Misadventures of a Gentleman

The Baron's Lover (2)

In the apartment above Temple of the Fates: Book Shop, two individuals laid yesterday’s newspapers on the rose tarlow dining tabletop and carpeted floor. The bewigged gentleman threw the rest into the hearth, where it caught fire and turned to ash. “Seems good enough.”

            Valentin Antonelli surveyed the floor and agreed with a nod of his dark head. “No stains tonight, hopefully,” he drawled. “But, my dear Chevalier, would you please light a few more candles? If we’re to make it clean, ample lighting is a must.”

            “Oh, yes! But where are my beeswax candles? That damn Familiar!” the Chevalier crossed to the hearth and pulled the tasseled cord hanging above and bells pealed in urgency. “Aethenide, where are you?”

            A series of hard, heavy thuds echoed from below the stairs, and a haggard, breathy voice answered, “C-coming, madame!”

            “Imbecile,” the Chevalier said under her breath.

            Shortly after, the apartment doors creaked open and Le Touriste stepped into the foyer with an inebriated gentleman hanging on his shoulders, Ms. Aethenide followed after. “You work your Familiar too hard, Chevalier,” said Le Touriste.

            “f**k off, Nick,” the Chevalier spat. “Put that fat f**k on the table—and you, worthless cunt—” she pointedly said to Ms. Aethenide, who was retrieving an ax displayed above the hearth. “Where the f**k are my beeswax candles?”

            “I-in the kitchen drawer, m-madame,” Ms. Aethenide stammered, her knees trembling.

            “Well? Go get them! We need light, you stupid cow!”

            “Chevalier,” Le Touriste said and hoisted the drunk fellow down on the table unceremoniously. The intoxicated victim’s head hit the table’s ledge and a distinct c***k gave pause to his thoughts. He put two of his fingers against the man’s neck and shrugged his shoulders. “Still alive.”

            “Be careful next time, Grazinsky!” Antonelli growled. “A dead man is as good as eating dog shit.”

            “Apologies, friend,” Le Touriste offered with a low bow of his head. “But this man is—how should I say—smashed and sloshed.”

            “That’s what opium does to you,” the Chevalier said. “And for f**k’s sake, Aethenide, where are the beeswax candles?”

            The Familiar brought two lit, branches of candles, one in each hand. She placed them on surfaces near the table, earning her a delighted sigh from her mistress. Aside from the candles, she also retrieved a kitchen knife and passed it over to the Chevalier. “I-I also prepared a butcher’s knife, madame.”

            “Give that to Antonelli and put that war ax under the table. We’ll be needing that a little later. Now, go back to your cupboard until it is time to get rid of the body. Do you understand?”

            Ms. Aethenide hastily shook her head and retreated to a small door in the kitchen.

            “I am not turning that piece of s**t into one of us. Just what will the Council think of me later on?” whined the Chevalier as she plunged her kitchen knife into the drunk’s right breast. The poor gentleman—too intoxicated and numbed by opium—however felt none of the pain.

            “Your eloquence moves me, Chevalier. However, one must ask: where did you even find that inbred Gypsy of yours—and that ridiculous wig?” Antonelli closed his mouth over their victim’s neck and bit hard on the flesh, drinking a mouthful of blood.

            Le Touriste twisted the kitchen knife out of the man’s chest, shook the ruffles out of his wrist, and sliced the drunk’s palm. He took a sniff of the red, sanguine fluid and wrinkled his nose. “His blood is thick with opium. I’d rather not partake this time, Chevalier.”

            “Suit yourself,” she replied blandly. “And Mr. Antonelli, if you must know, apparently, my Familiar is from a line of witches down in Salem.”

            “Salem!” echoed Antonelli in wonder. “The Salem Witch Trials?”

            “Yes, you f**k. Don’t interrupt me. Now, we all know a witch’s blood is potent.”

            “And reeks like pus and urine to us,” Le Touriste supplied with a shudder.

