41. Chapter 41

Chapter 41

"I have seen only you, I have admired only you, I desire only you." Napoleon BonaparteHenrique swirled the port in his glass and eyed his friends. If they thought it strange he was drinking at ten in the morning, they wisely kept their silence. Pedro and Griffin exchanged worried looks. A fishy breeze lifted the cloth from the squalid table. The dockside tavern was a shitty place to say goodbye, except he had not invited them. Henrique glared at Dio, who had not only seen fit to ask their presence to cast him off but had also bought tickets to accompany him to London. As if he needed a babysitter, a bearded and overgrown one at that.

He sat facing the ocean. The city and everything in it stood behind him, and he wouldn’t spare it a single glance. Still, the back of his neck burned. It was her. Isabel. The princess at the white palace atop the hill, her very own Olympus.

His luggage had been dispatched to the shipping company before the blasted trip to Spain, and he couldn’t wait to join his stuff. What time was it anyway? When he retrieved his pocket watch, he touched Isabel’s medal. Why hadn’t he disposed of it? He told himself the journey had been rushed. He came to the docks straight from the road.

Charles zigzagged to the table and dissolved into a chair. His complexion had a green sheen, and his red hair was matted. That’s what the human female did to its male counterpart, Henrique thought disgustingly.

Behind a lady’s sweet looks and gentle caresses hid the ruthlessness of a mantis. They wooed the male with a single goal—chop off his head and feast over his brains. That wasn’t fair of him. Comparing women with insects. The mantis was actually merciful, its technique fast and painless. What the human female did was much worse. She sucked the male’s marrow and released his breathing carcass into the world.

Dio smiled nervously. "What a superlative day for sailing, don’t you think? It invigorates a Portuguese to have the Tramontane wind blowing his coattails."

Henrique glared at his cup. "It is not the Tramontane. It’s the Mistral. The day is only superlative in its dismalness. The sun is dismal, the cackle of the gulls is dismal, and this old rickety port is dismal."

Isabel’s medal pulsed inside his coat, and he curbed the impulse to hurl it into the ocean.

Pedro clasped Henrique’s shoulder and stared into his eyes. "Mozambique robbed us of too much. Never doubt you deserve happiness. Sometimes the best battle strategy is to lower the six-pounders and negotiate."

Griffin exhaled and pulled his eyebrows to his hairline. "This is pointless, Almoster. I told you. Our Dom Juan here isn’t in love. Let him go in peace. Husbands from Lisbon to Oporto will enjoy the respite."

Henrique glared at the pretentious Englishman. Unable to come up with a suitable retort, he took another swig of port. He had loved Isabel like Paris loved Helen, like a peasant loves his wife, like a king loves his queen. But it was not enough. She loved her country better. Her duty.

Henrique tugged his neckcloth, cursing the propriety that was ever at odds with the climate. "Are you done meddling? Go back to your wives. I’m ghastly company today."

They ignored him, and a discussion erupted between the well-meaning bastards, with Charles offering a drunken ditty or two. Henrique covered his face with his hands and groaned. His black heart was a vessel of port and emptiness, lashing out, never settling. If there was an Entity above, he hoped It would shut up the noises and allow him to drown his sorrows in peace.

Dio raised his voice above the others. "Gentlemen, he can stay, or he can leave. If he stays, he should go after her. If he leaves, he should forget about her. Either way, he must snap out of this humdrum."

Henrique slapped his drink on the table, sloshing the liquid over the scarred wood. His breaths came in short bursts. "They can speak about it, but you cannot, Diomedes. This is all your fault. You and your myths. I embraced your hero’s quest. I saved the country, and I brought back the riches. By all accounts, I should be living in heavenly bliss. Do I sound blissful to you? Because to me, it feels like hell."

Dio raked his finger through his blond curls. "Every hero needs to go through hell. Hercules had to enter Hades’ realm to retrieve Cerberus. Dante had to search the inferno for his Beatriz. Only after the hero faces hell does he learn to be selfless and value what matters. Life is like a river—passion is the water, and duty is the rocky riverbed. Without the riverbed, water sloshes away in aimless pursuits. Without water, the riverbed is just a lonely, dry path."

"Stop. Not another word."

The ship’s horn sounded. Henrique pushed to his feet as if bullet-ants had targeted his arse for their lunch. Briskly, he shook his friends’ hands and boarded the steamer. Dio shadowed his steps, but Henrique ignored him.

The hours to cast off could not pass soon enough, and he paced the quarter-deck from aft to port and back, his speed increasing at each turn. His legs were charged as if voltaic batteries were strapped to the soles of his feet. He caught the pocket watch for the tenth time and cursed when he saw less than fifteen minutes had passed.

