She hugged herself with obvious anxiety. “It would be easier if I did not have to do this in front of people who know what I am and will… not understand.”
“I understand,” I said kindly. “I do, truly. It is very hard to live every day being stared at and whispered about—no matter the reason. But Chris, if you are going to live as a man, you will need to grow a pair of balls—at least figuratively. It will be hard. Only you can decide if the challenge is worth the reward—or if there is a reward worth achieving. There are other things you can do. I will not judge you if you decide to follow an easier course. I only despised the girl who lied about who she was and what she wanted. And…”
I glanced at the pistol she had moved away from and sighed. “And oui, I know you fell in love with me.”
Her features hardened for a moment, and then she sighed and nodded. “And I will never have you. You know, actually, it is not you. I do not say that in petulance. It is… I have kissed no other…” She shuddered. “What occurred with him does not count.”
“Non, it does not.”
She nodded. “How can he be so different? The man standing here was not the demon that attacked me. I do not understand.”
“I once tried to explain about his madness, but you would not listen,” I said, with little spite despite my choice of words
She sighed. “I will accept that, then. But how can I know he will not…”
“Will you attempt to seduce him again?” I snapped.
She sucked a long hard breath. “Non, I will not,” she said carefully without meeting my gaze. “I am not to blame,” she added.
This fanned my ire. “No more than a child is to blame when he is gored after baiting a penned bull for sport.”
She regarded me with incredulous protest.
“What was your purpose in the stable that day?” I demanded. “You were angry at me, non? You wished to…”
“Oui! I wished to prove he favored women. I wished to seduce him so that propriety would demand we were married. I wished to seduce him to… hurt you. Oui, you are correct!” She looked away. “I deserved it.”
“Non, you did not deserve what he gave. Nor did you deserve to reap a happy harvest of what you sought.”
She sank to the floor and cried.
I was moved to comfort her, but I held myself still. Instead I reached to her with words: because I did understand.
“Chris, I can only imagine the horror of being forced to carry a life in your belly that was put there through violence. And I know you did not wish for what occurred when you entered that stable. Non, you thought something—if not wonderful—at least pleasant would happen.”
“I wanted you,” she said sadly. “But I have wanted so many things. When I was a little girl, my father and mother told me I could have everything I wanted. But then every day I learned of something else I could not have, because I was a girl. And then I met you, and you should have been a thing I could have had because I was a girl. And then even that was taken away. Now I do not know what I want and I am afraid to seek anything because I feel it will surely be denied.”
I wished to protest that I was not so very great a prize, but then I knew I should not take it personally. The Fates had seen to cast me into a role in her life. Another actor could have played the part; but I wondered, did I play the role poorly, or had the Gods sought what I did bring to the part?
“Chris,” I said softly, “I say again, there is no glory in a simple life. Oui, if I had loved you as you wished, things would be different, but perhaps the… Gods wish for you to climb a little higher than your average love-struck girl can dream.”
She frowned up at me. “Then They are not being fair.”
“Are They not? Are sheep happy? Think of all those little ewes in the world: would you truly rather be one and have no ambition?”
“It would be easier and I would be happy.”
“Would it? Would you? I used to think so. I thought that it would be fine indeed to love women and find one and marry her and live as they do in fairy tales. But there are no fairy tales, and the more married men I met, the more misery I saw. Many people are simply not happy in this world, because… they always take a road that leads downhill: and their cart is always pushing them farther and farther, until they reach a valley from which there is no escape, and they find themselves surrounded by thousands of other couples chained to carts.”
She was frowning at me curiously: she knew nothing of the allegory of carts and teams.
I smiled. “Perhaps the easy roads never go anywhere interesting; and some people are never blessed with an interest in the interesting. Pity them: do not pity yourself.”
“I suppose you are correct.” She shook her head. “I still do not think I will find another like you.”
“Perhaps not, but perhaps you are meant to find someone better.”
“By dressing like a man?”
“Ironically, I think it will afford you the opportunity to meet and come to know more men—as they truly are, and not as the fools they tend to be while courting.”
She snorted. “True. Yet, I do not know if I can live a lie as you suggest.”
I frowned at that, thinking on lies. “Who are you lying to?”
“Everyone,” she scoffed. “If I do as you say I should.”
“Oui, but are you lying to yourself or the Gods, or just other men—and women?”
“I will be pretending to everyone. I will be living as God did not intend for me to live. And…”
“Stop,” I said with a smile. “You do not wish to be a man, oui? You only wish to act like a man in order to gain what men have. So, unless you believe that God desires women to be meek and think about nothing except babies, then you are not quarreling with God on the matter, but with men. And if you do believe God wishes for women to be meek, yet you feel you should not, then you have already chosen to disregard His intent.”
She sighed and nodded. “I do not believe God wishes for women to be meek. I feel that men wish for women to be meek.”
I chuckled. “It has been my experience that most men need women to be meek. So, you will pretend to be a man to live as men do, until… You find you wish to do something else. I do not see why you should make excuses and try and escape now. You came halfway around the world…” I realized I was not sure why she had come half way around the world. Was it merely to know why Gaston had agreed to be married to her?
