The Serpent Prince (23 page)

“What are you doing here?” Simon couldn’t help it; the words came out a hiss.

Lucy
here,
her hair undone, her face ghastly white. She clutched her cloak to herself, shoulders hunched, huddling, the fingers under her chin bluish with cold.

She looked as if she’d seen a horror.

He glanced down. Walker’s body lay at his feet like a bloody prize. There was a gaping hole where his eye had been, and his mouth sagged open, life no longer holding it shut. The doctor and seconds had backed away as if they were afraid to deal with the corpse while its killer still stood over it.
Jesus God.

She
had
seen a horror.

She’d seen him fight for his life, seen him kill a man by running him through the eye, seen the blood spurt. He was covered in gore, his own and the other man’s.
Jesus God.
No wonder she looked at him like he was a monster. He was. He could hide it no longer. He had nowhere to turn. He’d never wanted her to see this. Never wanted her to know he—

“What are you doing here?” he shouted, to make her back down, to drown out the chant in his mind.

She stood firm, his angel, even in the face of a screaming, bloodied madman. “What have you done?”

He blinked. Raised his hand, still clutching the sword. There were wet, reddish stains on the blade. “What have I . . .” He laughed.

She flinched.

His throat was raw, aching with tears, but he laughed. “I’ve avenged my brother.”

She looked down at Walker’s ruined face. Shuddered. “How many men have you killed for your brother?”

“Four.” He closed his eyes, but he still saw their faces against his eyelids. “I thought four was all. I thought I was done, but I’m told there is a fifth.”

She shook her head. “No.”

“Yes.” He didn’t know why he continued. “There will be another.”

She pressed her lips together, whether to hold back a sob or to contain her revulsion, he did not know. “You can’t do this, Simon.”

He pretended stupidity, though he wanted to sob. “Can’t? I’ve already done it, Lucy. I’m still doing it.” He spread his arms wide. “Who is there to stop me?”

“You can stop yourself.” Her voice was low.

His arms dropped. “But I won’t.”

“You will destroy yourself.”

“I am already destroyed.” And he knew, deep, deep in his blackened soul that he spoke the truth.

“Vengeance is for the Lord.”

So calm. So sure.

He sheathed his sword, still bloody. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Simon.”

“If vengeance is for the Lord, then why does England have courts of law? Why do we hang murderers every day?”

“You aren’t a court of law.”

“No.” He laughed. “A court of law wouldn’t touch them.”

She closed her eyes as if weary. “Simon, you can’t just take it upon yourself to kill men.”

“They murdered Ethan.”

“It’s wrong.”

“My
brother,
Ethan.”

“You’re sinning.”

“Would you have me sit back and let them savor their kill?” he whispered.

“Who are you?” Her eyes snapped open, and her voice held a hysterical edge. “Do I even know who you are?”

He stepped over Walker’s battered corpse and grabbed her by the shoulders, leaned down so that his no-doubt foul breath washed over her face. “I am your husband, my lady.”

She turned her face away from him.

He shook her. “The one you promised to obey always.”

“Simon—”

“The one you said you’d cleave to, forsaking all others.”

“I—”

“The one you make love to at night.”

“I don’t know if I can live with you anymore.” The words were a whisper, but they rang in his head like a death knell.

Overwhelming fear froze his gut. He jerked her body tight against his own and ground his mouth down on hers. He tasted blood—either hers or his, it didn’t matter and he didn’t care. He would not—
could
not—let her go. Simon raised his head and stared her in the eye. “Then it’s too bad you no longer have a choice.”

Her hand trembled as she wiped a smear of blood from her mouth. He wanted to do it for her, wanted to say he was sorry. But she’d probably bite his fingers right now, and the words wouldn’t come anyway. So he simply watched her. She pulled her soiled cloak together and turned and walked away. He watched as she made her way across the green. She climbed into the carriage and drove off.

Only then did he pick up his coat and mount his horse. The London streets had filled with people going about their business. Costermongers with carts, urchins on foot, lords and ladies in carriages and riding horses, shopkeepers and whores. A mass of breathing beings starting a new day.

But Simon rode apart.

Death had taken him into the company of the damned, and his bond with the rest of humanity was broken.

