* * *
She slid from the saddle even before he could help her down. In the afternoon shadow the little chapel was a dark smudge against the boggy woods, an old and unadorned rectangle of slate, windowless. With an echoing scrape of wood on stone, the knight pushed open the door and stood back to let her pass.
She saw it immediately. The skull lay in the shaft of light from the door, enthroned upon a wide bench below the crude altar. It was huge, and nothing like a basilisk's eagle head. Just as he had said, a long and pointed snout, with great eye and nostril hollows and vicious teeth like no living creature she had ever seen. Remains of its spine lay scattered in a rough line down the bench. A fan of thinner bones, like an enormous hand or a wing, was assembled carefully on a nearby table.
"It is a dragon." Melanthe strode into the church, stripping off her gloves, leaving the knight leaning upon the door to hold it open. She bent over the skull.
In the half-light it was bleached bone, the sunken eye holes deep caverns of black. But at the first touch, Melanthe sucked a hissing breath.
Stone. No real skeleton, but heavy and hard, solid inside where a skull would be gaping. The eye hollows, the backbone, the teeth—all white lime rock, impossible to misjudge.
She whirled to face him. He was still leaning on the door, his arms crossed, the faintest suggestion of an upward curve at the corner of his mouth.
"You lied to me." She narrowed her eyes at him. "It's nothing but a rock!"
His mouth twitched.
"You lied to me!"
"My lady wished a firedrake." His hidden smirk became a grin.
"You knew that I believed you. You took delight in it. You lied to me!" Her vehement words returned, fierce whispers echoing against the walls and floor, lied-lied-lied.
"Lied?" The door scraped as he pulled back his weight in the face of her sudden advance. "A tale, my lady, that I made for your pleasure. In verse—" He gave a modest shrug. "Of a kind."
"Verse! I—" She stopped. She remembered him searching for a word to describe the dragon, repeating the phrase under his breath, until he came out with the same sounds echoing and compounding through the sentence, rhyming at the head of words instead of the tail, like the old poetry. In the peculiar convoluted idiom that was his normal English, she had barely noticed.
He was still smiling at the floor. He thought it amusing. In a voice as cold as the dragon stone, she said, "If I discover you in a lie to me again, knight, you'll rue it to your early death."
Ruck raised his eyes, his humor expiring. She was white, staring at him with her chin set and trembling.
"As you live," she said through clenched teeth, "never lie to me. Swear it now."
"Lady—" He had meant only to amuse her. She didn't understand.
"Kneel!" she commanded.
He hesitated. He expected her to smile. He thought she would say that she made merry of him, and laugh as she had when she threw the sand.
"On your knees, knave!" She pointed at the floor. Her hand shook. "Abase yourself!"
Shock welled in him, and resentment, warring with his honor that was bound to her homage. Slowly he stood straight from the door.
"In the name of what you hold most dear," she cried, "before God!"
In outrage he slammed one gloved fist inside the other. The harsh metal sound of it rang in the little chapel, violence and submission joined as he gripped his hands together and lowered himself before her. The whip of his pride kept his head upright. He could see her fingers, balled tight in fear or rage or some emotion beyond his comprehension.
"Never will I speak false to you, my lady," he said briefly.
"Swear it!" Her voice rose nearly to a shriek. "Swear upon what you love as your life!"
He flung himself to his feet. "On my lady's heart, then, I swear!" he shouted. "Before God, I won't lie to you, not while I live! I have not lied, never! Was but a tale. A poem—for the delight of it, no more than that!"
She glared at him. Then she turned away, pacing to the stone dragon, her cloak sweeping the floor. She drew a breath. Slowly, as if she had to will it, her hands stretched open at her sides.
She spoke more quietly. "I depend upon you for truth." She looked back at him. Her lilac eyes were intense, outlined in black. "There is but one person on the earth that I trust, and that is you."
If she had said some incantation, some unholy powerful mutter, if she had spilled blood and boiled toads, stolen his hair and molded his figure in wax, she could not have bound him so well and finally. He felt love like pain, love for her when still he did not know who or what she was.