            “Aye, it reeks but hardly significant. I found that little cunt in the book shop below and just told her everything. And to your second question, Antonelli—this wig I found in one of my hunts.”

            “You snatched it from someone else,” Antonelli said, swinging the ax and chopping their intoxicated guest’s arm off—a fountain of blood spilling on the newspaper at their feet. “Get me a glass, Grazinsky.”

            They feasted for an hour, until hacking a man into the minutest pieces an ax and butcher’s knife could afford lost its novelty. They stuffed fingers, toes, forelegs, and forearms into pillow cases; the torso and head in a burlap sack, and the rest they wrapped in a carpet—and to the Chevalier’s dismay, the newspaper did not prevent the bloodstains on her carpeted floor.

            Ms. Aethenide, mindful of her mistress’s needs, stepped out of her cupboard and collected the body parts in quick sessions. The pillowcases she threw into the canal outside the apartment window. The burlap sack she buried in the rubbish collection area of the neighborhood, and the wasted carpet on the door of the shop across from theirs. The wet newspapers she threw into the hearth, where the fire blazed and turned blue. Once her task was done, she retreated to her cupboard and slept on her straw mat.

            The Chevalier sat near the fire, pulled her white wig, and shook the pins off her blue-black hair. She smiled to Antonelli who was leaning against the mantel. “None of the guests saw through my disguise, yes?”

            “Either you’re a master of disguise or they were too stupid; and neither I care for,” Antonelli said.

            “Aye, I will agree with you on this. But, admittedly, Mr. Ainsley lifted the mood a trifle.”

            “That sap-skull would make a great Familiar,” the Venetian aimlessly said.

            “If I weren’t stuck with the Gypsy, I might have taken Ainsley already. What about you, Nikolai? Didn’t you like any of our guests?”

            The Russian sank in his seat and smiled at his audience. “I was not aware that the soiree was for us to choose a Familiar and not a meal.”

            “We can do both,” replied the Chevalier.

            “But I do not wish for a Familiar, Chevalier.”

            “Because you travel alone,” supplied Antonelli.

            “Yes, but I did find someone of interest. That Baron of Ashford, he was a contemptuous man.”

            “That friend of Mr. Ainsley’s?” the Chevalier wrinkled her nose. “He was a bore and I found him dreadful. Fortunately, he didn’t stay long. I would have killed him then and there.”

            “Be reminded, my dear, you are still under probation for your unsteady character and mercurial temper.” Antonelli took the seat beside the Russian. “But you held your tongue—and fists—that I must congratulate you.”

            “Councilman,” the Chevalier seethed, “you’re a fat, useless c**k and tell that w***e, Mathilda, she’s a bitch.”

            The Venetian nodded. “Had you not exposed Mathilda to sunlight, I might have relayed your message to her.”

            The Chevalier snorted and shrugged her shoulders. “Le Touriste,” she said, bouncing to her feet. “Will that Baron of Ashford be your next conquest?”

            Le Touriste grinned, watching under heavy-lidded eyes the charred logs in the hearth turn to ash. “He is deeply disturbed and arrogant,” he said after a pause. “He turned his nose up when he saw me, but I left him a gift, you see.”

            “A gift?” Antonelli repeated. “I apologize, but Ashford left carrying none but his own person. Have you been playing one of your tricks again, Grazinsky?”

            “A harmless one, Councilman,” the Russian said with a dimpled smile. “An arrogant man must be brought to his knees, nyet?”

            The Chevalier stared at him with a hard gaze. “He has earned your ire, Le Touriste. I hope you will not break him like your previous victims.”

            “Compassion, my Chevalier, does not suit you,” Le Touriste said.

            They watched the fire together as the logs snapped and popped until the time for rest came. The Chevalier, unable to disregard the quiet rage looming over Le Touriste’s words, walked to her room wondering how her indolent friend would enact a lesson to the condescending Baron of Ashford.