Dark Heart by Margaret Weis;David Baldwin Page B

the black spots gave no sign of receding, but instead spread at an increasing pace, Justin hid his illness from his wife for the little time he could. Even then, with the evidence growing right before his horrified eyes, he refused to believe he would succumb. It was all too terrible to contemplate.
    He had not known then the meaning of terror. He had not known what pain was. He had not known what it meant to be damned.
    He knew now.
    The pain intensified. He seemed to leave his body sometimes, though he could never escape the pain. It came with him, an unwelcome passenger on his mad voyages through delirium. He would strike out at his wife while he watched his own erratic actions in confusion from some impossible mental distance. He would say nonsensical things, and then not remember them a breath later.
    Gwendolyne, his beloved Gwendolyne, had nursed him in his misery. She would come to him and put cool cloths upon his burning forehead. Even when he struck out at her in his madness, she’d wince, retrieve the dropped cloths, and resume bathing him to reduce his fevers. She ignored the bleeding scratches he made on her ivory cheek, the bruises on her body.
    Then there were the times his sanity returned to him. Times like this. He lay on his bed, staring at his grotesque body. The pain was a low murmuring thing crouched at the foot of his bed. He knew that if he moved, it would leap upon him.
    I am afraid it is necessary that you die…
    The local leech stood over him, one of the parish priests. Justin screamed at the priest, tried to tell him that he wasn’t wanted here. But his words weren’t in any tongue known to man. They were the insensible cries of a wounded animal.
    The priest stood there, holding a cloth-wrapped bundle of sweet herbs over his nose. The trailing ends of the perfumed rag hovered an inch from Justin’s cheek. He tried to turn his head away from them, but the growths in his throat made it impossible. He moaned and lay still.
    Gwendolyne stood behind the leech, waited in taut anticipation for his words. She was pale with worry, yet still so beautiful to Justin, even more so than usual now, despite her fatigue. He wondered if she ever rested at all. She had dressed up for him, in the elaborate gown and coiffure of a formal court appearance, going about her care for him as if nothing was seriously wrong, as if he weren’t rotting away before her eyes. Her safflower gown was made of embroidered silk as bright as the sun, even through the faded palette of his pain-tinged vision. Her waves of soft hair were confined in some complicated way with ribbons and braids and the odd tumbling ringlet. He loved to run his hands through her silky hair. But that was impossible now. Even if he could muster the energy, he would not defile something so beautiful with his wasted hands.
    Finally, the leech-priest turned his head toward Justin. He knew what the priest was going to say, and he cried out against it, but once again his voice sounded more like the howl of an injured wolf than anything a man would say. The priest spoke directly to him, though it was clear he was unsure if Justin was still capable of understanding him in his current state.
    “I am afraid it is necessary that you die. It is God’s will. You will be with him soon. One of my brethren will come to hear your confession and administer last rites.”
    Justinian heard Gwendolyne’s stifled cry of anguish. He tried to find her, but he could not see her through the haze of pain surrounding him.
    The door closed upon the priest.
    After some time passed, Gwendolyne stood before him once again. He could see her now. Her gown was tossed in the corner, her corsets unlaced. Even as he watched, she removed them, loosened the ribbons on her chemise and let it fall off her white shoulders across her breasts, then past her waist to the floor. She was as naked as she’d been the day God made her. Slowly, carefully, she climbed into bed with him.
    “No,” he