And I knew what it meant. I wasn’t a fool, after all. Perhaps I had been for some time, but now I knew. I knew.
Heaven help me, I was attracted to my own guard. How had I let that happen? He had been at the periphery of my life for so many years, what in the world did my heart think it was doing, attaching itself to him? Wanting him was ridiculous, laughable.
Only I didn’t want to laugh. My heart ached with the realization that I simply wanted to be close to him. I wanted him to want me in return and his words just now had sounded very much like he might—he just might. And that thought—that horrible, wonderful thought—made me want to run away. I couldn’t let myself believe it, not when all my experience had taught me that anyone ridiculous enough to care for me was dangerous. Only I couldn’t run away because he was West, my guard. Where I went, he followed. It was his job; I was his job.
Not only that, but I considered West a friend—which was a miracle in the first place—and I believed he saw me as a friend as well. I valued that too much. To acknowledge an attraction would be risking too much. I couldn’t lose him as a friend, and I couldn’t risk him losing his post. A mutual attraction would certainly be grounds for his removal from my service. I wouldn’t do that to him.
Chapter Eleven
AS MUCH AS I had tried to convince West that the kiss from Dante meant nothing to me, I couldn’t convince myself that it had meant nothing to him. This morning’s session was going to be uncomfortable at best and torturous at worst.
The moment Dante came into my space, the awkwardness settled between us. He wouldn’t meet my eye. “Where were we?” he asked, as if he couldn’t get his own thoughts straightened out.
I felt bad that my rejection seemed to have made him so uncomfortable, but what had he expected? That I’d fall into his arms?
As he tried to find his footing to start our lesson, my brow furrowed and I pressed my lips, unsure of how to respond to his lack of professionalism. As Dante tried to lecture while avoiding eye contact, it was difficult not to become annoyed. My life had provided me with a great deal of experience in acting unaffected by the opinion of others. I had to remember that most people could not so easily set aside their emotional distress. I was here to make progress, and I couldn’t let his discomfort turn me into someone I didn’t want to be anymore. So I let his quiet voice sift over me and tried to understand him instead of judging him. At least he wasn’t snubbing me or sneering.
I sensed the energy in the room shift and turned to see what had happened. Master Sterrino stood at the end of the room, near the stairs, his eyes scanning his students until they rested on me.
Dante finally noticed my distraction and turned to watch Master Sterrino as he crossed toward me.
I stood, wondering why he would choose today, this moment, to acknowledge me when he had been content to leave my instruction to Dante for weeks.
The master painter stopped before me, his perusal frank and assessing. I thought I should say something—a greeting or a question—anything. But my mouth was hollow, devoid of words.
His eyes cut over to his apprentice and then back to me. “Well,” he said with obvious impatience, “come with me.” He turned and strode back toward the stairs, never checking over his shoulder to see if I followed.
I did. I dropped my brushes and chased after him, scrubbing my hands on my apron as I went, then quickly untying it and tossing it aside just before I reached the stairs. I wanted to look my best if I was going to finally have an audience with the master.
We descended and entered the courtyard. He crossed it, threw open another set of French doors and stepped inside. I followed, glancing behind me to see that Dante followed at my heels, as did Stephen.
I turned back and realized that this room was very much like the one I had seen Master Sterrino working in the first day I had come, only this one was obviously used for painting instead of sculpture. It was almost empty, nearly cavernous. There was one large canvas sitting on an easel in the middle of the room. It sat atop a large piece of heavy cloth that covered the floor and held an assortment of paints and more brushes than I had ever seen sitting out, ready to be used. Perhaps this was a demonstration. I might be able to see the master painter at work.
My excitement dimmed when he turned abruptly to face me. His face was curious. “Dante says you have talent.”
Oh. He did? I didn’t realize Dante thought enough of me to mention something to the master. Especially after the fiasco yesterday. Perhaps he had spoken to the master before yesterday. I should have said something, but once again, I lacked the words.
