Indigo

by Nicholas Urfe

Chapters links for this page: 1 2 3 4

1. A Curious Device

The old man had a curious device: a box fashioned from tin, with a clever mechanism inside that rolled his cigarettes for him. I did not get a clear view of how it functioned -- it seemed to consist of a couple of rollers and a leather sling, the whole affair taking up so little space that the tin could be used to store his tobacco and papers -- and so, as each perfectly rolled cigarette popped forth from the slot in its lid, it seemed more than a little like magic. He offered me one and I lit it with the candle in the center of our table. "Neither of them have ever known a man, then?"

He leered at me. "You would really buy one of my daughters?"

"Would you really sell one?" I countered. "You made the offer. Was it in jest?"

"That all depends." He lit a cigarette for himself, waggling his bushy eyebrows in what he no doubt intended as some sort of conspiratorial gesture.

"Upon the quality of the merchandise in question? I quite agree." The cigarettes were oddly flavored, with a fine spicy tang which I fully enjoyed; the only first-class thing about this gentleman so far. "One has to wonder at the beauty of daughters a father's so eager to sell."

"I can see, sir," said he, with a pride only faintly dinged, "that you aren't a father, or, if so, you've been blessed with sons. Me, I once had three daughters. Wedding of the eldest nearly bankrupted me, between dowry and ceremony. Second's got her heart set on marrying as far above her station as the first, not even noticing how I must scrimp and save to pay her school bill every month. To take one off my hands would be a blessing."

"If the price is right."

His attempt at an ingratiating smile was pathetic. "If, as you say, the price is right."

I had nothing better with which to entertain myself, and so when he offered to show them to me, I accepted, stubbing out the cigarette on the scarred table (and earning a scowl from Molly, then). He led the way, brandy sloshing not a little from the glass in his hand.

He had taken one of the back rooms for them, as he confided in me on the way up the narrow flight of stairs; room only for one narrow bed for the two of them. He himself had to sleep in the commons. Just one more in the long line of inconveniences in having daughters, it seemed.

"Why, then, do you travel with them?" I asked.

"Eliza is on her way back to school. Holidays are over, after all. And Lucy, that's my youngest, can't bear to be parted from her until the last possible moment. She loves her sister, that one does. They'll be sleeping, you know. You'll be quiet."

"Of course."

The room was indeed small, and quite close, and retained much of the day's heat. The girls had gone to bed wearing only stockings and chemises; they had covered themselves in a sheet and a thin, threadbare quilt, but had kicked these aside, perhaps, in their restlessness, until the bedclothes lay rucked about their feet.

"That's Lucy there," hissed the old man, "and that's Eliza." He held the candle above my shoulder, that I might better examine them. "Lovely, eh?"

That they were. Lucy, whom I judged to be about fifteen or so, lay on her back, with one pretty leg half-raised. The skirt of her short child's chemise had fallen about her hips, leaving her raised thigh bare for all of its pale, slender length. Its collar was unlaced and fell open between her small breasts, to which it clung, rendered faintly transparent by a thin film of sweat. Her blond hair was unbound and spilled in a mad curly profusion over the pillow and down to the floor.

Her sister lay on her side, her head nestled on Lucy's shoulder; their hair, I noticed, was of the same shade and texture, so much so that, mingled together on the pillow, I could not tell where one's ended and the other's began. Lucy's mouth was half-opened, her face turned up and back, whereas Eliza kept hers pressed close to her sister, despite the heat. One hand seemed to be cradled beneath her head, while the other lay in seeming innocence in Lucy's lap, and she had twined her legs, as pale and as slender, about her sister's.

"Well," said the old man, in my ear.

I was aroused; more than that. In the first glimpse of the sleeping sisters (and here I look down, and glimpse them sleeping again; all innocence gone now, heads pillowed on each other's thighs, Lucy smiling in a surfeit of pleasure, one arm lifted toward her sister's feet, raising and flattening a breast with a pretty little nipple as pink as the inside of any fresh conch shell; Eliza, her fingers still tangled in the curls between her sister's thighs, still sticky with that pleasure, shivering as I stroke her cool, bare flank) the mad scheme upon which I am embarked sprang full-blown into my mind. It was too providential to be a coincidence. I was meant to find these girls, meant to take them away with me into my brief exile. If not me, after all, then someone else; men, who would separate them, break their fragile union and spend the rest of their lives resenting them, and hating them, for a reason they could never fathom. Better a brief time of happiness than a life of misery.

But the simple truth is, I had to have them. And I will have what I must.

The old man moved past me then, slurping noisily at his brandy, to take up the quilt tangled about their feet and pull it up and over their legs and bellies, their breasts. Lucy turned restlessly as he did so, her arm flopping over the side of the bed so that her fingertips brushed the floor. Eliza murmured something, and snuggled more closely to her sister, spooned against her back. The old man stood over them both, looking down with a kindly and indulgent eye.

"I would have them both," I said, my voice suddenly loud in the close room, and hoarse, from the smoke, and not a little from desire. He stiffened visibly, his head snapping up. "What? What!"

"Shh. Else you will wake them."

He turned on me then, a flare of anger lighting his eyes. It faded. He waved a dismissive hand. "You jest."

"Never. About something so important, that is."

The anger returned. "Sir, I -- "

"Papa?"

Lucy had stirred, and opened her eyes. I could not see their color then, in that light, but even then I could imagine it: pure cornflower blue, startling in intensity. And Eliza's are a cloudy green.

"What is it, Papa?"

"Nothing, my sweet." He bent to kiss her cheek, and I took that moment to open the door. "I was just checking on you."

I held the door for him as he walked out, his back stiff, his gaze cutting away from mine. As I turned to close the door, I looked back. Eliza had also stirred, and raised herself on her elbows; her chemise had also been unlaced, and had slipped over her shoulder. From where I stood I could see her breast, slightly larger than her sister's, the shadow of her nipple quite clear against her pale skin in that flickering, receding candlelight. She caught my eye as it traveled from her breast along her throat to her face, and there held it with a steady gaze and a small, unconcerned smile. She made no move to cover herself. Lucy, also, stared at me, motionless, and her face was without expression. I smiled at them, and blew them a kiss, and closed the door. My head was light and my knees were weak.

"They are indeed most beautiful," I said to the old man as I joined him in the hall. "Their mother must be quite a woman."

"Sir, I -- "

"What began as a jest -- your jest, sir, I believe -- has become something else entirely." I named a figure he had no way of knowing I could not pay, not now.

He blinked. "I couldn't -- both my -- I couldn't -- " He sputtered. "Lucy, perhaps, yes, but my girls, both -- " A wave of decision passed over him then; a palpable thing, as if sloughing off a visible patina of drunken twitches, slurs, slouches. "You may take my Lucy, sir. For half that amount. That's what I can do. But you're not a father, sir. You can't know what it's like. I can't sell you both my daughters."

There was then a rustle from the stairs; we both started, I'm afraid. It was but Molly, though, coming up for the night, maid's cap tucked under one arm, barefoot, unlacing the throat of her simple white dress. She stopped as she saw us. "Your pardon, m'lord," she said, curtseying at the old man.

"Come here, Molly," I said. "Come here." I held out my hand to her. She came to it, slowly, a puzzled smile playing at the corner of her mouth. I took her cheek in my hand and drew her closer than she had expected, kissing her fully on the lips even as my other hand drew up her skirts.

"Sir!" cried the old man.

I turned Molly about so that her back was to me and pressed her close, my right hand still tangled in her skirts. "Molly," I said, and kissed her neck, "who is this man?"

"My Lord George Ponsonby, a Baronet." She gasped as I found her drawers under the layers of skirt and underskirt and petticoat. I smiled; she wore one of the pairs I had sent to her over the years, pretty whore's underwear, little more than scraps of sheer lace held snug by a knotted cord. "Granted a small fief in return for services rendered during the last war, an' it please you." She moaned and began to move against me as I cupped her cunt through the lace, and rubbed my fingers against her lips, feeling the heat of them, and the dampness.

"His daughters?"

"I don't -- ah -- don't know much about them, save one married a Duke- to-be."

"Above her station, indeed," I murmured. I found the knot which held her drawers and slipped it loose.

"Sir, I -- " He stared, fascinated; his skin ruddied, and I fancied I could see the sweat beading on his forehead. I shushed him, and slipped the drawers down Molly's thighs. "And his wife?"

"Dead, ah!" I slid one finger inside her, then a second. She was most warm and wet, and she rolled her hips against me and arched her back. I kissed her throat as I frigged her, feeling the buzz of her voice against my lips as she said, "Dead now three years, oh, oh Indigo!"

"You!" gasped Ponsonby.

"I had not thought the mother of girls so beautiful could stand idly by as their father sold one or the other away." I stroked my fingers in and out of her now, as her hands dove into her skirts to play with mine, to stroke her thighs as they fluttered, her belly as it shivered. "You are correct, sir, when you say you cannot sell me your daughters. It is quite against the law even to offer so." She threw her head back against my shoulder, biting back whimpering cries as she began to come. "And yet, you have done so, and to the Queen's Champion, no less."

"You monster!" was the best he could manage, as Molly let loose one sweet pealing cry, her body quivering like a plucked bowstring. "I took you -- " sputtered Ponsonby.

"That's beside the point." I removed my hand from her skirts and held my fingers up for her to lick, which she did with a playful lascivity, relishing the taste of herself. "You made a mistake tonight. Learn from it, or not; your daughters are mine either way. Molly."

She looked up at me with a satisfied, feline smile. "M'lady?" she asked coquettishly.

"Draw my bath."

She took two mincing steps away from me, then lifted up her skirts to pluck at her delicate, lacy underwear that had pulled awry, drawing them down her legs, lifting out each foot in turn. Smiling, she handed them to me, then trotted down the hall to my room.

I knelt to pick up her cap, which earlier had fallen to the floor. "Don't think to try and spirit them away from me, either. My man will be watching their door." I smiled then, myself, and allowed a brief hint of the pain and frustration and anger and, yes, grief of the past few days to dwell there momentarily. He shuddered quite satisfactorily. "You know what happens to people who try to thwart me."

"She's dying, you know," he said, his voice a hoarse whisper. It confused me. I thought for a moment he meant Molly, or one of the girls - - ah, but of course, he did not know; few yet did, that she was already dead. Had died, two days ago, in her bed at Calmorra.

"You know my tastes, my 'proclivities,' as I believe the broadsheets term them. 'The Queen's Tribade,' you call me in your clubs. Believe me, sir, it goes far, far beyond tribadism. I shall enjoy teaching them." His eyes bulged, his hands trembled. "Then, if you weren't so blind, you might have noted how familiarly they lay together, on that narrow bed. Perhaps Eliza has already learned something at her school; perhaps she has been teaching Lucy some of what she -- "

"Insolent bitch!" he sputtered. "I will have satisfaction, damn your eyes, for what you have slandered about my daughters!"

I sketched a faint mockery of a bow. "First light, the yard. Rapiers. I shall be glad to oblige."

And you know, I think I finally shocked him with that last.

2. What's Past is Prologue : Two Ways to Climb a Hill

When first I met Molly, it was almost twenty years ago; I was but seventeen, and fleeing (again) the agents of Madame Dugal, and she, she was easily as young as Lucy, though not nearly so confident, nor so cruel. She had been working at her uncle's inn for maybe five days when I arrived there, had traveled one hundred and six leagues by stage from her father's home in near Malchurch, which was then suffering quite thoroughly from the perennial potato blight which has yet to convince them something in Harrowdale hates tubers. She was sent off to her uncle so that her parents would have one less mouth to feed, and it was understood this favor was great enough at the time that food and board would stand in lieu of wages, even the meager five crowns six specified as "pin money" for hospitality domestics in the Imperial records of that year. (In fact, when she took her leave of her uncle some two years later--Mortimer, I believe his name was--he attempted to bill her for the "education and training" he had provided, in her new "career.") She left home wearing a worn brown skirt of her mother's, an undershirt whose patches had patches, her father's third-best sweater, far too big, mismatched woolen socks, her wooden shoes, and a pair of scratchy grey knickers that bunched and lumped and chafed her thighs and buttocks as she sat on one hard and splintery coach seat after another. In Adenpool, in the mountains, her third day on the road, she found an old and battered carpet bag in the refuse heap behind the inn, and she took it, her heart in her throat, terrified that she would be caught out, accused of stealing, clamped in the pillory in the town square for nicking a ratty, moldy, threadbare old carpet bag thrown out by some traveling entrepreneur because a brass clasp had broken, and she cleaned it that night, washing it with stale water from the pitcher in the common room and darning it by candlelight in the garderobe, all so that she would not have to endure the shame of traveling empty-handed. She carried that carpet bag with her across two hundred Imperial miles of rough road and then through the three--or is it four?--inns (and one brothel) in which she has worked. She has it still, I know, I am certain, for all that I never saw it this last time we met. Molly was never one to throw things away.

Except those knickers. When she arrived at Mortimer's, her pretty bottom rubbed raw, the skirt with a new rip along one seam, she was shown to the bathhouse behind the inn, given a starchy black dress and white apron and freshly laundered mob cap, and told to make herself presentable. And when she had stripped off her clothing, and scrubbed herself free of road dust, and rinsed out her hair and squeezed it dry, she turned to put those rough grey knickers back on--and couldn't. She slipped the black dress over her naked body, tied on the apron, settled the cap on her head, bundled her old clothes into a tight ball, and dropped the knickers on the rag heap on her way back inside.

Now, she was to room with the other domestic, a girl named Ginger, who would show her her duties, and the routines of the inn, and what would be expected of her. They were to share a tiny room hived off the attic, far away from the main rooms, at the end of a rickety flight of stairs and across a long and dusty hall steeply rooved and lit only by cracks in the shingles above. Imagine her surprise, when she opened the door to her new home, dressed in an uncomfortable dress too short by far, and loose on her skinny frame (already she dreaded having to bend over, or sit down, or climb steps before some of the pretenders to the name of "gentleman" who frequented such establishments as her uncle's; already she regretted the rash action of throwing her knickers on the rag heap), carrying a dingy carpet bag with the only other things she owned in the world-- imagine her there, in the doorway, confronted by a girl not much older than herself, kneeling on the bed, wearing only a loosely laced grey corset of shiny, worn satin and a pair of lacy drawers like a palm's width of cobwebs held in place by a bit of silk string, counting out silver coins between her pale golden knees.

