Shadows on the Wall Chapter Sixty-One

Chapter 61:The Ministry of Love

by CollinsKid

Voice-Over (Alexandra Moltke):  "Collinwood, in the year 1897.  There is but one

god, and his name is Petofi.  His Hand sees all and judges all, and now it sees

the future and wants it desperately.  There are those that would challenge

Petofi, but sooner or later, every person learns that love is finite, and time

is endless."

finished

Angelique crumpled to the ground a third time, and was done.

She was smoking now.  He hadn't set her on fire -- for long, anyway.  The Count

loomed over her, black and vervasive, a blot on the night sky.  Beside him, the

shambling mess that was left of Charles Delaware Tate tittered and giggled over

the sight of her broken form.

She'd caught up with them in the woods just outside, all crackling eyes and

brimstone and uttered curses.  It had not lasted.  Two hexes and one malefic

inferno later and here she was, smoldering, body racked with horrific pain.

Above her, the image swam and shuddered with her writhing breaths, but still

she saw him:a victor.

"I thought you'd grown tired of this sort of nonsense, 'Miranda,'" Petofi

tsked, dusting off his gloved hands, then clapping them together.  "Honestly,

my dear!  What a mess.  Look at you, you're practically *broiled*.."

"Broiled," Tate repeated, snickering.  "Toiled, coiled, foiled -- "

"SHUT UP!" she screamed at him through cracking lips.  Her eyes were running.

She whirled on Petofi, struggling to stand, struggling to anything.  "You --

you -- you could never -- win in a fair -- fight -- " She collapsed to her

knees again.

Petofi let out a booming, hearty laugh, full of the knowledge of the gods, and

Tate clapped his hands excitedly and did a little jig.  "Oh, Miranda!" the

Count managed, breathless with laughter.  The wind screamed.  "Miranda,

Miranda, Miranda -- witch -- darling -- this is obviously not your finest hour

by any means; it is humiliation by proxy simply to, to watch you -- oh -- oh,

my -- well.  Oh.  You see, ah, I think it best to let you go on your way now, a

little crisped, but..."

"We will finish this now," she mumbled thickly, mouth full of ash, and wanted

to vomit. She tried again to stand, and this time succeeded, but clung to a

tree for support.

"Miranda," Petofi purred.  "Do you not see?  You are already finished."

"I am not finished until you are in the ground -- "

"I have tried to be gentlemanly," Petofi simpered, and it was in that lazy,

cold tone that Angelique felt her spine quake.  The wind whickered across his

lenses.  "I have tried to give you your dignity but you are *so incessantly

insistent!* Really, my dear, I don't know what to do with you anymore."

"I will destroy you long before I am wanted elsewhere," she snarled, scar

tissue racing across her limbs.  "I will offer you to him proudly, and then be

on my way -- "

"Will you?" Petofi murmured, cocking his head.  "Will you now?  I'm afraid you

have less time to shame yourself over and over than you might have once

thought, Miranda."

Angelique shuddered in the cold, but laughed in his face.  "You have no knowing

of how long I am here -- "

"But I do," Petofi cooed.  "At least, I do now." Then, like a languid cobra:"I

have reset your timepiece, Miss Miranda DuVal."

Angelique froze.  "That's impossible."

"Maybe to some men, but not to Petofi," he remarked drolly, rubbing his hands

together despite the cold.  "You have not long now, Miranda.  You will be

returned to sender shortly, far too quickly for you to put together any other

kind of ridiculous, pathetic ragtag offensive."

"You can do NO SUCH THING -- " she hissed, and now tears were in her eyes

again.

"I am Petofi," he said softly.  "I can do everything.  You, on the other hand,

can do nothing.  Not now, not ever again." He watched her bow her head and

shake, and tutted. "Weep not, witch.  Find your resolve and make your

apologies, and go quietly from the party -- while you still have a few

figurative minutes." He leaned in close and took her chin in his paw, hard, and

when he spoke again she smelled blood and charnel on his wolf's breath.  "This

is NOT your fight."

They were gone when she looked up again, and all Angelique could do despite

herself was finally vomit.

-

honestly

Edward Collins' dead wife was coming down the hallway for him, and all he had

was this stupid little trinket.

