Oubliette

he bliette   ile  The Oubliette

THE term “oubliette” came from the French for “to forget.” It was an apt description. Beneath the sandy soil of Spain, Edward Pembroke rotted away in a tiny dungeon, forgotten by everyone and forgetful of the life he’d known before. He did not know how long he had been there. There were no tools with which he might mark the passage of days. At first Edward tried to count the sunrises as they filtered through the bars above his head, but he had no hope of keeping track. He could feel from the growth of beard on his chin that many days had passed, but he could not have said how many if his life depended on it. Not that Edward’s life was particularly worth saving at this point. He was a wreck. His shirt and breeches, purchased while in Italy and of which he had briefly been inordinately proud, hung in tatters around his gaunt body. One stocking was torn and stained a mottled dark brown from dirt and dried blood. The other had disappeared entirely. That leg was bare beneath the knee, marred with fleabites and scratch marks from the claws of the rats that shared his dank home. Edward’s hair hung in lank strands. His face, the pretty face which had once made him the cosseted darling of nannies and aunts and later the desired prize of women and men alike, was hidden behind a matted, filthy beard.


he bliette   ile  Edward saw no one, not even his captors. He had not spoken in so long he doubted his voice still worked. At irregular intervals, a crust of moldy bread or a piece of maggoty fruit rained down from the barred hole above. In the beginning, when hunger still gnawed at his gut, Edward leaped upon this food as if it were a gift from the heavens. Now, as often as not, he permitted the rats to have it. It kept them away from him, at least for a time, and he had no desire to prolong his miserable existence. The last time they brought him to the surface, the jailer, Don Fuego, told Edward he had only himself to blame for his suffering. “If you were only a little more, how do you say it, friendly, I would be glad to return you with the other prisoners,” he said. There were others in the don’s custody, a few dozen English soldiers and sailors kept in army barracks behind fortified walls. They were still captives, but they were not forced to endure the lonely darkness of the oubliette. Edward dreamed about joining them. He might as well have dreamed of swimming home to England. From the moment Edward was brought to the prison, the don had made it eminently clear what he would have to do in order to receive humane treatment. While Edward, fresh from the wreck of His Majesty’s sloop Lady Mary, stood shivering in the jailer’s presence, Don Fuego walked around him until he stood at Edward’s back. Edward was not particularly tall, and the don stooped to place his mouth beside Edward’s ear. “You are, how do you say, a very handsome man.” Bile rose in Edward’s throat. He swallowed hard and hoped the don could not hear it. “And so well dressed.” The don ran a hand along the sleeve of Edward’s wet yet exquisitely tailored jacket. Edward had purchased it


he bliette   ile  during his time in Rome, shortly before embarking on the illfated journey home. “Some of my men have a taste for delectable English beef. I am certain you will oblige them, no?” Don Fuego said something in Spanish to the two guards at the door. They laughed, a filthy sound that turned Edward’s stomach. “My family is wealthy,” Edward heard himself say, his voice strangled. “My uncle is Earl Lawton. He would pay a fine ransom for my release.” A smile crossed the don’s lips, but he did not reply. He spoke again in rapid Spanish, and the guards stepped forward. One grasped Edward by the arm. In a fit of panic, Edward struck out. It was pure luck his fist collided with the Spaniard’s face, but the guard clearly did not see it that way. He dealt Edward a blow to the head that left Edward’s ears ringing. Edward felt hands grasping at his body, and he did the only thing he could. He kicked and punched, scratched, and even bit, his arms and legs flailing wildly. Before he knew it, he was cast into the fetid blackness of the oubliette. The grate slammed shut above him. Edward’s head spun and his entire body ached where the guards had struck him. He was so stunned, he did not even realize the cause of the strange tickling sensation on his legs until his eyes adjusted to the dark and he saw red-eyed rats scurrying over his body. He screamed then. The sound echoed uselessly off the damp stone walls around him. There was room for Edward to stand in the oubliette, just barely, but it was impossible to lie down or sit with his legs extended. By the time the don’s men pulled him out,