He tried to focus on the fish darting around the pilings, the masts reaching into the sky, the gulls flying overhead, but his eyes, damn their ocular muscles, always found the palace uphill. An Olympus guarded by milky white clouds. He bet she was there now, circled by her devoted ladies, bathing in men’s blood and extolling all the advantages of choosing duty and trampling his heart.

With a groan and a tug, the ship cast its moors. The ropes were pulled taut and then released. The droning sound of the steam engine vibrated inside his ears and empty chest.

Dio put himself in his way. "Won’t you go to the machine room? The first mate told me it has a hybrid converter, brand new."

Henrique wrestled his gaze from the palace and strode aft. "She robbed me of this as well."

"Are you sure science is your vocation? You should try the stage. You would displace Sarah Bernhardt with your dramatic streak."

Henrique glared at Dio. “If you are so offended by my performance, why are you following me?"

Dio threw his hands in the air and scoffed. "You wish to know why I follow you?"

"I believe it was exactly what I asked." Henrique grabbed the railings, his heart accelerating painfully with each yard the ship gained against the current.

Dio took a step closer, his eyes blazing. "I follow you now, just as I’ve done since we met. With you, I’ve drunk more in a night than Bacchus in a revelry. I’ve crossed frigid waters and the limits of morality. I’m here because you supported me when my family turned their back on me, and well, black sheep should flock together. And it’s getting harder, I must admit, but I’m here because I care for your miserable hide. Because of all the men I’ve known, you are the most brilliant, and the most stubborn, the bravest—and the least willing to confront his demons. You are generous with your friendship, your money, your vast knowledge—but you are awfully selfish with your heart. So for Christ’s sake, take your face out of your arse. Isabel didn’t leave you because she wanted to spite you or because she loves you less than you love her. She left to avoid war."

Henrique shook his head, shutting his eyes with enough force to bury his eyelashes in the skin below.

Dio grabbed his arm. "Stop pacing for a second. Would she be the woman you admire if she had allowed Alfonso to sail without trying to convince him to desist?"

An anguished howl burst from Henrique’s throat. "Don’t you think I know all this? It’s eating my insides and messing up with my legs so I cannot stay still. I screwed up. There’s no other word for it." He knew the instant Pedro left the tower, he had made a colossal mistake, and it was killing him. The Isabel he loved wouldn’t always sacrifice their love for duty, but he could depend on her to always do what was right. "I’m a blackguard."

"And she is a brilliant, courageous woman. No better consort for my Portuguese hero…"

Dio went on speaking, but Henrique ignored the words. One passenger leaned against the railing and opened a newspaper.

As if Henrique had conjured the image, Isabel’s picture stared at him from the black and white page. His thoughts scattered.

He grabbed the sheet and barked when the owner objected.

Dio grinned. "I knew you two blockheads were fated to be together. When we arrive in Liverpool, I’ll help you write the perfect love letter to soothe my little surrogate sister’s temper. A few of my inspired verses will wipe out your desertion."

Henrique shoved the newspaper on his friend’s chest and removed his coat. His shoes came next.

Dio’s mouth gaped open. "You can’t mean to swim back. It is at least half a mile against the current."

"We’ve swum longer."

Dio shaded his eyes, glancing at the port. "The river is frigid and fast. The ocean tide is rising, and the Tagus is treacherous in the high tide."

Henrique stood with feet braced apart, eyes focused on the palace. "We’ve crossed the Hellespont."

"You will lose your position in Oxford. The dean threatened to hire a replacement if you didn’t arrive in one week."

"There are chairs in other universities."

"She might never forgive you."

"She shouldn’t. You are right. I’m a selfish ass, but I cannot allow her to be ruined."

Dio nodded, his eyes conspicuously humid. "Spoken like a true hero." He leaned over the railings and eyed the Tagus churning beneath them. "There’s nothing to it, just water and fish. I’m coming with you."

Henrique shook his head. "You helped me this far. This I’ll have to do on my own."

Henrique hugged his friend tightly and pounded his back with hearty slaps. He pulled away from him, holding him at arm’s length, and fished inside his pocket. After opening Dio’s palm, he placed Isabel’s medal atop it. There wasn’t a worthier recipient.

"What’s this?"

"A recognition for services rendered to your country and to this ornery mule. Thank you, Diomedes da Veiga. I could not hope for a better friend."

Dio brushed the back of his hand over his eyes. "What will you do?"

"I’m needed at the palace. Duty calls, so to speak."

The sun shone brightly, coloring the Tagus with a brilliant green. What a lovely day to grow up. With a parting glance at Dio, he focused on Mount Olympus and leaped.