Ginger made her money, and more besides for Mortimer, by liaising regularly with a number of men who frequently traveled the stagecoach route; all by appointment only, and no unexpected surprises, quite humane, really. She made more money by posing (and more besides, for herself) for Petula, the famous sculptor of the Queen's bust. And all of these clients, the woman and the men, gifted her with fine scraps of lingerie, filmy stockings, gauzy chemises, all manner of clothing never meant to be worn out of the boudoir, all of which she wore as a matter of course, a lacy, silken surprise beneath her plain black servant's dress, too short and small as Molly's was.

Is it any wonder that Molly grew intensely jealous of the girl? When Ginger, who was (and for all I know still is) a perfectly lovely girl, learned of the state of Molly's wardrobe, she freely offered some of her own stash for Molly to wear, and was more than understanding when Molly proved ignorant of the intricacies of some of the garments. Is it any wonder that Molly began to loathe the girl, through no fault of her own? Ginger made her feel ugly, and awkward, and intensely out of place; publicly, Molly made a show of disdaining Ginger's offer, and pretended to be appalled at the stockings and corsets and sheer underthings, never meant to be worn under anything at all but bedclothes. Rebuffed by Molly's protestations, Ginger withdrew her offer, and perhaps a little of her warmth, and things were perhaps a bit chilly between the two of them. But in private, when she was alone (which was often enough, Ginger being away on her assignations), Molly would pull on a pair of stockings, or sheer, lacy drawers, would slowly, carefully, slip her threadbare black dress off her shoulders (listening all the while for a footstep in the attic hall) and down her breasts, to hold up a corset and model it in the watery metal mirror Petula had given to Ginger some months before.

Which was how I found her, running as quietly as I could through her uncle's inn. I'd spent a day clinging to the roof of the stage, knowing all the while that Madame Dugal's men were not far behind (how long would it take them to discover the theft? how fast was a man on horseback? how fast a stage?), and when we pulled into the innyard, I knew I might have but minutes to get out of sight. True, they would be looking for a girl, and I had changed my dress and stockings for trousers and a shirt and vest, and chopped off my hair with a knife and tucked the rest under a cap, but I didn't want to take any chances. She might have sent Nickel Rick, or Steamer Johnson, or the Dauphin, any one of whom would spot me in a minute--and, if I lost my cap at any moment, well, my hair was still white as milk. So. No chances.

Good thing, too. I hurried as nonchalantly as possible through the common room, keeping to its edges, and made my way to the staircase. As I climbed it, happened to look out in the innyard, where I saw the Dauphin sweeping in on a big black horse, followed by a big burly man in a patchy fur coat, on a lathered bay, a shorter man clinging to his backside with one hand and a top-hat with the other, both for dear life. The Dauphin was yelling and jerking his hand at the stage.

I wasted no time.

Unfortunately, her uncle's inn was a very small affair. The flight of stairs led only to the second floor, the second floor had only four doors to private rooms, all of them locked (and downstairs I heard the Dauphin's theatrical roar, "Where is the young girl who came, unaccompanied, on the noontide stage?"). I was eyeing the window at the end of the hallway, which opened out on the roof of the stable (but wouldn't he have left the little one out there to stand watch? or the big bruiser in the coat?) when the hatch to the attic caught my eye. I leaped up and caught it on my first try, and pulled it open, and a rope ladder down with it. I climbed (and heard, on the stairs beneath, "We'll just see about that. Hold him, Bo-bo," and wondered if Bo-bo were the big man or the small), rolled away from the hatch, and scuttled along the floor of the attic, looking for something, anything, to hide behind. Nothing presented itself but a door.

I threw it open.

Sunlight poured through a high, narrow window. A big wooden bed piled high with white pillows stood beneath it, and scattered across its counterpane were several gauzy underthings the color of a rainy day. Molly, all of fifteen years of age, knelt at the foot of it, wearing garments that Ginger had not offered to lend her: black woolen stockings that came up to the middle of her thigh, held up by knotted red ribbons, the very same grey corset she'd seen Ginger wearing, a gift from Petula, and the same silken drawers, like a scrap of cobweb laid over the small brown thicket of her sex. A shard of mirror lay between her knees, and she stared at herself in it, and ran her hands over her thighs. I must have gasped in wonderment, or maybe she heard the Dauphin roaring behind and below, "Well? Is she there?" for Molly looked up, her face flushed, her mouth opening to speak. I raised my finger to my lips, hardly daring to hope she would not scream. She did not, though she took a deep breath, so that her breasts swelled like a wave beneath the taut corset, and I felt a thrill run through my blood even as I heard someone, the little one, I thought, fumble his way up the attic ladder. Kicking the door shut behind me, I walked across the grey dusted warped wood floor to the bed where she knelt, all in black and grey, her hand on her thighs, her hair tied loosely behind.

"I," I said.

"Who are ye?" she said. "And what're ye doin in my room?"

"Please," I said. "You must help me. Stand up." For a scheme had entered my brain. I fumbled with the buttons of my stolen trousers.

She flushed. "Sir, I--if ye do not leave, I shall--"

I grabbed her arm with my free hand. "Please, I beg of you, just for a moment--we shall pretend--" I heard shouting out in the attic proper. She looked past me, at the closed door; I pulled her to her feet. Gently, gently.

"What is--" she started to say. I spun us around, like a dance, save that she ended up facing the door and I ended up behind her. "What do they want of ye?"

"Please," I said. "Pretend with me." I pulled her close against me, pressed myself against her, wrapped my arms about her. I leaned forward to kiss her shoulder. Gently, I thought to myself. Though if she fights, the illusion might still work. But better if she doesn't. She was tense, uncertain, pulling away.

"What are you--" she said. She felt my breasts, small as they are, pressing into her back. "You're a girl," she said, even as my hand slipped between her thighs.

"Shh," I said. Something fell over with a crash outside. She jumped, and I clutched her close, kissing her throat. I ran my fingers along her drawers, and found the silk hot and damp to the touch. "You were dressing up," I whispered, trying my clumsy best to think of something seductive to say. Madame Dugal's girls had never been reluctant, of course. This girl was trembling in my arms, ready to run, ready to holler at the drop of a hat. I thought if I could just caress her, touch her the way that Madame Dugal's girls liked to be touched... I slipped my fingers deftly through the side of her drawers, and found her wet and open. She jumped like a scalded cat.

"Stop!" she cried, struggling.

"Hold still!" I yelled. She kicked one leg up as I clamped my other arm about her shoulders and chest, holding her down. She kicked again, wrenching her hips, knocking my shin with her stockinged heel. Something shredded in my fingers; as she kicked once more, my hand came away, clutching the ruins of her cloudy grey drawers.

"No!" she cried.

The door burst open.

Bo-bo, presumably, stood there, the big man in the fur coat, like the pelt of some sick wolf. Molly, luckily, fell still and silent at the sight of him: his eyes had the cast of the Eastern barbarians; his cheeks, bulging up in a snaggle-toothed smile like shiny brown apples. His bald head was covered in a tight, brightly embroidered skull-cap, like a fanciful doily. He chuckled at the scene before him--a young man, pants at his knees, clutching a half-naked whore to him. I was, perhaps, silent a moment or two too long--I, too, was rather intimidated by his girth, and only half believing this mad scheme would work. Remembering my part--my coitus most certainly interruptus--I bellowed in the lowest, most aggrieved tones I could manage, "Do you mind?"

The chuckle died in his throat; the smile melted, those teeth mercifully hiding behind his thick, wind-chapped lips. "Most terribly sorry, guvnor," he said, in a thick but cultured accent. He bowed slightly, backed sheepishly out the door, and closed it.

Molly and I stood there a moment, then two, unmoving, though her breast still heaved from her struggles. I heard voices out in the innyard, and let her go; she staggered towards the bed, clutching at it for support, as I ran to the low gable window. Outside, the Dauphin was mounting his horse in a swirl of black cloak. The little man was holding the bay (and, still, his top-hat) as Bo-bo came bounding out of the inn, mounting the horse in a single leap over its rump, then, wheeling it around, bodily lifting the smaller man by one arm. "She must have dropped off earlier on the route! Back-track, boys! She can't have gone far!"

And out they rode, with dust and the thunder of hooves.

I was still congratulating myself on this luckiest of breaks when a low growl of anger and frustration reminded me I wasn't out of the woods yet. I turned to face the bed as Molly launched herself at me, her fists screwed up, punching at my shoulders and chest and face as she bowled me over. "You--! You--!" she gasped, crying. I grabbed at one wrist, then the other, and rolled us over on our sides, pinning her with my leg-- slight though I was, I still out-weighed her. "You," she gasped again, and it occurred to me she had no idea what horrible names to call me. I cooed to her, and held her close, gentle but firm, trying, clumsily, to comfort her.

"Ye ripped em!" she cried, at last. Ah. Her undergarments.

Gradually, haltingly, the story came out: Ginger, and her uncle; the inn; what Ginger did; the potato blight; her poor parents; the horrible, shameful grey knickers. And I apologized, and held her close, and promised her I would replace them, and kissed her tears away, and told her a little--very little--of who I was, and why they were chasing me. "Oh, and ye're from the Smoke?" she asked, and I smiled, and kissed her mouth. And a little later, she asked me, "What is that ye're doin to me?"

"You like this?" I asked.

She nodded, biting her lip.

"And you've never done this for yourself?"

She shook her head, and the little lost look in her eyes filled me more than all of Madame Dugal's painted pretty girls ever had. But I am getting ahead of my story, or behind it, rather, in the complex shape this narrative of my life has chosen for itself. I was writing of what had happened less than a week ago, in another inn, when I met Molly for the last and not the first time, and met the girls, my girls, and embarked upon this latest and what is most certainly the last mad scheme of a life that has been nothing but one mad, half-baked scheme after the next. I have spent so much of it improvising that it comes as no surprise when I sit down to write it out, that I do so without forethought, spilling memories across the page willy-nill.

To return, then, to that other inn, that night. My bath was drawn as I came into my room, and it steamed in the candlelight. Molly greeted me with a long, lingering kiss. Sweat from the heat of the night and the steaming bath beaded on her forehead, her shoulders, the slopes of her breasts, coiled the tendrils of her hair and plastered them to her cheek. She'd hiked up her skirts to show her long fine legs and undone the throat of her dress to show her small fine breasts. I reached out to undo the stays of her corset but she slapped my hand away.

"Not yet, you," she said. "You're the one wants relaxing, not me." She reached out to undo the row of hooks-and-eyes on my jacket, but I caught her hands in mine.

"There's something that needs tending, first," I said. "Monsieur Orphe?"

He can be quite still and silent, when he wants; I have seen him coax songbirds onto his shoulders in the woods with his utter immobility. So it is no wonder that Molly did not see him, and I smiled a little as she jumped, when he stood up out of the shadows.

He is one of the sylvan folk, the savages who haunt the forests of the New World; he is tall, and quite thin, and he moves with a certain inevitability that lends him an air of grace and strength that seems utterly alien to the trousers, the weskit, the jacket I'd had made for him. He owes me his life, and so, by his code of honor, he must give his life to me, in any way I ask. I have had many a sour smile since, realizing that out of all the world the one man I can depend upon is this supposedly faithless savage.

"There is a door." I told him of its location. "Behind that door lie two girls. Nothing is to disturb them until I come for them, a few hours hence."

"As you like." He nodded once, and left.

"I do not care for him much," said Molly.

"He's a good man," I said. "Better than most."

She pushed at my chest. "And I do not like this game you play, with the Baronet."

"And that is none of your concern." I smiled. "Though I'm afraid you won't be getting your drawers back."

"It's not as if I'll be needing 'em tonight," she said, tartly enough, though I heard some uncertainty in her wryness. But her hands did not hesitate as they quickly undid my hooks-and-eyes, and drew my jacket off; untied my lace ruff (stained with a spill of wine) and pulled it from my throat. She threw them in a corner.

"That's my good jacket!" I cried.

"Yes, and look how ye've been treating it," she said. Her hands busied themselves with the buttons of my threadbare weskit. "Don't ye see a tailor ever?" she tsked. The old Harrow cant of her voice had been softened and smoothed by years of service in the inns and taverns around the Smoke; odd, perhaps, to think of the urban patois as softer than anything, but take my word for it, if you've never heard the rough music of a full Harrowdale voice. The burr of it did come back to her now and again, especially when she scolded me, and I cherished it--my old Molly, come back to me from those first few days.

"I've been busy," I said. "Of late." I unlaced my shirt, and, once she removed the weskit, pulled it off over my head. She reached out to untie the cloth binding my breasts, which I wear more out of habit than of any real need for concealment, but I shooed her hands away, annoyed--and then stopped, struck by how business-like this presumed seduction was, especially compared with that first time.

"Molly," I said. I reached out and took her hand, pulled her back close to me, looking down into her eyes, which had, perhaps, a few more lines about them than twenty years ago. And I was about to say something about that day in her uncle's attic when she laid a finger against my lips.

"I know you," she said, "only too well, and I know what ye want to say, but ye've been drinkin, and ye're going to get all maudlin and weepy and spoil our night together." I opened my mouth to protest, to agree, to say something, but she had at that point undone my belt, she'd unfastened my trousers and begun tugging them over my hips. "Shh," she said. "Don't say it. Or consider it said." She kissed me then, even as her hand cupped the white curls at the juncture of my thighs, and one finger ran along the hot wet lips of my cunt, returning the favor I'd delighted her with in the hall. "Definitely," she murmured against my mouth, "consider it said."

And then somehow my boots were gone, and my trousers, my belt and rapier tossed in the corner on my poor abused jacket, and she was unwinding the grubby cloth from my chest, as I slid her blouse over her shoulders, kissing them, her throat, her chest, her breasts. "Stop that!" she laughed. "Ye need a bath, to relax."

"If I were any more relaxed," I said, pulling her close, reaching for her corset, "I couldn't stand up."

"I was bein polite," she said, and she shoved me backwards into the tub. Water splashed everywhere, dousing the lamp on the table, soaking Molly. She shrieked with laughter and scrambled over to the bedside table, to grab the candle, even as I snatched at her wrist. I missed.

She lit another lamp with the candle, and stood there a moment, in the flickering light. The wet dress clung to her skin, hiding nothing; her round breasts above her corset, her nipples dark and shadowed, her soft full mound below. She smiled, and I said none of the things I wanted to say. Silently, I beckoned her to me.

