Swoon 02 - Swear

by Nina Malkin

  “I am? Yes, of course I am.” Her gaze bounces irritably. “Why am I here—’tis oh so cold. Where is me shawl? Bring it, girl.” She’s not the boss of me—and we need to get that straight.

  “You’re here because I summoned you. You’re cold because you’re dead and damned. But if you’re honest with me, Mae Molly, the goddess of the underworld might release you, and you’d know peace, and no more would your soul be so easily called by this witch or any other.”

  A gasp from the ghost. “Witch!” Then she collects herself, says, “Honest?” in the huffy tone of liars. “What is it ye want, then—out with it!”

  “I want to know about your former mistress Antonia Forsythe—”

  “Mistress? I had no mistress! See my dress—is it not a lady’s finery?”

  “Think, Mae Molly. When you were young, you worked in a manor house.”

  “Did I? Oh, aye—yes.” Drifting, drifting, then with fierce and sudden clarity says, “But I did not work for that oafish brat. The mother was me mistress, and she of royal blood . . . Lady . . .” She wrestles with it. “Lady Anne!”

  “That’s right, Lady Anne. But you served Antonia as well.”

  “So what?” the specter says with a snarl. “So what if I did?”

  “So I want to know about her—and her relationship with Sinclair Youngblood Powers.”

  The sound of his name makes her clap her hands, those small, childish hands, so greedy and grasping. “Sinclair!” For a flash she’s young again—lustful, insatiable. “My Sinclair! He loves me, ye know.”

  Oh, no he doesn’t, I want to tell her. Never did. Never will.

  “And I love him, truly—but we were not to be.” The first part of her statement throws me, since after all she spurned the boy. But maybe her hunger trumped her heart, so I question her on the second part. “Because he loved another?” She cleaves those two hands together to squash the very idea.

  “That wasn’t love! He simply wanted in with the Forsythes.” Harsh laughter, tinged with admiration. “How could I fault him for that? Take Antonia in marriage, he’d never sweat over the forge again.”

  Whoa—interesting. Mae Molly thought Sin as acquisitive as she. When he told her he’d found love, he spoke of Hannah Miles; only she got it twisted, presuming he meant Antonia, his access to the Forsythe fortune. Rapacious people must believe everyone is driven by bottomless want. And I thought love was the great motivator.

  “Knocked me in the noggin, but Lady Anne might have conceded, despite Sinclair’s low birth, so as to be rid of the sulky little nuisance.” Again her palms rub, and with effort her lips creak upward. “But I put a fly in that ointment, by rights.

  Foiled them good and proper.”

  So the tarot proves true. Mae Molly O’Rourke, wielder of Five Swords, the spiteful, malicious cuts that bleed slow rather than kill quick. “You did? How?”

  “How what?” she asks, expression occluded once more.

  “Oh, why do ye plague me, girl?”

  “Because I need to know.” Then, commandingly, or is it desperately, “And you will tell me!” Mae Molly peers at me, cognizance returning, to foxily observe, “So ye love him too!”

  “That’s neither here nor there.” I see no reason to contradict, but I’m trying to keep her focused. “How did you foil their plans?”

  “It was the letters,” Mae Molly reveals with sparkly satisfaction. “When Antonia wasn’t with her roses, she was at her escritoire, that sphincter of a mouth screwed up all tight, quill poised as she composed her missives. Once whilst taking fresh linens to her room, I nicked a half-finished one from the desk—dripping emotion and metaphors likening his arms to tree boughs, that sort of rot. Ah, but even without peeking I could guess the contents, what with the moony way she acted whenever he’d come round. Well, of course she had no way to know Sinclair and I were lovers, so she had me deliver the epistles. Half daft and fully mute by then, she nonetheless made clear her plea—I saw the rapture in her eyes, his name across the envelopes.”

  “And . . . you didn’t do it?”

  “Do what? Oh, no . . . indeed I did not.” Could this be the secret to Sin’s unuttered vow?

  “I burned the bloody things. No . . . I thought to burn them, then thought otherwise, perchance they come in handy.” She taps her temple to show her savvy, and with a chuckle adds,

  “Lest they be considered incriminating . . .” Blackmail, she means. Why destroy evidence that someone of Antonia Forsythe’s standing claimed love for a common man, a bastard, a half breed.

  “Where did you put them?” I prod.

