She lowered her lashes. He leaned on his elbow, watching her, taking pleasure in animal sensation; in their legs entangled warmly under the sheets, in her hand resting in light possession on his waist. She was thinking, and he could expect some unforeseen slant to her thoughts when she spoke them—he would be amused or confounded or alarmed, he knew not which.
She had discovered things in him. Things he had not known himself until she touched them.
"You fix my penance," he murmured, burying his face in her shoulder, his arm across her breasts. "Your punishment is like bliss for me."
She turned her body full toward him, so that he couldn’t hide his face in shame for what he wanted. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders. Her eyes were very close; he could feel her lashes on his skin when she blinked, the brush of butterfly wings.
"Is it so for all men?" she asked shyly.
"No," he said. "You know it’s not." He heard the trace of helpless anger in his own voice.
"Only you?"
"Oh, God." He turned away onto his back. He stared upward, looking into the abyss of himself that he had not known existed. "I don’t know. Perhaps all the angels despise me, and give me pain for pleasure."
She raised herself over him, her hand splayed across his chest. He bore her contemplation like a blade against his soul. Even her position, subtly governing, her light touch a mastery, made his body stir again. "I love your pleasure," she said.
"Jesu," he whispered, tilting his head back, his bare throat exposed to her, his rod growing stiff against her hip.
She slid her hand down and covered the tip. He stilled, with fear humming through his veins. She pinched the tender hood between her fingers until he panted, gripping the sheets beside him. Then she drew down his sheath and scored fire across the head with her nails. He made a hoarse sound, arching to her.
They both knew, they both had learned these small cruelties and delights quickly, as if demons whispered instruction in their ears. His body wanted to roll and take her down and cover her, but she would kill him then, she would tie him to the wall and he was more afraid of that than of the pain. The vision of it sent him near to spending in her hand.
She let go, the only thing that saved him. But she rose over him, sitting across his chest. Her hair fell down in waves over his throat. The scent of their couplings drowned him as she held him, his body pinned within the compass of her spread legs while she reached back with one hand and caressed and pinched and tortured his cullions and shaft. He thrust into her palm with a rough sob, his muscles working hard against the pain that was utter bliss.
Then she brought her body forward, releasing him just as he could no longer endure it, and knelt over him with her hands against the wall and her rosy slit to his mouth, allowing him to suck and worship her. He felt it like a gift, that he could taste the depths of her and make her tense and rock and arch back in ecstasy.
His shaft throbbed and burned for her, still sore from her hand. When she moved back he followed her, turning over, rising with fervent obedience as she commanded him to serve her. She took a stance before him on her knees and arms, to be mounted like a lovely she-demon. She had abused him so that it hurt to enter her, but he was lost in it, gloried in it, his mind gone near to roaring blackness as he looked down at the sight of her pale back and sable hair, her round buttocks and his rod plunging in. He held her hips and shoved deep; he heard her whimper and cry, but it was delight and demand, and he answered fully, commanded by her even as he spilled his seed in blinded ecstasy.
Afterward he lay with her close in his embrace, curled around her body. His pulse still beat loud in his ears. She was soft and warm and delicate. He felt it fiercely, that she was under his protection, and the idea mingled and twisted in his mind with the way he submitted to her rule, a strange and sweet confusion, hardly bearable.
Lethargy tried to creep into this limbs. He drew a breath, to deny it and clear his brain. He threw back the sheets, setting her away as he rose. She made no protest, only watching him from amid the dark tumble of her hair as he sat on the edge of the bed.
He looked across a space of infinity to where his daggers lay.
With another deep breath, he stood and dressed himself in clean breeches and gray hose of Gerolamo’s provision, aware all the time that she observed him. His belt and bracers lay tangled in his father’s chair. Without looking at her, he crossed to them and drew his stiletto, gauging the edge. He sheathed the blade and took up the arm guards one by one, strapping them on.
"What manner were you punished as a boy?" she asked suddenly. "With scourging?"
