by Jackie Ivie
Averill looked from contemplation of the palace walls beneath her back to the bedchamber. She wondered if she should make another circuit of the room, concentrating on the dark space between each column and the wall. She’d already done it four times, and found nothing. Perhaps she’d been mistaken. Perhaps the minister had placed them here for no other reason than she was Captain Tennison’s lover. It wasn’t far-fetched. The room looked created for romance, especially the bed, lit as it was with moonlight.
Averill folded her arms on the balcony ledge and put her head on it and closed her eyes. It was very romantic, and she was very tired, and that made everything very dangerous. She tightened her lips in thought, lifted her head, and opened her eyes. And gasped. Burnoose-covered bodies leapt from one balcony beneath her to another one, their passage silent. Stealthy. Sinister.
She’d known it!
And Captain Tennison hadn’t listened. Or...they were truly interested in her…and actually trying to steal her?
Averill crawled backwards until a column stopped her. She was on her feet and to the next, and the next, and stopped there, trying to meld into the dark side of it. She was in shadow. In her dark-colored robe, and with her black hair, she’d be difficult to spot. Then again, they might be used to such a ploy. And she was out of time.
“She’s not here. Curse that Al-Marabandi! He always lies. It was supposed to be easy.”
“It is easy, my friend. What isn’t witnessed, doesn’t need to be silenced.”
“You really think he hid her?”
“Only if the ruse worked. What do we care? Come. We’ve work to do.”
It took every bit of her courage, but Averill moved her head enough to peek. There were three figures in view. They were putting something under the edges of the bed. She could guess what it might be. Wait. She saw a fourth man. There could be more. She didn’t dare move to verify it. They’d been whispering in a Turkish dialect, almost too thick to understand.
“There. It’s done.”
“What about the woman?”
“What of her? Perhaps Al-Marabandi has her and she’s already joined the harem. Who cares? It isn’t her body that we get paid for.”
“We’re getting gold?”
“We get the horses. It’s payment enough. Come.”
As silently as they came, they slid over the window ledge. Averill watched their shadows move on the opposite wall. Fear pervaded everything. Stopping her mind. Chilling her limbs. She couldn’t move. The hands clinging to the column were moist and her knees hit against it as they shook. She still couldn’t believe what she’d just witnessed.
She couldn’t stay there! She moved to the next column and then the next, until she reached the one closest to the door. She wasn’t supposed to leave the room, but what if the men had left something so insidious that to stay was more dangerous? What if the trap for Captain Tennison sprung early on her? What was it the men had whispered of? That they would have had to silence her? How could she find Captain Tennison and stop him from proceeding directly to the bed? He’d mentioned his exhaustion, hadn’t he?
Averill’s breathing quickened with each unanswered, unspoken question. And that’s when the large bulk of Captain Tennison pulled from the wall right beside her, grabbed her up, and hauled her to him. Averill gasped. She had just enough time to realize who it was before his lips came down on hers.
The effect was akin to fireworks. A shower of them. Blistering and shocking and exciting. A wash of emotion filled her belly, spreading outward from there. Rose-colored wonder filled her, changing the fear of a moment before into an ecstasy of sensation.
Captain Tennison lifted his head, breaking the contact and changing her world. It was difficult to see anything other than the sheen from his eyes. Averill licked lips with a tongue that trembled. It matched the rest of her body. And then someone cleared his throat in the room behind her.
CHAPTER EIGHT
“They’ve gone.”
“They probably used scorpions.”
“How many?” The captain’s chest rumbled with his words. The sensation came each time he spoke. Against her breasts. It was intimate. Thrilling. Wrong.
“We’ve found…six thus far.”
“Quite the welcoming present.”
“I told you it was a mistake to bring a woman along.”
“They weren’t after Averill,” Captain Tennison replied. “If they had been, they’d have had her by now, or faced Al-Marabandi’s wrath. It was a ploy.”
“If they weren’t after the girl, then what?”
