The Last Stitch (The Chronicles of Eirie: 2)

by Prue Batten

  Gallivant hurried up panting. ‘Sink me Adelina, what’s amiss? You took off as though your pants were on fire.’ He sat and fanned his face in a dramatic way, expecting some response from her. When silence ensued, except for the ‘hop-la’ on high, he noticed the drooping expression and the watery eyes. Oh Aine, he thought, here we go again. The thing is, he raged, she has every reason for the tears and the thwart emotions. Not just because of all she has been through but because...

  ‘You think you have grief under control and that life is more balanced,’ she spoke unevenly as she lifted the fraught face to watch the trapezes swinging back and forth. ‘But suddenly something happens - you see something or hear something. Aine, maybe even smell something and the world you have built shatters again. Like a pane of glass or a mirror. Tinkle, tinkle, tinkle.’ She made a movement with her fine long fingers, drifting her hands down to imitate the glass falling. ‘And you know if you are ever going to survive, you have to pick up every shard and join it back together and begin again. And it hurts, oh how it hurts. Because every shard is a memory and every memory a pain. And all you really want to do is tip it all in a bucket, like so much cullet, and forget about it.’

  Gallivant sat next to her, neither taking her hand nor speaking emotively. ‘I saw her and I saw Luther,’ he said. ‘At least we know for sure they will be in Veniche and can be on our guard.’

  Adelina lifted her hand to her stomach under the coat and rubbed and then reached for the hob’s hand and placed it on the subtle mound. ‘Do you feel it, Gallivant?’

  He kept his fingers still and beneath them he felt a tremor, a fluttering like butterfly wings. He sat very quietly until the soft agitation ceased and then he lifted his hands and slipped them into the caverns that were his pockets. ‘At last you have realised, Madame Needlewoman.’

  ‘You knew?’

  ‘Adelina!’ He couldn’t help being dismissive. ‘Of course I knew; the nausea, the loss of appetite for anything other than a dry toast and then later the bloom on your skin. Aine, woman, you glow like the Tan Ellyl.’

  ‘I thought I wasn’t well because of shock, because I was depressed. That I grieved. That the trauma of everything had upended my regular rhythms.’ She shrugged her shoulders, explaining away her ignorance.

  ‘There is no doubt it did. You still grieve. Patently. The symptoms of both are similar. Curious isn’t it? That such a wondrous event can present with the same awful feelings as the most shattering loss. But all that aside Threadlady, you are with child. And I for one am glad.’ He bussed her cheek with warm lips but she was serious as she sat back and tipped her head to the performers again.

  ‘It is a life, Gallivant. Kholi’s child.’ Her expression chilled, filled with none of the joy he hoped for. ‘And she, SHE, killed the child’s father and I want her to pay. An eye for an eye. And yet I am a Traveller and should be compassionate because it is what we are.’

  Quiet wrapped itself around the couple as the troupe disembarked from the wires and pontoon and presently the only sound was the ubiquitous frog chorus and the slapping of water against the piers of the walkways. ‘She needs some old fashioned Raji treatment.’ The hob’s voice funneled up from the standing collar of his coat where he had dropped his chin to rest on his chest.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘During the upheavals of centuries ago - aeons before you were born, Adelina - the Raj was an unusual place. As filled with art and culture as it is now but with inordinate brutality. They would bastinado, ganch, flay. And I ask you... she has murdered not just once but three times at least of which we know. Huh, milady. You may think I am utterly evil in my thoughts but nothing, nothing at all, is too nasty for her. Or Luther.’

  ‘Don’t, Gallivant. Not in front of my child. I can’t bear it. And I can’t bear that I must become a murderer as well.’ She gave an enormous sigh as the hands once again began to rub circles over the mound. ‘I must go to Veniche and it seems I have a number of things to do, doesn’t it?’ She began counting her fingers. ‘Finish the robe and take it to the Museo for I want it to be seen and my story to be found. Secondly I want to know Lhiannon is alive, that Severine hasn’t murdered her, that I haven’t in some way pre-disposed that brave girl to an untimely end. And three?’ She sat for a moment tapping the third finger she held up with the index finger of the other hand. ‘Aine forgive me, it is revenge.’

