by P. J. Fox
“This is true.” For a demon, Tristan understood his human fellows rather well.
Leaning forward, he caressed her cheek. Gracefully done, with the back of his hand. A practiced gesture that spared her his claws. What would, from another man, be an expression of tenderness. “Do you know why I didn’t kill you?”
“No.”
She swallowed. And then she waited, uncertain. She shouldn’t be startled by his lack of humanity, not by this point, but he still had that almost uncanny power over her. To make her melt. To make her stomach turn. To terrify her. She dared not even swallow as he traced a single finger down the curve of her jaw, and underneath her chin. The lone curved claw pressing into the soft flesh there. Dimpling it.
“Because you saw me as a man.”
“Oh.” The word was barely a whisper.
“And that…was precious to me. Is precious to me.”
A man. A terrifying man, to be sure, but a man nonetheless. She could scarcely think of him as anything else. And he, in turn, had been the first person to see her as something desirable. As a woman, not simply a cheesemonger or scullery maid. Who had wanted her, not what she could do. Or, by some lights, should do.
He’d offered her devotion, and all he’d asked was hers in return.
She smiled slightly, her lip trembling just a little.
He leaned forward, his eyes fixed on hers. Black pools of night that seemed to sap the light from the air around them. She felt herself losing herself in those eyes, in that penetrating stare that she’d known from the first wasn’t entirely human.
She tilted her head up as she fell against him, one hand pressing down between her shoulder blades as the other guided her mouth to his. She sighed, half in bliss and half in stupor, giving herself up to him completely.
His lips on hers were cool. Firm. Unhurried. He knew what he wanted and knew, too, that he’d take it. Take what she was all too ready to give. Sliding her hand up, she twisted her fingers in his short hair. A warmth was growing inside her and with it, a need.
She arched her back, opening her mouth more fully to his. He guided her down onto the couch, pinning her with his weight as he transferred his attentions to the hollow underneath her ear, her neck, and then further down as his hand slid up the bodice of her dress.
She sighed. He kissed the swell of her breast. He pinched her nipple cruelly through the fabric and her mouth opened in a silent exclamation. Her skin was on fire, every bit crying out for his touch.
He liked to toy with her, drawing out her agony until he gave her release.
Waiting until she craved it above all else.
Would do anything for it.
His lips, against her flesh, curved into a slight smile.
Easing a finger underneath the low, squared neckline he—
The door banged open. “Your Grace!”
Tristan’s head shot up. To an observer, he might have resembled more wolf than man. A wolf caught hunching over its prey, delighting in the warm innards and now on alert toward aggressors who might attempt to poach its meal.
His eyes flashed.
Isla wanted to sit up but she couldn’t move.
The guard who’d barged in on them, at first so eager, realizing what he was seeing, sputtered to a halt.
“Yes?” The word was a sibilant hiss, devoid of emotion.
Which seemed to frighten the guard all the more.
“I—”
TWENTY-FOUR
“Isla, what are you doing?”
The scandalized tone demanded immediate response.
Isla let Tristan help her up. He seemed unruffled, as usual. Isla, on the other hand, had rarely felt so humiliated in her life. She brushed down the front of her dress, pretending that no one could see her do it. Her breasts were still in her bodice, thank the Gods.
She drew a deep breath. And then, trying to sound as calm as her husband, “hello, Rowena.”
“You’re—you were—”
“Where is Hart?” The words were out before she could stop them. She saw her sister, her stepmother, her father, but her her brother was absent.
Rowena stamped her foot. Just like she had when she was a child. “Hart this and Hart that. Who cares about Hart? I’m here and let me tell you, I’ve had a horrible winter. Not that anyone cares.”
No one said a word.
“I’ve been—forced to card wool and eat gruel, gruel, while you’ve been lying in the lap of luxury. Quite literally, I see.” She sniffed.
Tristan, ignoring Rowena, turned toward his bride. “Hart is well.”
She slumped against him. She’d been so worried. How worried, she hadn’t realized until that moment. He’d been so on edge and then he’d just vanished, and then the rumors had started. Of a stirring in the mountains. And then the two riders had appeared, cut and disheveled, and been ushered straight into Tristan’s office.
Of Hart, there had been no word.
She knew that Tristan would have told her, had they brought grim tidings, but—
“This is completely unacceptable!”
“A woman has certain…duties toward her husband.” The earl coughed.
“Rowena received a marriage proposal over the winter.” Apple sounded smug.
As though they were things to be collected. “Why didn’t she accept it?”
“Rudolph will…explain those duties to you, after you’re married.”
Isla burst out laughing.
She couldn’t help herself. It was all just so horrible. And just when the wound was finally starting to scab over. Or so she’d thought. Now the pain was back again in a single, sickening rush. As though the intervening months had never occurred; as though her time apart from her so-called family had meant nothing. The family who’d used and abused her and whom, for all that, she’d tried so hard to please.
“As for your precious Hart,” Rowena continued, as though nothing had happened, “he brought us here, to the gates, and then just left. Left.” She sniffed.
