In Clarence's opinion, there were different kinds of hangover. Those that were nothing more than an annoyance, like a cold that makes you groggy and long for your bed, and those that crippled you. Clarence felt like he had been crushed by a horse, his head kicked by a stampede of donkeys and his mouth filled with the ash of a thousand knocked out pipes. Even closed his eyes stung, his head swam and he couldn't distinguish dreams from memories. Next to him, Beatrix sighed in her sleep. For a moment he thought nothing about it, and then a creeping doubt and half-remembered memories came back to him.
Had he?
Surely not.
But then- He looked across at her, she was wrapped in her cloak and still dressed in her own clothes.
He must have dreamt it. He lay back, trying to remember the dream. Where she had told him in the firelight that she had wanted him since she met him. Remembered the softness of her kiss, the smoothness of her body. The sounds she made as he explored her, and those she elicited from him. It had to be a dream. He couldn't have been so stupid as to give in to his desire for her. Now. With his reality bearing down on them. To show her any kind of affection would be the cruelest thing he could do.
Her eyes flicked open and she squinted in the morning light which shot through the shutters onto her face. He watched her with care, trying to judge her memories by her reactions, but he could smell her on him and he could remember more and more with each passing second. He should be feeling triumphant, satisfied, full of hope and love but he only felt mortifying shame.
"I feel like death," she muttered. "Whose stupid idea was it to get drunk when we have no food to line our stomachs? Oh, that's right, the stupid selfish pirate."
He sniffed a laugh and propped his head on his hand; if he felt this bad she must feel awful.
"I think I might still be drunk," Beatrix whispered. She ran her hands through her hair and closed her eyes again. "Do we have any water?"
"There's a jug of boiled water on the table. You brought it up after-" he paused, after what? "At the end of the night," he concluded.
"Did I?"
She didn't remember a thing.
"How drunk was I?"
Maybe I should tell her, he thought as he rolled up to try and summon up the energy to cross the room to get the jug for her.
She bit her lip and her eyes fixed on the middle distance and then slid across to him, for a moment she looked like she would laugh but the smile began to fade. Perhaps she had remembered, perhaps she could remember everything they did. Was she regretting every moment, from when she kissed him to when she pulled off his clothes and- she was still looking at him. Cat's couldn't give a more searching stare. Clarence pretended not to have noticed.
"Do you want water, I'll go and get it?"
She was silent, watching him, but a look of mild alarm resided behind her eyes. He felt his own fears rise as she continued to look at him, what if she hated him? What if she was ashamed? Had he taken advantage of her? He opened his mouth to try and make it easier but she spoke first.
"What happened to your back?"
Utter and abject mortification wiped out all other feelings. He hadn't put his shirt back on. He always wore his shirt, everywhere, at all times regardless of who he was with or what he was doing. He never took it off but she had taken it off him in the firelight the night before and he hadn't stopped her because he was so frightened that if he did she would want to stop for good.
He pulled his top back on, words failed him. He just wanted to be sick.
"I always wondered- all the time we have been travelling, all the time I've been with you in Gelding Town. Even when you came to my home on Earth- you never took it off." She sat up. "The scar on your arm was enough to illustrate your past," her voice halted. "I'm so sorry Clarence."
He hung his head, he wished his mouth would work so he could distract her, deflect her onto anything else. He wanted to detail every moment of their time together the night before because at least if they argued over that it would take the focus off of the mess of scars from the beatings he had received as a child.
"Why didn't you get them healed?" she whispered. "Can't Leprechauns heal themselves?"
Clarence's lips drew into a thin line, all he could do was shush her. His mouth wouldn't work to do anything else. She noticed how uncomfortable he was and she reached for his hand and squeezed it, her eyes met his, held them, and then she changed the subject. "I'd like to Jump somewhere close to civilization. I've been giving it some thought. If we go to the Fringe it will be obvious that we are hiding. We can't speak the languages and we are too different. We need a trade world- somewhere far enough away from a portal that it's remote but close enough that speaking Joining Earth Standard isn't odd. Somewhere where people have enough money to afford a teacher- but you can't play the violin- I think that's how they found you before- you're too good." She kept his hand in hers, spoke quickly so there was never a pause for thought. He felt a great sense of relief and overwhelming gratitude towards her. She understood exactly how he needed her to act.
