by Teresa Denys
Afterwards we sat back, replete, watching one another contentedly in the light of the brands which burned smokily in the wall sconces. With meat in our bellies some of the nightmare had departed, and I found myself thinking rationally again and felt less like an animal in a trap.
Instinctively my gaze sought Domenico, and I thought suddenly that I would not have recognized him as the elegant Duke of Cabria. His face was drawn and gray, and fair stubble covered his firm jaw; the brightness of his fair curls was dimmed with dust, and his clothes were creased and stained. Then, as he raised his hand, I almost laughed at the arrogant contrast of the heavy Cabrian seal ring on that dirt-encrusted hand, the trimmed nails black with grime.
Not that I was cleaner than he, I thought wryly, inspecting the backs of my hands. Nor any man or boy in this rout. But somehow it seemed unthinkable that Domenico—my proud and dazzling Domenico—should be so debased. It was as if the Archangel Raphael lay sprawled on the other side of the smoky stable, his brightness dimmed by dirt and his spirit sunk.
I must have moved then, restlessly, because he looked up. I thought his eyes met mine for an instant, but I could not be sure in the uncertain light; then he shifted his weight. I saw his mouth take on a cruel, reckless set, and his head moved with the watchfulness I remembered as his eyes traveled from face to unconscious face. He looked like that when he woke from his nightmares and was gauging the reactions of his attendants; whether or not they had learned too much of him while he slept, whether he would have to kill them.
As he turned his head, a gleam of torchlight lit his face, and I saw his expression clearly; aloof, withdrawn, his eyes like slits of calculation. I felt as though I watched a leopard debating his next spring, and my heart began to beat with slow, terrified strokes. Perhaps he was tired of tormenting me with mere indifference; perhaps he meant to give me a rival—no, a successor—from someone among this company. It would not be for love that he sought another partner, for no tenderness softened the cruel line of his mouth; but he might do it for cruelty, to find an occupation for his empty hands and a tenant for his bed. I could see the intentness on his face as he deliberately scanned his followers.
The dark eyes rested on Lorenzo and lingered, and my nails dug hard into my palms—it would be fitting, I told myself, that the nephew should salve the grief of the uncle's death. Domenico's charm would win the boy where Andrea's blandishments failed. But I could not stay and watch it.
As Domenico's head turned towards me, as if to savor my reaction, I scrambled to my feet and went stumbling over the slumped bodies to the door of the room where the horses were stalled. The hot smell and the darkness engulfed me as I pulled it to behind me. I can stay here, I thought, all night if I must. Santi will see what is going on and know why I could not stay in there with them. I withdrew further into the dark, groping with outstretched hands for the opposite wall, and then put my back against it, staring unseeingly at the light that flickered through the cracks between the boards of the door. It would be a very long night.
Chapter Nine
l was still standing there when a flicker of torchlight fell across my eyes, and I spun around, lifting my arm to shield my eyes. Behind the blaze a voice said softly, "You did not bring a torch."
"No." My voice was harsh with fright, wooden and sulky-sounding. "Thank you."
"Do you care so much for horses that you come to see them at this time of night?"
"No, I . . ." I felt as though I were suffocating. "I wanted to be alone."
"It is private enough here, in all conscience." There was an odd, bitter note in Domenico's voice, and he jammed the torch into an empty sconce above his head. The horse in the nearest stall whickered and stamped restlessly, but he did not even glance at it. I could feel his eyes on me and instinctively drew back into the deepest shadow.
"Come here."
An undercurrent of impatience stirred in his level tone, and his shadow crossed the band of yellow torchlight towards me. I stood rigid, my voice choked in my throat, as his fingers touched my cheek, traced the line of my jaw and the side of my neck, lingering on the pulse that thundered there. I caught my breath as he loomed so torturingly close: then I glimpsed, between his impossible lashes, a glint of the expression in his eyes. It was boredom; a black, corroding disgust and boredom.
