Ink and Steel

Kit disentangled his fingers from each other, lord, how can he be so beautiful, and hesitantly raised his right hand as if in oath and laid it gently, gently on the leading edge of that vast white wing. Rapture swelled his breast; he half expected to yank his hand back, fingertips scorched, but the feathers were cool and firm and slick over buried warmth. Bone and muscle moved beneath strong flexing plumage, tiny barbs catching the ridges of his fingertips with a rasp more felt than heard. He let those fingers burrow through feathers, into down soft as blown thistle seeds, to the blood-hot membrane beneath. And what has become of the burns on my hands?Lucifer shivered, a reflexive twitch of skin like a fly-bitten horse. Ravishing.

“Can you fly?” The wing flicked from his fingers like snatched paper, snapped shut with a slapped drumhead sound.

“If I care to.” Lucifer set his glass aside; it vanished when it left his fingertips, and moved toward Kit, golden curls in disorder against the black velvet of his doublet. He raised sinewy fingers and pressed them curiously against Kit’s forehead, hooking the strap of his eyepatch and dropping it to the floor.

“Oh, thou art too lovely for this.”

Kit thought he should step back, but the Devil’s fingers were cool against his scar. “I should think, to you, the damaged vessel might hold more appeal.”

“Perfection in all things.” Lucifer said. He caressed Kit’s sightless eye with rose-pale lips, the writhing shadows of his crown brushing Kit’s face with a palpable touch. “There. Scars do not suit thee.”

Kit blinked. And then gasped, because he could blink, and beyond blinking he could see. Not as he would have seen before. Not as he would see with his left eye, even now. But, he looked for a word, but otherwise.

The Devil still stood before him, close enough to kiss again, but on the right side Kit saw him as a vining of light and darkness, a twist of contradictions. Kit would have stepped back, but somehow those wings had crossed behind his back; he stood encircled by them and enfolded by the rich, heady pungency of sweat and good tobacco.

“I’ve dreamed of you,” Kit said, wondering.”

“And hast thy dream come true?”

“Not yet.” But he wasn’t sure it was truth as he said it.

“Now.” Lucifer whispered, and his breath at least was as hot as Kit thought it should be. “Bargain with me.”

Kit swallowed, shivered. The Devil’s hands stayed slack and open by hissides; only the wings restrained Kit. Who raised his chin to meet eyes that twitched at the corner with an almost smile. “Will Shakespeare,” he said. “I’m here to buy his life.

“The cost of that is dear.”

“How dear? I could take his place if I had to. But mayhap there’s somethin gelse…. I could pay you with a song.”

“Thine art might be enough to buy his freedom. Thy soul.”

“Mine art. All of it?”

Just that smile. The wings parted, shifted, opened. Lucifer stepped away half lovely swan-winged man, half vortex of light and shadow, and looked down, bowing his long aristocratic neck.

“What about my body?”

A gesture, as if the Devil reached out and pulled something from a table, although there was no table near him. He wheeled about, wings furled tight, their peaks reaching three foot or more over his head, their primaries brushing the floor. Still silent, he tossed the black thing that swung from his fingers at Kit. It sailed heavily though the air; Kit got his hands up in time and caught it, barking his fingertips. And almost dropped it, when he saw what he held.

Rough iron bands abraded his skin; if it were locked in place they would go across the top of his skull, under the chin, around the sides. Hinges made the thing to be opened. A padlock hung from the cheek-piece. The bit or mouthpiece was flat and broad, the size of a small woman’s palm, scattered with blades that would score his tongue and palate, worse if he was so foolish as to try to talk. It weighed a great deal.

“A scold’s bridle.”

Lucifer smiled, and as if the smile cast a shadow over him, seemed to change and darken. Kit found himself looking further up, into eyes he saw in his nightmares. Richard Baines. God help me.

“Holla,” the image said, his lips moving gently, “ye pampered Jades of Asia.”

Kit might have dropped the thing in his hands and run. But there was only abyss to run to, and his right eye showed him that same dancing twist of mocking light with the suggestion of wings behind it. And Will was here.

Somewhere.

“Father of lies,” Kit said. White feathers settled.

“Welcome to Hell, Christofer Marley. What wilt thou sell me for the freedom of thy friend?.”

“I…” He looked down at the instrument of torture in his hands, and remembered something a Faerie Queen had said, about mortal men and bindings. “If this is what it takes, Satan, I will do it. But I think I have something you would value more than a little sport to my torment.”