“Oh come, Harvey. You need ask? With the mark of your stitches on each and every saddlebag?”
“No one knows what we carry. We’ve been most secretive.”
“If more than one knows something, it’s no secret. Whoa there, I’ve no desire to be bitten.”
Averill twisted her neck to see. She had no desire for the captain to be bitten, either. She glanced at a large bag one of them carried.
“What should we do with these?”
“Smash them. There’s evil enough in the world,” Harvey replied.
“No. Wait. I’ve a better idea. I know where the minister sleeps,” one of the men whispered.
“It won’t be easy. He’ll be guarded.”
Captain Tennison smiled wickedly. Averill had never seen such an expression. “Give them to me. I’ll go pay my good friend, Al-Marabandi, a night visit.”
Averill bit her tongue to stop the exclamation from sounding. Captain Tennison was going to take the scorpions to the tall man? It was too risky a thing to do!
“I’ll accompany you.”
“No, Harvey. You’ll stay and keep an eye on Averill. That’s an order.”
“You expect me to nurse-maid a woman from the streets? I’ll have you know that is beneath me, and completely absurd. The earl will hear of this, yet.”
“Stop sounding like an old woman. I’ll take Thomas. We’ll make quick work of it.”
Tenny didn’t wait for an answer. He set Averill down, released her, moved to grab the bag and was over the balcony edge with one of his men before Averill could do more than blink. He hadn’t looked the least tired, either.
~ ~ ~
The waiting was horrid. The servant, Harvey, looked like he was suffering, too. Averill watched him walk back and forth in front of the same balcony, casting blue-tinged shadows throughout the room. Averill sat on the rim of the tub as she waited, gnawing on a fingernail with worry. Growing vexation. Anxiety.
If Captain Tennison got hurt...she wouldn’t think of it!
Harvey reached them first when they returned. Averill couldn’t move. A rope had dropped from the roof opening, snaking its way to the bed, and if she hadn’t been so choked with fear, she’d have screamed a warning. But it was the captain. Returning with his man, Thomas. And no sack.
“Andrew! Oh, thank God! This has been the worst wait of my life. When I think of the ramifications—”
“No need for dramatics, Harvey. I’ve returned soundly, and with little damage, as you can see.”
“Al Marabandi?”
“The pasha will need a new minister.”
“He truly is dead?”
“Saw it with our own eyes. The man needed better guards. Where’s Averill?” His voice sharpened as he asked it, and she stepped into sight. “Don’t hide like that. You scare a body.”
“I hid…well enough earlier, I would say.”
He smiled. “True enough. All right. It’s done. Everybody out. All of you. Watch the rooms around this one, too. Guard duty at all openings. Two on at a time. Now leave. We’ve a measure of sleep to get, and less than four hours to do it with. Damn my luck.”
“We still leave at daybreak?”
“You’d rather risk a repeat?”
“I thought you said the minster is dead,” someone spoke up.
“And my saddle is a hard bed, while my horse makes an ugly bedtime companion. Unlike yours,” another man replied.
&n
bsp; Tenny chuckled. He wasn’t the only one. “Very well. We’ll leave when we’re rested. Change the watch every two hours. Now, go! All of you.”
Averill watched him stretch while they obeyed him. It wasn’t until he untied his burnoose to toss it aside that he winced. Averill crossed to him. There was a dark streak staining the side of his tunic. It was black in the moonlight.
“Captain...you bleed.”
“One of Al-Marabandi’s guards got lucky. He won’t again. Help me off with this. I’ll see if it needs stitching.”
“You shouldn’t have gone. You should have sent one of the others.”
“You’ll not speak of this to anyone. Understand?”
It wasn’t a request. Averill didn’t answer. She helped him disrobe, displaying a nasty-looking slice crossing from directly beneath his left armpit to where his pants fastened at his waist. Blood seepage probably made it look worse. She sponged at it, but had difficulty meeting his eyes.
