“But at what price?” An undertone of dismay threaded her voice.
With the moon behind her, he still couldn’t see her face. Impatient, he strode around the chest to confront her.
The Angel of Mercy reclined on the window seat, one booted heel resting gently on the cushion, her cropped head haloed in a ruff of Bruxelles lace. A row of silver half-moon buttons marched down a doublet of eggshell damask. The silver medallion with her name in Hebrew gleamed against the flat plane of her breast.
The perfect essence of androgyny, though she referred to herself as female—the only angel in the higher echelons who did. Suddenly Zamiel found himself wondering how she felt about that. Perhaps he wasn’t the only outcast in Heaven. Perhaps others, too, toiled through eternity in a prison of aching solitude.
Her cerulean eyes observed him, the dispassionate gaze that turned him inside out. Then she turned to the window, letting the cool moonlight she loved bathe the pure, sorrowful lines of her face.
“The Tempter wants thee very badly. Of course he fills thy purse with a river of gold that never runs dry, and places his sigil upon thy finger. Zamiel, he wants thee to fall.”
“The villain’s hidden motives revealed,” he said, sotto voce, though he couldn’t suppress the small chill that crawled through him. “Of course he wants me to fall, to embrace willingly the fate he suffered by mischance when his great rebellion failed.
“Do you think, just because he’s Lucifer, he never suffers the pain of exile, nor the ache of solitude?”
Gabriele frowned, a small line appearing between her fair brows.
“He could repent,” she said at last. But she sounded uncertain.
Zamiel snorted. “He’s made his choice. He’d rather reign in Hell than serve in Heaven. Now, he’s truly damned. Even you couldn’t grant him the gift of Mercy. Only Jehovah could reverse his fate. And He’s not doing a hell of a lot, these past few eons, to ease anyone’s suffering—in case you haven’t noticed.”
She cast him a troubled look that told him, in fact, she had noticed. Another unpleasant chill rippled down his spine, raising goose bumps on his skin. Of all the Archangels, Gabriele dwelled closest to God, save perhaps for Michael. If even her loyal heart doubted...
“Tell me,” he demanded, seized by sudden suspicion. “How long has it been since you’ve seen Jehovah, or spoken to Him?”
She shifted uneasily. “Thou knowest time means naught to an angel.”
“How...long?”
“Since Christ,” she whispered.
Zamiel felt as though he’d been struck by lightning. During the millennia of his growing disillusionment, he’d thought himself alone in his doubts. Surely every attempt at rabble-rousing he’d tried in the Court of Heaven had fallen flat.
They called him troublemaker, rebel angel, anarchist. He’d secretly wondered if he’d imagined the entire affair merely as a means to relieve his boredom. Surely Gabriele herself had never shown more than distant sympathy for his pariah status. Most others in the heavenly host didn’t even grant him that much.
“Hell’s Bells!” Zamiel drove a fist against the wall, then nearly fainted when his abused shoulder exploded with pain. When his vision cleared, leaving him gasping but sane, he subsided weakly onto the seat beside her.
“Fencing injury,” he panted, at her puzzled look. “You’ve no idea what it’s like inhabiting this body. I starve, I thirst, I freeze, I roast. My cock aches for a woman at the most inconvenient moments, and I have to piss or worse with nauseating frequency.”
“How curious.” Her pale brows rose. “I rather obtained the impression thou liked it.”
An image of Linnet Norwood floated before him, color rising beneath her ivory skin, her sherry-gold eyes blazing like candles as she argued with him. The heavenly way she’d tasted when her mouth opened beneath his. A small, satisfied smile curved his lips.
“Some parts of it aren’t bad,” he allowed. By now, the fiery knives stabbing through his shoulder had dulled to general misery. “How could you not see Him? You’re supposed to sit at His left hand.”
Her gaze lifted to the waning moon, a sliver of light floating in the star-drenched heavens. “The winged Seraphim surround Him always, the many-eyed Cherubim are always watching, and the Thrones race their fiery chariots around the Seventh Heaven. He is there, as always, but we do not see Him.”
