Darkling (12 page)

“One, two, three,” he counts as we pick up the pace. I match his step easily enough, my elbow tucked in against his. I love to dance. We haven’t danced in years.
“One, two, three. One, two, three.”

He lets go of my waist and extends his arm and I twirl. The dress is heavy with beads yet still it spins. I feel the hem wrap around my legs as I face him once more.

“Excellent! One, two, three,” he continues, grinning.

I laugh. There is no subtlety here. No nuance.
Just happiness.
One, two, three. One, two, three.
We dance in a square, I twirl.
One, two, three.

“Music,” I say. “We need music!”

Tristan sings.

“
If I were a fish and you were the sea

I’d dance on your waves and bonny we’d be.

If you were a leaf and I were a tree

I’d catch you when you’d fall from me
.”

One, two, three
. We’re dancing so fast that I’m messing up the steps and laughing. I abandon my efforts and take the lead. I dance us in a circle, our hands on each other’s waists.

“
But you are the wolf and I am the moon

And it’s your howl that is my boon.

I am the song and you are the dance

We may be different but I’ll take the chance
.”

I’m almost tripping and Tristan is laughing as he sings. We weave around the chairs and low table. I smack into one and almost fall over.

“
For without you I’m a flower gone dry,

A ship without sails,

A star without a sky.
”

I do trip this time and would’ve fallen over had Tristan not been holding onto me. I’m actually sweating a little, and lifting up the hem of the dress, I slump onto the upholstered seat wide enough for two. I fan my face, giggling.

“Willow, I must say,” Tristan says as he catches his breath. “Your grace is beyond me.”

That makes me laugh and incline my head in a pretend bow. “That’s a beautiful song.” Tristan plops onto the empty cushion beside me, his body radiating heat. “I haven’t heard it before.”

“You wouldn’t have,” he says. He’s still trying to swipe his hair back. “In fact, you’re wearing the dress of the woman who used to sing it.”

My smile slips off my face. His family died. It’s not like it’s a surprise that I’m in a dead woman’s gown. But Tristan has a strange look on his face. He starts laughing, almost maniacally.

“In fact,” he pants. “It’s rather funny.” Though he’s laughing, his eyes are wounded. “The woman who sang that song is the one we’re trying to destroy. Can you believe it?”

He’s listing to the side, as if he’s literally off-balance. I feel sick to my stomach and it’s not from the pork.

“She’s my wife,” Tristan gets out with a choke. I’m distracted from what he said because I’m worried he’s being attacked again. But as he falls onto his hands and knees on the floor, I realize he’s crying. “My own wife. She has trapped me. She hurts me. And I love her.”

T
ristan’s back shakes as he weeps. I remain seated on the couch, sweat cooling against my skin. His wife. The corpse is his wife.

The pork now feels like it’s rotting in my stomach. The idea of treating a loved one the way she treats Tristan is so unsettling that I’m having trouble keeping track of my thoughts. For some reason, I’m irritated that he didn’t tell me who she was sooner. Surely he must’ve remembered when he gave me her gown. Then again, I experienced firsthand how full of holes his memory is, and it’s none of my business that he was married once.

He has collapsed on the floor now, sobbing into the crook of his arm. I have no words to comfort him. No insight into how such a horrible truth could be possible. So instead, I do what Draven did for me.

Gathering up the dress, I kneel beside Tristan. I rest my hand on his back to let him know I’m there,
then I run my fingers through his hair. It’s so soft and he isn’t warm anymore. In fact, he’s shockingly cold. Like his sorrow is tugging him back into the spirit world.

I need to pull him out of this. Not just for the sake of destroying his wife, but because it’s getting harder and harder to bear the sight of his suffering. I don’t know if he even notices my touch, for he continues crying for some time. It’s good for the human side of him to grieve, but I’m wary he’ll trap himself in his sorrow.

“Tristan,” I say softly. “You know that’s not really her anymore.” I don’t tell him that spirits are intensified personalities of the living. “No one who loves you would hurt you like that.”

He rolls over onto his back and looks up at me through a mess of hair and tear-stained cheeks. “She does it because she loves me.”

His eyes have faded back to their simpler expression of hurt. I try to shove aside the thought that we’re undoing all of the progress we’ve made.

“We wanted to be together.
Always. So when she died, she tried to take me with her.”

I brush the hair off of his damp face. “That’s not the way life works.”

“You think I don’t know that now?” There’s a bitterness in his voice that tells me he is still more man than spirit. “I didn’t ask for this. It was all her doing. We couldn’t let each other go.”

Remembering the intensity of my emptiness after Scarlet died, and the way it still sneaks up on me, I wonder if I would’ve done the same if I could. Being so near to Tristan’s pain is making my own well up again. I try to push it back but my throat is tightening.

“She never let me go,” he says softly.

I lie down beside him. I can’t look at his face anymore and I don’t want him to see mine if I start to cry. I want a story.
A distraction.

“Tell me about her in life.”

Though he has stopped crying, his breathing is still hitching in his lungs. The backs of our hands are touching.

“I was a student,” he begins. “
An… apprentice to an apothecary.” He pauses to take a deep breath, trying to steady his voice. “It’s odd to remember all this again… I guess I never truly forgot it, it just… became unimportant.”

“I suppose it would.” I focus on his voice rather than Scarlet’s laugh.

