Duke of Midnight

Maximus rose and stepped over to the mare. She’d stopped thrashing and lay, her great sides heaving. Her right front foreleg was held oddly, either broken or very badly hurt. An ugly hole marred the mare’s smooth chocolate hide at her chest, and her mane trailed, wet with blood, on the cobblestones. For a moment he saw his mother’s hair trailing bloodily in the wet street channel.

He shook his head and stepped closer. Cowslip rolled her eye as he neared, afraid and hurt.

He drew his short sword.

Maximus knelt, covered her eye, and slit her throat.

Chapter Eighteen

Lin screamed as the red-hot coal singed her palms, but she did not let go of Tam. King Herla flinched at her cry and made as if to tear the burning coal from her hands.

“No!” Lin said, holding the burning coal away from the king. “He is my brother and I must save both him and me.”

At her words his eyes saddened, but he nodded and withdrew his hand.

And the cock crowed.…

—from The Legend of the Herla King

Artemis woke in the early hours of morning to the sound of splashing. She rolled over in Maximus’s great bed and saw him standing by his dresser lit by a single candle. He was bare to the waist and splashing water on his chest and hands… water that was running down his chest in red rivulets.

She sat up. “You’re hurt.”

He paused, then continued sluicing himself, apparently without regard for his carpet. “No.”

She frowned. Something was the matter, he was too quiet. “Then whose blood is that?”

He looked at his dripping hands. “Captain Trevillion’s and a horse named Cowslip.”

She blinked, wondering if she’d heard right. But as she stared at him he said nothing more. She wrapped her arms around her bent knees. She remembered, vaguely, meeting the dragoon captain years ago in St. Giles. He’d seemed a stern man. She shivered. “Is Captain Trevillion dead?”

“No,” he whispered. “No, but he’s very badly injured.”

“What happened?”

“I found him.”

“Who?”

He finally looked up at that, and though his face was drawn, his eyes burned. “Old Scratch. The man who killed my parents.”

She let out a sigh. “Then you captured him?”

“No.” He threw down a washcloth he’d been using and braced his arms on the dresser. “We chased Old Scratch to the Seven Dials pillar in St. Giles. There he shot Trevillion’s horse and the horse fell on the captain.”

Artemis drew in a breath. Such accidents happened and they could easily be fatal to the rider. “But you said he’s alive.”

Maximus at last looked at her. “His leg is badly broken. I had to put down the horse and then I brought Trevillion here.”

Artemis began to rise. “Does he need nursing?”

“Yes, but I’ve seen to that.” Maximus held up his hand, forestalling her. “I sent for my doctor as soon as I arrived. He set the leg as best he could. He wanted to take it off, but I forbade it.” Maximus winced. “The leg is bandaged and the doctor says if it doesn’t putrefy Trevillion may live. I have one of the footmen sitting with him. There’s nothing more to be done tonight.”

Artemis stared. She was half on, half off the bed, stopped by his command. “But the captain may still die?”

Maximus turned away. “Yes.”

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered.

He nodded as he stripped his breeches off. “I’ve lost my only ally.”

She looked at him sharply. “And a friend, I think.”

He paused for a split second before he began unbuttoning his smalls. “That, too.”

“Will you send more soldiers out to capture Old Scratch?”

He kicked off his smalls and straightened, nude. “I’ll go after him myself.”

“But…” She frowned, glancing away from his distracting body. “Wouldn’t it be better to have help?”

He threw back his head and barked with laughter. “Better, yes, but I have no one to ask for help.”

She stared. “Why not? You mentioned before the two other boys—men now—that you trained with. Surely one of them—”

He made a cutting motion with the blade of his hand. “They’ve left off dressing as the Ghost.”

“Then someone else. You’re the Duke of Wakefield.”

He shook his head impatiently. “This is a dangerous chase—”

“Yes, it is,” she interrupted. “I can see the bruises on your ribs and you have a cut on your shoulder.”

“All the more reason to do this by myself,” he said. “I don’t want anyone else hurt in my service.”

“Maximus,” she said softly, trying to understand, trying to find what would move him. “Why must you do this at all? If he’s a highwayman the soldiers will capture and hang him sooner or—”

He whirled, sudden and violent, and kicked one of the chairs in front of the fireplace. It flew across the room and hit the wall, splintering. He stood, chest heaving, and stared at the battered chair, though she very much doubted he saw it.

“Maximus?”

“I killed them.” His voice was raw.

“I don’t understand.”

“On the night they were murdered. It was because of me that they were in St. Giles.” He finally looked up, his eyes dry and stark and so wounded she wanted to cry the tears he couldn’t.

Instead she lifted her chin and commanded, “Tell me.”