  “I burned them, I told you!” she reneges angrily.

  They didn’t call it Alzheimer’s back in the day, but clearly Mae Molly was afflicted. “No, you didn’t. You kept them. You hid them. Where?” I let her ruminate a moment more as my impatience percolates. “Tell me, and cleanse your soul. Tell me, and be set free.”

  Only Mae Molly brings her hands to her face and fills them with an anguished sob. When they fall away, I realize I’ll be leaving this boneyard with one crucial question still unanswered.

  “Have mercy, girl, I would tell ye—I would!—but a mouse has nibbled away at me mind like it were a hunk of cheese. The letters are in the manor, for certain. But I swear on my love for that man of mine I know not where I laid them.” I study her, a wretched crone in fancy clothes, cringing against her own gravestone. In her youth she plotted, seduced, and entrapped, only to wind up too bewildered to testify on her own evil. She got everything she wanted—just as Antonia believes she will—except, of course, for love. So I turn away from her.

  “Wait!” Mae Molly cries. “What of the peace ye promised me?” Wearily I turn back. “I didn’t promise.” The word is dirt in my mouth. “Your fate lies with my goddess now. Were you truthful, I trust that she’ll free you in my good faith. Were you lying”—I level my eyes on her—“then suffer, bitch.” I’m drawn to Forsythe Manor like the spokes of my bike are magnetized. There’s not much to see on a night so thick; it’s more like I sense the house, its corridors, rooms, and closets, its myriad nooks and crannies. Somewhere inside, Antonia’s love letters, unrequited and unread. Or not. In two centuries plus, any number of real estate agents, cleaning crews, or subsequent owners might have tossed them in the trash. Of course, everything I’ve ascertained about Mae Molly has me convinced that if she wanted the letters hidden, they’d stay that way till she was ready to retrieve them.

  I think of the people in that house. Those who live there—Duck and his parents. Those who died there—Early and all those rootless spirits. Mostly, imprisoned there, the sweet, sensitive guy in love with my best friend—Crane. Are they counting on me to locate the letters that could unlock the puzzle?

  I ought to head home. Instead I walk my bike up the curving drive and leave it at the top, then start across the lawn, following some masochistic mechanism toward Antonia’s garden. Outside the stone fence, the perfume is so intense I’m surprised it’s not visible as vapor. I don’t know diddly about roses—when they’re supposed to bloom, when they’re supposed to die—but by scent alone can tell they’re even more profuse now than on the day Crane vanished. You’d probably need a machete to move around in there—hardly conducive to a wedding.

  “It’s to take place right here.” A sentry steps forward from the gate, his voice husky, hurting, yet still not resigned. Sin.

  Why am I unsurprised to find him here, all alone in the middle of the night? Because I know him—he’s racking his brain, ransacking his memory, berating himself over some misinterpreted message he somehow must have sent. I suppose he simply aches to understand. Even if comprehension cannot keep him from the altar awaiting, he just wants to know.

  Together we stand at the gate. His gate. Her gate.

  With its stunning crux, that iron rose. Compelled closer, I find it in the dark, caress the petals just as Antonia did when she first set eyes on it. How thrilled she must have been—this work of art, rendered ju
st for her, the poor little rich girl who had everything but nothing.

  I pull back my hand and pivot, knowing my boy is near enough to kiss. And while my kiss might comfort him, it’s the magic music inside me that rises up instead. “Doesn’t matter what you said . . . What you promised . . . What you did . . .” A groan comes from him unbidden. “Oh, my drowsy thrush . . .”

  “Sin, I mean it! Pledge, promise, oath, vow—if there’s one thing I figured out, it’s that you can’t swear to love.” Speaking now, my pulse a rush and my words tumbling. “Love . . . happens to you; you don’t make it happen. You damn well don’t control it. Swear to love?” I shake my head. “That’s not love; that’s slavery.”

  Emotional slavery. Inflicted with expectations, executed with manipulations. It’s putting chains around a heart, shutting something beautiful up in a box. That’s what Antonia’s done to Sin. Guess no one ever told her if you love someone, set him free.

  “Love is a gift,” I rant on. “We don’t know what creates it and we don’t know what sustains it. If we’re smart, we revere it, treat it with the honor it fosters in us, but that’s still no guarantee.”