“Well?”
“When I speak, no one listens. Why would I bother? I told you the minister wasn’t after me.”
“It just grazed the skin. That’s what I thought, but I had to be sure. And, Averill?”
She was almost to the antechamber doorway that led to the bathtub. If they were going to keep it a secret, she’d need to soak his shirt. Averill swiveled with the garment in her hands, using it as a shield. He was leaning against one of the columns, bathed in light. In low slung trousers. She caught her breath while her heart seemed to skip a beat. All of it stupid. Useless. And it had to cease. She wasn’t going to allow him to affect her. And she refused to be in love with him!
“I do listen. Trust me.”
~ ~ ~
He wasn’t listening later. To anyone.
Averill watched where he rode at the front of the caravan, and twisted her lips. It had been stupid to give the pasha another chance, but Tenny had stayed another night, anyway. The worst part was that he’d stayed away from the white rooms. And her. She’d been left to wait and worry over his absence, interspaced with times when she couldn’t prevent a thrill of something wonderful at the memory of her first kiss. What she hadn’t managed to do was to rest. Sleep evaded her.
Averill sighed and wiped a sleeve across her eyes. It was such a waste of time. Captain Tennison had made his gentleman code very plain that first day. He wouldn’t be interested in her. It would be ‘unconscionable’ behavior on his part. She knew the rules. She’d agreed. So why was it getting harder to accept the longer she knew him?
Averill reached over for a canvas, her brushes, and her paints. She put dabs of vermilion, white, and ocher, on her canvas edge. She spent some time blending the colors together, trying for the pinkish shade of Apamea Palace. And once she had it, she forgot everything. Her surroundings. Any tiredness. Her discomfort.
Inspiration moved her brush, while fervor guided her hand. A sunrise-stained sky began to appear, blending with the walls of the palace on her canvas, making it a trick to see where one ended and the other began. She used the vermilion shade and added ocher to form tree-shaped shadows up the walls.
She was caught up. Enthralled. Driven. Her eyes continually watered and she dabbed at them time and again with her sleeve. When Pegasus swayed too far one way over the other, she held the brush until the camel resumed the cyclical motion she was used to. Then, she went back to work. Sometime in the early afternoon, they passed out of the mountainous terrain. She knew only by the fact that she didn’t have to stop and flex her fingers due to unaccustomed chill.
She painted images of coiled cobras and scorpions hiding in the shadows at the base of the palace, making it sinister and evil, once one looked past the beauty. She’d just finished putting the reflection of the pink into the bottoms of the clouds when the captain’s horse came up beside hers, making her lift the brush before she fumbled.
Her eyes were more moisture-filled than before as she turned to him, blinking rapidly.
“We’re stopping for the night. Just ahead.”
“Oh.”
“I came to see how you fared today. It’s been fairly uncomfortable for me.”
“Uncomfortable?”
“You forgot that I have a rather long scratch?”
“Oh.”
“Makes it difficult to sit a horse and pretend it’s nothing. Trust me.”
“Oh,” Averill repeated.
“Have you gone back to treating me with silence and one-word replies? I hope not. It was trying, and I did promise to listen. Remember?”
He grinned. Averill couldn’t halt the response. Her eyes widened. Her heart quickened. She trembled. Everywhere. It was a good thing she didn’t have the brush anywhere near her painting.
“Have you thought of me at all?”
Averill looked down. She couldn’t answer that. She didn’t dare.
“Well. I’ve thought of you. And little else. It’s becoming a curse. Why do you think I stayed away last night?”
“I didn’t know that you had,” Averill lied.
“Oh.” He cleared his throat. “That’s that, then. So. What have you been working on?”
Averill turned it to show him. He whistled softly.
“Bring it. I want to see it in the lamplight. I’ll see you at the tent.”
He spurred his horse before he’d finished and rode forward. Averill watched him ride off. She was worried now. Worried, and excited. And all of that was wrong.
