Chapter Twenty-five

Barryson's funeral was a few days later. It was to be a small affair, just the Irregulars, the Caesars, and a few people from the Folly.

He was a heathen, of course, and so was not to be laid to rest in a churchyard. The mourners gathered on a jetty jutting out onto the murky waters of the Thames and his body was laid in a cheap rowboat piled high with kindling, a musket laid beside him. A musket that technically remained the property of His Majesty's army but not a single person there gave a damn about His Majesty in that moment.

No priest was present—the faith of the old north was not popular in London and there was no time to bring a specialist from Newcastle, which meant the service such as it was fell to Captain James.

"I'm no man of God," the captain said, his back to the water and his eyes to the crowd. "Nor of any gods. Nor words, now I think of it. But I fought with Barryson five years and so there's that."

In the run-up to the event, Mr. Caesar had offered to help him prepare a more polished speech, as had Kumar, but he'd rejected their help. Not how it was done, he'd said.

"He told me once," the captain continued, "that his family went back to Ragnar Lodbrok, who I'd never heard of. But he said the name meant hairy trousers, and I thought that fit. And if his ancestors really did come from the north in long ships and burn Northumberland then, well, I reckon he went out in a way they'd be proud of."

There were murmurs of agreement from the Irregulars.

After a moment's reflection, the captain went on. "He was loyal. He was a laugh. He had my back. And most importantly, at the very end, he took the fucker with him."

This last phrase passed around the Irregulars like a chorus or a prayer. A low, sincere echo of he took the fucker with him.

Once the captain had finished speaking, the assembly took turns to say their personal farewells. When Miss Caesar and Miss Anne made to approach the boat, their father checked them.

"Best not to," he whispered. "He fought a bear and lost. You should not have to look."

Miss Caesar and Miss Anne exchanged glances, and then took one another's hand.

"I think," said Miss Caesar, her words less certain than her tone, "that we might have to, in fact. We are old enough to see terrible things."

The elder Mr. Caesar was not wholly convinced by this, but his wife laid a hand on his shoulder and nodded. So the sisters joined the line of mourners and approached the body.

A human corpse holds no horror for me personally. I am uncomfortably aware that you are all made of meat and mucus and so having that reality exposed to daylight in no way serves to heighten my disgust at corporeality. For mortals, however, things are different. And so it was that the Irregulars, in preparing Barryson's body for its send-off, had done their best to conceal the ways in which it had been mauled and mutilated by the beast he had reciprocally slain. A clean jacket had been fastened neatly over the wreckage of his chest, and his mangled arm had been severed from the few threads of sinew that were holding it in place, leaving a sleeve pinned smartly in place in a manner much reminiscent of the late Admiral Nelson.

Still, he was dead, and his body substantially less complete than when they had last seen it, so it remained something of a shock for the young ladies.

"I didn't really know you," Miss Caesar said to him—it seemed a poor opening but had the virtue of being an honest one. "But you helped me anyway. And I'm—"

"I'm sorry you're gone," Miss Anne filled in.

There didn't seem much else to say. Still, the girls lingered at the back of the line and thought, as all young things must do eventually, about death.

"If it pleases you, ladies," said Boy William, appearing at Miss Anne's elbow. "We're about to fire the boat. You might want to stand clear."

There were, in theory, ordinances against launching flaming barques onto the Thames, but in the opinions of all those there gathered, those laws could go fuck themselves. Captain James set sparks to the tinder—which in the absence of matches took slightly longer than was dramatic or decorous—and, when it caught at last, pushed the boat out into the water.

It was not, in the end, so very spectacular. Setting an inferno on water is difficult and unlike my own homeland, the physical laws of your world give no weight to theme. The boat burned, but by daylight the fire was pale and it quickly grew small on the river. By the mercy of whatever god was overseeing such things that day it did not rain, but the sky was grey and around the little band of mourners the business of London went on quite as normal. You mortals are insignificant things, and your deaths are insignificant. Especially when viewed from above.

