“Thank you,” said the fire.
“That’s what happens when you compliment things,” Bluebeard said sourly. “It goes straight to their heads.”
“Yes, my master.”
I cleared my throat again.
“I can make your life miserable in a thousand small ways, husband. I can distract you from your purpose. I could even take my own life – and then what would you do? Would you have time to find a new bride?”
“Tell me she wouldn’t do that,” Bluebeard called to Grosbeak. “Tell me she has more sense than that.”
Grosbeak opened his eyes and blinked slowly. “I doubt it. She took me on as a pet. That’s hardly sensible.”
“Ah, but had she not, you would have joined the heads of the other traitors in my crypt. An interesting prospect to be sure, but not quite as interesting as the fate she has granted you.”
His crypt? He really did collect the heads of his enemies? I suppressed a shiver. There wasn’t time for that when I was trying to make a point.
“I’m not asking for anything that doesn’t benefit you to give,” I insisted.
Bluebeard used his grip on my arm to lead me from the fire to the table full of food. He scooped up an apple.
“Care to eat, Grosbeak?”
“I do not, Lord Riverbarrow. I would like to sleep.” Grosbeak promptly followed his words with closed eyes and a snore that could not possibly be real.
Bluebeard huffed and bit the apple, dropping my wrist.
I leaned in close. “Have any of your other wives helped you? Have they found ways to goad your enemies or sing the harmony to your melody?”
He shot a glance my way out of the corner of his eye. His eyes were rimmed in dark lashes, shockingly pretty for a man’s.
“I am starting to think that they did nothing but sit in this house as you wiled away their days,” I challenged.
He looked at me, chewing the apple and raising a single eyebrow.
“They did?” It was meant to be an exclamation, but it came out like a gasp. “But what did they do with themselves?”
He gave a one-shouldered shrug as if it was hardly his concern and tapped the key around my neck as if I could get all the answers I wanted if I just went and read their hideous books. Which I supposed I would have to do ... but I wasn’t done with him yet.
I shook my head as he reached for a chicken leg but watching him eat was making my stomach rumble. I caught up a thin piece of bread that smelled of cardamom, lavished it with butter, and bit it. It was gone in moments and I followed it with dried plums and honeyed carrots, parsnips in mint sauce, a blue-veined cheese, something hot and bitter that poured from a kettle, and sweet spiced nuts that melted in my mouth. And when I’d eaten my fill, I met his eyes again and he was grinning at me as if my appetite amused him.
My cheeks grew hot, but I was not done. I leaned across the table, swallowing the terror inside me. I could do this and see some measure of freedom before my untimely death, or I could live shut up in this house for the rest of my days ... with the warm fire and all the food and the books that seemed to never end. I pushed that thought aside before it became too tempting. I wasn’t naturally bold or aggressive, but I needed him to hear me and to listen and if drama and bold words were the way he communicated, then they were probably the way he could hear me. I must use them or suffer for not using them.
“Only a fool leaves his sharpest sword behind when he goes into battle,” I said, catching his eye. “Only a fool leaves one of his oxen behind when he goes to plow. Only a fool gets married in his second-best shirt. If you don’t make use of me properly, then you’ve wasted what you have, and if you fail at whatever it is you are trying to achieve here, then you’ll have no one to blame but yourself. Why bother asking me to work with you if you only plan to use me as your tool and not your equal?”
He chewed his food, watching me carefully, and then he took my hand. To my utter shock, he kissed the back of it and then winked at me. He stood and led me over to a settee beside the fire, sat, and motioned for me to come closer.
I watched him warily. It bothered me to no end that one of us must always be silent. It made me say more than I would usually say. And also less.
It was like a burr under my dress, like a splinter in the arch of my foot, like a buzzing mosquito in the small hours of the night.
He took my other hand and drew me so that I sat on his lap, straddling him, and then he smiled.
