TWENTY

      

 

The light of the campfires glowed on tall tree trunks, highlighting the white scars of cut limbs. Under a shelter made of pine boughs, Elayne sat on a log bench, breathing the sodden smell of smoke and wet forest. Rain dripped from two places in the makeshift roof and made puddles at her feet. She was still trembling with fatigue, but her clothes were new and dry and the fires gave out a cheerful warmth.

After a goodly feast, if rough, Philip Welles’s men lay about under what cover they had, gulping large swigs of excellent Tuscan wine. A few women and children worked at clearing the meal, while the giggles of less industrious females sounded from unseen places.

Philip Welles was an Englishman. He had the strong laugh and pink cheeks of the northern isle, though there were deep lines engraved about his eyes and his hair had gone to gray. He held council under the pine boughs like Robin Hood, with a tree stump for a throne. It was difficult not to like him; Elayne had to remind herself several times not to blurt out her replies in English when he used his painfully awkward Italian to address her. He seemed to have some notion that she could not follow the general conversation in French, but his manner toward her was so fatherly and cheerful that she let him bumble his way through his misformed Monteverde tongue, and only nodded and smiled in reply.

Even Allegreto appeared to be in a congenial humor. His face seemed relaxed in the firelight, his hair still damp and his jaw clean-shaven. But when Philip dismissed most of his men and turned to the pirate, demanding to know what purpose was afoot, Allegreto’s dark eyes came alight.

"I have need to penetrate a castle," he replied.

"Where?" Philip asked instantly. "What defenses?"

"Maladire. The old Navona fortress at d’Avina."

"Hah!" The outlaw sat back. "Let us take London and Paris as well! I’ve thirty good fighting men!"

Allegreto smiled. "Nay, do you think I want a battle?"

Philip narrowed his eyes. "What do ye need us for, then? I’ve no craft with your poisons and stealth."

Allegreto’s smile vanished. "Such things are my office, aye." He looked into Philip’s face with no expression. "But don’t tell me you’ve not guile enough, old fox. I require a diversion."

For a moment Philip seemed aloof, as if he had been offended. Then he grinned, the lines about his eyes creasing deeply. "And how much would you be offering for this diversion?"

"One thousand marks of Venetian silver."

Sadly Philip shook his head. "Divided among thirty? Hardly worth our time on the muddy roads, my friend."

Allegreto lifted his eyebrows. "The traffic through this pass must be prosperous of late!"

The outlaw rubbed his lower lip with a stout finger. "Aye, we’ve had some luck." He frowned. "D’Avina, you say?" He glanced over at one of his men who had remained.

The man nodded, as if in answer to an unspoken question.

Philip ran his tongue over his lip. He jerked his chin. "Bring me those chests with the silver coins."

The man rose quickly and spoke to someone standing outside the shelter. In a few moments he returned with a companion, both of them lugging large metal-bound boxes. The chests hit the ground with a heavy chinking. Their tops were painted with the emblem of Monteverde, a castle upon a green mount.

Philip leaned over and slid a key into one lock. With a heave, he pushed the opened chest toward Allegreto. "Examine that," he said.

Elayne could see the glint of silver coin inside—a very great deal of it. She could perceive why the offer of one thousand marks had not been judged overly generous. Allegreto scooped up a few pieces and turned them in his palm. He shaved the edge of one with his dagger, then bit the coin and shook his head. He glanced at Philip, who said nothing.

Allegreto looked down again at the coins. He dipped a handful from the chest, sliding them one over the other with his forefinger. Suddenly he paused. He let the silver shower back into the chest and then picked up one piece at a time, setting them side by side on his open palm, rotating each as he looked closely.

He closed the chest, laying the coins out in even rows. He reached over and took a handful from the second box. Over and over, he compared coins, holding them close to his eye on the back of his hand. Finally he made a soft snort.

"All struck with the same burin. There is an extra prong on the crown." He looked up. "Did you rob these direct from a minter’s bench?"

"Not I," Philip said.

"Who?"

"We escorted a fellow of Germany through the pass," Philip said innocently, as if they had been hired for the task. "This was the payment."

"Luck indeed," Allegreto said with a dry smile. "I’d expect an armed company to convey such as this, and no deal with the likes of Philip Welles, begging your indulgence."

