Fruit of the Golden Vine (31 page)

“I enjoyed our few nights of conversation. Never have I met a woman more perplexingly wrongheaded.”

“I take great comfort in that.”

Delfina smirked. “Do you consider yourself a sinful woman, Silvana?”

“Perhaps. I certainly aspire to be one.”

“Even now, with everything at stake, you persist in remaining true to your unruly nature. To grovel and flatter me, to feign piety and beg forgiveness—that would debase you, wouldn’t it?”

“You know very well that it would.” Silvana tried to interpret the thought concealed in Delfina’s stare, but it was as pointless as reading a blank slate. “We have at least two things in common, Delfina. We’re both uncompromising, and we’re both devoted to Adelina.”

“Yes, it’s so. I am devoted to all my daughters. As a maiden I longed for children, never truly believing I might have them.” Delfina rose from the chair and moved to the window. She rested her hand against the glass and stared at the vineyard. “Adelina has always been a troubled child. I always expected she might someday go to a convent. Now she comes to me and tells me that her only chance for happiness lies with you.”

“And do you believe that to be true?”

Delfina’s eyes tracked the movement of a black bird—Felise’s large black raven, perhaps. “In a convent, Adelina would long to see the base world again. In a marriage, she would want for her independence and resist the imperative to have children. I have often shuddered to think of how a husband would force himself upon her. I imagined the fear and horror in her eyes, eyes so like my own. And I told myself that God wills it to be so.”

Delfina turned and fixed Silvana with her steady gaze. “Tell me, you who have seen so much more of the world—what life exists for a woman unmarried and childless?”

Silvana matched Delfina’s level look with one of her own. “In some societies, a well-lettered woman can become a scribe, even a poet or novelist. A shrewd woman might become a trader, owning property and accruing wealth. A woman skilled in crafts might be a jeweler, a tailor, a baker—whatever talent accords with her heart. In short, Delfina, any art you might have considered the province only of a son.”

“No doubt such societies are some great distance away. It would be dangerous for a woman to travel in search of such improbable futures.”

“Unless she had someone at her side. Someone who knows the ways of the roads, who can handle a sword but who knows when to sheathe it, a fearless companion and unrelenting guardian.” Silvana placed a hand upon her heart. “No man can ever love her as I do. No man can ever understand her as I do. Even you know this to be true.”

“Do I now? And without children, who will aid you in your infirmity? Who will carry on your legacy?”

“Irena’s children. Felise’s children, if she chooses to have them. And our friends and families will trade stories of us so that even in a thousand years, people will remember Adelina and Silvana, whose love was so great they defied even the frightening Delfina.”

Delfina’s lips twisted to form something between a grimace and a smile. “You came to me boasting of your idle, dissolute lifestyle. Wine, you said, and gambling. And yet here you are radiating noble sacrifice.”

“Without some ambition to bind it, it’s natural for a soul to sit in dissolution.” Silvana raised her voice while keeping her tone calm. “Will you truly stand between me and my salvation?”

Delfina returned to the chair and rested her head in her hands. “I am old. Too old for motherhood, perhaps. I was thirty-eight when I gave birth to Felise. Improbable, no?”

“I would say inconceivable.”

“Spare me your puns.” Delfina sighed. “I love my daughters. Irena, who radiates such unfeigned care and virtue. Felise, who allows me to revisit the joys of early motherhood when I had thought myself never to experience them again. And Adelina, whose mischief has animated this family from the day she could first walk, whether I wanted it to or not.” She closed her eyes. “Soon I will lose two of them. One to your brother. One to you. And I swear, by the God I hold dear, that if either of you mistreat them I will bring annihilation upon your heads.”

Silvana’s breath stilled on her lips. Had those words truly just been spoken? “Delfina—”

“I’ve no time to bicker with you any longer. I just hope you appreciate that on every other matter of our debate, you are entirely in the wrong.” Delfina opened her eyes and frowned. “Go now. I need to speak to Sebastian. Tell him I’m waiting.”

Silvana opened the study door and stepped into the corridor. She glanced back. Delfina was still hunched over the desk, her eyes distant and her fingers pressed to her cheeks. Perhaps she was praying. Or perhaps, this time, she had judged with her heart alone.

Silvana continued to the lobby, where Sebastian waited with Adelina and Irena by his side. All three heads turned toward her. “What happened?” said Adelina. “Has Mother ordered you to be served for dinner?”

“Perhaps.” Silvana nodded to Sebastian. “She wishes to speak to you.”