She was here, and alive, and indeed looked well to Isla. But still she was complaining. That was Rowena in a nutshell. Isla studied her. Well. Even a little fatter than she’d been at the wedding. The gruel couldn’t have disagreed with her that much.
“I demand to go home at once.” Rowena appeared to be addressing no one in particular, merely stating her wishes to the universe.
“Why aren’t you home?”
“Just—just look at me!”
She looked like a harridan. And bloated. There were twigs in her hair. But Isla said nothing.
“Rudolph will never want me now.”
“Then he isn’t much of a betrothed.”
Whatever girlish charm her sister had possessed had been burned off in the winter fires. Standing before her now, Rowena could clearly no longer summon the mask that had protected her for so long. She could pass for Apple’s age, and older. Hard lines had begun to form around her mouth. Lines that deepened when her eyes narrowed.
“Sit,” Isla said, surprising herself. “Rest. I’ll call for refreshments.”
After a moment, Rowena did. Apple joined her, while the earl went to stand near the fire. He was still uneasy around his daughter, the daughter he’d abandoned to Father Justin. He’d expected her to die; Isla knew that now. And yet, here she still was.
Undoubtedly he was trying to decipher the balance of power between them. Whether now, as she was still alive, she could be called upon for favors. Or whether she would, realizing that he was no further use to her in his current state, attempt to do her harm.
But she was nothing like him. Where her traits had come from, she didn’t know. The church of her childhood taught that all men, and all women, were merely the sum total of their parents; like begat like, as rich begat rich and poor begat poor. The order of things was set by the Gods, and thus unchangeable. Isla didn’t believe that, any more than she believed anything else preached by men like Father Justin, but she did wonder what her mother had been like. Truly
been like. If perhaps she’d inherited something of her inner core of strength from the mysterious woman she’d never gotten a chance to know.
“You are your own creation,” Tristan said. “As am I.”
Perhaps.
Isla signaled for one of the serving girls, spoke to her briefly, and then dismissed her. She returned to her seat on the same couch where she’d been with Tristan just a few moments earlier. A time that seemed hours past now. Years, even. A time when she’d been secure in her knowledge that she was finally free of her family. That Rowena wouldn’t come barging through the door, now or ever.
The refreshments arrived and with them, Asher. Tristan motioned him over, just the faintest raise of the hand. He didn’t want Asher to serve, then. Asher sat, as he was bidden, and the girl who’d brought the tray poured cups of mulled wine. There was also bread, and cheese.
Rowena sniffed. As though she were used to so much better. Isla restrained herself from pointing out that it was late and the kitchen was closed, the fires tamped down for the night as their young tenders slept before them, curled up in blankets. A job for the lowest of the low on the staff, but an important one. If Rowena wanted a real meal, she’d be better off waiting for breakfast. It couldn’t, at this point, be too far off.
Isla glanced at the window, but couldn’t see the moon.
“What’s that doing here?” Rowena gestured at Asher.
Asher accepted his mulled wine without comment, staring down the offending presence in an almost perfect imitation of his father beside him. He’d been served before Rowena, as was proper. Although no formal statement had yet been issued, the entire household knew the gossip.
The girl, who couldn’t have been more than sixteen or so, curtseyed slightly before turning to serve the guests.
“What are you doing here?” He sounded genuinely interested.
“The chivalrous response,” Tristan informed him without turning, “is not to draw attention to a lady’s failings.”
Rowena purpled.
Asher sipped his wine. Well watered, because for all his presumed status he was still a child. But behind the rim of his cup, he smiled.
“We…got turned around.”
“Because my husband couldn’t detect his own ass with both hands.” Throwing her head back, Apple finished her first portion in two swallows. She didn’t wait for a servant’s assistance, grabbing the pitcher with a surprisingly well-manicured hand and pouring herself a second that was far more generous. A little slopped over the side of the cup, wasting a portion of spices equivalent, Isla suspected, to the average Highlands husbandman’s yearly income.
The earl, for his part, said nothing. He continued to lean forward, one hand resting on the mantle, staring into the flames as though auguring his future. He, too, looked older. Old. Not like Rowena, or Apple, but frail. His skin looked paper thin, almost translucent in the reflected light. His eyes had lost some of their color, no longer vibrant like Hart’s but the subdued hue of a well-washed rag.
Or the dishwater in which it sat.
He was old, she realized with a pang. Well and truly old, and no man lived forever. Although why such a truth should bother her, when applied to her father, she couldn’t imagine. He wasn’t a good man, and hadn’t been a good father. He’d tried to offer one daughter into short-lived sexual servitude and have the other killed outright. Not because he was evil, but because he was weak. He was too weak to be evil.
He turned, his eyes meeting hers, and she couldn’t be certain but something of her thoughts might have passed between them. A troubled expression came over him then, like clouds passing over a clearing. Did he regret what he’d done?
Did it matter to her if he did?
His eyes still on hers, he opened his mouth to speak. Or at least she thought that was what he’d meant to do; the first word turned into a cough, one that only seemed to get worse. Coughing became great, racking spasms as he doubled over, his hands on his stomach.
