Angel of Ruin (48 page)

“He loves me,” she said, and her voice broke over a sob and tears began to mix with the river water. “He loves me.”

Betty clung to a corner of her bed and kept one eye open at all times. The slightest noise on the stair would send her curling up into a defensive ball, John’s name on her lips. If she saw Mary again, she knew her tired heart would stop beating and she would no doubt die of fright. But what was she to do about the girl? Run away? This was her home. Any attempts to banish the girl, however, would draw more repercussions. She wished she were not too weak and tired to think about it properly.

Someone approaching. She cringed under the covers, pulling them up over her face. Not John, with his careful feel-step, feel-step on the staircase. Not Liza, who had chosen not to return. One of the girls.

“Betty?”

It was Deborah. She steeled herself. Just because the youngest girl hadn’t yet turned her witchcraft on Betty, it didn’t mean she never would. “What is it?”

Deborah found her way through the part in the curtains and Betty saw that she was drenched. She had an expression of such serious intent upon her face, that Betty felt herself flinch.

“What is it?” she said again. “What has happened? Why are you wet?”

“Betty, listen to me,” Deborah said, sinking on the bed next to her.

Betty scrambled away.

“You are so serious. You frighten me.”

“I know you are still ill,” Deborah said. “But you and Father must get out of the house.”

“Why?”

“Be not so frightened. You will be safe. I am on the verge of putting an end on this whole wretched affair.”

“Get off the bed. You are wet. I shall catch a chill and die if you soak the covers.”

Deborah did not respond. “This afternoon, you and Father must purpose to go for a walk —”

“I am suffering from a terrible illness!”

“You are recovering rapidly. The illness was advanced by magic, it did not take hold of your body completely. Trust me. To stay here a moment longer is far worse. You must walk with Father, and at the bottom of the hill I shall have a hackney coach waiting for you to take you to Dartford for the night, where the driver shall drop you at a good inn and return to collect you the next morning.”

“We cannot afford a hackney coach. We cannot afford an inn.”

“Betty,” Deborah said, raising her voice, “you must listen to me and you must do as I say. If you do not wish to preserve yourself I would allow it, but you must preserve Father.”

Her stern tone jolted Betty into silence.

“I will pay the driver of the coach in advance for the whole expedition. He will arrive at five of the clock. You are to take Father for a walk, saying you are much recovered and you wish to take some fresh air. You are to lead him to the coach, put him in it and say it is Deborah’s command, and Deborah says he must trust her. He
must
trust me.”

“If he does not? If he purposes to turn and come home?”

“You must not let him.” Deborah reached over for her hand, but Betty withdrew it. “Betty, it is of extreme importance that you take care of this matter.”

Betty felt a terrible frightened sadness well up within her. “I despise you,” she said. “I despise all of you.”

“When you return tomorrow it will be over. None of us, not me, not Anne and certainly not Mary, will have anything beyond the ordinary powers to control the world around us. My older sisters may be sent away as apprentices and they will have no means to stop you.” Deborah sighed. “All will be well for you.”

Betty knew she had little choice. What Deborah promised was her dearest wish. As much as she didn’t want to give Deborah the gratification of seeing her bend so easily to her will, she nodded once. “I shall do it then.”

Deborah sank forward, and Betty noticed for the first time the dark shadows beneath her eyes. “What happened to you, child?” she said, more softly than she intended.

“I believe I may have done something foolhardy.” She pressed her face into her hands then looked up to meet Betty’s gaze. “What is your fondest memory, Betty?”

“Why, I don’t know.”

“You must have at least one fond memory. You must know a moment in which all was happy.”

Betty shook her head, wondering why Deborah was asking her. “My life has been very ordinary up until recently, when it has become frightening and precarious. There have been no great moments of joy.”

“What about small moments of joy?” Deborah said.

Betty waved her away. “Go and dress in dry clothes. You will catch a chill and then be no use to anyone.”

