The Prince of Midnight (13 page)

He was certain it was calculated, that sultry pose. She might appear
indifferent and composed, but she wanted to rub his nose in her ability to
affect him. She wanted him to break again, make of himself a goatish fool. And
even though he knew it, his heart and his reason kept getting confused. She was
female, vulnerable and hurt and alone; he wanted to protect her. His whole body
lusted for her. He imagined brushing his mouth against the curve of her throat,
breathing against her skin, the cool scent and living heat of her in all his
senses. Over his rhythmic work on the sword, he stared at her legs and
fantasized until she silently stood up.

She left the kitchen. He could hear her shoes echo on the stone stairs.

He knew where she was going. Where else was there to go upstairs but to his
bed? It was an offer as clear as a perfumed whore beckoning on a street corner.
It made him furious. He finished the sword in long, savage strokes of the
whetstone and stood up, balancing the weapon in his hand. With an inelegant
slash, he attacked his shadow on the wall. Then he laid the broadsword across
the table and picked up the colichemarde, made a parry and riposte with the
lighter weight weapon, watching the tip of the blade catch the firelight like
blood.

Sluggish. Far too reserved. His impulse to inhibit his moves maintained him
upright and inept.

He closed his eyes and lifted his arm slowly, keeping the sword extended as
he raised it. At shoulder level he felt his balance going, felt the weight of
his arm and the weapon rock him forward. He held, trembling, trying to find his
center within the slow sensation of toppling, trying to ignore that dizzy
phenomenon of pitching in endless tumbles and listen to his body instead of his
mind.

Inside the reeling spin was his shape, his hand raised before him, his legs
spread, his body hot, humiliatingly excited still, his feet solid on the floor
and his wrist and back and shoulders accepting the weight of the sword. He
lifted it higher, testing for the zenith of the arch. That was easier; he could
lock his arm above him and hold his head steady until the sense of rotation
settled.

He opened his eyes and lowered the rapier, assessing the same perceptions
with his sight: hand there, shoulder and spine there, feet braced, the floor
beneath him and the ceiling arched overhead. To think of her in the bed above
made him feel raw, embarrassed and violent, perfectly happy to kill anything
that came in reach. He let the sword tip rest against the stool. Then he took a
breath, brought the sword flat against his chest, and spun.

Instantly, his center shattered. The world gyrated around him. He tried to
stop, staggered against something, and clutched the sword while the room went
past in a sickening whirl. His knees buckled and he let them, let the rapier
clatter against the floor, finding the solid stone beneath his palms the only
source of stability. He stayed on his hands and knees, panting and sweating,
until the reeling gradually slowed.

Then he stood up and did it again.

A simple surgeon had told him once: make yourself dizzy. Force yourself to do
it. Make yourself dizzy, and the spells will go away.

Another charlatan, he'd thought, except the man had refused compensation.
S.T. had tried it twice, and it hadn't worked. But neither had all the nostrums
and potions pressed on him by more distinguished medical men.

He was down to this. By the third attempt, he'd lost the capacity to pull his
shaking knees beneath him and haul himself to his feet. He lay flat on the cold
floor, fighting dry heaves, his hand locked around the sword grip and his head
aching. He wanted to throw up. He wanted to die. More than anything, he wanted
to lie down in his bed and sleep the sickness away.

With a supreme effort he made it upright, using the sword as a support. He
careened into the armory and fetched up against the dark stairs with the room
spinning around him. He steadied himself and went up, one step at a time,
reached the top and hung onto the door. He blinked through the whirling
dizziness toward his candlelit bed, and remembered.

"Oh, Christ," he said, and sank to the floor where he stood.

He closed his eyes and let the vertigo have him. She left the bed; he heard
the squeak and rustle, but he couldn't open his eyes or he was afraid he would
retch.

Her cool hand touched his forehead. "I knew it," she murmured. "The fever."

He lifted his hand, felt her bent over him. He spread his palm against her
chest and gave her a ruthless shove, heard a faint gasp and a thump. He opened
his eyes and found her sprawled in front of him, struggling up onto her elbow.