  It’s dark but I see his eyes shine; I see his smile. And I realize how, when I woke up alone that morning last fall, I wouldn’t have been able to articulate any of this—I didn’t understand our love till now.

  A single step, and he closes the space between us. “What makes love so precious is its mystery,” he says. “No one knows that better than we.”

  When he holds me, it’s forever. When he holds me, it’s for never. Then I look into his eyes again. “I don’t care what happened at this garden gate two hundred years ago, and I don’t care what goes down here tomorrow. All I care about is now. I love you, Sin. I love you now.”

  Part V

  The Gift

  LXIII

  My name from his mouth. Spoken as only he can. Then Sin proclaims his love and kisses me, a kiss that starts with lips and leads to his full-court press, our fingers fastened, against the gate. After which he sees me home—him pedaling and me doing my best to balance on the handlebars. Now here we are, about to part in front of 12 Daisy Lane, and he begins, shyly if you can believe: “Dice, do you think . . . would it be possible for you and I . . . to spend an evening—tomorrow evening. . . well, I suppose it’s this evening by now—to simply . . .perhaps—”

  “Sin.” I have to interrupt. “Are you asking me out?”

  “Yes. Yes, I am. Dear lady, won’t you please come out with me, so that we may pursue, together, you and I, whatever our hearts desire, not to be denied?”

  Any wonder I wake up this morning giggling aloud at the absurdity: I’m Sin’s bachelor party.

  In preparation, I while away much of the day imitating an odalisque. I know, I know—I ought to launch a cellar-to-attic search for Antonia’s letters, only right now, in the throes of a potent, not unpleasant inertia, I could scarcely launch a search for toilet paper. I loll in my PJs, earbuds in, watching the ceiling fan spin. If only we had kumquats or bonbons—appropriate munchies for my mood.

  The polar opposite of Antonia’s mood. She’s in a veritable tizzy. When I venture downstairs, I find her flitting from one piece of furniture to the next, trying not to nibble her freshly painted nails (a pukey pink that clashes with her gray-green skin). The TV remote has become an appendage as she spasms through soap operas, chat shows, gossip, golf. For the most part we avoid each other, despite the close quarters—the way you do when you’re giving your mother the silent treatment. Though at one point the phone rings and we nearly butt heads.

  “Hullo?” I listen, then extend the receiver. It’s the Kendall Wynn Inn.

  “This is Antonia Forsythe. Oh, what wonderful news. Yes, we shall see you tomorrow. Thank you kindly.” They must’ve had a cancellation. Antonia seems tickled (pukey) pink. She’d scowled at the computer when it looked like the Ramada off the highway would be the location of yonder bridal bed. Now she stares me down, her flat triumph rumpled by a bump of indecision. To wit: I’m still here, her great big loose end. Should she do me in or spare me, put me out permanently or force me to witness at the sidelines of her victory? I stand here—jaw jutted, hip thrust, spleen stalwartly filtering blood—and then sashay to yonder fridge.

  No kumquats, no bonbons. Strawberries—that’s kind of concubiney. I tote them to the porch, bite off a sweet bottom, and hold the cap to the bars of the birdcage. “Snack?” I say.

  Peckish, Edgar investigates. “Not bad,” he says. “Not worms, but not bad.”

  Heaving a grunt, I pop another berry, then flop to rummage under the rhododendron. Bird Boy wasn’t kidding—it’s a squishy smorgasbord down here. I’m back in a flash with a repulsive napkinful.

  “All right!” Edgar gobbles, again and again. “You’re spoiling me.”

  “Don’t caw with your beak full,” I tell him, grinning.

  RubyCat, curled up on a chintz cushion, lifts her head to make sure she’s not missing out. “Me? Meat?” she queries.

  “No, my little furball,” I assure. “Just bugs and berries.” Still, she rises to her toes, stretches a horseshoe, and leaps to pose in front of the cage. Edgar hops to his perch. A staring contest ensues, yet remarkably I sense no threat from either side. They just . . . regard each other. Somehow when I wasn’t looking, those two established, if not a rapport, then a truce, a respect, no doubt in deference to me. Wiping my hands, I watch them watch each other, then park it in one of the wicker chairs. RubyCat claims my lap. Idly, I stroke her.

  “So . . . ,” Edgar says. “How’s it going . . . with all your . . . everything?”

