Countess of Delawyn (draft)

The Countess of Delawyn

By T. J. Young



Each year, the Countess of Delawyn commemorated her birthday with a parade.  She toured the streets in the rear of a splendid carriage, of which the maple cabin sat atop a gold-plated chassis, drawn by two finely-groomed mares.  Their passenger dressed with equal elegance: a cream silk gown with three-quarter length puffed sleeves adorned the Countess’s ivory skin, and a pearl chain around her neck displayed the largest gem Shay had ever seen.

The people had materialized on every street corner to watch the procession.  They waved and cheered and craned their necks to catch a glimpse of the otherwise elusive Countess Vitrerre as an attendant leaned from the side of the carriage to receive gifts on her behalf.  Spring bouquets; humble, hand-knitted scarves; trinkets of spun glass; jewellery; cakes and treats – the attendant stowed all manner of presents in the rear of the cabin.

The Countess had held tenure now for over two decades, yet one glance at her features indicated the untarnished youth of a debutant.  Locks of hair like spun silver curtained her narrow eyes, and she carried herself with the serene grace of a woman always posing for a painting.  Even on the anniversary of her birth, not a single member of the crowd could procure her exact age.  Nosy wives (particularly those prone to jealousy) would nudge their smitten husbands and whisper, “How old could she be?”

Forty?

Perhaps.

Fifty?

Unlikely.

The most brazen estimations placed her age at sixty.  Could it be possible?

Shay didn’t watch the woman’s physique; her eyes remained fixed on the prize amulet.  Each of its smaller pearls would fence for the price of a lavish supper or a new fur coat, not to mention the enormous, sparkling gem in the centre.  She turned an apple over in her hand, trying to decide which was larger.  “It won’t be easy.”

Jalil’s smile revealed two rows of teeth that shone brilliant against his dusky skin.

“No job ever is.”

“Yes,” she admitted, “but if the amulet really is enchanted as they say, if it really is the source of Vitrerre’s youth, she won’t be quick to part with it.  You’ll have to peel it off her neck as she sleeps.”

“I would imagine so.”

Shay rubbed the apple with the pad of her thumb.  The skin gleamed red and bright.  She’d never seen fruit so pristine in Al’kir, or Nambul or any of the Western Provinces.  When she bit into its flesh, however, she winced, gagged and spat it out.  A look at the apple revealed its centre had turned brown and spongy, rotten to the very core.  “Yuck.”

“At least after this job, we won’t have to survive on stale bread and spoiled fruit.  We’ll eat fresh apples daily from the vines of our own orchard.  And the ring I’ll buy for you, it will have a diamond so large you’ll have to wear your arm in a sling.”

“Don’t tease.”

“No, I mean it.”

Shay suppressed a smile as she tossed the apple away.  It was not the ring that mattered.  She’d never been one to laden herself in jewels and earrings or soak her skin in oils.  She possessed a flat, linear figure, stooped shoulders and brown hair tied back in a plain bun – the body of a thief, taught and dextrous – not the graceful figure of a swan or an indolent beauty.  And yet Jalil loved her regardless.

With a final wave, the Countess’s carriage rounded a corner, and the amulet disappeared from their sights.  A few page boys scuttled along in the carriage’s wake as it climbed toward the castle that sat atop Delawyn’s peak, amongst the hills where conifers gathered like solemn giants, their pine-needle breath wafting down into the township below.

“Come on.  We have work to do.”



***



The pair had rented a loft at the cheapest inn within proximity of the castle.  At its highest, the ceiling allowed them to stoop uncomfortably.  The furniture comprised no more than a few crates, a bed and a rickety table, but it would do.  They had known no better.

Like many thieves, as the hunter launches the arrow and the hound collects the kill, Shay and Jalil worked in tandem.  They shared a perfect synchronicity.  One would distract a shopkeeper as the other pilfered his wares, or one would keep lookout as the other wrestled with the tumblers of a tricky lock.  Though both displayed extensive talents, Jalil possessed the swifter movements and Shay the keener mind; she would devise the means of acquiring the amulet, and he would execute them.