“Of course, I can’t simply take his word on such things. It’s hard for me to believe that you could have that much promise, considering your background.” He shot the words at me, clearly meaning harm. “However, I am surprised that you have lasted this long without throwing a tantrum and storming off in a fit, so I thought I would take the opportunity to see for myself.”
My face heated in indignation, but I managed to hold in the words that crawled up my throat. It would have been so easy for me to respond to his arrogance with a healthy dose of my own, but I reminded myself that I was striving for humility. “Very well. What shall I paint?”
His eyes narrowed. “If you have to ask, perhaps you are not worth my time.” He turned in a way that suggested he was done with me.
“I am worth your time,” I called after him.
He spun around, pinning me with a steely gaze. “Anyone who has to ask what they should paint is not worth my time. A true artist would know that painting something from my suggestion would be a poor way of showing me what you are capable of. True artists have heads too full of life and thought and dancing images to bother asking someone else for ideas.”
I blinked, shocked that he had so successfully put into words what I felt. Only I had always viewed it as something to squelch, something to set aside, or control. And here he was asking me to pour the mess that was in my head onto a canvas. While he watched.
“What say you, Lorraina? Are you ready to be an artist, or should your guards pack your things this evening so that you can run on home?”
My eyes widened in shock. This was the man I had hoped would guide me. Yet he acted like a bully, purposefully poking at my insecurities. If he thought that I would back down, he was sadly mistaken. I opened my mouth to tell him as much, but his words stopped me.
“Now.” He stepped toward me, grabbing my arm and pulling me forward until I stood in front of the canvas. He jabbed a finger at the blank expanse. “This is your one chance. This is it. So I suggest you take it! If you are so convinced that I should spend my time teaching you instead of a worthier candidate, then prove it!”
My chest rose and fell as I battled my emotions. I fought for poise, for dignity. I fought for the righteous indignation I had felt only moments before.
But his words screamed through my head, over and over until all I could hear were the words Tobias had spoken to me. What’s pathetic is that you have one chance. And this is it. I—am it. I’m your one chance to choose, and you won’t take it!
It had been a long time since I’d felt this kind of burning anger, and I hated it. I hated that Sterrino had found a way to fling me back into the muck that I’d been in throughout my youth, that he could make me feel isolated and unwanted. What did he want? For me to paint something angry and disgusting? To tear open my healing heart and smear my own blood all over the canvas? I had put up with Dante’s provocations—his odd mood swings—all in the hopes of having a chance to work with this man, to show him what I could do. Now as he stood there, mocking, I couldn’t make myself move.
“That’s what I thought,” he said with grating satisfaction. “Brilliance comes from experiencing life, from true love and true loss. I didn’t expect a privileged member of the royal family to be acquainted with either.” He raised one eyebrow as a final challenge.
True loss? He wanted to know what my loss looked like? “Fine.” I stalked ov
er to the paints. “You want me to paint something you’ll understand?” I ignored the brushes and thrust my hand directly into the bowl of deep black, scooping out a handful and slapping it onto the canvas in globs. I grabbed a rag and smeared the paint until it spread in uneven, clumsy strokes across most of the canvas. But I couldn’t leave the black uncontaminated, so I grabbed two more rags, dipping one into the gray and the other into brown, smearing them on top of the black, mixing everything into a muddy mess. If pain and angst was all he wanted to see, then I could certainly give him that. I had spent so much of my life pushing people away—afraid that any close attachments would make me weak, that having fun with my sisters would make me less worthy of my title. I knew what isolation, anger and fear would look like. I threw the rags aside and curled my hands into claws, then dragged my fingernails over the canvas, slashing through the paint, criss-crossing in jagged, broken stripes. I scrubbed my hands on my skirts, forgetting that I had abandoned my apron, and moved on to the bowl of red. The final touch would speak of blood because that had been the ending of my tragic story. The story that I would just as soon have left behind but which Sterrino seemed determined to drag out of me. I grabbed a jar of linseed oil and dumped some into the red, mixing it until it was thin and fluid; then, cupping my hands in the bowl, I filled them with crimson liquid before flinging it at the canvas. It splashed across the surface, dripping down in rivulets. I shook my hands forward, splattering the edges with the excess paint from my hands, then took two steps back, my breathing labored as I took it in. What I had created was angry, torn, and ugly. Exactly what I had wanted. Exactly what I thought Master Sterrino deserved.