In a spasm of shock I wrenched myself away, evading the touch of his fingers as though it burned me. His mind was still with the dead; all he wanted was a human body to charm his senses into oblivion, and I would rather he ignored me, I thought wildly, than took me out of loathing, as a thing to minister to the need of his body and nothing more. I had to escape the spell of his voice and his touch, because he cared no more for me" than he would for a mouthful of food. . . .
With every nerve in my body aching to give him what he demanded, I ducked under his outstretched arm and flung myself towards the door that led to outside, into the silent farmyard. It creaked open, and I was almost out into the freedom of the blanching moonlight when his hand gripped my shoulder, his fingers digging harshly into my flesh. He came up behind me with one silent pace, dragging my body back against the hardness of his with brutal, inescapable insistence.
With a cry I struggled and then relaxed against him, too dazed to reason; then both his hands were on my shoulders and he was spinning me to face him, pushing me back against the doorjamb so that he could see me in the moonlight. I stared up at him helplessly; then slowly the strength ebbed from his grip, and his hands lay on my shoulders like dead things.
He said at last, in a queer gray voice, "You are dead. They told me you were dead."
I could only say, "Not I, Your Grace. Ippolito."
"You were with him. I sent him back for you."
I remembered Ippolito's relief when he saw me; how he had ceased to talk of his unfulfilled errand and spoke only of following the duke. Then I had been the cause of that burst of virulent fury on the battlements of Fidena—and could I have been part of the cause of this savage, wordless grief?
I said, "He was killed helping me. I told you."
He shook his head. "I have not spoken with you."
"I brought you the news of Ippolito's death. You spoke to me then."
"I did not know you. I only heard someone saying that Ippolito was dead, and that he was alone when he died—I thought the Spanish had taken you and killed you when they had done."
I said unsteadily, "I have ridden at your back these three days," and he shook his head again as though he were dazed, his hands tightening agonizingly on my shoulders.
"If it is the devil's work, I do not care. If some coven has raised you from the dead, I will be damned again for this night's work." He spoke so softly I could barely hear him, the words coming feverishly. His eyes were blazing black in his intent face as they studied every detail of mine, lingering greedily on my lips. I felt his arm slide behind me and pull me close, and then with an almost animal groan of "Felicia . . ." he bent his head and kissed me ravenously.
I was whimpering, half with pleasure and half with pain, when he lifted his head at last. His hand went to the neck of my doublet; then he looked up suddenly past me. I felt a rush of cool air against my face, and the next thing I knew he had half pulled, half carried me into the ruined farmhouse, where the moonlight checkered its rubble-strewn floor.
The broken tiles were cold under my back as I felt him undoing the strings which fastened my doublet and shirt, and his mouth was warm against my breasts like a hungry child's. I moaned, clawing at his shoulders through the padded tunic, and he made a sudden sound of impatience and began tearing at the buckles, swearing viciously under his breath.
Our skins clung where they touched, sticky with grime, but I held him as desperately as he held me. The rubble on which we lay, the cold and the smell of stale sweat—nothing mattered but the urgency of our need for each other. I lay with my body arched and my legs apart while his kisses invaded and possessed me, his hands exploring and stroking my thi
ghs. My fingers were caressing the back of his neck as he raised his head, running lovingly down his forearms as he knelt over me, his body shining silver with sweat in the moonlight, like a god's. Behind his head I could see the stars, so cold and remote compared with the fierce hunger that was taking possession of me.
A sudden hard thrust and his face blotted out the star-filled sky. We lay locked together like one single, straining, softly groaning animal; the two-backed beast, spending its strength upon itself and glorying in the spoil. I forgot that there was anything else in the world; there was only his strength pulsing through me, his body like a living wall around me, and the frightening and wonderful knowledge that, after so long parting, at this moment he was mine and no one else could lay claim to him. I dreaded the moment when we must separate, but he lifted me and held me against him so that there was no breaking apart, only the piercing warmth and a hurting, wonderful -completeness.
