Highlander: The Measure of a Man

by Nancy Holder

  “My scimitar,” he said suddenly.

  She lifted the edge of the cloak. The scimitar lay beside his naked thigh. He touched the razor-sharp blade, allowing blood droplets to pool on his skin. Then, assured that the weapon had not been damaged, he wrapped the cloak around his waist and inclined his head. “I thank you for what you’ve done. Had another found me…”

  “You would have been taken to the graveyard. There will be talk. Many saw how injured you were. Some saw you dead.”

  “Bloody hell.”

  “But perhaps if you stay on the islands for a time, we can claim that you revived from a deep stupor, which is true. And that your burns were limited to your body, not your face, and that they are now hidden by your clothes.”

  He groaned. More time lost, and he was back in Machiavelli’s web. She touched his hand, then quickly pulled away, blushing. “Mi dispiace, signor. I didn’t mean to be so bold.”

  “I warrant you’ve touched the whole of me,” he replied ruefully, and they both laughed.

  The main Muranese island rose from the water like a castle in a moat. An occasional pennant or spire of the palazzo could be seen from this distance, but nothing more. MacLeod had explored much of the island, and hadn’t realized any mortals there, perhaps excluding a few servants, had known the secret of the Immortals.

  “We’ll go straight to Machiavelli,” she told him. “I’m sure he’s very concerned about you.”

  “Oh, aye,” he answered wryly, but she didn’t seem to catch his sarcasm. Perhaps she was truly innocent, a bystander who had done good for the sake of it.

  The gondolier steered the craft to a stone landing at the water’s edge. He jumped out and secured it with a line, then helped the lady out. MacLeod disembarked, barefoot, sword in hand, feeling rather like a Roman in a toga.

  “He knows about Immortals, too. He’s one of Niccclo’s oldest servants,” Maria Angelina assured him, as if reading his mind. “He can be trusted. But he needn’t know our business tonight, si?”

  As if to assure MacLeod that this was so, the man, standing at a distance, pulled off his cap and bobbed his head.

  “Grazie,” MacLeod said. His hand went to where his pocket should be.

  She handed him a few pitiful coins. “These are yours, I believe.”

  Machiavelli’s money. He paid the gondolier with the Immortal’s metal and offered his arm again to Maria Angelina. She laid her cool palm over the back of his hand. Beneath the scent of smoke lay a perfume sweet and clean, and it made his head near spin.

  “You look at me so oddly,” she reproved him, though she smiled.

  He shook himself but said nothing. There was nothing to say.

  “Good,” Machiavelli said, clearly pleased as MacLeod finished his story. “Giovanni surely died in the fire.” He smiled brilliantly. “And you are spared the trouble.”

  “So this was done on my behalf?” MacLeod asked with deadly quiet.

  “Perhaps,” Machiavelli answered, his eyes glittering as if with a private joke. “As I have previously stated, what advances me advances us. The Doge will be thrilled by this turn of events.”

  “Thrilled that hundreds of innocents perished as well as one man suspected of trying to assassinate him.”

  Machiavelli laughed. “Caro Duncan, no one in Venice is an innocent.”

  MacLeod adjusted the slashings of his clothing. This outfit was closer in style to MacLeod’s own time, and simpler and easier to move in. That was good; if what he suspected was true—that Machiavelli had sent him to the banquet not to murder Giovanni Calegri, but to be beheaded himself by Ruffio—he would have need of agile movements very, very soon.

  “Oh, Signor MacLeod!” a voice shrilled from the doorway. It was Jean-Pierre, wild-eyed and jittery. “Grace à Dieu, you’re safe!”

  He waited, then pranced into the room as Machiavelli indicated his permission. “News of the fire has spread like a, well, a fire!” He clapped his hands together. “What a tragedy!”

  “You’re clearly distraught,” Machiavelli observed dryly.

  Jean-Pierre appeared not to have heard him. “It was to have been a fabulous event. They were going to have real Turkish harem girls dancing on pieces of ice in the pools. Can you imagine? I hear they are always quite naked. They rip the hair off their sexual parts with melted wax. It’s so painful they must be tied down. With velvet ropes,” he added softly. “Black eunuchs pull on their nipples for hours to make them big and red and juicy for the sultan. Most of them are lesbians, you know. They arc desperate for sexual pleasure. Their cucumbers are sent to them all cut up so they won’t use them.”