She said in a smaller voice, "You didn't tell me it was a poem."
"My lady—" He made a miserable bitter laugh. "Were no true poem, but a ragged thing, made out of my head. I won't be false with you, my lady—never, nor devise a lay or tale again."
Her furred cloak rustled. He watched her as she ran her finger down the dragon skull. "Was somewhat agreeable a tale," she said. "You may devise such—but tell me." She looked up at him. "Certainly tell me when you don’t speak in truth."
He bowed his head, just barely, in acknowledgment. He was angry at her, at himself, and still more mortified. The weariness of two nights without sleep marred his judgment; he didn't know why he'd hazarded to speak in sport to her, or even half in sport. "Were a stupid joke, my lady."
"Only tell me." She seemed almost penitent. "Only warn me."
"Yes, my lady."
With an unnatural bright smile she stroked the dragon skull. "This is a monstrous creation. How came it here, do you know?"
"I found it. In a place to the south, cemented in a shelf above a rockfall. For awhile, I carried it about as a penance. Weighs it sore, my lady. But a priest was here then, and he gave me absolution to dedicate it to the glory of Saint George's chapel, which he said this was."
"A penance!" She took on the smooth light manner of a court lady. "When have you ever sinned, monkish man?"
His mouth tightened. He disliked her mockery the most when she ridiculed the virtue that he fought so hard to preserve against her. Sin and dishonor and temptation incarnate she was, with her elven's boots and her black hair drifting free of its golden net. "Daily, my lady," he murmured.
"Daily!" she echoed, glancing at him and then down at the dragon.
He followed the slow caress of her fingertip across the stone, a carnal thing, simple and compelling. "Every hour, my lady," he said low, "and every minute."
She tapped the skull briskly. "Forsooth, I believe it must be a true dragon. Drowned in the Deluge. Or perhaps it stole a very ugly damsel by mischance, poor creature, and congealed to stone when it looked upon her. Some of us need no knight to fly to our rescue."
"More like it were the Deluge, my lady."
She regarded her own hand as if it interested her greatly. "Sober and chaste, monkish man. That is what they say of you." A subtle smile marked her lips. "What lady's heart did you swear upon, Green Sire?"
"My lady wife's," he said. It was not a falsehood. He was sure it was the truth. It must be the truth.
"Alas." She lifted one brow. "I may but mourn it was not mine."
"If I say you truth, my lady, I can't flatter also," he said stubbornly.
Pink flushed her cheek. "In faith, I'm honestly answered for my ungrace in asking."
Ruck had not spoken false. He must have sworn upon Isabelle, for she was his wife. But he looked at Princess Melanthe's face, and he could not remember Isabelle. Had not been able to remember, not for years.
"What wants you of me, my liege lady?" he asked harshly. "Dalliance and kisses?"
"Yes," she said, without looking up. "Yes, I think I want those things of you, otherwise would I not bear myself so bold. Such is not like me. But I'm not sure."
He had never known a woman to be so open about it, or so maddening. His heart thudded slow, but his blood felt too hot for his veins.
She made a peculiar laugh. "Too strange it is—I've said i
n my heart that now I'm free, now I have no need to deceive. Now I can speak always in truth—and I find I can't distinguish what is true and what is not." She faced him openly. "I've forgotten how."
The painted cross stood behind her, simple and stark. To cool himself, Ruck said, "The priests would tell my lady to pray and find God's truth."
"So they would. And then take themselves off to their dinners and concubines." She lifted her chin and threw back her shoulders with a little shrug. "But lo—you're a man with a nun for a wife," she said. "I know not what the world comes to, with these upside-down arrangements!"
"My lady," he said, "more upside-down is it, that so worthy as you would incline to so poor as your knight."
"Ah." She rested against the table and looked about the little shadowed space, opening her hand. "But among these hundred of suitors, you're my favorite, Sir Ruck."
