The Wind Dancer (7 page)

"Only because it was something I had to do." She moistened her lips. "He makes me
feel... " She paused, searching for words. "I feel like I do in that last minute before I steal
a fat purse. Scared and trembling but excited too."

"Hmmm. Interesting."

"Help me." Her hand clutching the wool shawl at her breast tightened. "I didn't feel
helpless with Giovanni, but I do with Lord Andreas."

"Why should I help you? Lion is my friend and you're nothing to me." He spoke with
complete detachment.

Sanchia's hopes plummeted. "I can't think of any reason why you should help me." She
paused, considering. "Unless it's because you'd find it more amusing to make things a
little easier for me. A scared mouse scurrying around Lord Andreas wouldn't be nearly as
entertaining for you."

He suddenly chuckled. "You are anything but a scared mouse." He paused. "Lion's fair.
Serve him well and he'll not misuse you."

Sanchia felt a surge of relief as she thought she recognized the slightest break in the wall
that Lorenzo Vasaro used to distance himself from everyone around him. "He has the
manner of a great lord. Is he very rich?"

He was silent a moment, and she began to think he wasn't going to answer. "He's lord of
the city-state of Mandara. He has great wealth but only the one fief. His father was a
condottiere and raised Lion to follow after him. Lorenzo de' Medici gave Lion's father
Mandara in payment for waging war against one of his less friendly neighbors."

"Where is Mandara?"

"To the south. Between Florence and Pisa."

"And now Lord Andreas is the lord of the city?"

Vasaro nodded. "Since his father died some thirteen years ago. Lion continued as
condottiere and maintained his father's armies until he decided to disband them two years
ago and return to Mandara." Vasaro gazed at her inquiringly. "Well, have you gouged
enough from me to abate your fears?"

"No." She sighed. "I suppose you wouldn't reconsider and tell me why Lord Andreas
bought me?"

Vasaro didn't answer.

"I didn't think so."

"Then you shouldn't have wasted--" he broke off and stopped short. "Santa Maria, what
is that?"

They were crossing the Mercato Nuovo where bankers with ledgers and fat purses sat at
their green-covered tables. However, it was not the bankers at whom Vasaro was staring
but a plump man surrounded by a crowd of snickering onlookers. "Am I mistaken or is
that obese personage peeling down his hose?"

"Oh, that's only a bankrupt," Sanchia said indifferently. "In order to be discharged he has
to strike his naked buttocks three times on that black-and-white marble circle that marks
the site of the symbolic Chariot of Florence."

"How undignified." Vasaro's lips suddenly began to twitch with amusement as he
resumed walking across the mercato. "Lion was worried that you might beggar him. I
must warn him if he does becomes bankrupt, it most certainly must not happen in this
illustrious city."

"I did not ask for so much. It was necessary to--"

"Peace." Lorenzo held up his hand. "I'm not interested in your protests and explanations.
Let me have a little blessed silence for a time."

They walked in silence for a short while until Lorenzo finally said, "Giulia's house is
around the next corner." He cast a glance at her. "I wonder if she'll let you through her
front door. I found Madonna Giulia very particular about all the appointments of her
establishment."

She frowned. "I won't steal anything."

"Your larcenous nature wasn't what I was referring to." He wrinkled his nose. "You have
a great and profound need for a bath."

"I'm clean. I bathed only this morning. It's the--" She stopped as they turned the corner,
her eyes widening in pleasure as she caught sight of the impressive two-story house.
"What a truly splendid casa. It looks as grand as a palazzo. You wouldn't think a whore
could do this well for herself, would you? It seems strange that men would be foolish
enough to pay so much to fornicate with a woman when the pleasure lasts for such a
short time."

His lips twitched. "It doesn't seem strange to me. But then I, too, am one of those foolish
men."

She turned and looked at him speculatively. His manner was so icy, so remote it was
difficult for her to imagine him rutting with one of the strumpets in this splendid house.
"Do you really fornic--"

"I think you've asked quite enough questions for the moment," he interrupted as he took
her elbow and nudged her toward the elaborately carved door of the front entrance. He
didn't look at Sanchia as he opened the door and murmured, "And yes, on occasion, I
most certainly do."

