The Black Dog and the Grey Wolf

Or, The Further Adventures of Samuel and Alison

By Valentina Jett

xXxXx

Part Eight: To Seek the Lost

Pain.

All about her, every breath, every moment was pain. The cry echoing into her ears and down the hallways of her mind, the pounding beside her and around and inside, it was pain, all of it, and it could not be borne. She fled.

But the pain followed, hissing in the voices of a thousand serpents. Yes, well done, run, it whispered. Run as you always do. Break your promises, and hide in the darkness forever so that no one will see your shamed face.

What good are you? What good have you ever done?

You squander your talents, waste them foolishly, use them where they should never have been used. You hide yourself away from the world you should help, and abet those who should have been left to their own floundering. You lie when it seems right to you, and break your word for the sake of your own comfort.

Why should you live? Why should you go on wasting the precious time of those who could do so much better?

Stay here, in the darkness. You will trouble no one ever again.

She curled herself in a corner of the silent plain, tears falling softly from her eyes, and waited for time to end.

xXxXx

Viscountess Alison Niger waited outside the door of the Grey Suite, stolidly ignored by the guard who stood at attention there.

A more tempestuous week I cannot recall, and hope never to experience again.

After their headlong flight through the woods, she and Samuel had slept out the night beneath a tree, then walked in the morning to the nearest village, where they bought provisions and began their trek to the capital. There were meeting places there, friends who could be identified with special words and signs, and the others of their scattered band would be making their way towards those places as well.

The word from the Wolf's Den had reached them on the second day of their travels; they had meant to stop for food at a small inn, but on hearing the gossip buzzing about the village, had quickly moved on. Alison had walked the afternoon in a fog of worry, not unspotted by tears, and had seen the like on Samuel's face. Morta shot by a panicked King's Man and near to death, John almost out of his mind with fear, and only the vaguest whisper of a third found in the Den, a third who was no one ever connected with the Wolf's Pack by any story at all...

The news from London had come on the fourth day. Paul Caudalis had been identified, by a more than usually alert captain of the Guard, and had babbled out the true story of himself and the Lutums and Samuel Niger when the captain hinted that it might be well to make a friend of the court. The King was duly horrified, and his Queen had a fainting fit in which she prophesied that doom would surely come to England if Samuel Niger were not given his just reward...

xXxXx

"And so Viscount Niger is sought throughout the land," the gaily dressed court messenger proclaimed. "If he will swear to reimburse any merchants from whom he had stolen—for the King is just, and through all the pirating years of the man called the Black Dog, there was never a killing which could be put down to his crew, only the theft of money—a full pardon will be his for the asking, and the same for all his Marauders."

"I wouldn't believe it if I heard it from the King's own mouth, so I wouldn't!" Samuel shouted from the back of the crowd, resisting Alison's half-laughing efforts to stop him. "It's a trick, that's what it is, a trick to bring the Black Dog to heel now that they've leashed the Wolf!"

"Sirrah, you impugn the honor of the King!" the messenger retorted stiffly. "Mind your tongue when you speak of your betters!"

"That I won't," Samuel shot back, "for it's not so many years since I called Linus a prating fool to his own face."

The messenger turned an interesting shade of mottled purple. "And who might you be?" he managed to choke out after a few moments of sputtering.

Samuel pulled down his hood and shook loose his hair with the same gesture he used boarding a ship. "I am the man whose life depends on that message you carry," he said coolly as several people around him gasped and began to whisper to their neighbors. "More, the lives of the men who follow me depend on it. I will not commit them to anything about which I am less than sure without asking them first, and they are not here to ask. Thus, I must be sure of it in my own person."

The messenger blanched dead white and bowed jerkily. "My Lord... Viscount Niger..."

"Either will do, man, but for the Lady's sake, not both," Samuel said, striding forward through the crowd. "Now, may I see this paper of yours?"