  ***

  Three little books finished with so much said and so much still to say.

  I feel myself in the throes of something momentous. I suppose it could be the birth of my child, after all is that not the ultimate achievement for most women? But in this instance, while I can hardly wait to hold Kholi’s child in my arms, I feel that is not the momentous thing I mean. There is something else, as if the whole of my world might shift, and it scares me. Travellers have strong intuition sometimes and something tells me there is a change coming.

  But perhaps we should read on.

  Continue to the second last design on the robe. Here you will find the deep indigo purple of the Bittersweet flower. It is of course known colloquially by another name, ‘Deadly Nightshade’, because its toxin is quite fatal and in its time has been used to counter malfeasant Others in their actions. I tell you, as I embroidered the deep violet petals, I would have liked to make a deadly infusion of the flowers and feed it to Severine in some of the wine to which she is notoriously attached.

  But I wander in my angst… Under the two flowers you will find two more books and underneath the delicate viridian butterfly another. The embroidery itself is a simple exercise in overcasting, satin stitch, and blanket stitch; nothing special but the effect is there; a flower the colour of a night sky when unseelie spirits fly from barrows and sidh.

  Read on.

  Chapter Twenty Seven

  The lute filled the afternoon air with its delicate melodies. The fine plucking, joined by the descant of the maids, produced a harmony that warmed the people’s cockles and the afternoon passed with soft and beguiling entertainment. As the maids danced dainty steps, Phelim’s attention drifted again and again to the full-flowering beauty of the Traveller. There was something about her and interest stirred.

  The lute notes faded on the breeze and a harp filled the space with soothing cords, the maids stepping with their baskets of flowers to colour the canvas and its surface of sand. A picture took shape; the magnificent face and naked body of a sprite depicted with leaf and petal. She could have been the Lady of the Marshes, a veela - any sprite who must be appealed to in her watery home, for this was a gift to the water, a dressing of great beauty, and if all the spirits were satisfied then the Marshes would be a safe haven for another year.

  Finally to the fading notes of the harp, one maid with silver hair whom Phelim recognized, lifted the canvas and carefully laid it on the water. The Marshers placed small floating candles alongside and the picture floated on the ebb tide as a silence ensued, albeit with the inevitable frog and cricket chorus.

  Eventually the waters conspired to pull the whole masterpiece below the surface and the Marshers cheered, for truly did the sprites not take it for their own? Clapping burst forth and the crowd began to make their way to the foodstalls before heading to the water square where they would spend the night watching the acrobatic show.

  A voice at his side caused Phelim to turn. ‘What did you think?’ the patron of his inn enquired politely.

  ‘Haunting and beautiful, the water spirits would be churlish to think otherwise. I’m grateful your wife told me of the festival. It would have been disappointing to miss it.’

  ‘Come with us now to the water square and have some food.’

  ‘You’re very kind but I must make my way. I’m late for my business in Veniche. Tell me, when does the next ferry leave?’

  ‘During the acrobatic display. Must you go?’

  ‘Sadly, but once again I’m grateful and have left a bag of gelt on my bed.’

  He shook the hand of his
host and as he turned away, seeing the man’s surprise at the frisson surging up his arm, Phelim wafted a gentle mesmer so that by the time he was lost in the crowd the fellow had forgotten who he was or that he had even stayed at the Inn.

  The Palazzo di Accia stood umber and candle-lit in its position amongst the homes of the rich and infamous of Veniche. At its feet the Grand Canal lapped delicately, like a cat with a bowl of very rich cream. The water traffic drifted back and forth although at this hour when dark had truly settled and a cold mist had wound across the laguna to fill the alleyways and smaller canals, it was dwindling to the doughty few; gondolas ferrying people to and from dinner or the opera, the theatre or some government reception. Women stepped into and out of the boats wrapped in stoles of taffeta and satin and men merged with shadow in tailcoats, the light of a flambeau catching the bright white of frilled shirt and silk scarf.