Laura was after him.  She wanted him dead.  He knew this as sure as he knew his

own name.  She had come back once before, and now she was back again.  The

woman who he had married and bore children with was not simply a woman, no; not

simply a wife, like Victoria, but a creature, a THING, a spirit, perhaps,

something unearthly and not simply inhuman but UNHUMAN, yes, beyond the

almighty's realm. Something...*supernatural.* Something supernatural that

wanted to kill him and take their children into her black, black abyss.

Being a right proper man of his time and station in life, Edward was at a loss

when it came to dealing with such a problem.  His wife was supposed to have

been a shrew, not a demon.  So he did what any right proper man faced with such

insurmountable absurdity did at such a time:he went to the gypsies.  He'd gone

to Magda, who at first tried to turn him away, looking wan and worn and older

than ever he'd seen the old freeloader, but after some pushing had finally

relented.

"Awright!" she'd snapped at him, eyes hot and liquid, face pinched -- he was

not her only stressor that night, to be sure.  "Awright, you want some help

with your awful, awful wife, I give you some help.  I got a firestone charm.

But this an' no more!  I got my own council to keep."

He'd taken the hastily-wrapped parcel she'd handed him, all cheap paper with

some flowers on it, and thanked her hastily and rushed home without opening it,

hoping it was not too late and Laura was not in fact there waiting for him.

Once back in his bedroom -- and after checking the corners for Laura -- he'd

torn the package open, only to find a rock.  A jagged, bizarre little rock,

gleaming yes, red yes, but just a rock nonetheless.  A 'firestone charm'

indeed!  Honestly!

That had been two hours ago, and since then, but for occasional sleepy visits

from Jamison or check-ups by one of the maids (not Beth, no, Beth had been an

utter wreck for days now; they really ought to either make that girl pick

herself up by her bootstraps or finally dismiss her could find a faster girl

for less money but ANYWAY) , Edward had sat alone in this room, clutching the

firestone in his hand, sitting primly and upright in his chair.  Until just a

moment ago, when he'd heard a skittering -- a faint ticking -- at the end of

the hall.  Like the talons of some great beast, klicking and scratching on the

wooden floor.  He'd gone to peer just out his door down the hall -- just a

whit, prudence was best -- and seen it:

A shape.  A great huge dark blot, huddled at the end of the hall.  Staring down

at his room. At his door.

Edward had leapt back into his chair and remained prim and upright.  He hadn't

really been able to tell whether that shape was man or animal, big or little,

male or female.  He did know that all pretenses aside, it was Laura, come to

eat him.

As he heard footsteps start to creak down the hall, Edward clutched the stupid,

stupid little rock to his breast and waited, breathing in shudders.  He stared

at the doorknob like a sacred mandala, waiting, waiting for it to turn.  The

wood creaked.

Waiting for it to begin its inexorable spin.

Waiting for it to spin and open and...

"Edward."

Edward whirled to his right.  Nora was already in his room.  He double-taked,

looking back at the door.  It was still closed.  He looked back, then, frantic,

and saw with dawning horror and a sinking stomach that this was not really his

daughter.  Well, technically, yes, yes that was Nora being co-opted by the

dread spirit that was his wife, but those were not her eyes glaring at him with

glittering, harsh desert sunrise disapproval, not her mousy chestnut hair

flowing up and around her shoulders like a mane with no wind to carry her, not

her mouth curled into a moue of exasperation, not her feet floating just a foot

or so off the ground, not her incandescent, vague spotlight washing over her,

and now, just a bit, him.  It was Nora but it was Laura.

"Nuh - Laura!" Edward choked out, hand to his mouth.  "Y-you -- you were

supposed to use the door!"

"Oh, shut up, Edward," Nora/Laura sighed, and that at least was Nora, her voice

overlayed by her mother's, and for the first time Edward realized with a cool

fear how similar they could sound when they tried and he instantly had grim

visions of his elderly years with his life perhaps in Nora's hands.  "My God.

You knew I was coming, if you'd wanted to do something about it you should've

thought sooner..."

