Bisclavret

by K. L. Noone

  He glanced at me, then away again.

  Then he sighed. And found a new ghost story, elegantly hand-copied by a calligrapher and translated from far-off Khazat, and settled onto a sofa to read aloud, while I lay atop him and kept him warm, a pile of shaggy wolf-limbs and fur.

  My heart beat and ached and yearned, as I did. And I knew.

  I loved him. I wanted—

  I could never have him. I never would.

  I could never pinpoint a moment of realization: it’d come over time, a string of bright golden moments dancing in the dark. Through the long winter, through the lapidary days of books and reading and speaking to wise men and women, and the gilded twinkle of Court sessions and feasts. My plate set beside his. The way he reached out to rest a hand on me, absently, when thinking. The understanding that he would be there for me, that I would be there for him. The way that the castle, and the bedchamber, and this life, felt like home.

  The bruise of love was sweet and bitter and heartbreaking, all at once, because it was so simply impossible.

  He was my King. The ruler of our land, its conscience and its heart. I lived sealed inside a wolf’s form, all toothy violence and voiceless pain.

  It was hard, sometimes, to look at him, then. Knowing what I wanted. Knowing with every fiber of my being that it would never be.

  I’d care for him. I’d be kind to him. I’d give him myself—my body, such as it was, if I were human, middle-aged and unremarkable, brown hair and brown eyes and slightly short legs and hairy chest. If he wanted kindness, if he wanted someone who’d make him laugh and take the time to know him before kissing him—

  I wanted to kiss him. Those expressive lips, those big hazel eyes, that boundless interest in people and the world. Those nicely muscled thighs from all that time on horseback, and the way he moved, drawing command and gazes almost unconsciously, owning a room but doing so with compassion, using power to listen to others’ stories.

  I wanted him, and I loved him, and I was a wolf. I did not growl aloud. I stayed with him. I kept him safe.

  I must have been unusually silent over the next few days; early the following week he ran a hand over my ears—we had been lounging on the rug by the fire, Andreas using me as a large and furry backrest while he read aloud from Equitan’s Nightingale, for which we’d found a shared appreciation—and said, worried, “Are you all right?”

  Wolves’ bodies are not built to shrug, so I turned my head to look at him and tried for a vocal approximation of “Hmm?”

  “Really,” he said, sitting up. “You’ve been distant.”

  How, I wondered, do you tell a man that you love him, when you have no human voice, no human eyes, no human hands or body? When you owe him your life?

  When you know you’ve been lying to him about your life? Your name?

  “I admit,” he went on conversationally, “the Nightingale might not be his best work; it’s always seemed a little overly dramatic to me, but that’s no reason to sulk over it. Or is it just that we’re having the state banquet tomorrow? At least you don’t have to wear velvet, though I do apologize in advance for any awkwardness. The Countess of Harford is rather afraid of large dogs, or so I hear.”

  The familiar sound of his voice flowed around me, all cheerful magpie chatter, hopping from one topic to the next. He’s always been made to love any scrap of life, no matter how arcane or trivial. I would have smiled, if I could have, but instead felt another tiny fracture deep inside my heart.

  “Don’t worry,” he said softly. “You know I wouldn’t have you anywhere but next to me.”

  The flash of love at those words buried the hurt, temporarily. I leaned against him, soaking up his presence.

  “We will find a way to see you human again,” he said, fingers tightening in my fur. “Restored to your life. I swear.” His voice held an odd note, somewhere between hope, determination, and a kind of longing resigned pain.

  I noticed new tiny lines around his eyes, then: lines that had not been there before. I wondered what had caused them: the weight of the crown, bearing that responsibility through a difficult winter? Some other, more secret, worry, one that he would not tell to me?

  Perhaps it was only the residue of too many nights reading late in the dark.

  It wasn’t—I know that now; I know because he’s told me: how deeply he feared to lose me, too. How deeply he wished to give me what he thought I wanted—an end to enchantment, my life back, my future—and how far the vow cut into his heart.

