No Greater Pleasure (34 page)

Quilla took Florentine’s hand. She knew little about Alyria and the way of life there, just that there had been a war, and that women had once been forced into servitude there.

“They didn’t let us love women,” continued Florentine in a voice unlike her normal bluster. “But I did. Born female, living male, loving women . . . I was a freak of the worst sort. And then, the war, and the women rose up and the prince became our king upon the birth of her son. . . .” Florentine’s voice shuddered. “And they were allowed to take off their veils. I could have become a woman, but I was afraid, Quilla. Because what was I? A man? Or a woman? Living as one and loving the same? So I ran, over the mountains, and then I met Master Gabriel, and he brought me here.”

“And now you’ve found someone to love,” Quilla said gently. “Where is the shame in that? You are as you were made, Florentine. You can be nothing else.”

“If she fails, as Allora did,” Florentine said in a low voice, “he will send her away, as well.”

“Rossi won’t fail. She is smarter than Allora Walles ever was. And Saradin is quiet, now. Rossi will be able to care for her appropriately.”

Florentine took her hand from Quilla’s and wiped her face, voice gruff. “Saradin has been quiet before. I don’t trust her.”

“Nor I,” admitted Quilla. “But I believe Rossi will be fine.”

Florentine sighed. “He never should have married that bint.”

“But he did,” said Quilla with a small smile.

“And now we are all stuck with her.”

“Yes.”

Florentine looked at Quilla. “Would that he’d met you sooner.”

“If he had not married her, he might never have needed me.”

Florentine rolled her eyes. “When will you stop being so bloody complacent?”

“Oh, perhaps when I die,” Quilla teased as she got up to finish with her tray.

“Huh,” huffed Florentine. “Maybe sooner than that.”

“You never know,” answered Quilla. “You never know.”

 

 

 

T
he wind rustled the leaves in the trees and made Gabriel cough. And heat—welcome at first after the many dreary months of winter. Hot wind and the sound of coughing woke Quilla from her sleep.

The instant she opened her eyes, they stung and watered. Gabriel still coughed beside her in the bed, not beneath the trees in the meadow, not under a hot summer sky. She sat upright into the cloud of smoke hovering over the bed and fell back at once, choking.

Quilla covered her mouth and nose with her hand and shook Gabriel, who had ceased coughing. She cried out his name, but he did not respond. She shook him harder, and he stirred feebly.

From someplace far away, she heard the sound of shouting, mostly drowned out by the roaring that she knew now was not made by the summer breeze in the trees.

“Fire!” Quilla shook Gabriel harder. “Fire! Wake up!”

He didn’t respond. Quilla, still naked, rolled out of bed and hit the floor with a thud hard enough to clack her teeth together. The air was clearer down here, but not by much, and she gasped in a deep breath. She crawled to the privy chamber and reached for the taps on the bathtub. Water splashed, ringing, against the tub’s metal sides. She threw in every towel and washcloth she could find, soaking them before dragging them out. She wrapped one around her body, her head, her hands, then flung the others over her shoulder and crawled back beneath the ever-lowering layer of smoke to the bed.

“Gabriel!”

She slopped the sopping cloths over his face and he startled, eyes opening. She realized she could see him, that the light from outside was highlighting his face, not white moonlight but the shifting red gold of fire.

“Fire!”

He blinked and started to sit. Quilla put her hand on his chest, pointing to the smoke now hovering mere arrows above them. She tugged him until he rolled off the bed and onto the floor.

The fall and the soaked towels seemed to revive him, because he shook himself and reached for her. She could not hear his words, though his lips moved. The noise of the fire, the sound of the rushing wind overwhelmed all other sound.

She helped him wrap himself in the cloths, already drying in the heat. “We have to crawl! Stay low!”

He could not have heard her, but he nodded in understanding. They crawled. The floor under her bare knees was hot. Smoke made her cough and blinded her; her head connected solidly with the door frame because she misjudged the distance. The tears of pain helped wash the smoke from her eyes. Gabriel’s hand closed upon her ankle.

Invisible Mother
, Quilla prayed as she crawled.
If ever I have offended thee with thought or action, I beg forgiveness. Save your servant, Holy Mother, I beseech thee. Or if not me, please, by the Land Above, save the one I love.

