lay Sabine out to be examined. The bleeding had worsened. As she kneeled her knees sank into the slurry of blood and dirt. She must stop the flow of blood, no matter the risk.
The light in the passageway flickered out and darkness enveloped them. Jonas screamed, Sarah moaned. Maggie could not see her own hand in front of her, let alone Sabine. Down the passageway a guttural scream pierced the silence. Ian? Pray God it was not.
The darkness wrapped around her like a shroud. Panic overtook her, and she yearned to join her voice with that of Jonas and Sarah. Only Sabine was silent; perhaps she had already died. No.
Maggie felt the ground beneath her, and her hand dripped with blood. She knew what must be done; it was the only way to stop the bleeding. Her right arm hung limp at her side, her shoulder throbbed with pain. She tasted blood, metallic in her mouth. The screams from the next cell continued, and the acrid odor of urine filled the air as Jonas gave in to his fear.
Maggie took a deep breath and prayed for strength, for the easing of pain, only long enough, please God, for her to help Sabine. She lifted up her skirt, and did the only thing possible. She thrust her fist up her birthing passage, at the same time pushing on her womb, to stop the bleeding.
For what seemed like hours, she held herself still, feeling her own consciousness waver as the pain in her shoulder worsened. Sabine stiffened and went limp. She must have fainted. Maggie dared not remove her hand, for she had no way of knowing if her bleeding had lessened. Her ears rang, and she began to crumple with a ti
ngling weakness. “Sabine, I am sorry,” she whispered.
Suddenly, Maggie felt upon her arms cool hands like her mother’s, like God, lifting her, murmuring, “All is well, all will be well, and all manner of things will be well.”
Hands laid a blessing upon her head as she continued to stanch Sabine’s bleeding and felt the nun’s strength flow into her. And then the woman was gone, but her power remained.
Eventually, Maggie began to feel the pulsing of blood in Sabine’s womb slow. When she gently removed her hand, the bleeding had all but stopped. But for how long? Poor Sabine. Out of necessity, Maggie had caused more suffering for her, and her whimpers stabbed like a knife in her side. She felt the absence of the holy woman as acutely as a babe yearns for its mother.
Chapter Twenty-Six
The echo of chants and words and melodies slammed against Ian’s head. The back of his eyes blistered fire. Every pore shrieked in agony, for the sirens’ songs had shattered into shards and cut him. If he moved his eyes at all, the fragments exploded in the darkness, blinding, breaking him, piece by piece. And he knew not how he came here, in this place of shadows. Where was Maggie’s steady grey gaze, her calm regard? He bore the lava flow of blood in his veins, as he had seen, from the cone-shaped mountain on those Islands, the breath, the ragged fragments of fire seething through his lungs. He closed his eyes, but could not mend the shattered pieces. He was a shard and not human anymore.
“Is he dead?” A voice in splinters reached his ears.
“No, I saw the poor bastard breathe.”
He lifted his head, impaled upon himself and could only scream.
“Easy now, chap.”
With great effort. “Where am I?”
A laugh. “Where do you think you are, you poor sot?”
No answer from him.
“You’re in King’s Harbour gaol.”
He lay for hours in fragments of shame and madness and opened his soul to it, when from the depths appeared his Maggie’s face, grey eyes wide with shock. He smelled the fear on her. He must find her.
A sepia-colored light filled the room. Rough, gnarled hands soothed his brow. At first, excruciating, tormenting touch, sending splinters slicing into his body.
Then, soothing words, a sip of liquid, another sip, the low, ancient voice, hissing, “Drink, you are needed. We must go.” She spoke in foreign words, but he understood them somehow.
After a while, the shards came together as one, and though the pounding still lingered, he came to conscious thought, seeing the old, bent woman kneeling before him, offering her cup, the snake upon her head with yellow eyes, mesmerizing and comforting him, earthy smell of clay dust in his nose. She straightened, bones creaking, held the cup to his lips again and said, rheumy eyes searing, “Recuerdas, remember. Litio. Litio.”
“We must go.” She led him out of the gaol without speaking. He did not know where he was going, only that he must. The drink she gave him, this litio mended the fragments, for rational thought had returned. Maggie. Where was she? There was something wrong. The gnarled woman nodded and faded from view. He would find his Maggie.
Lena met him at the door of the Siren Inn. “Where have you been? They have disappeared.”
“Who?”
“Lena, Sabine, Sarah. Thank God I have the baby.”
“Where is Samuel?”
“He’s searching for her now. Ruthie and Sarah’s baby are with Joannie.”
He climbed the stairs two at a time, ignoring the pounding of his head and the remnants of disharmony and found the room in shambles, and Maggie’s midwife bag on the floor. She would never have left it willingly.
“Edward Carter. He has made good on his threat.”
She nodded. “I have not seen him, and by now he is usually here with one of his doxies.”
“Have you called the constable? Is there any other way out of the inn without being seen?”
“Ach, I don’t know. I don’t think so. It was quiet when Maggie came in, and after she went upstairs to see Sabine, I lay down for a nap with the baby. I did not hear a thing. When I got up, I assumed she had left. It became crowded in here, so I did not check on Sabine, and the baby slept so I did not bring her up to feed. But my husband was about. Would he not have heard?”