  He sighed and put down the book. “I expect we should be in bed; tomorrow’s likely to be a horrible day. Receptions, politics, performances. Should be dreadful. Better with you, though.”

  As everything is, I thought. Better, with you.

  Neither of us knew, then, just how prophetic those words would be.

  Chapter 4

  The receiving line was long and deathly dull; sitting like an overgrown statue at Andreas’s side while he greeted all the visitors from near and far-off lands, I found myself—I still do—amazed at his capacity to exude welcome and good cheer to all. I personally would have run screaming after the fifth person—two ambassadors, two ladies, and the Earl of Hyacinthe—looked him up and down, batted eyelashes, and offered unsubtle invitations to come and look at fictitious problems in their guest quarters.

  Andreas, being himself, only widened earnest eyes at them and began naming engineers he could send over, all of whom were over fifty and happily married. I sat on his foot, and mentally rolled my eyes.

  He’d given in and put on the second-most elaborate crown, a heavy ornate thing wrought of dense metals and dark jewels. It flattened the gold of his hair and shadowed his face; I suspected that by the end of the evening he would have conveniently set it down on a chair or table and forgotten to pick it back up. As it happened, this was true. It generally is.

  I had been given a bath for the occasion, and my fur had dried in unfamiliar lightweight waves of silver and jet. In oblique revenge, the left leg of Andreas’s blue velvet formal attire was now covered in a hoary frost of wolf’s hair.

  The line seemed unending. I sat there gazing out over it, and wondered how long it’d take before I could shepherd him off to the peace and scholarship of our rooms upstairs. A place away from the hovering and fawning of courtiers, appointment-seekers, the curious and the flirtatious, the manipulative…

  The manipulative. I caught a scent. Lilies. Sweet and drifting.

  I knew that scent.

  I knew her.

  I shot to all four feet. Upright. A growl echoed, low and rumbling. Me. Instinctive. My skin prickled; the hackles on my neck rose. I couldn’t see her yet. But I knew.

  She was here.

  The men and women in the line in front of us melted away, snowflakes facing a vicious wolfish conflagration. Andreas put out a hand—not backing away, trying to catch my attention, the only one not frightened, as ever—but I heard nothing he said.

  I walked forward, unerringly and deliberate, letting her watch me advance.

  Of course the Countess was afraid of large dogs. She ought to be.

  I hadn’t recognized the title; her husband had only been a baronet before, a simple Sir Edgar. I hadn’t known she’d run to him, though I knew then, in that instant, and it all crashed into comprehension.

  She’d married him. She’d given him herself and her wealth, and he’d protected her. From me. The monster she’d feared.

  The gown she wore, dripping with jewels and real gold thread, testified to their prosperity if not their good taste. Her eyes were the same—not because they remained the tempting pale green I’d tumbled head over heels for in a market square, but because of the expression. The way they’d looked on the last day she’d looked at me, shuttered and opaque and afraid.

  Her new husband stood shaking beside her; for all his well-fed bulk, his face was grey with fear. To his credit, he did not leave her side; but I saw his gaze flicker around the room: acquaintances, social rivals, the on
es who would profit from watching a humiliated flight.

  Andreas’s men-at-arms, recovering from their shock, were drawing swords. Steel whispered; hands tensed. A wolf gone feral. Teeth bared. A threat to a guest. A threat to the King, who had run forward to follow me.

  The silence screamed and stretched and promised to shatter like glass if broken. Tapestries hung motionless; servers became pillars of distressed frozen stone.

  My wife—my former wife—held out a hand. Her lips moved, forming my name, though no sound emerged.

  I couldn’t hear her beg or plead or explain or make excuses. I leapt.

  I did not harm her, I did not bite her—not then—but I did fling all my wolf’s bulk against her. We fell, with me on top, and the floor was hard.

  Swords flashed. One nipped at my throat.

  Andreas said, “Wait.”

  He did not shout, though he had run to my side. He’s never needed to raise his voice to draw in a room, all eyes, the universe. He did not need to then.

