Indescribable: Book Two of the Primordial Page 16
In the most vivid memory yet, the one she was having now, it was like she was actually there. She fell flat onto the cool floor and let her mind spin her back in time.
It was the year 1795. It was the end of the summer. Even though the daylight hours had still been blisteringly hot, the night air held the hint of the coming autumn. That night, Carolina had been stepping through the doors at an elaborate masquerade ball.
Outside, it was dark. There was the distant sound of neighing horses. The deep, boisterous voices of men and the giggle of women could be heard from within the shadow of trees. As she had approached the ball just moments earlier, she had been able to hear the piano music a good distance away from the house, and as she had gotten closer, the sounds of raucous laughter and chatter coming from inside had become clearer.
In recent years, masquerade balls had risen to prominence in France and were just becoming popular among wealthier South Carolinians. This particular event was being held in a neighboring plantation house from her own. This house was huge compared to the Rimbault’s. Instead of the indigo that the Rimbaults were known for, this family’s main crop was corn. By this time of the year, the corn stalks in the fields surrounding the house had already turned brown. At night the dry leaves made a soft, clattering sound. It sounded like autumn.
The masquerade ball was a celebration of the changing of seasons. As Carolina walked further into the crowd she looked at the people that danced all around her. Like her, every one of them was wearing beautifully embellished masks. Some of the masks covered entire faces while others only covered half. From where she stood within the throng of people, there was an assortment of masked revelers all around her. There were furry masks that had been constructed from real animals; a bear, a rabbit, and several cats were among the assortment that she saw about her. Some masks were not made in the likeness of a creature at all. Instead, there were those that were bedazzled with gems, ribbons, and feathers. All of the masks had been made by hand, and some were so intricately detailed that they looked like works of art. Hers was a sequined mask that only covered her face from the bridge of her nose up. Colorful plumes of peacock feathers jutted out of one side, standing straight and high above her carefully styled dark hair.
She flittered about the floor in search of her friend, Blanche. They were supposed to be meeting there. Her eyes scanned the crowd, looking for her friend’s unruly red hair.
Aside from the masks, the men that were there that night were wearing the nicest coats and breeches that they owned. All of the women were dressed in beautifully elegant ball gowns, seemingly every color imaginable. Lit sconces lined the walls. Freestanding candles were on each tabletop. In her search for Blanche, Carolina unexpectedly came across someone else. It was the sight of this new figure that caused her to pause in her steps.
The man was a stranger. He was standing against the farthest wall of the room, alone. He was keeping a good distance from the multitude of dancers that stepped and moved about the floor in front him. Like most of the other men in the room, he was wearing a nice frock coat over a vest. His vest was a deep crimson. His breeches were tucked tightly into his boots. His mask was that of a lion. Like Carolina’s own mask, it covered the top half of his face, leaving his perfect, pink lips available. A black top hat sat precariously on his head. He was holding a large, amber colored bottle that he brought to his lips. Carolina could see that he was studying her from behind the mask. Even from the distance that she stood, she could see that he had the most beautiful blue eyes that she had ever seen. For a moment, the eyes had her captivated to the point where she couldn’t break away from his intoxicating glare no matter how hard she tried or told herself that based on his demeanor and the fact that she had never seen him before that night meant that he must surely be a dangerous man that had crashed into the party uninvited. As he lowered the bottle from his still pursed lips, she followed the motion of his hand and saw that his other hand was missing. Her first thought upon seeing the missing appendage was one of alarm, what kind of brute is he, she wondered, what crazy and reckless things had he done, but then her mind began to churn the tale that was spinning uncontrollably within her head into one of chivalry. Could he perhaps be a brave hero that had put his life in danger for a better good?
Just as her mind was beginning to accept the invitation that the man seemed to be silently offering, he stood up straight from where he had been leaning against the wall and stepped forward. The sudden movement startled Carolina. She gasped, turned her back to him, and ran through the crowd, brushing past men and knocking into an uppity woman, spilling her drink. While looking down at her wet bosom and dress, the prissy woman yelled after Carolina; “gah!” she said.
Carolina ran up the wide, twisting flight of stairs that was at the end of the room. When she looked back over her shoulder, wanting to see the stranger’s whereabouts, what she saw was that he had followed her through the crowd. She realized then that he had had been close to her the entire time that she had been trying to get away. He was standing at the base of the steps watching her as she ascended away from him. The attention of everyone else around the man was focused elsewhere, but his was directed straight at her. When she finally found Blanche, she was flustered beyond belief.
“Who was that?” Blanche asked with a smile. Blanche’s mask was a simple, wide, black ribbon that had been wrapped around her head, tied in the back underneath her piles of hair, and had two holes cut in the front where her eyes were located. “Scrumptious,” she added with a shrug of her shoulders and watched over the balustrade as the man disappeared into the masked, dancing crowd.
