The Day of the Duchess

by Sarah MacLean

  “You’d think he’d have given up on her, what with her clear disinterest.”

  His words were more growl than speech. “Ah, but it wasn’t disinterest. It was fear. Fear of what might have been. And, as he was a mortal, fear of what she would most certainly lose if she succumbed.”

  Her heart. Him.

  Sera remained silent, and he continued, his words soft and liquid in this private, untraveled space. They were as secret as the place itself. “Orion did not fear blindness. He only feared never finding her. Never having the chance to convince her that they were for each other. That mortal or no, he could give her everything. Sun, moon, stars.”

  “Except he couldn’t,” she whispered.

  He hesitated at the words, and she noticed his fist clench around the handle of the torch, the way the light trembled there, in the dimly lit corridor, as though her words could manipulate it.

  “The sisters went to Artemis, the goddess of hunters, thinking that if she called Orion off his search, he would listen. They pledged her their fealty. And she went to him.”

  “He refused,” she said, suddenly knowing the story without ever having heard it. She drew closer to him, desperate for the ending. Knowing it would be tragic.

  Wanting it to be happy.

  “Of course he refused,” Malcolm said, meeting her at a distance. “And that was his mistake.”

  “Never cross a goddess,” she whispered.

  He gave a little laugh then, and the years disappeared with the upturned lines at the corners of his eyes, his smile drawing her in, making her wonder at the way those eyes saw and knew and revealed. “As though I have not learned that lesson myself.”

  She watched the words on his lips, the memory of their smoothness and strength an assault. What if she kissed him? Not like she had the last time, with anger and frustration, but with pleasure? What if she kissed that smile? Could she catch it? Keep it for herself, for all the moments she was alone and wished she could remember it?

  No. “Tell me the rest.”

  He lifted his hand, and anticipation consumed her as his gaze moved to the place where his fingers hovered above her skin, an unfulfilled promise. “Artemis went to Zeus.”

  It would not end happily.

  Malcolm took a deep breath and exhaled. Sera felt the warm air at her temple. Ached at the touch. “She went to Zeus and asked him to hide Merope. To punish the man.”

  To punish them both.

  “How?”

  His gaze remained transfixed on his fingers, a hairsbreadth from her cheek. “First, he turned them into doves.”

  Her breath caught, and he looked at her then, as though he knew what she was thinking. She, too, had been turned into a dove. And it hadn’t been enough to hide from him. But he did not know Sera had been a dove once.

  “But finding his dove was no challenge for Orion, not even blind. Not even heartsick. He knew her song.”

  It meant nothing. It was a story.

  “What’s more, as a dove, Merope was all anguish. Doves, you see, mate for life. And so in asking for her to be saved from a lifetime with a mortal, Artemis had submitted her acolyte to the worst kind of pain—the pain of longing for her match. Orion knew this, and he did not rest, refusing to stop searching for her. He traveled to the ends of the earth to find her. To love her.” He watched her in silence, and a long moment passed before he said, “And he did.”

  Her breath was shallow and uncomfortable, Malcolm had never found her. He’d never looked for her. She’d found him. It had been her on the floor of Parliament, no longer a dove in search of a mate, but a sparrow in search of her freedom.

  “What happened?” she asked.

  “He nearly had her. They were nearly reunited.”

  Sadness coursed through her. “Not enough.”

  His fingers finally, finally settled like a kiss on her cheek. Light and perfect and gone. “Never cross a goddess. Artemis returned to Zeus.”

  Sera exhaled, hating the way she missed that barely-there, barely-happened touch. “Damn Zeus.”

  “Zeus gave Artemis her wish.”

  “But not in the way anyone wanted.”

  He turned away. “Not in the way they wanted, certainly.” He stepped into the dark room beyond, and Sera followed as though on a string, desperate for the end of the story. He crossed the room, torch in hand, pool of light following him, keeping him safe from the darkness beyond. The darkness that consumed her.

  “Merope was not destined to marry a god, but Zeus placed her in the heavens nonetheless, alongside her sisters.” The words echoed in the room, instantly unsettling her with their great, hollow sound reverberating against the walls. She turned in a full circle, looking up, disconcerted by her inability to place herself in space.

  “Fixed to the firmament.”

  She looked toward him, and saw two of him, his back to her and his reflection in the wall of the room on the far side. It was a massive mirror. A dome of mirrors. She looked up. She watched him in the mirror, his eyes black as he lifted his flame to light another torch on the far side of the room.

  “And Orion, desperate to be near her, begged to join her.”

  He lit another torch on the far side of the room. Not mirrors. Glass. Another. And another, until he finally set his torch in its waiting seat near the door to the room, reflections of light mirrored back and forth around the room, bathing them in the golden glow of each piece of thick, tempered glass, broken by ironwork the likes of which Sera had never seen. On the floor, the missing sister from the gazebo above—Merope, massive and glorious, writhing in stunning mosaic tile.

  And beyond the glass, water, made starlit with her husband’s fire.