The fire’s roar grew louder in the hall. Quilla could see nothing. Gabriel moved up alongside her, his face so black with smoke the whites of his eyes appeared startling.

“Dane!”

She saw his lips form the name of his son and fear again thudded her heart. She nodded. Dane’s room was on the second floor along with the other bedrooms. To get there, they would have to get down the stairs.

How they made it she would never know, for the smoke curtained the stairs and made watching their path impossible. Backward they went, knees and hands, bumping with every step until, at last, she tumbled backward into the second-floor hall and Gabriel caught her.

“Window!”

Gabriel pointed toward the end of the hall. Quilla nodded. Again, they crawled. Her knees began to bleed. A bit farther down the hall, the prostrate form of a man blocked them.

Bertram, red hair blackened with soot, face smeared with ash, lay unconscious. Quilla unwrapped one of her hands and put the now barely damp towel over his face. He did not wake. She could not feel the beat of his heart or see the rise and fall of his chest, but she did not think he was dead. She did not want to believe it.

Gabriel stood, the upper half of his body disappearing into the smoke. His hands came down to lift Bertram, and Quilla followed as Gabriel dragged the houseboy down the hall.

Glass broke, the pieces like diamonds scattered on the hall carpet. Before she could stop herself, Quilla had crawled atop some of them, and the cuts on her knees bled afresh. She used a towel to brush the floor clear, but glass still stuck in her flesh, and she had no time to pick it out. A sudden influx of wind made the smoke roil. The fire’s roar grew louder, the sound of a beast approaching from behind.

In another moment Gabriel knelt in front of her. Blood streamed down his arms from dozens of cuts on his now bare hands. He put his arm around her waist and hauled her upright. She found the wall with her hand, and then the window frame, still bristling with glass. The air rushing in tasted so sweet she thought she might intoxicate herself with it.

Gabriel yanked the towel from around her head and used it to smash out the rest of the glass from the window frame. He pushed her to the window. He meant to push her out.

“No!” Quilla shook her head, resisting. “Dane!”

Flames licked out of the windows on the second floor.
Oh, sweet Invisible Mother! Those are Saradin’s rooms!

In the courtyard below, she saw figures. Billy. Florentine. Some of the stable hands, passing bucket after bucket of water to each other and splashing them at the house. The cobblestones glistened. The snow around the house had melted, leaving bare earth, ringed with white, behind.

“Go, Quilla!”

“No! I won’t leave you!”

Just below them was the roof to the small portico. The snow had melted off it and was running in rivulets down the gutter. Bertram lay on the ground just below it, one of the housemaids bent over him.

“Go, Quilla!”

She shook her head, resisting. Gabriel gave her no other chance at protest. He grabbed her arms, the pain of her unhealed wound making her cry out. He lifted her over the sill. Her hands grabbed for purchase. He pushed harder. A piece of glass he’d missed tore the flesh of her palm. Blood made her grasp slip. She dangled, falling, and only his grip upon her arm kept her from tumbling to the ground.

Gabriel lowered her as far as he could. Her toes brushed the roof of the portico. He let her go. Quilla stumbled, slipped, and went down hard enough to crack the clay tiles. She tried to scream but had no breath. She slid toward the edge of the roof until her feet hooked into the gutter and stopped her from going all the way over. She slipped more, scraping her side along the gutter as she rolled over the side, but managing to catch herself at the last minute yet again.

Strong hands grabbed her calves, then her waist, and she let go, falling into Jericho’s arms. He, too, had been blackened by smoke, his blond hair gone gray with it. He wore a shirt and trousers, the shirt undone to his waist, sleeves unlaced and flapping. His bare feet slipped on the half icy cobblestones. He set her down, taking her by the arm to get her away from the house.

She slipped and almost fell but he held her up. “Gabriel went to get Dane!”

He could have heard no more than one word out of her sentence, so hoarse and choked had been her voice, but whatever he heard made him turn back to the house.

“Dane is still inside?”

He did not wait for an answer, but pulled his shirt off over his head and thrust it into her hands. It took her an eternity of instants to understand why—she was still naked and had not noticed.