She donned an apron and bonnet (as much as she despised such restrictive clothing), and insinuated herself amongst the castle staff.  Whenever the opportunity arose, she strolled the grounds and the halls with a sharp eye for entries, exits, open windows, decaying grates and loose roof tiles.  She observed the number of guards on duty, their patrol routes, the equipment they carried and the procedures they employed.  She committed the layout of the premises to memory and sketched maps complete with daily schedules and additional notes: blind spot between pillars… ideal hold for grappling hook….

While Shay conducted her reconnaissance, Jalil operated under the guise of “travelling acrobat in rehearsal.”  Each morning, in the Inn’s courtyard, he practiced tumbling and vaulting and balancing on a wire.  At night, he read The Shadow’s Virtue and held his palms over candle flames until the skin had toughened to leather.

Shay concluded that the new moon presented the ideal opportunity to enter the castle, when the sky would diminish to its darkest.  She had considered the canal that flowed into the moat, but wet footprints betrayed even the most silent steps.  Fortunately, a wagon of goods would arrive on the same night.  The guards, desperate to break the ennui of their shift, often assisted the driver in unpacking the load and stabling the horses.  This distraction would allow Jalil to scale the outer wall and approach the north-east façade.  He would pry open a window and slip into the dining hall long after the steward had cleared away the silverware and retired to bed.  The plan was flawless.

When the night finally came, Delaywn slumbered as the stars shied behind roiling clouds.  Shay helped Jalil prepare.  She wrapped webbing around his wrists and ankles.  In her palms she crushed charcoal and smudged it on his cheeks.  She had laid his equipment across the table: an assortment of lock picks and probes to suit any design; cloth shoes that made a whisper of one’s steps; and – the Saints forbid its necessity – a compact iron dagger, oiled and sharpened for the occasion.

Jalil’s ensemble consisted of a coat, gloves, trim leggings and a cowl – all as dark in colour as a raven’s feathers.  Beneath various straps and buckles, he deposited his picks, probes and other instruments, but left the knife on the table, untouched.

“You’re not taking it?”

“Whose blood would I shed?”

Shay put her hands on her hips, but Jalil was right.  If it came to a confrontation, the non-lethal solution always proved ideal.  “Just be careful.”

He lifted his mask, so that only his eyes remained visible.

“I will.”  Before she could say another word, he had unlatched the window and climbed onto the awning.

She watched him glide lithely down the side of the inn and across the street, until he had all but dissolved amongst the shadows of the night.  She sank into a chair, fingers rapping on the tabletop.  Every now and again, she cast an anxious glance to the window.  Trees swayed atop the hills, where a dense fog began to sheath the castle.  A breeze whispered between the tattered drapes, bringing wisps of damp air and inklings of a storm to come.  At least foul weather will hide him from the eyes of the guards, thought Shay, but still she could not shake an odd sense of dread.

An hour crawled by.  She decided she needed a drink to settle her nerves and descended the stairs to the tavern.  A few stragglers drank alone, slumped in booths and staring into their mugs as though the contents held a profound solution to all their problems.

The wind howled outside.  She crossed to the bar and ordered a drink.  Unlike his meddling wife, the broad-shouldered owner tended not to ask questions and delivered her ale with a gruff nod.  That suited her.

She took a sip and laid the mug down on the bar.  As her mind stirred, she adopted the same blank stare exhibited by her fellow patrons.  He should have returned by now.  Something’s happened.  Something’s wrong.  She took another sip.  The last mouthful tasted of gravel.  I’ll walk in worn sandals and eat rotten fruit and sleep on straw.  I don’t care if you come back empty-handed, just please come back….

By the time the other patrons had left, and only she and the owner remained in the tavern, the worry had wrapped around her chest until she could barely breathe.

The owner took away the empty mug and threw a dishcloth over his shoulder.  “Closing up.”

She nodded, placed a single coin on the bar and headed upstairs, moving without conscious thought.  Defeat struck her like a fatal arrow through the heart.  Jalil has failed.  If he is not captured, then he is long dead.