Deborah rose and left, heavy footed. Betty watched her leave and then pressed her fingers against her lips. All so complicated. She hoped Deborah was right. She hoped it would soon be over.

Father was grumbling and Betty was coughing and Deborah was sure her plan was doomed to fail as, that afternoon shortly before the bells had rung five, she realised just how stubborn Father could be.

“Betty, you are ridiculous. Just yesterday morning you were on death’s door, and now you want to walk! Go back to bed and rest. A dead wife is of no use to me.”

“But I am well!” Another cough. Deborah winced.

“You sound unwell.”

“I believe it was a short illness which has now passed. My heart beats strongly and I wish more than any remedy for fresh air. Please, John, we needn’t walk far.”

“Father, I can vouch for Betty’s colour,” Deborah said. “Her cheeks are rosy and her eyes bright.” This was very far from the truth, and Betty’s look of exasperation acknowledged it.

“And what if she should fall ill while we walk? What if she collapses and I cannot revive her?”

“‘Twill not happen, John,” Betty said.

“I shall walk with you, then,” Deborah said suddenly. “I will be the guardian of you both.”

Father relented. “Very well, if she is determined to walk.”

“Yes, I am,” Betty said.

Deborah heard footsteps on the stairs and her skin itched with anxiety. How was she to get her sisters out of the house next?

Still, one problem at a time.

“Very well, let us go, for evening will soon be upon us,” Deborah said, leading Father to the door and fixing his hat upon his head. “Come, Father, here are your gloves.”

Betty looked very pale and Deborah hoped she was not sending her stepmother into the arms of a greater infection. She steeled herself against such thoughts. It must be over. It must be over soon. She ushered them out in front of her and began the descent down the hill. She could see the hackney coach waiting at the bottom of the Walk — she had paid for the whole venture from the bag of conjured guineas — and felt her pulse rise. It was up to Betty to get Father into the coach. They approached it slowly. A few yards away, Deborah said, “I have a hole in my shoe.”

Betty turned to her and gave her a determined nod. “Return home then. We shall wait here at the corner.”

Father stood staring into blind nothing, unaware of the plan.

Deborah pressed two guineas into Betty’s hand. “I shall return presently.”

Betty eyed the money in shock. “Good luck,” she managed, as Deborah ran up the hill.

Deborah paused at the door of their house, could see Betty and Father arguing. Long moments passed. She watched, her breath held in the hollow of her
throat. Then, miraculously, Father was climbing into the coach and the driver was assisting Betty.

Thank you, Betty, thank you.

She turned to the house and was suddenly hit by a wave of sensation. He was here. Lazodeus was already here. Upstairs, in the bedroom.

Would she leave him be? Or would it be imprudent? After all, she had no guarantee that he would come when she called, other than a faith in his cunning and his desire to ensnare her as firmly as her sisters. Perhaps he was alone.

She felt around her neck for the angel key. Its cool weight rolled between her fingers.

“It is time, Lazodeus,” she said under her breath. “You shall let my sisters go.”

A
nne had laid down for only a moment — a brief rest from the immense load of holding her head up under such unbearable pressure — and the dream was upon her as soon as her eyes fluttered closed.
A funeral, her dead father in state, she comes to kiss his brow, his skin is smooth and cool, voices in the distance chatter and laugh but she is very cold and alone, he opens his eyes, his hand reaches up to seize her face, he hisses, “I see you, Anne, at last I see you.”

She woke with a start, her hand pressed to her breast. Was this what the rest of her life would be, suffering this awful burden of guilt? She rolled onto her side and her dark hair fell over her face. She had been fighting back sobs of terror and exertion since the night Lazodeus had proposed his plan. Her fear was that if she began to cry, if she let the thoughts that plagued her overwhelm her, she may lose her resolve. That resolve was growing weaker and weaker by the day, and she both longed for and dreaded Lord’s day. She knew that to keep Lazodeus — to have him by her forever, her dearest wish granted — she had to do as he said. But every time she slipped into that dream, she wondered if she would be capable of it at the end. Would her softer nature, her damnable timidity, undo
her at the very moment she was to prove herself to him?

