Chapter Nine #6
‘Maldred!’ Dermot cried. He no longer cared to look around, secure in his loneliness.
Upon receiving no reply, he whispered, ‘Monster.’ That he had been tricked into doing such a thing, slaughtering his own countrymen for the benefit of mainlander lords, did not bear thinking on.
He had been betrayed. His plot with Maldred was meant as a boon to his people, not a punishment, yet it had come to this.
His own hatred was used as a tool by his enemies to further their cause.
Yet he could not make sense of Maldred’s design.
Some of their people still prayed to faeries, though they would soon be burnt as heretics.
Ponder as he might, the sky steadily darkening as he did, he could not come to it.
Robert’s boots at his side, he cast himself forward so he was on all fours. Only then, stifling a yawn and blinking blearily, did he attempt to get up properly. He had spent so long on the floor.
Throwing the door open and finding the halls empty, boots clutched firmly to his chest, he rushed to the entrance and again found no one.
There was no chatter as he stumbled up the servants’ staircase, meaning dinner had likely come and gone.
Cursing himself when he thought of Robert missing his favourite pair of boots, he strode to a place he only dared go in the afternoon while the inhabitants were absent.
Ambling as he did, he could not see much.
The place was lit dimly in flame, walls of stone adorned by a few sparse tapestries that he could not discern due to the time of day.
He knew Robert’s room, of course, for it was the largest on the floor and the best decorated.
Sometimes he had dared look through Robert’s books, great tomes penned in dead languages, and lamented he would never be privy to their wisdom.
‘… a wretch,’ Robert was saying as Dermot stumbled to his door, a flicker of candlelight his only guide. ‘I have no patience for it.’
Another person shushed him. Intrigued, Dermot leaned against the door. He knew no one with so much sway.
‘He does grate, my lord,’ said Robert’s bed mate.
Kissing his partner on the cheek, thrusting almost imperceptibly forward, Robert said, ‘I begin to tire of him. These natives, I mean, and do you not think his complexion rather swarthy?’
Robert’s partner laughed and wrapped his arms around the back of Robert’s neck. The muscles confirmed him to be male. ‘Swarthy! Perhaps only in the soot of the fire. No, my lord, sometimes he looks red as a pig on the roast. Don’t you think?’
Hearing the winsome laughter and jovial tone, Dermot inched further inside.
It was then the scene was revealed to him in full; two silhouettes illuminated by dim ember.
Robert was in the middle of rutting, lying on top of Will as if they were the closest of confidants.
Dermot had thought it all rapine but their embrace was decidedly affectionate.
As they kissed, two snakes vying for dominion, their esteem for one another was evident.
Robert’s amusement came not as the usual huffs of breath but real, rich laughter that made Dermot startle.
‘Like the devil himself. One of the many ways we can tell these men apart from ourselves. We took the mainland with great strength… and you, my dear, your ancestors came as well, with your blond hair.’ He was on Will again, stifling his rapturous moans with a kiss.
Dermot cringed, boots near dropping out of his hands.
He had, for the first time in his life, no desire to see such an intimate play.
They evidently spoke of him, and his bowels moved so that a rumble might’ve alerted them to his presence.
His face must’ve been worse than any roast. The insult done to him from Will’s own mouth severed their friendship; to convey the extent of his betrayal was impossible.
Years were gone from them both. He dared not brood on it outside Robert’s bedroom.
To hear one barb from a friend was worse than a litany from his own mind.
‘William,’ Robert said. Dermot realised, to his great displeasure, he’d started extending himself in earnest. ‘We must play history again. Me, the soldier, and you, the barbarian I’ve captured to act as my wife.’
Dermot teetered back into the corridor, having no desire to listen to such lurid filth.
‘Stop!’ Will cried.
Dermot jolted and crept back inside with one ill-timed step. The floor shuddered below. He winced in tandem, head moving to watch Robert’s reaction.
‘Bastard, let go of me! You killed my father, my mother!’ Will shouted, kicking weakly.
At that, Dermot knew his sobs for Robert’s silly game. Will had no parents to speak of, something told to him once in confidence. Dermot spoke of it to no one, but Will defiled the memory of his parents while Dermot kept them safe in his heart.
The bed began to creak with more force and sound than Dermot would ever be able to intrude upon, Robert’s interests having been roused by the crying.
A master tiring of his dog was a rotten thing; the animal would simply be put down.
Will’s encouragement was another poor omen.
He did not have an ally in his enemy’s bed, instead his friend had become a viper.
The two of them were an awful sight, rutting in candlelight like the base creatures they were.
With a shudder, for he realised he despised them both, he stood shivering outside.
He had no qualms now. His legs quivered so that his worst fear was being found cowering like a child outside.
His own mother was named as a witch, their village discovered, and now he had lost Robert’s favour. There was no option but to run.
Creeping inside, a sliver of hope cut through him as the two went at it with more gusto than he’d believed a man capable.
A key sat on Robert’s dresser, shimmering in the room’s dim torchlight.
Dermot, careful to make sure the two were still at the task, feverishly placed the boots down and, in trade, took Robert’s keys to the castle.
Petrified as his sight momentarily darkened with shock, Dermot stumbled out with his arm extended to prevent any further commotion. Stifling a sigh and scarcely able to believe what he had done, he strode away. His heart knew where he went next; he had yearned for it often enough.
