Bastien Page 2

  “The Fellowship of Depravity convenes once again,” I note.

  “Bastien,” Liliane greets with a saucy grin and wink.

  I bow to them all, and when Adeline offers her hand, I take it, pull her close and kiss her cheek. “Good evening, my Lord,” she says.

  “Good evening, my dear,” I reply.

  The serving wenches load our table with ale, obliging us to stay a while. It would be rude to refuse, and so we amuse ourselves until nightfall with drink and a friendly game of cards. We do not play for money but for favors. Rarely does anyone collect on them. If we did, Firmin would be my slave for the rest of his life, and I would have to clean out Louis’ stables for a year.

  The men may know their tricks, but it would take a stronger man than any of us to keep his focus against the wiles of our womenfolk.

  My hand is good, and with a little playacting I can convince the others that it is even better. I am preparing to do so when Honorine says, “I want to raise the wager.” Just the way she says this has all of us rapt on her. She smiles and traces the neckline of her low cut gown. “I wish to wager my virginity.”

  The rest of the ladies fold, whispering their jokes behind raised hands, casting wicked looks at us men. Six of us against Honorine now. It is obvious she doesn’t intend to win. Adrien winces and pointedly places his cards on the table face down. “Gentlemen, good luck.”

  Honorine narrows her eyes at him but doesn’t comment.

  Firmin loses the next hand and is disqualified. Louis and Edgard beat out Gaspard and my hand takes out Louis. Honorine is still in the game. The next hand I am dealt is shite. Which is not to say I cannot win, only that it will take considerable effort. Edgard is sweating and Honorine is looking at me the way I’ve seen her covet a pastry she cannot have.

  If I bluff, I can eliminate Edgard and play Honorine alone. The question is whether the prize would be worth the effort. And, should the unlikely happen and I lose, what will she demand as her due? The thought of putting the little trouble maker in her place is tempting enough that, for a moment, I contemplate making a real play for her. It only lasts for that moment. As enjoyable as it would be to knock Mademoiselle Saintly off her pedestal, I can already see resentment on the faces of the others. She will never acquiesce to anything less than an honest tryst and no sooner than on her wedding day. This is all a ploy to get us riled and sic us against each other.

  A woman was never worth the price of friendship.

  I play perhaps the first honest game of my life. No tricks, no cheats. I play the hand I was given, knowing I will lose. Edgard’s hand takes the game and I am out. I feign disappointment and remove myself to the bar for a stronger drink while they finish the final round.

  Adeline follows me. “He is a fool,” she says. “I am glad you let him win.”

  “You presume me immune to Honorine’s charms?”

  “I know you to be.” Her fingers travel over my arm. “Innocence was never a lure for you, not even m-mine.”

  Adeline was an innocent the first time she rode alone through the night, slipped into my castle and beneath my bed sheets. Innocent in body, perhaps, but in no other way. I was the one seduced. The reminder makes me chuckle. I take her fingers in my hand. “I’ve always wondered just how innocent you really were,” I say. “And what precisely did you tell Honorine about that night to make her stoop to this?”

  Surprise, guilt, and finally hurt flash in her lovely eyes. She masks them quickly with an easy smile. “A right p-p-proper bastard you are. It is your good fortune that you are this handsome; otherwise, no one would be able to t-tolerate you at all.”

  I salute her with my glass. “But you did not contradict me.”

  A cheer goes up when Edgard wins. We both turn to watch everyone congratulate him while Honorine sits quietly possessed with her hands in her lap. Not surprisingly, the moment the rowdy group quiets, Honorine demurs and begs release from her wager.

  Bastards we may be, but beasts we are not. Faced with a lady’s—and I use the term lightly

  —distress, Edgard relents.

  Honorine smiles with relief and gratitude. She has no notion of what enemies she just made of all of us.

  Adrien clears his throat. “It is time,” he says. “Shall we say our prayers now or later?”