Ian scanned the room. There was a scuff mark and blood on the wood near the paneling. The stairway! There was a latch in the grooves of the wood. He lifted it, and a rush of cold air met him.
“Lena, alert the constable.”
He descended the secret stairway. He had not been able to keep her safe but would do his best to deliver her.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Edward Carter kicked Maggie’s boot. “Wake up, bitch. I’m bored.”
The lantern cast spectral shadows upon his face. He had not bothered to shut the door.
She felt Sabine and was relieved to find her breathing regular. The cold had seeped through her bones; she did not know how much longer the two women could withstand it.
“Did you hear me, whore?” He kicked her again and jerked her to her feet, causing Sabine to slump onto the cold floor.
Maggie held the sharp rock in her closed fist as he put her arm behind her back again, sparks of pain turning her vision red.
“It is exceedingly dull down here. So I thought I might chat with you a while.” He grabbed her chin and squeezed the swollen part of her jaw, laughing as she winced, then kissed her roughly, thrusting his tongue so far into her she could not breathe.
He dragged her across the cell by her chin and slammed her up against the wall. “You could not keep your mouth closed, could you? You had to ask questions. I warned you, did I not?”
“Why,” she croaked through his fingers. “Why would you kill helpless women when all they try to do is bring forth life?”
“I do it because it is easy and lucrative, and I am providing a service, to the betterment of medical science. So easy, easy in London and easy here: deliver a few babies without incidence with my wonder herbs, then keep an eye out for the weak ones, be solicitous and caring.”
He released her arms and ground his groin into her, hands rough on her breasts. “Then when they deliver, perhaps they were ill, or bleeding, or stricken with a disease like brain fever, for instance. Women die in childbirth all the time. You ought to know that, midwife.” He sneered. “What’s one more? Mind you, you’re not the least bit attractive, but you have the right parts and like I said, I’m bored.”
When he bent to lift her skirts, she stabbed him with all her might in the neck with the rock. It drew blood, and he knocked her to the floor. The blood from his neck dripped on her cheek.
He slapped her face. “If you struggle, I’ll kill her.”
“Who?”
He laughed. “Does it really matter? One whore is the same as another, and I might as well enjoy the blonde’s charms before I kill you.”
Her vision burst red. Without thought, she rammed her head into his, fire exploding behind her eyes. He swayed, held his head, tugged his breeches down, and slapped her again.
He yanked up her skirts, straddled her. His cock pulsed against her stomach.
He will kill me, after.
She struggled. He thrust his tongue into her mouth again, grunting, until she gagged.
Suddenly, his body was lifted off her.
“Maggie!” Ian had his knees on Carter’s stomach, his hands on his neck. “Are you hurt?”
She ran over to Sarah and Sabine and gathered them to her, as the two men rolled on the dirt floor. In the dim light, a flash of silver glinted, and Carter broke away from Ian’s grasp and crouched to his feet, wielding a knife and jabbing it toward Ian’s stomach. The lantern cast their struggling shadows on the wall, spectral and towering.
In a sudden rush of movement, Ian kicked his leg out and knocked the knife out of Carter’s hand and with the sides of his hand jabbed him in the neck. Carter moaned and dropped to the floor. Ian held him down, pounding his fists into his face un
til he was still and then tied him up with a length of rope from his pocket.
He rushed over and gathered Maggie in his arms. “You are safe now. Maggie, did he abuse you?” He took inventory of her face and ran his hands over her, grimacing at the injured arm.
She clung to him, the fingers of her good arm digging into his skin. “Where have you been, Ian?” She forced herself to relax her grip. “Never mind, not now. And I am fine, but cold. We must take care of Sabine and Sarah.”
Just then, footsteps approached. Samuel and Henry the night soil man burst into the cell.
“The magistrate and his men are coming,” Samuel said.
Samuel stood over Edward Carter. He lay on the floor in a fetal position, nose bleeding, one eye already swollen shut. Samuel kicked him once, hard, and gathered Sarah into his arms. She put her arms around him and reassured him she was fine.
“Can you walk?” Ian helped her rise.
“Yes, of course,” she said. “Help Sabine.”
He scooped her unconscious body into his arms.
“What about Jonas?” Maggie said.
“Leave him here for the magistrate,” Samuel said gruffly. “It is all he deserves.”
Sarah, her voice muffled against Samuel’s neck, said, “Jonas buried me. But...he dug me up, as well.”
With the hysterics borne of the cold, shock and exhaustion, Maggie began to laugh.
“Maggie.”
One word uttered by Ian and an assurance of comfort swept over her like an island zephyr. She came to herself.
Henry stood over Carter. “Get them out of here. I will wait for the magistrate and his men.” He grinned savagely. “He may be missing some teeth when he returns.”
They made haste down the passageway and stepped over the keeper’s body. He was bound with rope and unconscious. She could not help a shiver of satisfaction at the sight. Progress was slow as the men climbed the narrow staircase sideways, Sabine and Sarah in their arms.
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