Eventually, Barryson drifted out of sight, and the mourners turned away. Mr. Caesar, however, kept watching until Captain James laid a hand on his shoulder and drew him away.

"It's over, John."

"I know. I just—he saved me."

"He did what any of us would do. You stand where you can and hold off what you can and hope whoever's behind you has better luck. That day you had better luck."

A thought was niggling at the back of Mr. Caesar's mind. Well, in fact, several thoughts were niggling at the back of his mind; this was, after all, the first time he had attended the funeral of a man he had personally watched die. "He had a sister," he said at last. "He told me once. I'm not sure they got on, but will—that is, is she going to be …"

"Where Barryson comes from," replied the captain, "sisters can take care of themselves." His gaze landed for a moment on the Misses Caesar, who were walking away with the crowd and speaking politely but appropriately with the soldiers. "As can yours, most of the time. But the regiment'll see she's told what happened. She'll know he died a Northman. And we'll not let her starve, if that's ever a danger."

There was, Mr. Caesar reflected, much that was not right with the world. Like, for example, the fact that a good man had been eaten by a bear while attempting to prevent a murderous cult from performing a blood sacrifice to Artemis. But there was a rightness to this, to the captain and the Irregulars and the way they rallied to one another in a crisis. The way his family did the same. And the way that—when the captain was beside him—those things fit, however imperfectly, together. It had a sense of fragility still, they had a sense of fragility, that Mr. Caesar could not entirely trust. But, for the moment, if only for then, it made sense. It was enough. When so much wasn't.

The wake was held at the Folly, and Mistress Quickley, with typical wherewithal, was charmingly vague about who would end up being saddled with the bill for the drinks. The air filled with stories and with soldier's songs about leaving home and returning home and a certain amount about drinking, fucking, and killing.

In other circumstances, Mr. Caesar would have been concerned at his sisters hearing such things, but it seemed asinine after the events of the last few weeks to think they were in danger from unseemly words. Still, he kept a weather eye out for anybody who might be making untoward advances. As fond as he had grown of the Irregulars, they had not quite grown so close that he would trust them implicitly with a gentlewoman's virtue.

They—or at least Mr. Caesar and the captain—had entered a melancholy phase of the evening. The celebration of Barryson's life was winding down and the reality of his death was bubbling up in people's minds. Especially since the man responsible for the whole thing would, it seemed very likely, go back to his life with no consequences.

"We should've shot him there and then," Captain James said to his tankard. "Surrender or no surrender, and friends at court or no friends at court."

"You'd have regretted it." Mr. Caesar and sincerity were nodding acquaintances at best, but on this at least he felt oddly certain.

"I'd fucking not."

"You're a good man, Orestes. And as twisted as he might be, Reyne is a fellow soldier. He may have dishonoured himself, but you'd never dishonour him."

"Could have turned my back," the captain mused. "Let Jackson deal with it."

"Or Papa could have shot him." It was intended as a contribution, rather than a contradiction. "But he did not, because it would have been wrong."

"You think it's that simple?"

Mr. Caesar looked across the room to his father, who was engaged in an animated discussion with Callaghan about—he suspected—something political. "Honestly, I don't know. I like to think it is. For him."

"If you say so"—the captain shrugged—"I barely know the man, but from what I've seen he's not afraid of complicated."

Leaning back on his elbows, Mr. Caesar tilted his head back and stared despairingly at the ceiling. "Please don't. It's been a trying time and I don't think I'm ready to start thinking of my father as having layers just yet."

"You've seen him shoot a man, John. If that's not a layer, I don't know what is."

This was, Mr. Caesar had to admit, a fair comment, although it sat uncomfortably. His father had always been there, as immovable as you mortals think mountains. And given the choice between reexamining that assumption or changing the subject … "The men aren't too angry?"

Always a fast learner, the captain had grown accustomed to Mr. Caesar's segues, but was having trouble following this one. "About what?"

"One of you died because of me. Because of us. Because of everything between you and me and Mary and the Lady and the major and … all of it." It was a lot, when laid out like that, and Mr. Caesar was not quite sure what answer he was expecting.