He gave a slight laugh, like a harsh breath, and shook his head. "That’s not punishment."
"Worse?" she asked.
"I wasn’t punished," he said. He reached down for the waist belt. "Not as you mean."
She lifted her brows. "Never?"
"If I erred, he would have killed me," he said simply.
He felt her gazing at him as he drew each dagger and inspected their points. She hugged the pillow and made a grieving sound.
He had a sudden dread that she would shed tears for him. He girded on the belt and buckled it. "It was what I thought, at least," he said, sliding leather through the keeper. "Doubtless only a boy’s fear."
"How well you lie," she said.
He strode across the room and caught her hand and gripped it hard in his fist, holding it up to his mouth to kiss her fingers. "Dress for travel, my queen. The time has come for me to prove it."
* * *
The old priest was loyal, a Navona himself, distant blood-tie still clinging to this poor remote sanctuary in the hills beside the lake. The house of Navona had been scattered and decimated, the castles razed, the villages burned. It lived in hiding now, a web of shared hate for Riata, a promise of revenge and blood and fidelity to the bastard son of Gian Navona.
But he wanted no eyes to recognize him, no more complications than he must have. Gerolamo had arranged it; the priest would shrive a veiled woman of her sins and give her communion and ask no untoward questions of who she might be or why she sojourned here. For the character of the sins she had to confess, Allegreto thought, it would seem plausible enough that she came here because she dreaded to voice them to any but a stranger and God Himself.
He stood with her at the water’s edge, under a tangle of reeds and overhanging olive bushes. The lake lapped softly, rocking the little barque as he held it ashore with his boot at the prow. What village had once clustered about the pale stone church was deserted now, the houses burned, the small piazza gone to goats and weeds. At the last moment, Allegreto held her back. "When you confess—do not say that we adultered," he said, leaning down close to her heavy veil. "Do not mistake that we committed such a sin."
She turned her face toward him. He couldn’t see her beneath the cloth. It had only occurred to him in that instant, that she might remember the island, the false bedding, and think she had fornication, too, on her soul. He didn’t want any speculations or guesses of such a thing, even by ancient silent priests, but mostly he found that he didn’t want her to believe it.
"We’re wed before God," he said. "You had no troth to the Riata, no free consent."
The moment that he said it, with such insistence in his voice, he wished it taken back. He could see her pause, and think of things that she hadn’t before. He cursed himself for a sotted fool, that he had even spoken to deny it, to remind her that she had never given free consent to him, either.
She bent her head without reply. He felt a wave of desire for her, a wild thought that he’d go down on his knees and beg her not to go away from him into light and grace. She would return a stranger, made innocent again as she had been when she first came to him. She might even forget, or not want to remember. He thought of forcing her into the boat and back to the tower, a dream of locking her into it forever with him as her servant and defender; so satisfied with all he did for her that she would never want to leave.
&nbs
p; Such thoughts were a blink in time. He didn’t touch her. "Go now," he said. "I’ll wait here."
He watched as she walked out into the sunlight. It was a small church, and old; bare white stone with blunt corners and a single slit for a window above the door. He knew it inside, knew what it would be to step from glare into the sudden murk, to pause a moment and kneel, accustom his eyes to the golden pinpoint light of a few candles. The odor of incense, the stone floor, the massive columns marching into shadow, painted with spirals of red-and-white that led upward to a few faded saints who smiled down at the center aisle.
He stood there exiled from it, with a longing at the back of his throat. As she reached the door that Gerolamo held open for her, and passed under the arch, he turned away.
She would come back. If she didn’t, he would go and seize her, and the old Navona priest would be no bar if it came to that. Better perhaps if he did seize her, for then none could claim that she bore his society willingly, or defied the decree to shun him from any Christian relations.
He stepped aboard the boat, making a final tally of their provisions—clothing sufficient to see them into the mountain passes, small coin and walking staves, a tinder-pouch. Clouds had begun to roll over the peaks to the north where the steep flanks plunged into the lake. Gerolamo stood guard by the church door.
