by Jasmine Walt
"There is a good reason for my silence. The man that follows me does not simply intend to kill me – he will hurt anyone in my life if he knew their deaths would wound me. I intended to keep a low profile, to claim friendship with no one, to extract myself with little disruption from London if he did find me here. But you two—" he said, glancing from Isambard to Brigitte, and sighing. "You have destroyed my hope of this, for I care about you too deeply. Now that he has found me I must once again go underground, for I cannot have him catch me and destroy your lives in the process. Brigitte has, against my protestations, decided to go with me, but I'll not have you forsake your own life for my mistakes."
"This man hates you so much?" Tears streamed down Brigitte's face.
"If you knew my crime, you would not be so quick to side against him."
"Nicholas." Brigitte's voice seemed firm, large in the darkness. "I am hiding in a tiny box in the deepest reaches of an iron wall. I am cold and I am frightened. Your friend Isambard has come down here to tend to you when he should be celebrating. It's time you told us what is going on."
"We cannot help you until we understand the nature of the man we're up against," Brunel added.
Nicholas sighed. "Very well, but when you hear what I have done, you will change your mind and cast me forever from your life, and you will be all the happier for it."
So he told them the tale of his escape from the Navy, of his meeting with Jacques and the beguiling black-haired woman named Julianna, of his days spent studying, of his nights holding her while she cried, of how the atmosphere at the monastery had slowly turned poisonous, of his discovery of Jacques' brutality, and of their desperate flight that ended in him driving his sword into the heart of the woman he loved.
When he finished, he was weeping, the tears hot against his cheeks. Isambard pressed the beer into his hands, and he drank, long and heavy, ‘till the rawness of the memories floated away.
All three were silent for a long time, the only sound in the room the steady dripping of water somewhere in the distance and Nicholas’ wretched sobs.
Brigitte spoke, her soft voice cutting the air like a dagger. "I could not ask you to do this."
"Brigitte—"
"She was selfish, this Julianna. She wanted you to do this for her, knowing you loved her so, knowing what it would do to you thereafter."
"It wasn't like that—" He caught himself. "Perhaps she didn't expect me to live much longer."
"But live you did. And now you're in a world of mess, and it's her fault."
Nicholas felt a strong sense that he should be defending Julianna, but he said instead, "You do not hate me?"
"Why should I? You fulfilled the last wish of a dying woman, a woman who was already numb and dead inside, and you've carried the guilt of that memory like a shroud ever since. Do you think me so fickle that my love for you could be extinguished by some past crime? Do you think you alone own all the sorrow of the world?"
Love … she had spoken that word. He'd not thought about it, not dared to utter it, since that night in the valley. And here she was before him, this maid who knew nothing about him save his one greatest secret, and yet she professed her love for him.
"I do not think you fickle," he choked, trying to keep his voice steady. "But you should not profess such things, for they cannot be taken back, and you may yet meet the same fate as the last person to utter those words to me."
"She will not," said Isambard. "Buckland has done right to hide you here, for du Blanc cannot possibly find you. As soon as Buckland told me of your flight, I sent a guard to your home. He saw Jacques arrive there but three hours ago, with two Navvies in tow. They broke the front window and stirred your papers into frightful disarray, but they left soon after. He tracked them back to Stephenson's London residence, but they have not emerged since."
"He aims to make my death look like a simple Stoker/Navvy rivalry," Nicholas said.
"That is my guess, too. It was probably Stephenson's idea. It will take all my cunning to design a solution to this dilemma. I do not know when next I can return to you, but when I do, it will be with your salvation."
"Could you send someone else? What about Aaron?"
"He's still playing hero with the Stokers. I'll not trust him again," Isambard said. "Apart from Buckland, I'm the only one who knows about these tunnels and this room, and I intend to keep it that way. But just in case, I have brought you this." He drew from the darkness a long, thin object: Nicholas' sword.
He took it gratefully. "Thank you, Isambard. For everything."