"Aye." The outlaw did not take offense. "You would think so, eh?" He nodded slowly. "And yet he was a young man, with only two pack mules and a servant, and the coins hid among bags of onions." Philip shrugged. "Saint Mary, we wished the man no harm, and he went upon his way." He grinned. "Back home, I believe, as his traveling funds were a little low. Too liberal with their purses at every tavern, these young bucks, eh?"

Allegreto smiled dryly. "Take care how you spend these coins, my friend," he said. "The alloy is bad, as you know well enough. Now if you like good Venetian silver that will pass anywhere without a question—my offer stands. Make it fifteen hundred marks."

Philip seemed to ponder, as the firelight warmed his grizzled face and gleamed on the coins. He shook his head. "I am tired," he said slowly. "Tired of this life."

Allegreto said nothing. Beside Philip, he appeared timelessly youthful, as if age could never touch him.

"It is not enough," Philip said. "We’re thirty here. Three of us share half, and divide the rest by each man. Even with another fifteen hundred marks, after we split fair among us...not enough." He sighed heavily. He looked down at his open, callused palms. "I’m weary, boy. Weary of the rain in my bedroll and the weapon always in my hand."

"Tell me what you want, then."

The outlaw looked into the darkness. "Eh. A warm house in town. A plump merchant’s daughter to soften the featherbed. And peace."

"You would be fatigued to tears in six months of such a life," Allegreto said. 

"Nay, not I."

"What will you do? Eat and sleep and rut and grow fat. You’re not so old. Leave that for when your mind grows dim and you can’t think of a fraud to earn your breakfast."

The corner of Philip’s mouth turned up. "A fraud!"

"Aye, a fraud. As your black heart desires, I well know. Set aside the Venetian marks, then." Allegreto nodded toward the chests. "What is it you devise to plunder?"

The twist of the outlaw’s mouth turned into a grin. "You are ever one step ahead of me, lad. You tell me, then."

"I don’t know enough yet. There is an engraver’s burin escaped from the mint. Where is it? Who has it? How often is this watered coin leaving Monteverde?"

"It was not leaving. The boy was headed in from the north. Claimed his father is the chief officer of the mines here, if you can credit it. Name of Jan Zoufal, or something like, he said. Seems to be a foreigner."

Allegreto turned his hand suddenly, flipping the coins and catching them in his palm. "It’s extortion you have in mind, then?" he asked.

"Nay, I don’t doubt the honorable Jan Zoufal would send me packing if I tried that. Who would believe an outlaw like me against Franco Pietro’s head man?"

Allegreto looked at him a long time. His glance moved to Elayne, touching her like a leisurely brand. Even through her weariness, she felt it. He smiled at her and turned to Philip. "Still...there is promise in this," he said at length. "Much promise. I believe we can make an arrangement."

Philip grinned widely, kicking the chest at his feet. "I knew you would see it. Well met!"

Sudden shouts came from the darkness beyond the camp. The bandit instantly leaped to his feet, ducking outside. Allegreto followed. Elayne rose as she saw a big white pup run into the clearing, gamboling alongside a knot of men who emerged into firelight from the trees. They held a stumbling figure erect as they marched him forward.

She recognized Dario in the same moment as he looked up toward Allegreto. The youth’s broad face held a wild expression; he seemed to find his feet and then fell on his knees when he saw his master.

Allegreto strode forward. Nimue ran to Elayne, leaping on her skirts with big muddy paws, but Elayne could only grab the puppy and hug her close, staring in alarm at Dario’s bowed shoulders and look of agony.

"Matteo!" Allegreto demanded, standing over him.

Dario shook his head. He pressed his fists to his forehead, then bent over his knees down into the mud. "Escaped, my lord."

The bandits gathered mutely around. A silence spread over the entire camp. Even the women stopped their work, everyone held frozen, without sound but for the muted pop of the campfire and Dario’s half-sobs of breath.

"What passed?" Allegreto’s face had gone to a mask, his dark eyes to ice.

Dario sat up, his square jaw marked by slashes of mud. He spoke to Allegreto’s boots. "At the cross trail to d’Avina, in the night. We took shelter at a farmhouse. The babe was weeping and I thought to warm him. We had time; we were well in time to pause and rest. The woman was kind. We ate." He bent his head and locked his hands together until they shook. "My dread lord—I fell asleep—without securing him."