How do you know He’s there? Zamiel wanted to ask. But the implication was blasphemy, the alternative impossible to contemplate. He’d alienate her completely if he uttered the words.
For the first time, a fierce regret for his exiled status speared through him. If he were still Chief Ruler of the Fifth Heaven, he could ask new questions. The other Dominions were restless; he’d sensed that clearly. They were the warrior caste, after all, heavy infantry in the epic battle that had cast the fallen angels from Heaven. Though he’d never commanded his fellow Dominions—for command fell to the Archangels—Zamiel had always held a certain influence over his fighting brethren. They could hardly ignore him, the Angel of Death and Son of Lucifer in their midst. If they marched en masse to the Seventh Heaven and demanded answers—
“I recognize thine aspect,” the Archangel said dryly. “Brother, make not thy mischief over this. Thy purpose must be to make thy peace with Heaven, acknowledge thine error, renounce Satan and all his doings, and plead for divine mercy. Then can I speak for thee, instead of against thee, and beg thy forgiveness.”
Already, Zamiel was shaking his head. Make his peace with Heaven, renounce his only ally in this whole wretched business and admit he should have allowed Linnet to perish?
“Never!” he said, low and fierce. “Metatron would love to see me come crawling back to lick his boots—I who could be Prince of Hell. He’d love to see me silenced, the rebel discredited. In fact, I’ll lay odds the need to silence me is the true cause of my so-called punishment.
“I tell you this, Gabriele. If some treachery is brewing in the Court of Heaven, some plot among the higher echelons, Metatron and his twin Sandolphon are at the rotten heart of it!”
Seething with restless energy, a gnawing urgency to act set against the chafing knowledge of his impotence, he pushed to his feet and paced. They’d neutralized him in this mortal body, stolen his celestial power, made him neither angel nor devil. If he fell...Jehovah save him, if he fell...
The Archangel had fallen silent, her profile remote as she gazed at the dimming heavens.
“The stars are fading,” she murmured, “the moon sinking to her rest. My hour on the mortal plane is past.”
He pivoted to find she was right. The slim blond gallant was vanishing, insubstantial as a ghost.
Differing rules governed the angelic powers. Gabriele, the Angel of Mercy, was ruled by the moon. She could only take corporeal form when the moon rode the heavens.
A sudden, irrational dread seized him.
“Wait! We have to talk this through, Gabriele. Will you come tomorrow night?”
“The moon will be dark,” she said faintly. Even her voice was fading. “For the next three nights, I may not manifest on the mortal plane.”
“On the fourth night then,” he urged, kneeling before her. He wanted to seize her, force her to stay, but he knew how futile the attempt would be. “Promise me, sister.”
“I shall come if I can,” she whispered, so weak he could barely hear. “In the meantime, brother—do not fall.”
Zamiel smiled bleakly. “I’ll do my best.”
“These mortals...the sins of the flesh...” Her smooth brow furrowed as she stared at him, as though to compel his understanding. “If you couple with one of them...you will fall.”
“What?” Startled, he came to his feet. “What’s this you’re saying?”
Behind her, the moon’s thin sliver sank behind the London skyline. The Archangel smiled sadly, her shimmering silver-blue eyes filled with pain.
“Gabriele—sister—wait.”
Wildly he reached for her.
But his gauntlet passed through empty air. His fingers closed on nothing. The Angel of Mercy had vanished.
He growled an oath and fell to his knees. Flinging his arms over the window seat, he ground his brow against his forearms. Grief knotted his belly and burned like an ember in his breast—longing for the sister of his heart, the Music of the Spheres, the quiet solace he’d cast away. Now he cursed the ease with which he’d tumbled into Metatron’s trap.
If you couple with one of them, you will fall.
Wasn’t that a revelation? No one had bothered to warn him of that little precondition when he was sentenced. To the contrary, the old serpent had urged him to it. Lucifer had kept his eye on the prize, for he wanted Zamiel to fall.
Yet he’d played fair, for Lucifer. During their encounter, he’d warned his son he would lie twice. Clearly this lie of omission had been one of them.
