by SL Figuhr
In a moment, a lean man in a woolen robe and cowl, his feet and legs wrapped in cloth, slogged through the snow mere feet from the little boy’s hiding place. The man had a staff, and a rope over his shoulder tied to a deer he dragged behind him. Nicky didn’t know of any monks nearby, for that’s what the man reminded him of. But the man or monk had food and was therefore worth following, if only to see if he led to a better spot to hide. Nicky crept out of the cave, his sack with what remained of the archbishop’s treasures over his shoulder. The monk walked for quite a while, further into the forest itself, until he came to a clearing. The monk’s abode, hard to see, was built into the hillside, as was a small stable. Smoke rose from the top of the hill, and a stream ran through the clearing. Crude boards bridged the icy though unfrozen rivulet.
Nicky watched the man go about his work all morning and partially into the afternoon. He appeared to be alone as no other monks showed themselves. When it grew dark, the man disappeared inside. Nicky waited, to be sure he would not emerge. He crept closer to the hut, staying on the edges of the forest.
There was a small chicken coop; eggs, even raw, tasted like ambrosia to him now after so prolonged a span of scant rations. A goat ate hay in the stable, and though she bleated grumpily, the boy extracted a little milk from the doe. The boy stole an armful of wood from the wood pile and scurried back to his cave. In the morning, the boy returned to hide in the forest by the hut, and again he shadowed the lone monk about his daily chores. At night, Nicky crept out and stole milk and eggs.
The following day, however, the monk straightened up and called out, “There's no need to keep hiding. You’re welcome to come in out of the cold. I won’t hurt you.”
Nicky stayed away for several days until cold and hunger drove him back. He was half-starved, but still ready to bash the monk’s head in with a thick branch if he tried anything funny. Instead, he found in the stable a wooden bowl holding fresh bread, dried meat, and a few shriveled apples. Next to it was a mug full of goats’ milk. The boy fell on the meal ravenously. He suffered for it too; his stomach, unused to so much food, cramped and he threw it all up.
It was while the boy was bent over, sick, that the monk found him. Nicky was too weak to fight, and the man had no problem hauling the boy and his sack into his hut. When Nicky got better, he decided to stay as, unlike the others, the monk neither hurt him nor tried to convert him. He left the boy in peace, asking only that he do a few chores in return for food and lodging.
* * *
The little boy nearly slammed face-first on the floor as the memories retreated. Damn it! He had to get to his hunting lodge; there was no telling how long it would take before the king sent men for him. Nicky couldn’t afford to let anyone else take over his position. He needed to find out why he couldn’t call DiJinn to him, and fix the problem. He needed his servant to bring him the proper sacrifice so he could make himself big again.
As he contemplated events in the hall, it seemed more and more likely Rablias had tried to steal DiJinn from him. What had the asshole promised his demon? He would free him from Nicky’s bondage if he taught the Head Questioner how to do magic? Laughable, but at least he could rest assured the damn duchess hadn’t been a part of it. He should have stopped to see if she were still alive. Oh well, if she lived, perhaps she would come to fear him as she ought.
* * *
Nicky lay on the ground, bruised, bloody and bound with rope. He was able to turn his head and see the monk, tied to a beam of the stable. Both had been beaten badly. Their attacker was inside the hut, ransacking it. Nicky concentrated; he had not used his unique gift since the day his Da turned him over to the priest.
He was not about to become a slave again to some twisted freak of a man, and used as the archbishop had done, but he was hog-tied. The boy closed his eyes and rested the side of his face against the ground. He envisioned how the knots on the rope would have to undo for him to be able to slip out.
Nicky felt them loosen, and after a few more minutes of work, was able to free his hands. He rolled over and worked on the knots around his ankles. So engrossed was he, he forgot to keep watch on the hut. He felt a sharp pain. The world blacked out.
The boy awoke, once more in a cell, but unchained. A pallet of linen-covered straw made a bed of sorts in a corner. A stool and a small table. A chamber pot. The cell was dimly lit, with smooth glowing orbs. He had never seen anything like them. The boy rose, making his painful way to stand underneath, staring up and concentrating. The orbs seemed to sing, or hum.