With a nod of his head, Isambard retraced his steps back down the ladder, and Nicholas listened to his footsteps fading into the gloom. He reached across and clasped Brigitte's hand.
"Brigitte?"
"Mmhmmm?"
"If we make it out of this alive, would you object to marrying me?"
"Nothing would make me happier."
James Holman's Memoirs – Unpublished
A night and a day had passed since Brunel's sermon, and I was no closer to London. I had been ready to sneak off toward the castle after the night mass, when another Knight took it upon himself to be unusually talkative, and I was unable to slip away. I had already heard one carriage clatter away into the darkness – no doubt laden with a cargo of Sunken – and I knew I could not remain here much longer with the King's disturbing secret weighing heavy upon me.
I made sure to leave Travers College at the earliest possible hour, and upon reaching St. George’s Chapel, some thirty-five minutes before service was due to begin, I took up a stall closest to the exit. I needn't have bothered, for as the minutes drew out and the priests at last began their incantations, not a single other Knight appeared. They'd all decided to absent themselves from duty. Maybe luck would be with me tonight.
After the service had finished, I slipped around the side of the church, hid in a flower bed, and listened as the priests locked the chapel for the night. When I was certain the courtyard was empty, I slipped from my hiding place and crept toward the servants’ quarters.
Brigitte had said there was an entrance to the cellars in the castle kitchen, and although I'd never been there before, I'd have no trouble locating it. A short walk through the northern wing of the castle revealed a sharp scent of fresh herbs on the breeze. I'd found the kitchen gardens. From here it was a simple task to feel my way along the wall ‘till I found the door to the kitchen. It was unlocked. I pushed it open and crept inside.
The door to the cellar could probably be found in the larder. I stood in the doorway of this unfamiliar room and rapped my knuckles against the wooden bench, once, twice … I listened, the echoes creating an image in my mind. The shapes and positions of objects – though not their form or function – became clear to me. I took a cautious step forward, careful to avoid knocking any pans from the overhanging rack.
A blind man builds his image of a room in a very different way from a man with eyes. While the sighted man can take in the basics of a room in a single glance, I build my perception in layers – first, the position, density, and relationships of objects, then the intricacies of the space that surrounds them, and finally a complex map of textures, scents, and sounds. Normally, I would build this "image" over weeks, visiting a room many times to familiarise myself with every detail, but this night I didn't have the luxury. I stepped to the right to avoid the wooden table, my hands at my sides, fingers running across the surface of the object. Slowly. Methodically. Every sense on high alert.
I took another step.
On the other side of the room, a door creaked.
I froze, listening hard. There was a window beside the door, just behind where I stood. If the moon was high in the sky tonight, my silhouette would be illuminated to anyone looking in on the room.
I held my breath.
After several moments, I could detect no further movement, no other human presence. Satisfied it was just a draught, I took another step into the room.
A woman cr
ied out, and a heavy object slammed into the side of my head. Pain arced across my eyes, and I felt my knees wobble and give way. I pitched forward and hit the side of the table with a thud, and everything around me passed into silence.
I came to and found myself propped up awkwardly in a hard wooden chair. A harsh female voice barked orders at another girl, and some smelling salts passed under my nose. I pushed the hand away.
"My head hurts," I said.
"An' that's no one's fault but your own," snapped the rough voice. "Fancy sneaking in here in the middle of the night, frightening two helpless young women and all."
The voice sounded neither helpless nor young, so I concluded there were at least three women regarding me from around the table. The matron cleared her throat. Clearly, I was required to furnish an explanation for my intrusion.
"Forgive me, ladies. I had hoped to navigate the kitchens without rousing you from your beds. I am Lieutenant Holman, one of the Naval Knights of Windsor, and I am trying to escape the castle before we're forced onto those trains."
"What do you know of it?" The woman sounded suspicious.