  Louis waves him on, and the rest of us bow our heads.

  “Dear God, we humbly ask that you grant us wisdom to find trouble where it hides, strength to venture forth into it, turn of phrase to ease those disturbed sensitivities which can be eased, and coin to pay off those which cannot. Forgive us for the sins which we are about to commit and for not including you in them.”

  My mouth twitches with suppressed laughter. I solemnly intone, “Your prayers are heard.

  Go forth and sin, my children.”

  “Amen!”

  “Where shall we do our sinning?” Brigitte asks eagerly.

  “That, my dear, is a surprise,” Louis answers. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. No, this is something you all must see for yourselves.”

  Adeline shivers and loops her arm through mine. “I do love a good mystery,” she says.

  “Fellows, let us take the night by the horns!”

  Chapter Four

  Louis leads the way through town. The village of Fauve is far removed from this place, yet I could easily call it home. Cobblestoned streets weave between buildings tall enough to have three rows of windows. No thatched roofs here, all are covered with sturdy shingles.

  We walk at a brisk pace. There are still merchants about, finishing their final tasks of the day and closing their shops for the night. They are not welcoming of our presence, but as long as we don’t disturb them, the townsfolk are willing to tolerate us for the coin we always leave in our wake.

  Louis leads us all the way to the edge of town, where the cobblestones level out into stomped dirt and the houses become smaller and older. Not far off is a Gypsy village. I can hear the drums and fiddles from here. This is as near civilization as the Gypsies are willing to come.

  Many still wander in the way of their people, but most have settled here, in wagons turned into shacks, built up into what might pass for an abode. Fires are lit in the distance, perhaps some sort of celebration. Of what, I don’t know. Then again, Gypsies don’t usually need a reason.

  We stop before a shack consisting of four separate walls held together by rope and covered with oiled cloth. In front of the curtain which serves as a door sits a hunched woman in a cloak.

  An old barrel stands as her table, and on top of it is a deck of cards. Her hood is so large it covers her face. I see nothing of her except her hands, one smooth and young, the other gnarled and old.

  “What is this, Louis?” I ask, unnerved by the sight of an old woman. “Have you suddenly developed a taste for the arcane?”

  He laughs. “This is merely the...”

  A single gnarled finger rises to point at my chest, and the air is suddenly too thick to breathe. The woman gathers her cards and places them face down on one edge of the barrel.

  They somehow hover nearly half over that edge without tipping over.

  Adeline clutches my arm. “Bastien?” she says uncertainly. I can’t find my voice to reassure her.

  “Is this part of the game?” Adrien asks.

  “No,” Louis says. “Last time wasn’t... she didn’t...”

  The hag slams her old hand on top of the barrel, demanding silence. With her young hand, she takes cards off the top of the deck and arranges them in a circle.

  “Listen, we just want to enter,” Louis says.

  The hag holds up a young finger in a staying gesture and indicates the spread with her old.

  “What is she doing?” Adeline asks, half hiding behind me. Under normal circumstances I would laugh at her and extricate myself from her hold. At the moment, I am too unsettled to speak a single word. The hag pointed at me, she is looking at me. Whatever fortune she is about to divine is mine. I don’
t want to see it. With everything in me I dread the first card being flipped. But for the life of me I cannot look away.

  The smooth hand of youth reaches gracefully for the card farthest from her and flips it. The card says Wheel of Fortune and at its center is a golden wheel of the Zodiac, with star constellations clearly marked around it. It’s upside down.

  “It would seem the odds are not in your favor,” Louis says. He sounds bored.

  I dare not breathe as the withered hand reaches for the second card in the circle. Judgment.

  Also reversed. A set of scales tipped on one side mocks me from the makeshift table and as I am staring at it, the wheel in the first card breaks before my eyes. This is a hallucination. It must be.

  I am drunk, or perhaps it’s a trick of light and the wheel was never whole.