In the loft, the dagger laid patiently on the table.  She moved forward to caress its handle.  And if he still lives… what then?

A crack of lightning split the sky, and through the tear came a deluge spattering against the window panes.  Not knowing his fate clawed at her insides.  As torrents of rain washed over Delawyn, she began to strap her limbs and camouflage her face.  Last of all, she slipped the dagger into her belt and stole out the window, after Jalil.



***



Shay opted for the canal route; such a cruel downpour would soak her regardless.  Most nights, the water’s surface lay still enough to mirror the sky above.  Now it swelled and gurgled, fed in voluble torrents from gutters and drainpipes.  At the centre of a bridge some hundred paces from the castle grounds, she drew a breath, cast her arms forward and plummeted into the icy depths.

Blood rushed to her core.  He fingers and toes numbed.  She shuddered with each breath, allowing only her pale face to breach the surface and gliding along like the sleek lizard-beasts that stalk the southern swamps.

Up ahead, the light of stifled torches splashed over a marina.  She swam toward a gondola as it swayed against its tether, left carelessly to sink in the rain.  The groundskeeper had remembered to shut and bolt the tall gates that led into the boathouse, however, as she discovered upon hauling herself onto the pier.

She scaled a gate and tumbled into the eastern courtyard.  At the northern end, stood the keep, a large, square building that descended for many levels beneath the ground.  There, in the wretched depths of the dungeons, lay her greatest hope of finding Jalil.

A guard observed a lone vigil by the fountain in the centre.  He nursed one hand above his brow to keep the rain out of his eyes, and in the other, raised an oil lantern as if to peer into the fog.  She doubted he could even see beyond his nose.  Just in case, she took the long way around, crawling under rosebushes and springing over hedges until she reached the cover of an eave.  She didn’t need to pick to the lock; the latch lifted without contest.

A thick must covered the walls inside the narrow passage.  Shay followed the corridors as they twisted and sank and retreated into the shadows at the slightest patter of footsteps.  From her reconnaissance, she knew that at all times a jailor occupied the desk beyond the corner at which she had arrived.  Anyone entering or leaving the dungeon – guests, prisoners and staff – must pass his watchful gaze.

Though she could not see the stationed guard, she felt his presence.  She smelt the odour of burning tallow and her ears caught the rise and fall of his breath.  For all her skills, the situation presented an obstacle with no apparent solution – but one: she must take his life.

For you, my love, anything.

The deed had to occur quickly, silently.  A single scream would bring a dozen armed men clamouring down upon her.  She slipped the dagger from her belt.  Her heart thumped so loud in her chest she feared it would betray her.  This is it….

Then came a gentle noise like a saw through wood, followed by wheezing, followed by another intake of breath.  Is he… snoring?

Shay sighed.  She slid the dagger back into her belt and praised the Saints.

A moment passed before she dared to peer around the corner.  The man’s head was flopped to one side.  Spittle clung to his bottom lip.  On the desk, a quill sat in an inkwell atop several documents and a prisoner ledger while a ring of keys lay just beyond his sprawled fingertips.  Cell doors often beared intricate locks and Jalil had left her with only the poorest of their lock picks.  She crept forward, hooked her index finger under the ring and, ever so slowly, began to drag the keys across the table.  They fell over the edge of the desk with a jingle.

Shay froze.

The guard stirred.  His head rolled to one side and he gave a little snort.  His eyelid flickered. 

Her hand fell upon the hilt of the dagger.

The guard mumbled something incomprehensible, and then his head slumped forward and his lungs resumed their gradual sawing.

She left the dagger sheathed.  With the keys tightly in hand, she turned and crept down into the dungeon of Castle Delawyn.  The jailor’s key unlocked an iron grate, which screeched open to a corridor lined with cells.  A single torch cast rippling shadows as rats scurried across puddles on the floor.  The air carried the thick, cloying odour of vermin.