“Sort of like… what you had for dinner the night before. It didn’t matter anymore the next day. And with no one to converse with, I lost track of who I was completely.”

I’m watching the flickering shapes on the ceiling caused by the candles. “I’m glad you remember,” I say so quietly that I’m surprised he understands me. “What was her name?”

Tristan takes a deep breath and lets it out shakily. The back of my hand pressed against his is cooling. “Victoria. She lived down the street from the apothecary. I would often see her out and about, selling roses. Her father had a beautiful garden. Their roses were their livelihood.”

I can’t imagine living in a community where I could make
a living selling flowers. Then again, I’m sure some would pay a fortune for a rose now. A single joy before the end.

“She would stop me when I was out on my errands. She would ask me if I wanted to buy a rose. I never had time. The apothecary was very strict and it would’ve displeased my parents for me to have spoken to someone
of such… well, we were meant to be above those who sold their wares on the streets. I paid her no attention for quite a long time, I’m afraid.”

The light and shadow on the ceiling is mesmerizing. I imagine the shadows forming the shapes of a lady and a man, acting out the story for me like Scarlet used to do.
Scarlet. No, focus on Tristan
, I tell myself.

“She even came to the shop once, to sell her roses. That’s when I realized she wasn’t interested in selling at all. She was interested in me.” He smiles wistfully. “I’d been so focused on my studies that I hadn’t even noticed. The apothecary was watching so I dismissed her. But on the way home, I stopped and paid her handsomely for a red rose.”

I see the shadow girl courtesy and hand the man a black flower above me.

“I bought a rose every day so that I could speak with her. We couldn’t be seen together for long, so I snuck out to meet her in the moonlight. She was an artist.
A painter. Her thoughts were so fascinating to me. I was intently focused on the future. Memorizing herbs and medicines. Parts of the body. Everything had a compartment and place. But she showed me the joy of going for a walk just to be outside, not to get somewhere. Finding new shapes in the stars. Feeling the warmth of the one you love.”

I have forgotten that he is part spirit. He is only a young man. I’ve never heard such talk, least of all from a boy. Then again, the boys of my village are preoccupied with trying to survive. There isn’t room for such observations, such story-making. Or is there?

The backs of our hands are still touching. His cool fingers slide over mine then rest against my palm. His hand is warmer.

“My parents didn’t approve. She was poor. When I disobeyed them and snuck out to see her, they punished me. I was locked in my room like a prisoner. I was to focus on my studies and forget about her. I tried to, but she never let go of me. She left a rose on the doorstep every day. My mother would stomp on them and bring me the trampled petals. I scattered them all in my bed.”

I imagine what that must feel like. To care about someone so much that you surround yourself with whatever you can from them. Sleep and dream with them. I tense as I hear whispers in the corners of my mind. Are they hers? No, they’re Tristan’s. They’re tugging at me. He rests his temple against mine, squeezing my hand.

His whispers envelop me. I close my eyes. When I open them, I am Tristan again. Only this time, I have a proper human mind. I am aware of a dozen things at once, unlike when I was a spirit.

I hear rain falling outside. The constant drizzle has lent me some comfort in my solitary confinement. So long as it’s there, I know I am not missing pleasant days in garden paths with Victoria. I am alone in my room with all the lamps burning. The air smells of dust, rain and dried roses. My backside is sore from sitting in this wooden chair for so long. I am at my desk, studying drawings of herbs. Perhaps I should move to the bed. Though what difference will it make?

My chest is heavy. Perpetual nausea tints my belly. I close my eyes. It is late and I am tired, but I have nothing else to do to occupy my time. She’s gone and I’ll never see her again.

I kick a leg of the desk. That felt good. I have to stop myself to keep from kicking it again. The nausea in my stomach hasn’t gone away since my mother first turned the key and locked me in my room. That was a week ago. I’m starting to think that breaking my leg in the inevitable fall out of my second story window will be worth it to escape. I need to move.

The front door downstairs bangs.
I tense as I listen. Someone is pounding on the door. It’s far too late for callers. No one answers so the pounding continues. I rise and press my ear against my door. Perhaps it’s a patient. Someone hoping I can heal them. Who else would be here in wee hours of the morning?

More pounding, then hurried footsteps as my parents get out of bed. The door is opened.

“What are you –” my mother gets out before she screams.

Someone is pushed over and a piece of furniture falls. We’re being robbed. We’re being robbed and I’m locked up here and can’t do anything about it. My father shouts at the bandit to stop. Feet pound up the stairs. They’re heading for my door. I back up as the pounding shakes the wood in front of me. What madman would
–

“Tristan!”

I know that voice. “Victoria? What are you doing?”

The door shakes. She is ramming it with her shoulder. I can hear my parents arguing as they chase her up the stairs. “Where’s the key?” she shouts.

“Leave immediately,” my father bellows. My mother shrieks at something.

Victoria rams the door with her shoulder again. My heart is racing. What’s going on? Everyone in the hall is shouting at once and I can’t tell what any of them are saying. She rams the door again and it busts at the hinges. I just have time to leap away before it crashes to the floor.

Victoria stands before me, panting. Her dark brown hair had been in a bun but is now yanked out in places. Added to her flushed cheeks, she looks wild and beautiful. My mother is behind her in a dressing gown, holding a chamberstick, while my father is trying to shove past her. Victoria smiles as she catches her breath and holds out her hand for mine. That’s when I notice that the other holds a large knife.