Thank the True Creator his instincts had kept him out of mortal beds. Now it seemed he’d been right to be fearful—not on their behalf, but for himself. Even living as one of them in their very midst, the Angel of Death must remain apart and alone.
One truth was certain. He must keep far away from Linnet Norwood.
Chapter Eight
Linnet pushed away the heavy tome and straightened her aching back. For hours, she’d been poring over the household accounts of the Tudor court during the progress of 1536. Her eyes burned from straining over pages of cramped handwriting. Her bottom had gone numb from prolonged contact with the bench.
Clearly the court archives were not furnished for comfort—trestle tables, backless benches and poor illumination from the narrow casement. But she meant to take advantage of last night’s largesse. God knew, Elizabeth Tudor seemed as mercurial as her infamous father. She might revoke the privilege at any moment.
Carefully, Linnet sanded and blotted the parchment lined with her curling copperplate script—the list of noble households who’d journeyed with the King that summer.
Surely, if proud Catriona Norwood had strayed, she would have chosen a noble lover. If so, somewhere in this roster Linnet would find the name of her true father.
When she rose, pricks and needles raced down her legs. Wiggling her toes, she gazed longingly at the square of blue sky beyond the casement. Surely she’d earned the right to a brisk walk in the bright cold.
Soon, Linnet was striding smartly through the Great Orchard. Orderly rows of apple trees stood skeletal in the February sun, brittle branches raised for the warm kiss of spring. A thin crust of snow crunched beneath her boots. Severe cold had frozen the Thames solid this winter, just as it froze the breath in her lungs. Thankfully, it kept the courtiers ensconced in their fire-warmed chambers.
Wrapped in precious solitude, Linnet allowed her thoughts to stray to Zamiel. She’d lain awake half the night reliving that terrifying encounter with the Frenchman and his knife, and the lethal grace that was Zamiel in battle.
The sight of him lounging on her divan, perspiration glittering along the lean column of his throat, naked above the waist save for his decadent ebony mane and those sinister, silver-stitched gauntlets he never removed.
Sweet Jesus, the raw hunger of his kiss. That strange, fevered, awkward urgency, the bone-deep shock of his tongue twining around hers like wet silk. Her body flushed at the memory, nipples rising against her smock.
Last night, after hours of restless tossing, on fire beneath the blankets, she’d eased a hand beneath the covers to brush her tingling nipples, taut and aching beneath her nightrail. When her fingers circled and glided over the tight peaks, tendrils of sensation had zinged through her. She’d closed her eyes and shuddered, thinking of Zamiel’s gloved fingers.
Finally, driven mad by the sweet ache mounting in her core, she’d pulled up her nightrail and touched herself there, gasping when her fingers found slick swollen flesh. Surely, in the privacy of the marriage bed, a husband would stroke her just so, slipping one finger into her tight channel to find hot flesh coated with the creamy dew of passion.
Would he touch the throbbing pearl, hard and swollen, where her desperate ache seemed to center? The place she’d found so swiftly, swirling her own moisture around the sensitive bud, until her thighs spread and she arched into her own hand, writhing and moaning as her need mounted. Her pace had quickened until the last shameful strokes made her soar to the very heavens, alone in the darkness of her bed.
Shocking.
Shameful.
But oh, so seductive.
Somehow her fantasies about the marriage bed and Zamiel had tangled together and tied her in knots. The only proper context for such intimacy was marriage, but Zamiel of Briah was singularly unsuited for such a role.
A foreign sound intruded on her thoughts—the low melody of a woman singing. Her attention snapped back to the Great Orchard.
Now the winter sun hovered low and dim above the red brick wall of the Tiltyard where Henry Tudor had held his tourneys. Blue shadows stretched across the snow as the world held its breath in the deep hush of sunset.
Linnet had fancied herself alone in the gardens. Steps slowing, she pivoted, searching for the source of this lulling music. There, framed against the dark green tangle of the Maze, strolled a slender woman in a hooded cloak, basket swinging from her arm.
This was no glittering courtier, but a prosperous goodwife with Protestant sensibilities, fine-woven black skirts parted over white linen, with sensible boots and a black mantle to warm her. As Linnet watched, the woman paused beside a skeletal tree. Silver flashed as she cut down a withered apple, overlooked at the last harvest.
