Perhaps that was no longer true, for it appeared that death would defeat her son, and very soon. He had been able to replenish his strength by submerging himself in the Cauldron thrice daily, but they both sensed that the time was coming when that would no longer restore him.
Her little boy, now a rapidly aging man, would die.
She began to tremble, anticipating ruin: the end of all that was good, the end of the world as it was known. She told herself to have faith; Jean-Marc would not fail in his duty. He would live until her grandson was brought home. Jean-Marc was his father’s son, and Antoinette had loved and trusted Henri Regnier with all her body, spirit, and soul.
She remembered even now the day she had met Henri. Allowing her mind to wander for an instant, she traveled back in memory to the place where her heart had been won with a mere look, and a touch . . .
* * *
“They say he’s just the wickedest man,” whispered Antoinette’s lovely American cousin Marie, as they both endured the torturously tight lacing of their corsets by dark-skinned girls who never spoke a word. Marie’s blond hair was crimped into ringlets that framed her face like filigree; Antoinette’s raven-black tresses hung loose—not the fashion of the day. And yet, the young men of her acquaintance whispered often to her that they preferred her simple, raven coiffure to that of all other ladies. A lie? Perhaps. Did it matter?
Not in the least.
Marie continued, “They say Monsieur Regnier has, you know, a special friend.”
Antoinette shrugged, feeling very superior, very French, about such matters. “A handsome man in the prime of his life? Why would he not?”
“Antoinette Cormier, you shock me to my bones!” Marie shrieked, batting her. “Don’t you ever let my maman hear you talking like that!”
Antoinette grinned. “Mais non, I never will. But I say to you now, chère cousine, in France we accept that men have appetites that may not be satisfied simply by dining at home.”
“Appetites!” Marie was thoroughly scandalized. “How can you talk so!”
“Some women also have large appetities,” Antoinette added, delighting in the effect she was creating. “Many women hunger on occasion. Perhaps I. Perhaps even you.”
Marie batted at her cousin. “Antoinette! I declare, you are a wanton creature with no morals. I am a lady. I would never remotely wish to do . . . what you are suggesting . . . oh!”
The corsets done, the petticoats came next, yards of them, and then the superb velvet dresses Antoinette had brought from Paris.
* * *
Then—it was crystal-clear in her mind, even now in Boston with the Sons of Entropy gathering below, even with Henri dead over a century—the two cousins, together with Marie’s parents, had met Henri Regnier at the fanned wrought-iron gates to his home, aptly named the Gatehouse. How dashing he had looked, all in black, with his dark hair and mustache. How graceful his leg as he bowed in his old-fashioned way, how cultured his beautiful French, although he had assured them he had been born in Italy and had lived much of his life in England.
The party was not to be held inside his home; indeed, he did not so much as invite them inside it, which was odd indeed and, one might venture, very rude. The gathering was most strange and most intimate. For it was a moonlit garden party for only a handful of people. More curious still, the other guests appeared rather nervous in the presence of the cousins and their relatives. From their glances and appraising looks, she had the distinct impression she and Marie were being inspected. And it was then that Antoinette understood precisely that the two girls were being offered as potential brides for the mysterious and charming Henri Regnier.
Marie saw none of this, and she chattered on about the lovely ice sculptures and the petits fours and the champagne. But across the lawn, below the moon’s gaze, Antoinette held her head high as Henri Regnier stared at her without moving. There was something about him that held her, captivated her. There was an air about him of something more complicated than high society and the cut of his evening clothes.
She found herself longing for whatever it was, and whatever he was.
Then he crossed to her and bowed over her hand.
“Mademoiselle,” he said breathlessly, “I believe that you have come for me. Would you walk?”
“Mais, oui, m’sieur,” she had replied, and followed his lead without a thought to taking along a chaperone. Without wondering why none accompanied them.
Ignoring Marie’s arch quip in her ear, “Why, dear Cousin Antoinette, I believe your stomach’s growling.”