The distressing memory began to fade into a haze and The Mistress found herself writhing on the marble floor. Even all those years later, she was able to feel the adrenaline that had consumed her that night upon discovering that she had been followed through the crowd. When she came to and realized that all of that was in the past and that she was in Fractus, the first thing that she noticed was the fox’s head above the set of double doors at the end of the hallway. The head was mounted to a flat and polished piece of pine. Of course, over the years she had seen the taxidermy fox head countless times before, it was after all in her own home, but each glimpse caused her to let the statement of it sink in. By having it hanging above the large set of wooden doors, it was as if The Master was saying this is my room beyond these doors and look at what I am capable of.
Legend had it that The Master had killed the fox well before The Mistress’s time, and by doing so, he had freed the entire land of Fractus from the animal’s rule of tyranny. By killing the fox, he had become the leader. He had become The Master.
By then The Mistress was standing up again and pressing her hand against the stone wall to steady her self. Just as she was regaining her equilibrium, one of the double doors that were below the fox head opened up. The sound was one of heavy wood that echoed down the length of the hallway. To her it was too loud and unsettling. Once again, jolts of pain shot through her head. She needed to take the mask off. She needed to massage her temple in an attempt at easing the horrible pain that was suddenly jabbing at her all over again. Memories began to slam into her again, placing her out of Fractus and somewhere else. The visions faded as quickly as they came. Outside, there was that terrible rumble again. She caught a quick glimpse of Miles emerge from within the room beyond. She only saw a flash of his tattered, brown cloak and vulture-like face before the pain that was being caused by the rumble sent her back to kneeling on the floor, and her mind tumbled back in time.
In the memory, she had left the ball and returned to her parent’s home. She stood in front of a freestanding, full length mirror. She removed the masquerade mask from her face. Her nerves will still shaken from the man following her across the room. What had he wanted? Would he appear outside of her window in the dead of night? She looked at her reflection in the mirror. How could he ever love me? Carolina wondered as she studied the purple birthmark that covered nearly an entire
side of her face. She traced her fingers along the edges of the mark where it ended against her otherwise milky white skin.
Over the next few days, when Carolina would go into town, she would hear gossip of the one handed man. She learned that he was from one of the northern colonies, a Yankee. He was in the area with his traveling menagerie, “if you can even call it that,” she had heard other men say with a mine’s bigger than yours kind of laugh. The year of 1795 was well before the common circus became popular along the southern colonies, and instead of huge, red and white striped tents that were full of acrobatics, clowns, and elephants, there were much smaller, traveling shows. These shows were called menageries. The shows usually consisted of several large animals that were transported from place to place and exhibited to the public. This menagerie however, the one that was owned and operated by the one-handed man, held only one lion that he would take around with him. Word had it that he would be setting up in the town proper in the coming days.
After seeing him just that one time at the masquerade ball, Carolina often dreamed of the man. In the dreams they would be walking hand in hand across an empty, wide open field. The dreams were so vivid that even after she woke she could still feel the tall Bahia grass brushing against her calves; she could smell the honey on his breath from when he leaned into her and whispered in her ear. When Carolina would tell Blanche about the dreams that she had, the two girls would giggle with youthful infatuation of Carolina’s potential and dreamy suitor.
“Talk to him,” Blanche told Carolina with a shrug of her shoulders one day while they were sitting on a stretched out blanket in the garden behind the Rimbault’s house. The garden had already surpassed its peak, but the tomato plants still had plump, red fruit hanging on them and the herbs were just as fragrant as they had been back in July. A woven picnic basket sat between the two girls. Next to the basket was a freshly sliced melon. A silver knife stood upright in the refreshingly green flesh. That day, each of the two girls was wearing casual dresses and large, floppy hats. Off to the side, near the woods, there was an empty, silver plate that sat on the ground where the grass was just beginning to disappear into the much courser surface of the forest floor. The glimmer of sunlight that was reflected on the silver was blinding.
For the past year, Carolina had been bringing table scraps out on the plate and sitting it in that very spot. Each time, a red fox that lived in the woods would emerge from the shadows of the trees and happily eat the food. At first, upon learning what she had been doing, her father had been strictly opposed to the idea. He insisted that foxes were a symbol of evil and deceit. Her father was like that. He was a very superstitious man. Carolina had often heard him talking about symbols of good and evil, those of love and cowardice. There was a shelf in the basement of their house that was full of handwritten books that detailed these beliefs. As she got older, Carolina often wondered if her father held onto the superstitions with a firm assuredness or if it was more of an interest for him. “And they carry disease,” Stanwood said later in regard to the fox, but Carolina kept taking the scraps to the edge of the woods anyway, and eventually Stanwood gave up and let his daughter have her way. Just after feeding the small animal a couple of times, Carolina named her.
Violet’s right ear was nipped where she had either been in a confrontation with some other animal or had gotten snagged on a thorny briar. Whatever the cause of the scar, the imperfection let Carolina know that it was the same fox that came out of the woods every day to see her. It made her happy.
Carolina blushed. “I can’t do that! I can’t just go up and talk to him,” she said and giggled. It wasn’t common for girls to approach young men, except for those like Blanche. Girls like Blanche did things like that all the time. “I’m not serious about any of that stuff anyway. All of those things I’ve said are just dreams. I’ll probably never even see him again.”
