The Tetrachromat (On HOLD)

Chapter 12. Midnight Prayer

Wait a minute, what was Besson's dark secret? Given how terrified he was about explaining his escape... Did I miss something?

My answer took on the form of a roar from Uncle Vasilii. "Cross-dresser!"

I only recently met the man, but I could already tell he grew red in the face proportionally to his anger. His neck darkened to rich burgundy and, from chin up, his face looked like a plum. He held back his fury to get to the end of Besson's story, so it pressure-cooked above the boiling point and erupted in yelling.

"Cross-dresser!"

Only to save my life, I swear... Besson thought and didn't dare to interject. He cowered, with tears welling in his eyes. Hunger twisted his gut on top of it, making things even worse. Ironically, he fasted to find forgiveness for all his transgressions, including this one.

Uncle Vasilii could have easily deduced all that, if only he restrained himself for a minute. Yet, he didn't. Something about Besson putting on a dress set his sixteenth century mind spinning.

He huffed, puffed and stomped around. He yelled, "Cross-dresser!" a few more times. Just as I thought the storm was blowing over, he pinched Besson's cheek and said through gritted teeth, "Don't you dare shave your beard like a sodomite again!"

"D-dmitrii got upset whenever we looked too old..." Besson hiccupped his excuses. "It... it was to humor the prince, nothing else!"

"Dmitrii is dead!" Uncle Vasilii boomed. "So don't shave! Have you heard me?"

Besson gulped mutely, looking like he would grow a knee-length beard if it pleased his uncle.

His uncle's red-knuckled fist slammed the wall, anyway. I expected the logs to explode into splinters and the world to disintegrate around me again. Fortunately, the guesthouse withstood the assault. Uncle Vasilii gripped the table-top next, breathing hard.

Matvei moved away from the table and folded his hands in his lap. Besson trembled worse than an aspen leaf during a hurricane, but he tried to emulate the clerk.

Invisible and incapable of sitting primly, I tried to cheer Besson up. Stop bellyaching over the skirts. In a few short centuries, nobody would give a damn, anyway. Or they shouldn't, since they knew better.

Besson rubbed his aching cheek. Demon. Aye, demon and sorcerer you are. For my grave sins, I have to suffer your provocative speeches in my mind! Woe is me...

A demon? For what sins? Dude, Hell won't send a horsefly after you. I think we're together because we're both—

Besson screamed internally.

Jeez, maybe you should eat something. Raise your blood sugar, you know?

Don't use our Lord's name in vain.

Besson erected a wall between us after that. It wasn't completely impenetrable, but solid. That's what I got for trying to be in his corner! All I could hope for was that Besson was exactly like his uncle and cooled down fast. Without our dialogue, the sixteenth century just wasn't the same.

Uncle Vasilii lost his choleric color before Besson stopped walling me off. He tossed a herring into his mouth, decimated it and sucked on his teeth. "Why are you sitting like a stump in a meadow? Tell again, what did this witch look like?"

Besson blinked—had his uncle forgotten what he had told him only a short while ago? His uncle was many things, but senile wasn't one of them. "Uncle, I... I saw a shadow by the wall. I can't describe the witch more than that."

"Oi, a dolt! What a dolt! I shall play it's your youth and inexperience, not your father's seed." Uncle Vasilii bit into another herring. "Though what hope do we have? Handsome to look at, head emptier than a clay whistle—so alike in every detail... Why should it surprise me?"