Laura Kinsale (29 page)

He paused at the foot of the bed. She was awake, he thought. He couldn’t hear her breathing.

“Yallah!”
she said, so clearly that he startled—but the word held fear instead of anger. The bedclothes rustled as she twitched. She began to whisper, urgent babble that turned into low moans, like a puppy unable to howl. “Go!” she said plainly in Arabic,
“Yallah! Yallah!”

Her body grew still then, but she kept moaning.

“It’s all right,” Arden said.

“Djinn,” she whimpered. “A djinni!”

He knelt beside her, searching for her in the tumble of pillow and counterpane. He caught her hand. Her fingers twitched, closing convulsively. Faint yelps came from her throat.

“It’s all right.” He leaned over her, bending close. “You’re safe, wolf cub,” he said. “No demons. This is England.”

The whimpering ceased, but she was breathing in deep short gasps, clutching his hand.

“I’m here,” he murmured, kissing her cheek and her temple. “Don’t you know I’m here?”

Her breath caught. She seemed to make an effort to wake, inhaling. Her hand relaxed. She lay still, so still that he thought she must be awake, but she said nothing.

He waited for her to realize he was there, to jump up and scream, or cast him rudely out at the least.

Tentatively, he touched her temple with the back of his fingers. She sighed, a sleeper’s sigh, and turned over in the bed away from him, snuggling down with his hand caught in hers.

In the dark she was not Lady Winter. In the dark she was his game little wolf again, who dreamed of demons and had to touch him in her sleep.

He leaned against the bed frame. He didn’t try to lie beside her, because then she would wake and break the spell. He put his head down, resting against her warm back. For a long time, while she sank far down in the depths of sleep again, he knelt on the carpet with his arm around her.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Elizabeth, an active child, found her mother entirely too dull to be borne in the very early dawn. She knew that if she put her small face up to Mama’s, trying to wake her, she would only be snugged close and trapped, and then she wouldn’t be able to fall out of the bed all by herself. But she did take a moment to investigate the unusual circumstance of an extra arm, large and brown, hugging her mother.

Elizabeth thought hug was a nice word. Hugging was a nice thing to do. “Guh,” she said, touching the new arm.

A low rumbling sound came from somewhere the other side of Mama. The hand moved, and the arm, and a head of tousled black hair appeared. As Elizabeth stared in delight, a dragon lurked up from the floor, squinting and shaking its head. She pressed her hands together and smiled at it.

It blinked its blue eyes, and smiled back.

Elizabeth cooed. She crawled to the bed stool and turned about and let herself down very creditably. In her beribboned slippers, she ran around the bed and found the entire dragon, a great expanse of tanned brown skin right down at her level. She gave a squeal.

Mama murmured something sleepy. The dragon looked at Elizabeth with its laughing blue eyes and whispered, “Shh-hhh,” in a soft way, softer than the average hissing dragon that Nurse drew for her on paper. Very gently it disengaged itself from hugging Mama and rose.

It turned into a man as it did, and Elizabeth quailed back a little, less certain of men than dragons. But he didn’t try to pick her up; he just walked, tall and impressive in padded stocking feet, into her playroom. He started to close the door.

Elizabeth instantly ran forward. She was not going to be shut out of her room. She smacked her chubby hands against the door before it latched.

Zenia had an excellent sleep. She drowsed later than usual, dreamily surprised that Elizabeth was content to sleep so long and quietly. Zenia vaguely remembered a door closing—she could not decide how long ago that had been, but the maid always came to make up the fire, which usually had Elizabeth up and bolting for her toys.

She moved to check her daughter’s forehead for fever. Her hand swept across the bed. She sat up abruptly.

“Elizabeth!” She flung her feet to the floor.
“Elizabeth!”

She ran for the playroom and collided with the nurse coming the other way.

“Oh, beg pardon, ma’am—”

“Elizabeth!” Zenia cried frantically, brushing her aside to see that the room was empty.

“Oh, ma’am, she’s right as rain,” the nurse said soothingly. “She’s gone downstairs with her papa to breakfast.”

“Gone down—” Zenia pressed her hand over her throat. “Oh!” She realized that the nurse held a man’s shirt and trousers folded over her arm. “I didn’t give permission for her to be taken down!”

The nurse’s smile vanished. She curtsied deeply. “I’m very sorry, ma’am! But I—was I to say to his lordship that he could not take her?”

