For a second, I thought someone had planted a telephone pole in the middle of the road. I was leaning on the accelerator hard enough that it just looked tall and brown and straight, with a crossbar near the top.
As the distance between us collapsed, it came into relief, the center mass focusing into a long, brown coat, the crossbar, an identically colored, wide-brimmed hat. The monochrome was only broken by a long gray beard that sprouted from a similarly colored face. If I hadn’t been paying attention I would have plowed right through him.
It didn’t even occur to me to go around. I just slammed on the brakes, bringing the old Dodge to a rocking halt a few feet from him. I inhaled to scream at him through the windshield, to call him the crazy old man that he was, but he pinned me to the driver’s seat with crackling blue eyes.
My mouth was still hanging open when he finally moved. He bent down to pick up a sack that was so big I don’t know how I missed it sitting at his feet.
I watched him walk with it to the back of the Dodge, the windows of the car acting like some kind of prism he and the sack changed shape through, tall and thin to fat and short and everything in-between, the sack he was lumbering under becoming impossibly large in its proportions.
I don’t remember opening the trunk, but he dropped the mammoth sack in, then closed the lid with a heavy thunk. I blinked and he was by the passenger side door, folding himself until the end of his beard touched his knees and he slid into the seat next to mine.
The only thing I could think to say was, “How did you know I was going to stop?”
His voice was like something digging out of the ground, rumbling and inexorable, something that was there whether you wanted it to be or not. “They always stop.”
I looked out the window at the high, forested hills, the trees bare as dark skeletons, the longest night of the year settling in. I couldn’t imagine many people headed this way. Which is why I chose it.
I found bringing my gaze back to the old man hard to do, so I stared out at the road. “So where are you going?”
“Into the dark of the woods. There’s a road there. A special one. It’ll take us to all the places we need to go.”
I blinked, trying to shake off whatever whammy this old man had put on me. “Hey, I don’t know where you think I’m taking you – ”
The old man put an iron grip on my shifting arm, pulling me to his heavy gaze. He spoke forcefully enough it moved the whiskers of his beard. “You were a good boy once, Gerald. Before the war, before the divorce, before the pain and the pills. I know it. And so does the man in charge.”
“But that hole you’re in, son? You can’t hurt your way out of it. You know that. But you got to make up for the things you’ve done someway.
“So I’m here, cause I need your help. The world’s a dark place these days, and it’s squeezin’ the light. There ain’t no elves, no reindeer besides. Not no more. Maybe never again.
“So you’ll take me where I need to go. It’ll be the longest night of your life. I can’t say what you’ll look like on the other side of it. It does different things to different people. But we’ll travel some long paths to bring the light to those who need it.
“And I haven’t met a driver yet that regretted doin’ it.”
He lifted his hand from me then, and I locked on the blue eyes nestled in the wreath of his beard. There was a kindness there that I hadn’t seen before, a softness that made me realize he was giving me a choice.
I moved my hand back to the stick shift and my eyes to the road. “I guess we better get goin’ then.”
To start at the beginning go here. To hear an audio reading of the chapter, hit the play button above.
I wrapped the trench coat around me as I stepped out of the casino’s employee entrance. While the afternoons had started to feel like spring, this early in the morning it was still cool and damp. I watched the mist fall from a light sky and felt the droplets on my face. For a moment I didn’t think about the city, what it was or where it was going.
Eventually, I opened my umbrella and stepped over the stream running in the gutter to head over to L’Orange. The trams weren’t running for another hour or so, but I had picked the place based off its proximity to the casino and a few other factors.
The first of those other factors was that there were a number of spots nearby that I could watch the restaurant without being easily noticed myself. The second was, like a lot of places in Old Town, L’Orange faced out onto the narrow street while it had a service entrance in the rear. It was basically a shotgun shack in that you could have stood out in the street and aimed through its front door to shoot someone in the back alley. All in all, a very controllable space.
I watched the citrus-colored shutters of its front doors until I heard the tinny horn of the Citroën blare at some unfortunate pedestrian. I stepped behind the corner where I was roosting while Atwell found a place for the BX. After he did some impressive parallel parking, I watched his dark hair bob its way into the restaurant. His legs loped along with an urgency I wasn’t accustomed to seeing in him.