* * *
And yes, there was a hunger between them. It was a passion that transcended matters of the flesh and of the earth. For beneath that moon, in a garden scented with roses, he poured out his heart, weeping once, speaking of all the things forbidden for anyone but a Regnier to know. The other guests? Illusions. Aspects of himself, whom he had sought out with his magick, casting runes, gazing into crystals.
“How, I do not know, but you are linked to my house,” he said.
Then he took her in his arms, and their pact was made.
* * *
Jean-Marc was born three years later. Despite magickal assistance, the birth was long and painful. And on that night, Henri held his infant son in his arms and wept, “I am so sorry. Forgive me. You have yet to speak a single word, but your fate is sealed.”
Not long after that, a horror came to Boston Harbor. And it was that horror which sealed Antoinette’s fate as well.
* * *
Giles stood at the window of his condo, watching the two representatives from the Watchers’ Council who were ostensibly guarding him. They had shown up that day, and a quick chat had unearthed several disturbing facts.
The first, that no one had seen Micaela and that the Watchers’ Council had officially declared her dead. Giles grieved, but he did not give up hope. The second, that neither man had ever heard of Matthew Pallamary. A fact that surprised Giles not at all. The man had obviously been sent to retrieve him somehow, rather than to kill him. But for what purpose, he still did not know.
Finally, that only in the last few hours had they received word that Ian Williams—a household servant at the Council headquarters—had disappeared.
But of course he had. After all, since the Council had dispatched guards to watch over Giles, Williams had to realize that they would reveal Pallamary as an impostor.
Williams had personally vouched for Pallamary.
Unfortunately, Williams had also been in contact with Buffy, Angel, and Oz in England and sent them on to London. He prayed it was on a fool’s errand and not a trap. Giles had no way to reach them until they phoned in, and he had been on edge ever since. Joyce seemed to sense his unease, but he had pointed out his new “guards” as the source, rather than reveal his anxiety about Buffy’s safety.
At last the phone rang. It was Buffy.
Hovering about, Joyce Summers hung on every word he spoke into the phone, and he tried to signal to her that he would give the phone to her once he was finished speaking to Buffy. Her fear for her child was palpable, and Giles wished there were something he could do or say to allay her fears. But it would be dishonest indeed to tell her not to worry.
Buffy said, “So, this Ian Williams guy set us up to be eaten by the—Angel, what was it called?—I don’t know, eagle monster thingie, and it nearly ate Oz. And the Sons of Entropy showed up to take care of us in case the eagle monster didn’t, only they got burned up on the front lawn.”
“Indeed.” Giles was deeply troubled.
“Indeed indeed,” Buffy said angrily. “Your Watcher buds cannot be trusted.”
He sighed and looked out the window. One of the bodyguards hailed him. He gave a wave back.
“Where are you now?”
“The Sons’ mansion,” she said. “Phone’s probably tapped, but hey, let’s live dangerously. Since we are living dangerously already, Giles.” She was furious, and he didn’t blame her.
He
pushed his glasses up and considered his next words carefully. “For the moment, we’d best assume that the security of the Watchers’ Council is compromised. There may be another leak.”
“Their whole roof leaks, as far as I’m concerned,” she said.
“So I advise you to steer clear. As shall I,” he added. “We’ll have to play this close to the vest. Too much is at stake.”
“I’m not loving this,” Buffy said sourly. “Someone’s been killing the great Watchers of Europe—and Japan—and I hate you not having protection.”
“Why, Buffy,” he began, touched.
She continued, “Because my mom is living with you.” Then she actually chuckled, and he found himself admiring her immensely. And not for the first time. Perhaps this Slayer was more unconventional than the others before her—all right, there was no “perhaps” about it—but she was enormously witty and courageous in the extreme. He truly did not believe a better Slayer had ever lived.
“I shall be careful for her sake,” he added.
“Good.”
“She’s quite anxious to speak to you,” he added. “Shall I put her on?”