"It's not fever," he said sullenly.

The spinning had begun to recede, but nausea floated at the back of his
throat. He gripped the sword and stood, trying to breathe through the sickness.
For a long moment he stood still, aware of every muscle in his body.

"Get clear," he said, and extended the weapon, lifting it in the same
painstaking exercise: out and up, focus on his shape in the space around him,
turn his wrist to the side and down, concentrate, refuse the tumble in his mind,
collect his attention and fix it on the motion of his limbs, level and turn,
steady, watch the point and think of his own form and structure, turn, turn,
turn . . .

"You are utterly deranged," she said.

He came around in his slow spin and drifted to a stop facing her.. The nausea
faded; she only appeared to slide past twice before her image steadied in front
of him, her dark hair falling free over one of his voluminous shirts, her skin
pale and delicious.

"Your eyes look peculiar." She frowned at him. "Does your head ache?"

"It's not fever," he said impatiently. He came on guard and stepped into a
passado, focusing on the axis between his shoulder and knee. The move seemed
better, slightly faster, the dizziness a shadow of what he felt when he'd made
himself spin. Perhaps this was what the surgeon had meant. Just force it on
himself, until standing still was such a relief that it seemed easy in
comparison.

He straightened up and took a deep breath. Then he attacked the bedpost,
thrusting in
quarte,
opening his wrist and concentrating on how the
motion felt in his forward hip when he lunged.

He stepped up and examined the post, pleased to see that he'd left not a mark
on the wood.

"Is it still breathing?" she asked.

He looked toward her and gave a slight, mocking bow. "Only because I chose to
let it live."

"Fortunately, there were no bedposts lying in wait as you came up the stairs.
You weren't in such fettle then."

"A moment of light-headedness," he said carelessly. "I'm all right now."

She lifted her eyebrows. S.T. made a show of examining the blade and tried
not to stare at her naked legs.

"I can see that you are," she said. The shirttail just skimmed the top of her
thighs. He felt his body begin to betray him again. She added indifferently,
"I'm at your disposal, if you wish to please yourself."

He hated to be read so easily. He hated it that she meant to drive him off by
beckoning him on. His hand tightened on the sword. "Haven't yet paid off your
debts to me?" he mocked. "Perhaps we should just keep a ledger. Half crown a day
for nursing. Only a livre a week for bread and garlic soup, since you don't like
it. Ten guineas for a valiant rescue from debauched nobleman. Is that fair?"

"Quite fair," she said. "But I haven't the money, as you know."

He scowled at the bedpost. "I don't want money," he said, and then turned to
glare at her before she could speak. "Or to be paid in bed, either. Last
night—at the ruins— that wasn't what I wanted."

"No." She met his eyes directly. "It would appear that you want more than I
can ever possibly give, Monseigneur. I hope you understand that."

He did. It was a challenge, like the fencing and the riding; he'd lost his
skill for
l'amour
and would have to restore it. His swordplay was
coming back; he could feel it already. He could make her love him if he managed
everything properly. He could bring her to her knees. He'd done it a hundred
times. He'd botched the thing painfully 80 far, of course; she'd seen him at his
utter worst . . .

but if he kept his head he could pull the fat from the fire. Recoup his
losses and win in the end. A hundred times, he'd done it.

He curled his hand around the bedpost and looked at her slantwise. "You may
have the bed tonight," he said, as courteously as any ballroom gallant. "We'll
leave here at dawn."

They left Col du Noir in the teeth of the mistral. It had sprung up in the
night, wind howling down through the canyon and around the castle walls like a
thousand wolves in full voice. A low rumble seemed to fill the air, a constant
grinding sound that could drive a man mad if he listened long enough, sinking
into his head and his heart and his bones until he would scream at his wife and
thrash his children just for the sound of something human. S.T. felt it in his
bad ear as well as his good one; a vibration more than an actual sound, as if
some giant inside the earth hummed one constant, ominous note and would not
stop.