His destination was not far away from Robert’s quarters, except that Lord Stanley’s eldest son had the warmest room. The maids complained often of the coldness upstairs, saying the wind battered the windows like a siege.
Hurrying up the tower, the staircase became so steep that his sides touched the wall as he stumbled onto the castle’s highest floor.
He knew this place well. It jutted out prominently and was where Dermot’s eyes oftentimes settled.
The floor was without carpet, being only creaking wood, so that he was terrified of being discovered by some intrepid guard.
He had no wish to be found creeping towards Lord Stanley’s youngest son’s chambers.
‘Help me,’ Dermot whispered. He had no god to pray to. Maldred, being a devil guised as divine, only hurt him. He would be, as ever, faithful to himself. Gripping the key hard enough to etch it into his skin, he drew towards the door and turned the lock.
‘Aubrey?’ Dermot said as he entered. Fool that he was, he hadn’t anticipated total darkness. He could not see at all.
He closed the door with a soft creak, wincing as he did. Foolishly lurching forward to feel for the young man’s bed, his hands strained for something solid until at last plush bedding could be felt beneath his palms.
This same scenario lent itself to many a night’s pleasure, though never in these harmless fantasies had he stolen Robert’s keys. If either Robert or Will stirred during the night, surely its absence would be noted, as well as the reemergence of the boots.
‘Aubrey!’ he said, becoming hysterical. His hands had come to the boy’s form at last. Only after feeling his arm was he met with an answering murmur.
‘Aubrey, please,’ Dermot said, kneeling by the boy’s side in a fit of passion. Something like rope cut uncomfortably into his knee, and he marvelled at Maldred’s power waning at last.
‘Oh… pardon?’ Aubrey said, pushing against Dermot as he hurried to right himself. ‘Who…’ This was said with much feeling, timid but with burgeoning suspicion as if readying to bolt.
‘It’s me,’ Dermot said, cursing his own stupidity. ‘Dermot, the scullion.’
‘Dermot?’ Aubrey said, tasting the name on his tongue. ‘But what are you doing here? I have not had any visitors excepting my brother. And it is so late.’
There was no fear in the boy’s voice, only wonder. Wishing to continue in the same manner, Dermot said, ‘I have come to tell you that I am going away. I must leave for my village.’
After nearly a minute, Aubrey said, ‘I am sorry to hear it. Of course you cannot stay. It is not safe.’
Behind the practised aloofness, Dermot saw a tremor of despair. He put his hand just below Aubrey’s thigh. ‘Come with me. If it is unsafe, you can’t stay either.’ Aubrey hadn’t yet shouted that his room was breached by a madman, which seemed promising enough.
Gasping and putting his hand over Dermot’s, Aubrey said, ‘My brother would not permit it. He says I am not to leave my room. I had tried the door a few times, I thought it to be locked.’
‘It was,’ Dermot said. He brought the keys out. ‘I took this from Robert’s quarters.’
‘You!’ Aubrey gasped, soft and mindful of the danger. His manners, even now, were pristine. ‘You are in grave peril. My brother is not a man to be trifled with. Should he discover you, and I pray he does not, he would send you to the scaffold.’
That was a pretty way of putting it, since Robert would’ve either burnt him alive or thrown him off the battlements. Perhaps he would’ve even found a way to test that hot lead, enterprising man that he was.
Heart surging in his chest, Dermot grasped Aubrey’s hand and held it tightly.
He was not slapped, instead those delicate fingers curled around his own as if they were both porcelain.
‘I know this. But you can’t stay here, locked in your room.
After the trial, gossip has been cruel. Robert can do whatever he likes to you without anyone protesting.
’ He left it unsaid that any hope of securing a marriage or position was lost, owing to Aubrey’s supposed hysteria.
‘He is my brother,’ Aubrey said, though his voice was strained. ‘Were I to leave with you, surely we would be pursued. And were we caught, you, Dermot, would be in grave danger.’
His punishment would’ve been worse than mere execution. The likelier outcome was torture as well as Aubrey’s subsequent imprisonment and their separation.
‘You are right, of course. But I can’t leave knowing you’re at Robert’s mercy, the whole town thinking you’re a lunatic.
’ Dermot winced as he spoke. He didn’t enjoy recounting such evils to Aubrey but, as a base man, he could not be expected to talk prettily.
‘Come now. Robert is indisposed. I didn’t notice any men coming up this way, and we can leave through the servants’ quarters.
I know the youngest maid, the only one likely to be up at this hour, and she would not speak against us. We will go straightaway to my village.’
‘Is that not the first place they would look? I do not wish harm on your family. Please, think this through,’ Aubrey said.
‘We won’t stay long. I will tell my mother I have left service, and we’ll…
well. I have some earnings from my time here, I do not waste it on drink.
We can catch a ship together for the mainland.
If you were to bring some object of value, perhaps that brooch you sometimes wear,’ Dermot said, embarrassed by the ease of his recollection, ‘we could catch any ship for the mainland and make some life for ourselves. Perhaps in a company of likeminded people.’ This was a foolish idea of his, for he knew there to be communities of men working the land.
In such a place, there would be no lords.
Aubrey stuttered while Dermot sat trying not to tighten his grip on the boy’s hand.
‘Then… yes. Thank you, Dermot,’ Aubrey said.