"I know that unholy creatures haunt this castle, and I know that tomorrow we're being moved to a new residence in London, but the creatures are moving with us, secretly, so no one in London can glimpse them. I know our residence is behind a high iron Wall that promised to keep the dragons out, but will instead lock the citizens in."
The matron and her companions – their voices belonging to young girls – gasped.
"And I know that tonight is my last and only chance to escape that fate, so I might find my way to London and send up some warning, perhaps stop Presbyter Brunel from closing every exit through his Wall—"
"Travers College is all the way down the other end of the garden. How do you know of the Sunken?" the woman cut in.
"Brigitte Black told me of them. She used to be a maid in the castle, but—"
"—she left," a girl's voice, high and musical, interrupted. "She had a gentlemanly sweetheart, and so she left. And not a moment too soon, for the very next day the King was calling her to his chambers."
The matron's voice remained hard. "You know of Brigitte? She is safe?"
"Safer than any of us. Her sweetheart, Nicholas Rose, is my very dear friend, and he is architect to Presbyter Brunel. He is, at this very moment, working to avert this crisis."
"Maxwell the gardener's gone, too," the first girl piped up.
"Cassandra."
"Well, he has," she sniffed. "Last we saw him was the night Brigitte disappeared. He'd been so ill—"
"He helped Brigitte escape through the cellars," I said. "This is where I am going. She told me about a door—"
"There's no escaping that way," the woman said. "Them creatures have overrun every inch of the cellars. If you put your ear to the door you can hear 'em, chomping and snarling. You won't get ten feet before they tear you apart."
"What are we to do, then?"
"We?" the second girl asked, her voice trembling.
"I can hardly leave you ladies here alone now, can I? Not when you've shown me such hospitality." I smiled, rubbing the lump on my head.
"Me an' Cassandra an' Rebecca have our escape all figured out. There is perhaps room for one more, but you must listen carefully to all we say and follow us without question. It will not be easy for a blind man."
"Nothing ever is. When?"
"Tomorrow. You will remain here with us, and we make our escape early in the morning. You will sleep here, in the scullery, and you'll not," she said sternly, "move or make so much as a sound, or that frying pan will be the least of your worries."
"I'm worried about Holman. And Isambard." Nicholas hunched forward, folding his arms across his chest, then letting them fall at his sides, then clasping them together. If the room were tall enough to stand up in, he would be pacing, but it wasn't, so he folded his arms again.
Brigitte leaned against the other wall, spreading her skirts over her knees. "Why? Is someone trying to kill them, too?"
"The Sunken—"
"—are not our biggest concern of the minute, Nicholas—" She stopped mid-sentence. He started to speak, but she hushed him. Then he heard it, too. A clank, like someone trying to open the gate on the other side of the gangway.
"It could be a compie," he said, straining his ears and his sense to listen. He heard it again – more scrapes and clangs in the gangway below. They were definitely footsteps – someone was coming.
"It must be Isambard. I hope he's brought some more food and oil." Nicholas stood up, picking up the lantern – which was running low again – from beside her. "I'll help him—"
"Please?" she tugged on his trousers, her eyes large in the glimmer of the lamplight. "I don’t want to be left in the darkness."
Sighing, he stroked her hair and placed the lantern back on the floor beside her. Lowering his feet over the edge of the ladder, he climbed down onto the platform at the end of the gangway. He could see the faint glow of a lantern bobbing toward him, the figure shrouded in the shadow of a heavy cloak.
"Isambard?"
"You are mistaken," a voice rasped close to his ear. Nicholas leapt back, just as Jacques brought up his lantern and slammed the metal bracket across his face. Reeling, Nicholas cracked his spine against the metal ladder. He kicked out with his boot, but he was disoriented and the blow glanced off Jacques' shoulder.
"You'll have to do better than that," said Jacques, and Nicholas heard the slice of a rapier being drawn.
