Perfect Shadows

chapter 5

I woke the next evening to the news that I had company, not Southampton, as I had hoped, but Selby. I dressed hastily and went down to the room that served as my study. Lord Selby stood with his back to the door, rifling through the papers on the table. The man would never make a spy, I thought irritably, and I was going to have to see that another room was readied for the reception of guests, if this was any indication of what I might expect of their courtesy. I cleared my throat and the visitor turned, pages still in hand, and smiled at me, raising his soft, ring-laden hand to hide his blackened teeth.

“You are a poet, your Highness! I did not know.” He dropped the pages carelessly back onto the table and stepped closer holding out his hand. I stepped back, turning to the door and calling for wine as an excuse for not touching the man. I took the tray from Sylvie at the door; serving the wine myself sooner than expose her to my guest’s attention, then settled myself into a chair and motioned the man into another. Selby, well aware that he had been insulted, swallowed his pride with an ease that argued long practice and took the proffered seat.

“It is no secret, my lord, that I neither read nor write,” I said sharply, lightly tapping my eye-patch.

“Hence my rudeness, I fear,” Selby answered smoothly. “Having heard that, I could not contain my curiosity at the clutter of paper and volumes there. I do apologize. The play concerns an ancestor of yours, does it not? It is excellent—”

“I will tell my cousin, the Baroness Ramnicul, so.”

“Ah, your cousin. That would be the woman you are keeping here, then. I fear the all town believes her to be but your doxy—” He broke off, raising his hand in reproof as I stood suddenly, color flaming across my face. “Your grace, please! I did not say that I thought that, and indeed I am most happy, most happy, to hear it is not so! I will do what I may to turn such malice aside, I promise you, now that I know the truth. I am certain that it is no more than the tittle-tattle of servants in any case. Please sit back down, and let us talk.” I felt taut as a drawn bowstring and sank warily back into my chair, trembling with suppressed rage.

“I will now to my business, my lord. I have heard that you are thick with Sir Walter Ralegh, and that both he and Thomas Walsingham frequent your house here. But now you are seen in the company of my little friend Roger, and I am afraid that he does your reputation no good, no good at all. He has told me—things,” he paused to lick his dry lips, “and I have heard things from others, about your—tastes—your carnal tastes. We have much in common, my lord, oh, very much.” He reached out his hand, puffy fingers crawling like slugs across my hand, then reaching for my face. I jerked away, but Selby, recognizing the emotion, clutched tighter, digging his nails into my flesh.” Depend on it, your grace, I hold all the winning cards in this hand.”

“You want money I suppose, or you will—what?” I spat, gripping the seat of my chair in an effort not to reach up and throttle the man. He laughed softly, turning my maimed face to meet his eyes, dropping the other hand to wrench open my half-buttoned doublet.

“Money? Yes, later perhaps I will want money, but first—you are beautiful, my lord, so beautiful, and it would not be wise for you to refuse me the use of your body, although it will certainly pleasure me all the more to avail myself of you and you unwilling.

“I have learned the arts of coercion very well, my lord, the arts of seduction having failed with age, and do not flatter yourself that you are the first I have practiced upon. Now either I will have you, my sweeting, or Master Topcliffe will! How do you think old Bess would respond if she found that one of her favorites preferred boys? She is her father’s daughter, after all, and sodomy is not a charge she will take lightly. You’d be for the Tower, and not just you, I fear, but good Sir Walter and your pretty Tom as well. I would see to that. Your foreign blood might save you, or it might not. Nothing would save them.” His voice had dropped to a crooning whisper, his free hand had opened my shirt, which I had not bothered to lace, and his pallid eyes took in the burn scars on my bared chest as he drew his thick finger down the thin redline, the track of Essex’s blade. His breath hissed out at the sight of the brands. “Ah, I see that I will not be the first to teach you the pleasures to be found in pain, and the delights of submission. Oh, we will have such sport together, my sweet! Come now, surrender yourself to me, you know that you must, that you want and need this as much as I.” His slavering breath was coming faster, his eyes glazed.

“No.” I raised my hands, clamping relentless fingers about his wrists, forcing his hands back, pushing the looming body away. Rising and forcing the horrified man back into the chair he had just left, I stood looking down, only half hearing the broken threats that bubbled from him in a continuous stream. Crossing his wrists in front of him, I held them both effortlessly with one hand, using the other to force his chin up, capturing and holding his hate filled glare.

“How often have you played this game, my lord? How often have you practiced your sport on some unwilling victim? For the last time now, that I promise you!” My hand slipped into his hair, drawing his head back and exposing the pulsing vein in his throat. Disgust welled in me as my teeth sank into my victim and his sour blood filled my mouth. Soon his body relaxed against me and I pulled away. “Now look at me, my lord, look only at me,” I said, his blood still wet on my lips.

When I had finished with the brute I had Jehan take him to a tavern near Whitehall. I then went to the kitchen and forced myself to swallow a great deal of bread, which I promptly vomited up along with whatever remained of Selby’s foul blood, as tainted as his soul.