If Atwell held true to form, he’d pick a table at the very back. I circled the block until I found the entrance to the restaurant’s backstreet. I continued to think about what I’d say to Atwell as I walked. There were the usual rubbish bins and stacked boxes down the alley, but many of these had been covered with green, leafy plants in clay pots. Someone had attempted to make the row more livable space than the trash-catcher they usually were. I could imagine the bright Mediterranean sun lighting up fronds, but now they were only the silhouette of a jungle. Passing through that, I made up my mind for the direct approach.
The backdoor to the restaurant was open to let some of the kitchen’s heat escape. I walked through it as if it were the most natural thing in the world, just an ox there for a delivery. The clatter of the one working cook didn’t break in its noise. I made sure there was a clear path through the kitchen to the exit.
In the dining room Atwell was sitting at a table in the back, watching the entrance, confident that’s where I’d be coming from. In this early hour, with the sky just beginning to lighten, he had the restaurant to himself.
I took the steel-cored umbrella in hand by either end, looping it over his head and across his throat. I let him get his hands up for a meager defense before I yanked him out of the chair, silencing whatever protests he was bound to launch into. His legs thrashed out, knocking his teetering chair away, and they kept kicking as I dragged him out into the alley. When I was sure he was choked out enough that he wouldn’t immediately start yelling, I tossed him onto a pile of trash that was surrounded by elephant-eared plants, landing him in a refuse wilderness.
I’m sure it was all very confusing for him. I didn’t give him a chance to get his bearings. I grabbed him by the sweat-stained collar of his shirt.
I jerked Atwell towards me, throttling him as I pushed all of my anger into the sentence, “You idiot. Who did you tell?”
I derived more than a small amount of pleasure from the fear and confusion that was evident on Atwell’s face even in the alley’s dim light. “What?!?”
“The Ukrainian. Who did you tell about the Ukrainian?” I pulled Atwell up to his knees, continuing to shake him. I rattled him around enough to keep him disoriented. The product of this combination came out of him with another, more prolonged, “What?”
I repeated that the Ukrainian was the topic of conversation. “The cops found him. And only you, me, and Sartre knew where he was.” With my free hand I pointed out each of the subjects from my sentence, only thumbing out to the streets of Old Town to indicate the Night Governor. I ended with putting my finger in his face. “Who did you tell?”
Atwell recovered enough of his composure to use the leverage that had always kept me in check in the past. “Let go of me, you stupid fucker, or I’ll have you back in a cell before nightfall.” To his credit, Atwell tried to pry my hand off his throat. “Or worse.”
“You think I care about that?” I asked honestly. “Sartre thinks I might have tipped the cops. I’d rather be back in prison than vanished.”
The realization that the shield of his authority was no longer effective slowly transformed Atwell’s face. The anger in his eyes drained, his mouth gradually opening as if to give it someplace to escape. Instead a series of incomplete, stuttered words came out. “You mean –?”
“Yes. Sartre visited the casino to shake me down. If I hadn’t convinced him it wasn’t me who squealed, I’d be in a dumpster somewhere by now. So – who did you tell?”
His anger completely supplanted by fear, Atwell managed an honest denial. “I didn’t tell anyone!”
“Bullshit. The cop you told me about, Rotella, is investigating it.” I shook him hard enough that Cheryl’s voice reminded me not to kill him. I stopped long enough to make sure Atwell could understand my next question. “You just happen to know him and now he’s digging up the Ukrainian?”
“I don’t know him! A gendarme I coordinate with told me about the investigation!” Atwell’s words came out sharp and shrill. Even if I didn’t know he was telling the truth I probably would have believed him.
“Then how did Rotella find out about the Ukrainian?”
“I don’t know!”
Atwell was beginning to thrash in his panic so I decided to get to the question I really wanted to ask him. “You found out about the Ukrainian because you’ve been following Sartre. Why have you been following him?”