Shay wanted to call Jalil’s name, but retained her silence lest she reveal herself; the hall made echoes of falling droplets, and even her steps reverberated back to her from the darkness.  She crept to the first cell and peeked through the narrow door slit.  Scare light penetrated the chamber.  Her eyes adjusted, defining the form of hanging shackles, a bucket and a crude bed of straw – no occupant, though.  She moved to the next cell, and, when it turned out empty, she continued in a silent, frantic zig-zag from one to the next: three, four, five, six… all devoid of prisoners.  Seven, eight nine….  Panic tingled on her skin.

She reached the final cell and peered within… and found nothing.

Then something shifted amongst the gloom.  Her eyes had deceived her.

A figure squatted in the corner, frail and shrunken.  The man – he was a man as far she could tell – had wrapt himself in his own arms, for the rag he wore could not provide enough warmth in such a dank place.  Age and malnutrition had worn his limbs to knobbly sticks.  He trembled as he watched her with wide, dark eyes.  “Yer not ‘ere to take me?”

She shook her head.

“Yer not one of them are yer?”

“No.  Did they bring anyone in here tonight?”

The old man nodded.  “They did.  Young feller, lean lookin’.  Dressed in black, he was.  Like you.”

“Yes, him.  Where is he?”

The old man crawled toward the door and stared up at her like a feeble pet.  “She took ‘im away.  Him and another one who’s been in here about a week.  Took ‘em both, she did.”

“Who did?  Who took them?”

“Her.”  He raised a yellow fingernail to the ceiling.  “The pale lady in the dress.  The Countess.”

“Vitrerre took them?”

He nodded.  “She comes and takes them and they’re never seen again.  The young ones, always the young ones.  That’s why I been here so long.  Got no interest in an old crow like me.”

“Where?”

“Down the door there.  Don’t know where it goes.”

She turned her eyes to an iron-bound hatch set at the end of the hall.

“I wouldn’t follow.  You won’t listen to me, I know.  But I wouldn’t.”

“I have no choice.”  Shay knew she had little time to waste.  She considered letting the old man out, but from the look of him, he’d not want to leave the relative safety of his cell, nor did he seem fit for such a journey. 

“Go on then.”

She nodded.  No longer did she suppress the sound of her movements as she hurried along the hall.  She flung the hatch open.  A ladder descended from the aperture into darkness, which swallowed her whole like the maw of a great beast.  In the passage below, she felt her way along as a blind leper find his way through the halls of a sanatorium, drawn by no more than traces of incense in the air.  After much winding in her course, her hands found a heavy iron ring and lifted it.  The latch creaked as the door swung back.

She emerged in a high-ceilinged chamber, lit by a hundred red candles.  Despite their numbers, the lights scarcely contested the gloom.  A black stone altar stood in the centre, etched with scenes of skulls and rituals.

Next she discerned three figures.  One was Jalil.  He stood on the altar with both hands bound in chains above his head, dressed in no more than a rag about his waist.  Sweat beaded his bare skin.  His jaw hung ajar.  His eyes flickered, wide with fear.

The second figure lay on the altar, at the feet of the third.  Countess Vitrerre hunched over the thinner, paler man, whose withered wrists seemed to have slipped through the cuffs hanging above him.

She spotted the pearls strung about Vitrerre’s velvet shoulders, but something else caught her eye.  It protruded from the woman’s mouth, almost like a tongue.  The appendage had grafted itself onto the second man’s face and, like the proboscis of an insect, pulsated as though imbibing a liquid.

The man’s muscles shrank.  His skin wrinkled and stretched back over the bones until he resembled an emaciated corpse, rigid with terror.

The feeding ceased.  The appendage detached with a slurp.  Nothing remained of the man but a lifeless husk, liquefied and consumed from within.

Shay’s insides crawled and her gut heaved.  She held her mouth to keep from retching.

The Countess lifted her head and turned, revealing a face not quite human, maw dripping with saliva.  Her eyes had narrowed to slits and her teeth sharpened to fangs.  The appendage retracted down into her oesophagus and she spoke in a tone that shook dust from the ceiling.  “You dare disturb me?”