He had no time to fetch his own sword, still sitting on the floor next to Brigitte, so Nicholas let go of the ladder and flung himself at Jacques. The Frenchman fell backward, hitting the grating with a crack, Nicholas' full weight bearing down on top of him. Jacques' lantern clattered across the grating.
Nicholas pinned Jacques' sword arm with his knee and slammed his fist into the Frenchman's face. He felt no fear at all, no anger, only an odd sense of calm, as if he were merely a spectator to the fight instead of a participant. Jacques tried to rock his body over to free his arm, but Nicholas landed another blow to the side of his head and he slumped back down.
Something moved behind Nicholas on the grating. "I'll grab the sword!" Brigitte cried, rushing to his side and grabbing Jacques' arm.
"No! Go back!"
He turned and saw her prying Jacques' fingers from the hilt, but as he turned, his weight shifted, allowing Jacques to free his left arm and land a blow on Nicholas' cheek.
Brigitte stomped on Jacques’ wrist with the heel of her boot, and he howled. Nicholas felt his arm slacken and knew without turning that Brigitte had freed the sword. He pinned both Jacques' arms again, and landed another blow across his face before he heard more footsteps clanging across the grating.
How foolish I've been. Of course Jacques wouldn't come here alone.
Hands grabbed him, pulled him up, away from Jacques, whose cries of pain turned into peals of laughter. He shouted a warning to Brigitte. She stood her ground, sword raised, eyes defiant, but though she swung and thrust and opened a deep cut across a man's cheek, other men closed in around her and overpowered her with ease.
Nicholas struggled against his captors, but it was no use. They wrenched his arms tightly around him, and he watched, helpless, as Jacques – blood gushing from his nose – yanked the sword from Brigitte's grasp and held it to her throat. She whimpered as the blade pressed against her skin.
"Leave her be," Nicholas cried. "She has no part in this. It's me you want."
"Ah," said Jacques, smiling, and Nicholas' blood turned cold. "And by your very admission, Monsieur Thorne, I conclude she is exactly the person I want. Does not our situation here seem familiar to you? It does to me. Two years ago you murdered my wife – the woman who was carrying my child. I held her in my arms and felt the life drain out of her, while you ran into the forest like the coward you are. And so, tonight, I will murder the woman you love, and you too will know the pain I've lived with ever since
."
He spoke to his men in French, and they grabbed Brigitte's limbs and pinned her to the grating, her arms and legs spread wide. With a slash of his blade Jacques split open her dress. Brigitte screamed, but he silenced her with a slap so hard it jerked her head right back. Nicholas' eyes met hers, and he saw his own fear reflected there.
Nicholas gathered his strength, kicking and thrashing against the men who held him, but they did not loosen their grip. Memories flashed before him – another woman he loved, another life he had not been able to save. Jacques raised the sword high above his head, the blade glinting in the dim lamplight.
"No!" Rage burnt in Nicholas’ limbs, and his vision darkened with spots of red. His anger welled in his stomach, growing larger until it took over every limb, every pore, until it pushed out all other thoughts.
And, when his mind was clear, the mind of something else entered his body.
The thoughts slammed into his with such force his whole body jerked forward. The rage disappeared, replaced by a burning hunger that seemed to squeeze his muscles, wringing every shred of strength from him. His vision swirled and changed, the colours disappearing, replaced by a flowing, bubbling mass of wafting scents and energy. As he looked again at Jacques, he no longer saw the man who had hunted him for two years, a man who at this moment raised a sword to his beloved Brigitte.
He saw dinner.
Nicholas could only stare through the eyes that weren't his, a stranger in his own body, as the mind inside him pushed, pressed against some invisible force. Jacques drew the sword higher. Brigitte screamed.
The gangway lurched to the right, and Jacques – arm in the air, mouth open in silent surprise – fell back against the railing. Two giant rows of teeth clamped around his body, as a dragon rose up from the depths of the Wall to meet him. His leg exploded in a geyser of blood, and his sword clattered over the edge.