Molly knelt beside the tub, taking up a cake of Stilean soap and rubbing it to a fine lather, which she spread along my shoulders and my arms, my breasts (ah, so good it felt, free of that binding, as her fingers slipped and slithered across and around them, bringing them back to life). I lifted one leg out of the water and balanced it on the rim of the tub. She reached across to rub my foot, my calf; her hand darted beneath the water to stroke my thigh; I murmured something, she shushed me, and her fingers found the slick lips of my cunt. I leaned back against her, cradling my head against her shoulder, as a finger slipped inside me; we kissed with open mouths, and a second finger joined the first, in and out, slowly, and then more quickly, her other hand tracing lines of fire from our lips to my breasts and back. Slowly and then more quickly, as the tension in me pooled deep within my thighs and within my belly, gathering like a wave there, far out at sea, but coming inexorably to the shore. I groaned, and she shushed me, and we kissed some more; I lifted my body up then to meet her hand until I was half out of the water, my back arched like a bow, my head falling back away from her mouth, and she looked on smiling, the candles flickering in her dark dark eyes. It came over me all at once, that wave; the arrow was loosed, and I fell back into the tub, and more water washed over its side.

Ah, Molly, direct as ever. But this was just a start. There are two sorts of climaxes in general, I have found--only two, you cry? Ah, like any generalization, this is as much false as it is true. There are two sorts of climaxes, and this had been one of the second: hard, and fast, and gone almost before I'd had a chance to register it, and it left me drained, but not sated, with a desire to climb that hill again, by the winding, less direct route, one we might climb together, Molly and I, hand in hand. But just as one can say that there are two sorts of women: those who kiss with their eyes open, for instance, and those who keep them closed tight--well, that does not prevent every woman one beds from being uniquely herself.

"Fetch some wine," I said, when I could. She nodded and stood, splashing water upon me as she drew her hand from the water. After a moment, I followed, levering myself out of the tub and padding after her, dripping on the floor.

"You're wet," she said, as I pressed myself against her back and nuzzled the base of her throat with my lips. We both chuckled at the inadvertent entendre.

"Do you think the owner will mind?" I asked, toying with the stays of her corset. "All this water on the floor?" I loosened them, pulled them from their grommets, unhooked the thing. She lifted her arms. "Soaking the bed?" I unwrapped the corset it from her and dropped it, stiff and damp, to the floor.

"Oh, she's a bitch, all right," she said. Her white dress, still soaked, clung to her body, more erotic by far than if she were naked. More erotic to the fancy, perhaps, and I took a moment to drink in the sight of her, her head turned lightly to the side, her hair in a delightful disarray; but it was an impediment to my fingers and my hands, and my mouth, and so I knelt and grasped the hem and slowly, slowly, peeled it up, from her calves, her thighs. "She'll have words for ye in the mornin, I'm sure. Nasty, hurtful words, about the mess ye've made." I lifted the dress from her buttocks, catching and bunching the material in my hands.

"As long," I said, "as she waits till morning." I shifted my hands forward, to catch the spill of the front of her skirts, and lifted, peeling it from where it clung to the slim, concave curve of her belly.

"Ohh," she said, shivering, "I'm sure it's the furthest thing from her mind, tonight." Carefully, carefully, pressing my body against her chilled, damp back, warming her, feeling her buttocks press deliciously against the bottom of my mons (and I spread my legs slightly, to heighten this, and paused a moment, shivering myself), I peeled the dress from her breasts. "Ah," she said. And she half turned, in my embrace, clinging to me, as I caught the dress and kept it lifted high, ducking my head to taste her skin, to flick her nipple with my tongue. It swelled and strained at the touch. "Oh, oh Indigo," she said.

I caught her behind her knees and lifted her, with a little strain (damn the weight of the years, and my back). She pressed a dozen kisses to my throat, my cheek, my mouth, little nipping things gone as soon as they had landed. I laid her on the bed, pausing a moment as she struggled free of her dress, and climbed up myself and covered her. Naked, we embraced, and I began to tell her with my fingers and the palms of my hands, with my tongue and lips, with my thighs and my sex, my breasts, my nipples, with my eyes, everything I'd meant to say with words, and could not. And Molly--Molly had more than enough to say, herself.

I have lain with the Queen of the World, in her bed at the center of her labyrinthine castle, and I have bedded three of the wives of the Sultan of Maliq at once, in their silk-pillowed harem; I have stolen a kiss, and more besides, from the lips of the Bielli Dama of the Zharopnijayusch, in the cold and frozen North. I have fucked more whores than I could possibly recall, even if I make it to the halls of my Lady the Liuitin Lorgai Nochta when I die, and She asks me their names; and I have been fucked by at least three men worthy to be called such. I have done something I hesitate to call sex, with a warrior-mystic in the wastes of Ktkskis, and to this day I feel a chill (of revulsion? of desire?) at the thought of his--its?--rough, grey, keloid skin--and I even dallied with one of Doctor Twelge's fabulous Automata, and told him what I thought. I have pledged my love and my life not once, but twice, to the same person; and I have broken both those pledges, and my heart. I have committed crimes I cannot set down (not yet, not now)--though, in the end, I should have nothing to hide from these pages. And I have stolen my girls, and taken them away with me, hidden them in my last refuge, and I have begun teaching them all I know of this, this art, this instinct, this urge that, more than wine, or the sword, revenge, or (forgive me) the love I should bear for my Lady, has led my life down the roads it has taken. But I do not know if I can teach them this (I do not know if we, if they, will have the time): that this night, with Molly, only Molly, soaking wet and sticking to the dirty sheets of an ancient, creaking wooden bed in a hot and stuffy inn, two women unschooled but yet enthusiastic--this night was as rich, as sublime as any night spent on silks and velvets with a perfumed, lacy courtesan; as fiercely desperate as any hurried clench in a rainy, midnight alley. We kissed and rolled together upon that bed. She tested my strength, laughing, trying to push me over on my back, and I held her down, and pinned her arms helpless above her head, presenting her breasts to my cruel and teasing mouth. Her legs fell open and I felt the heat of her on my chilled thigh. She chuckled, and hissed, at the two bright points of pleasure on her body, my lips on her nipple, her lips against my leg, and she arched her back, pushing against my hand that pinioned hers, and with my free hand I grasped her buttocks, lifting and rolling, spreading my legs, gasping at the thrill that ran through me as my sex opened against her hip. She nearly bruised me as she wrenched again against my hands, my legs, "Oh, oh Lady," she grunted, the strain of the lust in her voice mixing most deliciously with the sacred wonder of her words. I shifted my weight, sitting upright, pulling her to me, so that we sat, facing each other, our legs entwined over and around each other so that our sexes, our cunts, open now, could press each against the other, and kiss like dumb, frustrated mouths.

The harem girls of the Maliq, where it is a crime for a woman to touch another, or to show more of herself than her eyes, have names for every lustful and lascivious thing women can do together, when they are hidden from their men in those soft and perfumed walls. They call this "eq khali a' taq," "the crushing of the roses"--and I wonder about the people who fear this thing so much the men kill and burn whenever they find it, but the women name it with such flowery poetry, and seek it ardently, by night, with downcast eyes and stifled moans. Molly and I crushed our roses together slowly at first, sitting upright in each other's arms, embracing tightly, our breasts crushed together, our mouths crushed together in kiss after kiss, our hands tangling in each other's hair, on each other's shoulders, caressing each other's breasts, flanks, bellies, thighs, tangling together, fingers grasping fingers, this urge, half primal, to press together, to become one. But it is a frustrated urge, ultimately, and it is not the best angle from which to crush roses; and at some point that other urge, wholly primal, the one that will not be denied, welled up between our entwined legs, levered into being by our arms and mouths and legs that were now incidental, tangential. We leaned back, away from each other, though we kept our sexes pressed tightly together, and they opened more for each other, blooming, I could feel her, wet and soft, yielding, yet hard, uncertain, slippery, the occasional pricks of pubic hair, the chafing burn of skin sticking to skin where it should slide, but we were connected by one cord that ran from the bases of our skulls down our spines and through that point, there, those roses, those cunts, those "gaping, gashed wounds," as Jonson has written it, those lovely, mysterious mouths, as I would counter--and when, our hands locked together for leverage, pressing, pulling, thus! I felt the cord tighten, and I knew it tightened in her, too, and this thrilled me, thrilled her. For a moment, some dim part of me wished for a dildo, that we each might penetrate the other, to satisfy deeper itches, but that part of me, the part that worried; that mourned; that wondered what would become of me, on the morrow, or the day after that--how many would I have left to me, when the news got out?--that part was banished, and all that was left was the terrible wonderful urge, the mechanical animal mindless beast that knew what it wanted, and had it within its grasp, and would not be denied, not now, not by anyone, not even death. We cried out so loudly, surprised at the size of it as it overwhelmed us, that there was a pounding on the wall next door. Our muscles, slowly, unlocked; our hands let go; we lay back on the bed, head to toe, gasping with laughter and the exertion of our labors, sweat cooling in the flickering air, hands stroking skin.

"Oh," I said, "we've gone and done it now. The mistress of the house will be, will be most cross on the morrow."

"Ah," she said, "I think she'll be too tired for anythin of the sort." We laughed, quietly, stroking. "Now," she said, after a full and silent moment, "ye were wantin some wine?"

I crawled up the bed to her, laughing at her jest, and answered her with kisses, held her weak and trembling body as I kissed her mouth, her throat, her breasts; drew a line with my tongue from her nipple to her navel, which I suckled for a time; spread her cooling thighs with my hands, and drank there the only wine I wanted, from the warm and lovely cup she held between them.

When she had come again, we lay in each other's arms, murmuring meaningless words in the still, hot air. I blew out the candle, dimmed the lamp. She rested her head on my shoulder and fell slowly, reluctantly, muttering into my breast, "Oh, Indigo, and what will I do without ye?" she fell into sleep.

I lay there, thinking of her, and of my Queen, and of all that I had seen and done. I could leave it here, I thought. I could take the honorable way out, and allow the Baronet to run me through; as rare a creature as I am, I do not have license to live beyond my days any more than any other. And I could take solace in the fact that there would be many a story told about me, the white-haired monster, Indigo, the Queen's Champion, the Woman who would be a Man. Feh. I could also have disappeared less noisily; could have taken Molly away with me in the morning, and she and I retired to my country house. The world would never hear from me again, and if there were any justice, it would not come looking for me, and there we could spend the rest of our days. I could have; all I needed to do was ask. But Molly had a life here, one she had made for herself; though she may have gone willingly enough with me, I would have to ask--and I could not ask her to give it up.

And I thought then, of the girls; of the look that Lucy had given me, and her sister Eliza, as I had seen them there, half-naked. The cool mystery, the promised delights. Selfish, perhaps. Yes, it is selfish. But I thought also of the damnable pride of that Baronet, their father; the same suffocating, insufferable pride as swells in the dark men of the Maliq, the pride that is so fearful of its precarious perch it must destroy whatever it perceives as a threat--even something so innocuous as this feeling, this wonder, that Molly and I had shared. I would have satisfaction, and I would have the girls. I saw in them a damosel in distress, two damosels, endangered by a dragon they could not see. And my one great weakness is that I have always seen myself as a knight.

And that, too, is selfish.

I disengaged myself from Molly, carefully, and dressed in the dark. The cloth that had bound my breasts was too grubby to put back on; I wrinkled my nose at it, and threw it away. Buckling on my rapier, I looked over to Molly, lying asprawl on her stomach, naked, her legs tangled in the sheets. Something equally akin to love and grief filled me. Silently, I crossed to her, and kissed the small of her back, once, for luck.

Then I left the room, and went to collect my girls.

3. A Rescue, A Duel -- What Came After

Of course, I had no intention of dueling the Baronet.

I find myself imagining you, whoever you are, reading this; sometimes I think you are my Queen, no matter that I know she is dead. Sometimes-- now, as I scratch these words on parchment, and my girls have sleepily gone away to their own bed, and my tea has gone cold and it is too late to ring for more, though the summer's night is cool and rain blows through the open windows and I am filled with too many memories--my imagination turns bitter, and I see you as you most likely are: a tight- lipped priest of my Lord Codlatan, with a sour disposition and a paunch in your belly, mopping the disapproving sweat from your brow as you catalog the sins within these pages before they are burned. (And I hope your yard has stiffened at least once as you read, perhaps so much you had to pull and stroke it for release, and that the shame of spilling your seed has driven you to mortify your flesh, perhaps with a whip, or a hair shirt; I would hate to think my words have no effect.) I fancy now I hear you gasp, as I tell you: though I accepted the Baronet's challenge in the hall, I would not be seeing it through. "But," you say, your voice choked and flustered, "what of honor?" Perhaps you stammer. "Ah," I say, lifting the cup of cold tea to my lips, "what of it?" I sip. "I have no need of it." And your face flushes with outrage, and your lips screw up in a sneer. "How," you say, "like a woman."

Indeed. Well, I say this to you: Women in this hateful world cannot afford morals, or honor, not with the way you treat them, you men and all your talk of "honor." And if, through the deception I began so long ago, I have avoided more than my share of what you deem a woman's lot-- What of it? I still learned the lesson long ago, as every girl who hopes to grow into a woman must. Let the baronet cling to his honor; I take what I want, because I can, and damn the consequences.

A pox on you and your honor.

And now I read those words I wrote last night, and I sigh. Fine sentiments, perhaps, when it is late at night, and one stares out the rain-slicked window and imagines raising a fist to one's enemies, mouthing a speech fit for one of Tenemus's plays; another to awaken, alone, with aching head and muzzled wits and old wounds sore and creaking with the damp, and to read them scratched in haste on good parchment. I contemplated screwing it up and starting over, but decided not to. I have nothing to hide, or will, when I am done. Especially not my follies. And that little diatribe was such a small one.

There is a kernel of truth to it, besides.

No, instead, I got out of my bed, and almost immediately slipped upon the silken dressing gown Eliza had let fall the evening before. I picked it up, and the pair of drawers, the chemise Lucy had torn, or perhaps I'd torn, a pair of stockings--rather, one of a pair; its mate seemed to have been lost. And them fine clocked silk bought in Cydonia and imported from the East. And I stood there a moment, casting about for their proper places--and then I stopped, shook my head, smiled, and tossed the handsful of lace and silk upon my bed. Clarissa, of course, will put them away, and further take the chemise to Mrs. Woolf for repair. I am not used to having servants; they came to me late in life, and servants, really, are something one must have been trained to almost from birth to make good use of. (Otherwise, they make good use of you, and you and your home run to their liking, not yours. Then, worse things have happened to me.) Chuckling, I dressed myself in harem pants (a costume I find most comfortable for lounging about mornings, or late nights), and the discarded dressing gown, and a pair of old slippers. I rang for Clarissa, rolled a cigarette with the Baronet's device, and sat by the balcony, its glassed doors open (it is still raining, lightly, but the air is cool and refreshing), and sat down to resume this latest chapter in my narrative. Which, I am afraid, has gotten off to a rocky start. So. To begin again:

I had no intention of dueling the Baronet. Then, I had every reason to suspect he had no intention of dueling me--which was why I'd had my man, Monsieur Orphe, stand guard outside the girls' door. As I met him there, he proved to me my suspicions were not unfounded.