Edward clutched the stone to him still, not letting her see it amidst his

quivering horror. He tried to be diplomatic, voice halting and shaky.  "Could

you - perhaps - go back - and use the door?"

"NO!" his daughter boomed, and the room shook and Edward whimpered.  The

sunrise in Nora's eyes crackled and spat fire, and then she floated a little

closer to him, her hair dancing just before his face, flowing like tentacles.

"Do you know why I married you, Edward?" she purred.  "Do you know why I

bothered?"

"You - wanted something," Edward wheezed out, hyperventilating.

"I had to BREED," Lauranora snarled.  "I had to make mine.  I am made to die

and live and die, and take my young with me.  I'm sure it's hard for you to

grasp.  I lay down with you out of necessity, and incidentially, you were

atrocious EVERY MISBEGOTTEN TIME." She hmphed, checking a nail.  "But, well,

hundreds of knitted afghans and mid-afternoon luncheons later, here I am."

Edward tried very hard not to consider the dichotomy of his very young daughter

saying these things.  He blinked up at the spectre before her, from whom the

light was now growing blinding and decidedly hot.  "Is there nothing I can do

to persuade you not to hurt

- us?"

Laura laughed uproariously.  "And damn my brood to years of corsets and watery

broth and horrible hygiene?  My dear Edward, you must be joking!" She took her

chin in her small hand, hard.  "There is no negotiating," Nora cooed, face

mocking sympathy.  "You have to burn, now.  First you, then us.  Except we'll

leave prettier remains than what I do to you." Her eye roiled with fire again.

"I loved you once," Edward attempted pitifully, petrified.

Nora rolled her eyes.  "Isn't that nice." She reared up, light starting to

shimmer and break, as the floor started to smolder.  "ANYWAY..."

That was when, inexplicably, somehow, Edward found his gorge, and somehow leapt

from the chair to lunge at his daughter, stupid rock thrust out in one hand

like a cross. "BACK, FOUL CREATURE!" he managed to sputter.

Nothing happened.

Edward remained in place, frozen.  Then, he looked down at the stone.  Shook it

in his hand.

Nora just stared at him for a minute, nonplussed.  Then, she started to

snicker.  And her flames started to grow higher.

Edward desperately smacked the rock in his hand.  Accursed thing!  Charm

indeed! Honestly, gypsies, if it's not one thing it's a-bloody-NOTHER -- he

cracked the rock against the bedpost, hard, in frustration --

-- and then there was a piercing, violent ruby light, spilling out and coursing

through the room, like miasma, and then a rushing noise, and the feeling of

electricity --

Nora blanched.  "oh -- "

There was a great vacuum, and then the stone fell to the floor, blackened, and

so did Nora Collins.

Edward stood there, agape at the scene, for a long moment.  He hesitantly felt

the air for any trace of Laura, of anything.  Then, he looked to his daughter.

Nora was sitting up, yawning.  "f-father...?"

Edward knelt beside her, helping her woozily to her feet and bracing her with

his hands on her shoulders.  "Oh -- oh, Nora, Nora -- my darling -- you ARE all

right, you are!" He clutched her to him, feeling suddenly quite the conquering

hero and perhaps slightly a parent.

"'course 'm alright," she mumbled.  "i was in bed.  now 'm not.  why is that?"

"Well," Edward began stumblingly, fawning.  "You see, Nora dear, something

dreadful was happening, a-and -- well -- now it's not, yes, and -- and I saved

you!  Yes!" He pointed to the blackened stone on the floor, grabbed it; it was

now going to slag, sort of falling off in clumps.  He handed it to Nora, who

looked disgusted.  "Yes!  You see, I, I used this firestone!  This *firestone

CHARM!*"

Nora held the piece of rock like a dead cat, looking revolted.  "Oh, Father,"

she muttered primly.  "Honestly."

Beneath his magnamanious grin, Edward felt his heart quiver in fear.

-

the once & future fool

"Don't."

He turned to her, in the dark.  Rain pelted the walls, shaking the walls

unusually this far back in the West Wing.  The lights were out now, the whole

room was blackness but for a few errant traces of light from the windows in the

hall outside.  That's how he'd wanted it. She'd tried to talk him out of it,

but he refused.  His prize -- both of their horrible prize -- lay in the dust

in the back of the room.  He couldn't look at it.  Neither of them could.  They

were afraid of what they would see, be it animal or man.