Apple only watched him, her expression unreadable. Rowena made to stand up, as if to help him, and then sat back down again. “Are…you well?” she asked. A rather backward nursemaid, Isla thought.
She, too, began to rise but her father waved her back.
“This happens all the time,” Apple said.
Ignoring Apple and her father both, she took a step forward. Happens all the time? Since when? She could tell, through the bond, that Tristan was interested. Merely interested. As for herself, she couldn’t quite categorize her own feelings. Which, regarding her family, was nothing new. She despised her father, hated him, even, but there was an inner core to her that couldn’t ignore a creature in pain.
She placed her hand on his shoulder. “Sit down. Rest.”
As he tried to speak again, coughing became wheezing, which in turn became a tortured fight for breath. The noise escaping him barely sounded human. His pale skin was darkening, turning a mottled purple that reminded Isla, in a sickening flash, of Father Justin.
Of the man’s corpse lying in state on a slab in the dairy.
“Father.” There was a hint of panic in her voice. No one was doing anything, why was no one doing anything? “Father I think—”
He took a step back, and then another and then, half-spinning, lost his balance and toppled to the floor.
TWENTY-FIVE
Lissa lay underneath the merchant, her head turned to the side as he thrust himself into her. He was a large man, not with the build of muscle gone to fat but with the soft, pudding-like folds of a privileged life spent relaxing and eating sweets. A sheen of sweat coated his brow and underneath the too sweet perfume of attar of roses, he reeked.
She wondered when he’d last taken a bath. She couldn’t wonder too much, as it would become apparent that she wasn’t paying attention. Most clients paid for more than sex, if they were honest with themselves, but some made the challenge harder than others.
Illusion.
Of desirability. To women. To themselves. Sometimes Lissa laid with women, mostly the wives of merchants who lived in town but not always. Sometimes they were merchants themselves. Sometimes the wives of visiting dignitaries. Women whose husbands failed to please them, either because their husbands weren’t interested in their pleasure or because they weren’t the kind of women who could take pleasure from men.
Lissa didn’t mind. The women were gentle. Usually.
Some of the men weren’t so bad. Even this man. He’d paid for her before. He was married; he wore a ring. She knew nothing about his wife, though. Unlike some others, he didn’t talk much. But he didn’t need to hit her to get hard, or to see her cry. He didn’t twist her nipples or leave angry, inflamed bite marks in her breasts.
His pendulous stomach slid up and down over hers, lubricated with more of his foul sweat.
She hated it the most when the noblemen came. Their sons, more properly. Titled in their own right but with nothing to justify their privilege. No deeds of heroism in their own names; no lands, as of yet, at least not under their direct management. But with something to prove. They could dominate her. They paid to dominate her. The same boy-men who she knew, as true boys, had delighted in tormenting insects.
She thought briefly of Hart. He almost hadn’t wanted her to touch him. It had been strange.
He’d been strange.
And terrifying.
She knew who he was, of course. Everyone did. He had the coloring of a Northman but wasn’t one. He was rumored to be the bastard of someone important. But not recognized; they distained a man’s accomplishments in the South in favor of his lineage. His proven lineage. A woman’s claims about the origins of her children mattered little.
Lissa didn’t know if she could have children. There had been an…incident, shortly after she came to the inn. The inn’s owner, Marcus, the man who’d purchased her indenture from the sheriff after her parents lost their farm, had found her curled up in a ball on the floor, in a pool of her own blood.
He’d paid for
her care. He hadn’t needed to; the law allowed him to divest himself of responsibility if she was no longer good to work. But Marcus…wasn’t a bad man. He hadn’t asked if she’d wanted to service men for a living but why would he have?
And what other options were there?
She told people she’d wanted adventure.
And, in truth, she had.
But Hart…. He’d given her pleasure. True pleasure. And he’d smelled nice, of fir trees and leather.
She tried not to think about him, because the chances were good that she’d never see him again. And that she’d be better for that. A man who drank the blood of his enemies after torturing them to death. A man who calmly referred to himself as having no soul.
He was one of the Forsaken. She knew that. She might be from the middle of nowhere but she wasn’t an idiot. Their expressions told the truth. What was in them or, rather, what wasn’t. A certain…blankness in the eyes. And there was the worshipful attitude of others, those who played at giving their souls to darkness.
Woe to them if the vows they swore for games, while half in their cups, were ever called to proof.
Lissa kept two small figures, one of the God and one of the Goddess, in the bottom of the modest six-sided chest where she stored the sum total of her earthly possessions. In her room, the garret space she shared with the other girls, above. Where freezing rain dripped through the ceiling boards and wind roared down the chimney and through the fireplace. There was never enough wood, and there were never enough blankets.
She didn’t own the gowns she wore, to entertain strangers. Nor the combs she used to put up her hair. A fact she hadn’t minded until—
But no.
She should try harder to please her client. But he didn’t care and neither did she. Judging from the expression on his face, she would have been surprised if he’d been conscious of her at all. He was off in his own world, his eyes rolled back in his head, fantasizing about whatever men like him fantasized about.
