For This Is Hell Read online

  The air smelled of fresh grass and early flowers and pine.

  There was one obvious thing missing from the panorama.

  Lorelei turned on him.

  “So, he of honeyed words, where is this fabled brook of yours?” Lorelei was obviously unsure, not angry yet, but far from at ease. She had her hands upon her hips, and a storm gathering behind her eyes. “I fail to see it. Tell me Marlowe, is it a creature of your imagination?”

  “Oh, there is a brook, a fabulous one, but not here,” Marlowe replied setting the basket at his feet. “It is a full league and more back on the other side of town. There isn’t a drop of water nearer.” He looked at her then, studying her beautiful face. “I felt it wise to put as much distance between us and water as possible. But, talking of creatures, surely you are one yourself—a true Beast, if you would—and all London shudders in your wake.”

  He had not been sure how Lorelei would react to the confrontation. Anger? Fear? Denial? Mockery?

  She threw back her head, hair streaming out behind her, and laughed long and loud and low. It was a deep rumble that sent shivers through him.

  “And finally the playwright with his great mind tumbles to the truth,” Lorelei declared, shaking her head. “I’d truly begun to despair that after all these years you’d forgotten me. It took you long enough. I had begun to think I was going to have to guide you by your very manhood to the sea and drown you in truth before you actually caught on.”

  “Oh, I know you, Beast,” Marlowe responded. “Kraken, I name thee, and in the power of naming order you gone. London is my city. She lies beneath my wings. I take umbrage at all who enter her fine streets uninvited and aching for blood.”

  “You think you’re so clever, don’t you, Phoenix? Oh, yes, I know you. Do I really need to tell you that you have no authority over me? I will, however, point out that London is not yours. You have made it your home, but you have never claimed it. Now I have. My visage lies behind every nightmare, every fever dream, every waking vision. I am throughout this city of yours, little firebird, in every damp corner, and all there tremble in my grasp. It is more mine that it ever was yours.”

  “Leave now, and I will not follow. You have my word. Stay, and I must destroy you.”

  Her laughter this time was shorter and sharper, a harsh sound not meant to allure but to humiliate. “You think a great deal of yourself, little flametongue. Do I really need to point out how thoroughly you succumbed to my charms, or how willingly, since our first meeting? What makes thee think this time any different?” She began to stalk toward him slowly, arms raised as her body swayed, and despite himself Marlowe could feel something inside him stir. She was like a serpent charmer… his flesh ached to respond.

  But the warm sunlight overhead softened the impact of her seduction.

  “Once, twice, a dozen times, yes, but that was always in your element,” Marlowe pointed out, and Lorelei froze in her tracks. He enjoyed seeing her surprise. “And of course I was out of mine.” He spun, spreading his arms wide. ‘Behold, Lorelei! Deptfordshire. No water for leagues in any direction, a blazing sun overhead. You have become, my dear, a fish out of water. Don’t make me kill you.”

  She edged closer, at a crouch now, resembling nothing so much as a snake in the grass, slithering carefully toward its prey. “The grass here is lush and strong, and wet with the morning dew. There is water everywhere. Water is life. Nothing will burn here, little matchstick.”

  “Would you bet your life on that?” Marlowe stooped and thrust one hand into the basket by his feet, all the while keeping Lorelei in his gaze. When he stood once more, the bottle of wine was in his grasp. “Let’s be civilized about this, shall we? My lady, I promised nectar to slake our thirsts and toast our love. Shall we?” The wine warmed in his grasp until the cork popped loose, and he swung the bottle in a slashing motion across his chest. The ruby liquid sprayed from it in a wide arc, splashing liberally across Lorelei’s face, arms, and bosom. She stared at him, livid, shocked at the insult.

  “Does it taste of fruit and love and promises?” Marlowe asked her. “Or bitterness and ash? Let it be our farewell cup. Depart now, Lorelei, go and never trouble these shores again, or your life is forfeit.” He doused her a second time in the wine. “Either way, it ends here, now. I shall not ask again. What is it to be?”

