Raised By Wolves 2 - Matelots (24 page)

My cock is quite a bit smaller than a baby.”

She laughed with me. “True.”

I tucked my disappointed member away.

She was searching my face. “I am scared. Not of that… but…”

“You should be. Marriage has serious consequences, and especially considering your reservations on the matter, I would think you a fool if you did not face it with some trepidation.”

“Thank you,” she said. “So, the day after tomorrow you will speak to my father. I would imagine we could be married a day or two after, and then… we shall consummate the marriage, and then you will sail.”

“Aye. I imagine your life will be much as it was before my arrival, with the exception that you will have daily calisthenics to perform and the building of a house to design and oversee.”

“I would be allowed to do that?” she asked enthusiastically.

“I do not see why not. It will be your house,” I said.

“And you will live in it when you are in port?” she asked with guarded eyes.

“Aye.”

“With Gaston?” Her tone was quite careful.

“Aye.” I frowned. “Truly, do you take issue with that?”

“Nay, why should I?” she said quickly.

She would not look at me. We were now within sight of Fort Rupert, and there were others about. I did not feel I could press her on it.

Gaston and Agnes joined us. He would not look at me either. I wondered what he had seen.

“Gaston said I might actually be able to injure someone,” Agnes said with pride, and brandished one of my matelot’s pistols.

“If she does not close her eyes while firing,” Gaston added with good humor. “We should go by Massey’s and find a smaller piece for her.”

“Can it wait until tomorrow?” I asked. “They should rest their feet.”

“Nay, let us do it today,” Christine said brightly. “I have never been to a gunsmith’s.”

And so we trudged to Massey’s and introduced the “lads”. He did indeed have smaller bored pistols with petite grips. They were pieces designed to be easily secreted under a man’s coat or in a boot. Gaston purchased two for each of them, and the necessary shot and powder.

Once outside, Agnes asked that we keep hers until the matter of her living arrangements could be resolved. I assured her we would see her on the morrow.

We parted company at the corner of Queen and Lime, and the girls hurried away to secretly change clothes in a back room of the Vines’

warehouse before dragging themselves home.

Gaston and I were at last alone.

“Did you assuage her fears?” Gaston asked.

“Oui. I kiss…”

His fingers were on my lips. “I do not wish to know.”

I nodded, and pulled him to me on the busy street to kiss him thoroughly. As most around us were buccaneers, no one made comment.

Gaston had responded well enough, but he was somber when I released him. “Let us go to Theodore’s.”

“And then what?” I teased.

“We have matters of our regimen to attend to.”

“I will always much prefer that over what I found necessary to do earlier,” I assured him.

He frowned, and adopted the look of annoyed wonder I find so endearing.

We stopped by the house and found Striker, Pete, Cudro, Liam and Otter in the afternoon shade of the yard.

“I have located a housekeeper,” I announced.

They all cheered and toasted.

“Her name is Agnes,” I continued, “and she is quite young, and not experienced. But I feel she will be able to keep the place from burning down, and the dogs fed while we rove. She promises to learn to bake pies and cake.”

This brightened Pete, but he was still leery. “She Be Mean?

She Like Dahgs? She Know They Live In Tha House?”

“Nay, aye, and aye,” I said quickly. “She is truly a timid little thing, not at all like Mistress Theodore.”

“Then IBe Nice.”

I smiled. “That would be appreciated.”

I wanted to add that she was an artist and might wish to draw him, but that would tip our hand that she had seen him before. I decided that could reveal itself in time, as could our other news of the day. I realized I did not wish to tell them I was to marry.

“We all went by Theodore’s and signed the papers,” Cudro said. “And I have petitioned for citizenship as well.” He sounded no more pleased with that than Gaston had.

“Gaston did not wish to,” I told him, “because he felt he might be compelled to wear wool and be steadfast.”

I looked to Otter, as he was also Dutch.

“I am already an English citizen,” he said quietly.

“An’ we were granted land near the Yallahs, fur comin’ ’ere with those idiots, Penn an’ Venables,” Liam added. “But we seen it only the once. We not be the farmin’ kind. Theodore said we could ’ave new with all o’ ya, an’ still keep tha other, an’ it be likely none be the wiser.”

