Frohock - Miserere: an Autumn Take

MISERERE

AN AUTUMN TALE

TERESA FROHOCK

Night Shade Books

San Francisco

Miserere: An Autumn Tale 2011 by Teresa Frohock

This edition of Miserere: An Autumn Tale 2011 by Night Shade Books

Cover art by Michael C. Hayes

Cover design by Rebecca Silvers

Interior layout and design by Amy Popovich

Edited by Jeremy Lassen

All rights reserved

First Edition

Printed in Canada

ISBN: 978-1-59780-289-5

eISBN: 978-1-59780-322-9

Night Shade Books

Please visit us on the web at

http://www.nightshadebooks.com

Dedicated to my husband

and best friend

Dick Frohock

PART I

Haunted by ill angels only

Edgar Allan Poe

Dream-Land

CHAPTER ONE

woerld in the sabbatical year 5873

N ight shadows deepened when Lucian extinguished the candle beside his bed. The cry from beyond his chamber ended too soon for him to determine its source. He sat on the edge of his mattress and listened for the noise to repeat itself. The hearth fire crackled. The blaze saturated the room with heat, but Catarina forbade open windows. His twin sister was always cold.

Sweat crawled through his hair. He dared not move; he had no desire to draw attention to himself. The seconds ticked into minutes, but Lucian remained still.

Listening.

Sounds drifted upward from the room beneath his chamber. A man laughed too loudly with a thin note of hysteria edging his mirth. The sound gave Lucian goose bumps.

Somethingperhaps a vase or a mirrorshattered. Another peal of laughter clipped the air before indistinct voices murmured in approval.

Reaching for his cane in the half-light, Lucian stood and limped across the room. His knee was stiff with the premature arthritis afflicting his old wound, and when he first rose, he moved more like a man of eighty than one of forty. He despised his crippling infirmity, and in his agitation, he turned the key with more violence than was necessary. It was a futile gesture; if his twin and her company wanted access to him, nothing so flimsy as a lock would stop them.

As he went to his chambers sole window, he kept to the carpeted areas so the rugs would muffle the sound of his cane against the floor. Elaborate tapestries covered the marble walls with his sisters favorite hunt scene. Firelight distorted the images woven into the cloth, elongating the faces of the hunters and hounds into freakish mutations. The stags eyes were almost human with their pleading, but there would be no mercy. The hunt was over. All that remained was death.

Lucian averted his gaze from the wall hangings as he passed his desk, piled with papers full of endless calculations. Books littered every flat surface, including the ottoman that squatted between two cushioned chairs by the hearth. He had only to ask and his every request was filled, but all the gifts in Woerld couldnt replace the life Catarina had stolen from him.

A prison, no matter how finely furnished, was still a prison. He reviled her house and all she stood for, but he had not tried to escape again. He had learned to fear his sister after his first failed attempt to leave her.

In spite of her edict, he went to the casement and pushed aside the heavy drapes to open the window over her sprawling gardens. The wide window-seat accommodated him comfortably, but his humor didnt improve with the cold breeze. Years of helpless rage slow-burned through his chest to rise like bile at the back of his throat.

On the opposite side of the city, the construction of the sprawling bastion for the Fallen Angel Mastema continued unabated. Dozens of fires illuminated the black stone turrets rising to meet the night. Girders stretched upward to the overcast sky, forming an open claw as if stone and steel could snatch the paradise the Celestial Court had denied the Fallen.

Lucian had no doubt Mastema would win a foothold in Woerld if Catarinas plans succeeded. Instead of searching for a site of power to hold back the Fallen, she perverted the teachings of the Citadel to calculate the appropriate longitude and latitude to find a weak Hell Gate in the city of Hadra.

The harsh northern provinces of Golan were isolated from the lower lands. Lucian was certain that Woerlds other religious fortresses were unaware of Mastemas temple; otherwise, they would have sent emissaries to assess the situation. Once they were assured of Catarinas goals, the various bastions would send their armies to stop her. Yet no word came from any of the three closest bastions: the Citadel, the Rabbinate, or the Mosque. The Hindu bastion of the Mandir, at the heart of Woerld, remained silent as well.

Of course, they had no way to know. Catarina was careful to mask her bastions true intent from the general populace, and the city of Hadra, nestled deep within the Aldilan Mountains, was especially secluded from the rest of Woerld. His twin sat in the center of her intrigues like a great dark spider, spinning her web of deceit and growing her army.

Downstairs someone shrieked; one voice rose above the others in pleasure and pain. Catarina no longer hid her perversions but reveled in them and dared him to admonish her. She ignored his efforts to guide her from her chosen path. He had failed to keep her safe. He had failed them all.

Lucian swallowed his misery as the sky lightened with dawn. Doors slammed below him; Catarinas guests were taking their leave to sleep through the morning. He wished he could flee with them. He had to get out of the house, even for an hour, to some place undefiled by her corruption.

Lucian closed the window, careful to secure the latch. He had to calm himself before he went downstairs. If she sensed even the slightest resentment in his attitude, she would slam the doors shut on him. Today he feared he would go insane if he couldnt leave.

Rather than call his servant, who would no doubt bring the usual array of light indoor clothing, Lucian dressed himself. Although it was only autumn, Golans northern winds had started to blow cold, so he chose his heaviest clothing and his boots. The merchants and priests knew him too well. Should he step inside a teahouse or church for too long, the proprietors would ask him to leave rather than risk Catarinas rage.

At his bedside table, he opened the drawer and removed his Psalter, wrapped in a silk scarf with faded crimson flowers. Other than his fathers signet ring, the scarf and book were the only possessions he maintained from his life before Hadra. He placed the scarf and Psalter in his breast pocket close to his heart.

With any luck, his sister would be in bed, exhausted from her night of debauchery, and he might slip out unnoticed. He opened the door to find a frightened manservant, who had been prepared to knock. The servant lowered his hand.

Lucian tightened his grip on his cane. What does she want?

Relieved, the man bowed twice before blurting, She wants to see you. Shes in the dining room. He hesitated, glancing up and down the hall. If you please, sir, he whispered.

No, it doesnt please me. Not at all. He wouldnt send the trembling servant back to her with that message. She would have the old man beaten to death. Lucian gestured brusquely, and the man scurried ahead of him.

It took him several painful minutes to navigate the wide, marble staircase, and he made no attempt to hurry. As he reached the main floor, one of the maids stepped into the corridor beside the dining room door. Tears streaked the livid bruise forming on her cheek, and she wiped her nose with her apron. In spite of her distress, she lifted her long skirts and curtsied as he passed.

He entered the room to find his sister seated at the head of the table wearing nothing but a loosely tied dressing gown. The deep frown that pulled her full lips downward marred her beauty. A gold filigree pendant that depicted two ravens, their beaks locked in an obscene kiss, hung between her breasts, which were partially exposed by her open robe. Without acknowledging him, she pushed aside the report she had been reading and violently rang a small golden bell.