John Wright - Orphans of Chaos

“I want to forget it,” I said in a low, soft voice. “I want to be able to look in your eyes tomorrow, and only see the stupid, low-class hired man I used to think you were. I don’t want you to look in my eyes and see the submission, the desire to surrender, you put there… ”

As well get hung for a ram as hung for an ewe. Time to pull out all the stops. I promised myself I would wash my mouth out with soap, later.

If I remembered.

I leaned closer and whispered teasingly:

“…You told me you wanted me to be this way. A girl who likes it rough. A helpless little slave-girl in a collar. Your collar. But I’ll have forgotten that all tomorrow. I’ll have forgotten Grendel the Bear. You’ll just be Glum, the groundskeeper. Dumb Glum. Not my master anymore. Not anything. You’ll be calling me ‘Miss’ tomorrow, and I’ll be looking down my nose at you… ”

There was a polite knock at the door. Rap, tap.

Grendel let go of me. There was a rustle and a thump. A whimper. From the direction of the noise, it sounded as if Grendel was trying to hide under his cot.

A voice as cold as death said quietly. “ By that Final Justice, gone on Earth but known below; by Avernus and by Asphodel; by the eternal Law of the Abode of Woe; I charge thee and compel: Open, open, in the name of Hell.”

I had the very distinct and strange impression that no voice was actually speaking; that something like a cold energy was entering the room, and that it had an intention, dark, remorseless, severe, and pitiless. Something in the room was… changing… that cold force into words, into a little rhyme, to make it understood to me; but also to protect me from what would have happened to me if the naked radiations of that energy had gone, unfiltered, into my brain.

It was Telegonus. He was standing between me and the door, although I could not see him. The force from behind the door was passing through him. He was letting his body act like the leaded glass that blocks dangerous and invisible wavelengths of radiation.

The door creaked and opened. I could see the snow-patched grass, colorless beneath the starlight.

There came a blur, and a shadow darkened. I saw the silhouette of a cloaked figure in the doorframe. His elbows were up, and he was removing a plumed helmet from his head.

There was starlight on the snow behind him; I could see nothing of his armor or features.

He put the helmet in the crook of one elbow, and reached out into the room toward me with his fist.

Slowly, he rotated his fist so that it was palm upward. He opened his fingers.

There was a glimmering light there, as if he held a star in the palm of his hand. From the miniscule flake of light, I could see that that hand was covered with a black gauntlet.

Telegonus became opaque in front of me, and stumbled, and fell prone, like a puppet with its strings cut.

A three-headed dog now stepped out of the shadows of the black figure’s cloak, growling and slavering.

With one head, it bit into the flesh of Telegonus, and began to drag the corpse backward, back into the shadows of the cloak.

The other two heads turned. One toward me, one toward the shivering cot.

A cold voice spoke. “Not these two, my pet. Very soon, my brute, but not yet. Grendel has a place prepared him in my domain, where he shall discover how weak and temporary is the pain his crimes inflict on others, when compared to perfect and eternal pain. As for the girl, it seems she comes to me in slices. This Phaethusa, on the morrow may be gone, and only Amelia, amputated in her memory, bewildered, will remain.”

Once again, I had the intuition or impression that Telegonus was blocking the force radiating from this being, turning unseen thoughts into words. But now I could see the little light in the palm of the gauntlet flickering, as if in pain, as the cold force passed through it. It was Telegonus. That little light was him, the real him.

The gauntlet closed; the light was quenched.

At that moment, I woke in my cot, back in my cell.

That morning, with no ceremony or ado, Dr. Fell and Mestor the Atlantian, Miss Daw and Nurse Twitchett, and Headmaster Boggin came down the corridor. Behind them, I could hear the stumping tap of Grendel’s wooden leg.

Mestor was dressed in a dark suit and buff overcoat. He had bags under his eyes and did not look well.

I sat up in my cot with a rattle of chain. Miss Daw unlocked the bars and opened the door. She then turned and blocked the door. She said, “Headmaster, it is not proper for a girl to receive visitors clad only in her nightthings. Please take these men out of eyeshot while Sister Twitchett and I clothe Miss Windrose.”

Boggin said jovially, “Ananias is a doctor; I am certain we can trust in his discretion. Dr. Fell, if you please? And as Miss Windrose may soon be asleep again in a few moments, there is no need to change her. Mestor and I will stay here, and check the environment for any other clues of the disturbance we had last night.”

Mestor said, “The Wild Hunt was called by Bran; and the damned souls rode the storms, looking for one of their own.”

Boggin touched him on the arm, and squinted, making the smallest possible shake of his head. “Let us not disturb our young guest here with news that does not concern her.”

“Why not?” said Mestor. “The girl isn’t going to remember anything in an hour anyway.”

I clutched the starchy blanket in front of me. “What are you going to do to me?!” I shouted. “Why am I not going to remember anything in an hour?”

Boggin, ignoring me, said in a kind voice to Mestor, “Ah, my dear friend, not only have you frightened one of my girls here, you have evidently forgotten how much you owe me, and how much you still have to owe. I see that the full, ah, import, I am tempted to say, the full ‘pressure’ of the facts governing our new relationship together have not been made… ah… pellucid to you.”

Saying that, without a single change of expression, he took Mestor’s hand in both his hands. Before Mestor could blink or think to turn his hand away, Boggin put both his thumbs on the other man’s pinky finger and flexed his hands, like a man snapping a wishbone to make a wish. There was a crack as Mestor’s little finger broke. Mestor screamed and fell to his knees, astonished by the sudden pain and shock.

Miss Daw and Sister Twitchett turned away, shocked. Dr. Fell had not bothered to look up at the commotion.

I was the only one who saw Boggin bend down to Mestor, who was sobbing, clutching his hand to his belly.

I saw Boggin’s lips move and I caught the smallest whisper of what he said in Mestor’s ear. I was able to piece together what he was whispering.

“And I am not sure, dear friend, I have made it clear how upset, yes, I might even say, angry, your attempt to take our dear Miss Fair to your dreary, dank city of slaves made me. The thought of that young innocent with your fingers touching her… well, it was not a pleasant image to me.”

Boggin straightened up. He cleared his throat and said in a normal voice, “Ananias…? Could you see to this after you are done with Miss Windrose…?”

Dr. Fell said, “Of course, Headmaster. The infirmary never runs short on business when you are around.”

“What was that, Ananias…?”

“Nothing, Headmaster.”

I had jumped out of the cot at this time, and had backed up in the cell as far as the chain would allow. Dr. Fell and Sister Twitchett rather matter-of-factly closed in on either side of me, and grabbed my arms. The Sister was strong, but I could feel her grip getting unsteady as I tugged against her; Dr. Fell’s hands were like the vice grip of a machine.

I screamed.