When I slid back to the ground at last the stars seemed paler in the sky. My breathing was shallow and rhythmic, and my fingers felt foolishly soft and relaxed as I reached up to touch him.
"Am I dead, Your Grace?"
He caught his breath. "No." Then his eyes, scanning me watchfully, narrowed; one white hand came out and touched the ground beside my head. "You have cut your hair."
"I had to," I retorted, startled. "A page with hair as long as mine would have made a blind man suspicious."
"Why come as a page?" His voice hardened. "I still have power enough to protect my mistress."
"I did not know you still wanted me. I thought you meant to leave me behind in Fidena and that I must fend for myself."
"Yet you came." It was the merest breath.
"At Ippolito's bidding. He sent me after you."
There was a short silence, and then Domenico said, "My good Ippolito!" in a tone that was half-tender and half-bitter; it was as if he mocked himself for his own memories. Then he said in an altered voice, "And you have ridden among these vassals of mine for three days, and none of them recognized you?"
"Santi knows," I answered and was startled by the look on his face.
"Santi! That . . ."
I interrupted quickly, "He helped me keep my secret from the others. I would never have contrived but for him."
"And what payment did he ask for this favor?"
"None," I returned steadily, "and he saved me from the importuning of Andrea Regnovi last night."
Domenico stiffened. "Andrea?"
"Yes. My disguise was too good—-he thought I was a boy." And then the long strain snapped and I lay laughing in sheer golden relief, with Domenico at first startled and then beginning to laugh too, and silencing my laughter with his lips so that both of us sank back again and the cause of our laughter was forgotten.
There was a wind running before the sun as I limped back through the horses' unlit stalls; the unfastened door was banging, slowly and monotonously, until I pulled it to behind me. I groped my way back to the inner door and into the room where the men lay sleeping, dark shapeless bundles like old clothes strewn on the floor. My eyes were accustomed to the dark, and I trod softly through them, my feet finding tiny spaces between the humped bodies, until I saw where Santi had spread his cloak for me. I lay down with a little sigh of thankfulness, so tired that my eyes shut of their own accord, and the shadow that passed me, soft-footed as a cat, seemed like a part of a dream.
Someone was shaking me, and I murmured protestingly, burying my face deeper in the cloak. Someone gripped my arm and pulled roughly.
"Hurry up, young sluggard, or you'll be left behind!"
I blinked drowsily and peered up into Santi's dark-browed face. His expression did not match his sharp words. I wondered hazily why I should feel so tired; then I moved, reluctantly, and had to bite back a cry. Santi said, "What is it?" and I shook my head, folding my lips tight.
I had not known so much pain since the first time, when I had woken torn and bruised and still bleeding sluggishly. When I got to my feet it was slowly, as though I had been beaten.
Santi was watching me carefully, and I knew that the blood was rising in my cheeks as memories of the night before came flooding back. He gripped my elbow as though to hurry me and said in a low voice, "I saw you come back last night. Is all well?"
I nodded. "I think so, messire. For the moment."
"Good," he returned, releasing my arm, "but keep your collar well fastened to hide those marks." Then he turned his back on me and went away, scowling as though he had been berating a lazy stablelad in the Palazzo della Raffaelle.
I crept through the motions of saddling and bridling like a snail, and once or twice Lorenzo glanced at me in impatient contempt. But gradually as I worked, the pain abated, until at last I was moving freely; it was only pressure on my love-punished flesh that still hurt me, and that I could bear. I could not quite suppress a gasp as I landed in the saddle, and one or two heads turned at the soft sound—Domenico's, his veiled eyes lit by a suspicion of teasing laughter, and Andrea's, quick and vigilant. I saw his gaze go from me to the duke and comprehension followed by a smothered leer cross his girlish features: well, I thought, there is one who has guessed something. I pray God he has not guessed it all.
