"I don't know," I whispered.
"I do. And I'll not deny Blessed Elua's precept a second time." Sidonie looped her arms around my neck and began kissing me; a gentle rain of kisses, falling on my lips, my cheeks, my jaw line, my eyelids, punctuating her kisses with murmured words. "Blessed Elua, hear your scion and grant us mercy, for we do but follow your precept. Gods of Alba, hear your scion and grant us forgiveness…”
That was as far as she got.
I was a man, mortal and in love. I took her face in my hands and kissed her, deep and devouring. And ah, Elua! It was so, so good.
I pulled her down on the bed, still kissing her. Sidonie clung to me, her body pressed against mine, making small noises deep in her throat. I unlaced her stays and got her out of her gown, kissing every inch of flesh I exposed. Her hands tugged impatiently at the laces on my breeches. I kicked off my boots, shimmied out of the breeches. My wounds burned, but I couldn't have cared less. I rolled down her stockings, kissed the arches of her feet, then worked my way upward, spreading her thighs.
When I tasted her, Sidonie cried aloud, her hips bucking. She buried both hands in my hair, tugging. "Please!" she gasped. "Inside me, all of you. Please!”
I crawled up the length of her body. Slippery. Somewhere, my gouges were cracked and bleeding. It didn't matter. Nothing mattered but sliding my rigid, aching phallus inside her tight, wet warmth, hard and deep, filling her to the hilt.
Why do we fit so well together?
Guilt and desire and yearning merged into one aching need.
Her heels, locked behind my buttocks. I growled, shoving her thighs wider. Fitting myself deeper. Her hips rocked upward to meet my thrust, nails digging into my back. Over and over, I drove into her, riding desire like a wave. Everything I'd wanted, everything I'd been denied. Our bodies were slippery with my blood. She bit my shoulder to stifle her cries, biting and sucking at my flesh.
I wanted more and more and more, and all that I wanted, Sidonie gave. She was the bright mirror and the dark all at once, reflecting all of me, good and bad. We reflected one another. We fit.
It drove away the horror. It kept the memories at bay.
It was a promise of absolution.
I felt her climax, the helpless shudder and surge of her body. I rode it hard, pushing her, pushing myself, until I could ride it no longer. I flung my head back, my back arching, and spent myself in her in a long spasm of white-hot pleasure.
And then collapsed on her, panting.
Sidonie freed one hand to stroke my face. I gazed into her black eyes, soft and satiated now. Her golden hair was spread over the pillow in tangles. The bright and the dark. She moved her head and kissed my lips with infinite tenderness. "You're bleeding. I don't think that's good.”
"Probably not," I murmured.
She pushed gently at me. "Roll onto your back.”
I obeyed, and watched her rise. She went to the washstand to fetch a bowl, a ewer of water, and a clean cloth. From behind, her naked body looked bright as a flame in the dim chamber. She came back to kneel beside me on the bed. There was blood smeared on her breasts and belly, sticky and drying. Sidonie ignored it, washing my wounds with care.
"You're a good chirurgeon," I said softly.
She rinsed the cloth in a bowl of clean water and dabbed at my ribcage. "I'd like to lock you up for a month or so, and nurse you back to health.”
I winced as the cloth caught the edge of a scab. "I'd have to punish you for being careless.”
"Oh?" Sidonie smiled. "I can be very careless.”
"You?" I smiled back at her. "Never.”
"Only the once." She dropped the cloth in the bowl, then leaned down to kiss me before sitting back on her heels. "A very fateful once. Sit up. I need to put your bandages back on. I don't think it's bad, but you're still bleeding.”
I let her rewind my bandages, and then I poured clean water in the bowl and made her kneel while I washed my drying blood from her, watching the pink-tinged water run over her creamy skin. "I was surprised that you came here," I said. "I was afraid to hope.”
"Believe me, it wasn't easy." She smiled ruefully. "Mother threatened to have me confined to my quarters. And I threatened in turn to withdraw from the Palace altogether and take up residence on one of the estates that are a rightful part of my inheritance if she attempted to curtail my freedom. It makes a difference, having one's majority.”
"I know," I said. "I ran all the way to Tiberium.”