"A man has been here twice now. Most insistent."

"Where is he now?" I asked.

"Downstairs. He is too fat, and breathes heavily, climbing the stairs."

"Fetch the carriage, and bring it under the window of this room. Hurry."

He touched his hand to his forehead and left.

I might have had some trouble had Molly been more resolute in keeping up with the fashion in locks. I had occasion once, in service to my Queen, to try one of Chihuly's new patent barrel locks, and was nearly a full hour crouching in a dimly lit hall, trying to get two small springy bits of metal to stay still, finding the proper pressure to twist and spring it open by touch alone. Fiendish little things. But this was a simple tongue-and-groove that I could have easily forced with my dagger, though that would have made too much noise. Instead, it fell to the skeleton key I keep tucked away in my purse for just this sort of emergency. A quiet snick, a tiny squeak of hinges, a creak of floorboards, and I was inside their room.

But Eliza was awake already, and looked up, eyes wide, as I slipped into the room. A small stub of a candle flickered uncertainly on the low table by their bed. Lucy still slept, her head pillowed on her sister's lap. Eliza pulled the sheets up to her waist, careful of her sister. Her chemise was still unlaced, and one hand leapt up to hold it shut. Her hair spilled down in disarray, and her mouth pursed in a small moue of disapproval, a schoolgirl's attempt to gather dignity. "You," she said.

"Me," I said. I locked the door and crossed swiftly to the window. It was narrow, but wide enough, and though we were only on the second floor, it was too high to jump or drop safely. I would need some rope. I threw the window open and secured it.

"I heard voices. My father's. What is wrong?"

"Much. What do you have that you cannot bear to part with?" In the corner I could see two trunks, one larger than the other, but both great heavy things, with frames of oak, wrapped in leather.

"I do not understand. I am traveling back to school; that trunk has some of my books, and all of my clothing."

Lucy stirred. "Eliza?"

"Shh."

"You don't understand," I said. I couldn't yet hear the sounds of Orphe bringing the carriage round, but it did take time to rouse the horses and harness them. "There is turmoil in the kingdom. The Queen is about to die. Your father has put you in my charge, for safekeeping, and we have very little time."

"Father!" said Lucy, a quiet little cry, and she sat up abruptly. The sheet fell away from them both, revealing Eliza's long legs, her black stockings still neatly rolled above her knees, her white thighs pressed tightly together as her other hand leapt to tug her chemise down, over her hips. Lucy's chemise fell from one shoulder, unnoticed, as she stared at me with wide eyes.

"It's all right, Lucy," said Eliza, reaching out to tug her sister's chemise back into place. "It is most improper for you to be here, sir."

I was once again feeling that lightness of head, that weakness of knee. "I do many things that are improper, but trust me." I smiled. "It is for your safety. Is there anything in those trunks that you must have?"

"Why do you not retreat from the room, sir, and allow us both to dress more properly?" asked Eliza. "Better yet, why not wait until morning?"

I let my smile drop and crossed the room in two strides, snapping my hand out to catch her chin between thumb and forefinger and lift her face. Her eyes flashed with sudden fear and anger, even as Lucy gasped and squirmed away from me. "Listen closely," I said, "and keep quiet, or I shall gag you with those sheets and carry you out over my shoulders. We are to make our escape now, this very night, and we are to travel as lightly and as quickly as possible. Your father wants you safe and away from the coming troubles, and I intend to see that you are. Is that clear?"

And still she had the fire to glare at me and say, wrenching her jaw from my hand, "Forgive me if I find you hard to believe."

I slapped her, not hard, but quick, so that it stung, and surprised her. Her cloudy green eyes teared up and she lifted her hand slowly from the hem of her chemise to her flushed cheek. "That," I said, "is immaterial." Outside, I could hear hooves clopping into the innyard; I leaned out the window to see Orphe leading the carriage from behind the stables.

Of course, I had not bound myself, nor had I buttoned my jacket. Lucy gasped, catching sight, no doubt, of my breasts, small as they are, pushing out my weskit. "You are a woman!"

"Yes," I said. "Get out of that bed, the both of you, and take only what you can carry from your trunks."

"Our clothing," said Eliza.

"I will buy you more clothing. Now is not the time for modesty or propriety. Move!"

Eliza stood, slowly, the hem of her chemise falling to its resting place, midway between her hips and her knees. She laced it up between her breasts and pulled it tight, her face still taut from the shock of my slap. I held out my hand to Lucy, who still cowered on the bed; she looked to Eliza, who nodded curtly, before reaching out to take it. I pulled her slowly up and to her feet. Eliza was almost my height, tall for a girl, and Lucy came up only to her nose. But for that, and their eyes, one might easily have mistaken them for twins. Eliza pulled Lucy to her, and the sisters clutched each other, their eyes still fearful. I reached out, and stroked their cheeks in turn, first Lucy, then Eliza; then, leaning in on a sudden impulse, I kissed Eliza on the forehead, thrilling at the touch of my lips to her warm, sweat-dewed skin. I drew back to see her eyes still fearful, and Lucy still looking on with some concern. My hand still against Eliza's cheek, I blotted away the tear from her eye as gently as I could with my thumb. "I am sorry I slapped you," I said. Her hand clutched mine, circling my wrist with her small fingers; it was hot, and damp, with anxiety. "Truly, I mean you no harm. Please. Get your things. We leave in two minutes."

"Who are you?" whispered Eliza.

I did not answer. Monsieur Orphe was calling to me, hoarsely, from beneath the window: "Lady!"

I went to the window and leaned out as, behind me, the sisters went to their trunks in a rustle of linen and wool. "Throw me the rope," I called down to him. The carriage was below the window, and Orphe sat his perch in the driver's seat, almost high enough for me to snatch the old top hat from his head. He lifted the rope from the bench beside him--bless his foresight!--and threw its soft, heavy coils up to me. The bed was already wedged into place between the wall and the window sill; I tugged on it, to satisfy myself that it would not move, then began tying the rope about the bedpost. Eliza knelt before her trunk, lifting out three or four small octavo volumes. Lucy stood beside her, hugging her bare arms closely to herself, watching me with an unreadable expression in her fierce blue eyes. Eliza began tugging a dress from the trunk, something black and stiff. "Leave it," I barked.

"But," she said, looking up, "what will we--"

"Leave it," I said. "I have told you I will buy you more clothing. Come here."

She stood, slowly, reluctantly, clasping the books to her breast.

"Come here," I repeated, perhaps a bit more firmly.

I watched her as she walked, careful of the feet of her stockings on the old wood floor. Her eyes were downcast. I held out my hand to draw her in, and as I gripped her shoulder I looked past her to see Lucy again. Lucy had not moved, and though her right hand still clutched her left arm, lifting her small breasts, holding in place the chemise that once again was sliding off her shoulder, her left hand had dropped and was--unconsciously?--rubbing at the bare white skin of her thigh, between the ivory hem of her chemise and the top of her black stocking, two inches above her knee. Her right stocking had unrolled below her knee, falling to the smooth swell of her calf. When I tore my gaze from her legs back to her face, was there a hint of a smile there? Then, I did not think so; now, I'm not so sure.

But Eliza was there, almost in my arms. "Give me your books," I said.

Wordlessly, she handed them to me. The top volume, I noticed, was from Lucas's interminable History of Cydonia. Leaning out the window, I called to Orphe, and dropped them into his hands.

"Now," I said. I sat on the windowsill, bracing one foot on it. "Come here." She took a step closer to me, her eyes still downcast. "Closer." She looked up then, a question in her eyes. "We are about to leave this room through the window," I said. "Unless you can safely climb down a rope, you're going to need to hold tightly to me as I carry you down."

She drew herself up then, and looked me in the eye, her mouth once more in that schoolgirl's defiant purse. The slap was wearing off, perhaps, or the unreality of the situation was bearing in on her again; really, this isn't the sort of thing they teach you at girls' schools, the proper etiquette for a nighttime escape in one's underthings, with a madwoman in trousers. I grabbed her by the arm and pulled her to me, hoping the shock would keep her off-balance, docile. It seemed to me then that Lucy looked to her sister for direction, and that if I could control Eliza, I would hold them both. "Sit upon my lap," I said. "Do it."

The purse of her lips melted, and the flash in her eyes flickered and died as her face slackened. Unaware, and rather fetchingly, I thought, she worried at her lower lip with her teeth as she took one stumbling step closer to me, and turned to sit side-saddle on my braced thigh.

"That won't do," I said. "I must hold the rope," and I lifted it, by way of example, "with both hands. You must hold onto me, and tighter than that." Dropping the rope on the sill, I braced her back with my left hand as, with my right, I took hold of the soft skin of her thigh and lifted her leg, turning her about so she sat astraddle me. (And if I were looking down then, and thrilled to see what I suspected, that in the heat of the still late summer's night, she had gone to sleep without a scratchy pair of knickers? If I caught a brief glimpse of a small patch of blond hair and a pair of pink lips before I pulled her snug to me, and felt the heat of her against my belly, and knew that she was perhaps not so proper as she put on airs to be? More fool me, then, to let my head float with thoughts of the taste of schoolgirls, to let my heart skip a beat at the thought of her beauty in my hands. There were questions raised here that I did not ponder, warnings I did not heed. Then, why should I have behaved any differently now than at any other point in my life? I plunged headlong down the course that would bring her to my hand, and had damned the consequences long before.) And she gasped, and moaned, frightened, throwing her arms about my neck as I took hold of the rope and leaned back, out the window. Looking over her shoulder, past her cloud of blond hair, I saw her sister, standing still across the room, tugging now at the hem of her chemise. I caught her with my eyes. "Stay still and say nothing," I said, firmly. "I will be right back." And then I toppled backwards out the window, as Eliza clutched at me, a little shriek escaping her lips.

My muscles protested as I walked slowly down the side of the inn, and the rope burned the skin of my palms. I wished I'd had the foresight to pull on gloves. Eliza was not so heavy as Molly, but only just; and I am, as I have said, getting old. And at any moment I expected the front door to burst open, to see the Baronet there, rapier gleaming in the night, to stop this horrible monster from making off with his girls. My heart was in my throat, and my blood raced, intoxicated on a heady draught of fear and lust, and my legs quivered, my arms ached, my ribs creaked as Eliza clung to me, murmuring a prayer to Our Lady under her breath, her lips fluttering warm and damp just above the skin of my neck, where she'd buried her face, her eyes, no doubt, shut tight.

Monsieur Orphe met us at the bottom, lifting Eliza from my arms as she whimpered and clung to me for a moment. He did so easily, tugging gently until she let go, catching her under her knees with one arm and her armpits with the other, holding her before him with no visible effort, so that she could lean against his broad chest. He stood still, waiting for some word as to what to do next, and I stood a moment too, the rope in one hand. I looked at Eliza there in his arms, her chemise bunched around her hips, the sweet curves of her legs in the black stockings, the bare white swell of her buttocks. I reached out and brushed her cheek with my fingertips, and she shrank from my touch.

"Make her comfortable in the carriage," I said, "and keep her safe. I'll be back in a moment."

He nodded, and I turned and, with heavy, aching arms, climbed back up to their window.

I could hear the pounding even as I reached up for the sill. "Lucy! Eliza! Girls! Answer me!" The Baronet's gruff voice lent me strength and speed, so that I almost flew through the window, landing in a crouch, my hand on the hilt of my sword. Lucy stood where I had left her, her right hand still clutching her left arm, her left hand smoothing the hem of her chemise nervously. She had a small, excited smile on her face, and her eyes shone, which gave me pause.

"Girls!" The doorknob rattled, then the pounding resumed. "You must let me in! You are in danger!"

I stood, beckoning to Lucy, and she half-ran across the room, flinging herself upon me. Startled, I staggered backwards, and she nearly fell before I caught her. She wrapped her legs about my waist and her arms about my neck, and I thrilled to feel the bare skin of her buttocks and thighs in my hands. She was lighter than her sister; still, her unexpected exuberance nearly knocked us both to the floor, or even backwards, out the window.

There was one final blow to the door, a heavy one, a kick, perhaps, and a "Blast!" Then the sound of footsteps, pounding down the hall to the stairs.

We would have to be fast, faster than the rope. I turned towards the window. "Duck your head down, girl," I muttered, "so I can see." Shifting her weight as well as I could to one hand, I lifted the other to brush her floating blond curls from my eyes.

"You've come to take us away," she whispered, in a small, light voice.

"Yes," I said, after a moment.

"Good," she said, and, to my astonishment, she pressed a small but definite kiss to my throat.

I took hold of the window frame with one hand. "Hold on tight," I said. "This will be hard. I need both hands."

Her arms and legs tightened about me, and I leaned so that most of her weight fell on my shoulders and above my hips. I grabbed the window frame with the other hand and, stepping up to the sill, levered us up onto it. "Duck," I said, and, balancing precariously there, made sure nothing would catch when we jumped. I looked down as much as I could, but I couldn't see past her shoulder. I remembered where the roof of the carriage was, below us, but that isn't the same as seeing it.

"Oh," she said, and I felt her shiver there, as if from pleasure, or a chill.

"Here we go," I said, and jumped.

Luckily, I did not catch the luggage bar with my head, or across my back; luckily, my sword did not catch, to thrust its hilt into my side, or Lucy's. I managed to land mostly on my buttocks and my feet, so that I did not roll on top of her, and though she is lighter than her sister, still, she was more than enough to knock my breath from me, and stun me.

"Lady!" I heard Orphe cry, and felt the carriage shake as he climbed up to the roof.

Lucy was laughing breathlessly, uncaring that one foot was pinned beneath us. She grabbed my head in her hands and pressed kisses on my cheeks and forehead and one long one on my mouth, her sweet lips closed but pursed, melding themselves to mine; a little girl's kiss, a sister's kiss. "Oh," she said, "oh."

"Lucy," I said, "get up--"

"Monster!" bellowed the Baronet, and Lucy jerked her head up, her mouth tightening into a slim, expressionless line.

"Oh," she said. "Him."

I pushed her up and off of me, and Orphe was there, helping, his dark hands shocking against her pale flesh. The sudden blast of danger had cleared my head; I no longer wasted time surreptitiously stealing glances, watching for a flash of cunny, the chemise to slip from her shoulder, baring a nipple pale in the cool starlight. As soon as Lucy was disentangled from me, half-limp in Orphe's arms (and still she never looked away from her father, nor did her stern expression change--more clues, more warnings I ignored; and would I have done differently had I not?), I scrambled to my feet. "What shall I do?" asked Orphe, his eyes also fixed on a point behind me.

I turned, there on the roof of the carriage.