Henrique flung the door to the dispatch room and sloshed inside. His clothes had dried up during the Americano tram ride from Belem to the Ajuda Palace. Still, his shoeless feet left wet prints on the parquet.

"Sir, the king is occupied." The secretary placed himself in Henrique’s way.

Henrique sidestepped the scrawny sycophant. "He will make time for old friends, won’t you, Luis?"

The king sat in his customary chair. A Goliath-sized man faced him, feathers and elaborate shells decorating his head. By his attire, he was a Mozambique chieftain.

The secretary lifted his palms, his face flushed. "Sire, I tried to prevent his excellency from barging in, but—"

"Fine, João, escort the Nkosi outside."

Both men left, the secretary closing the door silently.

Luis chuckled. "Can you believe the chieftain asked me for a cannon and a six-pounder? Shoot crocodiles, he said he wants. Says the nasty animals are a plague in the Zambezi River."

"They are called Crocodylus Niloticus, and they are not a plague. He probably wants the guns to blow up his neighboring tribe. I’m here to talk about Isabel."

"By the saints, man, lower your voice. I’m trying to avert a scandal and keep our friendship, but if you assume your deeds, I will have no alternative but to—"

"Export her like an unwanted commodity?"

"What do you suggest I do? You ruined her, didn’t you?"

Henrique looked into Luis’ eyes. "I took her maidenhead, yes. But if you imply that a man can ruin a woman of Isabel’s caliber with his dick, then you are inflating our masculinity. It would take much more than a cock to ruin Isabel, but since I read in the newspaper that she is, indeed, ruined, then it was another instrument wielded by males—a crown."

"How dare you?” Luis’ voice became high-pitched. “I sent you to Spain to protect her, and you seduced her, my own sister."

"You plunged her into a viper’s nest."

Luis’ face became blotched. "I had no choice."

Henrique took a shaky breath. He wanted to punch the king’s head until there would be no hope of removing his blasted crown. But violence would serve only his temper. To help Isabel, he needed to use politics, not his fists.

"You have a choice now. You can go there and tell the press, the court, what Isabel did. Tell them she saved the country from a senseless war. Tell them she sacrificed her—her reputation for the country."

The king flushed, and a glimmer of sadness flickered in his pale gray eyes. If he didn’t know the man for over twenty-five years, he might call it indigestion. "I can’t. She tied up my hands. The reporter had pictures… The queen and the ministers put their differences aside and aligned in this. They strongly opposed me linking myself to her. It would reduce my popularity—"

"Forget about those idiots who hail themselves as ministers. Be a man, for Christ’s sake, and protect your sister. She did the same for you."

"Not everyone can flaunt rules like the bon vivant Henrique Penafiel. Some of us have obligations to the country. If only you were a patriot—"

"If being a patriot means sacrificing a hero for public appearances, then I don’t want to be a patriot. If this country, the country of Camões, of Vasco da Gama, of Eça de Queiroz, of The Avis Dynasty, will burn a true hero, it does not deserve my patriotism."

"Isabel accepted the need for exile. Tomorrow, she leaves to stay with our aunt in Germany."

His insides rebelled, and his hands turned into fists. Henrique had hoped Luis would prove honorable. But pundonor was in short supply these days. Henrique nodded, and as if he didn’t have a care in the world, he strolled to the altar.

Luis watched him, his face tilted to the side.

Henrique dusted the image’s feet and lit the single candle. "Really, Luis, you shouldn’t neglect Saint John. He might never remove the curse."

Dom Luis eyed him with unease.

"Wouldn’t offering candles and prayers directly to the offended friar’s grave be more effective?"

"My mother, my grandfather. They spent their lives searching for the friar’s mausoleum without luck."

"Is that so? Then this is your lucky day."

Luis stopped breathing.

Henrique removed seaweed from his soggy shirt. "I have the location of the friar’s resting place."

The king went pale. "Impossible."

"It was with the letters from your Spanish mistress. Canastra didn’t want to take any chances with your manipulation. Shrewd of him. Placing you between the cross and the bed, so to speak."

"Damn it, Henrique. Show more respect."

Henrique shrugged. "You want to save your future heirs? I’m more than happy to oblige. But first, you will rescue Isabel."

The king hesitated for three seconds, and then he nodded.

Henrique grinned, already turning to leave. "Always a pleasure doing business with you. Expect the location as soon as I get hold of my luggage. It might take a while, but then, the friar is not going anywhere. After two hundred years, I dare say he enjoys holding a grudge."

"What, then, you will run and tell her? Isabel asked me to protect her yesterday, and I… I had to deny her."

"You are her hero. Let’s keep it so."

Luis clasped his hand. "You didn’t ask, you arrogant blackguard, but you have my blessings."