“I don’t know what game this is,” I said, still wary and worried. This intimacy was not what I was asking for. “But I would like an answer. Will you treat me like an ally? Will you show me the respect I deserve and see that I can work with you?”
He nodded very solemnly, his blue eyes locked on mine, and when I nodded, too, he smiled wickedly, and began to play with my hair.
I moved to get off his lap and he shook his head. He was tying little knots into my hair, oddly enough.
I might as well let him. I’d gotten what I asked for, after all. If all he wanted in return was to make a rat’s nest of my hair, I’d still made the better bargain.
The fire felt good against my sore back and it was nice to sit without the wounds touching anything. The soft movement of his tying knots in the lengths of my hair began to lull me to sleep. I leaned forward enough that I could rest my forehead against the padded back of the settee. He made a sound in his throat that sounded almost contented.
And without meaning to, I drifted off to sleep.
Chapter Twenty-One
I woke in the middle of the day. There was a knot in my stomach that made me feel like I was going to throw up. I pushed myself up from where I was slumped on the settee and pain flared through me like shards of glass under my skin. Sweat broke across my forehead.
I gasped, wavering on the edge of the settee. I’d fallen asleep half on top of Bluebeard and half on top of the settee. He was still sitting, head thrown back, breathing through his open mouth. It was shocking to see him so vulnerable, but I knew he was – that he’d left himself utterly at my mercy.
I could kill him right now if I wanted to and be free of him and his world of horrors.
I swallowed.
I could slit his throat before he woke. I could strike him on the head with the fire poker.
And then what? I would be a murderer just like him. My nation would be trampled in the game the Wittenbrand were playing. And it would be my fault.
I staggered to my feet. No. I’d told him I would back him. I’d made vows to him of marriage. I’d made my choice. Now came the part where I saw it through.
I was careful not to wake him as I stumbled out of the main room toward the dark corridor. I didn’t know what was in the rest of the house, but I was hoping to draw a cool bath and ease the pain of these stitches.
I snuck past Grosbeak who was snoring on the shelf and carefully eased my way into the darkness. The corridor had no windows and I stubbed my toe on what turned out to be a staircase. I crept up it, step by step. The faintest sound of birdsong seemed to echo with each step, but there were no birds on the spiral stairs and eventually, they arrived at a wide, airy room.
It was as odd a room as I’d expected from this house.
A four-poster bed was strung with vines that formed a canopy and hung all around it in verdant tangles. From the vines bloomed such a display of coal-black flowers that the bed seemed to be made of them. They fluttered in a non-existent breeze, their petals dropping all around and fluttering through the air. To my surprise, they smelled faintly of vanilla.
Boots and gorgeous clothing were strewn everywhere, and among them were various swords, staves, bows, stacks of books, and more arrows than I could count. It was as if someone had been living a life in this room one layer on top of the other, on top of the other, without ever cleaning the layer below, or even checking to see if anything was growing inside of it.
My fingers twitched with the desire to tidy.
But this wasn’t a room like
one you’d find in a house. One wall was completely missing, showing a shoreline where waves rolled in one after another to smash against the rocks. The other walls were hung with thick tapestries and bookshelves jammed full of books and odd items, just like down below. Also like the room below, the ceiling was hung with a wide chandelier dripping with fat wax candles, and the ceiling above was so high that all I saw was darkness and mist.
To one side, the stone floor smoothed into slick rock and a pool was formed with water tumbling into it from a stream that started halfway up the stone wall. It steamed as though it was hot, and set beside it was a full-length mirror and a small table with a teapot and delicate cup.
To my surprise, the teapot was warm.
“Well, this is a curious place,” I said.
“What do you find so curious?” asked the gargoyle at the top of the mirror.
I jumped. Little chills raced up my spine. But after a long breath, I answered him.
“There is hot tea but no servants.”
“The house provides what is needed.” I could have sworn that the gargoyle sniffed disdainfully.
“And if I drink the tea before he wakes?” I asked.