As the horses clattered out of the farmyard, Domenico twisted in the saddle, summoning me to his side with a swift flick of his fingers. My cheeks burned; I had hoped that he would leave me in oblivion at the back of the troop, but I should have known better. He had flaunted me before his court as his mistress, and even now he could not resist showing me off as his minion to these poor remains of his followers. I could hear the nudges and the amused whispers as I pressed my horse forward.
Baldassare fell back to let me reach Domenico's side. The duke leaned over lithely, and his gloved fingers brushed the side of my face where he had left a bruise, half-hidden by the short strands of my hair.
"Did you have good rest last night, good boy?"
The insinuation in his soft voice made my hands clench, but I answered woodenly, "Yes, Your Grace."
Behind me Andrea gave a little snicker of outrage, and Domenico heard. He did not trouble to look around but only checked for an instant, listening, and there was no sound but the hoofbeats on the road and the jingle of harness. Then he spoke again, almost idly.
"Your name? I have forgotten."
"Marcello, Your Grace."
"Marcello!" His eyes narrowed. "Why that?"
"I was named for my patron's son," I told him, and his eyes flickered to Santi and then came back to my face.
"You have our patronage now," he said deliberately.
From then on I rode as fast by his side as if I had been chained there—I might have been a dog he had whistled to him. Now it was for others to tend the horses and scavenge or hunt for food; I must stay beside the duke, talk to him when he pleased or be silent when he would, but never—-if I cared for his anger or the sudden flash of panic in his eyes—be out of his sight. If my mount lagged, he would take its leading rein; if it chafed, his hand would come out and steady it, or his voice would give me quick instructions to curb it. He watched me almost constantly as we rode, as though he thought I might vanish, and I was desperately afraid that he would miss the way. I did not breathe freely again until we had left the haunted plain of Trasimene and begun to climb the road veering northward.
I thought at first that it would take us back into the mountains again, but it skirted them and followed a long, long curving hillside down into a green valley. I realized then what Domenico was about: He meant to go north, out of reach of Rome, north away from the Spanish garrisons in Naples. I had learned so much of the country in my long hours with Father Vincenzo, and I knew that only to the north was there a gap in the encircling mountains.
The valley looked peaceful, oblivious to the little band of fugitives venturing into it, and I wondered for a moment whether I had dreamed the war from which we fled. Then some farm workers with a cart came plodding up the road towards us, an
d I knew that danger was the reality and not this mirage of peace. The men eyed us warily and went by in silence, but every face around me was stamped with the same grim fear that they had only to tell someone of what they had seen. . . .
All but Domenico's. He was staring through them with a frowning preoccupation that made it clear he did not see them; his thoughts were far away. We had reined in to the side of the road to allow the cart to go past, and when it had gone by, it was a moment before the strange, absent harshness smoothed from his face. Then he shifted his weight in the saddle and turned his head so quickly that his eyes met mine before I could look away.
As though by accident his booted leg brushed mine as we moved on again, and I pulled the mare's head around too sharply, veering away from him. I thought I heard a faint sound as though he were laughing under his breath, but even without looking around, I could feel his eyes on me and knew the expression that would be in them; speculative and searching, with a gleam of mockery in their depths as my discomfort grew.
He was coolly assessing how I came to pass as a boy, noting the raggedly cropped hair which was jammed untidily under my cap, my blistered fingers as ringless and dirty as on the day he had first seen me. I could feel his gaze penetrating the shadows across my face, scanning the features too weak, the neck too fragile for a boy's.
I stirred uneasily. His eyes were seeking the curves of my breasts beneath the concealing doublet and following the line of hip and flank and thigh. I felt as though my clothes were peeling back from my body like husks from grains of wheat; it was as though he stripped from me not only my usurped clothing but my faith in my disguise, for when he looked at me like that, I was hideously, palpably feminine.
"Boy." The teasing monosyllable made me start. "You are too far off; come nearer."
Silently I guided the mare a little towards him. There was a derisive half-smile on his lips as he watched me, and then he said, "Nearer," again.