Allegreto stepped forward and grabbed the youth’s hair. He yanked Dario’s head back and down. "You tracked him?"

Dario swallowed in his bared throat. "I tried. I tried. I lost him at the edge of the town. He’s gone into it, I think. I left word with the cat to hunt him, and came here."

For a long moment Allegreto looked down at him. Time stretched to taut infinity, as Dario winced and panted.

"Are you confessed?" Allegreto asked softly.

The young man’s face grew still. He wet his lips and clutched his hands together to his mouth like a man in desperate prayer, making a soundless whisper against his fingers.

Elayne let go of Nimue. The puppy dropped to the ground and bounded toward the remains of the bandit feast.

She saw Allegreto’s hand reach for his dagger. He had a look of inhumanity beyond any comprehension. Dario ceased his prayer and crossed himself, exhaling, his face and body relaxing into peace, as if he fell asleep with his head forced back and his clasped hands resting on his knees. For one instant she saw Allegreto’s face too change; his eyes drifted shut like a man about to lose consciousness—then he opened them, his fingers closing on the dagger as he drew it with a swift move. 

"Do not!"

Elayne heard her own voice ring like a bell through the clearing in the trees. She stepped forward.

Allegreto stilled, his knife poised to slash over the boy’s throat, the blade gleaming in the firelight. She could see Dario’s pulse pounding under his skin, but he made no move, no resistance.

"Let him go," she said.

No one spoke. Campfire smoke drifted slowly across the sodden ground in tendrils and rose into the trees. From the edge of her vision, she saw that the bandits stared at her, but she did not take her eyes from Allegreto.

He was like a statue with Dario kneeling before him. Not one flicker of emotion or expression crossed his face. When he raised his eyes, he seemed to look at nothing, unblinking.

Suddenly he shoved Dario’s head forward, withdrawing the knife. The youth fell down with his face and his hands on the ground, sobbing openly.

"Princess," Allegreto said. He made a cold bow to her and sheathed the dagger. He turned and walked away.

 

* * *

 

"Who is she?" Philip asked.

No one had spoken to Elayne in the night, after Allegreto had gone out of the camp. But now in the chill morning he was returned, and the bandits stood in a circle around the blackened fire-pit, gazing at her with wary awe, with the same expressions she had seen on their unshaven faces as they had watched Dario crawl to her and kiss her mud-sodden hem.

"The one who can grant all your pardons when she takes her place in Monteverde," Allegreto said. "Or have your hands cut off and hung about your necks for thieves, while your bodies dangle at the city gates."

Philip walked to her and went down on one knee, baring his head, his mail chinking as he hit the ground. With a sound of creaking and muffled thuds, all his men did the same. "Princess," he said. "God and Your Grace forgive me! I did not know."

Such reverence disconcerted her. She looked down at his grizzled hair. "I thank you for your welcome here," she said. "There is nothing to forgive."

He remained on his knee, and Elayne realized that he was waiting.

"Rise," she said in French. "Everyone."

Allegreto had not knelt. He stood looking across the banked fire at her. She did not think that he was pleased. "Philip," he said, "we must speak in private."

The bandit turned a little, not quite facing away from Elayne. "Aye," he said gruffly. "I think it a wise idea."

He sent his men to the perimeters of the camp and escorted Elayne into the shelter of pine-boughs. He insisted that she be seated on the tree-stump throne. She did not know if it was because he had discovered her title and hoped for pardon, or that she had averted Dario’s execution in cold blood in his camp, but he made it evident that he looked to her now as the higher power.

Dario himself hung uncertainly at the far side of the clearing, near where Nim was tied. Allegreto ignored him as if he did not exist. Elayne thought of calling him, of sending him to fetch Margaret’s babe that had been left with the woman at the farmhouse, but she thought better of it. The blind coldness had not left Allegreto’s eyes. The baby was likely as safe in a house as in this camp among women who drank more ale than the men. Better that they all feign Dario was invisible until his dark master decided otherwise.