“Did you do it?” In contrast to his appearance, Christian’s voice was low, almost calm.

“Do what?”

“Did you kill Ethan Iddesleigh?”

Sir Rupert sat back down. If he could, he would’ve lied; he made no bones about it. He’d found that deception was often the best way. More often than not, people wanted to be lied to; they didn’t like the truth. How else to explain why they fell for lies so quickly? But his son’s face showed that he already knew the truth. His question was rhetorical.

“Shut the door,” Sir Rupert said.

Christian blinked, then did as ordered. “My God. Did you, Father?”

“Sit down.”

His son slumped into a carved and gilded chair. His ginger hair was matted with sweat, and his face shone greasily. But it was his tired expression that bothered Sir Rupert. When had his son’s face become lined?

Sir Rupert spread his hands. “Ethan Iddesleigh was a problem. He had to be removed.”

“Dear God,” Christian groaned. “Why? Tell me why you would kill a man.”

“I didn’t kill him,” he said irritably. “Do you think your father so foolish? I simply arranged for his death. I was involved in a business venture with Ethan Iddesleigh. It consisted of myself, Lord Walker—”

“Peller, James, and Hartwell,” Christian interrupted. “Yes, I know.”

Sir Rupert frowned. “Then why do you ask, if you know already?”

“I only know what Simon has told me, and that has been precious little.”

“Simon Iddesleigh was no doubt prejudiced in his account, however small it was,” Sir Rupert said. “The facts are these: We had invested in tea and stood to lose everything. We all agreed to a course of recovery. All, that is, but Ethan. He—”

“This is about money?”

Sir Rupert looked at his son. Christian wore an embroidered silk coat that would provide food and shelter for a laborer’s family for the better part of a season. He sat in a gilt-painted chair a king wouldn’t be ashamed to own, in a house on one of the best streets of London.

Had he any idea at all? “Of course it’s about money, dammit. What did you think it was about?”

“I—”

Sir Rupert slammed the flat of his hand down on his desk. “When I was your age, I worked from before the sun rose until past dark of night. There were days that I fell asleep over my supper, my head on a plank table. Do you think I would ever go back to that?”

“But to kill a man over gold, Father.”

“Don’t you sneer at gold!” Sir Rupert’s voice rose on the last word. He brought it under control again. “Gold is the reason you have no need to labor as your grandfather did. As I did.”

Christian ran a hand through his hair. He seemed dazed. “Ethan Iddesleigh was married with a little daughter.”

“Think you I would choose his daughter over mine?”

“I—”

“We would’ve lost the house.”

Christian looked up.

“Yes.” Sir Rupert nodded. “It was as bad as that. We would’ve had to retire to the country. Your sisters would’ve lost their seasons. You would’ve had to give up that new carriage I’d bought you. Your mother would’ve had to sell her jewels.”

“Were our finances so dire?”

“You have no idea. You get your quarterly allowance and never think where it comes from, do you?”

“Surely there are investments—”

“Yes, investments!” Sir Rupert pounded on the desk again. “What do you think I’m talking about? This was an investment—an investment upon which our entire future depended. And Ethan Iddesleigh, who never had to work a day in his life, who had his entire fortune handed to him on a silver platter when he was but a babe, wanted to stand on principle.”

“What principle?” Christian asked.

Sir Rupert breathed heavily. His leg was hurting like the very devil and he needed a drink. “Does it matter? We were on the brink of destruction. Our
family,
Christian.”

His son merely stared at him.

“I told the others that if we got rid of Iddesleigh, we could go ahead. It was a short step from there to getting Iddesleigh to call out Peller. They dueled and Peller won.” He leaned forward and pinned his son with his gaze. “We won. Our family was saved. Your mother never even knew how close we’d come to losing it all.”

“I don’t know.” Christian shook his head. “I don’t know if I can accept that you saved us this way and left Ethan Iddesleigh’s daughter fatherless.”

“Accept?” A muscle in his leg spasmed. “Don’t be a fool. Do you want your mother in rags? Me in the poorhouse? Your sisters taking in washing? Principles are all well and fine, lad, but they don’t put food in your mouth, do they?”

