Ariadne's Diadem (8 page)

“I don’t spend my time contemplating my buttons,” Gervase pointed out a little testily, fumbling with the tying of his neckcloth, which was not at all easy in the dark and without a mirror.

Sylvanus’s lips twitched, but he said nothing more.

“Before we go,” Gervase said then, “there’s one thing I’d like to ask.”

“What?”

“Why has Bacchus put Miss Willowby in such unnecessary danger?”

The faun shrugged. “I have no idea, but my master never does anything without a purpose.” With that he turned up the collar of the coat and left the rotunda. His hooves crunched on the gravel, and as the hem of the costly greatcoat dragged on the ground behind him, Gervase pictured his Bond Street tailor’s reaction to such sacrilege. There wouldn’t be sufficient sal volatile in the whole of London to bring the poor fellow out of his swoon.

Sylvanus’s sense of direction was unerring, and a few minutes later they emerged from the maze close to the archway into the castle courtyard. The castle was quiet because old Joseph and Martin were out searching for Anne, and Mrs. Jenkins had yet to return from her sister in Peterbury. An owl hooted somewhere, and the sweet-scented cowslips in the park were pale in the moonlight as the faun led the way toward the river.

Gervase found it difficult to keep up, for Sylvanus’s goat legs were much faster than his own, but he didn’t fall too far behind as they hurried north past the jetty and through the riverside meadows. At last the faun saw the bridge ahead and Anne lying inches above the waiting water. He thought she moved slightly, and with a muted bleat of dismay he made a greater effort, for he was only too aware that if she fell into the river and drowned, neither he nor Gervase would be able to meet Bacchus’s terms. Keeping a wary eye on the lurking river, the faun pulled Anne safely from the brink, watching her closely to see if she was about to awaken, for it wouldn’t do at all if she were to come around to see him, but she seemed deeply asleep.

Gervase hurried up, and for the first time looked upon the face of the woman he had to win if he was ever to regain his true form. He saw she was slender and unremarkable, with untrammeled dark blonde curls that had escaped their pins when she’d fallen from the horse. The riding habit she wore was stylish enough, but at least three years old, and the top hat that lay nearby wasn’t quite what would have been admired in Hyde Park, although he had to concede that he found the addition of a lace scarf, rather than the more usual muslin or gauze, rather appealing.

The sound of hooves clattered from the road, and Sylvanus put an urgent hand on Gervase’s arm, pushing him down among the cowslips. They lay there in silence as two farmers rode across the bridge.

As the hooves dwindled away into the darkness again, Gervase got up and glanced across the meadow to where a small barn stood against the hawthorn hedge. It would afford shelter while he and Sylvanus wondered what to do next. He still didn’t know why Bacchus had chosen to place her in such a hazardous situation, and apart from that he hadn’t had time to invent a new identity
or
a plan for wooing her. Stooping to gather her into his arms, he carried her to the bam, where he rested her gently on the remains of a pile of hay from the previous year’s harvest.

Sylvanus collected her hat and followed, and then they both stood looking down at her in the moonlight. The faun hunched himself in the greatcoat. By the Furies, how cold and hungry he was! And how he hated being hundreds of miles away from Italy! He glanced out at the night, where stars now studded the sky. At least he could see the Corona Borealis, just as he could from his grove.

“What now?” Gervase asked.

Sylvanus shrugged. “
I
don’t know;
you
are the one who must woo her.”

“Which is all very well, but I haven’t had time to collect my thoughts, let alone anything else.” Gervase ran his fingers agitatedly through his hair as he gazed down at her. Prom the first moment he’d heard Anne Willowby’s name, he’d been convinced she was a brazen adventuress of some sort, certainly a schemer, but the truth was very different, and he didn’t know where to begin.

The faun hung the top hat on a protruding nail and watched Gervase a little crossly. Why did humans always make such heavy weather out of everything? All this man had to do was seduce a woman. There was nothing to it. Fauns seduced nymphs all the time! Sylvanus hopped impatiently from hoof to hoof. Gervase needed a nudge to send him on his way, and since virginal ladies were notoriously easy to shock, it would be simple enough to prevent this one from remembering anything. Oh, if only Bacchus hadn’t forbidden him to use his power to cause overwhelming sexual desire. If it weren’t for that, this whole business would be over and done with before dawn! Bacchus had to be obeyed, of course, but all the same, it was a very tempting thought. The faun’s lips twitched. His master was hundreds of miles away—would he find out about a few minutes’ disobedience? Sylvanus decided to take the chance, and after a sly glance up at the Corona Borealis, he snapped his fingers.