Atwell stuttered, a sure sign he was trying to think up a lie. I shook him again and switched to another question. “Have you been following Mitnick?”
More stuttering, which meant more shaking. I finished by throwing him back into the garbage pile. I crouched down to lean in close to him, my frame taking up all the space between two of the plants. “You’ve been following Sartre, but not Mitnick. Why?”
Atwell sputtered, “I – I – I –“
When he showed no signs of stopping I slapped him.
That got through to him. He stopped his noise. After all his time lording over me he actually sulked, holding a hand to his cheek, his brown eyes like a child’s. I almost hit him again. “Why are you following Sartre, but not Mitnick?” I pointed the umbrella at him, digging its sharp point into his flesh.
Despite the implied threat of a more sturdy beating, something that wasn’t fear or hurt rose in Atwell. “That’s a need to know, Marine. And you don’t need to know.”
I almost laughed that he trotted out that old chestnut. I had to admire his attempt to appeal to my sense of duty. “Normally, I might agree with you. But you’re fucking around is going to get me killed. So I need to know.”
Atwell opened and closed his mouth, searching for words that were most likely lies, so I jabbed him with the umbrella. “Out with it.”
For an audio reading, select the play button above. To read the first chapter. go here.
I shadowed my villainous uncle to the library, my physical training making it easy to keep up with him. despite having spent hundreds of hours in the room for study, it appeared he knew it better than I, for as I spied him from the balcony he stepped close to a bookcase, paused, then uttered the word, “Recludere.”
With that simple word, the bookcase slid open, and my uncle passed through the wall, leaving me to wonder what black and forbidden art he had mastered to allow for such an impossible mechanism. Witches and warlocks were still burned by the Church in Dunhill, but I knew from my studies that even this did not stop certain nobles from reaching for the personal power that the Left-Hand Path might convey.
Springing from my spot, I approached the bookcase to cautiously repeat the word. While I was surprised that the sturdy bookcase obeyed me as it had my uncle, I stepped into the dark corridor behind it.
The walls were lined with the same grey stone that the streets and buildings of Dunhill were constructed from, but my bare feet felt the ground slope downward and grow colder as I moved ahead. I went quietly and cautiously, only sparing a glance back as the bookcase slid shut behind me, sealing me in darkness.
I pawed my way along the path until a light could be seen ahead, illuminating an arched opening. I heard the crepitation of flames and the air grow slightly warmer as I stealthily moved to the side of the arched entrance.
The room I stared upon was large enough that its ceiling was not lit by the torches that dotted its walls. At a glance, I took it for a laboratory, so decorated it was by various tables with interconnected glass tubes, vials and alembics. However, the sight of a large cauldron, as empty as any abyss, sat in the middle of the wooden tables that surrounded it. At one of these, my uncle stood with his back to me, muttering to himself as he worked at something at a table. A repetitive slithering noise came from his direction.
Over the stropping I could hear some of his words. “All four elements are in place – temperature, diet, salts, and now Cole is of a proper age.” He stopped and held up a billhook in his hand, his examination of it putting his face into profile. “Jakob’s failure proves a blood relation is needed for a successful transference.” He spoke to no one, in a feverish tone that’s edges dripped with obsession. “Still, perhaps there is more to learn from a closer examination.”
He moved toward one of the other tables, atop which was a cloth covering an outline that made my blood run cold. Parts of the tarpaulin raised from the table with an unmistakably human outline. I wished nothing more than to flee as my uncle approached the table, but I felt paralyzed as if the cold of the floor had set icicles into my feet. I stared in horror as he pulled the cloth away, revealing the now ghostly corpse of Jakob.
I watched in stricken fright, my uncle thankfully directly between me and his ghastly work. Even so, the sounds of his cutting scratched a litany of fear into my brain, wiring me into place. My eyes only moved from him when Gildred stepped forward from a shadow holding a bowl in her hands. Slowly, now stained crimson up to his wrists, my uncle began to place organs into the bowl, one wet piece of tissue at a time.
