As a child, Hemlock Justinian lost his twin sister, Tigerlily, in an attack on their estates. Hemlock was hidden in an ore shuttle and escaped into space, where he was apprenticed to the Charioteers under the pseudonym of Keats. As an adult, Hemlock re-emerged to claim his birthright.
Only, as we’re about to see, that’s not quite what happened.
More recently, supporting the endeavours of an old friend (the Charioteer Cortez), Keats and Anton, the Marquis De Havilland, were taken prisoner and sent to Antioch. Two years passed. Anton escaped from the Palindrax’s prison, and found Keats, who it seems had suffered some sort of mental breakdown and was living as Tigerlily. Anton’s appearance rekindled Keats’ lost memories, and they escaped Antioch together.
Now, in a stolen Vuldrok explorer, Anton and Keats have jumped through to the system they last saw their friends and communicated their return. It’s a week’s voyage, but Anton and Keats are, at last, home free.
*****
Keats un-hunches from over the pilot’s console, sits back in the chair and exhales. ‘Course set,’ he rubs his eyes. ‘If you’re going to keep this ship, you’re going to need a proper pilot.’
Anton snorts, amused. The bridge is a dim, tight place: the screens show star-fields; most light comes from consoles and indicators. Sat in the captain’s chair with his wild-man beard, Anton looks every inch the pirate.
‘I can keep an eye on things. Get some rest.’
Keats nods, unfolds from the chair, but stops and perches on its arm. Warily, ‘Back on Antioch, how did you find me?’
‘A magic lantern show I saw in prison. You were in the arena. They said your name was Tigerlily.’
‘A magic lantern show featured me?’ Keats frowns, ‘her?’
‘Arcadia called you that,’ Anton mentions, almost nonchalant.
Keats nods. Grey overalls, head shaved. Androgynous. A tattoo down the side of his face proclaims – for those who understand it – that he fought for and won his freedom.
‘I couldn’t let him be dead,’ it comes out quiet, plaintive. Keats looks up from the floor and stares at Anton, ‘All the time on Antioch, I thought I’d saved him. When you and I were captured things got jumbled in my head. I thought I’d got Hemlock to safety: that they never appeared from the dark and cut his throat, that they took me away instead. Things never seemed right, like there was something I had to do if only I could remember it. But Hemlock wasn’t dead: he was somewhere back among the known worlds, happy, alive. I think I was content.’
‘Will he return?’
Keats shrugs, looking lost, ‘Maybe it’s enough. Sir Hemlock has deeds to his name! He helped clear Arcadia’s name at the tournament of St Gavin, slew the enemy who framed her, fought an inquisitor, came out in society, hosted a Decados and was in a way betrayed, publicly duelled, made friends, madeenemies, at least one mortal,’ Keats’ eyes shine wetly, ‘He lives! Unless –’
‘Don’t worry. I shan’t tell a soul. You have my word,’ which seems to calm Keats, ‘But what about Tigerlily?’
‘She was lost. In the attack on the family estates.’ Keats hunches. For all the world, he sounds like he grieves for a loved one.
‘Why?’
‘One of us died. If Tigerlily were alive, then Hemlock must be dead,’ then, quietly, ‘I miss her.’
Anton strokes his beard. It doesn’t put the beard in any better order. He thinks he follows, that this makes a sort of twisted sense. Maybe he should let Keats rest. But maybe, next time he asks, Keats won’t be so forthcoming or coherent. It seems cathartic.
‘And what about Keats?’
Keats looks up and quotes, ‘ “It would go easier on you, if you were a boy”.’ He laughs, a manic edge, and stops himself suddenly, ‘It’s what he said. The old retainer – Hobbs – who bundled me into the oreshuttle. The letter he gave me was the sort of thing you’d give a bastard: give this child a home and teach them a trade. It didn’t mention my name. So I chose to be a boy. And no-one cared enough to pry, or to make anything of it if they saw through it. And then I met Cortez, and was in his shadow. It was just common knowledge that Keats was a boy.’
‘Did Cortez help?’
‘He never knew!’ Keats bites his lip, ‘I never meant to lie to him! The longer it went on: I just couldn’tbring myself –’ he laughs again, that manic edge, and Anton wonders if he’s pushed too hard, ‘I think... I think, at the end, just before we were captured, when things got jumbled: I might’ve told him. I don’t remember too well.’
‘Whatever happened, he’ll be pleased to see you alive.’
‘I hope so.’
‘And who will you be?’
‘Keats. Just Keats, I think,’ looking up at Anton as if seeking permission, ‘For a while, at least. Being a noble is just so complicated.’
Anton laughs. Keats doesn’t know the half of it. Keats is at the door when Anton calls, ‘You know, there’s a flaw in your logic.’
Keats turns with a look of panic.
‘Who knows that only one twin survived?’
Keats shakes his head, ‘Everything burnt down.’
‘Hemlock was just a child, and in all the smoke and darkness maybe his mistook what he saw. Maybe Tigerlily survived, and was sold as a slave, wound up on Antioch and won her freedom.’ While Hemlock stares, thunderstruck, Anton adds, ‘And anyone who contradicts the arithmetic, well, they know something about the attack, and you might want to have words with them.’
Keats stands in the doorway as if at the edge of a precipice. Possibilities unspool in his mind.
‘Keats. For now, just Keats.’
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