As Anne stirred and began to open her eyes, her subconscious re-created the wheat field fantasy that had always meant so much to her. As a result, the first thing Gervase felt was that the spring night had brightened into the warmth of a summer day. He seemed to be standing by a hedgerow at the edge of a waving sea of golden corn, beneath a cloudless sky where skylarks sang. His nostrils were filled with the seductive scent of honeysuckle, but as he looked into Anne’s wide green gaze, he neither knew nor cared that the hour, the seasons, and even his own common sense had been turned topsy-turvy. An erotic charge swept irresistibly through him, and his whole body throbbed with excitement. He was conscious of the sweet invitation of her lips and the captivating curve of her breasts beneath the tight-fitting jacket of her riding habit, and he couldn’t help sinking to his knees to put a loving hand to her cheek. She sighed and moved against his fingertips, and his heart tightened with intense joy.

Gervase’s face was an anonymous blur, yet Anne knew she loved him more than anyone else in the world. She was reliving the caresses seen all those years ago, and the gratification was exquisite. She smiled sensuously and began to unbutton the jacket of her riding habit. So firm and taut were her breasts that she needed no stays or other undergarments to give shape to her figure, and her nipples were pert and upturned. Her breath caught with almost feline pleasure as he cupped both in his palms. Her hand crept tentatively to his thigh, and then slid slowly up to enclose the fierce erection that now strained the front of his breeches. After a few moments’ hesitation, she dared to stroke the steely shaft through his clothes, and his groan of desire intensified her own. Her whole body ached for the consummation she knew was about to take place.

The exquisite sensations passing through Gervase were almost painful. He wanted to be inside her, to feel her warmth encasing him, to feel his own final capitulation. He lay down and pulled her against him, finding her lips in a kiss that flamed so fiercely through them both that he felt he would lose his senses. Her mouth was sweet, and for a moment their tongues slid together. She pressed her body to his, molding to his shape so perfectly that she might have been fashioned just for him. His erection felt as if it would explode as she moved against it.

Suddenly, out of the clear starlit sky, there came a blinding flash of lightning. It struck a tree in the hedge behind the barn and lit everything with vivid electric blue. Bacchus had been watching after all. Gervase and Anne became frozen in mid-caress, their sensuous embrace caught as if upon a canvas, and Sylvanus gave a bleat of dismay as he at last realized why his master had put Anne in danger. It had been to create the very circumstances that might tempt a foolish faun into using forbidden powers. And he, Sylvanus, had fallen into the trap!

Confirmation of this came immediately.
“You have been found wanting yet again. Faun!”
Bacchus’s voice was inaudible to anyone except Sylvanus, who squeaked with dread.

“Be merciful, 0 Great One!” the faun begged, his teeth chattering so much he could scarcely be understood.

“
I
was merciful the last time,”
Bacchus reminded him severely.

“I’ve learned my lesson, I
swear!”
Sylvanus bleated tearfully.

“
I
doubt if you will ever learn, Faun,”
came the weary reply.
“Can’t you be trusted to do anything—except the wrong thing?”

“B-but if you put an end to me now, the duke will be on his own.” Sylvanus could only hope to appeal to what remained of the god’s better nature.

There was silence, and Sylvanus prayed that this boded well. “It won’t happen again. Master, please believe me,” he pleaded, his tone only just short of wheedling.

In spite of the faun’s undoubted culpability, Bacchus was disposed to be charitable.
“Very well, but you have had your
final warning. Disobey me again and it will definitely be the last thing you do!”

“Yes, Master!” Sylvanus whispered with relief. He waited for the god’s next words, but there was only the silence of the English spring night. The faun stole a glance up at the sky, but all was quiet again.

Then soft sighs made him glance down, and he saw that Gervase and Anne, freed from their brief immobility, were once again pursuing their white-hot passion. The faun was horrified. “Stop! Oh, please stop! Bacchus is very angry with me!” Their kisses continued unchecked, and at last he remembered to snap his fingers.

The bewitchment ceased immediately, the summer wheat field was no more, and Gervase looked around in confusion as Anne went suddenly limp in his arms and sank back into the deep sleep of before.