The messenger handed it over, his hands shaking, and Samuel skimmed through it, nodding at certain points. "It's got Linus' sound to it, and—ah, yes. The inkblot with which he always dots his I."

A ripple of laughter ran through the people as this was passed along.

"So you have sought, and you have found," Samuel said, returning the messenger's paper and bowing to him formally. "Will you assist myself and my wife in traveling as quickly as possible to London, that we may accept the King's most generous offer?"

"What—oh—yes. Of course. My Lord."

xXxXx

It had been one of the hardest things Alison had ever done, not to laugh in the messenger's face. Especially when Samuel began to imitate him the moment his back was turned.

My love, oh, my love. How you hated court life, and how I grieve to see you there again... but it is where you can do the most good at the moment. For us and for all. Perhaps, someday, there will come a time when we can return to our simple life together, Samuel and Alison, husband and wife, and have need of nothing more.

A noise from within the room caught her attention, a sound as of something heavy being moved.

But I should not say nothing more, for we will always need our friends...

And that need may well go unfulfilled if I cannot help them now.

A well-dressed man opened the door of the suite, his face grave. "Lady Niger," he said, inclining his head to her. "I hope you were not waiting too long."

"Only a few moments." Alison curtsied slightly to Doctor Eldus, the King's personal physician, then entered the suite and let him close the door behind her. "How is she?"

"No change. She remains in fever, though the wound seems to have escaped serious infection. Due, no doubt, to her husband's devoted care of her."

"Yes. How is he?"

"Again, unchanged." Eldus glanced towards the bedroom. "I fear for his health more than for hers at this point. Her life is in God's hands, while his is in his own, and I have never seen a man less inclined to do anything about his own fate."

"I have often thought them two halves of one being," Alison said with a sigh. "He will not long outlive her, no matter when she dies, be it tomorrow or fifty years hence. Nor would she long survive him, were he the first to die. If we wish to save either of them, we must save both."

"Then I suggest we work together on Sir John. Your friendship with him, and my expertise, might be enough to rouse him from his stupor. Though it would do better if we could find another with whom he has a strong bond of some sort. Your husband, perchance, with their long friendship..."

Alison smiled, a little of her hope returning. "I know just the one. Or the four, rather. Samuel and I between us can surely keep him here until they arrive, and once they are here, he will not allow himself to sink into despondency. Have you writing materials here?"

"Certainly, in the sitting room." Eldus led the way. "Might I inquire..."

"I will tell you only this," Alison said, allowing herself a smile more usual to her husband or to Morta. "The letter must go with all speed to Mellis Castle."

xXxXx

Two days later:

A bright gray pair of eyes peered around the corner of the market entrance.

There it is. The tent. Gaily striped in red and blue, set between two of the most prominent stalls, it was impossible to miss, and had been the talk of the village since it had arrived three days earlier.

And there's its master. A swarthy man in long robes was setting out merchandise on a table in front of the tent, though even from here the watcher could see there was nothing of true quality.

Of course not—he wouldn't want to risk losing it to thieves. I'm sure he keeps his better pieces in the tent. Now, if he does what he has been doing, what Henry and Rich have been seeing him do...

The man clapped his hands twice, and another robed man emerged from the tent, moving slowly with his head bowed. The watcher narrowed her eyes, trying to get a look at his face. She'd studied the portraits, but a lot of time had passed, and she might not be able to tell...

The other man looked up for a moment, nodded his head, then dropped his gaze again, but that moment had been enough, and the watcher's breath hissed out in exultation. She had found the man she was looking for.

And—just a moment—

The flap of the tent had opened again, and a woman was peering out. She wore a headdress, but her face was uncovered, and the features were hauntingly familiar.

The watcher pulled herself back around the corner and caught her breath.I knew he looked like her, but I didn't know how much...

"All right?" asked the small boy next to her, looking at her worriedly.

"I'm fine," Pearl Niger said, recovering her composure. "Just fine. You understand what you have to do?"