"If you want your little slave girl to be permitted to spend the night here, I think you'd
better come along and intercede with Giulia." Lorenzo stood leaning on the jamb of the
doorway of Lion's chamber. He covered a delicate yawn with his long, slender hand. "I
settled Sanchia's flock in their new nests but I refuse to involve myself between two
quarreling women."

"Where is she?" Lion stood up and moved quickly toward the door. The glimmer of
malicious mischief underlying Lorenzo's pretense of boredom always boded trouble.
Cristo, what was wrong now? Nothing had gone as he had planned since he had caught
sight of Sanchia on the piazza this afternoon.

"In Giulia's chamber." Lorenzo followed him down the hall. "We'd no sooner crossed the
threshold than Giulia appeared in the hall and took offense at your little Sanchia's... " He
paused before continuing euphemistically, "unusual fragrance. She insisted on calling her
servants and dragging the child up to her chamber for a bath."

"Which Sanchia clearly needs."

"But which Sanchia clearly doesn't want. When I last saw her she was being forcibly
restrained by two of Giulia's maidservants while Giulia herself was undressing her."
Lorenzo opened the door of Giulia's chamber. "Ah, I see they have her in the tub. What
wonderful progress."

"Why won't you
listen
to me, you stupid woman? I don't need a bath." It was Sanchia's
voice, the tone almost as fierce as when she had spoken to Giovanni.

Lion strode into the chamber and then stopped short. "My God, what's happened here?"

Clothing was tossed all over the chamber as if blown by a gale wind, Giulia Marzo's
golden hair was hanging loose about her shoulders, the rope of pearls usually binding it
had broken and pearls were scattered over the floor. The bodice of her sea blue gown
bore a three-cornered rip and torrents of water were splashed on the floor, on Giulia, and
on the two servants holding the struggling Sanchia in the hip bath while Giulia attempted
to scrub her.

Sanchia's gaze flew to Lion and she suddenly stopped fighting. "They wouldn't listen to
me. I tried to tell them that it wouldn't do any good."

"She stinks," Giulia said between her teeth. "Lorenzo tells me this she-devil belongs to
you, but I won't have her in my house until I've purged her of this vile odor." Giulia
dipped a cloth into the water and then scrubbed vigorously at Sanchia's neck.

"You're hurting me." Sanchia's amber eyes blazed up at Giulia. "And it will do no good.
I'm clean!"

She certainly appeared clean, Lion noticed bemusedly. The golden skin on Sanchia's
shoulders gleamed above the cloudy water, and she wasn't nearly as thin as he had
believed when she had worn that loose gown.

"Tell her to listen to--" Sanchia broke off as she met Lion's gaze. Her eyes widened, and
she stared at him as if mesmerized while a delicate pink tinted the gold of her cheeks.
Then she swallowed and drew a shaky breath. "Please, my lord, tell her to stop."

Lion gazed at her without speaking.

"Please, my lord." Sanchia's amber eyes were enormous in her triangular face.

"I do like a woman who says please."

There was an intensity in his soft voice that caused Giulia to look at him sharply over her
shoulder. "Lion, don't interfere. This is necessary."

"Her body looks clean enough to me." He dropped down on the cushioned chair a few
yards away from the tub and stretched his legs out before him. His intent gaze returned to
Sanchia's pink-tipped breasts which could be glimpsed just below the surface of the
water. The god Eros couldn't have created nipples more arousingly pointed and
amazingly sensual. "There's no use scraping and reddening that exquisite skin if there's
no need, Giulia."

"But the stench is--"

"It's my
hair
," Sanchia broke in with exasperation. "If you'd listened to me, I would have
told you. Every morning after my bath I rub a mixture into it. It's my hair that stinks and
needs cleansing."

Giulia sat back on her heels and gazed blankly at Sanchia. "You rub something this foul-smelling into your hair?"

Sanchia nodded. "Since I was twelve. Garlic, fish oil, and--"

Giulia quickly held up her hand. "Don't go on. I don't want to know."

"I do," Lorenzo said from the doorway. "Fascinating."

Lion's gaze narrowed on her face. "I'm not as interested in the mixture itself as in her
reason for concocting it."

"Giovanni has a very keen sense of smell," Sanchia said simply. "When my mother was
alive, every morning he would make her bathe and perfume herself. Then he'd have her
kneel naked on the floor of the shop and take her as a dog takes a bitch in the street. After
my mother died I knew that soon I'd be old enough for Giovanni to try to use me in the
same way."