"Remote but busy, close enough to the central world to feel connected but far enough away that nobody will find us? That's a tall order, Beatrix."
"It might well be," she agreed, "But we need to make a living. Your bag of gold won't last forever."
"What will you do?"
"Open a pub of course, what else? Just a little one though, the best way to hide is in the open. Before I came to Joining Earth I kept myself safe by being useful, by finding a job that gave me things to trade. That's how people are Clarence, a person's true value is dictated by what they can give, not what they can take."
"You are so jaded," he told her. "Always thinking people are driven by self-preservation-"
"The sensible ones are. You are. I am. Bobbin downstairs is deranged for being different. People like him get people killed. Worse, they justify why people should be killed."
Clarence got up and brought the water jug over, Beatrix stank of alcohol and once she had drunk from the jug she grew sleepy and their conversation became more and more abstract until she fell back to sleep. He tried to do the same but woke frequently and by mid-morning his stomach was rumbling and he was desperate to eat. Beatrix was puking into a bucket.
It wasn't until the mid afternoon that they were able to go down stairs, the night before still unaired between them.
Bobbin was sat in his usual spot carving his usual chess pieces, he now had half a set and if he had heard anything of their nighttime antics he didn't say anything more than, "Is your head as bad as mine?" After the agreements were half grunted he switched to other matters. "I've given our problem some thought Clarence if we want to eat we will have to break cover."
"Wishford?" Clarence asked.
Beatrix groaned.
Bobbin nodded, his face grim. "We will have to steal some food," he told them. "I think if we focus on the outlying houses we can get eggs at least."
"I found some small change in the palace," Beatrix told him. "Enough to get us something today."
Bobbin studied her, nodded once and returned to his carving. "It could be dangerous Clarence, can you Jump?"
"Not likely with this hangover," Clarence grumbled.
"Maybe you should stay here, let Bobbin go on his own?" Beatrix asked. Clarence feared being alone with her for longer, eventually they would have to address the things left unsaid.
"No. He'll go hunting for Innismen to bargain me back," Clarence shot him a look as if to say 'I know what you are about' but Bobbin sniffed a laugh.
"I'm too hungry to bother," he said. "Why do you think the Innismen would be anywhere near Wishford of all places?"
Beatrix shot Clarence a look and sunk into a chair by the fire, "We can't sit here starving Clarence and you won't get strong enough to Jump if you don't eat."
Clarence scratched the stubble that had now grown so long it was a beard and he shrugged, "We go carefully. Keep our hoods up, we scope it out first- If I say we call it off and we move to another town or village."
Beatrix nodded but Bobbin seemed less concerned, "Wishfords a big place and people pass through all the time to the capital. Nobody is going to notice three travellers, especially if we go away from the main streets."
They packed their bags, pulled on their cloaks and doused the fires. All of them agreed that it was too dangerous to come back to the palace once they had visited Wishford. Instead, they would go their separate ways. Beatrix and Clarence would head back to the coast and meet up with Pete's crew (Or so Clarence said) and Bobbin would continue to the capital to search for his sister. They walked in silence for nearly an hour as they made their way through the trees. Eventually, when the town was not far away Bobbin broke out of his retrieve.
"Rosa will have left them and gone to the Nags Head Tavern. She knows I will stay there when I'm in Salisbury."
"If she wants to," Beatrix told him. Clarence watched Bobbin frown at her.
"Why wouldn't she?"
"She didn't seem too worried when we left, I think she's on her own journey."
Bobbin brushed her comments off. "She's not like that, you don't know her enough to understand. She'll be at the Nag and she'll be wanting to get back to her farm. All those entitled bastards will treat her like scum and she will realise quick enough where her priorities lie- in hard work, honest folk and the smell of the salt air."
Beatrix shot Clarence a look behind Bobbin's back that said 'not likely' "I'm sure you're right, she is a Humanist, after all, she knows the fight is real."
"Exactly," Bobbin told her. "I'm glad you understand it at least. You know the pains we go through. She's lived it, she understands the truth in relying on nothing but your own muscles, your own eyes and your own lungs. No enhancements, no magic, to make us anything other than our true selves. That makes us more than those who have it easier."
"I don't understand how anybody could think otherwise once they have lived a day as a human," Beatrix coaxed him.
Clarence wished she would stop, she kept glancing at him, her mouth twitching with amusement as if sharing a private joke. Bobbin wasn't an idiot but it was surprising how convincing she could be.