"Yes, m'lady! I know just what to do!"

"And where to go afterwards?"

A nod. "You promised I could have some gold. And maybe shake your brother's hand. Is he really your brother? You look so different from him..."

"Yes, I do, but we are still brother and sister," Pearl cut him off before he could go too far. "My father and mother took him as their own son when he was a baby."

"Oh. All right. And you said maybe I could keep one of them...?" The boy trailed off hopefully.

"Be sure not to be caught with it," Pearl cautioned him. "I must pretend I had nothing to do with it, so I shan't be able to help you if you're caught."

"I never get caught," the boy proclaimed proudly. "Never have, never will!"

"Good." Pearl peered around the corner again. The swarthy man was exhorting passing folk to look at his wares, while the other man sat quietly near the end of the table with a long stick of wood in his hand. Clearly, he was there to provide security.

I wish I could check what Rich said he saw, but I trust him. It means I will need a key, though. And Henry saw those...

A quick examination of the master of the tent showed Henry's observation was still in force—a large ring of keys swung at the rope-like belt, to the left.

Now, as soon as I know how I can best handle him, I can begin...

Pearl smiled sweetly. Daniel, her wonderful brother, and Lia, her best sister (her only sister, but there was no reason to mince words), had told her how to judge a person, and the two of them had done a promenade through this very market the day before and sized up the tent's master like a pig for sale.

I just need to be certain I know what I am doing...

Certainty had come hard in their short week at Mellis Castle. The cubs of the Wolf's Pack had never been around many children other than themselves, and occasionally found the ways of the raucous crowd they were now thrust into bewildering. Why were boys not allowed in girls' rooms, while girls could enter boys'? Why were the sleeping rooms hidden away, hard to find even if you knew what you were looking for? And why did the other children regard them with such distrust and dislike?

That, at least, Pearl thought she could answer. They were outsiders, strangers, like the occasional guest brought to the Wolf's Den to dine with the Pack. Strangers were always watched carefully, for by definition they were untrustworthy. They had to prove themselves before they would be accepted, and there had not been nearly enough time for that to happen.

And I am woolgathering. One task, one mind, foolish Pearl. She shook herself and concentrated. Out to the center of the market, making for the fruit stand, as though she meant to buy apples, but taking a route past the stands full of pretties, and running her long string of pearls through her hand as she did... and just as she passed that particular tent...

Perfect.

Drawing a deep breath, she sallied forth, her basket on her arm and her necklace twined between her fingers.

xXxXx

Rabadas the Sinister, so called because he fought with his sword in his left hand, surveyed his tiny kingdom with complacence. From his father's threadbare trading goods, he had bargained and bribed his way to this. A respected merchant, trading around and up the sunny coast, he felt sure he was the first of his people to come to this place.

Though I suppose to my servants—no, in my own mind I may be truthful, even if there are no such in this England, my slaves—it feels like home.

He hid a smile in his beard, glancing to his left to see the quiet man who sat beside the table, watching all corners of the market. He was a landed man here, a noble, even. But he and his wife were abducted away by their enemies and sold into slavery, and I was lucky enough to buy them both.

And with her welfare as a guarantee, I can allow him some freedom of movement. He would hardly dare try anything foolhardy, such as running away, whilst she remains tethered here within...

A girl paused in front of his table, her fingers twisting in her long necklace. Her dusky face was wistful, and Rabadas frowned. If her family can afford to buy her a string of pearls such as she wears, why should she cavil at my wares? They are not of that same quality—at least, not the ones I show here outdoors—and without a doubt they are not so expensive—for those are real pearls, both the black and the white—

And just as he thought this, another seemed to come to the same conclusion.

"Ha!" shouted a boy smaller even than the girl, a very grubby boy, leaping upon her. "Give it!"

The girl shrieked and tried to shove him away from her, but he fastened his fingers on the necklace and yanked.

