At Your Pleasure

  She did not know . . . She could barely think . . . She could not parse for herself the truth of what he said. It was true that David was counting on Adrian’s tenants to aid in the cause . . . So many of them were Catholic; why should they not wish to fight for a Catholic king? But to call these lies . . . They were not lies . . .

  She forced herself to open her eyes, to pull away a little so she could look into Adrian’s face. How beautiful he was, his sharp features shadowed in the light of the lamp behind them. Her hand rose of its own accord to smooth his brow, the hollow of his cheek. Stubble abraded her fingertips. His beard had not been so thick when he was young. His shoulders had not been so broad. He felt like a man now, grown, strong.

  She felt the warmth of his exhalation. “You could not sit in Parliament,” she murmured. His bottom lip was full, the edge perfectly delineated, easy to trace with her thumb; it was so much softer than it looked. The deep hollow beneath it called up a strange tenderness within her. “You could not vote, nor go to London without a ticket of permission, when you kept your old faith. Those are not lies.”

  “No.” His voice sounded ragged now. “They weren’t.”

  She glanced to his eyes and found herself snared in an intense, unwavering look. “Then why . . .” She took a long breath, struggling to think clearly. A possibility occurred to her, wild, the stuff of dreams: imagine if she could win him to their side. Then he would no longer be her enemy. Then they could be friends, and he could hold her like this without causing her to feel like a traitor to her own blood . . . “Why should you do the German king’s bidding?”

  His hand closed over her own, holding it to his cheek, his grip intent. “Because he will remain the king. Because your brother’s cause is no wiser than a drunkard’s midnight gamble. The war he plots will be short and bloody—and he will lose, along with every Catholic in this land, no matter whether they take up arms or no.”

  “But James Stuart is our rightful king—a direct heir of Stuart blood. Surely you, of all people, cannot resent him for his religion!”

  A low noise of scorn came from him. “What difference does it make to me who deserves the throne? I save my cares for matters that touch me directly. Think you I abandoned my faith for some true revelation of God? No. I do what I must to protect me and mine. But your brother does not.” His hand tightened over hers, as hard as his words. “He is a boy in a man’s body,” he bit out, “who chooses to squander on foolish dreams not only himself but also those whom he owes his protection. I am cut of a different cloth, Nora. I deal in reality. This country will not stand for a Catholic ruler; it will destroy any who seek otherwise. But me and mine will not be among them.”

  In the silence she could hear her own heartbeat. He did not look away from her, his regard fierce.

  “You cast yourself as a man without morals,” she whispered.

  “My morals are in service to my purpose. I will keep safe what is mine. Now tell me what those men were after.”

  Some part of her felt the sting of his words, and recoiled at his return to interrogation. But the greater part of her attention reeled from a different cause: the ferocious conviction with which he spoke, and the strange, irresistible pull of his philosophy.

  I will keep safe what is mine.

  It spoke to the deepest part of her, that dark, tangled place that fretted incessantly over her own powerlessness; that craved so desperately to protect this place, and her brother, despite the fact that David’s own actions made these aims impossible.

  Her eyes focused on the sight of his hand over hers, large, powerful. She felt the calluses where his palm pressed against her knuckles. He was a swordsman. He had soldiered on the Continent for her majesty; he had played the diplomat between Queen Anne and George of Hanover. The strength in his body was but a reflection of the strength he exercised at court. He had loved her with this body that enfolded hers now. They tried to be strangers to each other, but they were not.

  Once, long ago, he had come back for her. He had tried to protect her, for she had been his then.

  “I was carrying your child,” she said.

  His grip seized.

  For several long heartbeats he stared at her; she looked back at him, astonished by her own words. Could such a secret, guarded for so long, held as carefully as a wicked splinter of sharp-edged glass, be tossed free so suddenly?

  The next words came just as unbidden: “I did not betray you. I told them nothing of the babe, either.” She swallowed. “How could I? I was so ignorant—I did not recognize the signs. My tirewoman saw them. She realized I was with child. She spoke to my sister, God rest her soul, who went to my lord father. I never told your name, but they found the telescope you gave me . . .”

  His grip was painful now. “The child . . .”

  “Lost before my belly even embiggened. He forced . . .” She took a sharp breath. “Some posset. I don’t know what was in it. It made me . . . ill.”

  “Your father,” he said.

  “No. Lord Towe.”

  “He knew?”

  “Oh, yes.” Her laugh felt jagged in her throat. It sounded strange to her, too . . . fraught. This was old news. It should not give her fresh pain. But she had learned recently how old news might set a person on her head. And to share this with him . . . after so many years of secrecy . . .

  She must be mad; lack of sleep had sickened her brain. His eyes seemed to fill her vision, his gold-tipped lashes unnaturally distinct, his attention riveted to her in a way that shut out all the world. He had come back for her. For that one boon, for that act of courage, he deserved now to know everything. “My lord father said—he said I would not wed you; and then, when I refused to bend to him, he said you refused to wed me, that you had mocked his proposal, for I was not a Catholic, and had proved myself a jade and a slut, no fit wife in your eyes.”

  “That is a lie.”