he bliette   ile  Edward could barely walk. The guards dragged him back to the don, who regarded him with what seemed to be amusement. “Now then, sir. Can I take it you are of a more amenable disposition today?” Edward considered it. At that particular moment, anything seemed better than returning to the vermininfested pit. But then he raised his eyes to the don’s grinning face, heard the sniggering of the men behind him, and found courage he did not know he possessed. “Go to the devil, sir.” “Such a pity.” The don clucked his tongue, and Edward returned to the oubliette. Thus began a routine. Every so often, the don’s men removed Edward from the pit. Every time the don made his lewd proposition, and every time Edward refused. Sometimes, as he lay in the blackness afterward, Edward cursed himself for his stubbornness. He was no maid preserving her virginity. That was long gone, but he could still maintain his dignity. Every time the don leered at him, Edward was compelled to say no. He could not force himself to consent to the man’s lewd intentions, no matter what horrors awaited in exchange for his refusal. Now it appeared the don had grown tired of asking. He had not disturbed Edward for what seemed like many weeks, perhaps even months. The oubliette was living up to its name. Edward was truly forgotten. Soon he would die and be truly free at last. He was ready for it. The oubliette was good for very little, but at least it afforded plenty of time to think. Since first being thrust below, Edward had made peace with God


he bliette   ile  many times over, and he had atoned for the various sins of his life. Pride, vanity. Lust. Edward had engaged in many imaginary conversations with absent friends and members of his family. Playing both roles, Edward offered apologies to the lovers he mistreated, to the men and women who adored him and whom he used shamelessly and tossed aside. He spoke frankly with his father, who in Edward’s mind forgave Edward for not being the strapping boar-hunting, heir-siring son he wanted. Edward professed his love for his late mother, who wept and warmly embraced him in Edward’s imagination the way she never had in reality. It was she who told Edward it was time to leave his suffering behind. Extending a hand, she beckoned her son to join her in paradise. Edward slumped against the damp wall of the oubliette and let his eyes slide shut. A moment later, a clear masculine voice said, “Wake up, Edward.” Edward’s eyes flew open. In the darkness he could just make out the figure of a man sitting against the opposite wall. The oubliette was so small that the man’s bare brown feet touched Edward’s dirt-caked toes. The man’s body felt solid enough, but Edward knew better. “I have finally gone mad.” “Perhaps.” The man smiled. He was young and handsome, with tawny skin and thick dark hair falling like a curtain to his shoulders. Canary yellow stockings encased his shapely calves, and he wore a slashed silk doublet and a codpiece in the old style. He had a strong accent, and Edward realized with a start he was a Spaniard.


he bliette   ile  Reflexively, Edward drew back, but there was nowhere to go. “Who are you?” He narrowed his eyes at the specter and willed it to disappear. It remained where it was, a tolerant smile on its lips. “I bring hope, Edward. It is not your fate to die here.” “Indeed?” It certainly seemed like that was the direction Edward’s life was taking. “How do you know that?” He blinked. “Are you God?” It seemed natural that if God were to appear to Edward, he would take the shape of a beautiful young man. Rather like a reverse Ganymede, Edward thought, but that was senseless. As senseless as the man being here in the first place. “I am not God,” the man replied. He laughed, obviously not offended by the error. “My name is Diego de Segovia.” Diego de Segovia extended a hand. No one had touched Edward in months except in violence. Edward jerked back, then felt a flush of embarrassment when the other man placed a gentle hand on his bruised, flea-bitten arm. “I mean you no harm, Edward. I wish only to help.” De Segovia looked at him with patience in his eyes. Edward was reminded of one of his favorite lovers in England, Roger Ballantyne, an endlessly good-natured, aristocratic friend of the family. He and Edward had enjoyed some thoroughly memorable romps together, the kind that ended with peals of shared laughter as the two of them collapsed, sated, onto the bedcushion. Edward eventually grew tired of Roger and threw him over for an actress named Delilah Steed. He felt a twinge of guilt remembering the disappointment on Roger’s kind face when he heard of it, but that scarcely mattered now. Roger