  MacLeod almost laughed aloud. He had never heard such outlandish stories told of the Ottomans, and yet clearly Jean-Pierre believed them.

  “I should like to have seen the palazzo burn up like a paper lantern with all those harridans prancing on their icebergs.” Jean-Pierre snapped his fingers. “All gone into smoke and steam. The fleeting nature of true beauty. A moment to treasure, do you not think so?”

  “What a strange creature you are,” Machiavelli said. “It’s hard to believe you were once a religious.”

  MacLeod observed them for a moment. Beneath the silly smile, MacLeod detected high tension in Jean-Pierre’s manner. His utter faith in Machiavelli had been undermined.

  MacLeod said to Machiavelli, “Tell me about the woman who rescued me.”

  The Immortal glanced at Jean-Pierre. “Maria Angelina? Your secret is safe.” He cocked his head. “She is most ravishing, is she not? Not a harem tart, that’s for certain, eh, Jean-Pierre?”

  “Oh, monsieur,” Jean-Pierre said in dismay, and Machiavelli chuckled.

  “All the men are in love with her,” Machiavelli said. “Even Jean-Pierre.”

  MacLeod made no answer. She was a new piece to the puzzle of this place. And though the pieces did not yet fit, it would be to his peril not to solve this puzzle as soon as possible.

  “What of Ruffio?” he asked bluntly.

  “Ruffio? What of him?” Machiavelli sounded confused. A master dissembler, MacLeod thought. He had never met a better liar.

  There was a clatter in the corridor. The door smashed open. Giuletta and Annette burst into the room.

  “Maestro!” Giuletta cried. “His Excellency the Cardinal is dead. He died in Rome this morning.”

  Jean-Pierre blanched and crossed himself.

  “How dreadful.” Machiavelli did the same. “How did it happen?”

  Annette said. “It was his bowels. Something he ate. It was quite slow and painful, his passing. There is to be a splendid requiem mass!”

  “New clothes shall be the order of the day,” Machiavelli decreed. To MacLeod’s amazement, Annette and Giuletta let out happy cries. “Now, go, my cherubs.” Machiavelli folded his hands and bowed his head. “Duncan, Jean-Pierre, and I must meditate on this tragic news.”

  The women departed. Machiavelli looked at MacLeod and smiled faintly. “What a relief the Papal Father did not eat the same thing. Or the king of France, who is this moment in Rome stirring up feeling against us. I hear they’re both fond of wild mushrooms.” He shrugged. “Va bene. Fortune smiled on him.”

  God’s head, the man was poisoning popes and kings. What had the previous Doge died of? The bastard would pay if ’Tonio was dead with his master. If Ali died.

  “I feel so sick,” Jean-Pierre whispered. “Oh, poor monsieur the cardinal!”

  “You look peaked.” Machiavelli said. “You should lie down.”

  “Signor MacLeod, would you help me?” Jean-Pierre whimpered.

  MacLeod understood that he wished to be alone with him, and wondered if Machiavelli understood it, too. He nodded.

  “With your permission,” he said to Machiavelli.

  “Of course.” He looked at him from over his shoulder. “Stay close to home,” he said. “Maria Angelina was quite correct when she told you to take time to ‘heal.’ If anyone sees you now, they’d burn you for a witch.”
<
br />   MacLeod walked out of the room, Jean-Pierre tagging after. He shut the door and hurried to catch up as MacLeod strode down the corridor. MacLeod’s fury was ungovernable. ‘Tonio. If he had harmed that child, he would die for that alone.

  “He murdered him,” Jean-Pierre whispered. “I have wanted to see you, signor. There is much to tell you. I have learned of terrible things!”

  “What?” On his guard, MacLeod held himself tautly and drew his weapon. From any quarter, there might be another attempt on his life. It was unnaturally dark; he had marveled earlier at the luxurious waste of candles and torches illuminating the interior of the immense palace. But now it was as cold and dark as the grave.

  Many deaths lay on his conscience. If he lived as long as Connor had once told him he would, there would be more. It was a painful thought.

  Almost as painful as the sword that sliced through his right forearm as he rounded a corner. With a shout of surprise, he changed his weapon to his left hand and lunged in the direction of the thrust.