Striker sighed and took another pull on the bottle before speaking.

“We’re becoming civilized, Will. But I do not think it will be a bother just yet. Theodore suggested that all of us with matelots have proper testaments drawn up, so that our matelots inherit within the law if it comes to that.”

I nodded. “Aye, Gaston and I have done so.”

“It will not all be resolved before we sail,” Striker said.

“No matter, as of yet.” That was a lie. If I was to be married before we sailed, it mattered quite a bit.

We sat with them and shared the rest of the bottle, talking of pleasant things. Then we made our way to Theodore’s at dusk.

I gave our good friend the news of my impending nuptials at dinner, and he crowed appreciatively.

“Oh, Will, I am quite pleased,” Theodore said. “In what little I have seen of her, I think she is a fine choice. I am sure her father will be amenable. I am sure yours will, too, once the deed is done and he is informed of it.”

I snorted. “I actually think he will be rather angry that I thwarted him, and will ask you directly if she is indeed a real person and a woman.”

He waved me off. “Be that as it may, I am sure all will be well, or at least better than the alternative.”

“There is another matter. I have located a housekeeper.” I explained Agnes’ plight and our wish to purchase her.

“So I will need a bondsman contract drawn up so that I can present it to her father,” I concluded.

“Nay, you will not,” Theodore said with a grin. “From what you have said, it is likely you will wish to burn the man’s house down, or worse, in the name of justice. I will negotiate with her father and see to it. It is only proper that a Lord send a barrister to do such a thing.”

I was amused. “Ah, of course. I will leave it in your hands, then. Will you speak for me to Sir Christopher as well?”

“Nay,” he said flatly, and returned to cutting his meat.

An hour later, we were finally able to retreat behind a closed door.

Gaston had been quiet and withdrawn while at our house and at dinner.

I embraced him from behind as he turned up the lamp.

“If you, at any time, say you do not wish for me to pursue this, it will stop,” I murmured.

He sighed, and lolled his head back upon my shoulder.

“Non. I am not against it,” he said.

I kissed the bruise I had made on his neck. With a start, I remembered that I was similarly marked. I wondered if I should attempt to hide it from Sir Christopher, I had surely not thought to hide it from his daughter. I was amazed Theodore had not chided me for it. Of course, when I met with my future father-in-law, I would be expected to dress like a gentleman, and that might serve to disguise it.

I found myself cursing, and I left Gaston and doffed my weapons to hurl them onto the trunk.

“Will?”

“I swore I would not do this,” I growled. “I do not wish to live a lie. I am yours. Why is that not enough?”

“I will not force you,” Gaston said guiltily.

I sighed, and tried to calm myself. “I am not angry with you. I am…

I saw your mark, and realized I must hide mine before seeing her damn father, and it…”

He nodded. “She does not seem pleased with the prospect, either.

But as with all of us, her protestations relate to the unfairness of how we are expected to be a thing we are not. I feel it may still be best that the three of us are united in this, because of that common injustice. She is like us, a creature that has become something she was not born to be.”I found that curious. “Do you feel she is a fellow centaur?”

He shrugged and doffed his weapons. “Perhaps not, but some mythic thing, as she is not wolf or sheep.”

“An Amazon perhaps,” I sighed.

He smiled, but quickly grew thoughtful again. “I pity her. I have not known enough women to consider how poor their lot in life is.”

“I have known many women, and not looked at it through the eyes of one who was dissatisfied with it before. Most are happy being sheep, or cows perhaps.”

“Well, we will liberate this one, as best we can,” he said resolutely.

“Oui,” I sighed. “I suppose that will be the good of it. That is what I considered when I resolved to ask for her hand this day. I will endeavor to remember it when I speak to her father, while pretending to be a thing that I am not.”

He grinned. “Oui, you must don your wolf’s clothing once again. I would now like to see you as a naked centaur. We have things to do this night.”

“Do we?” I teased.

“Oui, we still have our regimen to attend to.”