"Plenty of people are blind to suffering. It's easy to serve soup to a beggar and then go home to your eiderdown bed," Bobbin told her, though he looked at Clarence when he said it.
Clarence thought he had a point. It was what he had been doing for the last five years, and he'd had a lovely time doing it. Not because he thought he was doing anybody any charity, but because that life was easy. Beatrix was trying to prove one point and Clarence had taken quite another from it. He felt ashamed. And now it came to it, Fred had been taken and Clarence's honour, charity, integrity and friendship had been cast aside for his own selfish desires. He should be ready to die for Fred, but instead, he was running away. Justifying his actions behind more 'charity' because Beatrix must be kept safe. Because Grendal would be better for the Humanists. Because he didn't have to do anything hard. How he despised himself as they walked. He didn't deserve Beatrix's love, he wanted her to be repulsed by him.
"Rosa lived her whole life in shame though," Beatrix pointed out. "Shame that she has powers and the hardship that she brought to her family. Why should she feel like that?"
"Nobody's ever blamed her for what happened," Bobbin told her, quickly, as if he was keen for her to not think poorly of him. "She's a victim in all this too. Why do you think she decided to run a farm as a Human? She could have started again as a Witch but she decided that she didn't want to."
Because she was never trained to use her powers and untrained magic is dangerous, Clarence thought, but he held his tongue. He didn't care if Bobbin and his sister fell out. It meant nothing to him, he just wanted to get some food in his belly and enough rest to Jump away. Beatrix continued to have her fun with Bobbin for most of the journey through the woods. By the time they reached Wishford, Beatrix had convinced Bobbin that she was a Humanist through and through. Moreover, she was a human with a staunch hatred of the Council, who despised the magical community with a passion, present company excluded. Bobbin grew more and more animated around her not realising how much she was taking him for a fool, how she kept provoking him to expose the most extreme of his ideals. Ones that he never would have advocated if she hadn't been so much of a captive, doting audience. He was proclaiming by the end of the journey how much he regretted not speaking to her more, how he wished that she had been more vocal in her beliefs. "I haven't felt this inspired in years!" he proclaimed. "I see why Clarence holds you in such high regard!"
Clarence couldn't help but give a frustrated sigh as he looked around the outskirts of the little riverside town.
"What's eating you?" Bobbin asked him. "Finally feeling regret for your choice to give up on your friend for the sake of shirking your duty to your Empire?"
Regret? Of course, he felt regret, but not over abandoning his Empire. "Do give it a rest," Clarence grumbled. "You know my views on the Leprechauns."
Bobbin smirked at him, "Last chance Clarence. You could make such a difference."
Clarence shook his head. "Do you intend to say goodbye here Bobbin?"
"I don't expect you will come on to Salisbury with me," he shrugged. "You better jump far away though my friend because I will look for you and I will let them know where you are should I find you."
"True friendship," Clarence held out his hand and Bobbin shook it, nodded to Beatrix and walked away. "You really had fun with him, didn't you?" He said to her once Bobbin had gone.
"I've been itching to do that since I met him but I thought if I did I'd never hear the end of it."
"Was he as much a zealot as you thought?"
"And some. He'll go far that one," she laughed. "Good riddance."
"Well, let's get this food and get out of here. I think we should eat in the forest, rest away from the road and jump as soon as I'm able."
Beatrix nodded once and smiled at him and she put her hand in her pocket to find the gold but her eyes grew wide and she looked up at Clarence as her mouth formed an 'o'
"The bastard's robbed me-" she searched her other hiding places. "All of them! Damned double-crossing pirate bastards!"
Clarence pulled the pack from his back and breathed a sigh of relief as he realised he still had his money.
"He's taken the whole bloody lot!"
"I've got enough for both of us." Clarence had to see the funny side, in his mind she deserved it for baiting him so much.
"No wonder the thieving bastard was happy to walk away, he's got paid for his troubles and no mistake. I'll kill the-"
Clarence started to laugh, "Let's get food and get going."
"We could have been set up for years with that much gold!"
"And we still can, Light! Bea, I told you to keep an eye on him," Clarence pulled his hood closer to his face as he passed travellers on the road. Nobody paid them much attention as they went towards the markets. They bought pies, bread, cheese and ham. The bread was course, deep brown with thick crusts, the ham overcooked and the cheese flavourless but they were famished and it was the best meal they could hope for. After days of oats swimming in water a filling meal was delightful. So much so, that Clarence was slow to realise that they were being watched.