I might have stayed frozen in place until caught if things had not taken an impossibly darker turn. In the midst of his bloody work my uncle lifted a piece of Jakob’s flesh to Gildred’s mouth. To my horror, the woman snapped at it with her white teeth until she ground it between them with an inhuman desire. My uncle continued to cut into what was once Jakob, setting organs aside and feeding his servant, as if the corpse were nothing but a prize from the Overlord’s hunting grounds.
This finally snapped me from my paralysis and I disappeared back down the tunnel from which I came. If I made any noise, my uncle and his servants were too wrapt in their own orectic cravings to notice me.
I wish that I could say I bravely sprung into action and alerted one of Dunhill’s Blackcoat inspectors, and that only their reputation for corruption and my uncle’s wealth made me think twice about informing the constabulary. Truth, though, is that I spent the rest of that night cowering under my sheets, haunted by the image of Jakob’s corpse and the sound of my uncle’s tools cutting into his flesh.
Only my hate for him saved me. Shaking with fear, the most frightened child inside me imagined my uncle, covered in blood, coming into my room, seeking to satisfy himself as he had so many times before and I, as so many times before, unable or unwilling to stop him.
That awful echo of past events rolled into an anger that flattened my fear and pushed me out of bed. Dawn had not yet sprung between Dunhill’s towers and smog while I performed my ablutions and dressed myself carefully, buttoning my vest and tying my cravat as if preparing for a funeral. It was then, as the burgeoning light of day broke through, that I decided to kill my uncle.
Although it felt it might crack my face like plaster, I smiled broadly as I went down the stairs, moving into the kitchen, insisting with a happy invasion to make my own breakfast. My uncle’s mention of salts made me reluctant to eat anything not prepared by myself. When the servants protested at my presence I pretended with a giddy air to be thrilled at Jakob’s unexplained departure and insisted I was demonstrating my usefulness. Before any of them could press upon this thin deceit, I banished them from the kitchen with a gleeful cackle and the wave of a meat-cleaver.
My tutors, though, long having suspected something amiss, gave little to no protest when my attentions wandered from my lessons. In the library I watched my uncle come or go from his subterranean laboratory. As the secret door of the bookcase was not immediately evident, my uncle merely repeated the lie that his entries and exits were checks on on my progress, which I cheerfully responded to with hardened smiles. When he was not there, though, I poured through the library to see what I could learn of him. I found that he had an extensive catalogue of journals, written in a simple cypher that he must have though impenetrable as the details therein would have gotten him burned at the stake if they were to be believed. And the contents, had I not witness what I had, would have been unbelievable.
The earliest entries were mundane. I read of how my uncle had made his fortune from shipping, having spent much time going to and from the islands of the West, where he had brought back from spices and gold trinkets, both of which he sold to Dunhill’s merchants at exorbitant prices. He also wrote, though, of his intermingling with the peoples there, most of whom were innocents he was happy to exploit. It was when he was traveling with a Dr. Brodie that he learned of a small island, excoriated by the all others, with a population that the other islanders simply call Nr. The Nr grew nothing, did no fishing, presided over no trade nor industry, but pillaged everything from their neighbors, who so feared them they offered no resistance. Any that did were butchered with such brutality that their entire tribe would remember their screams for a generation.
The king of the Nr, though, was feared above the rest as the king remembered every torture and psychological terror that could be wrecked upon fellow humans. The king, called so regardless of gender, was the receptacle of all Nr history and knowledge. Dr. Brodie and my uncle took great interest in how one individual could know, and be trusted to know, so much. The pair learned that when the king was ready and a child of theirs at the proper age (and there were always plenty of these as no clothing, timing, consent or decency kept the king from procreating with whomever they chose) a ritual was set upon them.
I believe it was then that my uncle crossed the line from being merely a flagitious old bugger to true evil. His journal entries at this stage took on a fevered and hallucinatory pitch, describing how the child was educated in what passed for Nr knowledge andforced to live in a cold dark cave of the island. There, the child was fed a specific diet, heavy in the sea salt of the local lagoon, until the time was deemed right. The tribe’s most trusted witch doctor’s would then bind the child and place them into a large open basket and the king would enter the cave. When whatever iniquitous incantations were performed in that darkness were complete, the cavalcade of evil emerged and the child was proclaimed king. The old king, now bound hand and foot in the basket as the child had been, was set upon by his erstwhile subjects and cannibalized.
