The Bridge of Silver Wings

by John Wiltshire

  He saw the surprise on their faces, when just as it got light, he came downstairs. He was drawn and pale, cradling his arm. Andrea immediately stood, took one look at it and decreed she was driving him to the hospital. Nikolas didn’t say a word. He let Tim help him into some shoes and sat in the car alongside Andrea. When they returned, his wrist was in a cast, which made it look as if they’d been in a car accident when he sat alongside Squeezy. No one was sure what to do.

  It was unfortunate Kate turned up with Radulf then. No one had thought to call her and tell her. She came into a room of war zone survivors. But it wasn’t her reaction that finally cracked the ice of reserve Nikolas knew everyone was maintaining for his sake—it was Radulf’s. He came into the kitchen, his ears cocked to hear his beloved humans. He couldn’t hear either of them. He used his nose and located his favourite. He didn’t get a pat, so he trotted back to the door, expecting the other, whining in anticipation, wagging his tail. Nikolas turned. He saw the expression on Radulf’s face, looked to the door himself, then shot to his feet and wrenched it open. For one moment, he’d thought Radulf had heard Ben, that Ben was about to come slamming in, demanding food, laughing, teasing him, ruffling his hair, stealing his tea, sitting on him. But none of that would ever happen again. No one would ever come through this door that would do that again. Nikolas was alone in a bubble of isolation so profound he was as blind and helpless as the dog staring forlornly at the empty step, his tail now still and hanging unhappily.

  If Nikolas was one thing, he was self-contained. He’d become less so over the years with Ben, but still, he was always the most silent in any room, the one who most kept his thoughts to himself. He drew on those reserves of strength now. He wasn’t about to break down in front of these people. After that one lapse, that one moment of weakness, he wrapped himself up in a shroud of disinterest and told everyone he was fine and that he had things to do. That they must leave. No one wanted to leave him, but no one wanted to face his wrath if they didn’t obey. It was Squeezy in the end that stayed. He just told Nikolas to fuck off, and that Ben would want him to stay, so he did. He sat in the living room with Radulf watching back-to-back movies and making Nikolas cups of tea which he didn’t drink. It was a very long day.

  That night, Nikolas had a phone call from the Devon and Cornwall police. The fire appeared to have been caused by a candle. There’d been no electricity in the house, and there were the remains of candles in many strategic places. There was going to be an inquest, and he was welcome to send a representative or come himself.

  As he held the receiver to his ear, he saw the blisters covering his hand for the first time. He frowned. It was painful being burnt. It was not a way anyone should have to go and he’d have chosen a better death for B—Nikolas took in a huge gasp of air but couldn’t actually breathe. He could hear the voice on the phone, but all he could think about was Ben burning. His body, his beautiful body, burning. He dropped the phone. Radulf was whining. It was dark outside, dark in the kitchen. He’d forgotten to put any lights on. Was it dark where Ben was? Was he alone? Was he frightened? For the first time since he’d found Ben in the bathroom of their cabin on Aeroe, Nikolas understood why Ben had done what he’d done, why he’d wanted to follow on. Nikolas wanted to follow on now. He wanted to go where Ben had gone. But he couldn’t yet. When he went, he’d do it properly. He had the means and the knowledge to do it right. But he had things to do first.

  He needed to find out who’d murdered Benjamin Rider-Mikkelsen. Candle? Yeah. He’d seen their faces when Ben had told them he was going to sell the house.

  He wasn’t sedated now.

  They wanted to take what was his?

  They had no idea who they were dealing with.

  He went stealthily up the stairs and collected his car keys. It was a pity they had a manual; it was hard to change gear with a broken wrist. He’d manage though.

  He could hear the television in the other room as he moved silently past. It was a long drive back to Devon, so he’d better get on with it.

  By Taunton, he had to stop. His wrist had swelled up in the cast and was incredibly painful, pressing against the inside. He pulled into a service station, drew out his knife and cut if off. That was better. He continued. It was dark when he pulled up outside Camilla’s farmhouse. There were lights on and a car in the driveway. He moved to a window and looked in. He could see the old woman, but no sign of the younger one. He watched for a while. She was on the phone. He located the wires and cut them. When he entered the sitting room, she was punching a number into a mobile. Her hand flew to her throat and she stared. He plucked the phone from her and tossed it to one side. “What on earth do you think you’re doing? What are you doing here?”