  Severine felt a huge surge of relief as she surveyed her home, the epicentre of her power. Here she felt confident, strong, in control. Somehow over the last few days that omnipresent sense of infallibility had teetered. It started when Luther had told her Adelina must have had Other help to escape and her ego, her confidence in her ability to achieve her goals had cracked ever so slightly.

  Surely this was why she needed to be immortal. To never feel insecure again, to know that nothing could ever harm or that one’s plans and dreams could never be foiled. This was the fundamental reason for her desire for Adelina’s murder. Because she, Adelina, would appear to have the aid and support of Others by being nothing but herself - no force, no bribery, no blackmail. Just herself. Whereas she, Severine, had needed to claw her way into the consciousness of the Others and the thought was as bitter as gall. For one tiny moment, the idea that she was a Faeran changeling suddenly seemed improbable. Her heart skipped a beat and she paled.

  She stalked back and forth in the salon, hands clasped tightly in front, muttering to herself. Did they laugh, these Others? Did they think her fatuous? By Behir, if they did not live in fear of her perhaps they should. Gertus had been killed for far less, Huon had been diminished by her threats. She pushed the battered ring up and down on her finger.

  The ring, the soul-syphon. She had forgotten.

  ‘Others, if you laugh, if you think I am not serious, then,’ she sneered, ‘know you are so very wrong. And a message for you Adelina - I always intended for you to die but now your death shall be full of such exquisite pain. I want you to beg me, BEG ME, to allow you to die.’

  She threw herself down on a chaise and looked around the elegant room. It radiated wealth and largesse. An ormulu clock graced a marble mantle and delicate tables displayed Raji enamel work. A desk stood against the wall between windows as high as the gilded and fretted ceiling and the paper strips lay on its inlaid surface, drawing her towards them. As she handled them they rustled, reminding her she must conceal them with speed.

  Luther had unpacked in the rooms that were his apartments on the second floor. The windows opened onto one of the canals and he stood on his balcony watching the gondolas poling back and forth. The craft drifted under small bridges that joined one side of the moonlit canal to the other and people strode in various directions over the paths in his view. On a table between the open doors he had laid the tools of his trade; rapiers, a whip, pistols, powder and shot, and the silent and deadly arsenal he loved most - daggers, poniards, stilettos and the garotte.

  He turned from his idle perusal and picking up the latter he held it to the light of the lamps in his room. He fingered the wooden handles and took a twist of wire around each knuckle, stretching the wire a little and listening to the faint ‘ting’ it made as the ruckles and twists from where it had been curled in his saddlebag gave way to the tension.

  An image of Adelina filled his mind. He had seen her at the Crossing, he swore it was her. He would recognise that hair anywhere. The price he could get from the wig makers for a fall of such vivid hue would be stupendous, the colour so rare.

  He had kept the sighting secret. He couldn’t stand more vituperation from Severine. He had his own ideas of how he would entrap Adelina, no need to involve the Contessa. No, that red-coated bitch would surely require threads and other tools of her trade and so he would position spies at each of the six haberdashers of Veniche and she’d appear, he had no doubt. And when he found her he knew exactly what he would do and there was an end to it, he didn’t need the madwoman downstairs telling him what and how.

  He’d been an assassin long before he came to her employ. Working throughout Eirie, always for large amounts of gelt, dispatching targets like an unseelie shadow. He smirked. He was better at his job than any he knew of, the best. There were plenty of sad souls flying across the land who could attest to the fact.

  As to Adelina? She had refused his advances, ridiculed him, emasculated him. He tightened the garotte. He had a livid scar down his cheek from the bicce’s nails, he had a cut chin from his chase in Ferry Crossing and his groin hadn’t stopped aching since she was spirited away. No one had ever injured Luther the Assassin. Ever. And no one would again. He thrust his fists apart and the garotte straightened with a musical ‘twang.’

