“It is so dark,” I began.
“The light is like a lance to his head, my lady. He cannot bear it.”
“He does not seem to be in pain now.” I watched Brisbane uneasily. He was sitting quietly, but rather than seeming serene, he presented a picture of lightly restrained savagery—a lion waiting by the watering hole for an unsuspecting deer.
“He has tried conventional methods of relief and found them lacking,” Monk was saying, his tone faintly regretful. “He has resorted to dosing himself with other preparations. Absinthe, for one.”
“Absinthe!” I had heard of it, and I had heard what it could do. “Does he know that that rubbish can rot his brain? That it could kill him?”
Monk lowered his eyes. “Better it kills him than he kills himself.”
I rocked on my heels a little. “Is it that bad?”
To his credit, Monk did not despise me for the stupidity of the question. “I have to remove knives and glass from his room when he is like this. One of his wrists still bears a scar….”
I did not want to hear more. I could not believe that this self-possessed man whom I had come to think of as my partner in this investigation had been reduced to trying to destroy himself. I looked down at my silly basket, thinking how stupid I had been to bring hothouse fruit. What would that do to cheer him when he was accustomed to the vicious pleasures of absinthe?
Monk touched my arm. “My lady, it is best if you go now. This is the most dangerous time. He has been quite calm as of yet, but I cannot promise you will be safe here.”
I nodded, my mouth too dry for speech. Nothing would induce me to turn my back on Brisbane in that moment. He sat, watching motionless as I slid one tentative foot behind me. Before I could even put my weight upon the foot, he was up and across the room, moving with a speed and ferocity I would never have imagined.
I gasped when his hand closed hard on my wrist. He jerked, pulling me into the room. With his free hand he slammed the door in Monk’s face and twisted the key in the lock.
It occurred to me then that it was extremely careless of Monk to leave a key in the lock at all, but I realized that this was not the time for such recriminations. I flattened myself against the door, brandishing my basket in front of me—a feeble defense, but the only one I had.
He released my arm and made no other move toward me. He seemed content to stand, staring at me, his eyes clearly bloodshot even in the darkened room.
I heard Monk pounding on the door, his voice muffled through the thick wood.
“I am fine, Monk,” I called with more conviction than I felt.
“Thank God for that,” I heard him say. “Do not move suddenly, my lady. You must not startle him. I do not believe he will harm you.”
I tried to take comfort in that, but I decided it was much easier for Monk to be confident with three inches of stout oak between him and an unpredictable man driven half mad by pain and narcotics. But it was true that Brisbane had had quite enough time to do me harm if that was his intention, and he seemed content to watch me instead, his eyes unfocused and confused.
“Why have you come?”
The sound of his voice startled me. I had not expected him to speak, at least not lucidly.
“I was worried for you. I thought you might like some fruit,” I said stupidly, indicating my basket.
He said nothing and I continued to hold it, feeling absurdly grateful that I had at least this flimsy bit of wicker between us. He was quite close, near enough for me to smell again that sharp metallic scent over the lush sweetness of the fruit. It was on his breath, and I realized it must be the absinthe.
“Would you like to sleep now?” I asked softly.
His eyes seemed heavy, like a child’s fighting sleep, and I knew he was resisting the effects of his drug. He shook his head irritably, and I saw then the pendant at his throat, gleaming brightly against his skin. It was a small round of silver, threaded onto a thin black silk cord and engraved with a portrait of some kind.
“What is your pendant?” I asked, desperate to make some sort of normal conversation. Perhaps if I kept him talking calmly, Monk would devise a rescue.
Brisbane blinked slowly, then brought a finger to his throat.
“Medusa.”
I nodded, trying to keep my eyes averted from it. It lay in the hollow of his throat, and in the normal course of events I would never have seen it, or his bared chest. I tried not to look at that, either, although I will admit to a few stolen glances in spite of my fear. Edward had been pale and golden and smooth, like a slim Greek statue worked in marble at sunrise. Brisbane was more deeply muscled, with a spread of black hair over his chest and stomach. The effect was startling and I told myself that it was not at all attractive. I forced myself to look away immediately.
“It is time to sleep now,” I said firmly.
He moved and I thought he was going to seize my suggestion. Instead, he seized my basket. It slipped from his fingers to the floor, spilling pears and berries and a rather fat melon across the carpet. He looked at it for a moment, watching the juices ooze into the carpet, then turned back to me. Slowly, he reached out and lifted my hand, curiously, as if it were not attached to my person, but was instead an object for study. He turned it over, looking blankly at the soft leather of the glove, tracing the tiny stitches of the seams as if trying to remember where he had seen such a thing before. He paused briefly at the silk-cord edging, and then moved beyond, slipping a finger under the glove leather at my wrist to rub the flutter of my pulse. He was murmuring in a low voice, something unintelligible but familiar, perhaps an old song or rhyme, I could not tell. I pulled gently at my arm, but he held it fast, his finger dipping down to my palm, stroking the hollow of my hand.