It was a haunting melody, something he felt he should know. He hummed under his breath, trying to match the tune coming from the orbs. He managed to make them brighter, then duller, but couldn’t extinguish them.
Nicky was bored. He was left alone in his cell; no one came to threaten him, or even speak to him. But someone entered when he slept. Every day when he woke, there was food, and water to wash with, and the chamber pot emptied. He had figured out how to make the globes go on and off. It seemed with that little victory, a whole new world opened.
Everything hummed with the energy; it all wanted to speak with him. Sometimes taunting, sometimes tantalizing, but Nicky was determined to master the songs, as he had nothing better to do. Eventually, the boy undid the locks on his cell, and could wander around the larger room at will.
Nicky didn’t know how long he took to work his way out of the room, much less if he had done it of his own volition or been released by his captor. One night, the boy found himself walking up a long staircase, free of the dungeon. At the top was a single door, which opened to the boy’s touch. He came face to face with the man who had captured him. The man he was soon to call master.
* * *
The boy stumbled into his suite, glad once again he had cut out the tongues of his slaves so they couldn’t betray him by speaking of what they saw. The one slave left able to speak was blind.
“Lord Nicky?” the blind slave inquired at the sound of the door slamming shut.
“Rainton, should the king send slaves looking for me, you will make them understand I am hunting down those who created the disturbance tonight. I will send word to him when I can, and I was only nominally injured.”
“Yes my lord. Was it assassins?”
“Yes, if he wishes to know.” He could feel the memories overtaking him as he stumbled to his bed chamber. He tried to force the images away as he gave a few more orders, before being swamped by exhaustion.
* * *
“Why are you doing this to me?” Selene begged, “I cared for you, loved you, protected you!”
“You betrayed me! You told Mica about me! Now he wants to kill me!”
“I didn’t know he hated you! Please don’t do this! I can make it up!”
“Your death will serve a greater purpose. You think I like the life I live? That I enjoy being stuck a child?! The pitying looks I get? Or the ones who think just because I look like a kid, I can be used however they want?” Nicky yelled at her.
Selene was crying, curled up on the dirty brick floor, “I never, never...”
“You never do!” he screamed in rage. “No one ever does! You just look at me and think Oh, what a cute, poor little boy! Let me mother him, let him be the child I lost, or never had!”
The boy’s chest heaved as he sucked in air. “You never treat me like an adult!”
The woman looked up, tears streaming down her face, eyes red. The boy darted in to punch her. Chains clanked as she flinched back, one hand going to her cheek, the other held up in an effort to ward off any more blows.
“I’m sorry. Please, I’ll do better, I can do better. Just let me go, and I promise, I’ll treat you like an adult.”
Nicky sneered at her, “Would you?”
“Yes!” she exclaimed, crawling as far as her chains would allow toward the boy’s feet. “What would you like to do first? Get a place of your own? Have a bank account?”
He savored the look of hope and eager anticipation;
it would be so much sweeter when she was crushed by learning what he wanted. “So you can use it against me later? Take it away when I do something you don’t like?”
Confusion briefly clouded her face. “No, no, never. We can...We can put it all under your name.” She sat like a puppy looking for its master’s approval.
“A good start, but not what I really, truly want.” He played it out.
“I, I don'’t know what else I can give, what I can do. What do you truly want? Tell me, I’ll do anything I can to help you get it.”
“Anything? Would you really?”
“Yes!” Her face creased in a frown, “It’s not illegal, is it? I mean, I haven’t led a clean life but, I won’t murder anyone,” she added, fearfully yet defiantly.
“I want someone to love me,” Nicky said.
“But, but I did. Do,” she hastily corrected. “I’ve loved you since I saw you.”
Nicky looked at her in contempt, knowing she still thought of him as nothing more than a child. “Prove it.”
“But I just...”
“Prove it by kissing me,” Nicky interrupted her.