A soft touch on the back of her neck made her catch her breath. Anne turned over to see Lazodeus crouching by the side of the bed.

“Hello, my love,” he said, and for an instant — just an instant — she wondered if he had read her thoughts and made this visit to sway her more keenly to her purpose. But then he smiled at her, and any suspicion of manipulation evaporated. He loved her.

“Why are you here?” she asked. “I thought your visits were limited until the deed is done.”

“They are, but I missed you so badly.” His fingers grazed her cheek. “And here I find you looking so sad. What is the matter?”

“I am afraid.”

“We all know fear.”

She opened her mouth to speak again, but he trailed his finger over her lips and moved onto the bed next to her.

“Lazodeus, my sisters may be nearby.”

“No, Mary is in the garden and Deborah is not here. We are quite alone.”

The sheer curtain on the window moved in the breeze, sunlight diffused through it. Anne found herself beginning to relax. “I have missed you, too, angel.”

“Soon we shall be together always,” he said, his lips touching hers in tiny, butterfly kisses. “Do you not look forward to that?”

“’Tis all my pleasure to think upon it,” she said. His deft fingers were unlacing her house dress and loosening the buttons on the top of her shift. “Shall we make love every day?”

“Perhaps,” he said, his hand enclosing one of her small breasts.

“What else shall we do, tell me?”

His lips moved down her neck and across her collarbone. “We shall do whatever you wish, Annie.”

“Will you be happy?”

He looked up at her and fixed her in his green-blue gaze. She was astonished again by the clarity of his eyes. “I will be happy, I promise I will be happy. Will you? Will you be happy that you have saved me from imprisonment, that you will bring me praise and honour in Pandemonium?”

“Of course, of course I will be.” His lips descended and her dream was forgotten.

Deborah took the stairs with painful slowness and care. To give herself away now would be foolish and irreversible. Her presence would bind Lazodeus to the earth so that she could finish this business finally. If he fled before she got there …

Strange how she could sense him in her mind; like a warm itch in the field of her perceptions. She saw her own hand stretched out before her, reaching for the door. It swung in. She stopped and caught her breath.

A naked woman lay upon the bed in Lazodeus’s arms, her dark hair covering her face. Deborah’s first thought was that it must be Mary, but the arms and wrists were too thin, the hair too straight and long. Anne sat up and shrieked.

“Get out!”

Lazodeus staggered back, fixing her with a desperate look of fearful wonder.

“How did you —?”

“Get out!” Anne screamed again, throwing a pillow and pulling her shift against her naked body.

“No, Anne,” Deborah said, taking two steps into the room and standing firm. “’Tis you must get out. Leave me with the angel.”

“I shall not.”

A look of horror began to grow across Lazodeus’s face, and his mouth moved once, twice, without him saying anything.

“What?” Anne said, looking to Lazodeus. “What is it? Why do you look so horrified? You are frightening me, my love.”

“Oh, Deborah,” Lazodeus said, his voice quiet yet heavy with portent. “Deborah, what have you done?” His fear seemed to be as much for her as it was for him, and a frosty finger touched her heart.

“I have done what I had to do. Now tell Anne to get out, for you know she will be harmed.”

“What is going on?” Anne said, turning a frightened and confused face to Deborah. Tears had begun to stream down her cheeks and her attempts to dress herself had stalled. “Why do you both look so pale? What is happening?”

All at once Lazodeus seized Anne by the shoulders and pressed her in front of him like a shield. “You will not harm your sister,” he said boldly, and he was right.

“Lazodeus, what is happening?” Anne sobbed.

“Her purpose is to annihilate me,” Lazodeus said, his eyes never leaving Deborah’s. “She has an angel key … she may command angels against me.”

