Night of Fire

by Barbara Samuel

  Tendrils of that bright hair sprang free of the rest, more and more with each passing hour—a lock over her brow, down her cheek, across the straight white shelf of shoulder. He captured it all in his imagination so he could recreate it another day. What hue was that white? What tone, the red of her hair?

  He set aside such thoughts and opened the trunk, then took out a small, cloth-wrapped bundle and untied it as he carried it over to Cassandra, putting it down before her and pulling back the cloth with a flourish.

  Her reaction was all he could have asked for. A small intake of breath, a hand over her lips. Eyes to his face, hesitant, bright with excitement. "May I touch them? Or will it hurt them?"

  "I would not ask you to only look at them."

  Gingerly, she put two fingers on the top page, almost but not quite touching the words penned in ink. The parchment had darkened a little, and some of the edges were brittle and crumbling, but the fine strong hand remained, clearly readable. "Oh, imagine," she said softly. "His own hand, on this page."

  "Yes."

  She picked up the first and held it lightly between her fingers, careful to avoid the edges, and put it to her nose as if to inhale the essence. A prickle moved down his spine as he watched her; his breath caught high in his throat. Light edged her straight, sharp nose and the thin, fine eyelids, and he imagined pressing his lips to them, even imagined the jittery movements of her eye below, the bristle of lashes against his mouth.

  He stepped away and pretended to be looking in the trunk, but a ghost of himself stood yet with her, putting a hand lightly on her shoulder, a finger into an escaped lock of hair. His ghost did what he dared not.

  Cassandra began to read aloud in Italian, her throaty voice cascading over the syllables expertly, the sound soft and unimaginably sensual. He closed his eyes and listened, letting just that part of her come into his mind—the sound of her reading a passage about a wife kissing her lover, Anichino. When the story progressed, to Anichino creeping into the wife's room, he thought she would halt in feminine reserve, for the lover awakened his woman by putting his hands on her breasts.

  But she did not stop. She read it all, with no shift in her tone to speak of either coquetry or embarrassment, and he was surprised by her again. He turned.

  She raised her eyes. "It is so much more beautiful in Italian. The translations are often dry. I would like to convey the spirit of this, the…" She narrowed her eyes, not seeing him. "… the lushness. I love the bawdiness so much," she said. A smile, thoughtful and distant, touched her lips.

  More than the world, he wanted to fling himself across the small distance between them and bring to fruit another kiss, like that of the wife and her lover. His flaw had ever been his own delight in his senses, and they roared now with a clamoring unlike any he had known, for she offered a feast for eyes and mouth and hand and ear.

  But if he allowed indulgence in this moment, he would mortally offend her, offend the freedom she felt in speaking to him thus. So he considered his reply, taking something blindly from the trunk, then dropping casually into the other chair.

  "Yes," he said, "I like his passion—the passion to affirm life, after so much death from the plague. It is the most natural thing—to celebrate that which brings new life."

  Her smile of connection and happiness was gratification enough, that she was truly free with him, to discuss even that forbidden topic. "Exactly! It must have seemed the world had nearly ended. I cannot even imagine." She picked up the next page and grinned, for it was part of the Third Day's stories—the subject of her essay that had made him laugh. She read it aloud, and again shook her head. "It cries for better translation! Don't you agree?"

  "I have not read English translations," he admitted.

  "Oh, of course not. Well, I can give you an example." She took the page and began to read in very stilted English that captured little of the flow of the Italian. " 'And then, and then, and then…'" She sighed.

  "Terrible. You would be far better."

  He gave a mock shudder. "I intensely dislike translation work."

  "Ah, but you'd bring poetry to it."

  "So will you."

  She shook her head, smiling as she touched the words on the page again, her eyes following the path of her finger. "I am only clever, Basilio I have not the fire of a poet, that gift of song."

  "There is more poetry in you than you recognize."