Selene hesitated a moment, rose up onto her knees and kissed him on the cheek. She sat back onto her haunches, looking at him for approval, surprised when his face crumpled in rage.
“I knew you still think of me as a child!” Nicky screamed, his hands balling into fists.
The bewilderment on her face at this outburst changed to one of horror as she realized what he meant. “I...”
The rejection was too much for the little boy; he wasn’t waiting for the look of disgust soon to follow. He struck her with a fist, and danced back out of her lunge. She was no longer so compliant, or eager to treat him as an adult.
“I knew it!” Nicky screamed in rage and picking up a loose brick, darted behind her and smashed it against her head.
She gave a brief cry of pain, toppling over, fighting to stay awake. The back of her head bled. “I...” she began weakly. “I’m sorry, but I, I just can’t. Not, not that.”
Nicky bashed her again until her head was a caved-in mess, brains and blood leaking out onto the floor. He let the brick drop and walked away, shaking in anger. She would join all the other women who had refused to love him.
Chapter Two
The bar was dimly lit. Eron sat at a small table toying with a glass of whiskey, listening to the jazz band. He was contemplating drinking the bar out of business, although his fast metabolism made intoxication almost impossible. The waitress stopped by, asked if he wanted another, which he declined. He could see his friend onstage squinting at him and shaking his head.
After a few more songs, the band took a break, and his friend came over. Well, not really his friend, more a friend of Mica’s, though the man was good company. Steve was working the crowd as he made his way over. The waitress appeared again, and Steve ordered water, with a bottle of beer.
“She likes you, why don’t you ask her out?” Steve rasped as he lit a cigarette.
Eron shrugged, continued playing with his glass. What was the use? Everyone he loved died eventually.
“Come on!” Steve replied in aggrieved tones. “She’s nice, she’s single. Not like that other one.”
Eron lifted his head briefly to glare at the man. “Is that what you think? That I’m mooning over some...some unattainable woman?”
Steve took a sip of his water, then the beer. “Well, it sure looks like it! I mean, what do you really know about her? Hell, she doesn’t always seem to be on the up and up.”
“Mica told you that?” Eron asked.
“Look, for someone so old, who’s supposed to be all wise ‘n shit, you certainly can pick ‘em, can’t you?” Steve asked in disgust. “Donnie’s just a street kid what don’t always know better. He gets sucked in too much by shiny things, easy money.”
“He’ll learn, Steve; time will give him experience.”
He missed the look of disgust tossed his way before his friend took another gulp of beer and acknowledged a patron. “If he makes it that far. I don’t like that woman, and you know why? ‘Cause she’s fake; there’s something not right about her. My guys? They can’t find any real mention of her, it’s like she never existed.”
“Steve, there are lots of people you don’t have complete information on.”
“Speaking from experience?” his friend razzed him as he finished the last of his beer. “Look, all I’m saying is, Missy is interested; what would it hurt to ask her out on one date? You might find you have more in common than you think.”
Steve left his empty on the table, and taking the water with him, joined his bandmates back onstage as they started the last half of their set. Eron continued scowling at his glass. Movement nearby had him looking up. Missy was picking the empty up. She leaned over to look him in the face.
“You still OK? Ready for another?”
“I’m fine, thanks.” It came out a little sharper than he intended.
She compressed her lips, nodded once, tightly, “OK.” And turned to the table next to him.
“She likes you.” The silky voice near his ear startled him so he jerked and spilled what was left of his drink on the table top. He caught a whiff of some expensive, seductive perfume.
Eron looked to his side, but the speaker had already walked around the table and was now seated across from him. He inhaled, and smoothed his face out, so nothing showed; inside he felt happier. “Not you, too.” He mopped up the liquid with the useless paper coaster and his coat sleeve.
He watched as she settled back into the seat, her black camel-hair coat falling open to reveal a cream cashmere sweater, slender gold link chain belt snug around her slim waist. He just saw the top of her skirt, a red and black tartan. She wasn’t dressed much different from the other patrons, but the cut and material always made her look better turned out.
