Why did you do it?” Clovis asked, his voice low so as not to carry. He looked angry, his face pale and strained. We stood a few feet apart on a path through the main courtyard garden, the midmorning sun far warmer than the look in his eyes. “I’ve been trying to figure it out; trying to figure out everything about you.”

I’d chosen the open garden to talk with him, knowing that the only place safer than the utter privacy of the pressing room was to be in sight of all, in daylight. After last night, no one would question that Clovis wanted to exchange a few words with me. I felt helpless as he glared at me, and wanted to tell him of how Sygarius had ordered me to spy; wanted to tell him of how terrified of my fate I’d been since inviting him between my thighs. I wanted him to rescue me from the mess I’d made for myself. “The vision wasn’t on purpose; it just happened,” I said.

“At first I was angry. Then I thought: Clever girl! She’s giving us an excuse to demand she be given to us. It was only afterward that I thought to wonder at such a strange plan. But you’re a strange sort of slave girl, aren’t you? At least according to Lady Lydia.”

“You talked to her about me?”

“Talk is not entirely the right word. She was . . . remarkably eager to soothe me last night, although it did seem she wasn’t having much fun until I had a slave girl kneel over her face.”

My mouth dropped open as hurt slammed through me: he’d slept with Lady Lydia.

“Now move your tongue up and down, and you’ll have an idea of what Lady Lydia did to that girl while I was thrusting in her cunny.”

The hurt stabbed deeper. “You’re telling me this to wound me. Why?” I said, my voice pleading and confused.

“I’m telling you this so you know that I know how sex can be used to manipulate. I don’t have a thoughtless prick for a brain, like some men.”

“You accuse me of manipulating you? I gave you my virginity,” I cried softly. I looked quickly round the garden to be sure no one was near enough to have heard.

“A very clever thing to do, too, I thought. But then Lady Lydia told me more about you. To hear her tell it, you’re Sygarius’s obsession. You’re his exotic pet, cosseted and watched over, taught music and to dance and to read, and protected from hard labors that might roughen your hands or mar your beauty. He’s sculpted you into his fantasy of a graceful, artistic lover, who lives only to ease his sexual desires. Or will live only for that, once he’s broken your seal.”

He looked at me with a small furrow between his brows. “A seal that is no longer there, which is a puzzle. If what Lady Lydia said is true, then I don’t know how you could be so careless of your life as to lie with me. You’re either stupid and careless, or this was all part of a plot. Or maybe Lady Lydia lied to me, too.”

I shook my head, his accusations making it spin. “You’re confusing me. You seem to think that everyone lies to you, or has motivations three layers deep. I don’t; I don’t! I want freedom; I want to find the Phanne. I want you,” I said, and was scared he’d see just how deep that truth ran: straight to my heart, raw and vulnerable.

For a moment, his expression softened. “Your eyes . . . there are sparks of copper. Do they tell the truth, even when I do not know if your lips do?” His expression hardened again. “Your eyes were the same color while you spoke of the white horse, the shield and crossed swords. Was it a vision? Or was it a lie? That’s what I don’t know. How do I know you’re a seer, like you claim? How do I know Sygarius didn’t order you to seduce me in order to set in motion this entire series of events, so that he could place you as a spy in our midst?”

My breath caught, my eyes widening at how near he had brushed by a version of the truth.

“By Wotan,” he swore. “I see the guilt in your face!”

“No! You’ve picked up the right thread, but followed it to the wrong end. Sygarius did want me to spy upon your father, but I couldn’t do it.” My telling Sygarius what Clovis had said about Childeric’s motivations burned like hot coal of shame within me, but I would keep that secret. Clovis would not love me the better for revealing it. “Meeting with you was my own choice; you know that. You sought me out first. You are the one who should be questioned: did you truly meet a man named Maerlin, with tattoos like mine? You could have made it all up, to lure me to you, and make me a spy for you.”

He gaped at me for a long moment, then let out a loud laugh of disbelief. “You think to distract me by accusing me of dishonesty—I, who tried to tell you of your people, and would have preserved your virginity if you hadn’t forced it on me.”

I felt tears sting my eyes, my throat tightening. “You misunderstand me, Clovis!” My hands fluttered as I sought words to explain the jumble in my mind and heart. “I’m frightened; I imagine shadows in you, and jump at them before I see they are not real. I don’t know what’s going to happen to me, and I’m scared.”

He looked at me long and hard, his lips pressed into a thin line. I could feel him trying to read my sincerity. “Tell me, then: was it truly a vision you had last night, of my father’s death?”

I held my hands open. “I saw what I saw. I cannot tell you what it meant, or if it is true.”

“A convenient caveat.”

I shook my head, frustrated by his stubborn refusal to believe me; frightened that he might follow that stubborn refusal to a severing of all ties. “What else can I say?” I pleaded. “How can I prove myself to you?”

“You can’t.”

I gave a small cry of pain. To be so mistrusted; to be discarded, all hope gone . . .

He tilted his head, cold eyes upon me. “I’ll let Sygarius prove your honesty.”

“Wh-what?”

“My father completes negotiations with him as we speak. If Sygarius lets us have you, I’ll know you for a liar and a spy.”

I closed my eyes. It was hopeless. What a fool I had been, to believe there was a bond between us that was meant to grow; to believe that Clovis felt anything at all when he looked at me. All he saw was the potential for plots and lies, and a pretty face atop a body he could fuck.

I turned and walked away.