It made everyone irritable, even on the first day, and the likelihood was
that the tempest the French called
vent de bis
would blow for weeks
this time of year. Only Miss Strachan seemed unaffected—but then, she'd never
lived through it. The mistral was only wind yet to her.

There was no such thing as comfortable transportation out of La Paire, even
if they'd had the money. S.T. hoarded his twenty gold louis, only parting with
his flock of ducks and thirty livres for a decent donkey that he hoped they
could resell for the price of a hired chaise to Paris. The animal carried
Charon's saddle and bridle and their small stash of food, another few
sous
worth, enough for the four nights S.T. estimated to see them to Digne. He'd
packed four shirts and a pair of black silk breeches, strapped his colichemarde
to his sword belt and the spadroon in a halter across his back, and strode out
at a good pace on the eastern road.

The trees and mountain flanks gave some protection from the mistral, but it
came screaming with icy force down the valleys. He watched as her cheeks grew
redder and redder beneath the hat crammed down on her head, but there was no
pause in Miss Leigh Strachan's stride as she walked along in the other wagon
rut, tugging the donkey behind her.

He was secretly glad she'd been ill—otherwise he suspected that she'd be in
far better wind than he. In spite of S.T.'s enthusiastic start, the donkey set
the pace for all of them, excluding Nemo, by refusing to break into a trot. The
wolf cast about ahead of the small party, stopping to wait and running ahead
again, alerting them to other travelers by melting among the white rock and
underbrush long before S.T. could hear the sound of approaching humans.

Once, when Nemo's presence indicated they were safely isolated, he said with
studied casualness, "I think perhaps we should get married."

She took it rather better than he'd expected. "I beg your pardon?" she asked
coolly.

"Someone's going to recognize you for a female. 'Twould draw less comment if
you'd just go ahead and dress like one."

"I don't believe it's drawn any comment."

"No. Just wholesome admirers like the marquis."

She transferred the donkey's rope to her other hand and tugged at the
straggling beast. "I've thanked you for extricating me from that difficulty. I
shall be warned against such things in the future."

"If we're a married couple, no one will bother you."

"I see."

He put his hand on the hilt of his rapier, shaping the cool metal. His face
felt hot. He wanted to touch her instead of the sword. "I considered brother and
sister," he said, "but I'd rather we travel with some semblance of
respectability. 'Twould be remarked upon that you've no maid with you, and we'd
be expected to take separate rooms if we can get them. An unnecessary extra
expense."

"Yes," she said calmly. "I hadn't been intending to travel with a companion."

He recognized that jibe for what it was, but elected to ignore it. "You
needn't worry that I'll disturb your privacy by sharing your quarters." He broke
a branch off a bush as he passed and began stripping the leaves. " 'Twill just
be for the look of things. I shan't stay there at night."

"I see," she said again.

He kept his eyes on the switch he was stripping. "What do you say?"

"I'll think about it."

He silently damned her stubbornness. He could hardly set her up for a proper
flirt while she was dressed as a man. Boy, rather. Nobody could possibly take
her for a man. He'd look bizarre in public, trying to romance a pretty youth. As
hopelessly debauched as Sade himself.

That didn't stop him for the moment, of course. Nemo's actions told him there
wasn't another human being for a long way. He tried to think of something
charming to say, but somehow the kind of phrases that had come easily when
murmured in a rose garden at midnight seemed a bit more forced shouted into the
face of a freezing wind to a girl dressed in breeches and tugging a recalcitrant
donkey.

He had to settle for quizzing her. She wasn't overly cooperative with that,
either. After getting a few brief replies on the exact location of her home, he
dropped back a pace and gave the lagging donkey a light swat with the birch. The
creature jogged forward.

"Tell me this—just how did you find me?" he asked.

"I looked," she said briefly. "You're not so difficult to recognize as you
may think."

"What, then—did you just start out in the north of England with a
thieftaker's handbill, asking for some fellow with outlandish eyebrows?"

"Everyone knows you went to France," she said. "I started asking for a man
with green eyes and gold-favored nair in Paris."