  “No!” someone cried. “Please!”

  MacLeod sliced a piece of fabric in two, a hanging or curtain. Jean-Pierre screamed in terror as he swung the scimitar over his head, preparing to bring it down on his attacker.

  “Duncan MacLeod,” came the soft voice. It was Maria Angelina.

  “What the devil are you doing, woman?” MacLeod shouted at her, lowering his weapon at once.

  “Forgive me. I thought you were my husband.”

  Two fine-boned hands gripped his arm, and his adversary sank to the floor.

  Chapter Five

  “Men are so simple and so much inclined to obey immediate needs that a deceiver will never lack victims for his deception.”

  —Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince

  In the pitch-dark, MacLeod knelt on one knee beside the still form as Jean-Pierre held his breath and mumbled prayers.

  “Maria Angelina?” MacLeod searched the darkness and found the sleek fabric of her dress. His hand brushed her breast, the softness a shock against the stiff lace of her decolletage. Blood rushed to his fingertips; he quickly moved his hand upward, across the bared clavicle and the velvet of her skin, the hollow at her throat, lifting heavy, satiny curls away from the side of her neck. Hearing only the sounds his fingers made, sensing and hearing no other presence, he pressed his hand against her throat to check her pulse. It was beating like the heart of a hummingbird, shallow and rapid.

  “Is she dead? Is she dead?” Jean-Pierre demanded. “I should perform the last rites.”

  The blood from the cut in his sword arm dripped onto the marble floor. Had she been a true opponent, he would have been in trouble: she had separated the tendons from the bones. Even now it was incredibly painful; a swordsman of mediocre ability could have taken his head while he suffered from the pain.

  He realized that Jean-Pierre had just proved his loyalty. Or his cowardice.

  Maria Angelina stirred, sighing. Silky fingers touched his chin, found his lips. Her hand smelled of rainwater and lilacs. His body roused, and he felt dizzy; he caught her hand and held it.

  “Ah,” she murmured, “Duncan.”

  “Yes, milady. It’s Duncan.” He chafed her wrist to help bring her around. “Did I hurt you?”

  “No.” She sighed again. “Mi scusi. I had thought… there was a message. I thought you were my husband.” Holding on to his forearm, she sat up. The lilacs were stronger in her hair.

  “And you hoped to attack him?” Jean-Pierre asked in a high, startled voice.

  MacLeod was crestfallen. Married, she was. He had not thought of that.

  She said, “He’s a terrible man, Duncan. Please forgive me for lying to you.”

  “You nae told me you were unmarried. I nae asked.”

  Her hand cupped the side of his face. He took a deep breath, unwillingly remembering the sensation of his hand on her breast. Even now, in the darkness, he could recall each angle, each plane, of her face and the womanly curves of her body. Her scent was intoxicating him.

  He edged discreetly away from her. In a moment, he promised himself, he would get to his feet.

  “Maria Angelina, explain it to me, please,” he said huskily. “Tell me of this husband.”

  “He’s an Immortal. That’s why I knew of your kind. Not from Niccolo.” She took a breath. “They were once great friends.”

  He waited. He could feel her body heat. A tendril of her hair grazed the back of his hand and he focused on that, straining to ignore his other, more urgent reaction.

  “He had no patience with me. He hated that I aged. I was but fourteen when we married. And now…” She trailed off. “I’m older.”

  “Madness,” he blurted, seeing in his mind’s eye the incandescence of her skin, the deep, unending amber of her eyes.

  Jean-Pierre tugged at MacLeod’s sleeve. “We must go. I need to tell you—”

  “Every time he saw a wrinkle. Every time I displeased him. I wasn’t educated enough. I wasn’t pretty enough.” She choked back a sob. “I wouldn’t live long enough.”

  “He beat you.” MacLeod’s fists clenched. If the man had been here, now, he would have torn his head off with his bare hands.

  “It got worse and worse. Niccolo implored him to stop. Finally he took me away, and I’ve been hiding here ever since. Two years, it has been. But now Niccolo talks of reports that indicate he knows I’m here. When I heard you in the hall, I panicked.”

  She put her hand over his. “My husband told me once he had eternity to find me if I ran away from him. He said he’d kill me the way the Turks kill unfaithful women.” She shuddered. “He would torture me, Duncan.” She paused. “As the Turks torture their women.”

