To Save a World (32 page)

She pushed away his hot kisses as the man’s spent breathing hissed past his parted teeth, and sat up, retying her shoulder-ribbons with flying fingers. Was this the final ineffable joy, the delight immeasurable, about which the other maidens squealed and whispered? She pushed his hand away when he would have assisted her, her whole body flinching in revulsion. She felt bruised and shaken, and she clenched her teeth tight to keep them from chattering. She broke into his whispered stream of endearments with a quick, shaken, “Take me back—they will be looking for me.”

He raised her gently, as he might pick up a child who has stumbled, and she drew a deep breath, something… she hardly knew what… growing to swift birth inside her tight, throbbing breasts, her bruised and aching body. She forced herself to conceal her shaking, and to smile up at him, then leaned her head hard against his encircling arm and murmured with deliberate pathos, “You must take me back—I am almost a prisoner, you know.”

He supported her faltering steps, half carrying her, whispering, “Yes, yes, my little silken bird, my little flower.” He paused at the edge of the archway, retrieving his lantern from its hiding-place, and looked at her, saying hesitantly, “Little lady, you cannot return like this!”

In the crude light Sybil looked down at her crushed and torn ribbons, her crumpled and stained dress, tasting the blood on her lips with a slow satisfaction. She touched her tangled coppery curls with exploring fingers as he persuaded, “Come, little one, smooth your dress, let me fasten your sash. No one must see you like this!” There was fear in him again, and she could feel it like a taste in her mouth. Sybil tilted her head to one side, then heard the sound for which, without knowing it until this moment, she had been waiting. The clash of pikes, the ringing step and the challenge. She clenched her small fists, feeling her breath roughen and catch in her throat, smiling up at him.

“Must they not?” she murmured, then suddenly whirled, breaking away from him, and cried out imperiously, “Guard! Guard, to me!”

“What…” the man took a backward step; booted feet, running, echoed in harsh sequence on the flagstones and an explosion of lights burst in their faces; the face of a steel-capped Guard— Blessed Cassilda be thanked! It’s a Guard who knows me by sight!—thrust through the archway and a startled voice gasped “Lady Sybil-Mhari!”

She pointed, with a dramatic gesture, feeling the frightening power surge up inside her. “Kill him!” she commanded, and heard her voice breaking on what she herself would have taken for a wild sob of shame and fright, if she had heard it from another throat. She could almost see herself reflected in the Guard’s eyes, in his mind, swollen lips oozing a trace of bitten blood, the loosened ribbons falling to show her bruised breast, the skirt torn to show a hint of narrow thighs. The Guard spat out a cry of dismay and horror, shouting to his confederates; Sybil turned away, modestly mantling her face with her hair, as a second Guard appeared behind the first and his face echoed all the changes she had seen in the first. A tiny smile of contempt trembled on Sybil’s lips, but she made it into a piteous grimace, widening her eyes as she looked down at the man in whose arms she had lain only a few minutes ago. She whispered pathetically “The Lord Ludovic must never know—my honor is in your hands—but how can it be? But if he—were… somehow… to fall into the waterfall…”

And now she saw the blanching of terror, the whitening of nostril and jaw, as the man’s eyes sought hers in wild entreaty.

“Lady… little lady…” he gasped helplessly, and his hoarse and husky voice, as when he had whispered endearments, sent a thrill of warmth through her.

There is a power in you… and I fear it … oh, she thought ecstatically, if the Hastur sorceress could only know . . . she would have robbed me of this…

She watched the Guards seize the man, expertly pinion his arms; followed like a shadow, hugging herself with her thin arms, on the crest of rising excitement, as they hustled him rudely toward the cliff. He was shouting now, hoarse indecencies, until one of the Guards shoved a hand over his mouth. They struggled briefly at the wall, and suddenly Sybil felt a wild thrill surging through her body. It knifed hotly through her breasts, overwhelming as a kiss; stabbed fluid warmth all through her, gripped her thighs in a vise of pleasure. She gasped, her breath jolting out on the cresting heat of it, and cried aloud in unbearable delight as the man’s figure tottered on the ledge, clawed wildly at the air, flailed and disappeared. Sybil sank down in the grass, breathing in heavy sobs, knowing now what was the true power, the joy of love—vaguely, in her overwhelming surge of emotion, she wondered what his name had been, how she could discover his name. She would remember it always in her prayers for the dead, the name of the one who had released the power within her, had brought her to fulfillment. She became aware that one of the Guards was bending solicitously over her. She was too spent to rise; she let him lift her, leaning heavily on his arm, swaying helplessly.

“Lady Sybil,” he said gently, “Your honor, and your secret, are forever safe with me. I will conduct you safe to the women’s quarters; see you only that your maids do not gossip, and this night’s work shall never be known.” He guided her tottering steps with reverent hands. “Poor little lady, if I had been at hand, that beast, that disgrace to the Guards and their honor, had never dared lay his hands on you…

She lowered her long lashes. “What is your name? I would thank my… my preserver in my prayers, before I sleep.”

“Reuel, my lady.”

“Reuel. I shall… remember,” she whispered. She would not make that mistake again. “You will not find me… ungrateful.” Again the unendurable pleasure gusted up through her as she saw his thin swarthy face go foolish and soft with a sudden, incredible hope. She murmured, “I often walk in the courtyard here. Will you protect me?”

“With… with my very life, Lady.” he stammered, and she looked at him and smiled. With him the terror need not strike till she had fed on the desire for a day or two, and the fear, and the hope… till she had fed herself full. Now that she knew her power, she could wait for her pleasure.

She smiled, with the drunken joy of a woman who has discovered true love, and ran lightly up the stairway toward her chamber.