The Baronet stood there, in the doorway of the inn, silhouetted in the lurid light of a fire. In one hand he held a bare blade, an epée from the looks of it; his other held a knife, and that knife was pressed against Molly's throat. She stood before him, clutching a sheet to cover her nakedness, pinned by his curled knife-arm.

"Let them go," he yelled, his voice harsh. "There's still time to save the place."

"Go," I said to Orphe. "I'll catch up."

Wordlessly, lifting Lucy with one arm, he turned to take his seat, clucking to the horses. I stepped to the edge of the carriage and, as it jolted into motion, stepped off it, falling lightly to the ground. The carriage rattled toward the gates, Lucy's laughter pealing in its wake.

"Your choice," I called to the Baron, walking slowly towards him. "Chase after your daughters, or settle with me."

His eyes flicked from the departing carriage to me and back. I was close enough now to see him lick his lips.

"No decision?" I said. I picked up my pace, and drew my sword from its sheath. "Fine. Close enough to first light for my taste."

It was a tricky move. I couldn't do it fast enough to startle him into motion, but had to press him so that he couldn't decide, couldn't realize that this was, indeed, happening. I watched his eyes widen as I lifted the sword to shoulder height, watched him mull his options in those small black eyes sunk into his lined and weathered face, but too late. I lifted the blade up at an angle and then whipped it down, just missing Molly's face and shoulder to slash his cheek and ear. Swearing, he did just what I wanted him to; stumbled back from Molly, letting go of her as his clapped his knife-hand to his wounded face (he kept hold of the knife, damn him), trying to get room to raise his sword. Molly tripped over her sheet and fell, trying to get out from between us. I skipped to one side, slashing at his sword arm, and he fell back from my blow just in time. I drew him away from her, trying to give her time to escape. A referee would have called off the duel at this point, given the Baronet the victory for my un-gentlemanly conduct, but I wasn't trying to duel him. I was trying to kill him.

The burning inn was already hot enough to be uncomfortable, and bright enough to put me at a slight disadvantage. Patrons were already stumbling outside, though it sounded like more than one was trying to put out the fire. I feinted high, then as his blade jerked up to parry (slow, and fat) slashed down at his unprotected belly. He caught the blow on his knife-arm, and cried out. "Blast you!"

I slashed again and again, herding him away from the inn, and from Molly. Someone was helping her to her feet. "Indigo!" she cried, I think. He settled into the classic Estravi stance, his side to me, his knife hand back and high, and seemed puzzled by my own: squarely facing him, sword down, almost touching the dirt. His face screwed up, almost as if he were about to protest, and then settled into something approximating resolve. The moment before he decided to strike, I stepped quickly to one side and in, thrusting at his back; alarmed, he fell back, his sword swinging awkwardly to one side to try to parry. A simple flick of my wrist and my blade nicked his sword arm, blooding him a third time. His face was pale, and gleamed in the firelight with nervous sweat. "What," he said. "What."

I toyed with him. I prowled back and forth before him, lashing my blade like the tail of a restless cat, and he started at every move. I suppose I had it in mind to try and break him from his rigid stance, and I thrust once or twice at his legs, but he still goggled at me, shuffling, turning to keep his side fixed towards me, his knife wavering there above his head in a wrist too tightly held to do any good, as if we were in some narrow hallway at Oxbridge, settling a point of honor over a chambermaid, a number of black-gowned, disreputable dons placing bets on who'd be the first to yield. It soon palled. Abruptly, I turned my back on him, took two steps away.

"Wait," he said, his voice already hoarse with effort, or fear.

"Lady's sake, man," I snarled, spinning to face him. He hadn't advanced at all, still stood there, knife up, sword trembling in his pudgy, white hand. "I'm trying to kill you! Do something!"

His knife jerked in his hand as he took a shuffling step towards me. A drop of blood fell from it to stain his shirt, above the reddened slash I'd made across his paunch. His knife gleamed darkly with blood. Yet he hadn't touched me.

I spun back to face the inn.

Molly lay sprawled some yards from the door, where one of the patrons, an older woman in worn grey clothes and a shawl had dragged her. The sheet, half torn away, was black with blood that seeped into the dust. Two men ran inside, carrying buckets of water from the stable, as I took a step towards her, then another. "Molly?" I called, gently.

Perhaps the knife twisted in his hand, slick with her blood; perhaps I saved myself with the spontaneous gesture I made, reaching out to her with my left hand as I took another step. Perhaps killing someone was merely something the Baronet, in the end, could not do. The blade snagged on my jacket and turned, raking a burning line along my shoulder and upper arm and ruining the cloth as it ripped free. If he'd followed up, if he'd used his sword at all, I'd have died that night. Instead, he staggered to a halt, a numb look on his face as I didn't fall down, but turned and struck in one motion. I had no leverage or depth for a true thrust, but nonetheless managed to sink half the blade's length through his chest and out his back. I left it there, quivering, as I walked across the innyard to Molly. My hands shook and my head was full of rushing blood. I felt taut, tightened to the breaking point, as if some sudden move would shatter me.

She may have tried to reach out to me, but she was too weak, even then. I knelt beside her. "Careful," said the old woman.

"She's dying," I said, more of a statement than a question.

"No excuse," said the old woman.

Molly's eyes already were distant, and wet; her mouth worked absently, trying to speak, to draw a breath. "You," she said. I heard her. She frowned. My legs trembled, with exertion, with fear. Every breath I took fluttered in my lungs and did no good. I tried to touch her, but my fingers were numb. I bent to kiss her, but her lips was slack, and cooling.

I stood, pressing the back of my hand to my mouth, defying the sobs that threatened to wrack me.

"You!" the Baronet George Ponsonby roared weakly, his voice full of hate. I turned to look on him, the man who'd watched me frig Molly in the hall, who'd killed her somehow, who'd given one daughter to a Dukelet and tried to sell me another. He'd dropped his sword, and pointed at me with his knife, listing alarmingly to one side as blood poured down his shirt and trickled from his gut. My sword's hilt bobbed as he took a step not so much forward as to one side. "You." He tried to take another step, but fell to one knee, blinking as he hit, heavily. His knife did not waver. "I curse you," he said, "in the name..." He blinked again. "In the name..."

"Too late," I said. Taking hold of the sword, I planted my boot on his chest and shoved him over backwards, pulling my blade free. Blood bubbled up in the wound from his failing heart, and spilled down his throat, staining his ivory hair. Plucking aside his bloodied jacket, I fumbled through his pocket, finding the curious little cigarette box and pulling it free.

"You monster," he whispered. I kicked him, hard, in the head. And again. And it feels good even now, when the scratch he left on my shoulder merely itches, to write those words. I killed him, and it hurt him terribly, and he had time to realize what had been done to him, and why. And then I kicked him when he was down. Too many who deserve just that never get it, in the end.

The inn burned, but the rough team of disgruntled guests had done an admirable job of containing it, fetching water in a chain first from the stable's trough, then from the well itself, further away. They fell still as I strode toward them, bloodied sword in my hand. Inside, I could see the lanterns Ponsonby had smashed, strewing the oil about, the tables that had been scorched, the one blackened wall. Fire still licked at the bar. I stepped behind it and took hold of the shelf full of pretty bottles of whiskies and brandies and pulled it down, sending the liquor smashing to the floor. The fire licked at it and spread, quickly. Grabbing a surviving lantern, I threw it up the stairs, where it smashed on the landing. One of the bucket brigade, a beefy man with a full black beard, stared at me from the doorway as if I were mad. "Get out!" I roared at him, brandishing my blade. He fell back. The others did, too, as I stalked out into the innyard, and knelt by Molly. The old woman had gone. I closed Molly's eyes for the last time and awkwardly lifted her in my arms, and felt a tear leak from my eye as my back ached, and my legs trembled, and she did not reach her arm around to steady herself, and her head hung limply, and did not lift to press a kiss to my cheek. I carried her into the burning inn and laid her on the floor, close to her pyre of liquor. I stood there a moment, in the heat, and saw the sheet catch fire. I could not bear to watch any more. Blinking away more tears, I seized a chair leg and made sure it was well aflame. Stalking back outside, I heaved my torch onto the roof, firing the thatch. "Go!" I roared once more, at the huddled crowd at the far end of the yard.

I stole a horse. The light of the burning inn stained the sky behind me in a lurid parody of dawn for an hour or more, before I topped the Wandike and started down its steeper western face. A mile beyond, on a small rise before the first thickets of the Coursan woods, I came across the carriage, close by a low and spreading oak, magnificently full in his late summer foliage, and dark in the early morning light. Orphe had hobbled the horses nearby, and built a fire. Eliza knelt before it, wrapped in a blanket. She stood as I cantered up the slope, clutching the blanket to her. I swung off the horse as it slowed, walking towards the others, and strode up to Eliza.

"What's happening?" she asked. I grabbed her hands and pushed her back before me, until she fetched up hard against the side of the carriage, and I lifted her hands and pinned them above her head. The blanket fell open. She still wore her chemise, but had at some point removed her stockings. Fear flashed deep in her eyes.

"Where is your sister?" I asked, my voice as calm as I could make it. Unnamable thoughts had fluttered around my brain as I rode away from Molly's pyre, and now that I found myself at my goal they crowded about my throat, and made speaking difficult. I had to hunt for the right words. I had no idea what I wanted--or rather, I knew what I wanted, what I had to have: I wanted to throw her to the ground and enter her, smash into her, plunge deep inside and through her until I felt some sort of release, some sort of emptiness; but I could not, I cannot. This need kept my face fixed, and made words hard to come by, and my actions rougher, fiercer than they needed to be. And if it is not an excuse for what happened next, it is something of an explanation.

"Lucy," she said, after a long moment, "Lucy is inside, sleeping. I don't know where the man went--you're bleeding--"

"Your father," I said, fumbling with the catch for my rapier's sheath, "would have sold one of you to me. Which?" Finally, I ripped it from my belt, snapping the lanyard, and threw it away, into the grass.

"What?" she asked, her voice flat with disbelief.

"He was not rich. I doubt you were attending one of the better academies. One of My Lady's convents, I don't doubt, taking in girls to help with the rent. Am I right?"

"You're bleeding," she said. "You smell of smoke. And blood. Oh, Lady," she said, "oh, please..."

"Do you like it?" I asked, and I sneered, perhaps. "Some women find it an aphrodisiac. The reek of blood, of sweat, smoke and hot metal. It means their lovers have fought. Perhaps for them." But she was shaking her head, slowly. "I'm going to wager something, Eliza. I've made many wagers in my life, and I've won most of them." I shrugged one arm out of my jacket then, keeping her hands pinned against the smooth wood of the carriage, shrugged out of the jacket entirely. I winced at the pain in my arm. "So I'm not used to losing." With my free hand, hardly knowing what I was doing, I began unbuttoning my weskit. "Keep that in mind. In this convent school, did you ever see what My Lady's ladies do at night?" I ripped at the lacings of my shirt. Somewhere, unnoticed, my ruff had fallen away. In my room? During the escape, or the fight? "Did you ever see them put off their black gowns?" Her eyes never left mine, dulled now with fear and disbelief, her voice stilled. Her arms trembled in my hand. Her mouth fell open, slightly, no moue of disapproval, now, but an unconscious pout that unknowingly begged to be ravaged. "Did you ever see My Lady's face with a painted smile?" And I forced my hand between her knees then, though she held them tightly together, and I forced my way along her thighs, though she tried to stop me.

"Please," she said, "what--"

I swooped in until my nose almost touched hers and I felt her breath stirring my hair, lank and chilled with sweat. "Did you learn what they mean when they speak of honey-sipping?"

She said nothing; she did not nod, nor did she shake her head. But when I crushed her mouth beneath my own she pressed her lips shut only briefly, then opened them, hesitantly, for my tongue; and the grip she held on her thighs relaxed with a shiver, and my thumb, roughly, had her, and I found my way inside her schoolgirl's purse. And she was warm in the cool dawn air, and wet with more than dew. I had my answer.

I was quite rough, as if forcing my thumb deep within her, as if pinching her anus with my fingers, as if driving my thigh between hers and pressing her back against the carriage, holding her helpless there, sucking the breath out of her mouth as she panted and cried out, as if this would in some fashion release me. But I wanted her lost in herself, I wanted her bucking with pleasure, I wanted her to acknowledge me, to need me, I wanted to carry her to the very edge and leave her there begging until I so chose to topple her over it. I wanted this somehow to make up for Molly; I wanted her to take something from me she needed before I told her how her father had died. And though all of this is inarticulable, and quite impossible, in the end, roughly fucking her with my thumb and harshly jerking hips would get me no closer to my goal. She did not struggle, but she gasped beneath my lips, and her eyes squeezed shut in a wince of pain, not glory. I slowed myself, stopped, though my blood raced on. I kissed her, tenderly, softly, and felt her lips stir and open to me with slow wonder. My shoulder ached, and burned, from holding her arms up, and I let them go. She did not push me away. I slipped my thumb out of her and caressed her, gently, as her arms floated about me, and her tongue licked at my mouth. "Who," she said, "who are you?" as her fingers brushed my wound, and I hissed with pain. "Oh," she said.

"Pay it no mind," I said, but she held up her hand, and her fingers were red with fresh blood. Her eyes widened. "Shh," I said, though she said nothing, and I took her hand in mine, as my other gripped her buttocks, as her legs parted more to allow me closer to her, and closer. I kissed her fingertips, tasting briefly the copper tang of my blood, then pressed her hand to my open shirt, wiping the rest away.

"You're not a man," she said.

"No," I said. I kissed her fingertips again.

"Your breasts are very small," she said. She tugged her hand free and reached out, to touch my left breast, to roll my nipple beneath her thumb. "Who are you? What is to become of us?"

She hissed in pleasure as I stroked her cunt again, velvety, and hot. "My name," I said, "is Indigo." I kissed her again, and this time she was eager, her body throwing off the cares and concerns of propriety. And then I knelt before her, and as she pushed my shirt off my shoulders, baring them, one bloody, one clean, I feasted on her. She tasted of peaches, and spice, and of the trace of my blood still on my lips; she tasted like a schoolgirl, like something clean and fresh and pure in the midst of all this. She tangled her fingers in my hair and rolled her hips, her calves tightened beneath my hand as I licked as deeply as I could inside her. I reached for her breasts with one hand, catching one and pinching her nipple between my thumb and fingers, twisting the thin fabric of her chemise. I could not let her pleasure mount without a little pain. She gasped, and as I let go, groaned, and I slid my hand down her flank to her buttocks, ducking beneath the hem of the chemise to caress her skin as I found her little nub, her boatsman, with my lips, and worried at it. She cried out, something wordless, throwing her arms back against the side of the carriage to balance herself as her hips bucked. And after a moment, I--stopped.