“No.” But his son looked doubtful.

“You are as much a part of this as I am.” Sir Rupert fumbled in his waistcoat pocket before rolling the ring across the table at his son.

Christian picked it up. “What’s this?”

“Simon Iddesleigh’s ring. James had it taken from him when his thugs almost killed him.”

His son raised incredulous eyes at him.

Sir Rupert nodded. “Keep it. It will remind you of whose side you stand on and what a man must do for his family.”

He’d raised Christian to be a gentleman. He’d wanted his son to feel at home in the aristocracy, to never fear that he’d make a faux pas and give away his plebeian origins—as he himself had feared as a young man. But in giving him this confidence, this assurance that he need not worry about finances, had he weakened his son?

Christian stared at the ring. “He killed Walker this morning.”

Sir Rupert shrugged. “It was only a matter of time.”

“And now he’ll come after you.”

“What?”

“He knows about you. Walker told him that you were the fifth man.”

Sir Rupert swore.

“What are you going to do?” His son pocketed the ring.

“Nothing.”

“Nothing? What do you mean? He’s tracked down the others and forced them to call him out. He’ll do the same to you.”

“I doubt it.” Sir Rupert limped around the desk, leaning heavily on his cane. “No, I sincerely doubt it.”

“Do you care?” He set a candelabra on a table and shrugged off his coat. The blue silk was gray in places, and she saw at least one tear.

She tamped down her anger. It wouldn’t help right now. “Yes, I care.” And it was true. No matter what, she loved him and cared about him and what he did.

He didn’t reply but sat down on a chair by the fire and removed his boots. He stood again and took off his wig, placing it on a stand. Rubbing both hands vigorously over his head, he made the short hair stand on end.

“I was about.” He stripped off his waistcoat, throwing it on a chair. “Went ’round the Agrarians’. Looked at a bookstore.”

“You didn’t go hunting for Mr. Fletcher’s father?” That had been her fear all this time. That he was off making the arrangements for another duel.

He glanced at her, then stripped off his shirt. “No. I like to take a day of rest between my slaughters.”

“It’s not funny,” she whispered.

“No, it’s not.” In only his breeches, he poured out a basin of water and washed.

She watched him from the bed. Her heart ached. How could this man, moving so wearily yet gracefully, have killed another human this morning? How could she be married to him? How could she still care for him?

“Can you explain it to me?” she asked softly.

He hesitated, one arm raised. Then he washed under his arm and along that side as he spoke. “They were a group of investors: Peller, Hartwell, James, Walker, and Ethan, my brother.” He dipped the cloth he used in the basin, wrung it out, and rubbed his neck. “And apparently Christian’s father as well. Sir Rupert Fletcher.” His eyes met hers as if he expected an objection.

She made none.

He continued. “They bought a shipment of Indian tea together. Not just one, but several shiploads. Hell, a bloody fleet, as if they were merchant princes. The price of tea was rising, and they stood to make a fortune each. Easily. Quickly.” He moved the cloth across his chest in circles, wiping away blood and sweat and dirt.

She watched him and listened and made no sound, fearful of interrupting this story. But inside she was quaking. She felt pulled to the man washing himself so mundanely, despite the blood, and at the same time, was repelled by the stranger who had killed a man just this morning.

Simon splashed water on his face. “The only risk was the ships sinking at sea or wrecking in a storm, but that’s a risk any investor takes. They probably thought about it a minute and discounted it. After all, there was so much money to be made.” He looked at the basin of scummy water, emptied it into a slops jar, and refilled it.

“But Ethan, always correct Ethan, talked them into taking out insurance against the ships and the arrival of the tea. It was expensive, but he said it was the smart thing to do. The responsible thing to do.” He ducked his head into the basin and sluiced the water over his hair.

She waited until he’d palmed the water from his hair and straightened. “What happened?”

“Nothing.” He shrugged and picked up a cloth and toweled his clean hair. “The weather was fine, the ships fit, and, I suppose, the crew competent. The first ship arrived in port without problem.”

“And?”

He spent some time carefully folding the towel before laying it beside the basin. “The price of tea had fallen in the meantime. Not just fallen, but plummeted. It was one of those quirks of the market that they couldn’t have foreseen. There was a sudden glut of tea. Their tea wasn’t worth the cost of unloading the crates from the ship.” He walked into the next room, his dressing room.