  “You are truly a fool, aren’t you, Phoenix?” She snarled in reply, “You coat me in liquid and then threaten me? Water is my lifeblood, and what is wine but water mingled with spirits to frenzy the soul?” She advanced once more, hands held low, fingers writhing as if each were a serpent preparing to strike. Her shadow lengthened before her as she moved, stretching to sweep around him and gather him into its dark folds. It was monstrous, a massive figure ringed round with flailing tentacles and crowned with a circlet of snakes. He could feel their presence against his mind, hissing and swaying, seeking entry that they might tear his very self asunder and inject their foul poisons deep within his brain to rot away his identity from within.

  “What else is it?” Marlowe reminded softly. “Think, Lorelei. Or shall I spoil the surprise and tell you?” He sighed. Then he gathered himself and focused, raking the coals deep within so their flames burst forth, filling the air around him with light and color and heat. The shadows fled at once, driven away by his radiance, and the sun shone down upon him, adding its strength to his own. “It is water that burns, Kraken. And now it is your death, Lorelei. I wish you had just left.” And with that he swept both arms toward her, the fire lancing along his skin like great wings of flame until their tips just barely brushed Lorelei’s wine-soaked flesh.

  That was all it needed.

  The flames leapt eagerly across, dancing with glee about her glorious body, and she shrieked. There was nothing glorious about her cries. She raised both arms, beating at her body, trying to bat the flames away. But the blaze could not be shaken off, and grew stronger as the wine fed it. In moments she was a living torch, shrouded in fire and smoke, shuddering and shaking and swaying and moaning in a desperate attempt to break free. But the flames were implacable.

  And so was Marlowe.

  He stood there, watching. He didn’t move to help her. He didn’t move to end her suffering. He simply stood there, ensuring that Lorelei could not escape. The flames ate into her. He emptied the last of the wine over her face and hair, drawing the fire up on its searing quest to purge her. She fell to her knees, and then crumpled to the ground and lay there writhing and twitching until at last she was still. The flames continued to lick at her as would hungry dogs, until finally even they could find no more to consume and snuffed out, leaving only a charred figure behind.

  “Farewell, sweet Lorelei,” Marlowe whispered, kneeling beside her and resting his palm upon her forehead. “It seems we have our answer to which would win in love, fire or water. And, perhaps, despite it all, you truly were my muse. A portion of my soul resisted you, and that resistance forced me awake once more, giving light and life to a new bout of creativity. For that, I thank you. For the rest, though—for the deaths and the madness—I damn you.”

  He rose and brushed the dirt from his knees, then turned and began to make his way back down the hill. He left the basket.

  Behind him, Lorelei’s remains crumbled to ash. Then they scattered upon the wind. They would feed the plants below, but nevermore would they find their way to water.

  The Kraken would trouble London no longer.

  Scene Eight

  Wherein harsh words lead to foul and fatal deeds

  “Civilization at last,” Marlowe muttered to himself as he saw the first of the buildings that marked the edges of Deptford. He increased his pace. The walk back had taken less time than the journey there because he’d walked it alone and had no desire to dawdle or admire the beauty all around him, but still it had seemed a long trek. The sun had vanished behind a slurry of clouds, leaving the day cool and gray.

  At times he’d thought he could still hear Lorelei’s lau
ghter upon the breeze.

  Yet he knew that was not so.

  Life had fled her, he was certain of it, and the Kraken had been banished. Not destroyed, for the Beasts were immortal, woven into the very fabric of creation itself. The Kraken would return in time, but it would require an age to recover from this defeat, and then would have to begin the process of choosing new Avatars to vie for its mark. Many Beasts slumbered for decades, even centuries, between excursions into the mortal world. Perhaps the Kraken would do the same. Regardless, it would certainly steer clear of London for years to come, giving him some peace to work. That was all he wanted.