  I cock my head his way. Confessing to the crow about my magical efforts wouldn’t be a breach, would it? After all, he’s part of them. And it’s not like I’m making much progress, chatting up crotchety ghosts who’ve long lost their grip on reality. Maybe he’ll have an insightful take on my encounter with Mae Molly. Maybe it would just feel good to vent, unload, divulge. So I do, spilling all I know about the summer of 1768: Antonia’s mad crush, her maid’s malicious meddling, the cache of letters still tucked away somewhere in Forsythe Manor, the wedding proceeding tomorrow as planned.

  Edgar preens his ruff. Then he preens his chest. The cat leaves my lap for her cushion and begins to lick her coat fastidiously.

  Maybe grooming helps animals think, the way people will twirl a curl or gnaw a lip. Either that or I’ve bored the beasties.

  At last, the crow says, “Sucks to be you, then.” Wow, such wisdom—I’m truly in awe. “Actually, no. Sin and I are in love, and in a few hours we’re going on a date.” So ridiculous, considering all we’ve been through—and by ridiculous I mean glorious. “After that, who knows—divine intervention?”

  Edgar bobs his head with approval. “That’s right, think positive. A wing and a prayer and all that.” With a sudden flurry he tests out his own wings. “Speaking of which, I’m feeling A-OK and ready for takeoff. So why don’t you snap the latch and let me out of here?”

  Already? I was getting used to my acerbic feathered friend.

  But far be it from me to keep something beautiful in a box—or a cage. “You sure?” I say.

  A few more mighty flaps in answer.

  “You got it . . .” I swing the door and insert my forearm.

  Edgar climbs aboard, the pinch of his talons a scratchy caress.

  Carefully I bring him out until we’re eyeball to eyeball. On impulse I kiss the top of his head.

  He grabs a strand of my bangs, pulls it tight, lets it go.

  The tip of RubyCat’s tail twitches jealously—but just once.

  “Okay, Dice, you take it easy,” the bird says. “You’re a good egg.”

  “A good egg? That’s funny coming from—”

  Before I can finish my sentence, the fledgling has flown.

  Water roars into the claw-foot cauldron while I toss in feminine unguents and oils. Then I strip, the slopes and circumferences of my body growing dewy in
the rising steam. Candles? Sure, why not, I spark up a few. Then compile implements on a tray: razor, pumice, pouf. All set to leisurely pamper myself, anoint and appoint myself. For him. Oh yeah, now I’m dewy on the inside too. Bubbles threaten to overflow—I shut the taps and dip into the scalding brew. A gleeful pain, and gleefully I withstand it. Lower, lower, lower. Thighs waft wide. Breasts float free. In a syllable: Ahhhh!

  “Yo, rock star.”

  Ruby leans against the sink, her greeting piquant, her manner mild, and her outfit . . . vaguely familiar. Which is very strange.

  In life, she’d occasionally wear the same thing twice, but in death, different story: She knows no sartorial budget or bounds and constantly seeks to outdo herself. What’s more, this dress—long-sleeved, high-necked, basic not even black but beige—is so not her taste. Funnily enough she looks awesome—elegant, languid, even serene—like those frenetic fashion statements were kid stuff and she’s ascended to a whole new level. Just to mess with her, I scoop some bubbles and blow in her direction.

  She catches the froth on a fingertip, watches it fizzle to nothing. “I just wanted to check in,” she says. “Make sure you’re not mad, the way I sent you into that party solo.”

  “You mean up in Chester?” It feels like eons ago. Warm bath and fragranced atmosphere conspire, melting time and space to a misty swirl. Or is it Ruby, her dress so simple, her voice so soft, imbuing the room with tranquil entrancement. I sink to my chin and tell her, “Don’t be silly. I had the best time.”

  “I can tell,” she says. “That makes me really happy, Dice. Happy for you . . .”

  I look at her, though she’s blurry through the bubbles, in that demure dress, the last dress she ever wore. Now her voice sounds fuzzy too, as if she’s far away . . .

  “Happy for me, too . . .”

  Maybe that’s because I’ve dunked all the way. Dimly, from underwater, I hear her call me Dice and say good-bye, and it strikes me—gently—that she never calls me Dice, and she never says good-bye. So when I emerge and find her gone, I know she’s truly gone. Dissolved. Absolved. Bad influence turned guardian angel turned soul at peace. Everyone sensed a change in me after my night in the woods; Ruby understood it.