  A lump forms in my throat and I cannot clear it. I choke on the next forced inhale as the third card is turned. The Hermit. Nothing more than a hooded figure, hunched the same way as this hag who presumes to know my destiny. And the scales of Justice tip the other way.

  I can’t blink, or turn away. My companions are gone. I am alone in the night, the darkness drowning me in this magic. There is nothing but me, and the cards, and the hands turning them.

  My gaze is rapt on the next card to be turned over. The Moon. All the faces suddenly shift, moving now with a life of their own and, while the moon changes phases, the hunched figure of the hermit grows and tears at its cloak, revealing a monster underneath.

  My heart races, aching in my chest, and I can hear my own breath wheeze in and out of me on a feral growl. The hag pauses with her smooth hand hovering over the fifth card. She waits as though for divine guidance, her hooded head cocking slightly to the side. She dips a slow nod and flips the card—Strength. A crimson rose blooms on it, its thorns long and needle sharp. The hag’s hand passes over the card a second time and the rose is gone. In its place stands a woman, naked as the day she was born, yet standing tall and straight, looking right at me with a challenge in her eyes. I will not yield, her eyes say, and it makes me feel weak. She makes me feel weak.

  A whirlwind rises around me, so powerful I’m afraid it will lift me off my feet, and I don’t understand how the cards can be so still on that barrel, so steady, as if my future is already written in stone and it’s only my denial that tries to make me stray from the path set out before me. I fight it with all of my might. There is wilderness ahead, danger I can avoid if only I turn my feet around and go back the way I came.

  The pull of destiny and my need to escape it tears me asunder, and in my mind I scream for the hag to turn the last card. Finish this—save me somehow.

  She does, and everything stills once more. Breath leaves me, as desperate to escape as my own soul. The card is Death. The salvation I demanded stares at me from black holes in a bare skull. This card doesn’t move; doesn’t change. It is absolute.

  The previous fervor of my heartbeat stops completely and I clutch my chest, the barrel, anything to regain some semblance of steadiness. As my heart lurches back to life, I tear my gaze away from my own demise and just catch a glint of obsidian in the hag’s eye through a hole in her hood. I find no sympathy there.

  “Right,” Louis says. “This has been entertaining, but we’ve tarried long enough.” The hag turns to him as he reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out a card of his own. Holding it up for the hag to see, he places it into the center of the barrel. Ten of Pentacles.

  The hag straightens and becomes all business, pointing to each of us in turn before tapping the card on which ten silver coins glint merrily. The toll must be paid before we are allowed to pass. Each of us pays the coin she demands and only after she’s pocketed her due does she rise from her seat and pull aside the curtain door.

  Louis grins. “After you,” he invites.

  The women pair off with the men and enter arm in arm through the door. Adeline, who released me and took shelter in Adrien’s arms when the Death card was flipped, looks back at me before she disappears through the door. Only Louis and I are left. I hesitate before stepping through the veil. I try to catch the hag’s eye, but can no longer find it in the shadows of her hood.

  She is a statue, as still and uninterested as stone.

  Having no other choice I step into the darkness of the shack...

  ... and emerge on the other side into blinding light. For a moment I can see nothing but bright colors swirling around me. I hear voices as delicate as bell chimes and music as sweet as honey mead. I am not in the Gypsy village anymore, nor any other place in existence. Before me is a dream, a fantasy given shape.

  Behind me, Louis claps me on the shoulder. “My lords and ladies of the Fellowship of Depravity,” he says, “Welcome to the Faery court.”

  Chapter Five

  The cards are instantly forgotten. The door through which we entered is gone, vanished into thin air and all around me is pandemonium, a cornucopia of creatures from myth and legend.

  Three girls dance around the gathering, holding hands. It is only when I look closer that I realize how my eyes have deceived me. They aren’t holding hands—they have no hands at all. Rather, their arms are joined together at the wrist so as to make one creature of three.