“We were at the theater that night.” He held her eyes as if afraid to look away. “Only Father, Mother, and I, for Hero was too young and Phoebe was just a baby. It was something of a privilege for me—I wasn’t that long out of a governess’s care. I remember we saw King Lear and I was dreadfully bored, but I didn’t want to show it, for I knew it would make me seem naïve and young. Afterward, we got in the carriage, and I don’t know how, I can’t remember, though I’ve been over and over it in my mind, but Father was talking about guns. I’d received a pair of fowling pieces for my birthday, and I’d taken them out and shot some birds in the garden in London the week before, and he’d been quite angered. I’d thought he was done scolding me, but it came up again and this time he said he’d take my guns away from me until I learned to handle them properly. I was surprised and angered and I shouted at him.”

He inhaled sharply as if he couldn’t catch his breath.

“I shouted at my father. I called him a bastard, and my mother began to weep and then to my horror I felt tears at my own eyes. I was fourteen and the thought of crying in front of my father was too terrible to bear. I threw open the carriage door and ran out. Father must’ve stopped the carriage then and come after me, and I suppose Mother followed. I ran and ran. I didn’t know where we were, and I didn’t much care, but the houses were tumbling down and I could smell spilled gin and corruption. I heard my father’s shouts as he neared, and in a moment of malicious stupidity I ducked around a corner, behind some barrels—gin barrels—and hid. The smell of gin was overwhelming, filling my nostrils, my lungs, my head until I wanted to vomit. I heard a shot.”

He stopped, his mouth opening wide, as if he were screaming, but no sound emerged.

He bared his teeth and flung back his head, still holding her gaze with those awful eyes. “I peered around the barrel and my father… my father…” He closed his eyes and opened them again as if unable to look away. “He saw me, as he lay there with the blood upon his chest. He saw me hiding and he… he moved his head, just a bit, in a small shake, and he smiled at me. And then the highwayman shot my mother.”

He gulped. “I don’t remember what happened then. I’m told they found me over my parents. All I recall is the stink of gin. That and the blood in my mother’s hair.”

He looked down at his hands, fisting them and opening his fingers again as if they were foreign appendages.

He glanced up at her and somehow he’d come back to himself, contained all that terrible sorrow and anger and fear, enough to make ten strong men fall down like babes. Maximus held it all inside of him and straightened his shoulders, his chin level, and Artemis couldn’t understand it—where he got the strength to hide that awful, bloody wound in his soul—but she admired him for it.

Admired him and loved him.

She felt an answering wound open within her own soul, a kind of faint reflection of all the pain he’d endured, just because she cared for him.

“So you see,” he said quietly, in full possession of himself, even standing completely naked. He was the Duke of Wakefield now as much as when his stood and gave a speech in the House of Lords. “I have to do it myself. Because I caused their deaths, I have to avenge them—and my honor.”

She held out her hands to him, and he approached the bed and sank to one knee before her. “Can you look at me now, knowing what kind of coward I am?”

“My darling,” she said, cupping his face in her hands, “You are the bravest man I know. You were but a boy, then, surely someone else has told you this?”

“I was the Marquess of Brayston, even then.”

“You were a child,” she said. “A willful, silly child who lost his temper. Your father didn’t blame you. He protected you as he lay dying, telling you not to leave your hiding place. Think, Maximus. If you had a child—a son—wouldn’t you give your life for his? Wouldn’t you be glad, even if you died, that he lived?”

He closed his eyes and laid his head in her lap. She ran her palms over his head, feeling the soft bristles beneath her fingers.

After a while she bent and softly kissed his forehead. “Come to bed.”

He rose then and climbed beneath the sheets, pulling her close. She faced away from him, his heavy arm across her waist, and stared into the darkness and waited for sleep.

“YOUR GRACE.”

For a moment, as Maximus swam to consciousness, he thought he’d imagined Craven’s voice. He blinked. Craven was hovering next to his bed.

“Craven,” he said stupidly. “You’re back.”

Craven arched an eyebrow, looking miffed. “I never went away, Your Grace.”

Maximus winced. By the amount of “Your Grace’s” Craven was tossing around, he was still on the outs with his valet. “I didn’t see you about the house.”

“Your Grace doesn’t know all that goes on in this house,” Craven pointed out acidly. “There is a gentleman waiting for you downstairs. He says his name is Alderney.”

“Alderney? At this hour?”

Craven raised both eyebrows at once. “It’s just before noon, Your Grace.”

“Oh.” Maximus sat up, careful not to disturb Artemis. His mind felt muddy, but whatever Alderney had come for must be important.

“I’ve provided your visitor with luncheon and he seems quite content, so I believe you have time to perform your ablutions and make yourself presentable before entertaining him.”

“Thank you, Craven,” Maximus said a little wryly as he rose, nude, from the bed. “You know about Captain Trevillion?”

“Indeed,” Craven replied, back still turned. “I have looked in on the captain and he appears to be resting peacefully. The doctor has sent word he will return this afternoon to see to his patient.”

“Good.” Maximus felt better knowing the captain had survived the night.

Craven cleared his throat. “I couldn’t help but notice that Viscount Kilbourne was no longer in the cellar.”

Maximus stilled, water dripping from his face. “What?”

“He appears to have somehow freed himself from his chain with the help of a mallet and chisel and escaped.” Craven very carefully didn’t look at Artemis, still burrowed beneath the covers.