  “Sit down. We need to have a little chat.”

  “How dare you! Let me go!” She had no choice but to sit. She rubbed her arm where Nikolas had grabbed her. “I’m calling the police.”

  “Where’s Natasha?”

  “What? That’s none of your…” Her hand flew to her face when he slapped her. “She’s gone away. She needed to get away. She’s not here.”

  Nikolas sat back on his heels, regarding her. “Okay, that was the easy question. They’re going to get harder now, Camilla. I’m going to ask you who set the fire in the house. Then I’m going to ask you why. Do you think you can answer those questions for me without lying and without forcing me to make you answer? This is something I trained long and hard to do. And don’t think your age or your sex will save you. They won’t. You mean nothing to me.”

  She was staring at him as if he’d risen, whole and imperfect, from the earth beneath him. She swallowed. He nodded. “So, first quest—”

  “Nikolas.”

  They both turned. Philipa was standing in the doorway. She was calm and impassive, but she repeated that one word, “Nikolas.” He rose to his feet, frowning.

  “What—?”

  “I had an odd phone call from a polite young man called Tim. He stressed you might be here. Could we speak? Now, please.” She’d commanded royal children with that voice. She’d lived with Nikolas for ten years and knew him better than he thought she did. He glanced at Camilla then went toward her. Philipa smiled brightly and led him to a corner of the room, where he could watch his captive but not be overheard. “Ben wouldn’t want you to—”

  He cut her off. “Don’t say that. You didn’t know a thing about—”

  “Nikolas, I know he put more smiles on your face in one evening than I saw in ten years before he came into your life. I know he worshipped the ground you walked on for some reason none of us can understand. So shut up and listen. It was just an accident.”

  “No. They murdered him. You don’t understand. They blame him for everything. He kept saying he’d killed John Redvers, that he let him surf a beach he didn’t know, that—”

  “That’s nonsense, he—”

  “I know that! But Ben still—”

  “No! Not that. John Redvers knew that beach very well, Nikolas. That was where Hector drowned. John was with him when he was lost. They were surfing together. You must be—”

  “John knew that beach?”

  “Yes, so you see, Ben wasn’t at all at fault, and this has just been a…what?”

  Nikolas turned to look at the older woman. He tipped his head to one side thoughtfully. This changed things.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Ben woke to a world of complete darkness and silence, with his thoughts screaming, John! He tried to sit up but banged his head on something hollow and close. He felt up, then around and sudden and overwhelming panic hit him. He was enclosed on all sides. He hammered in the small space he had. He cried out. He shouted until his throat was raw. He knew exactly where he was and why his first thought had been of John. He was inside John Redvers’s coffin. He stopped shouting. He blinked. How did you know when you were dead? Did everyone wake up in their coffin, panicking, thinking this was the wrong place for them to be, only to come to the
realisation eventually that it was exactly the right place for the dead to be? He didn’t feel dead. He shouted again and hammered. He had the awful image of all the previous Redvers lying in their coffins, listening to him, thinking buddy, waste of time, we tried that. He felt around the opening, but in the total darkness, he was unable to find anything of use. No crack, no crevice, nothing. He kicked up at the lid. All he got was a hollow thunk. He refused to think…

  He utterly refused to think he’d been nailed into a coffin alive.

  For about thirty seconds.

  And then the realisation hit him.

  He’d been buried alive.

  Everything was dark for a long time after that.

  Panic and fear, though, are exhausting emotions, and after a time, Ben was too tired to keep them up. He fell into an almost calm reverie, thoughts sliding into his mind, half-captured then slipping away. John. He’d woken thinking about John. The funeral? No. Something else. He let the thought slide harmlessly away and thought about Natasha for a while. She’d been angry about something. Angry about Nikolas. For the first time in his coffin, Ben smiled. Nikolas. Nikolas pretty much always made him smile these days, privately if not noticeably on the outside. It didn’t do Nikolas any good at all to let him know not only was he beautiful and clever and incredibly sexy, he was also just fun to be with. In Ben’s experience, it was best to keep Nikolas’s ego and vanity flattened down a little. Which didn’t really fit with his decision to change his name. Ben Rider-Mikkelsen. He liked the sound of it just as much as Nikolas had. This thought though was an unfortunate one, for it only brought Ben back to his situation, buried in John Redvers’s coffin in the Redvers’s family vault.

