Page 1 of The Captive Duke
One
IN HIS PERSONAL HELL, CHRISTIANDONATUSSevern, eighth Duke of Mercia, considered the pedagogic days the worst of a horrific lot—also the most precious. The days when his captors used his suffering to teach the arcane art of interrogation might cost him his sanity, even his honor, but they also ensured he would some day, some night, some eternity if necessary, have that sweetest of satisfactions—revenge.
“You see before you the mortal form of a once great and powerful man, Corporal,” Girard said, pacing slowly between the table his prisoner had been lashed to and the damp stone wall where the corporal stood at attention.
Girard was a stranger to hurry, a necessary trait in a torturer. A big, dark, lean acolyte of the Corsican, Girard lived in Christian’s awareness the way consumption dwelled in the minds of those it afflicted.
“Our duke is still great, to my mind,” Girard went on, “because His Grace has not, as the English say, broken.”
Girard blathered on in his subtly accented French, and despite willing it to the contrary, Christiantranslated easily. As Girard’s ironic praise and patriotic devotion blended in a curiously mesmerizing patter, Girard’s superior, Henri Anduvoir—the actual intended student—lurked off in the shadows.
Bad luck in a man’s superiors was not the exclusive province of Wellington’s army. Girard made a science of extracting truth from those reluctant to part with it, and pain was only one tool at his disposal.
Anduvoir, a simpler and in some ways more-evil soul, was plainly addicted to hurting others for his own entertainment.
Christian filled his mind with the lovely truth that someday Anduvoir, too, would be made to suffer, and suffer, and suffer.
“Yet.Our duke has not broken yet,” Girard went on. “I challenge you, Corporal, to devise the torment or the prize that will break him, but be mindful that our challenge grows the longer His Grace is silent. When the good God above put Mercia into our hands all those months ago, we sought to know through which pass Wellington would move his troops. We know now, so what, I ask you, is the point of the exercise? Why not simply toss this living carcass to the wolves?”
Yes, please God, why not?
And then another thought intruded on Christian’s efforts to distance himself from the goings-on in that cell: was Girard letting slip that Wellington had, in fact, moved troops into France itself? Girard played a diabolical game of cat and mouse, hope and despair, in arole that blended tormenter and protector with a subtlety a better-fed man might find fascinating.
“We yet enjoy His Grace’s charming company because the duke serves another purpose,” Girard prosed on. “He did not break, so we must conclude he is sent here to teach us the breaking of a strong man. One might say, an inhumanly strong man. Now…”
The scent of rich Turkish tobacco wafted to Christian’s nose, cutting through the fragrance of lavender Girard favored and the perpetual damp of the Château’s lower reaches. Christian’s meager breakfast threatened a reappearance, a helpful development in truth. He focused not on Girard’s lilting, philosophical French, but on holding the nausea at bay, for he had reason to know a man could choke on his own vomit.
A boot scraped, and by senses other than sight, Christian divined that Anduvoir had come out of his shadows, a reptile in search of his favorite variety of heat.
“Enough lecturing, Colonel Girard. Your pet has not told us of troop movements. In fact, the man no longer talks at all, do you,mon duc?” Anduvoir sucked a slow drag of his cigar, then gently placed the moist end of it against Christian’s lips. “I long for the sound of even one hearty English scream. Long for it desperately.”
Christian turned his head away in a response Girard, who was by no means a stupid man, would have predicted. Anduvoir was an infrequent visitor, though, and like any attentive host—or prudentsubordinate—Girard trotted out the best entertainments for his guest.
Anduvoir moved into Christian’s line of sight, which, given the careful lack of expression on Girard’s face, was bad news all around. Anduvoir was short, dark, coarse featured, and behind his Gallic posturing, suffused with the glee of a bully whose victim could not elude torment.
“A quiet man, our duke.” Anduvoir expelled smoke through his nose. “Or perhaps, not so quiet.”
He laid the burning tip of the cigar against the soft skin inside Christian’s elbow with the same care he’d put it to his prisoner’s mouth, letting a small silence mark the moment when the scent of scorched flesh rose.
The blinding, searing pain howled from Christian’s arm to his mind, where it joined the memory of a thousand similar pains and coalesced into one roaring chant:
Revenge!
“Lord Greendale was a man of great influence,” Dr. Martin said, clearing his throat in a manner Gilly was coming to loathe, the way she’d loathed the sight of Greendale lighting one of his foul cheroots in her private parlor.
“His lordship enjoyed very great influence,” Gilly concurred, eyes down, as befit a woman facing the widowed state.
The bad news came exactly as expected: “You should prepare for an inquest, my lady.”
“An inquest?” Gilly gestured for her guest to take a seat, eight years of marriage to Greendale having taught her to produce an appearance of calm at will. “Theophilus, the man of great influence was universally disliked, approaching his threescore and ten, and the victim of an apoplexy in the midst of a formal dinner for twenty-eight of his most trusted toadies. What will an inquest serve?”
Since Greendale’s apoplexy, Gilly had dared to order that the fires in her parlor be kept burning through the day, and yet, the physician’s words chilled her more effectively than if a window had banged open.
“Lady Greendale…” Martin shifted a black satchel from right hand to left, making the contents rattle softly. Gilly was convinced the only items of interest in that bag were a selection of pocket flasks.
“Countess, you must not speak so freely, even to me. I will certainly be put under oath and questioned at length. I cannot imagine what the wrong words in the hands of the lawyers will do to your reputation.”
Hiswrong words, over which he’d have no control, of course. A just God would afflict such a physician with a slow, painful death.