Across the market a woman sat. He first noticed her bright yellow eyes, then noticed how they often looked in his direction. He pulled Beatrix on to other stalls but there she was again, at a distance, not yet aware that he had seen her.
"We're being followed," he told Bea. "Don't look round, keep browsing the stalls."
Beatrix leant over one of the market stalls, but her expression had fixed on her face.
"When I say, you take my left hand and we run back towards the forest. Don't stop, Don't slow down, even if you think your side is going to burst from a stitch or your breath will choke in your throat. You run."
"We won't make it," she whispered. "I really do not feel well."
"We have to, I can't fight them here."
As he spoke to her he noticed how many others were slowly making their way to his location, he could count four including the woman. Two behind and two from the side. In his right hand, he pulled his dagger from its sheath, his left closed around Beatrix's and he whispered, "run."
She jumped, unsure which way to go and he yanked her after him. As soon as he moved the four others sprang into action. He sprinted directly towards the one on the left. Barged past, shoulder low. Felt the man lift and be flung. Beatrix squeaked behind him, her hand still tight in his. She kept up with him well for the first hundred yards but then her pace began to slow and his grip tightened as he pulled her. "Come on!" he shouted, "Come on Bea!"
She must have looked behind because she managed to relay information to him, "Four!" she shouted. "Swords!"
He swore, he didn't even want to think about their weapons until he had some protection. He just needed to get Beatrix away.
"Closing- '' Beatrix squealed through her teeth.
"Stop telling me," Clarence shouted at her. "Save your breath!"
The trees were looming, the village dropping away. He could hear their footfall behind his, the rattle of their chainmail slowing them down, the creak of their leathers and then the trees swallowed them. Clarence practically chucked Beatrix to one side and turned to face them. First to reach him found Clarence surprisingly fresh for a fight. Fuelled on adrenaline and magic alone he pushed his powers to his muscles and eyes to react faster, be stronger. The first of the men raised his sword arm and got a dagger across the wrist. The sword fell, Clarence snatched it up and used it to slash at the man's neck. The steal met its mark. First fell back as Second came. Second, more competent but not as practised or trained as Clarence. Reactions too slow to be a match for his speed. Clarence drove the sword home.
Beatrix screeched, "Clarence!"
He turned to see her smash a log over the head of the woman with the yellow eyes. One second more and Clarence would have got a dagger in his back.
Hot pain shot across his forearm, he looked down to see a knife slash through his skin and the fourth attacker drawing into a defensive stance. Almost without thinking Clarence chucked his own dagger and when the man dodged it, Clarence ended him with a downwards hack into his skull.
Beatrix vomited. It splattered over the body of the yellow-eyed woman but Clarence hardly noticed. He was searching for more attackers, his breath coming in great steading gasps. "Light," he whispered, looking at the carnage he had left.
"She's still alive!" Beatrix squawked. "Clarence!"
He rushed to secure his prisoner before she had a chance to get away, With her hands tied behind her back she couldn't form a portal and as she came round she cursed them.
"Leave me alone," he told her, as clear as he could.
"I have orders."
Beatrix, behind Clarence, was walking up and down swearing under her breath. When the woman said about orders she turned to face her. "Orders?" she spat. "You've ruined our lives."
The woman didn't seem to be able to focus well, the cut on her head was bleeding. "I'm loyal to my future King," she hissed at Beatrix. "Regardless of the sacrifice in the short term."
Clarence growled, "Where is Fred Tavern? Where have you put him?"
The woman's face had gone limp on one side, Clarence noticed the signs of a stroke, Beatrix must have hit her so hard her brain was haemorrhaging.
"Where is he!"
"Go F-"
Beatrix kicked her. Hard.
"He's in Copperberry st-" she snapped, "Don't kick me." Her eyes grew wide, her face fell limp and she collapsed on her side.
"Good God!" Beatrix swore in her Earth Language. "Clarence!" she rushed to his side and grabbed him as their prisoner's body started to convulse. Clarence drew his dagger and plunged it into the back of her skull. Next to him, Beatrix froze in horror.