  Haven’s words cut through her astonishment. “So it is that Orion chases her. Forever.”

  Sera was consumed in that moment by all the things she should not do. She should not have stayed, but how could she not? At the center of an underwater ballroom, like something out of the myth he’d just whispered to her?

  Staying was one thing, however. Moving toward him was quite another. She should not have done that, either. She should have stood her ground on one end of the magnificent space, summoned her sense, and told him, categorically, that he should invite the remaining candidates for her replacement here, to win their hearts and minds. Because certainly, this place was magic enough to do just that to just about anyone.

  Which was likely why Sera moved to him, summoned by this place that she’d never imagined. That she could barely imagine now that she stood inside it, intoxicated by its magnificence.

  She resisted the idea of showing the others this place, hated the thought of their sharing it with him, hated the idea of them seeing this version of him, manipulating water and air with his strength and purpose. Strength and purpose that had intoxicated her before. That intoxicated her still.

  She stopped mere inches from him. Close enough that if he wished to, he could reach out and take her into his arms. If she wished to, she could reach out. Take him. Not that she wanted to.

  Liar.

  She shook her head. “This place . . .”

  She did not have the words for what this place did to her. What his words had done to her. This room was myth made flesh, sticking her in the firmament as surely as if he was Zeus himself. Of course, he wasn’t.

  “I built it for you.” The confession was so soft it almost wasn’t there, followed by more, a rush of words he seemed to push out before he could stop himself. “I built it so there would be something for you when you returned. Something . . . new.”

  Something that was not weighted down with the past. With what had been lost. Their child. Their future. Sorrow came like a blow and she closed her eyes, letting it wash over here before she took a deep breath and looked up at the magnificent dome, hundreds of black squares of glass reflecting her. Turning her into starlight.

  And him, too, the top of his head reflected dozens of times, his mahogany curls the only glimpse of him as he spoke, the w
hispered words echoing around them in acoustic perfection. “The day it was finished, I stood here, alone, thinking of you.” He looked up then, to the perfect black mirror of the dome, finding her eyes instantly. Holding her attention as he said, “I dreamed of you here. In song.”

  She snapped her gaze to his without the safety of the mirror. “You built me a stage.”

  He lifted one shoulder and let it fall. “You loved to sing,” he said, simply, as though it was enough. “And I loved to listen to you.”

  She knew what he wanted. Could hear the echo of the song in her head that she’d sung to him an eternity ago. Before their mothers had arrived and he’d discovered her silly plan—one that had never been so nefarious as it had been misguided.

  And damned if she didn’t want it, too.

  “I miss it.”

  “Singing?”

  Singing for you.

  The thought shocked her, and she cast about for a different reply. “Performance becomes addiction. One finds oneself craving applause like affection. Song, like air.” Her heart began to pound and she immediately regretted the words. She knew well the craving of the latter. How much had she dreamed of it from this man?

  “And so the Sparrow is born.”

  She nodded. “In song, freedom.”

  “Are you so caged? You’ve only been here for three weeks.”

  I’ve been here for three years.

  She did not give voice to the words, instead saying, “Three weeks is an eternity without approval, Your Grace.”

  For a moment, she thought he would fight her—push her for seriousness. But instead, he took a step back from her. “By all means, then, sing.”

  “And you shall approve?”

  “We shall see.” He was magnificent in his arrogance—had always been able to win her with it.

  She grinned and lifted her skirts, showing her ankles as she did a small jig. “Long live the ladies, lovely legs to the floor. Long live the duchess, the Sparrow, the—”

  He closed his eyes before she reached the end of the ditty, and she stopped, the final word hanging between them, at first jest and then jab, and she regretted evoking it, that word that had hung between them before, too many times.

  She dropped her skirts, and Malcolm opened his eyes when the echo stilled around them. “And so? Does the space suit?”

  He had built this place for her, he claimed. For the future and not the past. And even as she knew that it was impossible to forget the past that lay between them, she found herself unable to try.

  She nodded. “It’s perfect.”

  “Would you sing for me?”

  She knew what he wanted. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “Likely not,” he said. “But it does not change the desire.”

  And like that, she realized she wanted it, too, as though singing the song she’d sung to him years earlier would somehow free her. Free them. For something new and fresh. She hadn’t sung it in three years. Not since she’d sung it to him.

  But she remembered every note, every word, as though it were a prayer. And perhaps it was. Perhaps she could exorcise the past with it.

  She closed her eyes, and sang, full and free, the perfect dome sending the sound curling back to them. “Here lies the heart, the smile, the love, here lies the wolf, the angel, the dove. She put aside dreaming and she put aside toys, and she was born that day, in the heart of a boy.”

  When she opened her eyes, he was watching her with gleaming pleasure, color on his cheeks and breath coming harsh. He approached her, the last notes swirling around them, and reached for her, pushing a loose curl back behind one ear. She should have stepped back from him, but found herself riveted by him, so close. So present. “Tell me, Seraphina. If there were no one—no sisters or god or goddess to protect you, no American, no aristocracy to watch and judge? What would you do if I pursued you?”