  Back in the heart of the city, Marlowe had no doubt the madness had vanished, brushed aside by a cool breeze and warm sunshine. Those who had survived its touch would emerge, blinking and confused, disturbed in their slumbers for a while yet but still whole. And those who died at its behest, or whose minds had been bent beyond repair—well, they would be counted among the fallen still, unfortunate victims of this skirmish, though none would ever know the true nature of the conflict that had claimed them, or its combatants.

  He was tired.

  Tired but elated.

  The Kraken had been strong, even though not fully transformed, and its looming shadows and tendrils of wispy madness had pressed hard upon his defenses. But he had prevailed. That was all that mattered. The danger was past. And in his head there rested a new treasure, born in part from this battle and its outcome.

  He knew the last act of his play.

  He would return and commit it to ink and parchment at once, before a single precious word could slip loose.

  But glancing about, he saw neither the carriage nor its driver.

  Where had the man gone?

  Marlowe sighed. No doubt the driver had not expected him to return from an apparent dalliance so quickly—and why would he? In his place, surely the man would have spent hours upon the hill and inside the woman. Marlowe could scour the town for him, but it would be far easier to simply find an alehouse to sit, drink and waste the hours, and then look for the man later.

  Glancing about, Marlowe spotted a tall, stately house of red brick.

  He had been this way in the past. More than once, touring had brought the players out to Deptford. It took him a moment to recall her name, but it came to him. It was the home of the widow, Eleanor Bull. She maintained herself and her house by renting rooms, and by serving food and drink in the common room downstairs. He was hungry. He was tired. Where better to wait for his missing carriage? And perhaps they might even have pen and parchment for him to scribble upon while he waited.

  Knocking quickly on the front door, Marlowe was granted entrance by a maid, who showed him into the common room and accepted his order of a meat pie and an ale, though she was sad to say they could not fulfill his other request. She curtsied and departed quickly, leaving him to lean back and relax while he waited. He was running through the dialogue of the fifth act in his mind when she returned with a pewter flagon and set it before him.

  “Many thanks, miss.” Marlowe saluted her with the full cup, handing her a coin in exchange. She blushed and was gone once more, no doubt to wait upon other guests—there were a handful of men scattered at the other tables about the room. The lighting was dim and he could not discern faces, but he was fairly certain his absent driver was not among them. Well, he would eat now and worry about it later.

  Marlowe had swallowed only a single mouthful of ale when he felt someone brush up behind him. The next thing he knew, chairs were being pulled out at his table and heavy figures were dropping into them. Two men sat to one side of him, between Marlowe and the door, while a third lounged in the chair behind. Even in the poorly lit space he recognized them at once.

  They were the agents of the Privy Council.

  “Have you followed me out here to finish what your shadow-assassin could not?” Marlowe rasped in a low voice. He leaned in toward the silvered man, who sat closest beside him. “Or is this more gamesmanship designed to provoke me into something ill-conceived? I can act without thinking, believe me, my temper grows shorter and more explosive with each of these encounters of ours.”

  “Cease work upon the play at once, and turn over the pages you have written,” the man advised in equally quiet tones, ignoring Marlowe’s questions or his threat. “Or else I am afraid it will end badly for you, Marlowe.”

  “You have no hold over me,” Marlowe declared, aware how similar those words were to Lorelei’s only a few hours before, “nor any say in my work. I write as I will, and this play will be finished before I return to London. On that you have my word.”

  “I urge you again to reconsider. You are following an unwise course of action,” his unwanted companion warned. “Orders have been given, and must be met. This play shall not reach its conclusion, and anything you do to defy me will only make your own more swift.”

  “Do not threaten me,” Marlowe replied, causing the candle upon his table to flare to life. The other man reared back, squinting against the sudden blaze. He made the sign of the cross over his chest. “People who come against me burn at my touch, and blacken in my grasp. Do I make myself understood?”