~
"You were saving my life," Clarence told her as the fire cracked. They had gone so far into the depths of the forest that they were sure a fire wouldn't be seen by anybody. A shelter from their cloaks and branches. The bodies were left far enough into the trees that they would not be easily found but they hadn't bothered to bury them.
Beatrix hardly said two words since the woman had died and every so often she gave an involuntary shudder.
"The first is always the hardest," he told her- as if the fact that his own death count hadn't just doubled didn't affect him. "If you hadn't done it, I'd be dead, or worse- captured."
She poked at the fire with a twig.
"Did you hear what she said though? Copperberry Street is in Salisbury City, not in the Fortress. I suppose they hope that putting Fred there would be a foolproof way of making sure I didn't find him."
Beatrix's eyes broke from the flame.
"I'd be marching to the Golden Gate of the Leprechaun Complex and demanding to rescue Fred and all the while Grendal's got him safe in a house in Copperberry street. My old tutor is a scheming bastard. I knew he never intended to bargain with him." Perhaps it was the fact he had come away from his fight with only a skin-deep cut to his upper arm, perhaps it was the fact that he had a full stomach for the first time in a long time, but he felt brave. He felt like Grendal's mistake might just be the thing he needed. A chance to redeem himself. To pay back Fred's kindness. To save his friend.
"You want to try to get him?" She asked, her face blank of emotion. "Even though he's in Salisbury City? Even though it's too dangerous to go there?"
"You want to try too, don't you?" Clarence asked.
She didn't reply quickly, something was eating away at her. He could see it in the way she distracted herself with sticks and the fire, the way she sat, and bit at her lip.
"Say it," he told her. "You know I won't think poorly of you."
"I've betrayed him." She snapped. "I slept with you, I abandoned him, and I was relieved to think that this whole journey would soon be over. I was excited to Jump away and start again and I told myself he wasn't coming back. That I could move on without feeling guilty because there was nothing I could do to save him. Our new life could start, all ties severed." She chucked a stone into the fire and watched the embers spit and Clarence tried to ignore the way his heart skipped a beat when she told him she remembered being with him. "But he's in Copperberry Street and we have a chance to bring him back. If I tell you not to try, what kind of person am I?"
Clarence hoped that was rhetorical. "They will kill him when they can't use him any more."
Beatrix picked up another pebble but Clarence held out his hand to stop her chucking it into the fire. "He's my best friend Bea. If we don't try, it will hang over us forever. He's your best friend too. Any life we have will be forever tainted by the fact we turned our backs and ran away."
She held his eye for a long time. Tears shining but never falling. His hand still closed over hers and the pebble. "You remember last night?" he asked, so quietly that he wasn't sure he said it.
Beatrix leaned across and kissed him, "I'm going to bed," she told him. He didn't join her straight away, he needed to think. He needed a plan.
~
It was so cold that night that he worried about what would happen if the fire went out. He piled it full of wood and slept next to it with his cloak pulled around his shoulders. Every few hours he woke up shivering, built it back up and checked on Beatrix. She had pulled herself into a ball and like him, didn't sleep well. They packed up their camp before the sun began to rise. She took some time trying to fix her hair in the reflection of a puddle and he scratched at his newly formed beard and considered how much different he must look with it. "When we get to Salisbury we need to split up," he told her. "The Innismen are looking for a couple and our descriptions are easy to identify. Is there a way you can hide your hair or your eyes?"
"I'll tie it up, buy a hat?"
Clarence nodded. "What was Salisbury like on Earth?"
"It was a town by a river."
"Here it's a city that stretches from the convergence of the River Nadder and the River Avon up to The Fortress which is the name of the fortified home of the Council of the Light."
"The Fortress is built around the Stonehenge Portal, right?"
Clarence nodded. "Copperberry Street is in a popular Leprechaun area of the city near to the great canal. A number of the nobles who need to work in the Lower Town surrounding the Fortress have residency there."
Beatrix bit her lip, she was hanging on to his every word. "Explain it again," she urged. "I can't picture the Fortress."
"It's a city inside the city. Inside the Fortress is the citadel which is built around the Stonehenge portal, outside the citadel is the Lower Town which houses the court officials and the workers who need to be kept away from the general population because they work with state secrets, or have access to the court and pose a security risk. The Fortress is enclosed by a huge outer wall, and beyond that is Salisbury City. There are plenty of people who work inside the Fortress who have houses in the city, nobility and lesser country monarchs usually, who only get called to court on an occasion."