he bliette   ile  was miles away, as was everyone else who ever cared about Edward. They believed him dead, and soon they would be right. “Leave me alone.” Edward screwed his eyes shut and moved back as if to disappear into the wall behind him. Diego de Segovia shook his head. Edward kept his eyes closed for as long as possible. When he couldn’t take it anymore, he cracked open one eye, just to take a peek. The other man was still there, looking at Edward with big chocolate brown eyes. “I know what you feel,” De Segovia told him in that soft accented voice. “I was a prisoner here for a time.” He sighed. “A very long time.” “You mean you are still a prisoner.” If that were true, then at least the man was not a manifestation of Edward’s madness. He wondered what game Don Fuego thought to play by throwing a man such as this into the hole with him. De Segovia shook his head. His long, thick hair brushed over his shoulders. For the first time in many months, Edward felt a stirring of something that might be called desire. Not that he could act on it. His body was in no condition for such sport. “I am free now, Edward.” “Then what the devil are you doing here?” Edward no longer dreamed of freedom, but if by some miracle it were ever offered to him, he would be gone in an instant, before Don Fuego could change his mind. “I told you I wish to help.” De Segovia sighed. “I died here, but that is not what life has in store for you.” Edward blinked. So it was madness. “You….”


he bliette   ile  De Segovia laughed, a soft chuckle. Edward couldn’t remember the last time he’d heard anyone laugh without malice. “You could not think you were the first to suffer the oubliette.” Edward did not think about it at all. “I was a victim of the Inquisition. I came from an affluent family. The Inquisitors coveted our wealth, so they unjustly accused us of heresy.” Edward did not know what to say. In the end, he said nothing, and de Segovia continued. “They took all of us. My elderly parents, my sisters. My wife Maria and my lover Francisco Sanchez. Even my young son Ferdinand.” Edward cared nothing for children, but he felt a twinge of sympathy at the catch in de Segovia’s voice. “They wrenched my shoulders on the rack and starved me for days, and then they threw me down here.” De Segovia ran a hand through his wonderful hair. Edward was suddenly all too aware of his own disheveled state. “You look well for having come through all that.” The other man smiled. “This is the appearance I always wished to possess. In life, I was not so fortunate. Particularly not after the Inquisition finished with me.” “It is a very fine appearance,” Edward agreed. Again he felt a stirring that his body was far too weak to carry out. “Although something of a liability in a place like this.” Edward knew he was well favored. He had never regretted it. Indeed his looks had served him well until he arrived here. If Edward had been fat and fifty with a red face and a nose like a strawberry, he suspected Don Fuego and his men would not have treated him so dishonorably.


he bliette   ile  “My family perished, Edward,” de Segovia said. “There was no one to save me. You are not in such a state. You are remembered.” “That does me no good. Anyone who wonders at my whereabouts will surely find my ship was wrecked many months ago.” There was no reason to suspect anyone had survived the wreck of the Lady Mary, least of all Edward, the paid passenger making his way back from Italy. He’d braved the treacherous continent to visit his Papist sister Ann, firmly ensconced in a nunnery in Rome. Edward had wished to bring word of their father’s death in person. He regretted that courtesy now. The shipwreck itself was foggy in Edward’s memory. Edward recalled plunging into the frigid sea as the ship began to sink, clinging for dear life to a floating plank of wood until his hands grew numb and he feared his arms would fall off. He had never known such pain, but it was a mere taste of things to come. One of the larger rats, a stout fellow Edward had named John Robertson after a rotund cousin of his in England, emerged from a corner and raced across the cell. It ran over Edward’s bare feet, tearing his already bloody skin as it went. Edward could not take anymore. He had not cried in weeks, not since he was yet again remanded to the oubliette. He did so now. Caring not at all for decorum or restraint, Edward bawled like an infant, screaming out the fear and frustration of many long months. He expected Diego de Segovia to vanish like the figure of fancy he was. Instead, de Segovia moved over, crowding Edward’s body in the tiny cell. With a look of infinite