  “Heaven help us,” Jean-Pierre whispered.

  “Och, no,” MacLeod said, though he didn’t have the slightest idea what she was talking about. The Venetians regarded all Ottomans as sadistic butchers, but it was the sultans who did the deeds that shamed the entire empire. One such had drowned all the women in his harem because someone had hinted that one, just one, of them had slept with a eunuch. MacLeod knew many Christians far crueler than almost any Turk he could name. As well as many Christian kings who, if there was a God, would rot in Hell for the things they had done to their subjects.

  Most of the kings being English, and most of the subjects being Scots.

  He covered her hand with his, knowing it was wrong to touch her. She was married, and though he fully believed in love at first sight—all reasonable people did—he also knew it was wrong to love her.

  “No harm will come to you while I live.” Not able to help himself, he slid his arm around her waist. His stomach contracted, and he wanted her, he wanted her, couldn’t help the way his pelvis moved against hers as he lifted her up. He heard her sharp intake of breath and clenched his fists behind her back as her breasts pressed against his chest. He inhaled the sweet scent in her hair and closed his eyes. His heartbeat roared in his ears. “He’ll not touch you again.”

  She whispered in his ear, her breath hot and moist. “Niccolo has been my only protector.”

  “I need to say…” Jean-Pierre pressed.

  If only you knew what Machiavelli really is, he wanted to tell her. “This Immortal,” he ventured. “Your… husband. What is your husband’s name?”

  She hesitated as if afraid even to utter his name. “He is called Xavier St. Cloud.”

  “Oh, mon Dieu!” Jean-Pierre shrieked. “Signor MacLeod, I must tell you something now!”

  MacLeod reeled. St. Cloud was the murderer of his friend, Hamza el Kahir. Hamza had been the Immortal who had saved him from slavery when he had left Venice on a galley with a Venetian family en route to a marriage in Spain. Attacked and boarded by corsairs, the company had been taken to Algiers. MacLeod was sold at auction as a slave. To rescue him—an Immortal he did not even know—Hamza had bought him and offered him refuge within his household. He had even helped him try to rescue the daughter of the house, although tha
t proved to be a fool’s errand—she had engineered the entire episode in order to marry the corsair who had attacked them.

  Then Xavier St. Cloud had ridden in with the heat of the noonday desert sun and challenged Hamza. Rather than accept the challenge and fight—the honorable thing to do—Hamza had tried to flee. MacLeod, shocked by his cowardice, had tried to take his place. At the last moment, Hamza had stepped in, and he had lost his head, as he had known he would.

  For the sake of honor, MacLeod had pushed Hamza into combat. He felt as responsible for his death as he held St. Cloud.

  For a moment he was so off-balance he thought the floor had shifted and sent him sliding the length of the corridor. “It canna be,” he whispered. And then he thought, No, it canna be. Something is amiss here. “That is his name? You’re sure of it?”

  “What are you saying? Of course I know my husband’s name.”

  What treachery was this? Was it too much of a coincidence that of all people, she should marry an Immortal he had claimed as a blood enemy? Was this some lie, some scheme of Machiavelli’s? St. Cloud had surely known MacLeod had remained in Algiers after the death of Hamza. Had he followed him here? Had he been the one to tell Machiavelli about Ali’s mission to Venice, in order to throw the death of another friend in MacLeod’s face?

  “Do you know him?” Her voice rose and she pushed away from him. “Is he a friend to you, too? Are you all like that, all brothers who follow a code of loyalty among yourselves, and betray us mortals?”

  “A friend?” He shook his head as he grabbed her once more into his arms. Even now St. Cloud’s face hung before him like a ghostly image: the pale chocolate skin, the almond eyes, the infuriating, taunting smile that had tricked him into insisting that Hamza sacrifice himself for honor’s sake. His confusion notwithstanding, fresh rage and guilt hit him with the force of a blow across the face.

  “No, not a friend.” He seethed inside, his awakened passion translating into blind hatred. Connor had often warned him of the ferocity of his emotions. Survival required the ability to direct your emotion into the next move. Yet now he shook with thunder, urging her aside and grabbing up his sword. He fought everything within himself not to slash at something—the hanging, a chair, a statue.