Ink and Steel

“Dick,” he said, and extended the rapier over Will’s shoulder. He let the tip sway on a gentle arc between Poley and Baines, a motion including both ofthem. Kit feigned deafness to the shiver in his own voice, swallowed a mouthful of saliva and put his back to the window as he croaked, “Will, comeback here, please.”

Will didn’t stand, just skittered backward in a crouch that looked like it hurt him. De Parma’s blood reddened the palms of his hands, the knees of his hose.

Across the line of Kit’s rapier, Baines smiled and came a half step closer, a half step beyond the reach of Kit’s lunge. “Thou hast aged not a day. And the eyepatch suits thee. Did it hurt very much?”

“No,” Kit answered. “No. It didn’t hurt. Much.”

Baines nodded. “Not compared to some things, aye? Sweet puss. There’s nowhere to run, thou knowest. Back to the wall, and I can wait here all night, and thou hast nowhere to go.”

There’s a knife in my boot, Will. Kit felt fingers fumble it as much as he felt anything but the ice snarling his limbs.

“Kit,” Will hissed, grasping the window ledge to stand a little behind him, where he could not foul Kit’s arm, “he’s unarmed. Kill him.”

And it was true. Baines stood just inside the doorway, limned by candlelight, those big hands hanging open at his sides. Kit could imagine he saw the outline of his own teeth, sunk in the heel of the left one. He shuddered, and brought his gaze back up to Baines eyes. Better the eyes than those gentle, terrible hands. “He never needed weapons before.”

“Kit, shut up.”

Poley had a dagger, no good for throwing or he would have thrown it. Kit barely spared him a glance. He caught the light winking off the blade in Will’s hand as Will skinned it.

“What are we doing?” Will spoke in an undertone that Kit matched with a murmur, aware of Baines watching his lips for a hint of what he said.

“Get ready, William, my love. If this doesn’t work, I’m sorry.”

“Put down the little knife, puss, and I’ll be gentle” Baines stepped forward.

Kit flinched, and Baines smiled.

“What are we doing, Kit?”

Kit never dropped his eyes. He felt with his left hand, slipped it around Will’s waist, shifted his weight in a way he hoped Will would understand. Will switched the dagger to his left hand and gripped Kit’s belt with his right. He moved with Kit, in unison, and Kit nodded. No hesitation.

“Running away,” Kit answered, and let his knees go as weak as they wanted to, dragging Will backward through the window and the glass.

   Intra-act: Chorus

These things, with many other shall by good & honest witness be approved to be his opinions and Common Speeches, and that this Marlow doth not only holdthem himself, but almost into every Company he Cometh he persuades men to Atheism willing them not to be afeared of bugbears and hobgoblins, and utterly scorning both god and his ministers as I Richard Baines will Justify & approve both by mine oath and the testimony of many honest men, and almost all men with whom he hath Conversed any time will testify the same, and as I think all men in Christianity ought to endeavor that the mouth of so dangerous a member may be stopped.

RICHARD BAINES, A note Containing the opinion of one Christopher Marly Concerning his Damnable Judgment of Religion, and scorn of gods word, recorded May of 1593

Baines lunged, shouldering Marley’s slender blade aside. A half second toolate; the edge of Marley’s doublet brushed his fingers, and Kit and the crippled playmaker hit the glass with no sound of splintering. They vanished as if they’d tumbled into peat-blackened water. Baines caught himself hard against the windowsill before he could follow, headfirst through shattered glass and the shutters knocked wide, into the garden below. Something in his elbow popped, and he grunted as he pushed back. Fray Xalbador’s blood slipped and stuck under the soles of his boots. “Damme.” Quiet and wry, an edge of admiration in it Baines would not have permitted Marley to hear.

“Christofer Marley,” Poley said, not releasing his dagger. “Jesus fucked Mary and Joseph. Nick wasn’t drunk after all.”

Baines pressed his palm against cool glass, tentatively. The sensation was mundane, diamond-shaped panes and strips of lead between. He strode acros sblood and stopped not far from Poley. “You sound like our pussycat, Robert. Such blasphemy.”

Poley looked up at him, blowing the hair out of his eyes. “I buried that man, Dick.”

“Aye, and he’s come back from the grave?” Baines rolled his shirt-sleeves up. “Put the damned dagger away, as it did you so much benefit last time. Are you sure you killed the right poet?”

Poley turned his head and spat. “I checked his brands before we buried him.”

“But that was no ghost managed the friar so neatly. And you saw the eyepatch: Ingrim struck him fairly and laid him down.”

The slender blond agent nudged de Parma’s flaccid corpse with his toe. “We’ll have to dispose of this.”