“So the investors lost their money?” she called.

“They would’ve.” He returned with a razor. “But then they remembered the insurance. The insurance that Ethan had made them take out. So ridiculous at the time and their only hope now. If they sank the ships, they could recoup their loss.”

She frowned. “But Ethan . . .”

He nodded and pointed the razor at her. “But Ethan was the most honorable man I ever knew. The most honest. The most sure of himself and his morals. He refused. Damn the loss of money, damn their anger, damn the possibility of ruin, he would not take part in a fraud.” He soaped his face.

Lucy thought about Ethan’s honesty—how naive he must have been and how hard for a man like Simon to live up to. Simon’s voice was flat. Perhaps to someone else he would sound unemotional, but she was the woman who cared for him, and she heard the pain under the words. And the anger.

Simon set the edge of the razor against his throat and made the first stroke. “They determined that they must get rid of Ethan. Without him, they could wreck the ships and recover; with him, all was lost. But it’s not so easy to kill a viscount, is it? So they spread bloody, bloody rumors that were impossible to disprove, impossible to fight.” He wiped the lather from his razor onto a cloth.

“Rumors about him?” Lucy whispered.

“No.” He stared down at the razor in his hand as if he’d forgotten what it was. “About Rosalind.”

“What?”

“About Rosalind’s virtue. About Pocket’s birth.”

“But Pocket looks just like you . . .” She trailed away, the implication hitting her.
Oh, dear Lord.

“Exactly. Just like me.” His lips twisted. “They called Rosalind a whore, said I’d debauched her, that Pocket was a bastard and Ethan a cuckold.”

She must’ve gasped.

He turned to her, his eyes pained, his voice finally strained. “Why do you think we haven’t attended any London balls or parties or damned musicales, for God’s sake? Rosalind’s reputation was ruined. Absolutely ruined. She hasn’t been invited anywhere in three years. An impeccably virtuous lady and she was cut dead on the street by married women who’d had too many liaisons to count.”

Lucy didn’t know what to say. What an awful thing to do to a family, to do to brothers.
Poor, poor Rosalind.

Simon took a deep breath. “They left him no choice. He called out Peller, the one they’d chosen to talk the loudest. Ethan had never fought a duel, barely knew how to hold the sword. Peller killed him in less than a minute. Like leading a lamb to slaughter.”

She drew in her breath. “Where were you?”

“Italy.” He raised the razor again. “Seeing the ruins and drinking.”
Stroke.
“And wenching, I’ll admit as well.”
Wipe.
“I didn’t know until a letter was sent. Ethan, steady, boring Ethan—Ethan the good son—my brother, Ethan had been killed in a duel. I thought it was a joke; I came home anyway.”
Stroke.
“I’d wearied of Italy by that time. Fine wine or no, there are only so many ruins one can see. I rode to the Iddesleigh family estate and . . .”

He took some time wiping the blade this time. His gaze was averted from hers, but she could see his Adam’s apple move as he swallowed.

“It was winter and they’d preserved his body for my return. Couldn’t hold the funeral without me, it seems. Not that there were many mourners waiting, only Rosalind, nearly prostrate with shock and grief, and Pocket and the priest. No one else was there. They’d been shunned. Ruined.” He looked up at her, and she noticed that he’d cut himself under the left earlobe. “They did more than just kill him, Lucy, they destroyed his name. Destroyed Rosalind’s reputation. Destroyed Pocket’s hopes of ever marrying well, although she’s too young to know that yet.” He frowned and finished shaving without saying anything else.

Lucy watched him. What was she to do? She could understand his reasons for wanting vengeance only too well. If someone had done such a wrong to David, her brother, or to Papa, she, too, would seethe with indignation. But that still didn’t make killing right. And what of the cost to Simon, in both body and soul? He couldn’t have fought all those duels without losing a part of himself. Could she simply sit by while he annihilated himself in vengeance for a dead brother?

He washed his face and dried it off and then walked to where she sat. “May I join you?”

Did he think she’d refuse him? “Yes.” She scooted backward to make room.