I rocked back on my heels and watched her for a moment, spread against the side of the carriage, hem rucked up, exposing her wet and gaping cunt to me, the juices of her pleasure smeared along her trembling thighs, one hand pawing lewdly at her breast as her breath came in ragged, lusty pants. She was utterly beyond herself, and she was beautiful. And behind her, through the small glass window in the side of the carriage, I could see Lucy, awakened by the noise, perhaps, looking down on the scene, chewing absently on a strand of golden hair.

I stood up, grabbing Eliza's hands to pin them once again above her head. They were languid, and she did not fight. The pleasure and the lust pooled in her hips and fighting for release slowed her, confused her. "Please, " she said, "oh, please... What are you doing?"

"What do you want me to do?" I asked.

She tried to tug one hand free, but I held them firm. She tried to rub against me, press herself against my thigh, but I stood back from her. I took hold of her chin with my other hand and held her head still and looked into her eyes. Her hips bucked again, from frustration. "Please," she said. "More."

"More what?" I asked.

"Please," she said, a whisper, her eyes pleading.

"You'll have to tell me, Eliza."

Her head shook once, slowly. "More," she said, "oh Lady, more of that. Please. Oh."

"What did the ladies call it? What words did they use? Tell me what you want."

"Kiss me," she said, and the words were barely even a whisper. "Kiss my purse. My cunny. Please. Make me come--"

But I had already slipped a finger into her, so tight, so wet, and she went wild at the sudden sensation, crying out and coming in waves as I stroked her.

And later, I sat by the fire, stripped to the waist, and Eliza, still wearing that chemise, knelt behind me and washed the wound her father had made. She scrubbed at it lightly with a torn rag and cold water from the creek, and she went about it with a curious mix of repugnance and steely resolve, and perhaps a little tenderness. Her hair was still in disarray, and soot and dirt lightly smudged her chin and the breast of her chemise, where I'd grabbed her. The skin of her chest and throat were still lightly flushed, and her hand shook a little from time to time, but we said nothing about what we had done, and she did not meet my eyes, and we waited in silence for Monsieur Orphe to return with breakfast.

And after she cleaned the wound, she bound it with more cloth, torn from a clean shirt I'd fetched from my luggage. And then, as I sat there, still motionless, I felt her lean forward and press her lips gently, softly, to the skin above the dressing, and they were warm against my chilled skin.

"Your sister," I said.

"What?" she said, looking up.

Lucy, also still in her chemise, and still wearing her stockings (a twig, I noticed, distractedly, had gotten snagged to the bottom of one dusty black foot), came over to us from the carriage, limping slightly, her eyes studying the fire. As Eliza stood, Lucy took her hand, and rested her head on her older sister's breast. "You hurt my foot when we jumped," she said.

I reached into the purse on my belt and pulled out their father's device. With only a little clumsiness, I loaded paper and tobacco into it and rolled an only slightly misshapen cigarette. "Does Lucy know?" I looked up at them, and Eliza looked down at me, uncertain. "Does she know about sipping honey?"

She blinked, once. Lucy looked up at her. "Eliza?" she asked, in a warm, sleepy voice.

"Then we shall have to teach her," I said. I plucked a burning branch from the fire and used it to light the cigarette. I inhaled, and held it for a moment, then blew the smoke out, luxuriantly. "Won't we?" I said.

Taking Lucy in her arms, murmuring something to her, Eliza knelt beside me, and Lucy curled up like a cat, resting her golden head on her sister's lap. "I'm hungry," said Lucy.

"Soon," said Eliza. She stroked Lucy's hair. "We aren't safe, are we," she said, and some of that schoolgirl's defiance had returned to her voice. "With you," she added, as an afterthought, looking down at her sister.

"No," I said. "But you are together."

And I look at those words I have just written, and I realize most of the morning has flown; I have smoked three of the Baronet's cigarettes as I scratched away on this stack of parchment, and I have not been brought my breakfast. I rang for Clarissa hours ago, it seems; I just rang again, and I hear nothing. I shall go find her.

4. Cydonian Politics : Clarissa is Found -- Keeping a Journal-- A Picnic with St. Jane -- The Boatman is Found -- Something is Resolved

Should I write, then, of what happened, on the road from the Wandike to Lymond? How, in my carriage, I watched as Eliza seduced her sister Lucy? Or shall I write of what has just occurred, of where I discovered Clarissa had spent her morning, and of what happened thereafter?

How strange, that I should suddenly find myself with so much to say now that my days might well be numbered on the fingers of two hands. I spend so many hours scratching away with pen on parchment when, for all I know, deVere is marching here, today, his black hound's banner snapping in the wind over the blue and gold of the Queen's musketeers'. King's, probably, by now. I've had no news from Cydonia, but I do not doubt deVere will have sat poor Humphrey on the throne--his only choice, really. Shame. I was rather fond of Humphrey--now His Majesty, Humphrey the First.

News, and gossip; and how many times has my life been spared, my fortune bettered, by paying close attention to the occasional word overheard in passing, by chance? And news of this momentous occasion could be mine for the asking. Were I to send Orphe to the Ladysmith, I'd have a detailed accounting of Humphrey's coronation at Whitfriar's by sundown--what he wore, how he spoke, who carried the train, where deVere stood, and how my Lords Oxbridge, and Hungerford, and Stepney reacted. I'd know even what meats were laid forth on the table afterwards, how sick Humphrey became after his toast, which of the Gauntists' daughters would be handed him to wed--within the week, I imagine, to demonstrate for all the bargain is sealed, the rift mended. With a little more digging--an envoy, to Cydonia; another perhaps to Saint Martin's Inch, to confer with the factors there--I would know of Stile's response, and Estrave's; I would know how gold was being spent, and where; whether men were moving north, or east; where muskets, and cannon; where horse; where sail. And I would know when best to make my escape, and how to begin my mischief.

Instead--instead I sit in my harem pants and I drink strong whiskey and I smoke and I write, and I make most glorious and most depraved love, for is there any other kind? It was a poet, an Estravite, who said, "Anyone who has not awakened in a strange bed beside a face he will never see again, who has not left a brothel at dawn wanting to throw himself into the river out of sheer, physical disgust at existence itself, has missed out on something." Well, here we are. And oh, my Eliza, and oh my Lucy; and me--I am not missing out on anything, anything at all.

Late this morning, when I set down my pen after writing of Molly's death, and of my rape (there is no other word) of Eliza, I went searching for Clarissa. I knew where to find her, though I did not want to, so after I pretended to search the kitchen, and the scullery, I pretended to be surprised to find myself mounting the back stairs, and stealthily creeping down the east wing, to the apartment I'd set aside for my girls.

The curtains on the large bed were drawn, as were the curtains on the window itself; sunlight filled the room, and I could see them all. Clarissa lay on her back, her head by the foot of the bed, her legs still in their white knee stockings spilling over the side. Lucy knelt over the girl's shoulders, her pale white back to me, and her golden hair spilled down as she threw back her head, and lifted one hand to her bare pale breasts, her other steadying herself on a bedpost; and even from where I stood I could hear the wet and hungry sounds Clarissa made as she kissed Lucy's sex, and see the pleasure thrilling through Lucy as she did so-- kisses I didn't know Clarissa could give at all, let alone so well. And standing on the other side of the bed from me, Eliza, in the high-necked black dress Mrs. Woolf had cut down for her, her arms at her sides, a wistful little smile touching her lips, as motionless as I myself was.

It all seemed to hang there for one golden, languid moment, like the endless trill in a coloratura's aria, or one of Fiennes's light-filled paintings--one hidden away in a corner of his studio, I should hope. I could tell by her breathing, and the way she tossed her head, forward, then back, the golden hair spilling from her bare, pale shoulders, that Lucy was climbing that hill, with the help of Clarissa's mouth, and hands. I could see one of Lucy's feet, in her dusty black stocking, laid by Clarissa's hip. One of Clarissa's shoes hung half off her dangling foot; the other had fallen who knew where. Lucy leaned forward then, a little, catching herself on the edge of the bed, and I could see where the red ribbon tying off her stocking pinched her thigh, and I saw Clarissa's hand, her fingers gleaming liquidly in the hot noontide light, as it ran along that thigh, along the skin of it, up, up along her hip, her flank, to meet and tangle with Lucy's hand at her breast, and I imagined them tweaking one pink nipple. "Hanh," said Lucy, "hanh!" and she lowered her mouth to Clarissa's hand and kissed it, and let it fall, slowly, back down the skin of her flank, hip, thigh, to cup one bare, pale buttock and pull her in close and tight. Lucy leaned still further forward, beckoning to her sister, and Eliza took one hesitant step. "Oh, Lady," groaned Lucy, as she reached out to brace herself against Eliza's shoulder, and she tilted her head, and Eliza lifted hers, lips parting, and as their mouths met Eliza's eyes caught mine across the room and she shrieked.

It could have been comical; perhaps it would have been, were we different people, or if it had happened some days, or weeks, later, or earlier, than it did. Eliza stepped back suddenly, hands clapped to her mouth, as Lucy lost her grip on her sister's shoulder and began to overbalance, windmilling one bare arm, her hair whipping around as she tried to catch herself on the edge of the bed and turn to see what her sister was staring at and she was groaning, too, in a wordless mixture of surprise and a little rage, and a sudden sharp disappointment as the mounting wave of orgasm inside broke off and left her dangling, balanced on one knee, one hand, one black-stockinged leg kicked out for balance, the long slim lines of black wool and red ribbon and white thigh and buttock full of the sudden accidental grace of a fencer overextended, reaching for balance, straining for the mark. She might have held herself, too, had it not been for Clarissa, who, startled by Eliza's shriek, was struggling herself, trying to sit up, and she banged her head against Lucy's thigh and kicked her own feet for leverage (sending that shoe flying across the room, to hit the rug before me) and over Lucy toppled, with enough time to cry out before she hit the floor, thump! on the other side of the bed.

We all stayed there for another endless moment, frozen, no one sure of what to do or say: Clarissa, blinking owlishly at me, her face expressionless, her mousy hair in disarray, strands of it flying from her head in all directions, the neck of her dress opened and shoved down, over her shoulders, pinning her upper arms, her breast board loosened and twisted so that one breast plumped out over it, her nipple red and full, a flush tingeing the skin below her throat, her lips and chin wet; Eliza, staring, her green eyes wide to either side of her long pale hands, still clapped over her mouth and nose, as if to keep something in, some words or a cry, perhaps; and Lucy, lying on the other side of the bed, unseen, a thump and a rustle as she rolled over, maybe, or got to her knees, perhaps. And the frozen moment stretched, and lengthened, a second bearing more weight than any second should, as none of us moved, and none of us said anything, all waiting for something, anything else to happen.

"Ow," said Lucy.

Clarissa, her eyes downcast, pulled herself off the bed and to her feet, as Eliza helped her sister up. I bent down to pick up Clarissa's shoe as she shuffled up to me, pulling her dress back up on her shoulders, twisting her breast board around and back into place. She took the shoe from me with a little curtsey, and was about to leave, and it was precisely because we couldn't say anything about it, we couldn't acknowledge what had happened--Clarissa hadn't even tried to wipe Lucy's dew and her own spittle from her mouth, she ignored it, all of it, hoping this moment would go away like some bad dream-- It was precisely because I couldn't, shouldn't have said anything at all that I smiled and said, "Clarissa. Wait a moment."

And she stopped, trembling.

I reached into a pocket and pulled out a handkerchief and reached over and wiped her mouth with it. She blushed quite red and her mouth soured and she would not meet my eyes. "There's some mending on my bed. Take it to Mrs. Woolf when you clean."

And I waited, and made her say it: "Yes'm." Another little curtsey.

"Clarissa," I said, as she turned to leave. I lifted the handkerchief to my nose, and favored her with a smile.

"Yes'm?"

"Do something about your hair."

And she left, in as much of a rush as she could without seeming to flee.

"Was that necessary?" asked Eliza.

"No," I admitted.

And now I have two pages of parchment covered with speculations and ruminations, on politics, and the succession, and I smoked two cigarettes as I wrote them, and spent some time staring out at the trees tossing in the rain-wet wind. It was late afternoon, a storm was passing away somewhere to the south, and I could smell autumn in the air. And then I have seven more pages, covered in a hurried scrawl, writing of mouths, and thighs, and, and my girls-- Oh, Lady. And my third cigarette is half-smoked, and it was only now, when I paused, to try and think of how to write in words what I saw, how to capture that on paper, without paints, and a skill I'll never have-- It was only now that I looked up to realize the sun has set, night has fallen, and Clarissa must at some point have come in to light the candles.

I think it's obvious what's important to me.

How... exhilarating it is to write of these things, words I have never thought to write down before. How oddly thrilling, to call up in my mind the scene, the girls on the bed, the sounds, the smells, the way they moved, and then to try and carve it out of ink and parchment on the page, in words, to rig a scaffolding of syllables about it, to try and encode the music of it the way troubadours wrote down their songs long ago, so that now an old beggar can sing with the voice of a man centuries dead. Much is left out: the earthy smell of Lucy when she is aroused, at once musky and sharp, like fresh-ground cumin; the look on her face as she comes, a grimace of pain and pleasure and effort, as if she is lifting a great weight, so unstudied, almost like an animal; so different than her sister, whose eyes close, who looks almost as if she is about to weep softly before her eyebrows rise and her mouth purses and her breath comes in short, flat heaves, crying "Who? Who?" under her breath; I think of her, with her schoolmates in the open dormitories of one of My Lady's schools, a schoolchum snuggled close, hands busy under nightgowns, or hidden under blankets, mouths licking at cunnies as legs twist around heads, trying to come without anyone hearing, a chorus of quiet whos; and I wonder if she would be more free with herself, more like her sister, if she had come to it as her sister did, with no fear. I have left out the colors of Lucy's skin, and Eliza's, the white gold of it, so pale when laid next to the olive tint of my own; the way Lucy flushes in the oddest of places, behind her knees, a precise spot the size of a coin in the sweetly curved notch of her clavicle; the way her hair stands out wild and free from her head, stray tendrils tumbling into her face when least expected, to be blown away with fetching exasperation, a thick child's mane, overgrown, untamed by bands and ties and kerchiefs, as Eliza's was. Nor did I mention Clarissa's strong legs, which I had never seen before, in their white knee stockings, her dress up about her hips, or the curve of her hand as she tenderly cupped Lucy's buttock, or the jealousy that flashed through me when I saw her fingers caress Lucy in so familiar a manner, or the sudden images of how this had come to pass that flickered in my brain, that were but temporary phantoms until I scratch them here: A calculated seduction, perhaps? Lucy under the bedclothes, pulled up to her chin as she flirts, feigning some difficulty or other, or makes some difficult request of the serving girl, only to fling aside the bedclothes and laugh as the girl stands agog at her brazenness, her beauty? Ha. No. Writing a thing down does not make it any more possible, or true. An accident, then: Clarissa walks in on some innocent chore or other to see Eliza kneeling before her sister, kissing her between her thighs, her tongue licking just below the tiny thatch of golden down, as Lucy, naked but for black stockings tied with red ribbons above the knee, tangles her fingers in her sister's golden hair, pulling loose the black ribbon that ties up Eliza's curls. And Clarissa gasps, perhaps; they run to her, to comfort her, it is too much, her head swims as the sisters lift her skirts, hands playing along her thighs now as lips brush lips, and kisses flicker from one to another to a third, like sighs... And I left out the intent which formed, with a leer, in the back of my brain, to call Clarissa to me tonight, after the girls have gone to their bed, and to see what, exactly, she knows, and how she learned it.