It creaked open again, far sooner than it should have. Allegreto glanced up, looking through the tall reeds.
She appeared in the entry with the priest at her side. They paused for a moment at the door, the priest speaking urgently to her as Gerolamo drew respectfully away.
She shook her head beneath the veil and put her hand on the cleric’s sleeve with a small reverence. Then she left him, her head bowed low, and walked rapidly across the open ground toward Allegreto, her feet kicking aside her skirts with determination.
He stepped back onto the sandy bank, signaling Gerolamo to retire with a jerk of his chin. "What passed?" he asked sharply, as she came under the tangled shade.
She put back the veil and looked up at him. "I’ll wait to confess," she said.
"Wait? No, there won’t be another chance," he hissed. "I can’t vow safety elsewhere."
The priest was still standing under the church portal, looking after her. She couldn’t have done more than tell him she would not make confession; there had been no time for more. Allegreto could guess that the old man’s pressing words had been strong advice to clear her soul. He took her shoulder, reaching to turn down the veil again. "I know it’s difficult," he said more gently. "But he doesn’t know you, nor will ever."
She threw the cloth back. Under the black hood, her skin was like ivory, her eyes the hue of the deepest lake. The shadows of reeds and branches played over her face. "No, it’s not for shame." She lifted her chin. "I’ll wait for you."
"Wait for me?" He stood with his hands on her shoulders.
"I know you cannot. Not yet." She wet her lips. "But I’ll wait until you can be absolved, too."
He let go of her abruptly. "Don’t be a fool."
"I thought on it these many hours," she said. "By chance I am a fool, but I can’t say I’m full sorry, or ask for pardon alone."
"Why not?" he demanded. "I thought it was what you wanted."
"Because I thought on it—and thought—" She looked away from him, toward the lake and the dark clouds rising. "What if something goes wrong? What if we’re slain?"
"So much the more cause to be in grace!" He caught her arm, giving her a little shake. "These are deadly sins, you know it. You’re in danger of damnation for such."
She looked down at his feet. "Yes, and it’s pain of excommunication for me only to converse with you. I asked him, and he told me so."
"You asked him!"
"I didn’t say your name. I only asked it as a doubt I had, as if it were some neighbor."
He set his jaw. "And he answered rightly, but that we’re wed, and so you may speak to me and such common things without penalty. I’ve inquired into all of those matters well enough myself."
She lifted her eyes to him. It was true that a wife need not shun her own husband—that much was certainly true.
"We are wed!" he exclaimed, with mulish resolve. "We’ll have it blessed in the church when we can." He looked toward the sanctuary. "But the other need not wait. Here’s a confessor; you wished to repent and be shriven. It’s foolish and...and"—he searched for sufficient words—"sinful to delay!"
She smiled then, as if she knew a secret that he did not. "I will wait."
"Elena!" Her easiness about it made him strangely angry. "It’s your immortal soul at peril!"
She tilted her chin downward, like a wayward child, and looked up at him from beneath her lashes. "Are you a priest now, to be so alarmed for my immortal soul?"
He gave a huff of disapproval and stepped back. "No, I’m no priest. But Hell isn’t a game of morra, for you to smile at me that way about it. I’ll not see you in danger of damnation; don’t put that on my conscience, too."
"And neither do I wish to enter Heaven while knowing you could not. So I will wait."
"Elena! And risk—"
"Yes!" she snapped. "I understand what’s at risk. And this is what I choose."
He heard her words as if they slipped through his mind without catching—sounds come and gone, senseless—and then their meaning struck him full, like a clout across his face.
The reeds bowed and rustled around them. An olive leaf fluttered down, a silvery thin shape, catching in a black fold of her veil. Her lower lip trembled as he gazed at her.
"I would miss you for eternity," she said. "I would grieve."