  Not far away, a stunningly beautiful woman covered only with vines and leaves cuddles three ghostlike lizards. They notice my regard and unfurl massive wings, baring rows of sharp teeth in warning. The woman hisses and disappears.

  I spin in baffled circles as my mind struggles to make sense of this. Over there, a tall, handsome pair. Their skin is gray, their hair white as snow, and everywhere their bare feet touch, frost blooms across the ground. On the other side, a woman with hair literally made of gold.

  Behind her, a behemoth of a man; a monster with horns flowing from his temples, back along his head. His legs are like that of an animal, and giant bat wings are folded against his bare back.

  Right before me, a red haired woman laughs and twirls, faster and faster until she bursts into flames and burns away. As her ashes rain down, they swirl closer and tighter, growing thick with smoke until it solidifies and pales, and the woman is back again, dancing off somewhere else.

  My companions have left me. They are scattered everywhere, as awestruck as I, approaching creatures with caution. Only Louis remains, a smug smirk on his face. “Well?”

  “What is this? Where have you brought us?”

  Louis grabs my shoulders and gives me a shake. “To Eden, my boy. Now stop gaping like an imbecile and enjoy! I want to introduce you to our hostess. She is... perfect.” He sounds like a green lad talking about a sweetheart.

  I look for Adrien to reason me out of this madness. He is reclined on a bed of moss with a pale haired temptress feeding him grapes. Adeline is in the arms of the bat winged monster, dancing. The twins are watching the gray couple create ice sculptures out of thin air. I’ve lost sight of the others.

  Somehow a flower shaped cup appears in my hand. “Go on,” Louis says. “Have a sip. I guarantee you’ve never tasted anything like it.” He toasts me with a drink of his own.

  The chalice in my hands is alive, a real flower with petals soft as silk and glowing amber liquid inside. I am mesmerized by the sight of it. I take a sip, taste the sweet, thick nectar and sway on my feet. Head spinning, I look around again with dream hazed eyes. Suddenly everything makes sense as though I’ve known this place all my life. I am in the Faery court. I laugh. “Well done, Louis!”

  A figure slams into me, turning me sideways. The woman spins around so fast she becomes invisible, and before I know up from down again, my back is against the wall and a shining silver blade is pressed against my throat. The attacker has hair as black as a crow’s feather and eyes red as fire. She is dressed in what looks like black ribbons wound around her body. She is furious, much stronger than she appears, and I have nothing to defend myself with. Even if I did, I suspect it would do no good against this creature so I hold still and try to appear harmless.
The female bares her teeth at me and releases me with a huff. The ends of her ribbons trail after her as she walks away. She leaves bloody footprints behind.

  “I see you’ve met Discord.”

  Louis straightens and his eyes grow wide. He smiles like a child presented with a new toy and bows deeply to the newcomer. “My Lady.”

  The woman is perhaps the only creature dressed as a human. Her gown is a simple sheath of silk, her hair is half braided around her head and flows down her back. She is beyond beautiful.

  When she smiles I feel as though the sun has risen and I am blinded. No wonder Louis is so smitten with her.

  Louis shoves at me. I remember myself and take a bow. “My Lady,” Louis says, “allow me to introduce my best friend, Lord Bastien Sauvage.”

  “I am Lilith. And Louis didn’t tell me he was bringing such lively company with him.” The reprimand is delivered so gracefully I almost miss it.

  Louis seems dumbfounded and a little pale. If I know my friend, and I do, it never even occurred to him that we might not be welcome here. “You must forgive him,” I say. “He was utterly smitten at first sight of you and since then completely forgot himself. Now, having seen you for myself, I understand just how he feels.”

  Lilith is lithe in form, nearly of a height with me. Her hair is the color of sun and her eyes shine pale like stars. Inhuman. Inhumanly beautiful. God could not have created this creature; she is too perfect a temptation. I find I am not interested in resisting her.