  She rose impatiently, restlessly. "No. I am gifted enough to earn my way in the world with my pen, but my passion has ever been for study." She shook her head, a quizzical expression in her eyes. "There is a moment, when one has been steadfast in piecing together some subject, that a single detail falls into place, and there is suddenly a whole picture, an understanding. Enlightenment. Do you know what I mean?"

  His heart swelled—God! Such an intelligent woman—what a rarity! He leaned forward, putting his elbows on his knees. "I wanted to be a great scholar," he said. "But I can never stand far enough from the work, from my own thoughts on it, to make that picture you speak of. But sometimes, when I am writing, I feel something similar."

  "Yes? What brings it?"

  He narrowed his eyes, thinking. "I am not certain. It is in part what you say—one must be persistent, dedicated, through all the frustrating moments when it all seems a hopeless endeavor." He looked at her intently. "Perhaps it is a matter of detail. The single small word or phrase that pulls it into focus."

  "And do you see the whole in those moments? Or something else?"

  "Joy," he said, surprising himself, and laughed. "I see joy." He lifted rueful brows. "For me, it is the moments—suddenly I have captured one moment, and whatever is there on the page is not only for me, but for whatever reader comes."

  "Like your letters." Her skirts rustled as she moved toward him. A hint of a smile. "They brought Tuscan sun to my cold winter days."

  He smiled at her. "I was hoping I had done that."

  She sank to the floor by his knee in a puddle of green and gold, her head titled up to him. "You are very good at it."

  She was so close, so relaxed and natural. In his imagination, he put his forehead on her neck, breathed the scent from her skin. "What do you wish most to do?" he asked, then answered himself. "Ah, I know it already: you burn to translate Boccaccio."

  "I do," she admitted, and laughed a little breathlessly. "I am only terrified that I could not do it justice—

  and that even if I did, it would be scorned as the work of a woman."

  Basilio hesitated, then gave in to his impulse and brushed one finger over her cheek. Just once, then away. "Do it," he said softly. "I will slay your detractors for you when you have finished."

  There was a danger in her eyes, suddenly. A heat turning their brown liquid, like chocolate left in the sun.

  He looked away and caught on her shoulders, an endless span of warm flesh he could kiss for hours. His blood stirred, and he raised his hand again to her face.

  Her cheek was small against his palm, the cheekbone and jaw as fragile as the bones of a bird, and that evidence of her mortality pained him. She blinked, slowly, like a cat, and turned her face ever so slightly into his palm.

  He suddenly felt he should confess to her that he was betrothed, that he could not give himself to her even though he wished it more than breath. Perhaps if she knew, they could steal this small time, seal their hearts, one to the other. Perhaps she would not mind, if he explained that his duty required his marriage.

  But just as swiftly, he knew she would mind very much—that at heart, she was honor-bound to the plight of women, as he was bound to the duty of land and family. He could not ask her to make that choice.

  As she leaned softly into his palm, as he took that small offering with the same inner trembling as that of a boy touching his first breast, he regretted bitterly that life had brought his love to him only when he could not claim her.

  If he had been a stronger man, he would have lightened the moment with a jest or a smile. I
nstead, he lifted his other hand, to put it on her other cheek so he could touch her whole face. "Thank you, Cassandra," he whispered. "You have blessed me by coming."

  She put her hand over his. "As I have been blessed by coming."

  In silent agreement, they only smiled, like the most beloved of friends, then stood up.

  "I am suddenly quite fatigued," she said, smoothing her skirts. "I must retire."

  "Of course. We have much to see tomorrow."

  "Is it terribly far to the sea?"

  "You would like to go?"

  "Very much."

  "Consider it done." He gave her his arm and they walked, each in their own thoughts, to her chamber.

  There she paused, then stood on her toes, and pressed a chaste kiss to his cheek. "Thank you, Basilio, for sharing all of this with me. I had a glorious day."

  He forced himself to pat her hand and step away, bowing courteously. "My pleasure, dear lady."