I swallowed the lump in my throat, trying to tamp down the burning in my chest caused by the blatant reminder of the pain I used to cling to so desperately. I tore my gaze away, refusing to claim it as my own and spun to face Master Sterrino. He was staring at me, his eyes intent but unemotional.
I flung one paint-caked hand toward my work. “There you have it,” I declared. “Enjoy.” I sank into a mocking curtsey, but as I did, it reminded me too much of the way I used to treat people, of the way that Tobias used to taunt and humiliate, and I hated myself for stooping to such depths. I turned without meeting his eyes and stalked out of the studio.
Reaching the doors, I pressed my forearms against the heavy wood and pushed them wide, escaping into the clean air. I stumbled across the veranda and sank onto the top step, my elbows propped on my knees with my hands held up in front of my face. The blood-red paint dripped down to my elbows and onto my skirt. I glanced down at myself, noting my ruined dress before returning my focus to my hands.
What had I let him do to me? What had I been reduced to? This wasn’t me, not any more. A blaze kindled in my chest and spread upward, searing my throat and burning behind my eyes. My red hands blurred in front of me and my breath caught in my throat as the memories of all the loneliness I had inflicted on myself sped through my mind. I let my face fall into the crook of my elbows, fisting my hands into my hair and pulling. I wanted the pain in my scalp to bring me back to the present, to prevent me from sinking back into those moments—those moments when I had desperately needed someone to wrap me in their arms, but the wall I had built around myself prevented anyone from getting close enough. I kept spiraling down until a voice behind me pulled me back.
“Perhaps now you can start to really paint.”
My fists clenched even tighter at the condescending remark. I pulled my hands from my hair and stood, whirling around to pin Dante with my heated stare. “Do you think I have any desire to be taught by that man after what he just did?”
“He’s trying to teach you honesty in your craft. You need to be honest. I’ve been trying to pull it out of you, but I suppose I’ve become too soft-hearted.” He gave a self-deprecating smile. “I couldn’t do what needed to be done to get past your defenses.”
I didn’t want him inside my defenses, I wanted him away from me. “You think that was honest?” I narrowed my eyes at him. “That display had nothing to do with honesty. It was a result of the anger I felt toward Sterrino, not a representation of some deep, dark truth.” At least, I didn’t want it to be.
“Are you certain of that? I’ve been here since I was barely more than a boy. No one knows better than I how uncomfortable Sterrino’s tactics are, but they make us better. Each of his students come here believing they know enough and that all they have to do is practice and get a little bit of guidance. And every one of you is wrong. He can’t teach you until you can admit how truly ignorant you are. He strips you of your pride and gives you the chance to become artists.”
“So he sees himself as some sort of hateful god?”
His smile surprised me. “It may seem that way, but no. He has the unfortunate ability of seeing our potential and doesn’t have the patience to wait for us to find it on our own.”
“Because I couldn’t possibly be an artist without his help,” I bit out.
“Of course you could. I’m the one who told him you have talent.”
“You think you know me?” I asked. “You think that—” I jabbed my finger at the house, toward the tortured canvas inside—“is who I am?”
“Is it?”
“No.” Even as my strong voice made the declaration, I wondered if it were really true. “Not anymore. But perhaps that’s what he wants me to be. Perhaps his soul is so tortured that he can’t stand to think that some of us aren’t as mangled as he is.”