It was difficult to stop Pegasus later. She usually had her canvas hooked to the saddlebag by the time they stopped. Not this time, and not this painting. She had it held aloft, while her other hand kept a paint-filled brush from touching anything. The camel was well-trained, though. Once he was stopped, he knew what to do. His kneeling motion came with a swaying lurch. Averill clenched her thighs to hold on. The dismount was easier. And then she leaned the picture against her pack and knelt to swish her brush clean. It was too dark to see when she’d finished, and had everything put away. No one approached her. The captain may say he thought of her, but he was proving that falsehood. She sighed, picked up her painting and started the search for his lean-to.
~ ~ ~
“It’s amazing, Averill. Stunning. You know…there are few with a talent such as yours. May I have it?”
Averill looked away before she met his gaze. “It already belongs to you. If it were not for your sponsorship, I would have nothing. You know this.”
“You sell yourself cheaply.”
“I don’t sell myself at all, Captain.”
“Oh. Poor choice of words. Forgive me. That wasn’t what I meant.”
Captain Tennison reclined back onto his pallet, and then winced. He covered it over instantly.
“Does it pain?” she asked.
“Only when I move.”
Averill smiled.
“What I meant was – in the proper circles – you’d be in such demand, you could charge whatever you like. I would be surprised if your paintings didn’t fetch quite a few pounds back home. Twenty-five. Fifty. Maybe more.”
Her mouth fell open. “Surely...you jest.”
He rolled toward her, onto his side, catching his breath at the movement. His tunic had a dark spot near the waist. It glinted with wetness. Averill’s eyebrows lifted and her eyes met his.
“What?” he asked.
“Your wound.” She pointed.
“I said it was uncomfortable. The damned thing has opened up. I hope you’ll forgive the roughness of my language. A Tennison is usually known for his manners when around ladies.”
“I’m no lady, Captain Tennison.”
“Harvey already has that opinion, I’m afraid. I don’t share it. I’m thinking you’re very much a lady, and used to a very sheltered life. Until recently. Tell me I’m wrong.”
“I don’t…want to talk about myself.”
“As you’ve already informed me. I’m afraid I’m disregarding your wishes at present. What the minister offered back there at the Palace? You...u
h, you wouldn’t consider a future of that sort, would you?”
Captain Tennison wouldn’t meet her eyes. He pulled a string from the pallet before him. Averill watched as he wound it about his index finger, and then released it.
“What sort are you implying?” she asked.
“In a rich man’s harem.”
Averill inhaled sharply. It didn’t stop the pain. The sensation just kept spreading. She was even less successful at stopping the tremor in her voice as she answered. “I never...gave it much thought.”
“You aren’t annoyed at me for keeping you from it? Despite Al-Marabandi and his ilk, life at the palace would be easy. And the pasha is a very rich man.”
“I would rather die of starvation in the streets of Cairo than become a rich man’s play-thing.” Except with you. Averill kept from voicing the last words by dint of will. She watched him roll back over and shut his eyes. A tide of gooseflesh roved her arms. She was amazed that her voice hadn’t given it away.
“I must have the thickest tongue of any man in my acquaintance. You wouldn’t be that. You’d be his wife. Well…one of them. He’d wed you. I’d require it.”
“A man with more than one wife is a sinner,” she whispered.
“Ah. A clue.”
“Clue?”
“To you, of course. Were you in a convent, Averill?”
Averill’s eyes widened as he turned his head toward her. She put her hands over her face to shield it. “No,” she answered finally.
“To lie is a sin, too, Averill.”
“It’s not a lie.”
“I wonder what could possibly be so horrid that you’d flee the security of the church to the dubious protection of Sen-Bib.”
“It was no convent.” She hadn’t any control over her reaction. She’d managed to stave it off while painting, but she hadn’t any such option available to her now. All she had was the concerned gaze of Captain Tennison. “It was the mission…the orphanage of Saint Mary, next to the cathedral.”