"Pardon my bewilderment, donna—but you are Prince Ligurio’s granddaughter?" Philip asked bluntly, standing under the shelter with the dry green pine needles brushing his balding head. He looked from Elayne to Allegreto and back to Elayne again.

She nodded.

"I see it well enough, now I look," the old bandit said. "Though you were but an infant when we took you to Tuscany. You have your father’s eyes, Princess, and your grandfather’s certain way with a command, God assoil them both."

"You took me to Tuscany?" she asked in astonishment.

"I was one in the escort," Philip said. "It was before—" He made an apologetic gesture, his palm stretching open in his finger-less glove. "It was in better days for my company." He drew a heavy breath. "He was a great man, Prince Ligurio. I admired him."

"Aye. He was," Allegreto said quietly. His mouth made the faintest hint of a curve. "He too would have checked me last night."

Elayne looked up at them both. She had never thought deeply on her grandfather, only known that Lady Melanthe had been his wife, and he had been much older, and he had died.

"You knew him?" she asked Allegreto.

He shrugged, looking down at the rough-cut chips that scattered the ground. "Whatever of me is not my father’s, Prince Ligurio taught me."

"It was the undoing of this state, when Ligurio passed," Philip said. "It was the ruin of this place, to fall into vendetta." The bandit leaned against a tree trunk, flicking needles from his sleeve. "And you and your father were no small part of that, my boy, let the Devil blacken both your names. You mean to try to overthrow Franco Pietro now again, do you? That’s why Monteverde bleeds money to those French condottiere on the road to Venice, instead of fortifying against Milan, and Franco misplaced his betrothed. I should have guessed."

"If you’d rather Monteverde bled to you, old fox," Allegreto said, "I’m here to hire you to my side."

Philip shook his head. "You cannot win."

"I can," Allegreto said.

"You cannot. I see now who it was that escaped you—Franco’s son, eh? Slay the father and you must slay him, too. And it all begins again. Give us at least the poor peace we’ve had these five years, to build something back."

"What is it to you?" Allegreto spat on his hand and jerked it toward the clearing. "You’re naught but foreign condottiere yourself, or a bandit when you have no better prospect."

"This is not my land, aye. But I’ve lived here twenty years, and I’ll find my grave here. Kill Franco, and you will have civil war."

"Not this time." Allegreto glanced toward Elayne. "We are man and wife."

"Navona and Monteverde! There are those who will not suffer that union, and well you know it." Philip crossed his thick arms. 

"The people will rally to Ligurio’s blood." 

"If she survives it."

"Then help me make certain that she does. Or betray us to the Riata if you want his peace."

"You know I would not." The bandit laid his head back on the tree trunk with a heavy sigh. "But God and all the saints have at you, Navona. Give it up. Why not be satisfied with a little skimming of silver, and no more?"

Allegreto set his boot on one of the chests. "You won’t skim more of this silver, watered or not. It’s been sent in from Milan, to mix with our coin and shake the faith in Monteverde’s currency."

"You say!" Philip stood straight.

"That’s all it can be. Else why would it be coming in, instead of leaving? Why has Zoufal not come after you for it? Run your finger over the chests, you’ll feel where the Visconti’s viper has been painted out. Zoufal has some pact with Milan to mingle it with the good coin."

Philip made a rude noise, then glanced at Elayne contritely. "Your pardon, donna."

"Franco mistakes his men too often," Allegreto said. "But no doubt Jan Zoufal would vacate a snug warm house in town, if you would care to take his place as master of the mint."

Philip wiped his hand over his mouth. He looked toward Elayne again. "What think you of this fellow, Princess? I suppose he’s pretty enough for any woman’s taste. But you saw him last eve—do you like a man who’ll kill as easy as he breathes?"

"She knows what I am." Allegreto pushed off the chest. "And you are no bloodless saint, nor Franco either, when it comes to that."

The bandit fingered his lip thoughtfully, still considering Elayne. She felt herself growing warm under a contemplation that was almost fatherly, half-exasperated, as if Philip Welles had the giving of her hand and Elayne were a blushing maid too much in love to know her own good.

"When I commanded him to stop, he obeyed me," she said in a steady voice.

Philip shook his head slowly. "He did. But he did not want to kill that boy, my lady."