  Chapter 4

  Cassandra rose early the next morning, excited by the promise of a ride to the seaside. Beyond her balcony the light was gray, and she was ready to be disappointed, but when she flung open the doors, she halted in stunned delight. Rushing out on to the balcony in her nightrail, she leaned on the thick stone balustrade, inhaling the soft air, scented with new, exotic things.

  She had never seen fog like this. It was thin and silvery, draped around the tree limbs in wisps. Mufflers hid the tops of the mountains and the greens and blues of the landscape were deepened, intensified. But what made it so beautiful was the promise that it would not last. The heated, buttery sun pressed down upon that mist, breaking through here and there in soft pillars that illumined a tree or a hidden valley or the path to the sea, glittering in full sunlight between the breaks in hills. A noise from below caught her attention and she looked down to the courtyard to see Basilio come out, wearing only a simple white shirt with those extravagantly full sleeves and a pair of breeches. In her excitement, she cried, "Good morning!"

  He lifted that extraordinary face, and Cassandra saw his startlement, his pleasure, before he smiled and waved. "Come down! Have breakfast with me."

  She felt like Juliet, daring and wild and free in her sleeping attire, with her hair uncombed on her shoulders. She leaned on the rail, feeling her hair tumble over the edge. "Will you feed me more of your plums?"

  He laughed. "Yes! And more besides. Hurry!"

  She raced inside, splashing water on her face, tossing off the nightrail as she searched for some easy thing to don. She tugged a chemise over her head, and a simply cut shepherdess's gown over that. Later she would call her maid to help her into all the proper accoutrements of a lady, the corsets and stockings and other fripperies.

  For now, she brushed her hair and left it loose, stuck her bare feet into her slippers, grabbed a shawl against the chill, and hurried down to join him.

  The sensation of her unconstrained breasts moving inside her chemise as she raced down the stairs made her feel deliciously free. She embraced the slightly wicked pleasure of her loose hair on her arms, and her skirts swishing around her bare ankles. When she sailed through the glass doors into the courtyard, breathless and happy, a burst of sunlight suddenly cut through the mist to fill the square with a golden wash—a beneficent approval of this new lightness in her, this new spirit of joy. She halted and tilted her face into it.

  "Open your mouth," Basilio said, close to her ear.

  She startled, dropping her shawl as she spun to look at him. He stood dose, a hint of a smile on his lips, and appreciation in his eyes as his gaze brushed over her face and throat and even her breasts. She realized suddenly that she had wanted to see that look in his eye, that darkening, that faint flare of the nostrils.

  I want him.

  She didn't even question that fierce whisper in her mind, only gazed at him for a long moment, letting him see that she wished to put her hands in that glossy tumble of black curls, wanted to taste his lips. Then she closed her eyes and opened her mouth. She hoped it would be his tongue she tasted, and the thought sent shocked but delicious anticipation through her.

  Instead he pressed a supple roundness against her lips, and she bit into a plum with a happy laugh, sucking on it for a moment before she opened her eyes.

  He wants me.

  It was there in the piercing focus of his atten-tion, a naked expression of longing as he looked at her mouth. With a little shake of his head, he said, "You must have left a path of shattered men in your wake."

  A ripple of disappointment touched her, but she could not have said why. Because he had allowed his desire to show, when she just had done the very same thing? Unsettled, she bent to capture her shawl and moved away, speaking over her shoulder. "To the contrary. They're quite terrified of me." She bit again into the plum she'd taken from him. "Men do not like a woman who is smarter than they are."

  His hands settled on his hips. "You are not smarter than me."

  She grinned. "We shall see, won't we?"

  He inclined his head with measuring eyes and a hint of a smile. "So we shall."

  After breakfast, they rode down a narrow track to the sea. The sun had burned through the mist, and Basilio insisted she wear a hat to protect her fair skin, and a shawl over her shoulders. Sweat prickled on her brow and under the shawl, but she endured it for the promise of the beach.

  When they rode beneath a stand of trees to come out on an endless, white stretch of sand, when the sound of the waves first struck her ear, Cassandra dismounted in a rush and ran across the soft sand to the water. She just stood there, smelling it, listening to it.