Having bargained with the old king and then listened to new one, Uncle Daman became convinced that not just a transfer of knowledge had taken place, but a transfer of being. The old king, he wrote in barely legible script, had become the new king.
Dr. Brodie fell away from the journals’ pages, though I learned his death was recorded as an accident shortly after submitting a report to Queen Gloriana in which he recommended the complete extermination of the Nr. As the seat of the Queen’s, and indeed all of Britannia’s imperial administration, Dunhill’s usual brutality and thoughtlessness allowed this wise recommendation to pass without notice.
Whatever was behind Dr. Brodie’s fate, my uncle made many more trips to the island of the Nr, learning more of their ways and rituals, making whatever unholy promises he needed to in return. He augmented the knowledge he acquired upon these trips by acting as a messenger between the Nr and a splinter church of some power and ill-repute in Rzeczpospolita.
I also learned, most critically to me, that in all of his travels and carnal exploitations, my uncle had picked up more than one disease that he had cured, but left him with a weakened heart. It was this that inspired me and, with his insistence on my learning, became his undoing. My lessons in chemistry would be useful then as they are now, with the beakers, burners, and alembics of Uncle Daman’s laboratory becoming my beginner’s kit for his demise.
To start at the beginning go here. To hear an audio reading of the chapter, hit the play button above.
I nodded, my brain feeling the smoke and tendrils that crossed each other until I was here, with Sartre asking me to investigate a murder I’d committed. So I looked him in the eye and did what I do best. I played dumb.
“Where was this fire? I may need to check it out.”
“In L’Ariane, near Gairut, between Cimetière Hill and the canal. You cannot miss it.” At Sartre’s last statement I wondered how out of control the fire had gotten. I was suddenly very grateful to Ears that he had frightened off the attendant rather than beating him unconscious.
“I’ll need a car to get out that far.”
With another puff of smoke, Sartre considered this. Then he nodded, saying, “Speak with Thibalt. He will arrange something.”
I nodded again, walking down a mental checklist of all the things someone in my shoes shouldn’t know. Which brought me to, “How long have the police been on the scene?”
“Only since last night.”
I considered this, trying to appear grateful that only so little time had passed. “Do you know who’s in charge of the investigation?”
“It is an inspecteur named Rotella.”
“Do you have any pull with him?”
“Non.” Sartre made a face as if his cigarette had left a bad taste in his mouth. “He is his own man.”
“OK. Maybe I can point him at Mitnick. If Rotella knows he was involved somehow it might keep him busy and cause trouble for Mitnick.” Sartre grinned wickedly at this, in such a simple and evil way I might have thought he was considering having one of the rooks sap me in the back of the head. I found in the matrix of that moment that I was pretty indifferent.
“D’accord. C’est bon,” was his only reply. Still smiling impishly, he rose from his chair. Behind me, I heard the utility door open.
I stopped the room’s movements with, “What about the other thing we talked about?” Understandable for a man with so much on his mind, Sartre gave me his own blank stare. I prompted him with, “With Lanzo’s friends and Nika?”
Sartre’s smile dropped away and he stared at me like a sphinx. “Why would you ask about this? I said no.”
“You said the time wasn’t right,” I countered, holding my wrists together like I was handcuffed, gesturing to Sartre with fingers splayed. “It’s just that Mitnick keeps fucking with you, despite what you did at the casino.” Or because of it, I thought. “It might be a good way to fuck with him back.”
Sartre’s grin returned in a flash, boiling into a sadistic laugh that he was barely able to contain, a minor tremor compared to the earthquake in his car earlier. When he had that under control he said, “Tell them they may proceed.”
Bubbling with more chuckles, Sartre moved past the table and towards the utility door. By my chair, he stopped and placed a hand on my shoulder. This surprised me, causing me to look up at him. I found he was staring at me as if I were a crystal ball. He repeated, “You are very smart, American.”
Not sure what else to say I slowly pronounced a, “Thanks.”
