There were the sounds of gunshots also, something Talleyrand deplored. When he’d ran Napoleon’s empire for him there’d been perpetual musketry the length and breadth of Europe, despite all his best efforts and advice. And look how that had ended up!
He was in Yarmouth, Talleyrand felt fairly sure. Though not blessed with personal acquaintance, he’d heard that its castle was of the squat modern sort rather than picturesque and ruined kind. And here beside him reared a boring wall of the type you’d imagine. It had the royal coat of arms (Henry VIII’s, if Lord Vectis read correctly) above its gate but was otherwise unadorned: a pared-down weapon of unwelcome. He’d read that the fabric incorporated stone from Quarr Abbey, suppressed during that King’s ‘Reformation.’ Surveying the result as an aesthete, if nothing more, Talleyrand considered it a very poor exchange.
And what was this? Canon fire from the Castle’s portals? That wasn’t meant to happen! And certainly not in his model state. What a state of affairs! How extraordinary.
Talleyrand went to investigate. A dozen paces on he discovered Lazarans hurling themselves at the fortification, only to be blown back (and apart) by grapeshot. The consequent gore and gunpowder residue threatened his cravat. Naturally he retreated.
A siege? By unruly undead? Everything had gone to pot he concluded.
And had it confirmed for him by meeting one in Yarmouth High Street. A great cauldron, perhaps pillaged from an inn, bubbled away atop a fire made of furniture. Into it the undead fed bits of people. The suspiciously long limbs protruding from it were instantly identified. In an adjoining alley Talleyrand now saw a pen of human prisoners, either resigned or wailing, being one by one converted into portions by Lazaran butchers armed with cleavers.
He’d always heard that rogue Lazarans consumed their victims whole and live: no gourmands they! Yet these seemed a higher sort (the Jane Austens of their species perhaps) who demanded daintier rations. Or perhaps it was a refinement of revenge.
Naturally, Lord Vectis recoiled—straight into the arms of one of his surviving subjects (apparently an endangered species…).
‘Save yourself! Save yourself!’ said the man, gripped by strong emotions and delayed in the act of fleeing. ‘All is lost!’
‘No, sir!’ replied Talleyrand, and went so very far as to reprimand him with his walking cane. One, two; light mock-knighting blows to each shoulder. ‘No, I say. You save yourself—from shameful abandon!’
He drew the man to him by a handy chain draped about his neck. Then they were temporarily alone and out of the action, secluded in a shop doorway. All the shop windows were shattered, its display of lady’s-wear dishonoured.
The man rallied slightly. He looked at Talleyrand but did not really see.
‘They came out of the waves at Freshwater,’ he said—or babbled. ‘While we were clinging on at Totland! All is lost!’
Well, plainly he was, but, although a fabulously wealthy man, Talleyrand could not afford to join him. Panic was the most expensive of luxuries. Cathartic, possibly: but ruinously expensive. There would be time enough for panic in the grave (where it had the habit of putting you).
‘How can all be lost?’ he asked the man whilst he still had him. ‘This is just the Isle of Wight…’
‘Man’s last stand!’ said the man. ‘The end of England!’ And he wept. And fled. Leaving behind in Talleyrand’s hands his mayoral chain of office.
And then Lord Vectis was suddenly elsewhere (which was strange), oddly unclear about travelling between the two places. He now stood below verdant green downs. The village sign said ‘Brighstone.’
Its cottages were afire and there was that confounded pop pop pop of small-arms fire again. Oh, how he detested it!
Fortunately, the vile sound proved to be short-lived. Less happily, it derived from last gasps and mopping-up operations. Lazarans were in charge now. They strode the streets like masters and directed how things should be for the superseded species.
He observed prisoners being corralled in the main street and edged utensils being sharpened. He watched a Lazaran leader drag a respectable matron by a halter round her neck, screaming towards the village church. Perhaps she was his prize and treat. Talleyrand did not envy anybody here their fate.
The matron saw him. ‘Help!’ she called out as a change from shrieking, arms outstretched, clutching at fence posts and straws as the darkness of the church interior drew near. ‘Help me, sir, I beg you!’
Talleyrand bowed to her.
‘Never fear, madam,’ he said, at maximum dip. ‘I shall.’
And the fact that he stood by as she was ravished and eaten didn’t alter that resolve one bit.
Then Talleyrand woke up. Then he sat up. That portion of his silk sheets nearest his hands had been shredded. All of them were sweat-soaked (no mean feat for a diminutive man)
Well!
It was not nice: he’d go so far as to say (the strongest condemnation in his armoury) it really was appalling. Men of his vintage and calibre did not deserve to be appalled. It would not do and up with it he would not put.
Till then he’d had an mild preference for one side and policy. He’d dabbled here and directed there as mood took and opportunism offered. His core was not engaged (naturally). But now he sensed a need for commitment: urgency even!
Which was not like him at all. So perhaps he was being directed in his turn. But it was no angel that had shown what he’d seen. Nor would Jehovah send one of his famous ‘dreams’ to such as he. Would He? Surely not!
Though not so fast! Technically Talleyrand was still a Bishop. He’d left the business, true, and been excommunicated to boot, but in one sense the brand remained on him and always would. ‘A priest for life’ they’d intoned at his ordination ceremony all those years ago (though he’d been distracted by a piquant chorister at the time). So just maybe…?
Talleyrand had always taken it as a point of honour to examine all evidence in the problems Life presented him: no matter how disquieting some evidence might be. Braving disquiet and damage to the soul was the courage he’d shown in preference to scampering round a battlefield at someone’s else’s behest. Valour in the service of self and commonsense had always struck him as the far better part of… well, valour. Ditto not intercepting speeding lumps of metal.
Whatever the source, he now felt called to a decision. One of the big ones in his life, not like ‘Napoleon or the restored Bourbons?,’ or ‘loyalty to France or dealings with the enemy? No, this ranked alongside choosing a cover story for his club-foot (a childhood injury and neglectful nurse = sympathy), or appointing his chef (the all-rounder Carême or potato sorceress—but mad harpy—Madame Mérigot?)
Talleyrand could not find it in himself to love his species—even he was not capable of that level of deceit—but by and large he wished it well. For what was the alternative: the rule of trees and lichen? Or insects? Or Lazarans? It would be peaceful, granted, but not interesting.
Talleyrand preferred interesting and so plumped for that future. Regardless of any inconvenience to himself (within reason), he would make it so.
But not today, because today he was playing whist with some witty fillies. Therefore tomorrow. Or shortly. But certainly soon. Probably.