"I can't," he managed through cracked lips.  He tried to wet them and couldn't.

"I can't touch you.  Not right now.  Not ever again." He turned away.  "I'd

like you to go now, please."

Thunder rolled outside.  They stood there, in the ramshackle little room, in

the dark, and it felt like they were aboard a boat in this great storm, in the

last cabin left before the whole vessel was eaten by the sea.

"I have no place else to go," she said softly.

"That's not true and you know it," he said softly.  "Barnabas -- Magda --

whoever.  Not me." He laughed grimly.  "Look at what I've made of myself.

Father would be SO proud, wouldn't he."

"He would be proud because you are a good man -- "

"I am not a good man," he hissed, and there was no room in that voice for

arguing.  "I am a vain man.  I am a stupid man.  I am now, unless we're to

destroy that, a perfect man.  An unending man.  Whether or not Petofi sees the

future, I'm now quite certain I will." He paused.  "I wonder what that's going

to be like?  To not have an end?  I wonder if I'll go mad?" He turned to her.

"Do you suppose?"

"No, I don't suppose," she snapped, and her voice was thick.  "A-at -- at least

you won't -- you won't have to be -- as you were -- "

"You hate me for what I've done," he interrupted.  "I disgust you."

"No."

"Any smart woman would hate -- "

"NO."

"the-animal-that-walks-like-a-man," he recited.  "Right." He chuckled.  "But

it's worse now, you see!  Now I'm the Once and Future Fool." Then,

darkening:"I've given him just what he wants.  I'm beholden to him now.  I've

betrayed you, I've betrayed everyone.  I've betrayed myself.  When he asks

something of me, I won't be able to say no.  I'm his latest thing.  Charles was

last spring.  Now there's me."

He sighed, sat down tiredly in the chair, now a very old man.  "Go on, get out.

Get away from the fool who's damned you all."

"You're not a fool."

"Get out -- "

"You're not a fool -- "

She came to him, and leaned over him, and took her head in her hands, and they

embraced.  For a long time.  The room quivered and roiled on that sea of storm.

They lay there like that, spooned in the dark, listening to each other

breathe.

She cast her eyes over to the portrait, in the corner on the other side of the

room.  Then, she looked away.

"Make love to me."

He blinked.  "What."

"I don't care," she said into his ear, clutching at his neck.  "I don't care

who you are, or what lies you tell yourself, or what's not a lie and is

actually very true.  I don't care what you've done.  I don't care what happens.

I just don't care.  I love you.  I want you."

He tried to protest, couldn't.  He just took her hands in his.  "Are you sure?"

"Yes."

He sagged, and she felt him shudder, tears.  "Whatever happens..."

She nodded, and drew him to her, like a mother, like a everything.  "Whatever

happens..."

"Yes..."

They lay down on the divan.

Her hair was in her face.  She could barely see the orphanage now, and there

was the matron, and all her friends, in the pleated skirts and the white socks

and the saddle shoes...

(her name is victoria i can no longer take care of her)

"Kiss me."

He did.

They did.

She saw.

-

no one likes my face

She had been there waiting for him after they had finished and she had slept --

she had wanted to go with him but he'd begged her no -- Quentin had gone to the

Hill to try and think some way out of this, out of their current place.  But it

had been hours, and yet still she had been here, knowing he would come.  The

storm was passing now, just a strong wind and some rain left, and the

occasional bit of thunder.

Beth sat on a rock at the lip of the Hill, hair in her eyes, all askew, face

white and oddly serene, if somehow disjointed.  Quentin stopped dead when he

saw her.

"Hi," she murmured tiredly.  "Hello."

Quentin was at a loss.  "Hello, Beth."

Beth looked out to the black horizon, night still, waves still riled a bit

below.  "It looks like there's absolutely nothing out there anymore.  You

know?"

Quentin stepped forward, feeling very awkward.  "Yes, I suppose it looks a bit

peculiar," he ventured carefully.