"Does the Steward have a house in Copperberry Street?"
"I don't know," Clarence told her. "He has property all over the place."
"But this street is owned by rich people?"
Clarence nodded, he could see what she was worried about, they looked so travel-worn and filthy they would stick out like orange on blue.
"It doesn't get us any closer to Fred," Beatrix told him. "We can't just walk up and down the street looking like we do, hoping to find him and not get caught."
Clarence nodded his agreement, "I know. We won't be."
"So-" She pulled her cloak closer around her shoulders, "Do you have an idea what to do?"
"I think so."
"Is it going to get us caught or killed?"
Clarence hesitated, "Beatrix-"
"Don't start this by telling me I shouldn't come."
He puffed his cheeks and looked away from her. "I just want to see-" Clarence told her. "I just want to see if it can be done without insane amounts of risk. If it's too dangerous we will go, ok?"
She nodded.
"We're going to walk to the city," he told her. "I'm not jumping us. What strength I have I need to conserve."
~
It began to rain as they walked, a great heavy downpour that soaked through their clothes and chilled them to the bone. They gave Wishford a wide berth and went through the small farms outside the city. Came into Salisbury along the western road which was ankle-deep with clawing chalky mud. At first, the houses were little more than village suburbs and roadside inns, soon turned into the city properties. Clarence was grateful that the rain didn't let up because everybody they passed had their head turned to the floor, hoods pulled close over their faces and they did the same.
"If memory serves, go along this street until you meet the great canal. I remember sailing past her and seeing an inn called the Whistle. Get lodgings on the first floor, facing away from the canal, if you can, and hang your cloak out the window shutter so I know which room you are in."
"What will you do?"
"I'm going shopping."
He gave her his money and they separated. It felt odd leaving her alone; as if he were doing something awful. He turned and watched her disappear through the rain, hoping she was happy to be getting into the dry. He would not have the same luxury.
If he visited a good Taylors looking as he did he would be driven out, so the very idea that he could have clothing made to suit his needs was laughable. He tried to remember where he was going as he hurried across a canal bridge and into a much darker, poorer part of the city. A short cut, he hoped. As a child, he had been driven through in carriages or sailed down the canal but he'd never gone on foot. It was odd to think that he had spent so much of his life in this part of the world but had never truly known it.
Bobbin used to speak about buying a house on Copperberry street. In his childish mind, it symbolised that he had 'made it,' as if there was a point at which somebody won in the game of life. A stately home for the working man, a three-child family and an income of a hundred gold pieces a year. Guaranteed happiness.
From what Clarence had seen, money didn't make people happier. It just changed people's priorities. Primary importance to Clarence right now was that he didn't spend any money at all. He'd need every penny of it later.
A beggar turning up in a shop and handing a gold coin across the counter would earn him nothing but a visit to the Druids. He took the road left and found an actual beggar to ask directions. "Where are the rich people's houses?"
The beggar laughed and pointed, his breath reeking of alcohol and Clarence continued on his way. He walked the length of a wide street looking up at stone and wood dwellings which leaned out into the road, each one growing steadily more grand until he was sure that he had reached a nice area. Now he began to study their exteriors, which ones had candles flickering in the windows which had servants coming and going. He couldn't help remembering the last time he stole from somebody- a cart and a horse, food and clothes. The left sock of one of the people living in these houses would cost more than all of it put together and be worth infinitely less. He didn't feel bad about robbing them at all. He was sure that they would be indignant to find that their things had gone but they wouldn't be heartbroken. After a while, he chose a likely looking house at the end of the street that had a number of people coming and going from the servant's entrance. He scoped the property out and found a narrow lane for deliveries of coal and wood. The entrance was barred with a metal gate but he was over that without much of an issue and he snuck, keeping low, along the cart passage until he found the shoots for the coal and wood. With any luck, this would lead him to cellars and from there he could sneak his way through the house. The number of people coming and going from the house would mean they would not be alert to an unfamiliar face should he be spotted.
He pulled up the trapdoor and was pleased to see it did shoot into darkness, and he eased himself down and alighted without issue onto a pile of logs. He could smell the wood and coal but he didn't dare light a candle or anything in case the whole room went up in flames. Instead, he cast around for the exit and saw a faint slither of light coming from the other side of the vaulted cellar.