Then he left the condo and took the stairs down through the foyer and into the street.
The two guards regarded him with friendly eyes.
“Lads,” he said by way of greeting, “I’m so very sorry to tell you this, but it seems you’ve been discharged.”
* * *
Boston, 1875
The fog rolled over Boston town. It smothered the harbor and the Common and Beacon Hill. Mournfully the foghorns warned ships at sea of the danger. But it was not the fog that posed a mortal threat to all who ventured near it.
It was what lurked inside the fog.
One midnight, Henri turned to his wife, Antoinette, as he pulled on his greatcoat and placed a rose quartz in his left pocket. In the right he placed a gilded sphere decorated with Crosses of St. Birgit. Inside lay a piece of parchment on which prayers of protection were inscribed in Latin, Hebrew, and French. It was a talisman that his father, Richard, had taught him to make, and that had seen the Regnier family to the New World.
“So many times I should have been dead,” Richard had told him, at the time finally, terrifyingly, on his deathbed. “Such as this protected me.” He had sighed. “Had Catherine de’ Medici listened to me . . . but she is dust now. As are all the children Fulcanelli finally permitted her to have.”
“What comes after for us, Father?” Henri had begged to know. “After all this, are we, too, but dust?”
“We are duty fulfilled,” Richard had answered soberly. He looked older than the dead, his lips and hands dust-dry, his face the color of graveyard dirt. “We are a testament to all that is good.”
“To a life unlived,” Henri had said wistfully.
“To a life given in service,” Richard had replied, placing his hand over his son’s. “Never forget that to die for others is the highest purpose a person may achieve.”
Now, on Beacon Hill, Henri said to Antoinette, “I’m off now. Will you pray for me?”
“As always.” She reached on tiptoe and kissed him on the lips.
He closed his eyes and bowed his head, feeling completely unworthy of this woman. “I feel that I misled you, Antoinette. I did not fully disclose to you the misery of your life as the wife of the Gatekeeper. I wanted you so badly. I needed you.”
She smiled. “I knew. I saw the agony in your eyes, mon cher. The loneliness.” Her smile was tremulous. “And I knew you must have an heir.”
“That is not why—”
She stilled his mouth with her hand. “Henri, lies are unworthy of us both. You had to marry. I was the fortunate woman you chose.”
“Mais—”
“Are you seeing your death tonight?” she asked anxiously. “You speak as though we’ll never see each other again.”
He turned away for a moment, and then he nodded. “Dearest Antoinette, I must confess that I do.”
Tears welled as she shook her head. “Then you cannot leave this house.”
“I must. The fog harbors a great evil. If I don’t bind it, it will overtake this city, our home.”
She looked up at him, begging him with every fiber of her being not to leave her. “Perhaps this time you can find a way to send the monster back.”
He put his hands over hers and kissed her forehead. “Believe me, love, always have I tried, and my father before me.” He gestured to the house around them. “I have sought for over a century the means to make this place a real home, where laughter echoes down the corridors, and not the enraged shrieks of caged monstrosities. At every juncture I have failed.”
The tears came then, hard and bitter. “And if you die tonight, what will happen when the next horror comes?”
He was silent for a moment, and then he looked at her. “Jean-Marc is young, but he is my son.”
Her sobs grew harsh. “And mine as well. You cannot leave him fatherless so young. He has too much to learn.”
She laid her head on his chest and wept. “I beg of you, ma vie, mon âme, he is my only child.”
After a time, her sobs quieted, and he said, “Antoinette, there is something I can do for Jean-Marc. But it would be terribly unfair to you.”
She looked up at him. “Tell me to pull my living heart from my chest for him, and I will not hesitate.”
He took a breath. She saw grim purpose in his expression and for a moment, she was terribly afraid. Then she stilled herself and waited to hear what he had to say.
“I can bind you to this house, for him. When you die, you will not go to the rest you deserve, but care for him beyond the grave. You will walk as an earthbound spirit until his legacy is assured.”