"I wonder sometimes if there is," she said softly.  "Anything.  Out there

anymore, I mean. It's been quite a time."

"That it has," Quentin allowed.  "Beth -- "

"Do you know about when I was young, Quentin?" Beth asked him, and she sounded

like she was dreaming.  "Did I ever tell you?  Did you ever listen?  It's okay

if you didn't, I really, I just, I don't talk about it much.  I don't like to.

I was such an odd little girl -- " she laughed, but it sounded very hollow and

bone-dry -- "you know, hair that was too, um, it curled, unbecomingly, and we

were so poor -- it was New York, and, uh, they just have pots lined up and down

the streets, for people to, um -- to -- um -- "

"Beth," Quentin started.  This had to stop.  He knew she'd been ill, and --

"No," she cut him off, harsh.  "No, no, just, you see -- " she laughed again --

"I was an odd little girl, in more ways than just the one, because for some

reason they always said my color was too off, and Mama never said much about

who my father was, but I always wondered, maybe he was a sea captain, or an

aristocrat, or a *prince* -- that he would come and -- anyway -- anyway, it was

awful, but at least I knew my place and I knew my people, like me, dozens of

children who were *just a bit odd* -- " there was a sob in her throat -- "But

then Mama got sick and I went up to Bangor with her sister, but she hated us,

and everyone there was just so very -- beautiful -- and they spat on us, and on

me, but I made my way, I held my head, because that's what my mother had said

to do, is hold my head, and make my way, and find my way, and go on.  And I

did, and I got a good job.  And I met you.  Except I also -- it was in my job

description -- I kept all these secrets, I was playing nanny to your wife, and

then -- I mean, you have another woman every week, I should just expect, I

guess -- "

"Beth, let's go back inside," Quentin said hastily.  "We can talk about this.

I know you haven't been feeling well at all, and I think we should go inside

and take care of you, it's cold out here -- "

"There was a bird made of fire upstairs!" Beth screamed at him, rearing to her

feet, weaving, suddenly falling off that emotional edge into anger.  She seemed

to gravitate by the second now, from weepy fury to wistful laughter, before his

eyes.  "There was a THING, a BIRD, in Nora's room -- it was the most horrible

thing I've ever seen -- and it screamed at me, and it swallowed me up, and it

told me what to do, but you know, it's not the first person to do that, and it

won't be the last -- or maybe -- but, um -- " she laughed again -- "anyway -- I

mean, there was you, and my aunt, and Judith, and Edward, and Laura, and poor

Jenny -- god poor Jenny -- I never knew why -- how she could go from being so

beautiful to so -- so -- "

Her face shattered and she looked at him, tears streaming down her face.  "i

loved you."

"I know," Quentin said, reaching for her.  His heart was jackhammering.  "I

know you did. God, Beth, I know, I'm so sorry for all the wrong that's been

done to you, just please -- "

"Oh PLEASE," she countered, voice fluctuating from very low to very shrill.

She shook her head.  "It's always the same things -- 'god beth i know i'm so

sorry for all the wrong that's been done to you' -- but no one really is

because they just do something else. You're in love with her, and you have --

with her -- I saw -- and then I knew, in one instant, like crystal -- that this

is the rest of my life.  You can only hold your head for so long, Quentin,

until someone takes it off." She smiled bitterly.  "No one likes my face.  No

one likes my attitude.  No one likes my name.  I wanted to be a singer, I

wanted to be on phonographs -- they always said I could sing, but you would

never listen -- "

"I will," Quentin said --

"No, you won't," she said, drawing away, pulling back.  "You'll pretend.  But

once I'm fine then I'm fine and you'll forget." Her chin was on the verge of

crumbling.  "I can't.  I can't." She turned to the Hill again.  "There is

absolutely nothing out there.  Not for me.  Not for anybody who ever had a

heart.  You'll see, Quentin, if you live to see much else.  I can only imagine

-- in a hundred years -- will they still like your face, Quentin?" She stepped

forward.

Quentin reached for her.  "Don't -- "

She turned back once more.  "It's nothing," Beth said softly, her face serene

again. "Really.  Tell her for me."

Then, Beth Chavez let herself fall.

TO BE CONTINUED...