When the goodwife stood on tiptoe, tall and willowy, an errant wind rippled her mantle to reveal an inner lining of rich red silk.
The flash of crimson was so unexpected that Linnet laughed. The woman turned her head and saw her.
With a reaction that was almost pantomime, the goodwife pressed a hand to her breast, mouth rounding in an “O” of surprise. Smiling, Linnet angled her steps toward her.
The woman waited, swinging her basket idly. Beneath the hood, she was fair as any court beauty, white skin in pleasing contrast to ink-black hair and brows, lips cherry red from the cold. Her black eyes sparkled with amusement.
“A good eve to ye, mistress,” Linnet said politely. “Are ye finding many apples worth eating?”
“Just enough, for my purpose.” Her speaking voice was magical, musical and low, flavored with the trace of an accent Linnet couldn’t place. The haunting sweetness of apple blossoms floated in the air.
“Actually, I’ve a confession to make.” The goodwife’s eyes danced. “The apples are merely a convenient pretext. I followed you here from the palace. You’re Lady Linnet Norwood, aren’t you?”
Taken aback, Linnet hesitated. Prickles of unease raised the hair on her forearms. Zamiel’s warning whispered through her brain.
Someone at court is trying most determinedly to have you killed.
Her gaze dropped to the sickle-shaped knife held so casually between the woman’s long fingers.
As though sensing her trepidation, the goodwife smiled and returned her knife to its sheath.
Linnet blushed, ashamed by her own rudeness. “Aye, I’m Lady Norwood. Ye have the advantage of me, I fear, Mistress...”
“You can call me Modron.” The cowled head dipped, but she did not bow.
Proud, though she carries it well.
“An old name,” Linnet said politely. “Welsh, isn’t it? Why did ye follow me then, Modron?”
The goodwife glanced about as though she feared observation. Such a natural sense of drama she seemed to possess, like a mummer in a masque. Reflexively, Linnet too glanced back. The Great Orchard was deserted, the sky tinted mauve and purple as dusk crept in.
“Will you walk with me?” Modron asked. “I might as well gather a few more of these apples before nightfall. There will be no moon tonight.”
This, Linnet was reluctant to do. When darkness fell, she wished to be safely indoors.
/>
“What’s this about, can I ask ye?”
Modron leaned close, her black eyes no longer smiling. “It’s about Catriona Norwood. Your mother.”
For a moment Linnet reeled, so great was the shock of finding someone at last who would speak of her. Blindly she reached for the tree beside her.
“Did—did ye know my mother?”
“I knew her, aye,” Modron said. “When she came to court.”
Linnet scrutinized the face framed by the black hood. No thread of silver marred her black hair, no lines of age framed her lush red mouth and long-lidded gaze. Yet it came to her that this was no giddy young girl, or anything like. The newcomer carried herself with a woman’s poise.
Possibly, she had known Catriona as a young girl. If she did, no force under Heaven would prevent Linnet from hearing everything she had to say.
Smiling, the goodwife laced her arm through Linnet’s. Together, they strolled along the tree-lined avenue.
“How did ye know my mother? I’ve been looking for someone...anyone...”
“I’m an herbalist, my lady. And a midwife, like my mother before me. King Henry hired a dozen such that summer, to aid his Queen in bearing her precious burden. Most of the time, our duties were light. I formed a friendship with your mother, who shared my interest in herbs and growing things.”
“That’s true enough.” Linnet nodded. “Gathering herbs and flowers was her passion. Did she...was she happy that summer?”
“Never happier, so she told me. The court that summer was a joyful place. Your father the earl was rarely present, as his dour nature had not made him popular.” Modron paused. “I knew your mother had a secret admirer, a man who left her posies and trinkets—a wealthy man, I sensed, and a privileged one.”
Linnet couldn’t like the direction this ship was tacking, not when her goal was to prove her mother’s virtue. Still, she must get to the truth of the matter. She’d be a coward indeed to change course now.
Laura Navarre - [The Magick Trilogy 02] Page 14