The gargoyle made a horrible face like children do when they are trying to terrify you. When I said nothing, he eventually replied.
“More will appear when he wants it, child of foolishness.”
Well then. It only made sense to enjoy it if there would be more for him later.
I began to strip off my dress and then paused.
“I shall close my eyes,” said the mirror, closing them but then opening just one a small sliver.
I shook my head. But I was being absurd. It was only a mirror.
I pulled off my dress, unwound the bandages carefully, and slipped into the stone pool. Every part of me hurt, from head to toe. The water made my wounds sting worse than ever, but at the same time it seemed to soothe them, so I stayed in the water, carefully nibbling on the toast and drinking the hot tea. If I couldn’t sleep then I could at least take care of my body in other ways.
I needed to think.
Last night had gone well, all things considered. Bluebeard had agreed to respect me. I had settled in my mind that I would work with him. Note or no note. But if I was going to keep his respect, I would have to prove myself to him. What could I do that he couldn’t? How could I make myself useful?
I pondered the question as I bathed and then I stepped out of the pool and found a somewhat clean pair of blue breeches and a loose white shirt with arrows stitched all over it. Dressed in these, I felt considerably better.
I felt my back with careful fingers. My stitches were no longer hot and puffy. They still stung, but they also itched. Bluebeard had been right. His silver stitching had quickened their healing.
Sitting down on the edge of the bed, I basked in the light coming from the beach on one side of the wall. I wasn’t fool enough to walk through to it. For all I knew, it would leave me in another world. And I was on the second story of the house, so the sand that was drifting into the edge of the room and mixing with Bluebeard’s discarded things made no sense at all.
I couldn’t stay here, of course. This was his bed, in his room. I would just sit for a moment to catch my breath. The warm sun began to relax me. Okay, I would just lie down for a moment and catch my breath.
I woke to the hooting of an owl and something that sounded like splashing. It was evening again.
“Ah, you’re awake, fire of my eyes,” Bluebeard said, his voice low and sultry. I blinked my eyes open and immediately shut them. Then, like the gargoyle, I cracked just one open a little bit.
The mirror snorted.
“Only you would enter this room, you devilish sensibility.” He was sitting in a tufted chair beside the fire, one leg thrown over the arm of the chair with nothing on him but a pair of rumpled breeches. He had the teacup in one hand, his smallest finger on that hand pointed out delicately as he sipped. “You step where no one else dare pass.”
I blinked, confused.
“The nightingale stairs decide where to bring the person who steps on them. Faithfully, they have carried fifteen brides to their own rooms and beds, but you, they have brought to mine.”
I sat up. After all, he was the one who chose to sit half-naked while I was sleeping here. He could hardly feel modest now, could he? He was sipping his tea and reading a book called, Avoiding Military Defeat and Assassination: Don’t Lose Your Head.
“I rather like you in my clothing,” he said, watching me with a possessive gleam in his cat’s eyes.
I felt my cheeks heat as I stole a little peek at him. He was made entirely of muscle and scars except for a dusting of dark hair over his chest and forearms that made my mouth unaccountably dry. It must have been whatever was in the tea I drank. I licked my upper lip and tried not to think of tea or of hair that clung to hard muscular planes. No, I definitely wasn’t thinking of that.
Keep a clear head, Izolda. You may have agreed to work with him, but you know this marriage cannot exist in truth. You are simply working together. Besides, you have never let a pretty man turn your head before and you don’t need to start making a fool of yourself now.
His hair was damp and little beads of water flecked his cheeks. I realized, with a feeling I wanted to hope was horror, but was something else entirely, that there were wet footsteps leading from the bath to his chair. I could have woken any time while he bathed.
Could you blush all over your body? I thought I might be.
“Your bag of things is over there, wife,” he said, pointing to my saddlebag on the other side of the fire, “if you prefer something of your own. I don’t know why you would. Your taste in clothing is sinfully plain.”
