Nights of Villjamur - Mark Charan Newton [156]
He slumped in a chair by the fire, drinking and totally miserable. Outside, somewhere in the distance was the keening of a banshee. Another death, but that would be the job of some other poor bastard to investigate. Jeryd could not help wishing that Marysa’s new man was the one the banshee was screaming about.
He sat waiting in the darkness for her to come home.
She came in much later, a fluster of scarves and robes.
Marysa was acting as if nothing unusual had happened. The way she looked at him—all warm and loving—disgusted him. He was so unusually angry he felt as if some drug had taken hold of him.
She leaned forward to kiss him on the cheek, the ghost of another man on her lips. He was amazed that someone who was blatantly cheating on him could act so innocently.
“It doesn’t get any warmer, does it?” she murmured. “So, how was your evening, dear?”
“Fine,” Jeryd replied tersely, working out how best to approach the subject of her betrayal. He wanted to say so many things. To tell her everything he had witnessed. As she was hanging up her outer garments, he hurled the heavy mug from which he’d been drinking straight at the back of her head. As it exploded in a ceramic shower, he felt like some animal thing had taken possession of him. Like chemicals that weren’t meant to be inside of him had affected his thoughts.
“We both saw you!” Jeryd yelled out to her unconscious form, half in tears, fighting to maintain charge of his throbbing mind.
No response from her.
In all his decades in Villjamur, and during all his years in the Inquisition up to that point, Jeryd had never struck a woman. Men who did disgusted him, and now Jeryd disgusted himself. It was as if something had claimed his body, making him act with impulses he would have normally kept under firm control.
He felt drugged.
He knew all too well that there was a fine line between sanity and madness.
Later, Jeryd was aware of a knock at the door. “Sir, it’s me, Tryst. I was worried about you. Is everything all right?”
At last a friend, someone who can help. Jeryd rubbed his eyes because he’d been crying for so long and now felt numb as he was recalling what he’d done, as if he was starting to have no memory of the event. Jeryd let him enter amid a blast of cold air, and then tried to explain what had happened. He stared at the unconscious form of Marysa, who was breathing so faintly that he wanted to weep again.
Jeryd was glad that Tryst was there. Right then, he needed someone who could think clearly, because he damn well couldn’t.
“You hit her?” he gasped.
Poor guy, he shouldn’t have to see me like this. Jeryd remained in a stunned silence, sheer disbelief at what he’d done.
After leaning down to examine her in the shadows of the sparsely lit room, Tryst suggested they move her to the bedroom. Luckily there was no sign of wounding, and he was greatly relieved that rumels rarely bruised.
Every now and then he collapsed into sobs, whereupon Tryst tried to comfort him with a gentle hand on his shoulder. They carried her up the narrow staircase, to the marital bed which by now had changed all meaning for him. Her tail slopped limply, but her face was the illusion of peace. He covered her up carefully, then Tryst led him downstairs again.
“Aren’t you going to reproach me?” Jeryd said finally.
“No, of course not,” Tryst said emphatically, and Jeryd felt an instant surge of relief.
“You’re a good man, Tryst. A good friend.” Jeryd wanted to shake his hand in gratitude, but felt too ashamed for that. What he’d done was unforgivable. If Tryst told someone and Jeryd lost his career, it was nothing more than he deserved.
Tryst calmed him down. His tone was assured, and that’s what he needed right then, the sound of someone in control, any sort