he bliette   ile  tenderness in his eyes, de Segovia leaned forward and kissed him. It felt real. De Segovia’s mouth was hot and wet against Edward’s, his tongue a slippery fish sliding between Edward’s lips. Edward reached up, clinging shamelessly to de Segovia’s fine doublet. The silk felt deliciously cool beneath his fingers. Edward kept his eyes closed, not wanting the moment to slip away. When he felt de Segovia move back, Edward looked up to find they were no longer in the oubliette. Instead, Edward found himself in a cavernous room, the opposite of the oubliette in every way. High ceilings seemed to reach to the sky, and the stone walls stretched for miles. Bright sunlight of the kind never seen in England streamed through dozens of empty windows. It illuminated the room brilliantly, casting a warm yellow glow around the space. Edward glanced down to admire the beams of light on the flagstone floor and saw that his clothes had changed as well. He was no longer attired in his tattered rags. Instead Edward was dressed sumptuously, in snow white stockings and spotless breeches. His shoes were polished to a mirror shine, his cheeks were clean shaven, and when Edward raised a hand to his hair he could feel that it was clean and pulled back with a velvet ribbon. “Edward.” Edward looked up. Diego de Segovia smiled at him from across the room. He was not alone. A comely young woman in an exquisite golden gown stood beside him, holding a giggling young boy with a head of dark curls. On de Segovia’s other side there was a tall, well-built man with a pointed beard. De Segovia placed one arm around the man


he bliette   ile  and another around the woman. “There is someone here to see you, Edward.” Edward glanced back to see Roger Ballantyne in the doorway. Roger had not changed. He was as well dressed as the rest of them, his sandy hair pulled back beneath a large plumed hat. Roger’s cheeks were flushed, and when he saw Edward, a grin crossed his face. It was a fantasy, but Edward did not care. He rushed into Roger’s arms, and Roger caught him. Edward kissed Roger like he was drowning. He could not help himself. He ravaged Roger’s mouth over and over again, and the everpatient Roger allowed it. More than allowing it, Roger reciprocated, kissing Edward back with equal ardor. As much ardor, in fact, as he’d shown when, after a long time of circling one another, he and Edward finally came together. Edward had been a fool to ever leave him. The novelty of Delilah Steed did not take long to wear off, and when it did, Edward missed Roger more keenly than any other former lover. Pride did not allow him to go crawling back. Instead he did something stupidly outrageous as usual, gone to see Ann in Rome; and when he’d grown tired of Italy, he’d been fortunate enough to find passage home on the Lady Mary. “Fortunate” indeed. Roger eventually pulled back, but Edward was not ready to let him go. He clutched Roger’s hands, covering them in kisses. Roger laughed and disengaged one hand to run it through Edward’s hair. “I cannot stand this anymore.” Edward’s voice cracked with emotion. The tears that had been dammed for months threatened to start up again.


he bliette   ile  Edward gulped like a child, but Roger just shook his head and petted him gently. “Edward.” Roger’s expression was kind as always. “I am proud of you. When you are home at last, we will be sure to have a memorable reunion.” “I do not have the strength to go on.” “You do. And though you may not believe it, in time you will begin to forget these horrors.” Roger squeezed his hand. It felt real and solid, but the very next instant he began to disappear, a cloud of morning mist growing fainter as the sun came out. “No!” Edward grasped at the disappearing man, only to have the room evaporate as well. This was too cruel. Edward sobbed and clasped at anything he could get his hands on. It didn’t help. Within seconds he was back in the pit, his hands scrabbling uselessly at the slimy walls. “No.” Edward said it again. Screamed it in fact, over and over again until his throat burned. He howled like a crazed animal. He cursed Diego de Segovia and Roger Ballantyne and Don Fuego with every vulgar expression he’d ever known and a few he’d picked up from the sailors aboard the Lady Mary. When at last he could manage no more, Edward collapsed, landing squarely in one of the rank puddles which lay perpetually in the corner of the oubliette. It was then, as he lay panting, that he heard the voices from above. “You say it’s around here somewhere?” “I’m sure of it, sir. The dons said as much.”