He didn't know how he was to go on with her so near to him. She stood in this chapel, all but offering herself to be his lover. Never would he have looked so high above him, even had he succumbed to flirtation, but it was she who chose.
He closed his fist around the hasp of the door. "These are foolish matters," he said abruptly. "The night comes on too swift."
"And what if I made you a greater man? I have lands escheated to me, with yet no lord. I'll make you a present of them."
She stung his pride with that. "I am lord in my own lands, my lady, and my father before me. I need no whore-toll."
Her swift look made him instantly regret that he had said so much. She said mildly, "What lands are these?"
He held the door wide. "If my lady does please to pass?"
"Whence hails you?" she demanded, without moving.
Ruck stood silently, angry at himself. He felt her study penetrate him.
"You speak the north in every syllable."
"Aye, a rude and rough northeron I am, lady. Will you come then, before I cast you over my saddle and ravish you off to the wilderness, for to take my will like a wild man?"
She laughed aloud. "No, not while all is upside-down." She came to him, a sweep of cloak and warmth out of the shadow, taking hold of both his arms. "I'll take you captive, and have my will here and now, for I can't cast you upon a horse to ravish you away, and we're in wilderness already."
She leaned up and kissed him, all softness and glee, so that he was powerless, captive in truth. He was instantly beyond thinking of spells and enchantment: what she willed, he willed. He held his arm under her back and lifted her against him, hungry for her body against his, despairing that his armor screened all sensation of it.
"My lady," he mumbled on her cheek, when her indrawn gasp for breath broke the kiss. "It is a church."
"Then release me, monkish man, and I'll lead you astray outside."
He relaxed his arm. She slipped down, laughing still, and he followed her like a mongrel dog would follow a kind-hearted village girl in hopes of a scrap of bread, dragging the door closed behind him.
She turned and met him, another stand on tiptoe—he could not feel her, but he could not even think of her body, her breasts, without his member going full and stiff. He pressed his gloved palms wide under her arms, taking her up against him again. He leaned back hard on the door of the chapel, drawing her whole weight on himself so that he had some crude sense of her through his plated armor.
Her lips met his, so sweet that he knew it was a magic that could kill him and make him glad to die. He felt her slip and try to keep her place. Without lifting his mouth from hers he slid his back down the church door and sat upon the step, holding her between his legs.
She stood on her knees, cupping his face in her hands, smiling down at him. He came a little to his senses.
"I have a wife," he said to the white soft skin below her ear. "I can't do this."
"It's none of your doing. You're seized and cruelly assaulted." Her breath caressed the corner of his mouth. "I perceive you're a princess in disguise, Green Sire, with vast properties in unknown places. Perhaps I shall force you to marry me for your fortune."
He tipped his head against the door, evading her, breathing roughly with the effort of containing his desire. "You'd be sore disappointed in your bargain, my lady, I fear."
She sat back, catching his chin between her fingers, examining his face solemnly. "A beauteous fair damsel you're not, in truth. But it's a poor marriage founded on a comely countenance, so they say. I'll have you for your riches."
He shook his head, half smiling at her in spite of himself, pulling her hands down from his face and holding them gently in his mailed gloves. "Lady, you know not how thin you draw this thread."
"Perhaps I wish it thin," she murmured. She lifted her lashes, looking into his eyes. "Perhaps I desire it broken asunder."
She was so close to him that he could see each fine black brushstroke that formed her brows and lashes. In the lengthening afternoon shadow, her skin seemed like snow under moonlight, her eyes that strange deep hue, the color of flowers that bloomed in the winter dark, more rare than any dragon or basilisk or unicorn could be rare.
He felt as if he himself must break asunder, the unbending rectitude and loneliness of thirteen impossible years razed at a stroke, consumed by the clear invitation in her words and her eyes. "I pray you, think wiser, my lady," he said roughly. "It's this strange place and time. I'm far beneath you. Yourself said you be not certain of your desire." He curled his hands about hers. "My liege lady, my luflych, when we go back to court, your pride and your honor would be mortified, to know you kept close company with such as I am."