  He stood to depart, wanting to be rid of these men and their odious presence. All he wanted to do was eat, rest, and write. Why was the world conspiring against him still? They stood as well, moving to surround him.

  Before he could push past, the silvered man spoke again, but now he pitched his voice louder, that all around might hear it.

  “The bill must be paid,” he announced, grasping Marlowe by the shoulder. “And it is your turn, miser. Cough up your coin!”

  “I don’t know what game you are playing at,” Marlowe retorted, pulling free of the man’s hand, “But I assure you my bill is settled in full, and I won’t be held accountable for yours. Now leave me be. You have cost me far more than your company could ever be worth.”

  “I say again, friend, the bill must be paid,” the other man insisted. “Now dip into your purse and pay our hostess,” he shoved Marlowe then, a hard push across the chest, and sent him staggering back into the man behind him.

  “What is with you, man? You pick a fight over such pettiness as our evening’s fare?” that man roared, slamming Marlowe forward before he could properly find his balance, so that he stumbled into the silvered man.

  “Stand away, stand away!” Marlowe shouted, waving his arms to make space, but the men crowded him nonetheless. Then his eye caught the flash of steel, and he spun, grappling the man for his dagger before the blade could be plunged into his back.

  “Ah, so it is murder then?” Marlowe yelled, but his words were swallowed in the general hubbub as all three men rushed close and pressed in upon him.

  He forced the dagger away, hearing it clatter on the floor as he broke the man’s grip, but a reflected sliver of light betrayed the fact that a second weapon had been drawn, and too close for him to deflect as easily. He turned nonetheless, determined to bring the full weight of his burning gaze upon the damned fool, let him burn and be done with it and all of them and their bickering and their games—

  —and fell back, a curse springing to his lips but slipping away unvoiced as that same blade plunged full force into the flesh above his eye, sending a great gout of pain surging through his skull and then his body.

  He was barely aware that he was falling before he hit the hard planks of the floor. He couldn’t feel a thing. It was much as when Lorelei had held him in her poisonous coils, numb and cold, and a part of him wondered if she had survived her immolation and returned to take him unawares. But there were the three Privy Council men standing above him, peering down as if at the mouth of a well, and he knew that this was no Beast’s doing. The lucky blow of a mortal fool had struck him down.

  Then the pain swept all thought clear, and darkness claimed Marlowe.

  Epilogue

  In which our hero’s life is revisited

  St. Mary’s church, Deptford, in the dea
d of the night. A small plot out back served as the final resting place of the unfortunate, those who had died without name or kin to claim them. Among the flattened earth a single plot stood higher, its mound not yet tamped down, its soil still damp and worm-ridden from being recently turned.

  And then that selfsame earth began to shift and shudder, stirring from within.

  At last a hand burst forth, black soil clinging to cracked nails as it clawed its way free.

  A second hand soon followed, and then a head, the golden-brown hair now matted and dirt-clumped.

  Marlowe spat the dirt from his lips and mouth as he pulled himself free and fell gasping upon his back, there beside his own unmarked grave.

  He knew what had happened. Though powerless to stop it, he had retained enough awareness to take note as they had pronounced him dead “of a tavern brawl” and sewed him into rough burlap, then dumped him here in the ground and shoveled it down atop him. It had seemed wisest to lay still and assume the deathly pose they had already pronounced, rather than attempt to explain how he had survived such a blow.

  He blinked and tested his eye and brow gingerly with one finger. Yes, still tender, but already healed enough to grant him sight and reason once more.

  And that was not something to be believed, not even when spoken by a wordsmith such as himself.

  He sat up and sighed, tousling the soil from his hair and brushing it clean of his face. There was no hope for it, he knew. By now word of his demise would have spread to London, and to the Playhouse. The dramatic world would know that Marlowe was no more. He could not return without questions, too many of them and most whose answers were too fantastical even for those who played regularly at ghosts and ghouls and unquiet spirits to swallow.