he bliette   ile  It took Edward a long moment to realize why the voices sounded so strange. They spoke in English. Edward stood up. His arms burned as he lifted them over his head and grasped the grate that covered the hole. He shook it, jangling the rusty metal and shouting, “I’m down here!” He repeated it over and over again. His heart felt like it would burst, but still he shouted, and at last his calls were answered. Two faces, too pink and sunburned to be anything but English, appeared at the grate. “I say.” The men blinked in surprise. “Hablar… ah, Hablo inglés, señor?” “I am English.” Edward was no particular patriot, but he had never felt happier to say the words. The men blinked, and one said, “Hold on a tick. We’ll have you out.” They disappeared. Edward’s chest seized in panic, but they were back in a moment. There was a harsh clanging sound of metal against metal, and the rusted grate creaked as the men pried it open. “Come along, then.” One of the men ordered. There was a briskness to his voice, and from the marine blue of their jackets, Edward assumed they were Navy men. He would not have cared if they were Drury Lane pickpockets, but he had to know. “Don Fuego….” “Has been ordered to hand over all Englishmen in his care as part of a prisoner exchange.” The younger man sounded pleased to announce it. He reached down and took hold of Edward’s wizened body in his thick arms. “Here we go, then. Alley-oop!” Pain shot through Edward’s bones as he was hefted from the oubliette, but he couldn’t have cared less. The man staggered a little as he set Edward down on the Spanish soil warmed by the endless Spanish sun.


he bliette   ile  “Diego de Segovia.” Edward did not know who he was, but he knew that he was real and that he owed the man his life. Edward imagined de Segovia in his beautiful house, wherever that might be, with his beloved family around him as much space and sunlight as ever a man could wish. It was no more than he deserved. “Thank you.” “What’s that?” The older man squinted down at him. He was as bald as a herring under his foppish wig, and his neck was as wrinkled as a tortoise. Edward would still have kissed him if he’d had the strength. As it was, a whispered “Please take me home” was all Edward could manage. A tantalizing image of Roger, thrilled by Edward’s return not only to England but to Roger’s arms where he belonged, shimmered into Edward’s imagination. He coughed and repeated, “Please.” “Of course, old man. Our pleasure.” The younger sailor put an arm around Edward’s thin frame and hoisted him to his feet. Edward leaned heavily on him as they moved away. A square-rigged ship swayed on the horizon, and as they walked the oubliette faded into a terrible memory behind them.

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The Dreamspinner Press 2010 Daily Dose package of thirty stories is available at http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com.

About the Author

G.S. WILEY is a writer, reader, sometime painter, and semiavid scrapbooker who lives in Canada. Visit G.S.’s web site at http://www.gswiley.com/.

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Copyright

The Oubliette ©Copyright G.S. Wiley, 2010 Published by Dreamspinner Press 4760 Preston Road Suite 244-149 Frisco, TX 75034 http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/ This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the authors’ imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. Cover Art by Paul Richmond http://www.paulrichmondstudio.com Cover Design by Mara McKennen This book is licensed to the original purchaser only. Duplication or distribution via any means is illegal and a violation of International Copyright Law, subject to criminal prosecution and upon conviction, fines and/or imprisonment. This eBook cannot be legally loaned or given to others. No part of this eBook can be shared or reproduced without the express permission of the publisher. To request permission and all other inquiries, contact Dreamspinner Press at: 4760 Preston Road, Suite 244-149, Frisco, TX 75034 http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/ Released in the United States of America June 2010 eBook Edition eBook ISBN: 978-1-61581-497-8