“Why did you come here?” I asked.
Guilt flowed over her face and she looked away quickly. “I came to kill… my husband.”
My heart thumped painfully and the room swam in my vision for a moment: then it was all I could do to hold the reins and keep my Horse from killing her.
She shrugged and glanced up at me, only to appear stricken at what she found on my face. “But I could not,” she said quickly. “I saw him and… you barged in, and I watched you two with the letter and I… He is not the man I came here to kill. He is not that demon. And I was confused—and curious…”
I tried to calm my heart. She could have done it. We were such damn fools. We had become so damn complacent. And we were looking for armies of Church men or my father’s mercenaries, not lone assassins.
“Will, please. I will not harbor any such thought again.” She frowned. “Though I do not know what I will do if I see the demon again.”
I thought that wonderful: I would have to be worried about shooting her first if Gaston lost himself again. Then I realized I could not easily recall when last he had been solely in the grip of his Horse. It must have been on the ship after my rescue. I gave a huff of wonder. That was a year ago.
“That will not be a problem,” I said dully. “We have not seen the demon in a long time.”
She stood carefully, as if I might jump upon her. “So now what do we do?”
“I do not know. I need to…” I saw the letter in my hand. “I need to speak with Gaston, and we need to finish this letter. Then we will need to
see who is about and prepare them. Stay in here for now. There is water on the sideboard.” I left her without waiting to see if that was acceptable.
Gaston was still in the infirmary, sitting on a cot next to an old buccaneer: Schoen. Gaston had amputated the man’s left foot yesterday. It had become gangrenous—without a wound. Schoen appeared drugged and did not look toward me.
My matelot looked up. “Blood is not flowing into his feet. I do not know what I can do for him. The other one will die if this continues.”
“She came here to kill you,” I said flatly in English, “but changed her mind. She really wants to kill your Horse. Thankfully He was not available.”
To my amazement, Gaston did not appear surprised; and then I wondered why I had been.
“I saw it in her eyes when I first saw her,” he said quietly. “But then she did not, and I knew she would not.”
“I still feel we have become complacent. She just walked in. She could have…” I felt the horror of that possibility once again. “But it does not matter. We have the letter and we will be leaving.
Gaston looked at Schoen and sighed. “There are worse things than getting shot.”
“Aye, but…”
He smiled at me reassuringly and stood. “You know, I am actually pleased she is here now; and that all of this can be discussed. Like the other hurts in our lives, this one is a wound left too long to fester. Now it is draining.”
“Aye, you are correct. One less mystery as well. And there is a saying about keeping one’s enemies closer.”
Gaston nodded.
“Shall we finish this letter?” I asked. “And I can tell you all else that was said.”
He nodded, and we slipped past the closed surgery door and into the bright light of the atrium. It was filled with the family as always, though it was late enough for the children to nap. I dearly hoped Chris stayed in the surgery. I had no idea what we would tell everyone yet—or how they would react.
“I see you holding a letter,” Theodore said and emerged from the library. “Is it the news we have waited for? Or were there others you have not gotten to yet?”
I cursed silently as I recalled there were other letters—in the bundle on the surgery table…
“I will get them,” Gaston said.
I was gripped by the fear that she might have had a change of heart. “Non, I will.”
Gaston nodded, but Theodore eyed me with curiosity. I ran around the corner and gave a brief rap on the door before opening it. I found her looking over the letters. Thankfully, none appeared to be open.
“I was not going to read them,” she quickly protested.
I snatched up the book Gaston had been perusing and dropped it on the table in front of her. Then I snatched up the letters and left.
Gaston was not with Theodore when I returned. I felt the ugly flood waters of hysteria rising in my soul.
“Will, is something wrong?” Theodore asked as I handed him the letters. “Is that the one we have been awaiting?”
I looked at the crumpled letter in my hand. “Non, and oui, and… Oui, and I cannot discuss it yet.”
He was concerned and disappointed, but he nodded.
Gaston emerged from the storage room with a wine bottle and a hunk of cheese.
I nearly snatched the wine from his hand as we mounted the stairs. He regarded me with amusement as I took a great swallow before we reached our door.
“I almost lost you today,” I said as I closed the door.
His arms closed around me and I reveled in the solidity of his embrace. It held me above the hysteria.
“I do not feel I was in danger,” Gaston murmured after a time. “I felt the Gods knew she would not shoot.”
“Non. I felt doom upon seeing the ship that brought her. I fear that if I had not been here she might have. If we had not read the letter together—and thus she saw you as you are and not the demon of her memory—she would have fired. Then I realized you have not truly been lost to your Horse since my rescue, have you? It has been a year. We have been well…”
He stiffened at my mention of the passage of time. I pulled away to find him frowning.
“Oui, it has only been a year since your rescue. I have only been thinking of… your birthday.” He shrugged with a rueful expression. “I have buried the days when last we counted your birth away. I mean, I knew. I even thought, now what did I do for Will last year on his day? And I remembered, but I did not allow myself to dwell on it.”