  He wasn’t a fucking Redvers, and he spent some time shouting and screaming this out to the accompaniment of kicking the lid as best he could, given the small space he was occupying. It was just as well John had been nearly as tall. He giggled at this thought, then frowned. John. John was watching him in candlelight, standing just behind him. He’d thought, huh, he is shorter than me then…something.

  When had this happened?

  God, he was thirsty.

  He began to think about cold water: plunging into it, drinking it down. The first taste of the water they’d been given after the tsunami. Nothing had ever tasted so good. He smiled again, thinking of Nikolas’s face so covered in mud only the whites of his eyes had shown. The first time he’d met Nikolas he’d remembered thinking about the man’s suit, how perfect it was, how he managed to get his hair to fall just so. Ben had travelled up from Hereford to London by train, and it had been hot and crowded and he was nervous and had been incredibly aware his suit was crumpled. Nikolas hadn’t looked so perfect after that great wave. And they’d been so thirsty!

  He tried to bring saliva into his mouth but couldn’t. He needed a pebble to suck. They’d sat on the pebbles on the beach. He and John. Having tea and coffee. Could you kill someone for a cup of tea? For water? He thought he probably could. Did he have anything in his pockets he could suck? He fumbled into his jeans and, incredulous, pulled out his keys. The car, the house, his bike. He detached the smallest and put it in his mouth. Instant relief. For a while. The biggest he took in his fist and explored around the edges of his prison. It wasn’t a modern coffin, lined and airtight. It was still fucking solid though. Oak. How many people got to admire the craftsmanship of their coffins from the inside?

  What else did he have on him? He had his watch, a present from Nikolas. But then almost everything he owned had been a present from Nikolas at one time or other. He’d given it to him their second time. Not at the house, which had been their first, but at a hotel, one of the string of expensive hotels Nikolas booked when he returned from ops, where they could meet, have sex, not talk. But he’d given him a watch, complained his was embarrassing. Ben hadn’t thought it was. It told the time. He hadn’t even realised this was a present at the time as it had been given so casually. It had just been tossed at him as he’d lain naked and utterly bewildered on the bed. Fucking a man once could be put down to experimentation, drink, celebrating being offered a job; but meeting him deliberately at a hotel and letting him take you, taking him just as forcibly, that meant something else. So, bewildered had hardly covered it. Post-traumatic shock, more like. And then he’d been tossed a watch, which he’d later discovered, when idly flicking through a magazine on a flight to Singapore, had cost nearly thirty thousand pounds.

  He’d never even realised when Nikolas subsequently asked him what the time was, which he did as a matter of course every time they lay together, he wasn’t asking because he wanted to get up and leave to more pressing matters, but because he liked to hold Ben’s wrist and see the watch on it. He’d understood nothing of Nikolas then. He knew him better now.

  The key in his mouth was keeping him a little saner. Three days without water was all he could last. How long had he been in here? He remembered Monday afternoon. Natasha and Camilla arriving with a picnic and flowers. Nikolas had left. It was now one a.m. Wednesday, according to the faint digital glow. Possibly thirty-two hours. He cupped the watch in his hand, rubbing his thumb over the face. Thirty-two hours. He’d been in here the whole time? Why couldn’t he remember? The picnic. The flowers. Camilla had left. Yes, he remembered that. Camilla had gone, and he’d been drinking with Natasha.

  Ben shot up and hit his head once more on the roof. He’d been drinking with Natasha. His mind whirled back over the whole time he’d known Natasha. All the alcohol, all the times he’d felt so ill. How much better he’d felt at Philipa’s when he’d gotten away for a while.

  She’d been spiking his fucking drinks.