Resolutely she squared her shoulders. “And do you need to kill me to make this happen?”
His look of shock reassured her, and she held out her hands. “In any case, I consent, and I insist you perform the ritual before you leave this house.”
* * *
After it was accomplished, Henri bade his wife an emotional farewell and took himself down to the fog-covered harbor. Alone he rowed, loath to admit even to himself that performing the binding ritual on Antoinette had sapped his strength.
Yet there was nothing to be done for it now. For as he continued to press on into the fog, the lantern at the bow of his little boat cast a beam on something more substantial than the roiling mists.
As he had seen in his runes, it was the rotting hulk of the Flying Dutchman.
And the voice of the Captain called to him: “Henri Regnier, have you come to sail the hellfire seas with me?”
A chill shot down Henri’s spine. He had known that his approach would probably not go unnoticed, but he had not anticipated that the specter would know who he was. This did not bode well. Nevertheless, he rose up in the boat and spread his arms. A soft rose-crystal light glowed around him; tendrils of magick crackled about him and penetrated the fog. His voice steady, he began to intone a spell of binding.
“No!” the Captain shouted through the fog. “You dare not, Gatekeeper. Join us or die.”
Henri pressed on, concentrating on the words. The rose burned more brightly, and the fog began to stink of smoke. “Bind this ship and her crew to me and my house. In the courtyard of my manse, trap this hellish vessel and the dead who walk her rotting planks.”
“Ram him,” the Captain ordered. “Bring him aboard.”
The Dutchman shoved the rowboat backward. Henri fought to keep his balance. Fog poured down on him and as it touched his flesh, it began to sizzle. Blisters rose on his face and the backs of his hands, and still he sent the rose glow forth, determined to burn away every trace of the fog as he bound the vessel that hid inside it.
“I bind thee. By the gods of light, I hold thee,” he said. “By the power of my name and my house, which is Regnier, I imprison thee.”
The Captain shouted, “Sing, boys. Drown out the sound of this foolish nursery rhyme.”
> The fog ignited, flames shooting like comets across the upending bow of Henri’s sailboat. And the vast, decaying cadaver of the Flying Dutchman presented itself to him. Dead men—if the corpses of dried gut and bones could be called that—staggered on the canted, filthy deck, their eyes—if they had them—fully fixed on Henri. Jawbones sawed as they sang a chantey, their voices shrieking like a brittle gale:
Send these bones to Davey Jones,
Walk him, boys, drag him, boys.
Send these bones to Davey Jones.
Drag him down to hell.
They came for him then, leaping over the sides of the Dutchman and splashing into the water. He fought back with all the forces of his magick, creating a barrier between himself and his adversaries, as he had countless times before.
The Dutchman groaned forward, shattering the barrier, and pitched him into the ocean.
He shrieked in surprise and pain as the water chewed like acid through his clothing. Strips of flesh unfurled from his body. He went down, swallowing water that tore holes in his internal organs.
The pain was unimaginable. Unendurable.
“Join us, and it ceases,” the captain said in a lilting voice.
Henri closed his mouth and concentrated. Though his ruined mouth could no longer form the words, he said to himself, over and over, “To the gods I give all deference and honor. For the sake of order, I stake my life.”
Fleetingly he thought of Antoinette and their son and wondered if he would ever look upon them again.
* * *
The sun had almost set.
Buffy stood over Angel in the wine cellar and gazed down at his profile. Asleep, he looked like any young man. No, not just any young man.
The young man she wanted, and loved.
Just as she was about to nudge him gently, he turned over on his back and gazed up at her.
“I’m awake,” he told her.
“No rest for the wicked.” She regarded him for a moment, and then she said, “You okay in the, ah, food department?”
“I’m managing.” He returned her gaze. “You worried?”
She raised her eyebrows. “In the sense of, am I worried about you or worried for Oz and me?”
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