“Sure you can. And you will. He’s going to be gone in a few days, Carolina. Don’t lose your chance,” Blanche bit into a triangular piece of the honeydew melon. A line of clear juice dripped down her chin.
The next day, curiosity got the best of Carolina and she made her way to the center of town. Blanche’s words echoed in Carolina’s head. Don’t lose your chance, she had said, and for once Carolina intended not to.
It was a perfectly sunny day. That day, the market was bustling. There were people pushing carts that were full of just purchased goods. Dust was flung into the air by the turning wheels and stepping feet. In front of her, there was a crowd that had gathered. The women laughed and gasped. The men chuckled. Kids stared in amazement with their jaws dropped open. Even though she already knew what they were looking at, Carolina worked her way through the throng of people to see for herself what the fuss was all about. A small, metal cage was resting on the ground. Behind the vertical bars there was a large lion that was lying flat on the dirt. Dust that was being flung into the air by the bustling feet of the crowd lingered around the feline. Gnats hovered around his face and in his eyes. All around Carolina, the crowd was in amazement over what they had never seen before. She, however, looked at the lion and felt remorse. It made her sad to see the beautiful creature in such a tiny cage when she knew that it should have been roaming free in the wild. What kind of man would encage such an exquisite animal just to satisfy his own self and the curiosity of others? It made her think of Violet and she immediately wanted to run home and take the fox a plate of food.
Her eyes searched the area. Just as she had assumed, the one handed man was standing off to the side of the crowd. His scanning eyes caught her own. She could tell that it was a moment of remembrance, one of recognition. Their eyes were locked for a moment before Carolina broke away. Like she had done at the masquerade ball, she turned her back and made her way out of the crowd. The look in his eyes had been one of need and ownership. Somehow she knew that it was the same look that he gave the lion each and every day. By the time that she had made her way home, her nerves were jangling once again, just as they had been on the night of the ball. Eventually, she rested in the warm water of the wash tub. By then, a summer storm was raging outside. When she fell asleep, she dreamed of the man again.
In this dream, there was a pounding at the front door of the house. With a lit lantern in one hand, Carolina made her way down the steps, across the front parlor, and approached the door, but before she had time to even touch the crystal doorknob, it swung open on its own accord. The man stood on the other side, facing her. He was wearing his nicer clothes, the ones she had seen him in at the ball. He wasn’t wearing the mask, but the top hat was on his head. The lion was at his side, not chained. Behind the pair of uninvited quests, lightning struck through the black sky. Rain was coming down in sheets. The man looked toward his companion and spoke two words, “get her,” he said. Just as the large cat pounced, Carolina woke with a jolt and sat straight up in her bed. The thick, white linens fell down around her. She looked toward the window and saw that it was still dark outside. Her heart was pounding and she was drenched with sweat.
She didn’t mention the man to either of her parents. When she told Blanche that she had seen him in town that day and that she had been the one to go seeking him, Blanche responded with a quick, “he’s no good. I bet he would treat a woman the same way. It’s all about control. And I heard that he has had several run-ins with the authority. I don’t know what exactly, but that is what I overheard Daddy saying just last night.”
Carolina thought it was funny that just the day before Blanche had been able to see her infatuation with the man and was now opposed to the idea. Blanche was like that. She was able to change her opinion on a moment’s notice. And Carolina took Blanche’s words of wisdom to heart. She was right, he did seem no good, and Carolina intended to never see him again.
Carolina ran into him again the next day. This time it was an accident.
“My name’s James Percy,” he said. He was leaning against the outside wall of the general store. Carolina was
just exiting the store with a few items that her mother had requested. That evening Ella was planning on making one more cobbler from the end of the season peaches that had just been picked and had needed a few ingredients. James had just removed a pipe from his lips. Carolina could smell the tobacco smoke as it lingered around him in a haze. He carefully balanced the pipe on the store’s wood railing. He brushed his hand against his breeches and held it out to her.
“Caroline,” she said as she hesitantly held her free hand out to him. She knew that she shouldn’t introduce herself or touch him; she didn’t want to, but what would he do if she ignored him? He wrapped his hand around hers. His grip was tight. His skin was hot and a bit rough. She could feel the dampness of his palm. When she tried to remove her hand from his grasp, he only held it tighter. She tugged her hand away. “I need to be getting back,” she said. Her voice trembled and cracked.
Mr. Percy nodded. “I hope I see you again, Caroline.” He smiled, picked up the pipe, and placed it back into his mouth.
“I can’t stand the fact that he keeps that lion caged up like that,” Carolina said later that same day. She and Blanche were once again in the garden behind the house. “And I also can’t stand the fact that I, just a few short days ago, was infatuated with such an obviously horrible person.”
The truth was that even though she was disgusted by his actions and what they suggested, she was still overcome with a deep and insatiable yearning for him. She wouldn’t dare mention this to Blanche, not after they had decided that he was no good, and it was even confusing to her. She had never been put in this situation before. What she was feeling was an uncontrollable arousal, but at the same time, there was something deep within her telling her that she should beware. Blanche had no idea that she still craved him.