She knew it was so. As well as she knew he would have cut Dario’s throat if she had not checked him in the instant before. Allegreto stood still while they spoke, impassive, looking somewhere out beyond the shelter.

"I’ll wager he might even have a small idea that he ought to thank you for sparing him from it," the bandit said.

Allegreto turned and met her eyes. Nothing in his face changed. He only held her look for a long moment, his eyes as dark as midnight sky. She remembered his touch in the tower chamber, his hands in her hair, his lips at her throat. I would listen. I would try.

He had listened. Her fallen angel. Pirate, assassin, warrior prince.

"Mary save us," Philip grunted in the silence. "I believe they are in love!"

Allegreto smiled a little, glancing at the bandit. "Nay, I have no heart. My father hacked it out of me long ago, for his convenience." He nodded toward Elayne. "But she is my compass and measure now."

To hear him say it openly made her realize the depth of it, how much he gave up to her. Love was a light word, a plaything in comparison.

"Is it war, then, you want, my lady?" Philip asked. "That is the compass and measure of what he intends."

"No," Allegreto said sharply to her. "Once you take your place, they will yield. Why do you suppose Franco leaped like a hound at the chance to wed you?" He turned on Philip, scowling. "You know what Ligurio’s memory means to the people. They revere it more every year that passes under the Riata’s hand. Look what savagery it’s taken for Franco to hold his place! You think my father ever managed worse? If I had not had Matteo, he would have killed us to the last woman and child who ever whispered the name of Navona."

"Because he is afraid of you," Philip said intractably. "If you would surrender to defeat, and let it go, as Princess Melanthe did, we would have no more of blood revenge."

"Englishman." Allegreto made a hiss of disgust between his teeth. "You do not understand."

"I understand that you and Franco Pietro are as like as one dagger point to another." He rested a heavy hand on the tree, turning his grizzled face toward her. "Do you understand it, Princess? You were betrothed to Riata. Now you gaze at Navona here like a moonstruck maid. Take your pick, they’ll both have you for your name, and either one would tear apart all Prince Ligurio built to elevate their own. You were well out of this nest of vipers while they fought over his grave, my lady. God bless you, Princess. I am sorry you had to return, if this is all that will come of it."

Elayne hugged herself. She lifted her face and looked toward the old bandit. In truth she understood him better than she understood Allegreto, but she thought of Zafer and Margaret in Riata hands, of the child that might already be inside her, of Gerolamo waiting in the city and Dario on his face at her feet in gratitude for his very life.

"I don’t know what to do," she said. "I don’t know how to stop it."

"He’s bedded you," Philip said gruffly. It was not even a question.

Elayne lowered her eyes. She bent her head down in a wave of mortification.

"Aye, and sent word of our marriage all over Christendom!" Allegreto took a sudden step toward her. "Look up and show no shame for it! I won’t fail in this. I’ll make you safe. I’ll make Monteverde safe. I told you what I would do even though I burn in Hell."

She raised her head. He stood like dark Lucifer dressed in peasant clothes, daring hellfire in the gloomy light that filtered through the pine boughs. Elayne gazed up at him, helpless to find any way to leave or turn from him now.

The bandit heaved a sigh. "Forsooth, she is besotted! I see that it is futile to reason. Tell me what’s your plan then, you black murdering bastard. Perchance we can see at least that she lives through it."

 

* * *

 

Of the two dogs devoted to Elayne, Nimue was the least loyal. Whereas Dario would not allow her out of his sight, Nim was inclined to wander all over the camp, making friends and stealing anything that took her fancy. It seemed she had grown bigger even in a week, a bright-eyed beauty with the heart of a bandit, her brown eyes full of liquid adoration and her teeth capable of shredding chain mail. Or at least marring it beyond any reasonable use.

She was therefore banished along with Elayne when Philip Welles broke camp at word that Allegreto’s designs bore fruit. It was a strange exile, a hiding in plain sight in the town of d’Avina. Elayne took up residence with Margaret’s baby in a house built by Prince Ligurio himself, home now to a widow of strong Riata connections, childless and wealthy and pious, and devoted for years to supporting the cause of her late husband’s family—so that it was half-forgiven and mostly forgotten that she was the relic of some ancient failed attempt at reconciliation from Ligurio’s day, and had been a Navona before her marriage.