With a sharp snap, the string parted, and the pearls spilled. The boy crowed with glee and leapt on them, the girl screamed and beat at him with her basket, and folk from all over the market came running, some of them scooping up the rolling pearls, others trying to belabor or catch at the boy. One of them, a hefty man in a stained apron, shoved the girl aside roughly, and she fell to the ground and did not move again.

Rabadas started to order his slave to intervene, but the man was already moving, using only his two hands and the weight of his body to wedge his way through the crowd. He reached the girl's side, lifted her easily into his arms, and looked at Rabadas, indicating the tent with his eyes. Rabadas nodded, then began to shout. "Good people! Good people, hear me!"

The girl roused in the slave's arms with a tiny moan, audible as the noise of the crowd subsided. He stroked the side of her face to calm her.

"Good people, I will pay you two gold pieces for each pearl you bring to me," Rabadas said, his tones carrying even to the edges of the market and halting the beggars in their skulking flight. "The child deserves her necklet, and I would see it restored to her. Bring me the pearls. I will pay you more than you will get from any seller."

And her family will pay me more than that to have both her and the string restored hardly the worse for wear, I am sure.

The girl sat up in the slave's arms, and he set her on the ground, supporting her with one hand. "You are so kind," she said softly, her voice slipping under the excited chatter. "Thank you, thank you—"

And suddenly she was beside him, her arms around him, hugging him with great fervor. "I don't know what I would have done if I'd lost it!" she wept into his robes. "It was a gift, a gift from my dearest friend in the whole world, and that horrid boy would have stolen it from me... him and all the others... but you will get it back for me, I know you will!" She pulled away, smiling up at him tearfully. "Thank you, so much!"

"You are welcome, pretty one," Rabadas said, stroking her cheek as he had seen the slave do. "May I know your name?"

"Pearl, my name is Pearl..." The girl flushed, the expression just visible on her dark skin. "The necklet was a play on my name. For that I am a black pearl, but my three dearest friends are all pale-skinned. I must have them back, as many as possible. Please, do find them for me!"

"I will, dear Pearl, never fear." Rabadas patted her head. "Care for her," he told the slave over her head. "Have the woman make her something she will like to eat and drink, and bring me my cashbox, then wait within for me until the gems are recovered."

The man bowed his head, then came forward to collect the girl and lead her into the tent. Rabadas turned to the first man in line, the same one, he noticed, who had shoved the girl aside so roughly.

Very well, for you I shall save the clipped coins I was given in Lisbon...

xXxXx

John Lobos knelt at his wife's bedside, barely noticing the whispering from the room outside. She had not stirred in nine days, and he knew the doctor feared for her life if she did not wake soon.

Tell me only that it was nothing I did, he begged silently, clasping her hand. Tell me I could not have helped you, could not have saved you, could not have convinced you to run and hide with the children, or with Samuel and Alison, or with any of our other friends. Tell me it was not my burden to bear.

But she could not hear him, and might not ever again.

He no longer hoped that the sound and sight of their children, the cubs of their Pack, might rouse her and bring her back to him. He hoped only that they might arrive in time to say their farewells.

To both of us, truly, for I know if she dies I will have no spirit left to live.

My love, my love, what is it about you that holds my soul so bound?

He had never known. He might never know, now, unless God chose to reveal it to him.

"Do not leave me," he begged in a whisper barely louder than the hushed voices in the next room. "My Morta, do not leave me here all alone..."

Morta's breath seemed, for an instant, to catch. Then a whisper so soft that his seemed a shout reached his ear.

"Why?"

John stared at his beloved, frozen in astonishment, and could not speak a word.

xXxXx

(A/N: And thus ends another chapter of the most ridiculously long-drawn-out story ever. I'm sorry for the wait, people. I just seem to be unable to keep my mind on anything these days. Hope for more soon, but don't expect anything, please... though reviews do help to stimulate the writing side of the brain...)