  The swords hovered and did not end my life.

  He was looking at me, but I could not read his expression. He said, “You know him. Most of you. Those of you who have lived here. You know our wolf. And you know he’s offered no threat. No harm. He’s been a friend and a companion and a victim of magic. And if he sees a threat here…” He hesitated for a second, only a second; I think in that instant he had guessed. That scholar’s mind, fitting pieces and names and dates together. “If he’s seen a threat, I’d swear on my life—the life of your king—that he has some reason.”

  Regal hazel eyes settled on me, and on the woman I still held pinned, and on her husband, hemmed in by the press of the crowd. “Perhaps one of you can explain it.”

  I sat up, keeping weight on her, but allowing her to speak if she chose. She stared at me, paralyzed, and could not.

  But Count Edgar could.

  “Majesty,” he said, and fell to his knees. “This woman bewitched me with spells of love! I swear it! And she conspired to betray her husband and to have him killed! And—and she’s a witch! A sorceress!”

  The silence was quite total. I looked at Elaine’s shocked face and considered briefly that the irony of her new husband’s betrayal was extremely appropriate. Marriage appeared not to suit her at all.

  “Really,” Andreas said, watching them both closely. “Do explain more carefully. And choose your words wisely, as an accomplice to murder might.”

  The Count grew even more pale, but managed, between clumsy attempts to explain away his own involvement, to relate the story more or less as it had happened. Through it all, my wife made no move, though tears began to fall silently from her eyes. The room was spellbound; Andreas listened without interrupting.

  At the end, he turned to me. “Are you Lord Bisclavret?”

  I nodded, with my wolf’s head. My ears flopped.

  The great hall quivered, hushed and breathless.

  It was, I realized, the first time in…so long, so very long…that I had been acknowledged by name. It came back to me like something I’d almost forgotten: the taste of a first kiss, a disused memory stirring to the surface. Yes. I had a name.

  The Court stirred and murmured at this. I could tell that some believed the story, and some not; certainly gossip would be making the rounds at lightning speed within the hour. This was the stuff of which tales are made, after all: enchantment, betrayal, lust, and murder.

  Andreas said, still deceptively calm, “How can we reverse the effects of your crimes, and restore Lord Bisclavret to his natural shape?” The Count only shook his head, pleadingly, desperately, and did not know.

  I caught his eye and tipped my head toward my wife. “Ah,” he said, only that; but promises of consequences swam beneath measured control. “Lady Harford?”

  Elaine did not cry. I remember that. She looked at me, and at her King; she straightened shoulders, sitting in a puddle of rubies and embroidered Court finery, on the stony floor. Her chin lifted. “His clothing. The garments of a man.”

  Andreas’s eyebrows shot skyward in surprise, probably that it might be so easy; he asked, “Any clothing?” and she shook her head. “His own. From his life as a man.”

  He glanced at me, quickly, and then away. Fluttering hope battled anguish: we both knew she had likely burned anything I’d ever touched.

  She took a breath, and said, to me this time, “I can send for them. For you. I saved a set of your clothing—I thought—I don’t know. I had the maids pack a chest, before your cousin arrived. It’s at our summer estate, a half-day’s ride.”

  Her eyes were green as spring, as early mornings, as first love. She swallowed but did not flinch.

  Nor did she ask forgiveness. I did not expect it. She never did give anything away.

  I have forgiven her, I think. Writing it down, writing it now. She was afraid, and she did what she thought she had to do; she loved me, or at least she had, at some point, in some way. Enough to save me.

  I owe her for that: she gave me this life and this happiness. Even if she didn’t mean to.

  I wouldn’t be here, in love and beloved, if she hadn’t made her choices.

  Andreas watched me as she confessed this final secret: the truth that she had, after all, cared. The gift of a way to bring me back. He said later that he did not think I’d take her back as my wife—but that he hadn’t been certain. If I could forgive, if she could forgive, if we were in love—

  If he felt the wound of anticipation he hid it behind royal presence. I did not notice, not precisely; but I did see something move behind his eyes.