Elayne came in the guise of a young gentlewoman in some unspoken need of charity. The presence of a babe and her voluntary seclusion spoke their own tale for the gossips.

The widow herself was not ancient. Donna Grazia had no more than thirty years, to judge from her lovely face. All of the women loyal to Allegreto’s cause seemed to be lovely, Elayne thought with some impatience. Lovely and silent. Donna Grazia delighted in taking charge of the baby, but there were no more than the most necessary exchanges between Elayne and her hostess.

Elayne was immured with Nim in a chamber fit for a prince, heavy with tapestries and lit by three leaded windows of glass that gave out onto the street. It still held objects provided to her grandfather for his comfort when he visited the mines: a writing desk and lectern, a silver goblet embossed with his initials and ringed with tiny emeralds. Dario kept watch outside the only door. By the end of a day both she and Nim were almost frantic. Nim at least was allowed to walk outside with Dario once every few hours, but Elayne had no relief, not even care of the babe. She could only stare into space and think of Zafer and Margaret and what Allegreto planned.

She knew only the outlines of it. Zafer was to betray a meeting with Allegreto somewhere in the mines, a time and a location— but that encounter would never be convened, if Franco Pietro did as Allegreto predicted of him and went first to the fortress of Maladire to command his garrison there. A counterfeit betrayal of a false rendezvous, all to lure the Riata into his own secure and well-defended castle—where Allegreto knew every secret hole and passage of its dark Navona past.

Elayne closed her eyes, thinking of it. Five games of seven, she repeated in her mind. Five games of seven he could outmaneuver his enemy in chess. Five out of seven, five out of seven... the numbers worked their way into her dreams, so that she woke from nightmares of blocked doors and broken mirrors with her teeth gritted together in a soundless chant.

He had never remembered his arrangements with Morosini. He had to deduce what signal he had agreed upon with Zafer, what spy Venice had on the garrison, what agents Franco Pietro had in the town. He had to expose himself just enough that the Riata would believe he was near, awaiting Zafer, yet give no hint that he guessed Franco would attempt to seize him. And Matteo was vanished like a young ghost, with no knowing what he might reveal if he could reach his father.

Elayne was afraid for Matteo. Allegreto’s covert hunt through the town had found no sign of him. She imagined him alone in the mountains, or huddled in the mouth of some mine in the freezing night air. Elayne had extracted a pledge that the boy would not be hurt if he was discovered; it was her last word with Allegreto before they parted at the camp.

If she opened the window of round watery panes of glass, Elayne could see Maladire looming close, its blank sheer walls and single tower raised like a fist against the leaden sky. It had none of the elegance of the Navona castle on the lake. This fortress was a fierce and haunting silhouette, a barren challenge to the black peaks that encircled d’Avina, overlooking the green valley far below with a malevolence that matched its name. It had not been razed, but confiscated from Navona and strongly garrisoned: guardian of the mint and the mines, the silver lifeblood of Monteverde.

The smell of smoke lay heavily in the air. A strange grinding noise filled the street below, the sound of the miners dragging wooden tubs full of rock along the ground. The town itself clung to a ledge on the mountainside, its single street leading at one end to the castle and at the other to the slag heaps and gray landslides of the mines. Near the fortress, the steep-roofed houses were richly appointed, plastered and painted in frescoes, their gilded arcades and window casings agleam even under the threat of snow from the lowering clouds.

Bare-legged workers in white hooded smocks mingled with men and women in long blue robes, all of them hauling baskets and bags and bowls of broken stone toward the covered dais just below the castle, where men in opulent furs and brocaded gowns sat around a huge table and examined the ore set before them.

It seemed a busy and prosperous scene, like a vivid trance overlaid on the secrets below the surface. She leaned one knee on the wooden window seat, looking out, until she saw glances of notice from the people in the street. Then she played ball under the desk and over the bed with Nim until the puppy chewed the leather orb apart and fell into a happy nap amid the pieces.