My eyes widened. My things!
I hurried to them and to my delight, I found one of my woven dresses and tabards crumpled in the saddlebag, along with underthings and woolen socks. I was almost crying with the relief of something from home when I felt his eyes on me and turned to see him look suddenly away, his cheeks stained with sunset.
“Is it really too much to ask that you give your whole life to me?” he said, clearing his throat as if he were having trouble concentrating. “Is it really too much to ask that you risk the same way I do?”
“Mirror,” I said, crossing to where the gargoyle looked down at me. Below him, I could see Bluebeard scowling in the reflection. “Tell my husband that sacrificing your wife’s wellbeing isn’t nearly the same risk as sacrificing your own.”
“I’ll tell him no such thing,” the gargoyle said haughtily.
“What if there was a reward that came with the risk?” Bluebeard asked, tilting his chin.
“Mirror, tell my husband that if there is a reward, it would have to be vast to equal the risk to my life and future.”
“I will not be your messenger,” the gargoyle growled. “You are abusing me most sorely.”
“Oh, the risk is great, I’ll agree,” Bluebeard said, his voice turned to coaxing. “So, let me offer you the greatest reward I can imagine to match it.”
I quirked an eyebrow at him.
He grinned as if we were sharing a joke. “Me.”
“Mirror, tell my husband that I already own him body and soul. That is what marriage means.”
“That’s torn it!” the gargoyle shouted and then he closed his eyes furiously and pursed his lips in concentration. The mirror went black and he was gone.
I heard a wet sound behind me and turned to find Bluebeard right there, leaning in close. I kept my eyes firmly on his and definitely nowhere else. But my cheeks felt hot enough to melt that lead from yesterday.
“There’s owning and then there’s possessing, you sober monstrosity,” he whispered, leaning in so his lips brushed the shell of my ear. “You own me, as I own you, but I offer you more than that. Take this risk with me – offer your life up – and I will give myself to you beyond vows and bonds. I will give you heart and mind and my very soul.”
/> I pulled back so I could look into his eyes, frowning. An offer like that was too extravagant. No wonder he lived in a little cottage instead of a palace. He had no sense of how to make a good bargain.
Maybe that was what he needed me for.
The predatory look in his eyes stole my breath away as he lifted my hand toward his lips. I expected him to kiss the back of it as a lord might. Instead, he caught my index finger in his teeth – not enough to hurt but enough to suggest he could hurt me. At the last second, his teeth released the tip of my finger, and his soft lips wrapped around it instead as his bite turned into a kiss. He let it slide between them and away and as my finger left his lips, he gave me a devilish smile.
“Now, I’ve put you on equal footing, my wife. You have offered your life in a gamble for the future. I offer you my soul. Do we have a bargain? If we do, then we have equal risk and equal reward.”
It was what I wanted, wasn’t it? Then why did my throat feel so dry?
I could not explain it, but I felt like I was at a disadvantage here.
He lifted his hand and offered it to me, as if to seal the bargain. Shaking, I took it. I hardly knew why. Why gamble for something I wasn’t sure I wanted? Why gamble for something that technically I should already own? And yet my heart raced at the thought, and I could barely suppress the shiver that ran through my core.
“We have an accord,” he said with a fierce grin. “And we are late. The bids are supposed to begin at Peak of Night. I have held things up, but I cannot dally forever, or they will begin without me. So, dress and adorn yourself for a spectacle, for I have a task for you that will let you help me just as you offered to do.”
“Oh,” he said stalking across the room, reaching for something that hung over a dressing screen. “And wear this, my bride. We need all the spectacle we can muster.”
He handed me a filmy dress made of the finest silk and lace I’d ever seen and then pointed to a dressing screen in the corner. I looked longingly at my own dress in my other hand, but he snatched it away and threw it over the mirror.
Fly with the Arrow: A Bluebeard Inspired Fantasy (Bluebeard's Secret Book 1) Page 16