“Don’t be too smart. Get to work.” Veiled threats were stock-in-trade amongst men of violence, but I found myself watching Sartre very carefully, certain somehow that I wasn’t completely cleared of his suspicions.
Ignoring that, I moved to stand. “Right. I’ll go finish my shift.”
Sartre chuckled, grinding out his cigarette on the concrete floor. “No one is expecting you.”
I watched him twist his small foot into the butt, his meaning slowly coming to me. “Right.”
Sensing this, he grinned down at me. “Come and go from the casino as you please. Talk with Atwell. Cause trouble for Mitnick. These are the things required of you now, not watching fools throw away their money.” I nodded minutely, but didn’t say anything. My brain was too preoccupied with the math of how many people thought they had me on a hook.
Sartre and his rooks disappeared back through the utility door, folding themselves into it. They sealed it with a click, leaving nothing but the smoke and cigarette butt as indicators they had been there.
I sat there for a time, thinking. Despite Sartre’s words, I found a part of me, trained and ingrained to fulfill my obligations, wanted to head back into the casino. The idea that no one was expecting me only added to that. Now that the danger from Sartre had passed, at least for now, I would be safe in the casino, and I needed time to think. All of that combined into me heading out onto the casino floor and passing a few early morning hours watching the mostly empty slot machines.
The only pleasantry was a brief exchange with Thibalt who, to his credit, appeared only mildly surprised to see me. Instead of asking about the car, I asked to borrow the house phone, using it to check to see if there were any messages on the mobile. Learning there weren’t, I called Alon and asked him to meet me at L’Orange, my next destination, in a few hours. He complained, in a friendly French manner, that that would be near the end of his shift, but he agreed to meet me there.
When I finished up, I headed back to the locker room. I wasn’t even out of my jacket when Jasper appeared, his unctuous tone behind me as I groaned out of my blazer. “You are leaving?”
Sartre’s appearance guaranteed that management knew I was working with him, and I wondered how much protection that would project. If I bashed Jasper’s head into the locker, would there be any repercussions? Or would they assume I was doing it on orders from the Night Governor?
Instead of that, though, I closed the locker door. “Yeah.”
“Twice now Sartre has been to see you.” Jasper grinned at me as if he were amused, but then I realized it was whatever passed for happiness in him. He had confirmation he was closer to the center of power and it pleased him.
While this made me reconsider putting his head into the locker I just replied with, “Yep.” I pivoted on my heel like he wasn’t there, forcing him to step back or risk a collision with my much larger frame.
He followed behind me as I headed for the door. “Is there anything I can do for you?” The pronoun carried with it the plural form.
For whatever reason I found my inclination towards committing violence on Jasper was transformed by the question. Instead I found myself laying another potential bomb. I turned to him and said, “Yeah. Do you have a pen?”
I was at least marginally amused at Jasper scrambling across his person to locate a pen. I captured the hand he gave it to me with and wrote down a number, feeling a bit like a lover promising a tryst. “If you see anything out of the ordinary, call this number and leave a message.”
Jasper examined the number as I wrote it, but I managed to leave without any questions. He wouldn’t have any idea that the number was to the cell Mitnick gave me.
For an audio reading, select the play button above. To read the first chapter, go here.
Eventually I spotted my uncle shuttle a small, blonde into the home. Unlike the others that had disappeared, after several days my uncle called me down to the main hall, proud and beaming, the small blonde teen at his side. He introduced him as Jakob, and me as Cole, rather than as Master McDowell. I wondered at this breach of etiquette, recalling Jakob’s shabby clothing and unwashed hair, which had both been cleaned since his furtive entrance. This was explained when my uncle stated Jakob would be staying with us in one of the rooms, and that he would live with us as my brother.
My hand still gripping Jakob’s in greeting, I paused as my uncle’s words echoed through the hall. I examined Jakob, the difficulty of whatever place he had come unable to hide the softness of his cheeks, the blue of his eyes, or the loveliness of his hair. He managed to look me in the eye, though it was a struggle for him, being little more than an adolescent, and me close to leaving it. It gave him an appearance of shy kindness and I couldn’t help but imagine what my uncle would do to him once dusk arrived.