“Ah, and nothing more?”

“After that,” he said seriously, “I wish for you to make it all go away, as you always do.”

I nodded and stripped. He did likewise. He retrieved the sack with the whip and set it on the bed between us. I almost asked him if he was sure he wished to do that this night, but I saw the determination in his eyes, and held my tongue.

“Should I reveal it?” I asked.

“Please.”

I was not eager. The last time he saw a whip of this type in my presence I ended up with a knife in my belly.

I upended the sack, and the coiled whip dropped onto the bed linen. He stared at it. I watched him. He did not seem prone to a fit of madness. I offered him my hand and he took it. Several minutes passed.

“Should I speak?” I asked.

“Please.”

“Is it the type that struck you?”

He nodded. “I have been struck by many things, but this is like the one my father used.”

“What else have you been struck with?” I asked.

He considered the question seriously. “One headmaster was fond of a paddle, another a belt. With that one I forgot that sitting did not involve discomfort after the first month. I was always tender. I have been struck by birch rods, quirts, and a turnip in a stocking.”

I sighed. Once again I knew I would be plagued by visions of his hellish childhood.

“I have been beaten with a strap and a birch rod,” I offered.

“When was the last time?” he asked.

“When I was ten.”

He nodded. “I was not beaten while I was with the monks. And I have not been beaten since coming here, unless I was mad and…” He sighed.

“Were you afraid of whips, or perhaps being struck, prior to that night?” I asked.

“Oui. As I have said Will, not all things are tied to that night, it was merely the culmination of years of… pain.”

“I wish to hurt everyone who ever hurt you,” I said.

He smiled sadly. “I find comfort in that. I did hurt some of them, Will, but it only made things worse. They were always bigger, or there were more of them.”

He touched the whip with his fingertip: a quick poke. This was followed by a longer contact. Then he brushed a section of the braided length, and then stroked the handle.

“I have never touched one,” he sighed. “And I don’t recall seeing my father’s whip. It was rarely in my sight. I remember the sounds it made, though, vividly. It hissed across the floor as he pulled it back, and then there was roar as it came toward me, and… At first I could not hear the sound it made when it hit. I was screaming, and there was so much pain. But, as it continued, the pain receded until I was numb, and everything seemed very distant, as if I were floating in the sea. I could not scream anymore, or beg. And he did not stop. It went on and on: the hiss of it on the stone, the whir as it came to me again, and then the wet smacking sound when it struck. Then there was the spatter of the blood on the walls and floor. I could hear him panting. He got slower and slower. I would pass into unconsciousness only to return at another blow. Finally I woke in a carriage. And that was more pain; each jostle was as if he struck me anew. And then there was the laudanum, and I floated in the sea once again.”

His words tore at my heart, and I could envision it all clearly.

“Thank you for telling me of it,” I whispered.

His eyes met mine. “Have I not before?”

“Non.”

He frowned. “You are so much a part of my life now; I sometimes think you were there with me. It is odd how my mind works. Just as I know this is just a thing, yet gazing upon it, I feel as if a blow will come at any time. I am listening for it. That is what drives the Horse wild.”

“You do not seem distraught at this moment,” I noted with curiosity.

If anything, he seemed unnaturally calm.

“Oui, because it is as I hoped,” he said with a small smile. “You are here, and you are my touchstone for reality.”

I kissed his hand. “I am pleased. I am relieved I can be of service to you in this. I am relieved it appears to be easy as compared to my issue… I suppose it is because flogging you is a thing neither of us will ever do, whereas, what you must inure me to is…” I realized what I was saying in light of our morning conversation and I froze.

“I am sorry, Will,” he whispered. “I am not your touchstone, am I? I am the flint and tinder that brings all of your painful memories to light.”

I wished to refute him. “It is not… It has little to do with either of us. The things done to you were not things that should ever be done to another, whereas, the thing done to me was a perversion of a thing that should be done lovingly to another.”

He smiled. “You never cease to amaze me. You constantly spew forth balms to ease my wounds.”

I smiled. “That is not a pleasing image, but I am pleased you find solace in my sophistic meanderings.”