All left out of my account, when I first wrote it down, and though I now have alluded to some of it, I have still barely scratched the surface--and this is but one encounter; not even that, but one interrupted moment of pleasure, a brief stop, perhaps, on the journey the three of them would have made this afternoon had I not walked in when I did. And yet so many images, so much to see and smell and hear and taste and touch, and so many thoughts, fancies, frenzied half-formed wishes; so many tensions, so many possibilities. So many different kisses; so many different ways to come. Too many, certainly, to hope to catch but a fraction of them in paper and ink.

And yet. I have been keeping a journal now for many years, since my days in the Musketeers. And before today, had you asked me, I would have told you my life was in those pages. Where I went, what I did, how I spent my money, what I thought about my day, the weather, the news. Let me copy out how I described the events of five days ago, the seventh of Fructidor:

Rd 17 m, axle trble, stop 2 hrs to fix. Did not make Ladysmith, encamped o.o.d. Ate stores: v, cur. (dry), brd. Good clrt--Windham's. Used last of St.J. No csh outlay. Expect Lymond late p.m.

Which says much for the state of my accounts, and my diet, and I appreciate the note reminding me of the distributors of the claret; it was a quite good claret. But there is only one oblique note regarding what was perhaps the most important occurrence of that day.

We did not speak as we rode along that morning. Eliza did not look at me, but spent her time gazing out the little window beside her. Her sister sat close to her, holding her hand, and dozed, her head resting on her sister's shoulder, bouncing with the jolts of the carriage. For my part, I spent the morning smoking, taking care to blow the smoke out the window next to me, and I amused myself by gazing upon my girls. I believe it was then I noticed how Lucy's face was rounder than her sister's; how much wilder her hair was; how Eliza's legs were longer, slimmer, her breasts subtly smaller in proportion than Lucy's, and resting higher on her chest. Eliza sat with her stockinged legs pressed tightly together, her ankles crossed; and she would from time to time pull at her chemise, tugging it down over her thighs, though it could not hope to cover the bare skin between the hem and the top of her stockings, unrolled as high as they could go, a full two inches over her knee. I said we did not speak; I was wrong. Eliza asked me for a wrap, or a rug. I smiled, and politely declined, pointing out that the day was quite warm. She did not press the point.

Orphe informed me before noon that we would need to adjust the front axle; as he felt confident of his ability to perform the repairs himself, we made a picnic of it, stopping in a farmer's fallow field. As I stepped out to unpack the picnic things, and some food, Lucy awoke, yawning. The top two buttons of her chemise had once more come undone, and it fell open as she stretched prettily. Eliza scolded her quietly. As I walked around to the back of the carriage, she was buttoning her sister's chemise, and Lucy was looking down at her and smiling.

It still amazes me that I travel now with plate, and china, and glassware--even if I will not stand for the footmen considered necessary for their proper deployment. Nonetheless, there they are, nestled in red velvet in a wooden trunk strapped to the back of the carriage; dusty, perhaps, but unbroken. I fetched some rugs from beneath Monsieur Orphe's seat, spread them on the ground, and laid out the cold venison and the bread, as Orphe bought some butter from the farmer's wife--or so I remember, which makes my note regarding "no cash outlay" rather mysterious. I must have forgotten.

I fetched the bottle of claret, and four of the glasses, and, after pouring off a glass for myself, walked one over to Monsieur Orphe, who had stripped off his weskit and opened his shirt, and stood contemplating the wheels a moment.

"They'll want to get out," he said, taking the glass with a sharp nod of thanks.

"Give me a moment," I said.

I paused before opening the carriage door, kneeling and pulling from my boot a small leather sack I hadn't opened in at least six months-- since deVere's winter party; I'd put a pinch in the hollow between my thumb and the back of my hand, like snuff, and let Anne Mobrey, Curwen's youngest, lick it up, as the Queen watched. After that night, there was but a pinch left--St. Jane's wort, as they call it; dried and crushed and imported from Stile, and more expensive than saffron--but its pungent scent tickled my nostrils even so. I dusted the two empty glasses with what was left and poured in the claret, swirling it with my finger to make certain it was well-mixed. I tried not to sneeze. It is slow to take effect through the mouth, but alarmingly quick through the nose; I already felt a warmth lighting my belly, a pleasant languorous weight settling in my arms and legs--though how much was the drug's effect, and how much my knowledge and anticipation of it, I could not say.

I threw open the carriage door to see Lucy, bent over before me, adjusting one stocking, tugging it back over her knee. "Excuse us!" cried Eliza.

"If you would allow me," I said. Setting the glasses down on the floorboard, I reached up to tug Lucy's garter ribbon tight and tie it off. Lucy smiled as I did so, but covered her lips with her hand, looking to her sister with wide eyes. "You girls will want to leave the carriage. Monsieur Orphe must do some work on it, and if you remain, you will be quite jostled."

"This is most improper," said Eliza. "I seem to remember you promising we would be given clothing."

"In good time," I said. "We are off the road, and away from anyone who might see us, if that is your concern."

"One of them," she said, but I was already offering my hand to Lucy, who took it, and I helped her down, out of the carriage. She ran out into the grass, her hair blowing wild in the wind. I turned to Eliza, who stood, smoothing the front of her chemise over her thighs, and her hand trembled as I took it. I did not let it go when she stepped down, but pulled her closer to me.

"My--lady," she said, confused a moment as to the proper form of address.

"Indigo will do," I said. I reached down and picked up the glasses with my free hand. "Here," I said. "Some claret, for you and your sister."

"Ah," she said.

"See," I said. "I am not all bad."

Lunch proved a lively enough affair, despite its perhaps rocky start. The claret was a hit with the girls; Eliza pronounced it good enough for her Headmistress's table, which was funnier then that it is now, on parchment. And if Eliza took great pains to wrap her legs in one of the rugs, sitting carefully and demurely, mindful of the straps of her chemise as she leaned forward to select a slice of bread, or to pluck up a currant, one at a time, well, Lucy was free enough for both of them, sitting close to her sister, refusing to cover her legs with a rug; "It's too hot," she pouted, seemingly unconscious of her state of undress. Her top button had once again come undone; when she knelt, sitting back on her heels, she did not notice her chemise had ridden up over her hips until her sister irritably tugged it down for her, snapping, "Do behave yourself." But a flush was hot in Eliza's cheeks as she did so, and an embarrassed smile licked at her lips; and when she turned away to pluck another currant, Lucy, with a sidelong look at me, leaned over to poke her sister in the ribs. Her chemise rode up again. When Eliza slapped at her finger, irritably, she sat back, giggling, and her thighs were as bare as they had been before, from the tops of her unrolled stockings to the sweet curve of her buttocks, nestled against her black-stockinged heels. Her hair blew in her eyes, and she blew it out again, rolling her eyes.

Toward the end of our picnic, Lucy was already rubbing the skin above her stockings; she shifted her weight so that she could wriggle a finger under the wool, where the knot in the garter ribbon, above and behind her knee, rubbed her skin. Eliza had loosened the rug, stretching her legs out, and she did not seem to mind her sister's restless improprieties-- but she did seem to be sitting uncomfortably, adjusting her weight every few minutes; I imagined the heat building, in the darkness, in both of them, and I bided my time. Monsieur Orphe came over to us wiping his hands on his shirt, which he had removed, and I noted (with some annoyance) the frank fascination with which the girls stared at the sweat gleaming along his wiry shoulders, his thin, hard chest.

"We will not make it to the Ladysmith," he said.

"That's fine," I told him. "There's that nice spot beside Bookin's Water, only an hour or so away. The falls. Let's camp there for the night and make Lymond tomorrow."

He nodded, and all was in readiness.

I packed up the picnic things, as the sisters helped each other back into the carriage, as Orphe harnessed the horses. Eliza sat primly, not looking at me when I climbed into the carriage, but outside. Lucy sat close to her, leaning against her, her head resting on her Eliza's shoulder, her legs curled up beside her on the bench. I knelt before them.

"The seat can be adjusted," I said. I reached under the bench, brushing Eliza's calf as I did so; she jerked from my touch. I flipped the lever and pulled forward, and the bench reclined a little. "There," I said. "There are some cushions," I offered.

"Thank you," said Eliza. Lucy, sighing, snuggled more closely to her sister. I reached out to stroke Lucy's cheek, and she smiled; I stroked her lips with my thumb, and she kissed it, quickly, looking at me with her dusky blue eyes. Patience, I reminded myself. It is a virtue. I stretched out on my bench and settled down to bide my time, half-closing my eyes, folding my arms. The carriage lurched into motion.

Little things. Lucy, ever more irritated by her stockings, shifting her legs, finally untying the garters and rolling them down over her knees, rubbing at her skin. Eliza, reaching across to hold her hand a moment, stopping her. The third or fourth time this happened, Eliza did not take her hand away. And their fingers linked and interlaced, and Lucy pressed their joined hands against her thighs.

"I'm hot," she said.

"Shh," said Eliza.

Lucy pressed her nose against Eliza's shoulder. Eliza turned her head, pressed her lips against her sister's forehead. "Settle," she said. "Take a nap. Rest."

Lucy mumbled something, almost a whine. "I'm restless," she said.

"Shh," said Eliza.

Lucy unlaced her fingers, though Eliza's hand remained in her sister's lap. Lucy reached up and toyed with the buttons of Eliza's chemise. Eliza pushed the hand away, and it ended up in her lap. Lucy pouted.

"Don't," said Eliza.

"I'm itching," Lucy said. "I'm hot."

"Shh," said Eliza. "Don't."

I kept my eyes half-closed, still feigning sleep. Still biding my time.

"What did she mean," asked Lucy, in a whisper. "When she said 'honey.' "

"Don't ask," said Eliza.

"But," said Lucy, stirring a little, moving her hand higher along her sister's thigh.

"Stop," said Eliza.

"You're hot," said Lucy.

"Don't," said Eliza, sharply, knocking Lucy's hand from her lap, pulling her shoulder away from her sister. Lucy lay back, pouting.

"You mustn't talk of such things," said Eliza. "You mustn't do such things. They're indecent."

"But I'm so warm." Lucy pulled her knees up to her chest, and I saw her buttocks, her cunny, pink and open just a little, glistening in a pert pout. She tucked her chemise between her thighs, pulled it out, tucked it back again.

"Do sit still," said Eliza.

"I saw what you did this morning," said Lucy, wickedly. I, for my part, kept very still. Eliza said nothing.

"I said, I saw what you did this morning."

"I heard what you said."

"Was that what she was talking about?"

"Hush."

"Is that what you're supposed to show me?"

"You're not to speak of such things."

"Father let me--"

Eliza slapped Lucy, hard. Alarmed, Lucy sat silent, tears welling up in her eyes. Eliza stared at her, breathing heavily, a little wild-eyed. I managed not to leap up. Wait, I told myself. Bide your time. Let it unfold.

"I'm sorry. But you must never speak of such things. They aren't to happen. Do you understand?"

Lucy nodded, a tear trickling down by her nose. Eliza shifted closer to her, reaching out to pull Lucy to herself. She stroked Lucy's cheek, lifting her sister's face so that she could look into her eyes. "I'm sorry. There's too much to try to explain. You must trust me. Do you understand?"

And Lucy nodded, sniffing. Eliza leaned forward and kissed her forehead.

I knew how they were feeling, then. St. Jane had settled into their bellies, and reached out its seductive warmth through their veins; their fingertips tingled, the air smelt sharper, they felt flushes running along the skin of their thighs, the small of their backs, their necks, cheeks, throats. Sweat slicked the skin behind their knees, and trickled down their wool stockings. Their nipples engorged, rubbing almost painfully against their linen garments. And their cunnies enflamed, raging, weeping almost between their thighs.

So it was not a surprise to me, then--though it surprised them both, indeed--that when Eliza pulled back from kissing her sister, Lucy sighed, and Eliza froze for a moment, her lips parted slightly, and Lucy looked up and suddenly pressed her mouth to her sister's, in a quick kiss that was over almost before it began.

"Lucy," said Eliza.

"Please," said Lucy. "You've told me."

"Lucy, we can't."

"Please. I wanted to. I want to. I liked it."

"Lucy. It's wrong."

"You've told me. You've done it. I saw you, this morning."

"Not with you. I can't. It's wrong."

"Why!"

Slowly, Eliza leaned down and kissed her sister, a longer kiss, soft, tender. Lucy clenched her hands into little fists.

"Because," said Eliza. "You are my sister, and it would be wrong."

She stroked Lucy's cheek, and Lucy looked down, and then reached out and brushed Eliza's bare thigh. Eliza said nothing, but kept stroking Lucy's cheek. Slowly, deliberately, Lucy slipped her hand along Eliza's skin, under her chemise, lifting it, until she held Eliza's hip. And then back down again, and across to the other thigh, both pressed tightly together.

"Please," said Lucy.

Eliza shifted her weight a little. Lucy brushed her hand up again, lifting the chemise, her fingertips brushing Eliza's belly, and I could see the pale golden thatch of Eliza's sex. And then down again. Eliza said nothing. Lucy brushed her sister's thighs again.

"We've never," said Lucy.

"It's wrong," said Eliza.

Lucy frowned at her, pouting, her eyes flashing at her sister. "I," she said, "don't care."

And she lunged forward to kiss her sister, gripping Eliza's shoulders as they toppled backwards, to one side, and Eliza did nothing, didn't push her away. Lucy crouched over her, straddling her, her sex hovering over Eliza's thighs, and her tangled hair fell over like a curtain as she lifted her mouth from her sister's. "Kiss me," she said.

"Lucy," said Eliza.

"Kiss me."