  "It's so empty!" she said. "Why are there no villages along the beach? Are there terrible storms?"

  A lift of a shoulder. "Sometimes. But this land belongs to the princes, for their hunting and such things."

  "Are we being wicked, then?"

  That glitter in his eyes as he looked down at her. "Very."

  "Good." She turned and sat down in the sand, reaching for her shoes. "You won't be tiresome then, and be shocked if I take off my stockings and shoes?" Even as she spoke, she was stripping them away. "If I'm going to be wicked, I'd like to fully enjoy the experience."

  He reached for his neckcloth and untied it, tossing it down beside her pile of shoes and stockings, then took off his coat. "We could be very, very wicked and simply swim naked."

  "I'm afraid I'd rather not burn all those tender parts." She did, however, take off the offending hat and shawl. "Though you certainly may frolic nude if it pleases you."

  He sat down beside her, grinning wickedly. "I certainly will if it would please you, my lady."

  "What an astonishingly generous offer!"

  A purely Mediterranean shrug. "I wish only your pleasure."

  Smiling wryly, Cassandra stood, brushing sand from her skirts.

  "A moment, if you please," he said, lifting his foot. "One would hate to ruin a good pair of boots."

  "Oh, indeed." Expertly, she grasped his heel and toe and slid the boot off, then the other, and tossed them in the unruly pile growing in the sand.

  He took off his stockings and Cassandra was very nearly felled by an inexplicable fist of desire, triggered by his naked feet and shins. While they were quite beautifully shaped, with high arches and silky dark hair on the straight line of shin, she had seen quite a number of ankles and toes. None of them had ever made her want to have sex. Bemused, she shook her head. "I suspect you do your share of shattering, Count."

  Perplexed, he lifted his head, and saw her admiring his feet. "Ah! You like them?" He wiggled his toes and admired them himself, then plucked at his shirt. "I would be happy to take off the rest. Only in the interest of pleasing a guest, of course."

  She laughed, and if it was throatier than ordinary, so what? She stretched out her hand. "Come, my wicked Basilio Let's put our naked feet in the water."

  He took her hand and allowed her to help him up, then dashed toward the water with a cry. Cassandra ran after him, lif
ting her skirts, gasping with pleasure as the first ripples washed over her ankles. She halted, entranced, and looked down at the foam. Through the water, she saw her feet, tinted a pale greenish-brown. Sand sucked and shifted and rearranged itself in a thousand ways, and memories came tumbling from a thousand hiding places in her mind.

  She was seven and eight and nine, and heard the sharp shouts of her brothers and Adriana in the distance as they shimmied up trees and played pirate. She heard the low murmur of her nanny and Monique, just behind them, and the baby laughter of the little girls.

  "Tell me," Basilio said, wading toward her. "What puts that look on your face?"

  It was so easy to smile with him. She kicked a little water his direction, though it wouldn't make much difference. Unlike Cassandra, he had not cautiously tiptoed into the surf but waded in with gusto, and his breeches were wet to mid-thigh. The damp cloth clung to his body, showing him to be surprisingly strong and muscular. Tiny silver beads caught in the extravagant curls around his face.

  "I was thinking of being seven," she said. "I was very brave at seven."

  "Too serious. Big eyes."

  She nodded. "I liked to stand like this, right on the edge of the water, and imagine I was at the edge of the world. I tried to see those lands— what sounds they would have and what the people would wear and what strange creatures I would see."

  "What did you imagine?"

  "Elephants. India. Spices and glitter." She smiled.

  "Yes, that seems right." He reached down and snared a pretty pink shell, holding it out to her in his wet hand. "No pretty rocks and bangles?"

  "Oh, yes. I had many. Boxes full of them." She examined the spiral shape of the shell, and as if he were a ghost within the shell, her father appeared in her mind, not as he had been in his last, consumptive days, but as he had been then, when she was small. "My father used to bring them to me specially. We catalogued them together."