  He gave orders. Riders. Men to fetch the chest. They bolted away.

  The visitors and courtiers, astounded and marveling, shifted and chattered. They’d all have stories to tell. Minstrels and poets would be composing tales and songs. This moment, the werewolf and the king and the lady, would last forever.

  “Ah…” That was Count Edgar. Fidgeting nervously. “Should I…should we…Your Majesty, may we be excused, if…” His face was wet with perspiration, above the expensive silks of his Court attire; he twisted his fingers together as if he might break them off.

  Andreas regarded him coolly. “We will wait.”

  And wait we did. The King’s riders were and are swift; they would return soon.

  Tension ebbed, dwindled, faded. Conversations began; servers appeared with venison and quail, roasted apples and blackcurrant jellies and starry meringue towers. The atmosphere shifted, grew lighter, became almost festive. The men-at-arms kept wary eyes on me, but even more so on Elaine and Edgar, who were very politely being prevented from sneaking away.

  Andreas went back to the steps in front of the throne, in the great hall under the fluttering tapestries and banners, and sat down on grey flagstones, leaning back against gold-leaf and carved wood. He looked younger momentarily, a king who wanted simply to be a man, or a man who’d sacrificed part of his heart to save the world. Cut out and offered up. A trade for someone’s life.

  I couldn’t think. Too many emotions. Love, anger, pain, the blinding white brightness of hope—I could be a man again!—and the bone-rattling crunch of despair. What if this failed? What if I had spent too long in this wolf’s shape? What if the transformation was no longer possible? Did I even remember how to be a man?

  What if I no longer had a place here at his side?

  I came over and sat by my king, the man I loved, in defiance of this thought.

  He looked up, startled. A flicker of memory surfaced, incongruous: Andreas in a forest, bruised and injured, promising not to harm the wolf who’d caused him to fall.

  He held out a hand, not a demand.

  I wanted to weep, to hold him, to swear I’d stay with him. If he wanted me. If he wanted human me.

  I put my head in his lap, and he rested his hand in my fur, and we waited for the riders, together.

  Elaine took this in, standing in the hall. I saw her expression.

  She would be, I guessed, exile
d—the kingdom could not let magical crimes and betrayal go unpunished—or perhaps scarred; a nick on the nose, an ear, minor but someplace visible, had been common in Andreas’s father’s day. She would not be executed. She had done what she had done out of fear, out of love; she was, after all, very human.

  As I was not.

  But I was.

  The Count stood to one side, unhappily sweating. The courtiers nearest him had drawn back. He had none of their sympathy. He had not even been true to the woman he’d married, instead throwing her to—I would have smiled, if I could—the wolves.

  So: we waited.

  Hours later—well into the night, though no one at the castle would have dared depart and pass up the chance to see the ending of the tale—the riders came back, dusty and tired and carrying a trunk. The trunk swung lightly; it did not hold much weight, only clothing, but it held the heaviness of sorcery, of a curse or a cure, of hope. In simple smooth cedar, it made the ordinary extraordinary.

  Everyone parted to let the men pass: carrying it to their king. They set it at his feet and flung back the lid.

  Clothing lay revealed. A silk shirt, breeches, underthings, spilled out under blazing candlelight. A cloak. Even boots. Mine.

  I could not make a sound, could not breathe, could not move.

  Andreas bent, gathered a shirt into both hands—fabric fell over his hands like water, like tears—and turned and offered it to me.

  I gazed at the shirt. The magic, though it was barely magic at all. The totem and the power, old and thrumming. The symbol of a man, a human being, a creature of custom and intricate human manners.

  I couldn’t. Not here. Not in this hall, with every eye fixed on the spectacular show of the beast becoming man. Not with the insidious weight of all that curiosity and macabre fascination weighing down on my painful eruption back into my own naked skin.

  I could hear the susurrations. The noises of the watchers. They grew impatient. And I stood frozen there, unable to shed the form I had worn for so long. What would I find, if I did?