North
It was Mary who had taught Francis, so many weeks ago, to look up at the stars when he missed her.
"Look, here," she had said, pointing the slender curve of her index finger upward, toward the midnight black of the sky. His gaze followed her gesture, catching the path that her intentions had set for him.
"Yes, I see," he had told her, but he hadn't. His eyes saw the stars, but just as easily his face had turned back to her, entranced. Her sly smile, the curve of her lips, eclipsing anything that he might witness in the dull sky.
"No, look," she had teased. Her hands going to his shoulders, and then his face, forcing him to look away from her. "These three are the big dipper, and this one," her hand swayed across the swath of the night sky beyond the window they stood in front of, "This one is the north star. A navigational star. A star to help you find the way home."
"Home," he had whispered. The sound more like a sigh, or a prayer. She was home. No star, regardless of its brightness, could change that.
That night seemed so long ago, and now, as Francis lay, mind racing and body aching, he was alone, so far from her sight. It was autumn, and the trees around the castle were bursting with red and orange. Each day the sun crept farther and farther away, and the night sky collapsed against the day easier and easier.
Mary had been gone for weeks. Gone into the countryside, her backward glance some kind of apology for the pain that she was destined to cause him. Her horse countered away, despite his pleas.
The servants had lit various candles around the room, but after a fashion Francis had snuffed them all out. Wandering the space in a meditative daze. He had once witnessed Mary recline on the sofa near the hearth, her tiny feet propped up on an embroidered cushion. She had once twirled, chemise spinning all around her, to the echo of music from the great hall below them when they had escaped the endless party to be alone. Her laughter bouncing off the walls like the trilling of church bells. His fingers had once spent an evening touching each handstitched thread of her nightgown while she slept.
"Where are you?" He asked the darkness. Feeling the press of her cheek against his heart, followed by the soft whisper of her reply:
"Still with you. Still here."
Was she? He couldn't be sure. Again, he spoke to the darkness, feeling the silkiness of her hair around his fingers. "I can't find you?"
The sound of her voice filled his mind, "I'm right here. Look at the stars."
Francis did, and he was unmoved. He felt her phantom hands smooth over his body, fingers catching on the ridges of his skin. "Don't touch me like that."
Her touch continued, movements increasing.
"Mary, please."
"I love you," she told him. Likely a lie.
"Why aren't you here, then?"
"I'm right here."
In his mind, she pushed him against the wall, hard stone pressing into his shoulder blades and the back of his knees. Francis felt her lips on his skin, caressing his neck, before moving downward to his collarbone.
"Mary." Words caught in his throat as his mind filled with the buzzing that her touch always brought. He felt her kneel down in front of him, and the tops of his trousers were tugged. "You're not real," he warned.
She snickered.
"Mary," he said again, as her lips licked softly across his exposed skin. "Please. Come back to me."
"The stars," she whispered, "Look at the stars."
Francis turned his head, his gaze facing north, catching the stars glittering in the night sky. She moved her phantom mouth across him again and he shivered. His hand cupping the back of her head, guiding her.
"Mary," he breathed. "Mary, Mary."
Someone knocked at the bolted door, a voice softly beseeching, and Francis ushered them away with a quick rebuke.
The fire in the hearth crackled as the wood began to shatter under the heat of the flame and a meandering wind blew the scent of rain into the bedchamber from outside.
"I need you here with me," he begged.
Another knock came from the other end of the door.
"Why did you leave me?"
"Francis," she sighed against him, fingers digging tightly into the skin of his legs, pushing him harder against the cold wall.
"Mary!"
Another knock came from the doorway and her specter dissolved around him like mist clearing from the forest.