Quilla turned toward the sound of shouting and saw the stable hands Luke and Perrin rolling what appeared to be a cartwheel wrapped in tubing into the courtyard. Jutting from its top was a handle. A pump handle. She turned from it to shout after Jericho, but he had already run back toward the house and disappeared into the door as she watched.

She pulled his shirt over her head, the sleeves too long and the hem hitting her midthigh. Her feet were cold. Luke and Perrin had unrolled some of the tubing, and Billy had grabbed the end, pointing it toward the house. Luke jumped on top of the wheel. She saw now that the tubing trailed off toward the garden. He pushed the pump handle. Water jetted from the end of the house. Perrin and Billy ran toward the house with it.

Of course. A hose.
Her mind, dulled by shock and smoke, had not recognized it. Quilla stumbled on the uneven cobbles, but before she could fall, another strong hand caught her.

“Up, girl,” grunted Florentine. “Let’s get you tended to.”

Quilla did not move at first, her eyes locked on the sight of Glad Tidings. Flames now flickered in some of the third-story windows. The entire second floor appeared to be covered in red and orange and black. Smoke poured from the windows, which began to break one after another.

“Come, Quilla!”

She followed Florentine on numb and bleeding feet. The blood from her hand had slowed, gone thick, but painted Jericho’s shirt with crimson calligraphy. Florentine sat her on a bale of hay covered by a horse blanket, and grabbed up another from the ground to wrap around Quilla’s shoulders. It smelled of beast, of warmth and comfort, and as Quilla pulled it close, she shook so hard her teeth clattered.

“Sinder save them,” Florentine said as another window scattered glass onto the courtyard below.

“Invisible Mother save them!”

Quilla turned to the sound of the voice, and her face felt suddenly frozen into stone. “Jorja!”

The nursemaid’s cheeks had streaks of white left behind in the soot by her tears. Her grief did not impress Quilla, who stood and slapped the woman across the face as hard as she could.

“What are you doing out here when they are still inside!”

“Quilla—”

Quilla ignored Florentine and slapped Jorja again. The nursemaid went to her knees screaming pleas of mercy, but Quilla ignored those, too. She slapped Jorja’s face a third time, knocking her over. Quilla slipped in the mud left by the snow, but struck again.

“What are you doing out here when they are still in there?” Her fingers doubled up and she punched Jorja, missing her nose but catching her jaw and knocking the woman to the ground.

“Quilla! Stop it, Handmaiden! Stop!”

Again, Quilla ignored Florentine, fury making her strong enough to shake off the chatelaine’s grasp. Quilla grabbed the neck of Jorja’s night rail and hauled her upright, shaking her like a weasel shakes a chicken to break its neck.

“Quilla, ’tis not her fault! She took him! Saradin took Dane!”

Quilla let go of Jorja, who fell back to the ground, wailing. Quilla turned. “What do you mean?”

Florentine put her hands on Quilla’s shoulders. “She took him, Quilla. Saradin took Dane and set fire to her rooms. ’Tis not Jorja’s fault.”

“Oh, by the Arrow.” Quilla spat the taste of smoke from her mouth. “Oh, that cursed mad bitch!”

“Yes.” Tears had also streaked Florentine’s cheeks. “Yes, she is that.”

Quilla reached for Florentine’s hand. Their fingers linked, and they stood side by side, watching the house burn in front of them.

Time had slowed, had stopped, and yet had begun to go twice as fast. The roof of Quilla’s gable room collapsed. Her vision doubled, tripled, blurred with tears. Florentine’s fingers tightened in her own, the wound on Quilla’s palm covering their hands with her blood.

And then, she saw her. Saradin, atop the roof. The wind picked up her long blonde hair and spread it out behind her like a wedding veil scattered with fireflies. She wore a dress of flame, the black lace of smoke at her hem and sleeves, the ripple of yellow and gold at her throat.

“Sweet Invisible Mother,” said Florentine.

Quilla took a step toward the house, her hand outstretched, but Florentine held her back from going farther. “Dane?”

Saradin screamed, the sound horrid and high, the screech of a teakettle left too long on the flame.

“She’s going to jump,” said Florentine.