Anne looked in gape-mouthed horror at first one, then the other of them, and began to scream. “NO! No, Deborah you shall not! No! I won’t allow it. I love him, I love him!”

“Be quiet,” Deborah said. “Lazodeus, let her go. Be not so timid that you cower behind a mortal woman.”

“As long as you are with me, she will not do it,” Lazodeus said to Anne, “for to use the angel key in the presence of a mortal is to cause them terrible injury.”

Anne dropped her shift and spread her arms in front of Lazodeus in a protective gesture. “Ha! Hear that, sister? I can protect him.”

“I can finish him anyway, and choose to let you be harmed,” Deborah said, but there was little conviction in her words and she knew it. She had acquired the angel key to protect her family, not to destroy them.

A noise on the stairs. Mary. Deborah felt her heart sink.

“What’s all that noise? Why are you shrieking so, Anne?”

Lazodeus let go of Anne. “Cover yourself,” he said. But it was too late. Mary already stood in the doorway, gaping at naked Anne in Lazodeus’s arms.

“Lazodeus?” she said, in a little girl voice.

Anne was pulling on her shift, buttoning it unevenly.

“Anne?” Mary said.

Deborah wondered if this revelation could work for her. “I came in here to find them making love, Mary. Your sister has betrayed you. Your angel has betrayed you.”

Mary turned a contemptuous gaze on Deborah, but Deborah could see her chin working against the effort of holding back a sob.

“Mary,” Lazodeus said, “Deborah purposes to destroy me, but she will not as long as you and Anne are with me.”

Mary seemed hesitant to react, and Deborah found herself feeling as though time had slowed, and that they would play out forever this one scene. The angel key, faithless Lazodeus, her sisters regarding each other as enemies. But then Mary took four quick steps towards the candlestand by the bed and seized the heavy brass candlestick with purpose. Deborah quickly went to stay her hand, for she thought Mary intended to strike Anne with it. But Mary turned, and with a mighty heft, brought the candlestick down on Deborah’s head.

Deborah staggered back, her palm flying to her forehead. Blood. A loud ringing in her ears, darkness
on the periphery of her vision. Mary pushed her, she crashed to the floor.

“You shall not harm him,” Mary said to her. Then to the others. “Come, I know where we can go.”

All three of them fled, Anne fiddling with the buttons on her housedress. Deborah tried to sit up, but her head was a millstone. Her hand clutched at the mat, but then the ringing in her ears became too loud to bear, and she slipped into a swoon.

Mary led Lazodeus and Anne down the Walk and along Bun Hill, then through the gate into the city.

“Come, Anne, keep up,” Mary called cruelly, for Anne was without her shoes and the streets of the city were still strewn with blackened rubbish.

“Go slower,” Anne cried. “I will hurt my feet.”

Mary hoped she would hurt her feet. Mary hoped she would cut them to ribbons. Lazodeus belonged to Mary, and if Anne had to learn that through pain and suffering, then so be it.

“I cannot go slower, for I must save Lazodeus’s life,” Mary called behind her.

Lazodeus urged her forward. “Where are we going?” he asked.

“Sir Wallace’s house is part burned. He removed his possessions and went to the country, but the house still stands and Deborah will not thinking of looking for us there.”

“Wait!” Anne cried out, as they pulled ahead of her.

Lazodeus was a few steps in front now, and Mary quickly doubled back and grabbed Anne’s elbow.

“Thank you, sister,” Anne said.

Mary smiled, then kicked both Anne’s feet from under her, tripping her roughly to the ground.

Anne cried out in pain. “Oh! My ankle!”

“I am sorry, Anne, we have no time to wait.
Lazodeus’s safety is at stake.” She didn’t look behind her, but hurried her step, urging Lazodeus on. “Come,” she said, “we proceed faster without her.”

“I may need both of you.”

“She can’t keep up. She slows us down and Deborah might catch us.”

He glanced over his shoulder. “You are not to think that I encouraged her to expose herself to me. The poor girl has been in love with me for some time.”