Lorenzo chuckled. "You chose an exceptionally powerful deterrent."

Lion didn't feel the same amusement. He found he was experiencing a multitude of wild
emotions that took him completely off guard. Anger and pity battled with an odd sense of
guilt at the mental image that persisted in coming before his eyes. The image of Sanchia
kneeling naked on the floor, looking back over her shoulder with those huge amber eyes,
her pink tongue moistening her lips with nervousness.

Lust seared him, twisting through his groin in a scalding tide as he realized that the man
in his imagination, the man at whom she was gazing, the man she was ready to receive
into her body, was not Giovanni Ballano.

It was himself.

He abruptly rose to his feet. "Wash her hair," he muttered as he turned away. "And then
bring her to my chamber."

Lorenzo followed Lion from Giulia's room, down the hall, and into Lion's chamber. He
strolled to the table across the room and poured a stream of red wine from a silver pitcher
into two goblets. "Have a little wine." He turned to hand one of the goblets to Lion, his
gaze flicking mockingly to Lion's lower body. "I think you need cooling."

"Is that why you took me to 'intercede'?" Lion sat down in the large chair by the window.
"What game are you playing at now, Lorenzo?"

"I don't know what you mean." Lorenzo gazed at him with limpid innocence. "Your little
street urchin seemed very concerned about learning what and who you are, and I thought
it would be a kindness to throw you both into a situation where revelations would
naturally occur." He smiled. "Which they did. I had no idea Sanchia would be so alluring.
She has truly exquisite breasts."

"Yes." Lion's hand tightened on the stem of his goblet as the memory of Sanchia clad
only in wisps of steam and cloudy water returned to him. "But I didn't buy her to occupy
my bed."

"I know. Which makes the possibilities all the more intriguing." Lorenzo dropped onto
the embroidered cushions of the chair by the table and raised his goblet to his lips. "I look
forward with great anticipation to watching developments between the two of you."

"You mean you look forward to watching us writhe on the stake you're trying to skewer
us with," Lion said dryly. "I doubt if we'll furnish you with as much pleasure as you
hope. I don't know why you foresee my bedding Sanchia to be in any way unusual when
I've had more women than I can count in these last years."

"Ah, but there's one difference. You own Sanchia. She belongs to you." Lorenzo's gaze
narrowed with satisfaction on Lion's face. "And no one in this world is more possessive
than you, Lion. You can't bear to let anything you own be taken away from you. Look
how you're moving heaven and earth to get the Wind Dancer back, and it's only a statue."

Lion's fingers tightened on the stem of the goblet. "It's more than a statue."

"To your family perhaps." Lorenzo shrugged. "To you it's some kind of holy relic you
guard and protect. To me it seems more like a beautiful siren luring men to destruction."

"Sanchia isn't the Wind Dancer."

"No, but as your property she's bound to arouse the same instincts." Lorenzo sipped his
wine, smiling at Lion over the rim of the goblet. "What do you think will happen when
you take her to Mandara?"

"I'm not taking her to Mandara."

Lorenzo lifted a brow. "She said you told her you were taking her there."

"That was before I... " Lion trailed off, his dark brows knotting in a fierce frown as he
took a long swallow of wine.

"Before you decided to take her to your bed?"

Lion met his gaze. "Yes." The intention that had been forming since the moment he had
seen Sanchia in the hip bath was suddenly made. "Why not? As you say, she belongs to
me."

"There's no reason at all why you shouldn't take her." Lorenzo looked down into the ruby
depths of his wine. "I thoroughly approve."

"Which should immediately make me wary. Why do you want Sanchia to become my
mistress?"

"I admire her."

Lion gazed at him in astonishment. He couldn't remember the last time Lorenzo had
indicated he felt anything positive for a stranger. True, admiration wasn't liking, but the
confession was still out of the ordinary.

Lorenzo noticed his surprise. "No, it's true. She reminds me of myself when I was
growing up in the streets of Naples. She fights with every weapon she has to survive and
invents new ones when the old ones don't win the day." He shrugged. "It's a pity she has
such a soft heart. It's a weakness that will probably destroy her."