When Jakob joined me at the dinner table, it only reinforced my initial impression of him. We ate in relative quiet, only making cursory statements to the servants and each other. I longed to ask him where he was from or how my uncle had found him. However, his quiet nature seemed to insulate him in a gentle air that I did not wish to disturb. This only buried me deeper in my shame as I felt it was only a greater sign of my own cowardice that I should not try to warn or protect him. We dined for several nights in a row, ending with me going to complete my studies and he escorted off by my uncle.
One night I braved up to my rescue fantasy enough that I stealthily followed them to see my uncle lead Jakob into his library. As that did not seem the place for nightly emissions, I chose to hope that my uncle was, in fact, earnestly educating Jakob. Such was my pusillanimity.
This false, naive hope lasted until another nocturnal knock came at my door and I squeezed my eyes shut wishing my uncle leave. This was dashed when I heard my bedroom chamber door open. However, this time, the sound was not the heavy, sliding footsteps of my uncle, but light and quick. Finding my courage, I sat up to see Jakob standing by my bedside. His appearance, with his unblemished skin, thin frame, and straw hair, was so unlike my uncle that I couldn’t help but smile. The idea of spending a night with someone as gentle and guileless as Jakob touched me in a way I no longer thought possible.
This faltered quickly, though, when I looked Jakob in the eye and saw nothing of his gentleness there. In his eyes was the same hard avarice that I had come to expect in my nightly visitations. This was only reinforced by the quick and direct way he climbed onto my bed and pulled his own nightshirt off. His prick was hard and standing and I found myself staring at it as he pulled on my own shirt, attempting to access me in a familiar way.
While a part of me remained paralyzed as I had many nights before, I found a part of me was repelled by Jakob behaving so unlike the gentle boy I shared dinners. I grabbed his wrist, stopping his advance. This sparked such an anger in his eyes that I felt fear lance through me despite his smaller size and younger years. I began to vocalize a protest, but before I could Jakob spat out the words, “Now? After all this time, now you resist?”
It was then that I witnessed something change in Jakob’s blue eyes, as if he were swimming to the surface. His verbalizations became clouded as well, words merging together until they were incoherent. I had read of seizures such as the ones Caesar had endured and I imagined the pain and uncertainty they caused were much like this. But in a moment, the apoplexy passed and only Jakob’s fear shone through his eyes to meet mine. He stuttered out my name and sat up, confusion and panic shining through as his eyes darted around my room. Before I could say anything else, he slid off the bed and fled, a platinum shadow that escaped the room.
The next evening’s dinner, I sat to eat alone. When the servant Charles served me, I inquired as to whether Jakob would be joining me. Charles only flashed his white smile and said that Master Jakob was no longer in the house.
For the first time in my recalling I pulled the dark hair out of my eyes and spoke to Charles directly. “What’s become of him?”
Charles glared down at me as if he were the lord of the house. “He did not rise to Sir McDowell’s expectations.” With that lone statement, Charles set down my dinner and exited. This left me with such a void that, despite the hunger my physical lessons had left me with, I only pushed my food around and contemplated the previous evening’s strange happenings.
Those were mirrored that night when my uncle slid into my room. He crossed it and grabbed my bed covers to pull them from me. Rather than submit to him in my usual shame, I grabbed his wrist, feeling so different than Jakob’s, but stopping him much the same. “What became of Jakob?”
A familiar anger shown through the dark in my uncle’s eyes and, in a flash, he did something he had never done before – he struck me. He cuffed me across the cheek so hard and so fast that it turned my head and caused my ears to ring. As he spoke, I rotated my head back to him, wiping blood from my lips.
“He was a failure, unworthy of the McDowell name. You will never speak of him again.” My uncle spoke with all the authority he could muster, but I found on that night it collided with the palisade of my pain. Seeing something had changed, my uncle huffed and left, muttering about completing his work.
The blood still in my mouth and ringing in my ears, I waited until I could barely hear my uncle’s retreating footsteps. I then followed him.