“I see.” With reluctant steps, Sebastian retreated.

Adelina clutched at Silvana’s sleeve. “Details, Silvie, details!”

“Don’t you Silvie me,” said Silvana. “It’s bad enough when Rafael does it.”

A throat cleared behind them. Orfeo stood in an arched entrance. His fingers rested on the hilt of the sword at his belt—the master-crafted blade he’d shown off at dinner, by the look of the ornate hilt. That waxen-faced judge, Matheus, lurked behind him.

“I’m tired of sitting around waiting,” said Orfeo. “It occurs to me that you are guilty of two separate crimes, and one of them Sebastian can’t absolve you of.”

“I’m guilty of many more than two crimes, I suspect,” Silvana said. “Why did you come armed, Orfeo?”

“After you cut my face, I was visited by a strange compulsion not to leave my sword at home.” Orfeo touched the stitched line on his cheek. “It will scar, the doctor told me.”

“They say maidens like scars. Though whether this holds true for a scar inflicted by a woman, I couldn’t say.”

“You’ve damaged my reputation, Silvana. People are gossiping about how I was cut by a woman, about how the maiden I was intended to court instead consorts with her own sex and curses me in the most vulgar language—”

Silvana raised her eyebrow. “Most dreadful. You are certainly the true victim here.”

“Talking to you is a form of swordplay in itself, isn’t it? But regardless of what Bastian and Delfina decide in there now, you’re still guilty of striking me. There are two members of the town watch here, and Matheus says I have cause to ask them for your arrest.”

“Cause indeed,” said Matheus. His voice was fittingly sepulchral. “An attack of this kind could lead to a verdict of hanging. Yes, I believe so. It has permanently disfigured a man whose trade depends upon his ability to appear welcoming and benevolent. His very livelihood has been struck down.”

Silvana looked into Matheus’s eyes. Nothing seemed to look back. “Are you suggesting that Orfeo ever once appeared welcoming and benevolent?”

Orfeo loosed a low grumble. “Despite your ongoing mockery, I don’t want you hanged. Only imprisoned and to serve a minimum sentence. That’s all.”

“You can’t imprison her.” Adelina stamped her foot. “Damn it, Orfeo. Stop interfering in our lives. How is persecuting Silvana going to restore your honor?”

“It’s either that or a duel.” Orfeo straightened his shoulders. “I’ve lost too much on this. Silvana will be jailed and you’ll be married to me, or she’ll duel me and I’ll give her a scar to even the score. Nothing else will do.”

“You disgusting, uncouth brute—” Predictably, Adelina was once more red and heaving with outrage. As admirable as her natural sense of indignation was, she seemed liable to someday hurt herself from the exertion.

Silvana interrupted quickly. “Even if you duel me and win, Orfeo, you’ll not have Adelina. I’ll not be bound by any rule you set for me. Devotion to her is my only law.”

“Then perhaps we’d better duel to the death.”

“Don’t be absurd.”

“Why is it absurd?” Orfeo’s voice rose in heated temper. “Is it any more absurd than what’s already happening? A woman stealing away my bride-to-be? A horse could walk in here on its hind legs, ask for directions and I’d scarcely even blink, that’s how absurd this has become!”

“Then end the farce by walking away.”

Orfeo sneered. “No. You should end it by surrendering yourself and thus cease disgusting us with this grotesque charade you dare to call love.”

Silvana drew her sword, and a heartbeat later Orfeo drew his own. Matheus took several hasty steps backward as Orfeo flourished his blade in the sunlight, holding it so that a hard glow defined its killing edge. “Finally we come to something I can understand,” he said.

From the doorway came another hiss of steel against sheath. Rafael. “I don’t give a damn about how duels are supposed to work, Orfeo,” he said. “I’m not letting any harm befall my sister.”

Silvana smiled. Rafael was lucky to draw a sword without cutting himself, yet at that moment he looked every bit the defiant swordsman. “I appreciate the gesture, brother, but I suspect your assistance would only add to my criminal record. Is that not right, Master Matheus?”

“Yes, yes.” Matheus coughed. “A duel itself is not illegal, but if another combatant interferes, it becomes an ambush and should be prosecuted as such. My own verdict would be that all guilty parties should be hanged.”

“My quarrel isn’t with you, Baron.” Orfeo pointed his blade at Silvana. “It’s with your sister.” His face reddened. “Damn it, I don’t even have any animosity toward her, for that matter. I admire her courage. But I want this stain on my name lifted or else to see some justice done. I want my bride. I want my deals honored!”

