“Sir Christofer. It signifies nothing,” Kit replied. “It grates mine ears to hear such empty sound.”

“As you wish it,” Puck said, and leaned back. “The court has been in uproar.”

“I noticed.”

Will felt pleasure at his self-possessed tone, but from the looks Kit and Robin shot him, it read not so much level as emotionless. Forcing his tingling feet to move, he crossed to the washstand and lifted the ewer and bowl in hands that shook enough to scatter droplets on the carpet. All his gardening had given him strength, at least; despite the palsy, he balanced the weight easily.

“Come, Kit.” He brought the water and knelt beside the bed. “Peel off thy stockings; let me work my will on thee.”

Kit would not meet Will’s smile. Instead, he sat stiffly as an old man, tucking his feet aside as Will reached for them. “I can pick the gravel from mine own wounds, Will.”

Will grunted and heaved himself to his feet, sharing a sidelong glance with Robin as Kit peeled his shredded stockings from the lacerations on his feet. Puck watched with unsettling intensity.

“When commenced you to study witchcraft, Sir or rather, Kit?”

Kit tossed the garters on the bed. The stockings were rags. He hunched between his knees, using those rags to scrub the blood from his feet. The water in the basin grew pink, and so did the knot of knitted silk. “Since last night, Master Goodfellow.”

“You’ve mastered a great deal.”

“I had instruction.”

Will’s imagination, or did Kit’s voice break on that word? Puck stood abruptly, sweeping the chair aside with a clatter.

“I’ve just recalled, Master Marley. I’ve a package in my room tis thine: twas delivered this afternoon. Master Shakespeare?”

Will breathed again, in relief. “Can I be of service, Robin?” Ask of me an errand, good Puck. Anything. Get me out of this room before I strike the man.

“It is too heavy for me to carry.”

“Will?” Kit looked up, voice suddenly plaintive. “Robin, what sort of a package? Wilt be gone long?”

“Cloth, methinks.” The Puck shrugged. “I opened it not.”

“I’ll return in a moment,” Will said, and tugged open the door. “Robin’s rooms are not far. Good Master Goodfellow, wilt ask for us that food be sent, and Morgan and the Queen apprised of our return?” Will felt as much as heard Kit cease breathing.

“The Mebd knows,” Robin said. “Twas she that sent me. And Morgan.”

“Morgan?” Kit, not Will, although he did not rise.

“Morgan is not currently welcomed at court,” Puck said, and stepped through the door. He turned back over his shoulder. “Her Majesty was not pleased with the machinations that led to your brief absences from our company.”

Brief, Will thought, as Kit made no protest and Puck closed the door. He laughed. “A hundred years if it were a day,” he said, and Puck nodded.

“Tis as I expected. Was it very bad?”

Puck set a good pace. Will fell in beside him. “Bad enough. Robin.”

“Aye?”

“What’s wrong with Kit?”

Silence, and one Will didn’t like at all. They were nearly to Robin’s door when the gnarled little man spoke again. “Do you know how witches get their powers, Will?”

Will chewed his nail and considered while Puck opened the door and slipped inside. A moment later, and Puck returned, lugging a linen-wrapped burden that completely filled his arms. Will took it and tucked it under his elbow, where it compressed softly. “Kit’s thanks, I’m sure.” He had to force his smile.

“Twas nothing.”

There was a click as Robin shut the door. Will stood in the corridor for long moments, considering. Another price I am not worthy of,he thought, and shifted the bundle in his grip.

But how unseemly is it for my Sex,

My discipline of arms and chivalry,

My nature and the terror of my name,

To harbor thoughts effeminate and faint!

Save only that in beauty’s just applause,

With whose instinct the soul of man is touch’d,

And every warrior that is rapt with love

Of fame, of valor, and of victory,

Must needs have beauty beat on his conceits.

CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE, Tamburlaine the Great

Kit limped to the window on linen-wrapped feet and shouldered the casement open, careful of the bowl of bloody water in his hands. He poured it down onto the garden at the base of the wall and set the bowl aside. Leaning over the window ledge, watching the stars shiver out in the crystalline blue-gray of the heavens, he swore. If you cannot bear it, there’s always the knife. Suicide, and back into Satan’s hands.

He wished he didn’t know the shiver that crept up his neck was desire, and not terror. Back into his hands whenever he wants you. And you cannot pretend you did it for Will.

No. The first thing he had done for Will. His name. His identity. His legacy. Little enough for his love’s freedom and a chance at redemption. The second thing he had done was for power. Like Faustus. And, like Faustus, he would make good his revenge ere the devil claimed him. See if I don’t.

They called it soldier’s heart. This weariness, this unsounded sorrow. Kit had felt it before, when he’d seen men who had called him friend hanged for treason. He’d felt it after Rheims: a mad, manic hollowness no prayer or drink or lover could fulfil.

The door opened behind him. He turned, sighed in half relief and half panic when he saw who stood framed in the opening.

“Will. Distract me from my study; I am all black thoughts and foul humors tonight.”

Will shut the door and shot the bolt. He held something white as angel wings wrapped in his arms; it gleamed while he leaned against the door, hugging it as a child hugs a doll.

“Will, what hast thee?” Kit tugged the window shut and limped toward Will, stopping a few feet away. Will shrugged and dropped it on the chair that had settled kitty-corner, where Puck had left it. He stepped away, but not before Kit saw the shininess in the corners of his eyes. Will walked toward the sideboard where Kit kept wine and overturned cups. Kit came to the chair, picked at the wax and twine sealing the bundle; it fell open at his touch.

Oh. A waterfall of rainbow colors spilled across Kit’s hands, silks and satins and velvet and taffeta and lace. His cloak, in all its dozens of patches. And something more; someone’s hands had sewn a collar on it, an upright blunt-cornered affair of soft black velvet that was the second-richest thing that Kit had ever touched. The stitches were as neat and tight as Kit’s own hand, I imagine Will sews a tight stitch too, growing up in a glover’s house,and he knew before he pressed it to his face that it would smell of smoke and strong liquor. He bundled it in his arms, walked across the carpet, and leaned against the bed. He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, feeling the tears prick under his eyelids and hating himself for weakness as he did.

“He sent my cloak back.”

Will came back to him, carrying a cup. Kit slung the cloak across the coverlet, as if he meant to sleep beneath it. Accepted the wine. “I have a gift for thee as well,” he said. “I meant to give it upon thy leaving.”

“Kit, what could you…”

“Hush,” he said, and turned to root in the box on the bedside stand. The ring was gold, cool and heavy in his hand, the flat face marked with Will’s initials, which were both surmounted and linked by true-love’s knots a pair of them. “You’ll need a signet, if you’re to be a gentleman.”

Will took it from his hand and stared down at it, a muscle twitching in his jaw.

“We should sleep early. As early as we can.”

Tomorrow Will dragged a stool over, crouched on it, and began to work on his boots. “I have to go home to Annie, Kit.”

“Aye.” Kit tossed back the wine, set his cup aside, and methodically began stripping his buttons from their holes. “I’ve decided not to get drunk after all.”