He shucked his breeches and blew out the candle. She felt the bed dip as he climbed in. She waited, but he didn’t move toward her. Finally she rolled against him. He hesitated, then put his arm around her.

“You never finished the fairy tale you were telling me,” she whispered against his chest.

She felt his sigh. “Do you really want to hear it?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Very well, then.” His voice floated to her in the dark. “As you recall, Angelica wished for another dress even more beautiful than the first. So the Serpent Prince showed her a sharp silver dagger and bade her cut off his right hand.”

Lucy shivered; she’d forgotten that part.

“The goat girl did as he told her, and a silver dress trimmed with hundreds of opals appeared. It looked like moonlight.” He stroked her hair. “And she went off and had a jolly good time at the ball with pretty Prince Rutherford and returned late—”

“But what about the Serpent Prince?” she interrupted. “Wasn’t he in great pain?”

His hand paused. “Of course.” He resumed stroking. “But it was what Angelica wanted.”

“What a selfish girl.”

“No. Just poor and alone. She couldn’t help demanding beautiful clothes any more than the snake could help having scales. It’s simply the way God made them.”

“Hmm.” Lucy wasn’t convinced.

“Anyway.” He patted her shoulder. “Angelica returned and told the Serpent Prince all about the ball and pretty Rutherford and how everyone admired her gown, and he listened silently and smiled at her.”

“And I suppose the next evening she wanted a new dress for silly Rutherford.”

“Yes.”

He stopped and she listened to his breathing in the darkness for a few minutes.

“Well?” she prompted.

“But of course it must be even more beautiful than the last.”

“Of course.”

He squeezed her shoulder. “The Serpent Prince said nothing was easier. He could get her the most beautiful dress she’d ever seen, the most beautiful dress in the world.”

Lucy hesitated. This didn’t sound good for some reason. “She must cut off his other hand?”

“No.” He sighed wistfully in the dark. “His head.”

Lucy jerked back. “That’s awful!”

She felt his shrug. “The most beautiful dress, the ultimate sacrifice. The Serpent Prince knelt before the goat girl and presented his neck. Angelica was appalled, of course, and she did hesitate, but she was in love with Prince Rutherford. How else could a goat girl win a prince? In the end, she did as the Serpent Prince instructed and cut off his head.”

Lucy bit her lip. She felt like weeping over this foolish fairy tale. “But he comes alive again, doesn’t he?”

“Hush.” His breath brushed across her face. He must’ve turned his head toward her. “Do you want to hear the story or not?”

“Do.” She snuggled against him again and was still.

“This time the dress was truly magnificent. It was made all of silver with diamonds and sapphires strewn over it so that Angelica looked as if she were wearing light itself. Prince Rutherford was overcome with ardor or perhaps greed when he caught sight of her and immediately fell to his knees and proposed.”

Lucy waited, but he was silent. She poked him in the shoulder. “Then what happened?”

“That’s it. They married and lived happily ever after.”

“That can’t be the end. What about the Serpent Prince?”

She felt him turn toward her. “He died, remember? I suppose Angelica shed a few tears for him, but he was a snake, after all.”

“No.” She knew she was foolish to object—it was only a fairy tale—but she felt unreasonably mad at him. “He’s the hero of the story. He transformed himself into a man.”

“Yes, but he’s still part snake.”

“No! He’s a prince.” She knew somehow that what they were arguing about had nothing to do with the fairy tale. “That’s what the story’s called,
The Serpent Prince.
He should marry Angelica; he loved her, after all.”

“Lucy.” He gathered her into his arms, and she let him even though she was angry with him. “I’m sorry, angel, but that’s the fairy tale.”

“He doesn’t deserve to die,” she said. Tears pricked at her eyes.

“Does anyone? Whether he deserves it or not is neither here nor there; it’s simply his fate. You can no more change that than you can change the course of the stars.”

The tears had escaped and were rolling into her hair and, she very much feared, his chest. “But the fate of a man. That can be changed.”

“Can it?” he asked so low she almost didn’t hear.

She couldn’t answer, so she closed her eyes and tried to contain the sobs. And she prayed,
Please, God, let a man be able to change his fate.