  “I knew it,” she said. “Can you imagine I believed it? Never. I heard rumor of how they beat you in the courtyard, though nobody allowed me to see it. But then they said you had left the country—they produced your own brother to swear to it.” Her voice broke; she closed her eyes. “I was carrying your child, Adrian. They called me a disgrace. They starved me and the babe inside me. For the child’s sake, what was I to do? You had left me. Towe seemed my only choice.”

  The memory of that time lived in her flesh. It overwhelmed her now, dark and suffocating, like the locks of her hair, fallen free of her pins, that snaked around her face and throat. She shoved them away, heedless of snarls, glad for the pain they caused as she ripped through them with her fingers.

  But it was not enough. Her throat felt too tight. She needed air and liberty. She pulled free of Adrian’s grip and scrambled off his lap to the floor.

  He made no move to stop her. He appeared frozen. Only his eyes followed her as she moved.

  The stone floor was cold and smooth. She flattened her palm against it, grateful for the chill. The roiling in her stomach demanded shallow, careful breaths.

  Say it. Tell it all.

  She curled her fingers into a hard, aching fist and made herself look at him. His pulse beat visibly in his throat. Tendons stood out on the back of his broad hand where it braced against the floor to support his weight.

  “I did not know,” she said. “That they had told all to Towe—or the agreement they had struck. I knew naught of it. In our bridal chamber, that first night, after he . . . had his way with me, he called for libations. I was already . . . not myself. Drunk, drugged, what have you. I took the posset he gave me.” Some vicious thing uncoiled in her and made her eyes sting. “It had good effect. I never conceived again.”

  “God.” The word slipped from him softly. When he ran his hand over his mouth, it appeared to tremble. “My God, Leonora.”

  “I do not think He concerns Himself overmuch with such matters. He saves His attentions for judging us in the hereafter. In this world, we must fend for ourselves.”

  He
blinked, as though blinded. “And you . . .” He took an audible breath, then exhaled slowly. “And you wish,” he said, “for me to spare your brother.”

  She leaned forward. “Adrian, he was the only one to show me kindness.” He had slipped her bread and water. He had brought Grizel to tend to her in place of the tirewoman who had betrayed her so cruelly. He had braved their father’s wrath to offer her solace when no one else would.

  He had blamed himself for bringing Adrian into the household in the first place.

  “David was all I had,” she whispered. “The only one who helped me.”

  Some complex struggle was working across Adrian’s face. “You should have told me.”

  She sighed. “To what purpose? I was married when next we met. How would it have profited either of us?”

  His bleak expression admitted that he could make no reply. Fate had trapped them both very neatly.

  “Besides,” she said more gently, “my husband might have made trouble for you. Marriage to me enriched him greatly—by some six thousand pounds, I believe. But his pride could not have borne it if he thought you understood the arrangement he had struck with my father. He preferred you to believe him an ignorant gull than the willing husband of a slut.”

  He leaned forward so suddenly that she shrank. “Do not wrong yourself so.”

  “It is only a word,” she whispered. “Of all people, you know best if its meaning is meet in my regard.”

  He seemed to have no answer to that. He searched her face as though desperately trying to place who she was.

  She wondered if that had been her unconscious intention. Their roles in this room had been so much clearer some minutes ago.

  Perhaps it was safer to remain at this distance, and return to those roles.

  On a breath, she said, “Perhaps, rather than strangers, we may be proper enemies. Enemies may respect each other, I think.”

  He shook his head. He looked haunted, and his short laugh was ghost-soft and strange. “You are a fool,” he said.

  He rose and came toward her. She watched his approach in puzzlement, then gasped when he lifted her into his arms. The world tilted around her; his broad palm cradled her skull. “What—”

  “Shh.” He carried her to the bed, his steps smooth, his grip firm beneath her knees and shoulders. The scent of lavender rose as he laid her atop the quilts. She looked up at him in wonderment. In his face, her addled imagination now glimpsed a tenderness she had not seen in . . . years.

  He leaned down so close that she could see the striations in his irises, the green fading into a ring of gold around his pupils. His breath warmed her lips as he searched her face. She held still, uncertain what he looked for, riveted by the sensation of his body’s warmth. Everything in these past few hours seemed more and more like a dream. She could not attempt any longer to make sense of it.

  “I would ask once more,” he said, his tone very gentle. She felt the light brush of his knuckles down her cheek as he lifted a strand of hair away from her mouth. “What did those men come for?”

  She moistened her lips. His gaze dropped to watch them, and a queer, hot thrill blossomed through her. She felt almost drunk.

  Dream or no, this was dangerous. She pressed her lips into a hard line and drew a long breath through her nose.

  “I will not betray my brother,” she said. “You will have to force me by some other means.”

  Now his eyes lifted again to hers. “Suggest me a way.”

  “I cannot say one. I mean to repay my debts to him.”

  He showed her a brief, black smile. “As do I.”

  His voice held a promise of blood. She bit her lip to forestall the urge to protest of David’s kindness; to demand that he spare her brother’s life. She knew how it worked among men. David had shown no kindness to Adrian that day in the courtyard. He never would have supported a marriage between their families.