“Of course,” Zenia snapped, turning. She rang for her maid, but she was already dressed by the time the girl arrived. She waited just long enough for her last button in back to be done up and her hair quickly pinned under a black cap, then ran downstairs.

There was no one in the morning parlor. Bright winter sun shone across the long table, sparkling on silver and crystal. It was still too early for the earl and countess, but two of the waiting place settings had been cleared away already. There was a napkin laid flat where one of them had been, with a large orange spot in the middle of it—obviously a spill. Several of the toast racks had been heavily raided. The room smelled of ham and coffee. A footman entered, carrying a fresh pot. He set it down and automatically pulled out a chair for her.

“Where is Miss Elizabeth?” she demanded, disregarding the chair.

The footman bowed his head. “I’m not rightly certain, m’lady, but his lordship mentioned going to the stable after breakfast.”

“The stable!” Zenia whirled around and strode across the marble entry hall, the sound of her heels echoing from the red-veined columns and the floor. Another servant opened the door to the King of Prussia room, and Zenia broke into a trot as she traversed the great gilded length of it. At the end, she let herself out the French door onto the terrace, not stopping for a cloak.

The crisp air of morning struck her cheeks and lungs as she ran up a long path. The stables were a great distance away—they crowned the hill behind the house, as formal and elaborate a facade as Swanmere itself. She was panting icy puffs of steam as she reached the graveled court.

“Is Miss Elizabeth here?” She accosted the first groom she saw, a little man leading a horse under the arched entrance.

He bobbed. “The grass school, mum.”

“The grass school?” Zenia had never been into the stables; the carriages were always brought round to the house, and she had not ridden once at Swanmere. “Where?”

He seemed to sense her panic, for he threw the horse’s lead to a stableboy and bowed again. “This way, mum, if you please.”

Beth made giggling squeals as she bounced along, held in Arden’s arm on the front of the saddle. “Pa!” she cried. “Pa!” demanding that they resume speed when he halted. Shajar instantly sprang forward in a canter, her ears pricking, docile and pretty in spite of the strange surroundings. She rocked across the grass, much too small for Arden’s height, but perfect for a young girl’s mount. God willing, Beth would have twenty years and more with her, for Arabs were long-lived horses, and the mare just now six years old. The Bedouins grew up with their mounts. The greatest gift a sheik could give his baby son was the mare that would carry him into battle.

Arden carried his own daughter on Prince Rashid’s war horse, turning and feinting and galloping in huge circles, ignoring the shafting pain in his side. Beth would learn her first lessons on a good solid pony, of course, but the String of Pearls would be there, inspiration and reward—Shajar al-Durr, the splendid, perfect mare that her father had brought out of the desert itself for her.

Beth was fearless. On the ground she had not drawn back when the mare put down her muzzle and drew in great curious gusts in Beth’s face, but only reached out to touch the soft nose. She did not cry now, bouncing and flying, but laughed with joy. She might have been born in the black tents for the instant delight she took in mounting a war horse and jousting with the air. When Arden leaned his head down to squeeze her close and kiss her ear, she gave a squeal and then turned her face away.

“Oh, a cruel flirt!” he said. “You’ll bedevil their dreams, won’t you,
sheytana?”

She made a chortle in her throat, as if she looked forward to it.

“Elizabeth!”

The sharp outcry made the mare leap sideways. Arden clutched Beth tight while she laughed. As the horse steadied, he looked around.

Her mother stood frozen at the gate, her white hands up before her mouth. She seemed to have enough sense left in her to know that running forward screaming in a welter of flapping skirts was not the safest course. He made the mare stand still, and Lady Winter strode forward across the muddy grass.

“You are
mad!”
she hissed as she came close. She reached and tore Beth from his hold. The baby began to cry in protest, kicking to get away. Shajar threw her head, eyes rolling at the commotion. “You want to kill her!” Beth’s mother shouted at Arden. “You don’t care if you kill her!”

Her face was mottled, her dark hair straggling free of an ugly black cap. She had not even worn a cloak. She spun away, carrying Beth with her.

He dismounted, watching her stride to the gate. All the air had left his chest, as if he had taken a hard blow.

Lady Winter turned, hefting the crying child. “Don’t you
dare
touch her! Don’t touch her again!”