Ink and Steel

The Mebd rode on Will’s left side and Morgan on his right; as they had passed under the archway of the palace gate, Morgan caught his sleeve. When he had turned to her, unwilling to meet her eyes, the Mebd had reined her ink-black gelding shoulder to shoulder with the milk-white mare and reached over Will’s bowed head and hunched shoulders to press something onto his brow. A circlet, a band of resilient gold; he saw its reflection in Morgan’s eyes.

“You knew,” he said to the woman he had loved.

She nodded and swept a hand through the wire-curled tumult of her hair. “I chose,” she said simply, turning away again. Her bay horse dipped a white-blazed face as if to crop the grass at the roadside; Morgan twitchedthe reins and the mare snorted, soft purls steaming from her nostrils.

“I thought it would help him, in the end. We need your Christofer whole, sweet William.”

“Do not…” The mare tossed her head as his hands tightened on the reins. He forced himself drape them loose against her neck. She settled into her easy pace again. The horse knows her own way home.

“Don’t … what, my love?”

The Mebd rode close, within hearing of the softest murmur. Shadows seemed to grasp around the edge of things. Clutching branches and rustling limbs. Willow be walk, if yew travels late.

“Don’t call me pet names,” he said, hoping his voice sounded disinterested. “I saw.”

She smiled. White teeth winked in the corner of his eye. “Kit and me?”

“Aye.” The heat of his furious blush. And what did it matter now, lust or love, fornication or sacrament? He was damned.

The clawing shadows crowded closer to the road; Will, with ease, could imagine them, pitchfork-wielding demons.

“Ah,” she said. Yes. “Lovely boy. Very sweet in bed. Far too easy to manipulate. Twas one of the flaws I had hoped Lucifer could correct in him.”

“As if Hell were a schoolboy caning.”

“But Master Shakespeare,” honest startlement, her gray eyes wide in the moonlight, “it is.”

Whatever he might have found to say in response was ended by the flicker of a lantern a few hundred yards ahead, emerging through gaudy, rustling October leaves. The low yellow flame rested at ground level, silhouetting a square, glass-sided frame, the interleaved cobbles of a crossroads, and the shining dark hooves of a massive steed. It limned the figure on the stallion’s back from beneath the soft black velvet of his doublet, the sovereign shine of his hair. The kind alabaster arch of his enormous wings cast their own pale glow, feather edges stained gold over silver by the candlelight.

For Kit,Will thought, as Lucifer Morningstar lifted his chin and regarded the approaching trio. His wings fanned softly; he leaned back in his saddle in feigned surprise. “Why, tis not the soul I was bid expect. Good even, Master Shakespeare. How pleasant to make thine acquaintance again”

Morgan placed a warm hand on the small of Will’s back. He rode forward as much to elude the touch as because that was where his white mare took him. From the corner of his eye, Will thought perhaps he saw Morgan’s cheeks shining. Ridiculous that Morgan le Fay should weep for me.And then he smiled. As ridiculous as that she should moan for me.He turned back over his shoulder. Distantly, he thought for a moment he heard the echo of galloping hooves. Morgan wept indeed: Will forced himself to meet her eyes and speak coolly. Love her all you will, foolish heart. She’ll have no more kindness from thee.

“Tell Kit,” he said, his voice cracking. “Tell Kit I bid him care for my Annie and my girls.”

Whatever she might have said in return died on her lips, or under the peals of the white mare’s hooves as she bore Will forward beneath the mighty wings of the Prince of Hell. Lucifer turned his horse and, leaving the lantern where it lay, led Will and his strange knowing mount into darkness and down.

“You have the look of a man who will be hard to buy, Master Shakespeare”

“Buy, and not break?”

“And yet you have an imagination. That is well. I invite you to contemplate that we will be together for eternity. Will you serve willing?”

“I came willing, Will answered.”

“No one comes willing” Lucifer said. “They come because they have no other choice. Or because they will accept no other choice presented them. Or rarely, as thy lover Marley learned, because they have come to understand that Hell is all around them, and that they have never been out of it once”

Will blinked. The sway of the white mare under him was growing comfortable. He forgot himself enough to turn in the saddle and look up at Lucifer’s face. The rebel angel smiled down slantwise.

“This is Hell? I had expected”

“Torment.”

“Aye”

Lucifer hesitated. Will realized that his black steed wore no reins.