The answer he got, however, was: "Nah."

"What do you mean nah ? You can't just nah something like that."

Captain James took a swig of his beer. "Can and did. The men know right from right. You came through for us and they respect that."

"Even Jackson?"

The captain cast a wary eye across the bar to where Jackson and Sal were sitting in a corner deep in what can only be called cahoots. "Even him. He's a shit, but he's our shit. And he saw you put yourself in front of the boy."

"I don't think I even remember doing that."

"Doesn't matter." The captain kept watching as Sal and Jackson parted ways and went to find sport amongst the other guests. "He remembers. Got a long memory has our Jackson. Not saying you've got a friend for life, but you don't need to watch for glass in your food or knives in your back."

Mr. Caesar was about to say that he'd take his victories where he could, especially where Jackson was concerned, when the door to the Folly opened and a woman entered. She was tall, dark-skinned, and wearing a dress of cheap, fairy-woven cloth in shades of red and blue. Her hair was wound into a series of tight buns close to her head that looked, from any given angle, like a crown. Without her headdress and her ritual garb, it took Mr. Caesar a moment to place her.

"Amenirdis?"

She nodded.

Captain James looked up at her only slightly challenging. "Back to the old stomping grounds?"

"Paying my respects," she replied.

"Didn't know you knew him."

"I know you. "

"It was good of you to come," Mr. Caesar told her. It wasn't entirely his place, but the division of labour between him and the captain gave him a certain amount of leeway in social situations. "I suspect Mary will want to see you."

Miss Caesar was sitting with her mother and sister, talking politely with Boy William, who seemed to have grown very attached to the ladies, and Kumar, who was taking advantage of slightly more refined company. When Amenirdis approached her, she rose, bid a courteous farewell to her companions, and went to speak with her.

"I feel I should thank you," she said. "Although I confess I am unsure what you actually did."

Although she was no longer dressed in the aspect of a priestess, Amenirdis gave a smile so enigmatic she may as well have been. "That is how the best magic works."

They sat down together in a corner of the Folly and Miss Caesar cast about for something appropriate to say.

"Do you miss it?" Amenirdis asked. She didn't need to say what it was.

Miss Caesar shook her head. "It's like you said. It wasn't really anything. A fairy trick. I just wish I hadn't caused so much trouble."

Laying a hand on Miss Caesar's arm, Amenirdis shook her head. "You did not. Trouble came to you. And it will come to you again."

A stillness fell over Miss Caesar and she felt momentarily cold. "That sounds like a prophecy."

"Just a guess. This is a hard world for a young woman."

They fell silent again, just a moment. And then Miss Caesar looked up. "Would you teach me—"

"No."

"You don't know what I was going to ask."

"The same thing everybody asks," said Amenirdis. "I am a witch. You want me to teach you witchcraft. I will not, it is a difficult life. I would rather you went on to be happy."

Miss Caesar smiled like she'd won a bet. "Actually, I was going to ask if you could teach me to do my hair like yours."

Ordinarily, witches are outwitted even less often than my kind, although when they are it is usually by children. At any rate the novelty was enough to make Amenirdis laugh. "Did you never learn?"

"Who would I have learned from? I know no women who look like me."

"True. And yes, that much I will teach you."

And so the evening wore on, and to my great disappointment no fights began and no gates were opened into otherworlds. Funerals, in my experience, have a tendency to go one way or the other, something about grief either brings mortals together or tears them apart. I had of course been hoping for tearing, but I was, on this occasion, disappointed.

There are disadvantages, reader, to my reliance on stories that are in no way made up or embellished. In an artificial narrative I could easily arrange for events to tie up neatly at the end, for every thread of the story to weave together like some great and perfect tapestry. Reality, however, has the awkward habit of playing Penelope and unpicking that which a narrator would sooner have left intact.

Worse, mortals have no innate sense of pacing.