  She must protect David, for Adrian never would.

  He retreated a step but remained looking down at her a moment. Then he turned for the door.

  She frowned and pushed herself up on one elbow. He intended to leave? Had he given up on his questions? But she had one of her own. “What did you mean? How am I a fool?”

  His hand on the latch, he paused. She watched the line of his shoulders square.

  But when he spoke, he said only, “Go to sleep, my lady. Dream sweetly.”

  The door closed softly behind him.

  9

  The chapel was dark and narrow, hewn from stone in a time when a Plantagenet had held the throne. Adrian took a seat on the hard, chilled bench. Narrow windows of rippled glass permitted only a weak glow from the sun dawning without.

  He wanted to smash something.

  Something needed to shatter, bleed, and collapse.

  He stared at the ornate gold crucifix that loomed over the mahogany altar, at the broken body that draped across it. Someone had put exquisite care into crafting the agony on this wooden face of Christ.

  Perhaps Nora was right: God watched but did not concern Himself with this kingdom. In His son He had exhausted His interest in suffering. Now He waited indifferently until Judgment Day.

  Or perhaps He did not even watch. This Jesus on the cross must be blind to have endured the worship of David Colville and his father.

  Adrian exhaled. The events of her wedding day had been emblazoned into his brain with a searing force that no amount of time would blur. He could still recall with perfect detail the jewels around her fingers as she had lifted her wineglass. The smell of the feast, sharp alcoholic fumes mixed with the richness of roasted game. The lilting tune of the pipes playing in the gallery above. His own sensation of shock—like a full-bodied blow, an impact that somehow did not end—as he had backed out of the hall. The bite of the knife that had settled then against his throat.

  He could hear the words David Colville had spoken as though the man now stood beside him.

  Catholic dog, I would kill you and rejoice in it. But your life is not worth the meanest servant’s effort to clean these floors of your blood.

  What he could not recall was his own response—as if the great blankness inside him, like an explosion of light, had blotted out his senses.

  But he had said something to prompt David Colville’s parting remark.

  I would see her dead before you soiled her again.

  This was the brother she protected. This was the man whom she called her only help.

  I knew naught of the agreement they had struck.

  The memory of her soft words hammered at him. He had thought himself numb? He was rage, nothing but it. Rage . . . and horror . . . and regret.

  And shame.

  He made fists. He relaxed them. He breathed in and out.

  There must be a way to fathom this. It had happened long ago. It was done. It changed nothing of what had come afterward.

  So she had not betrayed him. So she had been cruelly abused. His course would not have altered had he known it. He had tried with every faculty and the last ounce of his strength to return to her. Knowing the truth now did not cast that effort in a different light, only restored to him the certainty that his effort had been just.

  It did, however, clarify his shame.

  He had lain with her only once. A single time, so fumbling and brief, so incandescently sweet, that it had seemed almost innocent. Blameless; a sanctified thing.

  Afterward, caution had reclaimed him. He had waged a mighty struggle to keep chaste, recognizing that the danger in lying together was all to her peril, not his. Cowardly indeed of him to put that risk upon her, though youthful ardor had painted it in a different light.

  Understanding now how she had been ruined by it—fathoming fully why she accused him of destroying her life—showed him the truth of that day in the fields. An embrace of transcendent sweetness now twisted in his mind into a clumsy act of violence, which had torn a bloody gash across the fabric of her life and his own.

  It sick
ened him in waves. If he had never touched her . . . if they had always remained chaste . . .

  And now he had come to ravage her life again.

  He looked down at his own hands, his palms upward atop his thighs, the posture of a penitent begging God’s forgiveness. But this test was man-made and had no divine resolution. Angels would turn their faces away. Only darkness lay ahead.

  He did not know if an afterlife awaited him, a judgment and a punishment. Perhaps there was no hell, or any heaven, either; perhaps his body would only molder, and turn into food for worms. Men made games of religion, did they not? They made God into a reason for warfare. Who was to say that He was anything more than an excuse, an invention, a convenient cause? Adrian had never felt Him save in His absence.

  Nothingness, then: no punishment for sin but death; no reward for virtue but the grave. Yet, even if there was a master in heaven, it would make no difference to his course. He would accept damnation as his due in exchange for an earthly life in which he and his were no one’s slaves.

  His own brother—who had known; who had known she carried his child—his brother was dead. Hexton was out of reach—for now.

  But David Colville would come into his grasp, and then there would be justice.

  There would be a smashing, and a shattering, and a collapse.

  There would be blood.

  He inhaled, tasting the musty air, the dust of centuries of penance, and spat it out.

  He came to his feet. He felt nothing in this space, no divinity, no disapproval, no breath of damnation. But as a monument to hypocrisy it was unrivaled.

  Here, before this blind face on the crucifix, he would slit David Colville’s throat.

  He started for the exit. Halfway down the aisle he heard a thought not his own, a dim voice that spoke in his head:

  And who will clean the blood from these floors?

  The voice sounded like Nora’s.

  Would he ask the mistress of this house to clean her brother’s blood?

  He drove his hand up his face and cursed.