She was silent, her hands unresisting in his. Tiny strands of her hair had long since come free of her netted braids, floating about her cheeks and temple. Slipping her hands free, she spread her fingers over his dirty gauntlets.
"No, I would be proud," she whispered. "I would be proud, when I think of such worse as I've kept company with." She bit her lips with a faint sound. "Oh, your good conscience will make me weep."
He lowered his head, gazing down at her hands. "Never in my life, my lady, could I believe this much would come to pass, that I could even touch you."
She skimmed her fingertips over his hands and his arms, up to his shoulders, over mail and plate, following with her eyes. He saw tears, which amazed him. He shook his head. "No, lady—don't; not for such a thing."
She leaned forward and kissed him. The sweetness ran down through him, unbearable. He put his arms about her and buried his face in the side of her throat to avoid her. "I beseech you, my lady," he said. "It will ruin us. It will be the ruin of us both."
She pressed her head hard against him. He could feel the silent unevenness of each indrawn breath, and her tears that trickled down below his ear and under his gorget. He sat holding her, waiting, because to say her nay again was more than he could do; he was body and soul at her will now, heedless of rank or witchery, of honor or his wife.
She set her palms against him and pushed back. He let her go, opening his arms.
"You're mistaken," she said fiercely. "Both of us would it not ruin, no—but only you, and that I will not have. Nothing more will we say of keeping company, but as sure friends and companions. Little you may reckon it, but my friendship is worth something in the world. I'll stand your true friend, Sir Ruck, in all that may pass."
He put his hand to her cheek and throat, resting it softly there, isolated forever from the feel of her by layers of metal and leather, by what he was, and had been, which was nothing. "I am your true servant. I'll lay down my life for you if you ask it."
She made a teary grimace. "Well, I do not ask it! Pray keep yourself alive and well, Sir Ruck, if you don't wish to displease me most grievously." She wiped hard at her eyes and swallowed. Then she pushed away from him and rose, holding her hands tucked close beneath her arms, her head bent. She shivered, but did not draw her cloak about her.
Ruck stood. His hands were open. He would have pulled her into his arms and warmed her. All night he wo
uld have embraced her, lain down with her and kept company with her, held her so near that she was one with him. But his fingers closed, empty.
"I could weep myself, lady," he said, "for wanting what you would give me."
She laughed, still crying. "Oh, honor and a silver tongue, too! Look what a lover I've lost."
"My lady—nothing is lost. I'm with you yet, and always, to serve you and say you never false. I swear it upon what I hold more precious than my life—" He reached out and touched her, laid his hand above her breast, against the soft green felt and ermine.
She raised her eyes. Even through his heavy gauntlet, he could feel her pulse.
"For my lady's heart," he said. "My life, my troth, and my honor. For your heart I swear it, and none other."
TWELVE
Melanthe sat with her mantle wrapped close about her, her back against the chapel wall, watching the frigid dusk come down. Her head felt dull with the unfamiliar aftermath of tears, her eyes heavy, but she was not melancholy.
Her knight lay across the door, his head on his arm, padded by his cloak. The steady sound of his breathing was the only noise but for the destrier cropping grass outside the open portal, and the occasional tinkle of Gryngolet's bells. Each soft chime brought a sharper breath and a suspension from him, as if he listened for peril even in sleep—then a shift of his body, and a long deep exhalation like a sigh.
She was to wake him before full dark gathered, so that he might sit up again all through the night on watch. He'd gone to sleep with his back to her, but soon enough his movements had turned him so that she could just see his face in the last of the light. He looked exactly what he was: a weary man-at-arms, shabby and handsome, resigned to sleeping in armor on stone. The strong lines of his face were no softer in sleep: only his lips, slightly parted, and the smoothing of the stern lines about his eyes and brows made him seem younger, more like the youth who had stared at her so hotly those many seasons ago in the Pope's palace.
For My Lady's Heart Page 68