I sighed. I had forgotten my birthday.
“Well, Christine is no present,” I said with as much jest as I could muster.
He chuckled. “Non, she is not my present to you.”
“So I will receive a gift?” I asked with genuine interest.
He placed his fingers over my lips and only moved them to allow his mouth better access. His kiss stirred my still-anxious Horse. I needed to run, far, far away from angry young women and angry old fathers. I pulled away from the kiss and swooped to nip his neck, hard.
He understood, and I saw the answering fire light in his eyes. I was soon against the wall with his cock inside me and his teeth in my shoulder. It felt good, but on this day it was not enough.
“More,” I grunted.
He stopped, and in that irrational boyish way, I feared his displeasure.
“Does this Horse need to run?” he whispered huskily in my ear.
“Oui, hard, this Horse needs to run hard.”
He withdrew, and I was soon gagged with my hands bound and looped over the hook we used to hang our weapons. It was not meant for this purpose—we so rarely played here—but it would suffice, as I did not wish to escape, only to be held. For a moment I worried about the sound. I listened with taut muscles and a painfully rigid cock. In our room I could hear the sinuous glide of leather on leather as Gaston rid his belt of the sword frogs and holsters and reduced it to a single unadorned strap. Beyond that, the usual commotion of many people and dogs in the atrium was quite loud. It was not night when the house was quiet. I resolved not to worry. I needed this—now.
I expected a heavy blow across my shoulders, but he started with a playful slap across my arse. I groaned with annoyance. He found this amusing, and began to tease me: each blow harder than the last: crisscrossing my shoulders and buttocks again and again until I was writhing in ecstasy: my Horse running hard and fast in the delicious fog where there was no pain or fear, only the running.
And then I saw an eye watching me through the crack in the shutters that faced the balcony.
I screamed into the gag and pulled free of the hook. The eye disappeared. Gaston tore the door open. Beyond the pounding in my ears I could not hear if words were spoken. I could only see Gaston clearly: standing there in the doorway in his naked glory. He dropped the strap as if the person on the balcony held a gun on him. I screamed again in horror.
“Will, hush,” he said and turned to look at me. Seeing my duress, he lunged forward and pulled the person on the balcony into the room. Then he was at my side, pushing me safely into the corner. I tore the gag from my mouth, wishing to yell at him for leaving his back to our attacker.
Then I saw her over his shoulder: Yvette, studying the outer windows quite studiously.
“I am sorry,” she said without looking toward us as Gaston pushed a blanket into my bound hands before fumbling with his breeches.
“I came to find you,” she continued. “Theodore wishes to see you. He is quite… Anyway, I heard… what I heard; and was curious if it was as it sounded. I have heard rumors about the two of you. And, I was curious. It was very rude of me.”
“It is a game we play,” Gaston said.
“I know,” she said and turned to look at us—now that we were covered.
My hands were still bound, but that seemed the least of my concerns.
“I was taught about such games.” She shrugged. “It was the specialty of one of my tutors in Marseille.”
At another time, her words wou
ld have stirred my cock well beyond curiosity, but at the moment, I—and it—was too traumatized. I felt the heat of a truly glorious flush spread across my head and chest. I sat on the hammock and willed it to leave—or at least her.
“I have tried binding Agnes, but she did not find being helpless pleasurable,” Yvette said. “I think I would, but not after…” She bit her lip and sighed.
“Will is complicated in that way,” Gaston said quite calmly as if he discussed our carnal play with women all the time. “He finds great peace and pleasure in it, despite all that has been done to him. I… If I am truly mad, I find peace in being bound, but it is not a carnal thing.”
“I saw that,” she said with a thoughtful nod and curious glance at me. “His enjoyment.”
I flopped onto my side on the hammock and pulled my knees to my chest.
My matelot found amusement in this. “We should speak about this later, if at all—before we mortify Will.”
“Of course. I am sorry, Will. Um, Theodore, oui. Sam found a young gentlemen in the yard looking for the latrine.”
I groaned.
“We know who it is,” Gaston said with a tired sigh.
“He said he was a relative of yours and returned to the infirmary to wait for you,” Yvette continued. “Then Theodore went to see him; and then he was calling for you two to be found. He is quite agitated.”
“I am sure he is,” Gaston said.
“Who is this guest?” she asked.
“Christine,” I blurted.
Gaston winced.
She frowned and then her eyes shot wide with understanding. “Oh my God! Here? She is here, dressed as a man?”
We nodded.
“And she shall stay that way,” Gaston said. “She wishes to live as a man.” He regarded me curiously, and I nodded. “And, now that we have received word from my father—though we have not finished reading it—we will need to take her with us.”
“Will! Gaston!” We actually heard Theodore bellowing.
“I will tell him you are on your way,” Yvette said. She stepped out the door only to pause and dip her head back into the room. “He is coming,” she hissed.
Wolves Page 40
