me. “My journals,” he said simply, settling back by the fire. I glanced at the page, but could make nothing of it.
“I’m sorry, but I cannot make out your hand,” I said, handing the volume back. He gave me a sharp look, but said nothing. He thumbed the pages, reading aloud bits here and there that told of his feelings about me and the course that Rózsa had charted. He had not thought it likely, at first, that I would rise, but that had changed when he learned of the monstrous manner in which I had died. He told me of those endless nights before the inquest, when they knew not if I would rise, and the desperate plans to steal my body. My corpse—I realized with a sickening lurch of my stomach that this body had been a dead body, a defiled and unclean thing. I forced my attention back to his words, away from my morbid thoughts.
I felt shaky and sick, but still I sat as Nicolas related the details of the difficult journey that brought me, oblivious, to this house. Geoffrey had not been here; he arrived in mid August, the night I awoke from my catalepsy. With horrified fascination I listened to the account of my first “awakening”, how I had raped and nearly killed a serving wench. How I had been no more than a ravening beast, mad and slavering. . . I cried out in shock and disgust. I could hardly bear Nicolas’ look of sympathy. “Where is the girl?”
“She died,” he told me, then seeing the spasm that crossed my face at his words, grasped my arm. “No! Not by your hand! It was an accident, last month. She was trampled to death in Paris. What happened was not your fault, Kit. It was mine, or no one’s. Geoffrey was unsure, but I thought it was important for you to know why you have been kept bound, and why we thought it best to send Rózsa from here.” He got up heavily and left without another word, and I sat staring at my hands for many long minutes after he had gone. How right they had been to send Rózsa away! I could never have faced her if she had seen me so. I felt that I could not even face the servants, and slipped up to my room unseen, to lie waking until the day-trance claimed me.
I awoke the next evening to a light tap on the door, followed immediately by Nicolas’ kind face. He smiled to see me awake, and spoke over his shoulder as he stepped into the room. He was followed by Jehan and the serving-wench who had helped me on the stairs yesterday, both with their arms full of clothing. I blushed, remembering what I had learned the night before, but soon became interested in the finery spread before me.
“Ah,” Nicolas said with a smile. “I thought that you would enjoy this. You told me once that you never had the money to indulge yourself in the sort of wardrobe you would like, and how you hated it when your appearance marked you as lower class. Indeed, you were still wroth years later, at having been clapped into Newgate as a ‘yeoman’ rather than the ‘gentleman’ to which you were entitled by virtue of your university degrees.” If that were true, I thought, my values were seriously awry. Nicolas chose a shirt and breeches for me, and waited outside while I dressed, a little puzzled by the plainness of the selected garments.
I was soon enlightened, for Nicolas led me, not to the study as I had expected, but to a wing of the building that had been fitted as a salle d’armes. Geoffrey, clad in much the same fashion, awaited us there. “There are fine schools of fencing near Cambridge,” he said with a feral grin. “Made you any use of them?”
“We shall see,” I answered with a grin of my own, and strolled to the racks lining one wall to select my weapons. I found abated rapier whose length and weight pleased me, and a practice dagger, then turned to face Geoffrey, rapier in hand. I looked down in surprise, realizing with a start that I was left-handed. My grin faltered a moment, then returned as I glanced at Geoffrey.
“I trust this does not inconvenience you,” I said.
“Not at all,” Geoffrey answered, switching his own blade to his left hand and deftly leaning into the attack.