Shay tried to keep her hand steady as she brandished the dagger.

Vitrerre licked her lips with a lurid tongue and grinned.  “Three meals in one evening, why, that will keep me sated until the end of winter.”

“Run, Shay!”  Jalil’s voice quavered with infectious fear.  He’d been a pillar of strength to her all her life, and now seeing him so shrunken and timid frightened her even more than Vitrerre’s demonic scowl.

The tail of the Countess’s black silk dress trailed the altar steps as she strutted down them.  “I doubt you’d get too far, dear, but by all means, try your best.  I could do with a moment to settle my stomach.”

When Vitrerre stood no more than five paces away from her, Shay took her chance.  She lunged forward, leapt up and brought the dagger’s tip down in a vicious thrust.

The Countess raised one arm and tossed her aside.

She crashed onto a pile of ancient bones which crumpled beneath her.  The dagger clanged to the floor.  A ringing in her ears drowned out Jalil’s cries as she spluttered for breath.  Through blurred vision, she watched the Countess’s figure loom toward her.  The slug-like appendage began to rear forth from her mouth, writhing and pulsating.  Vitrerre did not speak.  She made only a gurgling, churning sound… the sound of hunger.

When the vile orifice reached close enough that she could almost feel its breath upon her skin, Shay screamed.

It spread open and lunged for her.

She rolled.  Her fingers found the dagger’s handle and swung wildly.  “I’ll send you back to oblivion!”  The blade slid through the tongue like hot iron through butter.

The appendage hissed and writhed and then shrivelled as though deflating.  Vitrerre lurched back.  A howl burst from her lungs like the flight of a thousand bats.

Shay wasted no time.  She sprang to her feet, clutched a handful of the woman’s silver hair and swung the dagger in a backhand motion.  The blade struck the Countess’s neck, and, with much sawing, she cleaved it clean from her shoulders.  As Vitrerre’s body folded at the knees and toppled forward, the ruby amulet clattered neatly onto the floor at Shay’s feet.

She released the tuft of hair.  Vitrerre’s head landed with a clunk and rolled onto its side, ugly and misshapen.

Chains rattled across the chamber.  Jalil stirred.  He tried to murmur something but the energy escaped him.

“It’s all right,” Shay whispered.



***



The sun cast it first golden rays over the pine-needle hills and the fortress at their peak as the pair threaded the back roads of Delawyn, off to more fortunate provinces.  Jalil, still wqeak from torture, leaned on Shay’s shoulder to as he staggered.

She smiled despite utter exhaustion, and this time she let him see it.  “It’s a good thing you left the dagger behind, you know.”

“And it is a good thing you didn’t.  I never would have believed it… that she drank the youth out of her own prisoners.”

Shay reached inside her pocket and removed the Countess’s amulet.  As she held it up to the morning light, the sun’s glean revealed the matt tarnish of an obvious fake.  “Worthless.”  She flung the gem off into the shrubbery, where it might never be found again, and sighed.  “I guess wealth has a way of eluding us.”

Jalil smiled.  “On the contrary, I’ve got the largest jewel I need, right here.”

“And so do I.”



The End.



Analysis:



The primary idea behind the story is that of “looks can be deceiving.”  In particular, this relates to physical beauty.  This is most obvious when applied to the Countess’s beauty and her hideous secret.

While observing the amulet, Shay eats an apple and compares the size of the two objects.  This foreshadows the discovery of Countess’s true identity, as the apple happens to be rotten inside despite its pristine appearance. Furthermore, the amulet, which at first seems invaluable, turns out to be a worthless fake.

The theme of beauty also extends to Shay and Jalil.  She is unattractive, while he is born of a race that is often considered inferior amongst the citizens of Delawyn (this might become more apparent in later rewrites), and yet the two have an inner beauty that resonates.

The conifers surrounding Castle Delawyn are important too.  Confiers are a kind of evergreen tree that do not lose their leaves in autumn.  Because of this, they are perceived as a symbol of immortality, and in the story they serve to mirror the Countess’s eternal youth.