  His eyes darkened with his words and she could not look away. How many times had he spoken to her like this? In liquid, languid poetry? How many times had she dreamed it?

  He pressed on. “If I promised you sun, moon, stars? If I vowed to always hunt you, would you take flight? Or would you choose to be caught?”

  He was close enough that she could give in. That she could reach up and press her lips to his. That she could throw caution to the wind and take what he offered. That he could catch her.

  But he wouldn’t, not without her consent.

  “What if we could have it back, Sera?” The whisper destroyed her, the ache in the words matching the ache in her chest. “What if we could start anew?”

  She shook her head. “You should never have brought me here.”

  He took a step toward her. Ignoring the words. “Would you take it?”

  She swallowed, knowing she shouldn’t.

  He saw the hesitation. Leaned in, willpower alone keeping him from kissing her. How did he stop himself when all she wanted was to let herself go?

  He stopped for her. “Take it, Angel.”

  One time. This one time, and then she would end it. Pass him on. Let him find a new wife. Let herself pursue freedom.

  But this one, single time, she would take what he offered. What she desired.

  She would get him out of her mind forever.

  One time.

  She came up on her toes, closing the distance between them as he whispered—more breath than sound—a single devastating word, a word echoed in her heart.

  “Please.”

  Chapter 19

  Haven Hooked by Huntress

  There was nothing soft about the way they came together, nothing quiet or tentative. They crashed into each other as though the dome around them might implode and wash them away, and if this was to be their last moment together, why not let it be one of power and passion and devoid of regret?

  Why not have one, single moment when there was nothing between them—no plotting or anger or frustration or clamoring for something else—nothing between them but the desire that had always consumed them? The pleasure they had always wrought?

  Sera’s hands were instantly in Mal’s hair, threading, pulling him to her, her lips already opening for him as he sent her hairpins flying, bringing her hair down around her shoulders before his arms came around her, lifting her high against him as he stole her breath.

  As she stole his, as she claimed him.

  There had been a time, long ago, when she would have followed him where he led. But not now, not when she’d dreamed of him for so long and changed so much. Now, she was his equal. Each led, each followed.

  And it was glorious.

  His hands were at the ties of her bodice, unraveling her even as she set to work on his coat, shucking it over his shoulders. He paused in his work at her gown, flinging the garment across the room even as he refused to release her from their kiss. Her hands chased over the lawn of his shirt, reveling in the hard, warm muscle beneath as he tugged at the silk cords keeping him from her.

  After a long moment, he lifted his lips from hers. She opened her eyes, intoxicated by their kiss and desperate for him to touch her again. It was her turn to plead. To feel his desire shudder through him when she did.

  With a wicked curse, he clutched the edge of the fabric where the ties seemed to flummox him, and he pulled, hard and fast, rendering the silk cords unnecessary as the fabric split in two, baring her to him.

  Another curse. His. Perhaps hers, lost in their groans as his broad warmth pressed to her and they kissed again, long and rough and full of everything they had spent years denying.

  And then he tore his lips from hers and set them to her jaw, her cheek, her ear, down the column of her neck, giving her all the words she’d ever dreamed of, wicked and wonderful. “I have ached for you for so long,” he confessed to her skin, his lips playing at the secret places to which only he had ever had access. “It has always been you, every night, Angel.”

  His tongue came out, swirling a little circle at the place where her neck met
her shoulder, and when she gasped, he said, “I have lain awake every night, visions of you haunting me until I have no choice . . .”

  He trailed off, those lips sliding down the slope of her chest to the place where her breasts strained at the top of her corset. “Visions of your skin—miles of perfection—of your beautiful lips. Of your eyes, like sin. Of your breasts,” and then he was there, lifting them from her corset, sliding his lips over the delicate, desperate skin of them, drawing little, teasing circles around her nipples. “You used to love it when I suckled you here,” he whispered, the filthy words sending heat and heavy desire coursing through her.

  “Do it,” she whispered.

  “Anything you wish,” he whispered, his tongue finding the straining tip of one breast. “Everything you wish, love.”

  Love. The endearment thrummed through her, and she pushed it away, instead, setting her hands to his impossibly soft curls and showing him just where she wanted him. “I wish this,” she said, his lips coming to take her nipple into his warm, glorious mouth. He shook beneath her touch—or perhaps it was she who trembled. He stilled until she said the filthy word herself. “Suck.”

  He did, giving her everything she’d ached for on her own nights. In her own darkness. Pleasure coursed through her at his touch, at first one breast and then the other, until her knees were weak and he was catching her, lowering her to the tiled floor.

  He made quick work of the fastenings of her corset even as she tugged the shirt from his waist, her hands finding the warm, hair-roughened skin beneath, and tears threatened at the feel of him beneath her fingertips.

  She had forgotten. It had been an eternity, and she had longed for him so well, and so thoroughly, and still, she had forgotten the feel of him. And now, the memories returned and she could not hold the glory and the ache and the thrill at bay.