  ‘This, my pet’, he told the room at large, but really he was talking to Adelina. ‘This is for you.’

  Chapter Twenty Eight

  Adelina would not sit quietly and rest. Agitated, eager to get to Veniche, she harried Gallivant to the ferry wharf where they paid fare and sat, two lone passengers, waiting for the appointed time of departure. They could hear the appreciative crowd at the water square watching the acrobats and just like the Fire Festival so long ago, Adelina could hear the tabla with its pulsating rhythm, reminding her of Kholi and the Raj. She wondered what the acrobats wore. Somehow the thought of black and gold from the mountainous fire celebration didn’t sit well with her creative mind. The silver sparkle of the water and the chiaroscuro of the Marsh trees in the background required an entirely different palette. In her imagination, they tumbled and turned with silver sequins and strobes of pale green and blue, maquillage in soft marine colours of celadon and ice - a liquid fantasy as they swung and balanced and flipped like flying fish jumping or drops of water sparkling.

  Lost in her dream, only the ferryboat rocking disturbed her. Another passenger walked down the gangplank to take his seat in the small galliot. The rowers sat in pairs deeper in the hull on either side and chatting quietly, inviting each other to drink at an oarsmens’ tavern in Veniche to celebrate the end of their shift and a long muscle-bound day. They fingered their calloused hands, flexing their prodigious muscles and rolling wide shoulders. The rowers of the Eirish seas were highly regarded and earned good money, for theirs was the strength that kept the maritime coasts afloat.

  A small whistle blew once and Adelina could see there were only three passengers - herself, Gallivant and the stranger. The rowers on the port side sat waiting whilst the starboard side feathered and swept gently to bring the bow of the boat around and then with another short burst of the whistle and a command from the ferrymaster, the rowers pulled, the keel cutting through the water.

  The passengers turned and watched Ferry Crossing recede. Above the skillion rooves of the buildings, they could see the high wires at the water square and hear the roar of an appreciative audience punctuated by laughter at the clowns who no doubt sought to wrest attention from the aerial troupe. Gallivant stood to stretch his legs and walked to the stern, keeping clear of the rowers’ deck as they pulled rhythmically but silently through the water. He thought how much more pleasant it was than the shrill and constant whistle of Severine’s galliot which had torn the mellow Marsh sounds apart.

  He leaned with his hands on the taffrail, watching the phosphorescence froth and cream as the ferry coursed across the laguna. He was sure he saw faces under the surface, luminous and pale green, with sharp teeth that grimaced at their earthly Other brother.

  ‘Merrows?’

  He turned, a fractious hand to his chest. ‘P
ardon sir? You startled me.’

  ‘Merrows?’ The fellow indicated with a tip of his handsome head to the water beneath.

  ‘It would seem so, yes. Sir, I believe we owe you thanks...’

  Phelim shrugged. ‘It’s of no account. I didn’t like the ruffian. Tell me, you’re a Goodfellow, aren’t you?’

  ‘I am and you are a Faeran.’ Gallivant replied politely.

  ‘It appears so. Strange there should be two Others travelling on the same boat to Veniche at the same time.’

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘My name is Phelim. I haven’t been to Veniche before.’ He smiled as he admitted this to the hob.

  ‘Neither have I,’ Gallivant could not prevent a rueful note slipping into his voice Such ignorance about the place worried him fit to bursting. How could he protect Adelina in such ignorance? His companion’s voice broke in upon his anxieties.

  ‘I know nothing of the city at all and confess it readily. Does your friend?’ Phelim looked across at Adelina whose eyes were still on the shrinking sight of Ferry Crossing.

  ‘No. She has never been there. She’s a Traveller and wishes to peruse the markets and such. I am her Goodfellow so I must accompany her.’ Must I really. If I am Other, I owe mortals nothing at all. I am a free spirit and yet Adelina draws me like a bee to nectar...