Sylvanus swallowed. “I’m sorry.”

Gervase began to realize what had been happening, and after lying Anne gently back on the hay, and doing up her buttons again, he scrambled to his feet. He tried to muster his scattered thoughts as he stared down at her in the moonlight. What in God’s name had he been thinking of? He turned furiously on the guilty faun. “That was
your
fault?” he cried.

“Yes,” Sylvanus replied, unable to meet his accusing gaze.

“But what is she going to say? As soon as she comes around, she’ll remember and…” Gervase couldn’t finish, for it seemed the end of everything almost before it had begun! He’d never succeed with her after this!

“She won’t recall anything, so don’t worry about that. Besides, if anyone should be worried, it’s me. Bacchus knows I disobeyed him and has issued a final warning.”

“He knows?”

“Didn’t you see the lightning? Oh, no, I suppose you wouldn’t have because—” Sylvanus broke off and turned as a new sound drifted through the night. It was the swift rattle of a pony and trap approaching along the Peterbury road, and instinctively the faun knew that it signaled Anne’s imminent awakening. Without further ado he grabbed her hat from the nail and ran from the barn toward the bridge. Halfway across the meadow he unwound the lace scarf and draped it prominently over a hawthorn bush, and then at the bridge he tossed the top hat into the middle of the road, where the trap’s lamps would pick it out immediately. Dashing back to the barn, he grabbed Gervase by the arm. “Come on, we mustn’t be seen!” he cried, and together they ran along the riverbank to the hedge of the next meadow, where they hid to watch what happened.

The pony trap was conveying a rather nervous Mrs. Jenkins home after her visit to her sister. She had been chattering quite happily until the bolt of lightning startled her into silence. Now she glanced uneasily up at the flawless sky and shrank a little closer to her unruffled brother-in-law, who was too wise a countryman to be surprised at anything Mother Nature chose to do. Lightning out of a clear sky? Why not? There were stranger things at sea. So he stoically tooled the stocky pony along the lane, watching the animal’s pricked ears and fat rump, but then he reined in surprisedly as the top hat appeared in the beam of the lamps.

He climbed down to inspect it, and as he brought it to the lamp, Mrs. Jenkins gave a cry of dismay and clambered down as well. “It’s Miss Anne’s! Oh, no, was she struck by the lightning?”

“Don’t be daft, woman, for if that had happened, she’d be lying here all crisped to a cinder!” he replied.

“Oh, mercy on us, don’t say such things!” cried Mrs. Jenkins, now in more of a fluster than ever.

As they glanced around, a strong stir of wind fluttered the white scarf on the hawthorn bush. Mrs. Jenkins’s dismay increased. “That’s her scarf—only Miss Anne wears lace like that!” she gasped, and gathered her skirts to hurry into the meadow.

“Come back, woman,” grumbled her brother-in-law, but she took no notice, and so he followed her, grumbling all the time about foolish old fowls that flapped about anything and nothing.

There was another gust of wind, and this time it rattled a loose timber on the barn. Mrs. Jenkins’s gaze flew toward the sound, and as she looked, she heard a soft moan. Alarmed, she ran toward the barn, where she found Anne beginning to stir.

“Oh, Miss Anne, Miss Anne, whatever has happened?”

“I don’t really know,” Anne confessed, her brow wrinkling in puzzlement. Why on earth was she in the barn? She didn’t remember anything, except riding along the riverbank toward the bridge.

“Are you injured?” asked the anxious housekeeper, kneeling down beside her.

“No, except for a little bruising. To be truthful, I simply feel as if I’ve been asleep.” She also felt strangely warm and relaxed, as if something exceedingly agreeable had just taken place, although she couldn’t imagine what.

Mrs. Jenkins’s brother-in-law helped Anne to her feet, and she smiled a little foolishly as she brushed the hay from her riding habit. “I feel perfectly all right,” she assured them both.

“Are you well enough to walk to the trap?” the housekeeper asked.

“Yes, I’m sure I am.”

Sylvanus and Gervase had observed everything from the safety of the hedgerow, and at each gust of wind the faun had shivered, for he knew it was the work of the god of wild nature. Once Anne had been helped back to the trap, which then continued swiftly along the road toward Llandower, the secret watchers emerged. Sylvanus breathed out with relief as the pinpricks of light disappeared along the land. “Well, she’s safe now,” he declared.