“She is cute, would you like me to make you reservations at L’Canard Blu?”
“I don’t need help asking a girl out, especially from you.”
Her eyebrow winged up. “What about asking out a woman?” She turned her head to evaluate the waitress. “She is older than a mere girl.”
Eron scowled and, forgetting he had spilled the last of the whiskey, went to drink another mouthful.
“You do not look happy, ma chèrie, is it really so bad? You are alive, no one is trying to kill you, and a pretty woman is interested in you. What more do you want?” She reached a hand out and laid it over the back of his. She must have fed at some point, for her hand was warm and not her usual icy cold. The silken feel of her skin against his sent frissons of pleasure through him. As if she cares, if I were to tell her, I would only be giving her power over me. He yanked his hand out from under hers.
He noticed it was a while before Missy came back over to ask coolly, “What can I get you?”
“Espresso.” Missy turned her back to the woman at his table in dismissal and went to answer another table.
“I’ll have another, thanks,” Eron called after her, not sure if she heard him. “Why are you here? I didn’t think you liked jazz.”
“I don’t. I find it snooze inducing.”
Eron spread his hands. “So, again, what are you doing here?”
“Waiting.”
He looked at her, expecting her to elaborate, but she didn’t, merely turned her head to watch the band onstage. Missy came back with her espresso, and another whiskey for him. Illyria held up a Euro toward the waitress, not really paying attention. Eron noticed how Missy took it in two fingertips, with a slight sneer for the other woman before walking off. He glanced briefly toward the stage, saw Steve was now giving “what the hell?” looks.
“Is that not your friend on the sax?” Illyria asked. “He is unhappy with you.”
Eron hunched his shoulders. “Yeah, he is. Besides, he’s really more Mica’s friend.” Why the hell is everyone so concerned with my love life all of a sudden? He noticed she wrapped her hands around the tiny cup
but didn’t drink any of it.
“I thought you couldn’t eat or drink?”
Illyria was watching the people in the bar. He idly wondered if she was mentally tallying up which ones could be considered food, and which ones to leave alone.
“We do not. But the warmth,” her voice sunk a note with longing, “we crave it.” She gave a small shudder, her eyes closing briefly and reopening and her tone taking on a brisker note. “We are in a bar, it is what people do when they are in one, is it not? Order a drink?”
He did not respond, did not know what to say.
She turned back to him, her eyes drifting past his head and he watched as they lit up with happiness. Why won’t they do that for me? he thought churlishly and felt another presence behind him.
“Darling,” Illyria gave a dazzling smile to the person.
In a moment, the man was bending over, and they briefly brushed their lips together before he sat down in the chair facing the bar, with his back to the band. Steve’s eyes narrowed again at Eron, cut his gaze to the man and gave a chin jerk. Eron ignored him. He wanted to sit in peace and think, and now he felt like a fifth wheel. Missy came over with change, and another espresso was ordered. The drink came back quickly, and Phillip smiled most dazzlingly at Missy. She blushed, almost dropped the money he gave her, and fled, her cheeks crimson.
“Please tell me you two don’t intend to spend all night here.”
“Don’t worry, we have a dinner date later,” she laughed.
As the words sank in, he grimaced and downed half the contents of his glass as the male leaned in to whisper in Illyria’s ear. He could have stepped from the pages of a men’s magazine. Charcoal gray slacks sharply creased, a snowy-white immaculately pressed linen shirt complete with studs at collar and cuff. A subtly patterned red vest. When he shifted, there was glimpses of an expensive men’s watch under the sleeve of his coat. His hair didn’t fall in its customary waves to his shoulder, but was a mess of curls precisely styled to look like it hadn’t been. His black cashmere topcoat lay tossed artlessly over an adjacent chair, and there was the faint scent of some expensive and subtle cologne. Eron was aware the two of them received admiring looks from both sexes. It made him feel scroungy, sitting as he was in his comfortable jeans, burst-elbow cotton sweater of no particular color or all of them, salt-stained navy blue peacoat, and beat-up boots.