  He was sure of it. Christ, but he’d been so ill after that first party. He remembered waking up in the afternoon at the hotel, Nikolas telling him he’d kissed Natasha. He’d been so hurt. It wasn’t an emotion most people would associate with Nikolas, but then most people didn’t know him—Nikolas made sure of that. But Ben knew him. He hadn’t at first. It amazed him now they’d got to where they were, given where they’d started. He’d taken Nikolas’s coldness and disinterest entirely at face value: the guy was a bastard who just wanted to fuck a man on the side because he’d made a marriage of convenience and didn’t fancy his wife anymore. That’d been Ben’s simplistic view of what was happening. Nikolas cold and disinterested? Ben actually laughed at this thought, despite his situation.

  He had to concentrate. Why did his thoughts keep slipping to Nikolas, always Nikolas? He clutched his watch and forced himself to stop thinking about the infuriating, beautiful man who dominated his life. Think about Natasha. Why had she done that? What did she want? He couldn’t push his thoughts past the picnic and the drinking. Had he felt sick? Had he gotten up to use the bathroom? Is that why he kept seeing a face in a mirror? John. John had been standing behind him in the mirror when he’d been sick in the bathroom. He’d lifted his face and there he was, watching him, and he’d thought, Huh, he’s smaller than me. And then his face had hit the mirror. Ben sat up again and hit his head again. The bastard had pushed him! Again. He felt around his face and could feel dried blood. Wait.

  John Redvers wasn’t dead?

  That was the thought Ben should have had—not huh he’s smaller than me but what the fuck! He’s not dead!

  John Redvers had faked his death.

  John had faked his death? It didn’t seem possible. Ben had been there. He’d nearly died himself. But then he’d been fighting the rip. The one thing you should never do. He’d been swimming against the rip to save John. What if John hadn’t been resisting it at all and had just let himself be carried out by it? He’d have needed someone primed to pick him up…Ben closed his eyes and wondered if he was as dumb as Nikolas sometimes accused him of being, and in thinking that he lost the thought that had led to it as his mind spiralled inevitably back to Nikolas.

  He chuckled, feeling slightly demented but enjoying the loss of control. Nikolas had spent the last six years insulting him, bu
llying him, belittling him, occasionally hurting him and often humiliating him, but he’d also adored him, spoilt him…created him, freed him. Nikolas called him stupid because he knew he wasn’t, but he wanted him to use his brain, be more than he was. They’d still not come to an agreement on anything intellectual. Nikolas read (or pretended to) the Financial Times, the Economist and occasionally The Independent. Ben glanced at the headlines of The Sun if he was in a queue in the newsagents. Nikolas listened to PM on Radio 4 or preferred silence. He sang along to Radio 1. Nikolas played chess. He played strip poker.

  God, he’d played strip poker with Natasha, John and some of Natasha’s friends. Nikolas had asked him have you been good, and he’d joked it away. What would Nikolas say if he knew Ben had done that?

  Shit. Had John Redvers drugged him at the beach? Had the tea been spiked? Is that why he’d not been strong enough to save him? For, of course, John hadn’t wanted saving and would’ve needed to ensure Ben couldn’t. Ben swore for a while. This came from knowing nothing about fucking drugs. If he’d been Nikolas, he’d probably have realised what was happening. The taste? The sensation? He still remembered the day he’d gone to Nikolas’s study and opened the drawer to see all the pills and powder scattered there. He’d no idea what it all was, but he was damn sure it wasn’t legal or good. He’d had no idea. Another side of his personality Nikolas hid from the world. But hadn’t he earned the right to a little forgetfulness? A little pain relief? Nikolas hadn’t had an easy life. Ben bit his lip, blinking back the sudden feeling he was going to cry. He couldn’t afford to lose the moisture.

  If Nikolas’s life had been hard before, what was it going to be like now? What was Nikolas doing now?

  Ben’s blood suddenly had a sensation of running cold, an icy trickle spreading from his spine. Was he actually missing? Was it conceivable he could be missing for over thirty hours and Nikolas not find him? Nikolas would empty heaven and hell and torture all the occupants to find him. Of that Ben was in no doubt. He occasionally teased himself by playing with the idea Nikolas didn’t love him as much as he loved Nikolas, but he knew it wasn’t true. Nikolas never strayed, never seemed interested in anyone else, never ceased to focus entirely on him. So why hadn’t Nikolas found him already? There was only one answer really; Nikolas didn’t know he was missing.