Elayne paced the chamber. There were books inside the dark wooden chests, but she had not been able to concentrate her mind on reading. Finally she turned to the lectern that stood before the chimney, running her hand over a thick volume that lay wrapped in green velvet upon it. She pulled away the cloth and loosed the straps. The spine creaked as she laid the book open, as if it had not been used in a long time. She expected a Bible, or a book of hours, hoping there would at least be pictures that might distract her. But it was not a religious volume. Under a blank sheet of vellum, the first page was brightly illuminated, entirely covered in flourishes of green and gold and tarnished silver painted around the castle upon a green mount. Below the emblazoned Monteverde arms were Prince Ligurio’s name and the title in Latin.

A History of the Glorious Republic and Principality of Monteverde.

Elayne turned the page with a dawning curiosity. She drew up the lectern stool and began to read her grandfather’s words.

 

* * *

 

Allegreto came to her in the small hours. Nim gave one startled bark, waking Elayne from a drowse as she lay with her arms crossed over Prince Ligurio’s book. She did not know how he entered; he was there as she sat up in confusion from a dream of war and houses burning.

The weak firelight showed a dust of snow on his shoulders, flakes melting and catching sparkles in his hair. He brought a scent of cold and smoke as he leaned close to her. He put his hand on the back of her neck and drew her into a fierce kiss, his fingers and his lips chill, his breath warm. She was so glad to see him alive that she broke away and held his cold face between her palms, running her fingers over the outlines and contours of his cheeks and jaw as if to be certain he was real.

"Is it over?" she whispered.

He kissed her again, deep and probing, as if he could draw the life from her into him. "Nay, it only begins," he said against her lips. Then he let go of her and moved abruptly away, standing in the shadows. "They are come. He holds Zafer and Margaret in the castle, and gave the signal that betrays me."

She slipped from the stool. "And you’ve sent a reply?"

"God grant that I answered it rightly," he said. He stepped back, moving subtly away from her as she came close to him, ignoring Nim’s inquisitive nose at his boots. "But all is in train. I only came to tell you that if I do not return here by prime, in the dawn two days after tomorrow, Dario will take you to Philip, and he has the means to see you through the mountains to Zurich. There is a commandery of the Knights of Rhodes at Kusnacht; take refuge there and send to your godmother for aid."

"My godmother," she echoed.

"She has some pact with them about you, I’m sure of it. At the least they will spare your life from Franco." 

Elayne gazed at him in dismay.

"It is only if I am slain or captured," he said calmly. "Send word to her from Kusnacht."

She drew a shaking breath. She put her hands to her mouth and turned away and closed her eyes for an instant. But she did not want to let go of a moment with him now. She opened her eyes and went to him, lifting her face. But he stood unmoved. He looked at her, but she was not even sure that he truly saw her. She paused, clasping her fingers hard together.

He had already gone away somewhere beyond the reach of feeling. She saw it clearly—the firelight made a shadowed mask of his face, but it was the leopard that gazed out at her, not a man. Remote from her now, detached.

"Philip makes a show of hounding travelers on the road," he said. "They’ll have to send out a troop to cover it. And guards to watch the mines. The garrison will be thinned. Once I am inside—sometime tomorrow or tomorrow night—and find where he holds Zafer, I can move on him."

She walked away to the farthest side of the chamber, to prevent herself from saying the words that sprang to her lips. The desire to fall on her knees and beg him to stay his hand fought with the knowledge that Zafer and Margaret would die horribly if he did. It was too late for arguments and pleas—she thought it had been too late from the first moment she had looked up into the black eyes of a pirate prince and seen the guardian angel of all her half-waking dreams.

"Do it well, then," she said. "What you must."

"I will," he said with soft certainty—with something nearly like pleasure. "It is what I am made for."

There was no warmth in that pleasure, only a keen energy, a force that delighted in the game of life and death. She was not sure if it even mattered to him in that moment what came of it, if Monteverde were won or lost—it was only the game itself that counted for him now.

And it was best that way. If she had frantic prayers and words of dread and love locked up inside her, she would keep them there, out of his sight and hearing. She stood straight and silent, committing to her mind the look of him, the shape of him, the stark curve of his cheekbone in the fire’s red glow.

"I am yours," he said. He looked into her eyes, but it was like a chant, a motto spoken by rote, without tone or meaning.

"I know it," she whispered.

He turned from her to the door and left the room without farewell, so silently that it seemed he had never been there but for the scent of cold he left behind.