“And so you’d kill me,” said Silvana. “Or be killed by me, which seems the more likely outcome.” She brandished her sword, and its steel hummed with the motion. “If I cut you again, would that resolve our issue?”

“If I cut you, will you leave and cease your seduction of Adelina?”

“No.”

“Then it’s to the death, Silvana.”

“Stop it!” Adelina tugged on Silvana’s arm. “For God’s sake. This is a foolish way to resolve disputes, nothing but violence and bravado, and I’m not in the least impressed by either of you. Put your swords away and wait for my parents to return.”

Orfeo looked around the room. On the top balcony, a servant woman leaned over the railing, her eyes wide. The footman, too, had materialized, and stood beyond the open doorway beside the two watchmen. A wondering, enthralled crowd.

“And what of my reputation?” said Orfeo. “Everyone will gossip. Even Matheus will wag his decomposing tongue. They’ll say I backed down from a duel. They’ll say that I was made a cuckold by a woman.”

“Cuckold? I’m not even married to you!” Adelina released an exasperated groan. “God!”

“Everyone is looking at me.” Orfeo’s face had become a mask of sweat. “Judging me. If I back down now, nobody will take me seriously ever again. No, I’d rather death to that.” He advanced on Silvana, his blade whirring. Silvana’s pulse accelerated as she parried the blow. The sharp strike of steel against steel echoed through the lobby.

“Reputations can be rebuilt.” Silvana flicked her wrist, launching a quivering blow that Orfeo stopped with the edge of his blade. “Death is eternal.”

“You don’t understand!” Orfeo pressed a series of quick attacks that Silvana knocked aside with swift precision. Her heart gathered pace, and she took a careful breath to keep her nerves in check. “You don’t understand what it’s like to be ashamed!”

Silvana sidestepped a clumsy strike and tapped her blade lightly on Orfeo’s chest. “Rest in peace.”

Orfeo stumbled back and shifted his position. “Damn you.”

Silvana considered Orfeo’s stance. His dexterity was adequate, but he was too cumbersome on his feet. Without footwork, what use was a quick wrist? “I’m not ashamed, it’s true, but not for lack of people trying to make me so.”

Orfeo’s sword sliced the air, and Silvana’s whirled to meet it. “Whore,” she said. The blades clashed again. “Slut.” Another parry. “Bitch.” A parry and a quick riposte that sent Orfeo reeling. “Sinner.” Orfeo attempted to return with a rapid combination, but Silvana stopped every strike with a subtle shift of her wrist. “Perversity. Abomination. Monster.”

Orfeo took a deep, uneven breath. “Only words.”

“Words far worse than any you’ll have to hear.” Silvana spun her blade, and Orfeo flinched as its tip glanced against the guard of his hilt. “And yet here I am. Not merely unashamed, but proud. Imagine if I killed somebody every time my reputation was put into question. I’d never be able to wash the blood off.”

“Stop talking and fight me!”

Orfeo advanced, his movements more aggressive, and Silvana batted his blows aside with greater care. “You asked me once if I’d killed before.” Silvana danced away from a slow attack and touched the tip of her sword to Orfeo’s side. “Watch your guard, innkeeper.”

“Stop toying with me.” Orfeo grimaced. “You’re only making it worse.”

“As it happens, I have indeed killed.” Silvana moved her body to avoid a desperate lunge. “I bedded a woman who, it turned out, was married. Her husband returned home the next morning and found us still together. He insisted on a duel to the death. He had two children, and his wife depended upon his income. Naturally, I refused.”

Their blades struck together in a collision of trembling steel. “He drew regardless, and I had no choice but to defend myself. His wife and children watched as I cut the poor man down. I may as well have put the blade between my own ribs.”

Orfeo took a wild swipe that left him open, and Silvana prodded the tip of her sword against his collarbone. He gasped and stumbled back. “Rafael found me later that night in our tavern room. I was weeping and beyond consolation, drenched in the man’s blood. I’d tried to carry him to a doctor, but it was far too late. The look on his wife’s face, the howls of his children…yes, Orfeo, I’ve killed before.”

Orfeo’s blade trembled in his hand. “Be quiet.”

“No. You don’t understand the cost of this. I do.” Silvana twirled her sword and let its point rest against the floorboards. “While you have life, you may yet have love, and once you have love, you have everything. Forget your honor, Orfeo. In a year this will all be forgotten. Someday you will find another bride, and each time you think to mistreat her, I trust you will touch the scar upon your cheek and remember the day you decided against death.”