Chain of Thorns (The Last Hours, #3)

“And fire-messages,” said Christopher.

James sighed. “All right. I shall notify the runners. And the fire brigade.”



* * *



Thomas had no trouble finding Matthew’s flat. He had been there before, but even if he had not, anyone who knew Matthew, had they been asked to guess which building in Marylebone he would have chosen to live in, would have picked the Baroque pink monstrosity on the corner of Wimpole Street.

The porter let Thomas in and told him that Mr. Fairchild was indeed at home, but he didn’t like to disturb him. Thomas revealed his spare key and was duly sent up the gilded birdcage of a lift to Matthew’s flat. He knocked at the door a few times and, not receiving any answer, let himself in.

It was cold in the room, cold enough to send goose bumps flooding across Thomas’s skin. There were lamps lit but only a few, and those quite dim—Thomas almost fell over Matthew’s trunk as he made his way into the parlor.

It took him a moment to spot Matthew, who was sitting on the floor in front of the fireplace, hatless and shoeless, his back against the sofa. He was gazing at the cold grate, where the ashes were piled in soft gray drifts.

Matthew held a wine bottle in one hand, cradled against his chest; Oscar lay next to him, whining and licking Matthew’s other hand, as if he could tell something was terribly wrong.

Thomas crossed the room; he took a few logs from their holder, opened the fireplace grate, and began to build a blaze up. Once it was roaring, he turned to look down at Matthew. In the firelight, he could see that Matthew’s clothes were crumpled; his scarlet velvet waistcoat was unbuttoned over a shirt that bore what Thomas at first thought were bloodstains, before realizing they were splashes of wine.

Matthew’s eyes were rimmed with red, the green of his irises almost black. Another wine bottle, this one empty, was shoved between the sofa cushions behind him. He was clearly quite drunk.

“So,” Thomas said after a long moment. “How was Paris?”

Matthew remained silent.

“I’ve always liked Paris myself,” Thomas went on, in a conversational tone. “Lovely old city. I had a meal at Au Chien Qui Fume I’ll not soon forget. Best duck I’ve ever had.”

Without looking away from the fire, Matthew said slowly, “I don’t want to talk about bloody ducks.” He closed his eyes. “But next time you’re there, if you like duck—eating them, I mean—you must go to La Tour d’Argent. Even better, I think. They give you a card commemorating the particular duck you have devoured. It is deliciously morbid.” He opened his eyes again. “Let me guess,” he said. “Christopher was assigned to James, and you assigned to me.”

“Not at all,” Thomas protested. Matthew raised an eyebrow. “All right, yes.” He sat next to Matthew on the floor. “We drew straws.”

“You lost, I suppose.” Matthew took a long, deep breath. “Did Lucie talk to you?”

Thomas said, “She let us know you had returned. And she may have spoken a few words of concern related to your well-being, but the idea to speak to you both was our own.”

Matthew tossed back his head and took a swallow from the bottle in his hand. It was half-empty. Thomas could smell the vinegary tang of the wine.

“Look,” said Thomas, “whatever it is you feel, Math, I want to help you. I want to understand. But above all else, you must preserve your friendship with James. Or repair it, or whatever is necessary. You are parabatai, and that is so much more than I can ever understand. If you lose each other, you will be losing something you can never replace.”

“?‘Entreat me not to leave thee,’?” Matthew said, his voice weary. “Tom, I’m not angry at James.” He reached out and scratched Oscar’s head for a moment. “I am in love with Cordelia. I have been for some time. And I believed—truly, I believed, and I think you did as well—that her marriage to James was a sham, and that James’s love was only and ever for Grace Blackthorn.”

“Well, yes,” said Thomas. “Isn’t that the case?”

Matthew gave a dry laugh. “Cordelia came to me to say she was done with it all, that she could no longer stand the pretense, that it had grown unbearable. And I thought—” He choked out a sarcastic chuckle. “I thought perhaps this was a chance for us to be happy. For all of us to be happy. James could be with Grace as he’d always wanted, and Cordelia and I would go to Paris, where we would be happy. But then James came to Paris,” Matthew went on, “and as per usual, it seems, I was wrong about everything. He does not love Grace, he says. He never did. He loves Cordelia. He does not want to give her up.”

“That’s what he said?” asked Thomas. He kept his voice calm, although inside he was reeling. It was astounding what people could hide from one another, even from their closest friends. “Did Cordelia know any of that?”

“She doesn’t seem to have,” said Matthew. “She seemed as astonished as I was. When James arrived, we were—”

“I’m not sure I want to know,” said Thomas.

“We kissed,” said Matthew. “That is all. But it was like alchemy, but with misery changed to happiness, instead of lead to gold.”

Thomas thought that he knew exactly what Matthew meant, and also that he could not possibly say so.

“I know Cordelia well enough,” he said, “to know she would not have kissed you if she did not want to. It seems to me, if you both love her—”

“We have agreed to abide by any decision she makes,” said Matthew dully. “At the moment, her decision is that she doesn’t wish to see either of us.” He set down the bottle and looked at his hand. It was shaking visibly. Emotion and drink, Thomas thought with a terrible sympathy. He himself would have tamped down his passions, but Matthew had never been able to do that. Feelings spilled from him like blood from a cut. “I have ruined everything,” he said. “I truly thought James did not love her. I truly thought my decision was the best for all of us, but I have only hurt them both. Cordelia’s face when she saw him in the hotel room—” He winced. “How could I have gotten it all so wrong?”

Thomas slid over to Matthew so that their shoulders were touching. “We are all wrong sometimes,” he said. “We all make mistakes.”

“I seem to make especially terrible ones.”

“It seems to me,” Thomas said, “that you and James have been hiding parts of yourselves from one another for some time now. Both of you. And more even than the matter of Cordelia, that is what you need to discuss.”