“So there was no truth to that in there?” His voice was still that maddening calm. “Only someone holding on to a tremendous amount of pain would paint something like that.”
“Don’t presume to know anything about my life.”
“You wish me to believe that you’re not here to recover from some tragedy?”
“I lived through a tragedy, yes. And sometimes it still hurts, but I’m recovering well enough without some crazed master painter’s misguided attempts to make me more honest.”
“Tell me of your tragedy, then.”
I turned away from him, prepared to walk straight home. I was not about to entertain him with tales of my pain.
“You loved someone.” He threw the words at my back.
I stopped, breathing heavily, wondering if I could tell him that one part of my story. That one part that was the culmination of my own self-punishment. “Yes.”
“Did you leave him?”
I spun to glare at him, my arms crossed. “What does it matter?”
“I can’t imagine he left you.” I couldn’t tell if that was a backhanded compliment or not.
I shook my head. He wanted honesty, then here it was. “He was killed. Right in front of me.”
He fell back a step, his eyes wide with shock and concern. “You saw him murdered?”
My gaze remained steady. “It wasn’t murder. The law claimed his life.”
“You loved a criminal?”
“I loved the man I thought he could be.”
He looked me up and down, his gaze assessing. “I never thought of you as someone who would give in to their passions and bend the rules.” His eyebrows lifted, challenging, and I wondered if he was thinking of the way I had rejected his kiss.
My eyes dropped, unable to hold his gaze. “That’s because I’m not. Tobias was a mistake, one that I paid for for a long time.”
“I see.”
Did he? I had the suspicion that he didn’t see me at all.
He clutched his hands behind his back. “Master Sterrino has asked that all of your paintings be gathered for him to study tomorrow, including any that you brought from home.”
“What?” I breathed in shock. “He’s not having me sent home?” I had been certain he would. One of my reasons for painting such a hideous mess had been to provoke him into getting rid of me. I didn’t know if I even wanted to stay after experiencing Sterrino’s tactics.
“He was impressed by your passion. The way you held nothing back.”
I was flabbergasted, trying to work my mind around Sterrino’s logic.
“Your paintings,” he reminded me. “I’ll gather the ones here, but you’ll need to send over any that you’ve kept at home. Preferably this evening.”
I nodded mutely, trying to feel the triumph of gaining Master Sterrino’s attention, but there was no triumph in what I had just done.
Dante departed without further comment and I was left to stare at the red staining my hands.
Chapter Twelve
I WAS STILL standing dumbstruck on the veranda when the wind began blowing, making the air cold enough that I noticed. My legs trembled where I stood, but I forced a cleansing breath into my lungs and straightened my back. I slipped inside, keeping my eyes down as I found the washbasin and watched the red paint swirl into the water.
I went home. I don’t recall speaking a single word on the way there as I tried to put my memories of the past back in their proper place. I don’t know if anyone tried to greet me or gain my attention. If they did, my guards must not have let them get close enough to interrupt my roiling thoughts.
When the butler was helping me out of my cloak, I remembered Master Sterrino’s request and asked Stephen and West to gather my paintings and take them to the studio. As tempted as I was to abandon this entire endeavor, I knew I would regret leaving now. Painting was an integral part of me, and as much as I would have liked the ability to consider Master Sterrino’s opinion irrelevant, the truth was that if he judged my talent unworthy, I didn’t know where I would go from here.
As soon as I reached my room, I asked Sarah to draw a bath for me. I usually took my time to soak when I bathed, but today I climbed in and scrubbed my hands and arms, as well as my hair where I had fisted my paint-covered hands in it, ridding myself of the evidence as quickly as possible, then stepped out.
I put on a clean dress and joined Lady Brook for tea. She chattered in her usual pleasant manner and I tried to be attentive and smile when appropriate.
Painting Rain (Books of Dalthia Book 4) Page 10