He shook his head, all the feeble movement he could summon. If she had held out jeweled cities, riches, towers of gold, all the stars and the sun and the moon offered to him in her hands, he could have spoken. But he could not. She would miss him in Heaven. She would grieve.
She didn’t know what she was saying, in truth. What she risked. He had read every poem and sermon and hymn about it; he’d studied all the ghastly frescoes that portrayed the kingdom of Hell in terrifying and perfect detail. But that she would hazard the chance for an instant, or even think of it, for him...
He feared for a long moment that he would die where he stood, only from confusion. He put his hand on his dagger, for something solid, something he could understand in the roaring flood that engulfed him like water rushing from a broken dam of ice. "I pray you," he said helplessly. "This is madness. Go and repent. And then stay there. Stay away. Don’t come back."
She did not turn. She didn’t flee to safety and grace and the priest still standing in his infinite beckoning patience at the door of the church. "No," she said. "I’ll wait for you."
* * *
The boat seemed small, a mere chip bobbing and skimming below the terrible beauty of the mountains. The cliffs passed slowly nearer, closing upon the lake like the walls of some giant’s castle. She craned her neck as the gray crags grew steeper, the summits taller, masses of rock pitching straight into the water without even a narrow shore for relief. Ledge mounted upon precipitous ledge on overhangs that no man could climb.
A cold breeze funneled out of the north, creating small sharp waves that splashed against the prow. Clouds rolled over the cliffs and tumbled down the sides like foam pouring from a vessel. Shrouded under the pointed hood of a peasant’s mantle, Allegreto bent into the pull of the oars in time with Gerolamo’s efforts. His face was set in an unchanging scowl. He never once looked at her.
They kept to the center of the lake, far from any barges or boats or the towns and castles perched along the cliffs. It was darkening to late afternoon as they passed close under a vast spur of stone that thrust far into the lake. But the sun broke through looming clouds, lighting the water below the headland with a sheen of silver. The brisk wind dropped suddenly to a ripple over the surface.
A bright bay came into view. Across the water the sails of small boats drifted like white birds flockin
g toward the towers and walls and quays of a great city.
Elayne sat up. She knew it instantly. She had never held a clear memory, never been able to conjure it in her mind, but the sight of Monteverde was like a dream she had dreamed all her life.
In the midst of the towers rose an imperious rock, a high sharp promontory walled all around, crowned by a citadel that ruled the structures below. But the lower city pushed up toward it in proud challenge, a forest of towers reaching skyward, stone fortresses tinted in rose and cream and ochre with banners flying from their rooftops. Behind it the blue mountains lay in a circle of massive defense, cradling the rich valley at the head of the lake.
Allegreto sat back on his oars. He glanced over his shoulder toward the city. Then he turned a sidelong look to her from under his hood, watching her face.
Elayne put her fingers over her mouth. She felt startled and confused, almost mortified by wonderment. She shook her head a little, as if she declined some spoken invitation.
He smiled. "Not yet," he said, like a soft promise.
Never, she thought—but it was only an echo of an idea, a distant sense of trepidation. She had fallen in love. Directly and straightaway in love with a place, with the reality of it as it lay before her, lit by sun-shafts that toyed with the citadel and the towers, sparkled on the lake and vanished in cloud-shadow.
She huddled in consternation at this unforeseen sensation, watching as the sun angled lower. The light breeze carried them slowly toward the wild headland, as if they were only casting for fish along the shore.
It was as unexpected as his laughter, this dazzling city. Hidden by mountains, guarded by cliffs and fathomless water. A castle held the precipice above them, overlooking the narrows from the headland and another stronghold on the far cliffs. Tiny boats sailed alongside laden barges and bright-painted galliots. A warlike galley made a leisurely circuit of the bay, the oars flashing.
She thought suddenly of the fleet and army of men he had lost; realizing for the first time the magnitude of that attempt. To bring such a force—from the sea—up the lake or over the mountains, or both; what devices and plans he must have had, strategies laid out like the plays in a game of chess. Five years, he said, that he’d worked for it.