The elder Mr. Caesar, along with Lady Mary, left the wake early and took their daughters with them. Respect for the dead was all well and good, but St. Giles was not without its dangers, especially for young women. Even young women who enjoyed the goodwill of a small band of armed bastards. The younger Mr. Caesar, on the other hand, remained behind. A funeral, after all, was a time to be with family, and in that moment, in that exact context, the family that mattered were the Irregulars.

It would be neater if all my principals had come together for some manner of curtain call, but, alas, they thwarted me. And so I found myself for the last time having to divide my attention between goings-on on opposite sides of the city.

On the bright side, it was the third time I would need to do so in this tale. And some numbers are auspicious.

The Caesars had, at least, managed to secure the earl's carriage for the evening, meaning that they did not need to walk their children through a rookery by night. And it had been a long day, so as they rattled through the streets they let the motion of the vehicle rock them into a quiet somnolence.

… In the dark of the Folly, Mr. Caesar and the captain lay together, breathing in time and eye to eye across the shadows. "Thank you," whispered the captain. "For coming. And for staying." …

"Would it be very terrible," Miss Anne asked the carriage as a whole, "if I did not marry immediately once I am out? I am beginning to think that men are more complex than I had expected."

"That," her father replied, "would be very wise. Indeed your mother and I would be quite happy if you would not marry at all."

"Oh no." Miss Anne looked aghast. "That would be most dreary. But I am beginning to see that finding a truly good man may take more work than I anticipated."

… Mr. Caesar pressed his lips lightly to the captain's and whispered against them. "We don't have to, you buried a friend today."

But Captain James drew him closer, turned him gently onto his back. "I'm a soldier, John. I've buried friends before and will again, but life has to go on." …

As the carriage moved out of the worst parts of the city's underbelly into those with better lighting and more socially acceptable crimes, Miss Caesar looked sleepily at the faces of her family and let her thoughts wander.

Miss Anne's thoughts remained rather more focused. "I think it ill of John not to return with us. Now is surely the time to be with family."

"Family," Lady Mary pointed out, "can mean more than one thing."

… Sex and death have walked hand in hand for millennia, and it can be a terrible pairing or a beautiful one. As I have said many times and will continue to say for as long as I fear mortals will fail to believe me, I find little beauty in mortal flesh, but I can find great poetry in mortal feeling.

So it was with some care that I watched the captain and Mr. Caesar tell one another, through the lyrics of fingertips and ragged stanzas of breath, a story of wanting and keeping and hoping that even now neither could quite articulate with something as vulgar as words. …

Miss Caesar's thoughts, which had been straying across the city and the world, meandered back to the present and formed themselves, quite without her permission, into a question.

"Papa," she asked, "what was Grandmama like?"

… Mr. Caesar lay still with his head on the captain's shoulder. And his thoughts, which had been wandering past and future and flesh and blood, formed themselves, without his permission, into a request.

"Don't go." …

"You know your grandmother," Mr. Caesar replied, genuinely perplexed.

"Not Lady Elmsley," his daughter clarified. "Your mother."

Mr. Caesar grew very quiet and then said, softly, "I find it harder and harder to remember."

… "What do you mean, don't go?"

"To France. To war. I don't want to lose you."

"It's what I do, John." There was no anger in the captain's voice. But nor was there longing. "It's dangerous, but it's the life."

Mr. Caesar shifted, apprehensive. "And what do I do?"

"Wait. Like all the rest."

"You want me to stand on the docks and sing melancholy songs until you return?"

Captain James rolled over. "You wanted to be a soldier's man. That's how it goes." …

"Then …" Miss Caesar was saying in the carriage. "I should like to know what you do remember."

Settling back in his seat, the elder Mr. Caesar shut his eyes. "It is a long story. And there are reasons I have not told it to you."

Miss Caesar lowered her gaze. "Even so, I should like to hear what I can."

For a moment, it seemed her father would say nothing. "I was born," he began hesitantly, "more than fifty years ago in the Kingdom of Cayor. …"

And that, readers, is where I stepped away. I am a collector of stories, not a thief. I speak of things I have seen, not things I have heard from other narrators.