"And I ran to you." Sidonie gazed at me. "To snatch a morsel of joy.
My chest tightened. "I'd stay if I could," I said. "But I can't." The spectre of Dorelei's death rose between us. "I can't forgo Kushiel's justice. Not even for you, Sun Princess.”
Her brows quirked. "Did I ask you to?”
"No," I said quietly. "You didn't.”
"When will you—”
A knock at the door interrupted her. "My lord?" It was Urist's voice, muffled through the dense wood. "There's a D'Angeline lord demands to see you and the girl. Amaury Trente. Says he's the Queen's emissary. Small escort, four men. I don't think they've come to fight. Should I admit him?”
Sidonie and I glanced at one another. She sighed. "Go. I'll follow in a moment.”
"Yes, show him to the salon," I called to Urist, who answered in the affirmative. I dragged on my breeches and boots, shrugged into the linen shirt and left it unbuttoned. There was fresh blood seeping through my bandages. I helped Sidonie find her scattered clothing, then kissed her and left her to comb out her thoroughly tangled hair while I went to see what Lord Amaury wanted.
He was seated in the receiving salon and got to his feet when I entered, offering a perfunctory bow and straightening with a speech already on his lips. It faltered at the sight of me. "Elua's Balls! You look like—”
"I know," I said curtly. "It was a bear, Lord Amaury. What do you want?”
His lips moved soundlessly for a second. "Where's Sidonie?”
"She'll be here in a moment." I sat down in a chair near his. "Well?”
Amaury Trente looked unhappy. I knew him. He was the Queen's man, a good one and loyal. He'd served as her Captain of the Guard for a time, and he'd headed up the company that had travelled all the way to Khebbel-im-Akkad to rescue me, although he'd stopped short of crossing into Drujan. Only Phèdre and Joscelin had dared cross that border. When they'd led me out, alive if not unscathed, Lord Amaury had been the first person to greet me as Imriel de la Courcel. The moment was etched in my memory. Until then, I hadn't known.
"I…" Lord Amaury swallowed. "I'm sorry for your misfortune, Imriel.”
"Thank you." I didn't offer anything else. He took a seat and looked around at Urist and the silent Cruithne, then back at me. His gaze slid away from mine, fixed at a point on my uninjured left shoulder. He blinked. I glanced down involuntarily, twitched my unbuttoned shirt to cover what was unmistakably a large, vivid love-bite.
Amaury blushed, and blushed deeper as Sidonie entered, rising and bowing to hide it. "Your highness.”
"Lord Amaury." Her voice was cool. "What is it my mother wishes?”
Amaury blinked at her, too. I didn't blame him. Sidonie looked collected and composed, her hair neatly coiled, and not at all as though she'd recently been writhing in bloodstained sheets, gnawing at my flesh in the transports of passion.
"Your mother…" he began, then paused. "May I sit?”
Sidonie inclined her head. "Of course.”
We all sat. Amaury Trente cleared his throat. "Her majesty Queen Ysandre …Sidonie, your mother wishes you to put an end to this, quietly and with no further fanfare. Both of you. She …she sends me in good faith to ask what might so move you.”
"I see." Sidonie cocked her head, gazing steadily at him. "Well, my lord, common sense has failed to do so, as has time and distance. And now, it seems, so has foul magic and grievous tragedy." There were lamps lit against the day's gloom, and her black eyes held their flickering light. "So tell me, my lord, what bribe does my mother think will prove effective?”
"A measure of greater autonomy?" Amaury suggested uncomfortably. "More responsibility? Or mayhap less? I don't know, Sidonie. I'm here to ask." When she didn't answer, he cleared his throat again. "What of you, Imriel?”
"Can her majesty turn back the hands of time and alter the past?" I glanced at Urist's implacable face. "I would take that offer, Lord Amaury. To have the past year of my life to live over, to change the course of the future. To see Dorelei restored to life, to see our child born, whole and hale, and raised with loving joy." I rubbed my eyes with the heel of one hand. "That, I would accept.”
Lord Amaury's voice was low and miserable. " 'Tis easy to say.”
"No," I said. "No, it's not.”
He drew breath to make a reply, but whatever he might have said, it was lost in a sudden clamor rising outside the manor house. Hoofbeats, racing footsteps, the sound of a hunting horn raising an alarm.
