Alastair Archibald: Dark Priory

His hands look just like Grimm's hands did on me…

Fugitive images flickered into reality and, just as swiftly, disappeared: the large bed in the white tower at Crar; Grimm leaning over her, his face flushed and sweaty, but peaceful; idyllic mornings, spent at her beloved's side.

What followed that blissful, guilt-free congress? Whips, chains and imprecations! Endless hours of torment, of kneeling on sharp stones, of cleaning the dried blood from her white robes! The chants-the unending, droning paeans of submission, abjection and self-denial!

Drex saw Mercia lean close to Grimm and whisper something in his ear, smiling as she did so. Grimm smiled in return as he replied.

Something snapped inside her, shattering with a tumultuous crash within her mind.

"He's mine,” she whispered, feeling a powerful surge of long-suppressed passion and possessiveness.

"He's MINE, you little bitch!” she cried, as she leapt to her feet. “Get away from Grimm!"

Silence reigned; the birds in the trees and the insects in the grass stopped singing, and Drex saw every eye fixed on her. Numal continued to chant, but even he stared at her.

"He's… he's mine,” she whispered, as hot tears tickled at the margins of her eyes. Drex stayed them for as long as she could, but then gave rein to her dammed-up emotions. She began to sob, her shoulders shaking and her body heaving. She closed her eyes in an attempt to stem the sudden flood, but she could not do so. After a few moments, she felt a strong arm around her shoulder, drawing her forwards. She tried to resist, but the arm was too strong for her.

"It's all right, my love,” a soft, familiar voice said, with just a trace of tremulousness. “I'm here; I'll always be here, if you'll have me."

She buried her head in Grimm's chest, hearing his swift, shallow heartbeat echoing her own, and she clasped him tight in her arms.

"You didn't rape me, Grimm,” she whispered, not knowing if he heard her or not, but she did not care. “Never. Never!

"I'm sorry, Grimm.” Her voice grew louder, stronger. “I'm… I'm yours, and I always will be."

"It'll be all right now, Drex."

Drexelica felt his voice rumble in his chest as she crushed her head into it, not daring to relinquish her hold on him.

****

Drex's sobbing subsided to a gentle quiver as Grimm sat with her beside the road. He kept his arm around her, as if he could draw all the pain and anguish from her. He felt glad that the other travellers had the gentility to leave them alone. He felt quite at peace, at terms with what and who he was. He was many men, but this particular man was the one he most wanted to be. This was the Drex he loved; not one of Lizaveta's facsimiles, even though he knew the Prioress’ soul remained somewhere within her body.

"Will we be going back to Crar?” she asked, looking up at him with moist eyes.

"Eventually,” he said, “one way or another."

"And just what be you meaning by ‘one way or another', Grimm Afelnor?” she demanded, and the mage felt overjoyed at the brief resurgence of the unfussy Grivense patois she had been at such pains to eradicate from her diction.

"I want to tell everyone about it: Lord Thorn; Lord Horin; everyone. I want to scream it from the rooftops: ‘I love Drex!'” he said.

"So why can't you, Grimm?"

"I've broken Guild Law just by letting you into my life,” he said, with an unhappy shrug. “You know that. I'll still owe the House for my tuition for many more years; that's why I've tried to keep our relationship a secret. I don't want to live with that any longer, but they do have a hold over me. Perhaps they'll accept money in lieu of my continued service-I'm rich enough now-but they don't have to. And… even if I can give up my service to the Guild, I'll also have to give up working to redeem my family name. That means so much to me."

"Then don't,” she said, with stark finality, her mouth fixed in a firm, determined line. “I don't mind being your secret lover, as long as I'm your only lover. I'll be your docile housekeeper, or anything you want me to be, as long as I'm yours. As long as I don't have to hide, and as long as I can be me."

"I have a Quest to complete,” he said, “and it involves you, too. We have to return to High Lodge, with your soul cargo intact.

"We have to, Drex, otherwise we'll never be free. If we just run away, they'll hunt us down, and I'll be just another damned Oathbreaker like Granfer."

"I hate the old witch, now I remember what she put me through,” the girl whispered, with fierce intensity. “How she tried to turn me against you, and how she made us both suffer. I'd give almost anything not to have to go through it. However, if I have to deliver the evil cow to your High bloody Lodge just so we can stay together, I'll do it."

Grimm rubbed his forehead. “I don't know what they'll do to find out the truth, Drex,” he said. “I don't know what Lizaveta will say to them. The whole… thing between us may come out. I don't know if I can stop it."

"Then we'll face it together,” Drex said, her expression looking stern but loving. “They can't kill us… can they?"

"They won't kill you,” Grimm said, shaking his head. “Don't worry about that. I'm pretty sure they won't kill me either-I'm too valuable to them as a Questor-but they could do something to make me a little more… tractable."

Just a few minutes ago, he had felt happy with his lot, but Drex's sudden change had thrown a new, difficult problem into his life; however, this was a problem he knew he must not ignore, nor try to diminish. He did not want to.

Whatever happened, he knew there was only one answer.

"No matter what they do, Drex,” he said, feeling his blood rising in determination. “I want to face it with you, and only with you.

"I won't love anyone else, ever. I only want to be with you, whatever happens!"

"That's all I want,” she said, her lips curling into an almost beatific smile, and he felt his heart surge in response. “If you have to give me up, you have to: just remember me always in your heart. All I-"

"I think they're as good as they're ever going to be,” Numal cried, and Grimm returned to the real world.

"I'm sorry, Drex,” he said, giving her a swift but passionate kiss, which she returned in full measure. “I'm needed."

"You certainly are,” she said, as he rose to his feet with the help of Redeemer. “I know you'll do a good job of it-whatever you have to do."

Despite the nagging pains in his left leg and his ribs, Grimm walked towards the other travellers with a song in his heart.

****

Sprit-Lizaveta gasped as she felt the last dregs of earth-power fade with Weranda's-Drexelica's-words.

The disembodied soul thrashed and screamed to no effect. Devoid of her intimate contact with the nourishing, empowering earth, she felt her strength wilting like a candle in the fierce heat of a forge.

Guy… listen to me. LISTEN, rot you! Answer me!

She tried to contact her host, but she could not do so; all she received in return was a package of anguish, self-doubt and suppressed guilt.

Somebody… talk to me… talk to me…

Lizaveta had faced many setbacks in her long life, and she had defeated them all by guile, cunning and native power. Now, she, the pre-eminent witch of her age, was a helpless prisoner in the body of a callow girl. For the first time in her life since she had been the violated vassal of a Temperan slave-trader, whom she had later killed with her nascent Geomantic skills, she felt utterly alone and powerless.

It's all going wrong! Damn Afelnor and his bumbling grandson! Damn this worthless girl and the traitorous Score! Damn them all!

Labouring under the sick, heavy mantle of dread certainty, she realised that she had failed to complete the spell she had begun to cast on her grandson. She knew Geomancy had little in common with its mechanistic, male equivalent, but the concept of an inescapable, ever-amplifying Resonance was well-known to practitioners of both arts.