Mary felt a little satisfaction settle her troubled heart. “I know not what to think. But I assure you we need her not. I will cleave to you closely. Deborah cannot win this.”

Anne sobbed wretchedly as she picked herself up. Her feet were bleeding and her ankle felt as though the very bone had been twisted, but she could not let Mary and Lazodeus out of her sight. She saw them disappear up an alley ahead and hobbled in that direction, every step an arrow of pain, leaving bloody footprints behind her on the filthy, ash-stained cobbles. This part of the city had been touched by the fire but not levelled, so it would be easy for Mary to lead Lazodeus via a convoluted route in order to lose her.

She struggled to the corner and saw Mary’s red dress disappear to the left. Hobbling as fast as she could, she gave chase. The sun was sinking, and it had stained the sky blood orange. Amongst the approaching shadows of evening it was hard to distinguish the shape of her sister darting through alleys. A moment later, she emerged on the remains of Cradle Alley and saw Mary and Lazodeus running. The city had cleared a path through the wreckage here, and Anne gritted her teeth and ran after them. They disappeared into a house at the end of the alley. One side of it had been burned, the other was still intact.

Mary met her at the door. “Stay out, sister, we can manage this ourselves.”

“Please, Mary,” Lazodeus called from within. “Stay by me. Let Anne in.”

“What did you think you were doing with him?” Mary asked in a hiss. “As if he would ever love you.”

“He does love me,” Anne replied, her face straining to hold itself together. “Let me in.”

Lazodeus appeared at the door beside Anne and pulled her in, then dropped the latch. “Both of you, stop arguing and stay here by me.”

“Lazodeus, tell her it is me you love!” Anne cried.

Lazodeus roughly seized first Anne’s shoulder then Mary’s, held them in front of him and leaned forward with a dark face. “I may die!” he shouted. When both of them cringed away, he dropped his voice. “Do you understand that? Your sister has acquired the power to annihilate me. I do not know how many Seraphim she has with her, I do not know what she intends or when. All I know is that she will not destroy me while other mortals are nearby, for she knows it may destroy them as well. So you must stay with me and you must stop fighting with each other. I have to think about a way to save myself.” He released them and stalked to the window to watch the street.

“We’ll do anything,” Mary said quickly.

“Why do you not return to Pandemonium?” Anne suggested.

“Do you think I have not thought of that?” Lazodeus said impatiently. She could not bear his anger, it hurt her heart more than the cruel ground had hurt her feet. “The key has me earthbound. I am already falling under its power.”

“Haply I strook her hard enough to kill her,” Mary said.

“No, she is alive, or the key would not still be exerting its influence. I cannot escape.”

“Maybe we can —”

“Quiet!” Lazodeus roared, turning from the window. “Both of you be quiet and let me think. Anne, wash your wounds, you bleed upon the floor.”

Anne looked around properly for the first time. They were in a rich man’s house — she could tell by the coloured paint and the oriental carpet tacked to the floor — but none of the rich furnishings were present. The house was a hollow shell. Stairs led up to other rooms, which she presumed would also be empty. The carpet was faded in patterns around where furniture had stood. She could pick out the shape of a grand couch, a large table. Her own bloody footprints stained the carpet.

“The kitchen is through there,” Mary said, indicating. Anne hobbled in that direction. Water had not yet been restored to the pump, but a bucket stood by the fire and she plunged her feet into it, feeling the sweet pain of relief. She took a few moments to dress her wounds with an old apron which she tore into strips, then returned to the large room where Mary and Lazodeus were pulling up the carpet.

“What is happening?” she asked, hurt that she had been left out of this plan.

“We have decided to call one of Lazodeus’s colleagues through,” Mary said. “In the same way you and I and Deborah did when we first summoned Lazodeus.”

“He may be able to take me back with him, as he has not yet been in the presence of the angel key,” Lazodeus explained. “Can you find something to draw a triangle with?”