And Eliza did. She licked Lucy's lips, and Lucy opened her mouth, and their tongues played as their mouths crushed together. Lucy whimpered as Eliza shifted her legs, bringing them up, so that Lucy could rub her cunny against them. Eliza threw her arms around her sister, and pulled her down into a fierce embrace, as their kiss went on and on. Unnoticed, I sat up, opened my eyes, let their embrace stoke the fires building inside me.

A rough jostle of the carriage broke their embrace, sent Lucy rolling back against the cushions, gasping with sudden laughter, and as she sat up she tugged her chemise up and struggled out of it.

"Lucy!" said Eliza.

Lucy threw it behind her, stroking her skin, her small breasts. "Ohh," she said, "it feels so good..."

"Lucy," said Eliza, propping herself up on her elbows.

"You must take yours off. You must! I want to feel you against me. Your skin."

"We must stop this."

"No!" Lucy said, and she yanked at the throat of her sister's chemise, ripping a button free with her sudden vehemence. Eliza tried to pull back, but Lucy fumbled with the buttons, opening them all, pressing kisses to her sister's chest and throat. The straps fell from Eliza's shoulders, slipping down, baring her breasts, falling to her elbows, her waist.

"Lucy," said Eliza. "Please..."

Lucy licked at her ear.

"My titties," breathed Eliza. "Kiss them..."

And Lucy licked and kissed her way down from her ear to her sister's breast, kissing one, licking the skin along its slope, stroking the curve of it with one hand, reaching out with her tongue to take the nipple into her mouth, savoring it. Eliza shivered, then gasped, as Lucy squeezed her nipple between her lips.

"Oh, Lady," said Eliza. "Ow," she said.

"I'm sorry," said Lucy, breathlessly, but whatever hurt she'd done had already been forgotten, as Eliza pushed her sister away, briefly, wrestling her arms free from the straps of her chemise, letting it settle about her waist as grabbed her sister and pressed her close for another kiss, their arms pulling tight as if each was the only other thing in the world, their breasts pressing together, their stockinged knees and thighs bumping together as they tried to press closer, closer.

"Oh," said Lucy, between kisses. "Oh."

Somehow, I missed it, the moment Eliza's hand slipped between her sister's legs, the moment her finger slipped inside her sister. Lucy placed a hand against Eliza's shoulder, bracing herself, pulling back a little, arching her back, and she gasped, and I saw it then, Lucy's golden curls cupped in Eliza's palm as it undulated there, between her thighs.

"Oh," said Lucy. "Oh."

"Shh," said Eliza.

And they kissed again. And again.

I set aside my pen a moment, after writing that, walked to my window, looked out at the night, clear now, cloudless, the stars bright, the last few fireflies of summer busy at the bottom of the field. I feel I owe you some explanation, perhaps, for why I did what I did--whether you, oh reader, are my Queen, or a Brother in Codlatan. Why I took such delight in the corruption of these girls, drugging them, tricking them into each other's arms. For I almost quivered with it, watching them, watching Lucy taste her first kiss at her sister's lips, watching Eliza driven to it against her better judgment, caressing her sister, stroking her, lifting her to her first orgasm, and when it came, when she came, when Lucy cried out in excitement, her eyes wide open, when Eliza groaned, and hung her head, closing her eyes, her hand stilled between Lucy's thighs--I nearly came myself, just from the sight of it.I should have something to say, about why. I don't.

I stood then, trembling, undoing my weskit, opening my shirt. The sisters clung together, gasping. "Oh," said Lucy, "oh, I've never."

"Lucy," said Eliza. "Please."

"What," said Lucy.

"With your hand. No, there."

I knelt on the bench behind Lucy, pressing myself against her, my nipples, heavy with blood, brushing the skin of her back, and the touch thrilled her. "Oh," she moaned, leaning back against me, into my arms, "oh."

"Lucy," said Eliza, her voice weighted with desire thwarted, need frustrated.

I kissed Lucy's neck, and she turned her head to look at me, and I kissed her mouth, savoring the taste of her, delighting in the enthusiasm of her little tongue as it licked at my lips, my teeth, my own tongue. "Now, now," I murmured, shifting myself so that my trousered groin pressed against the small of her back, and her lips brushed my cheek as I felt for her hand, and she tried to kiss me again. "You've had yours," I said. "It's your sister's turn."

"Oh," said Eliza, seeing me for the first time, through the red film St. Jane leaves over one's eyes. "Oh, Lady."

My hand on Lucy's, I guided her between her sister's legs, and felt the heat of Eliza's sex there. "Gently," I said. "Stroke the lips. Like her mouth. Like your fingers were kissing her mouth."

"You're so hot," said Lucy, her voice filled with wonder. "So soft." She leaned forward and kissed her sister, gently, on the lips. Eliza's eyes were closed, and she did not move, but trembled slightly.

"Now," I said. "Gently." I cupped my hand under Lucy's, fitting my fingers to her, curling them up in mine. "Follow my finger." I extended my index finger, slightly curled, and felt her smaller finger crook against it. "Gently." Probing forward, unseen, between Eliza's spread thighs, I felt along the slick, wet lips of her sex. Eliza shuddered. "Please," she said.

"Like this," I said.

And pushing gently, we entered her, our two fingers sliding together, slowly, between the tight, hot walls of her cunny. Lucy gasped, to feel herself inside her sister. Eliza pressed her lips together, holding back a cry. And I smiled. "Hold still," I said. "We don't want to hurt her. I'm going to take my hand away--"

"No," said Eliza. She opened her eyes, and looked at me. "No."

"All right."

Lucy followed me as I rocked my hand back and forth, and our fingers moved slowly in and out of Eliza. She leaned forward, pressing a kiss to Lucy's mouth, then mine. Our tongues touched, and she breathed sharply.

"Careful," I said. "Feel with your thumb." I found Lucy's thumb, pressed against her sister's thigh, guided it along the lips of Eliza's sex. "There's a stiff little boatman down there, standing at attention."

"A boatman?" said Lucy, smiling. "Why is it called that?"

"I'll show you, later, perhaps," I said. "Do you feel him? Right there." Eliza's was small, but quite hard, swollen, perched atop her lips. Eliza started.

"So full," she moaned.

"I feel it!" cried Lucy, in delight.

"Stroke it," I said. "Gently. Be careful. Watch what it does to your sister."

Eliza's dew was running over my hand, and Lucy's hand, joined together. Lucy's finger pushed back and forth as her thumb stroked, inexpertly, perhaps, and I pressed my hand up to push our fingers against the top of Eliza's cunny. And Lucy watched, eyes wide, as Eliza squeezed her eyes shut, breathing quickly, "Who," she cried, "who, who, who..." And with a tremendous shudder, the warmth of St. Jane shaking through her, she came, came hard against our fingers, falling back against the cushions, her hips jerking, as Lucy fell against her, kissing her belly, her breasts, her throat.

"Oh," said Eliza. "Oh, Lucy. Don't."

"Lucy," I said. She looked up at me, and I beckoned her to me, and she fell into my arms as Eliza sat up, still panting, still trembling.

"Oh," said Lucy, "that was wonderful!" And we kissed, and kissed again, as her little fingers stroked my breasts. "I want to do that to you!"

I laughed. "In time," I said. "In time."

"We've stopped," said Eliza. And it was true. Sometime in our bucking about, the carriage had stopped. "Where," she said, and she swallowed, and sat up straighter, "where are we?"

"Somewhere safe. A few hours away yet from my house, where we will be staying." I held out my hand to her. After a moment, she took it. I pulled her to me, and held my girls close, stroking their hair, as Lucy's hand played with the buttons of my trousers, and Eliza rested her head against my shoulder. "We are together, now," I said. "Do you understand?"

"Can we do that again?" said Lucy.

"Of course," I said. "We can do it every day, if you like." She had worked open two of the buttons, and her little hand darted inside, her fingers feeling for my sex. "Gently," I said. "Carefully." I sighed, and kissed the top of Eliza's head. "Eliza? Do you understand?" I felt the heat of what little St. Jane I had imbibed--or the ghost of St. Jane-- ignite as Lucy's fingers fluttered between my lips.

"Yes," said Eliza, quietly, her breath stirring my nipple. "We're yours."

"And I," I said, as Lucy kissed my throat, "am yours. But most importantly, you have each other. Look at me, Eliza." She lifted her head, slowly. I stroked her chin, her throat, her breast. "Do you love your sister?"

She nodded.

"Do you?"

"Yes," she said, in a whisper.

"Would you want someone to come between you?" I asked.

"No," she said.

"I love you, 'Liza," said Lucy.

"And I will make sure that never happens. You are safe, with me," I said.

"Are we," she said, but Lucy had suddenly pulled her hand from my trousers and flung her arms about her sister, pressing kisses against her, and slowly, Eliza hugged her sister close, and returned her kisses.

I stood, undoing my trousers, sitting on the opposite bench to yank off my boots as the sisters, arms about each other, legs entwining, kissed and kissed, fingers tangled in each others' hair. Boots off, I stood up again to pull off my trousers. "Girls," I said. Lucy looked up, as Eliza kissed her cheek, her throat. "Pull off your stockings. We're going bathing."

And I threw open the carriage door.

Monsieur Orphe had parked the carriage in a small, steeply-sided bowl, with trees pressed close all about. The horses had been led away, to the field above, no doubt. Bookin's Water fell over the lip of the bowl in a small but lively waterfall, filling the bottom of the bowl with a deep, cool pool of water, hidden away from the road, a quarter of a mile distant. Lucy cheered, and began undoing the ribbon holding her stockings up, and Eliza sat up, and after a moment, struggled to lift her chemise up and over her head. Naked, we three stepped out of the carriage, looked at each other, breathed in the soft, warm twilight air; then with a whoop Lucy leaped into the pool, followed by me, followed by Eliza.

Lucy and I splashed into the deep water, floating above the rocky bottom, and she swam up to me, kissing me, then swam over to her sister, crouching by the shore, and kissed her. As she pulled Eliza deeper into the pool, I splashed out, went back to the carriage, and found my small bag of soaps, little cakes scented with orange peel.

"Here," I said, throwing them cakes. They broke their embrace, and, delighting in the smell, began to lather up the soap. "Wash each other's backs," I said. "It's more fun, with two."

And Lucy began to scrub her sister's back, and Eliza's hands fell still, as Lucy's traveled over her back, her buttocks, her thighs, around to her belly, up to her breasts. Lucy pressed close to her sister, and Eliza turned her head, and they shared a long, deep kiss, as I sat in the shallows, soap forgotten, and watched. Their blond hair, darkened by water, pressed against their skulls, their necks, the curves of their bare backs, still gleamed in the late light. Their pale skin shone over the dark, cool water.

Their kiss broke off, slowly, lingering. Lucy whispered something in her sister's ear, and Eliza nodded. Lucy pushed away from her sister and began to swim towards me, and Eliza slowly followed.

"It's your turn," said Lucy.

"Is it," I said.

"Your hair," she said, pointing to my sex. "It's white."

"Yes," I said.

"Is it because you're old?"

"No," I said. I smiled.

She reached out, brushed my thatch with her fingers. "Why is it called a boatman?" she asked.

"I'll show you. Kneel down." She did. I spread the lips of my sex for her. Behind me, Eliza waded up, and began to soap my back. She pressed her lips, cold with the chilly water, against my shoulder."Look," I said to Lucy. "Come close. It won't bite."

She giggled, and pressed her fingers against my thigh.

"Do you see how it comes together, like the prow of a boat?"

She nodded.

"Closer," I said. "Look closer. Hold the lips open with your fingers."

She pressed closer, her fingers fumbling with my sex, baring it to the evening air, her breath against it, sharp, sending thrills through my legs, my belly. Eliza's hands cupped my buttocks, kneading them, her fingers slick with soap against my skin, as her nipples, her breasts pressed against my back, and she kissed my neck.

"Do you see him?" I asked Lucy. "The little red man, standing there in the prow of the boat?"

She nodded.

"Lick him," I said. "Taste him. Kiss him."

She did, and I closed my eyes.

Lucy didn't need to be told; I braced myself as her fingers spread me, and as she sipped at my honey, tasting it for the first time, she licked down, then up again, from cunny to boatman, her chin pressing into me as she kissed me again and again. Eliza's fingers slipped between my buttocks, slick with soap, and I felt her fingertip suddenly pressing against the button of my arse. I gasped. Lucy feasted on me, grunting with her effort in digging as deeply into me as she could, and Eliza splashed cold water against me, washing away the soap, and I groaned. And then Eliza knelt behind me, and I felt the warmth of her breath against the chilled flesh of my buttocks, and though I would never have expected her to have known of it, she spread them, and her tongue licked out to find my arse, and then her finger, pressing inside, slipping in as far as the first joint as her lips pressed kisses against my buttocks, my thighs. Oh, Lady, Lucy before me, and Eliza behind, their mouths busy, fingers slipping in and out of me, and I could not hold back any longer. I threw my head back, crying out, coming again and again.

And when we retired to the carriage, wrapped in rugs to stay warm, we fell asleep in each other's arms, and I was awakened early in the morning by Lucy's soft cries, as Eliza licked and ate her up from sleep.

So much more than my notes about how far I went, and where I camped; what was eaten from stores; where I found a good claret, and a reminder to find some new St. Jane's wort. Not that I think I will have need of it, any longer.

Too many kisses to set down on paper, perhaps; so much of my life has been filled with moments like these, and women like my girls (though none, really, were so beautiful). But I must try. Where else is there to be a record of it? Not in my abbreviated notes, in my journals. Not written anywhere at all. Not even spoken of, expect late at night, on pillows. My Queen and I, lying together, would laugh quietly over how young Anne of Curwen cried out when the dusting of St. Jane, pressed against the lips of her cunny, filled her belly with liquid fire, and of how my tongue, and the Queen's, had quenched that fire with more pleasurable kisses than she had ever known. Nothing else. Nowhere else.

How better then, to spend my last days, than in recording this shadow life? Calling up the ghosts of old loves, pleasant times, setting them down, building a scaffolding of words to try and hold their memory fast to something when I'm gone. --Even if it is just the smoke that will rise when this parchment is burned. (Unless I've written so well, called up the beauties of my girls, and my Molly, before your eye so that you spare this page, hiding it away in the rumored library of banned books, buried deep beneath the cathedral in Cydonia. Have I? --But I will never know. So much the better.)

There are, of course, other divertissements. I must exercise my fingers, cramped from holding the pen so long. Shall I throw off my pyjamas, slip naked between my cool sheets, ring for Clarissa, and surprise her by flinging off the bedclothes at an opportune moment?

Perhaps.

Tomorrow, then, I shall begin to write.