All hell broke loose.
In the chaos that followed, it was difficult to discern the sequence of events. All I know for certain is that Barquiel L'Envers was the first to arrive, accompanied by a large contingent of armed men. He swept past Urist's sentries, dismounted, flung open the main door, and strode into the receiving salon like a bleak wind, his face lined with weariness and rigid with hatred, his cropped hair bristling. Later, I learned he'd ridden straight through the night to get here.
"Traitor-spawn!" L'Envers hissed, grabbing at the loose collar of my shirt and yanking. His violet eyes bulged, the whites shot through with red. "Seducing whore's son! Get your blade. I'm calling you out, now!”
"Barquiel!" Lord Amaury's voice, sharp. "Look at the lad, man! He's in no shape for this.”
L'Envers didn't care. He shook me. Lacking the strength to break free of his grip, I didn't bother trying. Instead, I spat in his face.
He roared. There was a lot of roaring, a lot of shouting and shoving. Urist, interposing himself between us, holding a knife pointed at L'Envers' belly. Barquiel L'Envers letting go of me and cursing him for a tattooed Pictish savage. I backed away. Claude de Monluc, Sidonie's Captain of the Guard, was giving crisp orders, ushering her out of the salon. Others, arriving. Soldiers in the livery of the Royal Army. A scent of apples. Ghislain nó Trevalion.
Hugues, wide-eyed, clutching a satchel.
Mavros Shahrizai, my cousin, looking overwhelmed.
Maslin de Lombelon, his face pinched and tight, trying unexpectedly to reason with Barquiel L'Envers.
Too many people, too much mayhem. It spilled over into the great hall. It made my ears ring, reminding me of another night, filled with blood and madness. Ghislain's soldiers were confronting L'Envers' men; Ghislain was confronting Barquiel L'Envers himself. Urist and the men of Clunderry trying to ward me. Amaury Trente was pleading in vain for calm. Servants were scrambling to get out of the way. Everyone else was lost in the swirl. I didn't know how they'd all got there, what they wanted. I shook my head, filled with helpless rage.
A shattering sound.
A ewer of fine porcelain burst against the flagstones.
"Enough!" Sidonie's voice cut through the chaos like a knife, high and clear and utterly controlled. There were bright spots of color on her cheeks. I'd never seen her angry. She looked like her mother, only younger and more vibrant. Her guardsmen surrounded her warily. She whipped her head around. "Lord Amaury, has my mother disinherited me since this morning?”
Everyone grew very still.
"No, your highness," Amaury Trente said quietly.
"Then I believe I hold rank here." Sidonie surveyed the room. "My lords, I am not insensible of my duty. I am well aware of the ramifications of what I have done, and I am prepared to discuss them with my mother and anyone she deems necessary, as soon as she is willing to acknowledge that I am not a recalcitrant child bent on rebellion. Now is not the time, and here is not the place.”
I wanted to cheer. I saw Urist give a fierce grin, his eyes glinting.
"Oh, duty, is it, child?" Barquiel L'Envers began contemptuously. "You don't begin to understand—”
"Yes, I do." Sidonie raised her voice. "My duty, Uncle, is not to you. It is not to secure the hold of House Courcel on the throne of Terre d'Ange, and it is not to advance the interests of my blood kin or those to whom they are indebted. It is to Terre d'Ange itself." She drew a deep breath, trembling a little. "It is to ensure the peace and prosperity that my mother has won for our nation continues. It is to honor our existing alliances, and seek out new allies. It is to safeguard our borders against all enemies. It is to ensure that the least among us may lead joyous and tranquil lives, secure in the knowledge that Blessed Elua's precept prevails here." Her chest rose and fell sharply. "That, my lords, is the vision of rulership my mother imparted to me. Would that she trusted me to honor it.”
Eighteen years old, and save for a pair of chambermaids doing their best to make themselves invisible, the only woman in the hall; and she put the peers of the realm to shame. If I'd had any lingering doubts that I loved her, they would have vanished in that instant. Only Barquiel L'Envers was stubborn enough to persevere.
"You're a fool, girl." He pointed at me. "He's Melisande Shahrizai's son.