Now he was out of the rain it became apparent how wet he was. As he moved he could feel his cloak dripping, so he took it off and left it by the door, shook out his hair and removed the outer layers of the rest of his clothing. By the time he was done he had only his trousers and cotton top on, he was freezing, but he hoped he looked more normal. Dagger's in his boot and belt he took a deep breath and opened the door.
Light flooded his eyes from a hanging lantern in the corridor. It smelled of beeswax, which was a good sign. If the household was using beeswax to light a corridor in the servant's areas they must have more money than sense. He checked his hands, his clothes and his boots. They were not too black from coal soot and not too damp from the rain. His heart was beating erratically, he thought about turning back. Now he had committed to this he was second-guessing his decisions. He dipped back into the cellar with the lantern and found a basket which he filled with some wood and he left again trying to look like he had a right to be present. As soon as he left the cellar he was surrounded by a number of tradesmen and servants. He stopped one of them, a girl with rosy cheeks who smiled at him as if she was hungry. "'You taking that up?" she asked. "He's been complaining it's too cold but she keeps telling him he's not to use all the wood."
"It's for him," Clarence played along. "I'm just helping- I'm with the-" he motioned his head back towards the room where a number of people were working on Light knew what.
"The first floor," the girl smiled at him and a bell ran that caused her to jump a little. "Must go!"
Clarence took up his wood basket and climbed the stairs two at a time. His heart was in his mouth and his brain ran through excuses for all eventualities as he came to a set of double doors and he knocked. There wasn't a response so he pushed the door open and entered.
It was dark inside the room, but thankfully it was also vacant. Clarence edged towards the wardrobe but became distracted by a number of glass vials dotted around, which on closer inspection held a collection of toe and fingernail clippings, pubic hair and teeth. When he reached out to open the wardrobe he was half expecting a body. Instead, he found a number of outfits that would be easily tailored to fit Beatrix. The woman they belonged to was larger than her and taller from the look of the clothes, but it would do. He pulled out a black dress and a green one with fur trimmings, a cloak, a belt, gloves, a scarf and a hat. they fit in the basket quite easily and were hidden under some logs. He left the room without delay, glad to be out of the oppressive space and he hurried across to what he hoped was her husband's room. When he knocked he heard a man call, "Enter" and he cursed under his breath whilst debating if he should do it. One steadying breath and he pushed the door open. The man who looked up from a writing desk was rotund and unshaven but his clothes were well made. He had the drooping eyes of a basset hound and all around his walls were etchings of women in various stages of distress.
"I've-" Clarence faltered. He could see what the man was doing, he was holding a pen drawing a huge pulsating-
"You've?" The man sneered. Clearly, he wasn't happy to be disturbed.
"The serving girl downstairs said you might be happy for some more wood for your fire sir?"
"Did she?" his eyes lit up and his hamster cheeks rose as he smiled. "Send you did she, cunning little fox, yes! Build it up lad, build it up."
Clarence crossed to the fire and shoved three fat logs on it. When he straightened up the man had gone back to his drawing.
"Sir, I'm supposed to go back to the kitchen with specific clothes they want to clean, the coat that matches your wife's fur-lined dress and the bits that go with it- sorry sir."
The man drew his eyes away from his work and he regarded Clarence without truly seeing him, "You're not the usual one?"
"No sir, I'm with the workmen downstairs but they told me to lend a hand elsewhere."
"Heh," he chuckled, "Very well, carry on." He jammed his thumb towards the wardrobe. "All in there, get you gone, get you gone." His attention had already faded from Clarence back to his drawing and Clarence took what he liked and left with the basket full. In the corridor, he didn't hang around. A brisk walk back the way he came drew nobody's attention and he was back by the cellar door within moments. He changed back into his wet clothing and stuffed as much as he could into his pack, but what he couldn't fit into it he had to pad into his own clothes. By the time he was done, he looked like a bread loaf and could hardly move. To get out of the cellar via the trap door he had to pile logs on their end and jump from that precarious platform without disturbing the pile beneath him. He dragged himself out of the cellar and pushed the hatch closed with a thud. Low growling made him freeze. From the depths, two eyes glinted. Clarence swore and dashed towards the gate. Behind him came the clatter of claws. Distance alone gave him the means of escape. One, two he jumped, scrambled and launched himself over the iron railings of the gate. Behind him, deep barks hounded his footfall as he dashed through the driving rain.